Nobody's Damsel

by E. M. Tippetts

  Steve toyed with his butter knife and frowned down at it as if he didn’t like the reflection it gave him.

  “So yeah, I always read Amber Alerts,” said Beth. “I may end up working on the case when the time comes.”

  Lillian returned her attention to me. “How are you holding up?”

  “I’m just doing the work that I can and trying not to go crazy.” I thought of the girl’s mother in the hospital, near death. The abductor was capable of unspeakable acts; I just wanted to believe he or she wouldn’t commit them against an innocent child.

  My mother-in-law watched my expression change. “Listen, all of you, the careers you’ve gone after aren’t for everyone.”

  “Why am I here, Mom?” asked Steve. “I’m going to be representing school districts and doing education law.”

  “Glad to hear it. Stay there.”

  “You thought I’d change my mind because of this case?”

  She shrugged.

  Steve resumed playing with his silverware. I didn’t know him well enough to guess at his thoughts.

  “Thank you for caring,” I said.

  “Chloe, honey… I know I didn’t help you get a restraining order when your brother was paroled the year before last.” Her voice was choked up with emotion. “I’m sure you wondered why.”

  “Um… no, not really.” She was referring to an incident that happened after I met Jason, but before I started dating him. He’d been photographed at my work and dropping me off at my house, so when I’d had a spate of vandalism, I and everyone else, including the police, had assumed it was jealous fans. However, that annoying paparazzo who was now stalking me in his white sedan had done me a rare favor. He got pictures of my brother, the guy who once tried to kill me, casing my home. As it turned out, he had been paroled and thought that it was a good idea to try to intimidate me, because I guess he thought this would improve his situation in some way. Like I said, Chris just wasn’t the brightest bulb. What it had meant, though, was that I needed to get a restraining order and that meant going up against the high-powered attorney my dad kept on retainer to defend Chris.

  Doug, my father-in-law, and Steve had stepped in, pro bono. It was one of the most extravagant gifts anyone’s ever given me, and in the process of gathering evidence we’d found enough parole violations to send my brother back to jail. Not once during that whole ordeal did I pause to wonder why Lillian hadn’t also helped out. Two attorneys against Chris’s one seemed like help enough.

  She dabbed her eyes with her napkin, which made me look at Steve. I didn’t know her well enough to know what to say or do in a situation like this. Steve set his knife down and put an arm around her shoulders. Beth gave her hand another squeeze. I felt sandwiched in the middle, unable to do much other than feel like I’d made her cry.

  Lillian took a couple of deep breaths, then smiled at Steve and Beth in turn before looking at me again. “I never could forgive myself for not getting a conviction for attempted murder all those years ago. You were in such bad shape, it should have been a slam dunk.”

  “You didn’t even argue that case,” I said.

  “I know, but I’ll always wonder if there was anything I could have done.”

  “But I’m fine,” I said. “It’s all good.”

  “Yeah, Chloe’s alive and well and part of the family,” said Steve. “Let it go, Mom.”

  She smiled tolerantly at him. “I can’t let it go, and knowing that this former little girl is going to be the mother of my grandchildren doesn’t make it any easier. It makes it harder. It makes me feel like I should have done more.”

  “You did plenty,” I said. “I’m grateful for what you’ve done for me.”

  “Thank you, but what I’m saying to you, Chloe and Beth, is that if you aren’t the kind of person who can let it go either, that’s all right. No one will think less of you if you change jobs. There are a lot of ways to be a hero. My biggest mistake was staying in that job for as long as I did. I thought if I cared enough I could make a difference, but in the end, every case comes down to circumstances and more than a little luck. Love, passion, and wishful thinking don’t change the outcomes at the end of the day. They just wear you down.”

  I nodded, taking her point. Beth frowned. Like Steve, she wasn’t someone I knew well enough to read.

