She stood and stared at Zach for a long moment. “You must be Dr. Marshall,” she said and extended her hand to him. “I’m Miranda Goode, Sara’s mother.” The strength of her grip surprised him. Her eyes held him with the same intensity as Sara’s. She blinked, breaking the spell.
She turned and walked to Sara’s father, giving him a peck on the cheek and whispering something Zach missed. “Oh, good, Jack, you made coffee.” She brought a cup and placed it gently in front of Zach on the table and went back to her husband’s side. In a low voice, she said, “Five bottles of peroxide and a roll of shop rags as requested, sweetheart.”
He grumbled something Zach couldn’t make out.
Jack Goode sat at the table again. Sara’s mother took the seat opposite Sara, and smiled at her over her coffee cup.
Goode stared at his coffee. After a long moment, he raised his eyes to Zach. Zach’s scalp prickled. Goode inhaled and, his voice glacier-cold, asked, “What’s your game, Dr. Marshall?”
Zach was taken aback. “I’m sorry. I don’t understand…”
Goode held up a hand to silence his wife and daughter and fixed Zach with eyes that gave nothing away. “It’s a simple enough question, sir. What game do you prefer? Just answer the question. Football, baseball, soccer, chess, backgammon, quiddich? What game do you like—?”
“Baseball,” he blurted without thinking.
Goode sat back in his chair and stared at Zach. “Why baseball, Dr. Marshall? The statistics? The RBIs? The lifetime averages? The betting?”
“No,” he said, “I’m sorry, I wasn’t clear. Not professional baseball, little league. Professional baseball is nothing but a corrupt, steroid-riddled show for the benefit of bookies and pharmaceutical companies.”
“What do you like about little league, Dr. Marshall?” Goode leaned closer to Zach. “Watching the kiddies play? Watching the little boys run around the bases, getting sweaty, stepping up to the plate and digging in, swinging their asses—”
Zach’s mouth dropped open. He shook his head and leaned away from Goode to breathe as heat flushed into his cheeks. Sara’s mother watched him as if waiting for something. Sara’s arms were crossed on the table. She stared at him with the same slate-flat expression as her father.
“Look at me, Dr. Marshall, not them.” The tone of Goode’s voice dragged Zach’s attention back to where Goode leaned forward, his forearms crossed on the table. “How are you with little girls getting to play, Zachary? Or are you a boys-only kind of guy?”
Zach’s thoughts stalled at the inappropriateness of the question. He scooted his chair away, shocked. He eyed the door, wondering if he could make it past Goode. “I’m sorry to intrude. I should be going.”
“Sit.” Goode’s voice was a whisper, but it carried the weight of someone used to being obeyed.
Zach froze. He had to force air into his lungs. His heart pounded.
Goode leaned in close to Zach. “I asked you a question, Zach.” The derision was clear in Goode’s accent of Zach’s name. “I said what do—”
“The game,” he said, a little too loudly. “I like the game. Because for a few weeks a year, kids get to play in the sun at a game everybody understands. And—”
Goode sat back and waved a hand in a dismissive gesture. “Well—”
Zach’s anger surged. He leaned forward this time. “I wasn’t finished.” He was trembling. His cheeks felt like he could’ve used them to light charcoal. “And every kid, even the one that’s too tall and gangly, and barely coordinated enough to tie his shoes, gets to play.” His hands clenched into fists on the table as memories he hadn’t thought of in years flooded into him. “And on one dog-hot August day, that kid accidentally catches a pop fly and puts his team up to bat in the bottom of the ninth.”
Zach’s eyes burned, his breath came in short hitches. “I love little league because any kid that hangs in long enough and has enough heart eventually gets up to bat. Even if he wears glasses and bats one-ninety, he still has the chance to slap a bouncing ground ball right between first and second with two men on. If he runs hard enough, and if the first baseman misses the ball, that kid can dive face-first into second and be a hero.”
“That’s a very stirring story, Dr. Marshall, but—”
“You be quiet,” Zach cut him off, carried forward by emotion. “I loved little league because every kid got to play, and every kid, no matter what else, just once, got the chance to be a star.” He blinked back tears at the memory of his childhood he’d never spoken about. He calmed his breathing and tensed, ready to walk out on this pompous nut job.
