by Sean Little
Duff was semi-sedated, painkillers coursing through his bloodstream. He was as mellow as Abe had ever heard him be. “Yo, brother. What’s shaking?”
“Where’s Kimberly Stevens?”
Duff thought for a long second. “She’s running. She’s scared. The brother who was her protector and servant is dead. She probably went to her brother’s house.”
“The F.B.I. is there now. It’s a crime scene. She wouldn’t be there.”
“Oh.” Duff sounded gassed and disappointed. There was a somber, airy tone to his voice Abe had never heard before. There was a long pause. “The picture.”
“What picture?”
“There was a picture on the board at the fundraiser. It was Kimberly playing with an older boy at some park. I’m betting the boy was her brother. I’m betting the park is near her childhood home. I’m betting that’s where she is. She went someplace sentimental that meant something to both her and her brother. If she’s not there, then she jetted and you’re not going to find her in Chicago.”
“Thanks, Duffer. I knew you’d know.”
“Hey, Abe? Am I in a hospital?”
“Yes, Duff.”
“Is this a real hospital?” Duff’s voice was lilting. He sounded sleepy.
“It is. Don’t worry. You just let them do the surgery, Duff.”
“Oh, I will. Now.”
“You’ll be better soon.”
“I feel pretty good now. Whatever they injected me with, I want to buy it in bulk at Costco. We gotta put it on tap in the office. It’s better than beer.”
Abe ended the call. “Duff says she’ll be at a park near her childhood home if she’s anywhere in Chicago. If she’s not there then she’s not in the city, and we probably won’t find her anytime soon.”
“She’s a high-value government official’s wife. How do they not have her chipped or something?” said Gates.
“Because the U.S. Government is not the business of tracking its own citizens, no matter what the public believes.” Mindy’s tone was clipped. Abe could tell the former C.I.A. agent had this conversation before.
“Private corporations are better at tracking the public than the government could ever be,” said Betts.
“I got sick last year. I put my symptoms into Web M.D. and Facebook started showing me ads for funeral homes,” said Abe. “That was really weird.”
“Where did Kimberly live? Anyone know?”
Abe used the app on his phone to connect to the database he used to search for information. “Earliest known address for Kimberly Stevens, formerly Kimberly Lafferty, is on Maypole Avenue.”
“That’s near Garfield Park.” Gates frowned. “I grew up near there. That’s a really big park. It could take a long time to search thoroughly.”
Betts hit the lights and siren. The car accelerated. “Then let’s get there and start looking.”
-18-
GARFIELD PARK, NAMED after President James A. Garfield, is a sprawling island of green on Chicago’s west side comprised of 173 acres of land filled with open spaces, gardens, small bodies of water, athletic fields, the famous Golden Dome Fieldhouse, and the Garfield Park Conservatory, one of the largest plant conservatories in the United States.
At night, it was intimidating, but not inaccessible. Gangs were a problem. Regular police patrols helped minimize activity, but the park still had its share of danger. As dawn was creeping above the horizon and the day was breaking, the park was very calm, very still. A few people jogged or walked dogs, but it was otherwise empty.
Betts wheeled into the southern entrance of the park. He killed the reds-and-blues. The siren had been turned off miles back. They did not want to alarm Mrs. Stevens if they could help it. “Jesus, I forgot how big this place is. I should call for help.”
Mindy leaned forward. “You start swarming this place with black-and-whites and she’ll either bolt or end herself. Smaller is better if she’s still alive.”
Abe concurred. “I think our best shot is if we split up.”
“Dump me and Abe here,” said Mindy. “You two go to the north side on the roads and start searching, working south. Abe and I will canvas as best we can heading north.”
“Maypole Avenue is on the north side of the park. If she went toward home ground, she’d likely be there,” said Gates. “Let’s go.”
Betts wavered. “I don’t like the idea of dropping you two off alone.”
“I have a gun.” Abe’s gun had never been fired in the shootout. He was legally licensed to carry. The police could not use it as evidence in the crime scene. Mindy’s gun had been taken from her to be processed, though. “Besides, it’s almost daylight.”
