5
THE ACCIDENT? Is that what Jack’s calling it these days?
Amy’s cryptic comment tumbled in Sarah’s mind. Tears pricked at her eyes as she ticked off the half-truths and lies that Jack had told her. She was tired of all the secrecy, the avoidance. Yes, Jack was reserved, private. But she had thought they had both known the important parts of each other’s lives.
She pulled out her phone and entered Jack Tierney into the search engine. Three hundred and eighty-one thousand results.
She plugged in two more words, Penny Gate, and it narrowed the search. Sarah clicked on the first link, a newspaper article headlined Penny Gate Woman Found Bludgeoned. Her eyes skittered down the page. The body of Lydia Tierney, thirty-six, was discovered yesterday afternoon in her rural Penny Gate home. Before Sarah could read any further, Jack approached.
“Sarah?” he asked, and she nearly dropped her phone. “What are you doing?”
Heart thumping, she quickly slid her phone into her purse. “I was talking to Amy. She just left,” she said. Jack’s eyes were red-rimmed and seemed to hold immeasurable sadness.
Jack sat down next to her, his leg pressing against hers. “They posted a security guard outside Julia’s room and made us leave,” he said. “They said that an autopsy has been ordered.”
“Why?” Sarah asked in confusion. “I thought it was an accident.”
“They wouldn’t tell us much of anything.” Jack rubbed his forehead in frustration. “Just that Julia’s injuries weren’t entirely consistent with an accidental fall down the stairs.”
“What does that mean? Like someone pushed her down the steps?” Sarah asked. “Who would do that?”
“I don’t know.” Jack closed his eyes and brought his hands to his face, forming a tent with his fingers. “It has to be some kind of mistake.”
“A home invasion?” Sarah wondered out loud.
“That’s the only thing I can think of that makes any sense. But then why wasn’t there any mess? Why was nothing taken?”
What was it that Amy had told Sarah earlier? It’s all my fault. Amy had dismissed it, but now Sarah wondered what she meant. Did Amy know more than she was letting on?
“Hal is a mess,” Jack added. “I don’t know how he’s going to get through this.” He reached for Sarah’s hand. His skin was cold and damp, and Sarah’s first instinct was to pull away, but he held tight. “He can’t face going back to the house right now, so we’re all going to go back to Dean and Celia’s. Do you mind heading there with Celia now? I need to stay here to help with some of the arrangements.”
“Whatever you need,” she murmured. She knew she had to be there for Jack and his family, but all Sarah really wanted to do was get back to the newspaper article she had discovered.
“I have to talk to Amy. Do you have any idea where she went?”
“She didn’t tell me.”
Celia emerged from the hospital. Her face was blotchy and her eyes swollen from crying.
“Cel,” Jack began, “Sarah will go back to the house with you. We’ll be right behind.”
Cel. Such a familiar use of her name. Sarah wondered if that was what Jack called her when they were teenagers.
Celia nodded. “Thank you,” she said, blinking back tears. “I really don’t want to be alone right now.”
“Of course. Whatever I can do to help.”
“I’ll call you later,” Jack said, and kissed Sarah on the cheek. His lips were cold and dry.
Sarah and Celia made their way to the hospital parking lot. “I can’t believe she’s gone,” Celia said, her voice breaking with emotion. “One minute she’s just lying there and the next she’s having a seizure.” Celia shivered. “I’ve never seen anything like it.”
Sarah stepped over a large puddle as she climbed into the passenger’s side of Celia’s truck. “Jack said that the doctor didn’t think Julia’s fall was an accident. How could she know that?”
“I don’t think anyone could know without an autopsy.” Celia started the car and then looked over her shoulder as she backed out of the parking spot. “It’s got to be a mistake.”
Celia offered a steady stream of commentary as she drove. “Our house is about a twenty-five-minute drive from here and Hal’s is just fifteen minutes farther. The funny thing is, you can walk through the cornfield right outside our door and end up in Hal’s yard in about the same amount of time. The town’s a little farther. I can’t believe you’ve never been here before.” She looked over at Sarah. “I’m prattling on and on. I think if I don’t keep talking I’ll start crying again and not be able to stop.”
“That’s okay,” Sarah said. “I was the same way when my dad died. If I kept moving, kept talking, I was okay. The minute things were quiet I fell apart.”
“I’m glad that Jack got here in time to see Julia before she died. I think he would have really regretted it, if he hadn’t. He’s always had such a soft heart.”
Sarah tried to ignore the flash of jealousy that sizzled in her chest. It was a long time ago, she told herself. Celia didn’t know him, the man he turned out to be. But then again, Sarah realized with a stab of regret, she wasn’t sure if she knew him as well as she thought she did, either.
“Hal said you and Jack dated when you were younger,” Sarah said, trying to keep her voice light. Conversational.
“Well, yeah.” Celia flashed a hint of a smile. “But that was ages ago. We went to school together. Jack and I were in the same class. Dean graduated four years before us. I got to know Dean through Jack. Didn’t Jack tell you that he and I dated through most of high school?”
“Well, yes,” Sarah fumbled. “Sorry, I didn’t make the connection.”
“That’s Jack for you, a man of few words.” Celia shook her head. “After Jack left for college I mooned around after him, hung around Julia and Hal’s house like a little lost puppy.” She gave a halfhearted laugh at the memory. “One evening, Julia had me over for dinner and Dean had just moved back to the farm. I hadn’t seen him in a few years and it was like the sun came out. A couple of years later we got married, and the rest is history.”
Celia turned onto a narrow two-lane highway that ribboned through the countryside, speeding past gold-and-green patchworks of cornstalks and soybeans, punctuated by an occasional farmhouse. Cattle gnawed languidly on grass, their tails flicking at unseen insects, their soft eyes barely glancing as they passed. It was beautiful, Sarah had to admit.
Once again, the sky had cleared and Sarah knew what Jack meant when he said the weather in Iowa changed on a dime. The air was clean and crisp like freshly starched laundry and the sky was a brilliant shade of blue that reminded Sarah of a time when the girls were four and Elizabeth described the sky as “so blue it hurts.” A blue so big and beautiful that it causes your heart
