Redemption Road

4

Elizabeth’s house had always been a sanctuary. Neat and trim, it filled a narrow lot on the historic side of town, a small Victorian under spreading trees that kept the lawn shaded and green. She lived alone, but the place was such a perfect reflection of what she loved about life that she never felt lonesome there. No matter the case or the politics or the collateral damage, stepping through the front door had always allowed her to turn off the job. She could study the oil paintings on the walls, trail her fingers along rowed books or the woodcarvings she’d collected since she was a girl. The house had always been an escape. That was the rule, and it had worked every month of her adult life until now.

Now, the house felt like wood and glass and stone.

Now, it was just a place.

Thoughts like that kept her up most of the night, thoughts of the house and her life, of dead men and the basement. By four o’clock, it was all about Channing, and those feelings spun mostly on the things Elizabeth had done wrong.

She’d made so many mistakes.

That was the difficult truth, and it pursued her until finally, at dawn, she slept. Yet, even then she dreamed and twitched and woke with a sound in her throat so animal it frightened her.

Five days…

She felt her way to the bathroom sink, splashed water on her face.

Damn.

When the nightmare let go, she sat at the kitchen table and stared at a manila file that was old and thumbed and dangerous enough to get her fired if it was ever found in her house. She’d spent three hours with it the day before, a dozen more the week before that. She’d had it since Adrian Wall’s conviction. Except for newspaper clippings and photographs she’d taken herself, it was an exact copy of the Julia Strange murder file that was stored, now, somewhere in the district attorney’s office.

Flipping to a sheaf of photographs, she took out a picture of Adrian. He was in dress blues, younger than she was now. Handsome, she thought, with the kind of clear-eyed determination most cops lose after a few years. The next shot was of Adrian in plainclothes, then another of him on the courthouse steps. She’d taken that one before his trial and liked the way light hung on his face. He looked more the way she felt now, a little worn and a little jaded. But still handsome and straight, she thought, still the cop she’d always admired.

Elizabeth flipped through newspaper coverage and got to the autopsy photos of Julia Strange, a young woman whose murder rocked the county the way few other murders ever had. Young and elegant in life, her beauty was stripped away by bloodlessness, a crushed throat, and the morgue’s bright lights. But she’d been lovely once, and strong enough to put up a fight. Signs of it were all over the kitchen: a broken chair and an upended table, a spray of shattered dishes. Elizabeth riffled through photographs of the kitchen, but saw the same things she always saw: cabinets and tile, a playpen in the corner, photographs on the fridge.

There were the usual reports, and she knew them thoroughly. Lab work, fingerprints, DNA. She skimmed the family history: the wife’s early days as a model, Gideon’s birth, the husband’s job. They’d been a perfect family in so many ways: young and attractive, not rich, but doing okay. Interviews with family friends said she was a wonderful mother, that the husband was devoted. Only one witness statement was in the file, and Elizabeth had read that a hundred times as well. An elderly neighbor heard an altercation around three in the afternoon, but she was bedridden, infirm, and not much help beyond establishing a basic timeline.

Elizabeth was a rookie when the murder happened-a uniformed officer four months into the job-but she had discovered Julia’s body on the altar of a church seven miles from the edge of town. That it was Elizabeth’s childhood church was an uncomfortable but otherwise irrelevant fact. It was a body in a building, a crime scene like any other. Elizabeth couldn’t know the effect its discovery would have on her own life. On her parents. Her church. Elizabeth had come that day to see her mother and discovered the body of Julia Strange, instead. She’d been choked to death in the most violent manner, the body undressed, then laid out on the altar and draped to the chin in white linen. No signs of sexual trauma were found, but skin discovered beneath her fingernails contained Adrian Wall’s DNA. Further investigation discovered Adrian’s prints on one of the shattered glasses in the kitchen and on a beer can found in a roadside ditch near the church. A court-ordered medical exam discovered scratches on the back of his neck. Once the prosecutor established that Adrian knew the victim, it was a hard, fast slide to conviction. He had no alibi and no explanation. Even his own partner testified against him.

Only Elizabeth doubted his guilt, but she was barely twenty-one, and no one took her seriously. She tried to investigate on her own, but was warned off. You’re biased, she was told. Confused. But Elizabeth’s faith in Adrian went beyond anything that simple. The second time she tried speaking to the witness, she was suspended. The next time she was threatened with prosecution for obstruction. So, Elizabeth let it go. She sat in the courtroom every day and kept her eyes straight ahead when the verdict came back against him. No one understood why she cared about Adrian Wall, only that she did. No one got it or possibly could.

Even Adrian didn’t know.

She spent another thirty minutes with the file, then heard a knock on her door and made it halfway across the room before realizing she was still in her underwear. “Hang on. I’m coming.” Slipping down the narrow hall, she snatched a robe off the back of her closet door and returned to the living room as someone knocked a third time. Putting an eye to the peephole, she saw Beckett’s wife on the porch. She was cheery and plump and looking at her face in a small mirror. Elizabeth cracked the door. “Carol, hey. What are you doing here?”

