I licked the tears from my lips and spoke in my most authoritative voice. “Mother, Sam lied to the police because he didn’t want to get in trouble for skipping baseball practice to hang out with Billy Mays. That is a closed issue. He is not a suspect. And I like his new friends. Robert hasn’t met them.” My hands weren’t shaking anymore.
“Still, it troubles your father and I that you left town to go on your exercise trip without making sure that Sam went to his father’s. You won’t like hearing this, but we think you’re spending too much time on yourself, and not enough time on your son. I’ve researched this issue.”
Your father and ME, I wanted to scream, but I didn’t, and it wasn’t even the point. She’d uttered her magic words: researched the issue. When my mother utters the word research in relation to any issue, she’s saying she speaks God’s only truth.
I stayed calm. I breathed. I thought about how unlikely it was that my father had expressed a thought about my trip to Huntsville. A strong and proud man, Papa said my abuelo knew when to speak and when to act, like when he moved my abuela over her vocal objections away from her family in the Valley all the way to Midland so he could get a higher-paying job in the oil field and help send Papa to Texas A&M. Like him, Papa rarely does more than nod his head when my mother goes on about something.
She was still talking. “And I know you’re spending as much time preparing for your race each week as you are going on TV and at work. There’s no time left for Sam. You’re being selfish. You need to—”
I threw the dust rag across the room and picked up the Endust can and chunked it after it. The can smashed against the floor and clattered into the wall.
“Selfish? I’m being selfish because I don’t sit at home waiting on a son who isn’t here because he’s sixteen years old and would rather hang out with his friends and go to his job and play baseball? I’m selfish because all my non-work and non-training hours go to my son? Meanwhile, my heart is breaking in two, I miss my husband, I miss Belle, and I don’t see Sam’s dad saying, ‘How can I help, Michele?’ Instead, he calls my parents and suggests I’m not fit to have custody of Sam.”
“We think you should save the race for next year, or when Sam is off to college.”
I wanted to scream at the top of my lungs and spin until I fell down, I wanted to be the knife-winged butterfly my father had named me after, but I tightened my jaw. “I am doing this race, this year. I am doing it for Adrian.” With Adrian, I thought. With Adrian.
“Adrian is dead, Michele. Sam isn’t.”
Her words stabbed me through the heart with a knife of ice. Now I did scream. “This race meant the world to Adrian. If I don’t go, he doesn’t go. And guess what? It’s part of my job, the job that puts food on the table for Sam twelve days out of every fourteen.”
“If Adrian were here, he would understand.”
I was panting with rage. “If Adrian were here, he would tell you that I can do both. Quitting this race wouldn’t make me any more ‘here’ than I already am.”
“You could—”
“Enough, Mom. Do whatever you think you need to do. We’re done here.”
“We just want you to think about it. We love you.”
“I’ll think about it. I just won’t talk about it. Not another word.”
I ended the call, lightheaded. I leaned over and put my hands on my knees.
“Mom? I’m home and going to bed.” Sam stood in the doorway to the kitchen.
“Okay, hon. I’m sorry about that.”
“It’s okay.” He hesitated, looking at me. “I love you.”
His words nearly knocked me over. “I love you too, Sam.”
He headed toward the stairs, and I sat down on the wood floor in the office and put my head between my knees. Why did it have to be that hard? I needed a break, just a tiny little breather. A moment. I needed everything to stop. My light head returned to normal, and I stood up. I needed to run, but I wasn’t going to leave Sam alone right then.
So I started to pace, making laps around the house. I had walked so many miles that way over the years. I need action, motion, when my emotions kick in. I always had. Adrian liked to go off by himself when he was upset. Not me. I wanted a fight, a dramatic fight with hands in the air, voices high, and full use of all available real estate. More than once when we’d holed up in our room to resolve an issue, he left with me hot on his heels—even, once, out onto the sidewalk when he tried to take a run to clear his head. That hadn’t made him very happy, and I’d given the old Jewish couple catty-corner across the street an earful.
Passion. Adrian and I had passion. I walked faster. It drove our marriage and my life. At first it scared me that our incredible lows offset the incredible highs of our emotional connection. When we got crossways, we lived out a one-act Greek tragedy. We didn’t bicker or pick at each other. We agreed on life’s big issues. Then we duked it out over minutiae we couldn’t remember five minutes into the battle, because the fight was about the passion. I had needed it. I still needed it. It was childish. It was exhausting. But it was love. What we had was real, it was glorious, and it was love.
One childless night when we had only to choose how to spend the evening together, Adrian had kissed my ear. “What do you want to do?”
“Oh, I like it when you pick,” I cooed, and snuggled up to him on the couch.
“I just want to make you happy.”
“It will make me happy if you choose.”
“I want you to choose because I don’t want to disappoint you.”
“You’re not going to disappoint me.”
“If you’re disappointed, it will ruin the whole night.”
“What are you saying? That I’ll pout or throw a tantrum? When exactly have I done that before? When have I ever ruined an evening because you disappointed me?”
