Mercy (3 page)

Allie picked up a catalog and whipped it at Cam's head. A glossy travel maga zine fell onto the desk between them. Her eyes widened at the white spray of beach and the weaving red sloop splayed across the front cover. She picked it up and curiously thumbed through it. "Well, at least it's not Playboy," s he said. She skimmed a list of all-inclusive resorts, and peered closer at a n advertisement depicting a tastefully nude sunbather.

Cam reached across the desk and plucked the magazine out of Allie's hand. Hi s face felt hot, his collar too tight; he didn't want Allie to know what he spent his time daydreaming about.

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Allie raised her eyebrows as a blush crept across Cameron's face. "I'll be d amned," she said. "You're trying to keep a secret." She leaned close to Cam.

"Not that it's up to me or anything, but I'd rather go sailing than skiing.

" She hesitantly moved forward an inch, keeping her eyes open, and touched h er lips to Cam's.

For a moment, Cam let her breath brush his mouth and then he kissed her q uickly and pushed her back. "Not here," he murmured.

"Then where?" Allie whispered, before she could stop herself. They both looked away, remembering the previous night. Allie's hands had st olen across the bed, slipping under the blue T-shirt he was wearing, moving in quiet circles. That was her invitation. And Cam had simply turned towar d her, his eyes setting a distance, his fingers staying her own.

"Oh," she had said, her hand dropping away.

"It's not you," he'd explained. "I'm just exhausted." Allie wondered where the myth that men wanted to make love more than wome n came from, since in her experience it was always the other way around. She did not like being less beautiful than her husband, or being the one who always made an advance. Sometimes Cam did not even bother to tell her he was tired. Sometimes he simply pretended to be asleep. She questioned if it might have been different if she were a classic beauty, or if she were sexy. She told herself that she'd lose ten pounds and cut he r hair and mold herself into someone irresistible, and then when Cam came gr abbing for her she'd simply turn away.

Maybe she'd find someone else.

And then she'd laugh at the very thought of letting anyone touch her the way Cameron MacDonald had.

As if she had conjured it, Cam reached for her wrist and began to stroke it with his thumb. He did not know what else to do. There were some things he just could not tell Allie, not even after five years. There were some time s he needed to be alone with thoughts of what he might have otherwise done with his life, and unfortunately that was often in the hollow of the night when Allie needed more from him. But in spite of what she thought when he r olled away from her, there was never any question in his mind about his fee lings for Allie. Loving her was a little like taking the

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same seat day after day on a commuter train--you couldn't imagine how it mig ht feel to be in the row behind, you could swear that the dimensions and hol lows of the seat were made just for you, you came back to it repeatedly with a whoosh of comfort and relief that it was still available. Allie was staring at him. If only she'd stop looking at him like that, her eyes catching his excuses and throwing them to the wind. He wished he could make her happy, or even spend as much time trying to as she did for him. C

am dug his thumbs under the loops of his heavy ammunition belt; out of the corner of his eye he saw a two-page spread of Acadia National Park. "I'm so rry," he said.

No, Allie thought, / am.

The woman stood behind the counter of the flower shop with her hands flying over a mix of fan palm, angel wings, bells of Ireland, gaultheria, oats, a nd milkweed. Cuttings carpeted the Formica and the black and white tiles of the floor. For a moment, Allie stood shocked in the doorway of her own sto re, watching a stranger do her job. Then she focused on the arrangement to the right of the cash register.

It was bell-shaped and quiet, a delicate arch of every shade of greenery that Allie had stored in the refrigerated case. At two spots, a splash of bright red caladium peeked from behind feathers of grass, shocking as blood. Allie took a step forward, and the woman jumped, her hand at her throat. "Yo u're in my place," Allie said.

The woman smiled hesitantly. "Well, then . . . I'll move." She hastily gathe red up the tools she'd filched from the back room, and in her hurry dropped a pair of shears on the floor. "Sorry," she murmured, dipping below the line of the counter to pick them up. She stepped around the counter and handed t hem to Allie like a peace offering.

