Hidden Truths Page 3

  Too bad for whoever had done this—he’d worked at a tire store in high school.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  THIS TIME WHEN Kellen’s spirit came to consciousness, when she found herself standing outside her body, she knew what to do. She caught a pink and blue ribbon of emotion, and let it carry her to the newborn nursery.

  The babies. Oh, the infants! Squalling, sleeping, pooping, battling the restraints of their blankets, their eyes unfocused…except when they looked at Kellen. Her they saw, and somehow they sent comfort and reassurance. Wherever they’d come from, Kellen was going, and they knew she would be happy there.

  Being the kind of love-song-listening type of person Kellen was, she believed them and sent thanks.

  Another emotion, writhing with misery, tugged at her, and she followed a weak, pitiful, constant crying into the ICU nursery. Other babies lived in this room, in their incubators, fighting for life with every breath. The emotion didn’t come from them, but from a tiny girl hooked up to a breathing tube and an IV. She exuded misery, pain, despair.

  Kellen hovered over her. “What’s wrong?”

  She didn’t have a voice, but the baby heard her and gave her a glance that pleaded and dismissed and returned to the fight that occupied all her strength.

  “Her mother was addicted to cocaine, alcohol, you name it.” It was as if the nearby doctor had heard Kellen and answered her question. He lifted his head from the patient’s chart and said, “The mother came in while in labor, produced the baby and was gone. Here this kid is, three months premature and in agony as she goes through withdrawal.”

  “I know that, Dr. Davis.” The pediatric ICU nurse seemed perplexed at the doctor’s explanation. “Poor kid hasn’t got a chance. Teratogens inhibiting normal growth, not enough time in the womb, no parents, no home. Can’t sleep, can’t eat, lungs underdeveloped…”

  “But she’s a fighter!” Kellen said.

  “Yes, Bernice, but she’s a fighter.” The doctor came over, slid his hand into the incubator and stroked the child’s head.

  For a brief moment, the baby took comfort and quieted.

  Nurse Bernice joined him to check the baby’s vital signs. “We’ve seen miracles before.”

  “This one will be a miracle.” He leaned over and smiled into the tiny, frowning face.

  The baby’s eyes drooped.

  “She will be if I have anything to say about it.” The nurse consulted the chart. “Mrs. Hibbert is coming in to hold her. Maybe she can make our little Jane Doe feel better.”

  “You have people who come in and hold these babies?” Kellen loved the idea.

  “The babies just sprawl on that skinny old bosom and absorb happy.” Nurse Bernice wasn’t talking to Kellen…but she sort of was.

  Dr. Davis moved back into the well infant nursery.

  Something began to tug Kellen away, back toward her room. She drifted toward the door, then backed away when an old woman with white, wildly spiked hair walked through, leaning heavily on her walker.

  “Mrs. Hibbert!” Nurse Bernice said. “We were just talking about you. Baby Jane Doe is wanting you.”

  Mrs. Hibbert nodded at Kellen as if she saw her, and tsked as the baby squalled out its hopelessness. “There, there, child. Grannie’s here.”

  “Her name is Joy,” Kellen said.

  Mrs. Hibbert sat down in the rocking chair and waited while the nurse extracted the baby from the incubator, wrapped her in a warm blanket and carefully brought her, with her tubes, to Mrs. Hibbert. Mrs. Hibbert took her with precisely as much care and settled the baby on her chest. Together the nurse and Mrs. Hibbert slid the baby into a sling and secured it to her chest.

  “There,” the nurse said. “You won’t strain yourself holding her.”

  “As small as this tiny thing is, it wouldn’t be much of a strain.” Mrs. Hibbert began to rock. “Have we named this baby yet?”

  “There’s no point in naming her until it’s clear the mother won’t return for her.”

  “This little girl needs to hear joy every day, so I shall call her Joy.”

  Nurse Bernice hesitated, then marked over “Jane Doe” on the chart, and replaced it with “Joy.”

