Blood Stains (22 page)

Becky frowned. “I can’t place that melody. It sounds familiar but—”

Something was pushing at the back of Maria’s mind—the sound of laughter, the brush of a kiss against her cheek, with a “sleep tight, don’t let the bed bugs bite”—but it was gone so quickly that she could have imagined it.

“It’s ‘Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star,’” Maria whispered, then set the globe on the floor near her knee. She was reaching back into the box when Becky’s phone rang.

“Rats. I left it on the hall table,” Becky muttered, and hurried to answer.

“Hello?”

“Mrs. Clemmons, it’s Detective Scott. I got your message. By any chance, have you heard from Maria Slade?”

“She’s sitting on my living room floor as we speak, going through her mother’s things.”

Bodie breathed a quick sigh of relief.

“Have you talked to your brother?”

“Yes.”

“Does Maria know what happened?”

“I haven’t said anything about it yet. I thought this was enough to deal with for the time being.”

“Good. I’ll talk to her when I get there. Tell her I’m on my way.”

“Will do,” Becky said, then hung up.

She glanced across the room, and for a moment it was as if twenty years had never passed and she was seeing Mary sitting on her floor playing, just as she’d done so many times before. Then she blinked and the notion was gone.

“That was Detective Scott,” Becky said, as she sat back down. “He said to tell you he’s on his way.”

Maria didn’t respond. She was staring at a pair of salt and pepper shakers that she’d just unwrapped. A little white hen with a red comb, and a rooster with a big red comb and a tail painted in garish colors. Without thinking, she shook the hen, watching blankly as a few tiny grains of salt fell out onto the wrappings. And the longer she looked, the faster her heart began to beat.

“I’ve seen these before.” She picked them up and turned them so Becky could see. “I’ve seen these before! Oh, my God…they had names. They did, didn’t they?”

Becky started to answer, then stopped. It wouldn’t help at all if she told. Instead, she held her breath and prayed.

Maria closed her eyes. The words were right there—waiting…waiting—just out of reach.

“The little hen and the big rooster…they had names. They had names. But what—” She gasped as her eyes flew open. “Matt and Kitty. Their names were Matt and Kitty.”

“Yes, because you and your mother watched reruns of
Gunsmoke
all the time. It was her favorite show. I always thought it was because she identified with Kitty…them being in the same profession.”

Maria’s eyes filled with tears. “It’s going to happen, isn’t it? Like you said, it’s going to take time, but this is a start. I’m going to remember.”

Fifteen

B
y the time Bodie reached Becky Clemmons’ house, Maria had emptied the second box and was on to the third. Her eyes were sparkling from the excitement of the hunt, and from the high of knowing that when it came to her memory, all was not lost.

Becky saw him drive up and went to the door before he could knock. She let him in the house, then put a finger to her lips and pointed.

The sight stopped him in his tracks. Maria was cross-legged on the floor, with a pile of wrapping behind her and the contents of two boxes spread out in front of her. Her head was down, her focus fixed on the paper-wrapped object in her lap. As if sensing his presence, she looked up, then broke into a smile.

Bodie’s gut knotted.
Have mercy. How did this happen? I am falling in love with a woman I hardly know.

“How’s it going?” he asked, as he walked over toward the empty chair beside her.

“Careful,” she said, pointing to her little unwrapped treasures. “See those?” She pointed to a hen-and-rooster salt-and-pepper set. “Their names are Matt and Kitty. I remembered that. It’s because my mother and I watched reruns of
Gunsmoke
. Isn’t that funny?”

Bodie sat with a thump, then looked up at Becky in surprise.

“She remembered on her own?”

Becky beamed. “Yes, and that snow globe, as well.”

“It plays ‘Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star,’” Maria said. “Mommy wound it every night when we were going to sleep.”

Becky’s eyes were filling with tears again, as they had off and on all morning. Maria didn’t realize she’d unconsciously shifted how she referenced her mother. She’d gone from thinking of her as Sally to my mother to Mommy in the space of a couple of hours.

Bodie was elated. For the first time since Maria Slade had walked into the station, he was beginning to believe they might actually have a chance of solving this case.

