Another knock. “Loreena?”
“Wait!”
Exploring the shelf above, she found nothing but more sweaters. On her hands and knees, she searched the floor. There. In the corner. Her palm fell on a folded pile. Her own clothes. Her skirt and stockings and button-up shirt, the ones she had worn the day she left home. Grabbing them all, she hugged them close, and then dressed, slipping her hands through the sleeves and gently guiding the waistband over her hips. In the end, she added her jacket, too, one more layer of clothing between her skin and the world.
Tying her hair into a ponytail, she walked across the room and stopped by the window. “Okay.”
The door opened. The scent of cigarette smoke wafted inside. It made her instantly angry.
“Why can’t you quit smoking? You smell like Raymond.”
He paused. “Yvonne said you weren’t getting out of bed.”
“You didn’t give me much choice. I knew you’d just push your way in here.”
He stepped inside and closed the door behind him with a soft click, moving carefully as if afraid of disturbing her. “I just wanted to see how you were doing.”
“Why? Have another job coming up?”
“Frank wants to talk to you before that.”
“Can’t wait.” She was surprised at the acidity of her tone. It sounded like someone else’s voice, like she was just listening from across the room.
He took a few steps closer, stopping by the foot of the bed. “He did seem to feel badly about what happened. It’s unusual for him.”
“Poor thing.”
“I’m just saying, he doesn’t hold it against you, you know, for attacking him afterward.”
Turning to face him, she set her jaw. “What are you here for?”
He hesitated. Was he nervous? “I didn’t mean for it to happen like it did. I wanted to make sure you were okay, and…” He faltered.
She waited. She wasn’t rescuing him.
Shawn sighed. “Your brother is all right.”
“Mrs. Markos already told me.”
He tapped his fingers on the card table. “Right. Good.” Turning, he moved to the foot of the bed and sat, the springs squeaking. “Yvonne says you’re giving up.” He took out his pack of cigarettes. The plastic crinkled in his fingers. He put them back. “You can’t do that.”
Loreena laughed out loud. “You’re a piece of work, Agent. Or was that all just a story to get me to go along?”
“Please, keep your voice down.”
“Oh, right, your big secret. Why don’t I just tell them? You’ve done nothing for me while I’ve been here.”
“You tell them who I am, they’ll bury me in the backyard.”
“Even better.” She turned back to the window, crossed her arms, and leaned her shoulder against the frame.
“Look, I was in there to protect you. He caught me off guard.”
She didn’t say anything, didn’t know what else to say to him.
“Just listen to me, all right? You can’t curl up and die here.”
“It’s none of your business. You’re not here to help me—you’ve made that crystal clear. So whatever you are, agent or Frank’s best friend, I don’t want anything more to do with you. I wish you’d get the hell out of my room.”
“I’m sure your brother is worried about you.”
“Yeah, and my chances of seeing him again are about as good as my chances of ever seeing my uncle again.”
“He did what Frank wanted. He’s in less danger now. And you—Frank knows you came through for him.”
“You think I care what he thinks?”
“I just mean—”
“He kidnapped me! He stole me away from the people I care about. He made me kill Dominic. And now, because of him, I’ve been…I’ve been…”
Shawn stood up and started toward her.
“Don’t!” She raised her hand. “Stay away from me.”
He stopped. “I don’t know what to say. I didn’t think it would get this bad.”
Turning back to the window, she pressed a trembling fist into her teeth.
A silence came over the room, heavy and awkward. Loreena breathed through her fingers, smelling lavender-scented soap.
“There’s one more thing I wanted to tell you.”
She waited.
“Bill is coming. Soon. There will be a fight.” Shawn dropped his voice to a whisper. “I’ve got enough recorded evidence, enough stolen records. As soon as I know the time and place, I’ll report to headquarters. They’ll come. They’ll take Frank.” He paused. “And you’ll be free.”
