3 Swift Run (15 page)

18

Outside, I had to loosen the scarf because the temperature must have been in the midfifties.
In February! The sun glared off the Hummer’s chrome, and I was grateful for the glasses.
I clambered up onto the seat and started the car once I’d found the keys in my purse.
My friends keep telling me I should get a smaller purse, but it’s so convenient to
have everything I need with me—flashlight, nail file, extra hose, snacks. I used to
watch
Let’s Make a Deal
when I was younger, and I just knew that if I ever got on the show I’d win something
by being able to pull out a boiled egg or a staple remover or whatever else Monty
was after.

Merging into traffic on Academy Boulevard, I had made it to the intersection with
Woodmen—the new exits confuse me—when a head popped up behind me. I caught a glimpse
of blond hair in the rearview mirror, screamed, and ran the Hummer’s driver-side wheels
onto a concrete traffic island. I was fumbling at the door, planning to run for it,
when a man’s voice said, “Jesus, Mom, it’s me! Get a grip.”

Dexter.

I turned around, openmouthed, to stare at my son. “Dexter! What are you—?”

“Just drive, okay?” He gestured out the window to where traffic was backing up as
cars slowed to look at us stranded on the median.

Waving apologetically to the people behind me, I reversed the Hummer, and it thudded
onto the roadway. I put it in gear and eased back into traffic. The car seemed okay,
thank goodness, since I couldn’t afford repairs. Dexter had ducked down again. I made
the turn onto I-25 and risked a glance in the rearview mirror. “What are you doing
here?” I asked. “Oh, Dexter, there’s—”

“The police are looking for me, Mom.” He didn’t sound so sure of himself now. “They
were at the house and—”

“What were you doing at the house? You’re supposed to be in school.” It was strange
talking to him when I couldn’t see him.

“I had stuff to do,” he said.

I wasn’t letting this slide, not this time. “What stuff? I’ve been to the school and
seen the note you got Kendall to turn in. You forged my signature!”

“Yeah, well.” He had a shrug in his voice like it was old hat.

“You can’t—”

“Mom, the police want to arrest me.” I heard fear in his voice, underneath the exasperation,
and I turned half around, trying to peer into the backseat.

“It’ll be okay,” I said, echoing Charlie. A honk made me face front again.

“You don’t know—”

“I do. Detective Lorrimore showed me a video of you visiting Heather-Anne’s room at
the Embassy Suites the day she was killed. Oh, Dexter, what were you doing there?”

“They have a video? Shit.”

“Shit” seemed like the right word in these circumstances, so I didn’t say anything
to him about his language.

“Why?”

There was silence for a moment. “I heard you and Charlie talking about her on the
phone. I thought maybe Dad was with her, or she’d know where Dad was.” His voice cracked
the tiniest bit, and for a moment he seemed more like my little boy than the grown
man he almost was.

“What did you say to her?” Curiosity tickled me. What had my son said to the woman
who lured his dad away?

“I’d met her before and—”

“You had? When? How?”

“Dad introduced us. We went to Cold Stone and—”

“Kendall, too?”

“Yeah. Does it really matter now?”

It did, and if I caught up with Les I was going to have it out with him. How could
he introduce my children to the woman he was running around with? It wasn’t the most
important thing now, though. “Tell me what she said.” I realized I’d missed my exit
and edged right to take the next one.

Dexter seemed to catch on to what I was doing. “You’re not going home, are you? You
can’t. There are cops there.”

I’d forgotten. If I pulled into the driveway with Dexter in the backseat they’d haul
him off to prison. Unsure what to do, I pulled into a Safeway parking lot, parked
as far from the store as possible, and twisted around to face my son. He was lying
on the backseat, but he slowly edged up, casting hunted looks out each window. Not
seeing any cop cars nearby, he straightened up.

“So Heather-Anne asked me in, being real nice, and even offered me a soda. She asked
me if I’d seen Dad, and when I said no, that I’d been hoping he was there—in the hotel
with her—she got all snotty and told me to get out. She said he didn’t want to see
me, that he had a new life, and that he was much happier without us ‘millstones’ dragging
him down and keeping him from achieving his true potential.”

I wished Heather-Anne was alive so I could kill her. Detective Lorrimore might not
think I was the murdering type, but right then I was.

“Then she kicked me out.”

“Did you see anyone as you were leaving?” I looked at him hopefully, hoping he’d say
he’d run into a murderous thug carrying a scarf in one hand.

