Devlin's Light (19 page)

“My favorite costume?” She frowned, trying to remember. “Umm, I guess the year that I had a hula costume and it was a balmy seventy-two degrees that night so I didn’t have to wear a jacket over it. I was so worried about that, that I’d
have to cover up my costume with a coat and the entire effect would be lost.”

“Why did you buy it, then?”

“Because I liked the way the skirt rustled. And I wanted to play the ukulele.” She laughed, remembering. “Ry was a pirate that year.”

“Oh, my, India, do you remember how mad he was when Mrs. Daley across the street wouldn’t let him borrow her parrot to ride on his shoulder?” Aunt August brought in a tray laden with coffee paraphernalia for three.

India laughed again. “I do. He picked that costume with that very parrot in mind.”

“He was just fit to be tied, that boy was.” August shook her head as she went back toward the kitchen. “I’ll just be but a minute.”

“Halloween was a big thing when we were growing up.”

“Us too. I used to take my sisters trick-or-treating. Of course, that was before the days when parents were afraid to send their children out for Halloween without an armed guard.”

“It is sad, isn’t it?” India poured coffee for him, being careful not to touch his fingers when she handed him the cup.

His eyes twinkled as if he knew that she was taking extraordinary pains to avoid touching him, and as if he knew why.

“Indy?” Corri called from the top of the steps.

“Do you need help?” India leaned forward, craning her neck to look up the stairs.

“Umm, I think so,” Corri said softly. “My tail won’t stay on.”

“Oh, dear.” August scooted into the room with a plate of homemade spice cookies and cast a solemn glance in Indy’s direction. “We certainly can’t have that.”

“Heaven forbid.” Indy chuckled and excused herself from the room after liberating a cookie from the plate. She knew they had been baked with her in mind and knew too that if she looked in the kitchen she’d find a whole batch of the fragrant treats all packed up for her to take back to Paloma.

The stairwell felt chilly after the warmth of the little sitting room. India’s hands, so recently cozied by the fire, were cooling rapidly. She found the problem with the tail and took Corri by the hand as they walked down the steps.

“She’ll know it’s me.” Corri shifted the mask on her face, trying to line up her eyes with the slits in the heavy fabric.

“Well, I think that’s unavoidable, don’t you? I mean, sooner or later, she’d figure it out.”

“Umm …” Corri poked her face into the room from the doorway.

“Eeek!” August shrieked. “It’s a giant mouse!” Corri giggled and flew into the room, holding her tail in one hand and peeling the mask off with the other.

“Oh, it’s a mouse child!” August laughed and held her arms open to the child who bounced into those arms and filled them.

“Do you like it?” Corri asked. “Indy bought it for me.”

“I love it.” August beamed. “And you’re the most adorable mouse I’ve ever seen. Don’t you agree, Nick?”

“She certainly is.” Nick nodded.

“I didn’t know you were here.” Corri frowned. “Now I won’t be able to trick-or-treat at your house. You already saw my costume.”

“Hmmm. That is a problem.” Nick pretended to ponder this. “Tell you what. No one is likely to come all the way out to the cabin, so how ’bout if I bring your treat to you, since you already tricked me tonight?”

“Really?” Corri’s face brightened. “Were you surprised it was me?”

She pulled the mask down over her face, once again twisting it this way and that, trying to line up eyes, nose and mouth.

“Corri, that mask is cute, but you’re really having problems with it, aren’t you?” August frowned.

“Maybe we should forget the mask and use face paint instead,” suggested India.

“Ollie has face paint.” Corri remembered. “She is going to be an Egyptian queen and she has face paint.”

“We could do whiskers and do something with your eyes.” Indy nodded.

“But you won’t be here,” Corri reminded her, her little face darkening in spite of herself. “You won’t be here on Halloween night to paint my face or take me trick-or-treating.”

“You’re right, sweetie.” India sighed, feeling an unexpected sting of disappointment. “Maybe Darla can do your face.”

“Nonsense,” August told them. “I can paint whiskers with the best of them.”

“And I’d be happy to take you out,” Nick said. “I can’t remember how long it’s been since I went out on Halloween. But you might have to share a treat or two.”

“Okay. Except for the peppermint patties.” As if lecturing, Corri pointed with her index finger, her face turning solemn once again.

