Accompanying Alice Read online

  After a pair of margaritas, Helen lamented the fact that now only she, Alice and Ma were still unmarried and it didn’t look as if Alice would be on the market much longer.

  At this point Alice, ignoring Gabriel’s restraining hand, advised Helen smartly that the major had better stay out of her sister’s business and look to her own, where she might, if it was possible for Helen to see what was beneath her own nose—meaning Skip—discover the direction of her own future.

  Helen countered by asking sweetly whether or not Alice had put the board under her mattress yet, since Aunt Kate and Uncle Delbert would be arriving tomorrow.

  Twink pointedly advised them both that if they would each shut up and stop considering every possible angle before making a commitment to anything that they might both wind up happier.

  Meg left the table several times to make phone calls, trying to find Grace. Skip offered to chauffeur Helen anywhere she wanted to go—and would she perhaps like to go to dinner and a concert if her schedule permitted? Edith, ever quick to spot a potential for disaster, invited Skip to join them all at Alice’s for sisters-sisters night, since Gabriel, it appeared, was already going to be there. Gabriel raised a questioning brow at Alice over the suggestion, and Alice shut her eyes and shook her head; he didn’t want to know.

  Sam’s beeper went off toward the end of the meal and she left thinking she’d have to go to a fire, and returned to announce that Grace had been stopped by the state police while on a pizza delivery run, had been late delivering the pizza and, to put it mildly, had been quite specific about where Sam and the rest of her sisters could stick their meddling, overprotective concern for her.

  Hearing the news, Alice surprised both herself and Gabriel by pressing her face into his shoulder with a whispered prayer of thanks. And it was with some astonishment that Gabriel discovered from the general giggles of relief, exchanged glances, hand gestures and quick little indrawn breaths exactly how apprehensive Grace’s sisters had been about her. They’d barely spoken about her absence, but apparently overt demonstration and knock-down-drag-out-arguments had nothing to do with love in the Brannigan family. The bond was simply something that they all took for granted, and would remain a constant channel marker in an ever shifting sea—regardless of sunshine or hellfire—forever.

  He stepped unconsciously away from them as they said goodbyes to one another in the parking lot, his heart beating fast, blood leapfrogging in his veins. This was the way the world ought to be. This was the reason he’d picked up a badge and a gun in the first place. Here was hope. He’d forgotten what that was like. His job had pushed him so far underground that he’d forgotten what it was to be trusted—or trusting. To be accepted at face value.

  Alice’s family—much like Alice herself—was from another planet, another time zone, and in some strange and indeterminate way they frightened him more than any undercover job he’d ever walked into. They did something that could prove dangerous to him. They drew him in, accepted him at face value, included him in their teasing, concern and relief merely because he was with Alice and they loved Alice.

  “You have a very nice family,” he said as he and Alice walked from the restaurant to her car.

  Alice snorted. “Much you know.” She peeked at him from the comer of her eye, wondering which worry puzzled him now. “They like you, too, but you’ve been accepted by a mob of lunatics. Don’t you wonder what that makes you?”

  Gabriel lined his arm through hers. “A lunatic’s apprentice?”

  “You’re cute, Book, I’ll give you that.” They reached the car, and Alice paused to unlock it. “I should have known you’d fit right in with them.”

  Gabriel slid into the car, leaned across to open her door for her. “I take it that’s not a compliment?”

  Alice shrugged. “Depends on what they’ve done to—umm, I mean for—me lately.”

  “But they love you.”

  “Of course they love me. They have to. I’m their sister.” Alice backed the car out of its parking space. “I love them, too, but the pressure gets to me sometimes.” She paused thoughtfully, glanced keenly at him before she guided the car into the traffic. “No, that’s not right,” she said. “It’s really not the love that gets to me. It’s living up to it—their regard, their expectations.” She made a sound of regret behind her teeth. “That gets rough sometimes.”

  Gabriel waited, silently watching her struggle with her thoughts, very aware that he wanted her to tell him about herself. For the first time in a long time he wanted to know someone else on a personal level, wanted to trade secrets he instinctively understood she would keep, tell her things about himself he hadn’t thought about in years.

