"It's hard. I've done terrible things."
Sarah was right. She did need professional help. He was angry at himself for not knowing exactly what to say.
The next few days settled into a surprisingly easy routine. Whatever her other qualities, Pam was a horrible cook, which failing made her cry twice with frustration, though Kelly managed to choke down everything she prepared with a smile and a kind word. But she learned quickly, too, and by Friday she'd figured out how to make hamburger into something tastier than a piece of charcoal. Through it all, Kelly was there, encouraging her. trying hard not to be overpowering and mainly succeeding. A quiet word, a gentle touch, and a smile were his tools. She was soon aping his habit of rising before dawn. He started getting her to exercise. This came very hard indeed. Though basically healthy, she hadn't run more than half a block in years, and so he made her walk around the island, starting with two laps, by the end of the week up to five. She spent her afternoons in the sun, and without much to wear she most often did so in her panties and bra. She acquired the beginnings of a tan, and never seemed to notice the thin, pale marks on her back that made Kelly's blood chill with anger. She began to pay more serious attention to her appearance, showering and washing her hair at least once per day, brushing it out to a silky gloss, and Kelly was always there to comment on it. Not once did she appear to need the phenobarbital Sarah had left behind. Perhaps she struggled once or twice, but by using exercise instead of chemicals, she worked herself onto a normal wake-sleep routine. Her smiles acquired more confidence, and twice he caught her looking into the mirror with something other than pain in her eyes.
"Pretty nice, isn't it?" he asked Saturday evening, just after her shower.
"Maybe," she allowed.
Kelly lifted a comb from the sink and started going through her wet hair. "The sun has really lightened it up for you."
"It took a while to get all the dirt out," she said, relaxing to his touch.
Kelly struggled with a tangle, careful not to pull too hard. "But it did come out, Pammy, didn't it?"
"Yeah, I guess so, maybe," she told the face in the mirror.
"How hard was that to say, honey?"
"Pretty hard." A smile, a real one with warmth and conviction.
Kelly set the comb down and kissed the base of her neck, letting her watch in the mirror. Kelly got the comb back and continued his work. It struck him as very unmanly, but he loved doing this. "There, all straight, no tangles."
"You really ought to buy a hair-dryer."
Kelly shrugged. "I've never needed one."
Pam turned around and took his hands. "You will, if you still want to."
He was quiet for perhaps ten seconds, and when he spoke, the words didn't quite come out as they should, for now the fear was his. "You sure?"
"Do you still--"
"Yes!" It was hard lifting her with wet hair, still nude and damp from the shower, but a man had to hold his woman at a time like this. She was changing. Her ribs were less pronounced. She'd gained weight on a regular, healthy diet. But it was the person inside who had changed the most. Kelly wondered what miracle had taken place, afraid to believe that he was part of it, but knowing that it was so. He set her down after a moment, looking at the mirth in her eyes, proud that he'd helped to put it there.
"I have my rough edges, too," Kelly warned her, unaware of the look in his eyes.
"I've seen most of them," she assured him. Her hands started rubbing over his chest, tanned and matted with dark hair, marked with scars from combat operations in a faraway place. Her scars were inside, but so were some of his, and together each would heal the other. Pam was sure of that now. She'd begun to look at the future as more than a dark place where she could hide and forget. It was now a place of hope.
6
Ambush
The rest was easy. They made a quick boat trip to Solomons, where Pam was able to buy a few simple things. A beauty shop trimmed her hair. By the end of her second week with Kelly, she'd started to run and had gained weight. Already she could wear a two-piece swimsuit without an overt display of her rib cage. Her leg muscles were toning up: what had been slack was now taut, as it ought to be on a girl her age. She still had her demons. Twice Kelly woke to find her trembling, sweating, and murmuring sounds that never quite turned into words but were easily understood. Both times his touch calmed her. but not him. Soon he was teaching her to run Springer, and whatever the defects in her schooling, she was smart enough. She quickly grasped how to do the things that most boaters never learned. He even took her swimming, surprised somehow that she'd learned the skill in the middle of Texas.
