by JJ Pike
Bill closed his eyes and thought back. There’d been a couple of quiet periods. He felt a chill run up and down his arms. There had been three “quiet” periods. Each of them coinciding with her pregnancies.
Dr. Moore took furious notes. “I haven’t met Alice and I can’t diagnose remotely, but it sounds to me like she’s suffering from an acute form of PTSD.”
“PTSD?” Bill was shocked and relieved, gutted and elated. Was it that simple? Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder. It made sense. She’d experienced war first hand. She’d had no one to take care of her. There was some involvement by a “very bad man” who he assumed was this “Mateo” she screamed about.
“She has no recollection of punishing your daughter?”
Bill was flooded with shame. How could he have not seen this coming? He’d known how frantic Alice was in her dreams.
“And your daughter is the same age Alice was when she saw her parents being murdered?”
The tears came again, hot and fierce. He got it. Alice wasn’t in the driver’s seat. She was being driven by a script that had been written when she was eight.
Eight.
She’d been eight years old, alone in the world, when Mateo Hernandez had taken control of her future.
Dr. Moore urged him to bring Alice in to meet her. It took time, but he eventually got her there. That was when he learned the whole story. And when he decided to go to Guatemala and see if there was a case to be built against Mateo. Because a man like that…does a man like that ever stop? There had to have been other children.
Bill banked his vacation, convinced Grandma Mimi to come stay with the family, told Alice that he was headed to a construction site that was having problems, hired a friend to come with him as his translator, and got on a plane.
It was that simple.
Mateo Hernandez deserved to pay.
Bill was going to make that happen. The end.
Chapter Nine
Jo couldn’t sit still for more than five minutes. Even on mute, the TV that hung in the corner of the Family Room was irritating because it told her so little. Still, she was used to reading between the lines. While it was true that no one who actually knew what was going on was ever going to talk to the press, certainly not on the record, the images themselves told a story. All she had to do was pay attention and the facts would start talking to her.
Any idiot could tell that the “dream” compound MELT, which Alice had been so gung-ho about, had gone off script. The TV crews couldn’t get close to the site of the original building collapse, so they were sending in camera-mounted quadcopters. The message those little cameras sent back was dire. The whole of Midtown West was now a hole in the ground and that hole was growing.
What the images couldn’t tell her was: why? Why had MELT gone ape? There was no way this was what K&P had intended. Sure, they wanted to revolutionize the plastics disposal industry, but this was beyond anything Alice had ever discussed at their round-table meetings. No, this was something else. Jo wrote off the media claim that it was the fire department’s “controlled take down” of K&P’s headquarters that had gone radically wrong. The damage she was seeing was too extensive for that. No, it had to be deliberate. The “sabotage” angle was where she needed to concentrate her attention. That meant interviewing Michael Rayton for real.
Jo needed more intel, an informational lever she could use to pry data from Rayton. Whatever the Bureau knew about this disaster, she wanted to know. It irked her to no end that the man responsible for this carnage might be standing not 15 feet away from her. When she thought about it like that, she realized they’d miscalculated. The morning K&P went down the Bureau had flagged it as just one in a string of unrelated attacks that had been logged that day. It hadn’t even been clear that it was an attack. Early indications were the building collapse was an accident. When Jo finally got the list with Rayton’s name on it, the hole in Midtown West was of growing concern but still not considered a matter of national security. Now that the damage had spread over several blocks, with no signs of stopping, the investigation had taken on a sinister hue. She needed to take Rayton in, just as soon as possible. Didn’t matter if he was the wrong guy or the right guy, they needed to bring in all persons of interest and hammer away at them until they got to the truth. Why had he polluted MELT? How? What was the end game?
Which begged the question, if he was the culprit why was he sticking around? It takes a certain kind of arrogance, as well as a deep-seated desire to believe you’re better than the top criminal investigators in the world, to pull off a crime of this magnitude. She could see the back of Rayton’s head in the Family Room. Was that the profile of a criminal mastermind? Had he done this as a test of his prowess? Did he have something to prove?
Or had it gotten out of control? Had he meant to take down his boss or his colleagues or even the building and not realized that the tweaked version of MELT was going to go running off the rails? Nope. Again, if that’s what he’d intended he wouldn’t be this calm. He’d have shown signs of stress. Unless he was a classic psychopath, in which case she’d never be able to profile the man. She’d have to have access to the physical evidence to work out his signature.
Jo made her way to the vending machines and stuffed the money-eating slot full of notes, then pounded on the keys until she had three packets of gummi worms, the last remaining can of sour cream and onion Pringles, and a bag of barbeque corn nuts. She needed to tamp down the fizz and buzz in her agitated brain and get herself back to thinking like a real analyst.
