Relative Danger (23 page)

My cousin’s silly warning washed from my brain, and I pumped up my mind with positive thoughts, deciding I was an all-right parent and grandmother, at least as good as I knew how to be.

I smiled at a barking dog that led the way for his master, a pear-shaped man in navy jogging clothes emerging from around shrubs at the corner. Leaves drifted to the sidewalk ahead of me, sprinkling my path. I inhaled sweet fresh air and loosened my hands from their clenched position, letting my arms swing free, while my pace slackened.

At the corner I spun around, reminding myself that exercise was one of the many things I chose to do or not. Now I selected
not
—at least not so much that I’d work up a sweat.

The sound of a fast-moving vehicle coming up behind made me aware that hair grew on the back of my neck. I sprinted forward and glanced over my shoulder.

Exactly where I’d just placed my foot to turn around, a truck sped across the curb.

That truck had run a red light. And almost hit me.

I stopped, my body shaking like a six-pointer on the Richter scale. How close I’d just come to being run down. Accidental? Sprouting goose flesh told me maybe not.

I rushed back to where I had been. The black truck’s rear bumper barreled around the far corner. The truck appeared mid-size, fairly new. Had I seen that truck in Sidmore High’s parking lot? I struggled to envision all those vehicles from school jumbled in clumps.

Unable to remember any one truck, I jogged back to the condo. The driver probably only missed the edge of the road, I told myself, stilling my jittery hands to throw the lock inside the door. Maybe the driver fell asleep. The hour was still so early.

Had that driver even seen the red light? Or was he, or she, color-blind?

I leaned against the door, waiting for my heartbeats to slow. Suppose someone had been lurking, knowing where I was. That person could have waited for me to come out. Where had I given this address? Only to the school board and the auto repair shops. But students had definitely noticed what I drove. The avocado mail truck had been parked out front of the condo like an ugly neon sign advertising
Cealie’s here
. Anybody from school could have recognized that vehicle. And now, the showy white Mustang convertible was parked out there.

“Dammit, Stevie,” I blurted. She had given me those fearful ideas. No one was trying to harm me. I was back in the condo, priding myself on my healthy duckwalk, pleased that I hadn’t worked my body nearly as hard as I used to. I mentally patted my back.

A chill skittered along it. Was it possibly that someone from school was coming after me? Yes. But I would go after them first. I needed to locate that black truck.

I grabbed the phone book. I had to find something.
Hernandez, Marisa
. On Holiday Drive. I jotted down her address. Breathing quicker, I flipped through pages, searching for more teachers. My shoulders fell. Not one other adult name that I knew from Sidmore High.

Changing my shoes, I took off in the Mustang. Maybe I’d see that black truck. After all, I was in the suburbs, not the city.

The streets slept during this early Sunday hour. I was usually asleep until after the sun rose, and now was surprised to see how vacant an area filled with moderate dwellings and businesses could become. Cars, trucks, and SUVs sat in driveways. Garage doors were all shut. No motion came from lawns or structures. I wondered about the people living inside. Most homes would hold hardworking parents and children who toiled at school. Some would house singles. A few—I wondered how many—might shelter killers.

“None,” I told myself, willing it to be true. I careened around a corner, knowing that what I’d said was a lie. The world did harbor killers. I saw their faces on the evening news. Behind these shut draperies I passed were people sharing a hearty breakfast while plotting their attacks?

I scanned streets, searching for a late-model black truck.

Finding none, I stopped at a convenience store, bought a map showing this area, and a sweet roll and milk. I then sat in a booth with breakfast and scanned the map. Holiday Drive was only five blocks away.

I found Marisa Hernandez’s street and saw bikes and plastic toys lying on some lawns. Most vehicles had been tucked into garages of unassuming brick houses, the majority of them one-story. I didn’t see a truck like the one that nipped the corner I’d just walked across.

I shook my head, trying to make that picture leave. But fear stuck to me. Murderers might be living in these homes. And one might attend Kat’s school.

I located Marisa’s house. Attractive white brick, burgundy shutters, freshly mowed lawn. A closed garage. I didn’t really suspect her, I told myself. After all, she was Kat’s friend. But why would some people believe she was a killer? Even teachers in the lounge seemed to think so.

Grant Labruzzo also used to live down this street, Abby Jeansonne told me.

