Devil Smoke (11 page)

She found a room filled with athletic equipment stacked in racks, and across the hall was a room filled with folded canvas tents—even more smelly than the room with the papers.

The next door, though, opened onto a magical world. She stood in the doorway, stunned. The Christmas nativity scene—except for the straw and twinkle lights—was arranged before her, larger than life. Joseph stood behind his wife, protecting her and watching over their baby, just like Daddy did—only without the beard. The baby lay in the cradle, arms and legs kicking like he was laughing.

But it was Mary who held Nellie’s attention. The Blessed Virgin Mother knelt, arms spread as if ready to hold her baby in her lap, smiling the same smile Mommy used to give Nellie. That smile was almost the only thing Nellie could remember every day; other things came and went before she could figure out a way to hang on to them, to keep them safe forever—or at least until Mommy came back.

She stepped inside the room, its only light the gleam from the hall and the wispy smudge from a tiny basement window high in the wall. She stopped and held her breath, half-expecting someone—the angel or one of the wise men—to tell her to leave, that bad girls like her didn’t belong here, didn’t deserve a mommy and daddy to look after them. But no one moved. No one said anything.

She closed the door behind her. Her eyes adjusted to the dim light and she carefully crept over to the Blessed Virgin—Mary looked so much happier before she became the Lady of Sorrows and someone pierced her heart with a sword—and crawled onto her lap. The statue was wood, hard, with tiny ridges where they’d carved the folds of her dress, but Nellie didn’t care. She twisted her body, fitting just right, head resting against one of Mary’s arms. Mary beamed down at her as if she’d been waiting forever for just this moment to hold Nellie.

Nellie had promised herself a long time ago that she wouldn’t cry anymore. Crying meant people asking questions she had no answers to. Like why was she crying, and when was her mother coming back, and didn’t she want to be a big, brave girl?

Or worse, crying meant seeing her father blink back his own tears before he’d pretend to be big and brave and strong. He’d wrap his arms around her, pulling her tight against his chest to where she felt his heart beating, and she knew it was breaking and she’d only cry harder for them both.

But here, that promise held no power. Joseph seemed to nod to her, the light coming from above and behind him, telling her it was all right: he’d watch over her and no one would know. And Mary cradled her and smiled Mommy’s secret smile that was just for Nellie. Everything was going to be okay, that smile said. After all, she was the Mother of God; she should know.

Nellie missed that smile so much. She curled up and sobbed, until finally she fell into an exhausted sleep.

<><><>

LUCY
AND WASH
were on the phone with Burroughs, reviewing the credit card reports Burroughs had run on Sarah after he’d verified her social security number and identity.

“Her car getting broken into was a real blessing,” he told them. “Since her wallet was stolen, we can investigate her as a possible identity theft victim, which gives us access to her recent transaction history.”

“You’re placing a hold on her credit for her, right?” Last thing Sarah needed was to regain her memory only to find her finances ruined.

“Yeah, what little there is. Only two credit cards, both with the wrong address, one with her name spelled B-r-o-w-n-e and the other with Sarah spelled without the H. Like she’s leaving a false trail for anyone looking for her.”

“Fits with her fleeing a stalker,” Lucy told Burroughs, looking over Wash’s shoulder while he scrolled through the credit card statements Burroughs had emailed.

“They both were used for small purchases,” Wash said. “Less than twenty-five dollars. Mainly magazine subscriptions—sent to two more false addresses.”

“What the hell is she hiding from?” Burroughs said.

“You mean
who
the hell. Anything on the dress and card TK brought you?”

She could almost hear his eye roll over the phone. “You’re joking, right? A few smudged prints, but I’m certain they’re all from Sarah and your people.” She noticed he avoided mentioning Tommy by name. “I tagged and bagged them just to preserve chain of custody, but there’s nothing helpful. I sent TK back to stay with Sarah.”

Interpretation: to relieve Tommy so he wasn’t left alone with Sarah. While she appreciated Burroughs’ help and his protective instincts, it was her team, and she’d run it the way she thought best. She was about to tell him exactly that when TK walked in the door. “Thanks, Burroughs. Let us know if you turn up anything else.”

“You, too.” He hung up.

“That was Burroughs?” TK asked. “He about laughed me out of the station house when I showed up with that damned dress.”

