41
When they found Detective Harrison, everyone was shocked. He was such an upright man who’d done so much good in the community, a good husband and a father, a good cop. No one could believe that he’d picked up an underage hooker on the outskirts of the city, did some heroin with her, and then passed out in his car to be found by police responding to an anonymous tip made from a nearby pay phone.
How terrible, they said. Rumor has it that his wife threw him out. He must have had some kind of nervous breakdown; there was no history of this kind of behavior. No drugs, his friends were sure. Not even much of a drinker, they added. There were rumors of a gambling addiction. Suspect deposits in his bank account. How sad.
He ranted and raved as they took him in and processed him as they would any perpetrator. The cops who had been his friends were unable to meet his eyes. He told them the whole story about the gambling debts, my false identity, what he’d learned about Grief Intervention Services and Alan Parker, how Ella Singer had Tasered him at the Powers home. This was a frame-up, he yelled, to keep him from getting any closer. But he sounded like a maniac. No one listened. He just came unglued, the other cops whispered in locker rooms, in bars after shifts ended-it must have been the stress from the gambling addiction, problems with his wife, a new baby.
The judge went easy on him: drug treatment, community service. He had come to his senses, admitted to his drug problem as his PBA rep instructed him to do, admitted to his gambling addiction, too. He enrolled in a place they called “The Farm,” a facility outside town where cops with addictions are sent to get well. He was suspended without pay pending the results of treatment. The PBA rep said they couldn’t fire him because the department views addiction as a disease-treat, don’t punish. Of course, everyone knew that his career was over.
But Harrison found he could bear it all-the humiliation, the weeks of treatment for a drug addiction he didn’t have, and all that time to reflect on what was wrong with his life, the inevitable loss of the only job he’d ever wanted to do. Even in the throes of despair he experienced as he lay in the uncomfortable bed, missing his wife and baby, thinking about how badly he’d let them down, he found he could live with the things that were happening because Sarah believed him. She looked into his eyes and knew that he was telling the truth. And she still believed that somehow, together, they were going to make everything all right again.
42
I feel a small, warm body next to mine, smell the familiar scent of Johnson’s baby shampoo. I’m afraid that it’s a dream. I feel her shift and move, issue a little cough, and my heart fills with hope.
“Mommy, are you still sleeping?”
I’m in a room flooded with light, so bright I can’t see. I close and open my eyes until they adjust. I see Gray slumped in a chair, staring out the window. I hear the steady beeping of a heart monitor.
“Mommy.”
“Mommy’s sleeping, Victory,” says Gray, edgy, sad.
“No, she isn’t,” Victory says, annoyed. “Her eyes are open.”
He looks over at us quickly, then jumps up from his chair and comes over to the bed where I’m lying.
“Annie,” he says, putting his hand on my forehead. He releases a heavy sigh, and I see tears spring to his eyes before he covers them, embarrassed. My lungs feel heavy and my head aches, but I have never been happier to see any two people.
“He’s dead,” I try to tell Gray, but my throat feels thick and sore. My voice comes out in a croak. “He’s gone.”
He shakes his head and looks confused, as if he isn’t sure what I’m talking about. He kisses me on the forehead. “Try to relax,” he says.
“Mom, you’ve been sleeping for a long time,” Victory tells me. “Like days.”
I look at her perfect face-her saucer eyes and Cupid’s-bow mouth, the milky skin, the silky, golden puff of her hair-and lift my weak arms to hold her. I feel waves of relief pump through my body. She’s mine. She’s safe. Victory.
“Are you all right, Victory?” I ask when I can finally bring myself to release her. I examine her for signs of trauma or injury. But she’s perfect, seems as happy and healthy as ever.
“What happened?” I ask Gray over her head. “How did you get her back?”
But then the room is filled with doctors and nurses. Gray takes Victory from me, and they stand by the window as I am poked and prodded.
“How are you feeling, Annie?” asks the kind-faced Asian doctor. She is pretty and petite, with a light dusting of lavender on her eyelids, the blush of pink on her lips.
“My chest feels heavy,” I say.
“That’s the smoke inhalation,” she says, putting a stethoscope to my chest. “Breathe deeply for me.”
“Smoke?” I ask after I’ve drawn and released a breath with difficulty.
“From the fire,” she says, hand on my arm. “I’m afraid it will be a while before we know if the lung damage is permanent.”
“I don’t remember,” I say, looking over at Gray, who offers me a smile. There’s something funny on his face, something worried, anxious. I know this look. It makes me feel suddenly very uneasy.
“You will. Don’t worry,” says the doctor, patting my arm. “No rush. Let’s get you better first.”
The next few hours pass in a blur of tests and examinations. I gather that I’ve inhaled smoke from a fire. But I don’t remember a fire. Whenever I ask questions, I receive strange, elliptical answers. Finally I’m given something to help me “relax.” I drift off. When I wake again, it is dark outside. A dim light beside my bed glows, and Gray is dozing in the bedside chair. I reach for him, and he startles at my touch, then leans into me and holds on hard.
I tell him everything that’s happened, even though it hurts to talk so much-the men who were killed on the ship, Dax, my abduction, my father, my flight to Florida, the Angry Man, my confrontation with Marlowe. He listens, stays silent and focused on me. He lets everything tumble out of me without interruption.
“Where’s Victory?” I say suddenly. “I don’t understand. How did you get her back?”
“Annie-” says Gray, laying a hand on my head. But I’ve already interrupted him with another question.
“When did you realize she was gone?”
“Annie-”
“Is she all right?” I ask, sitting up with effort. “I mean really all right. He wouldn’t have hurt her, I don’t think. Are Drew and Vivian okay?”
“Everyone’s fine,” he says, getting up and sitting beside me on the bed, gently pushing me back against the pillows.
“You must have been so worried,” I say, taking in the lines on his face, the circles under his eyes. “I’m so sorry.”
“Annie, please,” he says then, in a tone that causes me to stop talking. “You have to listen to me.”
I am gripping the sheet hard, and I’m suddenly aware that my whole body is rigid, as though I’m bracing myself for a fall. The expression on Gray’s face-furrowed brow, thin line of a mouth, eyes averted-tells me something is very wrong. I can’t even bring myself to ask what it is.
He takes a deep breath, then, “Victory was never gone, Annie, never in danger. I sent her on a cruise with Drew and Vivian. She’s been with them all this time.”
“No,” I say, feeling my chest tighten. I need desperately for him to understand and believe me. “Listen. Drew and Vivian were in on this. They helped Alan Parker. I think they believed they were helping me. But Parker took it too far. Then I had to save them by leading him to Marlowe.”