Making Faces (43 page)

“Fern. I am not going to make love to you on
the bakery floor, baby. And that's what's going to happen if you
don't get your cute butt out of here. Go!”

Ambrose dropped a kiss on her freckled nose
and pushed her away from him. “Go.”

Fern was still thinking about sweaty sex on
the bakery floor when she walked out of the employee entrance at
the back of the store. She almost couldn't stand to leave him.
Being apart had become torture. Soon Ambrose would be leaving for
school. And with Bailey gone and Ambrose far away, Fern didn't know
what she was going to do with herself.

The thought caused a flood of emotion that
had her turning back toward the employee entrance, eager to return
to his side. She wondered what Ambrose would do if she followed
him. She could register for school and get a student loan. She
could live in the dorms and take a couple of classes and write in
the evenings and follow him around like a puppy, the way she'd done
her whole life.

Fern shook her head adamantly, took a
fortifying breath, and walked toward her bike. No. She wasn't going
to do that. In recent days she had thought about what came next for
them. She had made her feelings known. She loved Ambrose. She had
always loved him. And if Ambrose wanted her in his life
permanently, not just as a temporary distraction or a safety net,
he was going to have to be the one to say the words. He was going
to have to ask.

Fern knelt by her bike where it was chained
to a downspout and clicked the combination absentmindedly. Her mind
was far away, wrapped in Ambrose and the thought of losing him once
more, and she reacted slowly to the sudden rush of footsteps coming
up behind her. Steely arms wrapped around her and shoved her to the
ground, causing her to lose her grip on her bike so it teetered and
toppled beside her.

Her first thought was that is was Ambrose. He
had surprised her in the dark before, just outside the employee
entrance. But it wasn't Ambrose. He would never hurt her. The arms
that gripped her were thinner, the body less corded with muscle,
but whoever it was, he was still much bigger than Fern. And he
intended to hurt her. Fern shoved frantically at the weight that
pressed her face into the sidewalk.

“Where is she, Fern?” It was Becker. His
breath reeked of beer and vomit and days without a toothbrush. The
immaculate Becker Garth was coming undone, and that scared Fern
more than anything.

“I went to her mother's house but it's dark.
I've been watching it for two days. And she's not at home! I can't
even get in my own house, Fern!”

“They left, Becker,” Fern wheezed, trying to
keep the terror at bay. Becker sounded hysterical, like he had lost
his sanity when he'd forced Bailey off the road. The police didn't
think Becker knew that they had Bailey's 911 call. Maybe he had
thought he could just come back home now that the dust had settled
and nobody would be the wiser.

“WHERE ARE THEY?!” Becker grabbed Fern's hair
and ground her cheek into the sidewalk. Fern winced and tried not
to cry as she felt the burn and scrape of the concrete against her
face.

“I don't know, Becker,” Fern lied. There was
no way she was telling Becker Garth where his wife was. “They just
said they were leaving for a couple days to get some rest. They'll
be back.” Another lie.

As soon as Rita had been discharged from the
hospital, she’d given her landlord notice and Sarah had put her
house up for sale with a local realtor and asked that it be kept
private. Rita was devastated by Bailey’s death and they were
afraid. With Becker unaccounted for, they didn't feel safe in their
homes, in their town, and they liquidated everything they could and
had decided to take off until Becker was no longer a threat, if
that day ever came.

Fern's father had arranged to have their
belongings sold and what couldn't be sold was kept in a storage
unit owned by the church. He'd given them $2,000 in cash, and Fern
had dipped into her own savings account. In less than a week, they
were gone. Fern had been so afraid for Rita. She hadn't thought she
needed to be afraid for herself.

Fern heard a snick and felt a slide of
something cold and sharp against her throat. Her heart sounded like
a racehorse at full speed, echoing in the ear that was pressed
against the sidewalk.

“You and Bailey turned her against me! You
were always giving her money. And Sheen tried to take my kid! Did
you know that?”

Fern just squeezed her eyes shut and prayed
for deliverance.

“Is she with Ambrose?”

“What?”

“Is she with Ambrose?” he screamed.

“No! Ambrose is with me!” Just inside the
door of the bakery. And so, so far away.

“With you? You think he wants you, Fern? He
doesn't want you! He wants Rita. He's always wanted Rita. But now
his face is all messed up!” Becker spit the words into her ear.

Fern felt the nick of the blade against her
skin, and Becker moved the knife from her throat to her face. “And
I'm going to cut you up so you match. If you tell me where Rita is,
I'll only mark up one side, so you look just like Ambrose.”

Fern squeezed her eyes shut, panting in
panic, praying for deliverance.

“Tell me where she is!” Becker raged at her
silence and backhanded her. Fern's head rang and her ears popped
and for a moment she lost herself, floating out and beyond, a
momentary reprieve from the terror that gripped her. Then Becker
was up and dragging Fern by her long red hair before she could get
her feet under her, pulling her over the curb, crossing the street,
and moving across the field that extended into the dark trees
behind the store. Fern scrambled, crying against the pain at her
scalp, trying to stand. And she screamed for Ambrose.