Goode shot forward in his seat again until he was nose to nose with Zach. “Why did you kill Dr. Thomas, Zachary?” The man’s voice carried a plaintive note, as if he actually cared about Laz or the people who knew him.
Zach’s anger flared to fury, red and hot. He gripped the table to keep from decking Goode. “Lazlo Thomas was my friend,” he whispered through gritted teeth. “And if I ever get my hands on the sonofabitch who killed him, I’m going to tear his goddamned heart out with my bare hands.” Zach blinked and looked around. He was standing, hunched over the table. Goode had retreated back into his own chair. Zach’s chair was behind him, where he’d shoved it when he stood. Pain knifed into his chest as he took too deep a breath.
Sara’s mother remained calm, staring at him. No, not at him, but into him, as if she could see his soul. Sara still regarded Zach with the same expression as her father. For the first time since this nightmare began, he felt trapped.
Zach cleared his throat. “I’m very sorry for my outburst, Ms. Goode,” he whispered, a little shaky. “Please accept my apology. Thank you for the coffee and the shower, ma’am. I think I’ve disrupted your family enough, and I should go, now.”
“Sit down, Dr. Marshall,” Goode said in an easy, cordial manner.
Zach stared at Sara’s father, speechless. His temper flared again. It took all his restraint to keep from going over the table at the man.
Goode’s face relaxed into a smile. “Please, Dr. Marshall.” Goode gestured to the table. “I apologize for your discomfort. Please.”
He turned to see Sara moving his chair in behind him. She laid a hand on his shoulder, gently guiding him down. “It’s okay, Zach.”
He settled into his seat, confusion overwhelming him. “I don’t understand.”
Sara’s mother sighed. “I hate when you do that at the table.”
“My prom date didn’t care much for it, either,” Sara said.
“That low-life,” Goode grumbled, his voice soft with caring. He grunted and said, “He wasn’t much of a loss.”
It was Sara’s turn to grunt. The similarity to the sound her father made almost caused Zach to smile.
Goode faced his daughter. “I believe him. I’m in.”
“In what?” Zach asked, shaking his head.
“You’ll be blamed for Dr. Thomas’ murder,” Sara said.
“What? But I didn’t, you saw—”
“Don’t forget the arson,” her father added.
Zach turned his head in Goode’s direction. “What?”
“A decent-sized chunk of your house was blown into the street last night,” Sara said.
He whipped the other direction, winced when his chest grabbed him again. “But I didn’t—”
“It’s all over the news feeds,” Sara’s mother said.
“But—”
“They’ll blame the car crash on him, too,” Goode added.
“Well, I did that,” Sara said.
Goode shrugged. “Just sayin’. They’ll never let you take the rap for it. They’ll bounce you, nice and quiet-like if you cop to it. Or they’ll have you guarding a sheep herder in the middle of Idaho. Either way, it’ll be the end of a career.”
“It’s shepherd, not sheep herder, Jack,” Sara said.
Her father grunted again.
Sara’s mother said, “They’ll probably get someone to kill him in prison…”
“It makes perfect sense.” Sara nodded. “And it’s very Murphy. If he can’t kill Zach himself, he’ll find some way to engineer it or manipulate someone else into doing it for him.”
“Be easy enough to carry out,” Goode said.
“Well, that sucks,” Zach said.
“Don’t get caught,” Goode said, turning to him. “If you get caught, you’ll never make it to trial.”
“I… is this supposed to make me feel better?” His gaze shifted from one to the other, finally landing on Sara.
“No, Zach,” Sara said. “It’s supposed to impress upon you how important it is that you not get caught.”
“It’s working.” Zach said. “But the only way to really end this is to take the fight to Stiles. Stiles is pulling Murphy’s strings, and I think I may know how to finish this.”
“Let’s hear what you have in mind” Goode said.
