The sun was burning down with unusual ferocity for May, and she might just be enjoying the air-conditioning. He couldn't tell whether her engine was running; the rumble of the generator in the batting cage was too loud.
"Alex Morse is nuts," he muttered, cracking a ball toward third base. His marriage might not be in a perfect state—if any such marriage existed on earth—but the idea that his wife was planning to murder him was so ludicrous that Chris hadn't even known how to respond. It was almost like someone telling you that your mother was planning to kill you. And yet…it wasn't, quite.
There was no blood tie between husbands and wives—not without biological children. And for some reason, Chris couldn't get Morse's deadly earnest eyes out of his mind.
She clearly wasn't the kind of person who would waste time playing games with people's lives. The answer had to be something else. Like emotional instability. Maybe Morse believed absolutely in the absurd scenario she had outlined today. Given the recent death of her sister, that wasn't hard to imagine. Chris had seen many extreme grief reactions during his medical career.
But what should he do about it?
Call the FBI field office in Jackson and report Morse's visit?
Call his lawyer?
Call FBI headquarters in Washington?
Or discreetly try to get more information on his own?
His receptionist had finally found a phone number for Darryl Foster, and Chris had tried to call his old fraternity brother, but he'd only reached an answering machine.
He'd hoped that Foster—an active FBI field agent—would shed some light on the mysterious Agent Morse before he had to face Thora, but the cell phone in Chris's pocket had not rung. Until he knew more, he wasn't going to let Thora know anything was amiss. It wasn't that he believed anything Morse had told him, but if he related the afternoon's events to Thora, her first question would be ….
Who did you report her to?
And what would he say then?
Why hadn't he reported her?
"You gonna hit the ball or what, Coach?"
Chris blinked himself back to reality.
His catcher was staring up at him with confusion. Chris laughed to cover, then hit a high fly ball to center field. As he watched its arc, he caught a movement to his right.
Thora was standing in the open door of her Mercedes now, her blond hair flashing in the afternoon sun. She was staring directly at him.
Had she noticed his little zone-out at home plate?
She gave him a small wave and smiled beneath her sunglasses, dark avian things that gave her the look of an art deco hawk on the side of a skyscraper. She was wearing running clothes, her lithe, muscular body on display for all. Maybe that's why she didn't get out, he thought.
But that was wishful thinking. For the past eight months—since running marathons had become fashionable among the young married women of the town—Thora had run between two and ten miles a day.
She'd bought $200 shoes, the wrist GPS unit, and all the other gear of the modern distance runner. The thing was, with Thora it wasn't just for show. She actually had talent. After just three months' training, she'd started beating the times of women who had been running for two and three years. But Thora's running garb typified another point of tension between them.
When she was married to Red Simmons, Thora had dressed conservatively. Fashionably, yes, but never pushing the envelope of taste. After a suitable period of mourning, though—about the time she'd started seeing Chris—she had subtly begun changing her style. In the beginning, Chris had approved.
The new look revealed more of her beauty and signaled an engagement with life that she'd sorely needed. But lately Thora had begun wearing things he would never have imagined she would buy, much less wear in public: ultrashort shorts; transparent tops meant to be worn with an outer garment, but worn alone; and push-up bras (when she wore bras at all).
Chris had kidded her about this, hoping she'd get the hint, but Thora had continued to wear the stuff, so he'd shut up.
He didn't feel he had the right to control the way she dressed. Maybe he was getting old, losing touch with the times. And until today, it hadn't seemed that big a deal. Nothing had, really. Only the issue of Thora getting pregnant had been disturbing enough to rob him of sleep.
"Coach Grant," he called to his assistant, another team father.
"Let's run some bases and then call it a day."
The boys cheered, and their parents started rising from blankets and chairs, packing up ice chests and babies for the trek home. Chris ran the boys for five minutes, then circled them and led them in a team shout that reverberated off a thick stand of oak trees to the west.
The boys packed the gear—a team tradition—and then everyone headed for his family car.
Ben walked beside Chris as they tromped toward the Mercedes. Chris tried to blank his mind but couldn't. Too many things were surfacing after a period of unconscious repression. Like the Mercedes. Last Christmas, Thora had bought herself an SL55 AMG. Hardly anyone in town knew how expensive this car really was. Several local doctors owned Benzes, but most were in the $50,000 to $80,000 range.
Thora's SL had cost $145,000. Chris didn't begrudge her the car—it was her money, after all— but while she was married to Red Simmons, she had driven a Toyota Avalon: forty grand, fully loaded.
She'd also worn a Timex watch. Chris had sometimes joked with her about it while she was on nursing duty. But a month ago, a Patek Philippe had quietly appeared on her wrist. He had no idea how much the watch cost, but the jewels on its bezel told him it was probably something north of $20,000—more than several fathers watching this practice earned in a year.
"Big Ben!" cried Thora, moving out from behind the SL's door with a grin and bending to hug her sweaty son.
"You didn't miss a catch the whole time I was here!"
Ben shrugged.
"I play first base, Mom. You can't play first if you miss balls."
Chris wished he could see Thora's eyes, but the sunglasses hid them completely. She gave Ben a quick squeeze, then straightened and gave Chris her thousand-watt smile. His gaze went to the Patek Philippe. Stop it, he said silently.
"You picked up Ben early today," she said.
"Yeah. I knew rounds were going to take a while, so I decided to do them after practice."
She nodded but said nothing.
He wasn't sure where to go next, but Ben saved him by asking,
"Can we go to La Fiesta, Mom?"
Thora glanced at Chris over the tops of her sunglasses, but he couldn't read her meaning. La Fiesta was a family-oriented Mexican restaurant with low prices and fast service; thus it was always loud and crowded.
"I really need to get to the hospital," Chris said.
"You guys go, though."
Thora shook her head. "We've got plenty of food at home, and it's a lot healthier than Mexican. I made chicken salad this afternoon."
Ben rolled his eyes and wrinkled his nose.
Chris almost said, I'll pick up something on the way home, but that would only result in Ben begging for takeout and Thora getting irritated.
"Help me load the gear, Son."
Chris and Ben tossed the two bulging canvas bags into his pickup.
Then Chris gave Ben a high five, hugged Thora lightly to his side, and climbed into the truck. "I won't be too late," he said through the open window.
As though in answer, Thora took off her sunglasses. Her sea-blue eyes cut right through his feigned nonchalance.
Her gaze had always caused a physical reaction in his chest, something between a fluttering and radiant warmth. (It caused a reaction lower down, as well.) Now that gaze held an unspoken question, but he broke eye contact, lifted his hand in a wave, then backed onto the road and drove north toward town.
Alex Morse drove her rented Corolla into the parking lot of the Days Inn, pulled up to the door of room 125, and shut off the engine.
When she opened the door of her room, her sister's calico cat mewed and dropped soundlessly from the bathroom counter to the carpet.
Alex paid five extra dollars per night so that Meggie could stay in the hotel room. She only had Grace's cat because Jamie had begged her to take it after the funeral. Jamie loved Meggie, but his father did not, and the boy had been afraid that his dad would take her to the pound as soon as Alex flew back to Charlotte.
Since Alex knew that Bill Fennell was quite capable of this small act of brutality, she'd accepted the burden. To her surprise, the bright-eyed calico had helped to ease the loneliness of the past five weeks.