It was the most presumptuous thing Allie had ever seen--some stranger walki ng into the store and making her own flower arrangement--and yet this woman seemed to blend into the shadows, like this had all been a mistake and out of her range of control. Allie glanced at the plum beret on the woman's ha ir, the nails bitten to the quick, the heavy knapsack slung against her rig ht foot. She was about the same age as Allie, but certainly not from Jodi Picoult

Wheelock or anywhere nearby; Allie would have remembered someone with ey es the wet violet color of prairie gentians.

Allie walked up to the counter, letting the softer greenery graze her palms.

"I thought you might be looking for an assistant," the woman said. She held out her hand, which was callused at the fingers from florist's wire, and sh aking slightly. "My name is Mia Townsend."

Allie could not tear her eyes away from Mia's arrangement, which brought to mind rolling fields and nickering horses and the hot, heavy press of a sum mer afternoon. She knew it had nothing to do with the actual flowers and fe rns Mia had chosen, but rather the skill of the placement and the thoughts that had gone into it.

Allie had not been looking for anybody; in fact in a town the size of Wheel ock most of her business came from the shop's association with FTD. But the n again, Christmas was coming, and Valentine's Day, and she'd kick herself if she let someone with Mia's talent walk out the door before she could lea rn a thing or two from her.

As if she knew that Allie was equivocating, Mia suddenly reached down for h er knapsack and pulled out a carefully wrapped package, which she began to unwind. Allie found herself looking at an exquisitely twisted bonsai tree; miniature, gnarled, ancient.

"Lovely," Allie breathed.

Mia shrugged, but her eyes were shining. "This is my specialty. They remind me of those babies you see sometimes, the ones with tiny little faces that look like they know all the wisdom of the world."

The wisdom of the world. Allie looked up. "I think," she said, "we can work something out."

T Tannah, who had a talent for eavesdropping, told Cameron that JLjL Vero na MacBean had written a book on the image of hell.

"It's not like it used to be," she said, tracing the top edge of her coffee cup

. "You know, fire and brimstone and all."

Cam laughed. "Don't tell Father Gillivray; he's looking forward to that stuff.

"

Hannah smiled at Cameron. "Verona says that instead of physical pain, it's more mental. Like, you know, if you marry this gorgeous guy only to find ou t in hell that he really married you for your money." 19

"I wouldn't worry," Cam said. "I don't pay you nearly enough." She smirked. "And suppose that in order to marry this hunk, you gave up s omeone who was really in love with you. The pain you'd feel knowing you p icked the wrong guy is supposedly what hell is like." Hannah wrinkled her nose. "Not that I can see where Verona MacBean, Wheelock Queen, would kn ow what hell is like at all."

Camerona's full-time sergeant, Zandy Monroe, stuck his head out from the l ocker room. "You forget, Hannah, that Verona used to date the chief." Cam threw a stack of mail at him. "Don't you have anything better to do?"

"That depends," Zandy said, grinning. "You taking me out to lunch?"

"No," Cam said. "I'm taking Allie out." He surprised himself; this wasn't s omething they'd planned when she stopped by earlier, but he knew she'd jump at the offer to spend an hour with him. He pulled on his heavy blue coat a nd locked his office door behind him. "If the town comes under siege," he s aid to Hannah, "you know where I'll be."

Walking down the half block to Allies flower shop, he started to smile. He'd step into the store and tell her he was looking for a bouquet, dahlias and li lies in colors that called back August. He'd say it was for someone special a nd he'd make her play along and give him a gift card and then he'd write, Wha t are you doing for the rest of your life?

Humming, Cam threw open the door of the flower shop and came face-to-face wi th a woman he had never seen before. Allie's name died on his lips as he sta red at the tangle of hair that bobbed just to her shoulders, the soft swolle n curve of her lip, the pulse at the base of her throat. She was not beautif ul; she was not familiar; and still all the breath left Cam's body. As he gr asped the hand she extended in greeting, he realized that her eyes were blue

-violet, the shade that he'd dreamed as the Bay of Biscay. Oh," Allie said, coming out from the back room. "This is Mia." And that was all she had time to tell Cam before Zandy Monroe burst through the door of the shop, throwing it back against its hinges hard enough to crack one pan e of glass.

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"Chief," he said, "you'd better come." Years of instinct had Cameron flying out the door behind his sergeant, left hand trained and ready on his gun. He saw a growing crowd of people in front of the police station; from the corner of his eye he noticed Allie and Mia shivering their way closer to the commotion.

