“This is my friend, Dylan Geer,” Laura said. “And my daughter, Emma.” Emma leaned against her leg.
A female voice came from behind them. “Let me take your coats.”
Laura turned to see a woman walking toward them. She was no older than sixty, with short salt-and-pepper hair, a warm smile and a vibrancy that radiated from her. A woman hard to dislike, Laura thought, and yet she instantly wished her gone from this scene. She had not pictured another woman in John Solomon’s life.
“This is my wife, Elaine,” John said.
They walked into the living room, and Laura felt Dylan’s hand squeeze the back of her neck in a gesture of comfort.
“What a beautiful setting you have,” Laura said as she sat down on the long, contemporary sofa. All the furniture had straight, trim lines. The flow of the room was open and clean, spilling out into the treed yard and the lake, and she found herself blinking back tears at the comparison between this life, this space, and Sarah’s tiny apartment and fading mind.
The conversation was at first superficial. They talked about the weather and the Lake Tahoe area.
“How much snow do you get?” Dylan asked. He was leaning forward, elbows on his knees, looking as though the answer to that question truly mattered to him.
“About seven hundred inches a year,” John said, some pride in his voice. “And would you believe our son and daughter both moved to Alaska in the last few years? Seven hundred inches wasn’t enough for them, I guess.”
“You have children?” Laura could not keep the surprise from her voice. Could that daughter be Janie, perhaps?
“Uh-huh,” Elaine said. “Just the two. And a grandson about Emma’s age. As a matter of fact, Emma, I have one of those neat coloring books from the last time he was here. You know, the kind where you paint water on the pages and the colors appear?”
Emma nodded, suddenly interested.
“Would you like to color in it?” Elaine waited for an answer.
“She’s not talking too much these days,” Laura said. “But I think she’d love it.”
Elaine walked into another part of the house, returning a moment later with a glass of water, a paintbrush and the coloring book. She settled Emma at the coffee table, then took a seat on the arm of John’s chair.
“So,” John said to Laura. “How did you know I used to work for the Post?”
Laura took in a deep breath. “This feels very awkward now that I’m here.” She smiled an apology at her hosts. “Do you know Sarah Tolley?” she asked.
The hearty color drained from John Solomon’s face, and from his wife’s, as well. Elaine put her hand on her husband’s shoulder.
“Go on,” John said to Laura.
“It’s a bit complicated,” she said. “For some reason I still haven’t figured out, my father, just before his death, asked me to check up on Sarah. I’d never heard him mention her before. I had no idea who she was.”
“What was your father’s name?” John asked.
“Carl Brandon.” She looked at him with hope. “Does that mean anything to you?”
He shook his head.
“So, I went to see Sarah. She lives in a retirement home, where she has her own little apartment. She’s in the early stages of Alzheimer’s, so she can’t—”
“Alzheimer’s,” John said.
“Yes. And she isn’t allowed out on her own. She doesn’t have any family, at least none that they know of. She’s told me a lot, though. We go for walks. She loves to get out. Her memory of the past is very, very clear. She told me about Joe Tolley.”
She looked at John’s face. There were tears in his eyes, or perhaps it was only the blur of her own tears that made her think so. John nodded for her to go on.
“She told me about meeting Joe on a train. Falling in love with him and marrying him. She told me about her work at a psychiatric hospital—”
“Saint Margaret’s,” John interrupted her.
“Right. Where they were doing mind control experiments. And Joe—you—”
John nodded.
“Checked yourself in to do some investigative reporting, but you disappeared and they told her they lobotomized you and—”
“That’s what they told her?” He leaned forward in his chair, and Laura could see that there were indeed tears in his eyes.
“Yes. And they wouldn’t tell her where they’d taken you. She tried to find you in the institutions around there, but she couldn’t. They threatened her. And they threatened your daughter.”
“Janie.” He was leaning forward so far, he was almost out of his seat. “You said Sarah has no family. Where is Janie?”