  “And Chloe, honey, I know you’ve got some questions about how you even got your job. Some suspicion that someone pulled strings. I just want you to know that Doug and I still have our connections. If you need help leaving gracefully, that could be arranged. Don’t ever feel trapped where you are.”

  “Thanks,” I said. I did feel trapped, but not by the Police Chief or anyone else who’d done me favors. Jason was the one who insisted I do this job, no matter what I said about wanting something different. But that wasn’t something I would talk about here. That was between me and him.

  “And I didn’t mean to get all of you riled up and worried about that little girl,” said Lillian. “You do what you can and you learn to let go. I’m a hypocrite, but that’s still my advice. Now someone change the subject so we can have a nice lunch.”

  We all shot each other blank looks and an awkward silence descended. I wracked my brain for something, and after a minute I came up with, “Jason brought me dinner at the crime scene last night.”

  “What a gentleman,” said Lillian.

  “He couldn’t actually get out of the car, or he’d have gotten mobbed.”

  “At a crime scene?” said Steve. “Are you kidding me?”

  “The paparazzi were there.”

  Lillian blinked in surprise.

  Steve just stared. “Are you kidding me?”

  “The press is building this narrative about us on the brink of divorce and…”

  “Oh, Chloe,” said Lillian. “I hadn’t been paying attention. That’s awful.”

  “No, it’s all right. We aren’t on the brink of divorce-”

  “Wait, why would they even say that?” said Steve.

  I opened my mouth to say, “Oh, you know. His fans really want him to be single, but before I could, Beth spoke up.

  “Cheating allegations.” Even my sister read this stuff?

  “We’d all beat him to death if he ever did that,” said Steve.

  “Thanks.” See, I thought to myself. See? This was Jason’s family and they had it ingrained in their very beings that cheating was wrong. I needed to learn how not to be so sensitive. It wasn’t like the media and their obnoxious stories would ever go away.

  That afternoon in the lab, I analyzed some fibers taken from one of the blood splatters on the wall and determined they were polyester dyed green, which was consistent with the color and material of the track suit the victim had been wearing. All of these little random facts I jotted down weren’t making much of a picture for me, but my perspective was limited. Detective Baca would have interviewed enough witnesses by now that he was probably hot on Esperanza’s trail. With luck, she’d be found and returned to family by the end of the weekend.

  “We’ve got a DUI on Coors,” said a voice on the police scanner. “Almost ran over some kids. They got the plate number and called us from their house.”

  “Good kids.”

  “I know, right? Doin’ their civic duty.”

  I returned my attention to shoeprints in the blood in the entryway. There were just so many of them, it was taking a long time to pick out how many individuals had passed through, but I worked systematically, identifying the type of shoe for each one in turn. It was tedious work, but someone had to do this and the more meticulous I was, the better the case we could build against Esperanza’s abductor.

  Partway through my work, it occurred to me that if there had been bloody footprints in the entryway the first time the cops had knocked on the door, they would have seen them. The front window was uncurtained, after all. Teresa’s big long bleed that stained the carpet would have happened after the attacker got away with the child. This meant that all
the footprints I was looking at would likely belong only to the emergency personnel. I fought down a surge of frustration and kept on working.

  That evening after work, Miguel and I went to the hospital. Odd as it may seem, I loved hospitals. The smells of antiseptic cleaners and the sparse utilitarian furnishings made me feel at home. The safest I’d ever been in my life had been in a hospital. I’d had my own bed, could sleep as much as I wanted, and had nurses and doctors who cared about me. I understood why some people got addicted to being in hospitals.

  The victim had her own room and lay on her left side, unconscious, her face so black and blue that it was hard to make out her features, her hair dark brown and scraggly. It’d been washed, but not combed out. She’d been punched at least once; the pattern of the bruise on one cheek showed the knuckles of her attacker. Her shoulder and arm were bandaged and her chest rose and fell so slightly that it was hard to see if I didn’t look closely. The sickly lights washed the color out of everything, making her unbruised skin look a pallid yellow. I couldn’t tell by looking how old she was or her race. Since she’d named her daughter Esperanza, I assumed she was Hispanic, but the name might have been the father’s idea.

