Discovering Normal (8 page)

Though he was sober, his reaction time was a bit off. Anita maybe? She was the most likely candidate, but she’d still been at Flaherty’s when he’d left.

Hell with it. Whatever this idiot was selling, Chris didn’t want to buy.

He signaled and pulled onto the road, watching the rear the entire time. Damn. The car slid back into the lane right behind him without turning on their lights. Chris sped up; the car did too. What the fuck was going on?

A light flashed a few feet away. High beams on, off and then on again. Chris swerved, but found a long limousine spread across the road. There was no way around it. He hit the brakes and came to a screeching stop no more than ten feet from the car.

Chris slammed into park and yanked the truck door open. He hopped out only to see a shadow emerge from the car. He squinted, considering, then stopped considering all together when an iron fist, bat or cannonball maybe, smashed into his gut.

C
hapter 8

Beth heard the incessant ringing of the phone and pulled a fluffy pillow over her head. Still it echoed.

She uncovered, reached to peek at the clock and then her cell. She’d turned it off before she’d crawled into bed so she was all but certain that it wasn’t hers, but the caller was merciless.

Finally it stopped and she shifted
to find comfort. It was only 6--
she still had a good hour before the kids were up and needing her. A knock sounded at her door.

She hoisted to her elbows. This couldn’t be good. “Yes?”

“Elizabeth.” Her father’s voice sounded thick with sleep or concern or maybe both.

“Yes, Daddy. Come in.”

He pushed the door and pulled tight the sash of his robe. “There’s a call for you. I picked it up in my room.”

Beth snatched her robe and threw it on. “Who would be calling me at this hour?”
             
Her father’s face looked ashen. She touched his arm on the way by and then quickly spun back. “The children are both all right?”
             
Her father nodded and reached into his pocket for his pipe. “They’re fine. I just checked them.”

Beth exhaled and moved her palm from her chest to the phone in the hallway.

“Yes?” she said into the receiver.

“Bethie?”

“Yes?”

“It’s Deej.”

Cosmo DeJohn, the five foot four, two hundred and fifty pound Bureau chief who had hired her. Despite his size, he’d once been the best of the best and was one of the few people who Chris truly respected. A character in every possible way, Deej had remained a faithful friend to them both, but she hadn’t spoken to him since she and Chris had attended his wedding to his long suffering fiancée
last year.

“Deej! Hello.”

“Hi, sweetie. I’m sorry to call you like this
. I
t took a
while to track you down.”

“How did you?” she asked with what she knew was a curious question in her voice.

“Well, that’s part of why I’m calling. First off, Bethie, I’m sorry about you and Chris. I feel so bad.”

“Thank you, but I have to admit I’m a little nervous here, Deej. What’s going on?”

He sighed and she could just see him in a shirt that was undoubtedly too tight with a mochaccino in his hand. “It’s Chris, Bethie. His truck was found not far from your driveway by a friend of his. He called the
police;
they did some investigating and found a suicide note in the cab.”

Dear God!

The world froze and spun at the same time. Beth struggled to find her breath as her heart hammered and jumped as far north as her throat. She must have uttered a choked sob because her father rushed to her side as she fell into an upholstered chair beneath the framed portrait of her Grandfather Winston Williams.

“That makes no sense.”

Deej cleared his throat. “His wife just left him, Bethie.”

She felt tears now as they bubbled out faster than she ever could’ve halted them. “How did you find out?” she managed to ask as she lowered her head to the antique chest the phone sat on.

“We’re notified when any agent dies in an unnatural way. I thought you’d remember that. I must say this is the hardest one I’ve ever encountered.”

“Did they find him?” she choked out.

“I don’t think yet, but they’re looking.”

“I’ll be there in a few hours.”

“I’m flying out too. I’ll wait at the airport.”

And Beth did one of the rudest things of her life. She hung up the phone without saying goodbye.

***

Beth threw what things she could find into a suitcase while her father made flight arrangements in the hall.

Francine straightened and refolded what Beth had flung while her mother sat on the bed and watched. “I just don’t understand this, Elizabeth. He called last night and I spoke with him briefly before I summoned the children. There was no indication
--
”

Beth swallowed yet another sob. “I don’t suppose he’d tell you if he’d been planning to end his life, Mother.”

