The chemical response truck inched down the steep grade to the pasture and sprayed the remains of the Mini Cooper with fire retardant. The Ford, a total loss, was chain-winched to the side of the road, and the Saab, also a goner, got loaded on the flatbed and started for town.
The mortuary transport rumbled up, never in any hurry, and the body was removed. The driver, a middle-aged woman named Ellen Bain, had been coming from her job at the Algonquin Waters Resort after having “just one drink at the bar,” according to her sobbing co-worker. Ellen was also “a very safe driver!”—although the friend admitted she never used her seat belt.
“She used to tell us about a driver who got burned right up because he couldn’t get out of the car.” The woman could hardly speak. “She always said she wanted to be thrown clear in case of an accident.”
Hadley, who had hiked down to the crumpled Mini Cooper to take pictures, had to turn her head away.
Eric and Kevin took photos and measurements of the skid marks, and the second wrecker came to impound Bain’s car until the final report had been written, and the chemical response guys sprayed the torn and flattened grass once more for good measure.
They gave the all clear to the fire police volunteers, and the road was reopened. Hadley watched as the volunteers’ pickups jounced past. Nothing now but three cop cars and some broken glass on the roadbed to tell what had happened here. Everything else had faded into twilight.
“I never understood why people made those roadside shrines until I became a cop.” Flynn stood beside her, his hands tucked up under his arms.
“It doesn’t seem right all cleaned up,” she agreed. “It shouldn’t be so easy to ignore. Or forget.” A harsh growl, a sound of anger and pain, jerked her around. “What the hell?”
Thud. Thud. Thud. A dull hammering, punctuated by McCrea’s voice, low and vicious. Coming from the slope below the road. “Eric?” Kevin’s hand went to his gun. “Are you okay?”
No reply. She and Flynn headed toward the noise, both their guns out now. McCrea was halfway down the slope, straddling a deep gash where the Mini Cooper’s bumper had dug into the earth and wrenched off. He was flailing at the dirt with the crowbar, beating—Hadley peered into the gloom, looking for the snake. There was nothing there.
“Goddamn fucking stupid bitch!” Eric smashed the bar down. “Goddamn fucking drinks—” Thud. “And speeds—” Thud. “And doesn’t wear a goddamn fucking seat belt!” Thud.
“Eric!” Flynn sounded appalled. “What are you doing, man?”
McCrea looked up at them, his eyes gleaming in the darkness. “We live in the safest fucking place in the world.” Eric’s voice was grating. “We have air bags and seat belts and traffic signals. We have highway inspectors and road crews and goddamn designated drivers. And that stupid bitch just throws—” Thud. “It all—” Thud. “Away!” Thud.
“I know. It sucks.” Flynn stepped toward Eric. “It really does. Why don’t you give me the crowbar, and we’ll go get a beer. Blow off some steam.”
“I don’t want to blow off some steam!”
Hadley shook herself. Eric McCrea was acting like a three-year-old lashing out at feelings he couldn’t name or express, and one thing she knew how to deal with was a cranky three-year-old. “Okay, Eric.” She kept her voice calm. “We’re not in any hurry. We’ll wait for you.” Flynn shifted his weight—going for McCrea or going for his car, she couldn’t tell—and she wrapped her hand around his forearm. “We’ll keep an eye on you to make sure you don’t accidentally get hurt. Go on. Go right ahead.”
Eric’s arm twitched. He kicked at the gouged and torn soil beneath his boots. “Just—leave.”
“No, man, that wouldn’t be right.” Kevin’s tone told her he had caught on to what she was doing and was running with it. “We came on the call together, we’ll leave together.”
“Jesus.” McCrea stepped toward them. Stepped back. Shook his head. “I can’t do it with you watching me.”
“Take your time,” Hadley said. “Just ignore us.”
McCrea barked a laugh. Harsh, but genuine. He tossed the crowbar at Kevin’s feet. “You two are assholes, you know that?”
Flynn picked up the crowbar. “Takes one to know one, big guy. C’mon.”