  I got my hairbrush out of my purse and went around the other side of the bed. Her hair was silky, though kinked with knots and tangles.

  “What are you doing?” asked Miguel.

  “If you’re stuck in a hospital bed, your hair can become a rat’s nest. I’m braiding it.” The room was devoid of flowers or cards. I wondered if anyone had been by for a visit.

  Miguel lifted an eyebrow but didn’t say anything as I brushed out her hair. A nurse, passing by in the hall, looked in to see what we were doing.

  “We work with the APD,” I said.

  “Oh, right. As a hairdresser?”

  “Stayed in a hospital for a month once,” I said. “Lost most of my hair. Had to get it cut off.” I twisted strands of hair around each other in a tight braid, which I secured with a rubber band I’d had around the handle of my hairbrush.

  The nurse smiled.

  “We should have received her blood draws from right after she was admitted,” said Miguel. “Do you know where they are?”

  “I’ll go check.”

  He muttered under his breath as she moved on down the hall. “Does this woman not have any family?” He gestured around at the bare room. “I’ve never seen anything like this.”

  I nodded, and moved around to where I could see her face. “Yeah, it’s very sad.” At least she didn’t seem to know we were here, which meant she wouldn’t know even if no one else had visited. I tried to take comfort in the fact that she was in a good, safe place now. Those long hours lying undiscovered on the floor were over.

  “All right Teresa?” he said to the woman. “We’re going to find your little girl.” He patted the unbandaged shoulder. He looked up at me, a silent prompt to see if I was ready to go.

  It felt strange to leave her, perhaps because I knew I likely wouldn’t see her again. I gave her one last look over my shoulder and hoped against hope that she’d pull through. She’d survived this long.

  The visit gave me some perspective, at least. My problems were small in comparison, and tomorrow was Saturday. I’d be able to visit Jason in LA and likely get rid of the latest round of jitters I had over the tabloid stories. I’d decided to take Dave’s advice and fly out in the morning as a surprise. I had some things to do in the morning, meeting with the decorator and that kind of thing, but I’d booked my flight for immediately after. As the schedule stood now, I’d make it in just before noon, in time to see Jason before he left for his first interview.

  The next day, Jason wasn’t at our house in Bel Air. From the pristine condition of the place, I guessed he hadn’t been there recently, and that was all wrong. This was where he was supposed to be staying while he finished off his press junket. Yet our house looked like a model home, impersonal and neat as a pin. I stood in the living room that looked out onto the pool deck. The pool was covered and beyond it, the guest house gazed back at me with empty window eyes.

  I called Jason’s cellphone and it went straight to voicemail. I frowned and called Dave.

  “Chloe.”

  “Hi. You allowed to tell me where Jason is?”

  “We’re at his agent’s office.”

  “Oh.”

  “On the phone with a lawyer.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “So we’ll be here a while.”

  “So I should…”

  “Jas, I’ve got Chloe on the phone. She’s at your house. No, not that house.”

  “Chloe?” Jason’s voice.

  “I tried to call but-”

  “You’re here in LA?”

  “Yeah, but if you’re busy-”

  “I am.” His tone was flat. “I thought you weren’t coming in until tonight.”

  “Surprise? I wanted to catch you before you left.”

  “Um… okay. Look, I’ll try to… I’ll send a car to take you to my first interview.”

  “Okay.”

  “Love you, bye.”

  “Love you.” No sooner had I said the words than I was talking to a dead line.

  Two hours later, I’d heard nothing from Jason and no car had come to pick me up. The interviews were for print sources, so it wasn’t as if I could watch them on television. Instinct said to call, but I couldn’t bring myself to do it. I wasn’t used to needing people. Too much independence was something Jason had torn me up about when we were dating. How things had changed.

