by Sharon Sala
She stopped and turned. A little dark-headed girl, who looked to be no more than three or four, was running toward her and laughing aloud. China smiled. Her daughter. Of course. What had she been thinking? She couldn’t go without her. They clasped hands as if they’d done it countless times before and resumed their journey toward the distant rhythmic sound. It didn’t seem strange that the child beside her was older than the child she’d been carrying. It was her baby, just the same.
They walked and talked, pointing at a bird sitting on a nearby tree, stopping to smell a patch of wildflowers nestled by the path. The longer they walked, the louder the sound became. Before long, China could just make out the sound of voices, and within a short time, she could hear what they were saying.
“Welcome… welcome. We’ve come to walk you home.”
Joy flooded her as she bent down and picked her daughter up, suddenly anxious to reach them. The child’s hair was thick and soft, and it blew against her cheek like so many strands of black silk, and then they were there in the midst of the murmuring crowd.
“China Mae, I’m so happy to see you, child.”
China started to laugh. Mother. It was Mother.
“We’re home, Mother, we’re home,” China said.
The murmuring began again, only louder, encompassed by an ever-growing light. China stood in awe of the illumination and knew a quiet recognition. Love filled her as she lifted her face to the light, then everything began to change. Her daughter was in her arms and then she was not. In fear, she saw her mother carrying her away.
“Wait,” China cried. “Wait for me.”
But the light blocked her path, and she couldn’t move through it.
“No!” China begged. “Don’t leave me here.”
Mae stopped and turned, her granddaughter perfectly balanced on her hip.
“It’s not your time, China Mae. You have to go back.”
China had no time to protest. One moment she was standing before the presence of God, and then she felt herself falling… falling… back to the pain and the cold.
And she was going alone.
***
Detective Bennett English pushed his way through the gathering crowd and then slipped beneath a strip of yellow crime scene tape, flashing his badge as he went.
“English. Homicide.”
The patrolman on duty nodded to let him pass and then turned his attention to some overzealous onlookers, forcing them back behind the barrier.
Ben shivered as he slogged his way through the muck on the street, thankful he was wearing his boots instead of street shoes. He approached a pair of officers standing near a parked ambulance. One of them was sipping coffee, while the other was using his baton to knock ice from the bottom of one shoe.
“I see you got the luck of the draw tonight, huh, English? Where’s your buddy Fisher?”
“Home with the flu,” Ben said, then pointed to the bodies. “What have we got?”
One of the officers shrugged. “Dead people,” he said, then took another sip of his coffee. “No witnesses. No nothing, which is no surprise around here.”
Ben gave the area a quick glance. It was true. This part of the city was not a hangout for Dallas’s more law-abiding citizens.
“Hell of a night to die,” the other officer said.
Ben frowned. “Is there ever a good time?” he asked, then turned, looking toward the blanket-covered body in the street.
“Do we know who they are?”
“That one’s a male. The Medical Examiner is almost through with him. As soon as he is, we’ll check for ID.”
Ben nodded, pointing toward the other body on the sidewalk and the paramedics hovering around it.
“What about that one?”
“Woman—mid to late twenties—pregnant.”
As cold as he was, Ben felt a deeper sort of chill invade his body.
“Damn,” he muttered, as he gave the paramedics a closer look. “So we’re looking at three deaths and not two.”
Suddenly there was a flurry of activity around the woman. Ben moved closer to the scene.
“What’s going on?” he asked.
“We’ve got a live one,” one of the paramedics said, as they began moving her toward a gurney.
Ben’s focus shifted. If she lived, it would make getting answers to this mess a whole lot easier. As they pushed her past him on the way to the ambulance, he glanced at her face.
Even with the snow melting on her cheeks and plastering her hair to her head, she was beautiful. She had a small straight nose above lips softly parted, and eyelashes so black and thick they looked like shadows. Her cheeks were pale and pinched from the cold, but the delicate cut of her features was impossible to miss, as was the small, perfect dimple in the middle of her chin.
