JJ09 - Blood Moon (14 page)

“Rachel Peterson.”

“It’s John Jordan. Is an inmate named Ronnie Cardigan one of your witnesses in the Reggie Dalton case?”

“You know I can’t tell you that.”

“I think he’s in danger. Just wanted to see if you were keeping an eye on him.”

“Oh. Well, he’s not one of mine, so . . .”

“Okay. Thanks. Sorry I disturbed you. ’Night.”

Maybe I was wrong about which case Cardigan had been referring to or maybe he was involved and she wasn’t aware of it. Of course, maybe what was going on had nothing to do with what he thinks he knows. It could have to do with his original case or something else entirely.

I turned and looked at the unconscious, partially dressed Emmitt, who was still slumped on the toilet.

“There’s no way to know without more info,” I said to him. “You know?”

He didn’t respond.

“If you disagree you can tell me,” I said.

The door to the sanctuary opened and inmates began lining up in the hallway outside my office.

I stepped over and closed the restroom door, then went out into the hallway and thanked the volunteer and greeted the inmates, several of whom launched into complaints, requests, and grievances.

Though I thanked the officer, he continued to ignore me.

He ordered the inmates to line up outside the chapel, and I walked the volunteer out into the black, blood-tinged night.

We both stopped and looked up, beholding the brilliant blood moon as if with a catch in our throats.

“Looks like a darker, more glowing version of Mars,” he said.

And it did.

I stood and waited as he made his way to the front gate and the inmates began their much longer journey to the center gate and their housing beyond, all the while staring up at the blood-red orb shimmering in the black night sky.

Back inside my office, I finished dressing Emmitt.

He was beginning to move more, which with his babbling made him seem highly, belligerently intoxicated, and though it made dressing far more challenging, I was relieved he was waking up, the drug wearing off.

By the time I had finished dressing him, he was lying facedown on the floor, the lower half of his body in the bathroom, the upper in my office.

Leaving him there, I walked over and sat down behind my desk.

For a moment, I just sat there catching my breath.

In the stillness and silence of the moment, I said a prayerful
thank you
. I was so relieved Anna was okay, so grateful to have her back.

Snatching up the phone, I dialed her desk.

“Classification, Rodden,” she said.

“How long before that’ll be Jordan?” I asked.

“Too long—even if it was right now,” she said.

“We haven’t really talked about marriage,” I said.

“Seemed premature,” she said. “Me not being unmarried yet and all.”

“True.”

“But I would love to be your wife,” she said. “Love to take your name––something I said I’d never do.”

Hearing her say
wife
reminded me of her kidnapper calling her my wife.

“I just called to tell you I love you and that I am so, so, so grateful to have you back.”

“You don’t know from gratitude,” she said. “I . . . I really thought . . . Anyway, I’m even more grateful.”

“It’s not a competition,” I said, “but you’re not.”

“Am too.”

“Are not.”

“Am too.”

“Hate to change the subject when the current one is so profound,” I said, “but . . . the kidnapper kept referring to you as my wife. He seemed to know so much about us, but he kept getting that wrong. Any idea why? Did they both do it?”

“The main one, the one who kept calling you, he did. He called me your wife and you my husband. The other guy never said a word to me and barely a word to the caller. The third guy didn’t say anything to anyone.”

“Any ideas why?” I asked. “I mean, he’s only wrong technically, but . . . did he say anything else that was technically wrong? Anything else that might give us some insight into who he was or why he did it?”

“I’ve been thinking about it. I have some ideas. I’m also gathering up some info on Cardigan and the Reggie Dalton case. Let me finish up, then we’ll talk about all of it face to face.”

When we hung up, I picked up the phone again and dialed the control room.

“What can I do you for, Chaplain?” Randy Wayne asked.

“Need an outside line.”

“Number?”

I gave it to him. “Emmitt is feeling bad again. It’s much worse this time. I’m gonna call his wife to come get him. Okay if I get her to pull up close to the control room?”

“No problem.”

“And I may need a hand helping him out.”

“Just let me know. I’ll send someone.”

“Thanks.”