“You got upset when we went to the Astros game that time and got kicked out of our seats.”
“Of course I got upset! Security escorted us to the door, Adrian. We used stolen tickets—not stolen by you, but you know what I mean. I didn’t get upset at you, though. You didn’t disappoint me.”
“Well, the way you acted, I felt like I had let you down.”
“You didn’t let me down. The experience frustrated me.”
“You can put lipstick on a pig, but it’s still a pig.”
“What did you say?”
“What? You mean lipstick on a pig?”
“Yes, I do. What exactly does that mean, Adrian?”
“That you can dress something up, but still, it is what it is. You can say you got upset for one reason, but bottom line is that I made the plans for our evening and you got upset.”
“So, in this story, who is the pig?”
“No one is the pig. The pig is just a, a—”
“A what?”
“A—”
I paced a lot then, too, but we’d generated fireworks that lasted all night as we made love on the couch, in the shower, and finally in bed, where we woke up the next day starry-eyed and holding hands. It hadn’t always made sense, but it was perfect.
Perfect comes in different shapes and sizes. Like my Sam, no matter what his father said or what my mother thought. I paced through the dining room, perfection in motion, cursing Robert, my mother, and fate. I paced past the kitchen island, cursing the woman in the Taurus who had me so shaken up. I paced past my hand-me-down piano that I hadn’t played since Adrian died, cursing Detectives Young and Marchetti, who couldn’t figure out who killed my husband but could terrorize my son. I paced back through the living room, looking out through the floor-to-ceiling windows at the tropical backyard—“Like Kona,” Adrian had said when we planted a dwarf palm together—cursing Diane for taking Annabelle, Scarlett for pushing me, and Brian for his expectations. And around the corner and back into the dining room, cursing Adrian for leaving me there without him.
And repeat.
All the while unwinding, remembering, coming somewhat to term
s with my life, and, finally thinking. Planning my attack on the world, on the driver of the Ford who was stalking my son, until I collapsed into bed, the pieces of the puzzle in my mind finally in place. I knew what to do, and I would make it happen.
Chapter Eighteen
I’d never been in a police station before. What a depressing gunmetal-gray place it was: gray floors, gray chairs, and gray doors. It smelled gray, too, like someone had mopped it with dirty water. Detectives Young and Marchetti sat across from me in the gray interview room at eight a.m. because I had requested help.
The number from Blake’s office appeared on my screen, calling me. Skipping my appointment that morning probably wasn’t the most auspicious start to my recovery, but in a battle between my knee and Sam, even Kona and Sam, there was no real contest. I turned my phone face down.
Detective Young looked at me with something in his eyes. I couldn’t tell what it was at first, because it was so different than what I usually saw from him. Then I recognized it. Pity. Pity brimmed over his brown eyes, oozed from the pores in his dark skin. He pitied me. I liked that even less than the look of challenge he’d always pointed my way before. I didn’t need pity. I had my fighter on.
He cleared his throat and glanced at the impassive Marchetti before speaking. “I’m glad you brought this to our attention, Michele. However, we have an eyewitness, remember?”
“Mrs. Hanson. But you haven’t found the car that killed Adrian. You have an eyewitness to a car that you have never been able to find.”
“Yes, but—”
“I have a suspicious person in a suspicious car following my son. A suspicious car that also showed up in Adrian’s life—even on the last day of his life, Detective.”
“We have a reliable eyewitness to a young man driving a white late-model Ford F150.”
I ticked on my fingers. “You don’t have a license plate number, a car, or a suspect. Unless you count ‘persons of interest’ like my son.”
“You don’t have a license plate number or a suspect, either.”
“I have a description of a suspect, and I have Texas plates. And I have suspicious circumstances.”
“Except you don’t have any motive, or a way to identify the person, or to tie the person to your husband or son.”
“Other than she stalks them. And that’s why you investigate, right? To find all this stuff out.”
“What you told me bears looking into, but it’s more than likely a series of coincidences. I can promise you, though, we’ll look into it.”
Damn him for brushing me off. Didn’t he see me in front of him, me, Michele Lopez Hanson, fully convicted, and ready to storm the Alamo? “It’s just not as high a priority as interrogating my boss, my papa, and my son, or as calling my ex-husband to feed him your low opinion of my parenting skills, is it?”
He held my gaze. “If you’re concerned with how we’ve handled things, you should file a complaint.”
“Of what?” Did he mean a complaint against him? I considered it, and the thought gave me a tiny thrill.
“Texas has an anti-stalking law. I could put you with an officer who could help you write up a complaint and you could file for a restraining order.”
Ah, not against him. Against the stalker. I tucked my hand under my thigh to keep my nails out of my mouth. I knew that at some level he wanted to help me. I didn’t like his methods, but I would do whatever I had to do to get this started. “Okay. But it’s important to me that this goes on the record as part of Adrian’s case. What you call a ‘series of coincidences’ is more than that to me.”
“I understand.” He paused several beats. “I’ll go get an officer to take your complaint now.”
