Hush, Hush

Chapter 21

Outside, the weather had shifted to cold and drizzling. The lampposts burned an eerie, sallow color that did little against the thick fog brewing along the streets. I hurried out of Blind Joe's, grateful I'd looked at the weather forecast earlier and brought my umbrella. As I passed storefront windows, I saw crowds gathering in the bars.

I was a few blocks from the bus stop when the now familiar icy feeling kissed the back of my neck. I'd felt it the night I was sure someone looked in my bedroom window, at Delphic, and again right before Vee walked out of Victoria's Secret wearing my jacket. I bent down, pretended to tie my shoelace, and cast a surreptitious glance around. The sidewalks on both sides of the street were empty.

The crosswalk light changed, and I stepped off the curb. Moving faster, I tucked my handbag under my arm and hoped the bus was on time. I cut through an alley behind a bar, slipped past a huddle of smokers, and came out on the next street over. Jogging up a block, I veered down another alley and circled back around the block. Every few seconds I checked behind me.

I heard the rumble of the bus, and a moment later it rounded the corner, materializing out of the fog. It slowed against the curb and I climbed aboard, heading home. I was the only passenger.

Taking a seat several rows behind the driver, I slouched to keep out of sight. He jerked the lever to close the doors, and the bus roared down the street. I was on the verge of offering a sigh of relief when I received a text message from Vee.

WHERE U AT?

PORTLAND, I TEXTED BACK. YOU?

ME 2. AT A PARTY WITH JULES AND ELLIOT. LET'S MEET UP.

WHY ARE YOU IN PORTLAND?!

I didn't wait for her answer; I dialed her directly. Talking was faster. And this was urgent.

"Well? What say you?" Vee asked. "Are you in the partying mood?"

"Does your mom know you're at a party in Portland with two guys?"

"You're starting to sound neurotic, babe."

"I can't believe you came to Portland with Elliot!" I had a sinking thought. "Does he know you're on the phone with me?"

"So he can come kill you? No, sorry. He and Jules ran to Kinghorn to pick up something, and I'm chilling solo. I could use a wing woman. Hey!" Vee shouted into the background. "Hands off, okay? O-F-F. Nora? I'm not exactly in the greatest area. Time is of the essence."

"Where are you?"

"Hang on… okay, the building across the street says one-seven-two-seven. The street is Highsmith, I'm pretty sure."

"I'll be there as soon as I can. But I'm not staying. I'm going home, and you're coming with me. Stop the bus!" I called to the driver.

He applied the brakes, and I was thrown against the seat in front of me.

"Can you tell me which way to Highsmith?" I asked him once I'd made it to the top of the aisle.

He pointed out the windows paneling the right side of the bus. "West of here. You planning to go on foot?" He surveyed me up and down. "'Cause I should warn you, it's a rough neighborhood."

Great.

I had to walk only a few blocks before I knew the bus driver had been right to warn me. The scenery changed drastically. The quaint storefronts were replaced by buildings spray-painted with gang graffiti. The windows were dark, barred up with iron. The sidewalks were desolate paths stretching into the fog.

A slow, rattling noise drifted through the fog, and a woman pushing a cart of garbage bags wheeled into view. Her eyes were raisins, beady and dark, and they twitched their way over me in almost predatory evaluation.

"What we got here?" she said through a gape of missing teeth.

I drew a discreet step back and clutched my handbag against me.

"Looks like a coat, mittens, and a pretty wool hat," she said. "Always wanted me a pretty wool hat." She pronounced the word prit-ee.

"Hello," I said, clearing my throat and trying to sound friendly. "Can you please tell me how much farther to Highsmith Street?"

She cackled.

"A bus driver pointed me in this direction," I said with less confidence.

"He told you Highsmith is this way?" she said, sounding irritated. "I know the way to Highsmith, and this ain't it."

I waited, but she didn't elaborate. "Do you think you could give me directions?" I asked.

"I got directions." She tapped her head with a finger that strongly resembled a twisted, knotted twig. "Keep everything up here, I do."

"Which way is Highsmith?" I encouraged.

"But I can't tell you for free," she said in a chiding tone. "That's gonna cost you. A girl has to make a living. Nobody ever tell you ain't nothing in life free?"

"I don't have any money." Not much, anyway. Only enough for a bus fare home.

"You got a nice warm coat."

I looked down at my quilted coat. A chilly wind ruffled my hair, and the thought of peeling my coat off sent a flush of goose bumps down my arms. "I just got this coat for Christmas."

"I'm freezing my derriere off out here," she snapped. "You want directions or not?"