  The current tugged more fiercely at Kellen, and she rode it down the hospital corridors and back toward the entrance of her room. As she went, she began to recognize people like her, spirits who had escaped their bodies and wandered free. Some of them, like her, still had color and substance, but some, like the spirit she had first met, were fading into an insubstantial white. Some drifted. Some moved with purpose, as she had when she went to the nursery. Some struggled, fighting against death.

  Could they succeed in avoiding the end of life? Perhaps they could, but to what end? Max wouldn’t allow her to be bound to a worthless body resting on a cold bed. She thanked him for that.

  As she reached the corridor that led to her room, she again felt the void of emotion she had experienced before.

  Harrison Benchley. He strode toward the nurses’ station, looking neither right nor left, passing patients and medical staff with the indifference of a man already dead. Yet he wasn’t ill, not really. Because of his strong constitution and robust lifestyle, he had survived the trauma of his accident and the loss of his arms. He should be happy to be alive.

  The woman who walked beside him—Diane Sánchez, read the name on her badge—spoke in a low tone. Diane knew he was closed off, but she tried to get his attention. “I can tell you’re doing your exercises. I wish all my patients were as determined as you. But please, you’re driving yourself too hard. You don’t want to have another setback.”

  “The last setback had nothing to do with how hard I work.” His voice was deep, commanding, impatient. “It was an infection. It’s the only reason I’m back here, in the hospital.” Ah! There was emotion in the way he said here. He loathed the hospital, loathed the weakness around him, loathed the illness, the death. Most of all, he loathed his own body. “As soon as possible, I’ll be gone.”

  “You mean back to the convalescent center.”

  He turned his head and looked at his physical therapist. “What else would I mean?”

  She stopped.

  He didn’t.

  She hurried to catch up with him. “You can do this,” she said.

  “I intend to.” He passed Kellen, entered a nearby room.

  The therapist followed and in a moment came back out. She walked to the nurses’ station, met the head nurse’s gaze and shook her head. In a soft tone, she said, “I can’t make him want to live.”

  The head nurse shook her head, too.

  They both glanced at the woman leaning against the desk dressed in scrubs and wearing a surgical mask. She pushed the mask down, watched the door Harrison had disappeared behind with such longing…

  In her thirties, dark curly hair, dark eyes, pretty. Who was she?

  No matter. Kellen had an appointment to keep with her body and her bed.

  And suddenly, she was in her room.

  CHAPTER SIX

  JUST INSIDE THE DOOR, Kellen stopped.

  Her body lay stretched out on the bed, thin, still, pale, her head shaved and sliced, her skin bruised. Death had marked her as his own.

  But sitting in the chair beside her was her daughter, Rae Di Luca, seven years old, bright, smiling, intensely alive and leaning forward, talking to Kellen’s still body. “Mommy! Today was the first day of school. My teacher’s name is Mrs. Melon. She told us her first name was ‘Water.’ Isn’t that funny? Some of the kids said they heard she was mean, but Grandma said she didn’t believe it. She said I should do my best, see how Mrs. Melon reacts, and make my own judgment. So I’ll do that. This year, for our play, we’re going to put on Annie. Do you know Annie? I’m going to try out for Kate. She’s one of the orphans. I was going to try out for Annie, but Grandma says I s
ing like she does so maybe I should set my sights a little lower. That’s okay, the girl who plays Annie only does it half-time because they don’t want anyone my age to strain her voice. Or his voice. Mauro is going to try out for the part. I heard one of the parents say he’ll get it just because it’s politically correct, but is that bad? I don’t think so. Are you missing Daddy? I’m missing him, too. Grandma’s mad at him for leaving you now, but I know God’s not going to let you die no matter what the doctor said so it’s okay. It would be great if you’d try to wake up before Daddy comes home. He’d be so excited…” Rae never drew a breath, never seemed to doubt Kellen could hear her.

  But Verona… Verona sat on the chair behind and to the right of Rae, and she cried, a low drip of tears she didn’t bother to wipe away.

