Sister Helen’s voice came over the intercom at the same time that Ben nudged her, calling her back from a suddenly overwhelming depression.
“Sorry, Helen,” she said. “Tell them I’ll be there in a few minutes.”
“Of course.”
Abby pressed the off button. She knew Helen would also call Sister Benicia, who would be glad to get up and go to the kitchen to heat leftover soup from dinner for the two women.
Abby bent over to plant a quick kiss on Ben, but he’d have none of it. Rolling her under him, he covered her from head to toe and pressed himself hard against her. “Just remember, I won this time.”
“Hell, you can win all the time,” she said, wiggling beneath him until it was clear he was aroused. “But I really must go,” she added, laughing. “Duty calls.”
He groaned and let her up. “Vixen. Okay, I’ll go back to town and check in at the station.”
“I thought you weren’t working tonight,” she said, tugging on clean jeans and a sweatshirt.
“I’m not. I just feel antsy after all that exercise.”
“It’s not the exercise that got you antsy,” she said, tossing a pillow at him.
Abby reached for her boots, and Ben swatted her on the backside on his way to the bathroom. “I didn’t say what kind of exercise. See you in the morning, Annie Oakley.”
Abby looked briefly into the little mirror on the door that led into the convent, and brushed her shoulder-length brown hair back behind her ears with her fingers. No time for makeup. A clean flannel shirt to cover the paint splatters on her tee would have to do.
Downstairs, she entered the large old reception room with its antique furnishings and expensive rugs that Lydia Greyson had brought here from her own Carmel home when she owned the Prayer House. It was cold in here and, shivering, Abby noted both women were standing, warming their backs at the fireplace. She drew closer, then stopped midway, surprised to see that she knew both the older woman and the teenager with her: Alicia Gerard, one of her oldest friends, and Jancy, her daughter.
“Allie!” she said, crossing over to her and holding out both hands. “What on earth? I haven’t seen you in, geez, what is it—two years?”
Alicia’s smile was tight, her eyes distraught. Her pale blond hair, ordinarily smooth and shiny, was tangled, as if she’d been nervously running her fingers through it.
As for Jancy? Abby remembered her as a cute kid with a brown ponytail, dressed in Catholic school plaids. Now Allie’s child was dressed all in black, had a short, spiked hairdo with orange and purple streaks, and a strange, staring expression in her eyes, which were so heavily made up Abby wondered how she could hold them open.
Still, Helen’s reference to Hades, whether god of the dead or hell, had been a bit strong. Little Jancy had simply become a teenager.
Alicia grabbed Abby’s hands and held on as if they were her only lifeline. “You’ve got to help us,” she said, her voice shaking. “Please, Abby. I couldn’t think of anywhere else to go.”
Looking into Alicia’s familiar green eyes, Abby knew she should be happy to see her old friend. Not only that, but she owed her so much. If Alicia hadn’t helped her, back when her own world was falling apart…
But something was very, very wrong. And some instinct—the kind that raises hairs on the back of one’s neck—told Abby that Trouble with a capital T had just walked through her door.
4
Alicia Gerard was forty-one, yet close up Abby could see that there were new stress lines in her forehead and around her mouth that made her look closer to fifty. Allie had always been beautiful, and still was. But her face now was more like a photograph that had blurred because life had moved slightly and unexpectedly, causing a distortion.
Abby had known Alicia Gerard since she was a reporter in Los Angeles, years ago. At that time, Allie’s husband was just beginning as a legal aid attorney. In a short amount of time he became a legislator, and finally progressed to what he was now—a mover and shaker in the business world. Abby had followed the growth of his career, from a real estate developer to a Donald Trump-like mogul whose face had been on the cover of every important magazine in the world. More recently, H. Palmer Gerard, better known to friends and family as Gerry, had spoken in Washington before a committee on illegal immigration. As one of the top developers in the world, he shocked the committee by taking the position that restrictions on immigration from Mexico were unrealistic and should be eased, and that pay for illegal Mexican laborers should be raised.
Paying illegal aliens a decent wage wasn’t a popular position, especially when the economy was in trouble and jobs were hard to come by. In an attempt to dilute Gerry’s argument, politicians came down on him in the media, calling him an “elitist who had so much money he no longer felt any loyalty to hardworking Americans who were struggling to make a living for themselves and their families.”
In response, Gerry then challenged the administration to create more jobs for U.S. citizens by cutting back on outsourcing—the hiring by U.S. companies of cheap labor in other countries at much lower pay than American employees commanded.
After his appearances on Capitol Hill, a storm of controversy began. Thanks to Gerry Gerard, the administration now had its hands full. If Gerry had been a politician, his career would almost certainly have gone downhill from there. But because of his powerful business ties, no one had dared to take an open stand against H. P. Gerard. Alicia’s husband was feared by senators and presidents alike—not because he played dirty, but because he refused to. Some said he could run for and win the next presidential election on the votes of the poor alone. There were impressive leaders of blacks and Hispanics who swore they could get out the vote if he ran.
Abby took Alicia’s arm and led her over to the sofa, at the same time taking in the state of Jancy, who, she thought, must be fourteen by now. Named Jan Christine, and called Jan C. to rhyme with H.P., the spirited little girl had changed the spelling of her name to “Jancy” herself, at the age of eight.
Abby urged Alicia and her daughter to sit on the large, comfortable sofa that was at a right angle to the fireplace; she sat across from them in a stiff antique chair with a cane seat. Jancy flopped down at the far end of the sofa from her mother and took up a slouching position, her arms crossed in front of her chest in a defensive manner.
For a moment, Alicia simply looked at Abby, a question in her eyes: Will you help us? Can we trust you? Abby had seen it so many times. Just about every time, in fact, that women came to her, pleading that she help them escape whatever abuse they were running from.
Paseo, the underground railroad that she’d operated out of the Prayer House for two years, was a secret organization. Ordinarily, women were sent here through the local women’s shelters. No one came here without their visit having been set up by a trusted third party, and great care was taken to ensure that they weren’t followed here, and that no one could know where they went when they left.
Alicia, however, had simply shown up. Might she have led someone here who could cause trouble for the Prayer House?
Before Abby could begin to ask questions, Sister Benicia came in with a polished wooden tray. It held three cups, three bowls and a plate of
