I'll Walk Alone - Mary Higgins Clark [51]
He settled down on the couch and looked around. The couch and the matching chair where his mother was sitting had been part of her original furniture, and no amount of persuasion had induced her to part with them when she moved. Instead Kevin had both pieces reupholstered for her as well as having her bridal bedroom set refinished. As she pointed out, “That’s ribbon mahogany, Kevin, and I’m not giving it up.” He’d also repaired her dining room furniture, which was “too good to throw out.” She did allow him to replace the threadbare, machine-made Oriental carpet with one in a similar design. He did not tell her how much the new one cost.
The result was a cozy apartment filled with pictures of his father and grandparents, various cousins, and lifelong friends. Whenever he walked into it, no matter how busy his day, it lifted his spirits. It felt like a home. It was a home.
That was just what Zan Moreland had pitched to him in her plea to withhold judgment on his decision between her and Bartley Longe until she could prove her innocence in the alleged kidnapping of her own child. People want to feel as though they’re living in a home, not a museum, she had told him.
Kevin realized that he had spent a good part of the day wondering why he hadn’t simply returned Moreland’s sketches and fabric samples to her with a brief note saying he had decided that Bartley Longe was the right person for the project.
What was keeping him from doing it? God knows he’d taken enough flak from his secretary, Louise, about how astonished she was that he would waste his time on a lying kidnapper. “I can tell you, Kevin, it took my breath away when that woman had the nerve to come here, and then ignore what I told her, that she could take her stuff, or I’d mail it to her. What did she do? Go running up to find you, and try to hold on to her chance of getting the job. Mark my words, she’ll be on Rikers Island in handcuffs before this is over.”
Not bothering to hide his annoyance, he had told Louise dryly, “If she’s arrested, I believe she’ll be out on bail.” Finally he had told Louise flat out to drop the subject altogether, which of course had brought on a wounded, reproachful attitude from her that she made doubly clear by calling him “Mr. Wilson” for the rest of the day.
“Kevin, watch! They’re showing those pictures of that Moreland woman picking up her child out of the stroller. The nerve of her, lying to the cops. Can you imagine how the father must be feeling all this time?”
Kevin sprang up and rushed across the room. There was a picture of Alexandra Moreland taking a little boy out of a stroller, and then one of her carrying him down the path. They stayed on the screen as the commentator continued, “She is seen here when she rushed back to Central Park after learning from police that her son was missing.”
Kevin studied the image. Zan Moreland looked in shock. The suffering in her eyes was unmistakable. That same look had been there this afternoon, he thought, when she begged him to give her the chance to prove her innocence.
Begged? That was too strong a word. And she had given him an out by saying that if he preferred Bartley Longe’s designs, she would understand.
She looks so wounded, he thought. He listened intently as the news announcer said, “Yesterday was Matthew Carpenter’s fifth birthday and now the speculation is about whether his mother gave him to someone to keep for her—or if he is no longer alive.”
In this past month or two Zan had been going back and forth to the apartments any number of times and putting hours upon hours of work into creating the designs for them, Kevin thought. I realize now that when I met her at Carlton Place yesterday, I could sense her suffering even though she seemed so calm. Why would she be in so much pain if she knew her child was safe? Is it possible she killed him?
No, it was not possible, he thought. I’d stake my soul on that. She’s not a killer.
Kevin realized that his mother had stood up.