by Karen Leabo
“Austin please, don’t.” She wanted to know how he felt about her—but not here, not like this, not when the burden of his guilt clouded his emotions. He might be grateful she was alive, relieved that she wasn’t seriously injured. Guilt could easily magnify those feelings into something more. She didn’t want to hear him say something he might have to take back later, when he was thinking more clearly.
Maybe she was even more fearful of having to reciprocate, to tell him how she felt. She wasn’t ready. She might never be ready.
“It wasn’t your fault,” she said again.
He stared straight ahead, hands gripping the steering wheel, a muscle in his jaw working furiously.
Caro could see that arguing was useless. She could forgive Austin from now till the cows came home and it wouldn’t make a dent in his misery. He needed to forgive himself, first, and that was something no person could do for another.
She understood that concept better than anyone would ever know.
* * *
Catching a serial kidnapper was a cinch compared to the aftermath, Austin thought irritably as he withstood another round of questioning, this time by Deputy Chief Raines, and the Chief was not nearly as enamored with Austin as the reporters had been. The two of them went over every nuance of the events that had occurred the morning of Caro’s kidnapping not once, not twice, but three times.
Each time Austin calmly answered the Chief’s questions. It was on the tip of his tongue to apologize for the foul-up, to admit that he’d been too green to run a covert operation of that magnitude, to beg for another chance. But he did none of those things. Some- time during the night, he had come to the conclusion that, were he faced with the same situation again, he would probably do exactly as he’d done. If that made him a bad cop...well, he was about to find out just exactly how faulty his judgment had been.
“How long was it between the time you lost voice contact and the time you left the van?” Raines asked.
“I’m not sure. About five minutes, I think. Long enough for Caro to get through the checkout line.”
“And when did the truck pull in front of the store?”
“After the truck pulled up, it was no more than a few seconds before Villaverde and I left the van.”
“A few seconds?”
“Twenty-two seconds, okay?” Austin snapped, losing his patience. He had a sudden sympathy for all the witnesses he’d ever interviewed who couldn’t remember exactly what they’d seen or done, the exact time frame. He removed his glasses and wiped his hand over his face. “I wasn’t looking at a watch, okay?”
“Yeah, okay.” Raines jotted a few notes down. “If I’m being overly thorough, it’s because my butt could be on the line over this thing. I was in on the planning stages of the operation, remember. I okayed it down to the last detail. And I have to answer to the Big Guy for any, er, irregularities.”
“I understand.”
There was a tap at the door. Chief Raines, suddenly all smiles, motioned for someone to enter. Austin didn’t have to turn around to know who it was. He felt her, smelled her, sensed her on some psychic level.
“Caro, my God, you look like the Mummy’s Wife,” Raines said, staring at her bandaged hands. “What are you doing here? I understood you were under strict orders to stay home and rest.”
“Orders from whom?” she said, her eyebrows arched almost to her hairline. She gave Austin an accusing glance, as if perhaps he’d had the temerity to give her an order. He shrugged, as if to say “It wasn’t me.”
She busied herself digging into her purse, coming up moments later with the decimated body mike with bits of tape hanging off it. She dropped it onto Raines’s desk. “I think you need to send this back to the Cracker Jack company,” she said, straight-faced. “Maybe next time we can spring for a piece of equipment from a bubble-gum machine.”
Austin smiled inwardly. He should have known Caro wouldn’t stand idly by if she suspected he was getting a grilling. She probably thought that if she made it clear she didn’t blame Austin for the kidnapping, no one else would, either. It was a noble gesture, barging in here full of disdain for the faulty body mike, but unnecessary. Austin and Tony had both explained numerous times about the equipment failure. Still, he was touched that Caro thought she had to “save” him.
Raines cleared his throat. “I’ve been apprised of the problem with the mike,” he said. Then he added, almost as an afterthought, “The press is going to have a field day with that angle. I can see the headline now—Budget Cuts Leave Police with Second-Rate Equipment, something like that.”
