magazine, he knew they had to be together. And now they were.
“I was so scared! I was like, oh my God, he’s gonna rape me, where’s Junior? And there you were-you were totally awesome!” She wiped her eyes on his shirt. “Ooh, I love your shirt. Plaid’s my favorite.”
She looked up at Junior like that Mary Ann girl looking at the professor on that Gilligan show he had seen at the motel. Then she said three words that brought tears to Junior’s eyes.
“You’re my hero.”
She hugged him again, burying her face in his chest. Junior’s heart was about to bust, he was so damned happy. Her hugging him, that made it worth losing Bubba and his explosives skills. Patty pulled back and squeezed his biceps.
“Wow, you’re buff, Junior. Totally studly. Hey, look, I’m real sorry about this morning, getting so upset and all. I mean, it’s not like we’re Republicans, for crying out loud. I’m sure you have a very good reason to kill the president.”
“He ordered the major assassinated.”
“The major your daddy?”
“Yep.”
“Well, there you go. That’s a totally good reason. I mean, who could blame you for being a little PO’d?”
“Now we’re gonna return the favor.”
“Nanna always says, What’s good for the goose is good for the gander. I’m not real sure what that means.”
He took her hands. “Patty, are you ready for your big surprise?”
He glanced over at the bedroom door by the kitchen; her eyes followed his and then turned back real fast.
“Well, yeah, sure, but, um, why don’t you show me later, after dinner maybe. Show me around your mountain first. I mean, our mountain. Before it gets dark.”
“Well, okay, I guess it can wait.”
“Sure it can.”
He smiled; she said our mountain. “Sure, okay.”
Patty got a funny look on her face. “Uh-oh. Did you get my tampons?”
“Oh, yeah.”
Junior went to the kitchen table and returned with the box of girl stuff. “Here.”
Patty took the box and said, “I’ll be right back.”
She disappeared into her room. Her talking about that girl stuff so straight out- period, tampons, bleeding — made Junior real uncomfortable. He never figured that would be a regular topic of discussion; he hoped it wouldn’t. A few minutes later she came back out.
“All better now. And, hey, sorry about calling you a numb-nut, during the road trip.”
“Aw, heck, honey, I been called a lot worse.”
Junior leaned down and cupped her pretty face. Then he kissed her forehead.
“Patty, I dreamed of this day-”
“Yeah, Mrs. Boyd told us about those kind of dreams in health class.”
Damn, there she goes again.
“Huh? Oh, no, I didn’t mean that.”
“Whatever. Let’s go see our mountain.”
She smiled real big at him, and he forgot about the tampon talk by the time they got outside.
“Lemme think here,” he said, putting his hands on his hips and turning in all directions as he thought of the best place to start the tour of their mountain. What would most impress Patty?
“Oh, I know, I’ll show you the creek first. It’s my favorite place in the whole world. Hey, you ever seen real bear tracks?”
He turned back, and she was gone.
See ya! What a loser! Does he really think I’m going to marry him? The bridal suite-that’s his big surprise? As if.
Gracie was running down the mountain like she was running down a soccer field on a breakaway and holding the tampons like relay batons. She was making good time on the dirt road, even though there were muddy patches she couldn’t see until she slipped. But she managed to stay on her feet each time. The sun was down; the road was getting darker and harder to see as it wound through the trees and down the mountain. She caught a glimpse of the main highway below; she was getting close. She saw a car drive by.
“Help me!”
The sound of her breathing was now joined by another sound-a truck. Junior was coming. She had to get down to the highway… The truck noise was gaining on her… She turned on the speed, tricky going downhill… What’s that in the road?… Some kind of metal plate, like they use when they repair the streets back home… The noise behind her was closer now… on top of her… She took a quick check behind her and her foot caught the edge of something and She went tumbling and the tampons went flying; she hit the ground hard and rolled over and over until her head hit something. Then the world was black.
When Gracie opened her eyes, her head ached, she was cold, and she was in a new place. A tight place. A box. She could see trees above. A face appeared over her. Junior. And she realized what he was doing to her.
“Please, Junior, I’m really sorry! I won’t run again, I promise! Don’t do this to me, please! ”
Junior’s face was hard.
“I’m sorry, too, Patty, ’cause you ruined my big surprise. Now I gotta teach you a lesson. Night or two down there, you won’t run again. The major, he used to put me down there when I needed to get my head on straight, and it didn’t do nothing bad to me.”
“Oh, no, nothing bad at all-you’re just some kind of freaking psycho!”
Then it was dark.
Downtown Dallas after five was a ghost town, especially on a Friday night. The lawyers and bankers had retreated to the suburbs for the weekend, gone home to mama and the kids. FBI Special Agent Jan Jorgenson had only an empty apartment waiting for her, so she was running the deserted streets of downtown, not an advisable venue for most joggers. But then, most joggers don’t carry a. 40-caliber Glock semiautomatic in their waist pack- well, this was Texas; maybe they did.
She had missed her lunch-hour runs every day this week. She needed exercise. Running cleared her mind and allowed her to think. So far she had thought her way into a dead end.
The revenge theory just didn’t hold water. Yes, Colonel Brice had a Viper tattoo. Yes, the man at the park had a Viper tattoo. Yes, Brice had served on Viper team under the command of Major Walker. Yes, Brice had testified against Walker and the other Viper team soldiers. But that was almost forty years ago. And Major Walker was dead. She had to face facts: there was simply no connection between Major Charles Woodrow Walker and Colonel Ben Brice and Gracie Ann Brice’s abduction. There were only coincidences-coincidences the size of a goddamned whale, but coincidences nonetheless.
Four miles and her body felt good again. She had exited the federal building on the western edge of downtown, run east on Main Street, slowing to check out the Neiman Marcus window displays in the day’s last light-she always liked shopping with her mom at the Mall of America when she was a kid-and then to the freeway. She turned north to Ross Avenue, then west past the I.M. Pei-designed symphony center and the Museum, then south a few blocks, then west on Elm Street, past a skyscraper shaped like a rocket ship and one with a hole in the middle of the damn thing- what’s the story with that? — and now into Dealey Plaza, past the School Book Depository and to the grassy knoll, unchanged in forty years, to the exact spot where an American president was assassinated She stopped short.
She turned back and looked up at the sixth floor window of the School Book Depository. Crouched in that window-a much greater distance than she had realized-Lee Harvey Oswald had aimed a bolt-action rifle at a moving target and fired three shots in six seconds, putting two bullets within a nine-inch diameter, the first shot in Kennedy’s neck, the third shot in his head. Standing here now, seeing the shot required-three shots, no less-she
