Bleeding Darkness

by Brenda Chapman

  Rouleau stood and walked across the room to get his jacket from the coat rack. His father was working on a research paper and would have forgotten to eat lunch. He’d stop at the butcher and pick up a couple of steaks. They’d go nicely with the New Zealand Pinot Noir he’d bought on the weekend.

  He stopped by the main office down the hall on his way out. The only one still working was Kala Stonechild, hunched over her keyboard and oblivious to him watching her from the doorway. He’d been avoiding being alone with her since he’d learned of Woodhouse’s complaint, partly to keep from any compromising situations and partly to keep her from guessing what was going on. He had no way of knowing how she’d react, but suspected she’d disappear as easily as she’d arrived in Kingston if it meant making his life easier. It wasn’t in her nature to fight for herself; he believed that her childhood in foster homes had taught her that escaping from bad situations was the least painful route.

  He saw Kala raise a hand and run it absentmindedly across her forehead and stepped back into the hallway out of her line of vision. He wanted to tell her to pack it in for the night and head home to Dawn, but he stopped himself. She’d be like a bulldog on this case until it was solved, and he hoped against hope that she’d be the one to succeed. Even better if Woodhouse came out incompetent and disproved the glowing assessment Chalmers had given and knocked down his own inflated view of himself. The morning meeting would give him a good indication of how seriously the board members took Woodhouse’s complaint.

  He’d decide what to do from there.

  chapter fourteen

  At exactly 4:22 a.m., David McKenna sighed his last shuddering breath and passed on to the next world. Evelyn was alone in the room, sleeping beside him in the leather hospital chair. Adam, Tristan, Lauren, and Mona had taken advantage of her falling asleep to go in search of a vending machine. They returned with cups of coffee to find a nurse standing next to the bed with their father’s wrist in her hand. She looked at them. “He’s passed,” she said and rounded the bed to bend over Evelyn. She gently shook her shoulder. “Mr. McKenna has slipped away, dear. I’ve buzzed for the doctor on call and he’ll be here any minute. It’s comforting to know that he’s been released from his pain.”

  Evelyn stood, eyes bleary with sleep. She looked down on her husband. “The Lord bless his soul,” she said, making the sign of the cross. “It was time his suffering ended. He’s gone to a better place.”

  Lauren later remembered the room full of medical staff, but only briefly, and then the interlude of stillness in the room as they waited for the attendants to arrive with a gurney to take her father’s body away. Evelyn had gone into the hallway to speak with the doctor and Tristan was in a chair near the window with his eyes closed, snoring softly. Mona and Adam were off finding a pharmacy to buy migraine medication for Mona, who’d felt one coming on. Lauren moved closer to the head of the bed where Evelyn had stubbornly sat throughout the vigil and reached out a hand to touch her father’s forehead. His face was free of pain and his mouth had relaxed into what could pass for a smile.

  “You look so peaceful, Dad. I’m glad you aren’t going to have to be here to face the fallout with Tristan.” She checked that her brother was still sleeping and then looked toward the door to make certain she was alone. Satisfied, she lowered herself into Evelyn’s vacated chair. She wasn’t sure if her dad’s spirit was still hovering in the room, as recounted by those who had near-death experiences, but she felt something or someone’s presence and wanted to believe. “I’m going to miss you, Dad, but I’ve been missing you for a while. She rested her cheek on his arm and closed her eyes, trying to feel him with her. “I wish I’d had a chance to tell you how much I love you, but I’m banking on the fact you knew. I’m sorry I haven’t made you prouder but I’m going to try. I won’t let you down.” Tears seeped from under her eyelids and down her cheeks. She whispered, “I’m so tired, Dad. I wish you were here.”

  She heard the door push open and footsteps on the floor. “What are you doing? Lauren, sit up!”

  She opened her eyes to see her mother’s furious face bearing down on her. This is how it feels to stand outside your own body, she thought, a curious spectator watching her mother fly toward her like a raging bull.

