She could see the back of his house over the fence.
“What happened to my home?” Andrew asked.
“Same thing that happened to mine,” she said. “We all lost our windows. That fragile old glass shattered. Mrs. Rutledge kept her husband’s ashes on the shelf over the stove. The urn fell off and broke, and it was Mr. Rutledge all over.”
Luke laughed, brief and sharp, then shut up.
“The automatic turnoff for the gas main worked like it was supposed to. It turned off the gas. The gas company can’t turn it back on until the pipes are checked, and the gas company’s officially decided they’ll get to us when they get to us. We’re all taking cold showers and eating cold cereal. Except the electricity is off—downed power lines, you know—and all the food in the refrigerators is spoiled, so it’s cold cereal with curdled milk.” She turned on the sycophants. “Where do you guys live?”
“In the apartments on First,” Matthew said.
“Not anymore you don’t,” she said. “The officials shut that place down. You’re in the gym at the high school.”
The apostles looked dismayed.
“What? Did you boys not understand the power of an earthquake? Or maybe you thought, because you study earthquakes, you would be exempt from damage?” Rainbow chuckled.
The three glared. But they didn’t talk back.
“You should go check.” Andrew waved them away.
The apostles turned and headed toward the downed apartment building.
Andrew waited until they were out of earshot. “So you were merely trying to humiliate me? My house is intact?”
“If that’s all it takes to humiliate you, you’ve got a fragile ego. Not surprising. As far as I know, your house is fine.” She lit another cigarette. “Why did you come back to Virtue Falls? You would have been a lot better off staying close to civilization.”
“I had to come back to supervise the digs.” His eyes lit up the way they always did when he talked about his job.
God, these scientists were predictable.
“Some important changes have no doubt been made to the terrain,” he said, “and I can’t trust that girl to document them.”
That girl? “Elizabeth?” Andrew really was a nasty little bully.
“Yes! Have you seen her?”
“Not since right after the tsunami, but I’m sure you’re pleased to hear she lived through it and the earthquake and was only a little hurt.” A tactful reproach, she thought.
Too tactful. He brushed it away. “Sure. Do you know? Did she observe the tsunami?”
“She filmed it.” Rainbow didn’t know why he trembled. Jealousy? Or anticipation? Probably a dollop of both. “If I see her, do you want me to tell her you’re around?”
“If you see her, tell her to report in at once!” He started to stride off toward his home.
“Please,” she said.
His head whipped around. “What?”
“I’m not one of your sycophants,” she said. “Tell Elizabeth I want to see her … please.”
He didn’t want to say it. She could see he hovered on the verge of a simple, rude gesture.
She straightened, squared her shoulders, took a step forward, and looked him right in the eyes.
“For shit’s sake.” He backed away. “Please, Rainbow, tell Elizabeth I want to see her right away.”
“Of course, Andrew. I’m delighted to do that favor for you.” She watched him steam away down the street like the little tugboat that could.
He was an annoying bastard who needed to be taught some manners, and she was just the woman to do it.
CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE
Dr. Frownfelter’s windowless office in the Honor Mountain Memory Care Facility held a small desk and three chairs, was lined with medical texts, and smelled of antiseptic. With one fluorescent fixture shattered by the earthquake, twilight lingered in the room.
Around his head, Dr. Frownfelter wore an elastic band with an attached light. With it he illuminated the stitches on Elizabeth’s palm, and as he cut them loose, Garik held her free hand between both of his and rubbed her cold fingers.
She kept her eyes closed as if not looking would help get her through the ordeal, and, in a joking tone, Garik said, “For such a logical woman, you’re not very logical about a little cut.”
Her eyes flashed open. She shot him a dirty glance. Then shut her eyes again.
Aware that Dr. Frownfelter regarded them curiously, Garik made sure it appeared as if all his concern was for Elizabeth. Which was true, in its way. But right now, he expressed that concern by observing the good doctor, sizing him up, judging what kind of man lived beneath his shabby white coat and stethoscope. Because Margaret had named him as a possible suspect for Misty’s lover.
