Thread of Deceit (25 page)

Ana squared her shoulders. “Let’s go find our children.”

The stairwell smelled of urine and vomit. Cockroaches skittered beneath piles of wadded napkins, paper cups, uncapped syringes, beer cans. Ana tried to hold her breath, but for some reason, the effort made her hand hurt worse. She huddled close to Sam as he knocked on the battered apartment door.

Did Raydell Watson really live in this place? She knew such squalor existed in the city, but still it shocked her. How could anyone find hope here? How could a child ever survive? How could a young man build himself a future?

“Who’s there?” someone called from the other side.

“It’s Uncle Sam and T-Rex.”

“Go away.”

“Raydell, open the door,” Sam told him. “We need to talk to you.”

“I did it, okay? I’m the one who set the whole thing up. So, now you know. Just go away and leave me alone.”

Sam glanced at Ana. She murmured an explanation. “The attack on me last Saturday. It was Raydell.”

“Why’d you do that?” Terell asked. “Miss Burns never did nothing to you.”

“I thought…” The voice behind the door fell silent.

“Hey, Raydell,” Ana spoke up. “I’m okay. It’s over. We didn’t come here about that. We miss you at Haven. And we want to ask you some questions about the little girl in the corner.”

“I never did nothing to Flora,” Raydell burst out. “I heard Sam say he didn’t want you coming back to Haven. He was trying to get rid of you, and I figured I ought to help.”

“Raydell, open up.” Sam rattled the doorknob. “Come on, my friend.”

To Ana’s surprise, the door swung open. The stocky teenager stood before them, his face swollen and bruised, and his gold tooth missing. Head hanging low, he stepped aside.

“My mama works nights,” he mumbled. “You can come in.”

Ana followed Sam and Terell into the filthy room. Plywood blocked the windows, and the odor of rotting food drifted from the kitchen. Gingerly, she took a seat in one of the mismatched chairs.

“Who did you, man?” Terell asked the boy.

“Them. I said I’d pay the two of ’em to scare her, but when they told me what happened, I refused.” He rubbed his hand over his eyes. “I never wanted them to hurt her. Not even to touch her. I told ’em not to lay a finger on her. But they said what they had been doin’, and then they told me how some kind of ghost came out of the darkness at ’em, and how Miss Burns got away. I was so mad that they…they did what they did….”

“They didn’t hurt me much, Raydell,” Ana spoke up. “I’m all right.”

As determined as she was to be kind, Ana’s agitation was growing by the minute. The pain in her hand was about to make her pass out, and now she noticed lines of baby cockroaches racing up and down her chair. Hundreds of them. Maybe thousands.

“When I told ’em I wouldn’t pay,” Raydell was saying, “they beat me up.”

“You sure it wasn’t anybody else?” Sam asked. “We heard your father had come home.”

Raydell gave a hiss of disgust. “That loser’s got nine more years, man. Even when he gets out, he won’t be comin’ around here. I ain’t seen him since I was six years old anyhow.”

Despite the boy’s obvious anger toward his father, Ana noted that Raydell knew the exact number of years left on the man’s sentence. No wonder the youth had bonded with Sam and Terell. They were his father figures.

“Raydell, you should have asked me about Ana,” Sam said. “I’d never want anyone to hurt her. Even to scare her. Never.”

“Well, you were yellin’ at her. I heard you. You told her not to come back to Haven, and she told you back that she could do anything she wanted. So I thought…” Raydell hung his head, the long dreadlocks hiding his features. “Forget it.”

“We need you at the door,” Sam continued. “Nobody can run it better. We count on you.”

“Yeah,” Terell concurred. “The place isn’t safe unless you’re at the door. When you coming back, dog?”

Raydell’s chin lifted an inch, and his hooded eyes searched the faces of the three adults. “You want me back?”

“Can’t do without you,” Sam said.

“And we need your help with Flora,” Ana added, deciding to stand as the lines of cockroaches came ever closer. “She usually comes to Haven with another girl. Gypsy.”

“I know Gypsy,” Raydell said immediately. “White chick, hair dyed black, about so tall. She comes around all dolled up for business. Brings Flora and leaves her at Haven till we close down.” He paused. “Gypsy’s thirteen. She told me.”

Ana swallowed hard. “Raydell, do you have any idea where Gypsy works? We need to find Flora. She may be in danger.”

“From who?” He jumped to his feet, the old defensive posture back in place. “Nobody touches our kids.”