I couldn't believe I was standing here. I couldn't believe I was bartering my coat with a homeless woman. Vee was so far in debt to me she might never get out.

I shucked off my coat and watched her zip into it.

My breath came out like smoke. I hugged myself and stamped my feet, conserving body heat. "Can you please tell me the way to Highsmith now?"

"You want the long way, or the short way?"

"Sh-short," I chattered.

"That's gonna cost you too. Short way's got an additional fee attached. Like I said, always wanted me a pretty wool hat."

I tugged the pink and white beanie off my head. "Highsmith?" I asked, trying to hold on to the friendly tone as I passed it over.

"See that alley?" she said, pointing behind me. I turned. The alley was a half block back. "You take it, you come out on Highsmith on the other side."

"That's it?" I said incredulously. "One block over?"

"Good news is, you got a short walk. Bad news is, ain't no walk feel short in this weather. 'Course, I'm nice and warm now I got me a coat and a pretty hat. Give me those mittens, and I'll walk you there myself."

I looked down at the mittens. At least my hands were warm. "I'll manage."

She shrugged and wheeled her cart to the next corner, where she took up a post against the bricks.

The alley was dark and cluttered with trash bins, water-stained cardboard boxes, and an unrecognizable hump that may have been a discarded water heater. Then again, it just as easily could have been a rug with a body rolled inside. A high chain-link fence spanned the alley halfway down. I could hardly climb a four-foot fence on a good day, let alone a ten-foot one. Brick buildings flanked me on both sides. All the windows were greased over and barred.

Stepping over crates and sacks of trash, I picked my way down the alley. Broken glass crunched beneath my shoes. A flash of white darted between my legs, stealing my breath. A cat. Just a cat, vanishing into the darkness ahead.

I reached for my pocket to text Vee, intending to tell her I was close and to watch for me, when I remembered I'd left my cell phone in my coat pocket. Nice going, I thought. What are the chances the bag lady will give you back your phone? Precisely- slim to none.

I decided it was worth a try, and as I turned around, a sleek black sedan sped past the opening to the alley. With a sudden glow of red, the brake lights lit up.

For reasons I couldn't explain beyond intuition, I drew into the shadows.

A car door opened and the crackle of gunfire broke out. Two shots. The car door slammed and the black sedan screeched away. I could hear my heart hammering in my chest, and it blended with the sound of running feet. I realized a moment later that they were my feet, and I was running to the mouth of the alley. I rounded the corner and came up short.

The bag lady's body was in a heap on the sidewalk.

I rushed over and fell on my knees beside her. "Are you okay?" I said frantically, rolling her over. Her mouth was agape, her raisin eyes hollow. Dark liquid flowered through the quilted coat I'd been wearing three minutes ago.

I felt the urge to jump back but forced myself to reach inside the coat pockets. I needed to call for help, but my cell phone wasn't there.

There was a phone booth on the corner across the street. I ran to it and dialed 911. While I waited for the operator to pick up, I glanced back at the bag lady's body, and that's when I felt cold adrenaline shoot through me. The body was gone.

With a shaky hand, I hung up. The sound of approaching footsteps tapped in my ears, but whether they were near or far, I couldn't tell.

Clip, clip, clip.

He's here, I thought. The man in the ski mask.

I shoved a few coins into the phone and gripped the receiver with both hands. I tried to remember Patch's cell phone number. Squeezing my eyes shut, I visualized the seven numbers he'd written in red ink on my hand the first day we met. Before I could second-guess my memory, 1 dialed the numbers.

"What's up?" Patch said.

I almost sobbed at the sound of his voice. I could hear the crack of billiard balls colliding on a pool table in the background, and knew he was at Bo's Arcade. He could be here in fifteen, maybe twenty minutes.

"It's me." I didn't dare push my voice above a whisper.

"Nora?"

"I'm in P-Portland. On the corner of Hempshire and Nantucket. Can you pick me up? It's urgent."

I was huddled in the bottom of the phone booth, counting silently to one hundred, trying to remain calm, when a black Jeep Commander glided to the curb. Patch slid the door to the phone booth open and crouched in the entrance.

He peeled off his top layer-a long-sleeved black T-shirt- leaving him in a black undershirt. He fit the neckhole of the T-shirt over my head and a moment later had my arms pushed through the sleeves. The shirt dwarfed me, the sleeves hanging down well past my fingertips. It mingled the smells of smoke, saltwater, and mint soap. Something about it filled the hollow places inside me with reassurance.

