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Mac parked across the street from the lavishly painted Victorian house. No bland grays here. It always made him smile to see it. He thought there were at least six colors. The base was blue. Then there was plum, green, yellow, and a darker blue. But there might be another color or two. He crossed the street, went up the steps to a small porch and knocked.
Kate answered the door. “Mac!” she exclaimed, and he thought she genuinely was glad to see him. Which was weird, but a relief. “Come in! Mom! Mac is here. Can you stay for supper?”
Mac laughed. “No,” he said, because he knew that wasn’t a good idea at all. “I really came to see Tim Brandt. Is he home?”
“He is,” Kate agreed. “I’ll get him.”
Naomi Fairchild came out of the kitchen. “Good to see you,” she said. And Mac thought she meant it too. They were nice people, and he suddenly had a nostalgic wish that they were still a part of his life. He shut that down. What was the phrase? Irreconcilable differences? “How are you doing?” she asked.
“Working on a story,” he said. “And last year’s Army of God stuff has popped up. Have you heard anything? What happened to Benjamin Ryan? Or his father?”
“I’d think you’d know, not us,” Naomi said, looking a bit confused. “You’re the reporter.”
Mac shrugged. “Been a lot of stories since then,” he said. “Hundreds actually. You get used to moving on to the next one.” Which was another problem with how they covered cops and courts.
Tim Brandt came down the stairs behind Kate. He was a tall, nerdy guy with brown hair that flopped into his eyes. The hair reminded him of Janet. Mother and son — an uncomfortable relationship for them both. But then Janet had left Tim on her parents’ doorstep to raise, and he’d turned out to be an insufferable prick — which shouldn’t have been a surprise, given her father had been the preacher in an evangelical community in bumfuck eastern Oregon. Tim had been a part of those who harassed Janet for her story in the package about the anti-abortion clinics. He hadn’t known she was his mother — just that she was the daughter of his adopted parents who had spurned them and their beliefs.
And one of the consequences of all of that, was that Tim Brandt now knew who his mother was. It hadn’t gone well. But Tim had helped him last spring with some research to support Janet’s role at the newspaper, and Mac had to admit the young man was bright. Still a prick. He was 20, and fast-tracking through UW headed toward med school.
“Mom OK?” he asked, then reddened. Mac raised an eyebrow. He didn’t know Tim was calling Janet Mom. Things had progressed.
But when he said something about it, Tim shrugged it off. “It slipped out,” he mumbled. “I’m not sure she’d welcome it.”
“Pretty sure she would,” Mac disagreed. “But you could just ask: ‘Janet, is it OK if I call you Mom?’ That way you don’t surprise her.”
Tim shrugged again. Mac hated that shrug thing. I’m getting old, he thought again.
“You were looking for me?” Tim asked.
“I need information about what happened after the Army of God,” Mac said. “Like to Mark Ryan and the Crisis Pregnancy Center, or to Benjamin Ryan. Or to that church where Steve Whitman attended?”
Tim looked confused, and started to reply. Naomi Fairchild interrupted. “Let’s have this conversation on the patio,” she said. “It’s not that cold.”
Mac nodded. The Fairchild home was a boarding house for young Christians going to the University of Washington. Probably it was best not to have this conversation where others might hear. He followed her out to the small courtyard. The space was enclosed by brick walls, and a tree was growing at one end. There were chairs and a table under the tree — some kind of tree that had red leaves in the fall. It made a mess under it, but it was pretty. The courtyard was one of Mac’s favorite places. He wasn’t sure why. Maybe he needed to make something like this in his and Lindy’s backyard, currently a patch of grass surrounded by rhododendrons.
Tim took a seat across from Mac; Naomi went back into the house and brought out glasses of iced tea.
Tim sighed. “Mac, I’d tell you what you want to know, except I don’t understand what you’re looking for. Start over?”
Mac considered that. So he told him about the drive-by shooting and that Nick Rodriguez had come out of a coma mumbling about how the Army of God and the Sensei followers had teamed up.
“That nice man?” Naomi exclaimed. “How horrible.”
Mac smiled at her. Not many would call the gruff lieutenant a nice man and mean it.
“So, I guess I’m asking what was the fallout in the churches after that?” Mac asked.
Timothy scowled. “There wasn’t any fallout,” he said. “Why would there be?”
Mac looked at him blankly. “Army of God sympathizers helped blow up those clinics? Weren’t they church members?”
“And they’re heroes to a lot of people in their churches,” Tim answered. Mac didn’t ask if he was one of them. Not going to get into that fight. “But, there are many churches, Mac. I don’t go to that one your co-worker goes to, for instance. It’s too big and too far from here. I go to a small one here in the U District. It’s more liberal than I like, but it’s convenient. And believe me, none of them were involved. They were angry that the clinics were bombed. But Valley View Community Church? Completely different case.”
