“So there are two ways you can go with that,” he said. “You can pursue the missing baby, which one of the men you met may have fathered-though I guess that kid isn’t a baby anymore, it’d be in school-or you can pursue the possibility one of them threw the rattlesnake at Rich Joyce, startling him into a heart attack.”
“There are those two possibilities,” I said, relieved to be talking about the whole situation. “And there’s the fact that Tolliver’s father has shown back up, and he’s trying to reconnect with Tolliver. And the girls. And there’s the weird thing that after all these years, someone’s reported a Cameron sighting.”
I filled Manfred in on our family business.
“So this might have to do with your little sisters, somehow. Or with your missing sister. What if this has something to do with Cameron?”
I was startled. “Why would it?”
“There’s a caller claiming to have seen Cameron. Then another caller threatens you. Two anonymous phone calls. Those sure might be linked, don’t you think?”
“Yes,” I said slowly, considering it for the first time. “Yes, of course they could.” If I hadn’t put this together before, blame it on the fact that people near me kept getting shot. “So this might have to do with Cameron.”
“Or with the caller knowing this was the surest way to get you away from Tolliver. Maybe he thought you would leave, go to Texarkana. He couldn’t have counted on the police being willing to show you the tape at the police station.” There was silence for a long minute. “Uh, Harper,” Manfred said. “You sure-for real-that the woman you saw in the tape wasn’t your sister?”
“I’m sure,” I said. “Her jaw was different, and the way she walked was different. True, she was blond and she seemed the right height. True, I don’t know why anyone would claim to have seen her when the case is cold and no one’s looking anymore.”
“You’re… I guess you’ve always been convinced that Cameron is dead?”
“Yes, always.” I said that firmly, as if there were no doubt in my mind at all. “She would never let me worry like this, not for all these years.”
“But you said you two had it real hard at home.”
“Yeah, real hard.” I took a deep breath. “She wouldn’t do that,” I said. I packed my voice full of conviction. “She loved all of us, all the kids.”
“So your stepdad resurfaces, and suddenly there’s a Cameron sighting,” he said, tactfully abandoning the possibility of my sister’s voluntary disappearance. “Isn’t that quite a coincidence, too?”
“Yes, it is,” I said. “And I don’t know what to make of it. I’ve never thought that he killed her. Maybe I should have considered it. But he was visiting a jailbird friend of his, a guy he did business with, and the time frame excluded Matthew.”
“What kind of business?”
“Drugs, and whatever else they could do to raise money.” I had to stop to remember. Crazy. I would have never believed I’d forget any detail of that day. “That afternoon Renaldo and Matthew were going to take scrap iron to the recycle plant to get some money. But I don’t think they ever made it.They started playing pool.”
“What was the friend’s full name?”
“Renaldo Simpkins.” I was very unhappy that I had to struggle to recover that memory. “He was younger than Matthew, and he was a nice-looking man; I remember that.” I tried to picture his face. “Maybe Tolliver will remember,” I said finally. I felt that in forgetting even the most minute circumstance of that day, I was betraying the memory of my sister. For the first time, I appreciated the records of that day that the police would have, and Victoria Flores, too.
We pulled into the parking lot of yet another hospital. Christian Memorial was maybe a little newer than God’s Mercy, though nothing in that area was very old. We walked into the lobby and asked the lady in the pink smock if she could give us directions. She gave us a practiced smile that aimed at being warm and welcoming. “Detective Powers is up on the fourth floor, but I warn you, it’s mighty crowded up there. You may not get to see him.”
“Thanks,” I said, smiling back just as brightly. We made our way across the lobby and into the elevator, where Manfred’s facial decorations attracted a certain amount of attention. He seemed oblivious to the startled and fascinated looks that came our way. When the doors opened on the fourth floor, we were confronted by a sea of faces, and the predominant clothing color was blue. There were cops in several different uniforms standing around, and there were men and women who could only be detectives. There was also a football player or two.
Though it hadn’t occurred to me to leave Manfred downstairs, I immediately realized I’d made a mistake bringing him up here. He attracted no little attention, and none of it was positive. I stiffened my back. Manfred was my friend, and he had as much right to be here as anyone. A tall woman with broad shoulders and a thick head of brown hair came up to me. She was in charge. She’d be in charge no matter where she was.
“Hello,” she said. “I’m Beverly Powers, Parker’s wife. Can I help you?”
“I hope so,” I said, feeling hesitant. Somehow, I hadn’t foreseen this crowd and all these eyes fixed on me. “I’m Harper Connelly, and Parker was shot when someone tried to kill me. I’d like to thank him. This is my friend Manfred Bernardo, who’s driving for me today while my brother’s in the hospital.”
“Oh, you’re the young woman,” Beverly Powers said, looking at me with a lot more interest. “I’m so glad to meet you. You understand, there are all kinds of stories going around about why you and my husband were out there together, and I very much hope you’ll tell me exactly what happened.”
“Of course I will,” I said, surprised. “There’s no big mystery about it.”
She waited, her eyebrows raised to indicate she was ready. I was taken aback, since I realized she meant me to tell her here and now.
Everyone around us was listening, though they were all trying to look like they weren’t. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw that Manfred had retreated to a spot against the wall. He was standing with his hands folded together, his eyes on me and his stance alert. He looked like an undercover operative of some kind. I was sure that was his intent. The man was a chameleon.
“My brother had been shot two nights before,” I explained, trying to pick my words carefully. “And Detective Powers came to the scene then. He and Rudy Flemmons. Detective Flemmons came to see me at my brother’s room in the hospital the next day to give me some information, and then last night, when I went back to my hotel, your husband was there. When I told him I was going for a run, since I’d been cooped up with my brother in his hospital room all day, he said he’d run with me, since he wasn’t convinced the shooter had actually meant to hit my brother.” There was definitely no point in mentioning Powers’s avid eyes. “He thought the person who shot Tolliver might have been aiming for me, and someone had called in a death threat for me that day. I guess neither one of us took that seriously enough, which was our big mistake-and for that, I’m so sorry. My only excuse is that I’ve gotten threats before, and they were always nothing. Your husband said he had his running clothes in his trunk, and he changed in his car, and we started out running. He got winded pretty quick-excuse me, he just hadn’t run in a long time, I guess.” To my surprise, my audience had relaxed considerably while I was telling Beverly Powers how her husband had come to be shot, and when I described how winded he’d gotten, a few people actually laughed, and a smile flickered across Beverly Powers’s face.
I suddenly understood: Mrs. Powers and Parker’s fellow officers had thought I’d been having an affair with him. My no-frills explanation had dispelled that suspicion. They weren’t really amused; they were relieved.