stalked into the living room.
“Did I catch some undercurrent there?” Carrie asked.
“Yeah, well, nothing’s easy,” I muttered.
“Not with you, anyway,” she said, but her voice was gentle.
“Actually, in this case, it’s him,” I told her grimly.
“Hmmm. You think this is going to work out?”
“Who knows?” I said, exasperated. “Let’s get this kitchen done.”
“It hardly seems right for you to work so hard, Lily. You spend all week cleaning and arranging other people’s things. Why don’t you go sit out there and have some down time?”
With Claude and Jack and Tom David? “Not on your life,” I told her, and finished placing pots and pans in the cabinet.
We worked on the bedroom next, sliding all the drawers back into their correct position, rearranging the clothes in the closet. I polished all the furniture after I found the cleaning supplies, and I quickly stowed away the bathroom things while Carrie set Claude’s desk to rights in the second bedroom.
Then I was through, and I knew it was time for me to leave. Carrie would have to be helping Claude do personal things, I supposed; he would be tired.
He was, in fact, asleep on the couch. All the men had left except Jack, who had opened a box of books and was shelving them in the low bookcase. He’d gathered up all the beer bottles and put them in a plastic garbage bag. He half-turned as he heard my steps, smiled at me, and pushed a dictionary into place. It all seemed so pleasant and normal. I didn’t know what attitude to take. He’d severed our connection until this episode was over. But we were alone in the room except for the sleeping policeman.
I knelt by him, and he turned and kissed me, his hand going to the back of my neck. It was a kiss that started out to be short and ended up to be long.
“Damn,” he breathed, moving back from me.
“Gotta go,” I said very quietly, not wanting to disturb the sleeper.
“Yeah, me, too,” he whispered, standing and stretching. “I need to listen to today’s tape.” He patted his jacket pocket.
“Jack,” I said in his ear, “if Howell won’t call the law, you have to. You’ll get in awful trouble.” It was an idea that had consumed any extra minute I’d had during the day. I darted a glance at “the law,” sound asleep on the couch. “Promise me,” I whispered. I looked straight into his hazel eyes.
“Are you scared?” he breathed.
I nodded. “For you,” I told him.
He stared at me. “I’ll talk to Howell tomorrow,” he said.
I smiled at him, rubbed my knuckles against his cheek in a caress. “ ‘Bye,” I whispered, and tiptoed out Claude’s door.
I pulled on my coat in the hall, zipping the front and pulling my hood up. It was really cold, biting cold; the temperature would be well below freezing tonight. I wouldn’t be able to walk even if I needed to. But after extracting Jack’s promise I felt very relaxed. It might not take me too long to sleep.
Just to make sure, I walked the four streets around the arboretum twice, very briskly, and then took the trails through the trees. When I emerged onto Track Street, it was full dark. My feet were feeling numb and my hands were chilled despite my gloves.
I was halfway across the street, angling to my house, when a Jeep rounded the corner at a high speed and screeched to a halt a foot away from my right leg.
“Where’ve you been, Lily?” Bobo was hatless and frantic, his brown coat unbuttoned. There was no trace of the ardent young man who had kissed me the night before.
“Helping Claude move downstairs. Walking.”
“I’ve been looking for you everywhere. Get inside your house and don’t go out tonight.”
His face, almost on a level with mine because of the height of the Jeep, was white and strained. No eighteen- year-old should look like that. Bobo was scared and angry and desperate.
“What’s going to happen?”
“You’ve been too many places, Lily. Some people don’t understand.” He wanted to say more. His teeth bared from his inner tension. He was on the verge of screaming.
“Tell me,” I said, as calmly as I could manage. I snatched off a glove and laid my hand over his. But instead of soothing him, my touch seemed to spark even more inner storms. He yanked away from me as if I’d poked him with a cattle prod. From between clenched teeth, he said,
My own anxiety level jumped off the scale. What could have happened so suddenly? I looked up at the facade of the apartment building. Claude’s new windows were dark. Deedra’s, above him, were also out. But Jack’s lights were on, at least some of them. His living room window was faintly illuminated.
I stood in the middle of street in the freezing cold and tried to make my brain work.
Without deciding it consciously, I began to run-not toward my house but toward the apartments. Once I was inside the hall, hurrying past Claude’s door, I tried to walk quietly. I went up the stairs like a snake, swift and silent. I tried Jack’s door. It was unlocked and open an inch. A ball of fear settled in my stomach.
I slipped inside. No one in the living room, lit only by the dim light reaching it from the kitchen. Jack’s leather jacket was tossed on the couch. Further down the hall, the overhead light in the spare bedroom glared through its open door. I listened, closing my eyes to listen more intently. I felt the hair stand up on my neck. Silence.
I’d only been in here once, so I picked my way through Jack’s sparse furniture very carefully.
No one in the kitchen, either.
I was biting my lip to keep from making a sound when I stood in the doorway of the guest bedroom. There was a card table holding a tape player, a pad of paper, and a pencil. There was a Dr. Pepper can on the table. The folding chair that had been in front of the table was lying on its side. I touched my fingers to the Dr. Pepper can. It was still cold. A red light indicated the tape player was on, but the tape compartment was open and empty. I ran back to the living room and fumbled through the pockets of the leather jacket. They were empty, too.
“They’ve got Jack,” I said to no one.
I covered my eyes to think more intently. Claude was downstairs unable to get around on his own. At least some portion of his police force was corrupt. Sheriff Schuster was dead and I didn’t know any of his people. Maybe the sheriff’s department, too, contained one or two men who at least sympathized with the Take Back Your Own group.
What if I couldn’t save Jack by myself? Whom could I call?
Carrie was a noncombatant. Raphael had a wife and family, and without putting it to myself clearly in words, I knew a black man’s involvement would escalate whatever was happening into a war.
If I went in and was captured, too, who would help?
Then I thought of someone.
I remembered the number and punched it in on Jack’s phone.
“Mookie,” I said when she answered. “I need you to come. Bring the rifle.”
“Where?”
“Winthrop’s. They’ve got-my man.” I was beyond trying to explain who Jack was. “He’s a detective. He’s been taping them.”
“Where’ll I meet you?” She sounded cool.
“Let’s go in over the back fence. I live right behind the Home Supply store.”
“I know. I’m coming.” She put her phone down.
This was the woman I’d cautioned about leaving town yesterday, and now I was urging her to put herself into danger on my say-so. But I didn’t have time to worry about irony. I ran down the stairs, leaving Jack’s door wide open. It wouldn’t hurt for someone else to become alarmed. I ran to my place, let myself in. I pulled off my coat, found a heavy dark sweatshirt, and yanked it down over my T-shirts. I found Jack’s forgotten watch cap. I pulled it over my light hair. No gloves, I needed my hands. I untied my high-tops and pulled on dark boots, laced them tight. I would have darkened my face if I could have thought of something to do it with. I came out of my front door as Mookie pulled in. She leaped out of the car with the rifle in one hand.
