River’s End

Olivia shrugged off her pack. “You don’t have to be alone for it to work.”
    “I guess not.” Carefully, Olivia unpacked the food, the thermos, then, sitting Indian style, offered Jamie her binoculars. “Maybe you can see Uncle David and Grandma.”
    “Maybe Uncle David dived overboard and swam home.” With a laugh, Jamie lifted the field glasses. “Oh, there are swans. I love the way they look. Just gliding along. I should’ve brought my camera. I don’t know why I never think of it.”
    She lowered the glasses to pick up one of the sandwiches Olivia had cut into meticulously even halves. “It’s always beautiful here. Whatever the season, whatever the time of day.”
    She glanced down, noticed that Olivia was watching her steadily. It gave her a little chill to see that measuring look in a child’s eyes. “What is it?”
    “I have to ask you for a favor. You won’t want to do it, but I thought about it a lot, and it’s important. I need you to get me an address.” Olivia pressed her lips together, then blew out a breath. “It’s for the policeman, the one who took me to your house that night. His name is Frank. I remember him, but not very well. I want to write to him.”
    “Livvy, why? There’s nothing he can tell you that I can’t. It can’t be good for you to worry so much about this.”
    “It has to be better to know things than to wonder. He was nice to me. Even if I can only write and tell him I remember he was nice to me, I’d feel better. And ... he was there that night, Aunt Jamie. You weren’t there. It was just me until he came and found me. I want to talk to him.”
    She turned her head to stare out at the lakes. “I’ll tell him my grandparents don’t know I’m writing. I won’t tell lies. But I need to try. I only remember his name was Frank.”
    Jamie closed her eyes, felt her heart sink a little. “Brady. His name is Frank Brady.”

Seven
    Frank Brady turned the pale-blue envelope over in his hands. His name and the address of the precinct had been handwritten, neat and precise and unmistakably childlike, as had the return address in the corner.
    Olivia MacBride.
    Little Livvy Tanner, he mused, a young ghost out of the past.
    Eight years. He’d never really put that night, those people, that case aside. He’d tried. He’d done his job, justice had followed through as best it could, and the little girl had been whisked away by family who loved her.
    Closed, finished, over. Despite the stories on Julie MacBride that cropped up from time to time, the gossip, the rumors, the movies that ran on late-night television, it was done. Julie MacBride would be forever thirty-two and beautiful, and the man who’d killed her wouldn’t see the outside of a cage for another decade or more. Why the hell would the kid write to him after all this time? he wondered. And why the hell didn’t he just open the letter and find out?
    Still, he hesitated, frowning at the envelope while phones shrilled around him and cops moved in and out of the bull pen. He found himself wishing his own phone would ring so he could set the letter aside, pick up a new case. Then with a quiet oath, he tore the envelope open, spread out the single sheet of matching stationery and read:
    Dear Detective Brady,
    I hope you remember me. My mother was Julie MacBride, and when she was killed you took me to my aunt’s house. You came to see me there, too. I didn’t really understand then about murder or that you were investigating. You made me feel safe, and you told me how the stars were there even in the daytime. You helped me then. I hope you can help me now.
    I’ve been living with my grandparents in Washington State. It’s beautiful here and I love them very much. Aunt Jamie came to visit this week, and I asked her if she could give me your address so I could write to you. I didn ‘t tell my grandparents because it makes them sad. We never talk about my mother, or what my father did.
    I have questions that nobody can answer but you. It’s awfully important to me to know the truth, but I don’t want to hurt my grandmother. I’m twelve years old now, but she doesn ‘t understand that when I think about that night and try to remember it gets mixed up and that makes it worse. Will you talk to me?
    I thought maybe if you wanted to take a vacation you could even come here. I remember you had a son. You said he ate bugs and had bad dreams sometimes about alien invaders, but he’s older now so I guess