“There you go.” Dr. Frownfelter pulled the last stitch free and pressed his thumb lightly on the thin red scar.
Elizabeth pulled her hand back and opened her eyes.
“Sheila did a good job, but because your hand is a delicate, complex instrument and you use it constantly, for the next couple of weeks, I want you to keep it bandaged and clean.” Dr. Frownfelter viewed Elizabeth sternly. “When you work, especially if you work in the canyon, make sure you wear a latex glove.”
She nodded her head.
Since her father’s most recent lapse of memory, since the moment he had blinked at them and asked, “Who are you?,” Elizabeth had said very little. Garik could see her mind working on the problem of Charles and his broken intellect, and not paying attention to Dr. Frownfelter’s warning. “Do you have a latex glove, Elizabeth?” Garik asked.
“What? Oh. No.”
Dr. Frownfelter reached into the cabinet behind his desk, brought out a box of gloves, and handed it over. “I know you’ll want to work before you should, but take it easy. No heavy lifting. Get a stress ball and an ergonomic hand exerciser, and use them several times a day.” He huffed. “I mean, get them as soon as you can. We’re not yet ordering items off the Internet and getting them the next day.” He stripped off his own gloves. “Now, about your father.”
Elizabeth straightened her shoulders as if bracing for a blow. “You said he had another seizure.”
“A petit mal seizure, now called an absence seizure. For a few seconds, he simply wasn’t there.” Dr. Frownfelter pulled the light off his forehead and clicked it off. “All seizures are present as symptoms of Alzheimer’s, and of course of other diseases and syndromes. You have to understand, in prison, he was beaten up, received a lot of head injuries, multiple concussions … I think it’s a miracle we haven’t seen seizures before.”
“So my father’s brain is not functioning as it should, probably for the reasons you’ve suggested.” Elizabeth’s face was expressionless, her voice quiet.
Other men might have viewed her composure as indifference, but Garik saw her pain.
She asked, “Is there a chance we’re dealing with a brain tumor, also?”
Dr. Frownfelter inclined his head. “Anything is possible. We’d like to do tests, but the state holds guardianship of Charles, and getting permission will take time, especially with so much of the state government impacted by the earthquake and the hospitals full of the injured.”
Garik jumped at that. “Can Elizabeth have guardianship of her father?”
Elizabeth looked startled. “Me? Have guardianship of my father? I … you want me to have that responsibility?” Then she caught herself. “Yes, I suppose I am the logical choice. I would make the right decisions for him.”
“I agree, that would be a good idea. But that would also take time.” Dr. Frownfelter’s mouth turned down. “Trust me. Between the government and the insurance companies, when it comes to medicine, good patient care is a miracle.”
“I can’t see anything except for my father’s bewildered face.” Elizabeth rubbed her forehead. “He asked, ‘Who are you?’ Immediately after, he had said, ‘Oh! It’s Garik and Elizabeth. How good of you to come for a visit!’ We had been w
ith him for two hours. He’d told us stories about their wedding, and meeting my mother’s family. I showed him the pictures I had.” She sighed deeply, then continued, “And he didn’t remember us being there at all.”
“He told you about being with Misty?” Dr. Frownfelter’s eyes flicked between Elizabeth and Garik.
“Yes. And during my previous visit, he told me about how he met my mother. It was like a gift. I’ve never heard any of it before.” Elizabeth stood, paced the short distance to the door, and grasped the door frame as if to steady herself. Turning back to the two men, she said, “But now I wonder … is it even possible for him to remember?”
“Certainly it’s possible for him to remember,” Dr. Frownfelter assured them both. “With Alzheimer’s patients, memory loss is progressive, but seldom linear. Sometimes a patient clearly remembers what happened fifty years ago, but not what he ate for breakfast.”
“I’m like that now,” Garik said.
