Julia Spencer-Fleming - I Shall Not Want

Please, God, please, please, please. Let him live …

She woke with a start when the day nurse entered. She was sagging off the end of the bed, her arms completely numb, her thighs cramping. She fell off the footstool when she tried to get up.

"Good heavens, Reverend. Fell asleep, did we?" The nurse hauled her to her feet and sent her lurching toward the waiting room. "We need to clear the room for a few," the nurse said. "Why don't we get something to eat and some fresh air in the meantime?"

"Why don't we?" Clare mumbled. She collapsed on a sofa opposite the sleeping Margy and tried to ignore the shooting pain of the circulation coming back into her limbs. She was lined up with the opening to the corridor, and so had a perfect view of Lyle MacAuley getting off the elevator. He had changed into a fresh uniform-she hoped he had burned the other one-but he was red-eyed and haggard from lack of sleep.

"You look terrible," Clare said.

"Not compared to you, I don't." He halted in front of her, like an out-of-gas car rolling to a stop where the road comes level.

"Sit down." She slapped the cushion next to her once, the best she could manage. "The CCU nurse is in there. No visitors right now."

MacAuley collapsed with a groan. He sat, simply sat, for a moment. "Any change?" he finally asked.

"No."

"Hell damn."

"Yeah."

They were silent for a while. She wondered if he was afraid to talk about it, like she was. Afraid that one wrong word, two, and she'd find herself saying I don't think he's going to make it .

"What's going on with the case?"

The lines in his face fell into something resembling a smile. "Well, that answers that."

"What?"

"I always did wonder if you were playing with police work because of Russ, or because you're terminally nosy."

"Both," she said. "Plus, it's a lot more interesting than the Mary and Martha's Guild meetings."

"Too damn interesting, these days."

She nodded. It seemed as if she could hear the slow whoosh… whoosh of the ventilator, breathing for Russ.

"We're pretty sure the Punta Diablos-that's a gang running pot out of New York-are the ones who did Amado. Looks like they left him up on the Muster Field so's we'd run into him sooner and head straight over to the Christies'." His face worked, as if he was chewing on something bitter. "They used us to clear out the dogs and the Christie men, and then went to the farm to get their property."

"The distribution list?"

"Told you about that theory, did he?"

"Yeah."

"Well, we still don't know for sure if that's what they were after. Neither of them can tell us." There was a grim satisfaction in his voice. "Have to sweat it out of the Christies."

"But why Amado? He had no connection to the Christies."

"They came after him, didn't they? And two of 'em got booked for it. Woulda been all over the county jail. You never heard gossip till you heard jailbirds."

"But why would they think a man the Christies hated would know anything?"

"Dunno."

"How did the Christies get hold of the list?"

"Dunno. Yet."

"What's the connection to the bodies behind the Muster Field?"

"Dunno."

"There's a lot you don't know, Deputy Chief."

He sank back farther into the couch. "You got that right, Reverend."

They sat silent again. Across the way, Margy Van Alstyne snored gently. She'd been up until two o'clock or so. Clare hoped she'd sleep on. Asleep, she wasn't eaten up with fear for her only son.

"You might want to go visit Isabel Christie while you're here."

"The sister?" she said.

"Ayeah. When Russ told her about Amado yesterday morning, she was pretty broke up about it."

"Oh, God." Clare exhaled. "So there was something there." She looked down at her clerical blouse. There was dried blood crusted on it. "I don't know if I'm in a fit state to help her."

He rolled his head to one side and looked at her. "Can't think of anyone better."

She gave him a wavering smile. Thought about losing someone you loved. Someone you weren't supposed to love.

"Lyle?"

He grunted.

She took a breath. "Was it true? About you and Linda Van Alstyne?"

He paused for so long she thought he wasn't going to answer. Finally he said, "Yeah."

"Have you talked to Russ about it?"

"Apologized. He wouldn't take it. We've been limpin' along since last January." He swallowed. "After he was shot, he-" He held up one hand and closed it around empty air. "He apologized to me. Called me-" His voice cracked. He snapped his mouth shut, muscles jumping in his jaw. "Friend." His voice was so husky she could barely hear him.

She took his hand and held it tightly, tears filling her eyes. "I know he forgives you. He loves you."

Lyle made a noise. "Jesum." He cleared his throat. "Don't be saying that in public. I'll never live it down." He looked at their hands. "He was thinking of you," he said. "The last thing. He said your name."

She closed her eyes. Hot tears spilled over her cheeks. "We were fighting," she whispered. "Before he got the call about Amado's body. I told him I hated him. Oh, Lyle-"

He reached around and pulled her against his shoulder. "Shh," he said. "Shh. Just what you said to me. He forgave you. He loves you."

"I told him we had to wait," she said between sobs. "I told him it was for him, but it was really for me. I was a coward. I was too afraid of getting hurt again to take the chance, and now-oh, God, that was the only time we had together, and I wasted it! Why? Why did I do that?"

"Shh." Lyle rubbed her back in comforting circles, just like her father would have. "Shh. I don't know why, Reverend. We don't have near enough time on this earth, and what we do have, we fritter away acting like damn fools."

She took Lyle's advice and went to see Isabel Christie that afternoon. She found her propped up in bed, her face half hidden by a bandage, the parts that weren't covered up puffy and purpling. Clare introduced herself.

"I never saw a lady priest," Isabel said. Her voice was stuffy, as if she had a head cold.

"I'm not much of a lady," Clare said. And sometimes not much of a priest, either .

Isabel eyed her warily, as if Clare might spring onto the bed and forcibly convert her. "Pastor Bob at the Free Will Fellowship used to say that priests were an abomination in the sight of the Lord." Even in her clogged voice, there was a note suggesting Pastor Bob hadn't been her favorite person.

"I bet ol' Pastor Bob said women should submit to men, right?"

"Yeah."

"And that parents that loved their children should chastise them?"

"Uh-huh."

"And that everybody who didn't worship at the Free Will Fellowship was going to roast marshmallows in hell?"

"Especially Catholics." Above her bandage-swathed nose, Isabel's forehead creased with worry. Amado had been a Catholic.

"Well, if Pastor Bob was right, then I probably am an abomination and all that. I say that male and female are equal in the sight of God, that Jesus would never have smacked a little kid, and that God's grace means we're going to be very surprised by who-all gets into heaven."

Isabel stared at the opposite wall, where a muted television showed the channel 9 news. "I never liked Pastor Bob. After I started developin', he used to hug me." She looked at Clare. "You know?"

"I know."

"There's my house," Isabel said.

Clare looked at the television. It was a distant shot of the Christies' farm from yesterday afternoon, with cops and SWAT team members still walking around. It was replaced by a photo of a smiling middle-aged woman standing on a mountaintop somewhere in the High Peaks. "That's the lady from Children and Families," Isabel said. "She tried to get away." She picked up the remote and switched the volume on as the screen switched back to the farm.