“Jim Slater,” Sam said. “He’s not the man we thought he was.”

Ana heard the resignation in his voice. She knew how hard he had resisted accepting the truth. The exposure of Slater’s pedophilia would rock the St. Louis community. His guilt would wreak havoc in churches across the state. It would affect countless charitable foundations. Certainly it must mean the end of Haven.

“Are you talkin’ about the guy who wears all them shirts with the…the stripes?” Raydell was asking, his lips twisting into a grin at the memory. “Aw, he couldn’t hurt nobody. I could knock him out with my little finger.”

“He hired a hit man,” Ana said, lifting her hand. Blood had begun to seep through the bandage. “The guy shot me tonight. Raydell, help us find Gypsy and Flora.”

“Let’s get goin’. I’ll take you to Gypsy’s corner. No problem.” The young man was out the door and down the steps of the apartment building before they’d had time to shut the door behind them.

Ana recognized her sister’s eyes in Gypsy’s face the moment she spotted the girl staring at them from a distance. Dark green eyes, full of spitfire and bravado. And behind the defiance, pain.

“Her pimp’s watching,” Raydell said in a low voice. “Stay cool.”

On the walk to the nearby area of downtown, Sam and Ana had explained the situation to Raydell. The teen was angry but not surprised. He had known men who preyed on children that way, he said. Some of his friends had been lured onto the streets—young boys who had prostituted themselves, sniffed paint or smoked marijuana to stay high and escape the shame they felt. Some had been beaten within an inch of their lives, and then they had vanished. He had no idea where they’d gone.

“I don’t see the pimp,” Raydell told the others, “but he’s around. He’ll peg us right away—knowin’ we ain’t customers. We can’t stay long, or the guy will make her pay.”

“Pay?” Ana asked.

“Slap her around. She’s supposed to be hustling.”

Remembering herself at thirteen, Ana studied the tall youngster. Gypsy wore a purple satin top, black miniskirt, fishnet stockings and four-inch-heeled ankle boots. The outfit could not have been more different from Ana’s prep school uniform—white blouse, pleated plaid skirt, knee-socks and brown leather shoes. At thirteen, Ana had sported a ponytail and a full set of braces. Gypsy’s hair, dyed black and starting to show its light brown roots, hung like a curtain over the side of her face. She glowered at the approaching foursome.

“Let me do the talkin’,” Raydell said. “She knows me.”

Ana stepped back and observed the grimy storefronts and cracked sidewalks that were this child’s world. What was Gypsy’s real name? How had she fallen into this impossible downward spiral? Was she already infected with HIV or some other disease? Did she use drugs to numb her bleak existence?

Ana’s heart ached with the burden of the girl’s suffering. Had Christ ever known such hopelessness? Did he understand the abandonment and fear that Gypsy knew? Ana recalled His betrayal and execution on the cross. Suffering, hopelessness, abandonment, fear. Yes, Jesus knew.

But what hope was there for this girl and the others who worked their corners in swaggering pairs or trios? Could Christ really bring healing to children so deeply scarred?

“Yo,” Raydell greeted Gypsy. “What’s up?”

“Nothing.” She eyed him with a mixture of suspicion and curiosity. Tipping a chin in the direction of Sam, Terell and Ana, the girl asked in a low voice, “What ya’ll want with me, huh?”

She had a surprisingly familiar accent. Texas, Ana realized. Gypsy was from Texas!

“We’re lookin’ for that kid you bring to Haven all the time,” Raydell said. “Flora. Where is she?”

Gypsy folded her arms across her chest and looked away. “I don’t know what you talkin’ ’bout, dog. Get outta my face.”

“You better tell us where she is. You don’t, and we’ll stick around till your man gets onto us.”

“Hey, I don’t know where she is!” Gypsy hissed. She glanced at a group of men down the street. Clustered in a tight group, they were conducting some kind of transaction. “What you want with her anyhow? She never did nothin’ to you.”

“Somebody’s after her. Lookin’ to kill Flora. The dude shot her tonight.” Raydell pointed at Ana, who held up her bandaged hand. “We wanna take her someplace safe.”

“She’s safe.” Gypsy looked away again and gave an exaggerated shrug. “You don’t have to get all punk about it.”

“If she’s here, she ain’t safe. And neither are you.”

“Raydell’s right,” Terell spoke up. “Anyone connected with Flora or Ana is in that dude’s line of fire. You know what kind of a place we run, Gypsy. You know we’d take care of Flora.”