“OK,” Mac said slowly. “So, what about Valley View Community? That’s where Whitman goes?”
Naomi set her iced tea down. “You need the background on this,” she said. “So, let me tell you about Valley View. It’s a big, non-denominational church. Ironically, those churches began because groups of Christians rejected the rule-ladened traditional evangelical and fundamentalist churches. But that’s left them susceptible to a different problem. They’re usually led by a very charismatic preacher, who may or may not have any theological training at all. Ten years ago, Valley View was a dozen families meeting in a local school on Sundays. Now it’s got 2,000 members, and a new church building that’s hard to describe.”
“I went to one of those when I was in Mount Vernon last spring,” Mac interjected. “Big screens, computerized music shows. It had a gymnasium and a school right there.”
“New Life?” Naomi asked sharply. Mac nodded.
“Well, that’s interesting,” she said. “I’ll come back to that. So, the pastor at Valley View? Last year there were accusations of assault that went public. At first, the church turned on the woman, but then others came forward. Last spring, the deacons asked for his resignation. And they began a search for a new head pastor. The church has about a dozen assistant pastors, many of whom were looking at applying. And factions were developing.”
“How do you know all of this?” Mac asked. Assault? And he’s asked to resign? Why wasn’t he in jail? Well, that was something he’d save to ask Janet. He didn’t recall any charges against a Rev. So-and-so. He set that aside to focus on Naomi’s story. “You don’t go there, do you?” He had gone to church with Kate; he was pretty sure that hadn’t been the one.
“No,” she said. “That church we attend is CMA, but a friend from high school goes to Valley View. She and her family are quite immersed in it. But Mac, here’s where this story intersects with what you’re asking about, I think. The deacons hire one of their own to run the search, since he’s at loose ends.”
“Steve Whitman,” Mac said, as the light bulb went on.
She nodded. “So, Steve Whitman does, and apparently he does a good job of it. A lot of churches would have split over it. But Valley View didn’t. They had guest pastors from the region preaching each Sunday, but apparently the clear choice was Rev. Daniel Nielsen, the pastor of New Life from Mount Vernon.”
Mac winced. “He’s one of those anti-Obama, pro-gun freaks,” he protested. “Anti-gay, anti-abortion, all that.”
“Well so is Valley View,” Tim interjected. “But yeah, I hear he’s pushing them farther out there into that way of thinking.”
Last Mac had heard, Tim Brandt was in that camp. He really wanted to ask him that. Focus!
“And Rev. Nielsen, in turn, hired a new staff director,” Naomi continued. “He’d gotten well acquainted with Steve Whitman during the hiring process, and so he asked Whitman to become the staff director. They both started the Sunday after Labor Day.”
Mac frowned. “And you seem to think this connects up?” he asked slowly.
Naomi grimaced. “A couple of weeks ago, I had lunch with my friend. She was going off about how they needed to take back law enforcement in this area like they had in Mount Vernon. That the police needed to clean house of those who would interfere with the Lord’s work. That if the police were allowed to follow the Lord’s Word, a year ago would have gone very differently, and the scourge of abortion clinics would be gone from this city.”
Well now, Mac thought. That linked up a number of things, didn’t it? He sat back in his chair. He wondered what Sheriff Pete Norton was doing these days. He had taken a leave of absence pending the outcome of his court case, Mac knew, and he was out on a PR bond. But what was he doing?
Buying guns for Andy Malloy’s gun range?
“Mac, is Janet in danger?” Tim demanded.
Mac nodded. “She was at the house when they did the second drive-by,” he said. It still made him choke up to realize how close he’d come to losing both Janet and Angie. He’d tried to send Angie to safety, but the damn woman hadn’t gone. And he hadn’t know whether to be proud of her or yell at her. Still didn’t. “And someone took another potshot at her Monday coming out of the coffee shop she goes to most mornings.”
Tim frowned. “You looking after her?” he asked. He didn’t look at Mac. For most of the last year, Tim had insisted he didn’t care about his mother. It had gradually changed. He didn’t like admitting to it, Mac knew, but Tim cared about Janet. Not nearly as fiercely as Janet cared about her son, but it was there. Hard not to respond to someone who cared about you like Janet cared about Tim.
“I’m trying,” Mac said. “Hard to do when she doesn’t listen. But yeah, there’s a safe house.” He shut up. These people are not your allies, he reminded himself. They might be friends, but they are not on the same side. And wasn’t that a weird combo? Were they friends? He wasn’t sure he knew the answer.