“That’s a deal.” Nick nodded. “Peppermint patties for you, Snickers for me.”

“Sure.” Corri grinned. “I don’t like peanuts anyway.”

“Okay, mouse child,” August told her, “go up and take that off and leave it in the sewing room so that I can put an extra stitch or two in that tail.”

“Can I have cocoa before I go to bed?” Corri asked from the doorway.

“It’s almost bedtime now,” August reminded her, “so if you can get ready quickly, there might be a half cup of something for you.”

Corri scurried out of the room and up the steps.

“It’s like living with a baby tornado, having that child around.” August chuckled. “And yet I don’t know what I’d do without her. She keeps me young and fit and sharp. It’s not possible to feel like an old lady when there’s such youthful energy in the house.”

“Doesn’t it get to be a bit much sometimes?” India turned her face from the fire to study her aunt’s expression. “Don’t you get tired?”

“Oh, sometimes a bit, maybe. But I’d not be without her, Indy. Not for the world. There’s eternity to rest, if rest is what you seek. I’m not in a hurry for it. Well, if you’ll excuse me, I have cocoa to make.”

August scooped up the tray as she passed by

“I really can’t thank you enough for offering to take Corri,” India started.

He held up one hand. “We’ve already talked about this. You don’t have to thank me.”

“I just didn’t feel I could leave without saying it again.”

“When are you leaving?” His eyes narrowed and seemed to darken.

“In the morning,” she told him. “I need to get back to the city. I have a trial slated to begin the end of next week. I have a lot of work to do.”

“When were you planning on telling me?” he asked.

“What?”

“That you were leaving. When were you going to tell me?” He stood up, obviously agitated.

She looked up at him, somewhat confused.

“You were just going to go, weren’t you?”

Numbly, she nodded.

“Why?”

“I guess because I’m just used to coming and going on my own,” she told him.

“Didn’t it occur to you that maybe I’d want to say goodbye?”

She shook her head.

“Or that maybe I’d be interested in when you were coming back?”

She was wide-eyed, watching him try to control his growing anger.

“Nick, I’m sorry that you’re angry. I just didn’t know how to call and say ‘So. I’m leaving tomorrow, I’ll be back in a few weeks.’”

“You just said it. You just said all you had to say.”

“I’m just not used to having anyone to say goodbye to,” she said quietly. “I didn’t know how.”

“You want to know how to say goodbye?” He stood in the doorway, his hands on his hips. “I’ll show you how to say goodbye.”

He crossed the room in two strides and drew her to him, his mouth seeking hers before she could so much as squeak. He kissed her, long and hard, before drawing back and telling her, “And
that
is how you say goodbye, India.”

By the time she came to her senses, he was already out the front door.

“Oh no, you don’t,” she sputtered, and she took off down the steps.

“Nick Enright, don’t you think you can come into my house, and … and …” She stood on the sidewalk, hands fisted in anger set menacingly on her hips.

In spite of his own pique, Nick laughed.

“What is so funny?” she demanded.

“You are,” he told her. “You come racing out the front door like some hundred-pound avenging angel, hissing and sputtering.” He cleared his throat and leaned back against his car. “I’m sorry, India, you were saying something. Don’t think I can come into your house and … and do what?”

She paused, wondering how anyone ever stayed angry with this man.

“Don’t think you can come into my house and kiss me senseless and then walk away.”

“Well then, I believe we’re beginning to understand each other. Yes, that is exactly my point.”

She walked toward him slowly, her arms crossed in front of her.

“Were you? Senseless, I mean?” She raised a questioning eyebrow.

“Totally.”

“Good.” She grinned.

He reached out to her and drew her close, uncrossing her arms and wrapping them around his neck. “Wanna say goodbye again?”

She did—his way, not with words but with kisses that would burn into her and make her giddy with their warmth.

“Do you realize that we are standing right under a streetlamp?” She pulled her lips from his long enough to get the words out.

“Umm-hmm,” he murmured. “Guess that’s why Mrs. Ellis there across the street is hanging out her second-floor window.”

“She’s not!” India jumped and peeked over his shoulder. “Oh, for crying out loud,” she said with a grimace, “she was looking out the window!”

