Reluctant Witness (12 page)

“Are you kidding? Hand him over!” I insisted.
He opened the door of the VW and waited for me to get settled
before he lifted the dog up and deposited him on my lap. Kary stood
on all fours, tiny paws balancing on my thighs, and gazed around at
the car like he was seeing it for the first time. He sniffed the
air to make sure this was a good place to be. When he was sure it
passed the smell test, he twirled around twice and curled into a
ball on my knees. I patted his back, watching as the brown eyes
finally closed and sleep took over.

A mere twenty-five minutes after I sat in the
passenger seat, strapped myself in, and got cozy with the dog, I
found out why he was called Karaoke.

Chapter Eleven

“How about some music?” the man in the
driver’s seat asked me as we headed down I-95. I should have known
from the impish grin he gave me that something was afoot.

“Sure.”

He flicked a knob and I heard the twang of a
country guitar. “I’m a big George Strait fan, Marigold. I hope you
don’t mind.”

“I love any kind of music,” I replied. “Rock,
classical, jazz....”

“That’s good. After Deirdre left me, I put
together a play list of my favorite tunes. Prepare to be dazzled.
Ready, boy?”

Kary suddenly stirred in my lap. His little
head popped up, alert to his master’s voice. When his eyes landed
on the driver, he sat himself up expectantly and reached out a paw
to Lincoln.

“All my ex’s live in Texas!” Lincoln sang
along to the tune, tapping out the beat on the steering wheel. “And
Texas is the place I’d love to dearly be....”

“Woo!” Kary chimed in. “Woo-ooo!”

“Your dog sings?”

“You bet his does,” Lincoln grinned.

The pair moved on to Toby
Keith’s
Wish I Didn’t Know
Now
, following that up with
She Got the Gold Mine
(I
Got the Shaft), sung by Jerry Reed. The longer they went on with
their performance, the more I laughed. By the time they ended
with
Goin’ through the Big
D
, accompanying Mark Chestnutt, there were
tears streaming down my face and I was head over heels in love with
Kary.

“What a dog!” I gushed, giving the pooch a
big hug. He rewarded me by licking my face.

The rest of the journey to Reston went
smoothly. We spent much of it in companionable silence, letting the
miles pass without speaking. I let my mind wander, thinking about
everything that popped into my head. I wondered what would happen
next and whether we’d hear from the Marshals Service soon. I wanted
to know how Shaun and Tovar were doing. Would they be okay? I
thought about the new baby. The marshal had been so thrilled when
his wife gave birth to Griselda. It didn’t seem fair that she might
grow up without knowing her father. Tovar was a good man.

Lincoln navigated through the
bumper-to-bumper traffic for about twenty minutes, the result of a
multi-car pile-up just northeast of the nation’s capitol, before
coming off the Beltway and cutting through this side street and
that. He clearly knew his way around the city, so Kary and I sat
back and enjoyed the view. By the time we got to Reston, I was
curious about the place he called home.

“You want to know about my condo? It’s a top
floor unit, one bedroom with a loft. My favorite perk is the
convenient underground parking space. The location’s pretty good,
too. It’s almost midway between Washington and Quantico. I teach
courses at the FBI Academy.”

“Impressive. I assumed you went to an office
every day and wrote reports, in between arresting bad guys.”

“Actually, I’ve spent the last three years
traveling to some of the world’s biggest hell holes, investigating
crimes against Americans, assisting investigators from other
countries on cases, and doing whatever needs doing. I go wherever
the FBI sends me.”

“Is that good or bad?” I wondered.

“Well, not so good when I was married,
because I was rarely home. Deirdre didn’t like that much. She said
it made her feel single, without benefits. But it’s been good for
me since the divorce, because I would have gone nuts otherwise. Of
course, now that I’ve got my boy back,” he acknowledged, patting
Kary’s furry head, “it’ll be hard to be away from home. But I’m due
for reassignment to a major field office as an assistant special
agent-in-charge within the next few months, so we’ll get through
it.”

“What does that mean for Kary?”

“I’ve got that covered,” he smiled. “He’s
going to a good foster home.”

“Oh, poor thing,” I decided, holding the dog
a little closer. “Just when you thought you were home again,
fella.”

