Closer Than She Knows

by Kelly Irvin

  Rick tugged his wallet from his hip pocket. “What’s your poison?”

  She shook her head and watched while he selected coffee with cream and sugar. The resulting swill was gray. Rick had something to say, and he would eventually get around to it. Another person with an opinion about her situation, no doubt. At least he knew Max as well as she did, maybe better.

  Stirring with a plastic swizzle stick, he studied the snack machine. “Caffeine and sugar. It reminds me of my college days.”

  “What did Max tell you about the accident?”

  “Not much. He was more concerned about a letter he found and the author’s obsession with you.” He set his coffee on a nearby table and bought a package of mini chocolate-covered donuts. “Don’t tell Noelle.”

  Rick’s wife, a vegetarian, grew her own vegetables, canned said vegetables, made her own bread and pasta, homeschooled their four children, and taught third-grade Sunday school without missing a beat.

  “I’m no tattletale.” Teagan ambled back into the hallway, Rick following behind. “Now I have to tell Max a woman he met at AA tonight is dead because he caught her in a lie.”

  “How could you possibly know that?”

  How much did Rick need to know? Was it necessary to sully his world with this incomprehensible, needless string of crimes? “We just do.”

  “Max is more than a colleague to me.”

  “I realize that.”

  “He puts on this big show of being a funny biker dude veteran who likes to sing and play the guitar, but on the inside he’s a romantic who just wants to be loved.”

  “I also know that.”

  Rick paused at the door to Max’s room. “So put up or shut up.”

  “Pardon me?” She put one hand on the door and held it. They faced off. “Seriously?”

  “Max and I’ve worked together for four years. We’ve known each other for five. I consider him closer than my own brothers.” Rick peeked into the room. “He’s still sleeping. Let’s not take this inside.”

  She let the door close.

  Rick set his coffee on the counter at the nurses’ station and tugged a donut from the package. How could he eat at a time like this? The brown skin around his ochre eyes crinkled as he enjoyed the donut. He swallowed. “What are your intentions with Max?”

  “My intentions?”

  “Max cares for you deeply.”

  “This is a conversation that needs to occur between him and me.”

  “He’s afraid to cross the line. He thinks you don’t trust him because of his disease.”

  “Because of the alcoholism? That’s ridiculous.” She trusted Max more than any man she’d ever known. “It has nothing to do with him. It’s me.”

  “You know that’s what people always say when they want out of a relationship.”

  “We don’t have a relationship. We can’t. I can’t let him yoke himself to a woman who can’t give him what he truly wants.”

  “What exactly is that?”

  It was one thing to tell her dad or Julie, who understood the line women walked between motherhood and careers, who understood the risks involved in caring that much for another human being. Still, Rick was her pastor and a counselor. His discretion could be counted on.

  “I care deeply for Max, it’s true. But there’s a bigger obstacle involved.” She explained her predicament in as few words as possible. “I know you don’t understand a good Christian woman not wanting children. Few people do.”

  “That’s not true. I see a lot of millennials today choosing not to start families. Having children doesn’t fit with their lifestyles or careers. They have staggering student debt. Child care costs are exorbitant. Housing is expensive.” Rick’s effort to keep his tone neutral was patently obvious. “Ultimately—and I know many of my pastor colleagues will disagree with me on this—having children is not a requirement of a godly marriage. People who truly don’t want children shouldn’t have them. Children deserve parents who are all-in, nothing less.”

  “Yet I can see you judging me. Why isn’t it okay for me to make that choice?”

  “I’m not judging you. I’m offering an observation based on love and caring. Your choice is based on fear. You don’t trust God with your life and the people you love.”

  “For obvious reasons.” She couldn’t contain the fierce anger that boiled up in her. She put her hand over her mouth and closed her eyes for a two count followed by a long breath. “I’m sorry. I know you mean well. I know you care about Max—”

  “I care about you, Teagan. We are both members of the body of Christ at Faith and Hope Community Church. We build each other up. We hold each other accountable. As children of God, that’s our job, to be family to each other.”