  Kellen and her mother-in-law didn’t necessarily agree most of the time, but Kellen also knew Verona wanted her in their lives, if for no better reason than it would make Max and Rae happy. At heart, Verona was a good woman. She didn’t want Kellen to die, for Kellen’s sake as well as for the sake of the little family.

  Kellen sank into the chair where she had first sat to listen to Max. Today had been good; she’d helped a baby. But here she was face-to-face with what she would lose when life vanished from her body.

  Her daughter. Her darling girl. Rae would go on. She would remember Kellen with sorrow and affection. But Kellen wouldn’t be here to see her grow and mature. She wouldn’t be here to help her, advise her, fight with her, exalt with her. She wouldn’t hear her sing (badly), or help her with her homework (not the spelling). All the good parts and bad parts of Rae could never be a part of Kellen. Kellen would be gone.

  Kellen also knew Rae would be okay. She had her grandmother, who she adored. She had her father, the bulwark of her life. She had the whole loud, loving Di Luca family.

  It was Max Kellen really grieved for. He loved her. He had loved her when she had been abused, homeless and afraid, nothing more than a shadow of a woman. He had loved her when she vanished from his life, and he had stayed true to her for all the years she’d been gone. He had loved her when he found her again, and he’d loved her through all their adventures, troubles and trials. He loved her in a coma, and he would love her past death.

  Maybe someday he would find a woman he could live with. Maybe someday he would marry again. But Kellen was the love of his life, and she knew she held his heart. Forever.

  Truly, it was Max she was abandoning. It was Max Verona cried for.

  As would Kellen. If she could cry.

  For the first time, Kellen looked down at her hands, pale and transparent, and wished things had been different.

  Not much more time on earth.

  Max, please hurry back. No matter what, please hurry back. I don’t know how long I can wait.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  MAX MADE IT back to the prison on time.

  Neither Warden Arbuckle nor Assistant Warden Korthauer seemed surprised, but neither one said anything about his grimy hands, either, and Max chalked that up as suspicious.

  Assistant Warden Korthauer excused herself from the viewing.

  Max wanted to ask if she was headed out to slash another one of his tires.

  Warden Arbuckle led him down the corridor and into a small room with a long glass window. “The window was installed in the sixties as a safety measure after one of our prisoners attacked his mother and badly injured her. It’s three inches thick and reinforced with wire, impossible to get through. You can understand our caution.”

  Max took one look at the dark-haired woman behind the impenetrable, wavy glass, and said in disgust, “I can’t clearly see her. I can’t identify Mara Philippi if I can’t see her.”

  “I can’t believe this. I can’t believe you. It’s her!” Warden Arbuckle threw out his hands. “It’s Mara Philippi. Who else would it be?”

  “Maybe it’s someone who looks like her.”

  “Are you accusing me of—”

  “I’m not accusing you of anything except obstructing my search for the truth.”

  This place, this situation, stank of collusion.

  “I want to see Mara face-to-face. If there must be bars between us, so be it.” Max piled on the sarcasm. “I assume you still have bars in this prison?”

  Warden Arbuckle was breathing hard, as if he wasn’t used to being challenged so blatantly. “Yes. We have bars in this prison.”

  “Then let’s go.” Max gestured at him. “Get her in a cell, make sure there’s adequate lighting, let me see her. Let me speak to her. Let me hear her voice.”

  “She could very well refuse to speak to you.” A capitulation.

  “Mara Philippi?” Max remembered her, her outgoing personality, her constant challenges, the way she seemed so normal. Then they’d found the stash of stolen antique books and the carefully curated dehydrated hands. Not normal. Not at all. “She’ll speak to me.” She would rage at him.

  “Tomorrow morning,” Warden Arbuckle said.

  “Tonight,” Max countered.

  Warden Arbuckle spoke as if he wanted to grind his teeth. “We can’t make it work tonight. There are regulations concerning the handling of prisoners, especially dangerous prisoners.”

  “So you’ve said.”

  “You don’t understand what Mara Philippi is.”

  “I do.”

