Guilty as Sin (23 page)

"Jeez, Ms. North, I didn't mean to scare you. I'm really sorry."

Ellen scowled at him. She picked up the amputated heel of her shoe and stuffed it into her coat pocket.

"Mr. Slater," she said, trying to hold her patience. "There really isn't a need to rush at a subject when you are the only reporter in the vicinity."

His lean face contorted into a variety of sheepish looks. "I'm really sorry. It's just that I wanted to catch you before you—well—got away."

"Why aren't you in Campion with the rest of the horde?"

"There's nothing much going on there. I mean, the search, but they haven't found the kid or anything. A bunch of people came back here for Anthony Costello's press conference, but then they went back to Campion for the prayer vigil. I thought I'd hang around, see if I could get a comment from you."

"It's better than nothing, huh?"

"Yeah—I mean—it's something. I mean, what's your take on Dr. Wright bringing in a hired gun like Costello?" He pulled his notebook out of his coat pocket and stood with pen poised.

Ellen's breath rolled out in a transparent cloud and billowed up into the darkness. The sodium-vapor lights around the parking lot were on. One shone down on her Bonneville, spotlighting it as the only car for twenty yards in any direction. The sense of urgency deflated inside her.

"Garrett Wright is entitled to counsel," she answered by rote. "Mr. Costello is very good at what he does."

"Do you think it means Wright's guilty? That he feels like he's going to need a better lawyer than he could find in Deer Lake to get him off?"

"I'm not privy to his thoughts. I wish I were. That would make my job easier." She bent and hefted her briefcase, balancing herself on her right toe to compensate for the missing heel. "I believe Garrett Wright is guilty. I will do everything in my power to prove that and to convict him. It makes no difference to me who his lawyer is."

"Costello doesn't intimidate you?"

"Not in the least."

"Even though he beat you about every two out of three times when you went up against him as a prosecutor in Hennepin County?"

"Where did you hear that?"

He shrugged. "My source in the system."

"Cases are individual," Ellen said, hobbling toward her car. "I'm confident in our case against Garrett Wright. I will also do everything I can to aid in the capture and prosecution of his accomplice."

"Got any clues as to who that might be?" Adam Slater asked, shuffling beside her. "Got any clues about motive?"

"I'm not at liberty to comment."

"I won't use your name," he promised. "I'll call you 'a highly placed source in the county attorney's office.' "

"There are only five attorneys on staff, Mr. Slater. That wouldn't exactly ensure my anonymity."

He rebounded with the undaunted resilience of youth and bounced on to the next question. "There's been no word on motive. What do you think this is all about? Crime is always about something—sex, power, money, drugs. Or in the existential, cosmic view, is it really just about good and evil?"

Ellen looked at him, at the avid light in his eyes as he waited for her answer, for a juicy, sensational tidbit his readers back in Grand Forks could scarf up with their breakfast cereal. She had seen degrees of good and evil all around throughout this ordeal: shades and shadows of darkness, small bright spots of hope for humankind. If Brooks was right about nothing else, he was right about one thing—that the drama being played out around them was, in many ways, a metaphor for the times. But Ellen had no desire to wax philosophical with a reporter who grew up on Brady Bunch reruns and was too young to remember the Beatles.

"I'm not an existentialist, Mr. Slater," she said. "I'm a realist. I realistically believe I can win this case. I won't be spooked by an attorney who spends more on suits than I make in a year or by the preposterous notion that we're up against a malevolent entity whose evil genius is larger than all of us struggling against it. When you come right down to it, Garrett Wright is just another criminal. I won't give him any more credit than he deserves."

It made for a good sound bite, she thought as she drove out of the parking lot. Too bad she didn't quite believe it.

CHAPTER
 
13

Hannah prowled the quiet house alone, soft music from the stereo her only company. Lily was asleep in her crib. Josh had fallen asleep on the couch watching Back to the Future.

Hannah had kept the VCR loaded since the night before. She didn't want Josh watching the news. She told herself she was afraid it might upset him, but the truth was that his reaction to the news bulletin about the Holloman kidnapping had upset her. She had tried to talk about it with him, but after his initial chilling comment he'd had nothing more to say.

"Josh, do you know who might have taken that boy away from his family?"

He shrugged, indifferent, and turned his attention to his box of markers, taking out each one and subjecting it to intense scrutiny.

"Honey, that little boy's family will be worried sick about him, just like we were worried about you. And he's probably scared, too, the way you must have been. If you could help find him, you would, wouldn't you?"

He pulled a purple marker from the box and held it at arm's length, slowly swooping it through the air as if he were pretending it was an airplane.

He had retreated once more into his imagination. Hannah was at a loss as to how to draw him out or even if she should try. Perhaps it was better to let him come to terms with it on his own, to simply offer him love and support and patience. Then she would think of Dustin Holloman's mother, knowing every fear the woman was experiencing, and she would think she should force the issue, that she should call Mitch and tell him what Josh had said, that she should have told Ellen North, that she should immediately drag Josh back to the child psychiatrist he had seen earlier in the day and relinquish her responsibility.

