Hear No Evil (31 page)

“Only what?” he asked. She slumped back against her pillows, put her hand to her forehead. “Before this, I been sensing danger. But today, all day it’s been like fog is closed round me.”

He frowned. “What kind of fog?”

“Just fog,” she said, “and nothing’s clear. Not one thing. But then, the fog opens, and I see Mimi walking toward me. In dreams lately I hear her footsteps on the porch. I hear her knock at the door. This afternoon I dreamt I was in my house, and I looked down on the bathroom sink, and there was her hairbrush. With her curly long hairs stuck in it, just like old times. And I thought ‘It’s true. She’s home at last, safe.’ ”

“Let’s hope it happens,” he said gruffly.

She turned her stare to him. “It
will
happen. And when it does, the danger’s past. I know that. When she’s home, then everything’ll be put right again.”

He said nothing.

“Thank Eden for me,” she said tiredly. “Thank her for all she’s doing. I’d try to do it myself, but it won’t come out right. It never does. I don’t know why. Tell her that … I’m sorry.”

He was touched. She hated saying she was sorry, and he knew how much the words hurt her pride.

“I will. But you’ve got to take it easy.”

“I know,” she said, then added irritably, “Where’d Eden go? Is she going to spend all night at that ice-cream machine? Where’s she took my honeyduck?”

She put her hand at her forehead. “I didn’t mean to
snap at you of all people. It’s just this fog. I can’t see nothing clear. It’s like God pulled down the curtain.”

Again Owen felt the nameless apprehension that had haunted him all day.
Some things
, he thought,
we aren’t meant to see, aren’t meant to know
.

He said, “I’ll bring your girls to you, Jessie.”

D
RACE MOVED THROUGH THE LITTLE HOUSE, SEARCHING
, probing.

In the strange room decked out as an office, he was shaken with anger to find labeled tape cassettes, one marked “Peyton,” another marked “Constance/Mimi.”

What were these fuckers doing? Nothing made sense; it was too bizarre, too unexpected. He felt as if, far away, an unseen edge of his plans had unraveled, and he did not know how dangerous the damage was or could be.

But he acted, swiftly and with purpose. He pocketed the tapes, cut the phone lines, and drove the security truck deep into the trees where it could not be seen. He plotted the most efficient way to take the enemy by surprise.

He heard a vehicle approaching the house. His muscles tautened and his heart slammed in anticipation.

Adrenaline surging, he moved to the living room, peered out between the drapes, and saw the van, its lights cut, wheeling past the house.

Raylene
. He smiled tightly as the van rolled past the graveled parking spot and around the corner of the drive, as he’d told her. She was to park the van behind the house where it could not be seen from the drive.

Drace hurried to the kitchen door and eased it open. In the gathering darkness, he saw Raylene’s trim figure climbing out of the driver’s seat.

Her face was a pale glimmer and her hair a ghostly silver. She wore her fitted camouflage pants and a matching jacket. She moved to him and seized his hands in hers.

“What about Mimi?” she asked tensely.

He could feel the anxiety coursing through her. “Did you take your Xanax?” he asked with concern.

She nodded, squeezing his hands more tightly. Somehow she looked younger to him tonight, almost girlish, and animated by a shaky elation that gave a fragile edge to her beauty.

“Frightened?” he asked.

She shook her head with conviction. “Not with you here.”

“We’ll take her in,” he said softly. “She’ll have her uses. And I want her to see.”

Raylene nodded and tossed her hair. Drace released her hands and slid open the van’s back door. He stepped inside and came out hauling Mimi, who stumbled. Her hands were still cuffed behind her back.

Drace pushed her toward Raylene and handed
Raylene the twenty-two. “Take her inside,” Drace ordered. “Secure her.”

He climbed back into the van, peeled up the strip of carpet, and slid open the floor panel to the cache of weapons and ammunition.

Raylene pushed the staggering Mimi into the house. Drace snatched up the two assault rifles, the ammunition belts, the handguns, and closed the compartment again.

