“I’m sorry, Mr. Linneman. I haven’t changed my mind. I booked a flight out of Knox County this evening at seven thirty.” I felt awful admitting that the night hadn’t brought about some miraculous change in me, but it was the truth. It hadn’t. It had scared the living shit out of me, and I couldn’t wait to get as far away from this massive, empty house as soon as possible.
“So be it. Then I have the release forms here for you to sign. That means you can go, that you haven’t accepted legal guardianship of the children. I’ll prepare them for you now.” Linneman sat at the kitchen counter while I boiled water for his tea. A rising tide of guilt swelled inside me one minute, receding the next to be replaced with self-righteous indignation.
Ronan really screwed this one up. Yes, it was sad that his wife died, but he shouldn’t have done something so terrible and left a near stranger in his place to pick up the pieces. That was just downright shitty of him.
I placed Linneman’s tea on the counter, and he placed down three sheets of paper on the marble, and the two of us then sat for a moment and pondered the articles in front of us. Linneman seemed as hesitant and regretful about picking up his mug as I felt about picking up my pen. Still, we both did what we had to do.
I scribbled my name in the spots Linneman had indicated with tiny, colorful tabs, while he gingerly slurped at the pale liquid inside his cup.
“Interesting,” he said under his breath, placing the cup down. “Very…warm.” I’d never made a cup of tea before; I’d clearly messed up some part of the process, but Linneman was too polite to say so.
“If you want to get off the island today, I’d make sure to call Jerry Bucksted and see if he plans on sailing that late. The storm we had yesterday was nothing compared to the one that’ll be rolling in around dinnertime. I’d best be off, Miss Lang. It was very nice to meet you, I’m sure.”
Another storm? Great. Fantastic. Just what I needed. No way I was missing that flight, though. If I had to bribe Jerry Buckwhatever to get me back to the mainland, then that was fine by me. When I saw Linneman to the door, the thunderheads were back, charging across the horizon toward us like a heard of stampeding horses. Foreboding and black, the clouds did not look promising at all.
******
“You’ll be Miss Lang, then?” The CPS representative showed up at eleven o’clock, a little later in the day than I’d anticipated. I thought she’d arrive at the house around nine, but apparently the crossing from Port Creef was already rough, and the boat had to postpone its departure for ninety minutes until a calmer patch of weather presented itself. The woman, Sheryl Lourie, according to the laminated card she showed me on the doorstep, looked so green that I was expecting her to throw up any second. Her shirt was too tight, the material straining to stretch across her considerable chest, and her pencil skirt looked way too constricting and uncomfortable for the morning she must have had, sitting on a boat while the ocean pitched and tossed.
I’d spent the morning playing dinosaurs with Amie and giving Connor some room to brood on the sofa with a book in his hands (something to do with tree houses). They had been asking where Ronan was, and both had looked beyond hopeful when the doorbell rang, immediately shouting out for their dad. Connor looked like he was about to launch his book through a window when he saw it wasn’t Ronan.
“Who is she?” he hissed at me, as we all went and sat in the living room. “Where’s my dad?”
At that, Sheryl spun around, clutching her purse to her chest, eyes wide. “They don’t know?” she mouthed.
I shook my head.
I watched as the blood drained out of her face. “I see. Well. Why don’t we all sit down and have a little chat, then, huh?” She hadn’t been expecting to walk into this situation. No one had let her know I hadn’t explained Ronan’s death to Amie or Connor. I felt bad for the poor woman. If she’d known, she probably would have had time to acclimatize herself to the idea and figure out the best way to handle the matter. Now she had to think on the fly, and that was no good for her or for the kids.
The coward in me didn’t want to stick around for the next part. It would be easy enough to slip out and let Sheryl do the hard stuff. They were going to be leaning on her far more than they would be leaning on me soon anyway. But it wasn’t right and I knew it. I sat myself down in between Connor and Amie, taking the little girl’s hand in mine. I tried to take Connor’s, but he shunted away from me, gripping onto his book, knuckles and nail beds turned white.
“Okay, then.” Sheryl tucked her hair behind her ears and got straight to it. I had to commend her—the woman didn’t mess around. “Your daddy’s been gone for a couple of days, hasn’t he?”
Amie nodded. Connor just stared. He had a struck look on his face, his cheeks pale, his dark hair falling in wisps over his forehead and into his eyes. Blinking, he opened his book and started to read, ignoring Sheryl.