Stepford USA (Jade Snow International Adventure #1)

by Lada Ray

  I better wake up Adelaide, I thought, or she would have no project to get back to. I cleared my throat loudly and the cat immediately turned around, saw me and gave a melodic meow. There was not a trace of guilt in her demeanor, only friendliness. You are just being silly, Jade, I told myself, my heart melting. Your imagination is running away from you. This is an angel of a cat! She would never do anything mischievous.

  Meanwhile, the cat smartly brushed her silky body across Adelaide's legs, which woke her up instantly. I waved to her from the window. Getting up with difficulty, she went to open the front door.

  “Isn't she precious,” cooed Adelaide, glancing fondly at her cat. “That's a good girl, waking me up so I could let Jade in.” She stroked the fluff in front of her and Lily responded with a satisfied purr.

  Adelaide pulled out a tin of her pearl jasmine green tea, which she saved for special occasions. I helped her set up the table and started cutting blueberry cheesecake I picked up at the bakery. We sipped tea and talked about knitting, when Adelaide asked me about my parents.

  “My parents are both gone,” I said quietly, my heart skipping a beat, but quickly resuming its usual rhythm.

  “Oh, I'm sorry,” said Adelaide. “I didn't know.”

  “That's okay,” I said. “It's been a long time, thirteen years ago. They died when I was fifteen. My Grandma Anastasia took care of me after that. But she was getting on with age and died during my sophomore year in college.”

  “What happened to your parents?”

  “Well, they were both investigative journalists on an assignment to South America. There was a small, unknown war, the kind of war that hardly ever makes news in the US. It was between some local drug lords and my parents got in the middle. They were shot. I only found out a month later.”

  “I'm so very sorry,” she said, and put her wrinkled, warm hand on top of mine.

  “Thank you,” I said, feeling grateful and tingly with that forgotten homey warmth that I vaguely remembered from my childhood.

  “I see you decided to follow in your parents' footsteps and become a journalist, too?”

  “I always wanted to be one. It was really a very natural choice for me. I love traveling, talking to people, getting to the bottom of things.”

  “Good thing you tan so well. That's highly unusual with your coloring. Reddish hair and blue-green eyes usually are not favorable for tanning.”

  “True,” I nodded. “But I do have some southern blood. My father was British and from him I inherited my reddish hair. My mother was half Russian, and my Grandma Anastasia is responsible for the color of my eyes. Another half was Spanish and that's the side that gives me a great tan.”

  We continued chatting, while enjoying our tea, when Jason came into the room. Seeing that Adelaide had a guest, he tensed defensively, his immediate reaction to head for the stairs, to escape.

  “Hello, Jason,” I greeted him amicably, hoping he might change his mind.

  “Hello,” he responded reluctantly and looked in my direction for the first time. His face underwent a transformation when he knew it was me. It was unbelievable, but there was no mistake – the expression on it was that of relief. “I remember you. You came with the rest of the knitting ladies the other day.”

  “That's right,” I said. “It was me.”

  “You are not like the others,” he continued, his body starting to relax. My eyes met his and I noticed a deep shadow of sadness in them.

  “Would you like to have a cup of tea with us, dear?” quickly asked Adelaide, seizing the moment. He nodded and sat down. I poured him tea.

  “I couldn't find any cranberry cake - it's your favorite, isn't it?” I said to him, “so I brought some blueberry cheesecake instead. I hope it's okay.” And I handed him a slice.

  “Thanks, it's fine,” he said. And amazingly, there was a semblance of a smile on that never-smiling face. Adelaide looked happy.

  We all drank the fragrant green liquid. Jason finished his slice of cheesecake and asked for seconds. There was a sound of mrrreow, and Princess Lily nimbly leaped on Jason's lap. He petted her gently with those callused, prematurely aged hands and fed her cheesecake from his spoon. The cat's tongue touched the smooth substance delicately and an inspired purr, like a song, emanated in waves from her little body. She licked the spoon clean and stretched luxuriously on Jason's lap. Then, she placed her snow-white paws on his shoulder, reached for his face and licked his cheek with great affection. He stroked the cat's fur in response, his face changing beyond recognition. There was absolutely no pessimism or pain left on it. It was peaceful, much like Adelaide's. This time, it was clear beyond any doubt: Jason indeed was her son.