Ben’s gaze moved from her face to the wound near her shoulder. His gaze dropped from that to her abdomen and the wide slash of red staining her coat.
“What about the baby?” he asked.
The medic shook his head as they moved past.
Sadness quickened. He could only imagine her despair if she lived—waking up in a hospital and learning that she had survived while her baby had not. He shifted his stance and looked away, unwilling to pursue his thoughts. He was letting his emotions interfere with his objectivity, and that was something he couldn’t afford.
As he watched, the last paramedic climbed inside and reached out to close the ambulance doors.
“Where are you taking her?” Ben yelled.
“Parkland,” he said.
Within seconds they were gone, speeding away into the night with a woman in need of a miracle.
Ben took out his notebook and moved back toward the body in the street. The ME was leaving. He caught him at the door of his car.
“Hey, Gregson, got a minute?”
Bob Gregson looked up. “Evening, English. I see you got the luck of the draw tonight. Where’s your shadow?”
“Red’s down with the flu. What can you tell me about the victim?”
“He died of multiple gunshot wounds. Won’t know which one did him in until we do an autopsy, but I doubt it matters. Someone wanted him dead real bad and kept shooting until the job was done.”
“Send a copy of the autopsy to my office, okay?”
“Don’t hold your breath,” Gregson muttered, as he slid behind the wheel of his car. “We’re backed up as it is.”
Ben empathized with the frustration in the ME’s voice, but knowing as much as possible within the first twenty-four hours of a homicide was crucial to solving the case. The coroner drove away as Ben moved back to the body.
“Find any ID on him?” Ben asked.
One of the officers handed him a plastic bag with a wallet and a couple of business cards inside.
“Some guy named Finelli… Charles Finelli.”
Ben’s pulse surged.
“Wait,” he said, and reached down, unzipping the body bag just enough to view the victim’s face. He grunted in disbelief.
“You know him?” one of the officers asked.
“By reputation,” Ben said. “He’s a bartender by trade and a psycho with a camera by night. He’s been booked a half-dozen times for trespassing. Thinks he’s some sort of Hollywood paparazzi type. Was there a camera on him?”
They all shook their heads in denial.
“Did you search the area?”
“We looked all over,” an officer said. “When we first arrived on the scene, we figured this for a domestic situation. You know… a man, a pregnant woman, probably an argument gone wrong. But neither one of them had a gun. We canvassed the area for everything from witnesses to gum wrappers, and if there’d been a camera to be found, we would have it.” He motioned toward the sky and the snow still falling. “Even the hookers took the night off, and according to the bunch inside the bar, no one heard a thing.”
Ben nodded. “Figures. No one ever wants to get involved. What about ID on the woman?”
�
�No purse, but she had this bag. We found it on the sidewalk near her body. Haven’t had time to go through it.”
They handed Ben the duffel bag and moved toward their patrol cars. They’d secured the scene, passed along all they knew to the detective division. It was Homicide’s problem now.
Ben tossed the bag into the trunk of his car, along with the plastic bag containing Charles Finelli’s personal effects. He would take it all to headquarters as soon as he made a few inquiries of his own inside the bar.
A few officers were still on-site as he stepped inside. It was a sleazy, inconsequential establishment, unremarkable in any respect except for the sign over the door—a bright-blue parrot in flight and the words The Blue Parrot glowing a bright neon-orange beneath.
He paused inside, ignoring the smoke and welcoming the enveloping warmth. The underlying murmur of voices silenced almost immediately as several patrons at the bar turned to stare. Their judgment was silent and brief. Moments later they turned back to their drinks, but the silence continued.
Ben stifled a sigh. Obviously he’d already been made, which did not bode well for getting any questions answered. He moved toward the bar.
“What’ll it be?” the bartender asked.
“Got any coffee?” Ben asked.
“No.”
“Then I pass,” Ben said.
