by Tami Hoag
It tasted terrible, but wet. She took one sip, then a second, then spat it out when a cigarette butt slipped between her lips and touched her tongue.
Gina let herself cry for few minutes. She was so tired. She hurt so bad. She knew no one would come here looking for her.
As her gaze settled on what looked like a pile of bloody clothing across from her, she had no way of knowing that above this hellhole and a hundred yards away stood Vince Leone.
47
Anne got out of her car in the parking lot of the mental health facility and took a deep breath—both to enjoy the fresh air and to clear her head before going in to deal with Dennis.
Clouds were gathering, gray and swollen and promising rain. She had always welcomed this time of year when the rains came. After months of baking heat and relentless sun, it was nice to curl up at home with a blanket and a good book and listen to the rain come down.
That sounded like a good plan for the evening. Vince had come home to rest and watch Haley for her while she came to see Dennis. Maybe she would get lucky and have her husband home for the evening, and the three of them could snuggle up on the couch and they could read a book to Haley, or watch a video.
She tried to check herself at the thought. They hadn’t had Haley in their home for a day yet, and she was already getting too comfortable with the idea of her being there. Not smart, Anne.
She was in Haley Fordham’s life for a specific reason. She needed to remember that. At the end of this investigation into Marissa Fordham’s death, Haley would go elsewhere, hopefully to a relative who would take her in and love her. Although, from what Anne had gathered, Marissa Fordham had been estranged from her family. So far, no one had even been able to find out where they were.
If no relatives could be located, Milo Bordain would try to get custody. It wasn’t that Anne had no sympathy for the woman. If Marissa had been like a daughter to Bordain, then Haley was like a granddaughter. Milo Bordain probably loved the little girl in whatever way she was capable of loving her, but that didn’t necessarily make her a good candidate to raise a small child.
Bordain was in her fifties, very staid and proper. Anne didn’t have to visit the woman’s home to know there would be a long list of rules and things not to be touched by a four-year-old. She could imagine little Haley dressed up in Burberry and Hermès, accessorized like a fashion doll.
Haley had grown up in the home of an artist, an environment full of inspiration and imagination, and probably few boundaries. In going through the clothes Vince had picked up for her, Anne found tie-dyed T-shirts and a pink tutu, a tiny denim jacket hand-painted with baby jungle animals and a fairy costume complete with wings.
Anne set the subject to a back burner as she went into the hospital and signed in at the desk, exchanging pleasantries with the staff. She had to focus now on Dennis Farman.
He was jumping around the room practicing karate moves when Anne walked in. He glanced at her out of the corner of his eye, but pretended not to know she was there, continuing to leap and shout and kick and chop.
Anne took her seat at the table and set her tote bag and purse on the floor.
“That’s pretty impressive Dennis,” she said. “Did you take lessons?”
“I’m a black belt,” he said, crouching and chopping with his arms as he moved around the table.
That was almost certainly a lie, Anne thought, though she had to admit she knew nothing about martial arts. On the other hand, she supposed if Frank Farman had thought to sign his son up for something it would be something macho like karate. The violent aspect would have appealed to him.
“Good for you,” she said. “But that’s enough for today. Have a seat.”
“I don’t have to,” he said belligerently.
“You do if you want me to stay,” Anne said calmly. “If you’re just going to goof off and be obnoxious to me, I’ll leave.”
He jumped up in the air, shouted, and kicked out with one foot. Anne pushed her chair back from the table, gathered her things, and stood up.
“See ya,” she said, turning for the door.
Dennis’s angry expression fell away. He didn’t ask her not to go, but he sat down at the table.
Anne waited for a moment, letting him think she was still considering walking out. He had to realize there were consequences to his behavior—consequences that didn’t involve him getting a beating. He needed to learn to take the feelings of others into consideration when he acted out.
He was pouting now as she returned to her seat, staring down with his nose inches from the tabletop.
“I’m sorry I couldn’t come yesterday, Dennis,” Anne said. “I was tied up in an important meeting.”
“More important than me,” Dennis said.
She didn’t take the bait. “Meetings have to happen when they have to happen. Judges have very busy schedules.”
At the mention of a judge, he looked up at her. “Was it about me?”
“No.”
“Then why the fuck should I care?”
“No reason,” she said, ignoring his language. “What did you do yesterday?”
“Nothing. There’s nothing to do here but watch the crazy people. That one weird guy with the dreadlocks pulled his pants down and shit on the floor in the activities room,” he said, laughing. “That was pretty funny!”
Oh my God, I have to get him out of here, she thought. She would look into group homes herself. There had to be one somewhere that would be appropriate for him.
“Did you do your reading assignment?” she asked.
“No.”
“Why not?”
“You didn’t come.”
“You should have read it Tuesday. You didn’t know I wouldn’t come yesterday.”
“But you didn’t,” he argued. “How was I to know if you’d ever come back again? You could have been dead for all I knew. You could have been murdered and stabbed a hundred times and your head cut off.”
