Street Smart

“Thanks.” Francesca wondered what someone her sister’s age would say. It had been less than fifteen years since she was a teenager, but it seemed like fifty. She’d felt more confident as a prostitute. “You need a ride?” she asked. “We could share.”

“Nah,” the girl said. “My ride’s coming.”

On a street corner? Was that the call the girl had made?

“I had an appointment up the street. They’re picking me up there.”

And she hadn’t been able to use the phone at her appointment? The reporter in Francesca asked questions while the big sister prayed this child could help her. She’d talked to more than a hundred people in three days.

But before she could haul out her picture, an unmistakable look of fear appeared on the younger girl’s face. “I gotta go,” she called as she turned, and ran across the street—against the light. She’d been watching a navy sedan stopped at the corner of the Strip, waiting to turn toward them.

If she hadn’t had only one mission left in life—to find Autumn—Francesca would have followed her. Followed the blue sedan to see if the girl climbed inside. And to see who was driving.

Could’ve been her mother, of course. And maybe the girl had sneaked away to call her boyfriend.

But somehow Francesca didn’t think so.

This girl had seen too much of life to be afraid of a little parental displeasure. And the fear on her face had been more than concern about being grounded.

Sliding down the familiar brick wall, welcoming the heat against her back and ignoring the light scrape of brick against skin, Francesca wondered, not for the first time, if she had the stomach for what might lie ahead.

Or, more accurately, if she had the heart.

Because she’d figured something out during these days on the streets. If Autumn was more than a passerby, if she’d been living in this town, finding her means of survival here, she wasn’t going to be anything like the young girl Francesca remembered.

And chances were, she’d done things, seen things, her older sister had never, in all her travels, done or seen.

Deciding to give the dinner she’d packed in her satchel to the next homeless person who passed, Francesca leaned her head against the wall and closed her eyes. She’d covered some pretty brutal things during her career. Natural disasters. Murders. Fires. Crime scenes.

Those she could handle.

The death of innocence she could not.

“You have today off, don’t you, Luke?”

Finishing the toaster waffle and coffee he’d fixed himself before dawn Thursday morning, Luke didn’t even lift his glance from the morning paper as he nodded. But the muscles in the back of his neck, and everywhere else he could possibly feel tension, stiffened. He’d hoped to be gone before she got up.

With things growing more tense at work every day that an explanation for the big wins eluded him, and no news on the baby front, he’d made plans for a little stress relief.

“What are you going to do?”

Be free. Out. Away from you.

“Jump.” He spoke almost belligerently, hating himself for doing it even while he deliberately chose the word.

She sank into the chair next to him, her short gray hair askew, her lined face bare and ancient. “Please, son,” she said, watery blue eyes filling with tears. “Please don’t.” She took a deep breath, looking down at the table, one shaky hand clutching the other. “Not ever again,” she said, her voice stronger as her gaze turned on him. “I can’t stand it,” she said. “I can’t sit here knowing that you’re up there, jumping out of planes, falling to your death. I just can’t stand it.”

He’d known his announcement would upset her. He hadn’t expected the shrill voice, the panic in her eyes. He’d been skydiving for years. Had honors packed away in a box from his years as a marine, when he’d been one of the best jumpers they’d had.

It was the one thing he did on a regular basis, just for himself.

“Mom,” he said, his voice softening even as his chest constricted. “You know I’m not going to fall to my death.” He’d expected a fight today—about her wanting him to spend his day off at home, with her. He’d assumed that if she’d caught him before he left, their argument would’ve been about his leaving the house. Not this.

“Luke, no!” Her translucent, bony hand clutched his forearm. “You have to promise me! You’ll never go up there again. You can’t! If you jump, you’ll die. I just know it!” She was sobbing, screaming. He didn’t have to look at her to know the lost, glazed look that would’ve come to Carol Everson’s eyes.