She hung around the ER doors—turning the facts over, sorting and resorting, weighing what little evidence she had gleaned—until Jim arrived. She put aside her “analyst” face and donned her “friend and neighbor” mask. Ack, that wasn’t true. She’d come out to the Adirondacks to keep tabs on a local secessionist group. True fact. Befriending Jim and Betsy, Alice and Bill, had been part of her cover. Also a true fact. But over the years, she’d come to think of them as real friends. Alice knew who she was—what she was—almost immediately, though they’d never discussed it directly. Alice had that quality most trauma survivors shared; she was hyper alert and a superb judge of character. Jo was fairly certain Jim and Betsy had her number, too, though they would never in a billion years have blown her cover. They never asked questions and she never told tales. It worked for all of them. Jim was her true friend, not some cover story. She led him to the Family Room and got him settled in one of the easy chairs. “Betsy’s still in surgery. No news yet.”
The man didn’t say a word, but his face spoke volumes. Elizabeth Andrews, nee McGinty—“Betsy” to her church group and book club and jam klatch, “Bets” to their intimate circle—was his honey, his sweetheart, his everything. He’d lived with her longer than he’d lived with his parents and his brother and sister, combined. They’d gone to war together, come back and faced down the naysayers together, made a home together, lost a child together. His life was wrapped around hers like ivy around a tree. Life without her was impossible.
Jim swallowed hard. It was heartbreaking that his generation had been trained not to cry. Now, of all times, the man needed to let it out. He never would. He’d be still and stoic, keeping his grief tamped down tight. Jo had heard a million stories about their endless adventures from Betsy, but the grief etched around Jim’s eyes told her more than she’d heard in the five years she’d known them. There was nothing she could say to ease his pain. Her job was to stay on task, make the compound safe from further incursions, and get Bill and Alice’s kids to safety.
The kids. Damn. She hadn’t thought about them since she’d left the compound. Midge was in surgery to repair a laceration to the scalp, but where were the others? Agatha hadn’t come in with Jim. She’d assumed she was parking the car, but it had been too long.
“Where’s Aggie?”
Jim roused himself from his somnambulist state. That’s what he needed, a distraction. She needed to get him talking about anything other than Be
tsy.
“Aggie?” She prompted him again, gently pressing her fingers into the crook of his arm. It was an intimate gesture, subtly signaling, “I’ve got your back.”
Jim smiled a sad, wan smile. “She saddled up and took off. Said she was going to grab some alone time.”
“Took off?” Jo pulled her hand back, so he wouldn’t feel her fingers curl into a fist and clamped down the violent urge to swear. Aggie might be a crack shot and an accomplished horsewoman, but she had no business heading off by herself. Not now. Not when they were possibly under attack.
Jim put his hand on Jo’s knee. “She’ll be fine. She’s spent more time in those woods than any of us. Me and Bets included.” He turned his face away at the accidental mention of his wife.
“I don’t like it, Jim. They’re supposed to be in our care. It’s my job to keep those kids safe.”
He didn’t look at her. His handkerchief came out of his pocket. Jo sat back, shocked and awed. Was the man crying? She could never say a thing about it, but she was damned proud of him. He dabbed at his eyes, then blew his nose. “She’s not gone yet.”
It took Jo a minute to understand what he meant, but when the penny dropped and she realized Jim thought she’d said keeping the kids safe was her job (singular) rather than their job (plural), subtly suggesting Betsy wasn’t going to make it, her internal compass swung from “proud you’re letting your true feelings show” to “horrified that I’ve put my foot in it.” She couldn’t have Jim thinking she’d written Betsy off and replaced her as the kids’ guardian. She’d meant that the three of them, collectively, were in charge of making sure the kids were safe. She opened her mouth to explain, then closed it again. No point digging when you’re in a ditch. Talking about it would only make it worse. She had to let it go.
She stared at the TV, wishing there were reruns of Sesame Street or Laverne & Shirley or Cheers, something positive and happy and distracting, rather than this dire string of images that showed that Manhattan was imploding.
“Her daddy made sure she knew her way around. Aggie brought Betsy wild lettuce, mushrooms, and rabbits she’d caught in her own snares; even the occasional deer, when the family were headed back down to New Paltz and couldn’t take it with them. She’ll be fine.”
Jo didn’t want to worry him while he was waiting on his wife to come out of surgery, but it wasn’t Aggie’s skill as a hunter or forager that was on her mind. It was Arthur’s wife or kids or buddies coming back to finish whatever he’d started that had her on edge.
“Betsy loved it when the kids came over.” Jim’s eyes were on the TV, but he was talking to her.
Jo knew what was coming next. Jim was going to tell her tales of his darling girl and her deep attachment to the Everlee children.
“She won’t have told you…” He trailed off, a real smile flicking at the corners of his mouth.
Jo smiled right back. Betsy probably had told her, over a slice of fresh banana bread or pecan pie right out of the oven with an insane dollop of ice cream on top. They’d spent enough time at her kitchen table for her to fill a book with “Betsy stories” most of which centered around what an incredible man Jim was, how lucky she was to have found him, how she’d never have made it through the loss of their little one without his unflinching support.
“She was like Dana Delany in China Beach,” he said.
That was new. Jo had never heard that before.
“Not just in the looks department, though my Betsy was a genuine head-turner.” He turned to look at Jo. “Have you seen China Beach?”
She shook her head. She knew what he was talking about, but she’d never seen the show. She’d been on deployment when it came out, and after her husband Cory had died she’d stopped watching TV altogether. It seemed too manufactured. She had no time for fake feelings. She had too many real ones of her own to contend with.
