The Last Mile

Chapter 1

Annie Harper-Briscoe

It was so late it was early. My deadline for the software patch technically isn’t until Tuesday morning, but call it obsessive compulsive disorder, or even foreboding. Something is going to happen this week, and if I don’t have this stupid thing done by morning, I’m going to miss my deadline. Er – never mind; it’s already morning. The clock on the mantle chimed three about fifteen minutes ago.

Sunday morning. God, where has time gone? I’ve got way too much to do. Antónia has to have vaccines this week (eight months old already!) and Ethan's summer break at the college is almost over. He’s been spending more time in the classroom preparing for the fall semester than he does after it starts.

A little thrill makes my heart shiver when I think about my husband. We’ve been married for five years now. We dated for five before the wedding, and Ethan’s put up with all of my hesitation – and running away – and endured the threat of my father hanging over our relationship. It still baffles me that we not only made it to the altar, but also managed to create the world’s most perfect child. I keep thinking I’ll wake up one morning, and the second after my eyes flutter open discover that the beautiful, complicated vision of my utopian life has been replaced by a nightmare.

Good things don’t generally happen to me. Well, not until the chapter of the first ten years of my life concluded. That was when Dad – my true hero in life – got wise to what was really going on between Faith and me, and kicked the wicked witch to the curb.

He thinks he knows the worst of it, but I love him, so he doesn’t even know half of what transpired between my mother and me in the years before the incident. That’s what I call it. The final insult. Her unmistakable, unhidden wrath.

My mother beat me, and at the time, I thought she had beaten me within an inch of my life. The world went sort of hazy when she clubbed me over the head with the baseball bat Dad gave me for my tenth birthday. I’ve never forgotten that moment, how the edges of reality turned black, and the gooey center was literally a murky gray. All the cones in my visual field were muted, rendered inoperative, leaving only rods to show me the limited gray scale that comprises the human visual spectrum.

She grabbed me by the hair, dragged me down a short flight of stairs in our split-level home, and then dumped me down the longer stairs to Dad’s sanctuary, his basement fortress, as he called it.

You love him so much more than you love me, you ungrateful little brat? Go live with him in his fucking basement, you rotten child!

Her words still come back to me, in nightmares mostly, but sometimes when I’m tired and frustrated too. I understand why now. How could I not? My father dragged me to counseling sessions for years to help me cope with the fact that my mother attacked me unprovoked. After all, I’d only asked her if we could grill burgers when Daddy got home from work that night.

I was unconscious when Dad found me at the bottom of the stairs. Apparently, Faith called him rather than an ambulance, and put on a very good show. Maybe she panicked when my leg broke on the way down the stairs and the flesh scraped off my shin and showed bone and ligaments beneath.

My father never left my side, and when the doctor in the ICU told him that my skull fracture was inconsistent with a fall down a flight of stairs, I was lucid enough to understand how upset he really was. A man came to my room and Dad signed papers. And then another man came, and they questioned me about what really happened that afternoon. And a lady came, one with ugly clothes but warm eyes, and asked me if my mommy had ever done other things that hurt me.

I refused to talk to her – at least in front of Dad. I figured if he knew the truth, that the mosquito bites I swore I just picked at until they were gaping holes were really cigarette burns, why I would cry when my mother told me that she was going to bathe me, why I was always ravenous when I got home from school because I had no lunch money, all of those things would’ve made him ballistic enough to just snap Faith’s treacherous neck. And I couldn’t lose my only parent. She preyed on that knowledge when I was a little kid – but by age ten, I didn’t feel so little anymore. I wanted her gone, and I wanted what she did to me to stop. So I told just enough.

The first man who visited was Dad’s attorney, and the papers he signed were for a divorce. My bruised brain would’ve jumped for joy if it hadn’t hurt so much.

The second man who came into that room was a police detective, one who Dad said worked specifically on crimes committed against children. He took my statement about what had really happened that day – and my story was as the doctor said consistent with the injuries documented.

