Authors: Midnight Hour
“I didn’t even know you were gone until you fell off the roof ” Grace said with some asperity. “I would have called the police if I had known, believe me, but I didn’t. Detective Marino was very kindly following up
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on the other things that have happened when we saw your shadow sneak past the window.”
Grace’s gaze was drawn to Marino as she finished that speech, and for a moment their eyes met. The memory of the kisses they had shared shimmered in the air between them, as tangible as a heat wave on a hot August afternoon, and then was gone. He was still exactly the same obstinate, exasperating, thick-headed macho lug she’d been dealing with for weeks now, Grace realized. But with those kisses, everything between them had changed.
A knock, muffled, since it came fi7om the front of the house, interrupted the conversation.
“I’ll get it,” Marino said when Grace instinctively started to rise. “It’s probably a couple of uniforms. They’re usually the first to arrive, Jessica, we’re going to need to know exactly where you were tonight and who you were with, and the same for any other times you’ve snuck out lately, so be prepared.”
Having delivered this warning in an unexpectedly stern voice, Marino left the room. Reminded of Jessica’s transgression, Grace glanced at her daughter, her expression chiding.
“Mom, I really am sorry about sneaking out,” Jessica said, having no trouble interpreting that look. “I shouldn’t’ve done it. I know it. I shouldn’t’ve done any of the things I did. It’s just-there’s this boy I like and he invited me to a party and I knew you wouldn’t let me go and
“If you wanted to go to a party, you should have asked me, Jess.” Grace met her daughter’s apologetic
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gaze over the rim of her cup as she took another sip of coffee.
“Would you have let me go if I’d asked you?” Jessica asked, the challenging note in her voice softened by a hiccup.
Grace sighed. It really was difficult for her to stay angry at this person she loved more than anyone else on earth. She could feel her wrath softerning over Jessica’s escapade.
“Probably not,” she admitted.
“Then what good does it do for me to ask?” “You wouldn’t be grounded for the rest of your life for sneaking out, for one thing,” Grace pointed out.
Jessica grimaced. “Is that what you’re going to do?” “I’m thinking about it. I’ll let you know.”
“All the other girls get to go to parties. Why can’t I? It’s not fair!”
“I can’t believe that all your friends-Emily Millhollen, for example, or Polly Wells-are going to parties with boys at age fifteen. Especially parties where there are kegs of beer, marijuana cigarettes, and obviously no parents present.” Grace’s voice was dry.
“That’s only because nobody ever asks them,” Jessica muttered, but had the grace to look away as she said it.
“Jessica-” Grace was interrupted by Marino’s reentrance into the room. With him were his brother Dominick and another man, who was not wearing a uniform but who, Grace assumed, was also a police officer. From sounds elsewhere in the house, Grace guessed that others were now on the premises as well.
“Grace, this is my boss, Captain Gary Sandifer.”
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“Judge Hart.”
“Captain Sandifer.” Grace stood up and shook hands with the tall, thin balding man in the tan trench coat, who was regarding her with the respect generally accorded to her office. Grace felt the mantle of authority that she wore primarily on the job settle over her. Her voice was crisp, her handshake firm.
“I understand you’ve had some problems-” Sandifer began.
“If you don’t mind, I’d prefer to talk about it in the kitchen. My daughter’s been upset enough.” Grace gestured toward the doorway behind them.
“Oh, of course.”
As Sandifer turned back toward the door, Marino detained Grace with a hand on her arm. In a low voice, he said, “Dom’s going to take Jessica’s statement. He’s got a daughter about that age, and he’s good with kids, so I’m hopeful he’ll get something useful out of her. We’re treating this as a threat against you in your capacity as a judge, by the way. Jessica, as a private citizen, wouldn’t be able to command the same degree of protection that you do.”
“All right. Good idea.” So he had handled it. As upset as she was, Grace wasn’t sure she would have thought to work it that way. The idea that he had perhaps done a betterjob getting something done than she could have was both novel and, in a way, reassuring. Having someone she could lean on was a new thing for her.