  When he’d almost decided she wasn’t going to live up to his hope, Alice turned the car onto a rutted dirt road that ran around behind a small private school. She brought the car to a halt near a tangled stand of elderly blackberry bushes and trees that broke the landscape between the school and a new subdivision under development, and rolled down her window. Yesterday’s downpour had left everything looking shiny, matted and damp. The air smelled of sunshine and rain.

  “Do you mind if we walk a bit?” she asked. “It’s so beautiful out and once tonight hits, there won’t be time to breathe again before Sunday and I need—”

  Gabriel put a finger to her mouth. “Let’s walk,” he said.

  They left the car in the shade and strolled across the school playground. A few fluffy cumulus clouds dotted the otherwise clean blue sky, and Alice dropped her head back and closed her eyes, lifting her face to the sun, feeling summer on her skin.

  “I used to bring Allyn and Becky here for picnics when they were little,” she said. “I’ve always liked this place. Matt and I used to cut class and come here sometimes. This school was closed then, and what with two big families and all, it was the one place we really had to be

  alone.”

  There was nostalgia instead of regret in her voice, which surprised Gabriel. His experience was that people hid their sins in closets full of shame, bringing them out only when forced to do so in order to protect themselves in front of a judge. He rolled up his sleeves and pocketed his hands, waiting, watching Alice, drawn to the beauty that lay beneath the unadorned surface. He doubted he’d ever been more uncertain about what would happen next in his life. Doubted he’d ever been less sure of what he wanted to happen. Knew absolutely what shouldn’t happen here, and couldn’t guarantee that he’d stop it if it did. Didn’t think he’d be able to, anyway.

  “Don’t get me wrong—there were a lot of things I didn’t like about my family when I was growing up,” she said now. “Few things that could still use some work, but when I’d see my friends with their parents, or listen to them talk about their families, I always remember being glad that I wasn’t them and that it was my parents who’d had me.” Puzzled she peered up at him. He looked like everything strong and sure in the world—relaxed, attentive, whole, secure. And yet... “I don’t know why I’m telling you this,” she said softly. “I don’t usually attack people and show off my life, but there was something in your face back in the parking lot—like maybe there’s something you need to hear. Or I need to let go of.” She studied the ground at her feet,

  kicked up an old golf ball buried deep in the wet green-and-brown grass. “I don’t know, maybe I’m crazy. Maybe—”

  “Alice.”

  He caught her whole attention just by saying her name.

  His eyes were darker than ever, shaded from the sun. Her tongue flicked nervously between her teeth, then retreated. Gabriel waited, not forcing her to continue the way he wanted to. Not offering her support the way he also wanted to. Not touching her at all. And God help him, whether he should or not, he wanted to.

  “You haven’t minced words so far,” he said gently. “Don’t start now. It doesn’t suit you. I’m part of your life for now by default. There are—” he grinned “—things I need to know in order to survive in it. Your sisters, for i
nstance. They’ve never seen me before and for all they know I could be Attila the Hun, yet within ten minutes of meeting two of them, I’m an usher for Grace’s wedding. You answer the door in your bathrobe with a half-naked man at your back. Anyone else would leave in embarrassment, maybe file the scene away for extortion purposes in

  the future, but your sisters stay and ask you if you had responsible sex. Now—” his jaw worked around a disbelieving laugh “—being an only child, I don’t know too much about siblings, but doesn’t this all strike you as odd?”

  “No.” Alice shook her head. “I am the one who stopped for you, remember?”

  “True.”

  “And we’ve always been a very...ah… open family.” She grimaced. “At least where my parents weren’t involved.”

  “Okay.”

  “And like my father always said, when you already have seven kids, what’s two or three more?”

  “That doesn’t explain yesterday.”

  “No. Umm…no.” She shook her head. “Yesterday—” her mouth curved “—that was just my family. One of the first things we were ever taught was, “Don’t be afraid to ask questions because it’s the only way to learn”—except when your father is tired of course. Then it’s probably better to be seen and not heard. But we were also taught that whether we agreed with one another or not, family was always there.”

