Someone behind her honked and she looked up to see that the light had changed.
She turned around to see a man in a black SUV giving her the finger. She hit the gas. “Hello?” she said into the phone. She looked at the phone LCD screen. Disconnected.
Susan’s heart was racing now. She pulled over to the curb, letting the guy in the SUV whip around her without even giving him a dirty look. “What the fuck?” Susan said quietly. She highlighted the incoming number and called it back.
No one answered. No voice mail. It was a local area code. But she didn’t recognize the number.
If there was a body, why tell her? Why not call the police? Should she call the police? That would be silly. Bothering them based on some weird phone call. Henry would think it was another joke.
But if it was real, and that guy was from one of those Beauty Killer fan clubs, then she’d really have a book. She’d have her pick of agents. Archie might even agree to be interviewed. And she’d have a great opening chapter . . .
What was the address? Fuck. Three something?Three-nine-seven? Susan looked around for a pen, and found several on the floor of the passenger seat. She grabbed a candy wrapper out of where she’d stuffed it in a cubby in the car door and turned it inside out. Fargo. She wrote that down on the white inside of the wrapper. It was North Fargo. Three-nine-seven North Fargo. She was almost positive.
The Gorge would have to wait.
C H A P T E R 10
There were eight therapy sessions a day at the Providence psych ward. Archie went to four. Two mental-health groups.Two substance-abuse groups. Archie wasn’t sure why they bothered breaking them up. It was all the same people. Most of them went to every session. It was something to do in between episodes of Emergency Vets.
“Do you want to stay?” Sarah Rosenberg asked him.
“No,” Archie said. He’d helped push the tables to the side, and then to arrange the chairs in a circle at the center of the room. “This is the schizophrenics and bipolars session. The depressives aren’t meeting until two.”
“Your sense of humor is returning,” she said.
“Is that a good sign?” Archie asked.
He followed her across the hall to one of the individual counseling rooms. He met with Rosenberg every day for twenty-five minutes. Why twenty-five and not an even thirty, he didn’t know. But he guessed it had something to do with insurance.
“How’s Debbie?” she asked.
Archie sat down in one of the two brown Naugahyde chairs that faced each other in the room. A light rain slapped against the window. “Probably a little tense,” he said.
Rosenberg sat in the opposite chair and set her coffee cup on the armrest. “What’s happened?”
Archie didn’t know how much Henry had made public. “I just think it must be exhausting. Living out there, knowing that Gretchen could show up at any time.”
“Does she like Vancouver?” Rosenberg asked.
“Being in a different state makes her feel safer,” Archie said. The truth was they didn’t talk much. She brought the kids by once a week to visit him, but she didn’t stay. She’d started seeing an alternative-energy entrepreneur, whatever the hell that was. They’d drop the kids off and go get a bite to eat downtown. “I try not to make it complicated for her.”
Rosenberg tilted her head and looked hard at Archie. “It’s important to you that she feel safe,” she said.
Archie leaned his head on the back of his chair and looked up at the ceiling. There was a sprinkler overhead. Just in case he burst into flame. “Yes.”
They were quiet for a moment.
Archie could hear someone shouting in the next room.
“Do you feel safe?” Rosenberg asked.
Archie lifted his head back up and wagged his finger at her. “I think I know where you’re going with this,” he said.
Rosenberg sat forward, resting her elbows on her thighs. “You’re off the painkillers. Your health has stabilized. You need to check yourself out of here. They have an excellent outpatient program. You’ll get a lot of support.”
Archie shook his head. Even if he wanted out, he had nowhere to go. “My liver enzymes are still high,” he said.
“Frankly, with the amount of Vicodin you took I’m amazed you’re not on the transplant list,” Rosenberg said. “If you want me to let you stay, you need to make an effort. You need to practice functioning outside this hospital. You’re Level Four. Go for a walk.”
The rain was picking up. Archie looked out the window. The ground was too dry. It would flood. “She’s out there,” he said. He could feel her. It was a stupid thing to think. People couldn’t feel each other’s presence. He wasn’t psychic. He didn’t believe in auras, or souls, or cosmic connections. But still he knew—as much as he knew anything—that Gretchen was never very far from him.