With adrenaline pulsing through his limbs, Cam stepped into the center of the group, where a red Ford pickup truck was parked. Zandy walked up to th e driver's-side window. "Okay," he said, "this is the chief of police." Wi th a shrug at Cam, he murmured, "Wouldn't talk to anyone but you."

"Cameron MacDonald?"

The man's voice was strong but strained; an officer with less experience tha n Cam might not have noticed the pain that ran ragged over the syllables. "Y

es," he said. "What can I do for you?"

The man stepped out of the car. He did not live in Wheelock, but Cam thoug ht he'd seen him around town this past week. At the post office, maybe the tavern at the Inn. He was every bit as tall as Cam, but thinner, as if be ing alive had simply taken its toll. "I'm James MacDonald," the man said, loud enough for everyone to hear his last name. "I'm your cousin." He took a step back toward his truck, gesturing toward the passenger seat, in whi ch a woman was slumped over, sleeping. "My wife here, Maggie, is dead." He looked up at Cameron MacDonald. "And I'm the one who killed her." TWO

A Totwithstanding Verona MacBean's standards, all hell broke loose. J. if Two women fainted, one striking her forehead on the sidewalk so that a thi ck red pool of blood puddled under her cheek. In a pointless act of chival ry Art Maclnnes, the local barber, walked up to James MacDonald and punche d him in the nose. Two children on bright neon bikes wove around the picku p truck and through the festering crowd.

"All right!" Cam yelled. He gestured to Zandy, who started to walk around to the other side of the pickup. For all Cam knew, this guy could be some nut; the lady in the front seat could be napping or in a diabetic coma or playin g along. Cam turned around to face the crowd. "You all go home," he said. "I can't take care of this if you don't leave."

No one moved.

Cam sighed and took a tentative step toward James MacDonald, his arms stret ched out in front of him. James was slightly hunched over, holding his hand s up to a face streaming with blood. Cam reached into his pocket for a hand kerchief. "Here," he said, waving the small white square in front of James'

s face, in a gesture that looked much like a surrender.

James MacDonald hadn't done anything threatening; there was no reason to bring him into the station in handcuffs. Cam would

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sit him down, offer him coffee, try to get him talking. He wouldn't arrest him just yet.

"Chief," Zandy Monroe said, "the door's stuck." At the sergeant's voice, James MacDonald whirled around to see Zandy tuggi ng at the passenger door of the pickup truck. When it wouldn't budge, Zand y slipped two fingers into the partially unrolled window and tried to reac h the woman's neck to get a pulse.

With a feral cry, James MacDonald ripped out of Cam's grasp and ran to the other side of the truck. He pulled the sergeant away from the door, throwin g him backward with the bodily force that a tall, strong man learns to keep in check. "Don't you touch her," he screamed at Zandy, his fists clenched, his teeth obscenely white against mottled skin. He turned back to the door and wrenched it open, and that was when Cam saw the door hadn't been stuck

, but locked; that James MacDonald had ripped it from its bearings. He caug ht the body of his wife as it slumped up against him; pressed his cheek aga inst hers. He spoke against the white curve of her neck. "Don't you touch h er," he whispered.

Cam's eyes met Zandy's over the hood of the truck. He started to walk arou nd to the passenger side as Zandy moved closer to James MacDonald. But Jam es did not resist as Cam pulled him out of the cab of the truck. "Mr. MacD

onald, I'm going to have to put you under arrest." He snapped handcuffs ov er the man's wrists. "Uh, Sergeant," he said, nodding at the body in the t ruck, "you want to take care of this?"

James began to strain against the handcuffs. "No," he whispered to Cam. "Yo u can't."

Cam had to lean close to hear him. "We've got to go inside, Mr. MacDonald.

"

"Please don't leave her alone with him."

Out of the corner of his eye, Cam saw Allie step out of the crowd. She was shivering as she walked up to them, and she did not look Cam in the eye. "I

'm Allie MacDonald," she said. "I'm Cam's wife." She laid her hand on James

's arm. "I can stay with Maggie, if you'd like." James looked her over, and then nodded his head. Cam let his breath out in a long sigh, and motioned for Zandy to hold James's