Tim chuckled at that. He looked at the courtyard, and then back to Mac. “You’ve built a team to look into it?”
“Why do you say that?” Mac asked.
“Because that’s what you do,” Tim countered. “You did it when you went after Janet to rescue her from Jehovah’s Valley. You did it when you went up into the mountains. Even with Whitman, you looked around, saw who might have information and you built a team of people to get it for you. Don’t you know that’s what you do?”
Mac looked at him blankly. Well, yeah, he did do that, he acknowledged to himself. A posse. A squad. A team.
So, had he ever been as much of a loner as he thought? He set that aside. He was developing a list of personal angst to think about later, he thought sourly. Maybe that’s how he’d celebrate his 30th birthday.
“So?” Mac said defensively.
“I want on it,” Tim said. “I have knowledge and contacts you don’t have. You don’t have a clue about church and religion. I do.”
“You also have classes to attend,” Mac countered, buying time.
“Mac, I’m in class six hours a week this term,” he said. “On two days. Everything else is independent study. My advisor wants me to graduate early, and he solved it by arranging this for me. I like it. The two classes I’m actually present for are interesting. The others are more interesting now that I don’t have to deal with idiots in class.”
Mac snorted. He’d met Tim’s advisor. He had a hunch he wanted Tim gone for reasons of his own. Tim was incredibly smart, but he was also abrasive and harshly judgmental. And wouldn’t that go over in the mix at Parker house? He grinned.
“How is Eli Andrews doing, anyway?” he asked, totally off subject, but he’d been wondering.
“They elected him pastor last summer,” Tim said. “He’s doing really well. The Valley likes him.”
Mac liked happy endings, even the bizarre ones like a homeless vet who needed to go home to his separatist Christian community to find himself again.
“And he and Janet got divorced,” Tim added. “I don’t know if you heard that.”
No, he hadn’t. He nodded at the information, though. “OK,” Mac said. “Pack a bag. We’re all living at the safe house. You’ll have to do that too. Someone will give you a ride to campus when you need one.”
Tim nodded, and went inside. Mac tried to decide if Tim’s phone or laptop would threaten security. He didn’t see how. This was not a team addition the other side would expect. Mac grinned.
Then he glanced toward the shadows. “You might as well come out,” he said. “I know you’re there.”
Naomi looked up at that, and she saw her daughter. She smiled. “I’ll get more iced tea.”
Kate sat down at the table. “You like this courtyard,” she observed.
He nodded. “I always have.”
“Did you hear? I’m getting married,” she said, and gestured with her left hand.
“I saw that on Facebook,” he admitted. “Are you happy?”
She nodded slowly, with a half-smile on her face. “I know it happened fast,” she said. “But I love him. We fit, you know? But also? Being with you, taught me a lot about what I wanted. And so when I met him, I knew.”
Mac laughed at that. “Being with me taught you that you wanted someone else,” he teased.
“Mac!” she said, and then giggled, because it was true. “And you? Have you found someone?”
He nodded. “Yeah, I think I have,” he said. “I’ve been dating a photographer from work. And like you say, we fit.”
“Is she the one who took those photos last spring?” Kate asked. “They were awesome.”
He nodded. “She’s really talented,” he said. “And you? Are you Professor Fairchild yet?”
Kate still had that smile on her face, and he wasn’t sure what it meant. A bit wistful? And some affection? “I started the research methods class this term for my PhD,” she said. “You’re very encouraging, you know?”
Mac laughed. “Not what most people say,” he said. “But I’m glad you’re going for your doctorate.”
Tim came back, carrying a small suitcase and his laptop. He had a backpack — of books, Mac guessed — over his shoulder. “I’m ready.”
Mac nodded. He touched Kate lightly on the shoulder. “Good to see you,” he said sincerely.
She smiled up at him, and he walked away. Walked back into the house. And then out the front door. Naomi followed him out. “They do love each other,” she said.
“Good,” Mac said, although he wondered why it was so important to them to tell him that. “Good to see you as well, Naomi.”
She patted his cheek, and turned to go back inside. “Don’t be a stranger, Mac,” she said. “Sunday dinner invite is always open.”
Mac headed across the street and clicked the fob to unlock his pickup. Tim went around the other side and got in. “I do not understand those two women,” Mac said as he pulled away from the curb.
Tim laughed. “They think of you as a stray cat,” he said. “And you’ve been rehomed, now, but they want to make sure you’re doing all right.”
Mac grinned. That was exactly what it felt like, he conceded. Tim nailed it.
“Don’t fret about it,” Tim advised. “All of their boarders, half the faculty, including my advisor, and any foreign exchange student looking a bit lost? Just stray cats to be taken in and rehomed.”
Mac laughed.