Hemlock Bay

of Lily’s bed, smiling down at her, so scared for this lovely young woman who was her sister-in-law. She’d have bitten her fingernails if she hadn’t stopped some three years before. “It was between an oven mitt with Alcatraz on it and the Golden Gate. Since Sean gums everything, Dillon thought gumming the Golden Gate was healthier than gumming a Federal prison.”
    Lily laughed. She didn’t know where it had come from, but she even laughed again. Pain seared through her side and her ribs, and she gasped.
    “No more humor,” Sherlock said and lightly kissed her cheek. “We’re here and everything’s going to be all right now, I promise.”
    “Who called you?”
    “Your father-in-law, about two in the morning, last night.”
    “I wonder why he called,” she said slowly, thinking about the pain that was now coming through and how she would deal with it.
    “You wouldn’t expect him to?”
    “I see now,” Lily said, her eyes suddenly narrow and fierce. “He was afraid Mrs. Scruggins would call you and then you would wonder why the family hadn’t called. I think he’s afraid of you, Dillon. He’s always asking me how you’re doing and where you are. When you were here before, I think you scared him really good.”
    “Why would I scare him?”
    “Because you’re big and you’re smart and you’re a special agent with the FBI.”
    Sherlock laughed. “Lots of people don’t relax around FBI agents. But Mr. Elcott Frasier? I took one look at him and thought he probably chewed nails for breakfast.”
    “He could, you know. Everyone thinks that, particularly his son, my husband.”
    “Maybe he called because he knew we’d want to come here to see you,” Savich said. “Maybe he isn’t all that much of an iron fist.”
    “Yes, he is. Tennyson was here earlier.” She sighed, tightened a bit from a jab of pain in her bruised ribs, the pulling in her side. “Thank goodness he finally left.”
    Savich looked over at Sherlock. “What happened, Lily? Talk to us.”
    “Everyone thinks I tried to kill myself again.”
    “Fine, let them. It doesn’t matter. Talk, Lily.”
    “I don’t know, Dillon, I swear I don’t. I remember that I had to drive that gnarly road to Ferndale, you know, 211? And that’s all. Everything else is just lost.”
    Sherlock said, “All right, then. Everyone thinks you tried to kill yourself because of the pills you took right after Beth’s death?”
    “Yes, I guess so.”
    “But why?”
    “I suppose I haven’t been exactly honest with you guys, but I just didn’t want you to worry. Fact is, I have been depressed. I’ll feel lots better and then it’s back down again. It’s gotten progressively worse the past couple of weeks. Why? I don’t know, but it has. And then last night happened.”
    Savich pulled up a chair and sat down. He took her hand again. “You know, Lily, even when you were a little girl, you’d hit a problem, and I swear you’d worry and work and chew on that problem, never giving up until you had it solved. Dad used to say that if he was slow telling you something you really wanted to know, he could just see you gnawing on his trouser leg until you ripped it right off or he talked, whichever came first.”
    “I miss Dad.”
    “I do, too. Now, I still don’t understand that first time you wanted to die. That wasn’t the Lily I knew. But Beth’s death—that would knock any parent on his or her butt. But now seven months have passed. You’re smart, you’re talented, you’re not one to be in denial. This depression—that doesn’t make a lot of sense to me. What’s been happening, Lily?”
    She sobered, frowning now. “Nothing’s been happening, just more of the same. Like I said, over the past months sometimes I’d feel better, feel like I could conquer the world again, but then it would go away and I’d want to stay in bed all day.
    “For whatever reason, yesterday it got really bad. Tennyson called me from Chicago and told me to take two of the antidepressant pills. I did. I’ll tell you something, the pills sure don’t seem to help. And then, when I was driving on that road to Ferndale—well, maybe something did happen. Maybe I did drive into that redwood. I just don’t remember.”
    “It’s okay. Now, how does your brain feel right now?” Sherlock asked, scooting in a little closer to Lily on the hospital bed.
    “Not quite as vague as before. I guess since there’s less morphine swimming around up in there,