  I walked back home, meditating on what I just witnessed. I had been to Afghanistan and Iraq; I've seen death and suffering. I met those, who committed crimes and those, against whom the crimes had been perpetrated. For the life of me, I could not imagine the man I just had tea with raping and nearly killing another human being, a young woman, just for the fun of it. He didn't feel like the villain of the piece - to me he rather resembled another victim.

  Something was fundamentally wrong with the official story of Rebbecca's rape. But what? And that's when I knew, I simply had to get to the bottom of this cold case. I had to uncover the truth!

  Chapter 6

  The next day, I woke up deep in thought. It appeared that the best place to start my secret investigation into Rebbecca's case would be where the original inquiry was conducted, at the local police department. Hadn't Anne mentioned that she worked there? That was very convenient. I decided to surprise her for lunch.

  The Stepford Police Department was also located on Main Street, but several blocks down from the Blue Peacock Inn and in the most unlikely building imaginable. It was a restored nineteenth century colonial, white, with smooth round columns and real black shutters. Those shutters that in the times past did the actual job of protecting windows from storms, unlike the new style plastic imitations permanently fastened to the walls, as is the pathetic fashion among contemporary builders. This white stately colonial, a reminder of the times past, would have been more likely to house a local history museum or an antique shop, trademark of the Berkshires.

  A police station in such a place was (to put it mildly) a surprise.

  But if the outside was a surprise, the inside was a shock. It looked the utter opposite of its outward shell. The interior was completely gutted out to accommodate the necessary police wiring and computer equipment. The thick black wiring in question spidered ominously along the walls painted in some indescribable shade of institutional grey. The picture was complete with a row of cold looking metal chairs chained together next to a bare wall, and a huge bulletproof divider screening off the dispatch area. The combination of the old, genteel exterior and the harsh contemporary interior looked forced, worse, tortured, as if someone tried unsuccessfully to fit a proverbial round peg into a square hole.

  Even more than in the incongruent architecture of the building, I was interested in the people working in its walls, particularly, Chief Nordini. I confess - taking my good friend Anne out to lunch was just a cover – so sue me! My real goal was to keep my eyes and ears open. In other words, today I hung my writing hat and donned that of an investigative journalist, the hat I'd missed so much, the one that always fitted me best.

  Anne, whose title was Police Department's Senior Dispatcher, was happy to see me and pleasantly surprised that I wanted to take her out. She left her workstation in the care of an eager new girl whom she was training. The innocent looking blond, who couldn't have been more than twenty or so, smiled at me from behind the giant bulletproof glass of the dispatch.

  In the short time it took Anne to get her things, a couple of officers went in and out of the building, throwing me sharp glances that were no doubt meant to make any potential criminal tremble and recoil. Otherwise, the station was dead quiet and there was no sign of Chief Nordini, apparently due to lunch hour. Too bad.
<
br />   No matter, I decided, I'd do more snooping around when we get back from lunch. And in any event, it was good that they saw me in Anne's company. If I needed to come back for more investigating, they'd be used to me, they'd see me as a non-threatening insider – as Anne's friend. Good plan.

  I let Anne decide where we'd go for lunch and she suggested Pepperino's, a nice, if a bit noisy, cafe on Main, which, according to my companion, served a wicked good sandwich. Sandwich it is, I agreed, longingly recalling my favorite grilled salmon from the Blue Peacock.

  Anne was right, the sandwiches were good. I ordered a grilled turkey with pesto on freshly baked rye bread and a side of veggies in lieu of French fries. And to quench my thirst, a cup of peppermint tea. Anne was having a sensible tuna fish sandwich on whole wheat. I sipped my tea, while throwing wistful glances at Anne's cup of steaming coffee. Oh well, whoever said that it was easy being an expecting mom?

