Sheriff’s Runaway Witness

by Kathleen Creighton

  The contraction seemed to be passing, thank God. The woman was only sobbing now, which at least was something more like what he was used to. In homicide, everybody did a lot of crying-family and friends of the victim, traumatized witnesses, even the perps, when they got caught. This he could handle.

  “I’m sorry,” she wailed, then hiccupped loudly. “I can’t help it. I just…can’t keep from p-pushing.”

  “Well, ma’am,” he said, trying a firm and authoritative approach, “since we are going to do this thing, I guess there’s no need for you to stop pushing. But I’m going to need you to do some things, okay? I’m gonna need you to help me out here. It’s been a long time since they told me how to do this, so I’m pretty rusty. I’m sure you know a lot more than I do. So you need to stay calm, okay?”

  “Okay,” she whispered, sniffing. She swiped at her wet cheeks with one hand. “What do you want me to do?”

  “Well, for starters,” J.J. said, giving her a smile he was sure wouldn’t fool anybody, “since it looks like I’m about to help your baby into the world, I’d like to be able to call you something besides ‘ma’am.’ Could you tell me your name?”

  She hiccupped again and gave a funny little laugh. “Rachel. It’s…Rachel.”

  Rachel.

  The name sounded strange, coming from her own lips, like a word in a foreign language. The person named Rachel seemed to her like someone she might have known a long time ago, or perhaps in another life. Another universe.

  The one she occupied now was a strange, dreamlike world where nothing seemed real and time had no meaning. How long had it been since she’d driven Izzy’s car into that ravine, since she’d put on Izzy’s habit and set out walking across the desert? One moment it seemed like hours-she knew it must have been hours-and the next she felt it had could have been only seconds. Right now she felt as if she was still out there plodding along, one foot setting itself down in front of the other in endlessly repeating sequence, sometimes without any direction from her.

  I’m so tired. She wanted desperately to stop, to lie down somewhere. But her body kept pushing her on, forcing her on.

  “I want to stop,” she said. “I have to rest.”

  She heard a soft deep chuckle, and the face from the Western movie swam into view. “Afraid you can’t do that, Rachel, honey. Looks like you’re gonna have your baby right here, like it or not.”

  What? Here? Ridiculous! She shook her head, adamant, furious. “No. I can’t. You’re taking me to the hospital. I have to go to the hospital.”

  But then she felt her body being wrenched out of her control again, and now it seemed it was trying its best to turn itself wrong-side-out. Again and again she was caught up by terrible, powerful forces and was utterly helpless to stop what was happening to her. The only thing she could think of to compare it to was once when she and Nicky had been at the beach, swimming, and she’d gotten caught in a huge breaking wave. She’d felt herself being tossed and twisted and dashed down into swirling sand and seawater, arms and legs going every which way like a rag doll in a washing machine, and her mind, disconnected from her body, had thought, Oh, wow, I’m drowning. And she’d felt no fear, she remembered, only mild surprise.

  Someone-the stranger named Rachel-was screaming. Belly-deep, grinding screams that sounded like something being torn in half. She felt unbearable pressure, pressure she was sure she couldn’t stand another second. She heard someone bellow, “I can’t…”

  “Shh…yes, you can…you’re doin’ fine, darlin’…just a little bit more…” The voice was deep and growly, like a tiger purring, and seemed to be very close to her ear.

  It was him again, the man from the Western movie. He even sounded a little like a cowboy, she thought, with that accent. A little bit like John Wayne. For some odd reason she found that reassuring. She realized that he was holding her, and that his arms were very hard and strong and that his shirt front was warm and slightly damp where her forehead pressed against it. She was sorry when he eased her away from him. She opened her eyes and watched his face as he laid her down. She noticed that he wasn’t wearing his cowboy hat now. His hair was damp and there was a groove around his head from where it had been. She wondered what had happened to his hat.

  She closed her eyes and whimpered, feeling ashamed, “I’m so tired.”

  “I know…rest a little bit now, okay? Just rest…that’s right.”

