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As I lowered my phone, it occurred to me that while I didn’t want totellanyone else about the Vigil’s suspicions, I did know someone who might be able to shed some more light on the situation without needing an explanation. Someone who’d known Dad better than anyone.
It was the weekend, so Mom wouldn’t be at work. She answered my call on the second ring.
“Hey, sweetheart. I wasn’t expecting to hear from you. Is everything okay?”
“Oh, yeah, I just had some free time and thought it’d been a while since we caught up. Is that new secretary still giving you issues?”
Mom let out a huff. “She’s gotten a little better, but you won’t believe what I had to talk to her about the other day.”
We went back and forth with a few workplace and school horror stories, and Mom told me about a trip she was planning on taking with Holand. Then her tone softened. “You sound a little tense, Maddie. I wish you could get away for a little while. Maybe in the summer?”
“We’ll see,” I said, hoping my laugh sounded light rather than forced. “My schedule is pretty hectic. That reminds me—there was something I wanted to ask you about because of one of my classes.”
It was Mom’s turn to laugh. “I’m not sure how useful I’ll be with the sorts of things you’re studying.”
“It’s not exactly that. We’re doing a unit on rare diseases, and I was wondering… did the hospital ever give you an answer about what exactly the sickness was that Dad died of?”
I hated bringing up the subject even though I had very good reason to. The momentary silence on the other end told me how the question had affected Mom, though her voice was steady when she spoke. “No, they never could identify what it was, as far as I was informed. Even the autopsy didn’t turn up anything definitive, from what I understand.”
“Did they mention any possibilities while they were trying to treat him, or specific symptoms they were particularly confused by?”
“I’m sorry, honey. I want to help, but when they started throwing around the medical terminology and Latin names for things, it went right over my head. That was your dad’s area, not mine. I don’t think they had any major theories, though. His condition declined so quickly they didn’t have much time to run tests.”
Her voice wavered a bit with that last sentence, and I swallowed thickly, wincing at the thought of the old pain I’d stirred up. I kept my own tone as light as possible. “That’s totally okay, Mom. It was such a long time ago too. I just figured I should check.”
“If I think of anything later, I’ll let you know.” Mom dragged in a breath. “You should never hesitate to ask me about him. I hope you know that. He was an important part of both our lives, and he deserves to have his memory kept alive.”
“I know,” I assured her. “You’ve always done that for me.”
After I’d hung up, a fresh lump of guilt settling in my gut, I thought back to my own memories of Dad’s final days. I’d visited him in the hospital. Maybe I hadn’t had much medical knowledge back then, and my impressions were clouded by my childhood guilt and grief, but I might have noticed something useful.
The first visit, he’d seemed pretty okay, just a little weak as he’d sat in the hospital bed. I’d brought one of my stuffed animals to keep him company when Mom and I couldn’t be there, and he’d thanked me and tucked it under his arm. He’d told me that he’d be home soon, that it’d all be okay, and I think in that moment he’d really believed it.
The second time… I didn’t like remembering that.
He’d been falling into a sort of delirium, maybe from a fever. While I’d been talking to him, he’d started babbling about things that made no sense, but sounding like he was really bothered by them. Mom had left us alone together while she asked the doctor some questions, but she’d overheard his change in tone from outside the door and rushed back in to usher me away before he’d rambled on too long. But just that minute or so when he’d been totally out of sorts was burned into my memory.
He'd veered randomly from one subject to another. Somewhere in there, he’d gone on about my purple bike with the training wheels, the one he’d taught me to ride on. Then he’d sounded almost angry, talking accusingly about a fish…Maybe it was the broken catfish—they did this.
I assumed that he’d seen a torn up catfish in the flood waters when he’d been coming to the beach. He must have wondered if it was my fault he’d gotten sick too, even if he hadn’t wanted to say that to me outright.
Except possibly he hadn’t gotten sick at all. What else had there been? He’d ranted a bit about the hospital’s coffee.Tastes like charcoal mixed with chalk.He’d claimed the picture hanging on the wall across from his bed had started moving, sliding around. It was his yell about the picture that’d brought Mom back in.
None of that connected any dots that I could think of. I definitely didn’t see how anything he’d ranted about could point to what would have gotten him murdered or who would have done it.
If he had been murdered. I still wasn’t sure if Logan was right. But as I got up from the café table, the knowledge gripped me like never before.
I wouldn’t be able to get the possibility out of my head until I’d seen definitive proof that it was or wasn’t true. I had to join the Vigil’s investigation and find out what really happened. If nothing else, I owed it to Dad.
CHAPTERFIVE
Madelyn
It was unnerving how much the vibe had shifted in the Vigil’s office. This was the first time I’d joined them since the mess at the warehouse, and it felt as if I’d never set foot in the room before.
The change wasn’t all bad. Logan had nodded to me as I’d come in with a wary glance but none of his previous hostility and sounded almost friendly when he’d asked how I was doing. Slade had dragged me over to the table in the middle of the room to sit next to him, his leg resting against mine with a companionable sort of intimacy that reminded me of our library hookup without being in any way obscene. My presence seemed to be accepted and even welcomed for once instead of an intrusion.
But the atmosphere in the room had darkened as if a storm cloud hung over the space. Every look that passed between the guys and every comment they exchanged held an ominous import that I’d never been aware of before.
