The Cruel Ever After (33 page)

Irina was lying in a single bed, on top of the white bedcovers, looking like a homeless waif, which, he supposed, in many ways she was. Her eyes were closed, her arms at her sides. For a woman who was always in motion, always tensely focused, she seemed unusually peaceful. She wore teal-colored scrubs and looked as if she’d lost even more weight. The bones in her cheeks protruded. She was without makeup, her hair unwashed. He wasn’t sure he would have recognized her if he’d seen her on the street.

“Irina?” he whispered. The room was so dimly lit, so quiet, he figured his normal voice would be too jarring.

Her eyes opened. “Chess?”

“No, it’s Steve.” He walked over. “Can I sit on the bed with you?” There was one other piece of furniture in the room, a chair, but it was too low, too far away. He wanted to be closer.

“I guess,” she said. As he sat down, she gripped his wrist. “Have you seen Dusty? Is he okay? Where are they keeping him? Why won’t they let me have him?”

He pried her fingers off and held her hand. “He’s fine. I’ve got him.”

“What do you mean you’ve got him? You’re here. How could you be here and be taking care of him at the same time? Am I crazy? That’s a logical question, isn’t it? Why am I here? They act like there’s something wrong with me. Mental. Up here.” She tapped her head. “Why won’t they let me go? One of the other patients said the doors are locked. How can the doors be locked? I’m an American citizen. I have rights.”

“Of course you do.”

“Then why can’t I have my son? I need him. Nobody else knows what’s best for him.”

“Misty’s with Dusty. He’s fine. Everyone’s fine.”

“She’s not smoking around him, is she? Or drinking?”

“Absolutely not.”

“Are you sleeping with her? Tell me the truth.”

He started to laugh but stopped himself. “Where did you get that idea?”

“You can admit it. I’m tougher than you think.”

His smile turned tender. “She’s the last person on earth I’d want a relationship with. Give me a little credit.”

She lay back, exhausted by her outburst. “I’m tired.”

“I know you are. You need to rest. I heard you didn’t eat any lunch.”

“I’m not hungry. How can I be hungry when my son is God-knows-where.”

“I told you. He’s safe. You’re safe.”

“Did you call my mother? Tell her what happened?”

He hesitated. “Not yet.”

She turned her face away. “Why does everything keep spinning?”

“Is that what it feels like?”

“I don’t know what’s happening to me.”

“I’m here for you.”

“Are you? Are you really?”

“If you want me.”

She turned back to him, gazed up into his eyes. “I don’t know what I want.”

“That’s fine. It’s a starting place.”

“Aren’t you going back to Iraq?”

“I’m staying here with you. Until you’re feeling better.”

“Then what?”

“Then I’ll bring you home.”

Still gazing deep into his eyes, she said, “Where’s home, Steve?”

“With me.”

“And Dusty?”

He pressed his lips together, swallowed a couple of times. “And Dusty.”

“All I ever wanted was for us to be a family.”

“I know that now.”

“I still love you.”

In Steve’s lexicon of important human character traits, courage and steadfastness in the face of trouble were at the top of the list. A man without courage was a man lost. “I love you, too,” he said, kissing her hand, holding it against his heart.

39

Jane felt like the angel of death passing through the land of Egypt. She drove from place to place, bringing the news about Mia to her family. She tried to stay positive. She’d talked to one of the police officers working with Amber Alerts and been told that they already had several leads to follow up on. She spent an hour in Cordelia’s living room. Melanie sat on the floor, holding her little dog, petting his head. Cordelia, reclining on the couch with her injured ankle up on a pillow, alternately cried and scolded herself for crying. Only Hattie, unaware of the significance of what was happening, continued on with what she was doing. She’d lined up the three felines that shared the loft with them and was instructing them on how to be better cats. At any other time it would have been funny. This afternoon, it was just background noise.

Jane went to her father’s office and got her dad and Elizabeth out of a meeting. She didn’t stay long. Her dad offered to drive her home, but she said she was okay. She said she’d monitor what the police learned from the alert and let them know.