  “All right, you don’t understand what she’s done since she’s been here. She was illiterate. She demanded to be taught to read. We kept her tutor separate, on the other side of a window. He used a microphone and there was a slot underneath where he could pass materials. Mara behaved so reasonably, the tutor was lulled into the belief that we were exaggerating. He fell in love, put his hand through the slot to touch her. She bit his finger so hard he couldn’t get loose. We had to pry her jaws open. The poor sap had to have surgery to reattach a ligament.” Warden Arbuckle swung away from Max. “No! Not tonight. I can’t do it! I don’t have the necessary manpower.”

  Max knew when he was defeated. “What time tomorrow morning?”

  “Eleven.”

  “Nine.”

  “Ten.”

  “At ten a.m., Mara Philippi, or the woman in her cell, will be behind bars, where I’ll be able to clearly view her, speak to her.”

  Max never doubted that Warden Arbuckle loathed him. “That’s the deal. Then you’ll leave town.”

  “I’ll be glad to leave town.” Max had never meant anything so much in his life. He also knew if somehow Mara Philippi had escaped, or been set free, and that seemed more and more likely, the warden and assistant warden were at the least guilty of concealing that fact. In this small town, they were powerful people. In this grim prison, they had learned to utilize violence. For the first time, he wondered—would he survive this trip?

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  ELYSE STOOD IN the doorway of the Aloha Motel office. “I didn’t expect to see you so soon!” she chirped.

  Max paused on his trip to his room, number 7. He turned on his heel to face her. “Didn’t expect to see me so soon? What do you mean?”

  “I heard you had a flat tire.” She stared at him and smiled, challenging him without fear.

  “Where did you hear that?”

  “It’s McFarrellville. News travels fast.”

  “Of a simple flat?” Not only flat, but slashed, yet he hadn’t reported that to the police.

  “You had to call someone, and that’s business for McFarrellville Tire. Russ is my cousin.”

  “I’m sorry to disappoint Russ and them, but I changed it myself.”

  She looked Max up and down. “I would have never guessed.”

  He headed back toward her, toward the office. “Can I get my bottles of water and the DVD of Hunt for Red October?” He’d seen it enough times it would occupy only half his mind, leaving him room to puzzle out the pris
on’s obstruction, and worry about Kellen, whether his mother was right, whether Rae was right, whether Kellen would survive long enough for him to return.

  Elyse pulled the two bottles out of the college-sized refrigerator behind the counter and had him sign for the DVD. He made her take note of the scratch on the corner; damned if he was going to buy the Aloha Motel a new copy of the movie.

  “Goodbye,” she said. “Good luck.”

  Before he stepped out the door, his phone rang. He snatched it from his pocket, saw the name on caller ID, and sighed with relief and annoyance.

  Washington, DC. Nils Brooks. Damn him to hell.

  Max stepped outside into the blaring sunset and answered. “Nils. What?”

  “Did you see her? Who is it?” Nils asked.

  Max ignored one question, answered the other. “No.”

  “What do you mean, ‘No’? Did you see her? Is it her? Is it Mara Philippi?”

  Nils was the head of the MFAA, a federal organization that tracked the sale of stolen antiquities used to fund terrorist groups. Because of the MFAA, Nils had been involved in Mara Philippi’s arrest. He’d also been romantically involved with Kellen, and despite the fact Max had won that battle and married her, Nils cared about her, maybe in a kindly way. Maybe in a lustful way.

  Max didn’t care how Nils cared about her; Max hated this bastard.

  “I haven’t seen her.” Max headed for his car.

  “You’ve been there ten hours. What do you mean you haven’t seen her?”

  “How do you know how long I’ve been here?” Max unlocked the trunk.

  “How do you think you got permission to visit so easily?”

  Max hadn’t thought it was easy at all, but sure. It had probably taken pulling all the strings. “No sighting yet. They’re playing games.”

  Nils’s voice sharpened. “Who’s playing games?”

  “Not sure.” Max picked up his backpack, then hesitated, his gaze on the tire iron. “The warden. The assistant warden. Today I’ve been in the prison twice. I’ve been obstructed twice.”