Thread of deceit, p.24
Thread of Deceit, page 24
“I know you didn’t hurt Flora, Terell,” he repeated. “I shouldn’t have accused you. I wasn’t thinking—”
“It’s that lady!” someone screamed. “She’s bleeding again!”
The children scattered, their shoes pounding across the concrete floor, their voices pitched high with hysteria. Sam pivoted away from Terell. He spotted Ana as she hurried toward him. One arm cradled the other against her body and pressed her hand to her abdomen. Even from a distance, he could see blood spattered across her face and shirt.
“Sam!” She ran toward him, calling out, stumbling through the mass of shrieking children.
He left Terell, his legs eating up the space between himself and the woman. “Ana, what happened? Who did this?”
“Oh, Sam!”
He caught her, pulled her close. “Ana, Ana.”
“You kids get on back to what you were doing!” Terell barked. “You’re out of your groups, every last one of you. Am I gonna have to put you on the list?”
With a chorus of cries and shrieks, the children scampered back to their activities. Terell clamped a hand on Sam’s shoulder. “Let me look at her, dog. She’s pale. She might be in shock.”
“I’m not in shock,” Ana breathed, her eyes focusing on the taller man. “It was him, Terell. It was Jack Smith.” She shook her head. “That’s not his real name. He shot me, and I barely—”
Her face crumpled. Caught in Sam’s arms, she sagged to the floor. He and Terell followed her down, lowering her gently to the cool concrete. She sat spread-eagled, her shoes missing, her head bowed, red stains spattered across her blouse.
“Get the first aid kit, Antwone!” Terell shouted to a teenager who still hovered near. “Call 9-1-1, and tell them to get over here with the police and an ambulance.”
“No, wait.” Ana lifted her head. “It’s just my hand. I think I can—”
“Did you hear me?” Terell snapped at Antwone. Then he twisted back to Ana. “I don’t care if the bullet went through your hand or your head, woman. You need a doctor.”
“But he’s after me. He’ll find me.” She caught Terell’s arm, her eyes pinned to his face. “I know who did it. I was so wrong about you. The predator is Jim Slater. He’s Primero. He sent the hit man after me, because I figured it out. We have to find Flora! Terell, please help me. Sam, I need you.”
“Ana, slow down,” Sam said as Terell eased her wounded hand away from her body and began to examine it. “You say Jack Smith shot you? Where did it happen?”
“At the newspaper building. He got in. It was the man Jim Slater introduced as his colleague from Arkansas. He told me his real name—at least the alias he is using with Jim—is Don Bering.” She winced when Terell prodded her palm. “Jim hired him. Jim’s real name is Jack Slaughter.”
“Jack Slaughter? So that’s why you couldn’t find any mention of Slater in Aspen.”
“Yes, and Bering…I’m afraid of what he did to those two girls. Now he’s after me. He’s going to kill me, Sam.”
“No way. I’ve got you now. You’re safe.”
“These bones are broken,” Terell announced. “Bone fragments in the wound. Shredded tendon. Her skin’s burned, too.”
“But no arteries,” Ana said. “Nothing important.”
“Nothing important? You’re a reporter, aren’t you? Your livelihood depends on a keyboard. A surgeon needs to set these bones and stitch the tendons back together if you want to keep full use of your hand.”
“I can’t. Not now. Just wrap it, and I’ll go to the doctor later. We have to find Flora. Bering will be after her, too. We need to look for Gypsy and see if she can tell us where Flora might be.”
“The only place you’re going, Ana Burns, is to the emergency room,” Sam cut in.
“Terell, you seem to know more about injuries than Sam. What do you think?”
“I think Sam ought to stop running his mouth all the time. Making accusations, bossing people around. That’s not how we act at Haven. I might have to put Sam on the list.” Terell chuckled, the first happy sound Sam had heard from his friend in the past twenty-four hours. “Let me work on this, Ana. I’ll make the decision.”
Sam digested the shards of hurt that remained in his friend’s voice. He suspected the injury to Terell would take longer to heal than Ana’s.
His attention riveted on his patient now, Terell began to work. Ana clutched her trembling hand, her pale face contorted with pain. As Sam gently rubbed her back, Terell unrolled a bandage, packed the wound with sterile gauze and began to wrap the hand.
“I know this sounds crazy, but I’m with Ana,” he told Sam. “She needs to see a doctor, but if the pain can wait, we’ve got other business. She’s been shot, and that means someone wants her dead. Ana, are you sure you saw who did this to you?”