  I can’t believe this is happening. My baby, Nicky’s baby- Carlos Delacorte’s grandson-is going to be born in a cop car. Delivered by a cop!

  That struck her as terribly funny. She wanted to laugh, but when she started what she thought was a laugh, tears squeezed from her eyes and ran down into her ears.

  “Easy, now…you’re gonna be okay,” the growly voice said. But then another voice-a woman’s voice-rode right over it and drowned it out.

  “J.J., Ridgecrest wants to know what’s happening. Um…like, what can you see?”

  See? “Uh…Lord, I don’t know…hold on a minute,” J.J. said.

  This was all happening much too fast for him. He ran a hand over his face while he regarded the woman, who was now lying back on the seat. She appeared to be crying. He could see her face, with tears streaming down the sides and into her already soaking-wet hair. Other than that, she looked to him like a great big mound of clothing. He knew what he was going to have to do next, and the only thing he could think of he’d have dreaded more was breaking the news to somebody that their loved one was dead. That was the worst. But peeling nun’s clothes off a woman in labor was right up there close.

  “Ma’am-uh, Rachel, I want you to listen to me, okay? I’m gonna need you to take off whatever you’ve got on under that gown you’re wearing. Can you do that?”

  He didn’t know what he’d expected-protests, maybe, or some shyness? But she didn’t bat an eye. Just sniffled and said, “Okay…” But then she only plucked ineffectively at the habit, like she didn’t know what to do with it.

  He took a deep breath…heaved a silent sigh. “Need some help?”

  She nodded and muttered, “I’m all wet.”

  It struck him then, that this must be something Mother Nature provided, this temporary suspension of modesty that made it possible for a woman to tolerate being intimately exposed to total strangers. Knowing that she truly wouldn’t mind made it easier for him, somehow.

  It also occurred to him that the habit made a pretty damn good drape.

  Still, it wasn’t easy, getting her out of her wet clothes. Especially since she wasn’t able to be of much help. She kept having contractions that doubled her up and seemed to take her off into a place where she wasn’t even aware of him and what he was doing. By the time he had her shoes off-at least they were good quality sensible athletic shoes-and her wet socks, and started tugging on her slacks, he was almost as wet with sweat as she was.

  But he got them off, finally, and her underwear, too. And that was when he ran into something unexpected. When he pulled off her underpants, something came with them-an envelope. It was thick and white and addressed by hand, with no stamp or postmark, just some tape around the edges, the kind used to hold bandages in place, the kind that doesn’t irritate the skin.

  What the hell? His cop radar was pinging again, this time clear off the scale. A pregnant woman wearing a nun’s habit-some kind of disguise, he now figured-clearly having suffered a fairly recent beating, found walking alone in the middle of the Mojave Desert-what was she doing with an envelope taped to her stomach?

  He’d have given a lot to know what was in that envelope, but right now he had more pressing things on his mind.

  “J.J.? Are you there?”

  “Copy…”

  “Ridgecrest wants to know what’s happening, and so do I.” Katie’s voice came tensely from his shoulder.

  “Uh…hold on…” He took mental note of the name on the envelope-Rachel Malone Delacorte-and the address, a very pricey part of Beverly Hills, then laid the envelope on t
op of the pile of shoes and clothing on the floor where they’d be out of the way. Then, hoping his hands weren’t going to shake, he lifted the edge of the habit.

  “Uh…okay, looks like the baby’s right there.”

  “Ridgecrest says, can you tell if it’s the head.”

  “Uh…yeah, seems to be.”

  “Okay, Ridgecrest wants to know, which way is it facing-up or down?”

  Jeez. “Too soon to tell,” he said tersely. He gulped in air to fight off the beginnings of queasiness and looked over the top of the draped habit. Smiled wretchedly. “Hear that, Rachel? Won’t be much longer now…” Lord, I hope.

  “J.J., Ridgecrest says you better get ready. Have you got anything to catch the baby with.”

  Catch the baby? Envisioning a giant-sized catcher’s mitt, he felt an absurd impulse to laugh.

