My Sister's Keeper (25 page)

“
Don’t you worry.” I washed the food down with a swallow of water, then turned to face her. “Are we on a date?”

She raised her head and wiped away her tears. “It’s the closest thing I’ve had to one in years.”

I drank another sip. “Me, too.”

I exhaled, grasped another slice of sandwich, took another bite, and swallowed it nearly whole. “Who do you think that was at the Jackson’s window? I don’t think it was David. I think he’s with Ashleigh.”

“
Could it have been the murderer?” she asked scooping dip on a chip.

I sipped my soda. “I doubt it. It was probably Mrs. Jackson. Ashleigh could have come for David and told them that there could be some dangerous people looking for her and for them not to take any chances.”

“
Then you and I show up.”

“
Exactly.”

“
Then a short time after we’re there someone else shows up and kills them?”

“
Right.” I took a long drink. “Someone that could very well have been following me.”

“
You think you’re being followed?”

“
I don’t think I’m the only one looking for Ashleigh.”

“
Like who else?”

One of the cars in the parking lot started its engine. “Like the guy that knocked me in the head for one.”

“
Do you think he’ll be back to see you again?”

As the car rolled across the parking lot, I noticed a sedan parked up the road with two men in it. One appeared to be looking at us through binoculars. I turned back to face the lake. “Don’t turn around. I think someone’s watching us.”

“
What?” Sydney sat up higher, but looked only at me. “Watching us right now?”

“
Scott wouldn’t have you followed, would he?”

She turned her head slightly and checked the car from the corner of her eye. “The one on the road?”

“
Don’t look at them.”

“
I don’t know. Maybe.”

“
It’s probably just the police. I’m their prime suspect right now.”

“
What about the ones that killed the Jacksons? Could it be them?” Her eyes were wide and intense.

I laid my hand on hers and squeezed it. “When you leave here, turn right, and go out the same way you came in. If they follow you, I’ll follow them. If they don’t, I’ll wait a few minutes, go left, and see if I can tell who they are when I ride by them.”

“
I’m scared, Richard.”

“
Just be careful. Keep your doors locked and if they follow you, go someplace where there’s a lot of people or to the police station. Just don’t let them get close enough to grab you.”

“
Now you’re really scaring me.”

I looked into her eyes. “What time do you get off tonight?”

“
My last class ends at 9:30. I’ll probably be there until 10.”

I snatched a pen from my shirt pocket, ripped off a section of the lunch bag, and wrote a phone number on it. “This is my cell number. Call me when you get ready to leave.” She folded it and clutched it in her hand. “And let me have your home number.” She ripped off another piece of the bag and wrote the number on it.

I read it, then tucked it away. “Okay. You ready to go?”

“
I guess.” She picked up her keys and water bottle as I put away the trash. I then took her hand and walked her back to her van.

“
Be careful, Richard.”

“
It’ll be fine.”

She started the van and waited as I straddled the bike and strapped on the helmet. On my signal, she pulled onto the roadway, turned right, and disappeared up the winding tree-lined road. The car with the two men didn’t move. I caught a couple more glimpses of her through the trees as she worked her way around the lake, then gunned the bike and eased up to the roadway. I removed my helmet, fiddled with the straps, and wasted time. The men, parked up the road to my left, seemed to ignore me. Finally, I snapped the helmet back on, turned left, and eased off toward them.

As I moved past them, they looked out at the lake to their right. They wore casual clothes—like policemen working undercover

or the FBI. Their license plate was so badly banged up, I could not read the numbers as I rolled past. I opened the throttle, roared up the road around the next bend, and pulled over.

A moment later they passed me heading in the same direction. They saw me, but made no attempt to slow down or stop as I whipped back on the road and dashed off in the direction Sydney had gone, then made a quick left, a right, and another left. I didn’t see them again and figured I’d lost them.

33

I
RODE TO MOM’S and I found Martha sitting in her wheelchair at the desk in the corner of her room. She was hunkered over a sheet of newspaper with all the parts to the cassette laid out on it.

“
Hey, hey! How’s it going?” I asked spreading myself across her doorframe.

She raised her hand. “Shhh. Mom’s upstairs asleep.”

“
Oh, sorry.”

“
What are you so excited about?”

“
I just had lunch with Sydney Deagan.”

“
A date?”

“
Sort of.” I browsed the bookcase in the hall, removed the oldest photo album, and carried it into Martha’s room where I sat on her bed.

“
Tell me everything,” she said without looking up.

I opened the dark leather cover on the album. It crinkled as it folded back. “Not much to tell. I picked up a couple of wraps and met her at the gazebo on the back of Greenfield Lake.”

“
Mmmm. Sounds romantic.”

“
It really was.” Each page of the album contained one sepia-toned photograph inside a thick matte with arched tops and gold embellishments. The album looked expensive. “What do you know about Uncle Charles?”

She was leaning over the cassette with a magnifier in one hand and a brush in the other. “Didn’t he die kind of young?”

“
I think so.”

“
Nobody’s ever talked much about him that I can remember. I just figured he died real young and that was that. Why?”

“
Just wondering.”

“
No, you weren’t just wondering. I know you better than that. What made you think about Uncle Charles?” Martha dipped a brush in a dish of white powder and flipped it back and forth across a piece of the cassette case while peering through a magnifier.

“
It was just something Dad said this morning.”

She twisted around and faced me. “What did he say?”

I turned another page. “I promised him I wouldn’t tell anyone.”

