Moment of Weakness

by KG MacGregor

  Bridget sighed and rolled her eyes. “I better take Jimmy Finch. A meth lab on Snake Mountain Road might be one of my cousins.”

  * * *

  Miles Blake was possibly the most obnoxious homeowner Zann had ever worked with on a building permit. If he treated his contractors with as much disdain as he treated the town’s code inspectors, it was a wonder any of them ever finished the job.

  “Carter’s boys have no idea what they’re doing. If they didn’t already have so much of my money, I’d send them all packing.” Blake gestured toward the small building erected in his backyard, a two-room structure meant to house a workshop for him and a craft room for his wife. A carpenter crew was inside repairing the sheetrock they’d damaged when they put up the vinyl siding. “Can you believe those idiots? If I hadn’t walked in when I did, they’d have ruined the whole damn thing.”

  The chief problem was Blake’s micromanagement of the project, including his insistence on buying all the materials himself so he wouldn’t have to pay the standard contractor’s fee of ten percent. He was a builder’s nightmare, and right this minute he was Zann’s nightmare too. “Mr. Blake, you’re the one who purchased two-inch nails. That’s too long for vinyl siding. Town code calls for an inch and three-quarters. I was standing right here last week when Mr. Carter tried to tell you that.”

  “Then the town code is bullshit,” he barked, his ruddy face growing even redder. “My cousin built his whole house from the ground up so you can’t tell me he doesn’t know what he’s doing. He told me to get two-inch nails or they wouldn’t hold in the summertime when it got hot. Vinyl expands, or didn’t you know that?”

  That meant his cousin was an idiot too, since he obviously hadn’t bothered to specify they be galvanized, the standard for outdoor construction. Regular nails would start to rust after the first rain. Still, she didn’t belong in a dispute between Blake and his contractor. It was past time to finish here and get on to the next job site.

  She was dead on her feet, having spent the night before tossing and turning. The trip to Zanesville was supposed to have exorcised her demons. Instead they were getting worse. Night after night when she closed her eyes, she fought helplessly to warn Whit away from the house, waking herself with strained squeals that wouldn’t leave her throat. The worst was when she reached Whit’s body and rolled her over to find Marleigh’s face.

  Marleigh was losing patience, not with her restless nights but with her continued refusal to come clean about the nature of her horrid dreams. That was the biggest demon she faced—a confession to the person she loved most that she wasn’t the hero everyone believed her to be.

  Her guilt was piling up. She’d lied to Marleigh just this morning, saying she’d gotten behind at work and was going in early to catch up. Instead she’d gone out to the shooting range to blow off steam, something she now did at least two mornings a week on top of her regular stint on Saturdays with the guys from her veterans group. There weren’t enough hours in the week for practice, especially now that she’d also acquired a Colt semiauto rifle—a civilian model made to emulate the M16.

  Unlike the others, she wasn’t shooting for the thrill of hearing a skillet clang or a pop on a paper target. She was shooting not to miss. Never to miss.

  Her intensive training should have prepared her for Dahaneh. Even injured, she should never have lost control of her rifle, should never have pulled the trigger without knowing where her bullet would go. Her battle instincts had failed her when it mattered most.

  “Zann?” Alan Carter, a contractor she knew from his work on dozens of permits, waved to her from the arch of the building’s entry. “We upgraded the junction box for Mrs. Blake’s pottery kiln like you asked. If I could get your John Hancock on that, we can finish up with the sheetrock in the back room.”

  Blake led the way inside, where his wife stood over her still-crated kiln reading the operator’s manual. Carter’s crew was in the craft room repairing the sheetrock. As Blake veered toward the room that would be his workshop, someone moved behind him in the doorway, a blurry figure that caused Zann’s spine to ripple.

  From the other room came a flurry of sharp bursts. Pop! Pop! Pop! For a millisecond, she saw Whit casually wandering through Baheera’s humble dwelling. “No!” she yelled to Blake. Then with a mighty shove, she sent him sprawling.

