Not Even Past (12 page)

“Jesus,” he said. As if seeing her for the first time, he blinked. “What did they do to you?”

“Stop asking me questions.”

The car idled.

“Listen,” she said. “They know we’re gone, and they going to come here to find us. Where else would we go?”

“If they’re going to hurt your parents, that’s more reason to be here.” Martin rubbed his chin with his right hand. His left stayed on the steering wheel. He couldn’t trust it to be steady.

Jeanne shook her head. It was slow and hesitant. Either she wasn’t sure, or the movement was causing her pain.

“You don’t understand them,” she said.

“Make me understand!”

As if a volcano was erupting, the words shot from Jeanne’s mouth. “This is on me, Bill! Me! No one else! Take me to a hotel and go home. Get out of my life. You’re going to get hurt.”

Martin rolled his neck, cracking it. He blew air from his nose. “You hurt me a long time ago,” he said.

“For your own good.”

“How was I supposed to know that?”

The porch light of the house they were parked in front of went on. Someone had noticed them. In a neighborhood like this—still rattled after Sandy and worried about looters—that likely meant the police were on their way. Martin thought about staying and waiting for the police. He’d badge them, talk to them, make them go away. At that point, though, they’d have attracted a ton of attention, and Jeanne would have no choice but to go see her parents.

He looked at her again, letting her face come into focus. There were dark circles and the hint of tears at the corner of her eyes. Crows feet had formed at the corners of her eyes. Her laugh lines were deeper.

“When was the last time you saw William?” he asked.

She flinched at the name. “When he was three months old.”

Martin pulled a U-turn, but instead of parking and going inside, he kept driving. There were several motels on Route 9. They weren’t clean and they weren’t high-class, but they were plain. Whoever was looking for her would have a hard time finding them there. He would even pay in cash.

“You can wait one more night.” He accelerated down the road. “Let’s find a place to get some sleep.”

M
ARTIN OPENED
his eyes and stretched. There was a sharp pain at the corner where his neck and left shoulder met and his legs were cramped. Sleeping on a loveseat in a hotel room will do that to you.

Especially at his age.

He sat up and reached over to the end table for his gun. He hefted it and undid the clip. Everything was still in place. If he got a chance later in the day, he’d need to clean it. Too much was at stake now to have to deal with a rare malfunction because of an owner error.

Jeanne made a snuffling sound and rolled over on the bed. Martin waited a moment, but she didn’t wake. He listened to her breathing go from momentarily ragged to easy and smooth second later. It had taken her nearly two hours to fall asleep after they checked in. She tossed and turned and cried. Martin made an attempted to go comfort her once, but she moved away from him.

Now he was content to let her sleep. They’d found a semiclean motel on Route 9 that advertised
DRIVING DISTANCE TO THE SHORE
and
HBO ON THE TV
. He also expected clean towels, but that might have been pushing it. The guy behind the desk asked for ID and Martin gave it, but he paid in cash. If whoever was looking for them was monitoring credit lines, Martin wouldn’t be tracked down. At least not today. He had enough money to get them through.

By the time he had to use an ATM, he was hopeful they’d be well out of state. Of course if Jeanne’s warnings came true, being out of state and staying away from credit cards wouldn’t matter. They would be found.

Martin put the gun back in his holster and stood up. Still Jeanne didn’t move. He wondered how much sleep she’d gotten when she was captive. An hour here or there? The body can’t keep up with that.

Peeking out the front window, he saw only his car in the lot. It wasn’t a weekend, so the shore crowd with smaller wallets hadn’t arrived yet. The college kids with their coolers of beer, bathing suits, and just enough cash to get by would be showing up tomorrow. For now, Martin and Jeanne had the place to themselves.

Coffee, though. That was a problem. Last night, he noticed a complimentary pot in the lobby. With the parking lot empty, it wouldn’t be too hard to keep an eye on things if he walked down to get a few cups.

He grabbed the key off the table and left, making sure the door quietly clicked closed behind him.

A bell jingled when Martin walked into the lobby. The same desk clerk came out of the back room and gave Martin a smile.

“You stayed the whole night.”

Martin went to the coffeepot and took two Styrofoam cups from the stack. He poured cream in both, but not before checking the date on the package. Then he poured coffee. He couldn’t remember how Jeanne took hers, so he put a couple of sugar packets into his pocket.

“Usually guys like you, they show up, stay a few hours, towel off, and leave.”

Martin shook his head. “Just looking for a place to stay.”

“That’s what they all say. She was cute.” The desk clerk grinned. His teeth were butter-yellow.

Martin tried to picture whatever the clerk saw. Jeanne had stayed in the car until Martin had checked in, and then she took a quick walk to the room. Guy couldn’t have seen too much. Just her body. Not the bruises all over her skin.

“Where did you find her? Not around here. Too many cheap dates around here.”

“Knock it off. She’s a friend.”

The guy nodded. “Okay.”

Martin put down his coffee. He remembered Donne jumping across the counter to grab the cashier earlier. He couldn’t let that happen to him. Stay cool.

The desk clerk shrugged. “Future reference. That’s all.”

He inhaled. Exhaled.

“Shut up,” he said.

“Okay. Okay.” The clerk put up both his hands, palms out.

“Thank you.” Martin picked up his coffee again and left.