  “I can’t see bringing children into a world full of people like the man who is currently obsessed with me. Does that seem unreasonable?”

  “What about bringing children into a world also filled with people like Max? A man after God’s heart who loves you and loves children?”

  “This world is falling apart. Glaciers are melting. The ocean is filled with plastic. Entire species of animals disappear every day. It’s filled with politicians so bloated with ego and self-interest it’s a wonder they don’t implode. This is not negativity. I love my small piece of the world. I love hummingbirds and homemade bread and tamales and luminarias at Christmas. That’s not what my hypothetical grandchildren will inherit. They get the sewer that’s left. Why do that to them?”

  “Because we trust in God’s plan. Maybe those grandchildren will be the ones to save this world. Maybe they’ll be statesmen and scientists who’ll change everything. Did you ever think of that?”

  An argument she had with herself in the dark night when she slept alone and longed to feel Max’s solid body in the bed next to her. Just when she thought she’d swung to the God-side, she wrote another court record in a trial in which a monster broke into a house and violated the occupants in ways no human should have to endure. She brushed past him. “This is between Max and me.”

  “No. It’s between you and God.”

  That was Rick. He always had to have the last word. “Can I have some time alone with him?”

  “Of course. I need to call Noelle and update her.” He tugged his phone from his pocket and walked away.

  Still shaking her head, Teagan shoved open the door and went in. Max smiled up at her.

  “You’re awake.”

  “Where’s Rick?”

  “Outside eating chocolate donuts and drinking caffeine sludge. Feel free to tell Noelle about it.”

  He laughed and then winced. “Ouch. Broken ribs.” The humor faded from his mangled face. “Rick said you had to go to another crime scene. Who was it?”

  She picked up a plastic pitcher and poured him a glass of water. Then she told him the story of Charity Waters’s demise.

  His face white with pain and anguish, he leaned back on his pillow and closed his eyes.

  “It’s not your fault.”

  “She was a kid.”

  “She was my age.”

  “I rest my case.” He coughed, winced, and reached for the glass of water. Teagan helped him take a sip. “If she hadn’t talked to me, she wouldn’t have let it slip about the sponsor.”

  “He wanted her to talk to you. That was the whole point of her being there. He thought he could tempt you with another woman. Just another way to hurt me.”

  “So he doesn’t know as much as he thinks he does.”

  Max rarely dealt in sarcasm. He tended toward humor instead. There was no humor in his face now. Marshaling her defenses, Teagan took a minute to set the glass aside. “You don’t think it would hurt me to see you with another woman?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “You’re hurt. We’re both exhausted.” She couldn’t help herself. She brushed his hair from his face. “Let’s not do this now.”

  “Teagan, about the letter, what it said I did—”

  “Don’t
worry about it. That also is a discussion for later.”

  They would have it, but not when he was in pain and lying in a hospital bed.

  “You’re right.” He closed his eyes, breathed, and winced again. “I wonder if she saw it coming.”

  “Take it from an expert. Don’t think about it.”

  “Can I pray for you?”

  “Yes.” She laid her forehead on his arm and closed her eyes.

  How easily Max talked to God amazed and astonished her every time. As if they were friends sitting on the porch, drinking lemonade and shooting the breeze. When she prayed it always felt like an argument, like making her case to a skeptical father. Max’s words flowed over her. The tension in her neck dissipated. Her angst seemed at least more manageable.

  “In Christ’s holy name, I pray.”

  The words ceased. She raised her head and Max smiled at her. “Go home. Get some sleep. God is on your side. Our side. Evil will not prevail.”

  “Can I sit with you awhile?”

  His grip tightened. “I’d like that.”

  She laid her head down again. When his grip on her hand slackened, she raised it. The snoring through his swollen nose sounded painful. She kissed his forehead and his cheek. “I love you, Max Kennedy,” she whispered. “We will talk. I promise.”

  He murmured something unintelligible. She backed away and tiptoed from the room to find Rick and say good night.