“Oh, look! Is this a diary? No…I think it’s a photo album,” Maria said.

“Can’t be a diary,” Becky said. “Your mother couldn’t read or write, remember?”

Maria opened the book, and the crudely printed and misspelled words literally leaped off the pages. “Oh, my God. Becky, look!”

Becky gasped.

marys babe bok

“I never saw her write anything but her name,” Becky said. “And even that was difficult for her.” She handed the book back to Maria.

Bodie was watching Maria’s face as she began leafing through the pages, and when she suddenly clutched the book against her chest and began to cry, he sat down on the floor beside her.

Maria took a deep, shuddering breath and then laid the open book back in her lap. When Bodie saw the pages, the love of a mother for her child came alive. Sally Blake might not have been able to write, but she’d kept a journal of her baby’s life in the only way she knew how. In pictures.

“May I?” he asked.

Maria handed him the book, then got up and stumbled out of the room. Becky followed. Bodie could hear her guiding Maria down the hall to her bathroom as he opened the book at the first page.

A tiny footprint and handprint had been stamped on the page, along with an old Polaroid snapshot of a tiny baby in a hospital nursery.

The next page had a tiny wisp of black hair taped to the page.

Each ensuing page had a different photo. One of Mary having a bath.

One of her standing beside a sofa, able to pull herself up but before she was walking.

Then a photo of Mary standing alone in the middle of a floor wearing nothing but a bib and a diaper.

Someone had taken a photo of Sally and Mary standing in front of the gorilla cage in a zoo. Bodie wondered if Mary’s absentee father had been on that trip, and if he was the one who’d snapped the photo.

Page after page, there were mementos of a little girl’s life, marked in the only way Sally knew how. It was no wonder Maria had dissolved into tears. Love radiated from every page.

Then Maria came back into the room.

“Sorry,” she muttered, as she sat back down on the floor. “It just took me by surprise.”

Bodie stroked the side of her cheek, then handed the book back to her.

She thumbed through the rest of the pages until she came to the last photo and once again was taken aback. It was a picture of her playing on the floor and surrounded by a dozen or more tiny, brightly colored horses.

“Oh, oh, oh…my ponies…my ponies.”

Her hands were shaking as she laid the book aside and began digging frantically through the contents of the last box. All of a sudden she pulled out a large shoe box and rocked back on her heels.

“What is it?” Becky asked.

Maria opened the lid, and then dumped them out onto the floor and began setting them up as she must have done as a child.

Her ponies.

“The herd. It’s my herd of My Little Ponies. I remember playing with these. They were my favorite toys.”

“And now you train real ones,” Bodie said.

Maria shivered. Again the ghost of her past was rearing its head into the present.

“I always thought I loved horses because Dad and Bud raised them. I didn’t know… I didn’t remember…about this…about having them before.”

She picked up the book, absently flipping through the blank pages to the end.

“I guess that’s all,” she said, but as she came to the back flyleaf, she saw a few more words. Suddenly she gasped.

“Oh, my God, look. It says ‘marys dade,’ only there’s no picture. Just the words. I guess the photo got lost.”

“Let me see,” Bodie asked.

Maria handed it over.

From where he’d been sitting, he’d seen a crease on the inside flyleaf, as if it had been pulled loose, then glued back down. He ran his finger along the edges, then frowned as he ran the flat of his hand across the page itself.

“There’s something under here,” he said as he pulled out a pocketknife. He carefully cut a slit along the bottom and side of the cover, then removed a single folded sheet of paper.

Bodie scanned the page, and when he realized what it was, he looked up.

“This is a lab report on a DNA sample. It doesn’t have a name on it, but listen to what it does say.

“‘Sample is 99.9 percent consistent with being the biological father of Mary Blake.’ Wow. Sally Blake might not have been able to read, but she wasn’t stupid. Somehow she got a DNA sample from your biological father and sent it off to some lab so she’d have proof.”

Maria snatched the page out of his hands and quickly scanned it, but he was right. There was no designated name for the donor. Only a series of numbers identifying the sample.

“Is there a way to find out who the donor was?” she asked.