She spent the rest of the evening at the hospital, sitting next to Nolan’s bed in the ICU. He finally opened his eyes around nine that evening. After the nurses and doctors had been in to talk to him, to check his vital signs and make notes about all the monitors he was hooked up to, Jane was finally alone with him for a few minutes.

Standing next to the bed, she said, “Welcome back.”

He looked around to get his bearings, then held up his right arm, glanced at the IV taped to his hand, and followed the tubes to where a bag was hanging on a stand next to the bed.

“You saved my life,” said Jane.

“Water?”

“Ice chips,” said Jane. She spooned a couple into his mouth. “They put a tube down your throat. Is it sore?”

“Yeah.”

“How do you feel?”

“Like I was hit by the entire Vikings defensive line.” His voice was softer than normal, weaker. “But it looks like I’ll live.”

Jane fought back tears because she knew something he didn’t. The bullet that Smith had fired had lodged next to his spine. The doctors weren’t able to remove it. There was a possibility that he might be paralyzed from the waist down.

“How long you been here?”

“A while.”

The new nurse came in to check his IV bag. Nolan winked at Jane, then introduced her as his daughter.

“Well,” said the nurse, glancing from face to face, taking in their different skin colors. “That’s really nice she could be here.”

“She’s that kind of daughter.”

“I’m Jane.”

“Lois. I’ll be your father’s nurse this evening. Do you live in town?”

“Minneapolis.”

She checked his blood pressure. “How’s the pain?” she asked. “On a scale of one to ten, ten being the worst.”

“Five,” he whispered.

“You’re due for more pain meds. I’ll go get them.”

After she’d left, Jane bent over and kissed his cheek. “Thanks, Dad.”

“Don’t mention it.”

“Do you feel up to a little conversation?”

“Thought that’s what we were having.”

“Do you remember what happened?”

Slowly, woozily, he said, “I got shot in the stomach, not the head.”

“How did you find me?”

“Tiny GPS unit. I put it on Redzig’s truck last night.”

“Who’s Redzig?”

“Eddy Redzig. I’m a PI, you know.” Another slow wink. “You knew him as Smith. Followed him to the marina this morning. Then the woods. More ice.”

She spooned more chips into his mouth.

He looked up at the TV, then over at the window. “I gotta close my eyes.”

“I’ll sit here a while longer.”

“No, go home. Come back tomorrow.” His eyes fluttered shut. A few seconds later, he was asleep.

*   *   *

On the way back to her house, Jane’s cell rang. Thinking it might be the police with an update, she answered without checking the caller ID.

“I just saw an Amber Alert on TV about a little girl named Mia Lawless,” came Julia’s excited voice. “Is it for real? Peter and Sigrid’s daughter?”

“I’m afraid so,” said Jane.

“Is there anything I can do? Anything at all—”

“I wish there was.”

“Do you have any idea who took her?”

Jane offered a few details but kept them general.

“I’m so sorry. If there’s anything I can do to help, you’ll let me know, right? If Sigrid needs a sedative to help her sleep? Of if you do, or Peter.”

“Thanks.”

“At a time like this, nothing else is important—but I thought I’d tell you that I took the cylinder seal I bought from Chess over to a curator at the Institute of Arts. I gave them the provenance papers. I should know in a few days if it was stolen or not. I’ll let you know. If it wasn’t taken illegally, I suppose I’ll have to write him another check. I canceled the one I gave him on Sunday.”

Jane simply couldn’t deal with it. “I suppose so.”

“Well, take care. And keep in touch.”

*   *   *

By eleven that night, Jane was sitting again on her back porch with a brandy, her dog’s head resting in her lap. Her mind was caught in familiar filaments of thought. Sometimes her life felt more like a circle than a straight line, with issues and themes doubling back on themselves, never truly reaching a conclusion or a sense of completion. Just hours ago a man had died within inches of her, one of her best friends was shot, and she’d been moments away from her own death. She’d experienced the world in a way she never had before, and yet here she was, falling back into the same old grooves, with the same questions swirling around inside her. Did a human have to look back in order to move forward? She remembered a favorite line
from Alice in Wond
erland. “It’s a poor sort of memory that only works backward.” Yet that’s where she was stuck. She would be caught and held forever in the past until she knew for sure what had happened to Mia.