“I’ll need a gun,” said Mindy.
Betts shook his head. “We don’t have another. Only have our service pieces and we can’t give you one of those. You have a phone, right?”
“I do.” Abe passed his phone to Mindy. “Betts’s number is in it. If it gets ugly, we can call them.”
“I’ll keep my line clear, just in case. If you find her, call us. We’ll loop the park’s roads once and then come back for you.”
Gates opened the rear passenger door for them. Mindy and Abe climbed out. When Gates was back in the car, Betts pulled away and rolled down the road.
“Where do you think she’ll be?” Mindy looked around at the expansive areas of grass.
“Someplace that meant something to her as a child, I bet. Maybe a playground?” Abe led the way toward the nearest set of playground equipment.
“Isn’t she a little old for playgrounds?”
Abe understood what she would be doing at the park if, indeed, she had regressed to something familiar. “In times of mental or emotional trauma, it’s not uncommon to seek out comforts of childhood. When I was in college, I read about a case study about a high-ranking C.E.O. who used to keep a pacifier in his desk. If stress started getting to him, he would lock the door, close the blinds, and spend five minutes sucking on the pacifier. It calmed him and comforted him.”
“I knew a guy in the Navy who brought his childhood bear on board ship.”
“Same sort of thing.”
“We made fun of him, at first. Then one night we get into a hell of a storm. The ship was pitching on the waves like an out-of-control roller-coaster. We were on full alert. Felt like the storm lasted for hours. I think every single one of us wished we’d brought a teddy to cuddle that night. No one made fun of him after that.”
They jogged along in silence for a few moments. Mindy, athletic and lithe, kept a strong pace. Abe, slightly paunchy and out-of-shape, lagged back. The humidity had them both sweating in moments. “We’re never going to cover enough ground this way,” Mindy called.
Abe agreed. “We need to split up. Get farther away from each other.”
“Keep within sight of each other, okay?” Mindy veered away from Abe, jogging through an expanse of green fields. Abe stayed on the road casting his vision back and forth, constantly scanning for movement, or a human shape, or something which just did not look right.
Abe saw a flicker of movement near some slides, so he ran over toward a playground, but it ended up being just a sweatshirt some child had removed and hung on an exposed bolt and then forgotten it when they left the park.
When Abe got back to the street, he had lost sight of Mindy. She had simply vanished among the fields and trees of the park. There was no time to worry about her, though. Abe had to plow ahead. She was tougher than he was. She would be fine even without a gun, he told himself.
Abe jogged north on Woodward Drive. He made good time, despite not having committed any time to cardio in the last few years. Or ever. The distance took its toll quickly, though. His breath got ragged quickly. His knees protested. His ankles creaked. He never had a graceful gait when he ran. Duff said he loped like a giraffe. Abe hated to admit it when Duff was right about his physical shortcomings, but when it came to running Duff was right; he had a halting, awkward pace.
He jogged past the bike
polo grounds, Providence St. Mel High School was in the distance to the right, a towering, gothic building that looked like a medieval fortress. He saw someone running in the distance to the left. It was Mindy still clipping along easily. She was scouting around the Music Court circle. Abe glanced back to the right. When he glanced left again, Mindy had vanished again.
There was a gust of cool air from the northwest. Abe looked at the sky. There was a thunderhead moving in on the city. The storms that always eventually showed up to cut the summer heat were on their way.
Abe swung to the right sweeping through the tree-dotted fields. The trees were not overgrown, but they provided some shelter from prying eyes driving along the main thoroughfares of the park. He jogged to the center of a copse of trees and slowed to a limping half-run. He hacked and spat phlegm into the grass and made a mental note to start a cardio regimen.
The big lagoon in the center of the park loomed in front of him. It was quiet there that time of the morning. The trees of the park formed an effective sound absorption barrier against the constant din of traffic. The slight sound of wind-driven ripples lapping at the rocks along the shoreline added ambiance. Abe decided if he could have gone anywhere for peace and comfort, the shore of a body of water would have been the best place to contemplate life. He jogged to the lagoon and finally gave up on running. His side hurt. His hips, thighs, and knees were in pain. His lower back still felt torn-up from when Duff fell on him. Use it or lose it, his dad used to say about the body. Well, Abe never really had it to lose in the first place, and now it felt like it was permanently gone.
