Blood Orchids

by Toby Neal

  “Not too likely.” Stevens said. “But if she doesn’t turn up to claim the car, it looks like she’s missing for sure.”

  “Do you think the hair the stalker sent me could be hers?” Lei put her fear into words. “I don’t know how long she’s been missing, I mean for sure yesterday, but I got the note the night before.”

  Stevens shrugged. She could tell he was trying to be casual but his mouth had drawn into a hard line and black brows lowered so she could hardly see his eyes in the dim light of the tired bulb.

  “Let’s find out,” he said. They pushed off from the wall and went back outside. It wasn’t long before they were on the road again.

  “I’m starting to wonder if this is all connected somehow. The girls, the investigation, my stalker, Mary’s disappearance. . .” Lei leaned her forehead on the cool glass of the window.

  “How? What’s the connection?” Stevens sounded serious.

  “I don’t know. I think Mary would have told me if someone was stalking her, and she never said anything. I don’t know, I just feel it.”

  “At this point we have to follow the evidence, track down every lead we can. Every hour that goes by the trail gets colder. I’m open to anything right now if you can find a link. In the meantime I’m calling this in.” Stevens picked up the handset radio and reported the abandoned car and their conversation with the bartender to the detective on duty at Puna PD. Stevens asked if there had been any emergency calls yesterday afternoon that Mary might have gone on. The dispatcher checked and said no, replied that a case was already open for Mary in Missing Persons.

  “Looks like they’re moving on it,” he said, hanging up the handset and glancing at Lei. “I’m sorry.”

  She rolled down the window and stared out, lifting her face to the arc of night sky. A million stars circled far above, visible without the light pollution of Hilo. The cool evening air blew across her face, anchoring her in her body. She didn’t let herself think about the Mohuli`i girls’ drowned faces but they hovered at the edge of her mind, unforgettable.

  * * *

  He watched her wake up with the dawn, the drugs he’d given her slowly wearing off. They were in the special place he’d prepared, so remote she could scream all she wanted and no one would hear. A trackless jungle of tall ohia trees and gigantic ferns surrounded them. Her hands were cuffed behind her, and a heavy cable attached to the handcuffs fastened her to a nearby tree.

  Terror and rage came into her eyes as Mary realized where she was, and she thrashed against her bonds. He sat on the plastic cooler and watched as she struggled, finally subsiding, sucking air through her nostrils above the gag.

  “I don’t have time for you now,” he said. “I have to go to work.” His voice was muffled by the ski mask he wore, his alter ego. He hadn’t decided if he was going to kill her yet, and it kept his options open.

  She glared at him and he could see her calculating whether or not she could take him.

  Oh, this was good. He wanted it to last.

  The first fingers of light pinkened the sky above the hidden grove where he had set up the shelter. He stood, looking down at her.

  “You’re going to enjoy what I have planned for you. Water’s in the cooler.” He leaned over, pinched her nipple. She writhed and heaved, trying to kick him, and he chuckled as he walked away, crunching through the dried ferns.

  He smiled to himself, pulling the hot ski mask off his head with a pleasurable sense of anticipation. She was secure, but she would figure out how to get her hands in front because he’d left her cuffs loose enough. Eventually she’d get thirsty enough to drink the water. He was counting on it.

  Chapter 19

  Lei poured her first coffee of the morning and splashed in some half-and-half from the carton. She looked out the window over the sink at the spreading branches of the plumeria tree, spare graceful branches ending in clusters of creamy yellow-throated flowers, bouquets of tropical fragrance. A cardinal hopped in the branches, an unlikely spot of red.

  Her head felt muzzy but she’d only had the one beer the night before in Puna. She looked over at Stevens. He’d put the cushions from the rump-sprung couch on the floor. They’d migrated during the night, leaving him sprawled on the floor, the crocheted afghan tangled around his legs.

  She tried not to notice the contours of his back under the tank-style undershirt, the long ropy muscles of his arms relaxed in sleep. His rumpled dark hair made her hands itch to touch it. Keiki padded over to him and licked his ear, and he woke with a groan.

