by CJ Lyons
He nodded and patted the step beside him. She joined him. "What's in the bag?" he asked.
"A surprise for your mother."
"She's still sedated, you know."
She smiled. "I know. You want to come see?"
He nodded and helped her to her feet. She kept hold of his hand, and he took a deep breath. There was no red haze now, just a tingling deep inside–the same feeling he'd felt when he watched Nellie and Jacob together.
Drake gathered her into his arms and held her there, his head bowed over hers, inhaling her scent. Allowed himself to be transported to a place where all his loved ones were safe, and he had no worries of mothers harming their sons.
"It's going to be all right, Mickey," she whispered. "Everything will be all right. I promise."
Now Drake believed. A weight dropped from his heart. Hart never made a promise she couldn't keep. He swallowed back tears of relief and clung to her, able to relax for the first time in weeks.
Finally, after long moments where the only sound in the stairwell was their breathing, he moved back far enough to look at her. Why had he waited so long to let her get close again? Careless–might have lost her for good.
She smiled and raised his hand to her lips. "Want me to read your palm?" she asked. "Rosa taught me how when I was a kid."
"Only if it's good news."
She nodded and kissed his hand once more before lowering it to rest over her heart. She held it there until her pulse and his had synchronized, as if their blood flowed through one heart. Then she turned his hand palm up and lightly traced the lines in it, staring with deep concentration.
"Your life line is long," she intoned. "But with several forks. You'll meet many challenges and overcome them all, have several careers–"
"Gee, that's a surprise," he laughed. She already knew about his art and his working with Ed Castro on the community clinic. "Tell me something I don't know. How's my love line?"
"I see sadness early on, but then it proceeds in a deep, straight furrow–no straying," she said, her face hovering mere inches over his hand.
"Is that my future or your command?"
She nipped at the flesh at the base of his thumb and turned to smile wickedly at him. "Better be both."
"I see. Guess I'd better start working on finding my soul mate, then." She slapped his hand away. "I have a surprise for you, too."
"What?"
"I'm working to get Charlie Ulrich placed in protective custody."
"Really? How?"
"I've a few journalist contacts who are nudging Children and Youth to take action. With any luck, I'll have a court order by morning."
Her eyes widened as her face lit up. "That's the best news I could have gotten." She flung her arms around him. "Thank you," she whispered. "After everything that's happened because of me–thank you."
Drake held her for an exquisite moment, reveling in her warmth, loving the way her enthusiasm erased all his doubts.
"Come on, I want to see what you brought my mother." He held the door open for her, and they walked hand in hand down to the ICU.
<><><>
Drake watched as Hart slid her Grandmother Rosa's quilt from the bag and clasped it tight against her chest. She buried her face in its rich velvets and inhaled as if she could smell the memories embedded in the fabrics.
"This quilt saved my grandmother's life," she whispered to Muriel as she smoothed the fabric over his mother's motionless body. "This," she traced her fingers over the intricate, thick stitching that joined the kaleidoscope of fabrics together, "this quilt is magic."
She reached for Muriel's hands and lightly lay them beneath one of hers, moving them with the light touch of a Ouija board, fingertips caressing the soft textures of the textiles. Drake's breathing became shallow.
All he could see was the woman before him. Are you casting a spell on me, Cassandra Hart? he wondered, powerless to resist the hypnotic allure of her voice. He leaned forward, adding his hand to the two women's. A tingle of energy shot through him as Hart linked her free hand with his, completing the circle.
"My grandmother Rosa made this perina when she was a young girl. Her mother and her grandmother helped her, contributing pieces, some of them going back three, four generations." Hart's voice took on a cadence in synch with their hands moving back and forth along the stitches.
"A perina?" Drake asked, his own voice subdued.
