The Reincarnationist (36 page)

“You can give him that, give it to him along with everything else as some kind of proof.”

She was already ripping the pages out in a frenzy of activity and manic energy that he found heartbreaking. And then she laid her head down on her arms and wept. Josh watched, helplessly. No matter what he said to her, he knew it wouldn't do any good. Nothing would, except getting her daughter back.

“I think you should try to get some sleep. I know it's going to be hard, but you need the rest. You won't help Quinn if you're this exhausted tomorrow.”

She nodded.

“Come on.” He helped her up. “I'm going to take you upstairs.”

“You're not leaving, are you?” she said in a shaky voice. The tears were still coming.

“No. I'm going to stay here. Sleep on the couch. I don't want you to be alone, not tonight.”

As they walked up the stairs, she leaned on him, and he could feel how cold her skin was through her shirt. In her bedroom she lay down, too tired to get undressed, so he pulled a quilt up over her. Now that she was in bed, her sobs intensified, filling the room with her grief and her fear. He sat down beside her, bent over and put his arms around her, and they stayed like that for what seemed a long time. Suddenly she lifted her face to his, leaned in and kissed him. The anger and fury in the pressure of her lips on his surprised him. He didn't understand, but that didn't matter now; there would be time later to consider how impossible their being together was.

“I just want to get out of my head for a while. Is that okay?” she whispered.

“Yes, Gabriella. It's fine.”

She wasn't gentle or patient as she took more than she gave. She ripped at his shirt and pants, pulling his clothes off him, not giving him a chance to do the same to her. He was instantly hard as he watched her undress quickly. He was barely able to glimpse her long legs, full hips and breasts because she was too fast for him. One minute she was pulling off her clothes, the next she was climbing on top of him, almost as if she was possessed.

And then she stared down at him with blazing eyes that never closed, that dripped endless tears on his chest as she tried to ride out her fear and her pain. Josh felt himself disappear into her, amazed at the heat that surrounded him. He
couldn't catch her rhythm; she was too frenetic, moving in an almost trancelike craze, so he stopped trying to, instead letting her set the pace. She kept changing her speed, keeping him on the edge, slowing down, barely moving, then riding him as if there was a race she needed to win, and just when he'd feel the pressure building, she would stop, idle for a minute, not moving her hips or legs or torso but only flexing her muscles, then rushing off again.

Gabriella was raw and open and rough, and Josh wasn't sure she knew who he was anymore other than a release and a reprieve from her terrors. But even knowing that, her pressure and pulsing and pushing moved him deeply. She was surviving the only way she could, and he was determined to help her through it.

Finally she threw back her head and gripped his shoulders so tightly he felt real pain. The low moan started deep where the two of them met and meshed. It rose up, increasing in intensity, becoming louder and primitive, sounding the way he felt, as if the world was exploding and imploding at the same time, and years of grief and passion and helplessness came together and escalated into a howl that filled the room and made him turn his head aside, and this time, he wept with her.

* * *

Josh woke up alone in the bed, naked, under the covers, remembering the night before. Not so much their violent coming together as what had happened afterward. How Gabriella had fallen asleep, exhausted and spent, nestled in the crook of his arm. And how he had stayed awake, watching her, wishing that the stones were already gone and Quinn was back and this was his life.

Gabriella was in the kitchen, drinking coffee, dressed, her hair still damp and curled around her face when he went downstairs. She looked up at him and tried to smile.
It was an intimate glance that reached out across the room and embraced him.

“Did you hear from Rollins?” he said, asking her the one thing that mattered.

She nodded. “He's almost done, thank God.”

“Any other calls?” he asked.

“No. I'm going crazy.”

“They'll call, Gabriella. They will.”

She nodded. “Do you want coffee?” She started to get up.

“I'll get it.”

“No. Let me. It will give me something to do. I need something to do.”

After pouring it, she put a mug down in front of him and then sat down opposite him. “I can't believe what I did last night.”

“You'd be surprised what grief does to people.”

She looked down into her mug as if she'd find an answer there. “But…it was…I was…”

“You were reaching out, you wanted relief. Don't do this. You're under more stress than you've ever experienced in your whole life. Don't be too hard on yourself.”

“It's just that…” She finally looked up at him. There was sorrow and confusion in her eyes. “I didn't use you, Josh.”

“There's a Buddhist koan,” he said. “A series of candles are set up on a table. The one on the right is lit, those to the left aren't. As each lit candle burns out, just before it expires, a monk uses its flame to light the candle beside it. And when that candle is about to burn out, the monk uses it to light the next candle in the row. The question is, is the flame that burns on that last candle the same flame as the one that burned on the first? The second?”

“It's the same. What do you think?”

