Exposure

How strange it was to see her own home and not be allowed inside. Lorraine pulled her arms across her chest. She felt like a refugee. A lost orphan.

The officer backed out of the threshold and closed the door. He held Belinda by one arm.

“Here you go.” He offered the bear to her with a small, sad smile.

“Thank you.” She clutched the bear in both hands.

“Does your daughter have a name for it?”

“Belinda. I don’t even know where she got that name. Must have heard it somewhere.”

He tilted his head. “Kids pick up more things than you’d expect.”

Lorraine shot him a look, but his expression belied no ulterior message.

Her gaze pulled back to the apartment. She envisioned the scene inside. The horrible job that awaited her.

A small seed of hope sprouted.

She ran her tongue over her lips. “When the people are done in there, will they clean up . . . everything?”

Remorse flicked over his face. “No ma’am. Afraid not.”

She ducked her chin in a nod and turned away.

Back in the car she held out Belinda. Tammy grabbed the bear and hugged it tightly, her eyes squinching shut with bliss.

On the way to the bank Lorraine stopped at McDonald’s. Tammy wanted a Kids Meal. Lorraine managed to swallow three bites of a hamburger.

When they reached the bank Tammy brought Belinda inside with her.

In no time Lorraine and Tammy found themselves surrounded by Martin’s coworkers. Two assistant managers left customers at their desks to greet her and extend their condolences. Even the tellers stepped out from behind their windows when they could. Neither of the two women who’d been held up with Martin were at work. “We gave them the day off,” a senior manager with a name pin reading Sandy Tourner told Lorraine. Sandy was in her forties with sleek dark hair and a perfectly fitting black business suit. Lorraine felt grimy and unkempt in the jeans and top she’d managed to throw on after the 911 responders screeched up to her door.

“Martin was a hero.” Sandy placed a hand on Lorraine’s arm. “Olga and Shelley both told me all he did. How he got them out of the vault and untied them. They said they owe their lives to him.”

They owe their lives to him. The words sank down inside Lorraine. Yes. Yes. Martin deserved to be remembered that way. For his own sake and for his daughter’s. It didn’t matter what she suspected. The truth didn’t matter. The only thing Martin had left now was his reputation.

Her gaze on Tammy, Lorraine made a silent vow to never say anything that could harm the memory of Martin Giordano.

Sandy promised she would cut Martin’s final paycheck as soon as possible and personally see that it was deposited into their checking account. One less thing for Lorraine to worry about. “And please let us know when the funeral will be.”

“Yes. I will.”

Lorraine left the bank on wooden legs, Tammy’s fingers entwined in hers.

One final stop. Before leaving the motel Lorraine had located a funeral home from the Yellow Pages. Her mind on hold, her heart dried up, she went through the motions of choosing a casket and making the arrangements for a ser vice. Tammy sat next to her on a chair, swinging her legs and talking to Belinda.

Back in the motel Lorraine crawled onto the bed, not an ounce of energy left. How was she supposed to take care of Tammy now? How were they going to survive?

Tammy smiled and talked to Belinda. She was obviously feeling better. “Mommy.” She nudged her mother on the arm. “Let’s play a game.”

As Lorraine forced herself to sit up, a voice echoed in her brain. The newspaper reporter at her apartment that morning, yelling a question: “I heard you were home during the murder, Mrs. Giordano . . .”

She tensed, her fingers digging into the side of the bed.

“Mommy, whassa matter?”

Lorraine blinked at Tammy. “Nothing, nothing. Just . . . let me go to the bathroom first.” She fled into the tiny room and shut the door. There she sat on the closed toilet lid, staring at the floor.

“I heard you were home . . .”

The TV reporter hadn’t mentioned that when Lorraine watched the news — maybe because the woman only had a minute or two to tell the story. But tomorrow’s newspaper article would be full of every detail its reporters had gathered today.

Lorraine lowered her head in her hands, a sick feeling worming its way through her stomach. Forget whether or not Martin’s murderer had informants on the Atlantic City police force. All that man had to do tomorrow was read the paper. He’d know she’d been home when her husband was killed. What if he thought she’d seen him through a bedroom window?

If he’d stormed over in broad daylight to kill Martin, what would stop him from coming back for her?

THIRTY-TWO

Chief Davis arrived at the station soon after Mark called him with the news. Minutes before he drove up, Kaycee had been pacing on the sidewalk out front, hands fisted and her lungs unable to get enough air. Every shot of that video screamed in her mind. Over and over she envisioned Hannah on Rice Street, pulling that little suitcase. Sucked into the night.

Kaycee stared with burning eyes past the red boxcar museum on Rice. She wanted to turn back time. If only she could place herself right here last night, ready and waiting to intercept Hannah.

The weight of being watched fell heavily on Kaycee’s shoulders. She swiveled to look up Main Street. A woman was entering the office of the Good News organization. Two people were coming out of the nearby Jessamine Creek Berry Company. On Kaycee’s side of the street a mother with toddler in tow headed for the drug store. No one paid Kaycee any heed.

Where were her tormentors? Had they taken Hannah?

Chief Davis pulled into the parking area and slid from his car. Kaycee watched him approach, dark imaginings tumbling through her head.

“Kaycee.” He nodded to her without slowing. “Come on inside.” He swung open the glass door to the building.

Kaycee scurried after him, casting final glances up the street.

In the police station, she, Mark, and the chief gathered around the desk where Rich sat. Once more Rich ran the film of Hannah turning up Rice Street. Kaycee watched with hands clasped beneath her chin, unable to tear her eyes away. Chief Davis looked on in silence.

When the sequence ended he inhaled deeply. “You looked further on in the tape?” he asked Rich.

“Yeah, while you were getting here. Haven’t seen her appear again.”

“Any vehicles come down from Rice Street soon after that?”

“No.”

“How about turning onto Main from South Maple?”

Rice Street curved right and became Walters Lane, which ended at South Maple in front of Kaycee’s house. Someone could have picked up Hannah, come down South Maple, and turned onto East Main, either right or left. As Kaycee remembered, at least one of the screens she’d seen in Chief Davis’s office displayed Main Street farther up, toward the Subway sandwich shop on the corner of South Lexington — Highway 29 — and Fitch’s IGA behind it. Perhaps other cameras showed Highway 29 both to the right and left of the Main intersection.