Obviously Janie was not the daughter he’d mentioned. “I don’t know,” she said. “Sarah once told me that Janie was hiding. But Sarah doesn’t think clearly. I know that the doctors at Saint Margaret’s made some veiled threats about harming her. Harming Janie.”
John’s nostrils flared. “Those doctors were capable of anything,” he said. He looked up at his wife and took her hand, then leaned back in his seat again, eyes on Laura. “This is very hard for me to hear,” he said slowly, then hastened to add, “but I’m glad you’ve come. Very glad. I’ve needed answers. And you need them, too, don’t you?”
“Please,” Laura said.
“First let me assure you that Elaine knows everything about Sarah and the past,” John said. “You don’t need to mince words with her.”
Laura nodded.
John continued. “Obviously, or at least I hope it seems obvious to you, I’ve never been lobotomized. And I had not known that Sarah was told that lie. I figured they told her I was dead.”
“What did they do with you, then?”
“Well, my memory is sketchy on this. I was pretty thoroughly drugged. I’d had shock treatment. I was physically very weak. But I am assuming, piecing things together, that someone—or several someones—from the government whisked me away from Saint Margaret’s. At least they told me they were from the government. I’ve never known for sure. They flew me here, to Nevada. To Reno. They gave me a complete new identity. New social security number, Nevada driver’s license, everything in my new name, John Solomon. They told me never to try to contact Sarah or Janie, or their lives would be in jeopardy. Frankly, I was so out of it, I wasn’t sure who Sarah and Janie were. I wasn’t sure some days if I was really Joe Tolley or John Solomon. They set me up in some ratty hotel in Reno, and I stayed there for over two years, just trying to survive. The drugs they gave me had a lasting effect. To be honest, I don’t remember much about those years even now. But very slowly…very slowly…the fog began to lift. I remembered my life back in Maryland. I remembered the threats made against Sarah and Janie if I tried to find them, but I tried, anyway. They were my family. All I had.” John shut his eyes momentarily, and his Adam’s apple bobbed in his throat. Elaine rubbed his shoulder as he continued. “I even hired a private investigator,” he said, “but I couldn’t find them. Sarah seemed to have disappeared. Old neighbors wouldn’t talk to the P.I., and I think, in retrospect, that they—Palmiento and his government gang—got to them. Threats were cheap in those days, and soon, even the P.I. wouldn’t return my calls.”
“You think they’d threatened him, too?” Dylan asked.
John shrugged. “Anything was possible. I thought maybe the people who’d gotten rid of me had gotten rid of Sarah the same way. Spirited her away and given her a new identity. I’ve always hoped she was able to make a new life for herself and Janie. That was the only thing that got me through that time. Now I realize she was trying to avoid being found, not by me but by the good doctors of Saint Margaret’s.”
“That’s right,” Laura said. “They were able to track her down very easily, so she moved several times, always trying to cover her tracks.”
“I met Elaine in 1969,” John said. “Ten years after I’d become John Solomon. We moved in together in 1970. We’re not legally married, although we’ve always referred to each other as hus
band and wife to make it easier for the kids. I didn’t know if Sarah was dead or alive, and as long as there was that uncertainty, I didn’t feel it was right to remarry, no matter what my identity.”
Relieved by his integrity, Laura nodded.
“We’ve had a good quasi-marriage,” Elaine said with a smile as she rubbed her husband’s shoulder again. “It’s been truly wonderful. But I know that John has never forgotten Sarah and his daughter.”
“I told my son and daughter just last year what happened to me,” John said. “I also told them they have a half sister somewhere. My son tried to find Janie, without any luck. I figured that they’d changed her name, too, and she’d be impossible to find. But now that you tell me that they never did change Sarah’s identity, I don’t know what to think.”
“I received a couple of unsigned letters warning me to leave Sarah alone,” Laura said. “Dylan and I wondered if they could possibly be from Janie. I don’t understand what her motive would be, but she’s our best guess.”