“Not the same, but not different, either. Without the first flame none of the other candles could have been lit.”

Gabriella nodded.

He went on. “We shared something. It didn't mean the same thing for both of us, but we ignited for a time and shared a burning. And we're both different for it this morning. It might never be repeated, but it won't ever disappear, either.”

She bowed her head just enough for it to be a movement, as if what he'd said was a benediction, and just then, the phone rang.

Friday, 10:48 a.m.

“I
told you to shut her up!”

As frightened as she'd been until this very moment, his screaming at her threw Bettina's heart into a rapid rhythm. It didn't seem possible that she could be so frightened for so long and not die of it. Could he hear her heart beating?

“Why
can't
we stop and buy candy?” Quinn asked for the sixth time in a whining voice.

“Because we're in a hurry, sweetheart. Let's just be quiet and be patient.”

“But I want to stop,” Quinn wailed.

“I swear to God, if you don't get her to shut up, I'm going to pull over and do it myself,” Carl barked from the front seat.

“She's not even three years old,” Bettina answered with an edgy tone, and then froze. She'd just talked back to him. What was he going to do? She no longer imagined that under his tough exterior was a soft soul that really didn't want to be bad and hurt anyone. She'd spent the past three panic-filled days with him, and she was sure that if there
had once been a human core inside of him that responded to kindness or love, it had hardened and dried up.

Bettina looked out of the car window, understanding that although she could see out, no one could see in. The car was like a coffin. Tight, closed, impossible to escape. Kidnappers usually killed their victims. She knew that. It was always on TV. How many lived? What was the percentage? She could picture a hundred newspaper headlines that she'd never paid attention to.

“Why
can't
we get candy?” Quinn asked yet once more.

“I said, shut her up. Didn't you hear me? Christ, she is getting on my nerves.”

“Honey, we'll get candy after we meet your mommy. We're going to see her really soon. And then you can get candy.”

“Let's stop and get candy and bring it to Mommy. I want M&M's.”

Carl turned his head around slightly. “I am telling you for the last time, put a sock in her mouth if you have to. I can't deal with this now. Do you understand that? Do you get that? Or am I going to have to beat it into you?”

There was no question that he could. That he would. She wiped her hands on her jeans and stole a look at the back of Carl's head, at the two inches where his hair ended and before his shirt collar started. His skin was ruddy but soft-looking. Were there veins there? Arteries? If she leaned up to him and bit him, could she hurt him badly enough to incapacitate him and—no. He was driving. If she hurt him, he might lose control of the car and kill them all. But this was as close as she'd been to him in the past three days, after all the frustration of being helpless in that motel room, listening to the droning television for seventy-two hours, after failing to come up with any kind of counterattack.

“Let's get a candy present for Mommy.”

“For fuck's sake, shut her the hell up!”

Bettina's body broke out in a new sweat; she shook, and her damn teeth began chattering again. Quinn, who had been listening to the sound for the past three days, and now associated the chattering with the man getting even more angry, broke out in loud, piercing wails.

Bettina's fear escalated. What if this was too much for him? What if he turned around now and shot them both?

“Come on, Quinnie, stop crying now. We're going to see Mommy, and she's going to be so excited to see you that she's going to cover you in kisses.”

But the wailing didn't stop. If anything, it intensified.

“Fuck. Fuck. Fuck!”

“Quinnie, do you want to play a game? Your bear wants to play a game with you.”

The cries were now shrieks.

“For God's sake, give her this.” Carl threw a pack of gum at Bettina. It hit her on the side of the face and stung for a minute. Tears welled up in her eyes.

“What's that?” Quinn asked, the tears stopping instantly as if she'd been able to tell from the shiny yellow wrapper that this was something sweet.

Of all the bizarre things Bettina could have thought of, in the middle of this holy terror, in the back of a car being driven by a cruel, frightening man who had a gun and who she was sure had used it more than once, all Bettina could think of was that Gabriella didn't want Quinn to have gum. It was one of the rules.

Unwrapping it, she showed it to Quinn. “This is gum. I'm going to give you a piece. But listen to me, it's not the same as other kinds of candy. You don't swallow it, you chew it.”

“It's not candy?”

“Yes. It's candy, but a special kind. You don't swallow it, you just chew it.”

“Just give her the fucking gum. Let her swallow it if she wants. Just get her to shut up. I need her to shut up.”

Bettina gave Quinn the stick of gum, forcing a laugh as Quinn put the wondrous thing in her mouth and instantly grinned as the sugar exploded and teased her taste buds.

“Don't swallow it,” Bettina warned.

Quinn nodded. Kept chewing. Smiled. Kept chewing.

At least she was quiet now.

Friday, 1:05 p.m
.

