The Borrowed and Blue Murders (The Zoe Hayes Mysteries) (7 page)

Wait, whoa—what was I thinking? I stopped walking, scared of myself. These thoughts—where had they come from? They didn’t seem like my own. I thought of what I knew about postpartum depression. That had to be it. It was my hormonal imbalance, a temporary phase that made the world seem bleaker than it really was. As Susan said, I could tough it out. Life wasn’t as bad as it looked right now. It was precious. And, in a matter of weeks, summer would arrive. With daylight savings time, days would be longer. The gray skies would clear. Luke would sleep all the way through the night, so I could, too, and maybe Oliver would be housebroken. Meantime, pushing the empty carriage, I held Luke close, comforted by the warmth of his small body and the casual ease with which he observed the passing scene.

A
T THE CORNER OF
Fifth Street, I stopped and turned around, almost positive that someone was following us. Seeing no one, I put Luke back into his carriage and, even though no cars were coming, waited for the light to change before crossing the street.

“Zoe—Zoe, wait.”

I looked around, certain that I heard someone calling my name.

“Zoe Hayes! Wait!”

Yes, definitely. Someone was calling. The voice came from across the street; my gaze followed the sound, spotted its source. Oh damn. I squinted, not believing what I saw. Bryce Edmond? Here? Why? Well, whatever the reason, it was too late to escape. The man had definitely seen me. He kept calling my name, repeating it as he ran toward us down Fifth Street. But his presence here made no sense. Bryce Edmond lived out in the suburbs somewhere. Haverford? Havertown? Haver-something. And then it occurred to me—had Bryce Edmond been following me? Maybe that was why I’d felt someone watching me all morning—because someone had been.

“Zoe—” He raced past Johnny Rockets, approaching the intersection, waving both arms, breathless, shouting. “Zoe—I’ve been trying to reach you. Didn’t you get my messages? We have to talk—”

I stood still, holding on to the carriage, wishing I could disappear, contemplating how awkward it would be to make a run for it, envisioning a woman with a baby buggy barreling through parked cars, the bespectacled, hollering Bryce at our heels. The fact was, I was in no mood, no frame of mind, to discuss work or the policies of the Institute. What was wrong with the man? Why couldn’t he wait at least until after the wedding? But my thoughts were useless; there was no escape. Bryce had already started across the street. I was trapped.

“It’s important—” Bryce kept yelling.

Behind him, on Fifth Street, a car suddenly screeched, accelerating, engine racing, drowning out his voice. And without warning, it veered, swerving sharply, turning to cross South Street right behind Bryce.

I tried to call out to him but couldn’t make words. In a heartbeat, I saw Bryce coming up onto the curb, the car careening behind him, lurching forward, closing in. Tons of steel charged right at us, and though I wanted to, I simply couldn’t move.

B
RYCE COULD, THOUGH.
H
E
leapt, actually flying off the ground. Arms extended, he hit me full force, knocking me sideways through the air. My body smacked the carriage, shoving it away, and I landed hard on cement where, banging my hip and hitting my head, I lay flat, breathless, unable to move, watching Luke’s buggy roll away. For an immeasurable moment, my body seemed disconnected; messages would not travel from my brain to my limbs, even to my voice. I heard a heavy thud, an unbearable grunt. A series of harsh scrapes and bangs, and then the frantic revving of an engine, a painful grinding of metal and the roaring of an engine speeding away.

How long did I lie there, not moving, unable to make a sound? I remember straining to turn my head, blinking at the carriage a few yards away where it had rolled to a stop against a storefront window. And wailing with a stab of fear—Luke. Oh God. Was he all right? I struggled to my knees, crawled over to the carriage, desperate, afraid to look inside. But Luke was intact. He glanced my way, gurgling, completely unfazed. A miracle. I cupped his cheeks, clutched his little hands, making sure he was really all right. But touching him, I noticed that my hands were covered with grime. I shouldn’t touch the baby with such dirty hands. I released him, began searching for baby wipes to clean my fingers. Where were they? The back of my head pulsed with pain, and I reached back to it, felt a tender bump, but no blood. I opened the diaper bag, rifled through diapers and teething toys, finally found the wipes, began rubbing my hands with one, realizing only then that someone was talking to me. A woman with spiked dark hair, a tattoo on her neck. A stranger, asking questions. She put her hand on my arm “…all right? How about the baby?”