With a single glance toward Jessica, who was replying with a small smile to something Dominick had said to her, Grace went into the kitchen after Sandifer. Ma-
T
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rino followed, then walked on past the two of them, presumably to supervise what was going on upstairs.
“I understand that there have been a number of frightening incidents, including your daughter’s pet being killed,” Sandifer said, when he and Grace were alone. “Here in Franklin County we don’t take kindly to somebody threatening one of our judges and her family. What we are going to do, with your permission, is make this a top-priority investigation and assign twenty-four-hour protection to both you and your daughter until we get this situation resolved. We’ll have someone with both of you everywhere you go and someone posted here in the house at night. Detective Tony Marino has been heavily involved in this case from the beginning, I know, and he has volunteered to be the protection officer in your house at night. I assurne you have no objection to that?” The look he gave her was a little searching, and for a disconcerting moment, Grace wondered if Marino’s kisses were branded in neon on her mouth. Which was ridiculous, of course.
“No. No objection.” Grace shook her head. Sandifer nodded. “That’s fine, then. As for your daughter, I assume she’ll be maintaining her usual activities, going to school and so forth?”
“I … haven’t had time to really think about it. At this point, I would answer yes.”
He nodded again. “We’ll have someone with her everywhere she goes, even in class. We’ve got several young-looking women officers who would be ideal, I think. “
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“Jessica is the priority. I want her kept safe. All the incidents have focused on her.”
“That’s what Detective Marino said. Don’t worry, we’ll take care of her. We’ll take care of both of you, until we get this resolved.”
“I appreciate that.” “Pardon me, judge Hart.”
Grace looked around inquiringly at the uniformed officer who had just appeared at her elbow. According to the badge on his breast pocket, his name was George Becker. He was a small man, about Grace’s own height, portly in build, with thinning black hair and a bristly black mustache. What caught her eye, though, was something else altogether: he was wearing what appeared to be surgical gloves, and carrying a small, zip-top plastic bag in one hand and a long handled Q-tip in the other.
” If you don’t mind, Your Honor, I need to get a tissue sample from you. I’ll be taking Orle from your daughter, too.”
Grace crossed her arms over her chest and frowned. “Why?”
“So we can compare the results with those from any physical evidence we find, and thus eliminate you or your daughter as sources.”
“What kind of physical evidence?”
“Hairs, body fluids such as blood, saliva, or semen, possibly a sliver of skin if someone has been scratched or cut, that type of thing.”
“Oh. Certainly.”
“if You’ll just open your mouth Grace did.
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As Becker inserted the swab between her teeth and the inside of her cheek, and swished it around, Sandifer asked, “Has any physical evidence been found?”
Becker withdrew the swab. -f really couldn’t say, sit. I just take the samples.” He put the swab into the plastic bag, sealed it shut, and headed toward the family
room.
ONY WAS STANDING in front of one of the long windows in Jessica’s room, arms crossed over his
chest, watching as Randy Zoller of the crime unit meticulously vacuumed the carpet. The contents of the vacuum bag would be examined for evidence such as hairs or textile fibers not consistent with the room or its inhabitants. Charlene Young, also of the crime unit, was performing the same service for the bottom bedsheet, using a smaller, hand-held vacuum.
Dom entered the room, distracting Tony’s attention. He walked over to join his brother by the door.
“Still think I’m taking her complaints too seriously?” Tony gibed in a low voice.
“It’s a freakin’ dead hamster, Tony, not murder one. The most we could convict the perp on if we caught him red-handed is cruelty to animals and trespassing.”
Tony shook his head. “You’re missing the big Picture, brother,” He held up his hand, counting possible ZD
charges off on his fingers as he spoke. “What we got here is possible terroristic threatening. Obstruction of
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justice. Interference with a public official in the performance of his-in this case, her-cluties-“
Dom interrupted. “Let me point out, this was alined at the daughter.”
“If somebody wanted to intimidate VOL], Wlldt would be the best way to go about it? Threaten you, or threaten, say, Christy?”
Christy was Dom’s teenage daughter. Dom looked at him. “Point taken.”
