Stolen Grace

by Arianne Richmonde

  Tommy could feel a lump in his throat. “That sounds very cynical, Ana. And Grace isn’t homeless. She was kidnapped by a very sick person. Her parents are desperate for her. She has a home. I’m sure the police will be as helpful as they can.”

  “I’m sure whoever took her had a reason.”

  His brow furrowed into a hard knot. “Hitler had a reason. All nutters have a ‘reason’ in their own sick minds.”

  “You think this woman was sick?”

  “Is sick. Yes. Very sick. Psychotic even.”

  Ana smiled faintly and stroked her nose again. “Perhaps she regrets what she’s done.”

  “If so, she would have brought our daughter back to us by now.”

  “Maybe she can’t.”

  “Can’t or won’t?” he retorted.

  “Same difference. Maybe she realizes she doesn’t even want Grace anymore.”

  “I doubt that very much. This woman is forty-six and can’t have children. She stole Grace because she was obviously desperate to be a mother. The woman went to all that trouble to steal her in the first place. Besides, Grace is an angel. So easy to fall in love with. She’s the sweetest, smartest girl in the world. Anyone would topple head over heels for her. And I’m not just saying that because I’m her father. She’s special. Unique.”

  “You never know. She might decide that being a parent isn’t what she thought it would be.”

  All the food arrived at the table at the same time. Ana’s eyes lit up, her wide grin planted on her face like a poster for a toothpaste commercial. She started to serve out the dishes on both plates. Tommy noticed she’d been smoothing her fingers across the fine bridge of her nose all evening.

  “Does it hurt?”

  “What?”

  “Your bruise. That bash from the horse. Is it sore?”

  “Oh, that. No, not really.”

  “Look, Ana, I don’t mean to sound pushy, and you’ve been very kind to offer your help but I really do want to see the police. I got a tip and I need to get Grace’s picture out there ASAP. I could really use your help.”

  “Do you have a photo of the woman?”

  “No, that’s the whole trouble. She seems invisible.”

  “I guess she must be super-smart.”

  “Something will make her slip up,” Tommy said bitterly.

  “You think so?”

  He took a bite of one of the shrimp ball things. It was good but he really didn’t feel like eating. There was something about this woman that was really irking him. She seemed strangely detached for someone who had seemed so keen to help earlier.

  “You don’t have kids, then?” he asked, with an accusing shift of his eyes.

  She looked up at the ceiling for a second and when her eyes rested back on him, he saw they were filled with quiet tears.

  “Sorry, have I touched a nerve?” he said, feeling awkward.

  “I did have a child,” she answered softly. “Grace’s age. Her name was Adela.”

  Oh dear, I’ve put my foot in it. “And what happened?”

  “She went missing one day. Just vanished. And I never found her again.”

  Tommy clawed his fingers through his messy hair. “Oh my God. I’m so sorry. So then you’re in the same boat as us? You understand and that’s why you want to help—you identify with the kind of pain we’re going through.”

  A tear slid down Ana’s cheek. “You see my point about the law here? They don’t give a damn. Trying to find a missing child in Brazil is like searching for a needle in a haystack.”

  Tommy’s insides churned. “I’m not just dealing with Brazil. I’m dealing with the whole of Latin America. Grace could be anywhere.”

  “Have you tried Central America?”

  “I was just in Honduras. Why?”

  Ana shrugged her shoulders. “I don’t know. Just a hunch. You might try somewhere like Nicaragua. The rainforest there is second only to the Amazon in size. With miles and miles of deserted beaches. It would be a clever place to hide a child.”

  “But I got a tip that she was seen here. They were here.”

  Ana took a long sip of her cocktail, and then said, “Well perhaps that tip was full of baloney. Perhaps that person was pulling your leg, have you thought of that?”

  “Yes, we had. The tip was anonymous which was a bit off-kilter.” Jesus, he needed to get out of this restaurant. But the poor woman looked so forlorn. So that’s why she offered help—she wanted sympathy from someone who’d understand.

