Читать книгу Man of His Word - Cynthia Reese - Страница 14

CHAPTER FIVE

KIMBERLY’S HEAD ACHED as the hotel room’s television blared out canned laughter from cartoon reruns that Marissa had watched a thousand times before. Yeah, it would be great if our problems could be solved in a half hour minus commercials.

She stared down at the list she was trying to make and attempted to focus on it.

People who might know something:

EMTs who responded

Police who responded

Emergency room staff

Newspaper reporter

Former fire chief

The person who took the picture of Daniel and Marissa

Daniel. He knew something. He was hiding some key piece of information.

The laughter blared out again. Marissa slurped loudly from the fast-food drink she still had from lunch and completely demolished whatever little focus Kimberly had managed to muster.

Kimberly whipped her head around, ready to snap at her daughter to turn the television down and throw the cup away already when she took in Marissa’s expression as the girl seemed to gaze at some point in the distance.

Marissa was stretched out, belly flat on the turned-back duvet, her chin propped on one hand and the empty cup in her other. Her eyes were wistful. Sad. She wasn’t paying the slightest bit of attention to the TV.

Kimberly pushed her chair back from the unsteady laminate table and crossed the room to switch off the television. Marissa didn’t even complain.

When she sat down beside her, Marissa jumped slightly. “Oh, sorry!” she mumbled. “I was thinking.”

“I can see that. What’s on your mind?”

“I just... Well, I just thought I’d know by now. You know. Why.”

The whole search for a family medical history had been a Pandora’s box, as far as Kimberly could see it. She’d waited as long as she could, fought the insurance company on appeal after appeal. But when that didn’t pan out, she knew she had to try to find another way to get that diagnosis.

Finding that diagnosis meant finding the girl who had given up Marissa. The prospect had filled Marissa with all sorts of conflicting emotions that Kimberly wished she could spare her daughter.

She squeezed Marissa’s arm gently. “I know, honey. I thought so, too.”

“We’re never gonna find her, are we?” Marissa flopped over and stared up at the ceiling. “And the doctors are just gonna keep poking me and doing test after test after test and you’re never gonna know what’s wrong with me. And...I’m never gonna know why.”

Kimberly’s throat closed up. She could barely breathe, much less swallow past the lump that had formed there.

Be the parent. Be the grown-up.

“Chin up,” she told Marissa in what she hoped was a brighter voice than she felt. “We’re not out of hope yet. I’m making a list of everybody who might know something.”

Marissa giggled, her nose wrinkling and her eyes crinkling up. “You and your lists.”

“Don’t poke fun. They work.”

“So let’s get started, then. Go bang on some doors. Anything is better than being holed up in this dump.” Marissa exploded off the bed and started a search for her shoes. A loud dull thunk resounded from the bed’s wooden toe-kick. “Ow! I stubbed my toe!”

“What? Is it—” Kimberly forced herself to stay calm. “Are you hurt?” She tried to ask this casually, as if she was a normal mom with a normal kid.

“Yes, I’m hurt! It hurts really bad—” Marissa hopped on one leg back to the bed, where she examined her toe. Kimberly could see no sign of injury.

The bruise would come later. And it would tell the story.

“Relax, Mom. It’s okay. Nobody ever died from a stubbed toe, it just hurts. Normal kid hurt, okay? No need to get all worked up. Why do they put that under there anyway?”

“To make it easier to clean up—if it’s blocked off, nobody can put anything under the bed,” Kimberly told her. She rose. “I don’t know if we can find anyone—”

“You mean, like a body? That would be creepy, wouldn’t it? Finding a body under the bed?” She shuddered dramatically.

Kimberly succumbed to the temptation of a heavenward gaze and shook her head. “I think they had in mind something more like dust bunnies or an absentminded eleven-year-old’s flip-flops. Like I was saying, it’s almost five o’clock, so I’m not sure what we can get accomplished today. Are you ready for some dinner somewhere?”

“I so can’t believe I’m asking this.” Marissa shook her head in doleful disbelief. “And if you put this on Facebook, I will deny it to my dying day. But can we go somewhere that’s not fast food? I miss real food. I miss you making me eat my vegetables. Can we go somewhere with some broccoli or something so that I can eat it and gag, and then enjoy a hamburger again?”

Marissa’s crooked little grin warmed Kimberly.

“Sure. Open that drawer there and hand me the phone book—”

But her request was interrupted by a knock on the door. They exchanged glances. Marissa held up her hands and in playful mock seriousness pronounced, “I didn’t do nothin’.”

Kimberly stepped to the door and stared through the peephole.

Daniel.

With shaking fingers, she unbolted the security lock and swung the door wide to allow the fire chief entry. “Daniel! I—I honestly wasn’t expecting you. Uh, come in!”

He didn’t budge from the threshold. Instead, he rested one hand on the doorjamb and shuffled a work-boot-clad foot before he said, “Actually...I just came by to— Uh, I was wondering. Would you two care for some supper?”

Kimberly was gobsmacked by the invitation. Was this his way of gearing up to tell them who Marissa’s birth mother was? Her thoughts were so weighed down with a blur of questions and pulsating hope that she couldn’t even give him an answer.

“Is it fast food?” Marissa blurted into the silence.

Regret etched his features. His rangy frame began turning away, as if they’d said no. “Uh, no. I wasn’t thinking of something quick. Sorry, I guess I didn’t consider what a kid might like to eat. I’ll leave you two to your—”

“I’m in!” Marissa bounced off the bed, the total antithesis of the pensive child she’d been a few minutes before. “Mom? You need your purse?”