Carol flashed a smile and lifted a small, blue valise. “I come with assistance.”

“I’m sorry, what?”

“My husband said you needed help with your hair?” Carol raised her voice as if it were a question.

“My hair?”

Carol pushed in and nudged the door shut with a hip. She examined the house approvingly, then turned her attention to the dark circles under Elizabeth’s eyes, the washed-out skin, and cool, quiet frustration. “He wasn’t kidding about the hair.”

Elizabeth’s hand moved unconsciously, three fingers on the jagged bangs. “Listen-”

“You didn’t ask me to come, did you?”

“Did he say that I had?”

“Look, I’m sorry. I can tell this is unexpected.”

Elizabeth sighed. Carol was a patient soul who’d never had a bad day in her life. “It’s okay.” Elizabeth smiled and nodded. “I think we both know how your husband is.”

“A bit of a control freak, God bless him.”

“You should try working with him.”

“Right, then.” Carol put the case down, her face suddenly businesslike. “So, he didn’t ask and didn’t tell you I was coming.” Hands on her hips, she did a slow look around the living room and kitchen. “Right, then.” The second time was less convincing, but she nodded regardless. “Shower for you. I’ll have a coffee while I wait, and then we can fix your hair once you’re dressed.”

“Look, there’s no need-”

“Maybe something conservative.”

“I’m sorry?”

“What?”

“You said I should put on something conservative.”

“Did I?” Carol looked appalled. “God, no. I’m sorry. I don’t know what came over me.” She fluttered a hand. “It’s the short robe and the long legs. Wait. No. I’m still not saying this right.” She took a deep breath and tried again. “You’re so pretty you’d look beautiful in anything. We’re just a little more modest at our house. Please forgive me. I honestly can’t believe I said that. I’m here in your home, unexpected…”

Elizabeth held up a hand. “It’s okay.”

“Are you sure? I would hate for you to think I’m such a prude. It’s really none of my business.”

“Just give me a few minutes. A shower. Another cup of coffee.”

Carol smiled weakly. “If you’re positive.”

“Five minutes.”

In the bathroom, Elizabeth stood in front of the mirror and breathed deeply as her smile drained away. She heard the sound of cabinet doors and dishes clanking, then put both hands on the sink and looked in the mirror. Dyer was right about the weight. She stood five-eight and normally carried enough lean muscle to do the job efficiently and well. Good shoulders. Strong arms. But she looked waifish now, the cheekbones more prominent, the eyes larger and deeper, their irises pale green. Stripping off the robe, she tried to imagine what someone like Carol Beckett saw. The hair was brown and short over a small nose and narrow chin. The skin was pale but clear, the face proportional in all the right ways. Elizabeth knew she was pretty, but a white scar ran across her stomach where a junkie with a knife had cut her from rib to hip bone, and a rough patch discolored her shoulder where she’d gone down on hard concrete. Men seemed to like her, but she didn’t kid herself about the deeper truths. She’d broken an arm and four ribs, torn skin going over fences, and been thrown through two different windows. Thirteen years on the force, she thought. And what am I? It was not a light question. She’d had five serious relationships, and all were dead ends. She was a preacher’s daughter and a college dropout, a drinker, a smoker, and a fallen cop. She was under investigation for the deaths of two men and felt no remorse at all. Would she change anything if she could?

Maybe, she thought.

Probably not.

There were reasons for everything. Why she hated her father. Why she’d become a cop, and why relationships were hard. She could say the same thing about the basement and the shooting and Adrian Wall. Consequence mattered, but so did the reasons.

Sometimes the reasons mattered more.

When she came out of the bathroom, she was clean and damp and dressed as conservatively as she could manage, which meant jeans and boots and a linen shirt. Maybe the jeans rode low on her hips, and maybe the shirt was a bit too tailored for someone like Carol. Elizabeth tried to make light of the whole thing. “Is this better?”

“Much.”

Elizabeth saw the Julia Strange murder file on the coffee table and scooped it up. “Don’t you have a wedding or something?”

“Oh, you sweet girl. Not for another hour, and this won’t take nearly that long.”

“Are you sure?”

She said it hopefully, but Carol dragged a chair onto the kitchen floor and patted it with one hand. So, Elizabeth sat and allowed her hair to be cut and sprayed and blown. They spoke of little things, but mostly of Carol’s husband. “He loves being your partner.” Carol stepped back, made a small movement with a brush. “He says watching you work is a beautiful thing.”

“Yeah, well…”

“Does he talk about me? When you’re in the car, I mean, or on a case. Does he talk about me or the kids?”

“Every day,” Elizabeth said. “He plays it like everything else-gruff and close-but there’s no mistaking how he feels. Proud of his kids. Loves his wife. The two of you give me hope.”

Carol beamed, and a little more energy found its way into her brushstrokes.

“Are you about finished?”

Carol gave Elizabeth a hand mirror. “Take a look.”

The hair was brown and bobbed and smooth. It was a little more sprayed than she liked, a little too styled. She handed the mirror back and stood. “Thank you, Carol.”