“I could have flown to the moon,” Anne said. “But that wasn’t likely. And it wasn’t likely that I had been murdered either. That’s no excuse not to do your homework, anyway.”
“Dr. Crane tried to murder you,” he pointed out. “Why wouldn’t somebody else?”
“Let’s talk about you,” Anne said pointedly. “I know you had a session with Dr. Falk yesterday. How did that go?”
“Somebody killed that other lady,” Dennis said. His small eyes gleamed with excitement. “They stabbed her a million times and cut her head off.”
“How do you know about that?”
“I know stuff,” he said evasively.
“Did you see it on television?”
“No.” She could see him contemplating whether or not to tell her the truth. Finally he said, “I read it in the newspaper.”
“Really?” Anne said, brows lifting in surprise. At least he was reading something. She would have preferred the subject matter wasn’t murder, but she wasn’t going to be choosy at this point. “I’m impressed. Do you enjoy reading the newspaper?”
“No,” he said, frowning, knowing he had gotten himself caught in something now. “Just about murders and rapes and stuff like that.”
“Reading is reading,” Anne said, determined not to react to his supposed interest in the macabre. He only said those things to rattle her. She hoped. “So you can write me a report about this murder. I want to see two pages tomorrow.”
His jaw dropped. “The fuck!”
“Yeah, life’s a bitch, isn’t it?” she said. “I’m a teacher. I can take anything and turn it into an assignment. I want you to write two pages about the murder. And no copying from the newspaper. I read it too.”
“That sucks!”
Anne shrugged. “You’ve got nothing better to do. You said so yourself.”
He hated it when she turned his own words around on him. The rims of his ears turned red and his freckles stood out like polka dots on his cheeks. He made two fists and hit the tabletop in frust
ration.
“I’ll bring you something special tomorrow,” she promised.
“Like what?”
“I’m not telling,” Anne said, thinking she would make a trip to the bookstore on the Plaza downtown and see if they had something Dennis might channel his reading interest toward. Some comic books, maybe. Superheroes fighting crime instead of committing crime. “But you have to have your pages written. Deal?”
He looked suspicious. “No. What if what you bring me is something stupid like sugar-free gum or some stupid toy or something?”
“What if it isn’t something stupid?” Anne challenged. “What if it’s something you’ll really like?”
“Like what?”
“I’m not telling.”
Behind the frustration Anne thought she could see a little glimmer of excitement. Dennis had had a rotten childhood. She was willing to bet neither of his parents had ever surprised him with any kind of gift. Half the time he had come to school in dirty clothes. Not even his basic needs had been taken care of adequately.
Maybe she could show him the world could be a better place for him—not just for the Wendy Morgans or Tommy Cranes of the world. If she could show him that people could take an interest in him and care about what happened to him, maybe he could turn around. It certainly wasn’t going to hurt to show him a little kindness.
Or so she hoped ...
48
Vince smiled as he watched Haley watching Big Bird on Sesame Street. The joy and keen interest in her eyes, the unselfconscious quality of her spontaneous dancing along with the character, her singing—decidedly off-key—all spoke of pure innocence and a wonder at the world around her.
He had missed this with his girls. Working long hours and traveling for the Bureau had carved him out a legendary career, but he had missed this. He would be a lucky man to get a second shot at being a father.
Not that he had written himself out of the lives of his daughters. Since his shooting they all had made an effort to stay in touch and to strengthen their relationships.
Anne had accompanied him to Virginia the past winter to meet the girls. Vince had been more than a little nervous about that. Anne was slightly closer to their ages than to his. He worried they would think he had gone off some midlife crisis deep end, taking up with a younger woman, moving to California, leaving the Bureau.
And they had at first. Amy, just sixteen, who had fewer memories of the tensions between her parents when they had been together, harbored more resentment toward him than had Emily, two years older. They still had things to work on, all three of them, but both girls had flown out for the wedding. He felt that was a good start to acceptance of his new life.
He stretched out in his big leather recliner—the Man Chair, Anne called it—in their cozy family room with its warm tan walls and cream-colored carpet. He was exhausted and still disturbed from his encounter with Zander Zahn. All that and he was going to have a nasty bruise on his cheekbone too.
Popped by a professor. The boys in the cop shop would have fun with that. Not that Zahn’s meltdown was anything to joke about.
Sighing, he closed his eyes for a few minutes in an attempt to relax his brain.
He had a lot of thoughts and theories turning over up there, and it had physically been a long day. But miraculously the pain in his head receded as he rested and used some of the breathing techniques he had learned from a chronic pain specialist. It rarely completely left him, but rather lurked in there somewhere at its lowest level, keeping him aware it could come out and nail him whenever it wanted to.
Gradually Vince came up out of the restful place his mind had been, and he became aware of the sense of being watched. When he opened his eyes he was looking into Haley’s. She stood beside the chair with her rabbit tucked under her arm.
“Hey,” Vince said.
“You were sleeping,” Haley said in her hoarse little voice.
He wondered if she would ever be rid of that reminder of being choked. At least the bruising on the exterior of her throat would eventually fade away, if not the memory.
