For the most part, he hadn’t allowed himself to have anything but the most ethereal sort of daydreams about Jamie.
But not always.
Joe awakened early and went for a run. There was a FedEx truck parked at the end of the block. The dark tint of the windows prevented him from seeing who was inside. Since when was FedEx tinting its truck windows, he wondered.
He headed for the track at the high school, where he did laps for almost an hour. When he returned, the FedEx truck had been replaced by a black panel truck with tinted windows.
He smelled the coffee as soon as he opened the door. His parents were in the kitchen, his mother at the stove, his father setting the table. When the phone rang, Joe had gotten there first.
And now, he stood facing his wonderful parents who loved him completely and would do anything for him and said, “I have to go.”
Tears began to roll down his mother’s face. “Please, no,” she said, her head moving back and forth. “When Jamie first called I wanted you to help her. But whatever trouble she’s gotten herself into is too big, Joe. Too dangerous.”
His father nodded his agreement. “Wait until they catch her. Then maybe you can help with the legal side of things.”
Joe considered. He could do that, of course. But something in his gut told him that Jamie’s problem was outside the normal boundaries of the law. She knew something that she was not supposed to know. At one time, he would have encouraged her to turn herself in no matter how frightened she was and let the law straighten things out, but the more he learned about the law, the more he realized that being innocent sometimes wasn’t enough. The rule of law was like religion. At its heart it might be pure, but all too often it was bent by those in power to serve their purposes.
Strong voices within him warned him that getting involved in Jamie’s problem could be his undoing and cause his parents great anguish. He should look the other way.
But what kind of person would he be if he did that?
Or was it just that he was in love with Jamie Long and had been most of his life? And she never even knew it.
“I have to try to help her,” he told his parents.
The look on their faces was one of absolute fear with just a touch of pride. He was across the kitchen in an instant and put his arms around the two of them. “You’re all we have,” his mother cried, clinging to him.
Joe showered and ate breakfast. The black panel truck followed him to the bank, where he cashed out a CD.
He waited until dark-a long day, with the three of them trying to act normal as they watched a golf tournament on television and puttered about the kitchen fixing first lunch and then dinner. After the late news, he went upstairs to his bedroom. He waited until midnight, put on his backpack, and crawled out of his bedroom window onto one of the thick, spreading branches of the ancient post oak that had been the reason his parents had built their home on this particular lot.
Keeping well in the shadows cast by the six-foot fence, Joe made his way to the back of the yard, scrambled over the fence, and dropped into another backyard. He went along the side of the house toward the street. Before he stepped out of the shadows, he watched a long time for any movement.
He took a circuitous route to the storage facility on Gessner Road. When he arrived he hid behind the small office building for twenty or so minutes. Finally convinced that he had not been followed, he entered the code on the punch pad to unlock the outer gate, then closed it behind him.
He got a bit of a thrill when he opened the overhead door to his storage unit and saw the vintage Harley parked there among the other possessions that he’d acquired during his Austin years.
Minutes later, he was on his way. Even though he was fairly certain that he was not being followed, he rode around the Memorial area for a time, then took a turn through downtown and headed south on Galveston Road. Only when he was absolutely certain that he was in the clear did he make a U-turn and head north, cutting over to Interstate 45. He then took I-610 to Highway 290, which took him into Brenham. He was there before dawn and checked into a generic motel where he slept for a few hours, then ate a huge breakfast at a pancake house and got directions to the Independence Cemetery from the waitress. He arrived well before noon, parked his bike in the back of the cemetery, and wandered around for a time. With its stately old trees and ancient tombstones, the cemetery was a poignantly beautiful place. Maybe someday he and Jamie could come back here and poke around.
He waited until after one o’clock, and since he hadn’t passed any semblance of an eating establishment on the ride out from Brenham, he made his way back to the town. He ate lunch in a vintage hotel and wandered around the quaint downtown for a time.
Around five, he headed back up Highway 50 to the cemetery. He waited until dark before heading back to town.
He downed a few beers at a tavern to take the edge off his disappointment, then fell asleep watching TV in his motel room.
The next morning he killed time poking around the rolling countryside, arriving at the cemetery well before noon. He wandered up and down the rows of headstones, glancing up every time a car approached, which wasn’t very often.
At two, he got on the Harley and headed back to town. At five-thirty he was back at the cemetery. Once again there were no people, no vehicles, no Jamie.
But it was not yet dusk.
To pass the time he began to make a more methodical inspection of the cemetery. He hadn’t taken two steps when he saw a pair of tattered athletic shoes jutting out from behind a tombstone.
The wearer of the shoes was a sleeping female with a baby in her arms. Her face and arms were sunburned and smudged with dirt. Her brown hair was dusty and disheveled. Her clothing was filthy. She looked limp-more like she had passed out than fallen asleep. The baby was awake and seemed to be studying the gently moving leaves on the low-hanging branch of a live oak.
He felt as though he should look further. This person could not be Jamie. Jamie had long, beautiful blond hair. Jamie was a lovely young woman. This woman wasn’t lovely. And Jamie wouldn’t have a baby.
But this person had her long legs. And the sweet curve of her chin.
He knelt and put a hand on her shoulder. When she opened her eyes, she smiled.
“Jamie?”
“Hi,” she said, struggling to a sitting position, the baby cradled in one arm. He grabbed her free arm and helped her to her feet. Once she was upright, she closed her eyes for a few seconds and took a deep breath.
“Are you okay?” he asked.
“Just hungry and thirsty,” she said. “And I desperately need a bath.”
Joe fished a water bottle and a small bag of peanuts out of one of the Harley’s saddlebags and watched while she wolfed down the peanuts and drank the entire bottle of water.
He helped her put the baby in a cloth contrivance she wore across her stomach, then held her arm as she slung a leg over the Harley. When he climbed on, she grabbed hold of his belt. “Don’t go fast,” she said. “I’m feeling kind of dizzy.”