Deadly Cross (Alex Cross #28)(39)
Kay and Governor Willingham had been estranged when the picture was taken, so her husband might have hired a private eye to follow her. But why would Vice President Willingham have wanted to discredit me and get me thrown off the case if he knew he’d be a logical source of the picture?
“He’s too smart,” Bree had said. “He’d never do that. And besides, it’s a moot point. Elaine Paulson did the deed.”
I agreed with her, so we’d spent the rest of the evening discussing other possible sources of the photo, from a jilted lover of Kay’s to a fixer to paparazzi. We discounted the last because the picture had never made its way into the tabloids.
I was pondering those and other possibilities when the funeral procession began. We all stood. The church behind us was full. A packed house for Billie.
CHAPTER 43
ANDREW AND HIS SISTER, KARI, walked behind the priest following Billie’s casket. John and Willow followed them.
Billie’s young daughter was trying not to cry but couldn’t help it, which really tore open the emotions in the room. You could literally feel the collective grief in the church in a way I had rarely encountered before, and I wondered if I had the strength to deliver Billie’s eulogy.
During the Mass I thought of her constantly, however, and that helped when the priest at last invited me up to speak. For a moment after I’d gotten to the lectern, I let my eyes wander over the people in the pews and the ones standing in the back, all of them looking at me expectantly. I glanced down at Billie’s casket and felt strangely calm.
“I thought this would be hard,” I began and smiled sadly. “I thought getting up here and seeing all of you gathered to mourn the loss of someone who was truly beautiful, inside and out … I guess I feared that my own grief might prevent me from talking about Billie Houston Sampson in a way that celebrated who she was and what she meant to all of us.”
I gazed at Sampson and his family. “But John, Willow, Andrew, and Kari, I am here to tell you that Billie’s spirit would not let me be afraid. I was sitting over there thinking about her, and suddenly I was no longer fearful about doing her justice. Though her body lies in a casket, her spirit is here. Billie — your wife, your mom, my friend — her spirit lingers in me and in each of you, and it always will.”
I lifted my head, pointed a finger at the mourners in the back, and smiled. “And I’m guessing Billie’s spirit lingers in all of you or you would never have come to say goodbye like this in such numbers.”
I could make out people all over the church nodding and dabbing their eyes.
I said, “It takes an extraordinary person to touch this many hearts, but Billie Sampson was an extraordinary person by every measure. She grew up in poverty and went to nursing school on scholarship before joining the United States Army and working her way up to head nurse at a trauma and burn hospital.
“During that time, Billie met the first love of her life, Andrew and Kari’s father, a decorated Green Beret who was framed for murder by fellow officers and unjustly executed before evidence exonerating him could be found. During the entire ordeal, Billie stood by her husband and believed in his innocence. To my knowledge that never wavered, not even after his passing.”
Her daughter, Kari, shook her head, said, “Never.”
I struck my chest lightly with my fist. “That takes heart, and Billie had heart. John felt it the first time he met her, told me he could not get over how much energy that little woman had.”
Sampson smiled.
“My son Ali used to call her the Energizer Bunny,” I said. “My grandmother called her Billie Whirlwind.”
Laughter rippled through the audience and there was a long low murmur and the sound of folks adjusting in their seats.
“I’ll bet every one of you has a Billie story to share, a testament to various aspects of her life. Her skills as a nurse. Her love of cooking. Her fitness. Her ability to connect almost instantly with people. The genuine warmness she projected at all times.”
I struck my chest again. “That warmness? That ability to connect? The discipline to stay in shape and constantly learn as a nurse? They all take heart, and Billie Sampson had heart in spades.
“In fact, one of the things I admired about her most was that she always led with her heart, and in times of conflict she always responded from her heart. It was what made her so genuine and special.
“Heart was what lit Billie up and heart is what lit up John and Willow and Andrew and Kari and I suspect every person in this church at one time or another. Heart was what allowed Billie to forgive the men who conspired to kill her husband. Heart was what allowed her to move on and find love again. And weakened as it was, heart was what made Billie, in her dying words, speak of her love for family and friends.”
I got choked up then and had to wipe my eyes and compose myself.
“She was remarkable that way,” I said, putting my right hand on my chest. “I hope we can all honor her by thinking less with our heads and more with our hearts in the coming days. If we do that, each and every one of us, there will be more love, more Billie Sampson in our lives, not less. And the world will undoubtedly be better for it.”
CHAPTER 44
BREE LEFT WITH THE CHIEF for a meeting with the commissioner. Damon took Nana Mama, Jannie, and Ali home. But Mahoney and I hung with Sampson after Billie’s funeral until the end of the reception, then saw him to his car with Willow and Billie’s children.