“It’s what I do.” Carol patted her blue case and was halfway down the stairs when her cell phone rang. “Oh. Would you hold this?” She pushed the case at Elizabeth and pulled a phone from her front pocket. Still on the steps, she said, “Hello.” A pause. “Oh, hi, sweetheart… What?… Yes, I am.” She looked at Elizabeth. “Of course. Yes. We’re at her house.” She pressed the phone against a heavy breast and spoke to Elizabeth. “Charlie. He wants to talk to you.”

Carol handed over the phone and Elizabeth looked at the street beyond Carol’s broad, powdered face. “What’s up, Beckett?”

“Your phone is off the hook.”

“I know.”

“Your cell phone’s off, too.”

“There’s no one I really care to talk to. What’s going on?”

“A kid got shot out by the prison.”

“I’m sorry to hear that. Why does it concern me?”

“Because odds are fifty-fifty Adrian Wall’s the one who shot him.”

Elizabeth felt the world go soft under her feet. She wanted to sit, but Carol was staring at her face.

“There’s more to it,” Beckett said.

“What?”

“The kid that got shot is Gideon Strange. Look, I’m sorry to be the one-”

“Wait. Stop.”

Elizabeth pushed on her eyes until she saw red haze and white sparks. She flashed on every autopsy photo in the Julia Strange murder file, then remembered what Gideon had been like on the day his mother had gone missing. She could see every detail of the boy’s living room, the furniture and the paint, the detectives and the crime-scene techs that drifted like smoke from the kitchen. She remembered Adrian Wall-pale as a sheet-and the feel of the boy’s hot, squirming body as he’d screamed in her arms and other cops tried to calm his wild-eyed, wailing father.

“Is he alive?”

“Surgery,” Beckett said. “I don’t know any more than that. I’m sorry.”

Elizabeth was dizzy, the sun too bright. “Where was he shot?”

“The high right side of his chest.”

“No, Beckett. Where did it happen?”

“Nathan’s. The biker bar.”

“I’ll be there in ten minutes.”

“No, you won’t come anywhere near this. Dyer was specific. He doesn’t want you around Adrian Wall or this case. Obviously, I agree.”

“Then why did you call me?”

“Because I know you love the kid. I thought you’d want to go to the hospital, be there for him.”

“I can’t do anything at the hospital.”

“You can’t do anything here, either.”

“Beckett…”

“He’s not your son, Liz.” She froze, the phone painful against her ear. “You’re just the cop who found his mother dead.”

That was a hard truth, but who else was closer to the boy? His father? Social services? Elizabeth had been the first on scene when Gideon’s mother went missing. It might have ended there, but she’d also found Julia Strange broken on the altar of Elizabeth’s father’s church, the body so vulnerable in its desecration she’d almost wept. They’d never once met; and yet Elizabeth, even now, felt a kinship between them, a thread that twisted through thirteen years and found its embodiment in the small boy left behind. A man such as Beckett would never understand that. He couldn’t.

“Go to the hospital,” he said. “I’ll meet you there, later.”

Beckett hung up, and Elizabeth handed the phone back to Carol, who said a good-bye that barely registered. There was a blur of face, a cough as the car started and made a brushstroke of color in the road. When it was gone, Elizabeth walked to the bathroom, kept her eyes down so as not to see her face, and used the sink to rinse spray from her hair. She was numb, her mind spinning on images of Gideon as a toddler, and then as a boy. She thought she knew everything about him, his wants and needs and secret hurts.

Why was he at the prison?

Elizabeth shied from the answer because deep down she knew that, too.

Sitting on the sofa, she opened the murder file and pulled a photograph taken by a crime-scene tech less than an hour after Julia Strange was discovered missing. In the shot, Elizabeth stood in uniform with a red-faced infant in her arms. The Stranges’ kitchen was in disarray behind her. Gideon had the fabric on her shirt balled in his tiny fist. As a rookie and the only woman in the house, she’d been given the child to take care of until social services arrived. She didn’t know then how she’d react to such need and helplessness. She was a kid herself. She couldn’t have.

Elizabeth leaned back, remembering all the days and months she’d spent with the boy in the years that followed his mother’s death. She knew his teachers, his father, the friends he kept at school. He called her when he was hungry or scared. At times, he walked to her house, just to do homework or talk or sit on the porch. For him, too, the old house had been a sanctuary.

“Gideon.”

A single finger touched his face, and when tears rose in her eyes, she let them run unheeded down her cheeks.

“Why didn’t you talk to me?”

But he had tried, she remembered, calling three times in one day, then again, and then not at all. She’d known that Adrian was getting out, and that Gideon knew it, too. She should have anticipated his distress, known he might do something stupid. He was such a feeling, thoughtful boy.

“I should have seen it.”

But she’d been at the hospital with Channing, then talking to state police and roaming the halls of her own private hell. She hadn’t seen a thing. She’d not even thought of him.

“You poor, sweet boy…”

She gave herself that minute to be soft, to feel the guilty fullness of a mother’s love when she was not, in fact, a mother; then she put the file away, pushed a pistol into her belt, and drove for the cinder-block bar that sat in the shadow of the prison.