  She gestured inadequately, misinterpreting his expression. “I don’t mean hiding fugitives from the law, or anything like that, but emotionally, supportively, there.”

  She started walking again, searching for words. “It’s... Like when I got pregnant and ran away and got married, my family wasn’t crazy about it, but they stood behind me, anyway. When Matt’s family found us and convinced him to let them get us annulled, I felt like I’d failed my family somehow. It didn’t make sense then, and it doesn’t now, but I felt like I’d thrown away something, disillusioned them, because I’d always sort of thought they saw me as a kind of saint—which I’d never been. I even used to wonder if I didn’t use Matt, if I didn’t get pregnant just so my family would stop looking at me that way, so I could stop having to live up to their expectations. So they’d know once and for all that I wasn’t perfect like they thought.”

  She shook her head, laughed at the idea. ‘‘‘Course the funny thing is, I found out by getting pregnant that they’d known all along I wasn’t flawless. They’d lived with me for seventeen years and I hadn’t fooled them about anything. And when I was feeling sorry for myself and thinking how unfair it was that they thought I’d hurt them, they really only hurt for me, not because of me. They didn’t like what I’d done, but they didn’t judge me for it, and they weren’t ashamed of me. They didn’t try to hide me in some closet where people couldn’t see me. And they welcomed Matt into the family and said they’d do whatever they could...”

  She looked at Gabriel. “Sometimes I feel like I still owe them for that. I’ve done so many stupid things and they’ve always been there. It’s kind of...” Her mouth worked around the word. “…daunting to have people go on loving you no matter what you do.”

  “But you said it, they’re not perfect, either, Alice.” Gabriel’s face was hooded, drawn, emotion brewing beneath the surface.

  “I know. That’s not the point.” Alice read the danger signals with a thrill of excitement. She was shooting in the dark and she was hitting things. Why that was so important to her, she didn’t know, but whatever she had seen hidden beneath his surface back in the parking lot, she was touching that part of him now, the heart of him. The only part that mattered. “It’s just the way I feel sometimes. I forget that they trust me to be there for them, too, no matter what. I forget that I’m not the only one who does stupid things.”

  She stopped and turned on him with sudden passion. “Neither are you.”

  He was silent, angry, not sure how to respond. Last night she’d exhibited an uncanny knack for reading between lines he didn’t even speak. The ease with which they communicated was something that both intrigued and disquieted him. He didn’t pretend not to know what she was talking about; that was the easy part. He’d told her about his job, about his findings. About how the people he had to trust were the ones he also had to suspect of hanging him out to dry. She was sharp enough to come up with the rest on her own. But he hadn’t told her about his family, about his guilt over them.

  With an unaccustomed sense of resentment, he wondered how Alice seemed to know what he was thinking all the time, how she was able to pinpoint with such accuracy where her life paralleled his—and why she seemed to know exactly who he was. He eyed her the way one poker player eyes another, watching for a tipped hand.

  “My family, my life—they’re not like yours, Alice. The mistakes I make are not as simply forgiven. When I do stupid things, misjudge a situation, trust the wrong people… It affects more than just me and my emotional life.”

  “Are you talking about the mistakes you make as an officer of the law, as a man, or as somebody’s son?”

  Her voice was gentle. Her question was as insistent as his mother’s last letter—and as unsettling. But he couldn’t ignore Alice the way he could ignore his mail. “I’m talking

  about all of it, Alice. Which is more than you have a right to know.”

  He turned his back on her, striding across the drive they’d come in on and forcing his way into the jumble of brush and trees on the other side. Branches scratched his face, and he shoved them aside. Rain puddled in leaves poured down his back, soaking his shirt. Unconnected snatches of memory stirred his conscience, blurred in and out of focus. Two days ago, Sunday night, a dark dirt road, raucous voices, firelight shuddering in an empty oil drum. The weight of a

  killer’s gun pressed into his hand and the feel of it tucked against his back. A deafening explosion beside his ear, a grunt of surprise, the sound of a body falling.