She drove back to the station with her heater on, despite the lingering warmth from the day. It took that long to get the chill inside her under control. In the squad room, they checked in and went straight to their reports. No joking or chatter tonight. Eric was the first to finish.
“The offer’s still open if you want a beer,” Kevin said.
Eric paused at the door. “Thanks, Kev. I think I’d better just go home. G’night, Hadley.”
“Goodnight,” she called. He left, his footsteps echoing down the hall. She glanced over at Flynn. It was just them now. Harlene had gone off duty after the last emergency vehicles had been dispatched; calls to the station would be routed through the Glens Falls board until morning. Ed and Paul were patrolling; if the need arose, one of them might stop by the station. A lot of times over the past year, she would have found the chief working late, but since Reverend Clare had gotten home, Van Alstyne bolted out the door as soon as possible and didn’t show up again until the morning briefing, blissed-out and yawning.
Nope. It was just her and Kevin Flynn. The situation she had been dreading since he came back from his TDY. It wasn’t that they had slept together. Yeah, he was a lot younger than she was, and yeah, it was against departmental regs, but, hey, things happen. In fact, if he hadn’t gotten all emotional about it, she would have been tempted to keep on as friends-with-benefits, because it had been pretty good. Okay, really good, if she was being honest. Flynn had acted as if she were the final exam in sex ed and he was determined to make honor roll. How could she have known it was all book-learning with no hands-on experience?
She had been very hands-on—and because of that, he thought he was in love. With her. Right.
Flynn shut his computer down and scraped his chair back. “You done?”
“Yeah.”
“I’ll walk out with you.”
They went down the granite steps into the sweet warm night. Hadley fished her keys out of her pocket. “See you tomorrow.”
“Hadley?”
Here it comes. “Yeah?”
“You were great with that pregnant girl. I’m glad you were there for her. I’m pretty sure she was glad, too.”
“Uh … thanks.”
“Good night.” Flynn clicked open his Aztek. He hopped in and was pulling out of the department’s parking lot before Hadley managed to fit her key into her car door.
She sat in the driver’s seat and looked at herself in the rearview mirror. Well. Evidently, she was no longer irresistible to Kevin Flynn. The small sting of that made her laugh, and laughing, she backed out and headed home to her kids.
YOU ARE NO LONGER STRANGERS AND SOJOURNERS, BUT FELLOW CITIZENS WITH THE SAINTS AND MEMBERS OF THE HOUSEHOLD OF GOD.
—Morning Prayer II, The Book of Common Prayer
MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 19
“Personal relationships.” Sarah let the phrase hang in the air while she looked from one member of the group to the other. In his wheelchair, Will Ellis stared at his knees. He was without prosthetics this session. Clare Fergusson sank lower in her seat and examined the ring she wore on her right hand. She buffed it against her short-sleeved black blouse. Tally McNabb lifted her hair away from the back of her neck and sighed.
They were having a spell of Indian summer on their third session, and the eighty-degree temperature would have been welcome, if the community center had better ventilation. Sarah could see, from the row of damp swimming suits and towels, how the preschool had escaped the heat. Unfortunately, she couldn’t move her therapy group to the kiddie pools in the playground.
“It’s a well-known phenomenon that a child who has been well behaved and cheerful at day care or on a play date will fall apart into tears and tantrums at home.
Why? The child bottles up any negative emotions during the day and lets them all out with his or her parents.” Eric McCrea and Trip Stillman were nodding. “Even familiar caretakers and friends might not be safe—but parents can be relied upon to still love the child no matter how badly he or she behaves.”
Will Ellis absently kneaded his thigh muscles. His disengagement worried her. It might be time to refer him to more one-on-one care.
“As adults,” she continued, “we carry on these same patterns. We unload our baggage on our partners or family members because we learned as kids that it’s safe to do so. The problem is, of course, that we’re not kids anymore. We’re not dealing with all-powerful, all-forgiving parents, either.”
Clare Fergusson shot a glance at Will Ellis. He looked at her and shifted in his seat. Sarah realized Will was, in fact, still dealing with his parents. Better cut the metaphor short.
“Let’s talk about how we’re dealing with our loved ones.”
WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 10
Eric was trying to keep his temper over being checked up on like a little kid. “I just wanted to make sure you didn’t forget,” his wife was saying over the phone.
“For chrissakes, Jen, I can remember to pick up my own son from practice.” He was running a little late, but jeez. He pushed back from his chair in the squad room and headed for dispatch. “I’m leaving the station now.”
“I didn’t put a dinner in the freezer, but there’s a bowl of meat sauce in the fridge, so all you have to do is boil some pasta—”
“I can handle feeding us. Relax, will you?” He logged himself off the board hanging next to Harlene’s communication center.
She sighed fretfully. “I’m sorry. I’m just not used to—I haven’t spent a night away from him since you were deployed.”
Which was a big part of the problem, Eric thought. Jennifer was so used to doing everything she practically tried to wipe the boy’s mouth for him while he ate. All the mothering had turned Jacob into a sulky, self-entitled brat.
“Maybe I should just come home.”
“No.” He shifted his grip on his phone as he walked down the hall and out the door. The long, slanting rays of the western sun struck him full in the face as he jogged down the granite steps. He held up a hand to shield his eyes. “Your mom needs you there. We’ll have a good time. Don’t worry.” As he turned the corner into the department parking lot, he held the phone away from his face. “Honey? You’re fading out.” He could hear her talking, shrill and distant, like a bird afraid of a stranger under her nest. “Honey?” he said to the phone, now at arm’s length. “Talk to you later.” He flipped it shut.
He stowed his service piece and duty belt in his cruiser’s lockbox and slid into the seat. He had parked in the shade, so the car hadn’t heated up too bad. He eased the cruiser across the bump where it interrupted the sidewalk and pulled into Main.
The pedestrians bothered him. He’d noticed it before, in the weeks since he’d been home. He was okay with people walking when he was walking, and he was as relaxed as he ever was with other drivers when he was behind the wheel, but driving past pedestrians—getting flickering views of faces, backpacks, hands, shopping bags—made his shoulders bunch up around his ears and his scalp tighten.
He went through his litany of reminders. Relax your shoulders. Breathe. Don’t drive too slow. Don’t pull toward the center of the road. That was another thing he had a tendency to do—steer himself away from the sidewalks and parked cars. His brain knew nobody in Millers Kill was going to lob a grenade into his cruiser or blow up an abandoned vehicle at the side of the road. Unfortunately, his balls hadn’t gotten the update.
He grew easier as soon as he left the town center. Away from the small shopping district, the sidewalks emptied except for an occasional kid on a bike or a dog walker. The high school was at the east edge of town, as far as you could go before hitting the rolling farmlands of Cossayuharie. He took the looping drive past the admin building, around the sprawling one- and two-story complex, and parked in the lot nearest the athletic fields.
There were still a handful of minivans and SUVs waiting while the remaining members of the middle school cross-country teams dispersed: long-legged graceful girls talking and laughing; gawky boys, some a head shorter, shouting and bashing into each other.
Eric was surprised to see a familiar grape-Popsicle-colored Escort. Hadley Knox was leaning against her car, watching her little girl cartwheel clumsily through the shaggy grass at the edge of the bleachers. Unlike him, she’d taken the time to change into her civvies.
“Hey, Hadley.” He slammed his door shut and strolled over toward her. “What are you doing here?”
She twisted to look at him. “Eric. Hi.” She gestured toward the bleachers, where a clump of boys stood looking at somebody’s Game Boy. “Hudson’s starting on the track team.”
“The cross-country team?”
She rolled her eyes. “Whatever. It’s all running around in circles to me.”
“He’s in middle school?”
“He’s eleven. Starting sixth grade this year.”
“God. I can’t believe it.”
“Yeah, well, I guess time flies when they ship you over to a desert and shoot things at you.”
He laughed. “It didn’t fly fast enough.”
“Your son’s on the team?”
“Yeah. This’ll be his third year. He qualified for all-state last season.” Anger twisted his voice. “And I missed it.” He tamped the heat down. Shrugged it off. “Oh well. He’s been putting in a lot of time training over the summer. I expect him to make state again this year.”
