Dark to Mortal Eyes (13 page)

The man ran his hand along the paper, up and down, up and down, while his eyes scanned the showroom. “Didn’t mean to startle you. My apologies.”

“Oh, no, no, not at all.”

“Audentes fortuna juvat,” he said.

She pulled a hand to her chest and wrinkled her mouth. It’d been weeks since her last meeting with ICV. She loved the Pacific Northwest for its natural resources, and this group claimed to fight for environmental concerns. They gathered and inspired artists, taught awareness, and collected and donated funds. More recently, however, they’d segued into anarchist activity under the guise of civil disobedience.

In her last meeting, she’d seen one recruit—only one—decry such means.

ICV’s retaliation was swift. Anything but civil. And she hadn’t gone back.

“Ma’am, I know it’s been a while. I’m seeking your help, hoping to sell my newest work on consignment.” The man stripped away the paper to reveal a white chess queen upon her castle walls. She was reaching for something, losing her balance. Concealed among thorns in a cubist foreground, a book was open, pages flapping. Was this the object of interest? A saffron streak marked the painting’s edge.

“My, my, my. Very original. Is this yours?”

The artist gave a nod, his aura draping him like a buffalo blanket.

“Striking. And quite good.” Suzette Bishop’s misgivings crumbled before her passion for creative expression. “I
like
its brooding magnetism. I’ll
make
a space.”

The man looked her in the eye for the first time. “Sounds trivial, I’m sure, but do you make deliveries of purchased works? That’s been my understanding.”

“Why, on occasion I’ve made such arrangements.”

“With a piece this large, it might be a necessity. My asking price is $3,999.”

She propped the canvas beside a shelf of amulets and bear-claw necklaces, mentally calculating her commission. If it sold quickly, she could attend the upcoming psychic fair. All was coming into alignment. Tattered Feather would have a chance to fly. “I can guarantee delivery,” she told the artist. “Not to worry, not at all.”

“Thank you, ma’am. In cauda venenum.”

“In cauda venenum.” The phrase spilled so smoothly through Suzette’s lips.

With the porter thick on his tongue and chlorine heavy in the air, Marsh let a waterjet drill at the tension in his back. Tomorrow he’d start fresh. He had hurt Kara with his words, but he would make it up to her. With any luck, she’d be happy with the changes in the parlor. He would let her tell of her encounter with Josee, and then maybe she would calm her hormones, and the kitchen staff could serve them a candlelight dinner in the dining hall, and they’d laugh and act as they had during their engagement in his junior year at Oregon State.

Before the pregnancy. And the doctor’s grim prognosis.

Before his mother’s enigmatic warning that had served as precursor to both …

“Son, I cannot tell you everything. Wish that I could, but Chance wouldn’t want it that way.” In his memories, Virginia’s voice was always shakier than in real life, as though the decades-old conversation were taped and wearing thin. “You need to know, though, a few things at least. Now that you and Kara are considering marriage, I’m obligated to issue a caution.”

“A caution?” Marsh snorted. “About what? You make it sound so ominous.”

She pushed ahead. “Marshall, you may be unfit for fatherhood.”

“Unfit?” He forced a laugh. “Who said anything about kids?”

“Your risk’s high. You’ve been contaminated, and it’d be wise to have a doctor—”

“What crazy talk is this, Mother? What’re you going on about?”

She screwed her eyes tight as if to block a chimera of horror. “One day you’ll see.”

“I’ll see? Oh, very cryptic! And helpful, I might add.”

“One day it’ll make sense. We can only pray that such a day never comes, that perhaps you’ll be spared. It’s a matter your father involved himself in at the end of the war, something bound to endanger your offspring.”

“My father was a good man.”

Virginia sniffled. “Duty called him into military aspects of chemical research. Son, you need to understand this. Please don’t disregard it.”

“What’s the point here?”

“Contamination. Your father suffered from his work. Only later did he realize the long-term effects.”

“What? Was there an accident? A chemical leak? What’re you trying to say?”

“It was no accident.” Virginia clenched her fingers in her lap. “I’m trying to protect you from a portion of the pain that I’ve gone through.”

“Yeah? That’s something every parent says. You ask me, this is insane.”

“We must break the chain.”

“You bet, Mom. I’ll start working on it right away.”

Infuriated by his mother’s gall, he had refused to broach the subject again.
He wouldn’t yield himself to this curse she had tried to drop at his feet. Later, however, when Kara’s obstetrician announced the ailing status of her unborn daughter, Marsh stewed in uncertain blame. The tiny baby did not deserve this. A blood disorder. An unknown form of hemophilia threatening her very life? He did not need this encumbrance on his time and finances. Surely he was not responsible for her sickness. Or was he? Had his own father passed along a genetic anomaly? What had actually happened at the end of the war?

Maybe his mother’s words were true; maybe he had afflicted a child with his own defective genes.

Unfit, indeed.

Stretched out in the hot tub, he felt a droplet of sweat sting his eye. He blinked twice. In his peripheral vision, he thought he saw a figure at the end of the cedar deck, and he shot up from the water. Called out in warning. Armed himself with a beer bottle and prowled the planks till he was convinced he was alone. Whatever it was, it had vanished.

“Oh, brother,” Chief Braddock chided. “Not this story again.”

Turney bristled. His superior had arrived with measured strides, keys swinging in rhythm from his belt. Although white hair showed at his red temples and wrinkles carved his rawhide cheeks, he moved like a younger man. Turney stood and let his sleeve drop back over his arm. “Hello, Chief.”

“Tell me, Sarge, whose ears are you twisting this time?”