He walked down the corridor to their room, scanning the parking lot again. Nothing out of the ordinary. It seemed like the venture would be safe. He put down one cup to retrieve his key and unlocked the door.

When he stepped in, he found Jeanne sitting up in bed. He put the cups down and pulled the sugar from his pocket.

“You’re up,” he said.

She looked at him, her eyes wide. There were tears streaked down her face. Her hands were shaking much worse than his.

“Where were you?”

“I went to get coffee.”

“You left me.”

“I could see the room the whole time.” That was a lie, but he could see the parking lot.

“You
left
me here. I was alone. What if someone came for me?”

“That wasn’t going to happen.”

She didn’t respond. Instead, she just buried her face into the pillow and wept.

M
ARTIN TRIED
to wait her out. Let her fight through the shakes and the tears and find the light. He sat on the couch and sipped coffee. She was buried in the sheets somewhere. They shook as she wept. He listened to her, thinking back to the day he got the call about her death.

He didn’t cry, at least not at first. He was in his office, and the chief had called him. There was a car accident. A blaze the fire fighters had trouble putting out. Another car with empty and half full bottles of whiskey on its floor. The license plate for the burning car led them to Jeanne’s name. The chief was so, so sorry. Martin stared at the phone in his hands while his extremities went cold. After some time—he didn’t know how much—he hung it up and went and closed the door. She’d already left him, promised herself to Jackson Donne. He was out of her life.

And he couldn’t be involved in her death.

Now he just watched her. It seemed callous, and he hated himself for that, but somehow he knew if he approached her she’d just shove him away. Matters would be worse. Occasionally, he’d say her name and ask if she needed anything. Jeanne didn’t reply.

The parking lot was still empty. He’d check through the blinds occasionally, sweeping the courtyard as well for anything suspicious. Other than the traffic picking up on Route 9, everything was quiet. Checkout was scheduled for 10
AM
, but he’d pay for another day if he had to. Though the thought of running into the desk clerk again made his biceps twitch.

Twenty-five minutes later, the crying started to slow down. Martin finished his last gulp of coffee. It was cold, and the cream he’d added did little to quell the bitter finish. Jeanne’s cup sat on the end table where his glock had sat, untouched.

Pushing the sheets away, Jeanne looked over at him. He waited. Her cheeks were streaked with tears. Her eyes were red. Bags had also formed underneath them. Her nose looked red too, as if she’d been rubbing it.

“I can’t trust you,” she said.

Martin wasn’t ready for that one. He sank back into the couch and waited. For the first time, he noticed the cushions smelled like mothballs. The oil and gunpowder smell was finally leaving his nostrils.

“You left me here, a sitting duck,” she said.

“Honey—” He immediately regretted it.

“Don’t call me that,” she snapped.

“I could see the parking lot the whole time.”

Jeanne shook her head. “You shot Jackson. Didn’t even flinch. Just aimed and shot him.”

“He would slow us down.” Martin tried to come up with a believable motive on the spot. “If
they
find him, maybe it’ll trip them up for a few days, and we can get away.”

Her head continued to shake. “Bullshit.” She slammed her hand into a pillow. “Bullshit. Bullshit. Bullshit.”

“Jeanne.”

“Stop it! Are you with
them?
” Her eyes were wide, and he could see where the redness ended and the white started again. “Answer me!”

“I don’t even know who ‘them’ is.”

An image straight out
The DaVinci Code
flashed in his mind. A cult of people dressed in white robes staring at a book on the table. In the book were names of people who done wrong. And where they were hiding.

“You’re going to kill me.”

“Stop,” he said, holding himself back from calling her crazy. “Jeanne, we need to get out of here.”

“Where are you going to take me? Back to ‘them’? To dump me in the Atlantic Ocean? I shouldn’t go with you. You
abandoned
me.”

“Jeanne, you’re in shock. It’s been a tough couple of days for you.” Understatement of the year. “We need to get you some help and get you the hell out trouble.”

She punched the pillow again. He wondered how cheap the pillows were that a punch sounded like a fist hitting a brick.

Martin tried to pull something up from his memory. A moment they could lean on together to get her through this. But nothing came. He could remember dinners out and nights in bed. He remembered a few spats, but nothing major. He was always worried that, if they fought badly enough, she’d go back to Donne.

In fact, when she did leave, he wondered if he had pushed her away. Once the accident happened, those thoughts went out the window.

“We’re going to go see William,” he said. “And your parents. They need to know you’re okay.”

Jeanne didn’t respond. She picked up the pillow she’d been punching and held it closer to her body.

“Once we do that,” he continued, “we’re going to take a ride and get you someplace safe. Where were you before all this?”

She clutched the pillow tighter and said, “Arizona.”

He almost asked her if she was in Witness Protection. Decided against it.

“We can drive there. It’s summer. It’ll be beautiful, scenic, and safe.”

Jeanne shook her head again.

“Why not?”

Her mouth moved, but words didn’t come out. Martin sat forward and the couch groaned underneath him.

She squeezed her lips together and tilted her head left. Tears filled her eyes.

“You can tell me, Jeanne. I’m here to help you.”

“I can’t go back into hiding. As much as I want to. That’s why I came back.”

“Why did you leave?”

“I left because they were going to kill me. I knew too much.” The words ran together like one long compound word. After she was done speaking, her breath came in large gasps. He worried she was hyperventilating.