“Don’t you worry about him, Marigold. He
loves visiting Tom and Jojo, and they love having him.”

Lincoln left the Dulles Toll Road and took a
right onto Reston Turnpike, heading towards Market Street. He
pulled into the parking garage of the Savoy at the entrance on St.
Francis Street, rounded the corner, and drove down the length of
the garage until he came to a pair of enormous cement columns.
Pulling past these, he eased his VW into his marked space.

“Let’s run the little guy outside before we
go up,” he suggested, as we exited the garage. Navigating the maze
of hallways, we made our way to a set of exterior doors leading to
a charming outdoor courtyard.

Meandering paths led us around the sprawling
four-story condo complex. The lights on the lamp posts softly
illuminated the snow-dusted landscape as twilight fell. Leafless
trees, waiting for spring to return, were tucked among evergreens
and shrubs. I wondered what they would look like in bloom. It was
peaceful here; other than our muffled footsteps on the brick
walkways and some quiet conversation, there was only the
occasional, faint city sound to break the stillness. Above me, the
night sky was clear and just dark enough to offer an impressive
display of twinkling stars. The spires of Reston high-rises broke
up the horizon, but they didn’t seem to spoil the park-like setting
of this urban oasis.

The FBI agent released the retractable leash
so that Kary could explore the shrubbery, which he did with great
enthusiasm as Lincoln walked me past the large, winterized swimming
pool and around to the meditation garden. The air was crisp. I
could see my breath as we strolled. It came out in little white
puffs of vapor with each word I spoke.

“What an unexpected delight,” I told Lincoln.
“Everything is so serene.”

“This is the quiet time of year. It’s really
quite different come summer. Over there is where the grill masters
meet for some friendly competition,” he told me, as he pointed to
the outdoor barbecue area. “There are a lot of parties and informal
gatherings here. People are very social.”

The small Shih Tzu was ready to retreat to
the warmth of the Savoy, and he made that clear when he pawed his
master’s leg, begging for a lift. Lincoln scooped him up and led us
back to the parking garage, where we retrieved our belongings from
the trunk of the Jetta. Bags and gear in hand, we wound our way
through the building to the elevator and rode it up to the fourth
floor.

“Here we are,” he announced, stopping in
front of the second door on the left. He slipped the key into the
lock and turned the knob. “Welcome to home, sweet home.”

Stepping into a long, narrow room with
pristine hardwood floors, soaring ceilings, and walls the color of
unbleached linen, I glanced around. To my left, a flight of beige
carpeted stairs led to a white-railed loft. Beneath this was a
kitchen, with builder-grade cabinets in a honey brown finish, along
with the requisite granite counters and stainless steel appliances
so often found in newer condos.

Much to my surprise, however, the furnishings
were unique and very much reflective of the man beside me. A round
antique oak dining table was positioned near the kitchen, its hefty
pedestal supported by strong claw feet. I thought it was a handsome
choice. Lincoln had paired it with four Victorian oak chairs, their
seats and backs upholstered in what looked to be the original red
leather, providing a comfortable place to sit and eat. A long metal
chain hung down from the ceiling, and from it was suspended an
antique brass oil lamp with a white hobnail glass shade, refitted
as an electrical fixture. It reminded me of my grandparents’
farmhouse and for a moment, a wave of nostalgia hit me hard. How I
would have loved to have some of the family heirlooms with me.
Instead, they had been sold after we went into witness protection.
It was too much of a risk to bring them along with us to our new
place.

Mentally shaking myself, I continued on.
Along the long wall towards the back of the room was an
overstuffed, well-worn, saddle brown leather sofa with rolled arms
and bun feet. Some of the nail heads were missing along the bottom,
and the cushions sagged in the middle. No doubt it was a favorite
spot for Lincoln to relax. It faced a sixty-inch flat screen TV
that sat atop an antique chest of drawers. A pair of sturdy dark
wood end tables on either side had turned spindle legs, and upon
closer examination, I found they weren’t identical. The subtle
differences just seemed to add to their charm.

A carved oak blanket box Lincoln used as a
coffee table sat upon a faded tribal rug, with a wear pattern that
suggested the woven carpet was over a hundred years old.

