Forgotten Witness (15 page)

“Kitchen’s back there; Reynolds’ office, too. I’ll see if I can scare him up.” Stephen started on his way, hesitated and put one finger to his lips as he thought out loud. “Don’t be disappointed if Hannah isn’t here. Once people start to run, it’s hard for them to stop.”

Josie tucked in her bottom lip as she inclined her head. He saw by her posture that his warning had come too late. Josie’s hopes had been up since the minute she heard Ian Francis whisper in her ear. Since there was nothing to be done about that, Stephen took off leaving Josie to wait.

She didn’t do it very well. She never had.

To her right were wide doors that opened to reveal a comfortable drawing room. Deep chairs were covered in chenille; there was a sofa with rolled arms and an old television console. The windows looked out onto the porch. She closed the door and went to the other side of the entrance hall and opened those. The room was identical to the first except this one had books on dark shelves built into the wall, a game table surrounded by four chairs, and another wheelchair. An old black man sat in the wheelchair seemingly asleep with his eyes open. Josie was careful to be quiet even though there was probably nothing short of the end of the world that could distract him. There was a buffet with a silver urn on top. Josie took a look at the books: classic fiction, Hawaiian history, and a full encyclopedia. The man in the wheelchair hadn’t moved so Josie went back to the hall. The time dragged on and still Stephen did not come back. Josie was about ready to follow him when she heard a noise upstairs. She listened harder and heard it again. Without a second thought, Josie went toward it, taking the stairs lightly.

The first.

The second.

She took the third and fourth and paused.

The sound was slight, even, and it was directly above her.

She went up three more steps and then four until she was on a wide landing. There was another shorter flight. She went up to the next landing that opened on to yet another hall. The walls and the three doors on either side were painted bright white. The sound must have come from behind the door at the end of the hall, discernible only when Josie had been directly beneath it downstairs.

She went straight to it but stopped before she went in. After all these months it couldn’t be this easy no matter how much she wanted it to be. A crazy man had pointed the way, after all. And it was only a sound that had come from this room, not the sound of a voice she recognized. Yet, she couldn’t turn back without knowing. Josie opened the door and found herself in a two-room suite.

The floor was the same dark wood that ran through the entire house. The main room was painted white but the light that came through the leaded glass windows made walls shimmer like silver. There was a bed covered with a blue and white Hawaiian quilt. To her left was a set of french doors, the glass panes covered by white lace curtains. The doors stood slightly ajar and through the lace Josie could see a woman rocking in the high backed chair. She could just make out the delicate shape of her head and her short, dark hair.

“Hannah?”

Josie pushed the doors open a crack. The woman stopped rocking. Josie stopped breathing. Her disappointment knew no bounds; her sense of emptiness expanded until it was bottomless. It took only a moment to realize that this woman was too tall to be Hannah. Her hair wasn’t black like Hannah’s but dark grey. This woman’s skin was not the color of cocoa but pale as if she had never been in the sun.

Not wanting to disturb her, Josie backed away only to stop when the woman turned and looked over her shoulder. Their eyes met through the narrow opening and when they did Emily Baylor-Bates smiled at her daughter.

“What’s your pleasure?” –
Bartender

“Beer.” –
Archer

“You got it.” –
Bartender

“Are you serving food at the bar?” –
Archer

“Name it.” –
Bartender

“Calamari and a bowl of chili. Can you turn up the sound on the TV?” –
Archer

“Most people prefer the view of the Golden Gate to the tube.” –
Bartender

“Just want to hear what the talking heads have to say about Patriota.” –
Archer

“He’s a slam dunk. I don’t even know why they’re going to bother with an election.” –
Bartender

“It would put too many advertising people out of work if they didn’t.” –
Archer

“You a political type?” –
Bartender

“My lady testified at one of his hearings.” –
Archer

“That and two bucks will get you a cup of coffee.” –
Bartender

“I hear you, but she still believes in miracles.” –
Archer

“She’s better off going to church. Calamari coming up.” –
Bartender

CHAPTER 11

“Bullocks! What have you done to yourself?”

