Page 122 of Paranoid

“What’s wrong?”

“Nothing. Just getting old. Strained my shoulder . . . been painting and tiling the bathroom.” He found the pod, snapped it into the coffee machine, and pressed a button, only to rub his shoulder. “Gettin’ soft, I guess.” He rotated his shoulder, then plucked a bottle of ibuprofen from the windowsill and shook two into his palm before tossing the dry tablets into his mouth. “Probably a pinched nerve or arthritis or something. No big deal.”

The Keurig hissed and sputtered before he handed her the cup and made another. “Real coffee,” he pronounced, replacing the old pod with a new one, snapping it into place and tossing the old one into the trash.

“If you say so.”

“Decaf’s for wimps.”

“Sometimes I am.”

He snorted. “I don’t believe it.”

She heard the ding of a text coming in, then another, but seeing that they weren’t from the kids, she ignored them. She glanced at the clock over the stove, time ticking away, and took a swallow of the coffee as she took a seat at the kitchen table that Ned had refinished himself.

“How’s Harper?”

“Dealing better than I thought she would.”

He slid a glance over his shoulder as his cup filled. “Watch her. Sometimes it hits later, after the shock wears off.”

She was aware of that all too well, she thought, as she ran a fingertip over the old knots and scars of the tabletop.

“How well did you know the victims?”

“Just in school. You remember. Violet more than Annessa. She’d come over once in a while.” But as he turned to face her, fresh mug of coffee in hand, she realized he didn’t recall her high school relationships. How could he? He was a full-time cop at the time, often worked nights, and the family was breaking up at that point, splintering as he and Melinda were well on their way to divorce. “But I didn’t keep in touch. Even though they lived around here, I didn’t know them.”

“They both stood up for you, if I remember right.”

“Yeah,” Rachel said, staring into her mug.

“They were there.” He took a slow sip. “And now they’re dead.”

“Killed.” It was surreal and horrible and painful. She remembered Violet in the darkened cannery, how she’d refused to wear her glasses and how she’d flipped out in the chaos that seemed to be a war zone, how Rachel had tried to drag her out of the building, where kids were shooting, blasting away, and then Luke . . . falling. Her heart began to pound at the memory, her pulse was racing, and little beads of sweat were forming at her hairline.

“Last night—Annessa’s murder—it was too close to deadline to make the latest edition of the newspaper,” Rachel said. “But just wait. The murder’s already been all over the news. Even though Harper’s under eighteen, they’ll find her. Mercedes will.”

“You can bet on that.”

Groaning, she let her head drop to the table in frustration. “Will it ever end?”

“Never,” he said quietly, then cleared his throat. “How is Lila handling all this?”

“Lila?” she repeated. “I guess in her usual Lila, over-the-top, near hysterical wanting-to-take-control way. She’s already freaked out about the reunion, if you can believe that.”

“I can. You know, I never felt she got over what happened.”

“None of us really have,” she admitted. “But she’s got Luke’s son. Kind of a living memory, a blessing, yeah, of course, but a reminder.”

He nodded, staring out the window over the sink, eyes narrowing.

She followed his gaze, saw he was watching a hawk as it circled, dipping low, visible for an instant, then disappearing in the mist again. But she doubted he was concentrating on the bird. No, she understood, his thoughts were far from this day, to another place and time.

?

?Your brother and I, we had our share of problems. Butted heads a lot,” he admitted, then took a long swallow from his cup, and she noticed how his once-sandy hair had silvered. “Too often.”

She couldn’t help recalling the fights. The yelling. Often created by Luke’s insolent attitude and Ned’s mercurial temper, which, in those days, had sometimes been fueled by whiskey. Luke had been quick to raise his fists and Ned had never been known to back down from a fight.