“I was about to get in that cab when that group of guys jumped me, right? Well, I don't know who they were, but I got the sense someone put them up to it.”
“Why? Who?” My questions would not end.
“The cab driver. He stopped right in front of me and then those boys jumped me. It was odd the way it happened, like he was pointing me out for those boys to get me. It didn't feel random. I know you've been involved with that court case and all, so I wasn't sure if it was all related. That's what I wanted to ask you about, if you think we're all being targeted.”
“Did you talk to the police about your suspicions?”
“No. What was I supposed to say? Everyone knows the cab stopped and then the boys jumped. I can't prove my feelings. I did tell the cops what I heard the driver shout out to the boys.”
“What was that?”
“He said, âDon't kill him.' That doesn't mean anything, necessarily. He could have just been a concerned citizen yelling at those guys before he drove away. Or . . .”
“Or what?”
“He could have been giving them directions. That's what it felt like, as if he was telling them to hurt me but not kill me; but how can I prove anything?” He studied my face, and then apologized. “I'm sorry, Ma, I'm not trying to upset you. Leon didn't want me worrying you. He said that you get worked up over minor details, and he doesn't want all this to affect your pregnancy.” Roman stared down at my stomach as if he was seeing it for the first time. His eyes stayed glued on my belly for a moment as I tried to process the mounds of info he'd just shared.
“There's a real person in there, huh?” He leaned forward and squinted his eyes at my belly as if he had some type of X-ray vision. “Am I having a brother or a sister?” He looked up at my face, finally pushing away his plate for good.
I didn't answer him. I couldn't answer him.
I knew Leon was just trying to protect me and the baby, but I had reached my final straw with him deciding what I needed to know or not know. We were talking about major things here: his work as a cop, my son's whereabouts and wellbeing, my feeling that something greater was going on than he wanted to notice or admit.
Sweet Violet.
“Roman,” I managed to get out, “have you ever seen an old homeless woman wandering anywhere near you?”
He raised an eyebrow. “Huh?”
“A woman in a long black coat, or maybe a pink sweat suit?” I shut my eyes trying to think of other outfits I'd seen her wearing during our conversations in the War Memorial Plaza.
“No, Ma. I have no idea what you're talking about.” He shook his head, stood, and stretched. “I'm going to go wash up.” He left the table, leaving me to my thoughts, just as I knew he'd slipped away to process his own.
I'd run into Sweet Violet a few times over the last six months. Her conversations were disjointed, broken memories, random nonsense, with occasional philosophical statements that gave me pause. I thought back to our New Year's conversation.
“Flowers can't tell lies. If you keep the sun off of them, dry up their waterbeds, and throw in weeds to choke 'em out, ain't no way or reason for them to bloom.”
That rose she'd admitted to planting had looked so out of place, I recalled, and like everything else that seemed to be happening lately, nothing made sense, nothing seemed to be what it appeared to be.
“If a rose is in full bloom when you know it's only been kept in darkness, and the ground it's planted in is cracked and cold, don't stop to smell that rose. There's a trap somewhere in those tempting dark red petals. There's deceit. Maybe even death. Run from that flowerbed. You don't want to get buried in that soil.”
A trap. Deceit. What was I missing? Here I was caught up in a murder trial that had put my life and my family's lives and wellbeing in danger. Now I knew that there was a bigger matter going on: undercover operations, the target of which I was not privy to. My husband, apparently knew more of what was going on than I did, and wanted me to trust him.
And all I was stuck on was Sweet Violet.
Did she have anything to do with my current situation? That was the main question I wanted answered at the moment. She showed up at random times and had been near all three murder scenes in person or via her property. Dropped her off at the shelter then Sister Marta is shot. Her purse was given to me by Amber and then the young girl ends up dead. She toasts a tree on New Year's and a popular respected businessman and philanthropist ends up shot by the bullet of two arguing men.
Leon said the suspect for the murders was really an undercover cop who couldn't have his cover blown just yet. So that meant someone else, the real killer, was involved, right? Leon also downplayed any reference I'd made to Sweet Violet over the months, stating she had nothing to do with any of it.
What if he was just saying that?
“Where's Roman?”
I nearly jumped out of my seat at his voice.
“Leon, I didn't hear you come in.” I stared at my husband who'd just emerged from the basement. “There really needs to be some type of camera or security screen on this floor and not just the other levels. You really scared me coming in like that.”