"The gypsy version of a bedroll. A heavy blanket to lie on under the stars or roll up in when it grew cold. The women would sew small treasures into the squares–pieces of gold and silver, bits of jewelry. Insurance for when times got bad. It was 1936 and Hitler was already rounding up the gypsies–or anyone that didn't conform to his idea of Aryan. Rosa and her clan as well as several other families thought by traveling together they could protect each other, move outside of Hitler's sphere of influence. Instead all they offered was a tempting target.
"It was the middle of a warm spring night when the soldiers came. The gypsies fought. All of them–men, women and children–but what good are knifes and rocks against machine guns?"
Hart's hand clenched around Drake's. Her eyes had a dreamy, unfocused look as if she'd passed beyond him to another time.
"See that rust-colored spot?" She pointed to a stained piece of ivory silk. "That's the blood of a Nazi soldier Rosa killed with her knife. Then someone clubbed her over the head. When she woke, she was on the back of a truck filled with other women. She was the only one there from her own family. The other women told her the men were mostly killed or taken elsewhere. They wouldn't tell Rosa what happened to the children, not at first at least."
"What happened? Did they take her to a camp?"
"Some ended at Dachau. Others ended up slave labor for local industries or government projects to aid Hitler's glorious Four Year Plan. Rosa was taken to a farm that needed labor to help with the spring tilling and planting. The army had taken his mules and oxen, so they substituted a dozen or so terrified women instead."
As she spoke of a distant land and time, the sights and sounds of the ICU seemed to fade away. He felt his mother's pulse strong and steady beneath his fingers, beating almost in rhythm with Hart's words.
"Rosa kept to herself, not complaining as they were worked from sunup to late into the night. She clung to her perina–the only possession she had. The Germans had taken all her skirts, her jewelry, even her shoes, and given her rags to wear. But they laughed when they saw her clutching the bloody, filthy and torn blanket, and called her crazy. Rosa let them think that. Everyday her perina grew more covered in mud and slime from the barn where the women were housed. She refused to clean it or to be parted from it, wearing it around her waist or shoulders as she worked in the fields each day.
"Then, one night, coming back from sowing a field, Rosa took a step off the path and was never seen again."
"What happened?" Drake asked, right on cue. He could almost feel the chill of the spring night, clouds masking a sliver of moon, the scent of peat fires mixed with a rich, earthy smell.
"The guards searched for her, but no trace was found. They took the rest of the women back to the barn and spent the night debating whether to send for more troops to aid in the search. In the morning they decided that they would be ridiculed by their compatriots and the better part of valor was to forget that Rosa ever existed."
"And Rosa?"
"By morning she was already far away, headed toward Budapest. She stole clothes from a nearby village, shoes from a train passenger's luggage and bought a rail ticket with gold that had been hidden inside her now clean perina."
"But how? How did they not find her?"
She smiled. "The perina. Everyday Rosa ground more dirt into it and also grass seed, moss, whatever she could find. Her body heat helped the seed to germinate until finally she had a blanket that was alive."
"The perfect camouflage," Drake said.
Hart nodded. "She stepped off the path into a weed-filled ditch, spread
the blanket overtop of her and voila, she was gone."
Drake looked at her, a smile creasing the corners of his mouth. "Magic."
His cellphone gave a raucous chirp, and they jumped apart. He frowned at the number flashing on the screen.
"I'd better see who this is," he told Hart, raising her hand to his lips before releasing her. He leaned down and kissed Muriel on the forehead, trying his best to avoid the bandages swathed around her.
The family room was empty. Drake stared out the window as he dialed the unfamiliar number. He yawned as the phone on the other end rang. The angel continued her vigil, her face smiling serenely, hinting at untold secrets.
"Hello?" came a tentative voice from the phone.
"Drake here." No response. "Someone there called me," he continued, more than a little irritated. If this was a wrong number from some punk, he was going to rip them a new one.
