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DETECTIVE MILLER CLICKED his pen twice and glanced at his notebook as though checking for discrepancies. “Okay, let me go over this one more time. Dr. Devlin had your sister kidnapped by Mr. Fillmore and threatened to hurt her if you didn’t come to the lab.”
“Yes.”
“His son shot Mr. Fillmore in the chest and Devlin ordered you to heal him by playing the piano?”
Emma nodded. She’d been allowed to go home with her parents the night before after preliminary questioning, but the detectives were back for another round. Her hands still shook so much this morning she hoped he didn’t ask her to prove she could play.
He grunted, his lips set in a thin line. “Unbelievable.”
Her mom and Kylie sat next to her on the couch, Kylie clutching her arm, her face pressed close. “That man was bad,” she said. “He took me in a van and tied me up.”
Emma put her arms around her little sister and kissed the top of her head. “Don’t worry. He won’t be back,” she promised.
“Definitely not,” Detective Johnson murmured from across the room.
“Can you tell me how your brother knew you were in danger from Dr. Devlin? How does he fit into this whole thing?”
“He was trying to protect me. Mr. Fillmore has been following him ever since he started looking into his birth records. We spotted him at the hospital but ditched him there. After we found out Dr. Brock was murdered, Zander suspected him as the murderer but couldn’t prove it. He thought he would put me in jeopardy, so decided to stay away. But then I saw someone parked outside on our street, watching the house and I got scared. I called Zander. He was too far away to come quickly, so he called his friend to pick me up. He had no idea Michael was Dr. Devlin’s son or that they were working together.”
Her dad hovered nearby in the doorway, his arms crossed tightly over his chest. His eyes were filled with guilt as though he could have prevented the night’s terror by just being a better father. “Haven’t they been through enough, Detective?”
“One more thing.” He met Emma’s eyes. “When Mr. Fillmore was shot, how close was the shooter standing?”
“Which time?”
“Are you saying he was shot more than once?” The detective raised his brows.
“Yes, Michael shot him twice. Once up close and once from across the room.”
“How do you explain the single wound in his chest? Did Michael miss the first time?”
“No. I told you. Dr. Devlin ordered me to heal him.”
Detective Johnson covered his mouth with his hand and looked at the floor.
Miller probed further. “So, you healed his wound the first time?”
“Only God can heal, Detective. I just play the notes.”
*****
THE DETECTIVES CLIMBED into Miller’s red “66 Datsun and backed out of the driveway. Johnson hated his partner’s car. Called it the death mobile. But he’d owned it since high school and wasn’t going to give it up just because his partner had uppity tastes in transportation. It might not be the most powerful vehicle on the road, but it still got better gas mileage than those SUV’s hogging the highways.
Johnson yawned and rolled his window down a crack. “It’s hotter than the Bahamas in here. Can’t you get that thing fixed?”
“Sorry. It’s got two settings. Hotter ‘n heck and Frostbite frigid. Which do you prefer? They said I needed to replace it.” He rolled his eyes. “Like that’s gonna happen.
Heaters for this make and model are hard to come by.”
“I wonder why,” Johnson muttered.
“Because it’s a work of art.”
He left Hanover behind and slipped onto the freeway, the little Datsun chugging along at a brisk fifty-five mph.
“So, what do you think? These kids really able to heal a bullet wound and blow windows out with their minds?” He snorted and drummed his fingers on the steering wheel. “I don’t know who’s the craziest for believing this junk, the wacky scientist or the kids.”
“Those windows didn’t blow out by themselves, Sam. We might never know what really happened since the video system wasn’t up and running. Sometimes you just have to let it go. There are mysteries in this world that can never be solved. Haven’t you ever heard of Ripley’s Believe it or Not?”
The crime scene at Howard Pharmaceuticals the night before had been like something out of a sci-fi movie. The lab was completely demolished, an entire wall of glass, shattered. No one seemed to know how. When they arrived on the scene it was absolute bedlam. Overturned tables and chairs, glass strewn everywhere, three dead: one stabbed with a shard of glass, two shot. One schizophrenic teenager rocking on his haunches over his dead father saying, “voices made him do it,” and a girl who claimed healing powers. Electrical surges had destroyed the hard drives of every computer in the lab, so any evidence that may have corroborated their story of a doctor using his sons as guinea pigs to test an experimental drug was gone.
Neither man knew what to make of Emma Tatum’s statement, but the hospital said Kylie was admitted for radiation treatment two days earlier, then suddenly released with a clean bill of health. They wouldn’t admit to a medical mistake, too afraid of possible lawsuits, and they wouldn’t go on record to admit they believed in miraculous healing. But one nurse had stated–off the record–that there was no other explanation. The girl had sung like an angel and her sister was healed.
Alexander Howard proved to be the biggest mystery. He hadn’t admitted to any super powers, but he was connected all over the place. Miller didn’t believe in coincidence. The boy’s father, Steven Howard, was the new CEO of the company, a perfect case of nepotism since his uncle’s death. Michael Devlin had been his best friend since grade school, and his grandfather just happened to be Marcus Dunbar, former senator and presidential candidate, also a longtime board member of the company. But the boy’s story about being followed by Fillmore seemed to track. What they didn’t understand was why that information was so damning as to be worth killing for. What was it about his birth and adoption that drove one man to kill and another to kidnap?
