Hush

by Anne Frasier

  "I adopted you because Cecilia begged me to," Max said from the doorway. "But sometimes fortune falls on those who least expect it. I'm one of those people. You brought something into my life that had been lacking. You are my son. I love you more than I can ever say. And I can't begin to comprehend how empty my life would be without you in it."

  Chapter 25

  Ivy often dreamed of the night she was attacked. But now, ever since visiting her old apartment, she relived that attack two, often three times a night. And every time the dream was the same, and every time it was different. Always painful, always brutal and smothering and real.

  Every night, she told herself it was a dream. Only a dream.

  But the music. It sounds so real. Right outside the door.

  It's only the people downstairs.

  And the sound of someone breathing, right beside my ear?

  Only Jinx.

  The smells.

  Just this old place.

  But the music. It sounds so real.

  Right outside the door.

  Open your eyes. Open your eyes and the dream will end.

  In the dream, she opened her eyes. And discovered she was still dreaming.

  Open your eyes, and you'll see that it's just a dream. Like a swimmer surfacing from a deep dive, she kicked her feet and swam up, up, up to the top.

  She opened her eyes.

  Slices of light from the street cut in around the window shade, creating geometric patterns of light and dark that fell across walls and floor.

  With one foot still firmly in the dreamscape, she thought, Something here is strange. Something is not quite right.

  The music.

  The music was still playing. Tinny notes. Just the melody, sounding as if it were coming from a miniature music box.

  Hush little baby, don't say a word.

  If that mockingbird don't sing,

  Mamma's gonna buy you a diamond ring.

  Gasping, Ivy shot upright, fully awake now.

  Jesus. She put a hand to her chest, grasping for a cross that wasn't there.

  Who was doing that? Where was it coming from?

  Outside her room.

  She tossed back the covers and got to her feet. Without turning on a light, her eyes accustomed to the dark, she moved in the direction of the now fading notes. Through the kitchen, to the locked door.

  Abruptly, the music stopped.

  She looked at the doorknob. Jinx's collar was still there where she'd hung it.

  She wrapped her hand around the bell so it wouldn't make any noise. Carefully, slowly, she unlocked the dead bolt, pulling open the door until the chain caught.

  Nothing. Nobody.

  She waited.

  She listened.

  Then she silently undid the chain . . . and opened the door several more inches.

  Nobody.

  No one.

  She let out a gasping breath, aware of the frantic lub, lub, lub of her heart. Behind her, Jinx meowed a question.

  She was beginning to think she'd imagined the whole thing when a final crystal-clear note rang out. She sucked in a new breath, her gaze pulled from the winding flight of stairs to drop to the floor in front of her.

  There, just outside her door, was a snow-globe music box.

  A multitude of possibilities collided in her brain. Was this a sick joke?

  Had the Madonna Murderer left it?

  If so, why had he singled her out?

  Did he know who she really was?

  Was he still in the building?

  The last thought had her slamming the door, locking the locks, appalled at herself for having opened the door in the first place. Then she rushed to the phone and called Max.

  He answered on the second ring, his voice groggy. "Irving," he mumbled.

  Gripping the receiver in both hands, Ivy's words tumbled out. "Max. The Madonna Murderer may have just been here. You need to set up a perimeter around my apartment building."

  "Tell me what happened." Now his voice was clear, alert. "Slowly."

  She told him about the snow globe.

  "Did you see anyone? Hear anyone?"

  "No. Just the music playing."

  "Are you calling from your apartment now?" A cautious question, containing components of his immediate concern mixed with a need to keep her calm.

  "Yes."

  "Are you sure he's not in there?"

  "In my apartment?"

  She looked over at Jinx, who was washing his face. Jinx would be acting weird if anyone else were there. "He's not here ... but I don't know about the rest of the building."

  "Lock the door and stay where you are. I'll be there as soon as I can."

  He hung up.

  Ivy gazed around her.

  What if the person who'd left the box was still in the building? What if he came back and retrieved his "gift"? Then there would be no evidence.

  You have to go out there.

  You have to go out and get it.

  No. Wait for Max. I'll wait for Max.

  It might be gone by then. He might come back and get it, and the evidence will be gone.

  Ivy flipped on the kitchen light. From a drawer, she dug out a package of yellow cleaning gloves. She ripped open the package and put on the gloves. Then she unlocked the door again.

  The globe was still there.

  The hallway was still empty.

  Shaking, her heart thundering so loudly in her ears that she could hear nothing else, she picked up the globe, careful to touch it in only two small places with a fingertip and a thumb. Back inside, she quickly relocked the door and leaned weakly against it, her chest heaving. Finally, when she'd calmed down enough, she looked at the object in her hands. With the illumination of the kitchen light, she could now see the interior of the globe.

  She frowned and lifted it closer to her face.

  Inside with the swirling snow floated a thick piece of something tan in color.

  What the—?

  The object was water-saturated, the edges ragged and fluttering. She could see holes. Then she realized there were straight black hairs poking out from the holes, which weren't holes at all; they were pores.

  She let out a little yelp and almost dropped the globe.

  Pores.

