"I understand. Maybe I should have just kept my mouth shut about the sheets, Lucy. I thought you'd want to know what the police had found. But this could have waited till tomorrow. I'm sorry I brought it up. I should have left it to Lauren and Cozy. I apologize."
"Don't. I appreciate it, Alan. I appreciate all you've done. Coming over here tonight was kind."
"I'll tell Lauren I was here, Lucy."
"I know. It makes no difference. By this time tomorrow I won't have many secrets left. You know," she added, "I told you I was going to make the rest of the phone calls to the Ramps that are listed in the phone book. I did, reached three more. Two of them I'm not sure I can rule out, so I'm going to go track them down tomorrow in person. With all that's happened tonight… I know I'm going to feel like getting out of Boulder. Maybe I'll get lucky and find the kid."
I knew that everything Lucy was suggesting was true. Whatever scrutiny she had received from the media up until then was only a warm-up to the firestorm she could expect after the news of her relationship to Susan Peterson hit the wires in the morning. And, regardless of the press coverage, one of us did have to continue our efforts to try to find Ramp.
"You'll go in the morning?"
She nodded. "Yeah. One of them lives all the way out near Agate."
"Where's Agate?"
"Out east on I-70, just before you get to Limon."
I blurted, "Limon is where Ramp and Paul played around with the explosives."
She cocked her head. "You didn't tell me that."
"I thought I did."
"Well, you didn't."
"My patient told me that Paul went out to some ranch near Limon and he and Ramp blew up a car or something."
"You didn't tell me any of this." The suffix "you idiot" was understood by both of us.
"I'm sorry."
"There's a listing out near Agate for a man named Herbert Ramp. Herbert's dead, but his widow, Ella, answered the phone. When I asked about a son or grandson, she kind of hung up on me."
"So it may be him?"
"You say the two boys played around with bombs out there? Damn right it may be him. I'm definitely going to go talk to her tomorrow."
"Maybe I should do it instead, Lucy. She may be wary of a cop showing up at her door."
"But a shrink from Boulder won't raise her suspicions at all?"
The tendons in the back of my neck felt like rebar. "I'm not sure what's best, which one of us should meet her. Let me think about it overnight, okay? We'll talk in the morning?"
"Yeah. Call me around nine; I think I'm going to try to sleep in a little bit. Use my cell; I'm not going to be answering my phone."
I stood to leave and opened my arms to give Lucy a hug. First, she dropped the pillow, then she leaned into the embrace with a hunger I didn't expect. When she finally released me, I turned toward the door. My hand on the knob, I stopped and asked, "Lucy, were you having an affair with Royal?"
The silence that followed was eerie. For the first few seconds, I suspected that she wasn't going to respond, and I wasn't surprised. I was already questioning my judgment in asking the question. Finally, I turned my head to look at her to examine the impact of my question.
The cuckoo clock chirped twice.
Lucy had spun away from me. Although I couldn't be sure from the reflection she made in the glass doors, I thought she was crying.
Our eyes met in the black glass. She said, "I wish it was that simple, Alan. I wish it was that simple."
Outside, the snow wasn't sticking to the streets, but the sidewalks were wet. The tree buds and flowers looked as though they'd been frosted.
CHAPTER 29
The alarm clock cracked me awake at six-thirty. Lauren was already up with Grace. Before I climbed in the shower, I wasted a minute trying to decide how many hours of sleep I'd had. Before I reached a number that felt correct, I concluded that the answer was simply "not enough."
After a quick shower and shave I joined my family in the kitchen. I was most of the way through a condensed rendition of the previous night's events for Lauren's benefit when my pager went off. Moments later, I was back in the master bedroom closet trying to simultaneously get dressed and maintain a conversation with Naomi Bigg.
She wasted no time. "Can I see you today? Any time at all. I'll leave work. Please."
"Just a second," I said while I zipped up my trousers and began to thread a belt around my waist. "I have to go get my calendar." I moved from the closet to the bedroom and retrieved my schedule from beside the bed. I was still undecided about trying to run out to Limon or Agate to see Ella Ramp. I didn't know where I could stick an emergency appointment.
She said, "Please, please. What we've been talking about with the kids? It's come to a head, I think. What you've been-what I've been… you know. Anyway, this morning, I found a… I found something that's convinced me that I need to…" Her voice faded away. "Please," she repeated.
Almost impulsively, I said, "Four-thirty this afternoon. I'm afraid that's all I have, Naomi."
"Four-thirty? Is that right? Okay, okay."
I could feel the pressure building. "Can it wait till then? Do you want to take a minute right now, Naomi, and tell me what-"
She hung up.
"I guess not," I said aloud.
"You guess not what?" Lauren asked from the doorway. Grace was asleep in her arms.
"A patient hung up on me in the middle of our conversation."
"Oh," she said, disinterested. She tilted her head back toward the kitchen. "The story about Lucy's mother is on the news. They make it sound awful. As though the fact that Susan is Lucy's mother gives Lucy a reason to murder Royal. It doesn't make any sense."
"They don't know about the wet spot?"
Lauren covered Grace's ears.
"No, they don't know about the wet spot."
"Well, I'm not surprised the press is making it look bad. That seems to be their job," I said. "I'm late-I need to get downtown. You're okay with Grace until Viv gets here?"
"I'm fine," she replied. She kissed the top of the baby's head. "We're great."
The previous night's snow was history. The faintest reminder of the storm still clung as transparent white frosting feathering the highest reaches of the Flatirons, but otherwise the morning was brilliant and warm and the city bore no evidence of the midnight flurries.
Lucy didn't answer her cell when I tried her a few minutes before nine, nor when I tried again at nine forty-five.
I finished with my nine forty-five patient right on time at ten-thirty. As soon as he was out the door, I checked my voice mail and retrieved two messages. One was a cancellation by my one o'clock, the other another call from Naomi.
"It's me again. I'm sorry I'm so scattered. You said four-thirty, didn't you? If that's not right, call me at the office. I can't tell you how much I need to see you. There's another bomb. That lawyer."
That was it.
There's another bomb. That lawyer.
I replayed the message to assure myself that that was what she had said.
There's another bomb. That lawyer.
Shit. I decided that I couldn't wait any longer to find out what Ramp was up to. I called Lucy one more time. Finally, she answered. She was already far from Boulder-at a diner outside Fort Lupton where she'd stopped to have a late breakfast-on her way to the eastern plains. She didn't argue when I told her that I wanted to meet her. I jotted down directions to Ella Ramp's ranch, which was almost precisely halfway between Limon and Agate, and I hustled out the door. From my car I canceled lunch with a colleague and all my remaining therapy appointments until my four-thirty emergency session with Naomi.