It took Timmie a full five seconds to realize that Cindy had appeared around the corner from Restcrest and was even now faltering to a halt beside to them. She looked wilted and tired, which meant she'd had a hard time with Mr. Peterson. Timmie knew she should be ashamed, but all she could see was a means of escape.

"Up to see my dad," Timmie said. "You remember Mr. Murphy?"

Cindy nodded, her hair bobbing low over her forehead. "There's a bed available in Restcrest," she said in what Timmie thought of as "Johnny tones." "You know I lost my little old man."

Timmie nodded. "I'm glad he got to stay up with his family," she said, her hand on Cindy's arm. "You know we just would have tortured him."

Cindy closed her eyes and sighed. "I know. He was just so nice. Both Alex and Ellen stopped by to help, but they didn't need to. I had it in hand."

Timmie must have reacted, because when Cindy opened her eyes again, she looked hurt. "I am good at some things," she said, defending herself.

"I know, Cindy," Timmie apologized. "I know... You know, Mr. Murphy's doing that series of articles on Restcrest. You could probably help him if you were to talk to him about what happened tonight. After all, it's as much a part of the story as anything else." Okay, so she was underhanded. She was desperate. And Cindy had never minded talking about herself before. "Maybe now, while you're thinking about it."

Cindy actually shook her head. "Maybe some other time. I need to go talk to Ellen."

Timmie was stunned. Usually nothing short-circuited Cindy's libido. But there was no mistaking her distraction. She really must have felt this one. It had been so long since Timmie had reacted to anything on that level, she almost couldn't imagine it.

"That'd work better for me, too," Murphy agreed, hardly deceived by Timmie's ploy. "Maybe in a day or two?"

Cindy smiled. "Thank you, yes."

Which meant that when Timmie finally did get on the elevator, Murphy got right on with her.

The door closed and Timmie punched buttons. "I'm still not talking to you," she said.

"Why not?" Murphy asked. "I don't think I need to remind you that you've already been threatened. Maybe I can help."

"And maybe you can get me more involved."

"You are involved. You'd just have answers."

Timmie turned on him hard, suddenly very afraid. She'd been working on the assumption that what she was facing was a limited problem. One suspicious death. Maybe an unexplained shooting. Murphy wanted to take it to a whole new level of play. "You know, Mr. Murphy, at this point in my life, my impulse control isn't what it once was. And my impulse right now is to use my knee to render you completely immobile so I can enjoy the rest of this ride in peace. You might want to think about that before asking another question."

He didn't even blink, and Timmie realized just what kind of power plant hummed behind those laser-green eyes. "You were sure singing a different song the last time I saw you. What happened?"

Timmie actually laughed. "What happened is that my father wandered out into the streets in his shorts to remind me of my priorities. Muckraking is for loners."

"Like me?"

"I'm not talking to you."

He nodded, eyes pensive as he scratched his chin. "Probably be the best for both of us, I guess. The last thing I need at this point in my life is to get involved in a messy investigation."

"It's not exactly one of the twelve steps," Timmie retorted.

That got Murphy's attention. "My reputation precedes me."

"Nah. I'd recognize a reformed drunk at a hundred paces."

He laughed. "Not reformed at all. Warned off. Is that why you won't talk to me?"

She heard the door open onto the fifth floor and gave him the benefit of one more glance. "No. I won't talk to you because I have nothing to say. Now, let me go see my father in peace."

And much to Timmie's eternal surprise, Murphy just held the door for her. "Give him my best."

Timmie, of course, believed that once Murphy left her alone, the rest of the trip would be easier. She should have known better.

"Do you realize what you've been doing to this man?" the nurse taking care of her father demanded.

A reformer. Timmie could spot those faster than old drunks. Those nurses who knew better than anyone else and saw it as their mission to impose the benefit of their wisdom on the unworthy, like circuit riders scattering Bibles to the savages. Tight, controlled, disapproving do-gooders with less humor than flexibility. This one had her zealot's eyes set squarely on Timmie and the grocery list of Joe's medications she'd brought.

"I've been trying to keep him safe," Timmie assured the woman, doing her damnedest to hold on to her temper.

She hadn't even made it into the room, where the lights had been turned low and Joe could be heard humming—"Carrickfergus," Timmie thought, which meant he was lonely. And Timmie, who might actually be able to help, was stuck out in the hallway like a fly in a bug light.

"You've been torturing him," the nurse accused, her posture aggressive. "I won't have it. He's a human being, not a side of beef."

Timmie sighed. "Fine. Good. Thank you. I beg forgiveness. Now, I'm going to go in and see him."

"I've just gotten him calmed down."

Timmie smiled. "Calm him down again."

She walked into the sterile, silent room while the nurse bristled back in the lighted hallway. "We've taken him off everything," she informed Timmie in arch tones. "Just so you know when you take him home."

"Home?" Timmie echoed, turning back to see the nurse silhouetted with hands on hips like Patton surveying the Nazis.

Home. Just the word was enough to drop a rock in her chest. She'd gotten a full night's sleep last night for the first time in a month. She'd had time to play with Meghan without having to keep an ear open for problems. She'd been able to pretend everything would be all right.

"Day after tomorrow. You didn't expect us to warehouse him for you, did you?"

Timmie fought hard for a calming breath. It would have been easier to take if she hadn't thought that very thing about relatives of some of the old people she'd housed. All those families she'd judged so blithely when her father had been a thousand miles away.

"And a nursing home?" she asked.

"He's on waiting lists."

Fuck. Shit. Timmie couldn't breathe all of a sudden, just with the thought of going back into that old house.

And then, to make it all worse, she turned back to her father, who lay open-eyed and still on the bed, the wailing notes of the lament drifting off him like old smoke in the dark.

"Daddy?"

Slowly he focused those old blue eyes on her. "Timmie?"

Timmie did her level best to smile for him when all she wanted to do was scream. "Hi, sweetie. How are you?"

His eyes teared over and he reached for her hand. "Take me home, Timmie. Please. I want to go home."

As if that would make it all better.

As if anything would.

* * *

It took another week for Timmie to have at least one wish granted. She got her trauma. Before she could get that far, of course, she had to spend the week settling her father back home without benefit of the major psychotropics that had been keeping him under control. She hired and fired three more baby-sitters and finally sent Meghan to stay down the block for a few days, just to keep the little girl safe from her grandfather's furies.