Kisscut (3 page)

Jeffrey chambered a round into the nine-mil. Sara's head snapped around at the sound, and she held her hand out to him, palm down, as if to say, No, calm down. Don't do this. He looked past her shoulder at the rink entrance. He expected to see a group of spectators with their noses pressed to the glass, but the doorway was empty. What had happened inside that was more interesting than the scene playing out in front of him?

Sara tried again, saying, "She's fine, Jenny. Come see."

"Dr. Linton," Jenny said, her voice wavering, "please don't talk to me."

"Sweety," Sara answered, her tone as shaky as Jenny's. "Look at me. Please just look at me." When the girl did not respond, Sara said, "She's fine. I promise you she's fine."

"You're lying," Jenny answered. "You're all liars." She turned her attention back to the boy. "And you're the worst liar of all," she told him. "You're going to burn in hell for what you did, you bastard."

The boy spoke in a fit of rage, spittle flying from his mouth. "I'll see you there, bitch."

Jenny's voice took on a calmness. Something seemed to pass between her and the boy, and when she answered, her voice was childlike. "I know you will."

Out of the corner of his eye, Jeffrey saw Sara step forward. He watched as Jenny sighted down the barrel of the short-nosed gun, lining it up to the boy's head. The girl stood there, stock-still, waiting. Her hands did not shake, her lip did not tremble, and her hand did not falter. She seemed more resigned to the task in front of her than Jeffrey did.

"Jenny…" Jeffrey began, trying to see some way out of this. He was not going to shoot a little girl. There was no way he could shoot this kid.

Jenny looked over her shoulder and Jeffrey followed her gaze. A police car had finally pulled up, and Lena Adams and Brad stepped out, weapons drawn. They were in a textbook triangle formation, with Jeffrey at the top.

"Shoot me," Jenny said, keeping her gun steady on the boy.

"Stand down," Jeffrey told the officers. Brad followed orders, but he saw Lena hesitate. He gave her a hard look, about to repeat his order, but finally she lowered her weapon.

"I'll do it," Jenny mumbled. She stood impossibly still, making Jeffrey wonder what was inside the girl that she could approach this situation with such resignation.

Jenny cleared her throat and said, "I'll do it. I've done it before."

Jeffrey looked to Sara for confirmation, but her attention was focused on the little girl with the gun.

"I've done it before," Jenny repeated. "Shoot me, or I'll kill him and then shoot myself anyway."

For the first time that night, Jeffrey assessed his shot. He tried to force his brain to accept that she represented a clear danger to the boy in front of her, no matter what her age was. If he hit her in the leg or shoulder, she would have enough time to pull the trigger. Even if Jeffrey went for her torso, there was still the chance that she would squeeze off a shot before she went down. At the level Jenny was pointing the gun, the boy would be dead before she hit the ground.

"Men are so weak," Jenny hissed, sighting the weapon. "You never do the right thing. You say you will, but you never do."

"Jenny…" Sara pleaded.

"I'll give you to five," Jenny told him. "One."

Jeffrey swallowed hard. His heart was pounding so loudly in his ears that he saw rather than heard the girl as she counted.

"Two."

"Jenny, please." Sara clasped her hands in front of her as if in prayer. They were dark, almost black with blood.

"Three."

Jeffrey took aim. She wouldn't do this. There was no way she would do this. She could not have been more than thirteen. Thirteen-year-old girls did not shoot people. This was suicide.

"Four."

Jeffrey watched the young woman's finger tighten on the trigger, watched the muscles along her forearm work in slow motion as she moved to tighten her finger.

"Five!" she screamed, the veins in her neck standing out. She ordered, "Shoot me, goddamn it!" as she braced herself for the Beretta's recoil. He saw her arm tense and her wrist lock. Time moved so slowly that he could see her muscles engaging along her forearm as her finger tightened on the trigger.

She gave him one last chance, yelling, "Shoot me!"

And he did.

Chapter Three

At twenty-eight weeks old, Jenny Weaver's child might have been viable outside the womb had its mother not tried to flush it down the toilet. The fetus was well-developed and well-nourished. The brain stem was intact and, with medical intervention, the lungs would have matured over time. The hands would have learned to grasp, the feet to flex, the eyes to blink. Eventually, the mouth would have learned to speak of something other than the horrors it spoke of to Sara now. The lungs had taken breath, the mouth gasped for life. And then it had been killed.

For the past three-and-a-half hours, Sara had tried to reassemble the baby from the parts Jenny Weaver had left in the bathroom and in the red book bag they found in the trash by the video game room. Using tiny sutures instead of the usual baseball stitches, Sara had sewn the paper-thin flesh back together into the semblance of a child. Her hands shook, and Sara had redone some of the knots because her fingers were not nimble enough on the first try.

Still, it was not enough. Working on the child, tying the tiny sutures, was like pulling a thread on a sweater. For every area repaired, there was another that could not be concealed. There was no disguising the trauma the child had been through. In the end, Sara had finally accepted that her self-appointed task was an exercise in futility. The baby would go to the grave looking much the way she had looked the last time her mother had seen her.

