by Alice Orr
“What about his eyes?”
She thought for another moment. “They had no compassion in them,” she said.
“I hear you.” Megan didn’t respond with the skepticism Katherine had half expected. “You say that this guy and Vic looked like they were buddies?”
“They hugged each other.”
“I see. Though I actually don’t know that I can see Vic Maltese hugging another man. I wouldn’t have guessed that was on his macho agenda, if you know what I mean.”
“I know what you mean,” Katherine replied.
She’d hoped Megan would make the worrisome aspect of Vic’s behavior go away. Instead, she was taking the incident in the center corridor as seriously as Katherine had.
“The most effective way to deal with this situation would be to come right out and ask Vic about it,” Megan said.
“I don’t think that’s a very good idea.”
Especially not after last night, Katherine added silently.
“I figured you’d say that.”
Katherine didn’t respond. She was wondering what she actually would consider a good idea. As she pondered the answer to that, her gaze wandered to her office window and her view of the parking lot.
“Megan, I’ll call you back later,” she said hastily.
Megan was asking, “What’s going on?” as the telephone receiver dropped back into its cradle and Katherine grabbed her coat and ran for the door.
KATHERINE HAD NEVER tailed anybody through traffic. She was only half convinced she should be doing it now. She’d seen Vic headed for his car and taken out after him more from instinctive impulse than because she’d made a reasoned decision to do so. He’d had his head bent down, almost hunched between his broad shoulders, in a posture she’d never seen on him before. What she knew about him told her he wasn’t on his way to pick up a cup of coffee and a doughnut. He had a goal he was after and, in light of what had been going on here lately, Katherine wanted to find out what that goal might be.
They’d spent the night together, and it had seemed wonderful and right and even necessary at the time. But how much did she, in fact, know about Vic?
He dedicated his life to helping kids, especially boys in trouble. That was certainly admirable, she admitted, keeping the black Trans Am in sight as it turned left from Livingston Avenue onto North Pearl Street. She was also keeping in mind what Megan said about the charitable impulse and how it could sometimes come from a dark place in the psyche. Katherine was well aware that her own similar inclination had a lot to do with her need to heal. She wondered what Vic might have to heal, or to hide.
She glanced to the right toward the brick facade of Hope House. Those words above the door inspired a silent prayer in her heart, except that she wasn’t quite sure what she should be praying for. That Vic wouldn’t turn out to be a criminal? That she and Vic would…What? She definitely had no idea how that particular prayer should end. She’d settle for the catchall plea that everything would come out all right for everybody when all of this was finally finished. She didn’t care to think about how real the possibility was that this prayer would not be answered.
She was driving through a street of deserted-looking industrial buildings and vacant lots where the crabgrass was hidden by snow. She watched the Trans Am but kept a safe distance back, with a car and a plumber’s van in between. She was glad for the presence of so many four-wheelers like hers on the road. She’d also not taken time to wash the Cherokee lately, so it was covered with a coating of dried mud splashes and road salt. The more nondescript the vehicle, the better. She didn’t want Vic seeing her back here. It didn’t seem likely he would with the other vehicles between them, especially not on this late morning, which had suddenly turned very gray, but she told herself she needed to have some kind of story fabricated to explain the coincidence if he did spot her.
The Trans Am turned left on Loudonville Road, and Katherine followed. Where was he going? They were headed out of the city. The wind blew harder as the Cherokee mounted an overpass, and the tall vehicle shuddered against the blast. She pushed the dashboard heater indicator closer to maximum output and wished she hadn’t decided to wear a dress today. She’d done that because she wanted to look more attractive than might have been the case in slacks or a skirt and sweater. She’d done that because of Vic, of course. Even before they went to the hotel, she’d packed this outfit, including her impractical knee-high black suede boots with the too-precarious heels, with Vic in mind. How foolish that seemed now. Something longer, with enough material in it to fall in folds around her ankles and keep her from turning frigid altogether, would have been a much wiser choice.
Vic veered right off Loudonville Road onto the bypass at the rear of Albany Memorial Hospital. Katherine stayed on his tail, but she was thinking about Megan lying in another hospital on the opposite side of the city. She was going to be all right, but that might not have been the outcome. A blow struck just a little more forcefully and to a slightly different spot could have left her brain damaged, her life drastically changed, the important work she did perhaps ended forever. Could Vic have had anything to do with that attack? Big black cars with scary men in them, professional break-ins, a small boy on the run from what Vic had hinted could be gangsters. And what was his connection to all of that? How much did he know that he wasn’t willing to tell anyone, especially not the police he so obviously preferred to avoid? Why had he been behaving so cozily with a man who looked like an outlaw and carried a gun?
Katherine hit the power button on the car radio in the hope of distracting herself from the troubling questions that had grown to inescapable prominence in her mind. She sighed when Christmas music poured out of the speakers and pushed the button to turn the radio off again. She couldn’t help remembering how she’d been singing along to a Christmas carol at the center such a short time ago. That thought filled her with the sadness of loss, the same kind of loss and sadness she’d vowed to shield herself from, no matter what. She didn’t feel strong enough to face an experience that echoed with the suffering she’d gone through when Daniel died, even if those echoes were only a fraction as powerful. Grief was grief, and she’d already dealt with about as much of that as she could stand. Yet, here she was putting herself in the way of more.