The woman with ugly clothes and kind eyes was from the Department of Children and Families. She also provided supervision when Faith was finally permitted to see me, and she was my counselor. She knew the whole story, and she kept my secrets from Dad. She also made sure that by the time the court realized it had been years since they’d reviewed the necessity of supervised visitation, that I was fourteen years old – the magical age wherein I was allowed to decide for myself whether or not I wanted to see Faith again.

I said no. And I meant it. Dad never pushed about why I made that decision, but I think that he was secretly relieved, if not pleased, that he wouldn’t be cradling my broken body as he carried it from a fresh crime scene.

My mom eventually gave up fighting my decision as a minor. The campaign began anew the day I turned eighteen. I guess she figured that since I wasn’t a child anymore that she could simply show up.

She did. Show up, that is. My high school graduation. My summer jobs when I was home from college. She even flew to Phoenix once to see me participate in a science exhibition in college.

It was on that fateful attempt that I made a serious mistake. I let the wretched creature get a foot in the door.

Dad was there too, always cordial without being friendly to his ex-wife. He never spoke ill of her to me. His message never varied. Darlin’, she’s your mother. If you want a relationship with her, it’s your choice. I love you. Period. Nothin’ is ever gonna change that. You’ll always be my baby girl, no matter what.

How liberating my childhood was after she was gone and it was just Dad and me! I never understood how wise he really was until Faith got her foot in the door, and I realized how much he had done to buffer me from her all my life – even before the divorce.

See, it was a rare occasion that Dad wasn’t home yet by the time bath hour rolled around. And he’d simply raise one eyebrow and say, Faith, she can take her bath on her own. She’s a big girl now, ain’t you sweetheart?

Mom would fume, but Dad always won the battle. It never occurred to me that he suspected she was being abusive to me, that if I flinched when she brushed my long blonde hair that she’d pop my bare bottom with the stiff bristles of the brush, or that she’d wash between my legs and tell me that this was a girl’s dirty place, that it was bad, and must never be touched or played with – and then would show me what a bad touch meant. I thought he didn’t know, because I believed her when she said, If you tell your father that I’ve told you all of this, he’ll be dirty with you, like he was with me, when I wasn’t very much older than you are, Annie. Is that what you want? Do you want your daddy to be a pervert with you?

Well, I’m pretty sure that he still doesn’t know most of that, because Faith’s still breathing, still making his life – and mine now too – hell.

By the time she showed up at the science exhibition, I was twenty years old. I’d met Ethan – he was two years ahead of me in college, and getting ready to start his graduate studies in biological science. My field obviously, was computer science. There was a bit of overlap between us in terms of course work. That’s how we met, actually. But for my last two years of college, Ethan was a teaching assistant. That’s what he wanted to do with his life – teach biology and anatomy and physiology to college students.

My attraction to him was instantaneous – and I felt pointless because he was about to become a person in a position of authority over undergraduates, so I completely ignored him.

It wasn’t easy. He’s gorgeous. GQ gorgeous, and in my opinion, completely out of my league. Dad laughed when I was moaning over the bad luck of my age and then brushed the whole thing off by announcing that guys like Ethan Harper didn’t notice girls like Annie Briscoe anyway.

And why the hell would you think any man is outta your league, sweetheart? You’re the most beautiful gal I ever seen, and that’s sayin’ somethin’. I’ve seen some awful gorgeous gals in my time.

Of course, he’s my father. He has to say stuff like that. But Ethan didn’t give up on me. I attributed it to that age-old theory that men simply love the chase. Once he had me, he’d lose all interest. It happens all the time.

I finished my undergraduate work and accepted a position with a small software developer in the Seattle area – and when Ethan heard about it, (he was still pursuing his Ph.D.) he showed up on my doorstep, wild, with more than a tinge of desperation.

Don’t leave Phoenix, Annie. Please. I’ve been waiting for two years for you to graduate, hoping that you’d see me as more than the guy who teaches this or that at the college, and maybe notice the man who very much wants to get to know you.