I drove down Holiday, hoping to find his name on a mailbox, hoping I could discern something by the proximity of his and Marisa’s houses.

Chapter 18

I circled blocks throughout the subdivision, peering at mailboxes that displayed last names. I didn’t see
Labruzzo
. Didn’t see a black truck. I made another pass in front of Marisa’s house. Still no sign of her or whatever she drove.

I left the residential area and wove through streets with little traffic, nearing a business section. The police station was close. Maybe I should tell Detective Dantin about what happened.

And what did happen? I considered. A black truck ran a red light and rolled over the corner of a sidewalk. A grin sneaked to my face. I sometimes made last-minute decisions while driving, took sharp turns and clipped a few corners myself.

Besides, tomorrow the detectives would question John Winston at school. Then he’d get more furious with Kat. And she’d get more furious with me and probably never want to see me. No way could I involve the police again.

I veered away from the station, sadness cloaking me. I wanted to help Kat, but each of my efforts only gave her more problems. A flashing indicator light on the car ahead made me realize I was creeping down the street just like the string of vehicles I followed. I would return to Marisa’s subdivision. Maybe I should leave Kat’s situation alone, but I couldn’t. The traffic ahead of me appeared to be turning beyond a row of tall hedges. The road must be blocked. I signaled for a turn and followed the others, determining how I’d get back to Marisa’s street from here.

“Silly, Cealie,” I said with a laugh, noticing that I’d pulled into a church parking lot. Foolish me, a lamb trailing its leader. I headed toward the lot’s exit. A second thought made me slow. My purse held my computer disk. Maybe I could pay someone in an office here to print out my instructions for the basics of how to raise a cactus. I circled the lot, saw lots of vehicles but no office. The only structure was a tall yellow warehouse with a marquee:
All-Believers’ Church. Enter All Who Believe. We Especially Invite Those Who Don’t.

All-Believers. This was Grant Labruzzo’s church. I hadn’t thought to look for it in the phone book, but now here I was. And maybe I fit into their sign’s last category. I parked beside a rusty minivan, determining that at the moment I almost didn’t believe in people, even myself. I hadn’t found Labruzzo’s house, but maybe I could learn more about him in here.

“Welcome, Sister!” a man’s voice boomed when I entered the vast structure. A small person with suspenders, he had little sprouts of white hair on his head and a tremendous smile lighting his face. He caught me in an embrace.

“It’s nice to see you,” I said on a tinny breath once he let me go. Another greeter caught me. The barrel-like woman squeezed away the last air remaining in my lungs, and I tumbled into a nearby pew. Any other well-wishers would make me need emergency oxygen.

The large number of people who chatted in the refurbished building that smelled of incense surprised me. The varnished pews appeared new. Thick dark wooden beams ran up the walls and across the ceiling. The concrete floor chilled my feet. In front of all the pews stood a stage, the only thing on it a high-backed chair covered with royal blue velvet.

I tightened my shoulders, feeling out of place. My parents had brought me to church, but after I grew up and left them, I knew their choice hadn’t been mine. In adulthood I perused other religions but neglected getting attached to any.

Voices swelled in the church cavity, filled with faces with tremendous smiles. “Good to see you, Sister,” a youthful female voice said from my right. A teenage girl in a plain brown dress with an apron top clasped my hand. Her skin looked fresh with not a trace of makeup.

“All of you are so sweet,” I said, taken with these people who seemed to honestly care. And Millie in the teachers’ lounge had complained that churchgoers here were all crazy. Little did she know. Grant Labruzzo had probably been as caring as these people.

“This is my mother,” the girl said, indicating a gnarled lady seated at her side. The lady looked much too old to be her parent.

“Happy to meet you,” I said, stretching my hand out and flashing my largest smile.

Mamma’s raisin face didn’t leave its study of the pew in front of us.

The teen whispered, “She can’t see or hear you or speak.”

“Ah.” I folded my arm back.

“She’s here to get the spirit,” the girl said, her voice having to rise with the upsweep of surrounding voices.

“I hope Mamma gets it,” I said. Cheerful men, women, and children made me want that spirit, too. Babies asleep on some shoulders enticed me to want to hold them. I asked the teen, “Did you happen to know Grant Labruzzo? I believe he came here.”

