Bloodstone Heart Page 16

  "You're weird," Josh said.

  "No really, think about it. If you could meet Dirty Harry wouldn't you be kind of in awe of the situation? Sure you might be terrified, but everybody knows him."

  "Dirty Harry is a cop - he's a good guy in a bad-ass kind of way, and he’s not real. How does that compare with the Dark Angel?"

  "Okay, well maybe not Dirty Harry, how about... umm... Lex Luthor, or um... Darth Vader, oh, um, Professor Moriarty, uh, Sauron or Snidely Whiplash."

  "You do realize all those are fictitious characters?"

  "Okay then how about Jesse James, or Doc Holliday, Wyatt Earp. They were real."

  "Okay then, I guess I can see if you were going to be killed it would be a tad bit more exciting to be killed by someone famous, but it's a little disturbing."

  "Maybe, but if you didn't get killed and you actually had a conversation with one of them wouldn't it be interesting to hear about what they've seen? I think it would be pretty cool."

  "Okay, if no one gets killed, I guess I can see the coolness."

  "Anyway, my point was that Anton might remember something over the next couple of days that may be important; you never know."

  "Hmmm. I haven't seen Dean or Sally in a couple of days. What's up with them?"

  "Sally got some permits and releases from the insurance company, so she's doing paperwork and clean up while Dean starts some of the repairs on the bookstore."

  "At least things are moving forward there. Insurance companies can sure drag their feet."

  "Yeah, but Sally seems to have things in hand. It's the fastest I've ever seen an insurance investigation finish up."

  Melanie got an early start in the morning. According to the stars and rectangles on her map, she would be heading up Highway 81 and cut over to Highway 86 until she reached Erie, Pennsylvania. She decided to check out Dubbins Landing at least to see the Bicentennial Tower. While she was walking, taking in the views of boats and people, she noticed a young boy who had obviously wandered off from his parents. He was squatting down between some pylons and leaning over way too far. Melanie looked around to see if she could spot a parent looking for a child, but she didn't see anyone, so she started walking towards the boy in a rather rushed manner and just as she got about an arm’s length away, he teetered forward a bit, then, overcompensating, he lost his balance and headed for the water as Melanie's gloved hand barely caught hold of his wrist.

  He hadn't seen her approach him and he was almost as shocked by his falling as he was by her presence. His green eyes were huge. Melanie could tell by his confusion that the eight or nine-year-old boy could not form words or even scream. The drop to the water was not more than eight feet and would certainly not kill him unless he hit something on the way down, but that didn't make it any less scary for either.

  Melanie spoke to the boy as calmly as she could and said, "It's okay, I've got you. Can you tell me your name?"

  "Chrrrrrisssss."

  "Okay, Chris, I'm Lanie," she said and just then her leather glove lurched down as it started to slide off her hand. Then Chris yelled. "It's okay, Chris. Look me in the eyes and know that I'm not going to drop you, but I need you to try to grab above my glove with your other hand and hold on tight."

  He didn't say anything but he immediately did as she said. Melanie was lying on the ground with both arms over the edge holding onto Chris and she looked around again to see if anyone was in yelling distance, but there was no one. She knew she was on her own. As fast as she could, she brought up her left hand and with her teeth wiggled her hand free of the glove and immediately brought it back down to Chris. She slid both of them nearer to the pylon on the right and with all her might she pulled him up to the point where he could put one hand on the top of the pier floor. She took another deep breath and used the pylon as leverage as she put her ungloved hand under his arm and pulled again with all her might. His waist was now almost on the pier as Melanie repositioned herself and got a new grip on the boy; she was now sitting and she used her strong right leg to push as she leaned back, pulling Chris on top of her. They both laid there for a second puffing from exertion when a woman came running up, screaming at Melanie.

  "What are you doing to my boy, you freak? Chris, get away from her!" she said as she yanked his arm up. She never stopped screaming as she walked backwards away from Melanie lying on the ground. Chris tried desperately to get in a word of explanation, but his mother was having none of that.

