Take Another Look (14 page)

“That is so gross.” The three of them groaned together.

“Was Olivia stinky?” Sydney asked.

“Oh, yeah. She reeked.” Harper giggled, and the girls laughed together.

“But I still don't get it,” Harper said. “If she hates water so much, why did her parents buy a house on the lake?”

“Yeah. Why even bother to live in Mirror Lake? I mean, we're around water all the time.”

“It's all about real estate values,” Emma said.

A wise girl.

 

After dinner the girls went up to Harper's room to listen to some music. Jane was glad for some privacy; she needed to talk to Luke, the sane center of this crazy, spinning world.

“How's it going over there?” he asked. “How's Harper taking it?”

“Surprisingly well, but then again, we're talking about the fall of her arch rival.”

“Yeah, well, she's got to feel bad for the kid. Did you see a glimmer of compassion?”

“Barely. She was more concerned with getting to an impromptu party, which I put the kibosh on. But I'm sick about Olivia. Have you heard anything new?”

“They've got her stabilized. No visitors. Marcus stopped by and talked to Pete Ferguson. He didn't see Linda, but Pete's pretty broken up. Rightly so. Olivia's suffered a serious contusion. The doctors are keeping an eye on it. If the swelling increases, she'll need surgery to alleviate the pressure on the brain.”

“That's awful.” Jane couldn't imagine what Pete and Linda were going through. And Olivia. “Poor kid.”

“But it sounds like Pete is staying positive, and overall the prognosis is good.”

Jane collapsed onto the corner of the sofa with a grateful sigh. “Well, at least she's stable and in good hands. Did Olivia say how she ended up in the water?”

“She doesn't seem to remember. Apparently she's disoriented, which is normal for a concussion. I checked out the symptoms on WebMD. Olivia might have a clearer picture of what happened in a day or two.”

“So we don't know . . .”

“We don't know if it was an accident or an attack.”

A shiver skittered along Jane's spine, and she slid down until her head nestled against the armrest. “That is positively creepy. I wish you were here.”

“I wish I could be there to protect. And devour.”

She smiled. “Easy there. I've got kids in the house. I don't want to scare them, but I can't stop thinking about Olivia. Did you know she has a fear of water? I keep thinking of the panic she must have felt, and somehow it's worse to think that someone might have deliberately pushed her into the water.”

“I want to think that this was all an accident,” Luke agreed. “That Olivia tripped and fell into the water. That she was stoned.” He gave a heavy sigh. “I want to think that because the alternative might compromise my faith in humanity.”

“I know. The prospect of a girl's being attacked in Mirror Lake—I mean, in broad daylight, with all those people around—it's awful.”

“The logical explanation would be an accident,” he said.

“That's what I'm hoping for.”

Her worries were eased by her conversation with Luke. At the very least it was a relief to hear that Olivia was holding her own. Still, the prospect of an attack pressed on Jane's thoughts. When Trish and Keiko arrived to pick up their girls, the quick, murmured exchange among mothers told her that they shared the same worries. What if it had been an attack? Were their daughters safe?

No one is safe,
Jane thought that night as she stared out into the black night beyond her bedroom window.
Danger crosses your path and strikes you down. Sometimes the attack is sudden; other times it's slow and subtle, a seduction of sorts, a slowly turning vortex that sucks you in. One wrong move, one poor choice, and you're caught in the trap. No turning back. No chance.

As she lowered the shade she caught a startling reflection of herself, jaw clenched in a grimace, eyes wild.

Whoa. Slow down; take a breath.
She had to stop slipping back to panic mode, back to that numb state of mind that had consumed her in the dark days of her imprisonment with Frank.

The sheets were blessedly soft as she stretched out and pulled back her tight shoulders. Although her nerves were all gummed up, she smoothed back the pages of the cheerful though improbable cozy mystery she'd been reading and gave it a try. The steely nerve of the sleuth was encouraging somehow.

The next thing she knew, the book was flopped onto her chest and Harper stood by her bed. In her boxer shorts and T-shirt, with Hoppy the bunny pressed in the crook of her neck, Harper could have been five years old again.

“I can't sleep.”

Jane lifted the covers. “Come on in.”

Harper slid in and huddled on her side, facing Jane. The stuffed bunny was tucked under her chin so that Harper's fingers could worry the worn ribbon around the animal's neck, a gesture that had soothed Harper since she was a toddler. That ribbon had been replaced at least three times.

“Do you feel sick?” Jane asked, grateful that her daughter still came to her in the middle of the night. She had never minded the late-night visits when nightmares or charley horses had awakened her girl.

“No, just... I don't know.”