“Mom,” he said, trying to emulate the calm but firm tone his father had always used. Trying, and—as always—failing. “I’ve been jumping since I was sixteen. You’ve watched many times—as recently as last month. Dad explained it all to you, remember?” Turning from the table he leaned forward, holding both of her cold hands between his own warm fingers. “You’re okay with this,” he reminded her.

Jumping was the only thing that had kept him sane during his years as a teenager in this house. He’d joined a club at school and, with the help of his father, had managed to hide it from his mom until he knew for sure he was going to like it. Then they’d had to convince her he was perfectly safe doing this.

“No, Luke!” Her eyes glistened wildly, her entire body starting to shake in the long flannel nightgown she was wearing in spite of the fact that it was summer and she lived in the desert. “I can’t allow it! Please, Luke! I saw a documentary on deaths from skydiving on television last week. Please tell me you won’t go! Not ever again!”

Tears streamed down her face as Luke looked helplessly on.

“The documentary was about the teams that perform aerial tricks. I don’t do any trick jumping,” he said slowly, softly. “I always wear a backup chute. I don’t take any unnecessary chances. I don’t even free-fall very far anymore.” He mentally crossed his fingers on that last one. Free-falling was the best part of the jump and he held the state record.

“No!” She choked. Luke handed her the half-drunk glass of water he’d poured for himself. She didn’t even see it. “Drink,” he said, raising it to her lips.

The glass lay against her lower lip, but he didn’t tip it. Her mouth hung open, unresponsive, and he knew what would happen if he attempted to force the liquid into her. It would dribble down her chin to her chest while she remained completely unaware.

“Oh, God,” she moaned. “Oh, God.” She was rocking back and forth, shaking her head.

Setting the glass on the table, Luke stood, frowning as he stared down at her. She wasn’t going to take skydiving from him, too. Anxiety disorders or not, she just wasn’t.

“Mom.” He tried again, squatting down, meeting her at eye level. He lifted a hand to her face, drying the tears, cupping her cheek. “It’s okay. Shh, it’s okay.”

“It’s not okay, Luke,” she said, her voice trembling with emotions he would never, in a million lifetimes, understand. “It’s not okay. You have no idea what you’re talking about.”

With a heavy sigh he dropped his hand. Straightened. “I’m here, aren’t I?” Shame warmed his skin as he heard the resentment he spent his life trying not to feel. Or at least to hide.

“It’s not okay!” she screamed, rocking, crying, this small pitiful creature who’d borne him.

“I’ll stay home today.” He heard the words, uttered a thousand times before, as if from a distance. Mostly he felt the familiar and deadening weight of obligation and debilitating resentment. Only thoughts of the life that was coming, the son he’d soon have, kept him calm.

“No!” she screamed again. “Tell me, Luke! Promise me!” Head raised, exposing a neck that was so thin, so frail-looking, he could hardly believe it. “You won’t ever jump again!”

Staring at her, Luke couldn’t make the words come. It had been this way for as long as he could remember. It had started with birthday parties. If his father was home he’d been able to go, but as an executive with Biamonte Industries—a position he’d needed to hold to pay his wife’s medical expenses and to keep her world contained enough to allow her to live outside a professional facility—Marshall Everson had had to put in ungodly hours, which also included a fair amount of travel. In later years there’d been dates, games, even a senior trip that Luke had to give up. He’d never been able to sustain membership on a team, be on student council, run for class president, join a club. He’d skydived. It was something he could do privately. On his own time or, rather, the time his father arranged for him.

“Mom…”

It was going to be different with his son. He was going to hire a nanny, ten nannies if he had to, to ensure that his son had all the opportunities he had not.

“Say it, Luke!” Falling forward with the force of the sob that followed, she lay there, chest to her knees, moaning. “Oh, God. I’m going to be…”

Luke grabbed the kitchen trash, put it in front of her and turned his back. When she was finished he handed her a wet cloth, wordlessly waiting while she wiped her face.

She’d be calmer now, at least for a while. She’d be able to swallow her medication and give it time to work.

But this wasn’t the end of it. He knew that.