Late Last Night (River Bend) (9 page)

Suddenly, she felt a movement behind her, and then the swish of fabric across her shoulders. “Put this on.” It was Harrison, draping a jacket around her. His jacket, she realized. Not part of his uniform, just a garment he must have had in his vehicle. It smelled of him, the clean, cottony scent she’d begun to know.

She was so cold by now that she didn’t argue. “Thank you.” She pushed her arms through the sleeves and felt as if she was wrapped in
him
not just his clothing. Wrapped in his care. Wrapped in his strength. The jacket was padded and zippered and warm, with a fleece collar that was soft against her bare neck.

He nodded in satisfaction when he saw her hands go to fasten the zipper, and for a moment their looks met and held. “It’s good that you’re here,” he said. “One of the few things that’s gone right for these kids tonight. The fact that you saw. That you can back up what Jay Brown is saying.”

“Yes.”

“Wish we could talk,” he blurted out, tight and fast.

“I know.”

“Stuff to talk about, I think.”

“I know that, too.”

But there was no more time for this now. They tore themselves away.

Ren and the three girls followed Kate to the pickup in silence, and in pairs. Ruth clung to Ren, while Lorelai and Heather seemed to be holding onto each other for physical support, as if they might otherwise fall. They carried their flimsy, spike-heeled shoes, and their bare, half-frozen feet looked far too soft and tender for the bitumen-coated gravel of the parking area, just like her own.

Ren took the front seat without discussion, and Ruth looked bereft at being forced into the back with the other girls. She and Ren really didn’t belong here, with these other kids.

“Tell me where you all live,” Kate asked them, although she already knew Lorelai lived above her family’s saloon, and Ren in a rather nice house half-way along Bramble Lane.

She dropped Lorelai off first, then Heather, then Ren, and was finally left with Ruth. Each time she’d stopped the pickup, she’d offered to come into the house with them, talk to their parents if they wanted, but none of them had. Grey’s Saloon had looked quiet and dark, and Lorelai had let herself in through a side door. Lights had been on at Heather’s place, and her dad had appeared as soon as he heard the car. At Ren’s place, Kate had seen both Fletcher parents in the doorway, and heard an exclamation from his mother.
“Qu’est-ce que se passe?”

Ruth had moved to the front seat after Ren climbed out. She’d tried to get him to kiss her, but he’d shrugged her off and loped quickly up to the house. “I’ll call you, okay?” he’d muttered.

Now she was crying, and Kate repeated her previous offer. “Need me to come in with you?”

“Yes, please.”

So there was a scene at the front door, with Ruth’s mother making horrified noises and Ruth shaking and sobbing, and Kate felt so helpless and inadequate, she just didn’t have words.

She remembered what she and Harrison had said to each other only four days ago about what a sheriff sometimes had to do, the news he had to break, the scenes he had to witness, and she felt a moment of profound… blessing, that was the only way she could think of it… because Harrison was in her life, because he hadn’t looked at her tonight out at the park in a way that suggested he and his ex were getting back together, as if that was the reason his house wasn’t on the market any more. Instead, he’d taken her hands and engulfed them in comfort and warmth, and now she was wearing his jacket.

This was the only thing that kept her going, and it seemed so selfish. Neve Shepherd was drowned, but things might
just
about be okay, because Sheriff Pearce had held Kate’s hands in a gesture of promise and given her his jacket to keep her warm.

After Ruth and her mother had gone inside and the light on their porch had gone out, Kate sat at the wheel of the pickup for several minutes, trying to find some direction. She wondered if Annette Shepherd had anyone with her, and if fourteen-year-old Kira was sleeping through the nightmare of her sister’s disappearance.

With only a vague idea of what she was doing, she drove over there, remembering their Church Avenue address because it had been staring up at her from Neve’s file, that day she’d met with Annette and Gary to hear their concerns about their daughter. They actually lived next door to the Morgans.

On the way down their street, three houses away from the Shepherds’ home, she saw a figure walking along the sidewalk, shadowed by the trees that lined the manicured verge between sidewalk and street.

Dear Lord, it was Gemma Clayton.

Chapter Nine

Gemma had her shoes in her hand and she was limping as if her feet were blistered and bruised—as well they might be. Was it possible she’d walked all the way here from River Bend Park? It was around two hours since she’d run tearfully after Judd and Garth’s departing car. The walk would have taken about that length of time. Lordy, no wonder she was limping.