My retort? The ever intelligent laugh followed quickly by, Yeah right. You’re not pursuing social science, so what sort of experiment is this, Mr. Harper?

Since it didn’t look like I believed him enough to let him over the threshold into my tiny apartment, he just spilled it right there in the hall.

"Experiment? This isn’t a game to me, Annie. You’re smart and gorgeous, funny and kind. I’ve never met anybody like you, never known anybody that I wanted to know everything about, not until I met you. If you think that’s funny, or some kind of game, I’m sorry. I guess there’s nothing I can say to change your mind. But I will tell you that I think you’re making a big mistake. Nobody could ever love you or respect you as much as I do. Who else would wait all this time just so he could ask you out on a date? But that’s not what you want, so I guess I missed my chance. I hope your life brings you nothing but great things. Good luck in Seattle."

The words dropped before I thought better of them. I’m not actually leaving… Phoenix, I mean. That’s the great thing about being a coder. You can do the job remotely.

It kept him from walking away, planted a gorgeous smile on his face while hope flickered in those deep golden eyes. Really?

I nodded. Yeah. I mean, everything is delivered digitally, but I can do the job from here or Hong Kong if that’s what I want.

Is it? What you want, Annie?

I… I don’t know. Maybe someday. I’d like to see more of the world than Phoenix or Darkwater Bay.

Oh.

But right now, I could go for some breakfast, I said.

It’s eight o’clock at night.

I grinned. Do you actually know any coders, Mr. Harper?

His cringe touched my heart.

Ethan, there’s this great little diner around the corner. They have more than breakfast food too. Would you like to… have a bite with me?

Now?

I withdrew a little. You’ve probably got other things to do. Sorry.

He reached for my hand, and never let it go. It’s been ten years since that fateful night when he was willing to walk away if that’s what I needed. He didn’t run, not from my father’s watchful eye (incidentally, Dad pronounced him a keeper after their first meeting), nor did he shy away from the sickness that is my relationship with Faith.

I started talking to her occasionally, after she showed up at that science event. She was warm when we spoke. Even apologized once and explained that alcohol does terrible things to people, and that if I couldn’t forgive her for the past, she understood. She didn’t know if she’d ever forgive herself.

Maybe it was that little girl dream, that one day my mother would wake up and cherish her child – the way they’re supposed to do. But the cold hard truth is that Faith isn’t normal, and she should’ve never been a mother.

Our relationship warmed for awhile, but she started pushing too hard, so by the time Ethan and I started seeing each other, I was grateful that there were hundreds of miles separating us. The last thing I wanted was her inappropriate behavior around Ethan, particularly after she hooked up with a grieving widower who is only ten years older than me. I had no doubt she’d try to latch onto Ethan too.

That’s part of my mom’s personality, I guess. She uses her body to make men ignore the ugliness on the inside of that shell. She did it to my Dad. She did it to poor Kent Spicer. She’s probably done it to more men than I wanted to realize.

I invited her to my bridal shower. She came – with porno DVDs and edible underwear as my gift.

We talked to Dad. Was it right or wrong to exclude her from the wedding guest list? Dad had his pat answer ready. That’s entirely up to you, honey. I’ll understand if you want her there. I love you no matter what.

Ethan felt it wouldn’t be right to exclude her.

She brought Kent to the wedding. It was the first time I’d met him. And I realized that the man was still steeped in grief over the loss of his wife years after the fact, years after he started seeing my mother.

I never forgot his toast: I envy you, the happiness you’ve found together. I wish you the best – that you’ll get all the things that newlyweds dream of having… family and children, and knowing that the person you love most in the world will be there for you at the end of the day.

It was beautiful really, and I couldn’t understand why this handsome young man was with my old hag mother. But it hit me that day. He was a widower. He wasn’t talking about dreams he shared with my mother, but dreams that he’d had with his wife on their wedding day – before he lost her, before Faith swooped in like a buzzard and started manipulating him into feeling sorry for her while he felt sorry for himself.