“We all are. The familiar and everyday don’t impress us. The big events of our pasts cling relentlessly, no matter how much we wished they wouldn’t. Which is why diagnosing Alzheimer’s takes time and is a difficult science. Charles Banner diagnosed his condition first.” Dr. Frownfelter cleared his throat. “I fought him, not wanting to believe it.”
“Why not?” Elizabeth asked.
“I was the prison physician. Most of the inmates have below-average IQs, their education seldom goes beyond high school, if it goes that far.” Dr. Frownfelter shrugged his massive shoulders. “He and I had a lot in common—advanced education and a scientific background. We could talk, and did … I didn’t want to lose his companionship.”
“Now he’s here, and you’re here. You certainly seem to follow where he leads.” Garik smiled benignly, but the answer greatly interested him.
“I was born in Virtue Falls. It’s not surprising I would choose to retire here.” Dr. Frownfelter folded his hands over his stomach, for all intents a benevolent, kindly physician.
“You have a very busy retirement.” Garik waved a hand around at the facility.
“If I don’t visit the memory care center and the nursing homes, who will? Small town doctors are hard to find.”
Garik believed that. It appeared that Dr. Frownfelter worked hard and discharged an important duty. But to think it was a coincidence that Charles Banner and Dr. Walter Frownfelter had been in three different locations at the same time?
No. Not even.
Since Charles had not voluntarily made the move to prison or back to Virtue Falls, that made Frownfelter the man responsible.
Yet was Frownfelter guilty of something other than curiosity? Perhaps he had a crush on Charles Banner. Perhaps he was one of those groupies to whom a specific crime held total fascination. Or perhaps he was writing an insightful tell-all book about the perpetrator of the crime. Although why would Dr. Frownfelter wait so long to publish?
Which took Garik back to his original question—was Dr. Frownfelter Misty’s killer?
If Dr. Frownfelter had any inkling of Garik’s thoughts, he didn’t show it. He was far too focused on Elizabeth—and given Garik’s train of thought, that was worrisome, too. “You know everything about the Banner family.” Garik watched the doctor’s face.
“Medically speaking, I do. I was practicing here in Virtue Falls during the … tragedy. I cared for Charles in prison and Misty was my patient.” Dr. Frownfelter returned Garik’s scrutiny. “I thought I knew all the kids in Virtue Falls, but I don’t remember you as a boy.”
“I moved here when I was eight. You were already gone.”
“Yes.” Dr. Frownfelter stroked his chin. “Of course. The Jacobsen case. One of my colleagues at the time told me about it.”
Garik wanted to smack him for bringing it up, for now Elizabeth looked between the two men, her eyes bright with curiosity.
Dr. Frownfelter stood and patted Elizabeth’s shoulder. “Try not to worry about your father. We’ll do some tests. We’ll find out what’s going on. No use imagining the worst when answers are merely weeks away.” He shambled out and down the hall.
Elizabeth watched him go, then swiveled around to face Garik. “Why did one of his colleagues tell him about you?”
Garik should tell her. If she hung around Virtue Falls long enough, she was going to hear about it, anyway, and she might as well hear it from him.
But not here. Not now. Not until absolutely necessary. “It wasn’t easy for Margaret to gain custody of me. It took a lot of string pulling, talks to doctors and lawyers, and I think some bribery.”
“Why did she want custody of you?” Elizabeth was zeroing in on the story.
Not here. Not now. Not until absolutely necessary. “Because even at the age of eight, I was the charming sort.” He smiled toothily and put his arm around her shoulders. “Come on. Let’s go into town and see how the locals are faring. When you write the companion volume to the PBS mini-series on the quake, perhaps you can add a chapter about the recovery in the area and how the people reacted. Readers love that stuff.”
Elizabeth looked down, and seemed to gather herself. Then she looked up and said, “I’ll be bigger than Ken Burns!” But her eyes watched him wisely.
And Garik knew his attempt at distraction had failed, and he had disappointed her … again.