He went inside the little house. Raylene had Mimi sitting on the living-room floor, legs crossed, prisoner-of-war style. She looked barely conscious, so stupefied she seemed lumpish and bestial to him.

He went to Raylene, handed her one of the Sierras and one of the holstered handguns. She buckled on the holster.

“I want you out there, up on that hill overlooking the house,” he told her. “You cover the drive. And keep it covered.”

He saw the dismay in her eyes. “But—” she protested.

“It’s safer,” he said firmly.

“But you’ll be all alone in here when they come,” she said, laying her hand on his arm.

Behind them, Mimi’s breath rattled and choked.

He smiled down at Raylene. “Don’t argue. Mind me.” He tugged at a lock of her blond hair. “Put on your ski mask, soldier girl.”

Once off the main highway, the route to Jessie’s was crooked and deserted, with the forested mountains rising so steeply on either side that the road seemed to snake through a nearly featureless maze of black.

Owen reached for the cell phone and punched out the number of the GuardLok office.

“GuardLok Security Systems,” answered a man who sounded deeply bored. “Bill Joe Wilmer speaking.”

Owen recognized the name and voice. Wilmer was a former traffic officer with the city police.

Owen spoke quietly, so as not to wake Peyton, who slept in the backseat. “Bill Joe, this is Owen Charteris. Alvin was at Jessie Buddress’s house installing a system. Is it in place—working?”

“I just come on duty. Let me check.” There was a long pause, then Bill Joe said, “Sorry, Owen. It’s not done.”

Owen’s nerves snapped to attention. “What do you mean, not done?”

“Well,” Bill Joe said, “Alvin logged in by radio that he got there, but he never done the tests. We haven’t had a peep out of him. It’s not connected. No.”

Owen frowned. “He got there almost two hours ago. He hasn’t even run one test?”

“No sir. I got a note here his wife called, wanting him to phone home. But they couldn’t raise him by radio, and the phone at the Buddress house was dead. He maybe hit a glitch. It happens.”

“Then he’s still there?”

“I reckon.”

“You reckon. But you don’t know?”

“Hell, Owen, maybe something come up. You never know.”

Owen didn’t like this. “I’m going to be there in a few minutes,” he told him. “If he’s not there, I’ll be in touch.” He hit the switch hook and dialed Jessie’s home number. He was answered by nothing, by silence.

He folded the phone shut and stared at the serpentine road winding ever more deeply into the darkness.

“What’s wrong?” Eden asked.

“Jessie’s phone line is dead,” he answered. “That means the security system’s not installed yet.”

She shrugged. “Well, these things take time, don’t they?”

“Yeah,” he replied, not liking his own train of thought. “They take time.”

“I forgot how dark it gets out here,” Eden said pensively, gazing out at the night. “How empty it is.”

Owen glanced sideways at her. “Miss the bright lights, big city?” he asked.

She didn’t meet his eyes. “I think I was born missing them.”

“Yeah,” he said tonelessly. “Well.”

“And when I’m gone from here, I’ll miss you,” she said.

“Well. Yeah,” he repeated. “I’ll miss you, too.”

They were silent a long moment, and the silence was laden with all they would not, could not, say to each other.

He nodded toward Peyton. “She’s sound asleep?” he asked just to have something to say.

“Yes,” she said. “With luck we’ll get her in the house and in her own bed without waking up.”

And then?
he thought, saying nothing.

“And then,” she said, moving her hand to his arm, “if we can be discreet about it, I’d love to make love again.”

His heart took an unexpected curving flight at her words, at her touch. “I’m a discreet guy,” he said.

He turned down the lane that led to Jessie’s house and his.

•  •  •

In the living room, Drace stood at the window, looking through the slit between the drapes, his weapon ready. His gaze was fixed on the lawn’s rise and the shadowy stand of mimosas, where he had sent Raylene to cover the drive.