M
alachai pulled up in front of Gabriella's house and sat in his car waiting. Less than two minutes later, she and Josh came out. They stood on the driver's side, talking to Malachai through the open window, filling him in on the kidnapper's instructions and going over their plans. Malachai was going to follow them in his car. If he lost them, he'd call on his cell. Once Gabriella got directions for where the switch was going to be made, Josh would call and give him the information. And most important, once Malachai was sure Josh and Gabriella were with the kidnapper, he was going to alert the police so in case anything at all went wrong, they had help.

“But you're going to explain to them how careful they have to be,” Gabriella said.

“I will, don't worry,” Malachai said soothingly, the way he talked to the children before he hypnotized them.

And then Malachai asked Josh if he could see the stones.

“Gabriella has them,” he said, giving her the option of whether or not she wanted to take them out. But she opened her bag, extracted a padded envelope, took out the tissue-wrapped package and handed it through the window.

Malachai unwrapped them, and hunched over them. Josh couldn't see the stones, or his mentor's face, but from the incline of Malachai's head and his stillness, Josh could tell he was doing what he'd done when he'd first seen them—just kept staring.

A minute went by.

“I'd like to alter the plan. When we get there,” Malachai said to Gabriella without looking up at her, still staring at the stones, “I'd like to be the one to make the exchange. I'm not emotionally involved, and I'm less likely to do anything rash. The kidnapper said you could bring someone with you. He'll be expecting you to be with a man.”

“No,” Josh said. “I'm going in with her.”

Now Malachai looked up and gave Josh a stern glance. “These should have been mine. If I can't have them, at least let me be the one to turn them over.”

Josh looked at his watch. “We need to go,” he said.

Malachai rewrapped the stones and, reluctantly, Josh thought, handed the package back to Gabriella. She gripped it as if the feel of it was keeping her from losing her mind. Then he took her arm, and the two of them walked over to her car.

* * *

They spoke only perfunctorily until they were on I-95, heading east, not even knowing their final destination.
After thirty minutes, Gabriella's phone rang and the kidnapper gave her an address off exit 8. Gabriella's tension electrified the air. Occasionally, Josh checked the rearview mirror and saw Malachai's Jaguar, three or four cars back, but wasn't worried about losing him. They had cell phones.

At 2:25 p.m., Josh pulled into a parking lot at a Dunkin' Donuts on the Post Road in Stamford as instructed, and they sat silently and waited, watching Gabriella's phone.

The overbearing scent of fried bakery goods wafted into the car but didn't defuse the nervousness that Josh was sure he could smell. Fear and tension has its own stench. It emanated from soldiers in battle. From prisoners on trial. From mothers whose children were in mortal danger.

When the phone rang again she reached for it so quickly it didn't ring a second time. She listened, said yes, then hung up and looked out the window and pointed across the street to a large stone church sitting on top of a small hill. It had a circular driveway, tall spires and a bell tower.

“They're in there. Right in there.” Her voice wavered.

Josh drove to the end of the block. The light was red. He stopped.

Gabriella clenched and unclenched her fists. She didn't take her eyes off the church when she spoke to him. “There is no way that anything has happened to my baby, is there?” Her voice was wrenched from a place so deep inside her it sounded as if it had traveled miles to get to the surface.

“Whoever did this doesn't want Quinn, remember that,” Josh said. “He doesn't want any more problems. He just wants the stones. That's all he ever wanted from the beginning. He didn't want to kill the professor or the
guard. They just got in the way. No one is getting in his way now. He just wants the stones and the mantra. That's all. The stones and the mantra,” he repeated, talking to her the way he had heard Malachai talk to the children when he was helping them relax into hypnosis. “The stones and the mantra.” As he said it, he wondered if the man he was talking about was Alex Palmer. Was he behind the original robbery and this kidnapping? Was Rachel staying away from him until this was over, as she'd promised?

The red light was lasting longer than seemed possible. Gabriella rolled down the window and leaned out, so far that Josh's instinct was to hold her back.

“The last thing Quinn needs is for you to get hurt,” he said.

Was she even hearing him?

“Gabriella, let me do this for you.”

She didn't say anything.

The light switched to bright, glaring green. Josh put his foot on the gas and eased out. There weren't any other cars on the street but he still went slowly. They were almost there. He didn't want anything to happen now.

Ten yards.

Twenty yards.

Thirty yards.

Josh took a left into the long driveway. Drove another twenty yards and then pulled up in front of the church. They both got out of the car. He went around to meet her.

“For Quinn's sake—” He held out his hand.

“I need to be in there.”

“Stay in the back, in the shadows.”

She still hadn't handed him the package that held the stones and the mantra.

“I promise Gabriella, I'll bring her back to you.”

She extended her hand. It was shaking, violently.