Sara took a deep breath, reviewing her report again before signing off on her findings. She had not waited for Jeffrey or Frank to begin the autopsy. There had been no witnesses to the cutting and dissecting and reassembling Sara had performed. She had excluded them on purpose, because she did not think she could do this job while other people watched.

A large window separated Sara's office from the outer morgue, and she sat back in her chair, staring at the black body bag resting on the autopsy table. Her mind wandered, and she saw an alternative to the death she had been assessing. Sara saw a life of laughing and crying and loving and being loved, and then she saw the truth: Jenny's baby would never have these things. Jenny herself had barely had these things.

Since an ectopic pregnancy several years ago, Sara had been unable to have children. This had been hard news to bear at the time, but over the years the loss had dulled itself with other things, and Sara had learned to stop wanting what she knew she would never have. Yet there was something about the unwanted child on the table, the child whose own mother had taken her life, that stirred up these emotions in Sara again.

Sara's job was taking care of children. She held them in her arms, cradled them, and cooed at them the way she would never be able to with her own child. Sitting in the morgue, staring at the black bag, that longing to carry a baby came back with startling clarity, and with it came an emptiness that made her chest feel hollow.

There were footsteps on the stairs, and Sara sat up, wiping her eyes, trying to collect herself. She pushed her palms against the top of her desk and forced herself to stand as Jeffrey walked into the morgue. Sara was looking for her glasses, trying to compose herself, when she noticed that Jeffrey had not come directly into her office, as he normally did. Through the glass, she could see that he had stopped in front of the black bag. If he saw Sara, Jeffrey did not acknowledge her. Instead, he leaned over the table, his hands behind his back. Sara wondered what he was thinking, wondered if he was considering the life the baby could have had. Wondered, too, if Jeffrey was considering the fact that Sara could never give him children.

Sara cleared her throat as she walked into the room, holding the autopsy report to her chest. She slid the chart onto the edge of the table and stood across from Jeffrey, the baby between them. The bag was too large for the baby and it gaped open around the body like a blanket because Sara had not had the emotional strength to zip the child into more darkness and place her on a shelf in the freezer.

There was nothing she could think to say, so Sara was quiet. She tucked her hand into the pocket of her lab coat, surprised to find her glasses there. She was putting them on when Jeffrey finally spoke.

"So," he said, his voice gravelly and low as if he had not used it much lately. "This is what happens when you try to flush a baby down the toilet."

She felt her heart stop at his callousness, and did not know how to respond to it. She slipped off her glasses and rubbed the lenses with the tail of her shirt to give herself something to do.

Jeffrey took a deep breath and let it go slowly. She leaned in closer, thinking she smelled alcohol, knowing this could not be the case because Jeffrey seldom drank more than the occasional beer while watching Saturday college football.

"Tiny feet," he mumbled, his eyes still on the body. "Are they always that small?"

Again, Sara did not answer. She looked at the feet, the ten toes, the wrinkled skin on the soles. These were the kind of feet a mother would kiss. These toes were the kind of toes a mother would count each day the way a gardener counts blooms on a rose bush.

Sara bit her lip, trying not to let herself go again. The emptiness in her chest was almost overwhelming, and she put her hand over her heart without thinking.

When Sara was finally able to look up, Jeffrey was staring at her. His eyes were bloodshot, tiny red lines shooting out from his irises. He seemed to be having trouble holding himself up. She did not know if this was from alcohol or grief.

"I thought you didn't drink," she said, aware there was an accusatory tone to her voice.

"I thought I didn't shoot children, either," he said, staring somewhere over her shoulder.

Sara wanted to help him, but she felt paralyzed by her own grief.

"Frank," Jeffrey said. "He gave me a shot of whiskey."

"Did it help?"

His eyes watered, and she watched him fighting this. His jaw worked and he gave a humorless smile.

"Jeffrey-"

He shook off her concern, asking, "Did you find anything?"

"No."

"I don't-" He stopped, looking down, but not at the child. His eyes were focused on the tiled floor. "I don't know how to behave," he finally said. "I don't know what I should be doing."

Something in his tone cut Sara deep down. To see him broken like this hurt her more than the pain she was experiencing herself. She walked around the table and put her hand on his shoulder, but he would not turn toward her.

He asked, "Did you think she was going to shoot him?"

Sara felt a lump in her throat, because she had not let herself consider this question up until now. Jenny's back had been to Sara. Only Jeffrey, Lena, and Brad had a clear view of the scene.

"Sara?"

The way Jeffrey was looking at her, Sara knew that now was not the time for equivocation.

"Yes," she answered, making her voice firm. "It was a clean shot, Jeffrey. You had to take it."

Jeffrey walked away from her. He turned and leaned his back against the wall, asking, "Mark is probably the father, right?" He rested his head against the wall. "The boy she was going to shoot?"

Sara put her hands in her pockets, made her feet stay flat on the ground so that she would not walk over to him. She said, "It would make sense."

