“That’s easy,” Andie had said. “Nothing upsets me as much as someone being scared and I can’t fix it. I hate letting frightened people down.”
Now imagining Christopher’s fear as he died tormented her not just because she’d been unable to fix it but also because she was responsible for it. And for his death. Causing harm went against Andie’s every impulse as a cop and human being. It was contrary to why she’d joined the force and why she got out of bed in the morning. Because she’d killed Christopher, she was tied to him with an intimacy she’d never had with anyone. Death’s unbreakable bond linked them. Forever.
To calm herself, Andie breathed in sync with Justice until, finally, at dawn she fell asleep. But into the Land of Nod she dragged her agitation, which was a lead albatross around her neck.
She dreamed that she was having coffee at Brewed Awakening and a man, whose face she did not recognize, peered at her through a window from the street. There was nothing unusual about him except that he looked menacing. He had a black aura of evil around him and could have been a universal, one-size-fits-all threat.
As he pressed his nose against the glass and stared at her, Andie had no idea what he wanted. Unsettled, she took a sip of coffee and was relieved when he walked away. But then he stomped through the door carrying a hatchet, and the skin on the back of Andie’s neck prickled with fear. He swung the hatchet above his head and started toward her. Sure that he intended to kill her, she stood up and drew her gun.
She shot. Click. Again. CLICK.
He came so close that she could smell garlic on his breath.
Click, click, click, click, click . . . The gun would not fire.
Andie screamed. When she woke, Justice was standing by her bed, his body pressed to the mattress as close to her as he could get. He was whimpering and straining against the cone to lick her face.
CHAPTER 17
TOM
After questioning people who lived around Brady, Ross Jackson had pointed out a dissonance between the local natural beauty and the dislike everyone had for one another. “I’d hate to go to a neighborhood potluck on Valley Road,” he’d said. That observation came to Tom’s mind as he was wrapping up his interviews. He knocked on the door of Eduard Kraus, who lived in one of seven houses between Brady and the Vanderwaals.
Kraus looked like an aged SS officer, tracked down somewhere in the jungles of Brazil. His white hair fell to his shoulders, there was steel in his blue eyes, and he stood as erect as rebar. The lines in his forehead suggested a chronic misanthropic scowl that would scare off those of lesser stuff than Tom.
Mr. Kraus was unaware that there had been a shooting. “On that night I drink schnapps. I listen to Die Meistersinger. I have no interest in these people.” He swept his hand through the air to indicate those on Valley Road.
“Do you know the Vanderwaals?”
“They are Dutch.” He spit out “Dutch” as if poison tulips were sprouting from the word. “Good-for-nothings.”
“Why do you say that?”
“Garbage cans turn over. Nobody cleans. American slum.”
Then why was Christopher so orderly? “Did you know the older son?”
Mr. Kraus grimaced. “Typical American teenager. Country goes to hell. Good-for-nothing lazy bums. All on drugs.”
His interest piqued at “drugs,” Tom asked, “Did you ever see Christopher high on anything?”
“No,” said Herr Kraus. “When I was boy, we were honest. Now everything is crazy. Terrorists. Politics. Criminals. The world falls apart.”
* * *
Tom could almost see his reflection in Kate Patterson’s lip gloss. Her clothes may have been left over from a party the night before. She wore spike heels, a way-too-scoop-necked top, and a skirt as tight as a sausage skin. Her false eyelashes looked like the wings of a desperate butterfly.
The wings fluttered as she devoured Tom with a quick, full-body glance. “Well, hello there. What can I do for you?”
Tom flipped open his notepad to convey that all he wanted from her was information. “You know anything about the shooting two houses down from here?”
“Yes,” she said. “Why don’t you come in? I’ll give you a cup of coffee.”
Served up with what? “Thanks, but I’ve got lots of ground to cover today.”
The butterfly wings drooped.
“That night, did you hear anything?” Tom asked.
“Gunshots. I thought they were firecrackers till all the ambulances and police cars showed up. It’s the most excitement we ever had around here.”
