China Lake (12 page)

I heard, ‘‘Too bad you don’t want to experience air cover.’’

‘‘Oh, you’re offering protection?’’

‘‘One hundred percent.’’

‘‘An officer
and
a gentleman,’’ I said. ‘‘Guess I had you figured wrong. Maybe you guys aren’t fighter pukes. Maybe you’re cargo haulers.’’

He slapped a hand to his chest, pantomiming heart-break at the insult. I climbed in the car, saying, ‘‘Keep your hand on the stick. You’ll stay happier that way.’’

He opened his mouth to respond, but stopped when he saw Luke. A kid—that confused the rules of engagement. I drove away feeling one up.

The last fifty miles of the journey cut across the rugged landscape you see in Marlboro ads. The autumn sun was slung low when I accelerated out of Red Rock Canyon onto a rising plain. Ahead, a ridge of hills began rising—the tail of the Sierras, California’s spine. Home-stretch. I nudged the Explorer up to seventy-five mph.

Luke, reviving, looked out the window. ‘‘Where’s China Lake?’’

‘‘There.’’ I pointed to the right.

In the distance, the city tumbled across the vast bed of a dry lake. It had the lonely, tenuous appearance of so many desert towns, the look of gravel spilled on a grand and merciless landscape. The navy built the base during World War II, as a site for testing air-launched rockets, precisely because the place is so remote. The Naval Air Warfare Center stretches north to the Panamint mountains across seventeen hundred square miles of test ranges and restricted airspace. Beyond that is Death Valley, and, farther east in Nevada, more closed military skies: Fallon, Nellis, and Groom Lake, popularly known as Area 51. This was the closest place I had to a hometown, a city that stops dead at the razor wire bordering the base, birthplace of the Sidewinder missile.

Luke said, ‘‘Dad said if we get there early enough, he’ll take me to the airfield.’’

‘‘You may be in luck, tiger. We should hit town in twenty minutes.’’

Traffic was light. One car headed south toward me. In the rearview mirror I could see a single vehicle, small and distant. It was black—maybe the flyboys’ Jeep.

The car heading south was a big American sedan, which made me lift my foot from the accelerator, because big American sedans can turn out to be police cars. I was decelerating toward the sixty-five-mph limit when it sped past—a Kern County Sheriff’s cruiser. I glanced at the speedometer and the wing mirror.

Is there anything worse than seeing a cop hang a U-turn toward your car?

He flipped on his lights. I muttered, ‘‘Shit,’’ and Luke’s head popped around. ‘‘Forget you heard that,’’ I said, pulling over on the shoulder.

Deep breath. I knew I was busted, even as I flash-fried excuses to serve up to the deputy. Luke squirmed around to watch him approach along the passenger’s side. He said in astonishment, ‘‘Are you getting a ticket?’’

‘‘Afraid so.’’ I put down the window on his side. ‘‘Afternoon, Officer.’’

He looked seasoned, a bulky man with a boxer’s flattened nose. ‘‘License and registration please, ma’am.’’

I handed them to him. ‘‘Sorry, Officer. Guess I was in too much of a hurry to get this boy home to his dad.’’ Shameless, but I thought it had potential.

‘‘Your license lists a Santa Barbara address. That’s the other direction.’’ His voice was as dry as the air.

‘‘Luke’s my nephew, I’m taking him home to China Lake—’’

The vehicle that had been behind me streaked past. It was indeed the pilots’ black Jeep. The flyers honked, hooted, and laughed as they drove by. I felt sunk.

‘‘Wait here,’’ the deputy said. He walked to his cruiser, talked on the radio, and returned, this time to my side of the car. ‘‘Step out of the vehicle, please.’’

This was wrong. He should have been writing up the ticket, not ordering me around. I opened the door and got out.

‘‘Place your hands on the roof of the vehicle.’’

Apprehension rose in me like cold water. He was going to frisk me. I leaned forward and rested my palms on the car. Felt his hands patting me down. He found my house keys and cell phone in the pocket of my jacket, left them. Luke was shrunken in his seat, as inert as a mannequin. The deputy took my arm and swung it behind my back. Warm metal flipped around my wrist. He cuffed the other arm and led me to the cruiser.

Shocked, I sputtered the obvious. ‘‘Am I under arrest?’’

‘‘Get in the car.’’

He pushed my head down, forcing me into the backseat behind the steel-mesh screen. Shutting me in, he walked back to the Explorer, opened the passenger door, and crouched down to speak to Luke. After a minute he returned to the cruiser. The car rocked as he sat down in the driver’s seat.

