Janine’s voice startled him out of his reverie. “Daddy? Do you have any tape?”
“Tape,” he said blankly. “What for?”
“I have to put up my posters.”
“Posters? Posters of what?”
“You know.
Posters.
Leonardo DiCaprio and Mariah Carey and a whole bunch of other people.” She stood in the doorway, hand on hip, her expression of impatience so like her mother’s that it threw him for a minute.
“Oh,” he said. “I don’t think I have any tape.”
“Then we’ll just have to go out and buy some, because I have to put up my posters, and I can’t do it without tape.”
He drove past Kathryn’s house on his way to Wal-Mart. The Toyota was in the driveway, but there was no sign of life anywhere. No Kathryn. No Elvis. He sighed with irritation and pressed a little harder on the gas.
“Dad? Aren’t we taking a roundabout route to get to Wal-Mart?”
She’d been in town for two hours, and already she knew her way around better than he did. “What are you talking about?” he said.
“Well, we were on Route 1 North before, but then you took a couple of turns and drove around for a while, and now here we are, back on Route 1 North again. Why didn’t you just go straight?”
A muscle twitched in his eyelid. “I was just checking something out,” he said.
She brushed her dark hair back from her face. “What?”
“Business,” he said. “I can’t really talk about it.”
Interest lit her face like a high-powered spotlight. “Cop business?” she said.
“Yeah,” he said, silently cussing himself for his misstep. “Cop business.”
“Everybody at school is so jealous because my dad’s a cop.”
Nick turned to look at her. “Jealous?” he said in surprise. “Why?”
“You do important things. You protect people. You put bad guys in jail, where they belong.”
He thought about the four months he’d spent in Elba, scolding prepubescent shoplifters and issuing parking tickets, and he felt guilty. His daughter’s admiration was undeserved. He was no hero, just an ordinary guy who’d run away from the problems in his life. “You know what?” he said.
“What?”
“I love you a whole lot.”
His little girl broke into a heart-stopping grin. “Aw, Daddy,” she said, “I love you, too.”
Chapter Seven
Kathryn lingered in the produce section, debating whether to buy okra or fresh spinach. After four years of eating the bland and flavorless institutional food served to the inmates at Carolina Women’s, she was awestruck every time she visited the grocery store. So much variety, so many choices. It was a joy, relearning the simple pleasure of being able to choose what she wanted to eat.
It was worth the twenty-mile drive to the Mechanicsville Food Lion. The selection was vastly superior to that of Elba’s Dixie Market, the prices considerably lower. And the one time she’d attempted to shop at the Dixie, the looks she’d received from both customers and employees alike had made her feel like a leper on a crowded city bus. Here in Mechanicsville, she was slightly less notorious, more able to blend into the crowd and be treated like any other customer.
She chose the okra, placed it carefully in her cart next to the fresh string beans and the basket of strawberries. Gaping in wonderment at a six-foot-high pyramid of grapefruit, she wheeled her shopping cart around a corner and slammed unceremoniously into a loaded cart that somebody had left sitting directly in the center of the aisle.
Irritated, she tried in vain to disentangle the two carts. And then a voice said, “Hey, kid,” and she looked up in disbelief.
“DiSalvo,” she said. “What the hell are you doing here?”
He stood there tossing a can of pork and beans from one hand to the other. “Same thing you are,” he said. “You know, McAllister, we really have to stop meeting like this.”
He was wearing jeans and a madras plaid shirt with the sleeves rolled up, revealing tanned forearms sprinkled with dark hair. Heat shot through her, and unbelievably, she felt herself blushing. Several awkward moments ensued as they both tried to pretend they weren’t scoping out the contents of the other’s shopping cart. Frozen pizza, she noted. Pop Tarts. Popsicles.
Count Chocula?
She stared at him in amazement. Did the man actually eat this stuff?
“Dog working out?” he said, nodding toward the fifty-pound bag of dog food that took up most of her cart space.
“Nobody’s threatened my life in at least three days.”
He gave her that smile, the one that always chased the shadows from his face and turned her inside out. “Sounds like my definition of success.” He tossed the can of pork and beans into his cart and moved closer to survey the damage. “Looks like your wheel’s caught on mine.” He knelt beside the two carts and manually redirected the position of the front wheels. “There. That ought to do it.” He stood back up, wiped his hand against his thigh. “So how’ve you been? Everything going okay?”
“I can’t get anybody to talk to me, DiSalvo. It’s like I’m wearing this huge scarlet M for Murderess.”
“I tried to tell you. You need to forget this damn obsession you have with
—
”
“I found it, Daddy! It’s only $3.95. Can I get it?”
