The Rosaries (Crossroads Series) (31 page)

“Yes Natalie, I did, and I really hated to do it; she really was a fine lady, but unfortunately she saw me. I thought I killed your friend here, too, but she got lucky. Until now, that is.” The blade moved slightly, and in that moment something strange happened.

Lakeisha
closed her eyes and prayed in an unknown language. The moment she opened them again, her eyes were glazed, and a rivulet of saliva dripped from her parted lips and hit the blade of the knife.

“The dead come back to protect the innocent.” With those words, she locked her gaze with the man standing by her, just as a large spider crawled up on his hand, seemingly coming out of nowhere. He screamed and jerked his hand back, the knife quickly slicing through
Lakeisha’s
throat. Blood shot out of the wound at Natalie who screamed and jumped back.

Mario reached into his jacket and pulled out a gun, ready to shoot Natalie, but Melody had already seen him. Her anger and fear came together in a powerful cocktail, and drunken with the intensity of her emotions, she sprung toward him, a tigress in distress pulled into action by a primal instinct she could not deny.

Surprised by her reaction, Mario turned and aimed the gun at Melody. Natalie, no longer in the line of fire, leaped to push Melody down and fell on top of her. The impact felt strange, almost as if a pillow was placed between the two of them, at waist height, to soften the impact. Suddenly everything became still, and the instant she and Melody touched, Natalie felt heat coming out of the rosary she was wearing. She thought she saw an old man standing by the old
Grandfather clock, and recognized him as someone she had seen earlier in the crowd; clad as he was, in his flashy suit and Fedora hat, he was not an easy one to miss. It occurred to her only now that she had seen him before, smiling from one of Aunt Catherine’s paintings.

The sound of a gunshot ripped through the air and the bullet hit Mario square in the chest. Paul stood there, the gun still hot in his hand. He looked at it, dropped it on the ground and glanced at Melody still lying on the floor. Blood flowed freely from the wound on Mario’s chest and quickly soaked into one of the white sheets used earlier to cover the paintings. As the stain continued to spread, Melody felt her anger flow away with Mario’s blood, replaced by intense agony. “Mario…why?” she cried out as she stood up and went to kneel beside him.

“I’m sorry Melody. I never meant to hurt you. I didn’t even know you had the other rosary. I loved you but I wasn’t in love with you. I couldn’t divorce you, but my heart truly belonged to someone else, so I thought that getting my hands on the rosary would give me the power to fix the mistakes I made, among all other things. I’m not too different than my brother, Melody. I, too, wanted the power of Obeah for myself.”

He struggled to talk, his breathing becoming labored as his skin began to get cooler and beads of sweat formed on his brow.

Melody was crying openly by now. “Why couldn’t you divorce me, Mario? How could the rosary help you?”

“I am in love with Tess, Melody – Teresa Booker, a lady I work with. She is a woman of strong faith, and she would never agree to be with a married man, even a divorced one. The rosary has the power to change time, and maybe it could have taken me back to the day I proposed to you. I never meant to hurt you, you have to believe that. I was going to leave tonight, after taking Natalie’s rosary, and I would have created a new life here in London while I searched for the other rosary. In time, and with the help of both rosaries, I would have found a way to bring Tess here. I even changed my name to Chris. Do you like it?” He grinned, and his eyes flashed a light of madness. Within seconds, Mario’s body began to seize, and he was gone right before the police arrived.

“Natalie is not answering her phone. I wonder if she is still at the gallery” Phillip told his wife after they decided to treat Natalie and Ryan to dinner at a new famous Indian restaurant he had read about on one of the magazine on the plane.

“Where is Ryan, by the way?” His wife asked.

“He said he wanted to surprise Natalie with something tonight, so I believe he went back to his hotel right after the exhibit closed. I saw Natalie hugging him before he left.”

“Well, I guess it wouldn’t hurt if I go back to the gallery before she makes other plans for the evening.”

“That’s fine. I will stay here. I think I need a little rest after today’s revelation.”

“I’m sorry, Angela. I found out right before we left, but I didn’t say anything because I was worried that you wouldn’t come if you knew. I really want us to have a fresh start, and
London
is the perfect place to begin our new life together.”

Angela smiled warmly, “It’s all past, Phillip. I do love you, and I want to spend the rest of my life with you. I don’t think I even knew how deeply I care about you until we were apart for a while.”

The relief Phillip felt was overwhelming, and he fought tears pushing against his eyelids as he held Angela close to his racing heart. He kissed her lips and smiled before rushing out of the room to fetch a taxi.

Lakeisha
was still breathing when the paramedics arrived, but she was already unconscious. Paul, Melody and Natalie stood in a corner, unable to talk to one another, their eyes transfixed on the surreal scene still unfolding in front of them.

Natalie told the paramedics she was going to the hospital with
Lakeisha
, but one of the police officers – a detective, she assumed - stopped her. “I’m sorry Miss, but I do have a few questions for you before you go. I will be happy to give you a lift to the hospital afterwards.”

Natalie nodded, too exhausted and shocked to argue. She sat on a chair, took a sip of the water the constable handed her. She saw Melody and Paul walk into a different room with another officer, but her mind registered the last events in slow motion. When her father entered the room, making way among the crowd of uniformed officers and medical personnel, he found
her like that, sitting down, her eyes glazed by a deep state of shock. The interrogation had gone on for a while, but the constable was still asking questions.

“I believe my daughter needs a few moments, sir.”

The constable nodded. “It should be enough anyway. I told Ms. Sanders I would give her a lift to the hospital.”

“I will take care of that. My taxi is still waiting outside.”

The constable agreed and closed his notebook, before handing Phillip a business card. “Please tell Ms. Sanders to call me if she remembers any other details.”

