by Sarah Lovett
His voice warmed up ten degrees. "Sylvia, we won't ignore this child. This morning I spoke with the attorney general—I got that insomniac out of bed—and tomorrow morning I'll file a petition with the courts for a blood test to determine paternity. We'll be in touch."
As the lawyer walked briskly down the hallway, Rosie spoke under her breath: "He's slick as floor wax, isn't he?" She caught Sylvia's eye. The dozen keys on her belt jingled. Her face was alive with curiosity.
A woman's voice rang out sharply. "Dr. Strange?"
Sylvia and Rosie both turned. Someone had stepped from the deputy warden's office into the hallway. She looked vaguely familiar, a medium-tall woman with shoulder-length strawberry-blond hair and classically European features. As the blonde brushed past Jim Teague, Sylvia made the connection: Cash Wheeler's sister.
"I'm Noelle Harding."
"Noelle." Jim Teague's commanding voice rolled through the hallway. "Let's do this the way we discussed—" His mouth twisted into a frown when Noelle Harding waved him off.
The woman approached Sylvia, fixing her with an intensely direct gaze. Agitated, she asked, "Do you have a picture of this child?"
Sylvia reached into her briefcase and pulled out a C.P.S. Polaroid. Harding took the photograph and studied the image—the child's face, dark, wide-set eyes expressing vigilance, mouth compressed with tension. In the photo, Serena's skin was still bruised and slightly puffy above one eye.
Noelle Harding didn't speak for almost thirty seconds. She seemed to be absorbing the chemical image. Her body remained motionless, her posture turned brittle with suppressed emotion.
Finally, she reached out to clasp Sylvia's wrist between ringed fingers: "Let's talk."
SYLVIA GAZED WARILY at Noelle Harding. The women were seated on plush leather in the back of Harding's black limo-van. Harding reached for a phone and said, "Stan, we'll be a few minutes. Why don't you enjoy a smoke?" After a second, the driver's door opened, then closed quietly.
A single pale pink rose was tucked into a brass vase. The scent of the flower was unpleasantly intense in the small space. On the other side of tinted windows, forty feet up the road, a prison utility truck was idling, and three inmates were pulling weeds along an asphalt edge; every few seconds, one of the inmates glanced furtively at the limo-van. Beyond the men, the building that housed the prison's sewage-treatment plant blocked the brilliant blue sky with gray. For several moments, Harding appeared to be completely engrossed by the scene.
Sylvia bit back her impatience and tried to gain a sense of Noelle Harding in this incongruous setting. In person, Harding was smaller and her features more delicate than the television news clips suggested. The Minicams had been interested in catching the nouveau riche social activist who raised massive funds for charities, the one-woman crusade who had dedicated ten years of her life to saving her brother from execution.
But the cameras had failed to capture the vulnerable woman who finally turned her full attention to Sylvia. Noelle Harding spoke in a soft voice. "I want you to understand our lawyer's position. This is a horrible time for my brother and myself. And for Jim Teague, too; don't imagine for a moment he's not emotionally involved with my family. With the execution date so close—" She raised her palms as if to ward off time. She fumbled in her jacket pocket and produced a pack of cigarettes. She was already flicking one out as she asked, "Do you mind if I smoke?"
Sylvia shook her head as the other woman lit a Sherman's. Harding brushed a shred of tobacco from her lip and inhaled. Sylvia felt a strong pang for nicotine and told herself the craving would pass in a decade or two.
Harding said, "From what I've already gleaned, you are involved with this child on a personal level." Sylvia began to speak, but Harding dismissed her words with a wave of her cigarette. "You and I are not at all different, Sylvia. You care for an abandoned little girl; I care for my brother." The woman lowered her head and ran a hand through her hair. When she looked up again her eyes were predatory, a female lion ready to defend her cub. Her voice rose harshly. "I don't want my brother's hopes raised, then dashed because all this turns out to be bullshit."
"What do you want from me?"
"Cooperation."