Emmitt’s wife on the way, I began the arduous task of helping him up and out of the institution.

“Can you stand?” I asked.

He mumbled something.

I lifted his arm and pulled. “Come on. Let’s get you up and out of here.”

He made what could be described as an incremental move toward standing, but it didn’t result in much.

Straddling him, I reached around his chest and heaved.

When I pulled him up, he made no effort to help or stand on his own, so I put him back down again.

Though he had a thick, stocky build, he weighed even more than he looked like he would.

I decided to call for help.

Stumbling over to my desk, I sat back down behind it.

“I guess I never realized just how heavy you are,” I said. “Probably because your wife is so large.”

In the tradition of Deep South rural route Pentecostal women, Dorcas Emerson dwarfed her husband and eclipsed the three chubby kids continually orbiting around her.

I called the control room.

“I am going to need help with him this time,” I said.

“Just sit tight, Chaplain,” Randy Wayne said. “I’ll have someone down there directly.”

Merrill’s mom used
directly
like that, but I hadn’t heard many other people do it.

“Thank you.”

“What’re you up to?”

This was the first thing out of Rachel Peterson’s mouth when I answered the phone, and it wasn’t the casual form of the question.

“Why’d you call and ask about my case?” she added.

“I told you.”

“Is my witness in danger?” she asked.

“Is he your witness?”

“Answer me first.”

“I think he could be. Tell me what’s going on. Please.”

“It’s simple. Reggie Dalton was murdered. The officers who did it not only disabled cameras and erased footage, they actually re-created the incident using a different inmate after Dalton was dead.”

“Cardigan?”

“Cardigan. I mean, he hasn’t said so, but . . . I know that’s what happened, and I’m pretty close to being able to prove it. Gotta hella video expert from FDLE workin’ on the footage. It’d really help to have Cardigan’s testimony, but the dumb little bastard still thinks the desperate killers he helped are going to help him.”

“Might not after tonight,” I said.

“Why? What happened tonight?”

“Something spooked him,” I said. “Something said or done has him questioning his options. Be a good time to talk to him.”

“I planned to first thing in the morning anyway. I’m trusting you more than I do most people by telling you all this. Am I wrong to?”

“No.”

“I hope not.”

“Are the officers under investigation on administrative leave or suspended pending the outcome of your investigation?”

“I haven’t had enough on them for anything like that. Still don’t without Cardigan’s testimony.”

“So they’re still here? Working? Could be right now? With access to Cardigan?”

“What could I do?” she said. “Until he decides to play ball, I’ve got nothing.”

“I had him placed in protection tonight,” I said.

“Good. That’s good.”

“Not if any of the officers working it are the ones involved.”

I called the control room again.

“Sorry I haven’t gotten anyone down to help you yet, Chaplain. Won’t be much longer now.”

“No problem. I was actually calling with a quick question.”

“Shoot,” he said.

“Are Marty Perkins, Lewis Milner, or Jack Kirkus working tonight and if so, where?”

“Let’s see . . . I’ll have to pull the duty roster to be sure, but . . . I know I saw Jack earlier. ’Course that may have been the day shift. It’s all runnin’ together by now. Let me look it up and call you back.”

It didn’t take him long to call me back.

“None of the officers you called about are on duty,” he said. “Jack worked the day shift. Don’t know when the others work. I can find out. Or I can call them in if it’s an emergency. What’s going on?”

“Nothing. Not an emergency. I’ll talk to them the next time they work.”

“You sure?”

“Yeah.”

“You looking into their case? Helping the new female IG or . . .”

“Thought I might see if I could help, but . . . was just a random thought.”

“They’re good men. If you or your dad can help them, you should.”

“Thanks.”

“Let me know if you need anything else. Oh, and Dorcas Emerson just called. Her car won’t start. She’s waiting for somebody to come jump her off. Can you just stay with him until she gets here? I’ll send someone down to help you with him then. Unless I need to call an ambulance.”

“No, that’s fine. I’ll be here. Thanks.”

When we hung up, I called Anna again.

“I can’t stand being away from you any longer,” I said.

“Feel the same way. I’ll head up there in a minute.”