  He felt rather than remembered the out of control sound of two more jarring reports, the accompanying sensation of blind panic, of blood in his eyes, of slipping and scrambling to get away.

  Blindly he pushed the brambles aside, but memory could not be coerced so easily. Twenty years ago, give or take a millennium, he was back in Southeast Asia by his choice, a medic who didn’t believe in causes or killing, but who arrogantly thought he could make a contribution and save a few lives. A patrol unit had brought a pair of wounded guerrilla prisoners into the hospital for treatment. One had taken a young soldier by surprise, grabbing his weapon and shooting another soldier whose rifle had fallen near Gabriel. Gabriel had picked up the gun instinctively, ready to fire it. And hadn’t. Not at the urgings of his head, nor those from the soldiers around him. A nurse had echoed the voice of his conscience with her pleading “Don’t.”

  It was the first time he’d ever picked up a gun; the first time he’d ever doubted the pure pacifism his parents had taught him to believe in. The first time he’d truly understood the impotence and violence of rage.

  He picked up a dead branch and swung it against a fallen tree, seeking to jar himself off the path his thoughts had taken. But they refused to be sidetracked, instead leaving him with one more deliberately forgotten vision. Fifteen years ago, academy graduation. His parents had attended the ceremony. They didn’t understand why he’d had to become a cop, didn’t understand what he’d meant when he tried to tell them he couldn’t sit by any longer and watch death happen around him the way he’d had to at the refugee hospital and not try to do something to prevent it. Try to make a difference. And if that meant he had to carry a gun, then he’d carry a gun and learn to use it.

  They’d assured him they loved him and were proud of him for doing what he felt he had to—for making a choice and sticking to it. They didn’t agree with his decision, but they’d have been disappointed if he hadn’t made it simply to pacify them.

  By the end of his third case, though, their view of him had shifted uneasily. He was changing, they’d said. There was something growing in him, somet
hing violent. He was starting to enjoy his role among the criminal element too much, and that made them afraid. Of him.

  He stopped and wrapped a hand around a tangle of wild grapevines. He’d stopped going to see his family because he was aware—even though he was unwilling to admit it then—that they were right to be afraid of him. Something hard, inhuman and violent was taking root inside him; something intolerant, unforgiving and bitter aimed as much at himself and the bureaucracy he battled almost daily to allow him to make his cases, as at the criminals he risked his life to build cases against.

  But he figured he’d made his choices, he’d lived by them. No one got through life without a few skeletons lurking in their memories. Some had more than others; many were worse than his. Some dealt with memory by confronting it, letting it rise and fall in a natural day-to-day progression. He’d dealt with his memories by burying them alive and changing his identity with his cases so that when his ghosts came out to haunt him, they wouldn’t be able to find him. For the most part it had worked. Until Alice.

  He ran a hand through his hair trying to come back to the present, get his bearings, remember which persona to put on. Damn, he might have known he’d been enjoying himself too much with her. And her family. He might have known that if he let himself relax even a little he’d start to question who and what he was again.

  He stiffened at the sudden cold flick of her shadow on his back, heard her puff in the clutter of branches behind him. Don’t, he thought, a warning to himself. Or was it to her?

  “Gabriel?” His name was a tentative sound in her throat. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean—”

  “Who are you, really, Alice Meyers?” His voice was controlled, intense, almost savage. Even now, when it was the last thing on earth he wanted to feel, he had the powerful urge to turn to her, touch her, ask her to hold him. His fists clenched at his sides. He’d never asked anyone to hold him. “What is it about you that lets you twist me in knots one minute and makes me want you under me the next?” He swung about and advanced on her, backing her into a tree. “What makes me want to tell you things I don’t even want to think about?” He ran a finger along her jaw, watched her pupils dilate, her breath quicken, felt desire rise. “Why, when I can’t seem to get far enough away from you, can’t I get close enough to you, either?” He dragged his finger