“There is a camera.” He went to a kitchen cabinet and swung it open. A small black-and-white screen revealed Mike coming in through the basement door. He closed the cabinet and looked back at me. “You talk to Roman?”
“Yes. And he told me everything. Everything.” I stared at him. “Leon, why have you kept me in the dark about so many things? You want me to trust you, but how can I, knowing that you were willing to keep my own son's whereabouts from me all this time? How could you?”
“I know you are upset, but please know that everything I've done, every decision I've made over the past few months, has been for your best interest. You are forty and pregnant with the media following you and a heavy trial hanging over your head. The last thing you needed was one more ounce of unnecessary stress.”
“But my son, Leon? You hid my son from me?”
“Roman was angry with you and I didn't want him saying something to you that would scar the both of you too much. I didn't want him to say something that he couldn't take back and that you wouldn't get over. He didn't want to talk to you and I wasn't going to force it. When he showed up yesterday, I knew he was on the road back to reconnecting with you, and it sounds like that is what is happening. You and he are talking now, right?”
I shut my eyes, wiped tears from them. “I don't know what to say to you right now.” I opened my eyes and glared at him. “Just answer this one question for me, no secrets, no half truths. Sweet Violet. What is her role in all of this?”
Leon shook his head, sighed. “Sienna, as far as I know and as much as I can tell, that woman has absolutely nothing to do with any part of the case.”
“Everything in me says she does, Leon.”
“Sienna, you do realize that you got sucked up into this whole trial because you wouldn't leave her alone. You are so adamant about proving your gut right, that it never occurs to you that you may be wrong.”
“Leon, you want me to trust you, and I do. I need you to trust me too. I know what I feel, and I've got good instincts. I need you to have some faith in me as well.”
I looked in his eyes, saw tiredness, exhaustion really. He didn't answer right away. He looked over at one of the suitcases we had packed for our trip.
“Sienna, our plane leaves this evening. If you want to do your own digging for answers about Sweet Violet, that's how much time we have. Please know that I do have trust in you, babe. I just don't want you getting hurt or getting pulled into this foolishness more than you already have been.”
“I need to find her, get some real answers.”
“You're not going to do anything without me. We're together now.”
“Then that's what we need to do: work together. No more secrets. No more arguments. No more hidden plans or agendas.”
Leon nodded. He took out his phone and set an alarm. “We have exactly seven hours before the cab comes to take us to the airport.”
I nodded. “Where do you want to begin? How do we figure out exactly who Sweet Violet is?”
“I'm following your lead. This is your case. I'm just assisting and protecting. Where does your gut tell you to begin?” He sighed again. “I can't believe I'm going along with this, Sienna.”
I thought about it a moment, tried to think rationally, but quickly, while I still had his support.
“The shelter,” I decided. “Let's go to the shelter where I dropped her off.”
Leon reached down into a holster hidden in his waistband. He pulled out a gun, loaded it, and put it back in its hiding place.
“Just in case,” he responded to the alarm on my face. “Let's go.”
Chapter 30
“I'm sorry. I wish I could say that I know who she is, but I don't. I'm sorry that I can't help you.”
We were sitting in Sister Agnes's office at A New Beginning House. The older lady had her graying blond hair pulled back into a tight bun. We'd just caught her after morning chapel service. Residents, or rather guests, had already been fed their breakfasts and dismissed for the day.
No daytime loitering was the policy here. The women were welcome to return at sunset.
“Sister Marta, the morning she was killed, informed me that the woman's name was Frankie Jean. She said that she had only been coming to the shelter for a short time. I dropped her off here early that morning after she showed up at Metro Community Hospital wearing nothing but a blue housecoat and slippers.”
“I know the ladies who come in and out of here on a daily basis, and that description just doesn't sound like anyone I've seen. I can't imagine that Marta would hide anyone from me.” Sister Agnes had a stern face, but her eyes lightened for a moment. “You know Marta worked here for nearly four decades? She came here as a guest herself back in the early seventies when my husband and I started this mission. She came here homeless and frightened and desperate and ended up staying here permanently as a staff member, our best staff member ever.” A tear washed down her cheek. The grief, the sorrow, looked genuine. “She kept the ladies here in line, and truthfully the shelter hasn't been the same without her. I don't know what we're going to do.” She cleared her throat, reached for a cup of water.
“I'm so sorry about your loss, and I apologize for bringing up her name. I know the pain is still very fresh.”
