Harvest of Ruins

by Sandra Ruttan

  “I know what personification means.” That's what Vinny Shepherd said the first time Hunter met her, when Vinny was just seven years old. Hunter had been partnered with Vinny’s dad for eleven months by that time. She’d heard her share of stories about his daughter, despite the fact that Tom kept his work and personal life as separated as possible. Hunter had never imagined she'd run into Tom and Vinny at Tim Hortons.

  Hunter hadn’t even realized he liked Tim Hortons.

  Tom was never available to go for dinner or breakfast after shift, and he didn’t meet up even occasionally for a drink at the bar. His wife seemed to keep him on a pretty short leash.

  “Hey, Tom,” Hunter said when she recognized him, only a few steps ahead of her in the parking lot.

  When he turned he instinctively pulled his daughter closer. His brow was furrowed, and his expression didn’t soften until he looked right at her and realized she was the one who’d spoken to him. The eyes widened a touch, not enough for most people to take note of, but more than enough for Hunter to pick up on, and although he loosened his grip on Vinny he didn’t let go of her.

  “McKenna.”

  She shrugged off the formality. Tom’s hesitation, his reluctance to be seen together in public when they were off the job, was obvious. Maybe it was the fear that his wife would find out and jump to conclusions.

  Or maybe it was something else, a different kind of fear. The fear that he’d find some happiness away from his wife and be confronted with a choice he wasn’t prepared to make. How long had that been her secret hope?

  He didn’t return her smile, but stood still, as though he was uncertain about what to do next.

  A polite formality would end the exchange and they could carry on, go about their business, pretend they didn’t know each other as well as they did and refuse to allow their paths to cross for more than a few seconds.

  Hunter turned her attention to the dark-haired, wide-eyed girl she’d heard so much about. “You must be Vinny.” She knew from Tom that Vinny’s mother disapproved of the nickname.

  She also knew the little girl preferred it, and that Tom did as well.

  Vinny rewarded her with a wide smile. Tom had said something about his daughter being sick and her skin was still pale, but despite that there was an obvious sparkle in her eye.

  “Is your name McKenna?”

  Hunter risked a glance at Tom. “That’s my last name.”

  “Then why’d Daddy call you that?”

  “When we work together, we call each other by our last names.”

  Vinny’s eyes widened. “You work with my dad?”

  She nodded. “I’m his partner.”

  “You’re a police woman?”

  Said like the little girl was stunned to discover not all cops were men.

  Hunter nodded again as Vinny looked up at her dad and then stared back at Hunter, her mouth hanging open.

  “Say hello to Ms. McKenna, Vinny.”

  Hunter reached out to shake Vinny’s hand, then laughed. "I'm sorry. I forgot about your arm."

  Tom had told her all about the reason for the cast. Three kids had let their curiosity get the better of them, and snuck off to the old Colville Farm. The property had been abandoned for decades, following the death of one of the children in an alleged farming accident. Anyone who grew up in the area grew up hearing the stories, about cages and dungeons and kids locked up in old ruins. They all knew kids snuck onto the property all the time, occasionally they claimed they'd been in the public wooded area that bordered the farm and just got lost, but the cops knew. They regularly checked the farm at night.

  Vinny's friends had talked her into sneaking onto the property during the day. It was possible they wouldn't have been caught, if not for the fact that Vinny had fallen from the loft and broken her arm.

  Tom said Rose had been furious. The arm was bad enough. Then Vinny got sick.

  Hunter smiled at Vinny and said, “Call me Hunter. That’s my first name”

  Vinny smiled. “That’s a good name. Can you write it on my cast?”

  Hunter glanced at Tom, who shrugged, and she signed her name for Vinny.

  “Are you going to have lunch with your dad?”

  The little girl nodded enthusiastically. She was leaning against Tom, but despite her pallor she’d started to glow. “Are you having lunch here too?”

  Hunter nodded. “It’s one of my favorite places to eat.”

