her fingers were, she reached for the zipper pull on her leather jacket. The catch of tooth gripping tooth sounded like a machine gun in the empty room. As she headed for the door, her boots rattled the wood floor, causing mini quakes. Puffs of dirt blasted up, stuck to her sweat and coated her throat until it was dry.
His suspicion writhed toward her, black-adder toxic. Or was it her guilt? Stop it, Felicia. Her knees quaked, but she willed herself to keep walking. Keep cool. Don’t give him a reason to get mad.
Once she reached the doorstep sunshine hit her face. “Give me two days,” she lied—for Hannah, for herself, for their future, “and I’ll be back.”
“Two days,” he said, and a wave of relief trickled through her. He didn’t know.
Chrome winked in the sunshine. The red metallic paint of the fender sparkled like wet nail polish. She could almost feel the wind numb her cheeks. Seven more steps.
The river ran hard with snowmelt, and she wished she could ride it all the way to the Long Island Sound. Five more steps.
Don’t rush. Take it slow and easy. Tossing him a smile and a wave, she looked back. “Why don’t you get a couple of steaks, and we’ll celebrate our first night in our new home with your favorite meal?”
Three more steps to the bike. Three more steps to freedom.
Chapter One
“Where can I find a book on pioneers?” asked the girl standing in front of Aurora Cates’s station at the Maplewood Library reference desk. The girl’s face was a pincushion of hoops and small steel balls. Her tangerine T-shirt seemed two sizes too small—probably to show off the belly-button jewel. A henna tattoo decorated the wrist of the hand that pulled at short brown hair. People let their kids out of the house dressed like this?
Then she thought of Felicia and knew exactly how it could happen.
“What do you need to know?” Rory typed in the subject title, Pioneers, into the computer while the girl frowned at her blue assignment sheet.
“Uh. What they wore. How long they lived. Things like that.”
A selection of titles popped up on the screen. “Try the 978 section.”
“Okay.” The girl blinked at her. She didn’t have a clue where to go.
Rory walked her over to the section, selected three books and handed them to her. “That should get you started.”
“Thanks.”
“If that doesn’t do it, let me know and I’ll drag out the book of historical statistics.”
“Okay.”
As the girl slogged away, Rory basked in the ray of sunshine streaming through the arched window. Her favorite time of the day was morning when locks still barred out the public and she could enjoy the old building by herself. The contrast between the dark-wood furniture and paneling and the pale walls and columns with their classic baroque effect, never failed to give her pleasure. And the books—well, they were her pride and joy, and coming to work was like having a daily reunion with old friends.
In the past hour she’d fielded enough questions about the lifespan of settlers in the West in the nineteenth century to deduce that a class was reading Shane and had a homework question that dealt with comparing and contrasting the lives of the fictional characters with their own. It wasn’t that she minded answering vague questions by clueless school kids; that was, after all, part of what she was paid to do. But lately her mind was focused on the 24/7 Reference System the library was installing. She resented anything that took her away from that new passion.
Once installed, the virtual reference desk would stay open twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week. A patron could chat in real time with the library’s reference desk. If the library was closed, then the system would forward the patron’s request to a library that was still open—even if it was in another time zone. The possibilities dazzled her.
While helping the director test the system, Rory had come across a bug in the city’s computer system that made the program and the system act like feuding siblings. Half an hour more at the reference desk, then she could get back to her basement office and back to exterminating that bug. She loved how this new technology would allow access to just about any fact to anyone with only a click of the mouse. Any fact, any time, any place—as long as you were connected. All that knowledge. She shook her head and smiled a private smile.
Rory sat back in her chair at her station and watched as yet another student with a blue assignment sheet approached. If she were truthful, she’d have to admit she much preferred dealing with patrons online than face-to-face. Another reason to get the new program up and running as soon as possible. It would be her baby. Even the two-hundred and sixty-thousand books, magazines and tapes in the library’s collection, even the thousands of other books she could borrow from the network of libraries all over the country could not compare to the information she could unearth with this program in place. Need an answer from the Kansas Paint Contractors’ Handbook at 3:00 a.m.? Where the locals went to eat in Honolulu, Hawaii? What the people of Portland, Maine, considered the posh part of town? No problem. Just sign on and ask; someone will find the answer for you. She couldn’t wait.
Before the boy could ask his question, the phone in the pocket of her tweed suit jacket bleated. “Hang on a second.”
Carrying her cell phone on her was not proper library etiquette, but she was worried about her sister. Felicia had seemed to settle down after she got pregnant. She’d quit smoking and drinking and started talking about the future. There was joy in her voice when she spoke of Hannah’s milestones and sadness when she talked of leaving her with a sitter to go to work. Rory had urged her to leave New Hampshire and come live with her in D.C. Together they could make Hannah’s life comfortable and happy. A month ago, Rory had heard a new edge in Felicia’s voice. Felicia wouldn’t explain anything, but said she and Hannah would soon visit. Not a word from her since then. No answer at her apartment, either. And in the past few days, even the answering machine was no longer picking up.
Rory pressed the talk button. “Felicia?”
“Is this Aurora Cates?” a harried voice asked.
“Yes. Who is this?”
“Candace Wilson. Felicia gave me your number.”
“Is Felicia all right?”
“No clue. She had me sit for Hannah yesterday and told me to call you if she wasn’t back by the time her shift started.”
This wasn’t good. Not at all. Why would Felicia leave Hannah with this sour-sounding woman and not return as fast as she could to her precious baby? “Where is she?”
“Look, I don’t know. All I know is that Felicia didn’t show up for work, and I can’t afford to miss another one of my shifts. You’ve got to come up and get Hannah or I’ll have to call DCYF.”
“DCYF?”
“Division of Child, Youth and Family.”
“No, don’t do that.” Felicia would never get Hannah back, not with her background, and losing Hannah could be the final cut that would send her reeling back to the wild life she was trying to tame for her daughter’s sake.