Speaking of where she was, what were they doing on their way into Loudonville? She’d followed the Trans Am beyond the Albany city limits toward one of the most exclusive communities in the Capitol District. Large, impressive homes lined the road on either side. She’d assumed Vic would drive straight on through, toward some less imposing neighborhood beyond this very privileged one. Then, he turned left onto a lane marked Crumitie Road and left again after a few blocks. He wasn’t on his way through Loudonville as a shortcut to somewhere else. He was driving into the residential heart of the township.
There was no traffic here, and Katherine had to be more careful than ever to remain undiscovered. She wished her interest in Vic’s destination, and his behavior in general, didn’t come from such a close and personal place in herself. She wished she didn’t care so much about him. Meanwhile, she kept on praying everything would turn out all right, though she wasn’t exactly certain what all right might be.
Chapter Nineteen
Coyote wasn’t sure exactly what made him crawl into the back of Miss Fairchild’s car in the first place. The parking lot at the Arbor Hill Center was cold, and too open to be safe for hiding. He had the idea of waiting near the center till nobody was around, then sneaking inside to look for Sprite. School was out today for Christmas. He couldn’t find her at Tooley’s place, so he thought Sprite might turn up here. He knew he was grabbing at straws, like they say, but he couldn’t think what else to do. While he was waiting, he’d ducked down behind Miss Fairchild’s car to get out of the wind. That’s when he saw a big guy coming out of the center. He wasn’t the man Coyote’d been running away from, but in a way this guy reminded Coyote of that man in the black car who’d dumped what co
uld have been a body in the alleyway on Broadway.
They both were big men across the chest and shoulders and looked like they could knock a boy down by just thinking about it. They walked very straight and didn’t bend their necks when they turned their heads. They made Coyote think of two blocks of wood. They made him afraid, too. Being scared was probably the real reason he slipped around Miss Fairchild’s car right then and tried the back door. He should have guessed she’d leave it open. She’d be the type to trust everybody. He could almost remember when he’d been that type himself.
He could even remember when he wasn’t scared of hardly anything. These days he was afraid pretty much all the time. So he climbed into the back of Miss Fairchild’s car and held on to the door without closing it all the way shut because that might make too much noise. He peeked up and saw the man who looked like a block of wood get into a big, dark car of his own that made Coyote shiver from more than being cold. He ducked his head down then and didn’t peek over the bottom of the window of Miss Fairchild’s car again till what seemed like a long time later when he heard an engine rumbling.
He saw Mr. Maltese’s black sports car back out of his parking place very fast and spin around to leave the parking lot with a squeal of tires. A huge puff of exhaust smoke almost hid the car inside as Mr. Maltese speeded out onto the street. Coyote was so busy watching that he almost didn’t notice Miss Fairchild herself on the way to the car where he was hiding. He ducked down onto the floor and dragged the blanket from the seat over him just in time. Good thing he’d pulled the car door shut already, or she might have gotten suspicious and checked the back seat. She didn’t do that, though, as far as he could tell. She got in the car and took off out of the parking lot almost as fast as Mr. Maltese had done.
Now, here Coyote was, still under the blanket on the floor between the front and back seats of Miss Fairchild’s car. She’d driven a pretty long time over roads that were bumpy sometimes. She’d turned a few corners, and he’d lost track of what direction they must be going after a while. Finally, she pulled over to the side of the road and turned the car off. Coyote waited a couple of minutes after she got out of the car before poking his head up very slowly and carefully from behind the seat. What he saw made him slip back onto the floor again while he tried to figure out where they were.
Coyote was sure he’d never been in this place. He didn’t even know where it could be. He didn’t think they’d driven far enough to be all the way to another city like Troy, but what he’d seen just now—big houses with wide lawns and very tall trees—sure didn’t look like the Albany he was used to. He’d heard about where rich people lived. He hadn’t been to any of those places in person, till now. He wasn’t going to get out of this car here, that was for sure. He’d be spotted straight off for not belonging. He was in enough trouble already without asking for more.
He did peek up over the bottom of the window again. The car was parked next to a high wall with bare vines all over it. Branches from big trees reached over the wall. Then he saw Miss Fairchild. She was at the far end of the wall from where she’d parked the car. What she was doing made Coyote’s eyes open extra wide.
She’d taken hold of one of the tree branches hanging over the wall and was trying to hoist herself up on it by walking her feet from stone to stone. She didn’t make it very far before she slipped and bumped into the wall. Coyote couldn’t see her face, but he’d bet it hurt when she hit the stones. He’d just about decided he had to get out of the car and try to help her when he saw somebody come around the corner of the wall.
