When I don’t answer, Donovan draws back. Holding onto my shoulders, he searches my eyes. “It’s going to be okay.”
Pressing my lips together tightly, I nod before disengaging myself from his arms and checking my side table for today’s mail.
Unearthing a postcard from Tomas in Russia, I lean over my chessboard and make the move he has sent me: Queen e2. I can see immediately that he’s aiming for a smothered mate. If I move knight to df6 to defend, he will move bishop to b4 mate. I study the board, biting my lip for a few seconds until I move my own piece. Knight to d6. That should give him something to think about. Grabbing a stack of postcards that have been preaddressed and stamped, I scribble my move and sign it with my signature, G.G. Can’t wait to see what Tomas has planned to defend against that. I set the postcard on the small table by my door so I won’t forget to mail it in the morning.
Donovan is watching me with a sexy half smile. “Why do you like chess so much? As opposed to, say, poker or something. Have you thought about it?”
He already knows that after my sister was murdered, learning to play chess helped me cope with the trauma and begin speaking again after six months of silence. But that’s not what he means.
“I’ve thought about it a lot, actually. What I’ve also thought about is why you won’t give it a try. I think you’d like it. It would be something fun we could do together.” I watch him down the rest of his beer. “Are you sure you don’t want to learn how to play?”
“Nah,” he says, winking.
Donovan walks over and undoes the top few buttons of my silky blouse.
“Tell me more about why you enjoy chess,” he says in a low voice that sends a shiver through me. He runs his hands down my back and even lower.
“There are certain truths you can find in chess.” I catch my breath as his fingers roam.
Donovan’s face is now only inches away from mine. His eyes are lowered, staring at my mouth as I speak.
“Go on,” he says with a sexy growl, his hands roaming down my sides, lifting my blouse to find bare skin.
“You can’t find a universal truth in life, but you can find it in chess,” I say, nearly losing my train of thought as I watch his mouth come even closer to mine. He smells so good, a musky man scent with the faint hint of cologne. “In chess you can achieve the seemingly impossible, such as the ability to confront a superior force and overcome it.”
With a flick of his wrist, my silk blouse is on the floor.
“But for you,” he says, his mouth coming closer, “chess is also a way for you to escape, isn’t it?”
He knows me like nobody else does. I feel like he’s always known me. I don’t answer, only stare at his mouth until finally it crushes mine. I melt into his embrace, closing my eyes for a second before an image of the massacre leaps into my mind and I pull back in dismay.
“What’s wrong?” He searches my eyes, concerned.
I shake my head back and forth. “When I close my eyes . . .”
“Shhh,” he says, kissing my forehead. “It’s going to take some time. Is there anything I can do?”
I answer by grabbing his head and pulling his mouth down to mine. He responds eagerly, pulling me close until it feels like every inch of our bodies is touching. When I finally pull back, it’s only to move my mouth over to his jaw, down his neck, my hands under his shirt and behind his back, holding him to me.
He pulls my hips even tighter against him, and I moan. He has picked me up and is moving toward the bed, when his phone rings.
Putting me down on the bed, he glances at the number on his cell. When he starts to reach for it, I know it is his work calling. I put my arm on his to try to stop him from picking up the phone.
“It’s Finn.” His partner. Which means a ninety percent chance he’s calling about a dead body. A homicide case means Donovan gone for at least the next twelve hours, if not longer.
He’s listening to Finn and nodding. I’m lying on my back on the bed, half dressed, wild with desire, and knowing in the pit of my stomach that I’ll be spending the night alone.
“I’ll be there in twenty.” He disconnects and runs a hand through his hair, making it stick straight up. “Goddamn it.”
At first I think he says it because he has to leave me.
“Gang shooting. This time it was one of my C.I.’s.” Confidential informants.
I flop over onto my belly and put my chin on my folded hands. I don’t look at him as I ask, “Can’t Finn handle it for the first hour? Can’t you stay just for a little while?”
