WindSwept Narrows: #16 Anna Carson & Catherine Jenkins

by Diroll-Nichols, Karen

  “No…no, they didn’t…” Catherine agreed softly. “But evidently they had each other and that made it okay for them.”

  “They’re a couple of prodigies, aren’t they?”

  “Yes…they are. They began reading and writing when they were eighteen months. After that…books fell like dominoes, according to Aaron,” she shared with the woman, not surprised to see her smile and nod. She accepted the packets back and the four photos she added to the six she’d pulled from the packets. “Can we borrow these and make copies?”

  “I can scan them or copy them for you,” Meredith took the pictures and walked to the computer desk setup just outside the kitchen. “My son lives in Southern California and I’ve always loved computers so we keep in touch that way.”

  “If you could scan them…” Catherine handed one of her cards to Bobby who gave it to Meredith Davis. “And email them to me, I would be really grateful.”

  “If you know who they are…the children…what are you investigating now?” Meredith circled back to her question.

  “The drug situation. The men in the drawings were involved in that, as well as their parents. One of the men in the drawings showed up dead six months ago,” Bobby explained easily.

  Catherine had her phone out, watching the scanned photos showing up in her mail box as they woman scanned. She reached into her pack, pulled out the folder and another sheet of paper.

  “One more question…this couple…” she handed her the rendition of the Austin’s taken back in age to the right time frame. “Do you remember seeing them at the house?”

  Meredith took the paper and stared for a long minute. “Different hair. Very blond, almost white and…and long. I thought the couple times I saw them that she was related to the mother of the twins. They looked a lot alike, you know,” she shook her head. “It’s parents like that that can make you want some kind of testing before a couple are allowed to have children. Thank you for letting me know they not only survived, but thrived. I appreciate that, Lieutenant Jenkins.” She handed the paper back to Catherine.

  “We really appreciate your help, Mrs. Davis. You have an amazing memory and I’m sure Anna will really like to see you again,” Catherine stood up and offered her hand with a smile.

  “They were really beautiful little children. You can see in the photos….thank you,” she walked with them to the door. “I’m going to go visit her this weekend.”

  “Well…” Bobby slid behind the wheel and started the car.

  “We had information Shipley didn’t have…the drawings and the Austin’s,” Catherine said, her head back and eyes closed.

  “Four year old kids…” Bobby shook his head in disbelief. “I can’t even picture my kids out roaming the neighborhood like that…where are the parents?”

  “I could find them…Aaron says he keeps them under tabs…but I didn’t pry on that point. They might or might not give up information.” She tipped her wrist up and gave him an address along the waterway. “Lunch. I’m buying if I can pry Aaron away.”

  She tapped a message on her phone, grinning at the response. “He’s pryable.”

  “You know you’re going to get nothing but grief once I get back to the shop,” he teased with a low chuckle.

  “I kind of suspected that…I can deal for twenty-five days.”

  “Cat with a guy…” He shook his head and pulled into the parking spaces along the side of the building. “You and a suit…” he added, watching the tall, lean man approaching. He knew the answer to an unasked question the instant the man’s gaze fell on his partner and nodded in approval.

  “Hey…he definitely makes a suit look sexy,” she murmured, using the door to lever herself onto the concrete. “Hi…” She barely got the greeting out before his mouth brushed hers. “My partner, Bobby Morris…this is Aaron Carson…”

  “Her fiancée,” Aaron supplied without a pause, his palm extended. “I take it we’re going to the restaurant across the street?”

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  “Fiancée?” Catherine choked on the word.

  “Aspiring,” Aaron winked at her.”

  “It’s close…and I have a couple things to talk to you about,” Catherine didn’t mind the arm around her waist as they waited for traffic to ease. “I’m buying…”

  “Hey, as a partner, trust me, that’s an occasion,” Bobby said with a grunt.

  “I feel for you. I’ve seen her kitchen,” Aaron commented with a laugh.

  “I could give you some scoop…I’m surprised the woman has muscle, I’ve never seen her eat anything that had color to it,” Bobby said with a nod.

