Angel Falling Softly - By Eugene Woodbury Page 0,87

held a pillow under her chin and pulled on the pillowcase. “I, um, promised we’d go see her when she got better.”

“Oh,” David said, following suit on his side of the bed.

“Remember I told you Milada came to the hospital to see Jenny? I think she developed quite an attachment to her.”

“To be honest, she didn’t strike me as the type.”

“No,” Rachel agreed. “But we should go see her. It’s important to Jenny.” Except that the moment Milada saw her, she would realize what had happened. Rachel set the pillow against the headboard and got into bed. “David, do you remember the story of Samuel and Eli?”

“You mean, when Samuel thinks Eli is calling him and gets up and goes to his bedside, and the third time Eli tells him that it is the voice of the Lord calling him?”

“Yes, but do you remember what happens before that?”

He thought it over for a minute. “What did happen before that?”

“Hannah, Samuel’s mother, promised that if she had a son she would give him to the Lord for all the days of his life. That’s why she took him to Eli in the first place.”

“Ah yes. I believe Laura calls it the Rumpelstiltskin story. Or was it Rapunzel?”

“Rapunzel.”

“Maybe it’s just me, but the humans in these fairy tales often behave as badly as the witches and goblins.”

“It’s not just you,” Rachel said quietly.

“So at least Hannah followed through.”

Rachel sighed to herself. If only David were more suspicious, more inclined to read between the lines. He would grab her and shake the truth out of her the way frustrated men did with their wives in television dramas. She knew he was puzzled, curious, and confused about his daughter’s remarkable recovery. But confronted with something beyond his expertise, like most men he resorted with a helpless shrug to Occam’s razor: the simplest, most logical, most obvious explanation—especially when it came to truths with emotional baggage attached—was presumed correct until proved otherwise.

Maybe metaphysical truth or existential truth or scientific truth would make her free. But it was better to live with some lies than drive people crazy with the cold, hard facts. The best lie told in all the scriptures is the lie God tells Abraham. Sarah laughs when told she will bear a child, but when God brings the proposal to Abraham, he tells him that his wife was concerned that she was too old to bear children. Exactly what a guy would tell another guy.

Except that’s not what Sarah said. She said that menopause aside, she just didn’t think the old codger could get it up anymore.

Funnier yet, Abraham was pretty sure that’s what she was laughing about, but Sarah denied it. Two lies in a row.

So Rachel was in good company. Small comfort.

Chapter 47

A guilty conscience needs no accuser

Milada sat behind her desk in her Midtown Manhattan office and stared out the window at the wet, gray day. Fog rolled in off the river. The same as the day Garrick and his men had come for Rakosi. She and her sisters were sent to Cheapside. Their previous lives were summarily thrown away.

Why should the memory of such a fortuitous day wear so heavily on her soul?

The cold rain weighed down her spirits, yet her body burned with a low, pleasant fever. She’d come to the office directly from the hotel. She kept a change of clothes on hand just for these occasions. She couldn’t even remember the man’s name. He’d volunteered no more information than she had. He’d claimed he was single.

Perhaps he was. She never looked for that telling white shadow on the ring finger. But if not, did taking away a memory also take away the guilt? For that matter, did taking away the guilt take away the memory? Was that what she was afraid of losing? Some small, perverse part of herself that missed what they’d had together, just the three—the four—of them, once upon a time in London?

Jane poked her head into the office, breaking her out of her reverie. “Garrick says to turn on your cell phone.”

When she answered her phone, that was Garrick’s first question. “When did you start turning off your phone?”

“Sorry. A bad habit I acquired in Utah.”

“About the proffer—do you want your first offer to appear tough but generous or just tough?”

“Generous enough to make them bite, but not so generous that they’ll settle on the first offer. Give Wylde some push-back room. It’ll strengthen his bargaining position and improve his standing among