  Melanie sat up on the dock and took her other glove off, throwing it angrily into the water and as she got up to a standing position and brushed herself off, she kicked the other one into the water and watched them wobble to and fro. She wasn't angry with the mother; in fact she could see how frightening the whole thing must have looked. She felt if she had the people skills, maybe she could have explained to the poor woman that she was not molesting the boy but saving him from a fall. She stood there with her hands folded into each other and she saw how white her hands had become from being covered for so long. She thought of the night when her aunt had first thrown the gloves at her and told her, "Put these on and try to act like a normal person."

  She had almost dropped the boy because of those gloves. She hated them, the gloves and what they represented. She looked again at her hands and then touched one with the opposite hand as if they were somehow foreign to her body. She had never been allowed to try and get used to touching things. Maybe given some time, she could control the flashes of the past much like Josh could control the volume in his mind of everyone’s thoughts. Her aunt wasn't around, why was she still following her orders? She watched the gloves wiggle away along the pier and out of sight with the lapping of the water. Good riddance, she thought. It's about time I take control of my life.

  As she turned to head back to the car she almost ran into Chris and his mother. Chris seemed to be dragging his mother back to Melanie. "Lanie?" Chris said, "I told my mom what happened."

  Embarrassed but appreciative, the woman smiled and said, "I'm so sorry. I didn't know what to think with both of you on the ground like that. I'm sorry I jumped to such a horrible conclusion."

  "Don't be. I'm just glad I saw him before he went into the water."

  Chris's mother's blue eyes filled up with tears and then spilled down her cheek as a gust of wind blew her auburn brown hair across her face. Melanie said, "Please don't cry. Everything is fine. Chris, here, was very strong. He did most of the work." Reaching down, she took Chris's arm and put it into a position where she could see his biceps and then with her other hand she felt the muscle and made an astonished face. Chris was as proud as a peacock and chuckled.

  Chris's mother laughed a little and pushed the hair away from her face. “Would you join us for lunch? We were just going to go over there and have something ourselves when I... well..."

  "That's sweet, but definitely not necessary."

  "No, really. It's the least I can do to say thank you!"

  "Well, I was going to have something to eat anyway, why not?"

  With one hand holding his mother's, Chris grabbed Melanie's hand with his other. A jolt of electricity went through Melanie that she tried not to show. A picture show of happy times, a skinned knee, giggles in bed, and many smiling faces between Chris and his mom. It was beautiful, just like any little boy’s life should be. Melanie smiled and they walked a few hundred feet to a restaurant that looked out over the dock and towards the tower.

  Inside the restaurant they were seated near a window where they could see the tower and the water. Melanie said, "Well, since I already know your name, Chris, maybe I should introduce myself to your mother."

  Chris thought that was terribly funny and his mother just smiled at him. Melanie said to her, "I'm Lanie."

  "I'm Lori."

  "Well, Lori, you have a pretty cute little man here escorting you. Do you two live around here?"

  Lori took a sip of water and said, "Oh no, Chris and I live in Summerset, Kentucky. We are here, well, Cleve
land, that is, for a convention I had to attend. We went yesterday so I thought we could do something a little more fun today."

  "A convention? Hmm. What field of work?"

  "I'm a nurse. One of the doctors in our clinic wanted me to come up here and check out some new medical paraphernalia for the office. It was pretty boring, wasn't it, Chris? But I'm making it up to him today with a little sightseeing."

  "Pretty cool mom you have there, Chris."

  The waitress took their order and Lori continued, "So are you from around here, Lanie?"

  "No. I'm on a little adventure of my own. I live near Seattle, Washington. To be truthful, this is really my first time going any real distance from home."

  Chris said, "What kind of adventure?"

  "Oh, the boring kind to little men, but adventurous enough for someone my age. I had some man troubles and decided a trip would be just what I needed."

  "Is everything okay?" Lori asked.

  "So far, nothing I can't handle. Thanks for your concern. Are you married?"