"Fine. You've got it. We're not on opposite sides of the fence." She leaned toward Harding. "The fact is, the courts, several federal agencies, the state police, and the Mexican Consulate are all involved because Serena is a minor, possibly a Mexican national, and because she's connected to a murder." Sylvia's eyes darkened. "I won't let this child out of my reach until I know who she is, who she belongs to, and if she's in danger."
Harding studied Sylvia for several moments. Then she nodded, exhaling smoke. "If you can prove the child has a parent in the U.S., she stays." She flicked her cigarette in an ashtray, casually summing up the stakes—a child's welfare.
"If by some miracle this child is my niece, I will do anything to help her." She leaned closer to Sylvia. "And she'll need my protection, because a killer is free . . . while my brother is locked away for a crime he didn't commit."
"You've never doubted your brother's innocence?"
Harding stubbed her cigarette out in the ashtray. "Never." Her stare was direct. "Cash loved Elena."
"Men murder women every day—love is the perfect motive."
"My brother isn't like that." Harding took a breath, readjusting the veneer of control that had slipped just slightly. She was dressed in a simple suit that had cost at least five hundred dollars; her small sapphire earrings were a perfect match with her eyes. She shifted her body in the leather seat.
"I don't know what you've heard about the case . . . or about my brother and me. Cash was nine and I was eleven when our parents died. We were dirt poor. We had an aunt who couldn't decide if she . . . could be bothered to care for us. We spent eight years off-and-on at a school for unwanted kids. In El Paso. That's where Cash met Elena."
As she spoke with just the softest hint of a Texas twang, Noelle Harding fingered the diamond-studded band on the third finger of her left hand. She took a quick breath and smiled. "My brother was a gentle kid . . . the kind you have to look out for every minute." For an instant, she'd sounded like a weary mother. Then her eyes changed, her voice hardening. "I won't sit back and watch my brother die."
"Then help me. Help Serena."
Harding's response was to press a button at her elbow, causing the window to lower with a soft whirring sound. The chauffeur was standing a few yards from the limo talking quietly with one of the prison officers. Harding called out, "We're almost done, Stan."
Sylvia didn't hear the chauffeur's reply, but she knew when he'd started the engine because the vehicle vibrated gently. She felt a fleeting sense of panic that her time had run out—not just with Noelle Harding but with Serena as well.
Noelle's eyes searched Sylvia's face. "I want to see her," she said. She touched Sylvia's arm gently. "I want you to take me to her."
Sylvia frowned. "You realize there's concern about her safety—"
Harding waved one hand dismissively. "When I'm in New Mexico, I play golf with both your senators." She continued slowly, as if she might be addressing a simpleton. "If I want to see the child, I will. She's been placed in Mesa Verde Hospital under your supervision."
Sylvia considered Harding's impatient assertion, the arrogance and the truth of those words, then nodded. "I think I can set up a visit for tomorrow."
"Not tomorrow. Now."
Sylvia and Noelle locked eyes.
"My brother has no time left. If the girl is his daughter, I need to know."
RENZO SANTOS STOOD at the window of his La Posada casita. Through glass, he had a clear view of the parking area—and of the boy who was stealing his car. The thief popped the lock on the Suburban's door; daylight didn't faze him. Renzo grunted—the boy's methods were crude but effective.
When a vacationing couple wandered out of the room next to Renzo's, the boy leaned casually against the Suburban; he patted his pockets down,
pulling out a pack of cigarettes.
"Forget your keys?" the man called out in a heavy Texas twang. The boy laughed noncommittally, and the couple walked on toward the main hotel building, probably headed for the dining room.
When they were halfway across the parking lot, the boy jumped into the Suburban, flipped the locks down, and disappeared behind smoked glass. It would take him less than five seconds to find the key under the seat.
Renzo had made one phone call, given one order: make a vehicle disappear. He was satisfied with the service and fairly certain the Suburban was on its way to Mexico, where it would be abandoned near the border.
Now that the car was dealt with, Renzo calmly embarked on his own course of action: he prepared to deal with his injuries, the resulting fever, the probable hallucinations.
Blood coated his body, staining the towels he'd wrapped around himself, droplets even dotting the hotel-room floor. He groaned, let the nausea roll over him, then tried moving. Messages flew instantly to his brain and back again to his nerve endings: pain.