‘‘What’s going on?’’ I said. ‘‘Why are you holding me?’’

He grabbed his radio and called the dispatcher. ‘‘Verifying I do have Luke Delaney with me at present. Shall I bring the child into the China Lake station?’’

The reply crawled with static. ‘‘Negative. China Lake police are rolling to your location with Mrs. Delaney, ETA twenty minutes.’’

Holy God. I leaned toward the screen. ‘‘Listen to me. Luke’s mother does not have custody of him. Repeat, she does not.’’

He started writing on a clipboard. ‘‘The boy told me he hasn’t seen his mom since January. Says his dad brought him to your house one night and left him there.’’

His voice was like a slap. The accusation was clear: He thought Brian had stolen Luke and stashed him with me. Luke had simply told him the truth, but his six-year-old’s phrasing had convinced the deputy he was an abducted child.

‘‘No. His mother’s lying. You cannot let her have Luke.’’

He got out of the car. ‘‘This time you aren’t giving her the slip.’’

‘‘I have proof of custody.’’ He was walking away. ‘‘The papers are in my car. Green backpack on the backseat.’’ He slowed. ‘‘They’re in a manila envelope. Check it out!’’

He looked at me, and at the Explorer, and at Luke, considering. I said, ‘‘Please!’’ Finally, he opened the back door and reached in for the backpack.
Yes
. My heart was hammering. He set the pack on the cruiser’s hood and unzipped it.
Yes
.

He pulled out Luke’s dispension.

I felt the blood drain from my face. He tipped the pack upside down and shook it. Out fell my camera, lipstick, chewing gum. No manila envelope. He shot me a look that said,
Gotcha, stupid
. With horror, I remembered Luke scrounging in the car at Jesse’s. When I wasn’t looking he must have removed the envelope from my pack to make room for his invention.

I shouted, ‘‘Luke put it somewhere. Ask him; he’ll know where it is!’’

‘‘Save it.’’

I blinked. Then I yelled, ‘‘Luke!’’ The deputy scowled. ‘‘Luke, the custody papers. Get the papers and show the policeman!’’

‘‘Hey!’’ The deputy pointed at me. ‘‘Shut that mouth or I’ll stick a gag in it.’’

I yelled, I begged him to search my car, to rip it apart. He ignored me. Luke didn’t move a muscle, even when the deputy squatted down to chat with him. I lay down on the seat, slipped my hands under my butt so that they were in front of me, and yanked on the door handle. Locked.

Twenty minutes, the radio dispatcher had said. Less now.

I wriggled my jacket around until I could pluck my cell phone from the pocket. Thinking, Call Brian, he’ll come, find Brian. I stared at the phone. I didn’t have his new number.
Dammit!
I phoned information, losing time. I bent low in the seat, out of sight, and got the number for the naval base. Another minute gone. Two. I finally reached the airfield. I told them to find Brian, told them it was an emergency, get him
now
.

The phone stayed quiet. Overhead, thunder rolled across blue sky. I looked out the window, saw Hornets, F/A-18s, carving arcs through the air. If that was Brian flying, I was hosed.

Then his voice came on the line. ‘‘Evan, what’s wrong?’’

‘‘Tabitha’s trying to grab Luke. Get out to Highway Fourteen with the custody papers.’’ I told him he had fifteen minutes, max, calculating that the airfield was about twelve miles away, and the papers who knew where.

He said, ‘‘Stop her. Do anything it takes to keep Luke with you until I get there.’’

‘‘Did I mention I’m handcuffed in the back of a sheriff’s car?’’

‘‘Anything, Ev. I’m on my way.’’

He broke the connection and I stared at the phone, hands shaking.
Anything.

I called the police. A woman’s voice answered, ‘‘Nine-one-one emergency,’’ and I said, ‘‘I want to report a child abduction in progress.’’

‘‘A child is being abducted, ma’am?’’

‘‘He’s going to be, in a few minutes.’’

‘‘Where is the child now?’’

‘‘In my car, on Highway Fourteen south of the Walker Pass turnoff.’’

The deputy stood up from his crouch and looked toward the cruiser. I hid the phone on my lap. His attention stuck, then loosened again; he looked away.

The dispatcher was saying urgently, ‘‘Ma’am, are you being pursued?’’

Briefly my legal training turned me stupid, as I thought, Am I?
Pursue: to chase; follow
. . . before a smarter part of my brain screamed,
Lie!

‘‘Yes! I don’t know if I can keep ahead of her much longer. Please send the police; she has men with her; I won’t be able to fight them off—’’

The back door of the cruiser popped open, the deputy’s mass filling the space. He grabbed the phone. I slumped against the seat, feeling time tick away.

