Peggy Sue Got Murdered

9

M. J. was too stunned to make sense of what had happened; she could only lie on her back in the grass and stare dazedly at the sky. Then, gradually, she became aware that someone was calling her name, that someone was brushing the hair from her eyes, stroking her face.

"M. J. Look at me. I'm right here. Look at me." Slowly, she focused on Adam. He was gazing down at her, undisguised panic in his eyes. He was afraid, she thought in wonder. Why?

"M. J.!" he yelled. "Come on, say something." She tried to speak and found all she could manage was a whisper. "Adam?"

The tension in his face melted into a smile. "Thank God. You're going to be all right…" He bent down, pressed kisses to her forehead, her mouth. "Just lie still. Everything's going to be fine…"

Through her confusion, she heard the sounds of running footsteps, shouting voices, calls of "Is she okay?"

"What happened?" she asked.

"Don't move. There's an ambulance coming-"

"What happened?" She struggled to sit up. The sudden movement made the world lurch around her. She caught a spinning view of bystanders' faces, of debris littering the lawn. Then she saw what was left of her house. With that glimpse, everything froze into terrible focus.

The front wall had been ripped away entirely, and the inner walls stood exposed, like an open dollhouse. Shreds of fabric, couch batting, splintered furniture had been tossed as far as the driveway. Just overhead, an empty picture frame swung forlornly from a tree branch.

"Jesus, lady," murmured someone in the crowd. "Did you leave your gas on or something?"

"My house," whispered M. J. In rising fury she staggered to her feet. "What did they do to my house?"

Then, as if there hadn't been enough destruction, the first flicker of fire appeared. Flames were spreading from what used to be the kitchen.

"Back!" shouted Adam. "Everyone back!"

"No!" M. J. struggled forward. If she could turn on the garden hose, if the pipes were still intact, she could save what little she had left. "Let me go!" she yelled, shoving at Adam. "It's going to burn!"

She managed only two steps before he grabbed her and hauled her back. Enraged, she struggled against him, but he trapped her arms and swung her up and away from the house.

"It's going to burn!" she cried.

"You can't save it, M. J.! There's a gas leak!"

The flames suddenly shot higher, licking at the collapsing roof. Already the fire had spread to the living room, had ignited the remains of her furniture. Smoke swirled, thick and black, driving the crowd back across the street.

"My house," M. J. sobbed, swaying against Adam.

He pulled her against him and wrapped his arms tightly around her as though to shield her from the sight and sounds of destruction. As the first fire trucks pulled up with sirens screaming, she was still clinging to him, her face pressed against his shirt. The roar of the flames, the shouts of firemen, seemed to recede into some other, distant dimension. Her reality, the only one that mattered, was the steady thump of Adam's heart, the unyielding support of his arms.

Only when he gently released her and murmured something in her ear was she wrenched unwillingly back into the real world. She found two uniformed men gazing at her. One was a cop, the other had an Albion Fire Department patch on his jacket.

"What happened?" asked the cop.

She shook her head. "I don't know."

"She'd just gotten home," said Adam. "We went inside, came back out again for a minute. That's when the house blew up. She caught the worst of it. I was standing behind her-"

"Did you smell gas?"

"No." Adarn shook his head firmly. "No gas."

"You're sure?"

"Absolutely. The fire started after the explosion."

The cop and fireman looked at each other, a glance that M. J. found terrifying in its significance.

She said, "It was a bomb. Wasn't it?"

They didn't say a word. They didn't have to. Their silence was answer enough.

It was after midnight when they finally pulled into Adam's driveway. They'd spent two hours in the ER getting their cuts and bruises tended to, two more hours in the Bellemeade police station, answering questions. Now they were both on the far side of exhausted. They barely managed to stumble out of the car and up the front steps.

Thomas was waiting at the door to greet them. "Good heavens, Mr. Q.!" he gasped, staring in horror at Adam's torn suit. "Not another brawl?"