  “I can see this as one of my lesser brilliant ideas,” Catherine murmured, her head shaking. “Tomatoes have color…I eat those…and lettuce…and pickles…and milk shakes! Hah! They have color.”

  Aaron only shook his head and requested a table for three. “I thought you were on convalescence leave for a couple weeks?”

  “Seriously?” Bobby looked at him as he sunk into a chair across from them. He met the dark eyes with a scowl. “You won’t get her to sit still once she gets a case stuck in her head. Hell, it was damn impossible to keep her in the hospital when she was shot last…” He saw the frantic shake of the dark head that stopped immediately when Aaron turned to watch her.

  “You were shot last year?”

  “It’s all part of the job,” she said carefully, her hands holding the menu and eyes trapped on the print, not the concern in his voice.

  “I know, Catherine,” he winked at her. “I’ll have to search for the scar,” he grinned and joined the deep laughter from Bobby before he picked up the menu, made a choice and set it down. They gave their orders and he opened the button on his jacket, leaning back and letting his arm drape over the back of her chair. “So what have you been up to this morning? You got the file from Carter?”

  “I did…and we’ve been reading it…” Catherine wasn’t sure of the territory she was treading on. “You haven’t met with the Austin’s yet, have you?”

  Aaron sighed, his free hand on his neck for a long minute. “I haven’t. They’ve called and left messages. They know where I am, Catherine, they could come to the office at any time. And the house isn’t gated. I know Anna doesn’t want to…I’ve grown up with her instincts, her…intuition. She can’t put words to why we shouldn’t….but for the moment, no, I haven’t returned their calls or met them. What’s going on, Catherine?”

  “I don’t know yet,” she answered honestly. “I just…for now…trust Anna’s intuition, please,” she lifted her phone and turned it, tapping into her email and pulling up the photos she had sent to her. “But I did find these for you and Anna,” she told him, handing him the phone and watching his face. She felt her eyes tear up, his smile soft as memories filled him.

  “Send them to me, please…” He handed back the phone, his head shaking. “Except for the drawings Anna did…we didn’t have photos. I think we started using cameras when we were about ten…got a couple for gifts…then we got phones at twelve and the cameras went by the wayside. But nothing from that time…where did you find them?”

  “One of the women who lived across from the house. She’s going to look up Anna. She has a drawing Anna did of her and her baby….she says she braided Anna’s hair one time at the library,” she watched the memory fill his features. “You can remember that? That long ago?”

  “I can…sometimes I’m not sure it’s a good thing, but yes, I can,” he said, turning to face the seafood in the spicy plate of vegetables before him. “She was nice. We used to walk with her around the neighborhood. A little boy in a stroller. I don’t think a lot of people paid attention to us…I learned kids are invisible to most adults. Why were you talking to her?” He looked from Catherine to Bobby, waiting patiently.

  “You don’t recall ever meeting or seeing the Austin’s then?” Catherine picked her words carefully.

  “No. The only grandparents we saw were the paternal ones, the El
lison’s. And we were taken to them, they never came to the house, either house, for that matter,” he said after a long pause. “What do the grandparents have to do with the first house, Catherine?”

  “I’m not sure yet, Aaron. Honestly. When we get it figured out, though, I’ll tell you, I promise,” she told him, sliding her hand into his on the table top.

  “You lied to him,” Bobby said an hour later. The conversation had shifted deliberately to things all around the globe before the meal was over.

  “Technically…no…I don’t have proof of anything, Bobby,” she kicked out at the floor board and groaned at the pressure it shot up her leg. “Damn it…”

  “So if I’m following the story…couple has a set of twins…paternal grandparents don’t want to raise the kids…I don’t know, haven’t seen a transcript of any conversation with them…but they pay for them. Provided them good places to live, clothes, educational toys…computers…and, if I’m guessing right, probably gave money to the parents to make sure they remained in good health.”

  “Right so far,” Catherine said quietly, giving him an address. “Let’s go see if Chuck Spencer kept any brain cells from long ago.”