Mainly he loved her, the sight, the sound, the smell, and most of all the feel of Pam Madden. Kelly found himself slightly anxious if he failed to see her every few minutes, as though she might somehow disappear. But she was always there, catching his eye, smiling back playfully. Most of the time. Sometimes he'd catch her with a different expression, allowing herself to look back into the darkness of her past or forward into an alternate future different from that which he had already planned. He found himself wishing that he could reach into her mind and remove the bad parts, knowing that he would have to trust others to do that. At those times, and the others, for the most part, he'd find an excuse to head her way, and let his fingertips glide over her shoulder, just to be sure she knew that he was there.
Ten days after Sam and Sarah had left, they had a little ceremony. He let her take the boat out, tie the bottle of phenobarbital to a large rock, and dump it over the side. The splash it made seemed a fitting and final end to one of her problems. Kelly stood behind her, his strong arms about her waist, watching the other boats traveling the Bay, and he looked into a future bright with promise.
"You were right," she said, stroking his forearms.
"That happens sometimes," Kelly replied with a distant smile, only to be stunned by her next statement.
"There are others, John, other women Henry has . . . like Helen, the one he killed."
"What do you mean?"
"I have to go back. I have to help them ... before Henry--before he kills more of them."
"There's danger involved, Pammy," Kelly said slowly.
"I know ... but what about them?"
It was a symptom of her recovery, Kelly knew. She had become a nomal person again, and normal people worried about others.
"I can't hide forever, can I?" Kelly could feel her fear, but her words defied it and he held her a little tighter.
"No, you can't, not really. That's the problem. It's too hard to hide."
"Are you sure you can trust your friend on the police?" she asked.
"Yes: he knows me. He's a lieutenant I did a job for a year ago. A gun got tossed, and I helped find it. So he owes me one. Besides, I ended up helping to train their divers, and I made some friends." Kelly paused. "You don't have to do it, Pam. If you just want to walk away from it, that's okay with me. I don't have to go back to Baltimore ever, except for the doctor stuff."
"All the things they did to me, they're doing to the others. If I don't do something, then it'll never really be gone, will it?"
Kelly thought about that, and his own demons. You simply could not run away from some things. He knew. He'd tried. Pam's collection was in its way more horrible than his own, and if their relationship were to go further, those demons had to find their resting place.
"Let me make a phone call."
"Lieutenant Allen," the man said into his phone in Western District. The air conditioning wasn't working well today, and his desk was piled with work as yet undone.
"Frank? John Kelly," the detective heard, bringing a smile.
"How's life in the middle of the Bay, fella?" Wouldn't I like to be there.
"Quiet and lazy. How about you?" the voice asked.
"I wish," Allen answered, leaning back in his swivel chair. A large man, and like most cops of his generation, a World War II veteran--in his case a Marine artillery-man --Allen had
risen from foot patrol on East Monument Street to homicide. For all that, the work was not as demanding as most thought, though it did carry the burden associated with the untimely end of human life. Allen immediately noted the change in Kelly's voice. "What can I do for you?"
"I, uh, met somebody who might need to talk with you."
"How so?" the cop asked, fishing around in his shirt pocket for a cigarette and matches.
"It's business, Frank. Information regarding a killing."
The cop's eyes narrowed a bit, while his brain changed gears. "When and where?"
"I don't know yet, and I don't like doing this over a phone line."
"How serious?"
"Just between us for now?"
Allen nodded, staring out the window. "That's fine, okay."
"Drug people."
Allen's mind went click. Kelly had said his informant was "somebody," not a "man." That made the person a female, Allen figured. Kelly was smart, but not all that sophisticated in this line of work. Allen had heard the shadowy reports of a drug ring using women for something or other. Nothing more than that. It wasn't his case. It was being handled by Emmet Ryan and Tom Douglas downtown, and Allen wasn't even supposed to know that much.