Kate slowed and Gemma turned at the sound of the pickup. She looked frightened, and Kate quickly lowered the window to call to her. “Gemma, it’s me, Kate MacCreadie.”

The fear evaporated from Gemma’s face, to leave her looking wrung out and oddly empty. Sheer exhaustion, probably. “Oh,” she said, then didn’t move or say anything more.

“
Get into the truck,” Kate prompted her. “You must be frozen.”

“No, I’m fine thanks.” She used that high-pitched, overly polite tone that some teens adopted when they were talking to older people and had a strong desire to conceal what they were thinking. Kate knew it well. She heard it almost every day.

“You’re not fine,” Kate said. “And you must get in the truck and get warm, and rest your poor feet. Where are you going?”

Gemma walked slowly and obediently toward the pickup and Kate leaned across to open the passenger door. She’d put the heating on high to warm herself and the kids coming back from the park so it was toasty in here now, and she kept the engine running so it would stay that way. Gemma seemed to respond to the heat like a living force, and for several long minutes she simply sat there in silence, as if she was clinging to the warmth for sheer survival.

“I don’t think you’re fine,” Kate suggested gently, once more.

“Really, Miz MacCreadie, it’s okay.” The bright, tinkling voice again. “I’m just cold, and tired, that’s all.”

“I’m not surprised. You walked that whole way back?”

“Whole way back?” She seemed frightened again, confused about what Kate was suggesting.

“I was out at River Bend Park,” she explained, still speaking gently. “I live out past that way. I’d seen on my way home that the party was happening there, and I wanted to make sure everything was all right. I saw Judd and Garth leave you behind when they roared off.”

Gemma closed her eyes and nodded. “Okay. That’s what you meant. I didn’t see you.” After a moment, she opened them again and said, “But I’m fine. Really.”

“I’m going to take you home,” Kate told her. “Is that where you’re headed?”

“Um, no, this isn’t my street. I was going to Neve’s.”

“To Neve’s?” Kate echoed blankly.

“See if she was home yet, from the after party. Just… hang out and talk and stuff, you know? I’m not sure if she ended up going out to the Sheenan ranch after the park, or what.”

Oh dear God, of course she doesn’t know. She left before it happened.

The night was such a muddle of drama and cold and sadness, Kate had lost track of the order in which everything had taken place. Gemma had run after Garth and Judd’s car before—

“Gemma, I need to tell you something.”

She didn’t even know how she managed to break the news. There was no good way to say it. Gemma took it in, silent and motionless—so motionless, it was almost as if she was
afraid
to move—and when Kate tried to coax a response from her, she blurted out, “I’m going to throw up,” and almost fell against the door as she opened it, before stumbling into a kneeling position on the grass and heaving.

Kate went to help her, bringing a wad of tissues from the evening bag she’d had at the prom, half a life-time ago, but Gemma waved her away. “I’m okay.”

“Please take the tissues at least.”

Gemma took them, then Kate coaxed her back into the
truck. “Take your time. I’m here to help, okay? This is a terrible, terrible thing.”

Gemma nodded, dry lips pressed together. There were traces of tear-stained mascara around her eyes and her honey-blond hair hung in rat tails around her face. Her lipstick had gone long ago.

They sat some more.

Two cars came down the street. One turned into the Shepherds’ driveway, while the other parked at the curb. It was Gary Shepherd and Sheriff Pearce. Both men emerged slow and stiff from their vehicles, and Harrison put a gentle arm around Gary’s shoulders and helped him toward the house with the care of a brother. Gemma saw them and said, “That’s her dad. Has he—?”

“Yes, he’s been out there, searching.”

Annette Shepherd ran down the front steps, looking wild with suspense and grief. Harrison seemed so quiet and serious in contrast, as he spoke to her, and was that fourteen-year-old Kira in the doorway? “They must have called off the search for tonight,” Kate said. “They’ll need daylight to keep looking farther downstream.”

Gemma was silent again. She hadn’t cried yet. Kate thought she was too shocked, and she hadn’t had an easy night before this, herself. She’d had that fight with Garth and Judd, whatever it had been about, and then they’d just abandoned her in the middle of the night to walk nearly eight miles home on her own in the dark and cold. This alone must have shattered her happiness and self-belief, and now the news about her friend…

It all went too deep for tears, maybe.

“I want to go in and see them,” Gemma said, her voice sounding suddenly stronger and more resolute.