“Excitement’s one way to look at it, I guess,” Tom said. “You hear anything else? Any shouting?”
“No, but I wish I had so I could help you.” Another flutter of wings.
“You see anything?”
“Just all the lights flashing through the trees. I thought of walking out onto the street to find out what was going on, but I didn’t want to be a rubbernecker.” Ms. Patterson picked her thumbnail’s platinum polish.
“Did you know Christopher Vanderwaal?”
“I don’t socialize around here. I’m divorced. I live alone,” she said.
“Right,” Tom said.
“I did see him outside once in a while. Dressed pretty well. Not like boys in those baggy pants falling down so you see their . . . buns.” She smiled.
“No evidence of Christopher drunk or on drugs?”
“No.” She shrugged.
“What about Officer Brady? You know her?”
“Not very well. We’ve met at the end of her driveway a few times. She’s not very friendly.”
Wanting privacy, cops often stay to themselves. “So you don’t have knowledge of a friendship she might have had with Christopher Vanderwaal?”
A lusty chuckle. “What are you implying?”
“Nothing. I’m trying to find out how well she knew him.”
“No idea. You think anything . . . interesting . . . was going on between them?”
“We’re looking for a motive.” Tom closed his notebook. “Thanks for your time.”
“You’re sure you don’t want some coffee?”
* * *
Miss Mildred Hawthorne lived next door to the Vanderwaals and, in contrast to their supposed slovenliness, not a leaf or blade of grass was out of place around her ranch-style house. When she answered the door, a net was pressing down her hair and her cheeks were caved in because she’d neglected to put in her false teeth. “I wasn’t expecting company,” she said.
“I’m not company.” Tom flashed his badge. “I’m here to find out if you saw or heard anything the night your next-door neighbor was shot.”
Miss Hawthorne gummed imaginary food. “I heard about that awful woman murdering the child.”
She’s more biased than the press. “It’s too soon to use a word like ‘murder,’ Miss Hawthorne. We’re trying to figure out what happened.”
“I was watching Keeping Up with the Kardashians that night.”
“You hear any shouting?” Tom asked.
“The Kardashian girls shout sometimes when they get mad.”
Oh, man. “I mean shouting at Officer Brady’s home.”
“I guess I had the TV on too loud. Didn’t hear a thing outside.”
So there goes that. “Do you know the Vanderwaals?”
“A little.” Miss Hawthorne sniffed.
“Any impressions of Christopher, their older son?”
“Hmpf.” Miss Hawthorne’s lips looked like she’d spent the morning sucking lemons. “I’ll tell you, I’m not nosy. I mind my own business, and I don’t judge people. Live and let live, I always say, but if you ask me, that family is a bunch of losers.”
“How do you mean?”
“The father works for some company nobody’s heard of, and the mother works as a nurse all night. I’d hate to count on her for a proper dose of medicine when she drags around exhausted all the time. If I were her patient, I’d be up a creek without a pickle.”
I can’t have heard that right. “Are they good parents?”
“They let those kids run wild. I always felt sorry for Christopher.” Miss Hawthorne leaned through the doorway closer to Tom and whispered, “Two weeks ago he and his dad had an awful fight. I went out on my back porch so I could listen. Franz called that boy a sissy and said he’d never amount to anything. Terrible to do that to a child. That man’s a bully. I thought of calling the police.”
“You’re sure he was shouting at Christopher, not Joey?”
“Joey had already left. He goes somewhere on his bike every Saturday morning at nine, like clockwork. Sometimes when his parents aren’t there, he brings home a girl. Who knows what those children are up to. I can’t see into Joey’s window.”
“What about Christopher? Ever see him with a girl?”
“No.”
“How about drunk or high on drugs? Any sign of that?”
“Not that I ever saw. He might have been scared of what his father would do if he caught him. Someone should take that man out and shoot him.”
“Miss Hawthorne, did you ever have reason to think that Christopher could be violent?”
“No, but I’ll bet his father could. I hope he’s sorry his son is gone. That man buttered his bread, and now he has to lie in it.”