I drifted. Faith pursued. In May last year, I told her the good news. Ethan and I were expecting our first child.

And that’s when it all became crystal clear to me, what she’d been after all along. She wanted to be there for me, for this child. This is my second chance, baby, a chance to do the right thing by my grandchild, the one your father denied me with you after I got well.

What about me? What about my recovery from what she’d done to me? All those years of counseling, all the guilt I felt, shielding Dad from all the awful things she’d really done to me behind that closed bathroom door, the day she showed me what menstruation looked like, where a tampon went – when I was six years old. She was obsessed with a girl’s bad place, and how no matter who touched it, I should always remember it was a very bad feeling, a dirty thing.

It took years of therapy as an adult before I got past most of that variety of her abuse, to get to the point where I could enjoy and experience intimacy with my ever-patient Ethan. We got there. We made it.

And to hear that vile woman talk about a second chance with my child – it curdled my stomach. Something inside me exploded that day. In retrospect, I think it’s the instinct that all good mothers have. We will fight to the death to protect our children.

You will have no relationship with my child, Faith, I said coolly. "Not even a supervised one. You got your second chance with me, and you’ve done nothing to prove to me that you’ve changed at all. For the sake of peace, I’ve granted occasional contact. I even thought perhaps you’d respond to this happy news in a different way, that you’d be supportive. Instead, like everything else, you see this event revolving around you. I’m sorry, but I won’t allow that. I don’t want to talk to you again, or hear from you, or see you. Don’t show up again. After all these years hoping that maybe you meant it when you told me you were sorry, I realize the truth now. I see that you were sorry, sorry you got caught. So no. There will be no contact with my baby, because unlike you, his or her health and happiness and sense of well-being means more to me than anything in the world."

Her smile chilled me to the bone. "More than you love your father, Annie? Because I promise you, if you don’t give me full access to this baby when it’s born, I will make Tony’s life a living hell. That pension he plans to leave you will be mine. I’ll ruin him if that’s what it takes to teach you a lesson you’ve had coming for years. And then I’ll sue for visitation rights to this child, ones that aren’t supervised. And I’ll win. Kent already told me that grandparents are winning visitation rights all the time these days. I’ll win. And you’ll lose."

That was the last we spoke. Ethan heard what she said – he’d come into the room behind her, and literally threw her out of our house and told her if she darkened the doorway ever again, he’d consider it a threat to his family and shoot her himself.

I don’t know if she believed him, but I sure did.

Faith made good on half of her threat. She hasn’t sued us for visitation rights to Antónia… yet. But she has made Dad’s misery a little deeper. I know she’s doing it, thinking I’ll relent to protect him.

Dad’s a grown man. He can take care of himself, and if I ever told him the truth about my last argument with Faith, he’d completely agree with me. I can almost hear his reply. Money don’t matter squat, baby girl. You take care of your family, and let Faith do what she will to me. I’ll gladly stand between your family and her. ‘Sides. She don’t know that I got no intention of retiring anyway. I’ll die on the job, and that asshole judge won’t change my last will and testament. I never intended a dime of that pension goin’ to anybody but you and Ethan and my grandbaby.

It was true. Dad said for years that everything he had left in the world would be mine when he passed. Not that he planned to do it any time soon.

My sense of foreboding was rewarded when my cell phone chimed, notifying me of an email, snapping me out of the unhappy thoughts and thrusting me into fearful ones.

It’s important. Your father was shot tonight. Meet me at the old house out on Suspicion Road.

I didn’t think. Panic swelled in my chest. I didn’t tell Ethan. I didn’t call Dad first to find out what was going on. Maybe it was the fact that I knew he’d willingly sacrifice himself to protect me, and my family. Could I do any less for him?

I only grabbed my purse and phone, called a cab, and went to the airport.

Ten hours later, when I found myself locked in Dad’s old safe room in the basement, I realized what a sucker – with awful instincts – I really am.

