Her fists punched holes in her hips when she arrived.
“Where’s Grace?”
“Dangit, Elizabeth, you promised her you’d make at least one game this season.”
“I promised my client I’d win his case, and I did. Now where’s Grace?”
John opened his mouth to remind his spouse that she had made and broken the same promise to Gracie before every game this season, that Gracie was more important than some bogus criminal even if he did pay her $400 an hour, that… but she seemed more agitated than usual tonight, tapping her foot at a furious pace, a sure sign she was seriously fried about something. Elizabeth’s personality was a binary system-off and pissed off. He wanted to ask her now, as he had always wanted to ask her, What are you so mad about? But, as always, he quickly decided that discretion was the better part of not being blasted with a streaming audio of profanities that would make a complete system crash seem pleasurable. So he kept his mouth shut rather than chance a random explosion of his wife’s volatile temper; he thought of it as risk management. And besides, Elizabeth did not allow him sex during her trials; this weekend would present his first opportunity in more than two weeks. He couldn’t afford to blow it with ill-advised flamage. He pointed the cell phone at the concession stand.
“Snow cone,” he said.
Coach Wally bit the top off his cherry-flavored snow cone; some of the cool red juice trickled down his double chin. He wiped his mouth on the sleeve of his Tornadoes jersey.
Wally Fagan was walking away from the concession stand and toward the field to retrieve the game ball he had left behind in all the excitement of Brenda’s winning goal. He bit into the snow cone again, wiped the juice off his chin, and noticed a woman approaching fast like a distant thunderstorm-dark hair, dark clothes, and a dark expression.
Gracie’s mom.
Wally’s pulse ratcheted up a notch and not because of her short skirt. He had talked to Gracie’s mom only a couple of times in three seasons, but for some reason she had always made him nervous. Fact is, Wally Fagan stood just under six feet and weighed just over two hundred forty pounds, but he was wholly intimidated by the slim woman walking his way. She was maybe ten years older than him, but he always felt like he was talking to his mother- Oh, shit, her mother! Which made seeing her tonight seem odd, now that Wally thought about it.
She approached, and they made brief eye contact. Wally smiled politely, waiting for a hint of recognition to cross her face. None did. He was a complete stranger to her. Wally debated whether to speak to her, since she was about to walk right past him. Without consciously deciding, he did.
“Gee, Mrs. Brice, I didn’t expect to see you here tonight.”
She turned on him in a heartbeat: “I had a trial, okay!”
Jesus! Her response so startled Wally, he almost squeezed the snow right out of his cone. He immediately regretted not letting her walk on by.
Now that he had interrupted her journey, she took the time to look him over: the high-topped Reeboks, the blue coach’s shorts stretched tight around his considerable belly and the gold jersey that didn’t completely cover it, the Texas Rangers baseball cap on backward, the heart tattoo on his left arm, and the cherry snow cone juice dripping down his chin.
“Who are you?” she demanded.
That hurt. Wally wiped his sticky hand on his jersey before extending it to her. She had a very firm grip.
“Coach Wally… I coach Gracie’s team.”
“Oh.”
No apology. She was staring at her hand; the sticky had rubbed off. She was apparently trying to decide whether to wipe her hand on her skirt; she said, “Well, Wally, I had an important case go to the jury today, so I was late for Grace’s game.”
“No, ma’am, I meant because of, uh… you know… your mother.”
She looked up from her hand and frowned. “My mother? What about my mother?”
“Oh, my gosh, don’t you know?”
“Know what? ”
Not even his executive experience as a night manager at the Taco House out on the interstate had prepared Wally Fagan to deliver this kind of news. But he had opened his big mouth too far to shut up now.
“Mrs. Brice, your mother had a stroke.”
She recoiled. “A stroke? When? ”
“Uh, today, I guess. She’s in the hospital.”
She appeared confused. She pointed back toward the field. Wally looked that way; a man was sitting alone in the bleachers.
“My husband didn’t say my mother had a stroke.”
“Gracie’s dad was at the game?”
She was now looking at Wally like he was a complete idiot.
“He’s sitting right over there in the goddamn stands!”
Now Wally was confused; he removed his cap and scratched his burr-cut head. He kept his hair cut short because that way he didn’t sweat as much under the hair net at work.
“You’re not looking for Gracie, are you?”
She exhaled loud enough for him to hear. “I didn’t come for the snow cones, Wally.”
“But… but she’s… she’s gone.”
“Gone where?”
“To the hospital, to see your mother.”
“My mother lives in New York!”
“But your brother said your mother had a stroke and he came to take Gracie to the hos-”
The woman lunged at Wally and grabbed his jersey, her eyes and face suddenly wild like an animal; she clawed so close he could feel her hot breath on his face when she screamed.
“I don’t have a brother!”
Wally was so scared he felt a drop of pee drip out. He dropped his snow cone. The wild woman released him and ran toward the concession stand screaming her daughter’s name.
“Gra-cie!”
Police Chief Paul Ryan’s voice mixed with the other voices coming from all around him in the dark, the voices of cops and civilians searching the woods bordering the park for the missing girl, and he thought, Kids don’t get abducted in Post Oak, Texas!
“Gra-cie!”
When he had gotten the call, Ryan figured a rich Briarwyck Farms soccer mom was throwing another conniption fit, as they often did over their very special children. His wife, a teacher over at the elementary school, called it the Baby Jesus Syndrome, every rich mom thinking her spoiled little brat’s the second coming. He had no doubt the mom would get a call on her cell phone and learn the girl had gone home with a friend, and the mom wouldn’t say “I’m sorry” or nothing, she’d just wave and climb into her SUV and drive off for the post-game pizza party over at Angelo’s, figuring the police department was her private security force to call out anytime she wanted. But when he had arrived on scene and talked to the girl’s coach, Paul Ryan knew immediately that this was a real abduction: a blond man in a black cap had asked for the girl by name.
“Gra-cie!”
All Ryan could see were the five feet of trees and ground cover in front of him illuminated by his Mag flashlight as he advanced deeper into the dark woods.
He hears the others around him, but all he sees now is a vague vision of trees and vines and undergrowth, dense and impenetrable-a jungle. He’s fighting his way through a jungle on a dark night. He hears a child’s distant cry. He picks up his pace, but it’s like trying to run through molasses. He’s got to hurry, something terrible is about to happen, is happening. He hears more cries. He’s drenched in sweat now as he struggles onward through the steamy jungle. Vines strangle him, branches slash his face and arms, undergrowth grabs his boots, the cries grow louder, his breath comes faster, his heart pounds harder against his chest wall — and he suddenly stumbles out of the darkness and into the light. Fires light a hamlet, straw huts burn, and flames spit out of rifle muzzles. He hears the BOOM BOOM BOOM of high-powered weapons, people screaming, pigs squealing, and water buffaloes grunting. He smells the stench of burning animal flesh. He sees women and children being dragged out of their hiding places and thrown into the dirt, the blaze of their burning homes illuminating their terrified faces, their Asian features so delicate and desperate. He watches them being herded up and driven forward down a dirt path, carrying babies wailing in the night and begging for mercy “NO! NO! NO! NO VC! NO VC!”