“Go in?”

“Neve… is… my friend. Her parents, her sister—I want to tell them… that I’m here for them… that I really loved her.”

It was a very
young
decision, and terribly, poignantly brave. Kate’s heart went out to Gemma and she said in a voice that had gone husky, suddenly, “Yes, okay, if you want to. I’ll come in with you.”

“Thank you.”

So they climbed out of the truck and made the short journey to the house, which was lit up in a way that no house should be lit up at this hour. Three o’clock, almost.

The front door was still open. Inside, Kira was sobbing her heart out, while her mother repeated over and over, “This can’t happen. This can’t happen.”

Gemma walked up to her and hugged her without a word, and she and Annette stood there for quite a while in their close embrace.

Lord, Gemma has grown up tonight, Kate thought. She’s grown up about fifteen years. There’s been no choice…

Harrison came to her, and said quietly, “We’ll see if they want some hot chocolate, or tea. Do you mind staying for a bit? Might help. Another woman…”

“No, of course not,” Kate answered. “It’s fine. Anything I can do. I’m planning to drive Gemma home, when she’s ready.”

“After that, could you come in to my office? I need to get a proper statement from you.”

“Of course.”

“And I want to make sure you’re okay,” he added in a different tone.

I’m okay when you’re around.

As if she could say that! She shouldn’t even feel it, when she didn’t know what was happening between them. He’d called Rick Styles from Helena, where his ex-wife lived, to have his house taken off the market, yet the moment Kate was within breathing distance of him, she felt safe and happy and incredibly good, and surely some of that was coming from him, it wasn’t all just her.

Was it?

Was she capable of any reasonable perception in this situation? She felt so fragile where he was concerned.

She had to blink back tears. “Been a rough night, and I’m only a bystander. I can’t even imagine…”

“I know. But being a bystander can get to you more than you realize. Might last for a while. Are you warm enough now?”

“Yes. Thank you. Do you want this back?” She hugged herself tighter inside it, and saw him watching the movement.

“No. Another time. I’m glad I had in the vehicle to give you.”

“Thank you,” she said again.

“Take care of yourself.” He made it sound more like
I’ll take care of you
and her throat thickened.

Please take care of me, Harrison.

Take care of me forever.

And tell me why you’re not selling your house.

They made mugs of tea, of which Annette and Gary each took a couple of token sips before the mugs found their way to a coffee table and stayed there, filled and cooling. Gemma gave Kira the same hug she’d given Kira’s mother.

There was an almost visible light of courage and… sacrifice, could it be?... coming from inside her, and once again Kate had the powerful impression that she’d grown up tonight. Somewhere between starting out from River Bend Park and finishing her long walk in the Shepherds’ street, Gemma had changed.

If Neve appeared now, miraculously alive, there would already be a distance between them, a gap in their level of wisdom and maturity. Growth was like that, for teenagers. Whether physical or emotional, it could happen in dramatic spurts that made you blink in disbelief. Kira, too, would be profoundly changed by what had happened tonight. She’d lost a sister, and it had hit her hard.

Finally, after about half an hour, there was a sense in the grief-stricken Shepherd household that it was time to move on, to continue with the next step in living, which was to go to bed for the few hours that remained of the night. The Shepherd family, made smaller than it had been a few hours ago, closed their front door.

On the sidewalk beside his official vehicle, Harrison said to Kate, “I’m going to head back out to the park to see how things are wrapping up there. I really need to, I’m sorry.”

“It’s fine. This is your job.”

“Can I meet you at the sheriff’s office? There’ll be someone to look after you if I’m gone a while, and there are vending machines, too, if you’re hungry.”

She nodded. “See you there.”

She dropped Gemma home and waited until the girl had rung the doorbell and her mother had come down. Gemma’s parents were long divorced, Kate knew, and her dad didn’t live in Marietta any more, it was just Gemma and her mom. There was a little flurry in the doorway—a mix of relief and anger from Cathy Clayton. She’d been worried, and was mad at her daughter for giving her a scare. Even for prom night, this was a late arrival home.

They soon disappeared inside, and Kate drove away.

At the law enforcement building, there was a deputy on duty who made her some weak coffee and found a couple of cookies for her. She asked if there was any news, and he told her the search would resume at first light, which in late May in Montana wasn’t long away. It was after four o’clock now. Sipping the coffee, she waited for Harrison to get back, and time went very, very slowly.