The bartender shrugged and started to move away when Ben laid his badge on the counter. The bartender looked at the badge, then up at Ben, obviously unimpressed.
“Two people were gunned down in front of your place about twenty minutes ago,” Ben said.
The bartender’s stare never wavered. “Yeah, so I heard.”
“Don’t suppose you heard the shots?”
“I don’t suppose I did,” the bartender drawled.
“Then who called the cops?” Ben asked.
The bartender shrugged. “Some guy came in off the street, said there were two bodies in the snow. I showed him where the phone was. He used it. That’s all I know.”
“Is he still here?” Ben asked.
“Nope.”
“Can you tell me what he looked like?”
“Nope.”
Ben had to resist the urge to grab the bartender’s shirt and shake that insolent tone out of his voice.
He turned around and raised his voice so that it could be heard throughout the small room.
“Anybody in here see what happened outside?”
Nobody answered.
“Anybody hear anything… like gunshots… or a car speeding away?”
Total silence.
“Well now,” Ben drawled. “I want to thank you for your assistance. I know the young woman they just took to the hospital will appreciate knowing how much cooperation you gave toward finding the person who just shot her unborn baby to death inside her belly.”
Ben laid his card down on the corner of the bar and walked out, disgusted with them and with the human race in general. He was halfway to his car before he realized it had stopped snowing. The streets were eerily silent, making the sound of his own footsteps seem ominous as he stomped through three inches of snow. As he unlocked his car, a cat squalled from a nearby alley. Instinctively, he spun, reaching toward the semiautomatic he wore in a shoulder holster under his coat, but there was no one there. Silently cursing Red for succumbing to the flu, he slid behind the wheel and drove away.
Three
Ben hit the period key on his computer keyboard, then leaned back in his chair, eyeing the report he’d just finished. The shooting down in Oakcliff wasn’t the worst case he’d ever worked, but there was something about it that bothered him more than usual. His gaze moved from the typewriter to the wallets next to his phone. Notifying next of kin sucked.
Charles Finelli’s father lived in Krebs, Oklahoma, a small, predominately Italian community known for thriving vineyards and fabulous food. Anthony Finelli had cried when Ben informed him of his only son’s demise. After several phone calls he’d learned that there was no one left to cry for China Brown.
He picked up the old red wallet he’d found in her bag and opened it again, as he had off and on for the past hour and a half. It was thin and cracked and held together with a large rubber band. No money inside, and the picture on her driver’s license was typical of most—a self-conscious smile in the process of being born—but the tumble of thick, dark hair framing a delicate face was not. Even there, her beauty was evident.
He laid it aside and then leaned forward, resting his elbows on the desk and closed his eyes, and still he couldn’t rid himself of China Brown.
Last known address—no longer valid.
He thought of the landlord he’d spoken to earlier. What a jerk, evicting a pregnant woman into the snow. According to the landlord, the boyfriend was a guy named Tommy Fairheart, who’d gotten her pregnant and skipped out on her days earlier, taking all her money with him.
Ben stood abruptly, grabbed his coffee cup off the desk and headed toward the break room. He hoped they both burned in hell.
The coffee was bitter, but it was hot, and for now it was enough. He sipped it slowly, expecting the warmth to envelope him. Instead, the image of China Brown’s snow-covered face slipped into his mind. He shuddered instead. God, would he ever be warm again?
He glanced at his watch. It was already morning. He needed to go home, get some food and a shower, at least pretend to sleep. But he knew sleep would be long in coming, if at all. So much about this shooting didn’t ring true, and the detective in him couldn’t turn loose of the puzzle, not even for the night.
Suddenly he set his cup down on the cabinet and strode to his desk, yanked his coat from the back of the chair and headed for the door. There was something he needed to do before he could sleep.
***
The nurse on desk duty in the ICU of Parkland Hospital was monitoring a patient’s erratic heart rate when the doors to the unit swung open. She stood abruptly, eyeing the tall, tousled-haired man with dismay.