The light from the bedside lamp cast a glossy glow over Harper's features, and for a moment Jane glimpsed a sliver of both herself and Frank. Could their daughter possess the best of them? Forget about genetic probability, the chromosome for blue eyes or a propensity for evil. Wasn't there some wondrous, creative magic in the emerging form of a human being?

“I can hear my heart beating in my ears,” Harper said. “Is that normal? It's beating so hard. I just . . . I feel kind of breathless and rattled.”

“That's happened to me before. I hate that feeling. If you let it take over, it will become a full-fledged panic attack.” Jane smoothed the dark hair from her daughter's forehead. “You know, fear and anxiety can have a strong effect on a person's body.”

“Like what?”

Jane tried to explain the terrifying anxiety that could overcome a person. “I'm not saying you're having a panic attack, but we're all a little freaked out tonight. It's been a tough day. Those were some scary moments when they found Olivia in the lake.”

Harper's mouth twisted. “I know. Now I feel bad for her.”

At last, a scintilla of compassion. “A lot of people are worried about Olivia tonight, thinking good thoughts and praying. That's what a community does when someone gets hurt. That's one of the reasons I'm grateful to live in Mirror Lake. I know we've got our share of nosy moms and spoiled kids.”
Ourselves included,
Jane thought. “But when someone needs help, the people around here do what needs to be done. Good neighbors and friends.” She was prattling on, filling the space with fluff to distract Harper, who yawned. It seemed to be working.

“I know. Is Olivia going to die?”

“No.” The blunt question was unsettling, but Harper deserved an answer. “It sounds like she's going to survive.”

“That's good. I feel kind of bad about how much I've hated her. I'm going to try to be a better person from now on. I mean, I'm not just going to try; I'm going to do it. I'm going to be nice to people. Even obnoxious people like Olivia. Like you always say, I'm going to take the high road and just, like, look the other way when someone annoys me.”

“That sounds like a wise plan.” Jane had to keep herself from gushing over Harper's epiphany. This was an enormous step in the right direction. “How's that heartbeat doing?”

Harper stopped twirling Hoppy's bow to press a hand to her ear. “It's gone. I can't hear it anymore.” She smiled at Jane. “Thanks, Mama-dish. You calmed me down.”

“You're welcome.”

Harper resettled with Hoppy and closed her eyes. “I'm so tired. Are you going to turn off the light?”

“Yup.” Jane reached for the bedside lamp, catching a last glimpse at the tempestuous light of her life before darkness fell over them. Harper had her bad moments—and indefensible, inappropriate actions. But deep inside she had a good heart. Of course, Jane was biased; she would never stop loving her daughter. And if the legend of love was true, eventually it would transform them both.

Chapter 15

T
he next morning Jane slipped out of bed, trying not to wake up the sleeping girl with dark hair spread over the pillow and an aura of peace settled over her. Jane grabbed her book and headed downstairs for coffee.

“Good morning, Phee-Phee.” She opened the back door for Phoenix, who sniffed the grass with little enthusiasm. “We'll go for a walk in a few minutes,” she promised. The sky was overcast—a pallid pearl gray that promised rain—but Jane knocked the webs from one of the chairs on the back deck and sat down with her coffee and book. Some mornings in the small yard she fantasized that she was weekending at a country resort. Funny, what a few flowering plants could do for your morale. Privacy, too. The tiger lilies between her deck and Nancy's fence were splendid and dense, a profusion of green dotted with orange flowers, each as fat as a melon.

In the rear corner of the yard were two small flowering pear trees that hosted native birds year round. When Harper had been in grade school, one of the science units that focused on local birds had required Harper to keep a birding journal. Together she and Jane had set up a small birdhouse and hung a suet seed cake from the fence. “When are the birds coming to eat?” Harper had asked. “Aren't they hungry?” It had taken a week or so, but they had arrived in flocks and pairs. Nuthatches and house finches. Tiny black-capped chickadees that seemed to be wearing black hoods. Long-tailed balls of gray fluff that Harper identified as bushtits. What fun that project had been. She had helped Harper with the illustrations, but Hoppy had handled the journals and bird sightings herself. Learning the bird names and characteristics, Harper had realized that memorization was one of her strengths. “All this time, I didn't think I had a strength besides sports,” she had told Jane, who now sighed at the memory. She loved that kid.

This morning Jane could hear birdsong, but the only sighting was of a pair of bossy scrub jays. Probably scaring all the other birds off.

Phoenix returned to the deck, circled, and then plopped down at Jane's feet. Over her first cup, Jane organized the day ahead. Harper had a game in the afternoon, but the morning was free. Well, sort of. Harper probably had some homework to do, and Jane had brought home a batch of letters to grade. The proverbial “What I did over my summer vacation” in letter form. As Jane had told the class that they could fictionalize, she looked forward to some outlandish reading.