“Do you have to take naps?” she asked.
“I like to take naps.”
“I don’t.”
“No? Why not?”
Her expression was very sober as she shook her head. “Babies take naps.”
“I’m not a baby,” Vince pointed out.
“No.” Her little mouth twisted up on one side in a funny smile. “You’re the daddy. Why don’t you have any kids?”
“Well, because Anne and I just got married. We haven’t had time to have kids yet.”
She thought about that, deciding it must be a reasonable explanation.
“Where’s Anne?”
“She had to go have a meeting with someone. She’ll be back in a little while.”
“I like Anne. She plays with me,” she said, as if she and Anne were longtime friends.
She seemed to have no reticence with strangers. But then her mother had been a very social person with a lot of friends who had come into Haley’s life on a regular basis. She had probably never had a reason to fear adults—until now. Vince wondered if that would change for her once the memories of what had happened came back to her. Probably.
“Will you play with me?” she asked.
“Sure,” Vince said. “What are we playing?”
“We’re playing you’re the daddy and I’m the little girl.”
“Okay. What do I have to do?”
“Read me and Honey-Bunny a story.”
“All right. You go pick out a book.”
She went to a basket full of toys and books Franny had brought over on loan and pulled one out, then came back and scrambled up in the chair with him, settling herself comfortably into the crook of his arm.
“Do you like to read stories?” Vince asked.
“I can’t read,” she told him. “I’m just little.”
“Does your real daddy read you stories?” He winced a little at the mental image of Anne kicking him in the shins for that.
Haley paid no attention to him as she opened the cover of the story-book.
“What about Zander?” he asked. “Does Zander ever read you stories?”
“Zander is weird,” she said without looking up.
“Weird how?”
She shrugged. “Just weird. He doesn’t like to touch anything. Isn’t that funny? Mommy says he’s fraggle.”
“What does fraggle mean?”
“I don’t know. Why does your shirt have a horse on it?” she asked, scratching at the purple Ralph Lauren logo on the black polo shirt.
“That’s a symbol for the company that made it,” he said. Fraggle? What the heck was fraggle?
“I like horses,” Haley said. “I’m gonna get a pony when I’m five.” She held up her small hand, fingers splayed wide to show him she knew how much five was.
Fraggle? Fragile?
“Did your mommy say fragile?”
Haley nodded. “Fraggle. What does that mean?”
“When someone is fragile it’s easy to upset them or hurt their feelings.”
Haley had already lost interest in the subject and was turning the pages of the book.
“Does Zander ever scare you, honey?” Vince asked.
She frowned but didn’t answer. “Do you know Zander?”
“Yes, I do.”
“Isn’t he weird?”
“Yeah, I’d have to say so,” Vince admitted.
“Read the story!” Haley said impatiently.
“Does your mommy read you stories?”
“Sometimes. Sometimes she makes up stories. She makes me books sometimes and paints the pictures in them.”
“That’s very special,” Vince said. “Are you missing your mommy?”
A faraway look came into her eyes and she said nothing for a moment. Finally, she said quietly, “My mommy fell down and got hurt.”
“I know,” Vince said softly. Anne was going to kill him. “Were you
there when your mommy got hurt, sweetheart?”
Tears welled up. Vince held his breath.
“You’re not playing right!” Haley insisted, lower lip quivering. “You’re the daddy! You have to read the story!”
“Okay. All right, honey. Don’t cry.”
He could only imagine the consequences if Anne came home and Haley told her he had made her cry.
She settled in against him as Vince turned to the first page of the book, her body tense at first, as if she were still trying to ward off the bad feelings he had stirred up with his questions. But as he began to read the story about a princess who wanted to be a fairy, he felt her let go. Before he had read three pages she was asleep, dreaming of a place where bad things couldn’t happen, he hoped.
49
“There’s no sign of Gina Kemmer, no sign of her car,” Hicks said. “One neighbor said she saw her leave her house sometime between five and six o’clock last night. She was alone. She didn’t have a suitcase. Everything looked normal.”
Back in the war room for the end of the day, someone had ordered pizza and sodas. Chicago-style pizza. That meant Vince had put the call in. Mendez was glad. He was starving. He couldn’t remember the last meal he’d had—or decent night’s sleep for that matter.
They sat on all sides of the long table eating like they would never see food again. The room was filled with the aroma of herbs and tomato sauce—almost, but not quite drowning out the smell of frustration.
“If she left town of her own accord, she did it without taking so much as a change of clothes or a makeup bag,” he said. “What woman does that?”
“None,” Dixon said. “If she was snatched from the supermarket parking lot, her car would still be there. If she went to stay with a friend, her car would be parked on the street or in a driveway.”
“She could have gone off the road into a canyon,” Hamilton suggested. “Or just plain got out of town. Maybe she has a friend in Santa Barbara or someplace else.”
“Or somebody has her,” Trammell said.
“Or she’s dead,” Mendez said. “To me this strengthens the blackmail angle.”