Save Her Soul (Detective Josie Quinn #9)(92)
Noah stepped closer to her and put his hands on her shoulders. “Josie,” he said. “You were a child.”
“But if everything I thought about the best parts of my childhood were a lie, what does that mean? If the foundation of my life—or the one thing left of it, Ray—was a lie, then what does that mean for me? Who the hell am I?”
“You’re Josie Quinn,” Noah said simply. “And that doesn’t depend on Ray or Lisette or your biological family or me or anyone. That foundation you’re talking about? It wasn’t Ray. Foundations are built, Josie. They’re built up over time. Ray helped you lay that foundation just like your grandmother did by being a positive, loving, stable force when everything around you was completely fucked up. The foundation you’re talking about—that’s all you.”
“How do you know that? How do you—how can you love me? You don’t even know who I am. I don’t even know who I am!”
He smiled again. One of his hands tilted her chin up toward him. “I know exactly who you are. Everyone who loves you knows who you are. You’re the woman who shot me, trying to save a teenage girl who desperately needed help.”
She looked away from him. “I wish you wouldn’t bring that up. I still feel guilty about that.”
“Don’t,” he said, cupping her cheek to bring her gaze back to him. “You’re the woman who is now best friends with Ray’s girlfriend—a woman you used to hate. You’re Harris’s Aunt JoJo. You’re the woman who saved a baby from drowning in a river, who jumped into a burning car to try to save a man because he was the only person who knew where two missing persons were. You’re the woman who solved my mother’s murder. You’re the woman who delivered a baby in the back of your car in a damn thunderstorm. You run toward the danger, Josie. Every time. You never hesitate. What does that make you? I know what it makes you to me, but only you can say what it makes you to yourself. My point is that nothing you find out about the past, no matter how terrible, can change any of that.”
She sank into his arms, pressing her face against his chest. Inhaling his familiar scent immediately sent her heart rate back down to a normal range. “Thank you,” she mumbled. “But I still wish I could know for sure about Ray and Beverly.”
Noah pressed a kiss into her scalp. After a few moments, he said, “You know, we could ask Misty for a DNA sample from Harris. Well, I guess if we’re going to start asking people for DNA samples then we could just go directly to Mrs. Quinn. You think she’d give us one to compare against the DNA profile of Beverly’s baby?”
“Probably,” Josie said. “But maybe I’m just being… I don’t know. I never would have believed that Ray slept with Beverly. Back then he was so good. He was still kind of innocent. We were deeply in love in the kind of crazy hormonal way that only teenagers can be. We had all these stupid plans. The summer before senior year we were going to take this road trip, drive to the beach and spend a week there. We had a list of places we were going to visit between here and there. It was so silly, and we were completely broke. But Ray wanted to make it happen for me, and he did. He spent that entire summer working construction. He was a day laborer for this general contractor. I barely saw him at all. He’d have to be on the job site at six in the morning and by the time he was finished, he’d be so tired. They were building that office building—oh my God.”
She pulled away from him. Noah looked at her, confused. “What is it?”
“Good God,” she said. “I know what we’re missing. I know why Beverly had Ray’s jacket and why his prints were on the Wellspring receipt.”
Forty-Four
2004
Ray and Josie stood outside the construction site. The structure had walls and windows now, resembling a building instead of some kind of Erector set. The noise from inside was still steady but less deafening. Josie swiped the sweat from her upper lip and squinted at Ray, wishing she’d brought her sunglasses. While she was wishing for things, she wished they were somewhere with air conditioning. The July heat was sweltering. She had no idea how he worked in it all day long.
“Ray,” she said. “How much longer?”
He checked his watch. “Not long. He said he’d be here to check out the site around noon today.”
“You don’t know that he’s really going to show up. These rich office people say all kinds of things they don’t mean. This is a waste of time.”
“No it’s not,” Ray insisted. “I’m telling you, this guy is really nice. He was one of the team sponsors last year. He was at the big game. Don’t you remember us having to take all those pictures?”
“Yeah, but I didn’t meet those guys,” Josie said.
“It doesn’t matter,” Ray said. “I told him all about you. He was the one who told me to bring you around. He has some foundation or something, and all they do is give out scholarships to girls. I’m sorry. Young women.”
“That’s it?” Josie said. “You just have to be a female?”
Ray gave a half shrug and adjusted the tool belt slung around his waist. “I mean, I guess you have to be studying a certain field. Like science or whatever. Technology. Computers.”