  Evil would not prevail. She had Max Kennedy and God on her side.

  19

  Sweet silence. Teagan made herself a cup of ginger tea to settle her stomach in the kitchen of her childhood. She sat on a stool at the butcher block–topped island, Tigger at her feet, and let her mind go blank. Billy had taken her admonition seriously that there would be no talking on the ride home from the hospital. He walked her to the door, unlocked it, and trudged away with his own orders: “Get some sleep.”

  If only she could. The thought of lying down in her old bedroom had its charm, but closing her eyes would only invite the images to invade her brain—Officer Moreno’s bloodied head, the way her head lolled to one side, Charity Waters’s pink Converse sneaker hanging over the side of the Dumpster, Evelyn’s blood on Max’s T-shirt. Max’s bruised face and mangled truck.

  Teagan stirred more honey into the tea and added a squeeze of fresh lemon. The scent soothed her. She picked up the transcript from Slocum’s trial in the murder of Olivia Jimenez. The 145th District Court reporter had done the transcript. She was fast and meticulous about detail.

  The image of Max’s battered face danced in her head, keeping her from seeing the pages in front of her. Red-hot anger coursed through her. “What’s the deal, God? Mom died, wasn’t that enough?”

  Apparently not.

  Teagan smacked her fist on the walnut and cherry wood strips that comprised the butcher block island topper. “Give me a break!”

  No response.

  Tigger barked and scrambled to her feet.

  “Sorry, shhh, don’t wake Dad.”

  “Too late.”

  Her father stood in the doorway squinting against the bank of lights illuminated over the island. He was clad in basketball shorts and a white oversized T-shirt.

  “Nice jammies, Dad.”

  “You’re lucky I didn’t come out here in my boxers.”

  “A visual I didn’t need.” She cupped her hands around her tea and sighed. “You couldn’t sleep either?”

  He extracted a half gallon of skim milk from the refrigerator and a box of Cinnamon Swirl cereal from the cupboard. “I’m not used to sleeping alone.”

  “Another visual I didn’t need.” She nodded at the oversized box of cereal. “Jazz approve of that?”

  “I might have made a run to the store after her flight took off.” His abashed grin made him look twelve. “Hey, her idea of a midnight snack is fat-free yogurt with dried fruit.”

  “Why bother?”

  “Exactly.”

  Did all men hide their food choices from their wives? Max wouldn’t. He ate oatmeal with fruit and almond milk in the winter and granola with fruit and almond milk in the summer. He’d abused his body too much to take it for granted now.

  “How’s Max?”

  Her dad had always been good at reading her mind. “If all goes well, he’ll be out in the morning. Rick was with him when I left.”

  “He’s a good friend.”

  “He’s also a good pastor. You should check him out some Sunday morning.”

  Dad slurped down several serving spoon–sized bites of his cereal before he responded. “The women in my life are the religious ones in the family. You know that.”

  Grandma O’Rourke had picked up where Mom left off when it came to church attendance. Teagan spent at least one weekend a month with Grandma O, who taught her to garden, bake bread, hate war, and love Jesus. Jazz made sure she went to church the rest of the time. “I’d like to see you in heaven. I don’t think it’s possible to be sad in heaven, but no one wants to think of their loved ones languishing in hell for an eternity.”

  “That’s a heavy topic for the middle of the night.” He wiped his mouth with his sleeve—some men never grew up—and laid the spoon on a paper napkin. “What brought it on?”

  “If Max had died this evening, I would’ve been devastated. Heart-broken. Probably as decimated as when Mom died.” Her throat tightened. She sipped her tea and inhaled the lemony scent. “But I would’ve been happy for him. He knows where he’s going. He’s ready to go at the drop of a hat. I’m not so sure about you. We’ve never had that conversation. We should.”

  “It’s your job, right?”

  “It’s my job to spread the good news. I do the grunt work, but God does the heavy lifting.” Heat curled around her neck. She longed for her comfort zone. “That’s what we are called to do.”