Sam nodded. “You wouldn’t be bringing her to Haven if you didn’t care about her, Gypsy. Tell us where she is. Her life is in danger.”

“Look, get outta here!” the girl snarled suddenly, her black-lined eyes filling with tears. “All of ya’ll, get off my street. An’ I mean it!”

Ana noted that a large man had separated from the group down the way and was headed in their direction. As Sam, Terell and Raydell stepped back, she leaned closer to Gypsy and whispered the name of her street and her apartment number. “Tell Flora that Ana is worried about her.”

“I can’t tell her nothin’. She don’t talk English.”

“Just say my name.”

Gypsy gazed at Ana for a moment, their eyes meeting, locking, recognizing. “I’ll take care of her.”

“I will, too. You come see me sometime, Gypsy.”

Without speaking again, Ana grabbed Sam’s hand and turned away. He beckoned the others.

“We need to find the guy who shot you,” Terell said as they started back toward Haven. “Whatever his name is, if he’s following us, he’ll hurt Gypsy to get at Flora.”

Ana fought the pain in her hand as she walked. “I’m worried about leaving Gypsy alone.”

“Nobody followed us.” Sam said it with such confidence that Ana looked up in surprise. “Recon. We’re clear.”

She let out a breath. “Then we should go to Jim Slater’s house. Jack Slaughter—that’s his real name. If he hasn’t gone on his ‘vacation,’ Bering will check in with him. I have a terrible feeling about the two girls, Sam.”

His arm came around her, holding her close. On her other side, Terell took her free hand and tucked her arm through his to support her weight as she walked. Raydell strode a few steps ahead of the others, his shoulders casting a broad shadow on the lamplit sidewalk.

F
lames lit the night sky, licking the stars and casting an orange glow across the clouds above Ladue. As Sam pulled his car to the curb in front of Jim Slater’s mansion, the flashing lights of fire trucks and police cars painted the high stone wall in shades of red and blue. Arcs of water shot through the darkness like crystalline rainbows, and where they ended, smoke billowed upward in feathery gray plumes.

“He burned down his house,” Ana said.

“Lord have mercy,” Terell whispered.

Raydell whistled. “That dude in the striped shirts lived here? Look at all the statues. Like a graveyard.”

Sam opened his door and stepped out into the smoke-filled air. A policeman approached, waving him back. The man carried a roll of yellow tape in one hand, using it to mark the walled compound off-limits.

“No stopping allowed,” he said. “This is a crime scene.”

“Jim Slater owns this home,” Sam told him. “I run a youth center downtown, and he’s on my board of directors.”

“Is he all right?” Ana asked as she emerged from the backseat. “Please, we need to know.”

“We got one body, I can tell you that. But no identification.”

“A body,” Raydell exclaimed.

“I can identify Jim Slater,” Sam spoke up quickly. “Could I talk to the sergeant?”

“I’ll bring him over. Stay back near your car. They’ve almost got the fire out, but the place is a mess.”

“Wait, please,” Ana caught his arm. “Two girls were living here. I have to know—is the body a child?”

“It’s a male adult, ma’am.” He paused, the roll of crime scene tape almost empty now. “Are you saying two girls may be inside the house?”

“Yes. I’d guess eight and ten years old. They speak Spanish.”

He frowned. “The firemen have been able to get through part of the house but not the whole thing. I’ll go tell the sergeant. Wait here.”

As the officer jogged away, Raydell spoke up.

“I vote we go around back and take a look at the house ourselves.” His face was lit with excitement, and the gap where his gold tooth had been knocked out gave him the look of an eager boy. “I can get into any place. It don’t matter if there’s cops around or nothin’, I don’t never get caught.”

“Ain’t you been in juvie, dog?” Terell asked, turning a skeptical eye on the teen. “Sounds to me like you got caught at least once.”

Raydell scuffed the toe of his sneaker on the pavement. “Okay, maybe once.”

“We’ll wait for the sergeant,” Sam said, determined to keep order despite everyone’s panicked concern for the children. He didn’t have to wait long. Three policemen—one in plainclothes—and a fire chief emerged from the area around the burning building and strode down the long cherub-lined walkway toward the open gate.

“You say there were children inside the building?” the chief asked as he stepped up to the group. “How many?”

“Two,” Ana told him. She gave a description as Sam spoke to the police.

“If the body is the homeowner, Jim Slater, I can ID him for you,” he said. “He was on my board of directors.”

“Not so fast, sir. What’s your name, and why are you here tonight?”