The man walked up behind Miss Fairchild and grabbed her arm. They talked for a minute, and Coyote saw her try to pull away, but the man didn’t let go. He led her away after that, back around the far corner of the wall and out of sight. From the way Miss Fairchild was being pulled along, Coyote could tell she was in trouble. No matter how much he wanted to stay here hiding in the car, he knew he had to do his best to find out where they were and what was happening to this nice lady who did so much to help so many people.
VIC HADN’T BEEN here in a long time. Still, the minute he stepped through the door, he was straight back in the middle of it all again, just as if he’d never left, and wondering if his reason for coming was really important enough to put himself through this. Nothing had changed much, at least not in terms of his feelings about this place and what it stood for as far as he was concerned. Those feelings were as uncomfortable and agitated as ever, especially when the woman he saw in his thoughts every day came hurrying through the double doors from the living room with her arms open wide to embrace him.
“Victor, I am so glad to see you,” she said.
The wideness of her smile shone with the truth of her words, and her eyes were bright with tears. Vic kept his gaze level and over her head so he wouldn’t have to see the joy in her face as she ran into his arms.
“I’m glad to see you, too, Ma.”
He felt tears of his own fill his throat. He hugged his mother until she pushed herself out of his arms and gazed up at him. As he looked at her, he noted with surprise that her blue-gray eyes were almost the same shade as Katherine’s.
His thoughts drifted to the evening before and to the sight of Katherine, eyes wide and shining and hair spread out on his pillow. He smiled to himself, remembering his hurt when he thought she’d left the hotel without a word to him, and then his overwhelming happiness when he’d found her note, which had slipped beneath the edge of the bed. He’d called the center, only to learn she was already in the board meeting, and by the time he’d arrived, she was busy in her office. He’d had the pleasure of watching her unnoticed for a moment, then had headed down the hallway with more energy than usual as he went to work.
He hoped his mother, who was still gazing at him, couldn’t read his mind.
“You are so very handsome, my son,” she was saying with such obvious pride Vic was afraid she’d have him blushing soon. “I’ve missed you.”
She said that simply, without any accusation in her voice. He felt a pang of guilt all the same.
“I’ve missed you, too, Ma.”
She could have jumped on that with both feet just by asking why, if he missed her so much, he didn’t ever come to see her. She didn’t do that. She wasn’t the kind of mother who tried to make her children feel bad. She also wasn’t the kind of woman who whined or complained. Katherine was like his mother in that way, too.
“Your father also misses you.”
Whatever softness and sentiment Vic had begun to feel cut off sharply when his mother said that.
“I don’t miss him,” he said.
His mother closed her eyes for a moment, probably because his words had hurt her. He’d had to say them anyway.
“Still, you’ve come here to ask him for something,” his mother said.
Her manner was more subdued now than when she first came hurrying toward Vic.
“What makes you think that?” he asked.
“You always hold your head a certain way when you are going to ask your father for something. You have a defiant expression on your face. It has always been the same.”
“I’ve hardly ever asked him for anything.”
Vic heard himself sounding like every belligerent, rebellious kid there ever was. He wanted her to understand he was more than that, but he didn’t know quite how to do it.
“I know all too well that you have come to your father for very little in your life, which makes those occasions all the more vivid to me,” she said. “As I say, I can tell that this is one of those few times.”
She’d been like this for as long as Vic could remember, able to read him with almost scary ease.
“Why don’t you come inside and sit down,” she said.
He hesitated.
“Victor, your father isn’t here now,” she added with a shake of her head.
She turned and walked away from him, back to the double doors, which she pulled open. Vic had no choice but to shr
ug and follow his mother.
The foyer was pretty much unchanged from what he remembered, except for a fresh coat of paint on the woodwork and a lighter shade of wallpaper in what he figured was probably silk brocade. After all, Gabriel Maltese never settled for anything but the best. The living room, on the other hand, had undergone a complete transformation. The original mahogany panelling had been replaced by lightcolored surfaces. The heavy drapes were off the windows. Even the furniture, formerly large antique pieces, was all different and much less old-fashioned and imposing. The only object in the room that wasn’t white or pale-toned was the tall, floor-to-ceiling live evergreen tree in the bay window that looked out onto the vast lawn. Its boughs were hung with the glass angels he remembered from his childhood.
“What’s this, Ma?” he asked, referring to the decor. “Your California period?”
She laughed, and he was suddenly aware of how much he’d missed hearing her do that.
“Your father,” she said. “One day he decided we needed to brighten things up around here. You know how he is.”
“I know how he is.”
His mother must have chosen to ignore the sharp way he said that because she kept on talking. “He gets an idea in his head, and immediately we have a project on our hands. He’s even more that way these days, since he retired.”
Vic stifled an exasperated groan. She talked about his father as if he’d been a regular businessman going off to the office every day, instead of what he really was.
“Besides, it isn’t true that you know how your father is,” she was saying. “You don’t know much about him at all, especially not now.”
“I don’t want to get into that,” he said, unable to hide his impatience.
“I know you don’t,” his mother answered with a smile that couldn’t help but soften him some. “Sit down with me and we’ll talk about what you did come here for.”