"Let's get you in the car," Patch said. He pulled me up, and I wrapped my arms around his neck and buried my face into him.

"I think I'm going to be sick," I said. The world tilted, including Patch. "I need my iron pills."

"Shh," he said, holding me against him. "It's going to be all right. I'm here now."

I managed a little nod.

"Let's get out of here."

Another nod. "We need to get Vee," I said. "She's at a party one block over."

While Patch drove the Jeep around the corner, I listened to my chattering teeth echo around inside my head. I'd never been this frightened in my life. Seeing the dead homeless woman conjured up thoughts of my dad. My vision was tinged with red, and hard as I tried, I couldn't flush out the image of blood.

"Were you in the middle of a pool game?" I asked, remembering the sound of billiard balls colliding in the background during our brief phone conversation.

"I was winning a condo."

"A condo?"

"One of those swank ones on the lake. I would have hated the place. This is Highsmith. Do you have an address?"

"I can't remember it," I said, sitting up taller to get a better look out the windows. All of the buildings looked abandoned. There was no trace of a party. There was no trace of life, period.

"Do you have your cell?" I asked Patch.

He slid a Blackberry out of his pocket. "Battery's low. I don't know if it will make a call."

I texted Vee. WHERE ARE YOU?!

CHANGE OF PLANS, she texted back. GUESS J AND E COULDN'T FIND WHAT THEY WERE LOOKING 4. WE'RE GOING HOME.

The screen drained to black.

"It died," I told Patch. "Do you have the charger?"

"Not on me."

"Vee's going back to Coldwater. Do you think you could drop me off at her house?"

Minutes later we were on the coastal highway, driving right along a cliff just above the ocean. I'd been this way before, and when the sun was out, the water was slate blue with patches of dark green where the water reflected the evergreens. It was night, and the ocean was smooth black poison.

"Are you going to tell me what happened?" Patch asked.

The jury was still out on whether or not I should tell Patch anything. I could tell him how after the bag lady tricked me out of my coat, she was shot. I could tell him I thought the bullet was meant for me. Then I could try explaining how the bag lady's body had magically vanished into thin air.

I remembered the crazed look Detective Basso had directed at me when I told him someone had broken into my bedroom. I wasn't in the mood to get eyeballed and laughed at again. Not by Patch. Not right now.

"I got lost, and a bag lady cornered me," I said. "She talked me out of my coat…" I wiped my nose with the back of my hand and sniffled. "She got my beanie, too."

"What were you doing all the way out here?" asked Patch.

"Meeting Vee at a party."

We were halfway between Portland and Coldwater, on a stretch of lush and unpopulated highway, when steam spewed suddenly from the hood of the Jeep. Patch braked, easing the Jeep to the roadside.

"Hang on," he said, swinging out. Lifting the hood of the Jeep, he disappeared out of sight.

A minute later he dropped the hood back in place. Brushing his hands on his pants, he came around to my window, gesturing for me to lower it.

"Bad news," he said. "It's the engine."

I tried to look informed and intelligent, but I had a feeling my expression just looked blank.

Patch raised an eyebrow and said, "May it rest in peace."

"It won't move?"

"Not unless we push it."

Of all the cars, he had to win the lemon.

"Where's your cell?" Patch asked.

"I lost it."

He grinned. "Let me guess. In your coat pocket. The bag lady really cashed in, didn't she?"

He scouted the horizon. "Two choices. We can flag down a ride, or we can walk to the next exit and find a phone."

I stepped out, shutting the door with force behind me. I kicked the Jeep's right front tire. I knew I was using anger to mask my fear of what I'd been through today. As soon as I was all alone, I'd break down crying.

"I think there's a motel at the next exit. I'll go c-c-call a cab," I said, my teeth chattering harder. "Y-y-you wait here with the Jeep."

He cracked a slight smile, but it didn't look amused. "I'm not letting you out of my sight. You're looking a little deranged, Angel. We'll go together."

Crossing my arms, I stood up to him. In tennis shoes, my eyes came level with his shoulders. I was forced to tilt my neck back to meet his eyes. "I'm not going anywhere near a motel with you." Best to sound firm so I was less likely to change my mind.

"You think the two of us and a slummy motel make for a dangerous combination?"

Yes, actually.

Patch leaned back against the Jeep. "We can sit here and argue this." He squinted up at the riotous sky. "But this storm is about to catch its second wind."

As if Mother Nature wanted her say in the verdict, the sky opened and a thick concoction of rain and sleet hailed down.

I sent Patch my coldest look, then blew out an angry sigh.

As usual, he had a point.