“Was it clean?”
“Yes.”
Josie put the vehicle in drive and pulled out of the parking lot, headed back toward the center of Denton. “Listen, Harris is a smart little boy,” she told Misty. “You’ve done everything you possibly could to prepare him for this.”
Misty scoffed and dabbed at her eyes with the crumpled napkin. “You’ve done everything to prepare him for this. I just spent the last three months telling him everything would be fine when I don’t really know that for sure.”
Josie reached over and touched Misty’s shoulder. “Of course it’s going to be fine. You’ll see. Do you remember your first day of kindergarten?”
Misty shook her head.
“Of course not. Because it wasn’t traumatic. The same will be true for Harris.”
From her periphery, Josie saw Misty raise a brow. “You’re just saying this because you gave him that alarm. That’s why you’re so calm.”
Josie shrugged. “Well, it does help.”
Four
A few minutes later, Josie left Misty at her home in much better spirits. As she drove toward the campus, she used the voice commands in her car to call Patrick and get the directions again. Denton University was located high above most of the city, in one of its hillier regions. The city itself spanned twenty-five square miles. Nestled among several mountains, the center of Denton was set out in a grid pattern with a large park butting up against the edge of campus on one end of the city. A branch of the Susquehanna River snaked through the heart of it. Quieter and more private neighborhoods sprawled along the perimeter of the city’s historic district, leading out to the winding mountain roads that stretched like spindly spider legs to neighboring towns.
The campus itself was a maze of large brick buildings, beautifully landscaped courtyards and walkways, and blacktop parking lots that were far too small to hold all the vehicles trying to park there at any given moment. Josie found the flat-roofed red-brick building that housed the pool, and after following a line of three other cars circling the lot in search of parking spots that did not exist, parked illegally on the pavement in front of the building. This was only going to take a minute.
She snatched the bag with Patrick’s red shirt from the backseat and jogged to the front of the building, pushing through a set of glass double doors. In the spacious lobby, she was overwhelmed by the smell of chlorine. A security guard clad in a brown uniform sat behind a crescent-shaped desk. He was an older man with thinning gray hair and a wiry frame. Craning his neck, he looked through the doors behind her. “You can’t park there, Miss.”
Josie took out her police credentials and flashed them at the guard even though she was not there on police business. “I’m looking for Patrick Payne,” she said. “He should be working here this morning.”
Mollified, the guard hooked a thumb to his right. “Vending machines.”
Josie turned her head to see Patrick feeding a dollar into a vending machine in a cubby just off the lobby that was filled with various snack and drink offerings. He punched some buttons on the machine and then thrust his hand into the return slot, pulling out a granola bar.
“Hey,” he said as he turned toward her. “Thanks for coming. You have my shirt? I’m already late. Thank God no one got here before me.”
Together, they walked toward a set of solid blue doors on the other side of the lobby desk. Josie handed him the bag. As Patrick turned his back to push one of the blue doors open, he kinked an eyebrow at her. “Did Denton PD change its department colors?”
Josie glared at him. Tugging at her collar, she said, “You left your red work shirt in my washer. All my shirts look like this now, Pat.”
Laughing, Patrick pushed all the way through the door. Josie had no choice but to follow him. “It’s not funny,” she told him. “These are expensive!”
“I’m really sorry,” he replied.
The college’s indoor swimming pool, with its eight racing lanes, took up most of the cavernous space. Large windows ran along the upper walls around the pool. Sunlight streamed in, reflecting off the blue water and causing the air in the room to shimmer. Tile floors stretched around the edges of the pool, lined with benches. It was hot and humid, and Josie felt a sheen of moisture cling to her face almost immediately. Patrick turned in the direction of a hall that was marked with a sign that read: Men’s Locker Room. Josie pulled up short, her eyes drawn to the water. She took two steps closer to the pool’s edge and then panic blossomed in her chest.
“Pat,” she cried.
The woman’s body floated face down, dark hair fanned out like a halo around her head. Josie took in the details like the rapid-fire clicks of a camera shutter. The woman bobbed fifteen to twenty feet from the edge of the pool. Second lane from the right. White tank top, blue shorts, white tennis shoes. Josie commanded her legs to run, but it felt as if someone had flipped a switch, setting her body on slow motion. Everything in the room seemed to stop. The stillness of the water before her was jarring. Some frantic part of Josie’s brain howled. Her feet reached the lip of the pool’s edge. Air pushed into her lungs again. She screamed, “Get help!”
Then she dove into the water.
Five
The water was shockingly warm. Submerged, Josie carved her way toward the woman as quickly as she could, some dimmed part of her mind flashing back to the floods that had devoured Denton five months earlier. At least now she didn’t have to fight a current or worse, a surge. Within seconds, she was beside the woman. Fitting her hands into the woman’s armpits, Josie turned her onto her back. Positioning herself so that she was cheek to cheek with the woman, Josie worked her way toward the pool’s edge. As she reached the wall, hands thrust out, relieving Josie of her charge. She recognized the security guard from the lobby as he and Patrick laid the woman on her back.
Josie climbed from the water and clambered across the tile. The guard’s fingers pressed into the woman’s throat. Patrick checked one of her wrists. “No pulse,” he said, and looked at the guard. “You get one?”
The guard shook his head.
“Move,” Josie told him. “Call an ambulance, campus police, and Denton PD. Now.”
He hefted himself up and jogged back out to the lobby. Josie pressed the heel of one of her hands to the center of the woman’s chest and then covered it with her other hand. Keeping her arms straight, she pumped, counting off the compressions under her breath. Once she reached thirty, she moved to the woman’s head, lifting her chin and checking inside her mouth for any obstructions. Then she sealed her mouth over the woman’s cold lips and gave her a rescue breath, then another.
Patrick said, “I don’t think you’re bringing her back.”
Josie glanced at him long enough to see the strain in his face. Beads of sweat lined his forehead. “Gotta try,” Josie said, resuming her compressions.
She felt Patrick’s eyes on her as she worked, her arms and shoulders burning with the effort. Compressions. Breaths. Compressions. Breaths. His voice was small when he said, “Josie, I think she’s gone.”