A Shadow on the Ground (18 page)

“So you quit your job.”

“No. I healed up, and went back to work. I only quit after Suzanne died. It wasn't a hard decision. Jeremy needed me. When I told him I wasn’t going to work for the agency anymore, he said, ‘I don’t care what you do.’ But as he was turning around, he couldn’t hide the look of relief on his face, and I knew I’d done the right thing.”

His dark green eyes held hers. A sudden flash of regret was replaced almost immediately by cold determination, a look he'd probably practiced for Jeremy’s sake to hide the fact that giving up the job he loved was one of the hardest things he’d ever had to do.

Gunshot wound or not, Gage Kirkland’s passion was going after the bad guys.

For years, she’d wondered what his life was like, if he was happy, if he had a family, if he had followed his bliss and was living quietly, practicing medicine somewhere in a Georgia hospital, charming nurses and patients alike. It had never occurred to her he would choose a life living on the edge, where dodging bullets and bringing dangerous criminals to justice were part of his everyday routine. Replacing the image of him she’d carried in her head with the real one was mind boggling. But she had to admit, that this side of Gage, a side she could never have imagined existed, seemed thrilling to her. It was like falling in love with Clark Kent one day and discovering twelve years later he was Superman.

Chapter 10

Morgan found Jeremy slouching in the front porch swing, reading. The kid always seemed to be reading. “Are you ready? I want to show you something seriously cool.”

“What is it?”

“A secret place.”

“It's not a garden, is it? That movie sucked.”

“It’s bigger than a garden.” She pointed to the hill behind the barn. “That’s called Pip’s Hill, but for slovenly, out-of-shape people like me, it’s a mountain. Are you up for it?”

He didn’t hesitate. “Sure. We can always roll back down if it gets too strenuous.”

Morgan laughed. “I like the way you think, kid. And you’re the only eleven-year-old I know who can use the word
strenuous
in a sentence.”

“I read a lot.”

“I talk a lot.”

They walked behind the barn, then hiked to the top and cut across the ridge to the woods.

“Jeez!” Jeremy said when they stopped to rest. “Is everything around here on a friggin' mountain?”

“Haven't you heard of the hills of Tennessee? Well, you just walked up one.” She pulled a bottle of water out of her jacket pocket and handed it to him. “Here. Save half for me.”

“I'm a kid, remember? I should get more than half.”

“You’re not a kid. You're a con artist.”

They followed the path through the dense hardwood forest until they came to a section of trees covered with kudzu vine. It dripped from the branches, wound around the trunks like green ribbon snakes, smothered the unlucky ones like dark, leafy shrouds. The air smelled mossy and damp. Shafts of golden sunlight cut through the green canopy, illuminating the tamped down dirt and grass. For a while, the only sounds they heard were the crunch of brittle sticks beneath their feet and the distant solitary cry of a bird.

Morgan cleared her throat. “Jeremy, you remember when I told you my parents died?”

“Yeah.”

“Their car was hit by a sweet little old man who had gotten confused and didn’t realize he was driving on the wrong side of the road. He didn't mean to kill them. It just happened.” Jeremy thrashed through a tall patch of weeds. “All I’m saying is that sometimes things happen, things we don’t have any control over.”

Jeremy picked up a stick and knocked it against a stump. He squinted at the treetops. “Didn't it make you mad?”

“Sure. For a long time. But one day, when I was missing them so much, I could barely speak, I remembered something my mom had given me.”

“What?”

“She loved quotes. She taped them on the fridge, left them on my pillow, put them in library books for others to find. This one was from Gandhi. Do you know who Gandhi was?”

“Another movie that sucked?”

“Gandhi was a wise man who said, ‘There are no goodbyes for us. Wherever you are, you will always be in my heart.’”

Jeremy turned to her. His eyes filled with tears. “I didn’t get to say goodbye to my mom. I don’t even know where she is. They wouldn’t let me go to the funeral.”

“Oh, sweetie,” Morgan said.

“Can you find out where she is? Can you ask my dad or something? I don’t talk to him about her.”

“Not talking about something doesn’t make it go away.”

He blinked up at her. “You sound like my therapist.”

Morgan playfully bonked him on the head. “I’m going to take that as a compliment. Unless she looks like Sigmund Freud in drag.”