  “How ’bout them Cowboys?” Dad burped quietly. “You think they’ll make it to the Super Bowl this year?”

  “Dad, it’s baseball season.”

  “I know. I was never sold on God to start with. I went with y’all to church because my wives asked me to do it. Now that you’re older, Jazz is less insistent.” The bravado disappeared, replaced by sadness rarely displayed on his craggy face. “After your mom died, I felt like my doubts were well justified.”

  “And then He led you to a new love.”

  “We can debate this from here to eternity—”

  “Not if we’re not heading to the same place in eternity.”

  He went to the sink, rinsed his bowl, and stuck it in the dishwasher. “Let’s let this sleeping dog lie, shall we?”

  Tigger’s head popped up. She whined.

  “It’s okay, sugar, we’re just talking.” Dad patted her head on his way back around the island. “If you want a middle-of-the-night heart-to-heart, explain to me why you became a court reporter if you hate law enforcement so much.”

  “I don’t hate law enforcement.” Teagan corralled sudden anger. “It made sense to me. I wanted to understand it without being a part of it. I simply record it. I hear the arguments for both sides, I’m responsible for the evidence, I record the closing arguments and the jury’s decision. I’m not asked to pass judgment myself, although I admit I often do. I want to understand what makes you do it. What makes Billy and Gracie do it? Why risk it? Why put everyone you love through this?” She ran out of breath.

  “So you chose it because you’re scared and you want to stop being scared.” He slid from his chair and came to her. His big hand stroked her hair. “What does your God say about that?”

  “He says 365 times, ‘Do not fear.’” She leaned her head on his broad chest. “I just haven’t figured out how to do that.”

  “When you do, let me know.”

  She raised her head to look into his clear blue eyes. “You’re afraid?”

  “I’d be an idiot not to be. You’re my girl and I don’t want anything happening to you.”

  “I’ll pray.”

  �
�You do that.” He enveloped her in a hug. “And I’ll carry my gun.”

  His bear hugs had the same ability to comfort and heal as they had for a small, bewildered little girl who missed her mommy. She breathed in his smell of milk, sugary cereal, and Dial soap. “You do that.”

  “You should do the same. You weren’t a bad shot in your day.”

  Years ago he’d insisted she learned to shoot. Grandma O’Rourke had tried to talk him out of it, arguing that Mom wouldn’t have approved. No dice. Not only did she have to shoot but she had to know how to load and unload the gun he’d chosen for her. She’d loathed every minute of it. The feel of the gun in her hand, the kick when she fired, the smell, the ear-splitting sound—all of it only solidified her sense that she would never own or use a gun. Guns were not her weapon of choice. Faith, love, and humanity were. Violence perpetrated violence. Barbaric acts of man against man.

  “I’m not carrying a gun. Now or ever.”

  “Fine. So this guy breaks into your house in the middle of the night. What do you do?”

  “Tigger will get him.”

  “What if he shoots Tigger?”

  “Dad!”

  “The FBI has done extensive studies on the question of how to live through an encounter with a serial killer. The number one recommendation from the experts is flee. Escape. If you can’t do that, the next is to resist verbally. Giving in and going along made almost no difference in the final outcome. It depends greatly on what kind of killer he is and what motivates him, but this guy likes to talk. So verbally resist.”

  Talk about heavy middle-of-the-night conversations. This one would only add to the nightmares. “I took a self-defense course for women. What about fighting my way out?”

  His cop face said it all. “He will overpower you.”

  “I know some moves.”

  “Honey, kick him in the family jewels if you’re that close to him, but I’d rather you not be that close. Keys to the eyes. Bite his nose off. But that means you’re too close.”

  “This is never going to happen. You guys are protecting me every second now.”

  “I was a Boy Scout. Be prepared. Be prepared to run.”

  Dad’s childhood had included working in his parents’ barbecue joint and earning money by delivering newspapers. “You never were a Boy Scout. Run, even if he has a gun?”