“I’ll meet you outside,” I said. “How are you feeling?”

“Good, actually. Surprisingly so.”

“See you in a sec,” I said. “Love you.”

When Anna stepped out of the front door of her building, I was waiting there for her, gazing up at the red glowing orb in the night-shrouded sky.

Something about the ember-like circle of the moon reminded me of an image I had seen in a film at some point—the pulsating end of a cigarette being smoked by an unseen watcher in the woods on a cold, coal-black night.

After embracing, both of our heads drifted up again, pulled as if the sea itself by the force of the moon.

“I’ve never seen anything like it,” she said. “It’s incredible.”

We stood there for a moment, gazing up, taking it in, trancelike, mesmerized.

She reached over and grabbed my hand.

“You are my blood,” she said.

I was, and she was mine.

I reached over and touched the small, now nearly invisible scar on the right side of her neck. It was the wound from which so much of her blood had been shed, the wound that saved my life, the wound that enabled me to save hers.

That had been so long ago now. If it’s true that all the cells in our bodies are replaced every seven years, then my blood was no longer in her, and who she was then she is no longer. But as much as we had become new people since then, we were still and would forever be the same two people who loved each other beyond any description and all explanation––at a level below cellular, beneath molecular.

She is my blood, and always will be.

“I’ve broken so many vows,” I said.

She turned from the moon and looked at me.

“I was just thinking that when you got that scar I had vowed never to use violence again. Which led to a litany of other broken promises, failures, faithlessnesses. I broke an inmate out of prison tonight––and that’s not nearly the worst thing I’ve done since I’ve been a chaplain. I’ve lost everything––at least a time or two––including my faith and my sobriety, but I’ve
never
,
not ever
, not loved you.”

“What you did tonight, you did for me, for love,” she said.

I nodded.

“That’s a kept vow,” she said. “So is your careful use of constrained violence. You’re less of a failure and the most faithful of anyone I know. No, you don’t break vows, you keep them. Not always in easy or obvious ways, but you do. And all of that is not to say that what you said about never not loving me was lost on me. It wasn’t. And the same is true of me for you.”

We embraced again.

“Everything else can wait,” I said. “Let’s go home. Let’s make love in our bed and sleep in each other’s arms.”

She pulled something from her pocket. A small scrap of paper. “I came across something while in my office. So much online pertaining to the moon tonight. I wrote it down so I could read it to you. It’s by Tahereh Mafi. ‘The moon is a loyal companion. It never leaves. It’s always there, watching, steadfast, knowing us in our light and dark moments, changing forever just as we do. Every day it’s a different version of itself. Sometimes weak and wan, sometimes strong and full of light. The moon understands what it means to be human. Uncertain. Alone. Cratered by imperfections.’”

“Cratered by imperfections,” I repeated. “I really like that.”

“You are my moon,” she said. “My blood. My moon.”

“Shakespeare was wrong about the moon,” I said.

“About it being inconstant . . . envious . . . what else?”

“Sick and pale with grief,” I said.

“He so was. I prefer the moon.”

“‘Yours is the light by which my spirit’s born,’” I said, quoting Cummings. “‘You are my sun, my moon, and all my stars.’”

“I looked into Cardigan’s case,” Anna said.

We were walking up the upper compound toward the chapel beneath the blood moon.

The night had the same ethereal quality as earlier, only more so. It was cooler now with an occasional light breeze, but mostly it was still.

Stillness and silence and something else, a resonance, a presence, as if the blood moon had cast a spell on everything and everyone beneath it.

“Whatta you think?”

“I actually remember it. We talked about it in one of my law classes. Judge Terry Lewis was a guest speaker. Wouldn’t comment on the case––even though it wasn’t before him and wouldn’t be––but we discussed the legal issues surrounding it. The adjunct teaching the class used to be in the same firm as Chris. He represented Cardigan. Wouldn’t comment directly either. He’s a good attorney. Did a good job with the case. There was no evidence Cardigan had ever even been inside the victim’s––Ashley Fountain––side of the duplex. Even more suspicious, none of his prints were on any of her stuff he was supposed to have stolen––not even the things he was believed to be using.”