He leans down, lifts my hair, and kisses the back of my neck. “I’m sorry. Hell, I don’t want to leave right now, either, but I have to. Be back as soon as I can.”
I don’t answer. My entire body is limp with desire, and he’s going to leave me.
When the door shuts behind him, anger surges through me. He knew I was ovulating today, and he still walked out. I thought he wanted a baby as much as I do. The window for getting pregnant each month is small—maybe twenty-four hours, possibly as long as forty-eight. I try to push back my frustration. It’s not his fault. But it lies there, simmering under the surface, even as I try to distract myself.
I’m not hungry for dinner. I don’t want to read. I don’t want to watch TV.
My computer is on a small desk across the room. I’ll check my work e-mail and see if there’s anything new on the Mission Massacre. Maybe an arrest? I scan the return addresses, looking for something from Kellogg or Nicole. Nothing.
My heart leaps into my throat when I see this return address: FA2858.
It’s him. Frank Anderson. The man who kidnapped and killed my sister. Even though I have no proof, I know deep down inside my sister’s killer is e-mailing me. He’s taunting me. But I haven’t told Donovan about the previous e-mails from Anderson. When I first got pregnant, he asked if maybe we could take a small break from hunting Anderson (aka me obsessing about finding my sister’s killer) while we concentrated on starting a family.
He pulled some strings and got a new detective assigned to Caterina’s cold case.
“I know it’s hard, but give it a try,” he said. “Let’s turn it over to the investigators and let them do their job. I’m worried about you. This guy knows how to get under your skin. I don’t want that monster in your head. He’s done enough damage. If you can, just let go for a little while and enjoy being pregnant.” His eyes were so shiny with happiness and excitement that I agreed to let go. Temporarily.
I promised to send the new detective any leads that came my way. But I soon found out that’s much easier said than done.
The first e-mail came right after my miscarriage.
The subject line said, Sins of the Father. The body of the e-mail said this: Exodus 20:5 You shall not bow down to them or serve them, for I the Lord your God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and the fourth generation of those who hate me.
I immediately knew it was Anderson. And while I didn’t have proof, I believed he knew about my miscarriage and was telling me that it was my punishment for being a killer—that my unborn child was punished for my sins. He knows. I don’t know how, but he knows. I forwarded the e-mail to the detective.
Tonight’s e-mail has a subject line that says, Thou Shalt Not Kill.
My hand hovers above the keyboard, trembling slightly. I want to click it open so badly, but instead, without reading it, I forward it to the detective. I know I’m doing the right thing for my relationship with Donovan—and probably my mental health—but I can’t help feeling as if I am once again turning my back on my sister.
Chapter 9
THE STACK OF police scanners is crackling with radio traffic when I settle in at my desk the next day. The normally monotone voices have something about them this morning that makes me lean over and t
urn up the volume, catching details in snippets.
“Motorcycle vs. center median.”
“Highway 10.”
So far nothing newsworthy. Then I hear it.
“Severed foot.”
And to seal the deal: “Cannot locate extremity.”
I grab my bag and dial Lopez in photo.
“Yo,” he answers.
“Motorcyclist. Severed foot. Highway 10. Meet you in the parking lot.” I reel it off staccato.
“I’m on it,” he says.
Even though it’s Saturday, I came in to work because Donovan is working that homicide all day. Nicole is in our Martinez bureau, scrounging for anything new on the Mission Massacre.
On the way out of the newsroom, I holler to the copy desk. “Motorcyclist vs. median. C-Lo and I are on it. There’s a severed foot involved.”
Someone nearby snickers. As I head for the back door, I hear someone in sports mutter, “Only in a newsroom would someone giggle hearing about a severed foot.”
AS WE COME up on the highway-patrol vehicle, I can’t decide whether to pull in behind it or in front of the tow truck parked in front of him. With the cars whizzing by at sixty-five miles an hour, I decide we’re safest in front of the tow truck.