“Who?”

“Never mind.” The forest had opened into a small, flat meadow. “See those trees?” Morgan pointed to a row of ancient chestnuts growing in a straight line along the upper edge. “We’re going to count down five trees, and turn left.”

Jeremy counted as they walked. After the turn, she said, “Now, look back where we came.” She placed her hands on his thin shoulders. “See the huge knothole at the top of the fifth tree? If you ever come here and get lost, use that as a marker to lead you out.”

“Where’s the secret place?”

“Behind that big rock. But be careful. I've always heard there are sinkholes and caves down there, but Sean and I could never locate them.” She looked at the vine covered trees. “I don't think I've ever seen so much kudzu. It loves it here.”

“Kudzu loves it everywhere,” Jeremy said. “It’s all over Georgia, too. I read that it came from Japan, and the government got farmers to plant it to stop soil erosion. Then it took over.”

“Like green wildfire.”

“It’s cool, though. The trees look like giant alien families. Aliens who live in the ocean. The arms grow down like seaweed, then sway in the wind.” He pointed behind him. “See, the biggest one is the dad. And the mom’s beside him. The little trees are the kids, I guess.”

“Or maybe they're alien soldiers getting ready to attack.”

“Or maybe they used to be ordinary people like us—”

“—until they danced around the forest one night during a full moon, and got beamed aboard the Giant Alien Kudzu Ship.”

Jeremy laughed. “You’re weirder than me, Morgan.”

“We're here.” She stopped. “Do you see anything? Take your time. Look around.”

Jeremy turned completely around, craning his neck. “Nope.”

“Follow me.” Morgan waded through the thick underbrush. She climbed around a large rock and stood beside a mound of kudzu slightly shorter than her head. Then she leaned down, put her hand through a thick web of vines, and pulled. A door opened.

“It's a car!” Jeremy squealed. “A car’s hidden under there! Are we the only ones who know about it?”

“I’m sure someone else knows. It would be easy to see in winter. Kudzu turns brown and dies after the first hard frost. Want to climb inside? You're not afraid of spiders, are you?”

Jeremy grinned and shook his head no. The elated expression on his face warmed her heart, a heart that had long ago hung up a “Closed for Business” sign where children were concerned. This must be what Gage had talked about missing with his son. This is what he’d been grieving for. It would take time for Jeremy to trust that his world was secure again, but she could already see a change in him.

The kid had been forced to grow up too soon, covering for a mentally ill mother who used him as an instrument of revenge against her ex-husband. If Jeremy had been Morgan’s son—and, oh, God, she wished he had been—she would have done everything humanly possible to safeguard his innocence. She would have put him first, protected him at all costs, loved him more than— She stopped and put her hand on her heart. The old familiar pain raked across it like broken glass, stabbing it until she couldn’t take a breath.

What was she thinking? She’d had a child growing inside her. Gage’s child.

And she hadn’t been able to protect it at all.

Jeremy crawled into the abandoned Ford Fairlane. He clambered over the split upholstered seat, then cleared away a trailing cluster of vines until he could scoot beneath the steering wheel.

Another wide grin spread across his face. “You're right, Morgan. This is seriously cool.”

****

Gage stood in the middle of Morgan's dining room, gazing from one end to the other.
Where the hell could it be?
He had searched everywhere, and one thing was clear—he had lost his edge. There was a time when he would have been in and out, recovered object in hand, in a matter of minutes. But his instincts had officially become defunct. Old houses were full of hiding places. A flag could be rolled up or folded. It could be anywhere. He closed his eyes and tried to channel Morgan. If he could think like her, maybe he could figure out where she'd stashed the thing.

He slipped Harlan’s cell phone in his back pocket and tromped upstairs again to her bedroom. Women liked to keep the things they treasured near them. He stood in the doorway. His gaze flicked across her now familiar belongings—from the calico skirted dressing table to the colored glass bottles lining the window sill to the collection of dulcimers hanging on the pale blue wall. She was everywhere. He could feel her watching him, sensing he was violating her trust.