Marchetti stayed to babysit me and fiddled with his mobile phone. I bit my thumbnail. To hell with my mother. I jiggled my aching knee. To hell with everyone. I needed to get out of the station to start the next phase of my plan. This visit was taking too long. At least I had doubled my workout that morning—and gotten much-needed connection and time with Adrian—so I had no other road blocks in front of me.
A reedy female voice sounded from the doorway. “Mrs. Hanson?”
A pale, freckled officer walked in. My mind redressed her in a plaid school uniform and knee socks that worked on her better than the creased police blues. “Here.”
“I’m Officer Nickels. N-I-C-K-E-L-S.” I felt a flicker of common-name-spelled-uncommonly kinship.
Marchetti left without a word, custody of the miscreant passed.
Nickels sat in the chair he vacated and spread some forms out in front of her. “You want to make out a complaint against a stalker and file for a restraining order, right?”
“Yes.” I leaned forward.
“Um, so what is the name of the individual?” She looked down at her form, pencil poised.
“I’m not sure. I know the car, though.”
She nodded. “That will help. License plate number?”
“It’s an old white Ford Taurus with Texas plates. I don’t have the number.”
She opened her mouth, then shut it.
“I think the stalker is a woman named Rhonda Dale, but I’m not certain. It’s at least a Caucasian woman, thirty-five or older, but I’d say younger than sixty-five. Can we see if Rhonda Dale has an old white Ford Taurus? If she does, then we’ll know it’s her.”
“I—” She stopped. Her eyes clouded over.
Come on, I wanted to shout, but I needed her help. I imagined what supportive would sound like, and tried to match it with my voice. “Or maybe we could just find all the women thirty-five to sixty-five in Houston within driving range of my home that have older white Tauruses.” I gave her our zip code.
“I’m not sure.”
I gave her the most encouraging smile I could muster. “Is there someone who can help you?”
She stood up. “One moment, okay?”
I smiled again, my cheeks tight. “Of course.”
I chewed off another fingernail.
Five minutes later, she returned. “Okay, we’re looking for white Ford Tauruses, older models, registered to Caucasian women aged thirty-five to sixty-five.”
“That’s great.”
“We should have the information within a week, and we can finish this paperwork then.”
Seven twenty-four-hour days. A lifetime away. “That’s not great.”
“What?”
“A woman is following my son in this car, and a month ago a woman in a car like this one followed my husband, and then a hit-and-run-driver killed him. Next week is not great. Tomorrow is not even great. Right now is great.”
“Well, I’m not sure what else we can do if you can’t identify her.” A fleeting image of Detective Young and Officer Nickels covered in honey and tied to aspen trees in bear country appeared to me.
“Maybe there are things I can do.” It was past time to picture Michele in her happy place, and my knee started bouncing again. I didn’t have the time to visualize bluebonnet skies or run to the pool.
She frowned, casting shadows in the pale skin on either side of the gap between her mouth and nose. “You shouldn’t take the law into your own hands, ma’am. You could put yourself in danger.”
“So, what should my son and I do in the meantime?”
“Well, you should stay away from her.”
Not helpful, young lady, I thought, shaking my finger at her inside my head. “Maybe I could keep a log of the times and places we do see her?”
“That’s a good idea.”
“And I could review all my husband’s papers and records. Maybe I’ll see something that connects him or us to the car or some woman—maybe even Rhonda Dale?”
“Yes, that would be great.”
“Bank records, credit cards, fan mail, old Day-Timers, computer files, all that kind of stuff.”
Her face relaxed, and she exhaled. Great. Well, at least she was easy to guide, if not highly self-directed. “All good ideas.”
“And you�
�ll call me when you have the information?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“And then maybe my son and I can come in and you can show me drivers’ license photos and see if we can identify her?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Excellent. So, I’ll have Adrian’s information assembled within three days. To whose attention shall I bring it?”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean who will be the lead investigator?”
“That would be me, ma’am.”
“Well, then, here’s my card.” I held mine out while she fumbled for hers.
“If you could sign the complaint for me, I can get things started, Mrs. Hanson.”
I scribbled my name and left, knowing one thing now for sure: it was up to me to protect Sam and find this woman.
Chapter Nineteen
I logged in to the desktop at home and pulled up my email, typed the name of my long-ago roommate in the search box, and scrolled through the results. I clicked on her last Christmas email and scanned it for the name of the private eye service she and her husband started that year: Stingray Investigations.
Adrian had said there was something off about the driver of the Taurus, so he must have been connected to her in some way, however small, and I had to find it. I hoped the connection wasn’t a night in a New Orleans hotel room after a half Ironman, yet Rhonda Dale had popped up as frequently as the car, and no doubt she’d followed Adrian, stalked him, across Louisiana and Texas. I just couldn’t imagine why she’d have an interest in Sam now.
I dialed my phone, checking the 340 area code twice. I’d never called anyone in the Virgin Islands before. She answered right away, and her voice hadn’t changed since our ten-year law school reunion. I loved her voice. Whether she was talking or singing, it was beautiful, with a timbre like handbells. I missed that voice.
Going for Kona Page 16