  “Okay…so the paternals' are footing the bills…all the while, getting visits from the little kids once a month…and the house in an upscale neighborhood has become a high dollar drug house.”

  “Got it in one…and since we know the grandparents never visited the kids, they had no idea. And the kids…are kids…they aren’t aware of what’s going on around them at the time, no matter how super smart they are,” she exhaled sharply. “Idiots.”

  “Yeah…putting it mildly…”

  “And the mysterious maternal grandparents…who now claim they were deprived their grandchildren from day one…are lying through their teeth.”

  “Yeah…that, too…”

  “And the mysterious guy wanting to be our next congressman?”

  “I’m thinking that’s gonna get ugly,” she said in quiet understatement.

  “I’m following your thread and be careful doesn’t even cover us,” he said with a long breath, his eyes darting around the dilapidated neighborhood, far from the pretty house they’d been in that morning.

  “We’ve fallen off the grid…” Catherine checked the harness beneath her jacket and pushed the car door open, pulling herself to her feet and taking in the casual people plucked down on the sides of buildings closed and boarded up.

  “No shit…trailer down this way, according to information,” he nodded down the alley, checking his own harness before striding with her along the crooked asphalt. He pounded on the door. “Chuck Spencer?” His voice boomed in the quiet alley.

  “Yeah…” A man well over fifty and just short of seventy pulled the door open, grey and silver hair poking off in all directions. He wiped a hand over the front of an already grubby looking sweat shirt, his gaze focused on Catherine. “Don’t get girls visiting these days.”

  “Don’t got one these days. Cop…got a minute to talk about your brother?” Catherine asked, her badge up and held for him to see, her arm up and showing off the gun tucked neatly at her side.

  “Rod? Long dead. What’s to talk about?”

  “You his only relative alive?” Catherine asked.

  “Yeah.”

  “You claimed the body?” Bobby picked up the thread.

  “Yep. He told me to.”

  “A dead guy told you to claim his body?” Bobby pushed, brows arched.

  “Stupid. He gave me money…told me claim the body when it happens.”

  “Rod knew he was going to get pounded into dust?” Catherine snorted loudly.

  “He was being weird. Not drug weird…just…weird. Came to see me about a week before and gave me this envelope. Extra money for you, he says. Just claim the body fast and cremate it,” he ran a hand over the wire of colorful hair. “I ain’t done drugs in a long time…I know I was on them then…maybe that’s why it made sense to me. Still don’t…next thing I know, cops are telling me he’s dead. No one cared much. He was bad news. Sick news…liked little girls…real little girls…sick…”

  “Yeah…sick don’t cover it…” Catherine thanked him and headed back up the street.

  “Maybe he had a crystal ball…” Bobby snickered, his head shaking as he waited for her to buckle into the car. “When you find a mystery, Cat, you don’t shit around.”

  “Yeah…no kidding…I’m done today…I got to make some kind of sense of this mess. Any luck locating the other four in the drawings?”

  “Names are easy…were easy…they popped right away but locating…that’s another story. It’s not like this kind keeps legal digs…but you know me…I’m tenacious,” Bobby assured her, cruising through traffic. “You have to tell him, Cat.”

  “I know…believe me, I know…I’m working on the how part so he doesn’t want to go off and beat something or someone to a pulp…”

  “Couldn’t say I’d blame him.”

  “I don’t need male bonding crap, Bobby.”

  “Hey…smart guys protect their girls…that includes sisters…I take it the creep was seen around the sister?”

  “Yeah…” she pushed a long breath between her teeth. “Yeah…and when you’re four years old, monsters in the closet aren’t your only nightmare.”

  “Did he…”

  “No…just words…but instincts…maybe intuition…maybe humans do have…hell, auras…somehow she knew he was evil…and it stuck in her mind. Scared her where it’s still in her mind, almost thirty years later,” Catherine wrapped her hand in the strap of her pack and pulled out her keys. “Thanks. I’ll be in touch.”

  “Be careful, Cat. Seriously.”