  We chatted about knitting and I learned all about mysterious abbreviations like yo (yarn over), k2tog (knit two together), and sl1 (slip one). Then, we proceeded to talk about Anne's two little nieces - oh, they are so adorable - and to review in great detail photos of her two blue-eyed and curly-haired angels in pink dresses, which she proudly produced out of her ample felted bag.

  As we got up to leave, Anne mentioned that she was concerned about Adelaide. “She isn't herself lately,” she said. “You should have seen her just a couple of months ago, when she was all energy and optimism.”

  “So, leaning on a cane is a new thing?” I asked casually.

  “I've never seen her use a cane before, and I've known her for almost fifteen years,” Anne said fervently. “I tell you, this son of hers is bad news. Having him around is killing her.”

  “Hmm...” I said, “so, you think he was the one who did it to Rebbecca?”

  “Yes, of course, everyone knows that,” she responded immediately… but then, did a double take. Keen eyes behind her oversized glasses looked searchingly into mine. “But...I take it you don't think so?”

  “I am not sure what to think,” I admitted. “I know one thing, in my journalistic career I've seen my share of killers and criminals and there is something about Jason that doesn't feel like he is one of them. Does that surprise you?” Somehow I felt that I could share my doubts with her, because underneath all her small town idiosyncrasies, she did seem like a woman of common sense.

  She considered this new thought. “No... no, I don't believe it actually surprises me. I guess... you must have some experience with that sort of thing since you've been to Afghanistan and all. Also, I'd think, you should have a good instinct about human psychology, being a journalist. So,” she concluded more confidently, “if you feel this way, there must be something to it.”

  I nodded, smiling to myself. I wasn't mistaken about Anne.

  A pensive expression rested on her face all the way to the parking lot of the police station. There was more activity there now with cars pulling in and out and officers coming and going. It seemed, the lunch hour was over. I promptly pretended I was passionate about mastering a new lace stitch Anne had been raving about earlier at lunch. My kindhearted companion volunteered to lend me a book that made it a “breeze to learn,” which - oh, luck - was in her desk. I enthusiastically agreed, as it gave me an excellent excuse to come in and stealthily look around the station.

  As we approached, we heard screams and crushing noises coming from the lobby. I gave Anne a bemused look, while her face registered an alarm. She wasn't the only one as right on cue, officers, who just a minute ago were busily going about their business, turned like one and rushed towards the building, some hastily feeling for their guns. Anne and I quickened our step.

  The fantastic scene that presented itself to our eyes, made my jaw drop.

  Chief Nordini stood in the middle of the lobby, looking like a bull who was seeing red, his large feet planted firmly on the ground, oversized fists clenched. His nose was bleeding and it was clear that it cost him a superhuman effort not to lunge at the man facing him. And facing him was none other, than the topic of our, and the whole town's gossip, Jason, in all his glory.

  Like Chief Nordini, Jason was also muscular, but not quite as tall and noticeably slimmer. Despite the difference in weight category and rank, he apparently punched the Chief on the nose and was at the time of our arrival being restrained by several officers - with difficulty. But that didn't stop him from yelling at his foe, “You, gutless maggot! Chicken shit! Still hiding behind your daddy's skirt! Be a man for once in your life!”

  Jason was finally subdued and dragged out of the room, while Chief Nordini stood silently, beetroot-red all over, fists clenching and unclenching. His small, sharp eyes surveyed the room, taking in all the witnesses of the scandal: the support staff ogling him with their mouths open, several confused policemen, and Anne. Then, his eyes froze on me. After that, without a word, Nick Nordini turned on his heel and stormed out of the building, like a big, angry tornado.

  “What was that all about?” I exhaled, finally reacquiring the gift of intelligent speech.

  “I don't know,” responded Anne, frowning. It was clear that she was not in a mood for any further discussion. She brought out the book she promised and said hurriedly, “I think we'd better talk another day. Looks like I might be busy for a while. Bye...”

