suspicion or hurt feelings-that I didn’t much like. I hoped neither of them heard it.
“Oh, open of course,” said Garcia smoothly.
I turned and retraced my steps down the hall, past the microscope lab, where Miranda’s open backpack still sat. It hadn’t moved, but it had changed-the map she was sharing with him had been printed in the bone lab, I felt sure, and brought to Garcia in the backpack. I drove back to the stadium feeling suddenly guilty and afraid. Afraid of what? I couldn’t have said, but a series of faces flashed in my mind’s eye: Miranda’s. Jess’s. Garland Hamilton’s. Stuart Latham’s. Edelberto Garcia’s. The faces of women I cared for-and men who threatened them, in reality or in my overactive imagination.
CHAPTER 12
THE STREET SIGN WAS HALF HIDDEN BY AN OVERHANGING tree branch, which doubtless added greatly to the neighborhood’s charm in the daylight but subtracted substantially from the ease of navigation at night. I flipped the headlights to high beam, but all that did was intensify the shadow on the sign.
I had located North Hills Boulevard without any trouble. A large subdivision sign, thoughtfully placed down at headlight level, marked the neighborhood’s entrance off Washington Pike. North Hills was one of three Knoxville “Hills” neighborhoods dating back to the 1920s. Sequoyah Hills, where I had managed to find an affordable ranch house amid million-dollar mansions, sprawled along one bank of the Tennessee River, a few miles west of downtown and UT. Holston Hills, on the city’s east side, flanked the Holston River, just upstream from the field where Miranda and I had burned the cars.
North Hills lacked the river frontage and the country clubs sported by Sequoyah and Holston, but it did not lack for charm. A broad median divided the boulevard winding into the neighborhood, giving the area the feeling of a park. In springtime the emerald grass of the median and the yards that lined it blazed with dogwoods and redbuds and azaleas. But this year’s blossoms had shriveled three months earlier, and the summer’s heat-and the ban on lawn watering that the drought had made necessary for the past two weeks-had scorched the grass to a pale, crumbling tan. The trees still clung to life and greenness, but it was a dry and desperate shade of green.
The houses were smaller here, tending more toward cottages than mansions, so the neighborhood had remained relatively affordable-the biggest house in North Hills would probably sell for half what a similar place in Sequoyah would fetch. Even so, it would have been a huge stretch for Miranda to afford a house in North Hills. I doubted that her assistantship would cover the monthly mortgage, let alone a down payment. But then again, I realized, her family might have helped her buy a house. Or she might be renting. Or she might have roommates. Or a partner. There was a lot about Miranda’s personal life I didn’t know-almost everything about it, in fact. Was that because I respected her privacy, or was it because I was uncaring and selfish, interested only in the forty or fifty or even sixty hours of work she did for me every week? But if I didn’t care, what was I doing here at nine o’clock at night, trying to find her house in the maze of darkened streets?
I was snooping, that’s what I was doing, and the realization shamed me, making me feel like a stalker or a thief.
As I strained to make out the name on the street sign, a car rounded the curve in the boulevard and stopped behind me. Cursing mildly, I rolled forward a few feet and cut the wheel to the right, pulling far enough out of the lane for the car to squeeze past me, and stuck my arm out the window to wave it past. Once the taillights disappeared around the curve, I opened the glove box, took out a flashlight, and aimed it at the green sign. “Kenilworth” was the word I was looking for, but according to the white letters on the sign to my left, Maxwell Street was the name of the cross street, and if I continued straight ahead, I would henceforth be on Fountain Park Boulevard. So what had become of North Hills Boulevard, which had begun with such elegance and promise? Ah, finally, I saw that North Hills took a turn to the right, stealing the thunder of poor little Maxwell Street. I appeared to be at the intersection of North Hills Boulevard and North Hills Boulevard, but how could that be? Confused, I shone the light on the map I’d printed before leaving campus for the day-the very map I’d seen on Miranda’s computer and Garcia’s desk.
Even though I’d worked closely with Miranda for four years now-and even though I’d sometimes wondered whether there might be more between us than academic collegiality-I’d never been to her house. I knew where she lived, since her address was on file in the department and her assistantship checks were mailed to her house. But anytime we went out on a case together-even once when a body was found less than a mile from her neighborhood-she arranged to meet me at UT. Was there something about me that worried her, that made her guard her boundaries against me? Or was she just one of those people who like to keep work and home completely separate from one another? Probably not the sort of thing I could ask her about, at least not without trespassing in the very manner she was trying to discourage.
I wasn’t sure what it was that had bothered me when I’d walked into Garcia’s office earlier: the mere fact that she’d handed him the map or the fact that when I walked in, Garcia had folded the map and changed the subject. I’d tried to forget about it, but it nagged at me, like a shred of steak snagged between two teeth. Was it possible that Miranda was getting romantically involved with Garcia? He was handsome, I had to admit, and he seemed smooth and quietly confident. But he had been here for only a matter of weeks. And I was virtually certain I had seen a wedding ring on his left hand.
Rightly or wrongly, I cut myself some slack, turned onto North Hills, Part B, and then onto Kenilworth, Miranda’s street. Now I was looking for house numbers, and reading house numbers in the dark made reading the street signs seem like a walk in the park. How in the world did police and firefighters find the correct house during an emergency at night? A mental cartoon flashed into my head-a sort of
Midway down the block, I glimpsed her white VW Jetta parked in the driveway of a gray bungalow. A yellow vehicle was parked behind the Jetta, and I was startled when I realized it was another Nissan Pathfinder-or the same one I’d seen parked beside the Lathams’ farmhouse. I felt a pang of fear, or jealousy, or dread, or shame, or some mixture of them all. I cut the headlights, coasted to the curb just beyond the house, and sat there for a moment. Then I got out, eased the door shut, and walked back toward the driveway. Golden light was spilling from every window on the front and side of the house; the place looked warm and inviting, and a chorus of crickets and katydids sang the praises of cozy domesticity.
I heard the low murmur of voices, then a peal of laughter-Miranda’s laugh, floating above the song of the bugs-and then a lower, deeper laugh. The laughter seemed to be coming from the side of the house, and I edged down the driveway, alongside the Pathfinder, toward the lighted windows. As I got closer, I found myself looking into the kitchen. Miranda sat at the table, chatting between bites of food. Eddie Garcia sat catty-corner from her, on her right, smiling and nodding. Then Garcia turned his head away from Miranda and spoke. I heard another voice- another female voice-and a dark-haired woman appeared behind him, holding a dark-haired baby on her hip. Garcia beamed and reached up, taking the baby from her. He nuzzled its cheek, then nibbled at its ear, and I heard the pure melody of baby laughter. Miranda spoke softly, and Garcia handed the baby to her. She sat the child on the edge of the kitchen table, her hands encircling its chest and tucked beneath its arms, and leaned her face close. I caught snatches of her voice, the gentle singsong of baby talk. Miranda looked radiant, and the baby grinned, and Garcia and his wife beamed proudly, and I felt a wave of sadness and loneliness and shame crash over me.