“Maybe they are.” John looked excited. “Where were they sent from?”
“One was from Philadelphia and the other from Trenton. Of course, there were no return addresses on them. And they were typed.”
“Not much help, huh?” John said, sinking back in his chair. He suddenly looked exhausted, and Laura wondered if she was wearing out her welcome.
“Well, I think I’ve dumped enough on you two for one day,” she said, standing up. She leaned over the coffee table. “You need to finish up, honey. We’re going back to the hotel now.”
John looked at Elaine, communicating something with a glance. Then he turned to Laura again. “Can you come back tomorrow?” he asked. “Elaine and I could use some time to talk, but I want to speak with you further about this. Will you still be in town tomorrow?”
“Yes,” Laura said. “We’ll see you then.”
40
“THIS HAS BEEN ONE OF THE LONGEST DAYS OF MY LIFE.” Laura dropped into the love seat in Dylan’s hotel room. The room was cozy, decorated in a Western motif that included a lampshade made out of a cowboy hat and a branding iron hanging on the wall. The coffee table, covered with empty cardboard boxes and paper plates from their dinner, was nothing more than a plank of wood set on top of two small wagon wheels.
They’d come back to the hotel in Truckee after leaving Serene Lake, and while Laura gave her exhausted daughter a bath, Dylan went out in search of dinner. He returned with a huge grocery bag filled with Mexican food. Emma only managed to eat a bit of a taco before her eyes closed, and Laura steered her into the room they were sharing and tucked her into one of the double beds. Then she’d returned to Dylan’s room to finish eating and perform a postmortem on the day.
“So, I found Joe Tolley,” she said. “But what’s the point? He’s essentially married to someone else.”
Dylan stood next to the window. He took a final swig of his soda and tossed the empty cup on the pile of litter on the table. “At least you solved a long-standing mystery for him,” he said. “And a short-standing one for yourself.”
“I am obsessive, you know that?” Laura said. “I get caught up in something and I can’t quit it until I’ve examined every angle.”
“I think that’s an admirable quality, actually.” Dylan walked over to the wall switch. He surprised her by flicking off the overhead light and coming to sit next to her.
“There’s something I want to tell you,” he said.
The room was dimly lit from the lights outside, but she could still see the blue of his eyes.
“What’s that?” she asked.
“I’ve decided I want to give up my ‘living day to day’ existence,” Dylan said. “I’d rather focus my time and energy on you and Emma. If that’s all right with you, of course.”
She was not certain what he was telling her. “Are you saying—”
“I’m saying I’d like to quit being a multiple dater and be a one-woman man, instead.”
“One woman?”
“One woman. Yes. You. If you’re interested, that is.”
She couldn’t stop her smile. “You think you can survive without all your girlfriends?” she teased.
“I’m sure of it. Except…” He took her hand in his. “I have to be honest. I’m worried about this. If we go into this, we have to be very…adult in the way we handle it. If it turns out we’ve made a mistake getting together, I don’t want Emma to be hurt when we split up. Though, of course, you still haven’t told me if you’re interested.”
“Oh, Dylan, of course I’m interested, but I don’t know if it’s a good idea, either,” she said, although she desperately wanted it to be. “I’ve never been very good relationship material,” she admitted. “You’ve only known me during a break in my career. You don’t know how dedicated I can be to my work. When I start working again, you’ll see a different side of me. It hurt Ray terribly. It hurt Emma. I plan to never be that selfishly driven again, but you have to know, that’s my nature.”
“I’m aware of that,” Dylan said. “You were just saying how obsessed you got with Sarah. I’ve witnessed that, remember? And I imagine you have that same sort of fixation when you’re working. I can handle that, Laura.” He looked out the window at the scattered lights of Truckee. “What I’m not sure I can handle are comparisons to Ray,” he said.
“Comparisons to Ray? What on earth do you mean?”