  “And something to tie off the cord.”

  “Copy.” He leaned across the mound of Rachel’s draped knees and said, “I’m just gonna go and get-”

  Which was as far as he got before a hand clutched at the front of his shirt, a very small hand with a whole lot of strength to it. “Don’t…leave…me.”

  He didn’t know why he did what he did then-he sure didn’t think about it beforehand. He cupped his hand behind her head and kissed her forehead, then pressed his cheek against her wet hair. Under the salty smell of sweat, he caught something sweet and exotic, like tropical flowers.

  “I’m not gonna leave you,” he said huskily. “We’re doin’ this together, you and me. I’ve just got to get some things out of the back of the vehicle to help us. Okay?” He pulled back and waited for her to look at him and nod her comprehension, then he kissed her forehead again. “Be right back…”

  For a moment then, he stood upright in the bright sunlight, pulling in big gulps of hot desert air, trying to get his bearings. Then he went around to open up the back of the SUV and took out the first aid kit and a blanket. When he got back to Rachel, she was lying back quietly, evidently resting, so he took a moment to open up the first aid kit and check the contents. Scissors…cotton balls, bandages, disinfectant…all good. Even a bulb-thing for suctioning out airways, which he seemed to recall he’d probably need. It was good to know some of what he’d learned in his training days was coming back to him.

  “J.J.?”

  “Copy.”

  “How are you doing?”

  The worry in Katie’s voice made him respond with more confidence than he was feeling. “Doin’ fine. I think we have everything we need.”

  “Okay, Ridgecrest says you’re going to have to help her push.”

  “Uh-huh.” Lord, how do I do that?

  “They say when the contractions come you should lift her so she sits up, don’t let her lie flat. Gravity helps.”

  “Gotcha.”

  “And J.J.? They say don’t let her push too hard. You, um…don’t want her to tear.”

  No, I sure as hell don’t want her to do that. He swallowed down another wave of queasiness and muttered, “Ten-four.” And then, although he wasn’t exactly a praying man and it had been a long, long time since his last appearance in Sunday school, he sent up a little one: Okay, Lord, I could use a little help, here!

  “I have to push again.”

  The sound of her voice startled him, it had been so long since she’d spoken. And when he looked at her he got a jolt that startled him even more. He wasn’t sure what it was, something about the determination in her voice, maybe, contradicting the stark fear in her eyes, but whatever it was, it made something kick in his chest, and the next thing he knew he had a lump in his throat and a big ball of fear in his belly. Because that went against his grain and everything he thought he knew about himself, his voice grated hard in his ears when he said, “Okay, let’s do this thing.”

  Those fearful eyes clung to his, and she whispered, “I don’t know if I can.”

  The truth was, he didn’t know if she could, either. It seemed an impossible thing she was trying to do, and it didn’t help to tell himself it had been done billions of times before, even under worse circumstances than these. Though he didn’t like admitting it, he felt just plain scared, more scared than he’d ever been in his life. Going into a house where a guy crazy high on PCP had just hacked up his wife and the family dog with a machete and was threatening to do the same to his kids-that had been a piece of cake compared to this. That, he’d been trained for. Prepared for. He’d felt confident, capable, sure. Here, he felt lost. Clueless. What if she couldn’t do it? There wasn’t anybody here who could help her. Just him.

  What if I can’t?

  “That’s not like you, Jethro,” he muttered to himself, and imagined he could hear his mother saying the words, the way she’d said them to him so many times when he was growing up.

  “Who’s Jethro?” She was gazing at him, looking confused.

  And he was saved from having to answer that when all of a sudden her face crumpled up and her eyes filled with tears and she grabbed hold of his shirt as if she was going over a cliff and he was the only thing saving her.

  He got his arms around her shoulders and held her up while she made sounds that turned his insides to ice water. He realized his own body had gone rigid and his jaws were clamped tight, as if somehow that was going to help her, and to make himself stop it, he began to talk to her in a voice that sounded like a truckload of rocks.