CHAPTER FORTY-SIX
Elizabeth watched the pitted, broken road that led from Honor Mountain Memory Care Facility to town, and remembered her aunt Sandy’s rant.
You’re moving where? Have you lost your mind? It’s cold and it’s wet. There’re no restaurants or nightlife. The people are all hippies and organic freaks. Not to mention your mother was slaughtered there. And you’re going back to work on your murderous bastard of a father’s geological study and to visit your murderous bastard of a father in a nursing home? I swear, Elizabeth, sometimes I think living with us didn’t give you any sense at all.
Elizabeth pushed her hair off her forehead.
“What’s wrong?” Garik asked softly.
She rolled down her window and let the air wash over her face. The August day was warm, but that wasn’t why she felt sick. Aunt Sandy was right. Elizabeth didn’t have any sense at all, and now she was paying for it.
“Elizabeth?” Garik drove slowly, carefully, and glanced at her frequently. He wore a concerned frown and defiant green eyes. “Are you mad at me?”
She wanted to tell him he didn’t need to worry. She wasn’t mad that he’d evaded her question about his past. Right now, she was far too scared about her father to do more than sigh about Garik.
They hit a pothole deep enough to make her teeth snap together, and she burst out, “This road reminds me of my life. It’s going somewhere familiar, but every time I look up, there’s a new obstacle to jump, another hole to fall in.”
“Luckily, you don’t have to wait for the DOT to come in and repave you.”
She was not amused, and showed it with a quick glare and a hard sigh.
“Okay, okay!” Garik patted her bare knee. His touch lingered …
And she liked it.
His hand flexed, then as if he suddenly recalled the divorce, he took his hand away and put it back on the steering wheel. “You know what Dr. Frownfelter said. The second seizure wiped your father’s short-term memory. Forgetting is to be expected after a seizure. Your father has Alzheimer’s, which makes it doubly to be expected.”
“I know. But I was listening to my father. I was hearing him, believing him, and I felt as if he was telling my own history, as if what he said put me into context. Now, I don’t know if any of what he said was true.” Even to herself, she sounded whiny.
Garik pulled into the driveway that led into one of the state parks. The picnic area was empty, the restrooms demolished by three tall Douglas firs that had been uprooted and tossed like pick-up sticks. He turned off the motor, and the silence of the forest enveloped them. He faced her, his expression serious and intent. “You tell me. The pictures sure match t
he stories.”
“You’re right. They do.”
“You know your cousins. You know your aunt and uncle. Did what your father was saying sound real?”
“My uncle and that line about how he used to have a six-pack and now he has a keg—I’ve heard him say that a thousand times. My cousin Hope is a bully. She made me miserable. Aunt Sandy is always angry because Uncle Bill won’t push and get ahead in his job, and they live in the same tiny house Dad described. The table is round. There’s a ding in the Sheetrock that’s never been fixed.” Like the ding Frankie Winston had put in the wall when she shoved her chair back.
Garik nodded. “Nothing about the stories your father told seemed like fantasy, and everything was backed up by a photograph.”
“I don’t have a lot of photographs.”
“How many do you need for proof?” When she would have replied, Garik leaned across to console and put his fingers on her lips. “Let’s acquit your father of being devious enough to know which pictures you have and making up stories to go with them. To me, he is guileless, so there’s no criminal intent in his stories. Which makes the stories credible. Even now, he recognizes that he and your mother’s ages were very disparate. He’s not painting a pretty picture of himself. He is, though, painting a pretty picture of their lives … and their love.”
She pushed his hand away from her mouth.
It settled around the back of her neck.
That was okay, a chance to lean into the comfort offered by the man she had loved … did love. “Yes. It’s a relief to hear that they loved each other. Aunt Sandy made me doubt…”
“Honey, your aunt Sandy came out sounding good in your father’s story.”
“Aunt Sandy was angry about my mother’s death. Really angry.”
Garik’s eyes heated until amber coals glowed in the depths. “So she took it out on you … what a sweetheart.”