"No. Just a bomb this time." He raised his hand to cut off Thomas's questions."I'll tell you all about it in the morning. In the meantime, let's get Dr. Novak to bed. She's staying the night."

"Would that be, er…" Thomas paused delicately. "In the guest room?"

The question hung unanswered, like a suggestive perfume.

Adam looked down at M. J. and saw her dazed expression. He realized that she was poised on the edge of collapse, and more vulnerable than he'd ever seen her. Tonight is not the night, he thought. Not if I care about her. Which I do.

"The guest room will be fine," he said to Thomas.

Thomas nodded, utterly unruffled. "I'll prepare the room," he said, and went up ahead of them.

Slowly Adam guided M. J. up the stairs. Her body felt so small, so fragile under his arm. It was a word he'd never thought would apply to M. J. Novak-fragile. But that's how she felt to him that night, climbing each step as though it were an impossible hurdle. Perhaps the blast had done more damage than he'd realized. This wasn't the M. J. he knew, the woman whose courage he'd held in awe. This was a woman who needed him.

He pulled her closer, felt those old masculine instincts stir to life. Not just desire-that had always been there-but something new. Protectiveness.

He helped her up the last step, and down the hall. By the time they reached the south guest room, Thomas had already turned down the covers, placed fresh towels on the dresser, and closed the drapes. "I'll see to your room now, Mr. Q.," said Thomas, and discreetly withdrew.

"Come. Into bed with you," said Adam. He sat her on the covers, knelt down to take off her shoes.

"I'm such a mess," she murmured, staring down at her clothes.

"We'll clean these in the morning. Right now, you need some sleep. Can I help you off with your clothes?"

She looked up at him with a faint expression of amusement.

He smiled. "Believe me, my intentions are purely honorable."

"Nevertheless," she said, "I think I'll manage on my own."

So the old M. J.'s still in there, he thought, meeting her quiet gaze. Even a bomb blast can't kill that spirit.

He sat down beside her on the bed. "It's gone too far," he said. "Doing your job is one thing, M. J. And I admire your persistence, I really do. But now it's turned ugly. This time you were fortunate. But next time…" He stopped, unwilling to finish the thought.

She looked at him, her eyes wide and bright with the threat of tears. "At least-at least I can be certain of one thing," she said softly.

"What's that?"

"You were there with me, and trying to get me to go out. Obviously you had nothing to do with it."

"How could you even begin to think I'd-"

"I couldn't help it, Adam! This has me so confused. I don't know who to believe, to trust. I wonder about Ed, about Sampson, about all the people I ever ticked off. And they must number in the thousands. But I don't wonder about you anymore. Because that bomb could have killed us both."

He gave a sheepish laugh. "I'm glad to hear there's a silver lining somewhere in this mess. Now you'll trust me one hundred percent."

"Ninety-nine point nine percent."

Smiling, he gently touched her face. "The ever-suspicious M. J. Novak. Will you trust me to keep you safe tonight?"

She nodded.

"Good. Because I will." He took her face in his hands and gently kissed her on the forehead. "I'm right in the next room if you need anything," he said, and rose to leave.

"Adam?" The name was said softly, so softly he might almost have imagined it.

He looked back. "Yes?"

"You're not at all what I thought."

"I take it that's a compliment?"

"The very best."

For a moment they gazed at each other, each of them seeing things they'd never seen in the other's eyes before.

He turned off the light. "Good night, Mariana Josefina," he said. Then he went downstairs to call Lieutenant Beamis.

M. J. was still asleep when Adam rose the next morning. He had glanced in on her several times during the night, just to reassure himself that she was safe, that she was really there in the next room, that she was more than just some lingering ghost of a dream. And there she was, snug in the sleigh bed, her hair a black thicket against the pillow. Quietly he sat down in the chair beside her.

Sunlight winked through the curtains, the beams dancing around the walls and the polished furniture. He'd forgotten how charming this guest room could be, how lovely it looked in the morning light. Or perhaps it never had been this lovely before; perhaps, with this woman sleeping beside him, he was seeing the room's charm for the very first time.