Nick laughed.

“Well, I guess that by tomorrow morning, everyone in Devlin’s Light will know that something was going on outside the Devlin house.”

“Oh, brother. Just like when I was in high school.”

“The joys of small-town living.” Nick laughed. “Come back more often and stay longer, so we’d have time to really give them something to talk about.”

He leaned down and kissed her again, whispering, “Don’t ever do that again, India. Don’t think for a minute that it doesn’t matter to me that you’re leaving.”

“Nick, I’m sorry. It’s no excuse, but I just wasn’t thinking. And no, I wasn’t sure that it would matter to you. My mind is on this trial that’s coming up. I’m nervous about it; some of the witness statements aren’t as strong as I would like them to be.”

“Do you know that your face changes when you start talking about your work?”

“What do you mean?”

“You lose the softness. Your eyes narrow and your jaw sets differently, and your face develops an attitude all its own.”

She shrugged off the comment.

“When you’re with Corri, you lose that edge. And I like to think that when you’re with me, you don’t need the attitude. It’s almost as if you are two different women.”

“Well, maybe in a sense, I am. My life in Paloma is very different from life here in Devlin’s Light.”

“Must be hard, having your life split in two like that,” he said, all too perceptively.

India watched him warily.

“Have you been talking to Darla?” she asked suspiciously.

“Not for a few days.” He shook his head. “Why?”

“No reason.”

“You know, I don’t know that I could do that.” He opened the car door slowly, his brows closing in on each other as if he was considering an impossible task.

“Do what?”

“Have part of me in one place and part of me
someplace-else,” he said over his shoulder as he got in and slammed the door of the Pathfinder. “I like my head and my heart to be in the same place.”

He started the ignition and rolled down the window.

“Good luck with your case, India.” Nick reached through the open window with an outstretched hand to touch the side of her face with his fingertips. “I’ll be in touch.”

She saluted him with her right hand as he pulled away from the curb, then stood in the middle of the street and watched the white car disappear into the fog at the corner.

India had stopped at her office—just to pick up the mail, she told herself—on her way through Paloma. It was almost eight o’clock at night before she finally left, two files and a week’s worth of mail under her right arm. By the time she arrived at the townhouse and unloaded the car, it was nearing eight-thirty. Just in time to call Corri and say goodnight if she hurried. Ignoring the blinking light on the answering machine, which seemed to be counting out a week’s worth of messages, she dialed the number and waited for Aunt August’s cheery hello. Flipping through the mail, which had slid onto the foyer floor from the mail slot, she kicked off her shoes while Corri was called to the phone, using the time to separate bills from junk mail from magazines from letters, of which there were few. An envelope with a Texas postmark went into the read-me-first pile. It was, she knew, from a woman whose only son had been murdered by a man who now rested more comfortably than he deserved behind bars that should forever separate him from the rest of society. Every year, on the anniversary of the boy’s death, his mother sent India a card, thanking her for her relentless prosecution of the animal who had taken her son’s life. That was how the mother had always referred to the defendant.
That animal.
India wondered if the woman had ever bothered to learn the man’s name.

India remembered.

Billy Kidman.

He was nineteen years old, hard-faced and smart-mouthed, when he was caught attempting to hide the corpse of a young boy—his third in as many weeks—in the storage bin of a basement apartment on the outskirts of Paloma.
India went after him like a hound on the heels of a fox. Kidman never had a chance. He was Indy’s first big case. She won with a combination of preparation and information, and by keeping her promise to the jury that she would prove, beyond doubt, that the defendant had in fact committed the dreadful acts of which he had been accused. Once convicted in Pennsylvania, he was extradited to Texas, where he would eventually stand trial for similar crimes for which he could possibly be given the death penalty. He still, she knew, awaited his fate—death by lethal injection—which he had successfully managed to avoid by filing appeal after appeal. India took no pleasure in knowing that eventually his appeals would be exhausted.

Kidman’s mother, a too young, too pale, too timid, too tired woman who had aged long before her time, had been at the trial for the first two days before returning to Houston, where her job as a janitress and her three younger children awaited her. She seemed unmoved by her son’s crimes as much as by his fate. India hadn’t been able to decide which bothered her more. No, India had not forgotten Billy Kidman.