Chapter Eight
Mel braced her cell on her shoulder as she made yet another pot of coffee. She watched through the tiny window over her sink as an SUV drove past. Most likely tourists looking for a secluded spot to park their RV.
“I’m not surprised Meyer is trying to shut him up.”
“I figured you wouldn’t be,” Lance said.
She slammed the bag of ground coffee on the counter and scooped out a generous amount, which would probably result in her losing the other half of her stomach lining.
“They’re pros at this game,” Lance added. “If we publish this without a pointed rebuttal from their experts, we get accused of pushing a biased and unbalanced viewpoint.”
“That would be reasonable, if it weren’t for the kind of quotes we get from their experts.”
“Yeah, they’re doing the whole ‘Dr. Woodruff claims he talks to bees’ and ‘Dr. Woodruff’s views are far outside the mainstream’ dance,” Lance said.
“I figured the ad hominem stuff would be their only real move.” Mel poured water into the coffeemaker, then remembered the carafe wasn’t in place.
The first drops sizzled on the hot plate as she scrambled to get the pot under the spout.
“I’ll need to contact Dr. Woodruff and explain the situation to him.
See if I can rebut their rebuttal. Can you send me the quotes they want to use? ”
“Already done. The article looks great so far by the way,” Lance said. “You’ve got your usual human-interest angle in there and Dr. Woodruff comes across as very knowledgeable and erudite. Much more charismatic than their experts.”
Charismatic. That was a good word for it.
“So, in addition to being a paragon of male magnetism, I take it he’s a nice guy?” Lance said.
“Real nice. You’d like him,” Mel said.
“Oh, I bet I would.”
“Down, boy,” Mel said. “I’ll get with him and see what he says. You know—”
“I know. Dr. Woodruff may not want to participate in word warfare with Meyer, and there goes your article,” Lance said. “Talk at you later. Good luck.”
Mel set down her phone and picked up her mug, watching the SUV pull into the driveway by her parents’ empty site. Sorry, folks, that one is taken. She slid behind her makeshift desk on the dinette table, reloading the page she had been looking at on her laptop.
She realized coffee wasn’t cutting it and she was running on empty. She needed to get out and get some decent food in but hadn’t even taken the time to unpack yet. After hardly any sleep, she’d roused herself at the crack of dawn to crank out the article and get it to Lance before noon.
Mel sipped her coffee and scanned the information on the screen. The lady who had answered the phone at the university had been very helpful, but also protective. She had offered to contact him for Mel and pass along any message, but Mel was determined to do so personally.
She also owed Daniel an apology, as well as a chance to offer a rebuttal to Meyer.
“I owe her an apology for dragging her off to Florence like I did,” Daniel said, taking a long sip of Ouida’s fabulous coffee. “She must have thought I was crazy half the time.”
“Is that the only reason?” Nick sounded skeptical as he drank his own coffee. “I saw her photo on the website.”
“Doesn’t do her justice. There’s a lot about Mel you can’t capture in a picture.” Daniel realized saying that out loud had been a mistake.
Nick’s eyebrow raised. “Oh, really?”
“Look, I just want to make sure she’s all right.
She’ll probably be in touch anyway to follow up on the article.
” Should he avoid any further contact with Mel though?
He didn’t need any more complications than he already had.
Then again, he really wanted to apologize…
for something he couldn’t even remember very well.
“She must really be something.” Nick pulled a piece of paper with four numbers scrawled on it out of his shirt pocket.
“First one is the one you’ve got on her business card.
It’s also on her website. Voicemail. Second one is the one her webhost provider said was her urgent business contact.
I got the voicemail of some guy named Lance there.
Third one is her personal number. By the time I found that, I had tracked down her flight status, so I didn’t call it.
Fourth one is her parents’ number. Didn’t call that one either. ”
Daniel studied the numbers, pulling his phone out of his pocket.
He tried her personal number, but it rolled straight to voicemail and he hung up, realizing he had no idea what to say.
She’d probably heard about the earthquake, the train.
Daniel knew she would make the connection, and she would probably be trying to contact him.
Then what? The smart thing to do was to avoid her at all costs, and here he was desperately trying to get in touch with her.
He put the phone down on the counter and took another gulp of coffee.
“Well,” Nick drawled as he pushed away from the breakfast bar, “I gotta go measure the nursery for furniture. Glad to be of help.”
