Everywhere She Goes

She laughed. “Do you have your fingers crossed behind your back? Grumble all you want. I just thought you ought to know he has his virtues.”

“Understood.” He braced himself and opened the door. Carrying the image of Cait’s laughing face, he was able to nod at the councilman who was a perpetual thorn in his side. His “What can I do for you, George?” almost sounded as if he wanted to be helpful.

Fifteen minutes later, he managed to extract himself.

Once again, he went for the stairs, mostly to avoid anyone he didn’t absolutely have to talk to. He was alone in the stairwell when his phone rang. He took it from his belt and his heart kicked at the name displayed.

“Yeah?” he said hoarsely.

* * *

NOAH CAME BY for her at five-thirty. She was shocked at the sight of his face. Lines she’d never noticed before seemed etched into his forehead. The ones between his nose and mouth had deepened. His mouth was compressed into a hard line.

She rose to her feet without a second thought. “Noah?”

“You mind Chandler’s again?” he asked as if tonight was any other night. “I’m not much in the mood for cooking.”

“Of course not,” she said. “But if you’d rather, I wouldn’t mind making dinner.”

He hesitated, then grimaced. “I don’t remember the last time I grocery shopped and I can’t say I want to do it right now.”

They walked again, and she reveled in the chance to be out on a warm evening even as she watched faces and passing vehicles and kept sneaking looks to see who was coming up behind them. Cait was learning that, as afraid as she’d become of Blake, that was nothing compared to the ever-present memory of the silver SUV, the window rolled down, the shadow of movement. Pop. The sound of glass crumbling. Her own harsh breathing and dry, stifled sobs. The grit under her knees and hands.

Even in her office at city hall and her bedroom at Colin’s, she didn’t feel completely safe. Each knock on the door had her freezing; in bed she kept thinking she heard a scuffing sound outside or a tap on the window glass.

She noticed that Noah stayed on the curbside as they walked, and that he didn’t let anybody get close to her. He’d pull her to his side and use his big body to block passersby. Like hers, his gaze roved nonstop. His expression was flat and hard. Neither of them talked until they were tucked away in the familiar booth at Chandler’s in the back. She’d begun to wonder if it was saved for him, like his parking spot at city hall.

She looked across the table at him. “Now something is wrong.”

“Let’s order.”

Searching his face, she nodded.

Even she knew the menu well enough now not to need to look at it, so they were able to make their choices quickly. While they waited for their drinks, she asked how it had gone with George Miller.

“I walked him to the elevator, nodded a lot and said, ‘I’ll be sure to look into that, George’ half a dozen times.”

Cait smiled even though she was too anxious to feel real amusement. “All lies.”

“Every word.”

The waitress smilingly delivered drinks. The moment she walked away, Cait reached across the table for his hand. It turned and gripped hers hard.

“Will you tell me?” she asked.

“The man you saw buried? He was my father, Cait.”

Her mouth dropped open. “What?” she finally managed.

“You heard me.” Blue eyes that could be so sharp and clear were opaque. Only the strength of his grip betrayed his turmoil.

“But…how do you know?” That might not be the most important question, but she had to start somewhere.

He told her about the damage his father had suffered in a motorcycle accident, and the medical examiner’s puzzlement at the extent of the dental work the dead man had had. “The minute I heard that…” His jaws flexed and the first hint of pain showed. “He dealt drugs. My father. Mom divorced him when he was doing a stint in prison. He didn’t start like that, but he somehow got addicted to opioids.”

“Maybe it was after the accident,” Cait suggested tentatively. “If he was in pain for long—”

“I don’t know. Mom didn’t talk about it much. I guess he went through treatment a few times. He must have tried, for our sake. I never saw his problems, but I wasn’t very old, either. I think my mother got so she hated him. He wasn’t very reliable, but I loved him anyway. I didn’t want to believe all the things she said about him. The last time I heard from him, he’d promised to take me to a baseball game, but he called something like an hour before we were supposed to leave and canceled. He’d make it up, he promised. I said something like, ‘Yeah, sure,’ and hung up on him. I never talked to him again. A few weeks after that, my mother told me he’d moved. Later I realized he probably had called and she wouldn’t let him talk to me. He might have kept calling. I don’t know.” He ran a hand over his face, as if trying to loosen taut muscles, or maybe to wipe away any expression that would reveal emotions he wasn’t willing to display. “I guess I understand why she’d think that was best. A couple of times I heard her and my stepfather talking, so I knew Dad sent money occasionally. Not reliably, of course.” What was probably meant to be bitterness sounded more like grief. “He’d quit being reliable years before.”