“These are family heirlooms,” I decided, as I
took stock of the furnishings. “You grew up with these pieces.”

“That’s very astute of you, Marigold. They
came from my grandparents’ place in the Catskills. Deirdre always
thought they had seen better days and wanted me to sell them, but I
put them in storage instead. When I finally got my own place, I
brought them here.”

I crossed the floor to examine a pair of
Victorian oak-framed chairs, upholstered in green-and-tan striped
velvet. The wood had the wonderfully dark patina that comes with
age and use. I could imagine the many human hands through the years
that gripped the carved paws of the wooden arms.

“I haven’t had a lot of time to paint or
decorate since I bought the place last year,” Lincoln told me. That
was said with a slightly defensive tone. “I’ve been busy with
work.”

“Mmm...,” I mumbled, somewhat absentmindedly.
Sitting in one of the chairs, I turned and peered through the glass
of the closest window. Four floors down was the outdoor courtyard
where we had just walked the dog. I turned to face him, ready to
give him my verdict. “Nice.”

He walked over to join me, settling in the
chair to my right. He stretched his long legs out in front of him
and folded his hands in his lap. I glanced up, to the other side of
the room, noticing how plain, almost stark, the walls were. Those
brown eyes followed my gaze across the expanse of beige, as if he
was trying to see it from my perspective. “You like the place?”

“Absolutely. I think I was expecting a very
contemporary place from you, all glass and metal, with sleek
lines.”

“What’s the ‘but’? You’d do something
different.”

“No, it’s not that. It needs...it needs
something from you, something of you. You’ve got furniture here,
but no books, no souvenirs from your trips around the world.”

He stared at me, for just a moment or two,
and then he softly smiled. “I guess I was well-trained. I learned
to let Deirdre make all the decorating decisions, in order to keep
the peace.”

“Oh, I’m sorry.” Mortified, I realized to my
horror that I had hit a nerve. It was hard to ignore the reality
that this man was a stranger to me. What right did I have to
intrude on the secrets of his past? It hadn’t occurred to me that
his ex-wife was the domo major of the household, chief
decision-maker in all things relating to the home they shared, but
given her obvious penchant for controlling everyone around her, I
really should have figured it out for myself.

“Don’t be sorry.” Lincoln brushed my concern
away with a good-natured shrug. If Deirdre had been so determined
to control every aspect of their home life, the least I could do
was give him the chance to recover his inner man in his own time,
at his own pace, and offer my support.

“It’s hard to restart your life, isn’t it?” I
commiserated. “Just when you get used to the status quo, everything
changes and you’re supposed to change with it.”

“After being married for so long, the last
thing I expected was to be living on my own again. That was
something that required some adjusting. I guess I’m still
adjusting.”

“It takes time.” I offered encouragingly,
even as he seemed to slip away mentally to some place I couldn’t
follow. Was he taking inventory of what his life had become or
wishing for what had been? The awkward silence grew as we sat
there, side by side. At last, Lincoln put his hands on his thighs,
stretched out his long, bony fingers, and reluctantly rose to his
full height.

“Let me show you the bedroom where you’ll be
sleeping,” he said. Waiting for me to get out of my chair, he stood
there briefly, a man with one foot still caught in the past and the
other poised to move on. I had seen the symptoms in other men going
through divorce. It was usually diagnosed as a heart torn by
sorrow, something that only time could heal. “It’s this way.”

He flipped a wall switch on as he led me into
a starkly furnished room with only a white queen-sized cast iron
bed, a walnut washstand, and an Eastlake chest. A small antique
lamp with a red glass shade gave off a warm glow atop the washstand
and the blue quilt was a cheerful touch, but these were not enough
to distract the eye from the overabundance of beige walls and
carpet. “I haven’t gotten around to decorating this room.”

Was that his way of telling me he hadn’t
moved on yet? If ever a man was conflicted, it was he. The pain of
losing the wife he had lived with for more than a decade was still
too fresh, too raw. When the bedroom was finally completed, would
that mean the divorce was real and he would finally accept Deirdre
wasn’t going to be part of his life any more?