Loreena stared numbly out the window, the outside a gray shadow.
“To go back home.”
Shaking her head, she crossed her arms. He didn’t get it. After what had happened, how could she go home? How could she walk inside the church? How could she face her uncle?
After Charlie, how could she ever feel free again?
“Do you understand what I’m saying?” he asked. “You’ll be able to go home.”
She walked past him and crawled back into her bed. “I’m tired.” She pulled up the blankets, buried her head, and closed her eyes.
After a few moments, he left the room.
14
The next day, Loreena woke to Mrs. Markos knocking on her door.
“You don’t have to stay in there anymore,” she said. “Get dressed and come down.”
It wasn’t a request. Apparently, the woman thought it best to be a little firmer with her.
Loreena didn’t protest. She was tired of the room anyway. After dressing in the same skirt and blouse, she went downstairs. No guards stood outside her bedroom door. In fact, it seemed the entire house was blissfully free of Frank’s men.
Had Shawn somehow managed this?
“Goodness, girl,” Mrs. Markos said. “You wore those clothes yesterday.”
Loreena smelled waffles. She felt her way to the kitchen table and sat. She’d forgotten how much more comfortable this chair was than the hard metal one she had been using in her room.
“Is everything else dirty up there?” Mrs. Markos whisked a mixture by the stove. Eggs, Loreena guessed. “I did wash just a couple days ago.”
“I want to wear my own clothes.”
The woman paused in her stirring. “Then I guess we’d better do some shopping.”
Loreena sipped her orange juice. She couldn’t imagine Frank allowing her to go shopping.
Mrs. Markos twisted a dial on the stove, clamped a lid on the pan, and crossed to the opposite counter. Sweet waffle scent filled the air as she pulled a couple off of the iron, dropped them onto a plate with a light poof, and placed the plate in the middle of the table. “Nice and hot,” she said. “Syrup’s to your right.”
Loreena followed her instructions, more to go along than because she was hungry. Still, the waffle smelled good, and she was tired of chicken soup. She reached her hand down once, searching for Brute, and he came and nuzzled her gloved fingers. She hadn’t seen the dog since she’d been locked in the room upstairs.
“Eggs are almost up.” The woman milled about the kitchen until everything was cooked and steaming on the plates, and then sat down. Loreena stopped petting the dog and picked up her fork. For a while the two ate in silence, Loreena taking small bites and holding the food in the back of her mouth until it melted down her throat.
“I heard you tore Frank’s ear. He had to get a couple stitches.”
Loreena visualized the wound on the side of the man’s head. Encrusted blood. Black lines where stitches held torn flesh together, the ear cocked a little strangely to the side.
“No one’s ever done that before. Raised a hand to him. And lived.”
Who cares? Loreena wanted to say.
Brute yawned and scratched his neck, jingling the tags on his collar. Mrs. Markos threw him a piece of waffle. The dog’s eager slurps and gulps seemed the happiest sounds Loreena had heard in days. She cut into her eggs. “Where
are the guards?”
“Gone.”
“All of them?”
“Frank’s orders. He wanted you to have some time without them.”
Did the woman expect her to feel grateful?
She finished her breakfast in silence. They spent the rest of the day in the yard trimming snowball bushes, and, later, in the flowerbeds around the house, clearing out dead leaves and weeds in preparation for the winter. Mrs. Markos guided her along, helping her to feel where she needed to work. It had been a long time since Loreena had done such chores. The church had Ben to take care of the grounds, and after him, a man named Gerry. The last time she remembered her hands in the dirt was at the house in Colorado, planting roses and petunias with her mother. The memories were usually painful, but here, in this place, where everything was foreign and her heart yearned for something familiar, she brought them back, sinking further into the past until she could almost hear her mother’s voice. She was singing, a song by Elvis. “Blue Hawaii.” Had her mother had ever gotten to go there? Loreena thought not, and as she scooped another pile of dead leaves into the garbage bag, she pictured the two of them there together, walking the beaches with the sand warm on the soles of their feet.
