Pietra opened the door and got out. He watched her disappear into the building. He put the car in drive and started for his next destination. Thirty minutes later, he parked on a side street between two houses that appeared empty. He didn’t want the van to be seen in the parking lot.
Nash put on the fake mustache and a baseball cap. He walked three blocks to the large brick building. It appeared abandoned. The front door, Nash was sure, would be locked. But one side door had a matchbook jammed into the opening. He pulled it open and started down the stairs.
The corridor was covered with children’s artwork, paintings mostly. A bulletin board had essays hung up. Nash stopped and read a few. They were by third graders, and all the stories were about them. That was how kids were taught nowadays. Think only “me.” You are fascinating. You are unique and special and no one but no one is ordinary, which, when you think about it, makes everyone ordinary.
He turned into the classroom on the lower level. Joe Lewiston sat cross-legged on the floor. He had papers in his hands and tears in his eyes. He looked up when Nash entered.
“It’s not working,” Joe Lewiston said. “She’s still sending the e-mails.”
32
MUSE questioned Marianne Gillespie’s daughter carefully, but Yasmin knew nothing.
Yasmin hadn’t seen her mother. She hadn’t even known she was back in town.
“I thought she was in L.A.,” Yasmin said.
“Did she tell you that?” Muse asked.
“Yes.” Then: “Well, she sent me an e-mail.”
Muse remembered Guy Novak saying the same thing. “Do you still have it?”
“I can look. Is Marianne okay?”
“You call your mother by her first name?”
Yasmin shrugged. “She really didn’t want to be a mother. I figure, why remind her? So I call her Marianne.”
They grow up fast, Muse thought. She asked again, “Do you still have the e-mail?”
“I guess so. It’s probably on my computer.”
“I would like you to print out a copy for me.”
Yasmin frowned. “But you won’t tell me what this is about.” It wasn’t a question.
“Nothing to worry about yet.”
“I see. You don’t want to worry the little kid. If it was your mother and you were my age, would you want to know?”
“Fair point. But again we don’t know anything yet. Your dad will be back soon. I would really like to see that e-mail.”
Yasmin headed up the stairs. Her friend stayed in the room. Normally Muse would have wanted to question Yasmin alone, but the friend seemed to calm her.
“What’s your name again?” Muse asked.
“Jill Baye.”
“Jill, have you ever met Yasmin’s mom?”
“A couple of times, yeah.”
“You look worried.”
Jill made a face. “You’re a policewoman asking about my friend’s mother. Shouldn’t I be?”
Kids.
Yasmin trotted back down the stairs with a piece of paper in her hand. “Here it is.”
Muse read:
Hi! I’m going to Los Angeles for a few weeks. I will be in touch when I get back.
This explained so much. Muse had wondered why no one had reported Jane Doe missing. Simple. She lived alone in Florida. Between her lifestyle and this e-mail, well, it could have been months, if not longer, before anyone figured out that she’d met up with foul play.
“Does that help?” Yasmin asked.
“Yes, thank you.”
Tears filled Yasmin’s eyes. “She’s still my mom, you know.”
“I know.”
“She loves me.” Yasmin started to cry. Muse stepped toward her, but the girl put her hand up to stop her. “She just doesn’t know how to be a mom. She tries. She just doesn’t get it.”
“It’s okay. I’m not judging her or anything.”
“Then tell me what’s wrong. Please?”
Muse said, “I can’t.”
“But it’s bad, right? You can tell me that much. Is it bad?”
Muse wanted to be honest with the girl, but this was not the time or place.
“Your father will be here soon. I need to get back to work.”
NASH said, "Calm down.”
Joe Lewiston stood from his cross-legged position in one fluid movement. Teachers, Nash figured, must get used to that movement. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have gotten you involved.”
“You did the right thing, calling me.”
Nash looked at his former brother-in-law. You say “former” because “ex” implies divorce. Cassandra Lewiston, his beloved wife, had five brothers. Joe Lewiston was both the youngest and her favorite. When their oldest brother, Curtis, was murdered a little more than a decade ago, Cassandra had taken it so hard. She had cried for days and wouldn’t get out of bed and sometimes, even though he knew that it was irrational to think such thoughts, Nash wondered if that anguish had made her sick. She grieved so hard over her brother that maybe her immune system had weakened. Maybe cancer is in all of us, those life-draining cells, and maybe they bide their time until our defenses are down and then they make their move.
“I promise I will find out who killed Curtis,” Nash had told his beloved.
But he hadn’t kept that promise, though that really hadn’t mattered to Cassandra. She was not one for vengeance. She just missed her big brother. So he had sworn to her right then and there. He had sworn that he would never let her know this pain again. He would protect those she loved. He would protect them always.
He had promised her that again on her deathbed.
It seemed to bring her comfort.
“You’ll be there for them?” Cassandra had asked.
“Yes.”
“And they will be there for you too.”
He had not replied to that.
Joe came toward him. Nash took in the classroom. In so many ways they had not changed at all from the days he’d been a student. There were still the handwritten rules and the cursive alphabet in both capitals and small letters. There were splashes of color everywhere. Recent artwork was drying on a clothesline.
“Something else happened,” Joe said.
“Tell me.”
“Guy Novak keeps driving by my house. He slows down and glares. I think he’s scaring Dolly and Allie.”
“Since when?”
“He’s been doing it for about a week now.”
“Why didn’t you tell me this before?”
“I didn’t think it was important. I figured he’d stop.”
Nash closed his eyes. “And why do you think it’s important now?”
“Because Dolly got really upset when he did it this morning.”
“Guy Novak drove by your house today?”
“Yes.”
“And you think it’s an attempt to harass you?”
“What else would it be?”
Nash shook his head. “We had it wrong from the get-go.”
“What do you mean?”
But there was no reason to explain. Dolly Lewiston was still getting the e-mails. That meant one thing. Marianne hadn’t sent them out, even though, after suffering so much, she had said that she had.
Guy Novak had.
He thought about Cassandra and his promise. He knew now what he would have to do to take care of this situation.
Joe Lewiston said, “I’m such a fool.”
“Listen to me, Joe.”
He looked so scared. Nash was glad that Cassandra would never see her baby brother like this. He thought about how Cassandra had been toward the end. She had lost her hair. Her skin was jaundiced. There were open wounds on her scalp and face. She lost control of her bowels. There were times the pain seemed unbearable, but she had made him promise not to interfere. Her lips would purse and her eyes would bulge and it was like steel talons were shredding her from inside. Sores covered the inside of her mouth toward the end so that she couldn’t even speak. Nash would sit there and watch and feel the rage.
“It’s going to be okay, Joe.”
“What are you doing to do?”
“Don’t worry about it, okay? It will be fine. I promise.”
BETSY Hill waited for Adam in the small patch of woods behind her house.