A China Lake police car arrived ten minutes later, pulling off the road in a cloud of blowing sand. Behind it came the green Dodge pickup I had seen outside Luke’s school. Brian, I thought, please hurry.

The China Lake officer, a rangy woman with big legs, walked around to open the police car’s passenger door. Tabitha got out tentatively and stood facing my Explorer, her auburn curls and soft white dress swirling in the breeze. From the green pickup emerged Chenille Wyoming in a lavender Stetson, and Isaiah Paxton, looking as hard as a length of pipe. They hung back, watching Tabitha.

She ran to the Explorer. At the open door she stopped. Her fingertips went to her lips, a movement of delicate anguish. She threw out her arms and burst into tears.

I shook the mesh screen, yelling, ‘‘No!’’

Her loud voice carried clearly. ‘‘Luke, it’s Mommy. Come on, sweet pea.’’ She tilted her head in sweet cajolery and gestured,
Come here
, with her hands.

And, for the first time since the deputy had pulled me over, Luke moved. He scurried away from her to huddle on the driver’s seat. Tabitha flicked a nervous glance at Chenille, who said, ‘‘What are you waiting for? Get him.’’

No, I thought, I can’t let her. I can’t.

I lay down on the seat and kicked both feet against the window. Nothing happened. I kicked again, screaming this time, and heard a dull crack. Once more, hard as a mule, and the window collapsed into beads of safety glass.

The door behind my head flew open. The deputy loomed above me, shouting, ‘‘Stop!’’ I kept kicking and yelling, smelling his leather gun belt and British Sterling cologne. He yanked me out by the collar. I dropped back, hit the sand, felt the breath clap out of me. The China Lake cop appeared and helped him flip me facedown. I felt a knee in my back and grit on my cheek, heard the cop say, ‘‘She’s high. It’s PCP.’’

The deputy flattened his nightstick against my neck. ‘‘Don’t move. I mean do not even breathe.’’

I had to squeeze out the words. ‘‘That man has a gun.’’

‘‘Jesus H. Christ.’’ The deputy exhaled harshly. ‘‘That’s what gun racks are for. You think he should hang potted flowers from it?’’

‘‘You’re
not
going to let her put Luke in a truck that has a rifle within reach. You’re
not
.’’ They pulled me to my feet and marched me toward the China Lake police car. I said, ‘‘And how are they going to belt Luke in? That truck has three seat belts and I count four people. That’s illegal.’’

‘‘So’s resisting arrest. Now shut up before I jam this stick down your throat.’’

They shoved me in. But, slamming the door, the China Lake cop said, ‘‘She actually has a point.’’

‘‘Make Tabitha go back to China Lake and rent a car!’’ I said. ‘‘And I’m not high—I’m trying to stop you from making a terrible mistake!’’

Outside the window Paxton appeared, his face in shadow. He said, ‘‘What a way for the boy to remember you.’’

Chenille barked, ‘‘Tabitha! Enough of this. Get your son.’’

Anxiety had stretched Tabitha’s thin face like a balloon. Cops were watching, and her Remnant overlords, and her sweet talk had driven Luke onto the floor of my car. She reached for him. He leaped up and scrambled over the gearshift into the backseat. She grabbed after him but he opened the back door, jumped down, and broke for open desert. I yelled ‘‘
Run!
’’ and he did, beautifully, with a high kick in the back, such a little kid to have an Olympian’s stride, as I shouted, ‘‘Go faster’’—faster, away from all this, forever.

Paxton caught him. He grabbed him by the shirt and brought him back thrashing and screeching. Please, Jesus, I begged. Let this be a witness to the cops. Let this
testify
. I cried, ‘‘Look at him!’’

But Chenille was showing the deputy some paperwork. Paxton, his face like cracked ice, handed Luke to Tabitha. Luke arched his back and pushed against her with his arms, head back, howling at the sky.

She didn’t flinch. She cinched her arms around him, securing her grip, speaking quietly to him. Paxton and Chenille grabbed his kicking legs, pressed him against Tabitha’s chest, and led her toward the pickup truck.

Luke shot a hand out, sobbing. ‘‘Aunt Evvie!’’

My heart broke.

Tabitha turned him away. Chenille shook her index finger at his nose. Her face was a hot rock. I read her lips:
Naughty boy.

Luke folded. His limbs went limp, his face blank. When Tabitha set him in the truck he looked like a broken doll, arms floppy, eyes empty.