They worked until near sunset. Just as they were about to finish, the doorbell rang. Mrs. Markos left Loreena in the side yard pulling out old wood chips to be replaced in the spring. Loreena felt around the stems of the perennials, dragging the chips toward her in shoveling motions, and then scooping them up to dump into the empty dog food bag Mrs. Markos had given her. The chips made clattering sounds as they dropped down inside, the scent of old cedar wafting up in their wake. It was satisfying work, like vacuuming, leaving behind only the raw dirt and stems in preparation for the new year.
“Looks good,” a voice said from behind her.
Loreena froze, gloved fingers framing her latest pile of chips.
“Yvonne’s cleaning the place up, hmm?”
Had he come to have her kill again? She moved back in a half crouch.
“I didn’t know the whole story, you know.” Frank stepped closer. “What happened.”
Loreena stood up and backed away, hands behind her, seeking the solid wall of the house.
“Your brother is fine,” Frank said. “On another assignment. Spying on Bill’s men. This is all going to come to a head in a few days.” He slipped his hands into his pockets and jangled his keys.
Loreena shuffled back a little more, tiny movements she hoped he wouldn’t notice.
“I know you killed Charlie. Even after, well…” He cleared his throat. “You’ve got guts. So look, you’re part of the team here. I don’t tolerate somebody roughing up one of my team. When this all goes down, you can kill Bill yourself. If you want.”
Loreena held her breath. Did he really think she blamed Bill for what had happened?
“Shawn feels bad. He went in there to protect you.”
When you didn’t want him to.
“I know you didn’t intend to come here, but you should understand. Your future—it’s secure. You don’t have to worry.”
Squaring her feet underneath her, she tried to make her eyes hold still.
“Yvonne is taking good care of you?”
She nodded.
“Good. Well.” He hesitated, shifting his weight from side to side. “Get some rest. I told the guards to take some time off.”
Inside the house, she heard a door slam, footsteps thumping across the carpet. Voices, Mrs. Markos talking to someone. Overhead, a jet plane cut across the sky, its hollow roar the voice Loreena wished she had so she could tell him what she really thought, and who she hoped would pay for what Charlie had done. Yet she stood meekly, unable to even lift her head in the man’s presence. Finally he walked away.
He’d gone only about five steps when the sentence escaped, a last-second, uncontrollable impulse. “How is your ear?”
He paused, scuffing the ball of one foot on the sidewalk.
Loreena took another step back.
“It will heal,” he said, and continued around the corner of the house.
She waited until she could no longer hear his footsteps, and then allowed a smile to crease her lips.
For two more days Mrs. Markos kept her busy, as if she were afraid to leave her alone for five minutes. First they loaded boxes of old lamps and tools and tarnished Christmas decorations in the back of a pickup to be hauled to the dump, and then swept off the newly visible cement floor in the garage. The next day they went through Mrs. Markos’s closet, cleaning out old hosiery and sewing tools and sweaters and books. The old woman told stories about the things they uncovered, from dresses to jewelry to belts to shoes, and in the end she put some of it back, but most of it went into the trash.
“Out with the old and in with the new.” She tapped Loreena on the shoulder and guided her out of the freshly organized room. “The past is the past. All we got is today. Tomorrow, if we’re lucky.”
Loreena let the woman’s words flow in one ear and out the other as she slapped dust from her gloves. She’d long stopped caring what Mrs. Markos had to say.
Of course they never did go shopping, but Mrs. Markos managed to get her some new clothes. They came with a strange woman who appeared at the door one day around lunchtime. Mrs. Markos spoke with her for a few minutes, and then closed the door and climbed the stairs. Later that night, Loreena found piles of them on the bed—long skirts, blouses, socks, underwear, gloves, even a couple pairs of pants and a new pair of canvas shoes, ones that were actually her size. They all had that new clothes smell and were pressed flat and free of wrinkles. Loreena ran her fingers over the fabrics several times, and then tried on each item until she’d separated the outfits she liked from those that didn’t suit her. In the end, she had three new sets to wear. She hoped that was all she would need.
