Storm Track dk-7

by Margaret Maron

  I wondered whose reputation would go in the toilet if Reid had to tell what bed he’d been in that afternoon.

  Speak of the devil and up he jumps.

  Thunder rumbled overhead and rain sprinkled the sidewalks as I hurried toward the parking lot before the heavens opened all the way and drenched my dark red rayon blouse. It isn’t that I mind the wet so much, but that particular blouse starts to shrink the minute water touches it—rather like the wicked witch when Dorothy empties the water bucket on her—and I was supposed to attend an official function that evening.

  I slid into my car just as the rain started in earnest and there was Reid’s car parked by mine, nose to tail, so that we were facing each other. Reid powered down his window. With the rain slanting into his window instead of mine, I did the same.

  “Feel like going to Steve’s for supper?” he said.

  “Not particularly.”

  My cousin Steve runs a barbecue house down Highway 48, a little ways past the farm, and it’s the best barbecue in Colleton County, but I was pigged out at the moment. During election season, that’s all they seem to serve at fund-raisers. “Why?”

  “No reason. Just thought it might be fun to go by for the singing. Y’all still do that every week?”

  “Yes, but that’s on Wednesdays.”

  I almost had to smile. My brothers and cousins and anybody else that’s interested get together informally at Steve’s after Wednesday night choir practice or prayer meeting to sing and play bluegrass and gospel. It’s so country and Reid’s so town. He doesn’t play an instrument, he doesn’t know the words and he’s never dropped in when we were jamming except by accident.

  “Well, maybe tomorrow night then?”

  Rain pelted his face. His tan shirt and brown-striped tie were getting wet, yet he didn’t raise his window as he waited for my answer.

  It was after five o’clock and I had plans for the evening, so I quit trying to figure out what he really wanted and said, “Sure.”

  Maybe he’d hit me with it before I had to watch him make a fool of himself at Steve’s.

  * * *

  A month earlier, Cyl DeGraffenried and I had been asked to participate in a “Women in Law” forum at Kirkland Prep, an all-female school on the southwest edge of Raleigh. Since Cyl’s apartment is on the way, we’d agreed that I’d pick her up early and we’d stop for supper somewhere first.

  Cyl and I aren’t best friends but we’re working on it. Chronologically, she’s five years younger. Psychologically, she acts five years older. She thinks my moral standards are too flexible, I think hers are overly rigid. When we argue politics and religion, she accuses me of being a flaming liberal. I know she’s a social conservative. She’s better read and more intellectual than I am, but she also has a dry, self-deprecating wit that keeps me off balance. Most true conservatives can’t laugh at themselves—they’re too busy pointing a sour finger at the rest of us—so Cyl’s mordant sense of humor gives me hope that I’ll convert her yet.

  I hadn’t seen her around the courthouse during the day, but that wasn’t unusual. She prosecutes cases all over the district, wherever Doug Woodall sends her, and I’d left a message on her voice mail that I’d be by her place around six.

  Her apartment’s in one of the new suburban developments that have popped up like dandelions between Garner and Raleigh. A swimming pool and fitness center surrounded by interlocking two-story duplexes that look more like yuppie townhouses than boxy apartments. Attractive low-maintenance landscaping. Tall spindly sticks that will eventually grow into towering shade trees if the whole place isn’t first leveled for another mall.

  It was still raining when I drove into the parking area in front of Cyl’s ground-floor unit. The wind had died, and rain fell straight down from the sodden gray skies with a steady, almost sullen persistence, as if prepared to go on all night long. We’d had so much in the last few weeks that the ground was saturated, the creeks and rivers were swollen and it didn’t seem possible that there was any more water left in the clouds.

  I did the umbrella maneuver—the one where you crack the car door, cautiously stick the umbrella up into the air and try to get it completely open so you won’t get drenched when you step out of the car? I managed to save my blouse, but when I reached back inside the car for my purse, I tipped the umbrella and dumped a gallon of water on my skirt.

  One thing about platform shoes though: they do help you walk through shallow puddles without getting your feet wet.