Miller chewed at the inside of his jaw as he drove. “So, we’ve got an extra shell casing that matches the revolver Michael Devlin used, but no bullet. The girl says both bullets hit Fillmore in the chest, but he only had one enter and exit wound. Unless he shot the second bullet through the exact same hole and the slug’s still rattling around inside Mr. Fillmore’s corpse, which is highly unlikely. But I guess now we wait for the autopsy.”
“I think we should revisit the circumstances of Dr. Kapoor’s alleged suicide. Looks to me like maybe he found out Devlin was experimenting on children and was killed before he could tell anyone.”
Miller picked at his front tooth with a fingernail. “You could be right. It sure would tie everything together.”
“’cept for one thing,” Johnson said, stretching his legs as far as they would go in the tiny car. “What was Devlin planning to do with the kids once he had them trained as super-power ninjas, or whatever?”
“Beats me.” He turned the heater to Frostbite frigid and accelerated to fifty-eight mph.
*****
“THIS IS KINDA WEIRD,” Zander remarked, checking his reflection in the side mirror of the car and smoothing his hair. “I don’t remember ever going to church as a family. Just with Aunt Marion.”
“Well, it’s about time we started a new tradition then, huh?” his mom said and mussed his hair again.
The church parking lot was nearly full. Last minute stragglers greeted one another as they entered through the sanctuary doors. He glanced at his watch. It was almost time to start and he didn’t see Emma anywhere.
“Are you sure they have the right directions?” his dad asked, always concerned about mapping things out ahead of time. “They live in Hanover. Maybe they aren’t as familiar with roads around here as we are.”
“Don’t worry, Dad. I put the address in your GPS and gave it to her.”
“You gave her my GPS?”
Zander grinned. “She said thanks.”
A Dodge Caravan pulled in and moved slowly along looking for an empty space. Zander waved his arm. “That’s them!”
Emma and her family met them at the doors. They made quick introductions all around. Pastor Williams was at the podium praying when they entered the church. Everyone waited at the back of the auditorium for him to finish, except for Emma. She moved quietly up the aisle and sat down at the empty piano bench. The pastor kept on praying, oblivious.
“Lord, thank you for this beautiful winter day. Thank you for all these fine folk showing up this morning to worship you.” He raised his hand in the air. “And Lord, we are grateful for the blessings you’ve bestowed upon us, especially for the gift of Jesus Christ who died that we might live guiltless before you.”
A chorus of “amen” rippled across the auditorium.
“Lord–one more thing. If you could send us a pianist, we would be most grateful. And all the people said...”
“A-men!” The congregation said as one voice.
Emma’s fingers connected with the keys at the exact moment Pastor Williams opened his eyes and realized his prayer had been answered–at least for one Sunday. She played “Joy Unspeakable,” and the people got up and sang along, shouting and waving their arms in the air.
The two families moved together to an empty row close to the front and attempted to sing and clap with the rest of the congregation. Zander didn’t know the words, so he just watched Emma play. A smile stretched across his face and he breathed a silent prayer of his own–a prayer of thankfulness. He remembered the verse in John underlined in his sister’s Bible. It said those that followed Christ would never walk in darkness, because Christ was their light. He no longer heard the voices in the dark of night. He hadn’t for over a week now. He glanced over at his mom. She smiled back at him, swaying and clapping to the beat, blending her bright soprano voice with others around her. He’d never seen her so vibrant and alive. He knew she was off the drugs, but it was something else as well. His dad’s face mirrored the same attributes. Contentment. Joy. Light.
After the service they were invited to stay for potluck in the church basement. While everyone was milling around, meeting and greeting, Zander and Emma escaped outside. Their breath came out in little puffs of mist as they talked about the service, and how cool it was the way their families seemed to click right off. They settled on a stone bench next to the church meditation garden, hunched in their coats against the cold.
A few straggling leaves hung from the maples beside the church, clinging like children, fearful and tottering on the brink. The ground below was covered in crinkled, brown and orange leaves waiting to cushion the fall of the stragglers and take them into the fold. Zander felt much like those remaining leaves.
“I know what you’re thinking,” Emma said, pulling the collar of her coat up around her neck.
“Really? I thought that was my power.”
“Don’t be selfish. I’ll let you play the piano sometime,” she teased.
“Okay, what am I thinking?”
She took his gloved hand in her mitten-clad one and smiled. “That you’re ready to let go now and fall onto the grace of God.”
He raised his brows. “That’s pretty good. You’re a hard act to follow. But I’m going to try anyway.” He stood up and put out his hand.
“Where are we going?”
“Inside. To play the piano.”
“Now?” She laughed and took his hand.
“No better time than the present.”
“Can we eat lunch first?” she asked, following him through the sanctuary doors. “Sour notes tend to squelch my appetite.”
Inside, they were greeted by smiles and open arms, and Kylie demanding, “Where’d you guys go? I was looking for you.”
“Sisters.” Zander said, shaking his head. He picked up Kylie and swung her around. “Can’t live with’em. Can’t live without’em!”