In my passenger seat, Lopez screws the telephoto lens on his camera and adjusts the ubiquitous earbud cord trailing down to the police scanner clipped to his belt. He is a true newspaperman from a bygone era. He’s also ex–Green Beret, wiry and small and usually packing a gun or two. He pulls the earbuds out of his ears for a second and turns to me as I pull over. “Dude is on way to hospital. Can’t figure out if they found his foot or not.”
The tow truck is parked so close to the cables separating the freeway from the median that we can’t squeeze by. Lopez doesn’t hesitate and army-crawls under the cables into the weeds. Within seconds, he’s upright, snapping photos of the wrecked bike being hoisted onto the back of the tow truck. I see a highway-patrol officer walking toward his vehicle.
Worried he’ll leave before I get the details of the accident, I scurry under the cable, knowing I look less than graceful and worried I’ll be the one to find the foot.
I stand and attempt to brush all the stickers and weeds off my dress while holding my phone, notebook, and a pen. I rush over to the officer, who is now in his vehicle. I hold out my CHP Press Pass dangling on a chain around my neck. “Gabriella Giovanni with the Bay Herald. Do you have a second?”
“I know who you are,” he says and smirks.
My heart skips a beat. He either knows who I am and hates me, or he knows who I am and likes me. He must see the confusion on my face, because he continues.
“I was there when they yanked Sebastian Laurent out of the ditch last year.”
Oh yeah. They let me in for the close-up because at first they thought it was a fatal accident, but it ended up being a homicide, the first in a string of them that led to me killing the killer. I feel heat flush across my cheeks. He knows exactly who I am and what I’ve done.
He’s started his car, but his window is down. The cool air from his air-conditioning blows on my sweaty face as I lean down. This part of the Bay Area is having a heat wave, and I’m not sure if I hate it or like it. Sometimes the temperature where I work and where I live varies by thirty degrees.
The sound of a helicopter overhead drowns out my voice as I speak to the officer. He peers through his windshield with a creased brow. I squint and try to see any markings on the small dark helicopter, but it’s too far away.
“One of yours?” I ask.
He frowns and shakes his head. A second later, he opens the door, but as soon as he gets out, the helicopter zooms off.
“What can you tell me?” I ask as soon as it is quiet.
“Don’t have a whole lot. You should talk to the PIO about it.”
The public information officer for the CHP is a good guy, but he’s sometimes hard to get hold of before deadline.
“Can you just give me the bare basics?” I ask. “I don’t even need to use your name.”
I wait as he thinks about it. He sighs, and I know he’ll spill it.
“About fourteen hundred hours, motorcyclist hit some gravel and swerved into the cable median. No other vehicles involved. Driver was transported via ambulance with non-life-threatening injuries.”
Looking up from the scribbles in my notebook, I wipe my brow and meet his eyes. “Heard something about a severed foot . . .”
“Not allowed to talk about injuries.”
“Come on!” He’s leaving out the most interesting part of the crash.
“That’s all I got,” he says.
“I heard the whole thing on the scanner, I just need you to verify it.”
“Sorry.” He smiles in a maddening way. This is fun for him. It’s all a big game.
Lopez is in the median, gesturing at me, for some reason. He paces and beckons.
With the cop watching me, I get down on my knees and crawl under the cables. I’m concentrating on watching the weeds in front of me, hoping that I’m not the one who finds the severed foot somewhere. Finally, I’m through and leap to my feet, brushing the grass and sticky weeds off my dress. I’m making a face as I gingerly step through the weeds in the median. When I turn to look around, I catch the cop watching from his window. He’s snickering.
“Don’t you dare say a word,” I say.
He laughs. Right before he pulls away, he says, “Don’t worry, they found the foot.”
Bingo. Confirmation.
In the car on the drive back, Lopez is frowning. “What was up with that helicopter?”
