The Body Keeper

by Anne Frasier

  CHAPTER 18

  At her desk, Jude ran a search for a woman named Nanette Perkins. A few key clicks and she was on her feet, grabbing her jacket from the back of the chair. “I’m going to follow a lead,” she told Uriah. The car accident had occurred south of Minneapolis. Lucky for the victim, the hospital was a good one.

  He swiveled and looked up from his monitor, hands behind his head. No line between his brows, no pallor or shallow breathing. She felt a rush of relief, telling herself she was worrying too much. He was fine. He had no secrets.

  “Need me to come?” he asked.

  “This is about the kid who showed up at my place, not the frozen bodies. I’ll try not to take long.” She explained that the tip line had gotten a call from a nurse at Fairview Southdale Hospital, where the accident victim was being cared for. “The woman who ran her car off the road south of town. The nurse claimed the woman spoke the word boy upon seeing the child on the news. The woman’s name? Nanette.”

  He raised his eyebrows.

  Yep. Thanks to the local press, it was looking like they might have found the mysterious Nana. Just hours ago, she’d learned CPS had been able to place the boy in emergency foster care with a family in the neighborhood of Richfield. She should have felt good about that, but instead the news made her uneasy.

  “Why are you getting information on that case?” Uriah asked. “Missing Persons should be dealing with it.”

  “I wanted to be kept in the loop.”

  He dropped his hands and swiveled back to his monitor. “Understandable.” His response was surprising considering their caseload and his past reactions to her drifting too far from Homicide.

  “Be back as soon as I can.”

  After exiting the police department parking ramp in her own car rather than a department vehicle, she took I-35 south. It was a sunny day, made almost blinding by the banks of snow everywhere. The interstate was clear, but even in the upscale town of Edina, the side streets were still a mess. Intersections were slick and slushy, and streets were enclosed by claustrophobic walls of snow being scraped away with front-end loaders and emptied into dump trucks waiting to haul it to designated lots.

  She parked in the hospital ramp and took the walkway across France Avenue to the hospital. With her badge and introduction, she was given the location of Nanette Perkins’s room. Avoiding the elevator, she hurried up the stairs to the third floor and knocked on the open door. Not waiting for an invitation, Jude stepped in, and the patient turned off the television.

  Even though this might be their mysterious Nana, it wasn’t hard to feel sympathy and even empathy for the person in the hospital bed, her foot suspended from a sling, bare toes swollen. It wasn’t long ago that Jude had spent days in a hospital before furtively slipping out and escaping into city streets like some criminal.

  Because of the swelling due to facial injuries sustained in the crash, it was hard to get a read on the woman. The only real expression came from the one eye that wasn’t swollen shut.

  Jude introduced herself.

  “I know who you are.”

  Not a surprise. A bigger surprise came when people didn’t recognize her. That’s how much her face had been on TV and in grocery-store checkout lanes. “It’s a little hard to fly under the radar,” she admitted.

  Sometimes Jude could observe and input information from a person’s grooming and self-care, from the way the skin looked and whether nails were trimmed. That wasn’t effective with a car-crash victim, so she worked with what she had. The woman was medium height, a little on the heavy side, but not much. Her dark hair was shoulder-length and matted from the accident, the surgery, and the bed. From Jude’s earlier record search, she knew Nanette Perkins was forty-three and a young widow living on a farm south of town. Those things spoke of a hard life. But that one unswollen, brilliant-green eye watched with a sharpness that was surprising, especially given that she was gripping a narcotic pump button so tightly.

  The tip-line caller had reported that Ms. Perkins had violently tossed a bottle of apple juice at her head. A miss, but the juice had exploded against a wall. Looked like the mess had been cleaned up, but Jude could still smell a lingering fruity vinegar under the scents of antiseptic and cotton blankets dried at a high temperature.

  “Guess I should be flattered they called you about my little tantrum,” the woman said. “But it seems a bit out of your line of work. Aren’t you a homicide detective? Or are you moonlighting as a therapist?” She pushed her fists against the mattress, trying to sit up a little higher despite her leg being in a sling.