They both looked up in surprise at the young girl who had joined them. She wore her dark hair parted in the middle, and she had that slender, beanpole look that young teenage girls sometimes get just before they begin to develop hips and breasts. “Kathryn,” Nick said, “this is my daughter, Janine. Janine, this is Kathryn McAllister.”
Janine looked at her father, at Kathryn, back at her father. “Hi,” she said carefully.
“Hello, Janine.” She smiled at the girl and raised an eyebrow in DiSalvo’s direction.
“Long story,” he said. “Janine’s visiting me for a while.”
“I see. What do you think of North Carolina so far, Janine?”
Janine stepped closer to her father, threaded her arm through his. “It’s okay,” she said.
Over the top of his daughter’s head, DiSalvo shot her a wink. They stood there arm in arm, father and daughter, looking remarkably alike with the same coloring, the same soulful dark eyes. “Well,” Kathryn said briskly, “I should be going. It was nice meeting you, Janine.”
“Sure,” Janine said sullenly, still clinging to her father.
Kathryn looked at DiSalvo, hesitated a moment, then steered her cart out around his. “Goodbye,” she said.
“Yeah,” he said, and his voice followed her. “I’ll be seeing you.”
They were halfway home when Janine said, “Who is she?”
His mind a million miles away, he had to force himself to concentrate on what she’d said. “Who’s who?”
“That woman in the grocery store.” Her tone grew accusatory. “Is she your girlfriend?”
At thirteen, she was already trying to legislate his love life. She was every inch her mother’s daughter. “No,” he said, irritated, “she is not my girlfriend.”
“She’d like to be, then. I saw the way she was looking at you.”
“She wasn’t looking at me any way,” he said.
“Yes, she was. She was looking at you the same way you were looking at her. Are you sleeping with her, Daddy? Because if you are, I think that’s really gross and disgusting.”
His fingers tightened on the steering wheel. “I will remind you,” he said, “that I didn’t invite you here. You’re more than welcome to stay with me for as long as you want. But you will not pry into my private life. Is that understood?”
Those huge, dark eyes filled with tears. She turned away from him, toward the window. “Yes.”
“Fine. And for your information, no, I am not sleeping with her.”
They drove in silence for a time. “She’s pretty,” Janine said.
He kept his eyes on the road. “Yeah,” he said. “She is.”
“Do you like her? As a girlfriend, I mean? You could ask her out on a date or something. I bet she wouldn’t say no.”
“Jesus Christ, Janine, I hardly know the woman.”
“Well, then, what about Mrs. Belmont, upstairs? She likes you a lot. I’ve seen her watching you.”
His landlady, Caroline Belmont, was an attractive, dark-haired divorcee who wore tailored suits in floral pastel colors. Another transplanted Northerner, she sold real estate for a living, and had twice tried to lure him upstairs for a drink. “Fine,” he snapped. “You want me to ask Caroline Belmont out for a date, I’ll ask her out for a date. Are you happy now?”
With typical female logic, she said in genuine bewilderment, “It doesn’t matter what I want, Daddy. I want whatever makes you happy.”
She was putting away the groceries when the phone rang. Elvis sat patiently beside the refrigerator, waiting for a doggie treat, his eyes following her every move. “Hang in there,” she told him, snatching the phone off the wall. “Hello?”
“Miz McAllister?”
Kathryn froze. She knew that voice. “Yes,” she said carefully, trying to conceal her excitement.
“This is Wanita. Look, I can’t talk right now, but I got some information that you’d probably find interesting. About your husband’s murder.”
Adrenaline gushed through her veins, and she forced herself to be low-key. “What?” she said.
Wanita cleared her throat and lowered her voice. “What’s it worth to you?” she said.
In the background, she could hear children playing. Her pulse hammered as she considered her options. “How much are you asking?” she said.
“Fifty bucks,” Wanita whispered.
“It’s yours. Shall I meet you somewhere?”
“Tomorrow night. Eight o’clock. You know that turnout by the lake, where all the coon hunters park their trucks?”
“On the Swanville Road?”
“Right. Meet me there at eight tomorrow night. You give me the cash, and I’ll give you the information.”
When she hung up the phone, her hands were shaking. This was the first break she’d had since she arrived in town. Could it be possible that the tide was turning in her direction?
She went to the cupboard and took out a doggie biscuit. Tossed it to Elvis. “Elvis, my man,” she said to the dog, “it looks like you and I have a hot date tomorrow night with Wanita Crumley.”
