Widowmaker (Mike Bowditch #7)(71)

“It’s a f*cking brand-new Bell.” She coughed away from the phone. “Steve was always going on and on about what a dream it was to fly.”

“Could something have happened to him in the air?”

“Like a heart attack? Maybe. I can’t believe they’re dead. I keep expecting to hear them coming back from the helipad.”

“How come no one knew where you were?”

“I stormed out of the office when Graham said he didn’t want me coughing and sneezing on everyone again. I was so pissed.” She took a sharp breath. “Oh God! That was our last conversation. I can never take back the things I said.”

It was the same harrowing realization I’d had a few minutes earlier, when I’d thought about the last time she and I had spoken.

Stacey began to sob harder. “So I went back to my room. I tried to sleep, but the medicine made me jittery. When I walked through the door, people looked at me like I was a ghost. Everyone thought I had been on the chopper. I feel so horrible now. I should have been with them. It doesn’t feel right that I’m alive and they’re dead.”

I rubbed my forehead with my hand. “But you’re not! You’re alive, Stacey. I wish I could be there with you.”

“Why?” She sounded genuinely surprised.

“To comfort you.”

“I’m not the one who needs comforting. I shouldn’t be sitting here sobbing. My friends’ dead bodies are still out there in the wreckage, and their families are sick with grieving. I need to do something.”

“You should think about your own family. When your dad finds out you weren’t on the chopper—you need to call him. You need to call him right this second.”

“Right. Of course. Shit.”

“Call me later.”

“I’ll call you when I have some news. I can’t promise when that will be. Good-bye, Mike. I love you.”

“I love you, too.”

A big eighteen-wheeler went barreling past and caught me up in its wake. For an instant, my truck rocked from side to side in the slipstream. I finally remembered to hit my hazard lights, but it seemed a little late at that point.





27

When I returned home, the house seemed altogether different. No one else had been there while I had been away. The temperature was more or less the same as when I’d taken off down the road.

And yet I found myself overcome with that paranoid feeling you sometimes get when you step into a favorite room and you perceive that some small item has been moved. You can’t put your finger on what it is, but your subconscious can sense that something is different. The more you try to identify what has been changed, the more agitated you become. It is how some people end up pulling out their own hair.

I found myself wandering from room to room, unable to sit still. I removed my combat vest and gun belt again, changed out of my uniform and back into jeans and a T-shirt, then decided I should run a few miles on the treadmill in the basement to burn off some steam, which meant putting on my shorts and sneakers. But I had barely started running when my legs started cramping and I was overcome with exhaustion, and I found myself sitting down on the weight bench with a towel over my head.

It wasn’t until I lifted the towel that I felt the fabric was wet. My hands slid down my cheeks when I touched them. I had been crying without even realizing it.

I made my way upstairs and removed the bottle of bourbon from the cupboard. I held the label up to my eyes for a long time, examining the elegant signature of James B. Beam, then dumped every last drop down the sink.

Eventually, I wandered into the living room and threw my sore body across the sofa. I closed my eyes, but the bulb overhead was so strong, it made the inside of my lids turn bloodred. I thought about getting up to turn it off, but I didn’t really want to go to sleep, either. My nerves were still too raw.

I reached for the television remote and was surprised to find that the New England Patriots were playing a night game. It must have been the play-offs. I started to watch, but the loud voices of the announcers sounded like air horns in my oversensitive ears, so I hit the mute button.

I needed to talk to someone.

I tried Kathy first, but I got a voice-mail message. She had become an early riser in her late middle age.

I wanted to give Charley and Ora space.

Call Pulsifer? No way.

I scrolled through the list of recent calls and touched the name of Captain DeFord. It was as if my finger acted of its own accord. The phone began to ring.

“Mike?” he said. “What’s going on?”

“There was a helicopter crash up near the Allagash. Did you hear about it?”

Why had I called DeFord, of all people? This man I was talking to was the captain of the Warden Service, not a chaplain or a grief counselor. He was my superior officer, and I barely even knew him.

“I was just on the phone with St. Pierre. He’s coordinating the recovery operation. What a tragedy.”

I tried to keep emotion out of my voice. “The initial reports were that Stacey Stevens was on that helicopter. But it turns out she wasn’t.”

DeFord knew Stacey was my girlfriend. He was also well acquainted with her parents. “Have you had a chance to talk with her?”

“A while ago.”

“How is she doing?”