  “Would you like me to adjust your bed?” Jude asked.

  “I can do it.” Perkins grabbed the control, and the bed groaned. “And I was kidding about the therapist. I know why you’re really here. I was watching TV, and the nurse thought I said something about that missing kid.” She squinted and glanced at the window beside her.

  “That’s what we were told.” Jude crossed the room and pulled the curtains closed, cutting the brightness in half. The fluorescents overhead were still intolerable. Not only the light they emitted, but the sound. A person might not notice it at first, not with all the other stimuli, but when you focused, you could hear a hum. “You understand that we have to follow up on any possible leads. We can’t overlook anything. But rest assured, we’re just doing our job.” She made it sound as if this was just one of many tedious visits in her day. “The hotline has generated a lot of calls.”

  “Still, homicide?”

  “I’m helping out. We do that sometimes.” A half truth.

  The woman relaxed.

  Jude tugged a small spiral notebook from her messenger bag. She often liked to use real paper and a pen, even though it meant having to spend more time entering the information in the database later. Paper and pen gave her focus as she mentally composed her questions. Sometimes she didn’t even write at all. Along with the notebook, she pulled out a photo and placed it on the narrow hospital table, then rolled the open-ended contraption over the bed and in front of the woman so she could get a good look at the eight-by-ten of the boy. Not the one Jude had captured in her apartment, but a more professional image taken by CPS, the one they were using for the tip line.

  “I’ve seen him on the news,” Perkins said. “Not much else to do here but watch TV.”

  “Do you know his name?”

  “They said it was Boy. I guess the kid told somebody that. Said it was Boy.”

  “That’s a strange name, don’t you agree?” Jude watched her closely.

  “He’s a kid. Kids get confused. I’m sure you know that.”

  “So, was earlier today the first time you ever saw this boy?”

  “Yes.”

  Perkins was beginning to sweat. Just a sheen of perspiration on her upper lip. Not necessarily a tell. Pain could cause a similar response.

  Jude set her tablet aside and grabbed her phone. “Would you mind if I took a photo of you? For our records?”

  “Hell no. No pictures.” Like someone trying to avoid the paparazzi, the woman raised a hand in front of her face, palm out.

  Jude put the phone away. “Why no photos? That makes me think you’re hiding something.”

  “I look terrible.” Perkins attempted to smooth her tangled hair. It didn’t help. When Jude had gotten out of the hospital, she’d had such knots she chopped off her hair, leaving about an inch behind. Easier than the alternative. “No woman would want a photo taken of her in a hospital bed, unless maybe she was holding a baby or something,” Perkins said.

  “Not a problem. I was able to find some photos of you online. They weren’t that recent, but recent enough. You don’t really have much of an internet presence. No Facebook or Twitter or Instagram that I could find.”

  “I’m not into social media.”

  “Me either.” Jude redirected the discussion. “Did you know the child was left at my apartment building?”

  The woman blinked. “That’s what I heard.”
r />   “I wonder if that was just some random thing. What do you think?”

  She shrugged. “You’re the cop.”

  “I’m not sure. If it was by choice, then why? That’s my next question. Maybe someone was trying to get him to safety.”

  “Maybe.”

  “And even though the snowstorm wasn’t the most ideal way to dump a child, maybe the person doing it was desperate.”

  “I could see that. You might be onto something.”

  Jude dug into her messenger bag again and pulled out three more photos she’d enlarged. She placed them on the narrow table along with the boy’s headshot. “These are close-ups of the physical damage to the child, inflicted over a period of years. Well, he’s only about four, but you get the idea.”

  The woman glanced at the images, then away, then back again. Jude watched her closely, watched her hands begin to shake as they hovered over the photos, like someone reading tarot cards and not liking the fortune in front of her.

  “Broken bones that were never set,” Jude explained casually. “That’s what it looks like to me. What does it look like to you?”