Sam knew it was time to tell the whole story. Ana joined him in outlining the most recent activities of the man they now knew as Jack Slaughter. They detailed the events of Sunday, when Slaughter and Bering had chased Flora, and she’d hidden in the garbage bin. Ana related her attempt to investigate Slaughter. As the detective took notes, she described Bering’s appearance in the
Post-Dispatch
building earlier that evening and their headlong run down the stairwell. When she displayed her injured hand, the fire chief leaned closer.

“Doesn’t look pretty from here,” he said. “We have an ambulance right over there, ma’am. I’d recommend you let the paramedics take a look at that. You need to treat a gunshot as quickly as possible. There’s often foreign matter in the wound. It can get infected.”

“Yes, Ana,” Sam told her. “Go to the ambulance. Let the paramedics take a look.”

“But, Sam—”

“Please.” He cupped her face in his palms and forced her to meet his eyes. “Do this, Ana. I care about you. A lot. I want you to be safe. Do it for me.”

She lowered her gaze. “All right. But I’ll be back here in a few minutes. I want to know about that body.” She started to walk away, then swung around and took his arm. “Sam, find the girls.”

“I will.”

As the fireman and the detective led her away, Sam pressed again to be allowed access to the dead man they had found. The sergeant shrugged. “I need an ID. The coroner’s here, and he’s working the scene with our homicide unit. It’s the two girls you saw in the house that worry me. You say this Bering was a hit man?”

“Pretty sure of it.”

“But killing children? I’ve never heard of hiring a hit man to do that. It doesn’t happen.”

“These girls know all about Slater…Slaughter,” Sam explained. “If we’re right, they would be able to nail the man. They’d know his connections in Honduras, St. Louis, anywhere he works. They could verify everything.”

The policeman made notes on a small pad he had taken from his coat. “We’ll be searching the grounds in a few minutes. There are some outbuildings—staff housing, I guess. We’re bringing a canine unit out here, too. Why don’t you come with me, Mr. Hawke, and I’ll let you speak to the coroner.”

Sam glanced at Terell and Raydell. They had been talking intently a moment before, and as they lifted their heads they both looked as guilty as sin. What were they planning? Sam didn’t like the sheepish grins on either man’s face. Not one bit.

He gave the best warning scowl he could muster. “Stay here,” he said. “I’ll be back.”

As Sam followed the sergeant through the gate he could almost hear the two scampering away. Great. Ana had gone off to show her hand to the paramedics. He was just about to look into the face of a dead man. And his two sidekicks were up to no good. Exactly what he didn’t want—everybody scattered, nothing going by the rules.

The coroner was a small man with a bald head and piercing blue eyes. He snapped the fingers of his latex gloves one by one as he questioned Sam. After signing several forms and handing over his driver’s license, Sam was ushered into the foyer of the smoldering remains of the house.

Swallowing, Sam stepped toward the prone figure of a man. Dark and stocky, he wore a surprised look in his glassy eyes. A halo of blood spread out across the marble floor tiles behind him, and a round black hole was centered in his forehead.

“This isn’t the man we’re looking for,” Sam said. “This is Don Bering.”

Sam stepped into the cool night air, found a smoke-free spot near a grove of tall oak trees and drew down a deep breath. He had seen dead men before. Many times. He’d seen dead women. Dead children. Even dead babies. And he’d never gotten used to it.

His stomach churning, he bent over and closed his eyes. Don’t see the girl, he told himself. Don’t see her. Don’t look at the small white dress and the bloody scarf and the thin arms with their baby hands reaching for help. But she was there before him again, her brown eyes staring into his face. Big brown eyes.

He had shot her. He knew his bullet had been the one that had pierced her tiny body and snuffed out her life. His fault. His guilt. He had held her close, begging her to come back. Breathe, breathe! But she lay unmoving in his arms, looking up at him with her empty brown eyes.

He had sat in the base clinic in Basra, trying to tell the story, swallowing the medication, listening to the psychiatrist talk about post-traumatic stress syndrome, hearing the cold facts. And knowing that no matter how long he lived, no matter how many times he told the story, no matter how much medication he took, she would stay in his mind forever. The little girl with the big brown eyes. The dead brown eyes.

“I got her!” The shout rang out through the darkness. “I got one, and T-Rex has the other! We got ’em both!”

Sam straightened, blinking, trying to remember where he was. He could see someone now, running across the lawn, skirting fallen concrete cherubs, and dancing around the policemen who surrounded him. In his arms, Raydell cradled a child—small, curled into herself, sobbing.