  “You, too.”

  Catherine took a long roundabout way to Aaron’s house, a bag of clothing in the back of the Porsche and her mind grinding through the interviews. She drove past the house once, checking for anyone watching him. Another glitch in her head said why would they go after him or Anna? If Spencer was the reason, why would he believe a couple four year olds would remember him? She needed to track the parents and knock them out of the loop.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  She dropped her pack on the desk chair, bracing her feet and staring at the board, adding information from the day before wandering to stare into the freezer. She found a bag with a couple marinated chicken breasts, and another bag labeled roasted vegetables. Nice, colorful and even looking a little tasty, she thought, following the easy instructions Anna had on the labels and popped them into the oven. She’d changed into a very oversized tee shirt and khaki shorts, using the banisters on the stairs when the sound of the front door caught her attention.

  “Hmmm…two days in a row and I smell food…even vegetables…”

  “Now you’re getting nasty…” She tossed down the stairs with a wrinkled nose aimed at his grin. She decided the tremble that sent a little spark into her belly was a really nice thing when his gaze swept from her feet to her head with that sexy grin. He took his jacket off and dropped it over the bottom of the banister.

  “Hobbling without the cane?” He held his palm out to her as she moved carefully down the stairs, the shirt she wore askew, one shoulder bared from the over stretched neckline.

  “It’s getting easier…a little…don’t smirk…even if it is a little sexy,” she mumbled, taking the cane he held out for her and heading into the kitchen. She set things on the counter, absently watching him tug his tie free and lay it over his suit jacket before striding to join her. He quickly had the table set, looking curiously at the ranch dressing she dribbled on her plate.

  He brought a half bottle of white wine from the fridge and emptied it into their glasses before sitting with her. He’d glanced at the board, saw the new additions, watching her dredge a roast little red potato through the dressing.

  “A busy afternoon?”

  “Another puzzling piece,” she answered, lifting her eyes to his. “How was your afternoon?”


  “Profitable,” he answered easily. “What aren’t you telling me, Catherine?”

  “I got photos of the Austin’s this morning when I was at Carter’s,” she said carefully, pulling some pieces together. “And I had Bobby back age them…to when you were four years old,” she got up and walked carefully to the pack sitting on his desk, opened it and pulled out her file. She handed him the computer drawing and went back to her seat. “Can you remember them?”

  “I remember her,” he said after a few minutes, chewing thoughtfully. He set the paper down and took a deep drink of wine. “She looks like our mother…but older. Her hair had been different then.”

  “They know where you work because of your phone message,” she said, absently lifting a roasted little carrot and biting down. “Because of the photos in the paper with Anna and Carter, they know where she works, too.”

  “They never told us who they were…we were never introduced to people,” Aaron thought about the time so long ago. “We didn’t know…the dynamics of a family. Not then. We knew the Ellison’s were grandparents, it was explained that our father was their child…and we were his. I think we might have asked about the mother’s family, but were ignored. So we never pushed or maybe we didn’t care.”

  ****

  Deann had prepared dinner, leaving the table set and the food warming when Anna came into the house and greeted her. She carried a gym bag of clothing up the stairs and put things away, dropped her shoes into the closet and went to stand beneath the shower, rinsing off the days’ dirt and grime from her planting and digging. Mostly spreading, she amended, her face tilted to the stinging of the hot water. She heard the sound of the door and knew Deann had gone to her apartment. Wrapped in a thick bath sheet, she pulled a pair of capri slacks from the bureau and dropped a stretched out sweater over her head, draping the damp towel on the door before going downstairs.

  The house smelled nice. A mix of sharp cheese and pasta. Carter entered the house to the fragrant dinner and a faint scent of fresh shampoo as he crossed to set his briefcase on the desk. His eyes caught on the photo on the monitor, his hand up to move the mouse to browse quickly through the others before he looked over at Anna, in the center of the sofa, knees drawn up and arms circling them protectively. Her chin was perched in the center, eyes closed. He went and sat beside her, his hand on her head.