  “You can have lunch with us.” Vinny twisted her head to look up at her father. “Can’t she, Daddy?”

  Tom’s mouth hung open for a split second. “I…” He stopped himself as he reached down and rubbed his daughter’s head. “Hunter might have other plans, Vinny.”

  The smile vaporized and those big eyes got even bigger as Vinny looked at Hunter. “Do you?”

  She looked at Tom and he offered a slight shrug. “No, I don’t,” Hunter said.

  “Can you eat with us?” Vinny twisted her head back to look up at her dad. “Please, Daddy?”

  Vinny seemed so excited to meet her dad’s partner. Hunter knew he’d give in. Tom wouldn’t deny his daughter’s happiness, especially when it was an innocent encounter he could justify in his own mind.

  It would be harder to explain to Rose, but Hunter guessed Tom had to answer to that woman for so much, he’d almost given up on the idea of appeasing her.

  Hunter felt the instant connection with the vibrant little girl. Or was it wishful thinking on her part, to imagine Vinny accepting her, and what possibilities that might lead to?

  They’d gone inside, found a table, ordered, and Vinny effortlessly carried the conversation, enabling Tom to set his discomfort aside. That’s when Vinny told her about the word.

  “I know what personification means,” Vinny said.

  “Really?” It sounded like a big word for a girl her age. “What does it mean?”

  “It’s when you take something that’s not a person and make it seem like a person by making it do people things.” Vinny pointed out the window. “Like today. The sun is smiling at us.”

  ***

  Hunter opened her eyes, tossed her sheet aside and got out of bed. It took only a few seconds for her to cross the floor to the window seat where her cat lay, curled in a ball, undisturbed by the change in weather. She leaned against the glass, and watched the water run down the windowpane.

  I know what personification means.

  It was the day of the funeral, and the sky was crying.

  LOVERS IN A DANGEROUS TIME

  - Bruce Cockburn -

  “…to be charged with negligent homicide…”

  Hunter watched the lips move, but all the words that came before and followed after those six faded into nothingness.

  All she heard were half a dozen words that sounded as though they’d been said as a statement of fact, not an accusation to be proven or a question to be answered.

  She was aware of the stoic face of the judge. Ackerley was a younger judge, with dark blonde hair, smooth skin and what struck Hunter as wise eyes. Boredom and indifference that had already settled on the faces of the jury. There was a petite woman, older, with sagging folds of skin on her face but sharp eyes that seemed to have the skill of a hawk. She struck Hunter as a firecracker. An older man was nodding off already, and he did slowly remove his glasses, clean them on his shirt for a moment, and yawn as he replaced them. There was the obvious mother, her diamond cross gleaming from her neckline, her modest shirt reflecting her Christian values, which were further evidenced by a lack of makeup and what Noah called the Pious Pose - the slight tilt of the head that made one look caring and spiritual, although Hunter was never sure why. To her, it looked like someone trying to get water out of their ear.

  Whenever she watched TV shows they always put the jury in a box to the right. Had she ever seen a show that put them on the left? She meant the defendant's left, when they sat facing the judge.

  Funny. Didn't the TV shows always put the defendant at t
he left table, too?

  As a police officer, Hunter had been in court enough times to know that things didn't always look the way Hollywood portrayed them. She was sitting at a table to the far right, on the outside of it, as far away from the jury as possible. They were sitting to her left.

  To the judge's right.

  Rows of faces she could still scrutinize from this far away. Rows of faces that would decide her fate.

  Rows of faces she wished didn't look so bored.

  Her gaze softened, like it had zoomed out like a camera. She could still see it all, but everything seemed farther away, as though she’d pressed a button inside her mind that let her zoom out and withdraw from what was going on around her.

  So far away, and yet so dangerously close, as though there was an unseen force pressing up against her and she couldn’t breathe…

  The featherweight touch of fingers on the back of her arm reset her focus. She was back, only a dozen feet away from the judge, a bit farther than that from where the jury sat, and mere inches from her attorney, John Solomon, who watched her as he let go of her arm. Hunter drew a deep breath and steadied herself.

