Double glass doors listed the hours the facility would be open for guests. She had called ahead to make sure when she arrived that visiting hours would be under way. Stepping inside, she was greeted by a friendly face behind a reception desk. The young woman chose to ignore the bruises and cuts on her face, treating them as if they were invisible, a gesture Jess appreciated.
“Can I help you?”
“Yeah, I’m looking for Max Jenkins. Can you tell me which room he’s in?”
“I’ll need you to sign in please.” While the woman hit a few keystrokes to pull up the information on her computer, Jess signed in under a fake name, not wanting to leave a trace she’d been to the place. But she took her time discreetly looking for Seth on the roster of guests. It didn’t take long to find his name, and she recognized his handwriting. He’d last visited late on a Friday—the week before his life went into the crapper—nearly two weeks ago.
“Mr. Jenkins is on the second floor. Number 204.” The woman smiled and pointed down the hall. “The elevators are to your right. And you’ll find signs upstairs to help you locate his room. Is there anything else I can do for you?”
“Actually, I’d like to speak to someone about Uncle Max. One of his nurses maybe. I live out of town, and this is my first visit. I’d like to get an update.”
“Then you’ll want to speak to Bernice Withers. She’s the second-floor nurse on duty. Her station is by the elevators. You can’t miss it.”
“Thanks.”
When Jess got to the second floor, she found the nurses’ station, but no one was there. That left her only one option. She took a deep breath and went looking for room 204, Max’s room. When she got there, his room was empty, but that didn’t stop her from looking around.
She wandered in and checked the view from his window, noticing his room faced the front entrance, a convenient situation for the stakeout she had planned. Even though seeing Max had been a huge part of why she’d come, the other reason for her visit left her feeling guilty. Jess had come to track down his son. And no amount of justifications or sugarcoating would change that fact.
“Excuse me. Can I help you?” A woman’s voice. Jess turned to see a nurse at the door.
The nurse wore a name tag, and Jess smiled when she saw it. Bernice had found her—a sturdy woman in white uniform and sensible shoes. She looked to be in her forties, with short brown hair streaked with gray. And she had a no-nonsense expression with the twinkle of good humor in her blue eyes—a face easy to trust.
“Yes, I’ve come to see Uncle Max. Is he here? I just got to town and wanted to see him before I headed out again.”
“I’m Bernice, honey. What’s your name?”
“I’m Michelle. Hi.”
“Michelle, come with me, dear. I took him to the dayroom. I’ll show you where it is.”
Jess accompanied the woman down a corridor toward a large sunny room at the end of the hallway. She took advantage of their time together by asking Bernice about Harper.
“I was hoping to see his son Seth while I was here. Has he been in lately?” She took the risk that this woman hadn’t seen Harper’s booking photo in the paper, but she’d know soon enough.
“You know, he missed last week, and that’s not like him. He comes every Friday, the last visiting hours of the day.” She smiled. “I told him once that his father isn’t aware of his punctuality, but he always said he wanted Max to count on him. Something about a promise to his father that he wanted to keep. I never had kids, but if I knew mine would turn out like that boy, I might’ve reconsidered.”
“Yeah, I know what you mean.”
Jess wondered how badly Seth wanted to keep the promise he’d made to his father. Getting arrested for murder had mucked up his last visit. And the cops seeking Harper as a person of interest in a second killing had “train wreck” written all over this week’s visit. And black humor aside, Harper would probably avoid daytime hours as too big a risk. To play it safe, she’d made up her mind to stake out the nursing home at night for as long as it took.
One thing she knew to count on was Harper’s loyalty. He’d told her once never to question it, that some things about him never changed. Of course at the time he was talking about his peculiar devotion to all things Jerry Springer, but she knew he’d intended to make a point, and she totally got it.
People who mattered to Harper got his full attention—the legacy of a father’s unintentional neglect.
Bernice led her across an airy room of sofa and chair groupings, card tables, and two televisions set to low. Windows along the far wall looked onto the grounds behind the nursing home, a pristine setting. Other residents took advantage of the inviting room and the view.
But one man in a wheelchair captured her attention. It had to be Max.
He sat alone, staring out a window. His body twitched and moved, and he muttered words she couldn’t hear. When she got close enough, his frailty shocked her. She remembered, as a child, being carried in his strong arms and hearing the comforting reassurance of his voice. It was all her young traumatized mind had grasped.
Time had changed everything—for both of them.
“Max, you’ve got a visitor.” Bernice raised her voice to make sure he heard. And to Jess, she gave advice. “It helps not to expect too much, honey. He’s got good days and bad. But you have a nice visit.”
She waited until Bernice walked away.
“Hello, Max.” She knelt in front of him and touched his hand. Nothing about this man triggered her recollection of his face until she looked into his eyes. Then it all came back in a rush, a flicker of images that connected.
“You may not remember me, but I sure as hell can’t forget you. You’re the man who saved my life. My name’s Jessica Beckett. You used to call me little Jessie, remember?”
For a brief instant, she saw recognition in his eyes. And he stopped his fidgeting and looked straight at her. But as quickly as their connection came, it faded away when his eyes glazed over again. Maybe it was only wishful thinking on her part that it had been there at all.
Undaunted, she pulled up a chair and began to talk—without a plan and without any expectation he’d understand. She would search for the words to explain what it meant to see him again and how things had been for her, then and now. And Jess wanted to tell him about his incredible son.
She hoped he would hear her.
10:15 P.M.
The stakeout looked to be a bust. Harper was a no-show, and the nursing home would soon shut its doors for the night. Jess finished the last of her cold coffee and stretched her aching back one more time. She’d moved the van down a side street and now sat steeped in the murky shadows of her vehicle. A bruise on her cheek throbbed with an aching heat, the aftermath of Pinzolo’s message from Nadir Beladi.
But Jess killed time by replaying the afternoon she’d spent with Harper’s father.
It had been a long day. Emotionally draining yet cathartic. Jess had told Max things she hadn’t even admitted to herself, knowing the one-way conversation had all the privacy of confessing to a priest. At the end of her visit, she had no delusions the truth would set her free, but it felt like a step in the right direction.
When she was a kid, the counseling sessions provided by the state had seemed like nothing more than a requirement, a box for an adult to check on a form. She preferred silence and isolation to the lip service of a state-provided psychiatrist. But after all these years, she felt ready to reopen the wounds that had never healed because talking to Max had been her choice.