  "I was once. It ended badly. My parents told me he was bad news, but I was in love and could only see what I wanted to see. I am thankful though. If it hadn't been, I would never have had Chris in my life and he makes it all worthwhile," she smiled looking over at Chris who was now connecting the dots on his placemat with a blue crayon.

  "I can understand that. He's a pretty special guy." Chris looked up and rolled his eyes and Melanie and Lori laughed. Melanie continued, "Forgive me for saying so, but you don't have much of a Southern drawl for being from Kentucky."

  "Oh, we aren't originally from Kentucky. I'm from Ogden, Utah. I loved it there, but my husband got a job out in Kentucky and I followed him. When he left I just didn't have the nerve to go back."

  "Why? I'm sure your family would be thrilled to have you come back with this little guy."

  "Maybe. After all the fuss I made when I ran off with his father, I'm just too... embarrassed."

  "Oh, Lori. Everybody makes mistakes when they are young. So you get a couple of I told you so's from a few of them, wouldn't it be worth it to be around all that you love and who love you to help you with raising Chris? Not that you haven't done a great job on your own, but moms need support too, right Chris?"

  "Yeah, Mom. You never do anything nice for yourself and I would love to see the farm you talked about growing up on."

  "You would love it and your grandparents would love to have you; I just don't know if they would love to have me back."

  "Well, let's just say from someone who has no family anymore, you should enjoy and treasure your family while you have them, because you just never know what tomorrow might bring."

  "I never thought of it like that. I'm sorry, Lanie. I guess when you have so much family it's overwhelming and you kind of forget about appreciating them. I'll think about it. It is a wonderful place to raise a child. Don't get me wrong, we've made some wonderful friends in Kentucky, but it just never has felt like home." She seemed to be in another world for a moment while Melanie and Chris played a couple of games of tic tac toe and one hangman game between bites of their meal.

  Melanie was so grateful for the company of Lori and Chris. She hadn't realized how lonely she had been. She wasn’t used to touching things without her gloves and she would get jolts of visions in her head like with the Spanish gentleman that took the dishes out of the dishwasher this afternoon, or the tired waitress that had wiped down their table before they sat down, but it was tolerable and she felt with time, she could tune things like that out. She felt like she had taken a huge step forward in living her life.

  They sat for at least another half an hour talking and laughing with Chris. The little man was a whiz at knock, knock jokes, and Melanie enjoyed them all. When they walked out of the restaurant and back to their respective cars, Melanie asked if she could get an address for them in Kentucky. Chris had mentioned his birthday coming up in June about ten times during their lunch and Melanie thought it would be fun to send him a little something. She also thought that maybe she would send them both some tickets to Salt Lake City and give Lori a reason to get past her fears and back to her family. She wrote their address, their last name, and Chris's birthday on the matchbook she grabbed in the restaurant. Chris gave her a disapproving look.

  "What is it?" Melanie asked.

  "You don't smoke, do you? You know cigarettes turn your lungs black and kill you," Chris answered matter-of-factly. Lori smiled at Chris and then shrugged her shoulders at Melanie.

  "Well, little man, I did know that. And to answer your question, no, I don't smoke," Melanie said and then pretended to punch him in the shoulder.

  "Then what do you want the matches for?"

  "I'm collecting them from all the places I have been on my adventure. I write in them who I met or something interesting I learned about the city. That way I can look back one day and remember everything. I thought it would make it more fun."

  "That's cool. We should do that, Mom."

  Lori said, "You're right. We should. Next trip we take, we'll do that, okay?" Chris nodded.

  Melanie said, "Well, this is me.” She pointed to Devon's car with the California plates.

  Chris said, "I thought you were from Washington?"

  "I think you are going to be a private investigator or an engineer, Chris. You don't miss a thing. I am borrowing a friend’s car from California. I'm hoping to meet up with them in the next week or so."

  Seeming to accept her explanation, he said, "Oh."

  Melanie bent down to talk to Chris eye to eye. "It was a pleasure meeting you, Chris."