“Maybe it’ll work in our favor,” Austin felt obliged to point out. There was little enough to be optimistic about. “Maybe next time we’ll get the use of some better equipment.”
Raines shrugged. “Maybe. Caro, how did you burn yourself? That seems to be the one answer no one has.”
She shuddered delicately. “All right, I guess I’ll have to reveal my idiocy sooner or later. My hands were tied behind my back, and I wanted to free them, so I found some matches and burned the cord, along with several layers of skin.”
Austin swallowed hard, imagining the courage it must have taken to hold a burning match while it seared flesh.
Chief Raines paled. “Damn, Caro.”
“When you think about it, it was all for nothing. Minutes after I escaped, the entire Clemson County Sheriff’s Department descended on the Good Shepherd Home. If I’d just sat in that closet for a few more minutes, I’d have been rescued.” She gave Austin a meaningful look.
“Somehow,” Austin said, “I can’t picture you sitting around waiting to be rescued.”
She narrowed her eyes. “Was that a compliment or an insult?”
“Oh, definitely a compliment.”
Raines cleared his throat again, as if to say he didn’t want any teasing banter in his office, not when he was trying to unravel the messiest day in recent Dallas Police Department history. “Seriously, Caro,” he said, “I understand you did a helluva job yesterday. This Sheriff Fowles thinks you’re the best thing to come along since chunky peanut butter, and the girl’s father, What’s-His-Name Arkin, thinks you should be given a medal or something. Why don’t you put in an application—”
Caro’s expression immediately shuttered. “Could we talk about this later?”
Raines nodded, looking decidedly disappointed. “Yeah, sure. Run along, both of you. Caro, go home if you’re not feeling up to par. Don’t let Sergeant Quayar give you any flack about it, either. And Lomax—”
“Yes, sir?”
“I don’t think you have anything to worry about. In your position, I’d have done the same thing. For what it’s worth, I don’t believe you and Villaverde were in any way remiss in your duty.”
“It’s worth a lot,” Austin said. “Thanks.” As soon as they were out of the Chief’s earshot, he added in an undertone, “No matter what he says, I think Raines is sizing you up to fill a vacancy in Homicide—mine.”
“Oh, Lomax, they wouldn’t fire you over this. If they do, I’ll...I’ll resign, too, as a protest.”
He grinned at her passionate offer. “I don’t think that’ll be necessary. You know how it is,” he said as they walked back through the maze of desks to his cubbyhole. “Any time an undercover operation goes wrong, the brass has to scrutinize it ten ways to Sunday, just to make sure it doesn’t happen again. I don’t really think my fat’s in the fire.”
“Please, don’t mention fire.”
“Sorry. How bad is it? I mean, does it hurt? Now?”
Caro grimaced. “Not really,” she said, though he suspected she was underplaying her discomfort. He’d burned his hand on a stove once, and he could still vividly remember the mind-numbing pain. That was only a minor injury compared to Caro’s. He still didn’t understand how she’d managed to get far enough past the pain to do everything she’d done that day.
“The burns really aren’t that serious,” she said. “But I’ll always ha
ve scars on my hands and back.”
“Your back?” He hadn’t realized.
“My sweater caught fire. I told you it was dumb.”
“I think it was incredibly brave.” Since she looked uncomfortable with his praise, he quickly changed the subject. “Did you hear the latest?” he asked, flipping absently through his phone messages. “I interrogated Odell this morning and she decided to cooperate. Spilled her guts. It’s a sad story, really. It seems her father, a doctor, forced her to help him perform abortions back when she was a teenager. For years she was convinced she was doomed to hell. And then she came up with this scheme to save the same number of babies as she’d helped to abort.”
“Is that what she meant when she kept saying ‘thirty-four’?” Caro asked.
Austin nodded. “Seems kind of crazy to think she could earn points with God by kidnapping teenagers.”
“Kind of?” Caro sat on the edge of Austin’s desk. “Why couldn’t she join a protest at an abortion clinic like all the other pro-lifers?”