  “Son of a bitch,” he groaned, clutching his shoulder as he rolled from side to side on the concrete floor.

  One of the carpenters rushed from the other room, still holding a nail gun. “What happened?”

  Blake glared at her. “That crazy woman just knocked me down.”

  “I’m so sorry. I thought…” Her lie materialized almost instantly. “That nail gun…it sounded so close. I was worried you might get hit through the sheetrock.”

  He lumbered to his feet and continued to rub his shoulder. “Donna, come over here and feel my collarbone. I think she broke it.”

  Zann’s hope that he was being overly dramatic was dashed when he unbuttoned his shirt and tugged it aside. Sure enough, his clavicle showed an obvious reddening bump, a clear indication the fall had caused a break.

  “We should get you to a doctor right away,” she said. He could have torn a blood vessel under the skin or even severed a nerve. Someone needed to stabilize the bone immediately.

  “I’m not going anywhere till the police get here and take my statement. Call them right now, Donna. I need to report an assault.”

  “The police?” Carter sounded incredulous. “Jesus, it’s not like she was fighting with you, Miles. Shit happens, man.”

  Zann spun and walked outside to gather her wits. It took all her courage not to get in her car and drive away from the chaotic flashbacks. The cops were on the way and she’d have to give them a statement. But first she needed to tell her boss what she’d done.

  “You stay right where you are and don’t say another word,” Malcolm Shively told her sharply over the phone. “I’ll be right there.”

  The police arrived first, two officers she recognized from their comings and goings at town hall. They bypassed her on their way into the building as she leaned on her city vehicle.

  Malcolm arrived in a luxury sedan belonging to Jackie Patterson, the town council’s attorney. Unlike the town manager, who was rotund and usually cheery, Patterson was thin and severe-looking, with graying hair drawn into a bun, and bold, black spectacles. She demanded to know if Zann had given a statement.

  Zann shook her head and gave them the lay of the land. “Everything happened so fast. I know this is going to sound crazy, but I thought one of those guys was about to pop him with a nail gun so I pushed him out of the way.”

  “Do not say that word again,” Patterson told her, shaking a finger in her face. “It was not crazy. It was a simple misunderstanding. Do you hear what I’m saying? Nod your head. That is exactly what you will tell the police.”

  The officer who eventually took her statement was Joey Crisp, a veteran of the force whose easygoing demeanor injected a much-needed sense of calm in the chaos. As he jotted down her side of events, Malcolm and Patterson stood by, the latter giving nonverbal cues and interjecting whenever she feared Zann would convict herself with her own words. The situation went from bad to worse when a pair of emergency medical technicians arrived in an ambulance and went inside to administer to Blake.

  Crisp pursed his lips as he tucked his notepad back into his shirt pocket and removed his handcuffs from a clip on his belt. “I’m really sorry I have to do this but it’s policy. No exceptions.”

  “You’re arresting me?”

  “It’s just procedure. Mr. Blake is filing assault charges so we need to take you down to the station and get you booked.”

  “Don’t worry, Suzann,” Patterson assured her. “I’ll take this to Judge Dougherty within the hour and get him to set bail. We’ll have you out of there this afternoon.”

  Malcolm held out his hand. “I’m going to need the keys to your city vehicl
e, Zann. I’ll drive it back to the lot and you can have Marleigh drop you off later for your car.”

  A second wave of panic consumed her. “I’ll get the keys back this afternoon though, right?”

  Patterson shook her head. “It’s best for all parties for you to remain on suspension until we get all of the details about what happened and determine what charges Mr. Blake is planning to file. Paid suspension, of course…unless it’s determined there was wrongdoing. If we come to some kind of understanding and get him to drop the charges, you should be free to return to work.”

  “So sorry,” the officer murmured again as he clicked the cuffs into place behind her back. Though he hadn’t wrenched them tight, the uneven pull of her left arm rendered them uncomfortable.

