Avenging Angel

by Justine Dare

  She hadn't understood then. She'd simply been so angry, not just at Daryl but at Marita for going back to the man. It had been a major turning point for her to understand that Marita, like many women who stayed with batterers, honestly be­lieved she deserved no better.

  But Marita was going to make it, Regan thought with grim determination. She would not accept any other alternative.

  "Girl," Marita said, "you've got that look on your face again."

  Regan blinked. "What look?"

  "That 'don't cross me' look. That I don't care what you say I'm going to make it happen' look."

  Regan didn't think she should admit her thoughts had been aimed at Marita herself. And in reality, Regan knew that Marita's battle was her own to fight. All she could do was make sure she had the time and space—and the safety—in which to do it.

  "I envy you that," Marita said, her voice very soft. "And what you've got inside that lets you look that way and mean it."

  Marita retreated to the kitchen, leaving Regan feeling a bit like a spoiled child. Her life had held tragedy, but it had been a festival compared to Marita's. Until the day she had come home to her apartment and found her best friend's dead eyes staring at her from the bloody mess that had once been her face.

  Rachel, for whom this place had been named.

  Rachel and Regan, sisters by choice.

  Even now, eight years later, Regan's stomach churned and a cold sweat broke out on her skin. She stood up, overcome by the need to move. She walked to the window and looked out, not really seeing.

  She lowered her gaze to the fresh bouquet of flowers Mitch Howe had clipped from their own garden and brought inside, as he did every morning. The gardener was a treasure left them by the previous owner of Rachel's House. He'd worked there for years now, and had taken the change from a private residence to a woman's shelter com­pletely in stride. He'd even been willing to share his twenty years of gardening experience with the residents. It gave them something else to think about, something to care for that wasn't any kind of a threat to them. For some, the gardening lessons were the first step along the long road back to a normal life.

  Regan glanced at her watch. Mindy should be back by now from the part-time job the Rachel's House Next Step program had found for her. Regan went into the living room, a big space with a sofa and an unusual number of chairs, placed there for the frequent free-for-all talk sessions. One cor­ner held the well-used computer; E-mail was often the only safe way for the women of Rachel's House to communicate with their families. Each of them had a mailbox, set up to receive mail only from selected senders, and outgoing mail was untraceable, protected by an expensive firewall.

  Next to the front door was a clipboard with the current residents' code names—a security measure Regan herself had instigated—and a sign-in and -out space. Mindy had signed out at seven-thirty this morning, but hadn't signed back in yet.

  Regan's stomach knotted. She verified the time. In less than five minutes, Mindy would be half an hour overdue. That was the deadline for being late without calling and verifying you were all right.

  Regan walked quickly toward her office, already thinking of the encrypted computer file where she kept the records of the women's various employ­ers, including the phone number for each. She dreaded calling, in part because it called more at­tention to the person trying so desperately to live a normal life, but mostly because there was always too big a chance the worst had happened.

  There was another possibility, though, she thought. Quickly she looked up the number in Mindy's file and called. After several rings, a man answered. Regan could hear talk and metallic sounds in the background/and guessed he was in the garage where his truck was housed.

  "Marty? This is Regan Keller."

  "Hi," Mindy's brother replied. "How are— Is something wrong with Mindy?"

  "No," she said quickly. "She's just a little late, and I thought she might have come by to see you."

  "No," he said, and Regan heard anger building in his voice already. "Damn it, if she's with that bastard again—"

  "There's no reason to think that, Marty," Regan assured him.

  "He lays a hand on her again, I swear I'll kill him!"

  Regan felt a chill sweep her. She told herself Mindy's brother was just angry, and rightfully so. Still, something in his voice made her wonder just how angry he was. Angry enough to kill? To have already killed?

  "Maybe I'll go find him right now, and make him pay for what he's done. The courts never will."

  "Marty, no, you can't do that."

  "I will," he raged. "Nobody gets away with treating my sister like that. I'll hurt him worse than he ever thought of hurting her."

  "Marty, calm down. You won't do Mindy any good by getting yourself arrested again."

  "I don't give a damn about that. He deserves to die, and if I have to—"

  She heard a noise at the door. "Marty, wait."

  Regan looked over her shoulder, and with relief saw the petite, fragile-looking blonde come into the room.

  "Marty? It's all right, she's here now. I'm sorry to have bothered you."

  "She's all right?" Marty sounded only slightly less furious.

  "She's fine," Regan assured him. "I'll have her call you later, okay?" As she hung up, she wasn't sure he was much calmer, but she had to deal with Mindy. The girl paused in the entry, fumbling with purse, sun­glasses, and keys. She turned and took a shopping bag from Mitch, who had apparently stopped his hedge trimming and held it for her while she opened the door. Then the girl spotted Regan and grimaced.

  "Yeah, yeah, I know, I cut it close."

  "I'm just glad you're all right. I bothered your brother, and I was about to call your work."

  "God, don't do that. Nobody but my boss knows, y'know, and if you start checking up on me all the time..."

  "It's the rule, Mindy," Regan reminded her patiently.

