by Alana Terry
Kennedy wanted to see Jodie. She wanted to hug her, apologize for not finding a way to help her sooner. How much did one little girl have to endure? And then after she assured herself Jodie really was safe, she wanted to sleep for a very, very long time.
But she couldn’t. Not now. There was still work to do. “Jodie’s uncle told one of his men to go and …” Could she bring herself to speak the words? “He told Dustin to go and kill that boy.” Had she really just said that? Had it all really happened? If she weren’t here lying in a hospital bed, if she didn’t have such vivid memories of the cold, the hunger, the knife stab, she might have thought it was a dream that felt a little too real.
“Well, you don’t have to worry about that,” the officer assured her. “Both Anthony Abernathy and Dustin were killed on the spot.”
Kennedy shut her eyes for a minute. Would she ever forget? Could she ever forget? “What about the other one? Vinny.”
“He got away, but we suspect he’s injured. Could turn up any minute. We’ve got a word out to all the hospitals and medical clinics. The important thing is you’re safe, and so is the girl.”
“Her family knows by now?” Kennedy wondered how Wayne and Vivian Abernathy would respond to a crisis like this. What would it do to their picture-perfect family? She hoped Wayne would have the decency to stand up for his daughter instead of worrying how the events would impact his campaign, but she had her doubts.
“I just got back from praying with them.” Carl sounded tired. “I think they’re blaming themselves for what Anthony did. They never suspected.”
“She was babysitting over there all the time,” Sandy added. “They thought he just needed the extra help since Moriah died. They had no idea …”
The officer cleared his throat, and Sandy took a step back. Kennedy tried to follow the gist of the conversation as he asked her more questions, but she never felt like she could grasp what was really going on. Her head felt as heavy as her calculus textbook when he finally left.
“I suppose we should be going, too.” Carl helped Sandy into her sweater.
“What, so soon? I thought the party was just starting.” The voice sounded familiar, but Kennedy couldn’t place it until she saw the hair.
“Nick!” Sandy spread out her arms and gave him a hug. “That’s nice of you to stop by.”
He ran his hand through his dreads. “Well, I got Carl’s text, and I figured I’d stop by right after youth group and see how everything’s going.” He gave Kennedy a little wave. “How d’you feel?”
She was too tired to smile but tried to give him a reassuring nod. “I’ll be just fine.”
“You bet she will.” Carl clapped Nick on the back.
Nick looked around the room awkwardly. He wore a bright orange Hawaiian shirt over a T-shirt with Jesus and his disciples all piled into a white Honda. The caption at the top read In One Accord. Kennedy probably would have been glad to see him if she weren’t so exhausted. She wasn’t certain she’d remember any of this in the morning. How long had it been since she had slept the whole night through?
“So the media is kinda going crazy over all this.” Nick didn’t seem to know where to focus his eyes, which darted from Carl to Sandy to the various objects lying around the room.
Sandy winced, but Nick went on with his explanation.
“I guess they’re saying now Anthony Abernathy was on some sort of rampage. Trying to sabotage his brother’s campaign.”
Carl shrugged. “Everyone’s desperate for a scoop.”
“No, that’s what he said before he …” Kennedy swallowed. Had she really remembered right? She could still hear the shouts of her rescuers and the sound of gunfire when she shut her eyes. Her whole body sank farther into her hospital mattress at the thought of Jodie and all she had gone through.
“I still don’t know how someone so close to Wayne could do a thing like that,” Sandy breathed.
“That appears to be the question of the day.” Nick put one foot up on a little hospital chair near the wall and drummed on his bent knee. “Some are guessing it has more to do with protecting his own hide than anything else.”
Carl made a motion to the door. “Maybe we should talk about this more on our way out.”
“That’s a good idea,” Sandy replied.
Nick offered a sheepish good-bye. Kennedy wanted to tell them she didn’t mind. She was dying to understand it all herself. But her vision grew blurry as she watched them gather up their things, and she was asleep before their voices died out in the hall.