  I splashed over to Cyl’s door and stood beneath its mini-portico to ring the bell.

  No answer.

  I rang again, then scanned the parking area as I waited. Yes, there was her car, two spaces over from mine. She was probably on the phone or in the shower.

  This time I leaned on the button a full thirty seconds.

  Nada.

  The curtains were half open but I couldn’t see any movement or much else inside the dark interior. On such a dreary late afternoon, her lights should have been on. Was the power out? Maybe the doorbell didn’t work? I pounded on the wooden panel, then put my ear close to the door and mashed the doorbell again till I heard endless chimes echo around the rooms inside.

  This wasn’t like Cyl at all. She’s not only punctual, she’s usually punctilious.

  I darted back to my car and used my flip phone to dial her number. The answering machine kicked in after the first ring and I said, “Cyl? Are you there? Pick up!”

  I finally decided that maybe I’d gotten our signals crossed and that she’d probably gone on ahead with someone else.

  Instead of a leisurely gossipy supper, I hit the drive-through at Hardee’s and ate a chicken sandwich in my car while the rain drummed on the roof and the windows fogged over.

  At Kirkland Prep, I joined Judge Frances Tripp, the appeals court judge who administered my oath of office when I was first appointed to the bench, and Lou Ferncliff, one of the highest-paid personal injury attorneys in Raleigh. But no Cyl. The facilitator was head of the social studies department and very p.c. In addition to enlightening the student body with our female insights into the field of law, we were also supposed to be a visual civics lesson: two white women and two African-Americans, colleagues in law and equals under the law.

  Cyl DeGraffenried’s absence skewed the balance and made the facilitator very unhappy. I wasn’t happy either. This was so totally unlike Cyl that I was starting to worry.

  Fortunately, Frances and Lou are troupers and had participated in panels like this so many times they could probably do it in their sleep. And I’ve never been shy about speaking up, so it was a lively discussion.

  The students were bright enough to ask intelligent questions and we probably turned a half-dozen of them on to the law. (“Just what this country needs,” Lou laughed as the forum broke up around nine-thirty. “More lawyers.”)

  * * *

  I probably should have gone on home, but Cyl’s apartment was only a couple of miles out of my way and I knew I wouldn’t rest easy if I didn’t satisfy myself that she was okay.

  Her car hadn’t been moved and this time I rang that damn bell for almost three solid minutes. Just when I was ready to give up and go call her grandmother, a light came on in the living room and a moment later, the door opened.

  “Cyl?”

  She looked like hell. Barefooted, wearing nothing but a long pink cotton T-shirt, her eyes were puffy and bloodshot, her face looked bloated, and she had a bad case of bed hair. She blinked at me as if disoriented.

  “What’s wrong?” I asked, startled by her groggy appearance. “Are you sick?”

  She shook her head dazedly. “Deborah? What time is it? Why are you here?”

  “The forum,” I said. “Supper. Kirkland Prep. Did you forget?”

  “Oh, Lordy, was that tonight? What day is it?”

  I reached out and touched her forehead, but it was cool to my fingers, so she wasn’t running a fever.

  “It’s Tuesday. When did
you last eat?”

  “Sunday? Sunday night?” Her shoulders slumped. “Sunday,” she moaned.

  I propped my dripping umbrella against the wall beneath the skimpy portico and moved past her. “You need food.”

  She made a gesture of protest but was too dispirited to do more than follow me into her kitchen and watch as I opened cabinets until I found a can of tomato soup.

  I dumped it into a saucepan and while that heated, put some cheese on a slice of whole wheat bread and popped it into her toaster oven. “Are you on anything?”

  Cyl shook her head, then paused in uncertainty. “Valium? I couldn’t sleep. I think I took a couple sometime last night? This morning?”

  I poured hot soup into a mug and put it in her hands. “Drink!”

  Obediently, she did as I ordered.

  Which only confirmed that something was definitely wrong here. No way does a functioning Cyl DeGraffenried take directions from me.

  I made a pot of coffee and when it was ready, she drank that, too, and even nibbled at the toasted cheese.