"Thank you for calling back, Detective Drake." The voice was lower now as if the speaker were trying hard not to wake anyone. Drake could understand why, it was after midnight. "It's John Trevasian. We spoke yesterday–"
"Nate's father." Drake sat upright. "Has something happened? Is he all right?" He wasn't certain why he assumed that the boy was in danger, just the kid had seemed so vulnerable. Lately Drake's world had been filled with too many wounded kids–like Mitchell Eades. Not to mention Sophia Frantz, Adam Cleary and Tanya Kent. And Hart's patient, Charlie Ulrich.
"Nate's fine," Trevasian assured him. "But something has happened. I was going to handle it myself, but something didn't feel right and I'd appreciate your advice–I'm just not sure–"
Drake cut the rambling father off. "What happened?"
"It's the dog, Snickers. He's out on my front lawn."
"I'm glad he got home all right," Drake said, stifling another yawn. What did the father want–him to come out and give the dog a scolding? Or check the mutt for rabies before the kids played with him?
"You don't understand. He's–" the man's voice caught. "He's dead. He's been butchered–hacked to pieces."
CHAPTER 23
Drake jumped to his feet, choking on his yawn. "Could you repeat that?"
"You heard me. Someone killed the dog and dumped him on my front lawn."
"Call the Zone Seven Station House, have them send a squad car over."
"I have. They said it would probably be a few hours before anyone was available. I covered him with a blanket, but–" Now the father's voice held a definite tremble.
Drake remembered the steady way Trevasian had handled his kids on their mission at the House. He didn't seem the type to scare easily.
"Look, I can't explain over the phone. Is there anyway you could come over yourself?"
Drake was silent. Of course he couldn't go. But how was he supposed to explain to Trevasian that he had to sit with his sick mother? Or that since he wasn't on active duty he wasn't supposed to respond to any calls–Miller would nail his ass to the wall.
Hart's reflection appeared in the window. Drake spun around. She was watching him from the doorway. "Hold on a second," he told Trevasian and covered the phone. "Everything all right?"
She nodded. "The nurses kicked me out. They're doing a procedure on the patient beside Muriel. After that it will be awhile before anyone can go back in, they'll be taking some X-rays. I'll stay and wait if you want to go home and get some sleep. Or," she nodded at the phone, "whatever."
Sleep was not an option, but Drake liked the way she read his mind. Better to be doing something than sitting here slowly going crazy with worry. To hell with Miller and her rules.
"Give me your address again. I'll be right over," he told Trevasian.
<><><>
Trevasian was sitting on the porch, his front door ajar, head cocked, listening for any sounds from inside the house. There was no sign of a patrol car. Drake parked in the driveway, and Trevasian met him as he got out of the Mustang.
The man wore powder blue cotton pajamas with white piping and his feet were bare. Drake hadn't seen pajamas like that since his father died. They were the kind wives picked out for kids to give for Father's Day.
Trevasian held a large flashlight while Drake grabbed his Maglight from the car. "My wife's out of town," he said in a low voice. "I'm trying not to wake the kids–especially Nate. It would kill him to see this."
He led the way across a dew-covered lawn. Well-mulched beds surrounded the house. Crocuses, daffodils and a few of the tiny irises that Hart loved were blooming, adding color to the night. "That's why I was tempted just to clean it up myself, but I have to tell you, Detective, this scares the crap out of me."
They crossed to the opposite end of the porch where a clump of boxwoods blocked the view from the driveway. Beyond the bushes, beneath the still-barren limbs of a small weeping cherry lay a form covered in a blanket bearing the Steelers' logo.
"Whose window is that?" Drake whispered.
"Nate's. First thing he does when he gets up in the morning is open his drapes. He loves getting up early, sometimes he sketches the birds." Trevasian gestured to the bird feeders hanging from the eaves above Nate's window.
Drake crouched next to the blanket, taking care to aim his flashlight beam away from the sleeping boy's window. He noticed that Trevasian stayed well back. He raised a corner of the blanket and shone the flashlight on Snickers–or what remained of the once beautiful dog.