***
Murphy paced across the marble tiles in the lobby of the hotel that held Stiles’s penthouse suite. “Grow some balls,” he said into his link to Newman. His neck pulsed against the collar of his crisp, white shirt as he worked to keep his tone low.
“Hey,” Newman responded. “Are you trying to get me fired?”
“The Secret Service doesn’t fire people. They transfer you to a bank squad in Nebraska, or assign you to guarding a boxcar of counterfeit nickels waiting to be melted down, or some other bullshit assignment.”
“Great alternatives. Thanks.”
“I told you there were risks. You handle it. This is America. You just bluff them out and they get tired of asking, then they get occupied with something else, and you go back to work. Now, get a grip and find out where Gopher Girl scurried off to.”
“You heard Johnson. She requested a few days personal leave. Boone thinks her mother took sick or something.”
“Thinks? Boone thinks? Kinda convenient, don’t you think?” Murphy fisted the keys to his wrecked Caddy.
“Coincidence?”
“No such thing,” Murphy said. “Where’s her parents live?”
“I don’t know.”
“Find out.”
CHAPTER 15
Sara’s mother stood and walked around to stand behind Zach. She put a hand on each of his shoulders and squeezed. “I believed you without all that,” she said in his ear. “Sara believes in you, and that’s enough for me.” She straightened. “If everyone’s appetite isn’t completely ruined, how about some breakfast?”
Zach’s stomach was trying to tie itself into a knot. He pushed his fingers through his hair at the temples, and pressed his palms into his eyes while he tried to regain control of his breathing. His thoughts swirled endlessly around the past twelve hours, trying to paralyze him with confusion and grief.
Goode took a sip of coffee. “Yeah, and Sara’s never been wrong before.”
Sara’s mother cleared her throat. “Scrambled eggs and toast good for everybody?”
“Yes, thanks, Ran.”
“Good for me, too, Mom.”
“Dr. Marshall?”
He struggled to find his voice. “Yes, ma’am, anything’s okay with me.”
She released her grip and moved to the kitchen, where she busied herself pulling cookware from the cabinets.
On Zach’s left, Sara snorted. “Okay, Jack, you were right. The Secret Service was a bad idea.”
“Don’t call me Jack, young lady.”
“Then don’t start crap.”
“Children,” Sara’s mother spoke softly from the kitchen, where she leaned into the open refrigerator. “Play nice.”
“Yes, Mom,” Sara spoke in a contrite tone.
“Yes, Ran,” Goode grumbled.
He turned back to Sara and her father. “I’m sorry, but what was all that?”
“He,” she pointed a finger at her father, “told me not to apply to the Secret Service, and I did anyhow.”
“And,” her father continued, “she discovered I was right after all. Surprise.”
Sara rolled her eyes. “It only took me two years to figure out taking a bullet for most politicians isn’t as good an idea as putting one into them. How long did it take you to figure out there was a revolving door at the jail, and money was the grease?”
Her father shrugged his shoulders. “Till we paid off the mortgage. Seemed like a good idea at the time.”
They sat in silence, glaring at each other, until Sara’s father cracked a smile, and Sara followed suit. From his side of the table, Zach watched the exchange.
“When did the Feds start using black Mitsu hybrids?”
“Jack.” It was Sara’s mother, this time.
“I’m just curious where she learned that trick with shorting out the Auto-nav, Ran.”
“From you,” Sara said.
“What?” Goode asked. Indignation painted his face like cheap makeup.
“You and Uncle Hank.”
Goode spoke toward the kitchen. “Ran?”
Zach followed his look to where Sara’s mother worked at the counter, her back toward them.
“And why not, Jack? She learned how to swear from the two of you.”
A smile wrinkled the corners of the man’s eyes. “That, she got from you.”
It was like watching a well-oiled machine spin to life. Miranda turned, fisted her hands at her hips, and addressed Sara’s father. “Only because you’re so god damn irritating sometimes.” She glanced at Sara, then at Zach, and rolled her eyes. “Damn,” she said, and opened the refrigerator, putting the door between herself and them.
Zach wondered if they were all crazy, or if he was. He half-expected an oversized, vest-wearing rabbit to hop through the living room at any moment, check his pocket watch, and scamper out the side door.
