“I’m fine, really. The house is no longer a crime scene, they cleared it this morning, but I’m not about to visit the attic, if that’s what you’re worried about.”
“Tell you what, Lucy, you stay right there, and I’ll be over with some takeout, all right? Sherlock and Coop won’t be back until late, a flight delay. I’ll call you later.”
She scarcely heard him. She punched off her cell and stared at the ring. That word—SEFYLL—when she’d said it aloud, when she’d said it correctly, time seemed to stop dead for a second or two, then replay itself. That sounded ridiculous. Was she being crazy? Maybe saying the word right on the ring conjured up some sort of weird hypnotic suggestion that made it appear that way.
Lucy took a deep breath, picked up the Chinese lamp that stood atop a side table, and flung it against the fireplace. As it shattered, she said clearly, “SEFYLL.”
Everything stopped, and suddenly the lamp was back on the end table, whole, untouched. She saw what seemed to be a small shudder in time itself. Another couple of seconds passed—nothing happened. She ran to the lamp, put her hands on it, and waited. More seconds passed, and still nothing happened, nothing at all. The Chinese lamp she’d hurled against the fireplace and smashed into a gazillion pieces was sitting, solid and unharmed, on the tabletop. She sat down in the large leather chair at her grandmother’s desk and stared in front of her. She wasn’t crazy, and if something unbelievable was happening, something incredible, she wouldn’t let it scare her stupid. She would understand it.
She began to experiment.
She held the ring—she learned she had to be holding it in her hand—and said the word clearly. Each time she did, the digital clock on her cell phone stopped, showed a time exactly eight seconds before, and with no pause, began to tick forward again. She hurled the lamp against the fireplace three more times just as she had before, and kept her eye on the second hand of her watch. As before, the lamp seemed to reassemble itself and the second hand on her watch always turned backward exactly eight seconds until it swept forward again.
Could she change anything she wanted in those eight seconds?
Lucy sat back down in the leather chair, her grandmother’s ring still on her middle finger, her hand fisted to keep it in place. Her grandfather had stolen it, hidden it, so she couldn’t use it again. Because he was afraid of what she would do with it? No, because she was going crazy, that was why. But her grandfather hadn’t been sure Lucy could make it work. Did it work for her only because it had been her grandmother’s? Evidently so.
Her father had seen his mother stab his father to death, but had he known about the ring? He must have known something about it; she’d heard her grandmother screaming about it to him the day her grandfather died.
The doorbell rang, but she ignored it, barely heard it.
Then someone was pounding on the door. She heard Dillon’s voice calling out, “Lucy! Come, open the door!”
She looked over at the giant clock in the corner. It was well past six o’clock. It was dark.
She slid the ring off her finger and quickly slipped it onto the gold chain she wore about her neck, stuffed it into her shirt. She realized as she ran to the door that her middle finger, once warm where she’d worn the ring, now felt cold.
“Lucy, open this door or I’m breaking in.”
“I’m coming, Dillon, I’m coming.” And she thought, tears stinging her eyes, Grandmother, if only you’d had the ring with you when my mother was hit by that drunk. If only.
CHAPTER 35
Lucy finally opened the door, wondering whether Dillon would really have broken it down. He looked at the banked excitement in her eyes, watched her as she said in a voice as bright as a new penny, “Sorry, Dillon, I was washing up,” and knew she was closed down tight. For the moment.
So he handed her the bag stuffed with Chinese takeout that included her favorite moo shu pork, and followed her to the bright kitchen to chow down on his own vegetarian delight. As they sipped the lovely hot tea that Sun Li, his and Sherlock’s favorite waiter, had insisted he take with him, he told her about Sherlock and Coop’s breakthrough in New York at the First Precinct, and showed her a printout of the sketch of Bruce Comafield that Sherlock had e-mailed to him.
Lucy bounced up and down, hooted. “Sherlock is unbelievable! Oh, yeah, it’s him. This is incredible, Dillon. Can you believe he’s wearing those same aviator glasses? Why don’t we go get him right now? Let’s grab him and haul him in.”
“Sorry, but we already thought of that. According to Lansford, no one has seen his aide since the evening we visited him at the Willard. No word as to his whereabouts yet.”
“We spooked him. I guess we should revisit all the witnesses in the other cities, see if anyone else saw this guy with her.”
Savich nodded and took another bite of the vegetarian fried rice.
Bruce Comafield. They were nearly to home plate. Lucy looked over at Dillon, marveled at him. And at Sherlock. Would she have been good enough to get that information and sketch out of the witness, Thomas Hurley? She didn’t know, but she’d missed out on an incredible find. She became suddenly aware of the ring pressing itself like a living thing against her skin, her incredible ring that had cost her grandfather his life. It was more than she could begin to understand, or begin to deal with at that moment. No, she had to focus here. She wanted more than anything to find Comafield, and she wanted Savich to trust her again with that assignment, rather than worry about her. She wanted to show him she was ready to throw herself back into the hunt for Kirsten Bolger. It hit her between the eyes that her boss was too perceptive, that any lie she told him, he’d recognize easily as a lie. Maybe he could help her.
“Lucy, you want some of this rice?”
She snapped back, fully aware he’d seen her distraction and known it for what it was.
She spooned up some rice and took a big bite, not caring if it was getting cold, because she hadn’t eaten since that morning and she was starving. As she chewed, she felt the weight of her sins pushing down on her head. She swallowed the last bite, fanned her hands in front of her. “So much has happened. I didn’t mean to worry you or alarm you. It was very nice of you to care enough about me to come over, and then you brought me dinner and told me about Bruce Comafield.”
A black eyebrow went up. He said in that deep, calm voice of his, “It’d be nice if you’d talk to me, Lucy, if you’d tell me the truth about how you’re feeling, and what you’re thinking.”
She looked guilty, she knew it to her heels, but she couldn’t help it. She could keep her mouth shut, and so she did. She shook her head.
He searched her face, then nodded as if to say, So be it. “Coop will catch you up on everything. He and Sherlock will be back from New York later tonight. I’m thinking things will move smartly forward now that we know about Bruce Comafield. If he was her supply line from the real world, he can’t be that any longer. Now he’ll be with her full-time.” He tapped his fingers on the tabletop. “I’m concerned about you, Lucy. Coop told me you visited a safe-deposit box today, picked up something that belonged to your grandfather?”
She nodded. “Yes, and it upset me, Dillon.” She drew in a deep breath. “The box contained an old ring, but nothing more than that.” She kept her head down so he couldn’t see the lie in her eyes, and pulled the ring out of her shirt and showed it to him.
He held out his hand. He could tell she didn’t want to, but she unfastened the gold chain, let the ring slide into her palm. She waited only a moment, then gave it to him. She watched him examine it. “Was there any explanation of this ring in the box?”