“Ray sounds like a real mixed bag to me. A great and altruistic man on the one hand, and a lousy husband and father on the other, and—”
“He wasn’t a lou—”
“That’s what I mean.” Dylan cut off her defense. “You have him on a pedestal, whether he belongs there or not. How can I ever compare to that?”
Laura tucked her feet under her and turned toward him, holding his hand on her knee. “Ray was a special person, that’s true,” she said. “He did a lot of good in his life. He made some real changes for the homeless, and his book will probably make more. But you said he had no right criticizing me for my obsessions, and you were right. He was more obsessed with the homeless than I ever was with my career. There were many times that I felt Ray’s charities were more important to him than Emma and I were. He was good to me. He didn’t have to marry me, but he did. He wanted to take care of me. But he…he didn’t really know how to do it. He wasn’t cut out for it. That’s where you’re different, Dylan. When I watch you with Emma—” she smiled at the thought “—I’m so amazed at how you give her all your attention. You have energy for her. Please don’t worry about not filling Ray’s shoes. You two are apples and oranges. Impossible to compare.”
He stared at her a moment, then leaned forward to kiss her, and Laura felt a moan escape from her throat.
“Do you remember anything at all from the night we made love?” Dylan asked in a whisper.
“Everything,” she admitted.
“You’re kidding.”
“No, I’m not. I remember it all.”
He pulled her close to him. “Tell me,” he said.
She leaned her head against his shoulder. “There was one light on in the bedroom,” she said. “It was a small Tiffany lamp on the dresser in the corner, and it gave the whole room a sort of pale blue cast. There was a huge bay window, and you could see the snow falling outside. Blowing sideways.”
“You have some memory,” he said.
Of that night, yes, she did. “The bedspread was green,” she said. “Hunter green. And we lay down on top of it.”
Dylan’s hand was on her throat, and she let her head fall back against the sofa and closed her eyes. She felt his lips on the line of her jaw, then his tongue circling her ear.
“It was a…four-poster bed,” she said, the words slow in leaving her mouth.
“Let’s do that now,” he said. “Let’s move over to the bed.”
She raised her head again, feeling a little woozy. “That bedspread’s blue,” she said.
“Good.” He stood up and held hi
s hand out to her. “I don’t want to re-create that night in every detail. This one, I want to remember.”
Laura stopped to quietly shut the door between Dylan’s room and the room she shared with Emma, then joined him on the bed. He rolled on top of her, gently spreading her legs with his own, and although they were both fully clothed, she felt the seductive pressure of his erection.
He kissed her deeply, then drew away to look at her. “I’m glad you’re Emma’s mom,” he said.
The words were a gift, and she wanted to reciprocate. “When Ray and I made love…” She bit her lip, knowing that making this confession would be more intimate than anything else she might do in this bed. “I used to pretend he was you,” she said.
He stared at her solemnly for a moment, then rolled onto his side, raising his hand to stroke her cheek.
“I love you, Laura,” he said.
“I love you, too.”
His gaze still on her face, he began unbuttoning her blouse, reaching the last button just as a wail came from the room next door.
Laura grabbed his hand and listened. The cry came again.
“It’s her nightmare sound,” she said, extracting herself from beneath him. She was off the bed, smoothing her hair down, making the transition from lover to mother in a few steps across the room.
“I’m here, Emma,” she said as she walked into the other room. She flicked on the light.
Emma was ashen-faced, tears streaming down her cheeks. She held out her arms to Laura.
Laura sat on the edge of the bed, drawing her daughter into her lap. “It’s all right, honey. We’re in a hotel in Truckee, remember? That town with the funny name? And I was just talking with Dylan in his room next door.”
Emma slipped her thumb into her mouth and leaned against Laura’s chest, sniffling, her body quaking with the residue of fear. Rocking her, Laura looked up to see Dylan standing in the doorway of the room.
“You sure you want to give up life in the fast lane for this?” she whispered to him.