Jason Pinter - The Fury

Reentering the room, I found my jeans crumpled into a ball on the floor, found the room-rate card. When

I looked at it, I nearly had a heart attack. There had to be other hotels in this city that wouldn't wipe me out within days.

Amanda stirred. I got up and went into the bathroom, not wanting to wake her just yet. I ran a hot shower, stayed in a little longer than I needed to, thinking about the previous day.

It was no secret that I would want to get to the bottom of Stephen Gaines's death, and while yesterday I thought about the possibility of Rose Keller or Scotty

Callahan being involved, the options were likely far greater.

The New York Dispatch had certainly mentioned my father's arrest, as did my own paper, and surely a few other locals as well. Anyone who knew me and my rep utation would correctly assume that I would do anything to clear my family's name. It was possible I was being followed, that somebody had seen me talk to Sheryl

Harrison, to Rose Keller, to Scotty. It was even possible that my discovery of Beth-Ann Downing's body had alerted someone to my interest. Whoever killed Stephen wanted it to be seen as one single murder. A lone death, unconnected to anything else.

I knew better. And someone else knew that.

When I stepped out of the shower, a towel wrapped loosely around my waist, Amanda was sitting up in bed, her knees tucked up to her chin, her arms wrapped around them. She smiled at me. Her eyes were blood shot.

"Hungover?" I asked.

"Just a little."

"Hang on." I went to the minibar, did a little trolling and found a packet of Advil. I ripped it open, poured her a glass of water and watched her down the pills.

"Thanks, Henry," she said.

"How you feeling?"

"Like a raccoon run over by a truck. Don't ever let me go drinking with Darcy again."

"I think I told you that the last time you went drinking with her."

"Well, next time come with us, so you can monitor my alcohol intake."

"If memory serves me right, the reason you didn't invite me last night was because you didn't want me to monitor your alcohol intake."

"And you listened to me?" she asked with a smile. I sat back down next to her. She scooted over, rested her head against my shoulder. I could smell her hair, hear her breathing. Then she sat back up and looked at me.

"Now, tell me why we're here."

Sighing, I faced her and told her everything that had happened. About my meeting with Scott Callahan.

Finding the man waiting for me at the apartment last night. The fear that if they knew where I was, that if somebody had been following me, they could have been doing the same for her. Enough young women had been killed in New York coming home from bars over the last few years, the confluence of paranoia made it impera tive we get to safety.

"How long do you think we need to stay here?" she said.

"I honestly don't know. Until I know who killed

Stephen, and know that person isn't a threat to us anymore. With any luck I can do that before my credit card starts getting declined."

"And what am I supposed to do? Just stay here? I don't think so, Henry."

"Today's Friday," I said. "Call in sick. If Darcy shows up, she'll surely vouch for you. Then we have the weekend. And I need to get my father out before the grand jury convenes. But right now I just need to keep you safe. Once things calm down we can talk about what to do next."

"You need to keep me safe?" Amanda said with a laugh. "You realize that since I met you I've had my life jeopardized approximately a hundred and ninety-six times. I won't be surprised if we both get turned down for a life-insurance policy. Safe to say if I never picked you up on the side of the road, Henry, I wouldn't have to worry about my safety quite as much."

I opened my mouth, ready to question why, if that was the case, she was still with me, but smartly stopped before a word came out. I learned a long time ago that she was still here by choice. No other reason. She'd had plenty of opportunities to leave and had not, and every moment I wasted contemplating why only divided myself from the reality of our relationship. She was here to stay. And knowing myself, knowing that I'd learned from past mistakes, as long as it was in her hands, she wasn't going anywhere.

So instead of bucking for a compliment and starting an argument, I just leaned over and kissed her. Her lips were soft, and I could tell she was smiling.

"I've been meaning to ask you," Amanda said.

"Where is your mother in all of this?"

I sat back, rubbed my forehead. "To be honest, I don't know. Probably nowhere. I remember the last few years before I left for college, she and my father barely spoke. It wasn't like she was angry with him, it was as though she'd just withdrawn. To her, he was more like a piece of furniture than a husband. He was there whether you liked it or not. It was your choice to put him there. But like a table or desk, you could ignore it."

"Why didn't she leave him?"

"I don't know. I wish she had. She turned inward.

You saw those knitting needles at the police station- they became kind of her solace. She was a kind woman, never hurt anybody. So whenever he went on one of his rampages, she would take it like more of a man than he ever was, then go back to her needles."

"That's awful."

"She deserved another chance at love, at life. It was almost like at some point she became shell-shocked, just her nerves and her wits fried by everything he'd done. I remember one night when I was about eight. I spent that summer working at a corner deli, restocking shelves a few hours a day for a dollar an hour."

Amanda laughed. "Even for an eight-year-old that's pretty far below minimum wage."

"It wasn't the money. They couldn't afford to send me to camp, and I didn't want to be around the house any more than I absolutely had to. One night I came home around seven, usually when we had dinner. It was one of the few times he was getting a regular paycheck. He got home from work around seven-thirty most days, and he would walk in and head right for the dinner table, sit down and start eating. It didn't matter if we were there to join him. To him, that's what he worked the day for. To be alone. This day, though, he came home early. We both arrived home about seven, and the meat loaf was still in the oven. One thing about her, my mom made the best meat loaf in the world. Onions, red peppers, just deli cious."

I continued. "He went to the table, sat down and noticed there was no food out. No drinks set. He yelled her name-Marilyn-and waited. She came out, stared at him, simply said, 'It'll be about twenty minutes.' It turned out he found out that day they were cutting back his shifts, and he'd lose about twenty percent of his salary. I didn't know this. Neither did she.

"He took a glass, threw it at the wall. It shattered into a thousand pieces. My mother just stood there, her mouth open, more confused than scared. Then he took a plate, did the same thing. It exploded. Then he took another plate, then another, then every piece on the table and threw it at the wall. I remember screaming, telling him to stop, worried he would hit her or me. Instead, he kept throwing until piles of broken glass were laid over our floor like a carpet. He was breathing heavy. My mother just stood in the doorway, mouth open. Then she turned around, went back to the stove and checked the temperature on the food. I called 911, but the cop they sent over ten minutes later was in a bowling league with my dad. Since nobody was hurt and my mother wouldn't press charges, it all went away. After that my father went upstairs, and twenty minutes later the food was on the table and he was eating. Nobody picked the glass up for a week. That's when I knew there was something wrong, that she wasn't like most of my friends' mothers.