  The girl made a face. "Yeah, well, if s a pain, always checking in, having you on me if I'm a little bit late. How's that any different from what I left?"

  Regan said nothing, just looked at Mindy steadily, letting her words hang in the silence. The young woman, barely out of her teens, wasn't doing well with house regulations. Not because she wasn't used to rules—her boyfriend ran or had run her life on an iron schedule—but because she hadn't quite given up on the idea that he might really change this time. That was always the hardest fan­tasy to give up.

  Regan wondered if maybe they'd pushed her too fast, if she wasn't ready for the next step in Rachel's House. Perhaps she should still be in a full shelter.

  After a moment, the girl lowered her eyes. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean that."

  "I know you didn't."

  "I just... it seems so ... I mean I know it's so I'm safe but... the reason I was late? I saw Joel."

  Regan stiffened. "You what?"

  "I didn't talk to him, or anything. But he was driving by when I left work."

  Coincidence? Regan doubted it. "Did you call the police?"

  The girl cringed. "No. I couldn't, Regan, I just couldn't. So I went back in and left out the back door. He never saw me." Tears welled up in her eyes. "But it was so hard. If I hadn't known it would just about kill my brother, I'd have gone to him. Joel swears it'll be different if I just give him another chance."

  "Another chance to put you in the hospital?" Mindy's hand shot up to her temple, where Regan knew the headaches she still got were centered. "Is that what you want? You want Marty to have to come visit you in the hospital again? Maybe get so angry that he gets into trouble again?"

  Her brother had already been arrested. After the incident that had put her in the hospital, he'd cornered Mindy's boyfriend and threatened him with a torque wrench.

  "Especially now," Regan added, "when the police are looking for somebody with a reason to kill abusers?"

  Tears began to brim in Mindy's wide, baby blue eyes. "No," she said. "But..."

  "I know it's hard," Regan said. "So hard
to believe the man you love will never change. But you've already given him half your hearing in one ear. How many more body parts are you willing to sacrifice in the hope that he'll keep the promise this time?"

  "But you don't know him, he can be so sweet—"

  "He has to be sweet, Mindy. That's what makes it work for him. He has to be charming, sweet, and contrite, and do it believably. Maybe he even believes it himself. Until the next time. And there will be a next time. There always is."

  But Regan knew Mindy still hadn't given up hope, and until she did, she was in danger of going back to Joel Koslow.

  Regan watched the girl gather her things and trudge upstairs. Regan went over and pulled the front door closed, sighing wearily. She couldn't put it off any longer, she had to tell Dawn. And she had no idea how the woman would react. Relief or hysteria, it could go either way. Or perhaps both, when she learned her violence-prone husband had paid the ultimate price, just like the two men before him.

  She hadn't been surprised when she'd read about the first murder, a few weeks ago. Cal Nor­man had been a cold, vicious man who had never given up trying to find his ex-wife. Just two weeks before he'd been killed, he'd taken Rosa's family hostage, trying to get them to tell him where she was. Eventually he'd found her, and her death had been violent, bloody, and horrifying.

  When the second murder had happened, her first reaction had been relief. Marcia had left the shelter and gone back to Rod just days before, and he had already begun the endless cycle of abuse again. But before he could seriously hurt her again, he was dead.

  Her second thought had been that the police would be showing up soon. But they hadn't, which had puzzled her.

  And now Dawn's husband.

  It couldn't be coincidence. Regan had sensed that even before this killing. Deep in her gut, in that same place that told her to watch out for that guy across the street, or that the noise in the night hadn't been just the wind. That place so many women were taught to ignore. That thing called, too often belittlingly, women's intuition, that warned you when you were in trouble, even if you didn't think you had a single concrete fact to back it up.

  She had to tell Dawn the news, and then she had to make that phone call to their benefactor, their prime supporter. It was only fair. After that she had to prepare herself, and the residents of Rachel's House. Because she knew it was only a matter of time.

  Soon, the police were going to be knocking on their door.

  Alex Court

  spotted Grimm the moment he stepped into the terminal. He knew what was coming. His mother's long-time aide-de-camp was never far from her side. He eyed the tall, cadaverous-looking man as he approached. As a kid he'd al­ways thought of Grimm as his mother's version of Lurch, from the Addams family, complete with ap­propriate name. He had nearly been caught count­less times imitating the man's lumbering gait and deep, spooky voice behind his back. And to this day he made Alex feel, even at six-one, short.

  Alex dispensed with the formalities, as he knew Grimm preferred. "Where is she?"

  "She is waiting in the VIP lounge," the rusty-hinge voice said, gesturing Alex toward the con­course walkway. "She leaves for New York in half an hour."

  "Wants to make sure I don't have time to argue, doesn't she?" He tried not to look like he was having to push to keep up with Grimm's long strides.

  "Mrs. Court

  does not like wasting time."

  "And arguing with her is definitely a waste of time," Alex said.

  "Precisely."

  "I don't suppose you have any idea what this is all about?" "I do."

  "What, then?"

  "That's for Mrs. Court

  to explain."