  Across the surface of the skin was a rose, and a banner that said MOTHER.

  Chapter 26

  By the time Max reached Ivy's, the perimeter had been established; there were two squad cars at the scene plus the crime technician's van. Outside the apartment building things were quiet, but inside was pandemonium. People in all stages of undress clogged the hallways, demanding to know what was happening while the police tried to calm them.

  The apartment manager ran up to Max. "What's going on here?" He wore boxer shorts and a white tank top stretched across his belly. "I don't want to lose my job over this. You vouched for that woman. I wouldn't have leased the place to her if I knew she was going to be trouble. My tenants expect to be safe here."

  "Mr. . . ." Max searched his brain for a name.

  "Hoffman."

  "Mr. Hoffman, let's try to stay focused on our main concern. Who else might have access to this building other than the tenants?"

  "Nobody."

  "What about newspaper delivery?"

  "The papers are left in the lobby and a guy on the first floor delivers them."

  "What about painters? Repairmen? Exterminators?"

  "Well. Yeah, sometimes I give people like that a key."

  "Get me a list of names." Then to a nearby officer, Max said, "Get a team to make a sweep of the building, make sure nobody's hiding anywhere." The officer nodded, then Max was moving through the crowd, hurrying up the stairs to Ivy's apartment.

  When he got there, Ivy was standing near the kitchen sink holding her cat in her arms. Two technicians, white masks around their necks, were staring at an object on the table.

  A snow globe.

  "You gotta see this," said one of the techs. />
  "Oh, yeah," his partner agreed, nodding as he kept his gaze locked on the globe.

  Max moved closer. Then closer, for a better look. Finally he straightened. "Is that real?"

  "We don't know. Have to get it to the crime lab."

  "Is that formaldehyde I smell?"

  "Oh, yeah."

  Max shook his head. "Do you mean to tell me that crazy son of a bitch cut a chunk out of his own arm?"

  "A little present for me," Ivy said.

  He stared at her for a moment. She didn't look too shaken, all things considered. When their eyes met, their thoughts collided somewhere in the center of the room, asking a question they couldn't speak aloud.

  Why did he single me out?

  Why did he single you out?

  Max forced his gaze away from hers. "Prints?" he asked.

  "Nothing on the globe. We're going to do the door and hallway, but with so many people living in this building it'll be tough to come up with anything. But if the tattoo is real, there's a remote chance the lab might be able to extract DNA."

  "Guess we got his attention," Ivy said.

  Her cat meowed and squirmed, then jumped from her arms, its feet thudding on the floor, and ran to hide under the bed. "Now we know he reads the paper or watches the news."

  What were they going to do with Ivy Dunlap? he wondered. And what did this mean? Had the killer figured out who she was? Or had he singled her out simply because she was involved in the investigation? He had an old habit of leaving small gifts for people involved in the case.

  Five minutes later, the crime technicians slid the globe into a paper bag and left the apartment. Ivy closed the door behind them.

  Max ran his fingers through his hair. "This has certainly gone in a direction I wasn't expecting."

  "I can already tell what you're thinking," she said, crossing her arms and leaning a hip against the kitchen counter. She wore a long T-shirt kind of thing—maybe something she slept in—with jeans pulled on underneath. Her feet were bare. A window air conditioner blasted tepid, stale air in his direction. "You're wondering how quickly you can get me on a plane out of here. No, we don't know why he singled me out. It could be he saw the picture in the paper. With a little investigating, he could have found out where I live."

  Max was fried. Burnt-out. Exhausted to the point of stupor. He dropped down on one of the stools. Elbows on the table, he buried his face in his hands. "Shit. I can't pull my head together." He was beginning to understand why Abraham had aged so quickly while working on the Madonna Murderer case. Max was standing in quicksand and the sky was falling, all at the same time.

  He felt her hand on his shoulder.

  He looked up, startled by the contact.

  "Want some coffee?" she asked, slowly pulling her hand away from what he now understood was merely a gesture of sympathy. Brothers in arms.

  "What time is it?"

  "A little after four."

  He should call Ethan. He would in a minute. "Do you have a gun?"

  "I asked if you wanted coffee."

  He looked up at her. "Do you have a gun?"

  "No."

  "Do you know how to use a gun?"

  "I learned several years ago."

  "We'll get you a gun. What about a mobile phone? Do you have a mobile phone?"

  "No."

  "We'll get you a phone too."

  She poured a cup of coffee and placed it in front of him.

  He took a drink. "We'll put twenty-four-hour surveillance on the building. Maybe a cop in your apartment."

  "I don't want this to be about protecting me. I want it to be about catching him."

  "We can do both at the same time."

  "Thanks."

  "For what?"

  "For not immediately telling me you're going to send me home."

  "You can fight with Abraham about that. And besides, whatever the Madonna Murderer knows about you—whether you're Ivy Dunlap to him or Claudia Reynolds—you're still our best chance to catch this guy. Tonight proves that." He was quiet a minute. "How did he get into the building?"

  "Anybody can get in the building if they wait at the door long enough. I have people let me in all the time."

  "At three in the morning?"