There were walking paths around the lagoon. Abe limped along one of them until saw a small group of trees along the bank a fair distance off the walking path blocking a passerby’s view of the water. There, Abe thought. If he was going to hide from the world, that would be where he would do it.
Abe approached the spot cautiously. He wheeled on the point from an angle, stepping through the grass as quietly as he could. When he got to a straight approach on the spot, he could see the shadow of someone seated at the base of the trees, something draped over them like a blanket. Abe knew who it was.
KIMBERLY STEVENS HAD taken off the light summer jacket she had been wearing and spread it over her knees, holding the collar of the coat to her neck. She was seated like a child, knees pulled hard to her chest making herself as small as she could. She stared blankly at the water. There were tracks of tears on her cheeks, but she was no longer crying. Her hair, which had been so perfectly coiffed at the fundraiser, was a mess; it looked like she had slept with wet hair and then combed it with her fingers. She did not stir as Abe approached.
Abe’s heart was in his throat. He had no idea what to expect. He should have called Betts, but he didn’t. A small voice in the back of his head told him to pull his gun. His sense of decency overrode that voice. The woman was clearly traumatized. She did not need a man with a gun creeping up on her. He moved with caution. He kept his hands out at his sides, palms exposed to her. He wanted her to know he would not harm her. The closer he got, the more his heart pounded. At the very least, he thought, Mindy will hear a gunshot if she kills me.
“Mrs. Stevens?” Abe’s voice was raspy from running. He tried to ease into the words so as not to jolt her. She did not respond. He moved closer. “Mrs. Stevens? My name is Abe Allard. I’m here to help you. I know you heard about your brother’s passing.”
Kimberly Stevens did not acknowledge Abe; she did not move.
Abe crept closer. “Mrs. Stevens? We know about the babies. We know something happened to Marcus, the real Marcus.”
A single, fat tear breached her lower eyelid and rolled down Kimberly’s cheek.
Abe was eight feet from her. She felt like she was almost close enough to touch. Abe did not want to press his luck until he knew her intentions. “Do you...do you want to talk, Mrs. Stevens?”
Another tear fell from her other eye. She licked her upper lip. Abe knew she was wavering. Her next move would tell him a lot. If she spoke, the guilt she was feeling would move her to talk. If she shot him, then the anger she felt would move her to run.
She said one word. Her voice was low and bordered on a sob. “Kimby.”
“I’m sorry?” Abe pushed his luck and took one more step toward her.
Stevens rasped and coughed. “My brother called me Kimby. Everyone else called me Kimberly or Kimmy or Kim, but Uriah called me Kimby. I liked Kimby the best of all my names. Robert called me Sweet K, but I secretly hated it.”
“I know how that goes. My parents named me Aberforth. When I was very young, my nickname was Abner. That’s only slightly better than Aberforth.” Abe crouched and took a knee to get on her level. His psychology training was taking over. You never wanted to physically lord over a patient. Always get on or below their level.
Kimberly shook her head. “Parents don’t think before they name kids sometimes, do they?”
“What makes you say that?”
“Marcus got named Marcus because Robert liked Marcus Aurelius. Who the hell knows who Marcus Aurelius is anymore? I wanted to name him John because I thought it sounded strong and plain enough to look good on job applications. That’s why he’s Marcus John Stevens.” Kimberly let out a shuddering, sobbing breath. She moaned lowly. “I was a bad mother.”
Abe slipped another inch forward. “Marcus is a splendid man. Why do you think you were a bad mother?”
Kimberly finally tilted her head, rolling her face toward Abe to see him for the first time. “Because I killed my baby.”
The words hung in the air like chimes from a large bell. They had weight and force. They reverberated in Abe’s chest. He swallowed hard and nodded. “I know.”
“How? How did you know? Only three people ever knew. Me, Uriah, and Ron.”
“You never told your husband?”