  “Coffee,” he intoned, sitting up and lurching like a zombie as he headed toward the pot, hoisting up sweatpants. His hair was spiky and eyes a dark, sleepy blue. She laughed, handed him a full mug. He took it, rubbing his lower back.

  “Sleeping on the floor is making me feel like an old man.”

  “Quit whining. Pretty boys like you are such babies.”

  “Pretty boy? Did I detect a compliment in there somewhere?” He blew on the hot surface of the coffee. “Can’t say I remember ever being called that before.” He took a sip. She felt his proximity like a magnetic field, raising the tiny hairs on her arms with awareness.

  “You’re so vain, you just want me to say it again.” Her face flamed. She dug in the utility drawer for Keiki’s leash.

  I’m so bad at this, she thought, but all thought stopped as his arms came around her from behind. He turned her and then, in slow motion, he leaned down, his lips brushing hers as gentle as a moth landing.

  She went rigid, her lips closed, the reaction instinctive. He looked down at her, stepped back, let go. Turned away. Picked up his coffee and took a sip. She let her breath out with a shaky whoosh, turned away to rinse her mug at the sink. His voice, when he spoke, was deliberately casual.

  “As far as today, I’m hoping the search warrant on the Reynolds house comes through. I could use some help on that if it does.”

  “Sure.” Lei made certain her voice was as even as his. He’d almost kissed her—and freak that she was, she’d made him back off. She wished he’d try again, but now wasn’t the time. “What do you think about Mary?”

  “I think she’s endangered missing, if she didn’t turn up last night. Check in with the detective on her case. Dispatcher said his name is Lono Smith.”

  “Sounds like a plan. I can’t stand to think something’s happened to her.”

  “So far there’s no sign of foul play. We just have to go through the steps. Try not to think the worst.”

  He put his mug in the sink, pulled on one of her corkscrew curls, stretching it out and watching it spring back, smiling at her somber face. Moving slowly, he put his fingers under her chin and rubbed the ball of his thumb across her lower lip. A tingle zipped down her spine, weakening her knees as he picked up his duffel and headed for the door. “I’ll give you a call later.”

  “Okay.” She followed him. “I want to get a hair sample of Mary’s and compare it to what the stalker sent.”

  “Good idea.” He turned. “Hey, get me a futon or something for tonight, would you?”

  Lei opened her mouth to argue, and he put his fingers over it gently, leaning in close. There were tiny flecks of green in his blue eyes.

  “Humor me,” he said softly. “Please.”

  Struck dumb, she closed the door behind him.

  Guilt smote her—how could she be thinking about kissing with her friend missing, and two girls dead?

  Lei and Keiki did their run, and as she was buttoning into her uniform her cell rang.

  “Come over to the Reynolds’ house. The warrant came through. I’m bringing Pono in too.” Stevens was all business.

  “On my way,” Lei said. She drove to the Reynolds’ house with its elegant carriage lamps and manicured lawn. Stevens’s SUV was in the driveway. Jeremy met her at the door.

  “The parents left when we got here and served the warrant. It’s a good thing. It’s easier to work with them out of the way.”

  “How’d Reynolds tak
e it?” Lei asked.

  “Badly,” Jeremy said, leading them into the living room where Stevens was lifting the cushions up on the couch, looking beneath them with a flashlight.

  “Reynolds left pretty angry, said he was going to get his lawyer. I’d like to be out of here before they get back,” Stevens said, pointing to a box of latex gloves.

  Pono walked in as Lei snapped on a pair of gloves and helped herself to some evidence bags.

  “What’re we looking for?”

  “Not sure,” he said. “Anything to link him to the two girls, the campsite. I figure we’ll know it when we see it.”

  Even with the four of them searching it was slow work. They went through every drawer, every closet, every box. Lei felt a stifling squeeze in her chest as she went into Kelly’s room.

  The pretty blonde teenager’s presence had been erased. The bedroom had been stripped of her belongings and made over into a guest room. Lei lifted the tropical print coverlet, shook out the pillow shams, opened the closet. Pink plastic hangers rattled in the space. She pulled out the wardrobe drawers. Empty.