Stephen Kyle and Bernard Reynolds had been coming up the stairs when they heard an anguished cry followed by the sound of breaking glass. Both of them had sprinted the rest of the way, Stephen pushing Reynolds aside and getting to the room at the end of the hall first. Now they were standing in the doorway, paralyzed at the sight of Josie kneeling on the floor in a bloom of broken glass, her hand a bloody mess, and her complexion ghostly. One pane of the door was shattered but she still had hold of it. Reynolds reacted first. He moved Stephen out of the way and rushed past Josie to the woman in the rocker.

“Emily? Emily! Are you all right?”

He fussed over her but she seemed not to notice. Instead, she looked at Josie, mildly interested and hardly concerned.

“Get that woman out of here. There’s a first aid kit in my office, back shelf of the closet,” Reynolds ordered.

“Yes. Good idea. Come on then, Josie.” Stephen reached for her.

“Don’t touch me,” she growled.

“Josie, come on. Stand up. Your hand looks bloody awful. It must hurt like hell. We don’t want to upset this lady anymore, do we?”

He took her shoulders but she yanked away again. Again he tried. Again she pulled back, lifting her head slowly to glare at him. Bernard Reynolds stopped ministering to the woman, fully aware now that there was more of a situation here than he originally thought.

“Kyle. Move this woman away now,” he warned as he put himself between Josie and Emily.

“And just how would you expect me to do that if she doesn’t want to go?” Stephen snapped. “Maybe you should move your woman there. Maybe that would do the trick because it seems mine doesn’t care if she bleeds to death right here.”

The air in the room crackled. Josie seemed to neither hear Stephen’s warning nor notice Reynolds’ anger. She had planned for this moment since she was thirteen years old. The script had changed over the years because a girl would react differently than a woman, but the outcome was always controlled.

How stupid.

How idiotic.

How predictably unpredictable.

This was a visceral moment, a blinding, gut-wrenching explosion of emotion that rendered her helpless.

“Josie. Come on up,” Stephen cajoled.

Josie looked at the hand he tentatively put on her arm. She heard him speaking but couldn’t make out the words. For a second she thought it was Archer come to help her. It should have been Archer. It wasn’t.

“That’s my mother,” she muttered.

“Ah,” was what he said, and then: “You can’t keep holding to the door that way. See. Look. You’ve got hold of a shard of glass. Got to hurt, don’t you think? It’s damn awful. You’re making a mess of Mr. Reynolds’ nice floor.”

He had one hand on her shoulder as he put his other firmly around her wrist. Josie seemed to understand. She looked at her hand. She saw what he saw: the glass, the blood on the floor, her pants, her arm, but she couldn’t connect it to pain.

“This wasn’t how it was supposed to be,” she said.

“I imagine not.”

He pried her fingers loose and the minute he did so the blood flowed more freely. He could see two major gashes, one across her palm and the other on her thumb. He pinched a shard of glass from between two of her fingers, tossed it aside and put his thumb flat and hard over that wound.

“Hold your arm up. That’s a good girl.”

“I want to talk to her.” Josie struggled to her feet, holding onto Stephen only long enough to get her balance. She yanked away from him as she pulled up her t-shirt and wrapped it around her hand to stop the bleeding. “I need to talk to her now.”

“Kyle!” Reynolds barked. “Do you want me to call my security?”

“Now is not the time to fight me, Josie.” Stephen watched Reynolds and whispered a warning. “Later, my girl.”

He put an arm around her and tightened his hold when she resisted. Josie’s eyes flashed, but his gaze deepened and his expression gave warning. She didn’t heed it. Her head snapped toward Emily. She pulled and pulled some more trying to get away from Stephen as she cried to Emily.

“Why did you leave? I want an answer. Why?”

Stephen dug his fingers into her ribs. Josie started to pull back, she was ready to fight him if she had to, then the realization of what had happened hit her broadside. Confusion, nausea, anger, fright, and the voice of reason collided and Josie was caught in the eye of the storm, suspended and paralyzed in the silent core. Sensing he had the upper hand, Stephen steered her toward the door, raising his voice for Reynolds’ benefit.

