He broke the surface and drew in a rasping, frigid breath. He pulled Evelyn’s head above the water. Even in the dark night, in moving water, he could tell she was not breathing.
“Here!” he heard over the current.
A series of lights flickered about thirty feet away, and he recognized Riley’s voice. They waited on the bank. “Here!”
He swam with one arm, holding Evelyn with the other, through a moving, wavy, frozen purgatory that took all his strength and promised him nothing for it.
Jerry found them and helped support Evelyn’s body, propelling them along with flippered feet.
Then David felt mud and the lights were in his face. Silhouettes reached for Evelyn and pulled her in, carrying her limp body off in some surreal pantomime. He began to protest.
Over the din of his rushing blood he heard Riley say, “Better grab him before he drowns, too.”
Chapter 39
EVELYN RESTED UNDER A heated blanket, which spewed tubes and wires monitoring her heart rate, temperature, and other vital signs. Occasionally her limbs would give a convulsive shake, like a dog throwing off water, but otherwise she slept as one dead. David wanted to wake her but didn’t, afraid to throw off her efforts as she fought her way back from the depths. He just waited, perched on the neighboring bed, watching her every breath.
The lights were too bright. He loathed that about hospitals, that the lights were too bright and the rooms were too damn cold. They had given him a dry gown to put on, but the tissue-thin cotton felt only a few degrees warmer than walking around naked, and he stole the blanket and spread off the vacant bed. The nurse berated him for it, but he gave her a blank look and she went away.
Evelyn suffered from hypothermia, and they hoped nothing else. The doctors found no sign of oxygen deprivation, but it was too soon to be sure. They seemed cheerful; the house physician told David that with luck, the mother of all colds would be the worst she got out of this ordeal. David recognized the attempt at humor but could not respond, could not cough up a smile. He had been scared out of his mind. He had seen his life come to one point in time where he had to succeed and he had not. He might have lost the one person who could have made his future worth hanging around for. Pretending to be all right was impossible.
He heard a scuffle at the door and looked up as a teenage girl threw herself at Evelyn’s bed. Behind her was an elderly woman who, he guessed, had done most of her aging in the past hour leaned in the doorway.
“Mom!” the girl said.
This must be Angel, David thought. And I’m wrapped in a nightgown and a blanket, hairy legs hanging over the bed. And I thought I’d lost my talent for making good first impressions.
Angel’s crying, Evelyn thought groggily. I’d better do something.
It was so hard to open her eyes. She felt as if the cement now encased her whole body, soft but too heavy to move. Each breath made her lungs ache, and what little air she could handle came out in an oof as her daughter leaned on her chest, quaking with sobs.
She tried to lift her arms to comfort her daughter. Her efforts produced only a twitch in her right hand, and she was still so damn cold. But she figured one thing out.
It’s me. Angel is crying over me.
She smiled.
chapter 40
EVELYN STOOD WITHIN A loose group of trees in her backyard, wrapped in a bulky sweater and savoring every breath. That the air was tinged with smoke and roasted fowl only made it sweeter. She looked up at the treetops and the bright gray sky and savored those, too.
David left the overwarm house, beer in hand, and joined her in the ring of melted snow around the smoker. He looked around at the white-topped evergreens. “This is beautiful.”
“Yeah.”
“But my feet are cold. Tell me again why you’re smoking a turkey.”
“Tradition.” Evelyn snuggled into her sweater, though the twenty-five degrees felt downright balmy to her.
“Whose tradition?”
“Mine. Just wait until you taste it.”
“It’ll taste like ham. Anything smoked tastes like ham. You could smoke an old shoe and it would taste like ham. Three of your cousins are arguing about who gets to sit next to that serology girl, Marissa.”
“How do you think I got her to come?”
“What happened to Jason, by the way?”
Her eyes gleamed with a nasty edge. “Oh, Jason. He was told his services were no longer adequate. I think Tony secretly misses his kaffeeklatsch partner, but he got to fire someone, so it wasn’t a total loss. It’s a little unfair, really. Jason couldn’t have known that Kopecki’s had anything to do with anything.”
“Then there was no reason for him to keep it to himself when I asked a direct question.” David’s fingers tightened on hers. “I notice Angel is among your guests.”
“She wanted to be here.” Evelyn happily rubbed steam off the temperature dial. “I told her it was okay if she went to her dad’s, that I was going to have plenty of guests and I’d be just fine, but she insisted.”
“She refuses to sit next to Ed, that guy from Toxicology,” David said. “So do I.”
“Be nice to Ed. His testimony about chloroform will be important at Max’s trial.” She shuddered. “What a circus that will be. Three counts of murder and one attempted. I wish we could prosecute him for Thalia Johnson and Christine Sabian as well.”
“Not without their bodies. In spring we’ll send the divers out again. I’m sure we’ll have plenty of time before the trial comes around.”
She watched the flakes of snow drift from the sky. “Defense attorneys are already fighting to represent him.”
“I can see it now. He killed because Mommy didn’t love him enough. Is that why he picked them? They reminded him of his mother?”
“Yes and no. They resembled his mother, but more than that, they made the mistake of being kind to him. For one brief moment, they each paid attention to him. And then they turned away.”
“Like throwing a starving dog a crumb. He wanted more—more attention?”
“What we all want.” She reached out her hand. “Love.”
He took her fingers in his, pressing gently. They stood like that for some time, listening to the trees whisper over their heads.
“Angel might want to sit next to you, by the way. She thinks you’re a hero.”
“The jury may still be out as far as your mother is concerned. She keeps asking me a lot of questions, where I am from, that sort of thing.”
“She wants to know if you’re a nice boy.”
“And am I? A nice boy?”
She looked him up and down. Her last wispy memory from her time under the water had been that of his arms around her, propelling her through the icy water to the surface, to life, his hands the only warmth in a frigid world. “I’d say you’re a very nice boy.”
He smiled.
She leaned over to lift the smoker lid and peer at the browning turkey. “Anything else you have to report?”
He took a deep breath. “That I think I love you, but I’m not going to say it.”
The lid settled back with a clang.
He breathed out again. “Impulsive acts always get me in trouble. This time I’m going to go slow and careful.”
“Good idea.”
He drew closer, trailing a finger along her jaw, one arm sliding around her back. She had a momentary sensation of drowning again, but this time it felt deliciously warm and she relaxed into the waves without hesitation.
“I love you.”
She shook her head. “Some people never learn.”
Acknowledgments
I’d like to thank the fantastic staff at the Cuyahoga County Coroner’s Office, especially Linda Luke, Sharon Rosenberg, Kay, Dihann, and Bernie and Jim, and of course Dr. Elizabeth Balraj.
I’d also like to thank: those whose brains I have picked for this particular novel—Larry Stringham of the Cape Coral Police Department, Brett Harding, Dr. Valerie Beck-Blum,
Dr. Andrew Wolff, the Cleveland Police Homicide Division, and my husband, Russ; Sylvia, my first reader, and Sharon, my most recent; my support system—siblings Mary, Susan, John, and Michael; my editor, Peternelle van Arsdale; and my miracle worker, agent Elaine Koster.
Copyright
Copyright © 2005 Elizabeth Becka
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without the written permission of the Publisher. For information address Hyperion, 77 West 66th Street, New York, New York 10023-6298.
ISBN: 9781401382766
First eBook Edition: August 2005
Trace Evidence Page 28