  “I’d try Central America.”

  Tommy couldn’t stop chewing his lower lip. “When I think of Nicaragua all that comes to mind is extreme poverty. You really think she would have taken Grace there?”

  “Well I think you might want to investigate places like that. Do you have any idea what this woman looks like?”

  “My wife does, of course. But all I’ve seen is the police photofit. You must have seen it too—it’s all over the web. On TV. My daughter said she looks like a weasel with eyes the color of poo. Funny that—you should always trust your first instinct about a person. We should have heeded more attention. Sadly, Grace changed her mind when that bitch bought her a pair of bloody shoes.”

  “Eyes the color of Pooh Bear?”

  “No. Eyes the color of shit.”

  Ana gazed downwards, a pained look on her face. Then she touched his hand. She downed the rest of her Caipirinha and said, “I’m sure you’ll find your daughter. I’m sure she’s just fine as we speak. Probably devouring an ice cream somewhere.”

  “Something makes me doubt that very much, I’m afraid, but nice of you to be so upbeat about it. So how do you cope never having found your daughter again? How do you get through each day?”

  Ana touched the gold cross around her neck. “Faith.”

  “You know what gets me most about this woman? The mendacity of it all,” he said in a low rumble. He felt like his insides would split. “The filthy lies, the tricks, the schemes. The pain she’s putting everyone through makes me want to literally kill her.”

  “But you said you don’t even know what she looks like.”

  “One day I’ll find her. And when I do? Well, that bitch had better watch out, that’s all.”

  “Tommy, you were right. We ordered too much. I don’t feel so well myself. Can I ask you one little favor? As one lost desperate parent to another?”

  “Sure.”

  “I could really use a hug right now.” Ana got up from her seat and moved over to his side. She sat on his knee as if she were riding sidesaddle. He thought she was wiggling about to get comfortable but he felt her pressing the muscles of her butt into his groin. She flicked her auburn hair close against his neck. She wriggled some more on his lap—he could feel the tension of her gyrating buttocks. Then she put an arm around his shoulder. She rested her lips against his ear and placed her other hand beneath her ass, cupping his crotch firmly, palming it with her whole hand. “You are so hot, you know that? So goddamn handsome! I would just love to straddle you—I bet you’ve got a really huge cock. I’m wet right now just thinking about it.” She put her tongue inside his ear and licked it slowly. “I could so fuck you all night and suck your huge dick, lick it up and down, up and down, put that huge, thick cock in my mouth and then ride you all night the way you deserve.”

  Tommy’s conscience was doing one thing, his dick was doing another. How could he undo millions of years of male DNA? He simply couldn’t help it.

  He felt himself getting hard.

  CHAPTER 30

  Sylvia

  Sylvia’s nerves about her trip to Rio de Janeiro had her teetering on the edge. Excitement, mixed with terror, and sprinkled with hope, surged through her fragile veins. Tommy, oblivious to her plans, still didn’t know she was on her way, and Melinda had insisted on coming to Rio with her. Good, she needed the support. They would find Grace. The thought of the contrary was too painful to contemplate and, as Tommy had said, “unacceptable.”

  For too
long now, she had been reacting, instead of acting. Things, from now on, were damn well going to change.

  Finally, Sylvia succumbed and took just one half of a Valium to get her through the night. She had thought that by reading poetry she could bring on sleep, but was suddenly horrified by her choice: Sylvia Plath. Why had she chosen her, of all people? Her namesake? A wave of sadness enveloped her when she envisioned the great poet’s suicide, wondering how she could have put herself through such a gruesome death; sticking her head in a gas oven with her two little children in the next room. Sylvia had the sensation that she was now re-living her father’s own desperation, the anxiety that must have plagued his mind. He took his own life! How could somebody actually go through with it? Would Sylvia take her own life if they never found Grace? She could never imagine doing such a thing but perhaps she would. It would take a lot of guts to pull it off. Were people who committed suicide brave, or cowards? Who was she to judge others? Desperation had a way of stamping on Hope. Hope . . . she mustn’t give up. Ever. She had to remain resilient. Strong. They would find Grace.