“Don Bering,” she said. “The man we met as Jack Smith. The guy who came here with Jim Slater after church on Sunday.”
“I didn’t like the looks of him,” Terell said. “That dude and Slater were up there like a couple of burglars breaking our padlock. Made me mad.”
“They were trying to get through the door and onto the fire escape so they could catch Flora. It’s because she can tell police what they’re doing. They know I’ve been talking to Flora, so Bering came after me tonight. He fired at me as I ran down the stairwell. He took my purse, so I didn’t have my keys. I barely made it onto a bus, but then the driver made me get off.”
“You were bleeding,” Terell murmured. “Bus drivers won’t do ambulance service. So, how’d you get here?”
“There was a…” She looked over her shoulder. “He was a…Where did he go? He got off the bus when I did. He led me here.”
“I didn’t see anyone but you,” Sam said. “Ana, I know you want to look for Flora, but you’ve got to stay here until the police and ambulance arrive. Terell and I will—”
“No, Sam. Absolutely not.” She pushed herself up, the end of the bandage floating from her hand like a white banner. “Bering knows I figured it all out—Jack Slaughter’s operation. The Honduras connection. Slaughter hired him to kill me, and I have no doubt he’s after Flora, too.”
“Then we’d better find her first,” Terell said, getting to his feet.
“She’ll be with Gypsy,” Ana told him. “But how can we find her? She could be anywhere.”
“Gypsy won’t be hard to track down,” Terell said. “These girls work regular streets. They stake out a corner, and the pimp protects it. If we can find someone who knows his way around—”
“Raydell,” Sam said, standing now. “Raydell knows everything and everyone in this hood.”
“You’re just breaking Haven’s rules all the time, aren’t you, dog? Butting in, giving orders, acting uppity.” Terell chastised him. “You fall in love, and the rules go right out the window.”
“I am not—” Sam bit off the denial. Unable to bring himself to look at Ana, he growled at Terell. “Speaking of rules, T-Rex, it’s against the law to shoot someone. Finding Flora is a job for the police. They know the streets better than any of us. And if you think Ana’s hand is going to heal right—”
“Those two little girls at Slater’s house!” Ana spun around and caught the sleeve of Sam’s T-shirt in her good hand. “We’ve got to go find them, too. Come on, Terell.”
“Now wait,” Sam called as Ana and Terell started for the door. “You don’t have any shoes on, woman. The ambulance will be here any minute. This is a civilian setting. There’s a certain order to the procedure.”
“Civilian setting? This is war!” Terell yelled over his shoulder. “Come on, Sam, you’re the reconnaissance dude. Put on that black beret again, and help us out.”
Standing in the middle of the gym, Sam stared at the two—the wounded woman, and the wounded friend. They both needed a haven, and he wanted to provide that for them. But they wouldn’t have it.
As Sam hesitated, the words of Jesus filled his head…. The greatest love is shown when people lay down their lives for their friends. Love. Ana’s idea of God was the rescuer, comforter, savior. But now he saw that the two facets of his Lord’s character worked together. Love demanded action. Action revealed love.
Sam held up a hand, signaling Ana and Terell to wait. He jogged to the office and pulled Caleb’s attention from the innards of a computer. The youth agreed to shut down the building early, to give Sam’s cell phone number to the police and to notify the ambulance that a woman with a gunshot wound to the hand would arrive at the hospital soon.
Questioning his sanity the whole way, Sam dug yet another pair of flip-flops out of the lost-and-found box. Though he knew it was crazy to venture out with a woman as badly wounded as Ana, his body hummed with the cry from Terell’s lips.
This is war.
And it was. Jesus had ordered His troops to care for “the least of these.” Wasn’t Flora the very least of all? Didn’t she—didn’t every child—deserve better?
Jesus had instructed His disciples to clothe the naked, and that description perfectly fit the abused children Ana knew so much about. They had been stripped of everything—their dignity, their self-worth, and most of all, their innocence. They stood helpless, completely defenseless against anyone who meant them harm. Their only hope was that some adult would care enough to reach out and find them, rescue them, clothe them in warm robes of love.
“What was the word in the poem Flora wrote?” Sam asked as he handed Ana the flip-flops.
“Esperanza,” she said. Her voice softened as she translated the verse. “‘It comes. Like moonlight. Like wind before rain. Like a green bud on a dead tree. Esperanza. Hope.’”
“So, are we gonna talk poetry all night?” Terell asked as he clipped the end of the bandage in place on Ana’s hand. “Because I’m ready to get out of this place. Hear the sirens? If we don’t beat them, we’ll be here for hours.”
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.