"There's at least three drug organizations up and running now. None of them are very nice folks." Allen said evenly. "Tell me more."
"My friend doesn't want much involvement. Just some information for you, that's it, Frank. If it goes further, we can reevaluate then. We're talking some scary people if this story is true."
Allen considered that. He'd never dwelt upon Kelly's background, but he knew enough. Kelly was a trained diver, he knew, a bosun's mate who'd fought in the brown-water Navy in the Mekong Delta, supporting the 9th Infantry; a squid, but a very competent, careful squid whose services had come highly recommended to the force from somebody in the Pentagon and who'd done a nice job retraining the force's divers, and, by the way, earning a nice check for it, Allen reminded himself. The "person" had to be female. Kelly would never worry about guarding a man that tightly. Men just didn't think that way about other men. If nothing else, it sure sounded interesting.
"You're not screwing me around, are you?" he had to ask.
"That's not my way, man," Kelly assured him. "My rules: it's for information purposes only, and it's a quiet meet. Okay?"
"You know, anybody else, I'd probably say come right in here and that would be it, but I'll play along with you. You did break the Gooding case open for me. We got him, you know. Life plus thirty. I owe you for that. Okay, I'll play along for now. Fair enough?"
"Thanks. What's your schedule like?"
"Working late shift this week." It was just after four in the afternoon, and Allen had just come on duty. He didn't know that Kelly had called three times that day already without leaving a message. "I get off around midnight, one o'clock, like that. It depends on the night," he explained. "Some are busier than others."
"Tomorrow night. I'll pick you up at the front door. We can have a little supper together."
Allen frowned. This was like a James Bond movie, secret agent crap. But he did know Kelly to be a serious man, even if he didn't know squat about police work.
"See you then, sport."
"Thanks, Frank. 'Bye." The line clicked off and Allen went back to work. making a note on his desk calendar.
"Are you scared?" he asked.
"A little," she admitted.
He smiled. "That's normal. But you heard what I said. He doesn't know anything about you. You can always back out if you want. I'll be carrying a gun all the time. And it's just a talk. You can get in and get out. We'll do it in one day--one night, really. And I'll be with you all the time."
"Every minute?"
"Except when you're in the ladies' room, honey. There you have to look out for yourself." She smiled and relaxed.
"I have to fix dinner," she said, heading off to the kitchen.
Kelly went outside. Something in him called for more weapons practice, but he'd done that already. Instead he walked into the equipment bunker and took the .45 down from the rack. First he depressed the stud and action spring. Next he swiveled the bushing. That allowed the spring to go free. Kelly dismounted the slide assembly, removing the barrel, and now the pistol was field-stripped. He held the barrel up to a light, and, as expected, it was dirty from firing. He cleaned every surface, using rags, Hoppe's cleaning solvent, and a toothbrush until there was no trace of dirt on any metal surface. Next he lightly oiled the weapon. Not too much oil, for that would attract dirt and grit, which could foul and jam the pistol at an inconvenient moment. Finished cleaning, he reassembled the Colt quickly and expertly--it was something he could and did do with his eyes closed. It had a nice feel in his hand as he jacked the slide back a few times to make sure it was properly assembled. A final visual inspection confirmed it.
Kelly took two loaded magazines from a drawer, along with a single loose round. He inserted one loaded clip into the piece, working the slide to load the first round in the chamber. He carefully lowered the hammer before ejecting the magazine and sliding another round into place. With eight cartridges in the weapon, and a backup clip, he now had a total of fifteen rounds with which to face danger. Not nearly enough for a walk in the jungles of Vietnam, but he figured it was plenty for the dark environs of a city. He could hit a human head with a single aimed shot from ten yards, day or night. He'd never once rattled under fire, and he'd killed men before. Whatever the dangers might be, Kelly was ready for them. Besides, he wasn't going after the Vietcong. He was going in at night, and the night was his friend. There would be fewer people around for him to worry about, and unless the other side knew he was there--which they wouldn't--he didn't have to worry about an ambush. He just had to stay alert, which came easily to him.
