Grave Apparel (76 page)

The
sweater
was
the
misleading
thing.
When
Cassandra
confessed to taking it, all the little theories, neat and otherwise, fell apart. Cassandra had the sweater with her in the
alley
be fore the attack; she probably
didn’t
even
know
what she
was
going to do with it, maybe just
throw
it in the
Dumpster.
The
Santa
Dude,
according
to
the
little
shepherd,
put
it
on
the
woman after he hit her
repeatedly.
And then he laughed.
So
the sweater meant something to him,
but
he
hadn’t
brought it

with him. Lily Rose took a long slurp of her drink and
looked
from
Lacey
to Jasmine
and back
again.

“But
they
knew
each
other,”
Jasmine said. “I heard
them.”
“I
know
you did, I
believe
you. But I also think you
have
something more to tell me, Jasmine. Maybe you
have
the
key.”
“I
don’t
have
a
key.
I
don’t
even
have
a place to
live
any
more,”
Jasmine said, sadness creeping into her
voice.
“Jasmine, did you
know
the man in the
alley?
You
know,
the Santa Dude?”

The girl
looked
down,
her
hamburger
clutched in her hand. “I told you, I
don’t
know
who he is. I
don’t
know
his
name.
”

Lacey
could
have
kicked
herself for not being more
aware
of what she
was
asking the
first
time she
talked
to Jasmine, when
she
thought
the
girl
was a
little
shepherd
boy.
What
kind
of
reporter
am
I?
she thought
ruefully.
Journalism
101!

“It’s
not your
fault,
Jasmine, I
didn’t
ask you the right ques tion.
Now
I
know
you
don’t
know
his name,
but
you did recog nize him. The Santa Dude. Who is he?”

Jasmine shrugged. Lily Rose said nothing. She
looked
at her big sister for reassurance.

“It’s
important, because I think maybe he
was
chasing you, not
Cassandra,”
Lacey
said.
“And
I
don’t
want
him to
find
you.”
“He
knows
my
mother.”
Jasmine put her halfeaten
ham
burger
down
and sighed
deeply.
Lily Rose did a perfect imita tion of her
sister.

“He
knew
your mother?” Lacey had to stop herself
from
joining in the chorus of sighs. The dots were starting to connect. The Santa Dude
knew
Anna Mai Lee. She had been killed, and Cassandra might
have
been killed. “I
have
something to tell you about your
mother.”
The girls
waited.
Lacey
took a deep breath.
“It’s
not good
news.
It’s
very
bad. I’m
sorry.”
Lacey
thought this might be the hardest thing she had
ever
had to do.

“I
know,”
Jasmine said
quietly.
“Something bad happened to
her.
He did something bad to
her,
or she
would
have
come back for us by
now.
He killed
her,
didn’t
he?”

“I
think
so.
I
talked
to
the
police.”
Lacey
took
the
girls’
hands.
“It
doesn’t
look
like
your
mother
is
coming
home
again.
They
found a
woman’s
body.
They
think
it’s
her.”
Lily Rose started crying and clutched
Lacey’s
hand. Jasmine tried to be strong,
but
tears were coursing
down
her cheeks. She leaned
against
Lacey
and
cried.
“I’m
so
sorry.”

Lacey
hugged both girls and her
eyes
filled
with tears. The girls cried
quietly.
She
didn’t
push them to stop. Life at Mc
Donald’s
went on around them. The other customers ignored them. Soon their tears eased up and
Lacey
had napkins ready to wipe their
eyes.

“We
really
thought
maybe
she
wasn’t
coming
back
this
time,”
Jasmine said, still trying to be the
brave
little
grownup.
“It’s
just that we
didn’t
ever
hear it for actual really sure until
now.”
Tears
still
streaked
her
face.
“You
know
what
I’m
saying?”
“I
know.
But
let’s
try to
figure
this out. Jasmine, what were you doing in that
alley?
And what
was
he doing there?”