“I will do that. Thank you for understanding.”

The constable left, and Natalie looked up at her father. A little nervous smile crept up on her lips. “I don’t know what happened, Dad.”

“Don’t worry Natalie. It’s over now, sweetheart. Let’s go.”

Natalie looked around. “Where is the woman that was here, Dad?”

“I believe she is still in the other room with the older gentleman.”

“I know it sounds crazy, Dad, but I’ve seen her before…in a dream.” She thought Phillip would laugh now, and would believe that his adoptive daughter wasn’t just a disappointment, but also crazy. But Phillip didn’t laugh, in fact, he looked at Natalie with tears in his eyes. “I believe that young woman there is your sister, Natalie.”

Natalie’s mind had already reached capacity, but this was too big to flush out. “What? How can that be possible?’

“When your mother became very depressed over our inability to conceive a child, I looked for a baby to adopt. Well, my original hopes of finding a little one were quickly dashed, as I discovered that it would take months, maybe years, to find an infant and finalize all paperwork. We could easily take in an older child, sure, but your mother’s screaming instincts needed a baby to love and claim as her own. Her mental state was so fragile that I was terrified she would do something crazy if I told her of the challenges ahead. Instead of talking to her, I spoke about it with a man I was still in touch with from law school. He knew a doctor that facilitated adoptions, and I was put in contact with him. He told me he had a lady who was ready to have a baby she didn’t want, so I jumped at the chance. I flew out to meet him in Raleigh, at the hospital where he worked. You were premature, so you had to remain hospitalized for a while. I asked to meet the mother, but he told me that she was not willing to meet the adoptive
parents. I stayed at a hotel, while all the papers were drawn. Being an attorney, I knew the channels to speed up the paperwork. The doctor asked me to keep things between us, since he didn’t want social services to get involved. The young woman, he said, was the daughter of close friends of his, and he had promised them he would keep the adoption extremely private.

When I took you home and saw the look on your mother’s face I knew it was all worth the effort. Angela was happy and her depression lifted like fog on a summer morning.”

Natalie felt speechless, but managed to whisper a few words. “Is my real mother still alive?”

“She is, Natalie. A few years after the adoption was finalized, I heard that this doctor was being investigated for other adoptions he arranged. I discovered that he targeted mothers of twins, triggered an early labor by scraping their membranes during routine check-ups, and then told them they had given birth to only one live twin.”

“But, didn’t anyone witness that? Where was my real father?”

“The staff was investigated too – they were all in it with him - and fathers did not attend births back then. When the whole thing blew over and I discovered the truth, your mother was happy, and I just couldn’t let her slip back into her depressive state. I shuffled things around a bit and paid a few people to keep quiet. Your birth records were never found.”

Natalie stood up and looked at her father, her expression a mask of anger and pain. “So my mother never gave me away…I was stolen and sold to the highest bidder.”

Phillip hung his head low, unable to look at his daughter. “That’s right, Natalie, but I didn’t know about it until it was too late, sweetheart. I should have told you when I found out, but I never found the courage.”

“And now what, Dad? Where do we go from here?”

“I believe in destiny, Natalie. If you and your sister were reunited under such odd circumstances, then who am I to stand between you? Just give me a few days to tell your mother…please.”

Natalie nodded. Years of self-doubt, endless nights of pain and rejection lifted off Natalie as the realization of what her father said sank in. She ran to the other room and looked silently at the woman standing in front of her; her feelings at that moment she just couldn’t describe. Melody stood without speaking, afraid to break the spell between them. Natalie’s tears flooded her face as she ran toward Melody and hugged her, her chest violently shaking with deep sobs. Paul sat on a chair by the window, unable to make sense of what was happening but fully aware that he was witnessing a miracle.

Chapter Twenty

Lakeisha
was still unconscious when Natalie and her father arrived at the hospital. Her throat was covered in bandages, and she was hooked up to what looked like at least half a dozen tubes. A nurse approached them as soon as they walked up.

“I’m afraid you can’t go in, Miss. Doctor’s orders.”

“Is she okay? May I speak to the doctor on duty?”

“He has already done his rounds for tonight. I don’t think you will be able to see him until the morning, but you can speak to the head nurse if you wish.”

“That would be great, thank you.”

The nurse left to go find her supervisor and Natalie looked up at her father. “She is going to be okay, won’t she?”

Phillip wrapped his arms around her and inhaled the scent of his daughter’s hair. For the first time in many years he felt she was his little girl again, and fought to keep his voice steady. “I hope so, Honey. I am so sorry about
Lakeisha
, too. I really wasn’t too nice to her; there was something about her that always intimidated me.”

“It does feel like she can read through you sometimes” Natalie said smiling at her father, “she really is a special lady. There is a reason why she came with me, dad.”

“I figured that much, although I still can’t figure out what’s happening.”

“It’s a long story, dad. Someday we will sit down and I will explain everything. You might not believe some of it, though.”

“I can believe more than what you give me credit for, Natalie, and it is my fault that you don’t know me too well. I guess I’ve always alienated myself, but that’s going to change starting from today. I am planning on starting things anew with your mother and with you.”

“Dad…Aunt Catherine’s daughter, Suzanne…she’s dead.”

Phillip drew a deep breath. “I’m glad Catherine will never have to go through the pain of knowing that her child was dead. She always imagined her happy and well adjusted like the little girl in the painting.”

“I know…hopefully they are reunited now.”

“Miss? I am Lorna Stewart, the head nurse.” Natalie and Phillip turned to look at a pleasant looking woman with kind blue eyes and a sprinkle of freckles on her cheeks. Her mid-length blond hair was pinned away from her face and kept tidy under a white nurse’s cap. Give or take an inch, she was about as tall as Natalie and quite petite otherwise.