Trevasian had been accurate when he said the dog was butchered. The animal's neck had been slit, deep enough so that his head sprawled to one side leaving the gaping wound wide open like a second, bloody mouth. The poor creature had been gutted as well, its internal organs pulled out to form some kind of warped anatomy display.
Drake could hear Trevasian retching behind him. He took one last quick look and replaced the blanket. He spent a moment shining his light around the area of the body but saw nothing except a faint impression of a drag mark in the mulch.
He climbed to his feet. He hadn't expected to find anything. Whoever had done this had planned it carefully, trying to maximize the terror with minimal effort or risk to himself. He moved to the edge of the lawn farthest from the house and beckoned Trevasian to join him.
"How did you find it?"
"When Marcia's gone, the kids like to bunk together. And I don't sleep well when my wife's away." Trevasian blushed. "Sometimes I'll crawl into bed with the kids. I tell myself it's to keep them from waking up scared, but–" He shrugged. "We were all in Nate's room, and I heard something like a flag or banner flapping in the breeze. I went to the window. Was just checking to see if a storm was coming, the wind picking up–and I saw a car drive off. Then I looked down." He shuddered.
"What if it had been Nate?" he asked. "Why would anyone do that to a kid? Why didn't they just come after me, pick on someone their own size?"
Drake was silent. Bullies never fought fair and neither would anyone capable of this degree of violence.
"Any ideas? You or your wife run into any trouble lately?" he asked the question as neutrally as he could. Most people took offense at the thought that they might have done something to warrant a personal attack. Everyone wanted it to be "some crazy" out there–as if every violent act were the work of some anonymous madman. But Drake knew that the overwhelming odds were that this had been done by someone the Trevasians knew, someone familiar with the family and their routines.
Trevasian didn't take offense, which impressed Drake. The man had obviously been thinking hard about the possibilities. "I'm an attorney," he told Drake. "But I specialize in estate law, hardly the kind of thing to promote animosity. Most people are happy to hear from me–it means they've come into an inheritance of some sort."
"And your wife?"
"She's a flight attendant for Southwest. As far as I know she hasn't had any problems, no run ins with obnoxious passengers, no friction with her coworkers. They usually work the same crews, so they're all pretty close. And," he went on when Drake looked at him with narrowed eyes, "we're h
appily married. There's no spurned lover hiding in the wings."
"How about the kids? Either of them having any trouble–fights at school?" Not that this was the work of a eight or ten year old. Maybe a parent?
Trevasian shook his head. "Other than Nate's refusing to talk and starting the medication for ADD, everything's been fine. And believe me, Katie Jean would have told us if any of the other kids were bullying her brother. After she slugged them herself," he added with obvious pride at the way the older sister defended her brother.
"When did Nate stop talking?" Mitchell Eades had a speech disorder as well. Why was this case reminding him of a murder eight years old? "Was he seeing a therapist?"
"He was fine until Snickers disappeared. Then he went all quiet. Marcia called the school psychologist who had tested him for the ADD, and he told her it was a normal reaction. Said Nate was scared by the realization that the world was not a permanent place and that he was worried either Marcia or myself might disappear next. Classic fear of abandonment, he said. So no, we haven't taken him to see anyone about it. If he'd seen that," he jerked his chin at the blanket, "we'd all need therapy."
Drake nodded. What the blanket hid was enough to give any kid nightmares for the rest of his life. He thought about what the Eades kid had seen when he found his mother and was struck again by the similarities between the two cases. Not in the actual crime–killing a dog was hardly the same as murdering a woman–but more in the emotional subtext.
How many actors out there would go to so much trouble to terrify a couple of kids? It could be the same actor, but after four years of silence, why start with killing a dog? Wouldn't he get more gratification from stalking and killing a human?
Drake shook his head. Something wasn't adding up. He pulled out his cell phone and called Jimmy. When it came to the psychology and people stuff, Jimmy was much better than Drake was. Give Drake a crime scene to read anytime–so much easier than people and the warped fantasies that drove them.