“He
was
with my mother the last time we
saw
her.
She left
with
him.”
Jasmine
played
with
her
fries
while
she
talked,
rolling them around, stacking them up. She had lost her
ap
petite. “She said
they
were going to a
party.
She
wore
her red dress and she
looked
really
pretty.
But she
didn’t
come back that night and she
didn’t
come back the
next
day and she
didn’t
ever
come back, not
ever.
She
didn’t
even
know
we got
kicked
out of our
place.”
Jasmine wiped her
eyes
with the back of her
hand.
She
pushed
the
long
locks
out
of
her
eyes
again.
“I
saw
him hit her one time, he hit her really hard and he called her
stupid.
But
he
didn’t
know
I
saw
him.”
She
scowled
at
the
memory.

“What were you doing on Eye Street?”

“I
know
where you can get free food, from the restaurants there.
It’s
a long
way,
but
we were
hungry,
so I go there. I
was
crossing
the
park,
you
know,
across
from
where
you
go
to
work.”

“Farragut
Square. Is that where you mean?”

“The man
was
there, with the dumb Santa hat.
Like
a Santa Dude. He
was
walking.
He
was
dressed up
like
he
was
going to a big
party,
wearing a
tuxedo.
But my mother
wasn’t
with
him.”

Lacey
recalled the people in black tie she had seen
walking
to
the
Army
and
Navy
Club
across
the
Square.
There
were
Christmas
parties
all
over
the
city
that
night,
including
The
Eye
’s
party at the National Press
Club.
Lots of men in
tuxedos
and Santa caps.

“He’s
got this big candy cane in his hand. Probably full of
drugs.
They
did
drugs
together
a
lot.”
Jasmine
looked
into
Lacey’s
eyes.
“I
think
that
was
why
she
liked
him,
he
always
had
drugs.
I
only
wanted
to
know
where
my
mother
was!
I

asked
him where she
was.
He
didn’t
pay
any
attention to me, because I’m just a kid, you
know.
Anna
Mai’s
little girl, you
know,
but
I’m not so little, am I? He just
walked
right past me
like
he
didn’t
know
me.
So
I
picked
up
some
rocks
off
the
ground.”
She slipped out of her chair and mimed picking up imaginary rocks.
“Like
this! And I
threw
them at him, just to
make
him pay attention to me.
Like
this! I said,
‘Where’s
my mother?’ ”
Jasmine’s
voice
carried,
but
no one bothered to look over
at
her.
“
‘Where’s
my
mother?’
I
kept
asking
him.
He
wouldn’t
talk to me. He
kept
just ignoring
me.”

“You
were
throwing
rocks at him?”
Lacey
could picture Jas mine doing it.

“Yeah.
A
lot.”
Jasmine
looked
away.
“And
then I hit him and he looks at me and he just comes after me
fast
like
he’s
going to grab me and hit me,
like
he hit my
mother.
But I’m not going to sit around and
wait
for it,
like
she did. So I took
off
running. And
that’s
when it
happened.”

“You
ran into the
alley?”

She nodded. “I
threw
another rock at him and I had a head start so he
couldn’t
catch me. I hid behind the
Dumpster.
He
was
too big to get in there. And too clean. He
wouldn’t
like
it back there, all dressed
up.”

“How
did he end up hitting Cassandra?”

Jasmine raised her
eyes
to
Lacey’s
and shook her head. “I
didn’t
see
all
of
it.
She
came
out
of
the
garage
with
her
bike
and
she
saw
him running after me and she yelled something at him and I hid. She
knew
him, I think,
but
I
couldn’t
hear what she yelled. She seemed really surprised and mad. He tried to ignore her
like
he did to me. He
was
pounding on the Dumpster to try to
make
me come out. She ran up to him and grabbed his arm. He tried to get
away
from
her,
but
she started yelling and hit ting him with her
bike
helmet. Then he took his big candy cane and hit
her.
He
covered
her mouth and
kept
doing it.
That’s
how
I
know
what happened to my
mother.
But I
didn’t
really
know
till you told me she
was—”
Jasmine stopped and gulped back
fresh tears.
“That’s
why
I
didn’t
want
your friend Cassandra to
die too, I guess. But I
couldn’t
help her ’cause he
was
too big. I had to hide from
him.”
Her
eyes
were
filling
up. “He
wanted
to kill me
too.”
Lily Rose
burst
into tears and
buried
her
face
in
Lacey’s
arm
again.