Only the light from the hall spilled into the room. Behind him Mimi sat on the floor, cuffed and helpless, in the semidarkness.

She was weak and sick with agony, but on some dim level she realized Drace and Raylene were waiting for her family. Her sister—how, she wondered in confusion, did Eden get mixed up in this? And Owen Charteris. In her pain, she could barely remember Owen Charteris.

But then there was her daughter.

Peyton
, she thought, and the name was like a distant gleam of light.
Peyton
.

On the couch lay Peyton’s familiar tattered yellow bear with its unraveled mouth. There was a brand-new doll beside it, a Raggedy Ann with a sparkling clean pinafore.

Somebody bought her a new doll
, Mimi thought dazedly.
Somebody’s taking care of her. My sister. Why my sister?

She thought of being with Eden in the backyard, behind Jessie’s trailer when they were children. Eden was trying to draw Mimi out of some deep fit of childish sadness.

Eden had knelt in the grass, holding a dandelion to Mimi’s chin.

“
This turns your chin yellow if you like butter
,” she said in her resonant voice. “
Do you?
”

Mimi had ducked her head, refusing to look at her. “
No. No. I don’t like butter
.”

Eden tickled her chin with the flower, leaving a faint golden smear of pollen.

“
Yes, you do, too
,” she teased. “
Go look in the mirror. You’ll see
.”

She had played so many games like that with Mimi when Mimi was a little girl, trying to stop her from crying. Mimi was crying because of Mama. Always because of Mama. Mama didn’t love them, did she? And so there was no place to be safe.

“
Don’t cry
,” Eden had said. “
Don’t. Shh. Shh. Do you like butter?
”

The soft, cool brush of dandelion petals beneath Mimi’s chin, the scent of grass, the warmth of May, the bluejays quarreling in the mimosa trees.

Eden, take care of me. Eden, take care of me
.

Mimi wanted to reach out for the Raggedy Ann doll, to hug it, hold it tight. But her hands, bruised and swollen, were pinioned behind her.

I am a prisoner of war
, Mimi thought.
I am a traitor. They will kill Peyton. They will kill Eden. They will kill us all
.

She straightened one leg. Drace did not seem to notice. She straightened her other leg. She edged toward the couch.

“Be still,” snapped Drace.

She thought,
I could get to my knees. I don’t know if I could stand
.

“Mimi,” he said, “if you go moving around, I’ll break your goddamn knees for you.”

And she thought,
Eden would not like this. Grandma would not want this. Peyton, Peyton, Peyton, I let it all go wrong
.

Her throat burned like fire, but she felt Eden’s presence. She felt a cool, ghostly tickle under her chin.

•  •  •

Peyton shifted in the backseat, made a small, unhappy sound. Eden glanced back at the child in concern.

“Are we home yet?” Peyton asked sleepily. She plucked irritably at the buckle of her seat belt.

“Almost,” Eden said. “Leave your seat belt on until we stop.”

They rounded a curve and Jessie’s house came into sight, almost, but not quite, dark. Alvin Swinnerton had apparently left the hall light switched on for them.

Owen said, “His truck’s gone.”

He picked up the cell phone again, punched in a number.

“What are you doing?” she asked.

He frowned, shook his head. “Jessie’s line’s still dead. It shouldn’t be.”

“He probably just got called away,” she said mildly.

He pulled up before the house, but didn’t stop the motor or cut his lights. Still frowning, he stared at the little house.

“What’s wrong?” she asked.

“Nothing,” he said, but he was troubled. Alvin must have quit mid-job, but why? Didn’t he know he’d knocked out the phone line? He had to know.

He realized he was holding his breath. He still did not turn off the lights or motor.

“Stay here,” he told her. “Let me check the house first.”

She looked at him questioningly.

He shrugged, not fully knowing his own motives. He opened the door of the Blazer.

He heard the dog’s shrill, silly bark, and it was full of alarm.

He frowned, wondering why the dog was barking. The dog never barked.

Then he thought,
The dog is dead
.