CHAPTER 26
A nurse came in sometime in the middle of the night and recorded Kennedy’s vitals. Whatever medicines they had given her were starting to wear off, and she itched and tried to get comfortable for another hour before dozing off again. In the morning, a nurse checked her bandages one last time and told her she would get her discharge papers ready. “Your pastor said he’d come pick you up in about an hour.”
Kennedy wondered what it would be like to go back to the real world after an ordeal like this. Would she ever feel safe on the streets of Cambridge again? Would she ever feel safe in her own dorm? She thought about the pregnancy center, about the big Thursday dinner that would go on as if none of this had happened. Could people really go on living in such blissful ignorance? She couldn’t. Like an over-stretched rubber band that can never resume its original shape, she couldn’t close her eyes again and forget it all.
Her dad would tell her he had been right all along, of course. He would probably chide her for following Dustin the night he came to her room. Kennedy had been worried about Willow, that was all. And her compassion could have killed her. She wouldn’t mind, though. Her dad could rage for an hour as long as Kennedy could hear his voice. As long as she could sit with the phone to her ear and listen to that strong, familiar, lecturing tone. All the homesickness of the past two months collected itself into one massive swell that came crashing down with tsunami-like force all around her. It wasn’t like drowning. It was like being hit by a ten-foot brick wall.
“Excuse me. Do I have the right room?”
Kennedy squinted at the man in the doorway.
He smiled. “So here you are. Remember me?”
There was something familiar about that red hair. The guy from the subway. The journalist. What was he doing here? He gave her a casual smile and strode to her bedside.
“I saw your picture come up on my news feed. I never forget a face.” He held up his camera case.
Oh no. Was he here for pictures, then?
Kennedy raised the back of her hospital bed so she was sitting up. At least she was in her street clothes already. What was he doing here? She wasn’t sure if she should be talking to the media at all. Or was that only what they told victims in novels?
“I’m not here to interview you or anything.” He patted his bag and kept it closed.
Kennedy stared. So he was a mind-reader, too? Or was he just used to people not trusting him because he was with the press? “It’s just that I don’t meet too many young people from Jilin Province. And, well, I guess when I saw you were involved in all this, I wanted to check in. Make sure you were all right.”
His endearing smile only took away a fraction of Kennedy’s misgivings.
He sighed. “Well, what do the doctors say?” He eyed her hospital room with a calculating, meticulous care. Was he some kind of Sherlock Holmes? What could his trained eye learn about her condition simply by observing her surroundings?
“I’ll be just fine. Maybe a week or two of taking it easy. You know, after I catch up on all the homework I missed.”
He crossed his arms. A little dimple dented his right cheek when he smiled. “I was a lot like that my first year, too.”
She didn’t ask him what he meant. She thought she was already learning.
He shook his head. “So you probably heard Anthony Abernathy was shot.”
A shudder started in the base of her back and sped up her spine. She winced when
it reached the spot of her injury.
“They’re saying he did it because of his wife.”
Kennedy felt her face scrunch up in about a dozen unasked questions.
He leaned forward. “Moriah Abernathy? Did you guys hear about her over there in Yanji?”
The name sounded vaguely familiar, but Kennedy couldn’t place it.
“Anyway, she was pregnant when they diagnosed her with aggressive cancer. She refused chemo. No abortion, either. She died a few weeks after her son was born.”
“Charlie.”
“Pardon?”
Kennedy shook her head. “Never mind. So this is all some sort of vengeance because his wife died?”
He tightened the strap of his camera case. “I guess he figures if she hadn’t gotten so much pressure from the pro-life camp, his wife wouldn’t have been so adamant. Maybe she would’ve gotten the medical care she needed.”
Kennedy wondered if it was the exhaustion or the pain meds that were most responsible for fogging up her brain.
