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"I hope she's strong," Anna mumbled. Then, louder, she told them, "As I have said many times now, I don't remember anything. I don't know who did it, or where they took me or why they did it. I just know that it's over now, and I'm putting it behind me."
Faith could feel Amanda's frustration matching her own.
Anna said, "I need to rest now."
"We can wait," Faith told her. "Maybe come back in a few hours."
"No." The woman's expression turned hard. "I know my legal obligations. I'll sign a statement, or make my mark, or whatever it is blind people do, but if you want to talk tome again, you can make an appointment with my secretary when I'm back at work."
Faith tried, "But, Anna—"
She turned her head toward the baby. Anna's blindness had blocked them from her vision, but her actions seemed to block them from her mind.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
SARA HAD FINALLY MANAGED TO CLEAN HER APARTMENT. She could not think of the last time it had looked this good—maybe when she had first seen it with her realtor before she had even moved in. The Milk Lofts had once been a dairy, serviced by the vast farmland that used to cover the eastern part of the city. There were six floors in the building, two apartments on each floor separated by a long hallway with large windows either end. The main living area of Sara's place was what was called an open plan, the kitchen looking onto the enormous living room. Floor-to-ceiling windows that were a bitch to keep clean lined an entire wall, giving her a nice view of downtown when the shades were open. There were three bedrooms in the back, each with their own bathroom. Sara, of course, slept in the master, but no one had ever slept in the guest room. The third room she used as an office and for storage.
She had never thought of herself as a loft person, but when Sara had moved to Atlanta, she had wanted her new life to be as different from her old as was humanly possible. Instead of choosing a cute bungalow on one of the city's old, tree-lined streets, she had opted for a space that was little more than an empty box. Atlanta's real estate market was just hitting rock bottom, and Sara had a ridiculous amount of money to spend. Everything was new when she'd moved in, but she had renovated the entire place from top to bottom anyway. The price of the kitchen alone would have fed a family of three for a year. Add in the palatial bathrooms and it was downright embarrassing that Sara had been so free with her checkbook.
In her previous life, she had always been careful with her money, never splurging on anything except a new BMW every four years. After Jeffrey's death, there had been his life insurance policy, his pension, his own savings and the proceeds from the sale of his house. Sara had left all of it in the bank, feeling like spending his money would be admitting he was gone. She had even considered refusing the tax exemption she got from the state for being a widow of a slain police officer, but her accountant had balked and it wasn't worth the fight.
Subsequently, the money she sent to Sylacauga, Alabama, every month to help Jeffrey's mother came out of her own pocket while Jeffrey's money compounded meager interest at the local bank. Sara often thought about giving it to his son, but that would have been too complicated. Jeffrey's son had never been told that Jeffrey was his real father. She couldn't ruin the boy's life and then hand over a sum that amounted to a small fortune to a kid who was still in college.
So, Jeffrey's money sat there in the bank, just like the letter sat on Sara's mantel. She stood by the fireplace, fingering the edge of the envelope, wondering why she hadn't put it back into her purse or jammed it into her pocket again. Instead, during her rabid fit of cleaning, she had only picked it up to dust under the envelope as she made her way down the mantel.
Sara saw Jeffrey's wedding ring on the opposite end. She still wore her wedding ring—a matching, white-gold band—but his college ring, a hunk of gold with the Auburn University insignia carved into the top, was more important to her. The blue stone was scratched and it was too big for her finger, so she wore it on a long chain around her neck the way a soldier wears his dog tags. She didn't wear it for anyone to see. It was always tucked into her shirt, close to her heart, so she could feel it at all times.
Still, she took Jeffrey's wedding band and kissed it before putting it back on the mantel. Over the last few days, her mind had somehow put Jeffrey in a different place. It was as if she was going through mourning again, but this time, at a remove. Instead of waking up feeling devastated, as she had for the last three and a half years, she felt enormously sad. Sad to turn over in bed and not have him there. Sad that she would never see him smile again. Sad that she would never hold him or feel him inside of her again. But not utterly devastated. Not like every move or thought was an effort. Not like she wanted to die. Not like there was no light at the end of all of this.
There was something else, too. Faith Mitchell had been so horrible today, and Sara had survived. She hadn't broken down or fallen to pieces. She had not come undone. She had kept herself together. The funny thing was, in some ways Sara felt closer to Jeffrey because of it. She felt stronger, more like the woman he had fallen in love with than the woman who had fallen apart without him. She closed her eyes, and she could almost feel his breath on the back of her neck, his lips brushing so softly that a tingle went down her spine. She imagined his hand wrapping around her waist, and was surprised when she put her hand there to feel nothing but her own hot skin.
The buzzer rang and the dogs stirred along with Sara. She shushed them as she walked to the intercom and buzzed in the pizza delivery guy. Betty, Will Trent's dog, had been adopted quickly by Billy and Bob, her two greyhounds. When she was cleaning earlier, all three dogs had settled onto the couch in a pile, glancing up occasionally when Sara walked into the room, sometimes giving her a sharp look if she made too much noise. Even the vacuum cleaner had not dislodged them.
Sara opened the door to wait for Armando, who delivered pizza to her apartment at least twice a week. The fact that they were on a first name basis was something she pretended was normal, and she routinely overtipped the deliveryman so that he wouldn't make a big deal about seeing her more than he saw his own children.
"Doin' all right?" he asked as pizza and money changed hands.
"Doing great," she told him, but her mind was back in the apartment, to what she was doing before the buzzer had sounded. It had been so long since she'd been able to remember what it felt like to be with Jeffrey. She wanted to dwell on it, to crawl into bed and let her mind wander back to that sweet place.
"Have a good one, Sara." Armando turned to leave, then stopped. "Hey, there's some strange guy hanging around downstairs."
She lived in the middle of a large city, so this was hardly unusual. "Regular strange or call-the-cops strange?"
"I think he is a cop. Doesn't look it, but I saw his badge."
"Thanks," she said. He gave her a nod as he headed toward the elevator. Sara put the pizza box on the kitchen counter and walked to the far side of the living room. She pushed open the window and leaned out. Sure enough, six stories down, she spotted a speck looking suspiciously like Will Trent.
"Hey!" she called. He didn't respond, and she watched him for a moment as he paced back and forth, wondering if he'd heard her. She tried again, raising her voice like a soccer mom at a NASCAR race. "Hey!"