  In a haze of sleep, she could hear noises. Was someone vacuuming downstairs? She got up and threw on her mother’s silky bathrobe and stood at the top of the sweeping staircase. It was already daylight. Someone was vacuuming, all right.

  “Jacqueline?” Sylvia glided down the stairs, her mother’s robe trailing behind her like a wedding train.

  Jacqueline was in the living room, standing on a chair, pointing and poking the long tube of the vacuum at the ceiling. She screamed. “Oh my Lord, Sylvia! You scared the living daylights out of me. What are you doing up when you need all the rest you can get?”

  “Are you killing spiders?”

  Jacqueline turned off the noisy machine. It was the same old sky-blue one from the 1970s. Still working, still faithful. Jacqueline, Sylvia knew, refused to allow a new one in the house.

  “Not the spiders themselves, honey, just their mangled old webs.”

  “You’re meant to be retired, Jacqueline. What are you doing standing on chairs?” Sylvia knew that the pension plan her father had set up for her was all in place and that the money had been sent that week. She’d checked with his lawyer.

  “I know. But you think I can relax during the day knowing creepy crawlies are taking over this house with their webs and the kitchen ain’t been cleaned and—”

  “That is not your problem. It’s mine, for being untidy. You should be playing with your grandchildren, not clambering about on furniture here.”

  Jacqueline stepped down from the chair. She had on her special work outfit. Faded, red velvet slippers, shiny flesh-colored pantyhose, and a pinafore over her dress. She always wore her hair up, too. “I had a feeling you was up to no good, planning trips and plotting and scheming.”

  “I’m going to Brazil. Today. To find Gracie. I was going to call and let you know.”

  “Oh my Lord. I knew it! I just knew it! You have news?”

  “Maybe. We’ll see. Don’t get too excited. Nothing’s sure. If we get good news you’ll be the first to know about it.”

  The old marble clock on the mantelpiece said ten fifteen. She still hadn’t finished packing and had some important calls to make. She realized she didn’t have that much time to get ready for her trip. Her plane was leaving at three.

  She raced upstairs to pack. Never mind taking a silly backpack—who was she kidding? She’d use a small suitcase with wheels. But then she did find a faded old backpack she’d once used for summer camp, at the back of the guestroom closet. Her parents seldom threw stuff out.

  As she slung her clothing into the backpack, Sylvia felt appeased, knowing that she was about to take action to find Grace. She asked herself if LeRoy would have aided her—used his military skills—had he ended up being a soldier. She imagined the what-ifs and fantasies of what could have been. Sylvia had been spoiled as an only-child, never had to share her toys, was never passed hand-me-downs. Her parents had both helped her with her homework. LeRoy was raised by a single mother in a poor neighborhood. Jacqueline never mentioned a stepfather, nor did Loretta speak about another man in the letters. Had it been tough for LeRoy? Sylvia supposed so. She knew that being white and privileged was an alien world to so many. Would LeRoy have resented her had he lived? What if she’d met him and disliked him? Or perhaps he’d been the sweetest kid ever. Maybe he would have disliked her. Thought her snotty. Or they could have ended up being best friends. Who were his ancestors?

  She wondered what Loretta’s and LeRoy’s roots had been. She supposed they’d suffered the racial segregation left over from the discriminatory housing policies. The problem was still rife. Saginaw’s river sliced the neighborhoods in two.

  Sylvia went back into the living room, her mouth poised in an O, ready for more conversation. Yes, she had a lot of questions.

  “I don’t want to retire,” Jacqueline grumbled. She had turned her attention to dusting. “There’s still life in me yet and this old house has been like my sanctuary. I find peace here. Even when your mama was hollering about this or about that, I still found my little corner of peace in this house.”

  “Nobody’s forcing you to retire, Jacqueline. Tommy and I have been thinking about staying in Saginaw, at least for a while. Put Grace in school here. When we find her.”