She started to laugh, but it turned into a choking noise. “He never cared about the baby.” Kimberly buried her face in her knees. She sobbed hard several times. “He was so wrapped up in being a politician. He was never home. He never helped with the baby. He was out getting wined and dined and meeting people. I was home. Alone. And I was struggling. I was struggling so hard.”
“Postpartum depression?”
Kimberly’s sobs sounded painful. “I was not cut out to be a mother. It took having a baby to show me. I never felt like I would be a good mother, but it was expected. I had to have a baby to show I was a woman, a good wife. A baby was a political move for us. It made him more appealing to voters.”
“What happened? If you get the guilt off your chest, you will feel better. I imagine you’ve been feeling like you were going to burst with this secret for more than three decades. I can’t imagine what it would do to you.” Abe inched closer to the woman. He kept his hands at his sides, palms facing her. Abe’s greatest gift as a psychologist was being as unthreatening as a bolt of brown felt. People responded to him for some reason. His passive, unassertive nature made them feel comfortable. He was an ideal listener.
Kimberly inhaled sharply. She was fighting to retain a semblance of composure, just as her years in Washington had taught her to comport herself. “I was home alone. Robert had just been elected. He was the new wunderkind. He was off being a politician, and I was home crying my eyes out. The baby would not stop crying. I fed him. I changed him. I held him. He just did not stop.”
“That can be frustrating. Did you try to reach out to anyone for help?”
“Who could I call? I had no one. I was completely alone. None of the other senator’s wives gave two shits about me because I was black. I didn’t fit into their little world. They didn’t want us there.”
Abe tried to sound understanding. “I can only imagine how difficult that would have been for you. You have my sympathies. Please, go on.” Abe could tell she needed to talk. She had more than three decades of guilt to unload. She needed to tell someone. She needed someone to listen to her.
“They didn’t talk
about depression then, especially if you were successful. But, I could not function. My days were just mindless. Everything revolved around the baby. And he only cried. It felt like he hated me. It was like he knew I was a bad mother, a bad person. It felt like he knew I felt nothing for him.”
“You were not a bad person. You had an imbalance in your brain chemistry.”
“I was a bad person.” Kimberly’s voice was adamant. Her tone lowered and she clipped the words sharply. “I should never have been someone’s mother. The baby just...just wouldn’t stop, and I was tired, and I was angry, and Robert had not been home in days, and I’m sure he was having an affair because Lord knows I was not up to doing anything for him, and there were always women around. And the baby kept crying, and crying, and crying, and his diaper was wet and I went to change him, and...and…” She started weeping openly, her back shuddered as the emotion took her.
“I... meant to just...lay him down to change him. But, I…” She gasped for air. A keening, guttural wail sounded from the depths of her body. “I slammed his poor, helpless little body onto the changing table. I didn’t mean to. I just...I lost control and his poor little neck...he…and then he stopped crying, and...” She buried her face in her knees again. She cried hard releasing decades of pent-up sorrow.
Abe let her cry for several moments. When she seemed to be getting ahold of herself, he ventured a guess. “Tasker covered it up didn’t he?”
Kimberly nodded. She brought out an arm from underneath her jacket to swab at her eyes with her forearm. The jacket fell off her knees. A slim handgun was in her lap. She swallowed hard. “Ron had said in the event of an emergency, I was to call him first and wait for further instructions. He came right over. He was my brother’s best friend, you know. He and Uriah came over and they said they’d make the problem disappear.”
“They arranged the adoption?”
“They did everything.” Kimberly listed actions on her fingers. “They found a girl having a baby only about two weeks younger than my baby to replace him. They arranged the adoption. They got me to a private doctor for some pills. They got me a nanny.” She coughed. “They told me to leave Marcus—my Marcus—in the crib like he was still alive for a day. If Robert came home, they told me to tell him Marcus was sleeping. Well, Robert did come home, but he never asked about the baby or even looked in on him. He was too consumed with his work, with being a bigwig in Washington.” She tried to laugh, but it came out as a sob. “All these years, that’s what hurts the most. He never noticed the baby he’s called his son was not his son. Never even questioned it. That’s how little he cared about Marcus. I don’t think he even held him until he was two or three.”