  “You may be seated.”

  Hunter fought to keep from collapsing in the chair. As a detective sergeant with the Ontario Provincial Police she was used to the physical demands of the job, the need to work for hours on end when a case was hot, even the need to chase suspects and apprehend them. Although she’d endured the tedium of waiting to testify for dozens of trials, what she’d never realized was how exhausting it was to be inside the courtroom process with your own fate hanging in the balance.

  The prosecutor was Troy Grainger. He remained seated behind his table. A young man with unruly, sandy hair he kept cut short so that it wouldn’t make him seem too boyish.

  He’d told Hunter that once. He hadn’t needed to tell her he overcompensated with the $1000 suits he wore.

  What was it her lawyer had said? If you’re confident you don’t need theatrics.

  She looked at how Grainger was dressed. Today, he was confident.

  Hunter glanced at her attorney, who did not overcompensate with expensive suits. Like Grainger, Solomon was young and sharp, but he didn’t have the challenges of Grainger’s unruly hair and freckled face. Solomon’s brown hair swept back professionally, and the lone dimple in his lean face made him look handsome, not childish.

  Despite her prolonged gaze, Solomon ignored her.

  Words were being exchanged. Formalities, she supposed. How many times had she sat in a courtroom as she waited for a verdict, and listened to others testify? All of it was a blur pushed out of her mind.

  Until Grainger said something she did hear.

  “The state calls Detective Sergeant Hunter McKenna, Your Honor.”

  “Objection, Your Honor.” Solomon was on his feet. “My client did not receive any notice of the prosecution’s intent to call her as a witness. She has the right-”

  “Your Honor,” Grainger said, “I wish to establish the facts of this case in the context of the events that occurred. As the detective sergeant who was in charge of the criminal investigation that started this sequence of events-”

  “Objection! Your Honor, my esteemed colleague is presuming as fact a theory he has not yet proven. The defense contends that the investigation he refers to was not the sole, or even the primary, contributing factor-”

  “And my esteemed colleague will have an opportunity to present his case to the court, Your Honor. I only asked that I be afforded the opportunity to call witnesses who are able to provide relevant information that supports the state’s interpretation of events.”

  Solomon opened his mouth to respond, but the judge raised her hand and stopped him.

  “This is highly unusual, Mr. Grainger. However, I am prepared to allow testimony from the defendant at this time.” Judge Ackerley looked at Solomon. “Mr. Grainger shall limit the scope of his questioning to matters related to the prior investigation. Mr. Solomon, you shall have the opportunity to call your client as a witness in her own defense if you choose, and Mr. Grainger shall reserve cross-examination on that part of her testimony until that time.”

  “Thank you, Your Honor,” Grainger said.

  Solomon echoed the words, but without the same level of enthusiasm Grainger displayed. He looked at Hunter as he sat down and nodded.

  She stood up slowly and walked on Jell-O legs to the stand. She went through the same routine she had before countless times, raised her hand, swore an oath, and sat down. But it wasn’t the same as all those times before.

  This time, the life that hung in the balance was hers.

  MURDER INCORPORATED

  - Bruce Springsteen -

  DS Hunter McKenna Testifying For The Prosecution

  - The Discovery of Adam Fields' Body -

  They say the last thing you see before you die is recorded in your eyes. Hunter McKenna wondered if this was what Adam Fields’ eyes would show if they could see that image. His body surrounded by a white porcelain bathtub surrounded by marble tile, water pelting down at him from above?

  “Goddamn CSI shit.”

  Hunter McKenna watched her partner swear, turn, stomp across the room and swing his foot at the trash can. When Noah Wilmott’s toe connected with the steel bin it rose into the air before it tipped sideways and the contents spilled all over the floor.

  He limped and cursed for a few steps, although he kept the words under his breath. Hunter knew him well enough to know what he was saying, though. It seemed like Noah hadn’t thought kicking the can would hurt as much as it apparently did. His hair was black as coal but he had the temper of a redhead, a temper he tried to rein in and offset with a groomed appearance, but there were times his nature defied the suit-and-tie charmer image he worked so hard to project.