  While she ate, I chattered about the forum and how we’d covered for her and how brilliant Frances and Lou and I had been. Eventually, she almost gave a half-smile as the food and caffeine started to kick in a little and I said, “What’s going on, Cyl? Something happen at work?”

  She shook her head listlessly.

  “Something wrong in your family?” So far as I knew, her grandmother was the only family member she truly cared about. “Your grandmother’s not sick, is she?”

  “No.”

  In my book, that left only one thing to make a woman like Cyl fall apart. “Who’s the man, Cyl, and what’s he done?”

  A further thought struck me. “Oh jeeze! You’re not pregnant, are you?”

  “I wish I were!” she burst out passionately. And then her face crumpled.

  If those red eyes were any indication, she’d already cried a river of salty tears. I put my arms around her and made comforting noises as she wept again, long hopeless sobs that echoed the rain streaming down her windows.

  There was a box of tissues by the kitchen phone and as her emotional storm dwindled, I pulled out a handful and smoothed her hair while she wiped her eyes and blew her nose.

  “Sorry,” she said at last, making a visible effort to pull herself together. “This is so stupid. I’m sorry I forgot about the forum and thanks for fixing me the soup, Deborah. I’ll be all right now.”

  Not the most tactful brush-off I’ve ever had. Not going to work either. If I thought she had a girlfriend to call or a sister she’d turn to, I’d have been out of there as soon as she hinted. But Cyl’s such a loner, I didn’t think it’d be healthy to leave her to keep going round and around in her head as she’d evidently been doing these last two days.

  “So when did he dump you?” I poured myself a cup of coffee and topped hers off again. “Sunday? Saturday?”

  “How do you know I didn’t dump him?” she asked, with a shadow of her old spirit.

  “I’ve dumped and I’ve been dumped and I know which one makes me want to stay in bed with the covers pulled over my head. It’s pretty bad, huh?”

  “We were only together twice.” Her voice was weary. “The first man I’ve been with since law school.”

  Why was I not surprised?

  “I didn’t want it to happen. Neither of us did. Not with him—not with him married.”

  Now that did surprise me. As many backhanded jabs as she’s made at my love life, I knew that Cyl’s personal code of morality was straight out of the Old Testament. She might be able to rationalize fornication but no way could she do adultery without a heavy load of guilt.

  “We didn’t realize what was happening until it was too late,” she said. “It was just friendship. Talking. A cup of coffee. He helped me through that rough time, the day I found out what happened to Isaac. He was so easy to talk to. Almost like talking to Isaac when I was a little girl. I felt as if there was nothing I couldn’t tell him, that he would just listen. Without judging or condemning.”

  Isaac was Cyl’s uncle, a boy who’d been more like an older brother than an uncle, a brother she’d idolized. He disappeared when she was only eight or nine years old and everyone thought he’d fled to Boston without a backward look, which was probably why Cyl had grown up feeling betrayed and abandoned and wary of trusting again. I was there the day she learned how he died, a day of high emotions, another rainy day like this one, with Cyl so full of grief that—

  “Ralph Freeman?” I exclaimed.

  Cyl looked almost as shocked as I felt. “How did you guess?”

  “Hell, I was standing right beside you when you asked him for a ride back into town. He shared his umbrella with you out to the parking lot. I remember asking about his wife and children and he said they were visiting her family back in Warrenton. Is that when it happened?”

  “Nothing happened,” Cyl protested. “Not that day, anyhow. We just talked. Then, two weeks ago, he came by the office to ask about a man in his church that he was trying to help. A misdemeanor. It was a Friday afternoon. Everyone else was gone. I pulled the shuck to check the charges. He was reading it over my shoulder. I looked up to say something. Our lips were so close. And then they were touching, and then—”

  She broke off but I couldn’t help wondering. Right there on Doug Woodall’s couch?

  “We knew it was wrong. But it felt so right.” She sighed and shook her head sadly. “We knew we’d sinned, and we said we’d never do it again. But it was like not knowing how hungry you are till you see the food spread out before you and God help us, Deborah, we were both starving. Touching him. Being touched. It was a banquet. Afterwards, I guess we tried to pretend it was a one-time thing. An aberration. We stayed away from each other for a week and then, Saturday morning . . .”