One bloody towel fell away, and the ragged wound on his thigh gaped open in an obscene show of raw flesh. The dog's teeth had gone deep enough to rip out muscle. He was lucky lobo loco hadn't killed him. The bite was centimeters from the femoral artery. He pressed another towel against the wound. He had smaller lacerations on his shoulder, his arms, his hands. Lobo loco had left a medium-sized bite mark at his waist.
First, Renzo would deal with the massive thigh wound—the blood loss and danger of infection were high. If he passed out within the next twenty minutes, the smaller injuries could wait.
As Renzo took three more steps, he clamped his jaw against the brutal pain. The movement of his leg muscles stretched the wound wider; when he removed the towel, the show of viscera reminded him of a terrible mouth.
He made it to the television, where CNN financial news was on the screen. He turned up the volume—loud enough to distract him, but not to cause problems with his immediate neighbors.
His muscles quivered, and he almost fainted. Shakily, he walked to the bathroom, where he vomited into the toilet. The feeling of nausea took him back to childhood. He lay down on the black-and-white tiled floor—he had no choice, although the effort caused him terrific pain. Smears of blood stained the floor; he'd started bleeding heavily again. He hung his head over the edge of the toilet bowl. His mind began to play tricks. The white porcelain supporting his cheek became a Mexican gutter. He became a boy named Jesús who watched the legs and feet of passing pedestrians. Someone spat near his face. As he lay there—fourteen years old, filthy, and stoned—he wondered which of the shoes belonged to his father? These were the streets his mother-the-puta worked every night. His father could pass him each day. The old man might be a shopkeeper, he might be a dentist, he might be a criminal, a junkie, a soldier. Jesús had seen the kind of men who used the putas. He'd already made up his mind to escape this world; he would do whatever was necessary. He would lie, he would sell drugs to his own family, he would murder. Jesús turned his face away from the street.
When the sickness and its accompanying vision passed, Renzo crawled to the shower stall, pulled himself up, and turned the nozzle to cold. Gingerly, he eased himself under the stinging flow. Pain redefined his world. He tried to make his inner self invisible. When he came to, he was huddled on the floor of the shower, water and blood swirling beneath his feet and buttocks.
Somehow Renzo made it from the shower to the toilet. He sat, took out his leather kit, and opened it. He removed his knife, rolled catgut, Betadine wash, a surgical needle, and various vials. Without water, he chewed and swallowed four large painkillers. Even morphine would not kill the pain. He flushed the thigh wound with the iodine-based disinfectant.
It was an ugly, imprecise wound. Lobo loco had partaken of his flesh. Now his body was inside the dead wolf. Renzo felt respect for this bond. Instead of its flesh, he had partaken of the animal's spirit, its life force.
That was the ritual of blood sacrifice.
He reached over to the wall, turned a black knob so the heat lamp flooded the room with light and warmth. He dabbed at the frayed corners of his skin with a washcloth soaked in iodine. It took him more than a minute to thread the needle with catgut; he stared at it for several seconds. His hands were shaking, and his unblinking gaze never quite landed on the sharp steel.
His fuzzy thoughts tried to settle on the next move he would make to find the child. He had already picked his local contact—he had the number, a private line. It was good to have friends in high places.
He brought the needle up to his face. He took a breath. Blood sacrifice . . . Serpent Skirt . . . Coatlicue . . . goddess of his ancestors.
When he was ready, he stretched one hand across his thigh so his fingers spanned the canyon of the wound. With a grunt, he pulled the edges together. The needle pierced one flap, then the other—not cleanly, not neatly. It took surprising force to pull the thick catgut through his battered flesh. After only three stitches he was overcome by nausea, simply heaving a small quantity of foam and bile onto the floor by his feet. He was careful to miss the lesion.
He heard something, looked up, and saw Elena's child staring at him. She was pointing at the dangling, bloodied needle. She was laughing. He reached out to touch her, but she shook her head and dissolved.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
THE PREVIOUS NIGHT, Serena had been transported from the crime scene to St. Vincent's Hospital and, finally, to Mesa Verde Hospital. The private facility was located on Santa Fe's west side; it covered half a city block, a bland institutional vision of Pueblo-style architecture.