  "Could he be a tenant? That would be a helluva coincidence."

  "We'll get Mr. Hoffman downstairs to give us the tenant list. I think that'll prove to be a dead end."

  "Maybe he got in the building earlier in the day, then waited."

  "Hid in a stairwell or something."

  "Yeah."

  "That seems the most likely scenario. We'll have to interview everyone in the building."

  "There are a hundred apartments in this building."

  "Have a better idea?"

  "No."

  Max pulled out his mobile phone and called Ethan. "I'm not going to be home until tonight," he told him.

  "What about my game?"

  "You have a game? Where?"

  "Home. At Cascade."

  "Catch a ride with somebody. I'll try to get there, but I can't promise you anything." Max knew he probably wouldn't make it, but at least he'd know where Ethan was.

  "What about finding my real parents? You said you'd help me with that."

  The kid was breaking his heart and didn't even know it. "I will."

  "When?"

  "Soon." Max told him good-bye and hung up, slipping the phone back in his pocket. "You were right about Ethan's problems being more than simple teenage angst," he told Ivy.

  "You talked to him?"

  "Yeah." Max let out a sigh. "He's suddenly decided that I don't love him, and wants to find his real parents." He elaborated on what he'd already told her about Cecilia, about Ethan being adopted not once, but twice.

  "Do you know anything about his real parents?"

  "Only that the mother was a friend of Cecilia's who had an unwanted pregnancy. I don't know anything about the father."

  "You must have contacts the average person wouldn't have."

  "What if his birth mother doesn't want anything to do with Ethan? I don't want him getting hurt. On the other hand—and I know I'm being selfish about this— what if she wants to see him?"

  "Some children have an overwhelming need to know where they come from. I can understand your concern, but his birth mother could never replace you. You're his father. You're the one who has been there for him all these years. You are his past. You are his memories."

  "What if his mother was a victim of rape? That happens more than you know. I wouldn't want Ethan to find out something like that."

  She crossed her arms at her waist. "My grandmother would have said you're oversteering your headlights."

  He looked up at her, and she could suddenly tell that he'd remembered her son, her murdered son.

  "Christ, Ivy. I'm sorry. I shouldn't be talking to you about this."

  "It's okay."

  "I don't know what I was thinking."

  "Do you know how nice it is that you know about my son? I've spent the last sixteen years lying to people about my past. Do you know how wonderful it is to hear about Ethan, to be able to say, I had a son too? And if he had lived, he would have been tall and strong, weak and wise. He would have needed me, and he would have pushed me away. Ever since he died, I've had to deny his existence. When people would ask me if I had children, I couldn't say I used to have a son. I had to say no. That hurt so much, to say no. And it created a wall between me and every single person I met. If I liked someone—male or female—I knew we could never be more than casual acquaintances, because my secret was too big. It was too much a part of everything I am, and I knew they would never be able to begin to know me without the knowledge of my past. I love to hear about Ethan. Because when you talk about him, when you tell me about the hardships of being a parent, I feel closer to the son I lost. So don't ever stop talking about him." Her voice caught, and she paused to collect herself. "Don't ever stop talking about him," she whispered.

>   He put his coffee cup aside and got to his feet. She thought he was leaving when he pulled her into his arms and held her close. Just held her, held her, held her.

  Chapter 27

  Darby Nichols tied her running shoes and headed out the door. She liked jogging early on Sunday mornings because everybody was still in bed. There wasn't much traffic, and there weren't many people cluttering the sidewalks, getting in the way, slowing her down. Come fall, Darby was going to be a high school senior, and she hoped to do well enough in track to get at least a partial sports scholarship. Her strength was distance running, and today it was her plan to go twelve miles.

  The course she'd mapped out took her through several Chicago neighborhoods, shopping areas, a forest preserve, and two parks. A half-mile from her home, she hit Crocus Hill Park, one of her favorite areas. Pigeons fluttered out of her way, then settled again on the wide sidewalk with clucks of mild complaint. The air was thick with morning dew, and the sun was just beginning to warm her skin. She was young. She was healthy. She had her whole life ahead of her.

  The sidewalk forked. She took the left path leading to a stone bridge that spanned a small pond where people gathered to feed the ducks. As she approached the bridge, her feet slapped a steady rhythm that seemed to coincide with her breathing and her heartbeat, a sound that put her in that slightly meditative state it took for her to make it the whole twelve miles.

  Without conscious thought, her gaze locked on something in the distance. A splash of color against the more muted shades of nature.

  Slap, slap, slap.

  Her brain registered printed fabric. A discarded shirt? Dress? People could be such pigs.

  As she drew nearer, she asked: A person? Sleeping in the park? A homeless person?

  In Chicago, you saw a lot of homeless people. She'd learned not to look at them, not to make eye contact. Because even though she pitied them, and wished something could be done so they didn't have to live on the street, they also scared her. With their bold stares and the weird things they said that made her feel she should respond out of simple politeness. It was better not to look.

  Finally she was upon the brightly colored fabric. Her legs slowed . . . and slowed . . . and slowed, until she was walking. Until she stopped dead.