For her evening attire, Caroline Belmont had foregone the tailored suit in favor of a soft mint green chiffon dress that swirled around her legs and clung in all the right places. Over her shoulders, she wore a matching silk wrap. Caroline was attractive, intelligent and vivacious, had graduated
summa cum laude
from Penn State, and had been to Europe half a dozen times. Her voice was soft and well-modulated, she could speak on any topic with ease, and she managed to ask questions designed to draw him out without prying too deeply into his personal life. On the arm of any man, president or pauper, she would have been considered an asset.
Nick had never been so bored in his life.
After numerous attempts at snagging his attention, Caroline set down her fork. “Nick,” she said.
“Hmn?”
“Nicholas?”
He started, looked up guiltily. “What? I’m sorry, did I miss something?”
“You haven’t heard a word I’ve said tonight, have you?”
He couldn’t tell her that while she’d been talking about the MBA she’d recently completed, he’d been thinking about the book Ingram had given him. He couldn’t tell her that while she was savoring the escargot and the cherries jubilee and the Debussy, he’d been remembering the barbecued ribs he’d shared with Kathryn McAllister in a smoke-filled, dirty hole-in-the-wall where Garth Brooks played on the jukebox, and none of Elba’s Junior League matrons would have deigned to show their faces.
“This wasn’t such a good idea, was it?” Caroline said.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “I’ve been distracted lately. Work.”
She raised a single elegant eyebrow. “I wouldn’t think that the police chief in a town like Elba would have too taxing a job.”
“Do you know anything,” he said, “about snake-handling churches?”
“Only what I’ve seen on the television news magazines.” She studied him quizzically. “Why do you ask?”
He shook his head. “Something about a case I’m working on.”
“You’re a dedicated cop, aren’t you?”
“I’m a cop,” he said. “There’s no other kind.”
It was barely ten o’clock when he brought her home. He followed her up the stairs to her apartment, admiring the sway of her derriere in the chiffon dress and the shapely calves that showed beneath its hem. At her door, they paused. “Would you like to come in for a drink?” she said.
He nearly turned her down, but she was an attractive woman, and he’d been celibate for a long time. “One drink,” he said, and she smiled warmly.
While she busied herself in the kitchen, he wandered around the living room, examining the family photos on the credenza, inspecting the bric-a-brac tastefully displayed here and there, studying the titles of the books on her built-in shelves. In the background, Harry Connick, Jr., crooned about flying to the moon.
“Nick?” she said softly, from the doorway.
He turned and took the drink she held out to him. Instead of drinking, he set it down on the table beside him and took Caroline Belmont in his arms. She was as willing as he’d expected her to be, soft and feminine and fragrant, and he kissed her open-mouthed, his knee thrust between her thighs, one hand pressed hard against the small of her back. For a full thirty seconds, he kissed her. And then he drew back and examined her lovely face. Those long-lashed eyes stared back at him, and he thought he saw amusement in them. “Well,” she said, “I guess we can’t say we didn’t give it a try, can we?”
“I’m sorry,” he said, and released her.
While he paced, hands in pockets, she smoothed her hair, her skirt. “Why’d you ask me out tonight, Nick?” she said.
He stopped pacing, shrugged sheepishly. “My daughter pushed me into it. She thinks I need to get a life.”
Her smile was genuine. “Look, Nick, you’re a very nice man. It’s not your fault the chemistry isn’t there.”
At the door, he gave her a brotherly peck on the cheek, and then he went downstairs and checked in on Janine. She was curled up on the couch, wearing her yellow flannel pajamas, his pillow cradled in her arms, watching
Caddyshack
for the umpteenth time. “Hi, Daddy,” she said, giving him that smile that never failed to squeeze his heart right there inside his chest.
“Hi, baby. Listen, I have to go out for a little while. Will you be okay?”
“Of course.” She waggled her eyebrows. “How’d it go with Mrs. Belmont?”
“It was okay. She’s one sharp cookie. She likes you a lot.”
“I like her, too. Go ahead and take your time, Daddy, I’ll be fine.”
“I won’t be too late, I promise. Keep the doors locked, okay?”
Janine rolled her eyes. “Yes, Dad.”
He locked the door behind him, double-checked it and went out into the hot summer night.
She waited ninety minutes at the turnout on the shore of Lake Alberta, but Wanita Crumley never showed.
At 9:30, she finally gave up, and drove back into town, past Carlyle’s Barber Shop and the Dixie Market, past the police station, eerily quiet at this time of day. Up Oak Street and past the quaint old house where Nick DiSalvo rented the downstairs apartment from Caroline Belmont. Blue light flickered behind the bay window, but the Blazer wasn’t in the yard, and she wondered where he was at this time of night while his daughter sat home alone with the TV.