  Next to Noah, Hunter felt frumpy. He had a nicer wardrobe, a more recent haircut and most of the time he appeared polished. Her hair wisped around her face, her curves threatened to push her out to the next clothing size, and she never had felt like dress pants fit properly anyway.

  Noah staggered out the door, down the hall.

  “Where the hell is Heineman? That goddamn spit-for-brains no-good sack of shit.” There was a pause as Heineman was located, and then Noah’s voice returned with a roar. “Prove you aren’t totally useless. Tell me it occurred to you for even just a split second to turn the water off and stop running evidence down the goddamn drain.”

  Under other circumstances a smile might have tugged at Hunter’s lips, but on this occasion she could understand her partner’s anger. The discovery of a body had been reported around the time early risers ate breakfast. The late risers had been deprived of their opportunity to sleep in, at least in this cul de sac, unless the growing chorus of sirens that had reached their crescendo outside this otherwise normal home hadn’t piqued their curiosity and their curtains were thick enough to block out the swirling lights of the half dozen plus emergency vehicles that had converged there.

  By the time Hunter and Noah had arrived the slipper-and-robe brigade had swelled to such a size that she guessed the bystanders included residents from as far as three blocks away. The joggers and dog-walkers, interspersed with the sleep-deprived, explained the spread of information throughout the quiet community.

  They’d been on the front step when the first camera crew arrived.

  Hunter looked down at the body in the tub, felt the heat of the steam on her skin as she snapped a plastic glove over her hand, reached for the tap and turned the water off. Goddamn CSI shit indeed.

  The reported body lay in the tub of what was undoubtedly the master bath, adjacent to a massive bedroom that a one-bedroom apartment could fit inside, with room to spare. Considering the size of the room, and the fact that the door to the master bath had reportedly been left open, the house must have had one hell of a hot water tank. The steam had fogged the mirror and she’d felt the heat when she’d twisted the spigot. Hunter stepped aside for Dr. E
aton, although the bathroom itself was as large as a standard bedroom, and she was hardly in his way.

  The wizened doctor, whose face made Hunter think of an albino raisin, prepared himself to examine the body and knelt by the tub. “Apparent cause of death would be from a gunshot wound to the temple.” Dr. Eaton’s voice was gruff but hinted at no emotional response. He carefully lifted the decedent’s hands and examined them.

  They’d been folded neatly across the boy’s naked body, resting on his stomach, where the spray of water from the shower nozzle had been directed.

  Deliberate or coincidence?

  “We’ll check for gunshot residue, but the water…” Dr. Eaton stood up and shook his balding head. “Obviously, core body temperature and rate of decomposition has been affected.” He bent over and lifted the victim’s leg a few inches, grunted, and nodded. “He’s pretty fresh. I can’t even swear to cause of death until I get him on the table.”

  Hunter nodded. It was what she’d expected to hear. “Hot water was still running. We might be able to establish a window based on the size of their tank, how much hot water remains…” She’d have to have someone shut the system down so that it didn’t start replenishing the supply. “Glad you were in the area.”

  He grunted again. “Convenient when I live across town.”

  Or not so convenient, Hunter thought as she watched him glance at the body again. “Recognize him?” she asked.

  “Adam Fields.”

  Adam Fields… Where did she know the name? It clicked. Her former partner, Tom. Tom’s daughter. Adam was a boy Vinny had played with. Hunter could remember a few times, when she’d been in the neighborhood where Tom’s ex-wife still lived, and seen Adam as a young boy. Blond hair, and truly white skin. He’d stood out almost as much as Jonah.

  Jonah, a gorgeous boy with light brown skin, huge chocolate eyes, and clothes that bordered on rags. Somehow, as children they’d overlooked the obvious differences.

  But with age came the loss of innocence, that taint of the world and the distorted views so many held.