Roxanne raised her hand.
“Can I speak with you for a moment in private?” he asked.
I saw my chance and shifted into the mom’s head before she left the lawyer, the police chief, and Jack to their disagreement.
Chapter 3
DOCTOR REYNOLDS TOOK Roxanne to a quiet corner near a window overlooking the crowd. It had grown considerably in the few minutes since we passed through it.
“We’ve calmed Cassandra with a sedative,” he said. “She’s no longer crying or shaking. Naturally, she wants her mom.”
“Before I go in there,” Roxanne said, “how badly has she been hurt?”
He sighed. “Not at all, physically. I’m afraid that emotionally she has been devastated. The poor girl witnessed her sister fighting with their captors. One of the monsters hit Iris very hard, knocking her head against a metal rail inside the van. That led to severe seizures and a quick death. A horrifying experience for anyone to witness.”
“What can you do for her?” Roxanne asked.
“In the short term, sedate her. In the longer term, she’ll need years of therapy. Fortunately, children have incredible restorative powers. I have high hopes for Cassandra’s long-term future as a normal young woman.”
“How can she bear this?” her mom asked. “I can hardly stand it myself.”
He nodded. “Unfortunately, I’ve seen many young patients who’ve experienced much worse abuse than Cassandra. I don’t want to soft-pedal the suffering she is undergoing, but she watched a single horrifying murder and was held captive for about a day. That was terrible, but many children suffer physically from years of abuse before being saved from their living hells. And even some of those children, who are far more damaged than Cassandra, can go on to lead relatively normal lives. We will do our very best for your daughter, and understand that you haven’t lost her, at least not for good.”
I felt a lot of comfort from his assessment, and so did Roxanne. She needed more than ever to see Cassandra for herself, and she pushed away her thoughts about other victims of violence. Thanks to her successful real estate business, she could afford to pay for the best shrinks for her only surviving child. They’d get no help from her ex-husband. He’d always been broke.
The shrink led Roxanne to a small room containing two sofas facing each other. It wasn’t a typical treatment room. A young blonde woman in scrubs was sitting next to Cassandra with an arm around her shoulders. On the opposite sofa, an older woman in a pink pantsuit was speaking in a quiet voice.
Cassandra stared into the distance with hollow, vacant eyes. The girl’s face was pale, and her cheeks were wet. She wore a Giants t-shirt, blue jeans, and sandals. When she saw her mom, she jumped up and threw her arms around her mother’s neck. Then she began sobbing against her chest.
I switched to Cassandra’s mind as Roxanne simply held her and whispered over and over, “Darling, you’re going to be okay now.”
I had to work fast, not knowing how much time I’d have with the poor girl. So, I immediately checked her memories about the attack.
She and her sister had worked at their part-time internships at city hall the previous morning. They’d finished and wanted to drive to the beach. Neither had noticed any trouble until they were grabbed from behind on the sidewalk near Iris’ car. Cassandra was much smaller than the man who wrapped his arms around her. She struggled, but he lifted her off her feet and carried her away.
Her sister, though, had taken karate lessons. She was two years older and much bigger. She fought the shorter guy, punching at his throat and kicking at his crotch.
The men swore at the girls and told them to stop fighting as they got pulled into a white van that had stopped in the street.
A woman in the front seat yelled at the men to hurry and close the van’s door. Before Cassandra knew what was happening, they were zooming away.
That’s when Iris bit her attacker on the forearm.
He screamed in pain. “You cunt!”
Lashing out, he swung that arm back at her, smashing the side of his fist into her face.
Her head snapped back and hit a metal railing in the back of the van. Iris collapsed and thrashed several times. Then she went still.
I was consumed with fury at how quickly the devils had turned to murder. Cassandra was shocked, but I was too used to their violence to be surprised. Sickened but not surprised.
The tall guy holding Cassandra in the van screamed in her memory. “Idiot, Bonito said we have to keep them alive!”
At first, Cassandra thought Iris had just been knocked out, but her sister never moved again.
Cassandra sat on the floor of the van and cradled Iris’ head in her lap. Her sister’s body was completely limp.
Cassandra vomited up her lunch. Her throat burned, and tears poured down her face. Iris had been so smart and funny and full of life. Not anymore.
My mind clouded with fury as I helplessly watched this horror continue to unfold.
Suddenly, the van carrying Cassandra stopped, and her captors moved her into a black SUV. Those assholes forced her to leave Iris behind.
The tall guy drove the SUV south, and the woman sat next to her. Cassandra got a good look at her for the first time. She was Hispanic, pretty, but she spoke with a cold voice. “If you behave, you’ll live. So, you damned well better behave.”
I wanted to reach through Cassandra’s mind into the past and throttle the woman with my bare hands. She was pure evil. Then it hit me that none of the devils had covered up their faces. They had to expect new personas right away from some demon powerful enough to change their appearance.
In Cassandra’s memory, the kidnappers drove south on the freeway until they reached the San Francisco Airport, then they headed west on a different freeway and south again. In her misery, Cassandra lost track of the roads they traveled.