Louisville Slugger was headed straight for my skull again – after what I knew was the last argument I’d ever have with Faith in my life.

Chapter 2

Helen Eriksson

It was one of those weird nights after half a summer of them. The stars were plainly visible over Darkwater Bay. It hadn’t rained in weeks. My husband was still ensconced in Montgomery at the behest of a man I’m really beginning to despise with every fiber of my being – our dear governor, Joe Collangelo. The silvery moon of early August hung low over the Pacific Ocean. I stood there watching it, the fullness, as if it were commiserating its pregnancy of lightness with my similar condition.

Wind whipped my baggy gauze drape around puffy ankles. Yes, I should have them elevated. I shouldn’t be munching on an enormous salted pretzel. Or drinking caffeinated iced coffee. Triple shot latte, no less.

I shouldn’t be alone, wondering what Johnny is doing, imagining Joe whispering enticements that would keep him away even longer. I shouldn’t be worried about my father’s impetuous trip with his new unofficial ward, Hedra Dearhart either, but couldn’t stop that anymore than I could the crashing surf below me on the rocks at the base of the cliff.

Johnny, wise man that he is, fixed our over-eager mistake with Hedra, and convinced everyone – including the court – that her emancipation made perfect sense. After all, she would be an adult in the eyes of the Department of Children and Families in November anyway, and the kindly old great-uncle had agreed to stay on to look after her in more of an advisory capacity.

Everybody – from the frumpiest bureaucrat in DCF, to the family court judge, a serene youngster judge by the name of Kent Spicer, hopped right on board with Johnny’s plan.

What makes tonight so very strange is that the heels gouging into my kidneys have been still. For hours. For the first time since that particular joy of pregnancy descended into my murderous-filled world I felt next to nothing.

I feel fine, actually. But this lack of movement… it’s very strange. Maybe that’s why I’ve jumped off the healthy dietary track. Wake them up with a jolt of caffeine and a salty snack.

So far, it isn’t working. I have an appointment with Dr. Harvey, my obstetrician, on Tuesday. Another ultrasound. More blood pressure monitoring. Another weight check.

In the beginning of this adventure, I bemoaned putting back on any weight that I’d lost in the first place when a very stupid move left me with a gunshot wound to the left shoulder. Depression (and a briefly intense love affair with narcotics and merlot) ensued. I lost a lot of weight I couldn’t actually spare, had regained a bit of it, and then found out I was pregnant.

Well, despite the intensity of first trimester morning sickness, my appetite returned, and I figured I’d pile on enough pounds to fully exceed what I’d lost in the first place, plus forty pounds.

My third trimester started about a month ago, and I still haven’t gained quite thirty pounds. Dr. Harvey is worried. Johnny is sick, convinced that there’s something terribly wrong despite everyone – from the doctor to her ultrasound technician – assuring him that the babies are fine.

Something is different now though. Maybe it’s the stress of Johnny’s several-week-long banishment to Montgomery. I doubt that it’s loneliness. I’ve never been a social butterfly after all.

But there is a restless tickle along my nerve endings. Wishing I think, that something will happen. My brain needs activity. Sudoku bores the hell out of me. There’s only so much internet surfing I can handle. Left to my own devices, I’ve ignored bed rest more often than not, even though I constantly lie to the doctor when I see her every week.

Akathisia, in the wonderful world of psychiatry, is a restless sort of agitation, and an inability to be still. Rocking while seated. Foot tapping. Pacing. It’s usually related to the side effects of medication. I know that prenatal vitamins don’t cause it, but that’s the closest way I can describe this sensation. Fiery nerves, expectant, waiting for something important to happen. I can taste the bitter flavor in the back of my throat. Tragedy is coming. Someone’s suffering is about to hit with gale force.

And it excites me.

A whiff of something else was carried on the gusty wind tonight. Darkness began to obscure the moon while the pungent odor of smoke filled my nostrils.

I gazed up, followed the dark thready strands that drifted out over the ocean back to the source, someplace east, too far for me to see a glow in the sky, but perhaps my feeling wasn’t simply wishful thinking. At least some small part of our world had burst into flame.

