“It’s called offlining.”
“If Strike’s telling the truth, she offlined her ass right onto a potential crime scene.”
“Look. The torso may or may not be Cora Teague.” My voice was light-years from sexy. Ryan’s attitude was starting to piss me off. “But Strike has generated a lead.”
“Or conned you into wasting time and energy.”
“Following up on tips is part of my job.”
“Strike’s got nads, I’ll give her that.”
“Perhaps we should talk about something else.”
“No, no, no.”
“Nice use of trilogy.”
There was a long silence amplified by irritation on my end, skepticism on his.
“How’s Daisy?”
Ryan’s peace offering was not where I wanted to go.
Katherine Daessee Lee Brennan. Daisy. My crazy-as-a-sock puppet mother.
When I was eight, my father died in a car wreck, my baby brother in a pediatric ICU after losing a heartbreaking battle involving white cells. I was relocated from Chicago to North Carolina, and lived the rest of my childhood migrating between the family beach house at Pawleys Island and my grandmother’s cupcake Victorian in Charlotte.
After spending decades ferrying her daughter through a ceaseless series of mental crises, Gran finally clocked out at age ninety-six. In the end, I think Mama’s craziness just wore her out.
Shortly after Gran’s death, my mother disappeared without apology or explanation. Four years later, my sister, Harry, and I learned she was living in Paris with a caregiver named Cécile Gosselin, whom she called Goose.
When I was thirty-five, Mama returned to the States with Goose. Since then they’d shifted between the Pawleys Island property and a sprawling condo on Manhattan’s Upper East Side. The arrangement worked well for me. Holiday visits. Emails and texts. Brief chats on the phone.
Then, without warning, Mama pirouetted back into my life shortly before Ryan’s own reappearance. With her Louis Vuitton luggage, Hermès scarves, and Chanel No. 5, she’d checked into the only facility ever to meet her extraordinarily high standards. Also traveling in the entourage was an untamed malignancy that would eventually kill her.
“Mama’s still terrorizing the staff at Heatherhill Farm,” I said.
“Goose remains bivouacked at the B and B down the road?”
“Yes. The woman is a saint.”
“Daisy’s probably promised to bequeath her the family fortune.”
“Mama’s estate planning centers on bouncing the very last check she writes. I don’t know. It’s hard to figure Goose. The woman rarely speaks.”
“We French are enigmatic.”
“But you produce good cheese.”
“And wine.”
“And wine.”
“Daisy would make a daunting websleuth.”
“Don’t you dare broach the subject to her.” Ryan was right. My mother’s skill at mining the Web is unsurpassed. But there’s a downside. When she’s in a manic phase, a mild curiosity can become an all-consuming obsession for Mama.
“Roger that. Any news on Katy?”
Another topic that kept me constantly anxious. Two years earlier my daughter had enlisted in the army and been sent to Afghanistan. She’d survived her tour, come home, and, to my horror, volunteered to return. She was now in the first month of her second deployment.
“Happy and healthy.” Or was at the time of our last Skype call.
“Good.”
There was a very long pause. I braced, knowing what was coming.
“I get why you had to cancel your trip to Montreal. But have you given any thought to my pitch?” Ryan’s tone was carefully neutral.
Pitch?
“Yes.” I ran a hand through my hair. Inhaled. Exhaled.
“And?”
“It’s hard, Ryan. With Mama.”
“Yes.”
“And Katy.”
“Katy will be fine.”
“Yes.”
“I love you.”
I knew I should reply in kind. Instead, I fought a wild urge to disconnect.
“I’ll take no news as good news.”
I shrugged. Stupid. Ryan couldn’t see me.
“Here’s my suggestion.” He changed topics again. “Shoot that recording over to your audio geeks.”
“I don’t have it.”
“Why not?” Still neutral. No one does it like Ryan.
“Strike refused to leave it with me.” Alone in the dark, I felt myself blush with humiliation at my own ineptness. “I phoned the Burke County sheriff’s deputy who recovered the bones.”
“What did she say?”
“I’m waiting for a callback.”
“It might be wise to have the audio analyzed.” Ryan stated the obvious.
“I’ll call Strike in the morning.”
That turned out to be a bad idea.
That night I attended a Mad Hatter’s party of the macabre.
I was seated at a table stretching as far as I could see in both directions. White linen cloth and napkins. Silver spoons and candlesticks. Porcelain tea service.
Ryan was across from me, wearing a bow tie, tux, and red wool tuque. Beside him was a woman who barely came up to his shoulder. Her hair was a foggy nimbus haloing her head, her features a shadowy landscape lacking in detail or definition. The woman’s body ended at the bottom of a rib cage rippling below a cut-off long-sleeved blue tee.
Behind Ryan and the woman, a huge arched window framed a neon sunset. Garish yellows, oranges, and reds, heaped layer upon layer, supported an ominous black disk floating just above the horizon.
I knew that was wrong. That the sun should be light. I tried to tell Ryan. He kept talking to the woman at his side.
Far down the table to my left, Mama and Larabee were engaged in heated discussion. Larabee was in bloodstained scrubs. Mama had on the black Chanel suit she’d bought for Daddy’s funeral but never worn.
At the far right, Hazel Strike sat alone in jeans and boots, backpack beside her on the snowy linen. The fiery twilight made her topknot look like brassy meringue.
Everyone was holding a tiny china cup. Ryan’s fingers looked huge on the scrolly little handle.
Mama and Larabee grew louder, but I couldn’t make out their words. Recognizing a dangerous note in my mother’s tone, I tried to stand, but found I was glued to my chair.
Drizzle began falling. No one seemed to notice but me.
I looked at Ryan.
“Will you melt?” he asked.
I tried to answer. My lips wouldn’t form words.
“Will you let Cora Teague melt?” Flat.
Still my mouth wouldn’t work.
“Melt.” Larabee, Mama, and Strike chorused in unison. The word reverberated, as though bouncing off the walls of an enormous chamber. I looked around. All three were staring at me.
“Will you let me melt?” Sharp-edged, no echo.
I refocused on Ryan. His eyes were angry blue flames.
“Do I disappear into the black hole?”
Before I could answer, Ryan swirled backward and vanished into the menacing death-disk sun. The woman’s fog-hair swirled, sucked upward by Ryan’s sudden departure. Her face, now revealed, was devoid of flesh, the empty orbits pointed at me in beseeching accusation. A beat, then the woman swooped a path identical to Ryan’s.
Frightened, I whipped my gaze left. Mama and Larabee were gone.
Right. Strike was on her feet, curling knobby fingers inward, telling me to join her.
I turned away. Tried to peer into the wormhole that had swallowed Ryan and the woman. Saw nothing but tomb-like black.
“Ryan!” I screamed.
I awoke, heart racing, skin slick with sweat.
Wildly disoriented, I took a moment to figure out where I was.
The clock said 2:47 A.M.
Birdie was up on all fours, back arched, undoubtedly annoyed that I’d interrupted his sleep. I stroked his head, and he settled at my knee.
I closed my eyes.
Inhale.