Sylvia had driven Noelle Harding in the Toyota pickup; Harding's chauffeur had agreed to follow thirty minutes later. She parked in the lot opposite a sign that read STAFF ONLY. Since joining the Forensic Evaluation Unit approximately two years earlier, she'd become affiliated with Mesa Verde as well as several other local institutions; her status as a staff member meant that she could continue therapy with clients admitted to those institutions. Mesa Verde specialized in the treatment of adults and teenagers with substance-abuse problems, eating disorders, and non-violent psychiatric disorders.
Serena did not fit the profile of the hospital's usual resident—but she had something in common with other patients: she was in residence for her personal safety.
Before Sylvia climbed out of the truck, she asked Noelle a question that had been on her mind. "Your brother's infant daughter, what was her name?"
For an instant, Harding appeared at a loss. Then she said, "Elena was murdered before she and Cash could name their baby."
Sylvia's eyes went wide with surprise. "But you said the child was almost two months old—"
"And my brother and Elena had been separated most of that time. Cash told me Elena wanted him to choose a formal name because he was the father." Noelle shook her head quickly as if she'd suddenly remembered something else. "Elena had a nickname for the baby. Angelina."
Little Angel. As Sylvia led the way up the narrow cement walkway, disquiet tugged at her consciousness—or perhaps it was the overload of so much new information. But she couldn't easily accept the idea that two lovers would go for weeks, even months, without choosing a formal name for their baby. She pushed open the hospital's double glass doors and entered the reception area.
A woman seated behind a desk smiled, and Sylvia greeted her with a crisp "Hello, Charlene." When she was almost past reception, she called out, "How was the Mud Ponies concert?"
Charlene grinned. "Hot."
Noelle kept pace with Sylvia along a main hallway where the walls were off-white and the rooms had no noticeable numbers. The sound of heels on tile was intensified in the hard, angular space. When they reached a reinforced door, Sylvia used a punch code to gain entry. But only after trial and error. Still, it was better than a key ring. The hospital was in the process of updating its security system, and some of the private rooms still had key locks.
The locked ward was different—the lights were dimmer and the tile was a soothing shade of pastel blue. Sylvia slowed, then stopped to glance through the window of Room 21. It was empty, and she motioned Noelle to follow once more. As they walked, Sylvia said, "I wanted Serena to participate in supervised activities. She's probably with Betsy, who's an intern and really good with kids."
They continued down the hall through another locked door. This new area consisted of offices and treatment rooms. Just beyond a small staff room that smelled of coffee, Sylvia ushered Noelle Harding into a cramped office. It contained a folding chair and a narrow desk. A notebook lay on the desk, directly in front of what appeared to be a wide mirror. Sylvia pushed aside the notebook, motioning for Noelle to step forward.
The mirror was actually an observation window. On the other side of the glass, inside a room that functioned as a play-therapy area, a young woman was seated at a low table. Just beyond the woman's easy reach, Serena was on the floor, hunched over scattered toys. The child seemed to be all knees and elbows, and her face was hidden beneath her mane of ebony hair, which had fallen loose from a ponytail.
Noelle leaned forward attentively, her composure worn like her perfectly tailored suit. "She's holding herself in . . . she seems stiff." She glanced worriedly at Sylvia, then returned her gaze to the scene beyond the window. "She's not autistic—"
"You're right, she's not." Sylvia was reminded that Noelle Harding, as founder of the Rescue Fund, would have seen hundreds of children with diverse problems, physical as well as psychological. This time, though, she was watching a girl who might be family—a niece who had been presumed dead for the last ten years.
Harding asked, "You mentioned that the hospital ran a battery of tests on her after the accident. Did they rule out all organic problems?"
"As far as we can tell, none of this is organically based. We know she's experienced trauma . . . and I believe she also exhibits aspects of a psychological disorder. It would affect her social skills, her ability to communicate with strangers." Sylvia shifted her gaze to Noelle.