“I’m sorry, sir, but you can’t just come in here like this. Visiting hours aren’t for another hour and…”
He flashed his badge.
“I don’t care who you are,” she said. “I don’t have any patients healthy enough for interrogation.”
“I didn’t come to talk,” he said softly. “I just need to see her.”
The nurse frowned. “See who?”
“China Brown… the pregnant woman who was shot.”
The nurse’s expression shifted, alarming Ben.
“She’s still alive… isn’t she?”
The nurse nodded. “But her baby didn’t make it.”
“Yeah, I know,” Ben said. “What’s her condition?”
The nurse checked the chart. “Critical.” Then she gave Ben a pleading look. “Please, Detective English, you have to leave.”
He turned, searching the beds for a glimpse of her face.
“Where is she?” he asked.
“Fourth one from the end.”
He took an impulsive step forward, then stopped when the nurse touched his coat sleeve, giving his arm a gentle squeeze.
“Come back tomorrow.”
He hesitated before nodding, his shoulders drooping with fatigue.
“Yeah, maybe I’d better. Sorry for the interruption. It’s just that she’s been on my mind ever since the—” He stopped, unwilling to bare his soul to a stranger.
“It’s a tragedy about the baby,” she said softly. “It was a little girl.”
Ben nodded. Halfway out the door he stopped and turned. He knew the routine. The baby would have been taken by Caesarian and sent to the morgue for an autopsy, even though it would have been assumed that the shooting was the cause of death. But then afterward…?
“About the baby…”
“Yes?”
“She doesn’t have any next of kin—Miss Brown, I mean.”
The nurse stood her ground. “I don’t know about that, sir. You’ll need to check with the docto
r who handled the surgery.”
“What’s his name?” Ben asked.
“Dr. Ross Pope.”
“I’ll talk to him in the morning,” Ben said. “In the meantime, if it matters, I’ll take responsibility for claiming the body until Miss Brown is able.”
“Yes, sir, I’ll make a note of your name for the records.”
Ben glanced back at the bed where China Brown was lying, then handed the nurse his card.
“If there’s any change—any change at all—I want to be notified. My home and office number are there. Call either, any time.”
She clipped the card to China’s chart.
Ben stood for a moment, staring down the length of the room to the woman on the fourth bed from the end, then stalked out as abruptly as he’d come in.
***
Bobby Lee Wakefield looked good and he knew it. The Armani suit he was wearing fit perfectly, accentuating his slim, wiry build and making his legs look even longer. The thousand-dollar Justin boots he was wearing were an affectation with the suit, but, here in Texas, quite appropriate.
He gave himself one last look in the mirror, smoothed his hands on both sides of his hair to pat down any loose ends and then headed for his desk. Ainsley Been, his campaign manager, would be here any moment to escort him to the Wyndham Anatole, where the press would be waiting. It was an elegant hotel, worthy of the announcement he was going to make. He glanced at his speech, then tossed it aside. He knew the damned thing by heart. He’d been planning it for years.
Bobby Lee Wakefield had come a long way from being a wildcatter’s son from Amarillo, Texas. Wearing clothes all through his school years that had been bought from the Goodwill store had not endeared him to any of his classmates, and he’d been deep in the jungles of Vietnam when his daddy finally struck it rich. Coming home to luxury had been as foreign as the jungle he’d nearly died in. He had taken one look at the elegance of their new home and known instinctively that it would take more than an endless supply of money for his family to match their surroundings. Within six months of coming home, he’d enrolled at Southern Methodist University and never looked back. Interning for every politician who would have him on staff had occupied his summers, and by the time he was ready to graduate, he had more than a foot in the door of state government. By the time he was thirty-five, he was serving his second term in the House of Representatives, and by his forty-second birthday he had been elected to a seat in the Senate. Here in Dallas, the city was his. He’d been divorced for years, was wealthy and handsome, popular as hell on Capitol Hill—and he was about to announce his plans to run for president of the United States of America.