Dinner was chicken, something Pam knew how to fix. Kelly almost got out a bottle of wine but thought better of it. Why tempt her with alcohol? Maybe he'd stop drinking himself. It would be no great loss, and the sacrifice would validate his commitment to her. Their conversation avoided serious matters. He'd already shut the dangers from his mind. There was no need to dwell on them. Too much imagination made things worse, not better.
"You really think we need new curtains?" he said.
"They don't match the furniture very well."
Kelly grunted. "For a boat?"
"It's kinda dull there, you know?"
"Dull," he observed, clearing the table. "Next thing, you'll say that men are all alike--" Kelly stopped dead in his tracks. It was the first time he'd slipped up that way. "Sorry . . ."
She gave him an impish smile. "Well, in some ways you are. And stop being so nervous about talking to me about things, okay?"
Kelly relaxed. "Okay." He grabbed her and pulled her close. "If that's the way you feel... well . . ."
"Mmm." She smiled and accepted his kiss. Kelly's hands wandered across her back, and there was no feel of a bra under the cotton blouse. She giggled at him. "I wondered how long it would take you to notice."
"The candles were in the way," he explained.
"The candles were nice, but smelly." And she was right. The bunker was not well ventilated. Something else to fix. Kelly looked forward into a very busy future as he moved his hands to a nicer place.
"Have I gained enough weight?"
"Is it my imagination, or ... ?"
"Well, maybe just a little," Pam admitted, holding his hands on her.
"We need to get you some new clothes," he said, watching her face, the new confidence. He had her on the wheel, steering the proper compass course past Sharp's Island Light, well east of the shipping channel, which was busy today.
"Good idea," she agreed. "But I don't know any good places." She checked the compass like a good helmsman.
"They're easy to find. You just look at the parking lot."
"Huh?"
"Lincolns and Caddys, honey. Always means good clothes," Kelly noted. "Never fails."
&nbs
p; She laughed as intended. Kelly marveled at how much more in control she seemed, though there was still a long ways to go.
"Where will we stay tonight?"
"On board," Kelly answered. "We'll be secure here." Pam merely nodded, but he explained anyway.
"You look different now, and they don't know me from Adam. They don't know my car or my boat. Frank Allen doesn't know your name or even that you're a girl. That's operational security. We ought to be safe."
"I'm sure you're right," Pam said, turning to smile at him. The confidence in her face warmed his blood and fed his already capacious ego.
"Going to rain tonight," Kelly noted, pointing at distant clouds. "That's good, too. Cuts down visibility. We used to do a lot of stuff in the rain. People just aren't alert when they're wet."
"You really know about this stuff, don't you?"
A manly smile. "I learned in a really tough school, honey."
They made port three hours later. Kelly made a great show of being alert, checking out the parking lot, noting that his Scout was in its accustomed place. He sent her below while he tied up, then left her there while he drove the car right to the dock. Pam, as instructed, walked straight from the boat to the Scout without looking left or right, and he drove off the property at once. It was still early in the day, and they drove immediately out of the city, finding a suburban shopping center in Timonium, where Pam over a period of two--to Kelly, interminable--hours selected three nice outfits, for which he paid cash. She dressed in the one he liked best, an understated skirt and blouse that went well with his jacket and no tie. For once Kelly was dressing in accordance with his own net worth, which was comfortable.
Dinner was eaten in the same area, an upscale restaurant with a dark corner booth. Kelly didn't say so, but he'd needed a good meal, and while Pam was okay with chicken, she still had a lot to learn about cooking.
"You look pretty good--relaxed, I mean," he said, sipping his after-dinner coffee.
Without Remorse (1993) Page 11