LITMIR.BIZ

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past. The mother I knew had left months before her physical body stopped functioning.”

      So now David was alone. Michael had told her once that they had no other relatives. Both of their parents had been only children, and their father had died years before.

      “I’m sorry,” she repeated.

      He lifted one shoulder. “I survived. My faith was a great comfort.”

      Another contrast between the two brothers, Caroline thought, recalling Michael’s skeptical attitude toward religion in general. Though the brothers hadn’t been raised in a household where faith played a central role, David had sought out the Lord as an adult. And the Christmas they’d met, Caroline had discovered that he’d found something that she had envied deep in her heart. An inner peace. A sense of greater purpose. Something to cling to through the turbulent seas of life. She’d wanted to question him about it, but the time hadn’t been right then. Nor was it now. In ten minutes she was scheduled to do a phone interview with the mayor, and she needed to get focused.

      “Well…I do have to get back to my desk. Was there something you wanted to talk about?” she asked when the silence between them lengthened.

      With a jolt, David realized that she wasn’t going to invite him to her office. Although Mary appeared to be busy, he suspected that she was tuned in to the conversation taking place only a few feet away, and what he had to say wasn’t meant for public discussion. But he wasn’t leaving without accomplishing the purpose of his visit.

      “Is there somewhere private we could speak?” He lowered his voice and angled his body away from the receptionist.

      After a brief hesitation, Caroline nodded. “But I have a phone interview to do in a few minutes.”

      “I’ll be brief.”

      Without responding, she turned and led the way to the inner door, holding up an ID card to the scanner. The door responded with a click and she pulled it open.

      The office was much more expansive than David expected. And far more modern than the quaint exterior of the building had suggested. The newsroom was quite large and honeycombed with dozens of cubicles. There was a hum of activity, and staff members stopped Caroline twice to ask her questions as she led the way through the maze.

      When they reached her glass-enclosed office, she stepped aside and motioned him in, then followed and closed the door behind her.

      “Busy place,” he commented.

      “And this is a quiet day. You should see it when things are really hopping.” She moved to her chair, putting the desk between them.

      “I guess I didn’t realize that a smaller paper would be so…thriving.”

      “The Chronicle isn’t small. It’s the second-largest paper in the city, next to the Post-Dispatch, and we continue to acquire smaller community newspapers. But I don’t need to tell you how mergers and acquisitions work. You deal with that every day.”

      “Not anymore.” At her surprised look, he explained. “I took a new job a couple of months ago. As executive director of Uplink, an organization that pairs gifted high school students in problem environments with mentors for summer internships. That’s why I moved to St. Louis. But it seems you’ve changed directions, too. I thought you’d be back at the Associated Press by now.”

      Her eyes went flat. “No. I’ve seen enough blood, sweat and tears to last a lifetime. This suits me just fine.” She checked her watch, and he got the message.

      “I know you’re on a tight schedule, so I won’t keep you.” He reached into the pocket of his jacket and withdrew a small, tissue-wrapped object. “When I was packing for the move, I came across this among Michael’s things. A few weeks after he…after the bombing…AP sent me some personal effects that had been returned by the authorities. I didn’t give them more than a cursory look at the time. It was too hard.” He stopped and cleared his throat. “I did notice this, but to be honest, I thought it had been sent to me by mistake, that it belonged to one of the other victims. It wasn’t a symbol I would have associated with Michael. But when I was packing, I looked at it more closely and saw the initials. I think it must have been something you gave him. So I thought you should have it.” He handed it across her desk, his lean, strong fingers brushing hers as she reached for it.

      Curious, Caroline unwrapped the tissue. Nestled inside lay a small pewter anchor on a chain. As she stared at the medallion, the air rushed out of her lungs in a sudden whoosh. She groped for the edge of her desk, and for a brief second the room tilted. Then firm, steadying hands gripped her upper arms, and the world stabilized.

      “Are you okay? Why don’t you sit down for a minute?”

      She drew in a ragged breath before she lifted her head. David’s concerned face was just inches from hers as he leaned across her desk.

      “I’m fine. It was just a…a shock.” Nevertheless, she made a move to sit in her chair, not trusting her shaky legs to hold her up.

      As David released her arms, he shoved one hand in the pocket of his slacks. “I was pretty sure the initials on the back were yours.”

      Turning the anchor over, she traced the familiar inscription with a gentle finger. CMJ to MWS.

      “I gave this to Michael the Christmas we got engaged.” Her voice was whisper-soft. “He always told me that I was his anchor. That whenever the world got too crazy, he would think about me, and then everything made sense again. That I kept him stable through the storms of life. After I gave this to him, he never took it off. He said it was his good luck charm.”

      Her voice choked on the last word, and David swallowed hard. No doubt they were sharing the same thought: that he hadn’t been so lucky the day he’d gone to the marketplace.

      “There’s something I’ve been wanting to say to you for two years, Caroline. I’m sure you know that Michael and I argued about Mom the night before he was…before he died. And that our relationship had been strained for several weeks. You have every right to put at least some of the blame for his death on me. I know he was upset when we talked. And I’m sure he was distracted when he went out on that assignment the next day. I lived with the guilt for almost two years, and even though I found some measure of peace about it after a great deal of prayer, I suspect it will always be with me to some degree. I just want you to know how sorry I am. And that I hope you can find it in your heart someday to forgive me.”

      The regret and anguish on David’s face mirrored that in her heart. Yet she knew hers was far more deserved. That she was even more culpable than the man across from her. No one else was aware of that, though. She’d never spoken to anyone of the part she had played in Michael’s death. But now that she realized the depth of David’s distress, had glimpsed the burden of pain that weighed down his heart as he shouldered all the blame, she couldn’t in good conscience keep her role a secret from him. It wouldn’t be honest. Or moral. She might not agree with the steps he’d taken, against Michael’s wishes, to institutionalize their mother, but she couldn’t let him continue to think that he alone was at fault for the tragedy.

      Gripping the medallion in a tight fist, Caroline rose. When she spoke, her voice was taut with tension. “The guilt isn’t all yours, David. Or even mostly yours.”

      “What do you mean?” He sent her a puzzled look.

      She tried to swallow past the lump in her throat. “Michael shouldn’t have been in the marketplace that day. It was supposed to be me. I was working on a hot story, but I got sick. He volunteered to meet my contact for me.” Her face contorted with anguish, and when she continued her voice was a mere whisper. “I was the one who should have been killed by the suicide bomber.”

      A shock wave passed through David as he digested Caroline’s revelation—and tried to comprehend its ramifications. Somewhere, in a far corner of his mind, he realized that her confession had absolved him from a portion of the blame for the tragedy, and he felt a subtle easing of the guilt that had burdened his heart for two years.

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