  A growing panic pounded in her chest. “Wait. Malcolm, I…I have some things in the trunk, underneath the spare tire…my pistol’s there. It’s not loaded but there’s a box of ammo too. I went out to the shooting range this morning before work.”

  He took a menacing step close enough that his belly brushed against hers. “You carried a handgun in a city vehicle while you were on duty? What in the name of Jesus Holy Christ were you thinking, Zann?” After a sidelong glance at Patterson, he marched to the car, popped the trunk and removed her gun case.

  “It was never accessible while I was working,” she argued.

  Dropping the case in the backseat of the vehicle, he gestured toward the second officer coming out of the building. “I’m done talking to my employee. She’s all yours now.”

  Chapter Seventeen

  With almost fifteen years of news reporting under her belt, Marleigh had visited the jail more times than she could count. That did nothing to normalize the eerie feeling of why she was there—to pick up her wife, who’d been arrested for assault.

  She’d gotten only scant details about the initial altercation from Ham, who’d been good enough to call her once word reached the mayor’s office. According to him, it was all one big misunderstanding. Zann was trying to prevent an accident and ended up causing one instead. But the business about her having a gun in the trunk of her city car…that was unfortunate, he said. The town council would not be pleased.

  Zann appeared in the hallway on the other side of a glass door, where she stopped and collected her belongings. Apparently in no hurry, she slid her belt through its loops and tucked her wallet into her back pocket, saving her wedding ring for last.

  The tension as they walked to the car was electric. It was bad enough they were barely speaking because of her disappearance last weekend. Zann had lied again this morning about where she was going at a quarter to seven, saying she was behind at work and needed to catch up. Now with every step, Marleigh grew more furious at the lies and at her stubborn refusal to speak. Surely Zann realized it was up to her to explain herself.

  “What the hell were you thinking?” she finally blurted once they pulled out of the parking lot. “A gun in your city car?”

  After a deep sigh, Zann turned away to stare out the window. “Malcolm already chewed my ass out. I’d appreciate it if you’d cut me some slack.”

  “Cut you some slack.” Marleigh lurched forward after stopping at an intersection, enough that her back wheels squealed against the pavement. Given how much her knees were shaking, it was a miracle she could drive at all. “I’ll cut you some slack when you start telling me the truth for a change. I want to know where you go, who you’ve been with and what you were doing.”

  “What’s left to tell? You already heard I had a gun in the car. The reason was because I went to the range this morning.”

  “This morning…when you lied to me and said you had to go to work early because you were behind.” The lies bothered her more than the guns.

  “I didn’t want to lie but…” She sighed dramatically, a gesture that riled Marleigh even more. “Remember that night we went out with Bridget and Rocky? You practically went ballistic when I started asking him about the gun range, so I knew you’d get on my case about it. Did you forget that I’m a trained marksman? I happen to enjoy target shooting. What’s the big deal?”

  “The big deal is you’ve been sneaking around behind my back like I’m stupid. Did you think I wouldn’t notice that you took sixteen hundred dollars out of our house account, and you haven’t been putting your check in? Don’t even think about denying it.”

  “I’m not denying anything. Saturdays I usually meet up with some of the guys from the vets group, but during the week I go out there by myself. Sneaking around…there you go again, making it sound like I was cheating on you.” Zann’s defensive tone was way more hostile than it needed to be, especially since she should have been showing at least a hint of shame and remorse. “Not that any of it matters now because Malcolm confiscated my gun. And he suspended me from work because that douchebag made a federal case out of a broken collarbone. It was an accident.”

  “You know what, Zann? I don’t give a shit about your stupid guns—including the rifle you’re hiding in the garage. You can drive around with a rocket launcher on top of your car for all I care, okay?” She angrily pounded the steering wheel. “Just tell me why every goddamn thing you do has to be such a big fucking secret. Huh? Can you at least tell me that?”

