“No, but when they find out, they’ll cheer you for being such a heroine.”
Julia saw a couple of tourists in jeans and short-sleeved T-shirts, trying to brave the cold wind, shivering violently. She should tell them the sun would come out, maybe, but instead, she threw back her head and broke into “Tomorrow.” Several more shivering tourists standing some twenty feet away turned and listened. When she finished, they applauded. She gave them a small bow and waved.
She said, “The district attorney called me today. Are you ready for this, Cheney? Fact is, he apologized. He’s got a truckload of proof against Thomas Pallack, and with Charlotte more than eager to testify against him, I know he meant it.”
No matter how many apologies the D.A. gave Julia, Cheney would still like to smack him in the chops.
“I’m big with the paparazzi again, for a short while anyway. They photographed me at my house speaking to one of the insurance people.”
“So long as they don’t trail you to my condo, we’re safe.”
She sighed and snuggled in close. The wind died down as the fog thickened, the tops of the bridge towers nearly covered now. She was sorry, but there was no chance of sun today. They both shivered at the sight of two lone sailboats on a broad reach, heeling sharply.
“There’s no more beautiful place on earth,” she said, “even if you freeze half the summer.”
He smiled, felt happy enough to burst with it. Not all that long ago he’d gotten himself a date on a Thursday night for the Crab House on Pier 39. He hadn’t gotten his cioppino, he’d gotten Julia.
Fate was something he marveled at, but accepted. As for the local woo-woo wizards, he imagined it would always be hard not to roll his eyes. He pictured Bevlin Wagner in his slipping towel and grinned.
He said, “Let’s go brew some coffee and talk about that new house we’re going to find.”
MAESTRO, VIRGINIA
It was easy to dig Christie’s grave. Bobby Ray Parker and Lynn Thomas hadn’t used equipment, no need. In the early morning hours beneath a soft steady rain that had begun the previous evening, they’d shoveled deep and deeper still and the earth was still damp and yielding. They spoke of Christie Noble, her kindness, how she’d yelled her head off at her boys’ games, and how sometimes life was just too bitter to bear, and it wasn’t fair, now was it? But at least she’d finally come home.
Four hours later, Dix stared at that massive wet black mound of rich earth, at the three red roses laid carefully atop it, and felt pain like a gash to his heart.
He held his boys’ hands, theirs squeezing his hard during Reverend Lindsay’s brief graveside litany, his deep quiet voice somehow reaching to the last person in that crowd of at least five hundred people, all of whom had come directly from the memorial service at the First Presbyterian Church of Maestro to Penhallow Cemetery, to attend Christie Holcombe Noble’s interment next to her mother.
Dix looked over at Lone Tree Hill, at the single oak, an ancient sentinel, keeping vigil over the rolling hills and the row upon row of graves. Its leaves were greening up nicely. Suddenly the sun came through the clouds, blurring through the gentle rain, and he saw raindrops sparkle fiercely on the oak leaves. He squeezed his boys’ hands and slowly they raised their heads and looked to where he nodded, toward that old oak, at the sunlight coming through the rain. He heard Rob sigh, felt both boys move closer against him.
Dix felt Savich and Sherlock behind him, Savich solid as a wall, and Sherlock, her hand resting lightly on his shoulder throughout the entire graveside service. His anger toward Savich was long gone, but he remembered how he’d wanted to smash Savich in the face when he’d refused point-blank to let him see Christie’s remains. Why? he’d asked. You already have the image of her you want to keep in your mind and your heart for the rest of your life, Dix. Let it rest, let her rest now. It’s over, finally over.
And Sherlock had stood with Savich, united against him. Ruth hadn’t said a word, he remembered, simply listened to him rave and yell. He knew she would never say anything about that remote site in southern Tennessee where the dogs had found—no, it was over, Christie’s life was more than three years over.
He straightened when Reverend Lindsay called for the final prayer, a prayer of acceptance, of granting oneself a measure of peace and the chance of becoming. What did becoming mean for him? But of course he knew. It meant bringing Ruth in fully, it meant bringing his boys forward now that they’d said a final good-bye to their mother, and it meant becoming what they were meant to be. He wondered what that would be for each of them. But whatever happened, the four of them would be together now.
It was over. Reverend Lindsay finished speaking. Dix felt hands touching him, heard quiet voices speaking to him and his boys, accepted the endless stream of words he couldn’t take in now, but they would be there in his memory, and perhaps he’d recall them one day.
Chappy, tears running down his face, didn’t want to let him go. He held the older man, Christie’s father, so many times a pain in his butt, but still Christie’s father, who’d loved her more than anything, and his grandsons, her sons, at his right elbow. Behind him stood Christie’s godfather, Jules Advere, who’d collapsed when he’d seen Charlotte Pallack in San Francisco. The phone call from Chappy seemed a lifetime ago, but it wasn’t.
The gentle monotone of voices went on and on until he thought he might start to weep, and not stop.
At the end of it all, Reverend Lindsay came over to shake Dix’s hand. The reverend had a strong hand, dry and firm. “Dix—”
Reverend Lindsay said nothing more until Dix raised his face and looked at him directly. He said very quietly, his voice as firm and steady as his hand still holding Dix’s, “Christie’s home now. And she knows you and the boys will always hold her in your hearts, in rich memories that will never leave you.” Like Savich’s words, Dix thought. Reverend Lindsay laid his hands on both boys’ shoulders. “Rob, Rafe, I want you to remember your mother as a woman of joy, laughter, and endless goodness. She loved you both with all that was in her.” He drew both boys against him. “She had such great pride in both of you, enjoyed both of you so very much.”
When he turned to Chappy, he enfolded him in his arms as he had the boys, and held him, not saying a word. The sun went behind the clouds again, and the rain began to fall more heavily.
Ruth raised her face to the rain and felt how warm it was, and how it seemed to soothe away some of the deadening pain. Dix looked at her over his boys’ heads.
She smiled, and nodded, and took his hand. The four of them made their way through the lingering crowds of townspeople, some who’d known Christie only by sight, some dear friends, their eyes still red with tears, and they walked slowly through them, trying to make eye contact with them, shake hands, so many hands, all of them wanting to say the right thing. Rob sobbed and Ruth leaned down and kissed his cheek, nothing more. He plowed ahead, doing what his father was doing, speaking and nodding, grateful there were so many people who’d wanted to say good-bye to his mother.
Savich and Sherlock stood beside Tony and Cynthia Holcombe. Tony’s cheeks were stained with his tears, but he smiled as he shook Savich’s hand.
“Thank you for helping Dix. Thank you for bringing my sister home.”
“Dix managed that all by himself,” Sherlock said. “He wouldn’t let it go. It was Dix who brought it to an end.”
Hours later, when everyone had left Dix’s house, and it was quiet, and the four of them were finally alone with themselves and with each other, Dix suddenly stilled. He could swear he felt Christie close, felt her warmth, the memory of the light sweep of her fingers against his cheek. He felt her there, in front of him, smiling and nodding, and then, slowly, she backed away, farther and farther, until there was only the still warm air, and his family.