  I know where her clothes went—in the trash. What a weird way to grieve—poor kid. She saw the girl’s face again in her mind’s eye, part of her nose gone, blue eyes shadows behind puffy lids. Lei pinched herself to stay in the present moment, sitting back on the bed.

  Stevens came to the door. “Anything?”

  “No. Totally cleaned out. Looks like they’re making this into a guest room.” She gestured to the faux rattan headboard and orchid-print drapes.

  Just then Jeremy called, “Come see this!”

  They went into the den, where Jeremy had been searching the computer. He swiveled the flat-screen monitor so they could see pictures of Kelly.

  She was wearing the ruffled yellow skirt Lei remembered from the evidence room, sitting with her legs open. Jeremy clicked to the next photo. She was naked. Her flaxen hair was spread over small breasts, her hand over her mound. Her eyes shone with misery. More pictures, each progressively more seductive, and her eyes more glazed. The background was the oatmeal-colored couch in the living room.

  The last picture was of Kelly and Haunani naked, lying facing each other in the green grass beside a stream. The composition was beautiful, the colors rich—and the subject matter haunting and terrible.

  “Holy shit!” Pono exclaimed. “This motherfucker just had these pictures sitting on his desktop? He was just asking to get busted!”

  “I broke his encryption,” Jeremy said. “It wasn’t too complicated. This file is called ‘baby photos’ and I knew he never had any babies, so I checked it.”

  “I think we got him,” Stevens said. Lei turned away and went back to Kelly’s room. She felt dizzy. She turned on the special vacuum with its evidence collection bag, sucking any fibers out of the carpet. Bile seemed to be pressing up in her throat and she gulped it back, gripping the vacuum hard. Get a grip, she told herself, and felt hysterical laughter threaten.

  Her cell rang. It was Irene at Dispatch.

  “This is your reminder call. You have counseling today at two p.m., and it’s one-forty-five. I thought you might forget. I know you guys are out searching the Reynolds place.”

  “Shit,” Lei said, ripping the vacuum cord out of the wall. “This is not a good time!”

  “When is it ever?” Irene said cheerfully. “Say thank you for the reminder, or I’ll give you a graveyard shift.”

  “Thanks, Irene. Are you sure I can’t reschedule?”

  “Mandatory means mandatory. You ask me, you got off light so no mess with the Lieutenant on this.”

  “Shit,” she said again. “Okay. Thanks.” She clicked the phone closed. “Stevens, I need to go back to the station.”

  They were still clustered around the computer as she came back in, the vacuum bag in hand. Pono turned to her.

  “What for? We’re in the middle of something.”

  “That damn mandatory counseling.”

  “Bad timing,” Stevens said. “I need you here.”

  “If you guys weren’t just getting your jollies looking at the dead girls, we might be getting more done,” she snapped. All three of them stared at her.

  “Unplug the computer and we’ll take the whole thing down to the station,” Stevens said to Jeremy. He looked at Lei. “I think you better go get that counseling.”

  Fury and shame clogged her throat. She dropped the evidence bag and left, the screen door banging behind her.

  It took her the whole drive to the station to calm down. She knew her response to the search was irrational, knew it had to do with her past. As usual, knowing didn’t help. She took some deep breaths and put her hand in her pocket, feeling the triangular corner of Stevens’s note. Asshole, she thought, glad they hadn’t kissed but wishing they had. Wishing she could get the images of the girls out of her mind. Wishing she was normal.

  She parked the Crown Vic and went into the industrial beige women’s room, splashing water on her face and making sure her hair was under control. She touched up with lipgloss and brushed some lint off her uniform.

  “I look fine,” she said out loud. “Not remotely psycho.”

  Chapter 20

  She went down the hall to Dr. Wilson’s office. The police psychologist opened the door after her tentative knock. She was a diminutive woman, neatly dressed in khakis and a polo shirt. The bell of her smooth ash-blonde hair swung as she gestured Lei in.

  “You must be Ms. Texeira. Come on in and get comfortable.”