  “You’re doin’ fine, sweetheart…that’s it…just a little bit more…okay, ease up now…that’s it…rest a minute…almost there, darlin’…”

  And it became a kind of rhythm, almost like a dance they were doing. She’d grab on to him and he’d hold her, and while she strained and hollered he’d talk to her and tell her how strong and brave and beautiful she was, and it never occurred to him he couldn’t possibly know whether she was really any of those things because he’d only known her for an hour or so. Just then, it seemed to him he’d always known her, and always would. Right then, it felt like they were the only two people on the face of the earth-the two of them plus the baby she was trying to push into the world. The SUV’s air-conditioning did the best it could, but sweat ran into his eyes and stung like fire, and soaked his shirt and every bit of clothing they were wearing between the two of them. Between contractions he gave her sips of water and poured some on the cloth thing she’d been wearing on her head and bathed her face with it. And it occurred to him while he was doing that, that once he looked past the sweat and the bruises, she really was beautiful.

  Who in the hell would hit a little bitty pregnant woman? Especially one with a face like that?

  He vowed if he ever found out who’d done this to her, he’d give the animal a dose of his own medicine.

  Yeah, idiot, and it was that kind of impulse that got you banished to this desert Siberia in the first place. Last thing you need is to get emotionally involved again.

  Great advice, he told himself, but hard to follow when the woman in his arms was twisting the buttons off his shirt and soaking his collar with her tears and sweat.

  “One more,” he told her grimly.

  She screamed at him in desperate fury, “You said that the last ten times!”

  Then, when he thought neither of them had enough left in them for one more time…

  “That’s it-I see the head! Come on, baby, just a little bit more…keep pushing…almost there…”

  “J.J.,” Katie’s voice squawked from his shoulder, “Ridgecrest wants to know…” And he didn’t even hear the rest.

  He was yelling, laughing and…who knows what else, but he didn’t give a damn who heard him. “How ’bout that, honey, we have a head!”

  “A head? Really?” She was laughing and crying, too, weakly, and breathless with relief. “Is it…is he…?”

  But J.J. was too busy to answer her, using his hands and whatever else happened to be within reach, wiping off the scrunched-up face, remembering the bulb-thing to clear stuff out of the flattened lump of a nose and the p
uffy purple mouth. Then she was pushing again, and he gently held the head while first one shoulder appeared…then the other, and suddenly there he was, with his hands full of slippery, squirmy, brand-new living human being.

  He couldn’t believe it. He’d never felt such exhilaration in his whole life. Or such awe. And when, after a strangled-sounding gurgle, he heard the first mewing cry, such sheer overwhelming relief.

  “My baby…” She was struggling to sit up, sobbing, hands frantically reaching.

  J.J. shoved all the habit material out of the way and placed the baby right on her stomach. “Well, Rachel,” he said gruffly, as he guided her hands to cradle her newborn, “looks like you have a son.”

  Chapter 4

  Time passed in a haze for Rachel. Fearful and trembling, she watched her unlikely Western movie hero tie and cut her baby’s umbilical cord, then wrap him in a blanket and place him in her arms. She had a sense that she might be crying; she didn’t know why, she wasn’t sad, except that maybe there was just too much emotion inside her, too much joy and relief and awe, and it had to find its own way out.

  She could hear the woman’s voice on the radio giving her hero-J.J., she called him-instructions from the hospital in Ridgecrest, telling him how to help her to get the baby to nurse, which was important because that would help stop the bleeding. And it didn’t seem strange to her at all that this big man with whiskers and long hair and a gun on his belt should be touching her in intimate ways; she barely registered the fact that it was the stranger’s rough hand on her breast, gently guiding the nipple to her son’s seeking mouth…another hand cradling and dwarfing his tiny, still-wet head. All she could see was her baby’s face…his beautiful, perfect round little face, with black hair, wavy like Nicky’s. And Nicky’s eyes, dark slate-gray now, like all newborns’ eyes, but wide open and looking straight back at her.