Over the course of the afternoon and evening, she’d talked to the police half a dozen times. None of their leads had panned out. She could tell that the man she’d last spoken to was trying, in an official yet gentle way, to prepare her for the worst. She decided to wait until morning before she talked to Peter and Sigrid again. She had nothing new to add and didn’t want them to hear the pain in her voice.

By midnight, the numbness had, gratefully, returned. She remembered a line of scripture her mother sometimes quoted. “Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof.” Jane had always taken it to mean “Time for bed.” That was the way her mom used it. When enough bad things had happened, it was best to call it a day and hope for a better tomorrow.

Headlights hitting the garage door alerted her to a car pulling into the driveway. She opened the screen for Mouse and then walked out after him.

Lee was just getting out of the driver’s seat of an older-model Chevy van. “Hey,” he said. “I just heard about Nolan.”

Mouse lunged for the fence.

“It’s okay, boy.” She grabbed his collar, ordered him to sit.

“Dogs and me don’t mix. Never have. Maybe they smell a cop. Look, I, ah … I decided that the Twin Cities isn’t for me after all.”

“You’re leaving?”

“Thought I’d come over, say my good-byes.”

“Where are you headed?” she asked, stepping up to the gate.

“Not sure. I was thinking about Seattle. Go west, young man, isn’t that what they say?”

“Planning to do more preaching?”

“Oh, I suppose. It’s cheap entertainment.” Covering the gatepost with his hand, he continued, “You okay?”

She took a deep breath. “Not so good. Those people who were staking out my restaurant, they not only shot Nolan, but they kidnapped and may have murdered my niece.” The act of saying the words out loud gave them a reality she still resisted.

Lee’s eyes panned across the yard.

“I’ve never felt so helpless.”

“Yeah … about that.”

The hesitation in his voice caused her to look him squarely in the eye. “What? Do you know something?”

“I’m sorry for the part I played in this whole mess.”

“Your part? What are you saying?”

“I was part of the group hired to retrieve the bull. My job was to get to know you. Feel out the situation, see if you knew where it was.”

“Where
is
she?”

“Give me a minute, okay?”

She stood very still, almost afraid to breathe.

“There’s stuff I need to explain. I never worked with Redzig before. I mean, that guy was bat-shit crazy. A psychopath. The other groups I’ve been a part of weren’t like this one. I was recruited two years ago by a friend I first met in seminary. He told me he was working for an ex-major in the old Iraqi army. The more he talked, the more interested I became. I agreed that returning looted antiquities to the museum in Baghdad was a just cause. What I told you is true. I’m not much of a Christian, but the Bible and the history it represents is important to me. And hell, I needed a job, something that required more than pushing papers around a desk. So I signed on. But I never signed on for what happened here.”

“I don’t want your excuses,
I want to know where my niece is
.”

“I never expected to like you so much.”

“Where is she?”

He extracted an envelope from the back pocket of his jeans. “Here.”

She ripped it open. Inside was a page torn from a legal pad. She couldn’t make out the words, just that they were written in all caps. “What’s this?”

“It’s a list of all the people who are part of the operation—the ones I’ve come in contact with in the last few years. Down at the bottom, you’ll find info on the three who run the show. They call themselves the Baghdad Union. Names, phone numbers, addresses, e-mails. Everything the FBI will need to track them. Don’t ask me how I got it. Just take it and give it to the police. The cops will be the least of my worries if that’s ever traced back to me.”

“I don’t care about this. I want
Mia
. Is she alive? Dead?” She grabbed the front of his shirt, but he backed away. Walking around to the rear of the van, he motioned for her to join him—and then he opened the doors.

The little girl was lying on her stomach atop a sleeping bag, one that had been spread over a bare, dirty mattress. Her eyes were closed. “Is she—”

“She’s alive.”

Jane lunged inside, lifted her into her arms, and pulled her out.

“She’s been sedated,” said Lee, following Jane through the back gate into the house. “I made sure she was treated well. I told her right off that I wasn’t going to hurt her, that she’d be home in a couple of days. She was scared at first, sure, but she got over it. We watched movies together. I bought her all her favorite fast foods. We played games. When Redzig gave the order to get rid of her, I slipped her out the back door and took off.”