“Don’t take it personally. He’s just frustrated. Hard enough to help a woman who has lost her memory, but looks like Sarah was deliberately hiding her tracks even before she hit her head.”

TK flounced into the chair beside Wash, angling herself so she had a good view of his screens. “I know. You should see her place—everything she owns fits into one suitcase.”

“You’re one to talk,” Wash said.

“That’s because I was homeless,” she retorted. TK wasn’t ashamed of her past; she saw it as a failing of society when a decorated veteran working two jobs couldn’t pay for a roof over her head, not a failing of her own. “Sarah has a home. Only it sure as hell doesn’t feel like one.”

“So you and Tommy didn’t find anything.”

“Not a takeout menu, no pizza coupons, not even a fridge magnet. Only thing in her trash was the receipt Tommy sent to Wash.”

“Yeah, about that…”

Lucy turned to the analyst. “What?”

“Well, I’m not sure if it means anything. The receipt is from the same Sheetz Tommy’s wife was last seen at. I mean, I know it’s a year apart, but isn’t that kind of weird?”

TK stretched her legs out and crossed them at the ankles. “I doubt it. That stretch of highway, your choices are limited. Sheetz or keep going to the interstate with that skeevy truck stop. If you’re a woman, you always go for Sheetz.”

“Cleanest restrooms around,” Lucy explained. “TK’s right. I’ve been there myself.”

“Okay, so just a freaky, small-world thing.” Wash shrugged and cleared his screen. “Then we’ve officially got nothing.”

He and TK looked to Lucy as if expecting her to conjure a woman’s life from thin air. “Not nothing,” Lucy said. “We have a vulnerable victim who is a potential target.”

“And who would have no idea if she came face to face with her stalker.” TK shuddered. “I can not even imagine being that powerless.”

“Thoughts on the best way to protect her while we keep running the databases and track down any family?”

“What about having her bunk here?” TK said. “If it’s okay with Valencia. I’ll crash now, pull guard duty tonight.”

“Guard duty?” Wash sounded alarmed. “You really think someone could track her back here? And get through Valencia’s security?”

“The police put her out there on every screen in the area with the public service announcements before Burroughs canceled them,” Lucy answered. “Anyone looking for Sarah knows she’s working with us, that she has no clue who’s stalking her. What better time to strike?”

TOMMY ROLLED THE
tiny ballerina over in his palm, still protected from his flesh by the maple leaf. Sarah was right: there was no way to be certain it was Charlotte’s charm. Hell, he couldn’t even be one hundred percent certain it was the same size and pose as Charlotte’s dancing girl. Had she had both her arms up like this one? Or had one been stretched out and the other curved into the air?

He blinked back his confusion. A year was simply too long for a man’s mind not to lose grasp of essential bits and pieces. It was hard enough to keep hold of Charlotte’s laugh, the special sly smile she had for him when they were alone in bed, the way her hands and feet were always moving, dancing to invisible music…

“What should we do?” Sarah asked.

“I don’t know.” He shoved the charm, leaf and all, into his jacket pocket and stood. “Keep following your trail, I guess.”

She kept hold of the camera—a good thing, the way his hands were trembling—and led the way. They both moved more slowly now, searching for… what? If he didn’t know, how could she?

They entered a tunnel formed by centuries-old mountain laurel. Dark foliage and intertwined branches created the walls and roof, and thousands of pale flowers hung from stems, like stars showered across the night sky. The air was still here, noise muffled as if they stood apart from the rest of the world. Sheltered.

Sarah stopped in the middle of the tunnel to look around, both through her camera and her eyes. “It’s so beautiful. How could I have forgotten this?”

Tommy could only nod; he didn’t trust his voice. All he could think was how much Charlotte would love this place.

“I’m sorry.” Sarah turned to him, touching his arm. She did that a lot. Whoever she was, she was the touchy-feely type. Not that he minded, it was just that he wasn’t used to anyone touching him. No one had, not like that, gentle, familiar reminders that he wasn’t alone—not since Charlotte.

“My missing memories must seem so small compared to losing your wife,” she continued. “I’m so sorry. Are you okay?”

“You’re right,” he said after a pause. “That charm can’t be hers. She wasn’t here.”