She was in the kitchen refilling her coffee cup when the phone rang. When she heard Gray Tarkington's voice, a flicker of surprise made her straighten.

“I hope I didn't wake you,” he said. “Sunday morning and all.”

“No problem.” She took the steaming mug back out to the deck. “What's up?”

“I'm calling about Harper's bat.”

“You found it?”

“Actually, the police did, just before dark last night. It's an alloy bat with Blue Lightning emblazoned on it, right?”

“That's it.” Jane was almost afraid to admit it. “But the police . . . Where did they find it?”

“In the bushes by the boat cabana. So . . . you haven't heard from the cops yet?”

“No.” Suddenly, her coffee seemed too acidic to handle. She put the mug on the table. “Gray, what's going on?”

“Look, Jane, I'm probably not supposed to be telling you this, but the cops want to talk to Harper about how her bat found its way to the scene of the crime.”

“How would she know? The bat was stolen from her bag. I told you about it.”

“I remember. That was one of the reasons I could identify it so quickly.”

Jane's mind was spinning. “You know Harper. She would never do anything like that.” Like what? Use her bat to conk Olivia on the head?

Even as Jane objected, her words rang false in her ears, reminding her of the vapid parents who defended their wicked little darlings.

“Look . . .” Gray paused, fumbling in silence for a moment. “Harper's a good kid, but everyone knows about the bad blood between Olivia and your daughter.”

“Yeah. It's no secret.” Hadn't Jane and two dozen other witnesses seen Harper come after Olivia with Blue Lightning in her hands? “But rivalry is one thing. Knocking another kid unconscious . . . that's not Harper. Most of our students wouldn't cross that line.”

“I hope not.” The distress was apparent in his usually deadpan voice. “I'm sorry, Jane. I don't mean to insinuate anything about your daughter, but I do want the cops to get to the bottom of the attack on Olivia.”

“So it
was
an attack? Is that confirmed?”

“I think so, but I can't say for sure. They took the bat as evidence . . . a possible weapon. I'm sorry. Maybe I shouldn't have called. I don't want to give you misinformation. You need to talk to the police.”

He was right about that, but the prospect of facing the police right now was like a knife in her gut.

 

After a conversation with Luke, Jane decided to take control of the situation and contact the police.

“Tell them you heard that they found your daughter's softball bat and that she needs it for this afternoon's game,” Luke advised.

“Will they really believe I'm that naïve?”

“Hey, they don't know you watch
Law & Order.
And maybe Gray was wrong. Olivia could have hit her head on the dock as she fell into the water. They'll determine that from the size and angle of the wounds—that part is science, but I doubt the investigation has gotten that far yet. And maybe they've ruled out assault. Who knows? They might just give the bat back to you.”

Despite Luke's logic, Jane still found the idea of confronting the police daunting. “Maybe I should hire a lawyer.”

“For what? Even if the bat was used as a weapon, it doesn't mean Harper was the person who wielded it. Save your money. Talk to Harper. Make sure she has her story straight; a police interview can be very intimidating, even when you've done nothing wrong.”

“That's why I'm worried.”

“As long as she doesn't get rattled, she'll be fine.”

Jane ended the call with Luke, and then phoned the precinct. A detective named Eldon Drum thanked Jane for calling and agreed to see them this morning. Sick with worry, Jane moved to the stairs.

Waking Harper was never a joyful task. Jane eased the blinds open and started by saying there'd been a change of plans.

Harper must have sensed the tension in her mother's voice. “What happened?” She opened her eyes and stared sternly at the ceiling.

When Jane told her that they had an appointment at the police precinct, Harper sat up suddenly. “Wait. Why?”

“They found Blue Lightning near the boathouse.”

Harper grinned. “They found it!”

“That's the good news, I guess. The police think someone might have used it to hit Olivia. That would make it a part of the crime scene—an assault weapon. I suspect they want to ask you how the bat got there, and where you were around the time when Olivia was found in the lake.”

“They're so stupid,” Harper whined. “How would I know how the bat got there when it was stolen?”

“That's exactly what you need to tell the police,” Jane said, “but in a much nicer tone.”

Harper moaned as she plucked at Hoppy's bow. “This is not what I wanted to do this morning.”

“Same,” Jane returned, using her daughter's shorthand.

“But it's better to get this over with. You don't want to miss your game.”

“Well, yeah.” Harper threw back the comforter of Jane's bed. “Do you think they'll give me the bat back? I really need it today. We're playing Canby.”

“I wouldn't count on it.” Jane pulled a pair of jeans from the drawer of her dresser, and then turned back to face her daughter. “As I said, they'll want to know where you were when Olivia got hurt.”

“Okay.” With Hoppy dangling from one hand, Harper plodded out.

“Wait. Where were you?”

“With Emma and Sydney.”

