Fatality (16 page)

The bones of Anjelica’s face stood out like a preliminary drawing for a painting. “Stealing a police car,” she said finally. “It’s rather amazing, don’t you think? Why didn’t Rose just take the diary back from the police and refuse to turn it over to them again? She would have been within her rights. Anything she didn’t want them to read, she could have gotten rid of in a sensible, quiet way. Stealing a police car? Tell me that didn’t knock your socks off.”

“Yes,” said Chrissie.

“I wanted to understand,” said Anjelica slowly. “I was part of her life for a moment and it turns out to have been a very important moment. So I drove down here, thinking we would talk. She wasn’t enthusiastic about spending time with me, but she didn’t refuse. We were halfway across the parking lot when the man came up and she seized on the excuse to go with him instead. She knew him. She said hello first. She was surprised and pleased to see him.”

Surprised and pleased, thought Alan. Who could this be? “Did she say his name?”

“I had the impression Rose couldn’t remember his name. That she knew him once, or knew him when he was a kid and he’d changed. He said to her, ‘Tabor’s rearranged his final exams and he’s coming home early. He wants to sort things out. We’re meeting him at the airport.’”

Alan’s skin crawled. Was he totally wrong about Milton Lofft being the driver of the hit-and-run? Could the driver in the hit-and-run have been this unknown man? Could the driver have been
Tabor?
What if
Tabor
had run somebody over and driven away and pretended to be elsewhere? Rose would protect Tabor from anything. But whose car would Tabor have been driving? He hadn’t owned a car four years ago. This unknown man’s car? Four years ago, who had they all known who owned a car? That Rose would be surprised and pleased to see again?

But Anjelica had lost interest “Now I have to go inside to get my order ,” she snapped. “I hate going inside. This is your fault.” She grabbed her purse, opened her door, making Alan step back, and stalked to the side entrance.

“That was just an excuse,” said Chrissie. “She doesn’t care about food. She just wanted to get away from us before we asked more questions.”

“I’m too stupid to think of more questions,” said Alan.

They sat in his Explorer. The windshield glass had magnified the sun and the car was toasty.

“I’ve got Tabor’s beeper number,” said Alan finally. “He gave it to me the other day when he called to tell me to keep an eye on Rose.”

They used Chrissie’s cell phone to call Tabor.

Anjelica came back out of the restaurant. Her little brown paper bag smelled deliciously of salt and grease. Chrissie truly had no idea if Anjelica was friend or foe. She tried to imagine somebody attempting to kill Rose on the highway. She even tried to imagine a
third
secret, one that none of them had figured out.

“Who were you phoning?” said Anjelica. This time she was the one standing on the pavement looking in the car window and waiting for information.

“Tabor. You might as well sit with us while we wait for him to call back,” said Alan ungraciously. “Get in.”

She got in the back. “Your entire car is a trash can, Alan.”

“I don’t have servants to vacuum it. And you’re not driving much of a car at all. What’s with the Pathfinder? Your suburban disguise?”

Anjelica went red. Then she shrugged. “You’re right. I usually drive a Boxster. I borrowed this.”

They sat uncomfortably.

Alan yearned to know what color her Boxster was but he forced himself not to ask. He yearned to have some of her French fries, too, but he gritted his teeth and played with the steering wheel instead.

It was another five minutes before Tabor called. “Chrissie Klein?” he was shouting in horror. “Chrissie! What’s going on? Why are you calling me? What’s happened to my sister?”

“It’s me, Alan,” said Alan. “I forgot Chrissie’s name would come up on your beeper. Sorry. Just tell me if you’re catching a plane and coming home early.”

“No,” said Tabor.

Alan filled him in. “Who could this guy be, Tabor?”

Tabor was still breathing hard from anxiety. “He’s got to be somebody I know pretty well, or Rose wouldn’t believe he’s the one meeting me at the airport. But I can’t think of anybody.”

Chrissie felt as tense as if they were in the last ten seconds of a tied game. And she had to make the bucket or they’d lose. In this case, Rose would lose. “It’s not good,” said Chrissie, “that the guy lied about why Rose should go with him. Listen, Anjelica. What kind of car was it?”

“Sports utility vehicle of some kind. I think a dark color. I didn’t really look. I was upset and I felt stupid and I just wanted to get away and pretend I hadn’t tried to talk to her in the first place.”