Sara’s mother stepped to the table and poured coffee into his empty cup. “Would you like more coffee, Dr. Marshall?”
He touched her hand. “If everyone else is. I’m sorry, but what’s going on here? I mean, we’re just going to have breakfast like nothing’s wrong and I’m not a fugitive. Seriously?”
Sara’s mother looked from Zach, to Sara, to her father, and then to Zach. “What’s going on is some very determined people are trying to discredit and kill you.” Miranda said to Sara, “You’re the one with the head injury, right?”
Sara rolled her eyes in response.
“Just checking,” Miranda said, and returned to the stove.
Her matter-of-fact summary of his life imploding caught Zach off-guard.
“And then she decided to bring you home,” Goode added.
“He’s not a stray dog,” Sara said.
“You mean,” her father interjected, a look of surprise on his face. “He didn’t follow you home? You actually brought him here? On purpose?”
“What else was I supposed to do? I couldn’t very well check into a Holiday Inn, bloody and battered, and book the bridal suite. The Valet would have had a fit when he parked the car.”
“That’s a head injury for you,” Goode said, with a shrug. “Speaking of which, I hope you don’t think I’m going to clean up the mess on the seats.”
“It’s my blood, I’ll clean it up.” Sara countered.
“Uh,” Goode snorted. “What you’re planning on doing with the car would be my question.”
“It followed me home, Daddy. Can I keep it?” She batted her eyes at her father.
It was Goode’s turn to roll his eyes. “Don’t think for a minute I’m calling Hank to have the thing hauled away.”
Sara cocked her head at him. “To keep your only child out of prison? Heaven forbid.”
“Excuse me,” Zach said in a quiet tone. Sara and Goode went silent and faced him in unison. “I don’t mean to be rude, but what the hell was all that about games and kids a few minutes ago?”
Goode stared at Zach. “That was called being questioned. I suggest you get used to the idea. At some point, you’re going to be questioned by other cops, most of whom will be seriously trying t
o pin something on you.”
“They’ll come at you in twos and threes,” Miranda said from the kitchen. “They’ll play good cop, bad cop, they’ll switch up on you unexpectedly.”
“They’ll lie to you and generally do anything they can to intimidate you, badger you, confuse you, and trip you up,” Sara added.
“Why?” He hadn’t had time to consider how his involvement in last night’s events might be misinterpreted or that he might actually be blamed. The possibilities set his heart racing and left his mouth dry.
“They’ll need a fall-guy,” Goode said, as he leaned toward Zach. “They’ll need to close the case. They won’t stop and they won’t play fair. So when it happens, have a lawyer, keep your mouth closed, and if you say anything, tell the truth, because it’ll be the only thing that can save you. Trust me.”
Sara touched Zach’s forearm. He stared at her fingers. His eyes drifted up to her face.
“And it’ll feel just like this except a hundred time worse—a hundred times scarier, Zach. How to keep you alive and out of jail is what we’re trying to figure out, but…” Her attention shifted to the table for a moment. She shook her head. “I promise you I’ll do everything I can to help you.”
“We all will,” her father said.
“Thank you.” He studied Sara, then her parents. “I don’t know what to say.”
Goode studied Zach, his expression giving nothing away. “That’s a good line. Stick to it.”
Zach stood. “I’m sorry. I need to step outside for a moment—to clear my head.” He walked around and through the small laundry room into the carport. The Mitsu’s deep, metal flake skin was cool under his fingertips as he stepped to the rear of the car and leaned against the trunk lid. Tears started as he thought of Laz, their friendship, and his carefully constructed life that’d been ripped away in a blink. He steadied himself, hands on knees, eyes closed, while panic scrabbled at his heart.
A hand touched his shoulder. “You okay?” It was Sara. She leaned on the rear of his car next to him.
He sniffed, pushing the feeling down. “Yeah. No. I was thinking about… everything. I’m scared.”
“Here.” She handed him a napkin. “I know. It sucks, but you can’t let these assholes win… we can’t let these assholes win, or it was all for nothing.”
Indigo Man Page 17