I shrug. “No clue.” He’s chewing at his lip and looks worried.
“Why do you ask?” I say.
“Helicopters like that are what we saw in ’Nam. Black helicopters. Called ‘The Quiet Ones.’ Used for some covert shit. The military uses copters like that for stealth missions, inserting and extracting personnel. No reason for a chopper like that to be out here in East County.”
Lopez is the best, but sometimes I worry that what he saw in Vietnam might make him a little more paranoid than the average person. Instead of answering, I look out the window and decide not to tell him I saw the same kind of helicopter at the scene of the Mission Massacre.
BACK IN THE newsroom, I ignore the night cops reporter, May, as I sit down.
She wears crisp, pressed slacks, a starched blouse, and fat pearl earrings, and she smells overpoweringly like Chanel. Doesn’t she ever have to cover wildfires or crawl under freeway medians like I do?
We are only civil to each other when we absolutely have to be. I tolerate her—barely—because she’s good at her job and I don’t have to worry about her missing any big stories on the cop beat overnight.
She owes me for her beat. I intervened to get her off covering education. But that doesn’t mean we need to be best friends. As if she is reading my mind, she proves why we can never be pals by sneering slightly at me, eyes pointedly fixating on the big grass stain on my dress.
Note to self: never, ever, ever wear a dress to work again. Even as I say it, I know I’m lying. It’s too hot here in the summer to wear pants every day.
Digging through my purse, I can’t find the reporter’s notebook I took out to the crash. I try to remember if I threw it in my bag when I got back into the car. I was so busy talking to Lopez about how stupid it was for me to wear a dress to work that I’m not sure what I did with the notebook. Rushing out to the newspaper parking lot, I check inside my car. No dice. Damn it. It’s somewhere in the center median of the highway. It isn’t the ideal way to write an article, but I write my severed-foot story based on memory.
Before I pack up, I get online and search “Iraq War,” “samurai swords,” “black helicopters,” and “soldiers with PTSD.” I print out about fi
fty pages of information and tuck them into my bag. Some light reading for bedtime.
Donovan is working the homicide again, so I’m on my own for dinner. Back in North Beach, I eat some sourdough toast and slice a tomato, but my heart isn’t into it. I grab the sheaf of papers I printed out, hop in bed, and vow to stay awake reading until Donovan gets home so I can ravish him. We should be spending every second tonight making love in case there is still a chance I can get pregnant. Instead, here I am reading about the Iraq War in bed. Alone.
Chapter 10
I WAKE IN the night, screaming. It takes me a few seconds to realize Donovan is back home and holding me in his arms, rocking me back and forth and whispering soothingly in my ear that it is just a bad dream and everything is okay. I fell asleep reading the papers I’d printed out.
I flick on the light by my bed, hoping it will dispel the memory of my dream. In it, I was in the Martin apartment again, nudging the door open. This time, the girl has her head turned away. I make a soft, cooing sound to get her attention. Her head snaps in a 360-degree arc like the girl in The Exorcist, and her eye sockets are black holes. Her pointy vampire teeth are still chewing on chunks of flesh she’s ripped from her dead mother’s breast.
I’m afraid to tell Donovan about the dream. He’ll think I’m even more in need of therapy than I really am.
He holds me as I calm down, allowing my breathing to get normal again. Sweat is trickling down my brow, and my body is trembling. But Donovan’s presence calms me. He breathes into my hair and rubs my back until I’m not panting for air.
After a while, I pad over to the kitchen sink and fill a large glass with water, drinking it all in several gulps. Donovan is sitting up in bed, leaning against some pillows propped on my headboard. “You okay?” His eyes are soft, squinting in the bright light. He’s been asking me this a lot lately. The question itself makes me feel high-maintenance and guilty.
“How long have you been home?” I say.
“A few minutes ago. Have to be back in two hours.”
Blessed Are Those Who Weep Page 4