He leaned forward. “Between you and me, there’s chatter about other motives for hiding the girl’s pregnancy, too. Selfish ones. Meant to hide incriminating evidence, if you catch my drift.”
Kennedy squinted. Did he mean what she thought he meant? And if so, was she really surprised?
“But that’s all spec at this point. You know how it is.”
No, she didn’t, but she wasn’t going to tell him so.
He leaned against the end table by her bed. “You hear about the computer they recovered?”
She still hadn’t figured out if this was an interview or some strange and unexpected courtesy call. If it was an interview, he was revealing lots and gleaning hardly anything, at least nothing she was giving him verbally. What was it her dad always said about Kennedy trusting strangers?
“I guess it had all kinds of incriminating evidence,” he went on. “Wayne Abernathy’s itinerary, blueprints of his election headquarters. Sounds like they were also planning to target some pro-life fundraiser later on this week.”
Kennedy couldn’t keep her poker face and felt her eyes grow wide. “But they stopped it?”
He shrugged. “As far as I know. I’m sure they’ll have extra security just in case. You might want to tell your pastor to plan for more guests.”
A nurse bustled in before Kennedy could figure out how he knew so much about her and about the whole situation. “I’ll have to ask you to leave,” she told the reporter. “We have some discharge directions from the doctor to discuss.”
He cracked another wide smile, his dimple pierced his cheek, and he was gone before Kennedy learned his name. She had a hard time focusing while the nurse went over all the paperwork. She wished she could go home to her parents for a long weekend. Why couldn’t they live closer?
The nurse left, and Kennedy reached over for the Bible on her nightstand. Had someone left if for her there? She couldn’t remember seeing it last night, but she had been so drugged up and exhausted she could have missed anything. There was a note inside the front cover.
To Kennedy ~ Psalm 139.
Psalm 139. It sounded like a passage she should be familiar with. The pages crinkled as she turned them.
You have searched me, Lord, and you know me. How many times in Yanji had she ached for God to show himself to her, for him to let her know he cared for her, not only the missionaries and evangelists of the world?
You know when I sit and when I rise. She looked back on the past thirty-six hours. The whole time, God had known where she was. He had a plan to rescue her all along.
You perceive my going out and my lying down. You are familiar with all my ways. Her life, as isolated and lonely as it had felt for the past few months in the States, was an open book her heavenly Father had memorized. There wasn’t a lab write-up, a calculus problem, a late-night snack of dry Cheerios that he didn’t know about. And he loved her.
Kennedy was only halfway through the Psalm when Carl nudged open the door carrying a colorful bouquet of flowers and brandishing a huge smile. “Grab your things. Sandy insists you spend the next few days with us while you recover.”
Kennedy wanted to argue. She wanted to tell him that she needed to get back to her dorm, back to her classes. She couldn’t even guess how far behind she already was. But the dull ache in her back had grown exponentially since she woke up until she was sure she could feel Anthony behind her, stabbing her in the same spot repeatedly whenever she shifted her position. The doctor had assured her it would get better and ordered her to rest. Well, there wasn’t time for that. Not with labs and calculus and Crime and Punishment …
“She’s already baking you muffins.” Carl rolled a hospital wheelchair to the side of the bed. “She said the food back in your dorm won’t heal you up half as fast as her home cooking.” He reached his hand out and helped her down. “You ready?”
There was no point arguing. “Yeah.” Once in the wheelchair, Kennedy put the new Bible on her lap. She had to swallow twice before she could trust her voice again. “I’m ready.”
CHAPTER 27
Kennedy spent that day resting on the Lindgrens’ couch, napping in their guest room, and assuring her mother over a series of five different phone conversations that she really was safe and unharmed. She nibbled her breakfast, finished about half of her lunch, and by evening was so hungry she cleaned her dinner plate twice.
Kennedy got in touch with her professors and wasn’t expected back in class until Monday. She had some work to do in the meantime to keep from falling too far behind, but Carl and Sandy insisted she stay at their home through the end of the weekend. Kennedy surprised herself and didn’t protest.