* * *
As long as Tom was close to Andie’s house, he walked over to take care of a clerical problem. The phone number she’d listed on her incident report didn’t match the one on her department roster. Tom rang the doorbell, took off his hat, and was smoothing back his hair when he heard barking fierce enough to freeze his blood. Justice sounded like he was about to rip through the door and grab Tom by the throat. When he stopped barking long enough to take a breath, the dead bolt clicked.
Justice’s curled lip told Tom, One false move and you’re going to meet your maker.
At the sight of Tom, Andie stepped back, clearly surprised. She looked like she hadn’t slept in a couple of months. Tom almost felt sorry for her.
“Hello.” He held out his hand for Justice to sniff, though it was awkward with the cone.
“Um . . . hello,” Andie said.
“Poor guy. Those cones are miserable,” Tom said. “Justice seems to be doing well, though.”
“He’s getting his old self back,” Andie said as her puzzled expression asked him, Why are you here?
“He smells my Sammy. She’s a golden.” It was pleasant to have almost a normal conversation after their encounter at the station. Tom reminded himself, Back to business. “I have a question.”
Andie narrowed her eyes. “You shouldn’t be here without Ron Hausmann. We’re always supposed to have a lawyer present.”
“You won’t need him to discuss your phone number. In your incident report, you said this was yours.” Tom opened his notepad and pointed to a string of digits, written with a black felt-tip pen.
When Andie leaned over to read it, the smell of her shampoo wafted to his nostrils. It was nicer than he’d have expected from a cop.
“That’s my mother’s old number. I guess I was too upset that night to think straight.”
“So this is your number?” Tom pointed to the one below her mother’s and got another pleasant whiff.
“Yes, that’s it.”
“Good to know. We might have to get ahold of you.”
“Not without Hausmann.”
Okay, lady, I get it. We play by the rules. Tom straightened up and looked into those green eyes. They looked right back. “As you know, we need the right contact information. We’ll be in touch,” he said.
CHAPTER 18
ANDREA
At last, a week after being stabbed, Justice was permanently free from the Cone of Doom. He polished off his celebratory dinner of cottage cheese and a broiled chicken breast, after which he pranced around the kitchen with Bandit in his mouth. He let the world know, This is my own personal teddy, and nobody else can have him.
Justice sat on his golden throne in the posture of a maharaja—his bottom firmly on the pillow and his front legs, straight as scepters, propping up the rest of him. His gaze steady, he surveyed the kitchen, his dominion, with Bandit, his loyal colonel, at his side.
Andie was finishing her own dinner, chicken-and-dumplings, which Doug Baker’s wife had left on the front doorstep with a note: “We’re with you, Brady. Don’t let the jerks get you down.” So far there had been just a single jerk, Tom Wolski, whose grilling had been bad enough, but why couldn’t he have gotten her phone number from Stephanie at the station? Why did he have to turn up and harass Andie in her own home?
Unlike Wolski, Andie’s colleagues on the force had shown nothing but support. Every day on her porch she’d found surprises—cards, flowers, pies, casseroles, loaves of homemade bread, and even bubble bath from Stephanie with a card urging Andie to relax in the tub. On several nights, she’d needed to triple her gratitude list in order to mention all the kindness. Her kitchen counter was covered with empty dishes to be returned. Though her colleagues couldn’t talk about the case, they’d let her know they cared.
Fortified by their reassurance, she speared a dumpling with her fork and asked Justice, “What do you think, Sweet Boy? Do we dare watch the news?”
He cocked his head, his triangle ears alert. She could always count on him to pay attention.
“You think a week has been long enough for the press to lose interest? I don’t want to see myself dragged through the mud,” she told him.
If Justice could talk, he’d have advised Andie to wait a few more days. A cautious and protective dog, he picked up even her mildest distress in a flash. Besides, he had his own TV viewing preferences. On the Animal Planet channel, he enjoyed reruns of the Puppy Bowl and Glory Hounds, and on the Hallmark Channel, he went wild over dramas in which someone rang a doorbell.