  She fell silent for a long moment and tears pooled again in her large brown eyes. “It was even more wonderful,” she whispered.

  I didn’t know Ralph Freeman’s wife except by reputation: a God-fearing, commandment-keeping woman who didn’t trust white people. I did know his children though, an eleven-year-old son and a seven-year-old daughter who was an engaging little gigglebox. Kids like Stan and Lashanda are one more reason I don’t mess with married men.

  As if reading my mind, Cyl said, “He has children, a wife, a commitment to Jesus. And he’s right. It could jeopardize my job, too. He can’t—we can’t—That’s what he came to tell me Sunday night. We can’t ever see each other alone again. And he’s right. I know he’s right. But, oh Deborah, how can I stand it?”

  And she began to cry again.

  CHAPTER | 11

  Never did a storm work more cruelly.

  September 4 (Weds.)

  —As of 6 a.m. Hurricane Fran 26°N by 73.9°W.

  —Winds at 100 kts. (115 mph)—now a Category 3 hurricane.

  —Predicted to hit land sometime tomorrow night.

  —Hurricane watch posted last night from Sebastian Inlet, FL to Little River Inlet, SC.

  —Evacuating coastal areas of NC, SC & GA.

  —Trop. strm. winds 250+ mi. from eye & hurr. winds out 145 mi.—gale-force wind & rain if it hits NC.

  Stan Freeman finished jotting his morning notes with a sense of growing excitement. Maybe they’d get a little action this far inland after all.

  Certainly his parents seemed concerned when he joined them for breakfast. The kitchen radio was tuned to WPTF’s morning weather report. Rain today and more predicted for tomorrow with gusty winds. Unless Hurricane Fran took a sudden sharp turn soon, North Carolina was definitely in for it.

  “It’s a biggie,” Stan told them happily. “Almost three hundred miles across. A lot bigger than Bertha and you saw what she did. They’re talking winds a hundred and thirty miles an hour! Storm surges twenty feet high! And if it comes in at Wilmington, we might even get tornadoes.”

  “Stanley!” his mother protested.

  “Tornadoes?” Lashanda’s ey
es widened. “Like Dorothy? Our house will get blown away? Mama?”

  “Your brother’s talking about ’way down at the coast,” Clara said with soothing tones for her daughter and a warning glare for her son. “That’s a long way away. And it seems to me, Stanley, that you should be praying the storm passes by instead of hoping it hits and causes so many people grief.”

  “I’m not wishing them grief, Mama,” he protested as the phone rang and his father got up to answer. “I’m just telling you what the weather reports say. I have to keep up with it for my science project. You want me to get a good grade, don’t you?”

  As he knew it would, citing school as a justification for his excitement somewhat mitigated her displeasure.

  “Don’t worry, Shandy,” he told his little sister. “We’ll be safe this far inland.”

  A drop of milk splashed on Lashanda’s skirt and she jumped up immediately for a wet cloth to sponge it off. She was wearing her Brownie uniform since they were meeting immediately after school.

  His father hung up the phone and came back to the table. “That was Brother Todd. He and the other deacons think we ought to cancel prayer meeting tonight, and spend the evening taking down the tent. The canvas is so rain-soaked that it’s dripping through. One strong gust could send it halfway to Raleigh.”

  “When will you start?” asked Stan. “After school? I can help, can’t I?”

  “Me, too,” said Lashanda.

  “You’re too little,” Clara told her. “Besides, that’s men’s work.”

  “It’s not fair!” Lashanda’s big brown eyes started to puddle up. “Boys get to have all the fun.”

  “I thought we agreed not to stereotype gender roles,” Ralph said mildly.

  Clara’s tone was three shades colder. “Wrestling with a tent in the wind and rain is not appropriate for a little girl.”

  “Or a little boy either,” he said with a smile for his daughter. “But I bet we can find something that is appropriate. Maybe you can gather up the tent pegs, honey. Would you like that?”