  “Why are you showing me these awful things about a boy I don’t even know?” She glared up with that one eye. “You need to leave.”

  “I’m wondering about the circumstances that might lead to such a thing.” She gathered her notebook and pen. “It might not have been abuse. People immediately think that, but there are many reasons for a child to end up in such dire circumstances, the biggest one being financial.” Of course the injuries weren’t accidental, but Jude was trying to put Ms. Perkins at ease and open up a conversation. “A child falls down, breaks an arm, breaks a collarbone. It costs a lot of money to repair those kinds of injuries if you don’t have health insurance. And even if you do.”

  The woman nodded. “That’s true. I have no idea how I’ll ever pay for this.” She looked around the room.

  “But these . . .” Jude pulled out another color eight-by-ten. “This wasn’t caused by a financial crisis or neglect. This was abuse.” She placed the photo on top of another image, directly in front of Ms. Perkins. “What does this look like to you?”

  No reply.

  “I’m going to say cigarette burns. Wouldn’t you agree?”

  “They could be anything. Bugbite scars, I’d say. Have you ever seen a spider bite? They leave a round scar.”

  “True, but cigarette burns are highly specific and easily recognizable. I have a lot of data on cigarette burns.” She tossed the tablet and pen aside, slipped off her jacket, and unbuttoned the top three buttons of her shirt, pulling it open enough to expose her shoulder, turning so the woman in bed could see it. “Some tormentors like to hold cigarettes against a person’s back,” Jude explained. “My theory is they want to hear the screams, but they don’t want to watch the victim’s face. It’s just a little too much. But others get off on seeing the reaction and the pain they’re causing.” She turned and pulled up her shirt to reveal the midsection of her stomach. “As you can see, cigarette burns all look alike. They leave a precise scar.” Pause for effect. “I know a cigarette burn when I see one.”

  The woman made an angry choking sound and swept the photos off the table to the floor. “This has nothing to do with me. Get out of here. Now. And don’t come back.”

  Jude continued to watch the woman in the bed. She was in pain—real pain, not emotional pain. Jude felt bad about that. But Perkins knew something about the boy. No doubt about it.

  She buttoned her shirt and put on her jacket. She picked up the photos with care and returned them safely to her bag. Perkins was lying back, eyes closed, fumbling for her pain pump. Jude stepped forward and put it in her hand. “I hope you feel better soon. Oh, and Ms. Perkins? I’ll be back.” After she visited the boy at his foster home to show him a photo of Nanette Perkins.

  CHAPTER 19

  Twenty years earlier . . .

  The alarm woke her at three a.m. Nan had set it to go off every hour so she could keep tabs on the outdoor temperature.

  “Lyle.” She shook her husband’s shoulder. “Get up.”

  He groaned and she shook him again.

  “It’s twenty below. You need to put heaters out there.”

  Like a sleepwalker, he tossed back the covers and shuffled away. She heard the jingle of his belt as he pulled on his jeans, heard the zip of his jacket and the metal click of his lighter, followed by a whiff of cigarette smoke. Then the door slammed, and she dropped off again. At some point he returned to bed, shivering, saying something about how damn cold it was, his arm hugging her waist, his legs like ice.

  They both fell back asleep.

  Several hours later, she woke to howling wind rattling the farmhouse. She checked the RadioShack temperature gauge next to the bed. It had a cord that ran along the baseboard and out a window. Still twenty below, but at least it hadn’t gotten any colder. She recalled some worse nights.

  A cold front had blown in late yesterday, and she and the rest of the team had come to the last-minute decision to wait on making their next delivery until morning because of the threat of black ice on the roads. No sense risking lives and their valuable merchandise. Nan didn’t like it when things didn’t go smoothly, and the weather in the Midwest was especially challenging. Plus, they had a reputation to maintain. Their isolated farmhouse served as the national hub for smuggled goods, and a fast and effortless delivery was of utmost importance.