Shoving in his shirt, Turney felt his cheeks grow hot. He’d faced ridicule before, learned to keep his trap shut, but with Josee at his side he felt an urge to defend himself—an urge he hadn’t experienced this strongly since before his fiancée’s passing.

Milly. Josee. Different in lots of ways, but both had that feisty streak.

Time to speak up. He opened his mouth. Stood there like a confounded fool.

“Full of the usual wit, I see.” Braddock turned. “And you must be Josee.” His eyes flashed reproach, then dalliance as they roved from her attire to cheekbones to upturned eyes. “Josee Walker?”

“Maybe. Who are you?”

“Don’t tell me you’re buying Sarge’s drivel.”

“You know, we were having a private conversation here.”

Sergeant Turney gave a silent hurrah. He knew what it was like to be on the other side of Josee’s attitude.
Let him have it, kiddo
.

The chief rested his hand on a belt buckle where shiny flint letters spelled
Big Juan
. “I’m Chief Braddock. You know what that means? It means I come and go as I see fit. I’ve been around this area a long time, and nothing’s private, not to me, not in this city.” He spun a chair and straddled it.

Turney said, “Josee and I were just finishin’ up a report.”

“That so? Looked to me like you were about to launch into one of your stories. Let me guess, the one about the snake?”

“Actually, she—”

“Listen, he’s yanking your chain, Josee.” Braddock wagged a censuring finger. “Sarge tells a good story. Don’t get me wrong. But he’d be better off saving his ideas for some campy late night TV show,
X-Files
or somethin’.”

“TV?” Josee gibed. “I yanked the plug on the great surrogate mother years ago.”

“Surrogate mother?”

“Yep. Baby-sitting America’s kids, telling them how to look, how to act, how to—”

“As I was saying …” Careful to leave his badge visible and gleaming, the chief folded his arms and flicked aside her interruption like lint from his starched uniform. “Years ago the famous Thunder Turney met his match in a hospital corridor. This very place, in fact. He was just a kid, you understand, but he couldn’t hold his own. Ever since, he’s fabricated these stories to salve his conscience. Truth be told, a woman was shot, and her newborn baby was lost. Unfortunate. Wasn’t his responsibility though. You’d think he’d move on and let it rest, but, oh no, not our boy Vince.”

Josee said, “Bet you just love belittling people.”

Braddock’s laughter was a stone skipping over the cafeteria tables.

Turney bit his lip. Jabbed at the crust of his hamburger bun.

The chief said, “Now don’t get your shorts in a wad, Sarge. We’ve got work to do. I’ve just come from the Rotary Club, and I’m meeting with the hospital administrator shortly, but in the meantime I’ll keep Miss Walker here company. As for you—”

“Josee hasn’t seen her friend, sir. She’s worried. I was plannin’ to take her—”

“Just told you the plan. I’ll make sure she gets her visitation time. Now you’ve got paperwork to go through at the station. Need you to set up next week’s swing-shift schedule and have Rita post it today. And while you’re at it, if you’d be so kind as to arrange tonight’s lodgings for the young lady here, I’m sure she’d appreciate it.”

“Don’t need it,” Josee piped up. “I’ll sack out here in the waiting room.”

“It’d be better if—”

“I’m not leaving, not till I see Scooter.”

“You’ll see him. Then you gotta trust the sergeant to set you up. That clear?”

Josee massaged her earlobe. “Sure, I guess I can trust him.”

“Well, well, score one for Sarge.”

Turney looked straight ahead, his heart slowing to a stop.

“So,” Josee carried on, “why don’t
you
trust your own officer to stay here and take care of business? He seems like a good guy, despite the junk you’re flinging at him. I’d rather we just keep things the way they are.”

Braddock dragged a hand over his sun-wizened cheeks, fixed his eyes on a fluorescent light overhead. “Girl, I’m going out of my way for you as it is. I’ve even requisitioned benevolence vouchers for you, something to tide you over while your friend’s healing up. Am I wrong in assuming that you’re strapped for cash? Take what’s offered, and knock that chip off your shoulder.”

“But I can’t help it,” Josee said, her words dripping with sincerity. “It’s an extra appendage. Had it since my day of birth.”

“Then maybe, just maybe, you need to go back and start over.”

“Maybe that’s exactly what I’m trying to do! What do you know anyway?”

Turney placed his hand close to Josee’s tray. He could see her leg jittering beneath the table. He hated to admit it, but the chief’s brusque manner couldn’t hide the truth in his words. Turney said, “Josee, things’ll be all right. You just sit tight, do as the chief says, and we’ll get you a place to lay your head for the night.”

“What’s wrong with staying here?”

“First off, the hospital’s not real wild about runnin’ a hotel. Through the department, we’ve got a list of homes ready to open up whenever we need a bed.”

“You mean whenever someone like
me
needs a bed.”

“These’re kindhearted people. They’re not judging you. Neither am I.”

“So Josee,” Braddock broke in, “you ready for some news on this Scooter kid?”

Her eyes batted in coy machination. “Pretty please, Chief, with a cherry on top.”

“Knew that’d please you. You girls’re always easy to figure.”

Turney held his breath for fear of what he might say.

“Hold tight, you two,” Chief Braddock directed, “and I’ll be right back.”

Josee watched the chief plow between tables and chairs. “What a jerk.”

“That’s the man’s style—always gotta stay on top.”

She turned and saw Turney’s eyes sinking deeper into cookie dough, melting in the heat of his self-reproach. “Tell me what happened. What did he mean about the lady and her baby?”