“You have to admit, she was one clever lady to pull it off for as long as she did.”
“What about Henry? Did you ask her about the murders?”
“Odell admitted that Henry was ‘odd,’ but that’s all she’d give him. She didn’t believe he was capable of killing, although she didn’t rule it out completely. And the girls who had their babies at the Home—” He picked up a list from his desk. “Odell gave their names as Jennifer Brown from San Antonio, and Tanya Liese and Jillian Wysocki from Houston. There was another one, Heather Collins from Austin, who miscarried. Odell says she gave them a tranquilizer, and then Henry drove them away and abandoned them in places where they’d be found and returned to their homes.”
“And?”
“All four are still missing.”
Caro winced. “How about that? This case might turn out to be a homicide, after all.”
“I’m willing to bet on it. Incidentally, I spoke with Henry’s doctor a few minutes ago. He’s responding well to medication, and we can question him now. I was on my way to Parkland when His Highness summoned me.” Austin shrugged into his leather jacket.
“Mind if I tag along?”
That surprised him. He’d thought Caro would stay as far away as possible from Henry’s interrogation. “Sure, if you’re up to it.”
They took the elevator down to the basement garage—the only place he could park where the reporters couldn’t follow. On the short drive up I-35 to Parkland Hospital, he paid close attention to Caro. Her face was a tight mask of tension—whether from apprehension or the discomfort of her burned hands, he could only guess.
A receptionist directed them up to the psych unit on the eighth floor. There, a psychiatrist by the name of Dr. Wayne Lassiter met them. He expounded at length on Henry’s condition—officially diagnosed as schizophrenia.
“I’ve seldom seen such an elaborate delusional framework as Henry has constructed,” the doctor enthused. “He apparently has numerous voices who have been speaking with him since childhood—God’s messengers, angels, whatever. The delusion itself isn’t so uncommon. But the fact that he’s been able to hide it from others all these years, to pass himself off as merely ‘odd’—that’s the fascinating thing. It’s a shame he didn’t get psychiatric intervention before now.”
A shame? Austin thought it was more like a tragedy of disastrous proportions, and the parents of those missing girls—undoubtedly dead—would likely agree with him.
“Will he be competent to stand trial?” Austin asked.
“I expect so. However, I’d be surprised if you get a conviction.”
“Not guilty by reason of insanity,” Austin murmured. “Helluva break for him, if he did what I think he did.”
Austin and Caro were taken to an observation room, where from the outside they could look through a two-way mirror and see Henry within, chatting casually with a suited man who was no doubt his attorney. His grimaces and facial tics, so evident the day before, were almost unnoticeable today.
“You can go on in,” the doctor said. “I’ll be observing, but only to monitor Henry’s mental state. I understand that you need to do your jobs, but if I feel the questioning is doing him harm, I have the right to call a halt.”
Austin didn’t care who listened, so long as they didn’t blab to the press. He reached for the doorknob, but before he could twist it, Caro laid a hand on his. “Wait.”
He looked at her expectantly. He’d known that sooner or later she would get cold feet.
“I want to do it.”
“You’re kidding,” Austin blurted out.
“I want to interrogate Henry. I think I can get him to tell me where those bodies are.”
Austin could think of nothing he’d like better than to see Caro rip Henry a new one. Mentally ill or not, the guy had squeezed the life out of four innocent young girls. He didn’t deserve to be handled with kid gloves. And maybe she could exorcise a few ghosts of her own.
Austin opened the door and gestured for her to enter. “Be my guest,” he said, making sure she knew how pleased he was. “I’ll be right outside. Yell if you want some support.”
She flashed a nervous smile and entered the room, closing the door behind her. Austin watched through the mirror as she greeted Henry affably.
Henry stood and extended his hand. “Hello, ma’am,” he said.
“Do you remember me?” she asked.
“Not very well.”