  "You mean saving me from falling in the water?"

  "Well, that too, but getting to know you has been great, not to mention getting to know your mom. She's pretty great too." Melanie looked over at Lori who smiled. Melanie turned back to Chris and gave him a hug goodbye and told him she would send him a little something for his birthday. He grinned from ear to ear. Then Melanie stood up and walked to Lori and gave her a hug too. "Thank you for lunch, and think about what I said. Family is forever."

  "Thank you for saving Chris, and I promise I will think about what you said. Have a safe trip."

  Chris and Lori waved as Melanie got in Devon's car. As Melanie drove away, she could see Chris in the rear view mirror smiling. He was jumping up and down and waving enthusiastically. Melanie smiled as she turned onto the main street and headed for the highway.

  Chapter 20

  Anton had a busy day ahead of him. He needed to drive to Boston and meet a prospective buyer's associate to haggle a price for a piece that had become exceedingly popular when the artist died of a stroke six months before. Anton had been waiting for the right buyer and he was pretty sure this was the one.

  He didn't always meet clients this way. He had a very capable staff to do the day-to-day business duties, however, when it was a special piece or one that Anton had grown attached to, he would do the business himself, and such was this occasion.

  Bernard, Anton and Dominic’s butler, served him breakfast early and got him out of the house and on his way in plenty of time to meet his destination on schedule, as Bernard always did. Normally this drive would not be bad at all, but today it was raining and he knew that things would be slowed down because of it.

  Though there was normal traffic going through the city, it wasn't bad today. Anton often wondered why on rainy days, it seemed people forgot how to drive. How ridiculous that seemed, when it rained quite often. Oh sure, rain caused its share of accidents, but sometimes, with no accidents in sight, the traffic would still crawl at a turtle’s pace in the rain. Thank God that wasn't the case today.

  Anton pulled into the parking lot adjacent to the building where he’d have his meeting. What luck, he thought. A car was pulling out in a primo spot where he would not even have to use his umbrella to get to the safety of the building. What he hadn't noticed was a black Lexus had been waiting for the slow-poke car to pull out for eons, while they put
their packages away, strapped the kid in, strapped themselves in, checked their makeup, all the while the woman waiting in the Lexus had her blinker on to make a left hand turn into the parking place. Imagine her dismay when Anton slipped into the parking place instead.

  As Anton got out of his car, the woman in the Lexus honked her horn at him and pointed to the parking space. Anton turned towards the woman and shrugged his shoulders, dismissing her dilemma, and ran for the cover of the building's overhang.

  Feeling rather good at getting to his destination with plenty of time to spare, Anton went to the lobby coffee shop and got himself a tall mocha. The line was long, but he still had plenty of time to make his appointment upstairs in the conference room. After waiting for about ten minutes or so, he finally got his order. Making sure to get a little sleeve for his cup of coffee, he also made sure that the top was on tight. A disaster a few weeks ago, with a top that was not on tight had made him wary of unsecured coffee lids. Happy, he turned and headed out of the coffee shop and held the door for a woman that looked like she had just crawled out of a swimming pool. Her hair was plastered to her head, to the point that he wasn't quite sure what color her hair was dry. It could have been brown or maybe dark blonde, but either way, she was not a happy camper. As he held the door open for her, she bolted through it, ignoring his gallant gesture as if it were his job. She never acknowledged him or even made eye contact. Under his breath he said, "You're welcome, your Majesty."

  The woman jerked her head, spraying water all around her, and gave him a look that actually made him jump a little. He hadn't really intended for her to hear it, and he was sure that it was barely audible to a normal human, but by the look on her face, he was quite sure that she had heard him. Hmm. Maybe she's a vampire too. Could be, although I can't sense her or smell her like I usually can. Maybe she's just a very sensitive human.

  Again he dismissed it as he had the parking incident and went on his merry way. Still with plenty of time before the meeting, he went to the front counter and asked to use the house phone to check for messages at his office. There were none - good. That meant the meeting wasn't cancelled.