Chrissie thought, Anjelica borrows cars. She could probably borrow a killer, too. Maybe we were right about the second secret. Maybe Anjelica is still trying to protect her father. And here we sit, giving her an alibi while her hired hand gets rid of Rose.

Except—Rose knew the guy. Who is it?

Rose still had not thought of his name.

Okay, she said to herself, he was the founding member of Tabor’s band. He didn’t stay long. He was—who was he? He’s—he’s —

“Verne,” she said out loud, beaming at him, relieved to have remembered.

He was not good-looking, although Halsey and Erin had thought him terrific at the time. Perhaps it had been just age; perhaps eighteen was so beautiful to a twelve-year-old that it needed nothing more. Perhaps with his guitar and his driver’s license, he had seemed the pinnacle of manliness.

Rose hadn’t known that Verne and Tabor were still in touch. It did not surprise her, however, that Tabor would change his finals. He was probably in danger of failing something and Tabor was adept at excusing himself from difficult tasks. What a great reason to peddle to a professor—a sister who desperately needed him at home.

Since Mom and Dad couldn’t afford to fly Tabor in again so soon, how was he paying for this?

He must have a job, she thought, and he’s actually saved the money himself! Dad will be so proud. He loves it when his kids manage money well. It doesn’t happen often.

She settled in for the ride to the airport. It was a relief not to have to talk to Anjelica after all. Rose had obediently written down Anjelica’s beeper number and car phone number and maybe she would call one day, because Anjelica had not seemed threatening, but sad and lost. What could beat down Anjelica Lofft?

Verne left the school parking lot behind and turned toward the city. The airport was out in the country, miles from here. She wondered what they could talk about for such a long drive. She couldn’t remember where Verne went to college. Or if. Verne had faded toward the end of his senior year, as if he’d used himself up already. “How’s school?” she said, hoping for a clue.

“School is fine,” said Verne. He gave her an exceptionally happy smile. She didn’t know what to make of it.

“Where is it you’re going now?” she asked.

“The airport.”

She laughed. “I mean, which college?”

He shrugged.

“You dropped out?” she said anxiously. Parents were so disappointed and angry if their children dropped out of college. She couldn’t remember Verne’s parents. Had they ever come when the band played? They must have.

Verne adjusted the volume of the music he was playing on the car radio, but instead of turning it down low enough for conversation, he hiked it so high that the car vibrated. Rose’s head hurt from the assault of heavy metal. He turned the bass up even more, until the drums seemed to beat on Rose’s skull.

She pressed her hands to her temples and the volume of many voices roared in her ears, and most of all, the volume of Aunt Sheila’s voice.

For four years, Rose had turned that volume down, until Aunt Sheila dwindled into nothing, and Rose could not hear those terrible words. Now, as if sneering inside the pounding scream of Verne’s tape, the bass spiked up until it controlled Rose’s heartbeat, and Aunt Sheila’s words blared forth.

“Of course I haven’t seen Rose in five years,” said Aunt Sheila, “so I was holding my breath. How would she turn out? You are so lucky, Julia. A person could pretend Rose looks like Tommy.”

“Tommy thinks Rose does look like him” agreed Mom. “Tommy likes to say Rose is just like her great-grandmother.”

The sisters, Julia and Sheila, laughed.

Rose, in the hall, inches from the final step into the kitchen, did not laugh.

“It must have been such a relief to you when Bruce moved away,” said Aunt Sheila. “Did Bruce ever know you were going to have a baby?”

“No,” said Mom. “I never told anybody but you.”

“It’s safe with me,” said Aunt Sheila, “and of course since Rose hasn’t grown up to look like Bruce, nobody’s going to guess. Did Tommy ever even wonder?”

“No. He was away on business a lot that year, starting up his company. He never suspected a thing.”

“Let’s hope you don’t run into one of those awful DNA situations, or blood donor things, or genetic illness. What would you do then?”

“Both our families have always been very healthy.”

“Except,” pointed out Aunt Sheila, “Rose doesn’t belong to both your families.”

“Well, and that’s the thing, Sheila. Tommy must never know.”

Speakers roared.

Voices screamed.

Hearts turned over.

“I agree,” said Aunt Sheila. “If he knew, it would kill him.”