“You mean she wasn’t here now, without you? Does that mean you’re giving up? You think she’s dead?” Sarah raised her camera, framing his image, then lowered it quickly. “I’m sorry. I don’t mean to—”

“No, no, it’s fine. I just, I haven’t—there hasn’t been anyone I could talk to about this. I mean, I don’t know what’s more painful. Hoping she’s still alive out there, somewhere, living her life, or…”

“Maybe she’s like me?” she said brightly. “Maybe she has amnesia. That’s why she hasn’t come home. As soon as she remembers…”

“If she’s like you, she’d have people like me and the police to help her. Someone would have recognized her from the missing persons reports. Someone would have found her, brought her home.”

Sarah hung her head. “You’re right, I guess.”

“Funny thing is, the police, except for Burroughs, think she is still alive. They think she ran away.” He hauled in a breath. Here, sheltered by an otherworldly cocoon of green, he could speak the truth. Finally, for the first time in a year. “Maybe she did.”

“Really? Why?”

“I don’t know. But when I look back, she was acting strangely in the weeks before she vanished. Nothing I can be certain about, nothing I could ever explain to the police. She wasn’t sleeping well. I’d find her talking on the phone at strange times, a strange look on her face. A few times, I came home from the ER and she wasn’t home yet. She’d always show up later with a bag of groceries, saying she stopped at Giant Eagle, but, it never felt… right.”

“Doesn’t sound like a lot to go on.”

“I know. That’s why I never told anyone else. Maybe it’s all in my imagination, grasping for hints that aren’t there, searching for any kind of explanation.”

They passed through the tunnel and back into the light. The forest came alive around them once more, and Tommy blinked as a ray of sunshine angled through the treetops. The trail grew steeper here, but Sarah didn’t seem to mind.

They were almost at the plateau halfway up the mountain where the old iron furnace stood. The trail forked at the furnace, one path leading up to follow the steeper ridgeline along the top of the mountain, the other winding down the backside of the mountain and circling around, ending up just above the parking lot where they’d begun.

“Could she have been having an affair?” Sarah asked in a soft tone as they walked.

“Now you sound like the cops. That was the first thing they asked. Well, second. Right after they asked if I killed her.” He stepped over a fallen branch. “No, I don’t think so. I think if it was something like that, if she really wanted someone else, she would have just told me. One thing about Charlotte, she didn’t pull punches. And she never would have left Nellie to be with another man. That much I’m certain of.”

“Okay, then. Something at work? You said she was a social worker, right? Maybe a case got too personal?”

“No. She’d been working with the rehab unit the past three months. A nice break from rotating through the ER or with the trauma team or OB-GYN.”

“Hmm. Her family?”

“Solid. And I don’t have any, not local, so no meddling in-laws for her to worry about. She did volunteer with the women’s shelter, but that was mainly answering phones, putting together care packages, arranging transportation and logistics like visits to attorneys and the like.”

“Still, working with victims of domestic violence—don’t they worry about abusers coming after them? I heard about a shooting where the man broke into the shelter his wife was staying at, killed four women and then himself.”

“It’s the one thing Charlotte didn’t talk about. She was very serious about confidentiality, for just those reasons, to protect the women and children at the shelter. But she’s volunteered there for years; she wouldn’t have continued if it was dangerous.”

“Then what else could it be? If not something at home or work? Unless—” Her eyes grew wide. “Maybe she saw something she shouldn’t? Like a drug deal or mob hit or something? Or maybe someone was stalking her, like whoever that creep is who sent me that dress? Sneaking around so she wasn’t even certain herself, not until it was too late.”

Tommy had no answer. Those and a thousand other scenarios had been suggested and examined by him, the police, the press, Charlotte’s parents, the private investigators they’d hired, and everyone he’d ever met, it seemed. “What-ifs don’t help,” he said. “Not when there’s no evidence.”

They reached the old stone iron furnace standing at the center of the plateau. The pyramid-shaped structure had crumbled with time but still stood a good thirty feet high. On two sides, arched openings as tall as Tommy led into the central area below the chimney, where the heat would have been concentrated. A waterfall above created a stream that trickled down past the furnace before continuing down the backside of the mountain. When the furnace had been in use, the trees had been cut to burn inside it, leaving the area clear except for a few bold saplings now taking hold among the limestone.