The girl’s eyes glazed. “Brother Labruzzo.”

Other voices dropped off. The girl peered toward the front, her countenance taking on a glow. I glanced forward, as all alleluia broke out.

“Alleluia. Alleluia, alleluia, brothers and sisters!” a preacher called out as he erupted from a door near the stage.

“Amen! Alleluia!” the congregation shouted. I said a quiet alleluia, wanting to replace my doldrums with these people’s contagious joy. I was ready to hear their message. I especially liked seeing wholesome-looking teens in positive action.

“God loves you,” Preacher called. Like a Broadway dancer, the agile man swooped down the center aisle, pumping his arms from beneath folds of his coral-pink gown. “He loves
you
.” Preacher stopped, his wrist cocked, his outstretched finger appearing to count every person in the warehouse. His statements drew more alleluias and many yeses. His finger-pointing toward the faithful made everyone start hopping. Preacher’s fingertip found my area. Nearby bouncing bodies drew me out of reverie. Caught up in the energy, I felt special.

Believers began scurrying to the center aisle. People of all ages gathered, stretched their arms, and swayed.

I hoped I wouldn’t have to join the jostling. But then I determined, as more of the congregation filled that area, I’d surely done worse. And their stretching and bending with arms flailing must be excellent exercise. Fun, but not strenuous. Kind of like a Richard Simmons workout.

The teen girl beside me screamed, “Oh, yes, yes!” and fell over sideways.

I gasped and reached for her.

“Alleluia!” Mamma yelled near the girl. Then the prune woman slumped.

Mamma could talk! I’d witnessed a miracle, I realized while rooting through my purse for my cell phone. The 911 lady answered. “Yes,” I said, breathless, “I’m in a warehouse church.” I started to explain the crisis—two people down in one family—when rising voices and thumps of falling bodies made too much noise for my voice to be heard. More people fell. Others tossed out their arms and shouted. People swayed. They slumped and fell to the floor. Had Legionnaire’s disease filtered in through the vents?

“And He wants you! And you. And you!” Preacher called, his finger selecting for God. And once God chose, His elect tumbled, one after the other to the chilled cement floor.

“What’s your emergency?” the woman on my handset yelled. “I’ll send paramedics or firefighters or police. But you’ll have to tell me what’s happening.”

My eyes expanded to take in the falling bodies. Beside my feet, the teen girl lay crumpled across a kneeler. She didn’t appear to be breathing. My pulse raced. “People are passing out. You might need to remind me of how to do CPR,” I hollered to my phone, which I set down on a pew while I knelt beside the girl.

As I went down, I spied a man from Sidmore High. Three rows up. Skinny vice-principal Tom Reynolds. He’d missed school Friday. His arms weren’t flailing when he saw me. His eyes widened, his mouth opened, his face looked pale.

I folded down into position and clasped the girl’s chin. Her cheek was cherry red from where it hit the kneeler. “You’ll be all right,” I said, hoping she could hear. I turned her nostrils so she could get air and hoped I could hear the 911 woman giving me instructions. I’d try for Mamma next. But she was lying so still. My mouth neared the teenager’s, and her eyes popped open. “Alleluia, you’re alive,” I cried. Here I was, saving a person.

The aqua eyes of the girl with an angelic nature glared at me with such harshness that my hands shrank away. Her glare reminded me of Sledge. Her eye color made me think of another boy. “Your eyes resemble a student’s,” I muttered. “John Winston’s.”

She stared at me. “That darn John passed the note, made us believe Miss Hernandez was a killer.”

My pulse stilled. I glanced at Mamma. She lay motionless, her big blue eyes peering at mine. Another miracle from Preacher. I let the teen go, and Mamma’s lips curled into a grin. She shut her eyes, and her arms again slumped over the pew.

The sweet teen girl watched me sit back. When she seemed certain I’d remain there, she released a loud sigh and turned her face back against the kneeler.

“Hello! Are you still there?” the frantic words shouted from my phone.

I peered at people swooning everywhere. Preacher’s well-fed face beamed. Bodies were falling around him like garbage being dumped into a heap. “I’m sorry,” I said into my phone. “It’s not an emergency. It seems there’s a party going on.” The 911 lady hung up. I peered around for Tom Reynolds.