Traces of her perfume—the sweet, soapy, vanilla-spice thing that drove him to distraction—wafted through the air. He glanced at the unmade bed. Images from the night before flooded his brain—Morgan's eyes, half-closed with desire, her soft hands roaming across his back, setting his nerve endings on fire, her sweet lips seeking his with a hunger that matched his own. Christ, he’d wanted her more than he'd ever wanted anyone. He’d never stopped wanting her, or wishing he could make love to her again. Last night, on that sweet-smelling tumble of sheets, his wish had almost come true.

“
Enough
,” he said, shaking his head. “Focus, dammit.”

He opened her drawers for the second time, one by one, running his hands around the perimeters, feeling for false backs. He forced himself to stay detached and not let his gaze linger any longer than it had to on her things. He propelled it along, skimming over her books, the neatly folded clothes, the framed photographs of her family forever locked in her young embrace. He rummaged through her closet, moving things aside, putting them back, careful to leave no trace anyone had been there.

Tyson always said Gage had been born with the gift of ransacking someone's property without leaving footprints. Not exactly something to make your parents proud, but he had no parents. Never had, really. His mother died of a stroke giving birth to him. After that, his father had wasted away grieving for her, then spent years drifting from one failed business venture to another until a swift and deadly bout of pancreatic cancer took him out in a week.

Gage lifted the flowered dust ruffle and peered under the bed. Not even a respectable collection of dust bunnies. He glanced at the clock on the bedside table. Morgan and Jeremy had been gone for almost two hours. They would be back soon. He was running out of time.

He opened the bedside table drawer and inspected it thoroughly. “Bingo,” he whispered, withdrawing the tiny crowbar like a miniature sword. He glanced around the room, then scooted her rocking chair aside, and flipped the rug back. He ran his hands over the polished wood floor. Not a mark on it. Oh, she was good. Better than she knew, in fact.

He inspected the grooves between the wooden slats with his index finger, slowly and methodically, until a sharp ridge scraped against his fingertip pad. He inserted the crowbar and carefully pried up a small section of attached floorboard pieces. He lifted out the Lucite box, opened it, and rubbed his hand against the rough cotton flag. He wanted to unfold it, see what all the fuss was about. But he had no time to waste. He returned the box to its hiding place, smoothed out the rug, and replaced the rocker.

He would talk to her this evening after Jeremy was in bed. Tell her to get the flag out of the house before someone came looking for it. If she became suspicious, and asked him straight-out why moving the flag was so all fired important, he would have to come clean with her. It was the only way he could protect her.

The front doorbell jangled above him.

He went downstairs and flung the door open. Ethan Spannagel's hand, poised to knock, froze in midair. Ethan's gaze traveled from Gage's unbuttoned shirt to his bare feet.

“Hello,” Gage said, enjoying the shocked look on the man's face. He didn't like Ethan Spannagel, and he didn't know why. Jealousy, maybe. Ethan and Morgan seemed to have a special bond that went way back. He crossed his arms over his chest like Mr. Clean, then reconsidered trying to intimidate the guy and held his hand out. “I’m Gage Kirkland. I don’t think we’ve officially met. Thanks for helping me get Morgan and Peach away from the fire last night.”

“Is Morgan—”

“Not here.”

“But you are.”

“My son Jeremy and I are staying in the guesthouse.”

Ethan's eyes narrowed. “Last time I looked, it was behind the main house, not in it.”

Gage shrugged. “Well, the soaking tub is in here.”

“Where’s Morgan?”

“She’s with Jeremy. They walked up Pip’s Hill. Do you want to wait?”

“No, thanks.” Ethan shoved his hands in his pockets, but made no move to go. “You know, this is a small town. People like to talk. You might want to think about that the next time you show up at Morgan’s front door half-dressed.”

“You’re right. Next time, I’ll put my shoes on.”

“Or you could stay somewhere else.”

“I could.” Gage shifted his weight to the other foot. “But I’m not.”

“Morgan and I have known each other since grade school.”

“She told me,” Gage said. “What's it like growing up with a slaughterhouse in your backyard?”

“I'm a vegetarian.”

“Umm. Well.” Gage nodded. “I...uh...heard about your father. I'm sorry. Is there anything I can do?”

“Do?” He looked at Gage incredulously. “What would you do?”

“Maybe help find the person who killed him?”

“What I think you should do is stay away from Morgan.” Ethan squinted.