It was the fear that had governed Rose’s life for four years: If her father knew, it would kill him.

Which was more terrible? That she was not a Lymond, didn’t have Lymond genes, wasn’t part of the family she loved? Or that it would kill her father to know?

All the rest of seventh grade, Rose assumed that it would kill Dad to look at her, knowing she was a sham, a stranger; he had not been part of the making of her. When she got older, Rose realized it might be the affair itself that would kill him, and the awful proof of Rose. His wife had once loved a man named Bruce more than she loved her husband, Tommy.

It struck Rose as strange now that she had been angry at Aunt Sheila. In one of her war books—very early war; ancient Greeks or Persians, perhaps—they killed the messenger who brought bad news.

I would have killed Aunt Sheila, she thought, and in my heart, I did. Whereas my mother, who had the affair, I didn’t want to kill her.

She knew suddenly that was the reason she liked to read about war. She was at war. It was the reason she liked attacking the root system of an invading marsh grass. She, too, had been invaded.

“Are you listening to me?” shouted Verne.

I’m listening to my genes, thought Rose. They rattle around in me, some stranger’s genes. “I’m sorry, Verne. What were you saying?”

We’re going to get my brother at the airport, she thought. He’s actually my half brother.

She adjusted the treble and bass to normal and then lowered the volume level so they could talk.

Verne watched her hand accomplish that. “I know why you’re protecting me,” he said, in an odd, proud voice.

That got her attention.

“You had some crush on me, Rose,” he said, smiling. His smile did not fade like a normal smile, but continued on, so that Verne was smiling at stop signs and beaming at yellow traffic lights. “I always meant to read your diary, you know, Rose, and see what you said about me. Every time I glanced up from band practice, you were sitting on that top step, hoping I would notice you.”

She had never given Verne a thought. It was Alan who absorbed her then and absorbed her now.

“I asked Tabor where you kept the diary,” said Verne, “and he even told me where to find the key. But I never got around to it.”

His eyes were fixed on the road. A frown was taking shape above his smiling eyes, splitting him in half. “You saw me working in Frannie Bailey’s rock garden,” he said. “I was standing between those two weeping spruce trees, with those creepy long-armed branches, and you looked right at me, Rose.”

I wish I had a jacket, thought Rose. I’m cold. I’m shivering.

She remembered shivering all the way back to the Y, shivering almost uncontrollably in the locker room, shivering so hard it was difficult to get into her bathing suit. She rejoined the swim class, having missed three quarters of it. The instructor didn’t ask for an excuse. Rose didn’t offer one.

She remembered the laps. She remembered getting out last, pruny and wrinkled. She had been crying underwater, but nobody knew. She cried in the shower, too, and when she got home her eyes were red and her mother said, “My, there was a lot of chlorine in the pool today, wasn’t there?” and her father said, “Rose, I’m going to miss you this weekend. I was looking forward to our movie and popcorn.” He told Aunt Sheila, “Rose and I still go to the matinee together. Any minute now she’s going to be too old and have better things to do than hang out with her father.”

“Go pack, darling,” said her mother. “Mr. Lofft will be here in a moment”

And all through that night, alone in the Loffts’ strange and murmuring mansion, she had written and written, page after page, trying to get rid of the facts, trying to glue them to the paper, so they wouldn’t stick to her.

They stuck.

Verne’s jaw was jutting forward, as if he were biting hard on pizza crust and then pulling back to tear it off. It gave him an unpleasant caveman look.

“Frannie Bailey paid real well,” said Verne. “And sometimes we’d talk, her and me. But then Milton Lofft showed up and her and Milton Lofft were yelling about money, and yelling about contracts, and when he finally left, she came out of that house saying what she would give for just one smart man. I told her to look no further. I’d take the job. I didn’t want to waste time on college. I’m too smart for that. I’m as smart as Bill Gates and those other Harvard dropouts. I could make a billion dollars before I’m thirty, too. I told her about my brains and my plans
and she laughed,
Rose. Frannie Bailey laughed and laughed. She said I needed help to dig manure into topsoil. She said she’d never met anybody who needed college more than I did. She said when she called the landscaping company to get a worker for a few hours, they told her I was on the bottom of their list. They said to wait until she could get somebody else but she said she didn’t like waiting.”