“Fine show. Got a lot right.” Jim whipped his phone out and searched for the show. A couple of clicks and he had an actress’ headshot on his screen. She was pretty in a wholesome, Midwestern kind of way: pale skin, chestnut hair, pearl-white teeth. Jo could see the resemblance. “Betsy was our Colleen McMurphy. She was a nurse in an evac. hospital in Vietnam. Pretty, smart, and endlessly compassionate. And pining for her true love, naturally.” He blotted his eyes again. He was deep in the memories.
Jo didn’t dare let her eyes flick to the clock. He might never have the chance to tell anyone this story again. If Betsy didn’t make it, this would get locked away in his proud, military heart and never see the light of day. She needed to bear witness to what he had to say.
“I was a sailor. Brown Water Navy. Deployed in country. We don’t get much ink in the stories of Vietnam, though I can’t say I approve of anything that glorifies war.” He patted her absentmindedly again. “But the true tales. Those I have time for. The stories of the people who took their hearts into the field and did what was necessary. Those are my stories, my people. We watch it every year.” He pointed at the screen. Jo wasn’t sure she followed. “I know. Madness. We’ve seen it every year since it came out. The whole series. Betsy sings along with the Supremes in the opening credits.”
It was a whole new side to their marriage. Jo would never have guessed that Jim was a China Beach fan.
“Betsy likes the episode when McMurphy first arrives in Vietnam and sees what war is really like. She always says they should have gone even further with that one. Because you do lose your innocence. There’s no way not to. You’re under fire, knee deep in death, trying to make sense of a war that your own people hate you for. Don’t get her started on her folks. Her brother went to Canada. I don’t know that she ever truly forgave him for that. She said she had to do double duty because he skipped out.”
Jo remembered the first time she’d been pinned down by fire, a dead man in her arms, an empty helmet spinning in the dirt, her adrenalin so high she could have lifted a tank with her own bare hands. The phrase “lose your innocence” didn’t come close to covering what had happened to her.
“My Betsy patched up hearts as well as holes. She knew what post-traumatic stress was before it had a name. If a fellow came in and he was falling apart on the inside, she knew what to do. And if they couldn’t go back out there, she’d find a way to keep them close, like McMurphy. There was no one like her, Jo. Never has been, never will be.” He fell quiet.
Out of the corner of her eye, Jo could see the tears dripping from his chin onto his trousers. She took his hand in hers and squeezed it tight. He squeezed back and nodded. They were in agreement. Betsy was the very best.
She let the past wash over them, filling her heart. Some had fought and died for her freedom, these two had fought and lived. They carried with them the unadulterated horror of war, but with it the knowledge that they’d done right by their conscience. China Beach might be Jim and Betsy’s kind of story, but Betsy and Jim were her kind of people.
She took a deep breath and wiped away her tears. Now it was her turn to do what was necessary. She had to go back to the compound, retrieve Arthur’s body and dispose of it. She skooched around in her seat and looked at her friend.
Jim already knew what she was going to say. Did she need to say it out loud? Perhaps. No reason to go back if there was nothing to clean up. There were too many people in the Family Room for her to state it outright. She had to go at this sideways. “Mimi is still at your house. She hasn’t gone outside?”
Jim nodded.
She needed to be sure he took her meaning. “Petra’s hanging all over Sean, I take it?” It was still a bit oblique, but if he understood what she was driving at, he’d answer accordingly.
He nodded again. “No one has swept the yard since yesterday morning. It’s a mess.”
Jo smiled, involuntarily. It was wonderful when you worked with an operative who was as smart as you. Not that Jim was an “operative” in the strictest sense of the word, but still, he was as sharp as a tack. He might need a walking stick to get aroun
d at the moment, but he didn’t need a thing in the marbles department. Still had them all rattling around in that big brain of his. She stood. He’d understand why she needed to go there immediately. “I’ll be back here as soon as I can. You have my number?”
Jim nodded, folded his arms across his belly, and closed his eyes. Jo squeezed his shoulder and left as quickly as she could.
Adjusting to the present took her a couple of seconds. There was something wrong. Something she was supposed to have one eye on at all times. Rats, she couldn’t see Rayton. He’d left the Family Room when Jim had his phone out showing her pictures of Dana Delaney. She figured he’d gone to the vending machine or bathroom, but he hadn’t returned. He wasn’t in the hall or the loading bay. She picked up her pace, jogging towards the Jeep. She turned the corner in the parking lot and there he was, leaning on the rear bumper as if nothing had happened. He was one cool customer.
He’d made himself useful while she’d been listening to Jim. He’d removed all the garbage and repacked the med kit. The blood was still there in the bed of the Jeep, drying into dark rivulets, making sure she knew she’d be getting an F for this particular escapade. She had known what would happen as soon as the second building went down in Midtown West. She knew what people were capable of, that there was going to be great violence once Manhattan opened its bridges and tunnels and people started making their way upstate. But she’d gotten the timing wrong. Arthur, Bill’s alleged “college buddy,” had slipped in between her certainty and lack of preparedness. She deserved to look at all that blood and feel bad.