Critical Reaction (28 page)

Emerson just stood there, as though waiting for Poppy to say something more. His discomfort growing, Poppy muttered a “See you around” and dropped all but two of the washers back into the open bin before starting in the opposite direction, toward the checkout counter.

Poppy’s tension rose as Emerson matched his steps down the aisle.
What’s he
following me for,
he thought.
And why’s he walking
so close?

“Hey, listen, Poppy,” Emerson said as they reached the cashier. “I heard about that business at the softball game a few weeks back. You showed real guts stepping in for that kid. Real guts. Some of the guys at LB5, when they heard about that, weren’t too happy. But I told them, that Poppy’s a man of principle.”

Poppy’s stomach knotted. “Thanks, Mel,” he muttered again, trying to look disinterested as he reached into his hip pocket for his wallet.

Now he was
really
too close, leaning in like he was Poppy’s best friend about to give him a secret stock tip.

“Yep, that really took guts, Poppy,” Emerson went on. “Especially since you’ve got to be as mad as anybody about this lawsuit by Kieran Mullaney, am I right?”

Poppy ignored the last comment, accepting his change with a nod at the cashier who was trying to look away from the conversation, then striding toward the exit with Emerson on his heels. Out on the street, he sensed Emerson’s presence the instant before he felt a grip on his arm, bringing him to a stop.

He turned hard on the man. “
What do you want
.”

Emerson’s eyes narrowed. “You sound angry, Poppy. You don’t have any reason to be mad at me. I didn’t cause the explosion. The Mullaney kid did. He’s the one you should be mad at.”

Poppy sized the man up. Though he’d been looking from a distance, this guy wasn’t too far off from the height and shape of the man who’d gone up to Kieran’s house with the crows that day. Maybe even one of the guys in the shadows of the retirement home that night, loading the body into the SUV under the lamplight.

“The kid’s a gold digger, Poppy,” Emerson went on. “We all know the risks of working at a nuclear defense facility. If he doesn’t like it, he can quit and move to Seattle or Portland. He
shouldn’t mess with the mission. There’s plenty of others who would kill for his job.”

Kill for his job
. An image arose of the crows in Mullaney’s garden.

“Just what mission are we talking about, Emerson,” Poppy said.

The man leaned in close again. “We all know the mission, Poppy. It’s never changed. And there’s no sidelines here. In this industry, nobody’s ever had that luxury. You’ve gotta pick sides.”

He’s talking about my
refusal to change my statement,
Poppy thought, a fire lighting in his chest.

“So whose side are
you
on?” Poppy muttered, stepping back enough to throw a punch.

He wondered if he could take this guy, who had three inches and fifteen years on him. He could or he couldn’t, but Poppy was past caring. Everything that was happening to him was suddenly centered on this man standing three feet away in the hardware store parking lot. He
wanted
this to happen now.

Emerson scrutinized Poppy’s face without any doubt about what was coming. He shook his head and stepped away. “This isn’t about me and you, Poppy. It’s not personal. It’s about decisions that have consequences. For us. For the people we care about.”

Emerson turned and strode quickly away. He was out of reach before Poppy was sure that it was over, sure that he’d
let
it be over. The man was getting into his car when Poppy finally unclenched his fists, feeling the blood flow back into his fingers. His chest was still pounding and his ears buzzing with adrenaline as he looked around to get reoriented and remember where the truck was.

He’d just gotten into the cab when his phone went off. The sudden sound annoyed him; he didn’t want to talk to anybody just now. He had to think. Plus, the caller ID read
unknown.
Still, he punched the button to answer.

“Yeah,” he said.

“Is this Poppy Martin?”

“Yeah,” he answered uncertainly. The voice was faint. “Who’s this?”

“Beverly Cortez,” the voice came back. “You’ve been trying to call me. But I won’t talk to you on your phone.”

Lew’s girlfriend. His heart raced again. Before he could speak, the woman continued. “Maybe we can talk out at the Atomic Café.”

The line went dead. Poppy fumbled with his keys for a moment before getting them into the ignition and throwing the shift lever into gear.

On the drive to the Atomic Café, Poppy checked his mirrors so often he felt a kink growing in his neck. He saw nothing. But the renewed pounding in his chest still hadn’t stopped by the time he pulled into the café parking lot.

The lot was almost empty. Poppy parked near the door and went into the restaurant.

Only two elderly couples occupied tables this afternoon. Poppy checked his watch. Two forty-five. He found a bench and took a seat facing the door, next to a window overlooking the lot.

The waitress refilled his coffee twenty minutes later. In all that time, no one had even pulled into the parking lot. He was wondering how long he was supposed to wait when he heard, in the background, a telephone ringing. Not a cell ringtone. A real, old-fashioned phone.

The sound was coming from the small lobby area near the front door. Poppy glanced in that direction. No one was there. But a phone kept ringing.

He stood and walked to the entryway. A battered pay phone hung on the wall. Poppy’d hardly noticed this museum piece before; he’d walked right by it like most everyone probably did, with their cells resting in their pockets. He picked up the receiver.

“Yeah,” he answered.

“Mr. Martin? Is that you?”

“Yeah. Beverly?”

“Um-hmm.”

“How’d you get this number?”

“I called the café and they gave it to me. I knew the phone was there. Lew and I used to go. I’ve only got a few minutes. I wanted to tell you that you’ve got to stop calling me.”

“Beverly, I’m just trying to find Lew. I was his partner. I haven’t heard from him for eight months.”

“I know who you are. Lew used to talk about you.”

“Do you know where he is?”