Justice loved doorbells—one bong and he jumped to his feet and barked, ready to take on the world. Yet as much as he cared for doorbells, he disdained those who sometimes came to the porch, especially petition-signature seekers and door-to-door salesmen. After Tom Wolski had stressed Andie over her phone number, he clearly wasn’t a favorite of Justice’s, either. In his brain, he’d stored the conviction that Wolski needed surveillance.
“How about if we look at the news and then your shows, Sweet Boy?” Andie asked. Sure he’d agree—Justice agreed to most anything as long as she was safe—she aimed the remote control at her TV and pressed the power button on. The TV was set to Channel Four.
The notorious Sid King was perched on a sofa, his toupee slicked back in a European style. His shiny sports coat’s arms were too short. He wore owlish horn-rimmed glasses to make himself look smart, not that his viewers had witnessed much of a brain. He rested his elbows on his knees and leaned forward like he was about to whisper sweet nothings into somebody’s ear.
But Sid King was not known for sweet nothings. He was known for his barracuda tactics. He whipped his forked tail, exposed his razor-sharp fangs, and fixed his eyes on someone across from him. He asked, “So tell me, if you could say anything to her, what would it be?”
Who is “her”?
The camera answered Andie’s question. Across the coffee table from Sid, Jane and Franz Vanderwaal were pressed together, side by side, as if they needed each other’s body heat to get through their blizzard of grief. Jane balled a handkerchief in her hand; Franz’s hands rested on his lap in fists. Christopher’s framed school photo sat on a table four strategic inches from Jane’s elbow so that the big brown eyes on his young face could melt viewers’ hearts.
“I’d tell Officer Brady I hope she rots in hell,” Franz said.
If Andie had squeezed the remote control any harder, she’d have cracked its case. Her wiser self demanded, Turn it off! Turn it off! But the devil, who happily resides in everyone, poked her with his pitchfork and chortled, Oh, go ahead. You know you want to watch. Think how juicy all that hate is going to be.
Except the hate wo
uld be directed at Andie, and it was exactly what she’d wanted to avoid. Still, her curiosity made her helpless.
“And what would you like to say to Officer Brady, Mrs. Vanderwaal?” Sid asked.
Jane looked like her limited strength had drained out on the floor. Her face was hard. She peered into the camera as if she were peering into Andie’s soul. “I’d ask her: Why did you have to confront our defenseless boy? If you were scared, you could have called nine-one-one. Better police than you are could have protected him from you.”
Protected him from me?! What about protecting me from him?!
“In all fairness, we’ve learned that your son allegedly had a knife, Mrs. Vanderwaal,” Sid pointed out.
Yes, a knife! And the Supreme Court ruled that if cops are threatened, they can use force one increment up from the force they face. I had a right to use my gun.
“I’m glad you said ‘allegedly,’ ” Franz responded for Jane. “We don’t believe Christopher had a knife. That woman planted it.”
Are you kidding me?!
Franz continued, “If we’re wrong and Christopher did have a knife, he stabbed the dog in self-defense. That woman sicced him on our son.”
Andie could have sworn Sid smirked.
“About the dog,” he said. “This afternoon I talked with one of the first responders to the scene. He said when he arrived, Officer Brady was administering first aid to the dog, not your son. He was a few feet away . . . bleeding to his death, as it so sadly turned out.” The sorrow in Sid’s eyes expressed a mortician’s practiced concern. “Do you think Officer Brady cared more about her dog than your son?”
“Absolutely!” Franz snapped. “She’s guilty of far more than negligence. Attending to her dog like that was criminal.”
“You may be pleased that others share your opinion,” Sid said. “Are you aware of the highly influential San Julian group Islanders for Collaborative Policing? They’ve called for Officer Brady’s arrest and criminal prosecution.”
Surely not. It can’t be. The kitchen floor seemed to shake; the walls trembled. Andie felt her world tumble down. She grabbed the remote and aimed it like a gun at the TV screen. She pressed “off ” so hard that the button imprinted a small white oval on her thumb.
A Healing Justice Page 9