Mist on the Meadow (30 page)

Wolf’s pulse rate quickened and spots danced
in front of his eyes. Not the best time to be driving at high
speeds. “So if I’ve got nothing on you, why are you hiding
out?”

“My employer is unhappy about the latest
developments. He’s not a friendly man, my employer.”

Wolf laughed. “
This
employer is
unhappy with the latest developments. So what? I’m supposed to feel
sorry for you? Think again, Bederman.”

“Yeah, didn’t think you’d be as reasonable as
your uncle.”

Wolf’s fingers curled around the steering
wheel while he clenched his jaw. “What do you want?”

“Seems you’ve become a liability, Wolf. Just
calling you to tell you to watch your back.”

“And who am I watching for?”

Elliot laughed. “I imagine you’ll recognize
‘em when you see ‘em.”

Wolf checked the rearview mirror. Saturday
traffic was light. There didn’t appear to be any cars following
him. “Am I supposed to thank you?”

“Doesn’t matter. I’m not trying to help you,
although you can thank me for letting your girlfriend go. She’s not
worth the trouble, you know? She doesn’t seem like such a witch to
me. Bet she’s real sweet, eh Wolf? Bet she’ll be sad when you die.
Maybe she’ll need someone to console her.”

Wolf checked the rearview mirror once more.
“Not dead yet.” He disconnected the call.

It no longer mattered if Marissa wanted to
talk to him or not, he had to make sure she was safe. Wolf checked
the clock. She’d be at the café. He called Don Walker and reported
what Elliot had said.

“Where are you now?” Don asked.

“Cooper Village exit. I’m going to the
café.”

“She’s not there. I’m more concerned about
you at the moment. That threat was aimed at you, not her.”

“You sure she’s not at the café?”

“I was just there, Wolf.”

Wolf tapped the top of the steering wheel.
“What about the extended stay?”

“She checked out.”

“Are you sure?”

“Would I have said it if I wasn’t sure?”

“Then maybe she went to her parents. I’m
going there.” Wolf heaved a sigh. Her father would have to
understand.

“I think you should go to the PD and file a
complaint, buddy. You’re the immediate target.”

“After I find her.”

“And if they’re after you, you’ll bring the
trouble to her doorstep. Wolf, you need to think about this,” Don
said. “I’ll ride behind you. I don’t see you yet. Where are
you?”

Wolf looked ahead to the next intersection.
“Main and Harness Road.”

“Pull into the parking lot at the bank. Wait
for me.”

And then a car appeared in Wolf’s rearview
mirror. “I got me a bogie,” he said.

“Parking lot,” Don repeated. “I’m five
minutes away.”

Wolf disconnected the call. He couldn’t
afford to split his concentration. If he hadn’t shared Marissa’s
vision, he likely wouldn’t have recognized Elliot Bederman,
especially eleven years later.

Wolf passed the bank. Ahead, the mall wasn’t
open yet. The road was deserted. Elliot was behind him now, too
close for safe travel. Wolf considered stomping on his brakes to
put an end to this game. If Elliot rear-ended him, Elliot would be
at fault, but clearly Elliot wanted to repeat history. Elliot
dropped back and rode the center line. In another minute, they
would reach the scene of the accident that killed Wolf’s
family.

Elliot pulled alongside Wolf and gave him a
smile before he veered into the lane ahead of Wolf. The snow piled
alongside the road took away the shoulder, but at least the road
itself was clear. They weren’t to the light pole yet—the light pole
that replaced the one Wolf’s father had crashed into.

Wolf glanced in his rearview one more time.
He and Elliot were the only two cars within viewing distance. He
took his foot off the accelerator to put distance between himself
and Elliot. The brake lights on Elliot’s car lit red, then Elliot’s
back-up lights glowed white. Wolf accelerated into the oncoming
lane, speeding ahead of Elliot’s car, while Elliot moved in
reverse. Wolf steered into the mall parking lot. If Elliot wanted
him, he’d have to get out of the car.

Wolf parked, stepped out of his car and
leaned over the roof to see what Elliot would do.

Elliot’s car skidded to a stop, just short of
t-boning Wolf’s car. He threw open his door and vaulted toward
Wolf. “Do you realize the trouble you’ve caused me?”