“Sam? Hey, Sam!” Terell’s voice called, and he emerged in the artificial light around the burned house. “Sam, we found them! The girls are all right. Where are you, man?”

Sam staggered forward, out from the copse of trees where he had hidden himself and his shame. The two children he and Ana had seen inside the house were alive. Police and paramedics blended with the silhouettes of his two friends and their fearful burdens. Shouts echoed amid the confusion.

Sam could see that one policeman had drawn his gun, and then another. He broke through the ring. “Terell,” he called out. “Sergeant, tell these men to put away their weapons. Raydell, give the little girl to the paramedic.”

“They was in the pool house.” Clearly giddy, Raydell handed off the child and then jumped up and down, whooping with joy. “They had ropes and all, but we cut ’em loose. We did it, me and T-Rex.”

The sergeant supervising the investigation approached Sam, who quickly explained the situation. Terell apologized for disobeying the order to stay with the car, but the broad smile on his face belied every word from his mouth.

“Don Bering didn’t kill them,” he said, taking Sam’s shoulder in his big hand. “I had a feeling he couldn’t do it. What man would? Not even a hit man could have a heart that bad.”

“Thank God. They’ll go into legitimate foster care until INS locates their family in Honduras.”

“Two little girls,” Terell said. “Look at them, Sam. Just look at that.”

Female paramedics were checking out the children, gently rubbing ointment on the rope burns on their wrists. Someone brought a couple of teddy bears from the box policemen kept in their trunks for emergencies involving children. Both girls took one look at the toys, stiffened and burst into tears all over again.

“You need to get a victim’s advocate out here right away,” Sam told the sergeant. “They have to be taken to a hospital immediately and examined for signs of abuse. If what we suspect about Jack Slaughter is true, then…then…”

“They’ve been molested,” Terell filled in.

“The man was keeping them in this house until he could send them to a client. Sell them, maybe. He was a predator. These children are his prey.”

The sergeant shook his head. “I’ve read newspaper accounts about this fellow you’re calling Jack Slaughter. The guy I know as Jim Slater is in the society column nearly every week—going to one charity event or another. He’s a big donor, and I’ve heard he does good work through his adoption agency. Now you’re telling me he’s supplying pedophiles with children from Honduras?”

“Everything I know about the man points to that conclusion,” Sam said.

“Where is he then?”

“No idea.”

“Look, I know who Jim Slater is,” the sergeant said, “but I don’t have a clue who you guys are. I’m half inclined to arrest you on suspicion of involvement in a crime. And you—” he pointed at Terell “—you and that kid are guilty of trespassing.”

“Sir, we couldn’t just stand by—”

“Save it,” the sergeant cut in. “I’m not in the mood for excuses.”

“I need to see about Ana,” Sam said. “May I go?”

The man eyed him for a moment. “The coroner’s got your identification, but I’m going to need names and contact information for your two pals here.”

Sam produced a business card and jotted Terell’s and Raydell’s names on the back. “We all work at Haven downtown,” he said, handing the card to the officer.

“Haven.” He inspected it for a moment. “I know the place. You do good work there. Okay, get out of here, all three of you.”

The sergeant brushed them aside and stalked off. Sam and Terell grabbed the teenager by the arms.

“But what about the little girls we found?” Raydell protested. “That lady is taking them away.”

“They’re going to be all right.” Sam propelled him down the walkway, through the gate and back toward the car. “And you’d better not ever do anything like that again.”

“I’m gonna be a cop,” Raydell announced. “I decided it tonight. I’m going to the police academy after I graduate.”

“You got a record, dog,” Terell reminded him.

“But I was a minor. It was juvie, and that don’t hardly count. They’ll take me.”

“I thought you dropped out of high school after eleventh grade.”

“I’ll get my GED, T-Rex. I can pass. I want to be a detective and do investigations.”

Sam paused near a fireman who was winding a hose. “Where’s the ambulance that was right here? Did you see a woman with a bandaged hand?”

“Sorry,” the man said.

Sam asked a group of policemen standing nearby. The officers shook their heads and resumed their conversation.

Sam stood in the street and stared at the place where she was supposed to be. Ana was missing.

I hold my sister’s hand. It is cold, and her fingers feel small and thin. She puts her head on my shoulder. She is tired. Her eyelids slide shut.

“Aurelia,” I whisper. “Wake up. Wake up and talk to me.”