As long as she stayed quiet and didn’t move, they ignored her. More tears flooded her eyes, and her throat was so tight she could hardly breathe. It had all happened so fast. Iris was gone.
Eventually, Cassandra’s tears stopped flowing, and she realized she wasn’t helping herself or the police to find her kidnappers. She’d always wanted to be a detective, but she wasn’t paying attention. If she could survive, she could tell them what’d happened so they could find the bastards.
I wished I could tell her to cut herself some slack, but all I could do was to watch it unfold and use the truth to give Cassandra justice.
She looked outside the SUV when it left the freeway and drove up a curvy, steep road. They were heading toward the sun, so southwest. The hills were covered with dead grass and a few valley oaks, but then they dropped into a valley thick with redwoods.
She’d visited the redwood parks lots of times, but she didn’t recognize this road. And the forests all looked the same. They drove through deep shade, passing only a few clearings. Lots of houses were tucked back in these woods, but she didn’t see any distinct landmarks.
But finally, they drove past a small clearing next to the road. In the center, she spotted a pair of redwoods that formed a tall V. She’d definitely remember that.
A moment later, they turned onto a gravel road and drove a mile before stopping in front of a log cabin with a green tarpaper roof that was covered with moss. The air was fresh and clean.
But evil had come to these woods. The assholes dragged Cassandra inside, and the woman locked her in a bedroom. Its window was covered on the outside by a sheet of plywood so she couldn’t escape. They left her there, no food or water, until darkness fell. She laid on the bed and slept fitfully.
The next morning, they kept her in that room, letting her out only to go to the bathroom. They gave her scrambled eggs and sausage and an unopened bottle of water. She didn’t eat breakfast, the food was probably drugged, but she was dying of thirst. She twisted the cap off the bottle and downed it.
The day passed slowly. She couldn’t stay focused on a
nything for long. She’d made so many mistakes. She’d fought with Iris too many times. It was too late to make it up to her.
In the early evening, the two men opened the door suddenly, grabbed her, and dragged her back to the SUV. All of them drove away leaving the cabin’s door open.
This time, she tried to remember as many landmarks as possible. They left by a different road, and she spotted an abandoned Union 76 gas station. One house had a mailbox shaped like a bear standing on its hind legs.
Eventually, the SUV crested a hill and popped out of the redwoods again. In front of them, far below, she could see a freeway and the southern end of San Francisco Bay. They were west of San Jose, somewhere up in the hills.
The SUV headed down until it reached some suburb. A few minutes later, they passed a Walmart. The driver entered the parking lot. Without a word, the woman opened a door and pushed Cassandra out onto the pavement.
The SUV with the three assholes sped away. Cassandra screamed for help.
-o-o-o-
IT TOOK ME a minute to come to grips with all I’d seen in fifteen-year-old Cassandra’s memory. You poor girl! No wonder you yelled for hours.
The demons had taken Cassandra to a redwood forest south of San Francisco, but I didn’t know the area well enough to recognize the roads. Cleo or Jack would know more. The most distinctive landmarks were the V-shaped trees, the Union 76 station, and the cabin itself. With any luck, the angels could find the hiding place based on my memories.
Cassandra’s mom was obviously going to stay with her, so I switched into the head of a nurse who entered the room. The woman checked Cassandra’s vital signs then left again.
When she got back to her station, she was approached by a frowning thirty-something man with pale skin and a crewcut. “I’m looking for Cassandra Winter. I’m her uncle, Ben Winter.”
“She’s with her doctors and her mother in a treatment room. I was given strict instructions that they cannot be disturbed.”
He argued with the nurse about seeing his niece, and I slipped into his mind to find out if he’d been the go-between connecting the kidnappers with the mayor.
Sure enough, that was how the demons had avoided the monitoring by the FBI on the mayor’s communications. This was my best chance to learn how the family had gotten Cassandra back. His memory told me. The demons hadn’t asked for money, at least not directly. They’d told Ben they’d return the girl if the mayor promised to support something called the Santiago Project. Ben had passed the information on to his brother the mayor who’d agreed to support the development.
I had no idea what the project was, but some powerful demon must’ve held a stake in it. That connection was likely the best way for us to find the person who ordered the kidnapping. The three flunkies had called him Bonito.
Jack stood a short distance away in the lobby, still talking with the lawyer. Cleo had remained with him.
I sent him a mental message, I know what happened to Cassandra. More important, the brother is in this up to his neck. He facilitated a deal to approve a new building in the city.
Jack approached the brother and introduced himself. “I’d like to talk to you about the kidnapping. Please come this way.”
“Not now. I need to see my niece, to make sure she’s okay.”
His refusal to cooperate put Jack in a bind. We didn’t have enough information yet to arrest the brother. Instead, Jack made an appointment to talk to the brother the next morning at the FBI’s office.
But we could investigate the Santiago Project right away. I switched into Jack’s head, and he took me and Cleo to the elevator. Once we were alone, she and I resumed our human forms. He called his office and arranged for someone to follow the uncle until he could get an arrest warrant in case he decided against keeping his appointment.