Thursday night the storm began. Winds whistled at the window, rain pelting the glass in waves. The thunder came later, rumbling the floor. Loreena pulled the covers over her head and tried to go back to sleep. After a time the thunder drifted past, and when she awoke again she smelled coffee. For a fraction of an instant she thought she was home, and sat bolt upright, but then her fingers touched the lace edging on the sheets and she remembered. She managed to soothe herself with the thought that her uncle was still there, in Stillwater, having his morning coffee, and one day, if what Shawn said was true, she might see him again.
All day Friday the rain fell, the clouds thick enough to block most of the sun’s light. A heavy gloom gathered over the house , the humidity thick in Loreena’s hair, weighing it down and frizzing the ends. The steady sound of the raindrops on the windows dulled her senses, and she sat on the couch listening, merging with the storm in a sort of meditative trance as her thoughts turned to what Shawn had told her, that soon there would be a fight, and the FBI would come and take Frank into custody, and she and Saul could finally go home. As the rain went on until even the house smelled wet and the rugs seemed damp, she began to feel that today something was going to happen, that today might be the day everything changed. Her thoughts drifted again to her home, to the evenings spent in the living room with a book in her hands and her stockinged feet tucked underneath her on the couch. Her uncle would be relaxing in the easy chair nearby, making notes for his latest sermon, and the fire would crackle in the warm fireplace, and her bed would welcome her when she retired. The next morning, the church bell would chime—at least she could imagine it would—and she would feel the cool piano keys under her fingers. For the first time in a long while, she allowed herself to picture it, what it might be like to go home.
It wouldn’t be so simple for Saul. She hadn’t wanted to think about it, but now that the time seemed near, she realized that even if, as Shawn said, the authorities saw her as a victim, they would be unlikely to see Saul in the same light. For him, things were the same as they had been, except worse, as he was now even more involved. Somehow, she had to figure out a way to help him
. Maybe Shawn could do something, if he was who he said he was. Meanwhile, the important thing was getting Saul out alive.
When the van came up the driveway that evening, she stood up, already dressed in her pants and canvas shoes, her old big-buttoned jacket by her side. This was the night, when Frank would finally have to atone for everything he had done. Mrs. Markos looked out the window. Loreena heard the van door slam shut.
“Must be that Frank needs you,” Mrs. Markos said.
Frank needs. Frank wants. Frank says. The woman made her sick, always bowing to Frank’s demands.
Loreena put on her jacket but hesitated by the couch. The knock came. Mrs. Markos opened the door and Bert spoke from the other side. Loreena walked slowly across the living room until she stood on the tile floor of the entryway.
“See you tonight,” Mrs. Markos said. “I’m making your favorite—chocolate cream.”
Loreena hesitated, but couldn’t bring herself to thank the woman.
In the van, she sat in her usual place, boots fighting for space among the discarded beer bottles. Her chin tucked into her jacket collar, she rode with her gloved hands between her thighs. No cuffs this time. She’d waited at the door but they hadn’t put them on; Bert simply told her to get in. More of Frank’s directions, she imagined, or maybe they were learning they didn’t have much to fear from her. Either way, she was grateful. The wounds on her wrists had started to heal, and she dreaded reopening them.
Digger breathed through his noisy nostrils behind her, Bert jabbering on through a full mouth. Cab grunted the occasional response. It all seemed quite routine now, even the knots in her belly, except for the constant pattering of the rain on the windows and the occasional splash when the tires hit a puddle. How far would they have to drive this time? The thought of being in some new bar with Frank made her shiver. If only she could stay in the van, tucked down where no one could see her.
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