My toes dug into the lush grass beneath my feet. Most of the city was so dry after weeks without moisture, I felt almost wicked for watering my yard, keeping it full and green and succulent. A fire in this weather… well, it could be extremely tragic.

Drifting into the house, I flicked on the police scanner in the office. The usual radio chatter soon filled the room, occupied my mind.

A 10-91A in Nightingale (stray animal). Thrilling.

A 10-66 on Hennessey Island at the bridge (traffic light out).

I snorted at the 288 call (lewd behavior) to an address on Mercer Boulevard in Darkwater proper. Hooker in an alley, perhaps?

Someone in Downey on a 10-99, suspected 502 (routine traffic stop, drunk driving).

I sighed. Someone with a sadder life than mine, out driving drunk on a Sunday night. Well, technically, it’s Monday morning now, since midnight came and went more than two hours ago.

An 11-81 in Fielding (traffic accident, no injury). Lucky bastard.

And then I heard it. State police, Dispatch, we’ve got a 11-44 outside Downey, six miles north of the state police annex, 2265 Suspicion Road. Over.

Dead body, coroner required.

10-4, sixty-two. Is this the location of the code 11? Over.

That’s a 10-0, dispatch. On scene command has issued a code N out here. Just get the coroner over here ASAP.

10-4, sixty-two. Dispatch clear.

I scribbled the information on the border of Saturday’s Sentinel. Suspicion Road – what a name – address 2265.

Code 11 is a fire department call, and it was linked to a call for a coroner. They mingled with the heavy barbecue scent floating over my property about as far west of the state police annex as one could get without falling off a cliff. But the call for the coroner was still Bay County, whether it was a state police call or something from one of Darkwater Bay’s various divisions.

Maya. They were going to call Maya out to a fire where a dead body was found.

My fingers tripped over the keyboard, typed the address into Google maps and waited for the property to come into view.

Damn, I whispered. According to the most recent satellite image from my preferred mapping service, Suspicion Road was heavily forested with lots of space between homes, but if a fire raged after a dry summer? Not good.

I pulled up the street view.

The house was larger than I suppose I suspected. A sprawling tri-level home. Basement. Three car garage. Satellite dish mounted on one side of the house. Crushed rock driveway. A flag pole?

I rolled my eyes. Not unpatriotic really, but I couldn’t see flying a flag from the center of my circle drive. Maybe for a holiday or something. Then again, who knew when the street-view car made the rounds?

The flowers were blooming in the photo. The grass was green.

A late model Volvo was parked in front of one of the garage doors, license plate obscured, as was the name on the bricked-in mailbox at the end of the driveway.

I opened another program and typed the address into the fields and clicked submit.

Holy… shit.

I almost tripped on the hem of the thin nightgown in my haste to dash for the closet. Considering who owned the property, Chris Darnell – the only member of OSI left in Darkwater Bay at the moment – would be calling me out to help anyway.

The original homeowner thirty some years ago was one Anthony Briscoe. Current owner was Faith Briscoe.

Tony. He’d mentioned having an ex-wife once. Commiserated with Crevan about giving up much in a divorce settlement but that there were some things more valuable than property.

I learned a couple of months later what a man like Tony Briscoe would value more than his stuff, when he returned from Phoenix after visiting his daughter Annie. She’d just delivered his first grandchild, and Tony hastily (which was odd for my Darkwater Bay history teacher) explained that he raised Annie alone.

Now it clicked in my head. He’d given up everything to keep his child.

And the house had a code 11 tonight. A coroner was needed.

One leg shoved into a pair of charcoal gray leggings (I’ve abandoned anything that is constrictive at all), and the phone started ringing before my ankle thrust through the waist for the second leg.

Hold on, I shouted, like whoever was calling in the middle of the night could hear me. It was probably Darnell, and more than likely, he figured he’d be calling for some time before I roused from the dead of sleep.