Wolf raised his eyebrows. “You mean by
stopping you from stealing from me?” Wolf’s vision blurred and he
shook his head. He rubbed his forehead to stimulate circulation. He
couldn’t pass out. Not now. Elliot’s fist landed on his jaw and
Wolf was down, on the ground, the world shrouded in mist. Elliot
raised his hand again, this time holding a glint of steel, a thin
blade.

“Stop!” The command came from behind Elliot’s
car. Wolf was vaguely aware of Don Walker’s voice, like a
foghorn.

He turned his head and in a clear patch, the
only spot of clarity beside the street light, his father’s Buick
passed down the road. The brown Chevy materialized behind it, and a
pedestrian stopped on the sidewalk. There was a witness! But why
was he seeing this? And without Marissa? Suddenly Wolf was in the
backseat, beside a teenaged Chuck.

“
C’mon you guys, that’s my uncle,” Chuck
said.

“
Move it!” Elliot shouted out the
window.

“
Look, he’s scared,” Rudy laughed.

Then Elliot reached across and grabbed the
wheel, slicing the car in front of Wolf’s father. Chuck went
careening across the back seat.

“Who is it?” Wolf shouted.

“Wolf. Are you okay?” Don Walker extended a
hand to help him up.

The fog was gone. Wolf blinked several times
to establish his surroundings. He took Don’s hand and pulled
himself to his feet.

“Who is who?” Don asked.

Wolf looked for Elliot, safely tucked in the
back seat of the squad car.

“Are you hurt? Did he cut you? Do you need an
ambulance?” Don asked.

“I’m fine.” Wolf grunted and marched toward
the squad car. “Bederman. Who was the girl?”

Elliot scowled. “What girl?”

They’d all been focused on Wolf’s dad. No one
paid any attention to the girl on the sidewalk.

Wolf moved his jaw side to side to test the
pain threshold. With one hand, he massaged the throbbing point of
impact.

“You should get that looked at,” Don
said.

“Right after I talk to my cousin.”

Marissa looked up when Angela walked into the
café. Seven o’clock.

“What the hell happened to you?” Angela
asked.

“Tired,” she said.

“More than tired. Are you still sick?”

Marissa managed a smile. “How are your
parents?”

“My parents are fine, and don’t change the
subject. You look like you’ve been run over by a truck.”

Easier to dodge the questions, at least for
now. “Yeah, still under the weather, I guess.” The positive test
result heightened the queasiness, even if the reaction was only
psychological. Marissa held up a finger and ran to the
bathroom.

When she returned to the kitchen, Angela made
the sign of a cross with two fingers. “Out of the kitchen if you’re
going to be horking all day.”

But the café was strength. Something Marissa
and Angela had created. Something good. She needed to draw on that
sense of accomplishment, the physical evidence that she was
intelligent and independent and capable, to gather enough courage
to face Wolf.

Angela waved her hands in front of her.
“Shoo. Out with you. I can take over from here. Have a cup of tea
or something. Go home. Go back to bed. You haven’t been infecting
our customers, have you?”

Marissa smiled. “No. I promise.” She
retreated to the dining room.

“Hey,” Angela called after her. “I can come
over after we close, bring you some chicken soup. We can catch
up.”

“No more Christmas sailor?”

Angela grinned. “Break’s over. He still wants
to see me. But we can talk about that later. Go home.”

Marissa nodded and continued to the coffee
counter, where she dispensed a cup of hot water and grabbed a tea
bag. She sat at the corner table and watched Becky dispatch the
early customers.

No Mercedes in the parking lot.

By nine o’clock, her stomach had settled, but
the butterflies continued. Marissa had gathered enough resolve to
take the drive over to Harper Manor. The pressing question was
whether he was at the Manor or shuttered away in the city with his
new girlfriend. The answer to that would be the only one she
needed. Marissa pushed away from the table.

“Stepping out,” she said.

“Go home,” Becky replied.

Marissa smiled. “I just might.”

As she walked to her car, intermittent
snowflakes drifted from the sky. She cast a glance at the scratch
on her bumper, the scratch that started it all.

As she drove across town, the snowflakes grew
larger and more frequent. Large, fat flakes fell to earth like
feathers from a pillow fight. The last thing she wanted was to be
stranded at Harper Manor in a storm. Or was it?