“No need to apologize.” Sister Agnes smiled, her lips a tight line. She reached for a photo album that had been sitting on the corner of her desk. “Talking about Sister Marta brings back only good memories. The pages in this album,” she said as she flipped through them, “simply show how much of a role she played here at A New Beginning House over the years. Every decade of our service is highlighted in this album, and every decade highlighted has a picture of her.” She looked at a few of the photos with a faint smile, and then her face turned to business again.
“Again, I apologize that I can't help you any further. I just am not familiar with a Frankie Jean or a Sweet Violet, whatever you are calling her. I have to prepare for lunch now.” She slammed the photo album shut, pushed it back to the side. “Though the ladies are not allowed to linger around during the dayâthey should be looking for jobs and housingâwe do serve a daily hot lunch to make things easier for them. I need to check on the kitchen and make sure that meal preparations are going correctly.”
She stood and so did Leon and I. The fact that he had not asked any questions let me know that he was not taking my search for answers seriously.
But at least he had come. At least he was playing along.
“All right, Sienna,” he finally spoke as we headed back to the car. Mike was playing chauffeur again. I could see him bopping his head to some music in the front seat.
“Wait,” I said, looking up the street at the several blocks of abandoned homes. “Let's walk up there.”
Leon raised his eyebrows and sighed, but he followed. I heard Mike start up the car. Leon looked back at him and gave a thumbs-up sign. The engine shut off and the music boomed louder.
“Why are we going here?” Leon asked as we crossed the street and headed for the row of vacant homes. Some changes had happened in the months since Amber's body had been found in one of them, I noted. A couple of them had new windows, polished steps.
Renovations.
Obvious construction had started on several of the row homes in the block, but the one which Amber had termed her abandominium, the one in which her body had been found, still had a crumbling walkway, boarded windows, remnants of yellow tape.
I looked up at the worn, decrepit façade, knowing that the broken home only housed the horrors of a young pregnant girl's broken dreams. Who knew what other untold horror stories it held?
A group of construction workers came out of the house two doors down. Blueprint papers were in their hands and one held a bucket of tools as they bounded down the steps and headed toward a van that held ladders and other supplies.
“Excuse me.” I approached one of them. “I see that you are renovating some of the houses on this street.”
“Yup.” A man with a thick, bushy mustache stopped to talk to me as the others continued to the van. “In a few months most of this block will be transformed into a brand new rental community. We're just the contractors, though, so if you want more information, you'll have to contact the new owners of these properties.”
“New owners?”
“Yeah, the city sold some of these vacant homes to a development company who took ownership.”
“Why just some of the houses and not others?” I pointed to Amber's “home.”
“Well, the city only sold what belonged to them. A few of the homes on this street had a private landlord, a slumlord, if you ask me. I think they can't find the owner to make an offer, but that is the plan.” He shook his head as his attention turned to the van into which the other workers had piled. “I sure hope they find the owner of the rest of these homes. It will be a hard sell trying to rent out renovated row homes if there are vacant units interspersed among them, you know? Doesn't make sense to me, but like I said, we're just the contractors. Okay, ma'am.” He nodded and headed toward the van.
“Excuse me,” I called after him. “All of the other vacant homes on this street have the same missing owner?”
The man nodded as he stepped into the driver's seat of the van. “That's what I've been told,” he shouted back. “Have a nice day, ma'am.” He closed the door, started the engine, and pulled off.
“Ready?” Leon nudged me from behind as I stood there considering what had just been shared. Aside from Amber's hideaway, about five other homes on the block looked to be in the same dismal state. They were mixed in with the renovated properties.
“That's odd that the city would agree to a renovation project with so many vacant properties in the mix.” I shook my head as we turned back toward Mike's car. No black sedan with tinted windows today, just his white Lexus.
“Yes, that's odd,” Leon agreed, “but for them to have given the green light, they must be fairly certain they'll catch up with the slumlord and buy him or her out. So,” he sighed, “are we finished chasing down this Sweet Violet woman or do you have another stop you want to make?”
I thought for a moment as we got into the car. “First a phone call, then one more stop. Then, if we get no more answers or direction, I promise that I will leave it alone. For good. We leave in a few hours.” I bit my lip, avoiding the urge to check the time again. I was determined to keep my promise to him.
Which meant I needed immediate answers.
“Good. I like that promise.” Leon nodded while scrolling through his phone. “By this time tomorrow, we'll be lounging on a Caribbean beach counting down the moments to our baby's arrival. Here, use my phone to make your call. Don't want to risk that your calls are being bugged.”
It was a scary thought, but a real possibility if he mentioned it.