  “Don’t touch him. I can’t bear for you to touch him.” Evelyn’s face was bright red and her eyes shot daggers.

  Lauren pulled back and her mother’s open palm landed on her shoulder instead of her face.

  “Stop it, Mother!” said Tristan and Lauren saw him striding across the floor to grab onto Evelyn’s arm. “You’re distraught. You don’t know what you’re saying.”

  “I don’t want her near him.”

  “It doesn’t matter. I’m leaving,” said Lauren, pushing her way past them both. “I don’t need this shit.”

  She grabbed her coat and purse from the chair and shoved the door open, colliding with an overweight bald man as she stumbled into the hall. “Are you okay, ma’am?” he asked, steadying her with both hands as she shoved and manoeuvred her way past him and the man standing behind him.

  “I will be,” she said.

  The cops have come for Tristan, she thought, but she kept running down the hall toward the elevators, slowing to a walk when she reached the door to the stairwell. She swiped at her eyes with the back of her hand to clear the tears and blurriness and climbed down the three flights to the street. Exiting onto the sidewalk, she breathed in great gulps of frosty air and calmed herself enough to form a plan. She’d return to the house and throw her things in the car and be in Toronto before lunchtime. Tristan could fend for himself and the rest of them could go to hell for all she cared. This would be the last time she set foot in this town.

  Over. This is over.

  Lauren had put her suitcase into the trunk of the car when she heard someone calling her name. She slammed the trunk shut. Boris Orlov was standing on the front steps to his house in his housecoat and slippers, waving a rolled-up newspaper.

  What now? she thought but she walked toward him on the snowy path that Boris had cleared between their two properties.

  “Are you leaving?” he asked. “Is there news of your father?”

  “I’m sorry to tell you, Boris, but Dad died this morning. I’m going back to Toronto.”

  He squinted. “God gave, God took back. Your father lived a good life. Come in and have a cup of tea before you go. Antonia will need to be told.”

  “I really have to get going.”

  “I just made a pot. You have time to sit for a moment.” His words became an order. “Come in. I’m getting cold standing here.”

  “Just for a minute, then.”

  Lauren climbed the steps and followed him into the house. She removed her boots and went after him down the hallway into the kitchen.

  The Orlov home had the same heavy smell that she remembered from childhood: beets and cabbage with an underlay of furniture polish. She remembered Antonia working all the mornings of her childhood scrubbing and cleaning with afternoons spent in the kitchen making borscht, cabbage rolls, perogies, bread, corned beef — food that forever tied her to her homeland. For as long as Lauren knew her, Antonia had been a stout, buxom woman with a silent, hangdog face who wore black skirts past her knees, nude knee-highs, and flowered aprons that only came off when dinner was served. Lauren now wondered if her strong Romanian accent was the reason she kept to a silent presence seemingly content to be in the background. She had no idea what Antonia thought or dreamed about. What made her happy.

  She took a seat at the kitchen table and Boris poured tea into chipped mugs, the roses faded from bright red to pink in the dishwasher.

  “Antonia!” he called. “Lauren is here.” He added sugar to his tea and pushed the bowl toward her. “She hasn’t been feeling well.”

  “I hope it’s nothing serious.”

  Boris shrugged. “God’s will.” His eyes bore into hers. “Tell me, did your father say anything before he died?”

/>   “No … he slipped into a coma and didn’t wake up again.” She turned her head to listen. “Is Antonia okay? I don’t hear her upstairs.”

  “She’s fine. She’s fine. Your mother. How did she take your father’s passing?”

  “Not well.”

  “Ach, then. Nobody does.” He slurped his tea, rough hands large around the cup. Your father was a good man. He always put his family first.”

  Lauren paused. “Maybe he shouldn’t have. Not always, I mean.” The tea was stronger than she liked. She reached for the sugar bowl.

  “When you live through a Communist state like I have, you will understand that all you really have is your family. You can trust nobody else. Your father knew this truth.”