The arguments tumbled around and around in her mind, in her conscience. Ultimately, she felt she would do nothing, and she felt selfish and weak and wrong because of it. But in her heart she wanted first and foremost to protect Josh, to keep him safe with her, hoping all the ugliness would just go away.

She looked down at him, sleeping soundly, and every molecule of her being hurt. She had failed to protect him once. She didn't want to fail him again, but she was flying blind and she felt so alone. She felt as if she had been taken from the world she knew, where she was certain of her role and her skills, and thrust into an alien world, where she didn't understand the language or the customs.

Until Josh's abduction, she had never faced real adversity in her personal life. She had never acquired the skills necessary to cope. Even now, as she acquired them unwillingly, she wielded them clumsily, uncertainly. She felt out of balance and knew what was missing was her husband's support. She and Paul had been a team for a long time before that balance had begun to shift. To be without him was to suddenly become an amputee.

Beyond the kitchen the door from the garage to the mudroom opened and closed. Hannah whirled around, automatically putting herself between the unseen intruder and her son. Then the kitchen door swung open and Paul stepped in.

"You could have called first," Hannah said angrily as she stepped up into the kitchen.

"It's still my house," Paul answered defensively.

Hannah drew breath for another attack, then stopped herself short. It had become habit—the thrust and parry of verbal warfare. They didn't even bother with greetings anymore. They had shared a decade of their lives, brought two children into the world, and had reduced themselves to this.

"You frightened me," she admitted.

"I'm sorry." He offered the apology grudgingly. "I guess I should have known better. I didn't think you'd get used to having me gone so quickly."

"It isn't that."

He arched a sardonic brow. "Oh, so you've decided maybe there's some reason to be afraid of me after all?"

"Oh, Christ." She pressed the heels of her hands against her closed eyes. "I'm trying to be civil, Paul. Can't you at least meet me halfway?"

"You're the one who threw me out."

"You deserved it. There. Are you happy now? Have we been ugly enough to each other?"

He looked away, staring at the refrigerator and the notes and photos and drawings that cluttered the front of it. Evidence of their life as a family.

"I came to see Josh," he said quietly.

"He's asleep."

"I can't frighten him then, can I?"

Hannah bit her lip on a retort. She wasn't sure what he wanted her to make of it or what she should make of it. She didn't want to think Josh had any reason to be afraid of his father. Logic told her there was no reason, that Garrett Wright was the man to blame. Garrett Wright was in jail.

And another child had been taken.

And it was Paul who had caused Josh to react so violently.

"He fell asleep on the couch," she said, and turned and walked down into the family room.

Paul followed her, hands in his pockets, feet seeming to drag across the Berber rug. He looked down at their son over the back of the sofa, some nameless emotion tightening his features.

"How's he doing?"

"I don't know."

"Is he talking?"

She hesitated for a split second, wanting to confide, but realizing she didn't want to confide in Paul. "No. Not really."

"When will he see the psychiatrist again?"

"Tomorrow. Ellen North and Cameron Reed from the county attorney's office came by today with a photo lineup for him to look at to see if he would pick out Garrett Wright."

Anticipation sharpened his expression. "And?"

"And nothing. He looked at it and walked away. He seems to be blocking the whole thing out. Dr. Freeman says it could be a long time before he faces it. The trauma was too much for him. He was probably told not to talk about it. Threatened. God only knows."

"God and Garrett Wright."

Paul bent down and touched Josh's hair. One stray lock curled around his forefinger, and his eyes filled with tears. Hannah stood where she was, knowing that not long ago she would have gone to him and put her arms around him and shared his pain. That she would no longer do so brought a profound sadness. How could their love have gone so completely? What could they have done to stop it from leaving?

"I
 
wish
 
we
  
could
 
go
  
back,"
  
Paul
 
whispered.
  
"I
 
wish ... I wish . . ."

The chant was as familiar as her own heartbeat. Hannah couldn't count the empty wishes, the unanswered prayers. The most important one had come true—to get Josh back—but it had brought on a whole new set of needs and longings and questions she wasn't sure she wanted answers for.

"I wish we could go back . . ." to the time in their lives that seemed like a distant fairy tale. Once upon a time they had been so happy. Now there was only bitterness and pain. Happily ever after was as far beyond their reach as the stars.

"I'll carry him to bed," Paul murmured.

Hannah started to say no, worried that Josh might awaken at the movement and panic at the sight of his father. But she held her breath instead and asked God for this one small favor. Whatever had gone wrong between the two of them, she didn't want to see Paul hurt that way. She didn't want to believe he deserved it.

She followed them up the short flight of stairs and stood in the doorway to Josh's room as Paul settled him into the lower bunk and tucked the covers around him. He kissed his fingertips and pressed them softly against Josh's cheek, then went across the hall and looked in on Lily.

"She asks about you," Hannah admitted.

"What do you tell her?"

"That you're staying somewhere else for a while."

"But it isn't just for a while, is it, Hannah?" he said with more accusation than hope. "You don't need me."

"I don't need this," she said sharply as they stepped down into the family room. "The constant sniping, the snide remarks, the feeling that I have to walk on eggshells around your ego. I would give anything for us to be able to set all that aside for Josh's sake, but you can't seem to manage that—"