There was a knock on the door. He turned to see Thomas poke his head in.

"I thought perhaps she would like some breakfast." whispered Thomas, nodding at the tray of food he was carrying.

"I think what she'd really like," said Adam, rising to his feet, "is to be allowed to sleep." He followed Thomas into the hall and softly closed the door behind him. "Did you collect her clothes?"

"I'm afraid they're quite beyond repair," Thomas said with a sigh.

"Then would you arrange to have some things sent up to the house? She'll probably need her entire wardrobe replaced. I doubt anything survived the fire."

Thomas nodded. "I'll put a call in to Neiman-Marcus. A size six, don't you think?"

With sudden clarity, Adam remembered how slender she'd felt against him last night, climbing the steps to the guest room. "Yes," he said. "A six sounds about right."

Downstairs, Adam lounged about the dining room, sipping coffee, picking at his breakfast without much appetite. He listened with amusement as Thomas made phone calls in the next room. A complete wardrobe, Thomas said. Yes, undergarments as well. What cup size? Well, good heavens, how should he know? Thomas hung up, and came into the dining room, looking distressed. "I'm having a problem with, er… dimensions."

Adam laughed. "I think we're both out of our depth, Thomas. Why don't we wait until Dr. Novak wakes up. She can give them a better idea of her, uh, dimensions."

Thomas looked relieved. "An excellent idea."

They heard the sound of tires rolling over gravel.

Adam glanced through the window and saw a blue Chevy pull up in the driveway. "Must be Lieutenant Beamis," he said. "I'll let him in."

He was surprised to find both Beamis and Shradick waiting at the front door. Apparently they came as a matched set, even on Saturdays. They were even similarly dressed in strictly nonregulation golf shirts and sneakers.

"Morning, Mr. Q.," said Beamis, pulling off his sunglasses. He held up a briefcase. "I got what you wanted."

"Come in, please. There's coffee and breakfast, if you'd like."

Shradick grinned. "Sounds great."

The three men sat down at the dining table. Thomas brought out cups, saucers, a fresh pot of coffee. Shradick tucked a napkin in his shirt and began to adorn a bagel with cream cheese. Not just a dab here and there, but giant slabs of it, topped with multiple layers of lox. Beamis took only coffee, heavily sugared-a favorite energy source, he said, from his patrolman days.

"So what do you have?" asked Adam.

Beamis took several files from the briefcase and laid them on the table. "The files you asked for. Oh, and about the explosion last night-"

"Not a gas leak?"

"Definitely not a gas leak. Demolitions went over what was left of the house," said Beamis. "It appears there was a pull-friction fuse igniter, set off when the front door opened. The igniter gets pulled through a flash compound, lighting a sixty-second length of fuse. That in turn leads to a blasting cap. And a rather impressive amount of TNT."

Adam frowned. "A sixty-second fuse? Then that explains why it didn't go off right away."

Beamis nodded. "A delay detonator. Designed to blow up after the victim is in the house."

"They aren't fooling around. Whoever they are," Shradick added, around a mouthful of bagel.

Adam sat back, stunned by this new information. Until now he'd hoped for some simple explanation. A faulty furnace, perhaps; a natural gas leak whose odor he hadn't detected. But here was incontrovertible evidence: Someone wanted M. J. dead. And they were going to extraordinary lengths to achieve that goal.

He was so shocked by the revelation that he didn't realize M. J. had come down into the dining room. Then he looked up and saw her. She seemed swallowed up in one of his old bathrobes, the flaps cinched together at the waist. She brought with her the scent of soap, the sweetness of shampoo. Gone was last night's look of defeat; this was the M. J. he knew, back again. She glanced around the table at Beamis and Shradick.

"You heard what Lou said?" asked Adam.

She nodded. Then she took a deep breath. "So I guess it's time to face the facts. Someone's really trying to kill me."

After a silence, Adam said, "It does appear that way."