  Lei took a seat in the corner. The room was furnished simply with a couch and several deep, cushy chairs. Amateurish paintings decorated the walls, and there was a low coffee table with a Japanese sand garden on it, complete with a tiny rake.

  The psychologist took another chair across from Lei. She had a clipboard and a pen.

  “Just a few housekeeping items before we get started,” she said briskly. “You have six mandatory sessions. This one was scheduled, but we will set up the next one at a time we agree on. This time is completely confidential and I keep very few notes. However, at the end of your last session I have to fill out this assessment form.” She held up the clipboard showing the form. “I have to give you a rating as to how engaged you were in the process and my opinion as to whether you are fit for duty. Needless to say that’s a big axe to have hanging over your head, so I am going to remove it now.”

  She filled out the form. The 1-5 rating scale on engagement was circled at 4.5, and she printed “Fit for Duty” in the outcome area. She signed it, a bold Patrice Wilson, Ph.D., and held it up.

  “I have never felt this was the way to treat people,” she said. “Now we can put that behind us and just see what comes up.”

  She folded the paper and slipped it into an envelope, sealing the edge and writing “Lieutenant Ohale” on the front. She laid it on the coffee table and sat back comfortably.

  “Isn’t that unethical?” Lei frowned.

  “Isn’t it unethical to expect counseling to work with that kind of threat hanging over the process?”

  “I don’t know. I think this whole thing is bogus.”

  “So do I. But they still pay me.”

  Astonishingly, she snickered. It was such an undignified noise coming from such a polished, respectable-looking woman that Lei just stared.

  “Want something to drink?” Dr. Wilson asked, getting up and going to a little mini fridge in the corner. Lei halfway expected her to hold up a booze bottle, the way things had been going, but she just held up a water. Lei took it, realizing she was parched from the busy day. Might as well shock this lady, she thought, draining the water bottle.

  “I was raped when I was nine.”

  “Huh,” said Dr. Wilson, sitting back down. “You’d be surprised how many police officers were.”

  Again Lei was off balance, flummoxed. Her other counselor had been warm, teasing the story out of her by inches, affirming her all the way.

  “Female police officers,
I should say,” Dr. Wilson clarified. “Some guys get into the force because they like being aggressive. Got a lot of wife beaters around here.”

  “Huh,” Lei said, mimicking her. “Well, it was my mom’s boyfriend.”

  “What did you do about it?”

  Again the unexpected response. Lei felt the heat of rage roar up her neck. “I fucking took it. I was nine years old for chrissake. What the hell kind of counselor are you?”

  Dr. Wilson said nothing. Lei felt the anger recede, felt the pressure of her secret easing. She settled back into the couch.

  “I guess I didn’t just take it. I got good with weapons. I decided no one was ever going to do that to me again.”

  Dr. Wilson inclined her head. “Nice,” she said. “You’re a fighter. How are your relationships with men? Do you have sex?”

  “Not if I can help it,” Lei said. “I’d like to, but I get all frozen.”

  “So are you gay?”

  “What the hell? No, I’m not gay!”

  “Okay. So have you been to counseling before?”

  “Yeah. I went to my Aunty’s when my mom died of an overdose. She sent me to a bunch of them.”

  “Was it helpful?”

  “Some of them were. Mostly not. The one I went to in college helped me the most. She gave me some things to do when I . . . disappear.”

  “So you dissociate?”

  “Is that what you call it? Yeah, I do sometimes. It’s under control though. It doesn’t interfere with the job.” Not too much, I hope, she thought.

  “Tell me about the last time you dissociated.”

  “Recently.” Lei thought of the pictures on the Reynolds’s computer. “Can I talk about a case?”

  “Only if it’s relevant . . . and, it’s all relevant.”

  “Okay. The last time I almost checked out was this afternoon. We found some pictures of the girls who were murdered. I got a really sick feeling, kinda dizzy. I had things to do so I left the room, and when I came back in the other detectives were still looking at the pictures and I got super mad. I just wanted to kill them, and him most of all, the guy who did it.”