Jane shook her head as a queasy feeling niggled at her. “I saw them. You weren't there.”

“Yes, I was. God, Mom.” And Harper disappeared down the hall.

 

On the way to the precinct, Jane tried once again to nail down Harper's whereabouts. “It's important that you tell the truth,” Jane said, sparing a quick look of concern at her daughter before glancing back at the road. “If you change your answer in any small way, they'll think you're lying. You'll lose all credibility, and they'll begin to question everything you tell them.”

Even to Jane, the warning seemed more like a lesson in swindling than an endorsement of trustworthiness. How had she raised Harper all these years without instilling important concepts like honesty and integrity?

“I was with my friends, okay? What do you want me to say?”

“Just the truth.”
The real truth,
Jane thought as her fib radar sounded the alarm. She sensed that Harper was hiding something. Time spent with a boy? With senior students? Alcohol? Drugs? She sighed, hoping that she wasn't delivering her daughter to the lion's den.

As they entered the police station there was a moment of awkwardness when Jane acknowledged the female officer at the desk. The cold fish. The woman's bland, flat eyes were uncaring, but they also gave no indication of recognition from the curfew incident. This meeting would be Jane's third or fourth encounter with local law enforcement in as many weeks. You go fourteen years without even a traffic ticket, and suddenly you're a precinct regular. She took a seat in the steel and plastic chair, hoping for another fourteen years of law-abiding peace.

“Mrs. Ryan?” A graying man with a pleasant smile and twinkling eyes hobbled into the small waiting area. His skin tone, a rich mocha, suggested that he was mixed race. “I'm Eldon Drum.” He shook Jane's hand, and then turned to Harper. “And this must be the softball star.”

Harper glimmered, all blue eyes and shiny braces. “I'm Harper.”

“I appreciate you coming in. Your mom told me you have a game later today.” He shuffled toward an office, obviously struggling with pain as he walked. “Don't mind me. Bad knees. I'm getting some bionic replacements soon. Titanium! Until then, basketball is out.” He eased himself into a chair. “Now I know you play softball, Harper. How about hoops?”

“My favorite sport.”

As Harper talked basketball with the detective, Jane took a welcome breath of relief. Compared to old “Fish-eye” outside, this cop oozed personality. They had lucked out.

“So let's talk about your teammate, Olivia.” Eldon Drum had a patient yet energetic delivery, like a minister sharing a joke. He showed Harper a photo of Blue Lightning, and she nodded.

“Sure looks like my bat.”

He asked her when she'd seen it last, and she gave him the timeline: from practice at the school field to the swim park to stowing the bags behind the snack shack.

“So the other girls brought their bags to the picnic. And they had softball bats with them, too?”

“Most of them.”

“Interesting.” He scraped back his hair, which curled over his collar in the back. Frank would have had a conniption over that haircut on a cop. He had been a stickler for the elite esprit de corps—a tight, buttoned-down dress code for officers. Annoyed with herself, Jane dug her fingernails into the flesh of her palms. Why was she dredging up a memory of Frank as if he were an authority on law enforcement? Years ago she had worked, purposefully and tediously, to chase him from her psyche; perhaps it was time to reaffirm her commitment to sanity.

While Jane was lost in reverie, the conversation volleyed between Harper and the detective, a smooth, uncontentious match. Eldon Drum did not shed any new light on Olivia's injuries, and although he was cautious about making too many speculations, he believed that she had been attacked.

“That's a frightening thought,” Jane said, speaking up for the first time. “I know many of us have been hoping it was just an accident.”

“Not from where I stand,” Drum said, “though I could be wrong. It's happened before, and it'll happen again. The human condition! Anyhow . . .” He turned back to Harper. “I appreciate your dragging your mom in here today. My job is to gather as much information as possible, and your cooperation is making my job much easier. I'd been wondering why anyone would bring such a nice softball bat to a park without a playing field; now I know why. But I have to say, I can't imagine how that bat got from the area behind the snack shack to the boathouse without anyone seeing. There were hundreds of students in that park yesterday, and so far the kids we canvassed do not recall seeing anyone walking around with a blue and silver softball bat.”

“Actually?” Harper's blue eyes were earnest. “There's an easy way to do that without being seen.”

What the hell? Jane shot her a scalding look, but her daughter was already explaining how the culprit could have disappeared into the bushes that lined the property's border.

“Show me on the map,” the detective said, pushing out of his chair to go to the satellite map pinned on the wall behind him.

Her fingers tracing the dark line of shrubs and small trees, Harper showed Drum a route around the edge of the park. “Even if you climb the fence to the neighbor's yard, they don't mind,” she said. “Kids do it all the time.”

Staring at the map, the detective rubbed his jaw. “This I did not know. Wow. That answers that question. Thanks.”

“You're welcome.”