In Plain View (34 page)

“I’m sorry? Did you say ‘full rock band’? My funky, Amish-modern-world tragedy,
This American Life
meets
60 Minutes,
sure-bet-for-an-Emmy-nomination-at-least, now has a music video soundtrack?”

No answer.

“College, did you ever explain to me exactly why they kicked you out of school?”

“Ha,” he laughed nervously. “Funny.”

“We’re going to talk about this later. I’m hanging up now. I think I may be hallucinating.” My pride sluiced through a filter of relief. “Thanks, Ainsley. For handling stuff on the work front. I’ll call you in the morning.”

“You’re welcome, Maddy.”

Jenny decided she was hungry as soon as I got off the phone. Curzon volunteered to stick around and supervise the heating of the frozen pizza. Then he stayed while we watched a mind-numbing kids’ movie on cable. When Jenny finally fell asleep on the couch, he was the one who carried her into her room while I limped along behind them. But he left me to do the tucking in.

“You did good today, kid,” I whispered to the sleeping girl. If people in a coma can hear you, why not someone merely dreaming? I brushed the hair off her face and rubbed her forehead lightly with my thumb. Little by little the motion smoothed the furrows between her brows. “Don’t give up on me.”

She didn’t answer. She slept. Peacefully. That was enough.

For the moment.

Before I went back into the family room, I went and found my messenger bag and the large plastic storage container that my sister had filled with medicine and supplies. The same one Jenny had pulled out to treat me after my fall. Hobbling back into the family room, I set the box on the coffee table in front of Curzon. Curious, he reached for the lid. I stopped him from lifting it.

“Did you know?” I asked.

“Know?”

“Pat. My sister. He drove the car—”

“He tell you that?” he interrupted, suddenly shifting forward on the couch.

I nodded. Holding so much inside, I lost the ability to verbalize. I was afraid I’d scream if I opened my mouth.

Curzon stared at me. “He’s going to jail. For a long time.”

I hit the top of the plastic box with the flat of my hand. The sting helped. “Did. You. Know.”

“I suspected.”

I heard my breath rush out as if I’d taken a hit. “Why…why didn’t you say something?”

“I told you I hadn’t given up investigating your sister’s case.” He was completely matter of fact about it. “I’ve been watching that guy for weeks.”

“Why didn’t you tell me!” It wasn’t a question. It was an accusation.

“Same reason you didn’t you tell me, until a few hours ago, you had an SUV following you all over town!” He stood up fast and sent the box skidding across the table. “You have secrets you need to keep, Maddy O’Hara? I have mine.”

True enough. I hadn’t told him half the things I should have.

Curzon tipped his head and winced, as if he didn’t like the sound of his own words. “Nicky’s letter had the fire service people in an uproar. I couldn’t go near Pat without a written complaint, something concrete to investigate. The IAFF filed a grievance against the police department that named every man at station six. Politics muddied the water.”

I sat down on the edge of the table. “That’s why you were nagging about reporting the car that ran me off the road? Politics?”

“Pat’s connected. You know how things work.”

“Where’s the pressure coming from? The guy who brought Pat to your party? The one who’s challenging you for Sheriff?”

“Got it in one.”

“I’ll witness a complaint. But I can do concrete, as well.” I pulled the box close and took off the lid. Beneath the princess band-aids and the hot water bottle sat a gallon-sized baggie full of several dozen foil blister packs. “This is what Pat was looking for. Jenny found it out in the garage the other day. According to Pat, my sister took it from him. She was planning to turn him in.”

Curzon squeezed the bag, smooshing the foil packets around inside. “They’re samples. Handed out by the pharmaceutical companies to doctors as trial medicine for patients. Not tracked like other medication because they’re supposedly available in limited quantities.” He looked at the labels. “These are popular on the club scene.”

We both took a few calming breaths. Curzon finally sat back down on the couch.

“I have one more thing to show you.” From the bottom of my backpack I pulled out Tom Jost’s cell phone and put it on the table. “Jane Q. Public wants to turn this in.”

“Christ, O’Hara! I’ve been looking everywhere… Where did Jane get it?”

I thought of the old man in the plastic hospital tent and his daughter in Grace’s car, both struggling to heal in isolation. Curzon was right. I needed to keep their secrets. “Jane doesn’t remember.”

The sheriff did not look happy with that answer, so I kept talking. “The phone numbers in memory show that Tom Jost called the authorities and invited them to his pending suicide. He also called his dad. And Pat.”

Curzon nodded. “I looked those calls up with dispatch after Jane gave me her last tip. Didn’t know about the dad or Pat. But that fits.”

“Fits how?”

“Am I still speaking to Jane? Or am I speaking to Maddy O’Hara?”

“Maddy’s story is in the can. Jane is merely curious.”

“Tom did write a note. He mailed it to the fire chief. Didn’t say he was going to kill himself, but he confessed that he’d failed to discourage Pat from engaging in harmful activities and the fire chief might want to investigate.” Curzon waved the sample packet in the air. “Figured it was something like this. I tried to use the note as leverage for a warrant but there was too much blow-back. How could the judge trust the word of a guy who was obviously unstable?”

“Shit.”

“Pretty much.” Curzon flicked at the edge of the foil tablet packaging with his thumb, an angry, nervous gesture that reminded me of someone playing with a cigarette lighter. “In the letter, the guy apologized to the entire universe. Then he warned the chief they’d need someone to cover his shift days from now on.”

A tired sigh deflated me. “No way.”

“There are some things I will never understand.” Curzon tossed the packet into the box. He held out his empty hand.

I took it.

“There’s more to the story, isn’t there? Pat’s no evil genius. There’s no way he got into this all by himself.”

Curzon tried to stonewall but the man had just spent the last two hours eating pizza and insulting the intelligence of cartoon characters with me. The blank face no longer worked as a disguise.

“Am I wrong?”

“Press and police sit on opposite sides of the fence, O’Hara. Most of the time.” He tugged my hand and pulled me beside him on the couch. The dip in the cushion rolled me toward him. “Your sister’s death was a tragedy. The man responsible is going to jail. Don’t get focused on the wrong thing here. What happens with you and Jenny now, that’s the part you can do something about.”

I thought about the fight with Pat. Jenny’s safety, physical and mental, all that mattered. Still, “I want to know what happened. I want to know the rest of it.”

“So do I.” He said the words with quiet conviction.

I believed him. “Can I help?”

“No.”

“Can you stop me from helping?”

“No?” he replied, rhetorically, then leaned forward and oh, so gently, touched my cheek. “I haven’t done this sort of thing in a while.”

“Me neither.”

Overcome evil with good.

In Curzon’s eyes, I saw goodness. It reminded me of something I didn’t tell Ainsley. Sometimes what we see describes half-forgotten dreams of what might yet be.

“Kiss me?” he asked.

I thought of Curzon’s words and the truth he’d told me so far. This was another part that mattered, another part that I could do something about.

Slowly, I felt myself tilt toward him in a motion both grand and imperceptible as the earth shifting on its axis.

Tomorrow would be soon enough for all the unasked questions.

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