“
Tell anyone what?” Her voice was emphatic, but low.

I raised my index finger to my lips. “Shhh!”

“
Don’t shush me. Tell me what he said.”

“
You’re the brilliant investigator. Can’t you figure it out?”

She turned back to her cassette. “Forget it.”

I turned another page and studied the pictures. She pressed a wide strip of cellophane tape to a hunk of the black plastic. “Will you tell me if I guess it?”

“
Of course. Now who in here could be Uncle Charles?”

She slowly peeled the tape off the cassette. “No one. That book’s too old. That’s the early 1900s. There’s another one where you found that one.”

She pressed the tape onto a square of black paper while I stepped into the hall and exchanged the book for one that was more like a scrapbook. The photos in this one were attached to thick black pages with little black glue-on corners. Some of them had comments written under them in white ink. It was the history of my grandparents, Charles and Georgia Lynn Baimbridge and their children; Beverly, Charles Jr., and Augustus.

There were photographs of the kids as infants, as children on bicycles and ponies, at the beach, and at family gatherings. As the kids got older, there were fewer photos. When I turned the page, I found myself staring at what I’d swear was an old photo of me! A teenage boy with no shirt on, leaning back against a 1950s Chevrolet. His arms were crossed over a strong upper body. Under it was written, “Charlie’s first car —1958.” His hair was thick, dark, and wavy, and his eyes were deep-set like mine. I jumped off the bed and held the book in front of Martha.

“
Look.”

She stared at the photo a moment. “What?”

“
Who does that look like?”

“
Who? What are you getting at?”

She turned the next page and there was a picture of Uncle Charles with a girl under which had been written, “Prom – 1960.” Martha gasped and the hairs on my arms stood on end.
The girl was our mom.

Uncle Charles had on a white dinner jacket and Mom had on a ball gown with a huge corsage pinned to her shoulder. He had his arm around her and a lit cigarette hanging from his lips. They were standing in a line along with dozens of others dressed similarly. Uncle Charles had a mischievous look in his eye. Mom leaned against him with one arm around his back and the other on his chest.

“
It looks like Mom used to date Uncle Charles,” she whispered.

I didn’t say anything. She flipped the last page over. There was a single picture of a crowd of people gathered around a funeral casket holding umbrellas. It was hard to tell who they were. Many held handkerchiefs to their faces. “That’s probably Uncle Charles’ funeral,” I whispered. I found it hard to take my eyes off the photograph.

“
So Mom dated Charles before she dated Daddy.”

“
Looks that way.”

“
So?”

“
So, maybe they were…” I lifted the book over her head and stepped back to the bed where I laid it in front of me and studied the picture of Charles with his arm around Mom. “I wonder how he died.”

“
What are you saying? That maybe they were lovers?”

“
Could have been.” I slipped the photo of the two of them from the album and into my shirt pocket.

“
Oh, my God!” Martha screamed. “Oh, my God!”

I leapt from the bed. “Wha-a-a-t?”

“
Come here! Look at this!”

I left the album on the bed and leaned over her shoulder. She held the magnifier up to me and pointed at the sheet of paper. “Look! Look at this!” She bounced in the chair as I moved around her, held the lens over the print, and looked through it. I saw a partial fingerprint. She tapped a finger on another fingerprint lying next to it. “Compare it to this one.”

The one on the sheet was not a complete print either, but what was there appeared to match the other one. “It’s the same, isn’t it?”

“
Son of a bitch!” She wheeled the chair back from under the desk. Her chin quivered and her face turned red. “You know whose print that is?”

“
Whose?”

Her eyes glossed over. “That print came from the windowsill at the warehouse. That bastard is still around and has something to do with that house you were in last night.”

34

W
E GOT THE CALL about four o’clock that Dad was awake and the three of us raced to the hospital as quickly as we could. They let us spend a little time with him separately. Mom went first, then Martha. I stood at the window and watched as he held my sister’s hand and cried with her. There was something very strong between them and I realized that Dad could
never
love me in the same way he did Martha. I was not
his
child. Tears blurred my vision. A part of me was relieved that I wasn’t. Yet, a part of me wished I
was
.

Later, sitting next to him holding his hand, I saw him differently. I saw him as a man instead of my father. I judged him differently.

I spoke softly. “I found a photo of Uncle Charles and Mom.” He didn’t say anything, just looked away and nodded. “I was wondering how he died.”

“
Christ, boy.” His voice was tired.

“
Do you know? Were you there?”

He covered his eyes with his free hand. His breath whistled out of him like a kettle just pulled off the fire. “Don’t ask me to go through that. Not right now.”

I squeezed his hand. “Okay.”

“
You straight with the police yet?”

I exhaled through my nose. “Working on it.”

“
You’re your mom’s favorite. Don’t break her heart. If you don’t do nothing else worthwhile in your life, please get this fixed.”

“
I will.”

“
I’d like to see it done before I die, so don’t take too long. I ain’t got much time.”

It was odd to feel important to him, to feel something for him, to care about what he wanted. I squeezed his hand. “I’m working on it.” I kissed his forehead, left the room, and took Martha for a walk around the hospital grounds. I parked her chair next to a bench outside and told her what Dad wanted. “I want to get it straight before he dies and I’m going to need some help with it.”

“
Sure. Anything you want.” She lit a cigarette, dropped her lighter in her bag, and took a long pull on it. “But I need you to do something for me, too.”