A young guy with a shaved head and a dozen metal face piercings ran over to her, exhaling clouds of gray. He interrupted her, asking about her dishes. “Hey—did you get the plates?”

No, she shook her head. She hadn’t. She hoped he had. But he hadn’t, either. Damn. Nobody had the plates. Then they discussed color. Of what—the plates? Blue? White? I had no idea what they were talking about; it didn’t matter. I wanted to sit down. No, to lie down. When my hands were smudge free, I picked Luke up and held on to him, buried my face in his jacket.

“I think it was a Bronco.” The woman couldn’t stand still, seemed to hop from foot to foot.

The kid frowned, not sure he agreed. “Looked like an Explorer to me.” He had no coat on, just a T-shirt and jeans with studs in them.

I watched them, my brain functioning in slo-mo. Bronco. Explorer. Oh—cars? Of course. They were talking about the car. The license plates. The make and model. I saw it again, coming out of nowhere, accelerating, speeding right toward us as Bryce pushed us—wait. Bryce? Where was Bryce? I turned, searching the sidewalk.

“Bryce?” My throat felt like sandpaper. “Bryce?” I spun around too fast, suddenly felt dizzy, nauseated. I held on to Luke and closed my eyes to steady myself, and remembered.

B
RYCE HAD BEEN HIT.
The impact catapulted him a good twenty yards, and he’d landed in the vestibule outside Baby Gap. He lay there, his skull beside a cornerstone, caved in on one side. His forehead was wet and purple, his blood still pouring onto the sidewalk. His face seemed unbalanced, his features distorted, and his hair was slick, matting with crimson clumps.

“Bryce—” I put Luke into the carriage and knelt beside Bryce, saying his name, but he didn’t respond. I took his hand, but it was limp, indifferent to my touch. Oh God. The woman and the pierced guy were pacing around, talking on their cell phones, and other people had begun to gather, gawking at us, murmuring.

I touched Bryce’s face to comfort him, stroked his cheek. “It’s okay, Bryce,” I assured him. “You’ll be fine.” I held on to his hand, feeling useless, unable to recall my first-aid training: What were you supposed to do for head injuries? Should I cover him? Yes, of course. Probably. Keep him warm. I took my jacket off, laid it over him, held his hand again, not releasing it until the deafening sirens had quieted and the paramedics made me move away.

Dazed, I tried to answer a police officer’s questions. No, I wasn’t Bryce’s wife. He was a colleague from work. I recounted the way the car had come up onto the curb, right at us, how Bryce had pushed me and Luke away, had been hit himself. He’d been a hero.

The questions wouldn’t stop. I kept answering. No, I didn’t need to go to the hospital. I was fine. So was the baby. No, we didn’t need to be checked out.

The paramedic didn’t know, of course, about the lump growing on the back of my head. Or how his face shimmied when he moved, doing a blurry dance. There was no reason to tell him; I’d had concussions before. I knew the drill. I just needed to rest and it would get better. Bryce was the one to worry about. He’d saved us from being hurt. If he hadn’t come running, pushing us away, who knew what might have happened?

The witnesses stepped up, telling the police what they’d seen. The woman who thought the car was a Bronco said that she’d seen the whole thing; the driver had aimed right at the three of us. She thought the driver was a woman. No, she didn’t know how old. Hadn’t noticed her race or hair color. She’d just glimpsed her briefly, had seen the outline of wavy, shoulder-length hair. But there was no question that the driver charged up the sidewalk on purpose.

The pierced kid hadn’t seen the actual impact; he’d heard it and come running out of his shop in time to see a dark red Explorer disappearing down South Street.

“No, it wasn’t red.” The woman crossed her arms. “It was dark green, or maybe blue.”

“Sorry.” The kid was emphatic. “Red.”

The officer turned to me. “Do you remember the color of the car?”

I tried to. I closed my eyes, replaying the scene. Bryce running, shouting. The sound of screeching tires. Bryce taking off, flying off the ground, shoving me aside—and then, a terrible thunk and a flash of light. Maybe silver? Or no, white?