  “You will. Just keep praying—keep believing.”

  “I do.”

  Jacqueline stopped what she was doing and turned her head and gazed at Sylvia. Her almond-shaped eyes sparkled with hope. “You mean you ain’t going back to that mean and cold Crowheart house of yours?”

  Sylvia felt as if she had betrayed Crowheart in some way, with all her complaining. “Oh, it’s not all mean. It’s beautiful in summer. And the winters in Michigan are just as severe as they are there. The cold is drier there. Here it’s damp and it creeps into your bones.”

  “Maybe Sylvia, honey, but at least this old furnace is still working like a dream. You got friends here. People that care.”

  “Very true. And we’re ready for a change, that’s for sure.”

  Sylvia picked a small Spanish phrase book from the bookshelf and leaned against the fireplace, flicking through its thin pages. “Jacqueline, where did Loretta come from?”

  “Why here, in Saginaw.”

  “But where were her parents from?”

  “Saginaw too, I think.”

  “So LeRoy’s family went back a long way, then?”

  “I don’t rightly know for absolute sure, but I think that family goes back a few generations. Saginaw through and through.”

  Sylvia knew just a little about black history in Saginaw. She’d learned at school that some of the earliest African Americans settlers were the first freed slaves from the North and Canada. Many of them found work in the lumber business, and then later, to join the automobile industry in nearby Pontiac and Flint. General Motors was booming then. Perhaps that was when Loretta’s parents arrived. Although many were poorly educated, there was a strong middle class of entrepreneurs and professionals, even artists and doctors. Some blacks became extremely wealthy.

  “What did they do for a living?” Sylvia asked.

  Jacqueline swiped the feather duster over small crystal chandelier. “Well, Loretta was a secretary. Her father was . . . what was he now? I think he was a manager at one of them automobile plants. Her mother was a homemaker.”

  Sylvia cleared her throat and said, “Now there’s something important I’d like to know.”

  “Let me guess. You wanna know how your daddy and Loretta got involved in the first place?”

  Sylvia nodded. Jacqueline knew her so well. It seemed she could read her mind.

  “Loretta was mighty pretty in her day.”

  “Yes, I saw that from her photo.”

  Jacqueline got down from her stool. “She was your father’s family maid.”

  “But I thought Hyacinth was. For forty years!”

  “And Loretta was Hyacinth’s niece. Sh
e came to help one summer. And that’s when it happened.”

  “When she got pregnant?”

  “When they fell in love.”

  “So my dad wasn’t just taking advantage of her, then?”

  “Nuh-uh. He was crazy about her. She was a few years older than him and he thought she was the most beautiful woman he’d ever set eyes on.”

  “How do you know all this?” Sylvia asked.

  “Loretta told me the story.”

  “And then she got pregnant?”

  “Nobody knew. But your grandparents did get wind of what was happening, that your daddy was fool crazy for Loretta, so they arranged for her to leave. Gave her double pay just to get her outta the house. But she kept that baby a secret. Kept her stomach hidden the whole time. She once told me she planned to give the baby up for adoption, but when he was born she couldn’t go through with it. She was mighty proud. Didn’t wanna ask for no help, no money.”

  “Yes, I gathered. From her first letter to him.”

  “By the time she gave birth, your daddy was already engaged to your mama. Lordy, Lordy, that was a quick marriage because he’d made your mama pregnant, too.”

  “What?”

  “When your parents got married, your mama was with child.”

  “But not with me?”

  “No, not with you. She lost the first baby. Miscarried after a few months. But they were good ‘n married by the time he found out about LeRoy.”

  Sylvia stood there, open mouthed. “I had no idea he was . . . like that.”

  “He was mighty handsome in his day. A little bit of a ladies’ man, I guess.”

  “Well did he love my mother?”

  “Yes, siree. You know he did.”

  “Well I knew how dependent he was on her. But dependency isn’t always about love.” She pictured Tommy. Was he dependent on her? Was their union about love? “So then what happened to Loretta?”