Alongside the road, Marissa caught sight of a
buck as it loped into the forest preserve. Not Uncle Balt. Not a
quiet moment. She had to keep going before she lost her nerve.

The falling snow frosted wooden gingerbread
accents on Harper Manor. A fresh coat of paint might make the
difference between the gloomy Halloween appearance and the
showplace it once was. Marissa drove through the iron gates and
stopped behind Pete Harper’s Cadillac, parked in front of the
house. Not the car she’d hoped to see, but if his uncle was there,
Wolf might be, too. She glanced toward the closed garage doors.
Until she knocked, she wouldn’t know for sure.

She probably should have phoned first. Her
heart did flip-flops and her hands shook. What would Wolf do when
he found out? Marissa looked to the woods behind the house and saw
the buck—the same buck?—barely obstructed from view by the copse of
trees.

She willed the buck to step into the open and
provide her with a moment of peace before she got out of the car.
“I could use a little moral support,” she said, but the buck
remained in the undergrowth. Marissa was on her own. She closed her
eyes and took a deep breath before she approached the house.

Chuck opened the door. Had Chuck borrowed his
father’s car? “I was hoping to speak with Wolf,” she said, more
timidly than she’d hoped.

Chuck’s wide eyes glittered. His barrel chest
rose and fell with each rapid breath. “Come in.”

Marissa hesitated. Something didn’t feel
right. “Is Wolf here?”

Chuck shot a glance over his shoulder and
winced. “I think so.”

“You
think
so?” She couldn’t see the
woods from the front door, couldn’t tell if the buck was still
hovering at the edge of the woods. Now would be a good time for one
of those quiet moments, or at least for one of those psychic
flashes.

Chuck bowed his head. “Come in.” He waved her
to the parlor. “I think he’s out back.”

“In the snow?”

“He, ah, was getting something from the
garden shed.” That wince again. Chuck’s hands were curled into
fists at his side.

“Is something wrong?”

Chuck smiled, but his nostrils flared and his
eyes were still drawn tight, as if he was in pain. He shot another
glance over his shoulder and bowed his head again. “He’s been out
there a long time. Maybe he’s having trouble finding—” The fists
tightened.

“Finding what?” The hairs on the back of
Marissa’s neck stood on end. She wasn’t taking her coat off until
she knew what had Chuck in such an agitated state.

He opened his hands and held them out,
exploding with a sigh. “I don’t know what he went out there for. He
just did.”

Marissa nodded. “Should I wait?” She tilted
her head, waiting for a reaction.

One more wince, and this time Chuck
half-turned away from her. His voice was strained when he answered.
“Maybe you should find out what’s taking him so long. Then he can
tell you what you should do.”

As much as her senses were on alert, she
wasn’t sure she could work up the nerve to face Wolf another time.
“Okay.”

Chuck shook his head.

Wolf might be out there with his new
girlfriend, and Chuck would know that. Marissa might be the
clueless girlfriend who didn’t realize she’d been replaced. Her
nose tingled again, but she wouldn’t give way to tears. She’d
always faced her problems head-on, and this was one more problem.
Closure. If Wolf had moved on, now would be the time to find
out.

Marissa took a deep breath and held her head
high. “So where is this garden shed?”

Chuck wouldn’t look at her. “Backyard. You
could go through the kitchen if you want.” His shoulders
drooped.

“Might as well go through the front door
rather than traipsing snow all through the house.” She grabbed at
the doorknob and marched down the front steps, around the yard and
spotted a wooden shed midway to the copse of trees.

She followed boot tracks in the snow and
stopped in front of the door. A padlock hung on the loop of the
open hasp. Marissa cast one last look at the woods, but the buck
was no longer visible. “Wolf?” Her voice sounded faraway, muffled
in the fresh falling snow. She stepped inside the shed and the door
swung closed behind her.

Marissa jumped, and then took a minute to
compose herself. A lone window cast dim light on a bag of mulch,
some topsoil and the usual array of garden implements. Certainly
she hadn’t expected to come upon Wolf and his new girlfriend
coupled together on top of that bag of mulch—or had she?

Marissa spun around to leave, but the door
wouldn’t open.

* * *

Wolf slowed in the driveway at Harper Manor,
unable to continue to the garage past the two cars in his way. His
heart skipped a beat. He recognized his uncle’s car. Was it
possible the other one was Marissa’s?