The line went silent. “I was told,” Poppy continued, “that Covington asked Darter Security to transfer him out to Covington’s operations in Savannah River out east. Is that true?”

“That’s what they told me, too. Please stop trying to reach me.”

He feared she was about to hang up. “Wait, wait. I have to find Lew. Covington’s trying to get me to change my statement about what happened that night, especially about Lew firing his rifle.”

Silence. “I don’t know anything about that.”

She didn’t sound convincing. Poppy’s mind raced. “Have you spoken with Lew since the explosion?”

“Just once.”

“When.”

Silence. “That night. From the hospital. They’d taken his cell, but he called from a nurse’s desk.”

“What did he tell you.”

More silence. “I can’t tell you.”

Now the tentacles of fear reached over the line and into Poppy. “Have you tried to reach him in Savannah River?”

“No.”

“Why not?”

“There’ve been messages, texts from his phone. He says I’ll hear from him when he’s ready and I shouldn’t try to reach him until then.”

That tone. “You don’t believe it, do you, Beverly.”

She didn’t respond for a moment, then answered, “No.”

“Please, Beverly. I’ve got to know. What did Lewis tell you that last time you talked?”

But for the soft breathing over the line, this time Poppy would have been sure the girl had hung up.

“He said he was okay,” she finally said in a near whisper. “He was worried about you at the hospital that night. But he told me they’d warned him not to say anything about the explosion, so I couldn’t repeat anything he told me. Lew never could keep a secret. I’m afraid . . . I’m afraid Lew could get in trouble for my telling you this.”

Poppy wracked his memory for something to keep her on the line.

“How long did you date, Beverly?” he asked.

There was a pause. “A year.”

“Did you know he named his rifle for you? Did you know that?”

It sounded stupid—but nothing else came to mind. “No,” she answered after a moment.

“He did. He must have thought a lot about you.”

A sob came across the line.

“Beverly,” Poppy kept on softly, “did Lew say whether he fired a shot that night?”

Quiet. “Yes.”

“Did he say what he was shooting at?”

“A man. A man in a white coat.”

“Did he hit him?”

Silence. “He thought so.”

“What else did he say?”

Her voice grew more strained with each breath. “The guy was
coming out of an emergency exit where no one ought to have been. That’s all. He told me to keep it to myself, that maybe he could talk more after.”

“After what?”

“After his meeting.”

Poppy’s stomach tightened. “Meeting with who?”

“He didn’t say. Somebody from the Human Resources office.”

“And you haven’t heard from Lew since?”

There was a clicking sound over the line.

“
It’s them,
” Beverly moaned.

“How can I reach you again?” Poppy pleaded. “I couldn’t find an address for you. You’ve got to tell me how I can reach you again.”

The clicks fluttered in rapid succession.

“
You can’t
.”

“Be careful,” Poppy said. The line went dead.

Poppy dropped the phone back on the cradle. He looked out the door into the parking lot. No new cars had arrived at the restaurant. He looked around the corner into the dining room. The old folks were still the only occupants, nursing drinks while the waitress cleared the tables.

This was an old pay phone. He could hardly remember what it was like to use one. Maybe the clicks were a bad line, or because they’d run out of time on the call.

Poppy went back and handed the waitress a few dollars for his coffee, then he returned to his truck.

Suzy’d be at work now. He had to make sure she was safe and talk this through with her. It all was getting too crazy.

CHAPTER 30

T
HREE
D
AYS
U
NTIL
T
RIAL

It began while Emily was resting in her room: the faint
thwat-a-thwat-a-thwat
of her dad’s speed bag in the basement. She’d heard it every day since the pretrial hearing. When they’d gotten back from the courthouse that day, her father had gone to the sporting goods store and bought the bag, installing it in the Annex basement.

Emily rolled to a sitting position and reached for her shoes. She wondered how she’d feel if her father hadn’t stepped up for the trial. A part of her regretted making him take Kieran’s case—especially hearing the bag day after day.

But then she hadn’t made her father this way; he’d always lived a life of intensity. She recalled her mother softly chiding him at times, soothing him when it got to be too much, when the grind of his pace was reflected in an icy mood or exhausted face. Her mother’s special touch almost certainly made his life better—and a gentler father when he was around. Did it make him a better lawyer?

Her experience these past weeks now made Emily aware that her father must have reciprocated her mother’s love in his own way. Though too young at the time to remember, she wondered if he had shouldered the worst of the litigation for
her mother—taking on the Dr. Strongs and the Judge Renways of their world, just as he was beginning to do in this case. Perhaps in that way, he’d helped to preserve the best parts of her mother—the empathy and compassion she showered back on Emily and her father. Three months ago she would have rejected the notion. She couldn’t any longer. Because he was striving to do it for Emily right now.

The image of her father as that kind of protector had never occurred to her before this summer. She’d only begun to consider the possibility that his absence growing up might have been the price for her mother’s presence in Emily’s life.

The pounding of the speed bag continued unrelenting as Emily forced herself to her feet and headed downstairs to pick up the trial work once more.

Dr. Minh Trân had spent the afternoon and early evening of this Friday before trial completing errands in Sherman. Though Ryan Hart had told him which day of trial he’d likely testify, the lawyer had also asked him to be available to help with cross-examination of Covington’s experts. So he’d extended his reservation at the Holiday Inn Suites for two full weeks.

He pulled his rental car into the hotel parking lot and turned out the headlights. It was far past suppertime, and he felt a deep weariness. The report had been exhausting to prepare in such a short time frame, and he was still recovering from sleep deprivation. Tonight he prayed that room service was still available, and that he could get an early bedtime.