“Nah.” His brows came together slightly. “But I kinda thought there might be someone
in the other room while I was there.”

“The other room?”

“Yeah, Heather-Anne and I were in the living room kind of area, with the TV. The bedroom
door was shut. I don’t know why, but I thought there might be someone in there. I
thought it was Dad, but he’d have come out when he heard my voice, so it wasn’t him.
And the way Heather-Anne asked me about him, I knew he wasn’t in there.”

I tried to read my son, but I couldn’t. His blond bangs fell across his eyes, and
his mouth was set in a straight line. His hands were tucked into the kangaroo pocket
of his hoodie, and he kept his gaze on the floor. I couldn’t tell if he was angry
or hurt or worried, or all of the above. “We need to tell the police,” I said.

That brought his head up. His eyes practically bugged out of his face. “Are you out
of your mind? They’re not going to believe me. They’ll think I’m making it up about
someone else being there.”

That thought stopped me.

Dexter leaned forward, trying to convince me. “If you give me some money, I can leave.
David’s at the University of Minnesota. He’s sharing an apartment with a couple of
guys. I’m sure I could crash with him for a while. When this blows over, I can come
back.”

“What about school?” I asked the question without thinking; I wasn’t letting my son
leave home to avoid the police. If he left, I might not see him again until he showed
up on
America’s Most Wanted.
“No. Absolutely not.”

“I could get my GED.” The thought of missing school lit up Dexter’s face, and I could
tell he was liking his plan more and more.

I started to hyperventilate at the thought of Dexter on the lam, becoming a grocery
clerk or petty thief to support himself, hanging out with David and his frat boy friends
who probably spent every weekend binge-drinking, never getting his high school diploma.
I thunked the automatic locks down and used the child safety switch so Dexter couldn’t
run off, then pulled out my phone. I called Charlie’s lawyer friend.

*   *   *

Tucker Winston—it confuses me so much when people have two first names, or two last
names—arrived in the parking lot twenty-five minutes later. He got out of one of those
Jeeps that don’t have any doors and walked toward us, a big smile on his face. His
very young face. He didn’t look much older than Dexter, and I watched his dreadlocks
bounce on his shoulders with dismay. Even though he wore a very pricey, very British
pin-striped suit that looked like Anderson & Sheppard, the dreadlocks made me nervous.
The only other white person I could think of with dreadlocks worked at the Panera
where I had lunch at least once a week. I buzzed down the window as he approached.

“Mrs. Goldman?” He had a deep, rich voice that reassured me slightly. “I’m Tucker
Winston.”

“Do you have a driver’s license?”

“It’s good to be cautious.” He flipped open a thin billfold and handed me his driver’s
license.

He might think I was making sure he was who he said he was, but I actually wanted
to see if he was old enough to be a real lawyer. From his birth date, I figured out
he was thirty-three and handed the license back, feeling a bit better. Charlie wouldn’t
have said he was good if he weren’t, but I needed to be sure.

Sliding the wallet back into his pocket, he said, “I’ve contacted the police, and
I think it’s best if Dexter and I have a chat with them. They’re prepared to be reasonable.”

Dexter muttered something that sounded like “I want to go to Minnesota.”

“What’s ‘reasonable’?”

“A very good question.” Tucker Winston smiled broader. “Are you sure you’re not a
lawyer?”

I felt flattered and relaxed even more.

“They’re not looking to arrest him at this time. They just want to hear his story.
Mrs. Goldman—”

“I’m Gigi. G. G. for Georgia Goldman, get it?”

“Why don’t you go into the Safeway and get yourself a sandwich or something while
I confer with my client. I think it would be best if I talked to Dexter alone,” he
added when I started to object.

“Okay.” I got my purse, unlocked the door, and looked back at Dexter, who hadn’t said
anything to me since I made the phone calls. “Will you be okay, honey?”

“Like you care.”

His words made me tear up, and I hurried across the parking lot to the Safeway, thinking
a one-pound bag of peanut M&M’s suited my mood better than a sandwich.