  He should have known better, Alex thought. Getting more than a sentence at a time out of the taci­turn Grimm had been a lifetime challenge that had rarely been met by anyone except his mother. The only time he recalled it happening was the day his father died.

  "What if I hadn't already been on my way home?"

  "Then she would have summoned you."

  Alex got the message. And he knew the man was right. His mother wouldn't have ordered this hasty meeting if it hadn't been urgent. But he was tired after flying across the Pacific Ocean.

  "I just flew nearly nine thousand miles, a lot of it in a puddle-jumper plane. I spent three hours in the airport in Seoul, and my brain still thinks it's tomorrow morning. Cut me some slack."

  "It's a short step from slack to slacker," Grimm intoned imperiously.

  Alex groaned. "Where do you come up with those things?"

  Grimm made a nasal, grunting sound that indicated he was through with the exchange. Alex let it go, knowing better than to try to pry out anything more. Grimm had worked for his mother for as long as he could remember, and when he was done talking, he was done talking.

  A blast of air-conditioned air hit the back of his neck as they walked into the airline's VIP lounge. He didn't mind; the jungle he'd left had been in the mid-nineties, coupled with the added joy of ninety-five percent humidity. He couldn't wait to get out into southern California's drier air.

  His mother was on the telephone, deep in conversation with, Grimm told him grudgingly, some­one from Aurora Technologies, the troubled software company CourtCorp had a controlling interest in. She glanced at him, but made no more ac­knowledgment than to look at her watch. But to his surprise, she ended the conversation abruptly and hung up.

  "Sit down, Alexander. We don't have much time."

  "Nice to see you, too, Mom," he said as he stretched his legs out gratefully. She was her usual perfectly attired self, in a navy suit that showed off the trim figure she worked hard to keep. The short businesslike haircut made her look younger than her sixty-two years despite the pure white of her hair. It suited her, as did the discreet display of gold at her throat and ears. "Will I be going to New York with you?"

  "No. The problem is here."

  "And the problem is?"

  "Murder."

  Alex's grin faded as he stared at his mother. "What?"

  Lillian Court

  grimaced. "You heard me."

  Alex straightened, shifted to the edge of the seat, and leaned forward. "Who got murdered? Some­one from CourtCorp? When? By who?"

  "Three people, no, within the last seven weeks, and that's why you're here."

  It only took him a split second to work out the four answers, and when he did his brows fur­rowed. Not at the idea that his mother would send him out after a murderer, but why they were get­ting involved at all.

  Outside, he heard the muffled announcement that her plane had arrived at the gate. Grimm walked away without a word.

  "The police don't generally care for civilians tromping through the middle of their investigations," he said, his tone neutral.

  "I trust you to handle that appropriately. And you won't be in the middle, not really."

  Alex studied his mother for a moment. She was a master at hiding her emotions when necessary, but he was her son and he could see that she was deeply troubled.

  "What is it?" he asked. "If it's not our people, why is this your personal concern?"

  She took a thick manila file folder out of her briefcase, the battered, distinctive, initialed case that had been his father's. In the beginning she carried it, she had told him, as a subtle reminder to those who might underestimate her that the power that had once been Edward Court

  's was now hers. Now, when no one in their right mind would doubt her authority, she carried it simply because she was used to it.

  She handed the folder to him. "Those are the clippings on the murders, plus everything Research was able to access. You will find that the... victims all had two things in common."

  Alex didn't miss the change in his mother's voice on the word "victims." He tapped the folder with a forefinger. "Save me some time."

  "They were all abusers. Each one of them put a wife, girlfriend, or their own child in the hospital. Some repeatedly."

  "And so
mebody's paying them back?"

  "So it seems."

  "What do the cops say?"

  "Officially?"

  Alex's mouth quirked up at one corner. "Unofficially. I assume officially is in the file and I'll get to it."

  "The murders were all committed within a fairly small area, and each body was found in a very public location."

  "Meaning they were supposed to be found?"

  "One assumes."

  "They're up to three bodies, the official standard, so any feds involved?"

  "Not yet. They're not even officially agreeing the killings are linked, despite the similarity of method."

  "So they haven't got a solid suspect yet?"

  "No. Chief Raines says the killer is very good, and very careful."

  Alex knew his mother was on good terms with the local police chief. She had been instrumental in helping the city put together the deal that had drawn the man to Vista Shores from Arizona.

  "By the way, Chief Raines also said he's considering forming a task force, calling in help from the county and other agencies."

  "Not a bad idea. This is a bit much for our quiet little town to handle, and it could help stall off the demand for him to call in federal help."

  "He hasn't decided yet, but I thought you should know."

  Alex nodded. "You said they had two things in common."

  "Yes. I got a call this morning from Regan Keller, the director at Rachel's House."

  Rachel's House was, Alex knew, the battered women's shelter his mother funded. She provided the operating budget, ran interference with bureaucrats if necessary, and took a close personal interest in the entire operation.

  "And?"

  "Each of the murdered men's victims are or have been residents there."

  Alex's brows rose, and he drew back slightly. "Do the police know?"

  "They should by now. I told Regan to call them."