  Lauren had overheard snippets of the Orlovs’ history although she’d never given their previous lives much thought. “You grew up in Romania,” she said, thinking back to a conversation with her father. He’d explained to her why they had accents and ate different food when she’d asked. She was in grade two and her new best friend had come to play. She’d made fun of Antonia’s clothes and the way she spoke to them when she offered them cookies. Lauren had made fun of Antonia too and her father had overheard.

  “We came to Canada after the revolution. After they executed Nicolae Ceauşescu.”

  “Dad told me that he was a brutal dictator, but I don’t know much more about that time. What was it like living there?” She was embarrassed that she’d given the Orlovs so little thought. They’d just been the neighbours, older people of no interest. Part of the furniture of her life.

  He looked past her, his eyes distant, reliving something long ago. “What I have seen would give you nightmares. Antonia is my reminder of what evil people are capable of. Nobody is immune.”

  “What happened to Antonia?”

  He refocused on Lauren. “It was a long time ago. You take for granted all that you have in this country.” He motioned toward the door. “It is time for you to be going. I will tell Antonia that you came by with your news. She will be sad that David is gone.”

  Lauren was startled by the rough change in his expression and she stood, bumping her knee on the table. “I hope she’s feeling better soon. Thank you for the tea.”

  Boris nodded, but didn’t make a move to get up. He resembled a bear, his broad shoulders hunched over the table. “We will visit your mother later. Let her know that.”

  Snow was falling when Lauren stepped outside. It coated her car and would need to be cleaned off before she began the drive home to Toronto. She pulled up the hood of her jacket and started back across the lawn. Before she reached the driveway, a car drove up and parked on the street. Adam jumped out of the driver’s side and waved at her.

  What the hell now? she thought and kept trudging through the snow toward her car. Adam couldn’t stop her from leaving. She should have hit the road when they were all at the hospital.

  He trudged his way through the snow to her. “The police have taken Tristan in for questioning. Hauled him out of Dad’s hospital room.” He glanced across the yard. “What were you doing at the Orlovs’?”

  “Letting them know about Dad. They haven’t charged him?”

  “Not yet.”

  “What do you mean not yet?”

  “You have to know he could have done it, Lauren.”

  “What about that musketeer speech in the hospital? One for all and all for one?”

  “That still applies, but we have to be realistic.”

  She stared at him. She remembered all the times he’d gone his own way and left her and Tristan to fend for themselves. Nothing had changed. Nothing ever changed. She walked past him and opened the trunk of her car. She kicked the rear fender. Shit, shit, shit. She reached in and took out her suitcase and slammed the trunk shut.

  “Were you leaving?” he asked, his voice incredulous.

  “I was, but can’t very well now, can I?”

  “Fuck you, Lauren. Our father just died and Tristan lost his wife and baby and you were running away like you always do. Thinking only of yourself.”

  She turned and Adam was standing motionless glaring at her. Hair glistening with snow as the sun came out from behind a cloud. Looking so bloody perfect in the glow from the heavens.

  “When have you ever been there for me?” she yelled. “When did you ever put our family first? Because I’m not so sure I’m the one who let everyone down. You ran away to Vancouver and left Tristan and me with her.” She jabbed a finger toward their house. “So don’t talk to me about being selfish or tell me what I should or shouldn’t be doing. You can go fuck yourself.”

  He held up both hands in mock surrender. “Okay. Okay. You’re right. I’m a big hairy ass and I’m sorry. But we have to —”

  “I know. Stick together.” She hoisted her suitcase and started back toward the front door. “I’m staying but only because of Tristan. Once they let him go, I’m out of here. Back to Toronto and my life that has nothing to do with this dead-end town and my seriously deranged family.”

  She stomped up the sidewalk and slammed her way into the house. She heard Adam’s car rev away from the curb as she was kicking off her second boot.

  “Just great,” she said to her face in the hall mirror. “Why didn’t you leave when you had the chance?”