*   *   *

Two hours later, we were done at the police station and Tucker Winston, Dexter, and
I were walking out the door. The police hadn’t arrested Dexter, although Detective
Lorrimore had told him not to leave town. I hadn’t been allowed to sit in on the interview,
but Tucker Winston filled me in when they got done. Dexter had told the police what
he’d told me, and they’d seemed equal parts skeptical and interested to hear there
might have been someone in the bedroom while Dexter talked to Heather-Anne. Dexter
stood with his arms crossed over his chest, a sulky-scared expression on his face.
I’d spent the time in the waiting area, trying to read a four-year-old
Field & Stream
magazine and chatting with a guy as big as Shaquille O’Neal who had so many tattoos
he looked like a highway overpass graffitied by gang members. I’d been nervous of
him at first, but he mentioned he was there to get fingerprinted for a special ed
teaching job, and I’d shared my M&M’s with him, and we’d talked about how sad it is
that kids can’t take peanut butter sandwiches to school anymore since so many kids
have peanut allergies.

*   *   *

By the time Dexter and I entered the house from the garage, it was almost four and
Kendall was home from school. She was peeling a cucumber over the sink when we walked
in and took a large bite out of it before saying, “Where’ve you been? I had to get
a ride home with Eli since Dexter wasn’t there, and he asked me to the Spring Fling.”

“Did you say yes?”

“Ew. As if. He has pimples, and I once saw milk squirt from his nose when he laughed.
Come on—we’re going to be late for practice if we don’t leave right now.”

I noticed she was wearing a long-sleeved leotard and thin sweatpants and her skate
bag sat in a lumpy heap on the kitchen table. “Sorry, Kendall,” I said, feeling frazzled.
“Dexter can drive—”

Without a word he turned and stomped out of the kitchen. I heard him climbing the
stairs seconds later. I sighed. “Get in the Hummer. I’ll take you.”

I returned to the garage and walked around the Hummer to the driver’s side as Kendall
hopped into the passenger seat and slammed the door. The sound ricocheted through
the mostly empty four-car garage, and I winced. I closed my door more gently and put
the Hummer in reverse, remembering just in time to raise the garage door. It rumbled
up.

“Where’s Dex’s car?” Kendall asked.

I landed hard on the brake, making the tires squeal.

“Mo-om.”

Where was Dexter’s car? I started down the drive again, realizing Kendall would be
late for skating if I went in to ask Dexter about the BMW. Had he left it in the office
parking lot? I closed my eyes, trying to visualize the parking lot. No, I didn’t think
I’d seen—

“Watch out!”

My eyes popped open, and I swerved to avoid the neighbors’ Maine coon cat. She was
sitting on the sidewalk, tail swishing as she watched a squirrel chitter from a tree
branch. We thudded off the curb, and I gave Kendall an apologetic smile. “Sorry, sweetie.
I was thinking about something.”

“Well, don’t.”

We drove to the World Arena Ice Hall in silence. Kendall texted the whole way, and
I thought. She was out the door before I could kiss her good-bye. “Angel can give
me a ride home,” she said, walking briskly into the low building.

Would it kill her to say “Thanks for the ride”? I had more important things on my
mind than Kendall’s manners, though, and I sped home.

“Dexter,” I called as I came through the door. “Dexter!”

When he didn’t answer, I trotted up the stairs to his room. Even that brief exertion
made me breathe heavy, and I promised myself I’d start using the treadmill again,
just as soon as all this was over. I was way too stressed for exercise right now.
Dexter’s door was closed, and I knocked. “Dex? Honey?” I didn’t hear anything from
within, so I said, “I’m coming in.”

I pushed open the door, and the smell of teenaged boy smacked me. I think it’s equal
parts musky aftershave splashed on too heavily, spray deodorant, and hormones. Not
that I know what hormones smell like, but that’s what it must be. All the other parents
joke about teens’ rooms being disaster areas and compare them to landfills or the
mess left after a hurricane, but Dexter keeps his room neat. His bed, desk, dresser,
and entertainment center all came from Ethan Allen and had a light cherry finish.
I’d tried to talk him into letting me have his room painted a pale tan to coordinate,
but he’d insisted on navy blue walls so dark they seemed black. He’d’ve painted them
black except Les put his foot down. His laptop was closed on his desk, his iPod and
cell phone charging in a little station beside it. The flat-screen TV had the entertainment
center all to itself except for a couple of books from last year’s American lit class
that looked so new I suspected he hadn’t ever opened them.
SpongeBob SquarePants
was on, but Dexter had the sound muted. He lay atop the navy-and-green-striped comforter
on his queen-sized bed, arms behind his head, remote in one hand, staring at the TV.
He didn’t look at me.