  I walked home, the knitting book absentmindedly clutched in my hand, replaying the scene I've just witnessed. It unraveled in slow motion and as it was, the scene made no sense. Whatever Jason might've been, he wasn't crazy, and neither was he stupid. He must've realized that attacking the police chief in broad day light in front of a dozen witnesses, most of them cops, could put him away again for a long, long time.

  I tried to place myself in his shoes. What on earth made you do this, Jason? What caused you to forsake reason and self preservation? The only answer that came to mind was this: it was something very, very serious.

  Chapter 7

  Paul hasn't called in a week and the next morning, sick with worry, I was about to contact Time magazine's editor-in-chief to demand that they send him back to me. Because... well, because, I wanted my husband... I needed my husband! Now!!!

  All of sudden I realized that I was in a mood to break something. I looked around – a vase? Neah. There will be nothing left to keep my favorite daisies in. A carriage clock on the mantelpiece? It was ticking very annoyingly, but it belonged to the owner of the house and I didn't think the sweet lady who rented us her cottage would appreciate it if I broke her heirloom timepiece. What else, what else... Dishes? Too much cleaning. Besides, all that broken stuff on the floor would make for terrible feng shui! Finally, common sense won over, but it took me a lot of self-control to restrain the burgeoning impulse.

  To compensate for the loss of such tempting destructive opportunity, I started pacing around my living room. Round, and round, and round... I paced, while muttering under my breath, “I deserve better than that... Oh, they are gonna get it... they'll see...” and other such nonsense. But after ten minutes of painfully biting my lip and wringing my arms – something I've never done before in my life – I finally paused in front of a mirror, attracted by the fantastic image of my upper limbs suspended in a highly creative twist of desperation. I looked ridiculous. What's worse, my mind it seemed, was mimicking the movements of my arms and resembled an emotional roller coaster gone berserk.

  I sat down and looked at my hands in disbelief. What was going on with me? I've never been this emotional, almost hysterical, before. Did pregnancy cause this? Or was I influenced by the drama that was unfolding right before my eyes? In any event, I told myself, I won't get anywhere this way, that's for sure.

  I put a pillow on the carpet for additional support and turned on a CD, entitled Beethoven for Meditation. Then, I sat on the pillow and took some deep breaths, trying to stay as close to the lotus pose as possible, but failing miserably due to my growing tummy. I struggled with my body that didn't want to obey me an
y more, wondering, what would my yoga instructor say when he saw his star pupil not even being able to maintain a lotus pose? And then, it occurred to me that he would probably say, go with the flow. I smiled as I knew - that was exactly what I needed.

  Relax and go with the flow, the rest will take care of itself. How do I do that? Let's see... By themselves, my legs unfolded and stretched full length in front of me. I uttered a moan of relief and closed my eyes, absorbing the soothing sounds of the Moonlight Sonata. Calm your mind, calm your mind, I intoned, picturing myself floating in a river with water so crystal clear that the whitewashed pebbles lining its bottom were visible in the moonlight. The banks of the river were lush with greenery, the overhanging bushes creating a cozy, sheltered environment. Ah, peace...

  I enjoyed it for a while and when the CD ended, I opened my eyes slowly, my lips stretching in a serene smile. Mental note, tell Rachel to bring me some more meditation CDs when she comes to visit. The happy smile lingered, as worry subsided and my usual positive attitude gradually returned. I knew now, Paul was fine, he just couldn't reach the phone, that's all. I was sure he would be calling me as soon as possible. Happy with myself and the wonderful world around me, I looked at the clock. It turned out, my meditation lasted longer than I thought and I was running late for my knitting club meetup.

  “So I'll be a little late,” I said to myself with the same sunshine smile. “Remember, go with the flow, go with the flow.”

  Humming my new little tune and dancing to its accompaniment, I changed into what has become my uniform of late. First, an oversized cotton tunic – purple today, some delicate green leaves sprinkled lightly over it – very Zen. Next, a pair of stretchy pants with an elastic waist. The tunic hid my growing tummy very well and the pants' cut was presentable enough. Designer clothes were out of my wardrobe and spandex was in, lots and lots of it!