“Here you go. I have you well in hand. I served in her majesty’s army. Didn’t wait for a medic when one of us took a shot. Tough boys, those. You would have done well,” he blathered.

“I deserve to know,” Josie began, but Stephen had her well in hand.

“Shhh, love. You’ve got a tiger by the tail. We will figure this out bit by bit.”

“Wait in my office,” Reynolds called after them. “I’ll be down as soon as I have Emily taken care of.”

“Excellent,” Stephen called as he walked Josie through the door. Once they were in the hall she pulled away.

“I don’t need your help,” she said.

“Yes, you do if you want to see your mum again,” Steve assured her. “Reynolds is none too happy. He could have us tossed out of here in a snap and then where would you be?”

“You don’t get it. You don’t,” Josie whirled and tried to go past him but he caught her around the waist and pulled her close.

“You’d make a good dancer if you had any hips on you.” Josie struggled but he held tighter and lowered his voice. “Don’t try it. You’re not up to the fight.”

Josie caught her breath in a way that could have been construed as a sob and then she melted into him. Stephen gathered her up as she buried her face in his shoulder.

“You’re a strong one,” he soothed. “You have to be if you’re still standing after seeing your mum brought back from the dead or wherever she’s been.”

He gave her hair a pet and when she didn’t cry he led her down the hallway and to the stairs. They took them slowly and carefully all the way down to Reynolds’ office. Josie didn’t resist because Stephen was right. She wasn’t up to a fight. She didn’t even know she had stumbled onto a battleground until she was face to face with the enemy.

***

Michael Horn ran five miles, fixed a broken light fixture in the house, and closed a deal to insure a town of three hundred thousand souls when he got to the office. At noon he determined it was an appropriate time to call California again.

He dialed and waited. And waited. Even California couldn’t be that laid back. It was after nine. There should have been a body in that office by now. Just as he thought that, he heard a breathless woman say:

“Baxter and Baxter, how can I help you?”

“I called a few days ago. I need to speak to Josie Bates, please.”

“She’s out of town, and I don’t know when I expect her back. This is Faye Baxter. Can I help you?”

“No…” Michael began before he had a change of heart. “This isn’t a legal matter in the normal sense. I need to talk to her about Washington.”

There was a definite change. Michael could feel it and it felt good.

“Do you have information on Hannah?” Faye asked.

“Who?” Michael asked.

“I thought you wanted to talk about the hearings,” Faye said.

“I want to talk about Ian Francis. Could you just tell her I need to talk to her about Ian Francis as soon as possible.” The winds changed again. This time it didn’t feel so good.

“I’ll give her the message. What was your name again?” Faye asked.

“Horn. Michael Horn.” He recited his phone numbers again. Three of them and hoped that this woman was taking them down. “It’s very important that I talk to her.”

“I’ll give her the message. But she’s in Hawaii on personal business. I honestly don’t know when she’ll be back,” Faye answered.

“I have to talk to her. You give her that message.”

Michael wished he could take that back the minute he said it. It wasn’t what he said; it was how he said it. Even to his own ear his anger and frustration seemed to be at the boiling point. The woman on the other end went on the defensive.

“I’ll let her know. She’ll call you when she can. Have a good day.”

“Wait. I’m sorry. Can you tell her I’m going to send her some information? It’s about Ian Francis.”

But Faye had hung up. Michael Horn held onto his receiver just a little longer. Any lifeline, no matter how tenuous, kept his hope afloat. Finally, he got a glass of water and went back to the living room. There he started rifling through his research but his heart wasn’t in it. At least not until he picked up the information he had downloaded the other night. Once more, he read through the list of documents made public and then again. Finally he started to make sense of the information that had only been an impression before. He circled one entry over and over again with a red pen.

“Hawaii,” he whispered.

Michael Horn sat down and started to compose a letter to a woman he had never met. If Josie Bates was following Ian Francis’ trail then they must have something in common.