  She carried her suitcase back upstairs, lay on the bed, and stared at the ceiling. She needed to figure out the best way to help Tristan when all she really wanted to do was go back to the bar and have a drink. She sat up and swung her feet onto the floor. Some of her best ideas came over a shot of hard liquor. Why should solving this problem be any different?

  chapter fifteen

  “Did you know we brought in Tristan McKenna?” asked Bennett on his way to his desk. “Woodhouse is letting him cool his heels in interview room one before we have a go at him. Woodhouse thinks he can get McKenna to confess.”

  Kala looked up from her computer. “Did Rouleau okay that? I heard David McKenna died early this morning.”

  “I have no idea but I’d be surprised if he did.”

  “Well, whatever. I made a pot of fresh coffee ten minutes ago.”

  “Thanks, I could use a cup. The dampness has gone right through me.”

  Woodhouse strutted into the office and Kala went back to reading. She looked up again to find him standing next to her desk.

  “What’s going on with the Zoe Delgado file?” he asked.

  “I interviewed her dad and brother but they didn’t tell me anything that wasn’t in the files.”

  “So you essentially have squat that I can use?”

  “If you want to put it that way.”

  “Well, keep on it, Stonechild, and let me know if you come up with anything. I want to connect the two murders with some solid evidence. They’re obviously linked by the killer.”

  She didn’t bother to respond. What would be the point? Woodhouse’s dark presence drifted away and she went back to reading. She observed Gundersund come out of his office and motion for Woodhouse to join him. He didn’t include her so she continued making notes. Woodhouse exited the office five minutes later looking as if he’d eaten a lemon.

  “Let’s go, Bennett,” he said on his way past Bennett’s desk. “Naptime is over.”

  “See you later,” Bennett said to Kala. “Are you going to watch us interview McKenna through the two-way?”

  “I don’t think so.”

  “Get the lead out, lover boy,” said Woodhouse. “Fraternize on your own time.”

  “Don’t rise to his bait,” Kala cautioned quietly. “He’ll only get worse.”

  “You don’t need to tell me.”

  She waited a few minutes after they left before knocking on Gundersund’s door. “Got a minute?”

  “I do. Take a seat. Still feels weird being in this office instead of the main one.”

  “The perks of power.” She smiled and sat across the desk from him. “Tanya Morrison seems to be settling into your old chair.”
/>
  “I might have to arm-wrestle her for it.”

  The chair creaked as he leaned back and put his hands behind his head. His hair was getting long and wild-looking and he seemed like someone who should be sailing a large boat on the Atlantic or climbing Kilimanjaro rather than stuck behind a desk. “So lay it on me and I hope this has nothing to do with Woodhouse.”

  “No. I was wondering if you had a chance to follow up on the whereabouts of Fisher Dumont?”

  “I have a call in. Is this urgent?”

  “Important but not urgent.”

  “I’ll follow up this morning.”

  “Thanks.”

  He was openly searching her face but kept to himself whatever he was thinking. “What are you up to today?” he asked.

  “I’ve been rereading the Zoe Delgado file and interviewed her family yesterday. I’d like to have spoken with David McKenna, but that’s obviously out of the question now. I was going to drive over to their house to speak with other McKenna family members, but I think I should give them a day to grieve his death.”

  “Woodhouse didn’t show the same restraint. He picked up Tristan at his dead father’s bedside.”

  “I know. I might have waited until after lunch to bring him in.”

  “But you have the milk of human kindness running through your veins.” He grimaced and ran a hand across the scar on his cheek. “Anyhow, enough about Woodhouse. My eye’s already twitching.”

  “I might make a run over there anyway to speak with the neighbours. The Orlovs. They lived next door when Zoe went missing and were never seriously considered suspects since they gave each other an alibi. They might have insight into the McKenna family back then.”

  “Apparently, they’ve given each other alibis for Vivian McKenna’s murder too.”

  Kala heard a question in his voice. “Do you think there’s something there?”