“Sorry.” I simply had no idea. What was wrong with me? Why couldn’t I remember the car? If not the make, at least the color. Why hadn’t I looked at the driver? Oh God. A paramedic handed me my jacket, warning me to keep warm, telling me about shock. I put it on, ignoring the wide scarlet stains, watching them lift Bryce’s gurney into the ambulance. He showed no sign of life.

B
Y THE TIME THE
ambulance pulled away, the police had finished taking my information, and the crowd had begun to disperse. Assuring the police that we didn’t need any help, I continued our walk. Without thinking about it, I headed three blocks west and a couple of blocks north, straight to the hospital. I rolled the carriage through the emergency entrance and up to the registration desk, where I identified myself as Bryce’s cousin. The woman behind the desk had a slightly out-of-focus face like the paramedics and the police, and her frown slithered snakelike above her chin as she told me that Bryce had already been taken upstairs for surgery. She had his wallet and was filling out his insurance information, wondered if I had the phone numbers of his wife or other next of kin.

I stammered, embarrassed, that no, I didn’t. Not on me. I apologized, complicating my lie, explaining that I had all the family numbers at home. But it worried me that she’d asked. Did she need to contact them because Bryce was dying? Oh God. I saw him again, lying on the concrete in puddles of blood. Damn. Why hadn’t I just turned around and met him on the other side of the street? If I hadn’t made him chase us, we’d all have been unharmed. The car would have smashed a trash can and hit a brick wall. Nobody, except maybe the driver, would have been hurt. But what about what the witness had said, that the driver had deliberately targeted us? That made no sense; why would someone try to run us over? She had to be mistaken. The fact was that if I hadn’t been avoiding Bryce, we wouldn’t have been in the way of the car and he’d be completely fine. It was my fault he might die. I paced the waiting room floor, guilt ridden and worried, until Luke began to fidget hungrily. I pushed the carriage into a corner, collapsed onto a chair and, covering myself with my bloody jacket, let him nurse.

As always, as I fed Luke, the world around us seemed to fade. Luke’s hunger, his fervent sucking, his needs, overtook all else. Holding him, I felt the turmoil of the last half hour settle down and my brain stop sizzling. I rested, leaned my sore head back, closed my eyes, felt my breathing begin to slow. When I opened my eyes again, for the first time I noticed other people waiting with us. A dark-skinned woman clutched her right side, moaning softly as an older woman, probably her mother, touched her back, cursing the doctors for making them wait. A man in a wheelchair sat pale and expressionless, as if waiting were his permanent condition. A mini-skirted blonde in leopard-patterned high heels strutted back and forth near the doorway, talking into her cell phone.

I held on to Luke, suddenly disoriented. What were we doing here? We’d been out for a walk, and then—poof. We’d been plucked from our lives, transported to the hospital emergency room, plopped among strangers. In fact, Bryce Edmond was basically a stranger, someone I barely knew with whom I’d never even shaken hands. And now, unpredictably, that casual acquaintance had become my responsibility. But what was I supposed to do? How could I help him?

Maybe I should call the office and tell them what happened. But it was Sunday. The administrative staff wouldn’t be there; their office was closed Sundays due to budget cuts. Okay, then I should call his family. But I didn’t know his family. And surely the hospital would notify his wife. If he had a wife. Did he? I didn’t know. In fact, I didn’t know anything about Bryce Edmond except that he worked at the Institute. I certainly didn’t know what he’d been doing on South Street. Or why he had been chasing us. Or what he’d so desperately wanted to tell me.

Again I pictured him, running, waving, calling my name. And again I realized what would have happened if he hadn’t been there to push us out of the way. There was no doubt; by whatever circumstances, by chance or coincidence, Bryce Edmond had saved our lives. And for that reason alone, he was now my responsibility. I wasn’t sure what that meant. But at the very least, it meant I would stay there, keeping a vigil for him.

Luke’s tummy got full, and he fell asleep. I tucked him into his carriage, dug around in the diaper bag for my cell phone and called Nick to tell him where I was and why. Alarmed, he came right over, insisting on taking us home. But I refused to budge. So while Luke napped, Nick and I both took seats opposite the man in the wheelchair, and after I explained to Nick what had happened, we stayed there, cell phones turned off, staring at the wall or the television hanging from the ceiling or the sleeping baby or our joined hands.

A few hours later when Bryce Edmond’s brother and sister-in- law arrived, we were still sitting in the waiting room, waiting for news.