Austin couldn’t help but admire Caro’s skillful questioning of the suspect. She handled Henry very differently from the way she’d treated Ray Seifert. She never lost her temper, or even raised her voice, perhaps sensing that to scare Henry would be counterproductive.
With questions that grew increasingly provocative, Caro led Henry up to the night Odell had delivered the first baby and drugged the young mother, Tanya Liese. Henry maintained that he had driven several hours away to the outskirts of Houston, where he’d deposited Tanya in a convenience store parking lot.
“Can you tell if he’s lying?” Austin asked the doctor.
“It’s hard to say. If this story is part of his delusion, he’ll stick to it like glue. He might have convinced himself that the lie is true.”
Inquiries about the other two missing girls brought similar responses. Then Caro changed tack. She began what sounded like an innocent discussion of the land surrounding the Good Shepherd Maternity Home, of Henry’s hunting adventures with Phoebe the bloodhound, his fondness for hiking and nature. He revealed that while his father had not actually taught him to shoot a gun, he had given him permission to use a large hunting lease that a client had given him in lieu of a legal fee.
“There’s an old hunting lodge there and everything, with animal heads on the walls. Aunt Odell let me stay there overnight once.”
“Sounds like a wonderful place,” Caro said wryly.
Austin squirmed at the thought of sleeping in a room with dead animals peering down at him from the walls.
“Does anyone else use the lease?” Caro asked.
Henry shrugged. “I don’t think so. I’ve never seen anyone there, and there’s plenty of game.”
Caro cocked her head to one side and placed one finger on her chin. “Is there by any chance...a well on this property?”
Henry’s gaze shifted from side to side, his mouth working furiously while no words came out.
Clever girl, Caro, Austin silently cheered. He’d never have thought to go this roundabout path toward the truth. Get off the subject of the missing girls altogether, and the delusional framework doesn’t get in the way.
“It...a well?” Henry stammered, turning pale. “I don’t know. I never...noticed, I don’t think.”
“Yes, you do know, Henry. You remember. It’s the well that’s full of dead bodies—the girls you killed because they had the devil in them.”
Henry shook his head vehemently. “I never killed no girls.”
“Are you sure, Henry?�
�� Caro asked. “You told Amanda you killed them.”
“Amanda lies. She has the devil in her.”
“Is that why you tried to kill her?” When he remained sullenly silent, Caro continued. “I saw you with your hands around her neck, Henry. Would you have put her in the well with the others to rot?”
“I wouldn’t have killed her,” he said. “She has a baby inside her, so I couldn’t. I just wanted to teach her a lesson. She ruined everything. She pretended she wanted to be my girlfriend, and she made me lie to Aunt Odell. Because of her I almost...”
Austin could see the doctor growing more agitated. He would have called a halt to the questioning, but Austin laid a hand on his arm. “Wait, just one more minute.”
“Almost what, Henry?” Caro said.
“I almost hurt a baby, an innocent.”
“And that would have been much different than killing, say, a girl who’d just had a baby.”
Henry nodded enthusiastically, as if relieved that someone finally understood his dilemma.
Caro stood. “Okay, Henry, that’s enough for now. You’ve been a big help. Would it be okay if I came and talked to you again?”
“Sure.”
She said goodbye to the lawyer, who understandably looked a bit green. But there’d been little he could do. Caro hadn’t even come close to infringing upon Henry’s rights.
She came out of the observation room, allowing the doctor to go inside and soothe his patient. As soon as the door closed, she slumped against it, nearly gasping for air. She’d been more nervous than she’d let on.
Austin grinned. “That was a thing of beauty.”
“Then why am I sick to my stomach?”
“You probably just need some lunch.”
“No, what I need is a hug.”
He tensed, remembering the last time he’d hugged her. Ignorant of her injuries, he’d hurt her and she’d pushed him away.
“I’m serious, Austin. My knees are like a couple of wet noodles.”
He could hardly say no. Mindful of the bandage beneath her sweater at the small of her back, he embraced her gingerly.
“Harder,” she said.