On Thursday morning, Sandy drove Kennedy over to her dorm so she could pick up her books. The door to her room was slightly open. Kennedy’s body shook at the memory of what had happened the last time she was there.
“So, our little celebrity finally makes her grand stage debut.” Willow’s face lit up when they entered, and she stood up from her desk. Her hair was already a darker shade than it had been at the beginning of the week. She took a step toward Kennedy. “I’m like not gonna injure you if I give you a hug or something, will I?”
Kennedy blinked. Her dad had ordered her a new set of contacts that would arrive in the mail in a week or less. “No, just be gentle.” She smiled. It was the first time she and Willow touched each other, at least as far as she could remember.
“So, you selling your book rights yet or anything?”
Kennedy winced at the shouts and gunshots bursting from Willow’s computer game.
“Oh, sorry about that.” Willow reached out and shut the monitor off.
Kennedy looked around. Besides Willow’s hair color, nothing had changed. There were her books on the shelf, her bag on the floor. She could tell by one of the lights that her laptop hadn’t even been shut down properly. Her phone — the real one, not the clone — was right there on her desk where she had left it.
“Do you want me to pick out a few outfits for you to bring back with us?” Sandy asked.
Kennedy had forgotten Sandy was there. “That would be great.” So far, she had been wearing Sandy’s old house dresses, which were comfortable enough on her back but not exactly what she’d consider her own personal style. She had already seen the way Willow raised her eyebrows at the oversized floral thing she was wearing today. “By the way, Sandy, this is my roommate Willow. This is Sandy, my pastor’s wife.”
She half-expected Willow to go into some tirade about the horrors of organized religion, but Willow simply waved her hand and gave her stage-ready smile. Kennedy pointed out the books she’d need, and Sandy packed them in a little duffel. To Kennedy’s surprise, Willow remained where she was instead of plopping back down behind her computer. “So you skipping town or something? Going into witness protection?”
Kennedy laughed. “No. I’m just going to be staying at Sandy’s for another few days until I’m recovered.”
&nbs
p; “Well, I know you’re going to be wicked busy because you’re a huge over-achiever that way, but you need to make time for me to take you to the L’Aroma Bakery so you can tell me everything that happened. You know, before your memoir hits the bookshelves and everything.”
Kennedy wasn’t sure if Willow was being sarcastic or not, but she could sense the genuine concern behind the words. “Yeah, I’d like that.” It might be a while before she was ready to talk about it all, but she was glad Willow would be there to listen when the time came.
“Oh, by the way, your boyfriend’s been stopping by … I don’t know, like every other hour to see if you’re back. He said he’s called you a dozen times or something, but your phone battery must’ve died. Again.”
Kennedy felt Sandy’s curious stare at the mention of the word boyfriend. Well, even though they weren’t dating, it was sweet that Reuben was so worried about her. She made herself a mental note to call him back at the Lindgrens’.
Sandy refused to let Kennedy carry any of her things back to the car. As soon as they were on the road, Sandy stole a quick sideways glance. “Boyfriend?”
Kennedy tried to keep her voice casual. “He’s just a good friend. My lab partner.”
“Just a friend?” Sandy asked with that same playful tone. “Just a friend that stops by every hour on the hour to see if you’re ok?”
Kennedy felt the smile creep up on her face before she could stop it. Part of her wanted to change the subject. Part of her looked forward to getting her phone charged and hearing Reuben’s easy-going voice and cool accent again.
Sandy put on some worship music, and they drove for a while without saying anything. Kennedy didn’t know how she could ever show her full appreciation to the Lindgrens for everything they’d done for her. She wished she didn’t have to have this next conversation, but she may as well get over it. It wasn’t going to get any easier later.
“You know, I’ve been meaning to tell you and Carl …”
Sandy reached over and lowered the speaker volume.