Hugging her arms to her chest, M. J. began to move slowly around the room, thinking as she paced. The picture of calmness, thought Adam. Except for her hands; he could see they were trembling. She stopped by the window and gazed out at the sunwashed lawn and trees.

"Believe me, M. J.," said Beamis. "Bellemeade Precinct's got all cylinders going on this. I've spoken with the detectives. They're checking all the possibilities-"

"Are they really?" she asked softly.

"There are a lot of angles to consider. Maybe it's someone you gave expert testimony against in court. Or an ex-boyfriend. Hell, they're even questioning Ed."

"Ed?" She laughed, a wild, desperate sound. "Ed can't even program a VCR. Much less wire a bomb."

"Okay, so it's probably not Ed. Not him personally, anyway. But he has been questioned."

She turned to look at Beamis. "Then everyone agrees. It's a bona fide murder attempt."

"No doubt about it. It only takes one look at your house. Or what used to be your house."

She looked out again, at the trees. "It's because of them."

"Who?"

"Nicos Biagi. Jane Doe. It's because of what's happening in the Projects."

"You could have other enemies," said Beamis. "And you lost your purse, remember? One of those punks could've gotten into your house-"

"And set a sixty-second delay detonator?" She shook her head. "I suppose they picked up a case of TNT at the corner grocery store. Lou, they were kids. I grew up with kids just like them! They wouldn't fuss with flash compounds or blasting caps. And what's their motive?"

"I don't know." Beamis sighed in exasperation. "They did rough you up-"

"But they didn't kill us! They had the chance, but they didn't." She turned to Adam, her eyes alight with green fire.

God, she was fearless, he thought. Magnificent.

"Well, say something, Adam!" she snapped.

He looked at Beamis. "I have to agree with her. She's right, Lieutenant. Those kids wouldn't know about fuse igniters. This bomb sounds like a sophisticated device. Built by someone who knew what he was doing."

"A professional," said Shradick.

The word was enough to make M. J. blanch. Adam saw her chin jerk up, saw the tightening of her lips. She was frightened, all right. She should be. In silence she moved to the table and sat down across from him. The bathrobe gapped open a little; only then did he realize she was naked beneath that terrycloth. How defenseless she looked, he thought. Stripped of everything. Even her clothes.

And at that moment, defenseless was exactly how M. J. felt.

She sat hugging the robe to her breasts, her gaze fixed on the tabletop. She heard Beamis and Shradick rise to leave; dimly she registered their goodbyes, their departing footsteps. Then there came the thud of the front door closing behind them. Closed doors. That's what she saw when she tried to look into the future. Closed doors, hidden dangers.

Once, life had seemed comfortably predictable. Drive to work every morning, drive home every night. A vacation twice a year, a date once in a blue moon. A steady move up the ranks until she'd assume Davis Wheelock's title of Chief ME. A sure thing, he'd told her once.

Now she was reminded that there were no sure things. Not her future. Not even her life.

"You're not alone, M. J.," said Adam.

She looked up and met his gaze across the tabletop.

"Anything you need," he said. "Anything at all-"

"Thanks," she said with a smile. "But I'm not big on accepting charity."

"That's not what I meant. I don't think of you as some charity case."

"But that's exactly what I am at the moment." She rose and began to pace. "Some sort of-of homeless person! Camping out in your guest bedroom."

To her surprise, he suddenly laughed. "To be perfectly honest," he admitted, "you do look a trifle threadbare this morning. Where did you find that awful bathrobe, by the way?"

She glanced down at the frayed terrycloth and suddenly she had to laugh as well. "Your linen closet. I had to wear something, and I figured it was either this or a towel. Where are my clothes, by the way?"

"A lost cause. Thomas had to throw them out."

"He threw out my clothes?"

"Some new things are being delivered."

"In the meantime, I walk around like this?"

"Oh, I don't mind, really. A towel would be fine, too."

She caught his amused downward glance, and realized the robe had sagged open again. Irritably she yanked the edges back together. "Is this how you treat all your lady houseguests? Toss out their clothes and expect them to make do?"