  It shamed her to hear the harshness in her voice and language. This wasn’t the way they talked to each other, but no amount of patient cajoling and concern had cracked the wall Zann had put up all around herself. Anger and frustration were all she had left.

  “Look, if you aren’t going to talk to me, then at least talk to somebody. A therapist, not those guys at your veterans group. I don’t know what’s going on down there, but they’re making it worse instead of better.”

  When they reached the city lot at town hall, Zann exited without a word and trudged toward her vehicle. Marleigh drove off slowly, peeking in her rearview mirror to see if Zann was following her home. It wouldn’t have surprised her if she’d turned the other way in another effort to avoid more pointed questions about her behavior.

  The day’s events should have been a breaking point, forcing Zann to finally come clean about the secrets she was hoarding, about the nightmares that awakened them both with her panting and agitation. Instead, she was digging in even deeper, her stubborn silence now turned to open hostility.

  And confrontation had only made matters worse, Marleigh admitted dismally. Whatever the cause of her turmoil, she needed love and encouragement, not harping and blame. Hard as it might be, it was time for Marleigh to suck up her pride and try to treat Zann the way she’d want to be treated.

  She waited in the driveway until the Jeep pulled alongside, willing herself to behave like the supportive partner she wanted to be. “Zann, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have yelled at you. What happened today, with the police and Malcolm and all…I know it’s been hard on you. I can see that. It’s not fair what Miles Blake’s putting you through.” She held out her hand and led them up the stairs to the porch. “Let’s forget about this for now and you go chill. Stretch out on the couch or take a soak in the tub if you want. I’ll throw something together for dinner and we’ll just hang out tonight. No more fighting.”

  Sadness overwhelmed her as she caught Zann wiping tears from her cheek with the back of her hand. It wasn’t at all like her to cry.

  “Sweetheart, please don’t cry. We’re going to get through this. I love you with all my heart. And whatever it is, I’m here for you.”

  Zann shook her head, making only fleeting eye contact as she slogged through the door. “I’m not who you think I am, Marleigh.”

  There it was, the first clue to her confession, so cryptic it cast even more confusion. “Who are you then?”

  “I don’t even know anymore. But I’m sorry for everything. I promise I’ll make this up to you.” She fell onto the couch and stabbed at the TV remote, signaling her intent to disengage.

  Marleigh couldn’t quit now, not after Zann had shown a crack in her facade. For days she’d been
sitting on the knowledge that Zann was meeting her friends at the gun range in hopes she’d voluntarily confess when the time was right. That secret was out in the open now, meaning the one she continued to protect had to be even darker.

  “Okay…okay, Zann. But there’s one thing I have to know. Promise you’ll tell me the truth.” Until that moment, Marleigh had mostly pushed the horrible thoughts from her head, but her resolve was crumbling. With tears building, she asked the question that gnawed at her day and night. “Do you still love me?”

  “God, are you serious?” Zann leapt up and pulled her into a crushing hug. “Of course I love you. I can’t believe you’re even asking me that. You’re the most important thing in my life. Don’t you ever, ever forget that.”

  There was an anguish in her voice Marleigh hadn’t heard before, a desperation that made her ashamed for asking. Yet it was exactly the assurance she needed most, to know that whatever Zann was fighting, it wasn’t rooted in a desire to throw their life away.

  * * *

  Her body still pulsing with the aftershocks of her climax, Zann pushed herself up on her elbows so she could look into Marleigh’s eyes. “I truly am sorry for today. I screwed up royally. But hearing you doubt me…that was the worst feeling in the world. I don’t ever want you to think that again.”

  “I know, I won’t.” Marleigh raised her lips for a light kiss. “We’ve been together for four years, Zann. I never saw you cry about your feelings before. I know there’s something that’s tearing you up inside. It kills me to watch you suffer and not be able to help.”

  The tears were because it shamed her to hear Marleigh apologize when she’d been the one causing all the pain. And then Marleigh questioning her love had been devastating. That’s what her secrets had done.