She looked past the bleachers to the center of the track, where Jacob and two other boys were vying to outdo each other in push-ups. “Training during the summer? That sounds pretty hard core for a kid who’s in, what—eighth grade?”
“It is. We’re looking ahead. Millers Kill High School has two traditional strengths, basketball and cross-country track and field.”
“That makes sense. Neither of those takes a lot of money.”
“You got it. Anyway, MKHS has fielded several kids who got running scholarships to college. That’s what we’re shooting for.”
“You’re kidding me.” Hadley’s eyes sharpened. “You can get scholarships for running?”
“Sure.”
“Huh.” She chewed her lower lip.
One of the other parents honked, and the Game Boy–playing group broke up. Hadley’s son pelted over and gave his mom a hug, despite the presence of other kids. He was short, dark-haired and dark-eyed like his mother, and Eric’s heart squeezed as the boy started babbling on about his practice, his arms unself-consciously wrapped around Hadley’s waist. When Eric had left for Iraq, Jake had been like that, still a little guy, still wanting to be his dad’s best bud.
“… so Coach says he needs an assistant and we should all ask our parents for a volunteer,” Hudson was saying.
“Not me.” Hadley shook the boy’s shoulders slightly. “Hudson, do you remember meeting Sergeant McCrea?”
“Oh. Yeah. Sorry. Hi, Sergeant McCrea.” The kid peered at him more closely. “Hey, aren’t you the one who was in the war?”
“That’s me.”
Hudson’s eyes brightened. “Cool! Didja shoot anybody?”
“Hudson!”
Eric laughed. “Sorry, no.”
“Our priest went to Iraq, but she just flew helicopters. I don’t think she even had a gun.”
“And you’re not going to ask her, either.” His mom shook him again and swatted at his rear. “Get your sister and get in the car.” She grimaced. “Sorry about that.”
Eric shook his head while Hudson thundered toward the bleachers. “Don’t worry about it. It’s a boy thing. They all think guns are cool.”
“I just don’t get it.” Hadley shuddered. “I hate guns.”
“You’re kind of in the wrong profession, then.”
“Don’t I know it.” She swi
veled toward her kids, now roughhousing in the grass. “Into the car, you two!” She corralled them, and with a final “See you tomorrow!” she was off down the access road, along with most of the other vehicles.
“C’mon, Jacob!” Eric shouted. “Let’s go.” In contrast to Hudson Knox, Jake was taking his own sweet time, disappearing into the bleachers while Eric shifted from foot to foot. His stomach rumbled. Finally, Jake reappeared, water bottle in hand. He slouched toward his father.
“What the hell took you so long? The McIlverys are probably sitting down to eat by now.”
Instead of answering, Jake eyed the squad car with disapproval. “God, Dad. Did you have to drive that thing here? It’s so embarrassing.”
“You used to love riding in the cruiser.”
“I used to love Barney the Dinosaur, too.” Jake ran a hand through his hair, exposing pimples on his forehead. “I was talking to Iola Stillman.”
“Who’s Iola Stillman?”
“She’s on the high school team. They had practice before us.”
Eric, who was opening his door, paused. “She’s still here?”
“Yeah. Her dad’s supposed to pick her up. She forgot her phone, so she can’t call.”
Eric scanned the empty parking lot and the vacant school beyond it. The sun sinking into the western mountains. The only thing likely to show up here on a hot night in August was trouble. “I’m going to see if she needs a ride.”
“Dad! She’s Iola Stillman. She’s a sophomore. And you’re driving a cop car. She’s going to think I’m the biggest dweeb in the world. Dad! No!”
Eric strode off toward the bleachers. He rounded the corner and saw the girl, huddled in a tangle of bony knees and elbows. She started up when she saw him, then sank onto the bench again.
“Iola?” He stopped straight in front of her. The poor thing looked miserable. “I’m Eric McCrea, Jake’s dad. Jake says your father was supposed to pick you up? Do you know when?”
She looked down at her running shoes. “He was supposed to be here an hour and a half ago. I woulda left with one of my friends, but I was sure he was going to show.”
One Was a Soldier Page 10