Laura Lippman - What The Dead Know

It still might, Miriam realized. It still might . Today’s world would never allow this reunion, if it proved to be that, remain private. It was almost enough to make her hope that the woman in Baltimore was a liar. But she couldn’t sustain the wish. She would give up everything-the truth about herself, ugly and unpleasant as it was, the truth about Dave and how she had treated him-she would trade it all, without a second thought, to see one of her daughters again.

She scooped up an armful of tabloids, deciding to think of them as homework, the future text of her life.

“Do you think this will finish it?” Heather asked, staring out the car window. She had been humming under her breath since they got in the car, a hum that had risen to a high-pitched drone when Kay took the entrance to the Beltway. It wasn’t clear to Kay if she was aware of what she was doing.

“Finish it?”

“Will it be over, once I tell them everything?”

Kay was never glib, even about the smallest matters, and this question struck her as particularly grave. Will it be over ? Gloria hadn’t bothered to provide that information when she called and asked Kay-told her, really, issuing orders as if Kay worked for her, as if she were the one who’d been doing all the favors and Kay was in her debt-to bring Heather to the Public Safety Building by 4:00 P.M. And now they were running late because Heather had fussed so over her clothes. She’d been as petulant as Grace dressing for school, and almost as impossible to satisfy. Ultimately, she settled on a pale blue button-down and a stretchy tweed skirt, which worked, in spite of itself, with her clunky black shoes, the only items of her own wardrobe that she was still willing to wear. All this bother seemed funny to Kay, because Heather didn’t give off the vibe of someone who thought about her appearance. A shame, really, because she was such a striking woman, blessed with things that only nature could bestow-high cheekbones, the kind of willowy frame that age never thickened, good skin.

“Nothing’s changed with the boy, if that’s what you mean. His condition’s improving steadily. Gloria seems confident there won’t be serious charges in connection with the collision.”

“I wasn’t really thinking about him.”

“Oh.” It bothered Kay, how seldom Heather thought of anyone but herself. But that would be the logical consequence of what had happened-assuming that Kay’s theories were right. Working from the scant details that Heather had meted out so far, Kay had decided that Stan Dunham had taken both girls but killed Sunny because, at fifteen, she was too old to interest him. He had kept Heather until she, too, ceased to be of use to a pedophile, then retained her for a few extra years until Heather was sufficiently traumatized to keep his secrets. How? Kay didn’t want to think about that. Clearly, he had turned her into his accomplice somehow, made her feel as if she were a criminal, too. Or simply left her so racked with fear that she would never consider telling anyone what had happened. Kay was not troubled, as the detectives seemed to be, by the fact that Heather had not tried to get away or tell anyone what was happening to her during those six or so years. Perhaps he told her that her parents were dead, or even that they’d arranged for him to take the girls. Children were so suggestible, so malleable. Even Heather’s continuing reluctance to tell the full story was logical to Kay. Her new identity, whatever it was, had been central to her survival. Why should she entrust anyone with it-particularly men and women who had worked in the same department as her abductor?

“Do you think they know anything new?” Heather asked.

“New?”

“Maybe they found my sister’s body. I told them where it was.”

“Even if they did-and I think that might have made the news, since it would be hard to excavate an old grave without drawing attention to it-it would take weeks to identify her remains.”

“Really? Wouldn’t this be a high-priority case, something they could rush through?” She seemed a little insulted not to be given the treatment she thought was her due.

“Only on television.” Through her work with the House of Ruth, the same channels in which she’d become acquainted with Gloria, Kay had gotten to know a forensic anthropologist from College Park, who was a rueful guide to the pedestrian restraints, mainly budgetary, that kept her from producing the miracles the public expected. “There are some things they can tell right away-”

“Like what?”

Kay realized she wasn’t sure. “Well, certain…um, damage to the body. Blunt-force trauma or gunshot. But also the gender, I think, the approximate age.”

“How do they do that?”

“I don’t know exactly. But, obviously, skeletons change in puberty. However, if your old dentist is still around, he’ll be able to ID your sister pretty quickly. I understand that dentists are very good at recognizing their own work.”

“John Martielli, D.D.S.,” Heather said, her voice almost dreamy. “His office was upstairs, above the drugstore. There were Highlights magazines, of course. Goofus and Gallant. If we didn’t have cavities-and we never had cavities-we were allowed to go around the corner and buy whatever we liked from the bakery, no matter how much white sugar it had in it.”

“You’ve never had a cavity?” Kay thought of her own poor, tortured mouth. Just this year she’d undergone the tedium of having every silver filling replaced, and now there were crowns aging out, the result of cracked teeth that Kay considered the legacy of her divorce. She had ground her teeth until two sheared off, the bits coming up with the granola bar she was eating at the time. The crowns had led to an infection and a root canal, and the dentist thought she might need additional surgery still. She knew that her dental woes weren’t her fault, but the problems in her mouth made her feel vaguely unclean, unhygienic.

“No. Even when I didn’t go to the dentist for years-because I didn’t have health insurance in my twenties-my teeth were perfect. Now I go every six months.” She bared her teeth, showing them off. Good teeth, great bone structure, a naturally slender frame, lovely skin-if Kay hadn’t known Heather’s story, she would have hated her a little.

“Could we stop?” Heather asked, holding her stomach as if she had a cramp.

“We’re running late as it is, but if you’re carsick or need something to eat-”

“I thought we could go to the mall.”

“The mall?”

“ Security Square?” Kay glanced at Heather. It was hard to make eye contact while driving, especially when one was trying to merge onto the Beltway, but she had learned from dealing with Grace that eye contact was overrated. She got more information out of her daughter when they were staring straight ahead, through the same windshield. The mall was one exit past where Heather had been picked up Tuesday night. “Is that where you were trying to go, all along?”

“Not consciously. But maybe I was. At any rate, I need to go there now, before I do this. Please, Kay? It’s not the worst thing in the world, being late.”

“I’m not as worried about the detectives as I am about Gloria. She doesn’t value anyone’s time but her own.”

“I’ll call her on your cell, explain we’re running behind.” Without waiting for Kay’s agreement, Heather grabbed the phone from the cup holder between the seats and used its received-calls log to find Gloria’s number and call her back. She manipulated the phone with ease, as comfortable with gadgetry as Seth or Grace. “Gloria? It’s Heather. We’re just getting on the road. Kay’s ex-husband was late picking up the kids, and we couldn’t very well leave them there, could we?” She didn’t give Gloria time to reply. “See you in a few.”