We three left the hospital and sat in Jack’s car, I explained to both of them what I’d learned from Cassandra and her uncle. Then I said, “I’d like to see if we can find that cabin. It might provide an alternative path to find the demons and Bonito. I also want to check with Honah to find out if we can help Cassandra to cope with the horrors she endured.”
“Good ideas,” Jack said. “I’ll investigate the project and its backers. You deal with the chief.”
I contacted Honah, and he teleported me back to the barn at the ranch in Golden. There, I explained what I’d learned and how I hoped an angelic healer named Yasmin could help.
“I agree that finding the cabin could be useful,” Honah said. “In the morning, I will direct a team of twenty angels to fly the area where the cabin has to be. Even though there are many roads in those hills, we ought to be able to find the cabin quickly. As for Yasmin, I will send you to her as soon as possible, but don’t expect her to intervene directly. Her time is completely filled with one emergency after another. Our struggles with demons worldwide continue at an accelerated pace, and Cassandra is only one tiny skirmish in the overall war.”
I’d take whatever help Yasmin could provide. She was always too busy for her own good.
-o-o-o-
Tuesday, August 8th
IN THE WEE hours of the morning, Honah sent me to Yasmin’s grotto in Iran. In an instant, I found myself standing on a trail about fifty yards away from where I’d normally meet her.
Her main bodyguard, Lin, greeted me instead. He looked sterner than ever. Given her importance to the angelic world, I had no doubt he could take on an entire brigade of demons and win.
“Before you visit her,” he said, “understand that she just finished one of her most challenging healings ever and needs time to recover her strength. I am only allowing her to see you because she claims to enjoy your company, although I can’t imagine why. Do not take advantage of my goodwill, or you will bitterly regret it.”
He’d never seemed to like me, but this was the first time he’d been so hostile. I was always friendly with her. I put it down to his worry for her health. “I need advice, not healing.”
He moved out of the way so I could proceed to the grotto. At her cave’s entrance, Yasmin greeted me with a warm smile, and she grasped my hands in hers. Then she led me to a wooden bench where we’d often sat together.
“Honah tells me you are helping him with a heartrending case in California.”
I briefly summarized Cassandra’s situation. Then I said, “She has no physical injuries, but she’s severely traumatized from watching her sister die. Having lost my mother as a child, I can appreciate how devastating it is for a child to lose a loved one.”
My healing mentor patted my hand. “Mental suffering is often the most difficult injury to address. It takes great skill, but I’m afraid I’m not permitted to help her myself. Milton was quite explicit a few days ago. He said, ‘You cannot take on side projects for any reason.’”
Even if I had the power to tell them what to do, I wouldn’t argue with Milton’s priorities. He faced so many obstacles to keeping the world safe, and he deserved the benefit of the doubt.
I told her, “So many times, you’ve soothed my worries and suffering. Can you explain to me how? I might be able to help this girl, at least in some small way. Otherwise, she’ll have to endure years of anguish.”
“How is your meditative practice proceeding?”
She already knew, just from sitting close to me. I figured the question was intended to get me thinking about the question. You’ve let her down, Gabe, I admitted to myself.
“I haven’t advanced nearly as much as you’d like,” I said. “After the crisis with forest fires in Colorado, I took some time off. I’m just getting back into the swing of things now.”
Her furrowed brow told me she wasn’t satisfied with my answer or my progress. But instead of saying so, she sighed. “I can teach you a spell to remove painful memories. It will not provide a complete answer to her distress, but it should dramatically improve her mental state.”
“I’ll take whatever help I can get.” Per
haps it would be enough to save Cassandra most of the misery headed her way. I’d been haunted for over a decade by my memories of my own mother’s suffering as she died from cancer. Anything that might save Cassandra from retracing my steps was worth trying.
Yasmin and I meditated together, and she helped me reach a deep peaceful state so I could connect to God’s eternal grace. Often, I was able to reach that state on my own, but it required a long period of calm concentration. Yasmin could make that eternal connection instantly, one of the benefits of thousands of years of intense mental training.
Her voice sounded in my head. I’ve planted a magical healing kernel within you. Now, you just find the painful memories in someone’s mind and think, ‘Unburden yourself to me.’
I memorized the spell. Then, as a bonus, she collected the memories of my mother from the last few times I saw her, near death then dead on her hospice bed. The poor woman had been nothing but skin and bones.
Before it was too late, I remembered I was supposed to help Yasmin unwind. We chatted for a few minutes about the flowers now blooming in her forest.
Then, suddenly, she said, “I regret that we must end our conversation here. An injured warrior is on the way. Perhaps you would help me with her, thereby easing my burden.”
“Happy to,” I said.
The words were barely out of my mouth before a large female guardian angel appeared on a mattress covering a flat rock next to us that Yasmin used as a treatment bed. One of the angel’s wings dangled, barely attached to her body. Even worse, a gaping wound on her right side extended from under her right arm to her hip. The sword had cut through her ribs and sliced into her lung.
I was used to incredible changes happening in an instant in this immortal world, but I was still shocked. This angel’s injuries were so severe I couldn’t believe she’d survived. Blades forged in hellfire were cursed with poison and much deadlier than a normal sword or axe.
Infernal Justice (Angels at the Edge Book 2) Page 3
