Hannah Alexander - A Killing Frost

“How do you know?”

He looked at her and grinned. “It was a favorite parking spot when we were in high school. Don’t tell me you never-”

“No, I never.”

His grin widened. “Good for you.”

“Don’t act so surprised. The rumors of my adolescent crimes have been hugely exaggerated.”

“So you weren’t the one charged with vandalism for climbing Mr. Earle’s prized dogwood on the school grounds.”

“I’m just saying-”

“You’re saying you never went parking here,” Tyrell said.

“Never.”

“Amy didn’t-”

“Amy was too busy working her way to valedictorian to mess around with messing around. So…who’d you go parking with?” Jama asked.

“Why are you asking?”

“I bet it was with Patty Miller.”

“You’d lose that bet.”

“Sandra Green?”

“There’s nothing wrong with parking at the river and watching the moon float between clouds as you talk and dream and share a kiss or two.”

A kiss or two? “Aha! So it was Sandra?” Jama felt a sting of unwarranted jealousy. “Did that often, did you?”

His gaze on her was teasing. “A gentleman doesn’t kiss and tell. Don’t you wish it had been with you?”

She glared at him as he opened his door and got out.

If only…

In spite of Jama’s vigorous insistence that they could find Doriann on their own, Tyrell did not agree. He wasn’t nearly as supportive of this action as he led her to believe. Although he felt fairly certain, as Jama did, that the FBI had not extended their search boundaries this far, he also knew the agents had surveillance equipment that could do the work of a hundred men. But like Jama, he couldn’t just give up searching for Doriann.

And so he called Agent Sydloski on his cell phone, and told him about Jama’s speculation that Doriann had fled the barn and headed to the river. To Tyrell’s surprise, the agent seemed grateful for the input, but also adamant that Tyrell and Jama not get involved.

Not that the feeble warning was going to stop Tyrell from walking the river’s edge.

“Keep your light aimed directly at the ground in front of you,” he told Jama after he disconnected the call.

“Okay, sorry, I wasn’t thinking. I thought I heard something in the trees.”

“Like what?”

“Oh, I don’t know…wind? Air movement that could keep the frost from settling? Maybe signal a change in weather?”

“Don’t I wish. Then we wouldn’t be burning hundreds of dollars worth of good hay to save the crops.”

“Okay, not wind. Maybe that surveillance equipment you’ve been telling me about, placed in the treetops by the FBI to monitor all movement on the ground. The agents would have checked to see if the abductors managed to escape via the river, wouldn’t they?”

Tyrell looked out across the pockets of dense fog across the waterway. “Yes, but something tells me the kidnappers couldn’t have gotten far without a boat, and considering the accident that landed them here in the first place, I doubt they came prepared. What you’re hearing is Fern Creek trickling into the river a few yards ahead.”

Jama walked a few feet to his right, silent for the moment. They crossed the creek, then moved closer together as the tree line encroached over the riverbank.

His attention returned to the fog. “I see something that reminds me of a jewelry store.”

He heard a soft intake of breath beside him, and he wondered if she was thinking about the ring he had wanted to give her. He could see only her dark silhouette. The rhythmic swish of her jacket whispered a soft and steady pulse into the air.

“The gemstones in the sky?” she asked. “The pearl of the moon and the sparkle of the stars?”

“Wrong. Jama, you’re getting rusty at this game.”

“Then the onyx glow of the moon’s reflection on the water.”

“That’s a nice thought,” he said. “Much nicer than what I was thinking, actually, but not as fitting, because the moon isn’t reflecting on the water, it’s reflecting on the fog.”

“I see some clear spots out there now.”

“I’m looking at the fog, Jama.”

“Okay, why would fog remind you of a jewelry store?”

“Don’t you think it looks like the cotton the jeweler layers into the boxes?”

“They don’t do that in jewelry stores. They do it in department stores for costume jewelry. The expensive stuff comes in fancy boxes with velvet linings.”

“Oh.” He studied the fog again. “Then try this. Looking out across the river, seeing the patches of fog interspersed with patches of blackness, I’m reminded of the patches of darkness I sense in you.”

Her steps slowed, then sped up. “Nice segue, Mercer.”

He followed her.

“I have a new job,” she said. “Secure for two years, at least. I know the people, so I don’t have to settle in with new patients. Maybe I’m more conscious of my high-school years now because there are so many people to remind me about them, but it isn’t something I’ve agonized over all this time. If anything, it’s a triumph, because given my school record, who would have expected me to come back and work in River Dance as a doctor someday?”

“Yet you seem unhappy about being here.”

“Maybe things are uncomfortable with my new supervisor, but that can happen anywhere.”

Tyrell misstepped in the darkness, landed into water up to his calf with a splash, and stumbled out. “Would you slow down a little?”

“Sorry.”

“So you and Dr. Lawrence weren’t able to work things out today after you returned?”

“Define what you mean by working things out. Nobody told me she was a missionary who had left her mission in Africa, and apparently her husband, as well.”

Tyrell nearly stepped into another spot of water. “She told you this?”

“Keep your voice down. Eric told me.”

“Eric?”

Jama explained what she had learned about Ruth today. “She must have contacted Eric Thompson about a job when she left Tanzania.”

“A missionary? Really?”

“My thoughts exactly. Eric told me not to ask her about it, which probably means I shouldn’t be discussing it with you, either, but since almost everybody in River Dance will probably know her whole life history within the next month or so, I doubt I’m breaking any sacred trust.”

“Why would she leave her husband and their mission?”

“I don’t know. It isn’t as if we share confidences. I’m surprised every time we exchange a civil word with each other.”

“She’s obviously under a lot of stress, which can make some people unpleasant, and prone to building barriers for protection.”

Silence for a few steps, then Jama asked, “Have I been mean to you?”

He hesitated, thinking of the safest reply to that. “There are other behaviors that can suggest an emotional wound.”

“This is interesting, Tyrell, listening to you philosophizing tonight.”

“Are you making fun of me?”

“Not much.”

“You are. Maybe that’s to distract me from developing another theory. Is there someone else you’ve been seeing since our breakup? Because that would provide a whole ’nother reason for this not-getting-married position of yours.”

Jama hesitated, and Tyrell felt a twinge of dismay. Maybe he shouldn’t have introduced the subject. He didn’t want to know.

And yet, he had to know. “Jama?”

Her steps slowed, and then she stopped. Her breath sent puffs of mist in the air as she looked up at him. “You don’t get it, do you?”

He braced himself.

“Tyrell, don’t get a big head or anything, but there’s never really been anyone but you.”