"No, you're privileged. The others only get towels. Hand towels."

Now he had her laughing again. She sat down and noticed the stack of papers on the table. "What's all this?"

"Lieutenant Beamis dropped it off. They're police files. Or, rather, photocopies of files."

"He gave them to you? That's highly irregular."

"It's also just between us. He and I have what you might call a mutual back-scratching arrangement."

"Oh. So what's in the files?"

Adam picked up the top folder. "I have here Nicos Biagi. And Xenia Vargas. And Jane Doe." He looked up at her, almost apologetically. "I'll be honest with you, M. J. I didn't ask for these files on your behalf, but on mine. For Cygnus. I can't argue away the facts. That is my drug out there, killing people. I want to know how they got it."

She focused on the top file. "Let's see what's in there."

He opened Nicos Biagi's folder. "Names and addresses. His family might know where he bought the drug."

"They won't talk. Even Beamis couldn't get it out of them."

"Does that surprise you? They probably smelled cop a mile away. So I'm going to ask them."

"I wonder what odor they'll pin on you."

"The smell of fresh greenbacks? It's very persuasive."

"Adam, you can't walk into the Projects with a bulging wallet!"

"Can you think of a better incentive?"

"You go in there without protection, and they'll have you for an appetizer."

"Then how am I supposed to reach these-people?" he asked, pointing to the folders. "I went through a half-dozen private detectives, trying to trace Maeve. So I don't have a lot of confidence in so-called professionals. I know that some friend of Nicos, or of Xenia Vargas, has to know the answers. You're the one who said it, M. J. If we can't pinpoint how the drug's getting out of Cygnus, perhaps we can figure out whom it's going to. And how he's getting it."

She looked at him in wonder. She used to think he was just a pretty boy in cashmere. He always managed to surprise her.

"Are you sure you really want to find out?" she asked. "What if the answer turns out to be a nasty surprise?"

"You're referring to Maeve?"

"Her name did cross my mind."

He sighed. "It's something I'll… have to face."

"That's why you're doing this yourself, isn't it? Why you don't just hire a PI to do the legwork. You're afraid of what some outsider will find out about your daughter."

He looked away. "You know, I used to think I could protect her. Pull her off the streets and put her in some sort of program. But it's not going to happen. She refuses to be helped. And in the meantime, people are dying, and I don't know if she's the one responsible…"

"You can't protect her, Adam. One of these days, she'll have to face the music."

"Don't you think I know that?" He shook his head in frustration. "All these years, that's exactly what I've been doing! Protecting her, bailing her out. Paying her bills when she bounced her checks. Booking her appointments with therapists. I kept thinking, if she just had enough attention, if I could just do the right thing-whatever that was-that somehow she'd pull out of it. She wouldn't end up like Georgina."

Georgina . She thought of the name she'd seen, inscribed on the plaque in Hancock General. The Georgina Quantrell Wing.

She asked, gently, "How did your wife die?"

He was silent for so long, she thought perhaps he hadn't heard the question. "She died of a lot of things," he said at last. "The official diagnosis was liver cirrhosis. But the illness really went back, to her childhood. A father addicted to martinis and work. A mother addicted to pills and cigarettes. Georgina looked for comfort wherever she could find it. By the time we met, she'd already been through two husbands and Lord knows how many bottles of gin. I was twenty-four at the time. All I saw was this-this absolutely stunning woman with an adorable daughter. Georgina was adept at covering up. If she had to, she could go off the bottle for weeks at a time, and that's what she did before the wedding. But after we got back from the honeymoon, I noticed she was having a few too many highballs, a few too many glasses of wine. Then Thomas found the stash of bottles in the closet. And that's when I realized how far it had gone…" He shook his head and sighed.

"Fourteen years later, she was dead. And I'm still trying to deal with the aftermath. Namely, Maeve."

"You stayed married to her through all that?"