  I tried to read a book, then paced for a while, then wondered what work I could do in the lab instead of just sitting idle in the house.

  Jason’s ringtone blared from my phone and I grabbed it to answer. “Hello?”

  “Hey. Okay, so the second interview will just be Vicki this afternoon. I’m coming home.”

  “Okay.” I tried to sound bright and upbeat.

  “Be there in a few. Love you. Bye.” He hung up.

  Moments later I heard the garage door and then the back door open. He’d waited to call me until he was almost here. I told myself to smile, but Jason took one look at my expression and said, “Yeah, I’m sorry. I had no idea you’d be here this early today.” He ran his fingers through his hair and sat down on the couch, rather than coming to hug me like he usually did. “Did you get lunch?”

  I hadn’t been hungry for lunch, so I just shrugged.

  “Well, I’m going to have something.” He got to his feet and I watched him head over to the fridge. This living room adjoined all of the other rooms on this floor, and kitchen was separated from the living area by only a counter, so I could watch him haul open the fridge, grab a food item wrapped in butcher paper, then toss it back in. He shut the door and leaned against it.

  My bewilderment began to give way to annoyance. “Jason, what’s going on?”

  “Nothing.”

  “Tell me the truth.”

  “I am telling you the tr-”

  “Jason, up until now, the media have barely ever cared about me, all right? I’m boring. All I do is go to school and work and walk around looking annoyed with people. What’s changed? And don’t tell me it’s just them being random. This doesn’t feel like randomness.”

  “What are you accusing me of?”

  “Not telling me what’s going on.”

  He shrugged and sighed. “I’d tell you if I knew.”

  “Do you have a guess?”

  “I dunno…”

  “Why won’t you even look at me?”

  He turned around, his gaze uncertain. He knew something.

  “Tell me.”

  “Stand down, Chloe. Jeez.”

  “Then talk. It looks like you haven’t even been living here, you weren’t where you said you’d be this morning, and you’re treating me like I’m an intruder. I just came to surprise you. I thought you’d like that.”

  “Wait… what?”

  I folded my arms and waited. />
  “I have been living here. If you count sleeping as living. Most meals I’ve had with producers and stuff. You know how it is. As for this morning…” He turned his gaze to the wall and came to lean against the far side of the island countertop. “I’ve been having to do some thinking about stuff for my career and it’s kinda been all consuming.”

  “Everything all right?”

  “I dunno. We’re discussing some rewrites for the film that would require last minute contract changes, and it’s stressing me out.”

  “Oh.”

  “And I’m sorry about the media, all right? I’m sorry you get stalked by photographers for no good reason. I don’t ever wish this on you.”

  “I didn’t say that you did.”

  “Why are you so uptight?”

  “Because I feel like there’s something you’re not telling me. Maybe I’m paranoid. I don’t know. I love you, all right? Which is a little scary…” I shook my head. That didn’t come out right.

  Jason looked at me, surprised.

  “I do not want to be a needy person.”

  “Nobody called you needy. But yes, it did feel like you showed up this morning just to check on me, and I don’t like that. We have to trust each other. The media are harassing me too. Actually, the only reason they report stuff about us is because of me.”

  “I’m sorry.” I met his gaze and didn’t look away. Something still wasn’t right, but I didn’t know if it was him or me. Was I paranoid, or was he holding something back?

  He nodded, as if making up his mind, then came around the island and pulled me in for a long, deep kiss, his arms wrapped tight enough around my waist that I almost struggled to breathe. Before I could say anything, he kissed me again and again, then pulled me in the direction of the bedroom.

  I did not understand what was going through his mind, especially not when we lay down on the bed and his fingers dug into my shoulders hard enough to make me gasp. “Okay, pain,” I whispered. “Not good.”

  “Sorry.” He carried on, stripping off his shirt and mine.