“No, I don’t suppose. But I want you to promise me that you won’t be riddled with guilt over this--”

Beth spun around and flashed a glare just as her father entered the room.

“I got you on a 7:40 flight. We’ll have to hurry.”

“Fine,” Beth said and threw a sweater she forgot she’d even brought into the mix.

“Please reconsider and let me accompany you, Sweetheart.”

“No,” Beth said without looking up as she grabbed a blouse.

“Elizabeth--”

Beth lifted her head to see her father fidgeting with his pipe. “Thank you, but no. Deej is flying in and I have a lot of friends in the area. I have to call Chris’ parents, but I want to have more details before I do. What I need is for both of you to stay here and tend to my children…” How absurd that this was what they were now--truly just her children. “
Our
children.” She sucked in a breath and closed her eyes. “Promise me you won’t tell them anything until I know for sure what happened. Keep them from the TV and Noah from the papers. As soon as the press gets wind of the ace agent’s suicide, it’ll be a field day. That is what you can do for me, Daddy.”

“All right then,” he said with a sigh.

***

Beth bit her nails for the entire flight. With these ridiculous new ‘
no smoking’
rules, what choice did she have?

She was a widow now, though it probably wasn’t a fair title since she’d pushed Chris to this by walking away. But it was all so strange and uncharacteristic--like a puzzle piece that didn’t fit.

Chris was big on retaliation, and retaliation to him would mean carrying on so she
would d
amn well know that he’d be fine without her. He also adored his children and unless he’d been in a drunken stupor, she couldn’t imagine he wouldn’t have considered the effect it would have on his son and daughter that he was leaving behind.

The flight landed and Beth grabbed her carry-on. Deej was the first person she saw when she walked into the terminal. He didn’t say a word, just extended his arms, pulled her tight and let her cry into the scratchy polyester of his suit coat.

“Chin up,” he whispered.

“Chin up,” she whispered back.

“Chris was the toughest and the smartest agent I’ve ever had the privilege of working with. I don’t know what the hell the son-of –a-bitch was thinking,” Deej said with a squeeze.

“I guess I haven’t known that for a long time.” Beth reached for the hankie decorated with a huge ‘
D
’ that he handed her.

***

Jack had been waiting at the curb when Beth and Deej emerged with their luggage. Beth was so grateful that he’d brought Ramona along for the ride. Now Jack pulled up the
long
drive
to the house
and shut off the engine. Deej instantly hopped from the car, but Beth lingered in the backseat, holding Ramona’s hand for just a moment more. She’d left here only seventy-two hours ago and now she was back and her husband was dead.

It was unfathomable.

“Come on, honey,” Ramona whispered.

Beth climbed out and heard the same bird calling in a distant tree. Did he recognize that she’d come home--even sadder than when she’d left and so much more humbled?

Sundance dashed toward her and Beth stooped to pet him before she followed Ramona up the walk, but paused when Jackson pulled open the screen door.

No squeak. No slam.

The jerk fixed it.

Deej
gestured
his head for her to follow and she did, entering her kitchen as if she were a stranger and had never seen it before. The counter was a mess--coffee stains and sugar sprinkled around the coffeemaker. The sink was full of dishes--an unwashed frying pan and countless mugs and plates.

For some strange reason, Beth pushed her foot on the pedal of the garbage can and peered inside. A bag of chips, wrinkled napkins, a Popsicle wrapper, eggshells and the cored inner seeds of a green pepper?

Beth let it slam closed and turned when Deej called her name. She hadn’t even noticed Larry Thomas, a cop who had worked summers as a farm hand before he’d gone into the academy five years before, was near the kitchen doorway. “I’m sorry, Beth,” Larry said.

“Have you found him?”

Larry shook his head. “No, we’ve got a team on it. One of the herdsman said that Chris kept his hunting rifle in a safe in the barn office. We were able to get it open and the rifle’s gone, Beth. We’re working with the assumption that he wandered out into the woods beyond Dennison’s place.”