  She got out of bed and put on layers of clothing. Jeans, sweatshirt, wool socks, heavy insulated boots. In the living room, she turned up the thermostat a couple of degrees, muttering to herself about their move to Minnesota. A few years ago, they’d had some merchandise go bad in the Oklahoma heat, and they’d thought moving north might be a good idea. “Nobody will be looking for us in rural Minnesota.” It was true, and not a bad move except for the winters. There was no way she could have been prepared for this. Sure, she watched the news, knew it got cold, but a person really had to live it to understand what kind of hell it truly was.

  In the kitchen, she turned on the coffeemaker. While it spit liquid into the glass pot, she laid out twenty pieces of white bread on the kitchen table and began scooping generic peanut butter from a big plastic jar. The bathroom door slammed, and Lyle appeared, tucking in his flannel shirt, a red cap on his head that advertised a popular tractor brand.

  Everything was about blending in. They were just a couple in their twenties interested in working a few hundred acres. Luckily, Lyle had worked on a farm before deciding to go into the family business and knew how to make it look official. For the last two years, he’d even sold the corn crop they’d raised. In the summer, Nan had a stand at a market in the city where she sold eggs, and she’d started making strawberry jam that wasn’t half-bad. It was easy to get sucked into the life and almost start believing it yourself.

  Lyle looped an index finger through the handles of two mugs and filled them as liquid from the machine sizzled onto the warming plate. With a clatter, he replaced the carafe, set a cup of coffee near her, tapped and dumped two cigarettes from the pack on the table, and pulled a lighter from his pocket. Without a word, he lit both cigarettes and passed one over.

  Their routine, his silent little love song to her.

  This was something they did together. Drank coffee and hard liquor and smoked. But the smoking was the real glue in their relationship. A lot of couples bonded over a love of smoking. That was her theory, anyway. Because when you looked at a relationship closely, that was all some people had. A love of smoking in a world that increasingly marginalized smokers. Restaurants had smoking sections now, in the worst part of the building, usually next to the restroom. She wouldn’t be surprised if they tried to stop smoking in bars. Ridiculous, since smoking and drinking went together.

  But all the chicken eggs and strawberry jam couldn’t make her like Minnesota. She’d finally admitted to herself that she hated it. She hadn’t told Lyle yet, but she was hoping they could
sell the farm and move the hub back to Oklahoma. But it wasn’t going to be easy. Lyle seemed to like it here, and he would take some convincing. She didn’t mind the contraband they smuggled from all over the country, but she was sick of the cold. And yet Lyle seemed to actually enjoy the life they had on their pretend farm that she was afraid wasn’t really pretend anymore.

  She spread the peanut butter, and he put the slices of bread together and stuck them back in the bread bag. “Gonna need water too,” she said.

  “Got it under control, hon. Checked the road report and everything’s clear.”

  They’d talked about having a kid because she’d really like a little boy or girl of her own. But hell. Lyle was like a kid sometimes. She had to watch everything he did. What kind of partnership was that?

  “I’m going to start the truck.” At the back door, he stuffed his feet into a pair of boots that were supposed to be warm enough to wear when temperatures reached forty below zero. Forty freakin’ below.

  “Let’s just move so we don’t have to worry about this damn cold.” She wanted to see if he’d agree. He didn’t.

  He slapped on a pair of gloves and grabbed the bag of sandwiches. “I’ll put these and the water in the truck, then we’ll load up.” Frigid air blasted her in the face, almost taking her breath away. A few minutes later, he was back. He just stood there, wind blowing in.

  “Shut the damn door.” Distracted, she stubbed out her cigarette and stuck her hands in the pockets of her sweatshirt.

  He didn’t move.

  She started to yell at him about the cold and the door, but then she noticed how white his face was. And was he shaking? Yes.

  “What’s wrong?”

  He moved his mouth, but no sound came out. He pointed behind him.

  Something told her this was serious, this was bad.

  The farmhouse addition had two entries. One for loading and unloading, and one just off the kitchen. She headed for the one off the kitchen.