“Do you feel that?”

The words came into Ambrose's mind as if
Paulie stood at his shoulder and spoke them in his ear. His deaf
ear. Ambrose rubbed at his prosthetic and stepped back from the
mixer. He flipped it off, and turned, expecting someone to be
standing there with him. But the bakery was silent and empty. He
listened, the silence expectant. And he felt it. A sense of
something wrong, a sense of foreboding. Something he didn't have a
name for and couldn't explain.

“Do you feel that?” Paulie had said before
death had separated the friends forever.

Ambrose walked out of the bakery toward the
back door, the door Fern had exited less than ten minutes before.
And then he heard her scream. Ambrose flew through the exit door,
adrenaline pulsing in his ears and denial pounding in his head.

The first thing he saw was Fern's bike,
laying on its side, the front wheel pointing into the air, the
pedals holding the front half up in a slight tilt, freeing the big
wheel to spin slightly in the wind. Like Cosmo's bike. Smiling
Cosmo, who wanted his family to be safe and his country to be
delivered from terror. Cosmo, who died at the hands of evil
men.

“Fern!” Ambrose roared in terror. And then he
saw them, maybe 100 yards away, Fern struggling with someone who
held his arm around her throat and was dragging her across the
field behind the store. Ambrose ran, sprinting across the uneven
ground, his feet barely touching the earth, rage pouring through
his veins. He closed the gap in seconds, and as Becker saw him
coming he yanked Fern up against him, shielding himself. In a hand
that shook like someone who was strung out and beyond reason, he
held a knife out toward Ambrose as Ambrose hurtled toward him,
closing in fast.

“She's coming with me, Ambrose!” he shrieked.
“She's taking me to Rita!”

Ambrose didn't slow, didn't let his eyes rest
on Fern. Becker Garth was done. He'd killed Bailey Sheen, left him
lying in a ditch, knowing full well he couldn't save himself. He'd
abused his wife, terrorized her and his child, and now he held the
girl Ambrose loved like a rag doll, shielding himself from the
wrath wrapped in vengeance that was coming for him.

Becker cursed viciously, realizing that his
knife wasn’t going to prevent a collision with Ambrose. He dropped
Fern, releasing her so he could escape, and screamed as he turned
to run. Fern screamed as well, her fear for Ambrose evident in the
way she staggered back to her feet and spread her arms as if to
stop him from hurling himself into Becker's knife.

Becker had staggered only a few steps before
Ambrose was on him, knocking him to the ground the way Becker had
knocked his wife to the ground. Becker's head collided with the
dirt the way Rita's head had collided with her kitchen floor. Then
Ambrose let loose, fists flying, pummeling Becker like he'd done in
ninth grade when Becker Garth had terrorized Bailey Sheen in the
men's locker room at school.

“Ambrose!” Fern cried from somewhere behind
him, anchoring him to her and to the present, slowing his fists and
calming his rage-fueled barrage. Standing, he grabbed Becker's long
hair, the hair that looked like Ambrose's old locks. And he dragged
him, the way Becker had dragged Fern, back to where Fern was
swaying on her feet, trying not to collapse. He released Becker and
pulled Fern into his arms. Becker fell in a heap.

“Don't let him get away. We can't let him
find Rita,” Fern cried, shaking her head and clinging to him. But
Becker wasn't going anywhere. Ambrose swept Fern up in his arms and
carried her back to the store where her bike still lay, its front
wheel still spinning gently, impervious to the drama that had
played out nearby.

Fern's face was bloody along her throat and
blood oozed from an abrasion along her cheekbone. Her right eye was
already swollen shut. Ambrose sat her gently against the building,
promising her he would be right back. He grabbed the wiry bike lock
that dangled from the downspout, and digging out his phone, he
called 911. While he calmly told the 911 dispatcher what had
transpired, he hog-tied Becker Garth with Fern's bike lock in case
he regained consciousness before the cops arrived. Ambrose hoped he
did. He hoped Becker woke up soon. He wanted him to know how it
felt to be trapped on his back in the dark, unable to move, knowing
he couldn't save himself. The way Bailey must have felt in ninth
grade in a black locker room, lying in his toppled chair, waiting
for rescue. The way Bailey must have felt, face down in a ditch
knowing his attempts to help his friend would cost him his
life.

Then Ambrose walked back to Fern, fell to his
knees beside her, and pulled her into his lap, wrapping his arms
around her gently, humbly. And he whispered his thanks into her
hair as his body began to shake.

“Thank you, Paulie.”

Prom, 2002

Fern fiddled with her neckline for the
hundredth time since arriving and smoothed her skirt as if it had
suddenly become wrinkled since she’d smoothed it four seconds
ago.