“Glad to be of help with what?” Grace walked across the family room, followed closely by Pooka, the farm’s Plott hound and unofficial mascot.
She wore a T-shirt that proclaimed “I can grow people! What’s your superpower?
” in red and blue, stretched across her protruding stomach. Her hair was a riot of copper.
Daniel got up and hugged her gingerly, careful to avoid skin contact. “Hey, you look great!”
“You look like crap.” She frowned and gave him an assessing look. “Something’s wrong.”
He picked up the phone again and dialed the second number on the list. “Not really. I just need to follow up on something.” Because I’m a glutton for…something.
Grace sat on the stool opposite him. “The journalist?”
Daniel nodded as the phone picked up.
“Anderson,” came a male voice.
“I’m trying to find Mel Noblett. I was given this number. Can you tell me where she can be reached?” Daniel asked.
There was a long pause. “Who is this?” The voice sounded a bit hoarse and watery, as if the man had a cold.
“Dr. Daniel Woodruff. She interviewed me in Italy and I—”
“Dr. Woodruff?”
“Yes. Do you know—?”
“Mel’s d-dead.” The man’s voice broke, as if he didn’t want to utter the words.
Whatever had shown in Daniel’s expression brought Grace to her feet. Daniel braced himself on the counter.
“But she… But she was on a plane. Did it…?”
“Not over there. She was home. She was fine. I talked to her this morning.” The man was babbling now, disbelief in his voice. “They couldn’t reach her parents. They called m-me instead.”
Daniel’s throat was suddenly tight. “What happened?”
“I’ll have to call them. Her parents,” the man said, as if to himself.
The edges of Daniel’s vision had gone dark and all he could see was the piece of paper, stark white against the counter, with the phone numbers on it.
I don’t want to see this.
Daniel tried desperately to focus. “Is this Lance?”
“Yeah.” Lance coughed and cleared his throat. “Sorry. M-Mel and I… We go way back.”
“What happened?” Daniel repeated.
Shut it off now.
He could only see black numbers on white.
“A fire in her RV. She was t-trapped inside.” The man was swallowing sobs. “I just talked to her and… The damn thing exploded.”
Shut it OFF!
The black numbers blinked out.
When he woke up, he was already half out of the bed. With his head splitting, he groped for his cell phone on the bedside table. It skittered out of his hands to the floor. He went to his knees, desperately trying to find it, but his eyes refused to focus.
“Grace?” he shouted as loud as he could. “Nick?”
He could feel the rubbery edges and glass surface of the screen, but it would be impossible to dial anything without being able to see anything but a blur.
The nausea was bad enough, but the pain in his head was making him dizzy.
“Grace!” He stumbled to his feet, groped for the door, and stumbled, slamming his outstretched fingers into the wall. He made it into the hall, somehow, but taking the stairs in his condition would be a disaster, and the elevator at the other end of the hall was too far away.
“Damn… Grace? Ouida? Somebody?” He leaned on the banister and squinted at the screen of his phone. No good.
He heard Grace’s rapid footsteps on the steps. “Daniel? What’s wrong? Danny?” Her voice held a frightened edge.
He waved his phone in her direction. “Call this number, quick.”
She grabbed the phone and he jerked his hand away before her fingers could brush his.
“Wha—?”
“Just do it!” he snapped. He recited Mel’s personal number from the list he’d seen in his dream, hoping he got it right.
Mel groped for her cellphone on the table without opening her eyes. She could hear it ringing. Where had she put it? She opened her eyes and looked at the clock. Just after noon. She had only drifted off for a moment.
She blinked. What was that haze in the air between her and the clock? And what was that smell? Damn. Had the coffee maker shorted out?
No. Smoke was curling up from somewhere.
Smoke! There was a fire somewhere, and if it was making that much smoke, she was getting out of here fast. She grabbed her laptop and backpack and bolted for the door.
As she slammed it behind her, she remembered, too late, that her phone was still ringing away inside.
But her parents had trained her for this. You had respect for a fire in an RV. Get out, period. Don’t hang around. Don’t go back for anything.
She fished her keys out of her backpack, shoved in her laptop, and climbed into the Mini, throwing the backpack into the other seat. Her hands were shaking, but she managed to back it up right into Mrs. Crumpski’s drive while laying on the horn for all it was worth.
Mrs. Crumpski, her white hair in curlers, scuffed out onto the porch of her trailer.