“It’s been twenty years. I doubt this lab is still in operation, but I’ll check. I can, however, run these results through the computer. If the man had ever had an occasion to have a DNA sample run through CODIS, we might get a hit. Either way, it’s still a long shot. Can I take this?”

“Yes, yes,” Maria said, and handed it to him, then took Becky’s hand. “I cannot thank you enough for saving all this. Not only have you given me the only link I’ll ever have with my mother, but thanks to you, we’re closer to finding out who killed her than anyone’s ever been.”

Becky was elated. But while she was happy the past was being revealed, even in small increments, there was something Maria also needed to know about the present. She stood up, then glanced at Bodie.

“It’s after twelve. I’m going to make some sandwiches. Will you stay and eat with me? Nothing fancy, but I’d love the company.”

Bodie glanced at Maria. She nodded.

“That would be great,” he said. “But as soon as we’ve finished, I want to get back to the office with this.”

Becky raised an eyebrow, then stared pointedly.

“I’m sure you two have plenty you need to discuss. Take your time. I’ll call you when lunch is ready.”

Maria began rewrapping her treasures to be shipped back to Montana, then stopped. Since some of them were breakable, she wanted to use bubble wrap instead of the old newspapers they’d been in to ensure their safe arrival.

Bodie stopped her with a touch, then took her by the hand and pulled her down beside him on the sofa.

“We need to talk.”

The tone of his voice put a knot in Maria’s stomach.

“What happened?”

“Last night, up at the lake, someone broke into Sam Vincent’s house and tried to kill him.”

Maria gasped. “Oh, my God. Is he all right? Did they catch the guy who—”

“Sam’s fine. The man kicked in his door. Shot and killed his dog, and tried to take Sam out.
Sam
killed
him
, instead.”

“That’s awful…just awful. Was it a robbery gone bad?”

“Not according to Sam.” He proceeded to tell her about Sam’s belief that it had to do with the reopening of her mother’s murder case. When Bodie mentioned that the killer had called Sam “Tank” and the implication of that, she paled.

“So you’re saying…?” she began.

“That it probably wasn’t a robbery, that the man was there to kill someone connected to Sally’s past. What we don’t know is why someone wants Sam dead now, when it didn’t matter before, unless they’ve somehow linked you to the case, and then to him.”

“But how? I didn’t tell anyone but you.”

Bodie frowned. “There might be a leak in the department. My boss is on it. We’re not sure how it’s all going to play out, but you and Becky need to be careful. Don’t open your door to anyone unless you know them, and if you haven’t ordered room service, don’t open the door to anyone from the hotel, even if they’re dressed in a hotel uniform.”

“A man’s dead—maybe because of me,” Maria whispered, and covered her face.

“Don’t feel sorry for him,” Bodie said. “He took his chances when he messed with Sam Vincent. What you need to take heart in is the fact that maybe secrets are starting to unfold, which is what needs to happen to solve the mystery.”

“Yes, okay. I get what you mean, but it’s also frightening. I’ve never been involved in something criminal. I haven’t even had a speeding ticket.”

Bodie cupped the side of her cheek. “But that’s just it, Maria. You
have
been involved…in a murder. And you’re finally beginning to remember how.”

Maria felt the weight of the world on her shoulders as she leaned into his touch. This was hard—so hard.

Suddenly Becky called them from the hall.

“Lunch is ready!”

“Be right there,” Bodie said.

He got up, then offered Maria his hand. Their fingers laced as he pulled her up, but instead of stopping, she wrapped her arms around his waist and hid her face against his chest.

He pulled her close, his voice low and urgent when he spoke.

“I’m sorry for the reason you had to come back to Tulsa, and that you’re having to go through all this, but I’m not sorry you came. I can’t imagine living my life and never having known you.”

He tilted her chin until their gazes locked.

Maria slid her hand behind his neck and pulled.

He groaned beneath his breath as their lips met, and then his hands were on her back and sliding down to her hips and holding her close—as close against him as she could be without him being inside her.

Becky came into the room, grinned, and did a two-step backward and out before they ever knew she’d been there.

The meal was nearly over when Bodie’s phone rang. It didn’t take long for him to make an apologetic exit.