“Did you get anything useful out ofjessica?” “The daughter? Where she was, who she was with, any eneniles she might have-apparently half Hebron High School, she thinks. I got it all down. One interesting thing. She was on her porch late one nightjust after this started and thought she saw someone in the yard, watching her. She ran into the house, so scared she slept with her mother.”
“You think we got something?” Tony knew his brother well. He could tell that Dom was starting to believe there might be some substance to Grace’s fears after all.
“Maybe.” Dom shrugged. “Okay, there’s probably something here. But it looks to me like what it might be is somebody stalking the daughter, not the mother.”
Tony and Dom both watched as Charlene Young bagged the bottom sheet.
“Like I said, if somebody wanted to get to
you …
“Okay, okay. The only thing is, we can’t justify an investigation of this scope or t-wenty-four-hour police protection if the perp is just some kind of weirdo
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targeting the daughter, We’re ooIV able to do t if the target IS VOUr girltriend, because she’s a public official.”
-16ny gave Dorn a sour look, “Would you quit with the girlfriend crap? And I’d say there’s a good possibility that Grace is the target. We need to check out the cases she’s working on, people she might have sentenced lately, that type of thing.”
“Well, gee, I guess I’ll just let you go over all that with Gracc.”
Tony’s sour look lightened fractionally. “When’s the last time somebody told you to go fuck yourself?” Dom pretended to ponder. “A couple of days ago, I
think. And I think it was you.”
Tony laughed. “Yeah, well, this time I mean it. Anyway, let’s get to work.”
By the time the police finally left, it was after four A.M. Jessica lay on the family room couch, nearly asleep. Grace sat in the blue leather chair nearby. She was yawning when Marino walked into the room, having seen out the last of the contingent of police officers who’d scoured the house from top to bottom looking for evidence.
“You look beat. Both of you. Go on to bed,” he said, looking from one to the other of them with a crooked half-strille.
“What did …” Grace began, and yawned again. “Anything you want to know, I’ll tell you tomorI
row. Go to bed.”
To Grace’s surprise, she found the thought nearly irresistible. “All right then.” She got to her feet,
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walked over to the couch and pulled Jessica LIP as well. “Let’s go, sweetie.”
“Oh, wow, I’m tired,” Jessica said.
“You need any help?” Marino asked Grace, as Jessica swayed on her feet. Grace put an arm around her. “No, I can manage. There’s a daybed upstairs in iny
office. It’s all made up, all you have to do is throw the little pillows off it. If you need extra blankets
She yawned again.
“I’ll find them. Don’t worry about me. Good night.” His voice was faintly dry.
“All right. Unight.” In truth, Grace was too tired to worry about him. She was so tired her eyes felt gritty, and every other breath was a yawn.
But as she settled into bed–-she and Jessica were in her bed, because Jessica could not bear the thought of returning to her own-she did reflect, with one of her last, conscious thoughts, that being able to surrender so fully to sleep was a luxury she had not enjoyed since the night she had found Mr. Bear down by the road. And the only reason she was able to do so tonight was because she was perfectly confident that she and Jessica would be safe as they slept.
And the reason she was so confident that they would be safe was that Marino was in the house, spending the night.
Cbapter
32
HE ONLY GOOD THING about his mom was that —./she made the best rice pudding in the world. With a spoon, he scraped out the last creamy remnants from the big white mL*xing bowl and ate it with leisurely enjoyment. Then he carefully pulled the Saran Wrap back over the empty bowl and returned the bowl to the refrigerator, in a kind of revenge of the nerd thing, he thought with a snicker. His dad was going to be home before lunch tomorrow, which was Sunday, and his mom had made the pudding special for him. Which had made eating it just that much more fun.
The house was completely dark, except for the glow of a single TV and the light from the refrigerator, which he now shut. His mom was in bed. She had fallen asleep partway throughJay Leno, and it was her TV that was still on. Even in the kitchen he could hear little bits and pieces of some dumb late-night movie. Donny, jr., having just finished humping Caroline on the couch down in the basement, was at that moment hustling her out the basement door. Through the