"I felt I didn't have a choice. But then, neither did she. Self-destruction was in her genes, and she didn't have the will to fight. She just wasn't strong enough." He paused, and added quietly, "Unlike you."

He looked at her then, and she found her gaze trapped in the blue-gray spell of his eyes. They reached out to each other across the table and their fingers touched, twined together. That joining of warmth was enough to make her heart sing. They held on, even through the ringing of the doorbell and the sound of Thomas's footsteps crossing the foyer to answer it.

Only the polite clearing of a throat made them finally look up. Thomas was standing in the doorway. "Mr. Q.?" he said. "The wardrobe consultant is here from Neiman-Marcus. I thought perhaps Dr. Novak would like to look over the selections."

"Wardrobe consultant?" said M. J. in surprise. "But all I really need right now is a pair of jeans and a change of underwear."

"You needn't take the consultant's advice," said Thomas. "Although…" He glanced at her bathrobe. "I'm certain she'll have a number of, er, helpful suggestions."

M. J. laughed and pushed back from the table. "Bring her on, then. I guess I need to wear something."

"When you've made your selections, Dr. Novak," said Thomas, "just leave the bathrobe with me. I'll see that it's properly taken care of."

"Whatever you say," said M. J.

"Very good," said Thomas and he turned to leave. As he walked out of the room, he muttered with undisguised glee, "Because I'm going to burn it."

Protection was what they needed in South Lexington. And when it came to hostile territory, M. J. decided, the best to be had was from the natives. So it was to Papa Earl's apartment they went first, to have a talk with his grandson, Anthony. The boy might not hold any real power in the Projects, but he'd know how to reach those who did.

They found the boy slouched in his undershirt, watching Days of Our Lives in the living room.

"Anthony," said Papa Earl. "Mariana wants to talk to you."

Anthony raised the remote control and changed the channel to Jeopardy.

"You listening, boy?" barked Papa Earl.

"What?"

"Mariana and her friend, they come to see you."

M. J. moved in front of the TV, deliberately blocking Anthony's view. He looked up at her with sullen dark eyes. It was heartbreaking to see how little was left of the child she used to baby-sit. In his place was a tinder-box of rage.

"We want to ask the big man a favor," said M. J.

"What big man you talking about?"

"We're willing to pay up front. Safe passage, that's all we ask. And maybe a friend or two to watch our backs. No cops involved, we swear it."

"What you want safe passage for?"

"Just to talk to some people. About Nicos and Xenia." She paused and added, "And you can tell Maeve we're not after her."

Anthony twitched and looked away. So he was the one who had warned her, she decided.

Anthony was trying in vain to look past her, at the TV. "How much?" he asked.

"A hundred."

"And how much does the big man get?"

The kid was sharp. "Another hundred."

Anthony thought about it a moment. Then he said, "Move outta the way." M. J. stepped aside. He pointed the remote control and switched off the TV. "Wait here," he said. He stood up and walked out of the apartment.

"What do you think?" asked Adam.

"He's either going to come back with our bodyguards," said M. J., "or a hit squad."

"Don't know what I'm gonna do 'bout that boy," said Papa Earl. "I just don't know."

Ten minutes passed. They all sat in the kitchen, where Bella banged pots and pans on the stove. The smell of old cooking grease, of frying sausages and simmering pinto beans, was almost enough to drive them out. Those smells brought back too many memories for M. J., of stifling summer evenings when the smells from her mother's stove would kill whatever appetite she had, when the heat from the kitchen seemed to suck the air out of every room. Now, as she watched young Bella, she saw the ghost of her own mother, squinting into the haze of hot oil.

A door banged shut. Adam and M. J. turned to see Anthony come into the kitchen. With him were two other boys, both about sixteen, both with the cold, flat expressions of foot soldiers.

"You got it," said Anthony. "Just this one day. You want to come back again, you pay again. They'll watch your backs." He collected his two hundred dollars from Adam. "So where do you want to go first?"

"The Biagi flat," said M. J.

Anthony looked at the boys. "Okay. Take 'em there."