"His parents won't let us interview him until tomorrow. Did you know that?"

She shook her head slowly side to side. Mark wasn't under suspicion for anything. It wasn't as if Jeffrey could arrest the kid for having a gun pointed at his chest.

"They say he's been through enough." Jeffrey let his head drop down. "What would make her do something like that? What has she been through that would make her think…?" His voice trailed off as he looked back up at Sara. "She was one of yours, right?"

"They moved here about three years ago." Sara paused, trying to shift gears. She knew that it would help Jeffrey more to talk this through like any other case rather than to dwell on the horror of his involvement. At this moment in time, it was irrelevant that this wasn't what
she
needed.

He asked, "Where from?"

"I think they were from up North somewhere. Her mother moved down here after what sounded like a nasty divorce."

"How do you know this?"

"Parents tell me things." She paused. "I didn't know Jenny was pregnant. I don't think she's been in for at least six months, maybe more." Sara put her hand to her chest. "She was such a sweet kid. I never would have imagined that she'd do something like this."

He nodded, rubbing his eyes. "Tessa's not sure she can I.D. anybody from the restroom. Brad's gonna take over one of the yearbooks from the school, see if anybody looks familiar. I want you to look, too."

"Of course."

"It was so packed," he said, obviously meaning the skating rink. "People left before giving statements. I don't know if we'll be able to track everyone down."

"Did you get anything?"

He shook his head no. "You're sure only two people went into the bathroom? Jenny and one other?"

"That's all I saw," Sara answered, though after tonight she did not know how she could ever be sure of anything again. "I didn't see her. I suppose if she was in my practice I would have recognized her. I guess." Sara stopped, trying to remember, but nothing new popped into her head. "She was tall, maybe wearing a baseball cap."

He looked up at this. "You remember the color?"

"It was dark, Jeffrey," Sara answered, knowing she was letting him down. She understood now why so many witnesses willingly gave false testimony. She felt stupid and useless for not knowing who the other girl was. Her mind tried to compensate for this by throwing out random bits of information that could or could not be real memories.

Sara said, "I'm not even sure if it was a baseball cap, now that I'm thinking about it. I wasn't paying attention." She tried to smile. "I was looking for you."

He did not smile back. Instead, he said, "I talked to her mother."

"What did you say?"

His flippant tone was back. " 'I shot your daughter, Mrs. Weaver. Sorry about that.'"

Sara chewed her bottom lip. In a larger county, Jeffrey would not have been in charge of notification; he would be off the job pending an investigation. Of course, Grant County was far from large. All the responsibility rested squarely on his shoulders.

"She didn't want the autopsy," he said. "I had to explain to her that she didn't really have a choice. She said it was…" He paused. "She said it was killing her twice."

Sara felt guilt settle into the pit of her stomach.

"She called me a baby killer," he said. "I'm a baby killer now."

Sara shook her head no. "You didn't have a choice," she said, knowing this was true. She had made love to this man, shared her life with him. There was no way he had misjudged.

Sara said, "You followed procedure."

He gave a derisive laugh.

"Jeff-"

"You think she would have done it?" he asked again. "I don't think she would have, Sara. I'm thinking back on it, and maybe she would have walked away. Maybe she would have-"

"Look at this," Sara interrupted, indicating the table. "She killed her own child, Jeffrey. Do you think she wouldn't have killed the father, too?"

"We'll never know, will we?"

Silence came like a thick cloud. The morgue was in the basement of the hospital, a tiled room with an institutional feel. The compressor on the freezer was the only noise, and it turned off with a loud click that echoed against the walls.

"Was the baby alive?" Jeffrey asked. "When she was born, was she alive?"

"She wouldn't have survived long without medical help," Sara said, not answering his question. For some reason, she wanted to protect Jenny.

"Was the baby alive?" he repeated.

"She was very small," she said. "I don't think she would have…"

Jeffrey walked back to the table. He tucked his hands into his pockets as he stared at the baby. "I want…" he began. "I want to go home. I want you to go home with me."

"Okay," she answered, hearing his words but not sure she understood what he wanted.

He said, "I want to make love to you."

Sara's eyes must have registered her shock.

"I want to-" He stopped himself midsentence.

Sara stared at him, a sinking feeling in her chest. "You want to make a baby."

The look in his eyes told her this had been the last thing on his mind. Sara felt a flush of humiliation. Her heart jumped into her throat, and she could not speak.

He shook his head, "That's not what I was going to say."

Sara turned away from him, her cheeks burning. She could not think of words to cover what she had already said.

He said, "I know you can't-"

"Forget about it."

"It's just that I-"

She was mad at herself, not Jeffrey, but when she spoke to him, her tone was sharp. "I said forget about it."

Jeffrey waited a few beats, obviously looking for the right thing to say. When he finally spoke, his tone was plaintive and sad. "I want to go back about five hours, okay?" He waited for her to turn around. "I want to be back in that stupid fucking skating rink with you, and when my pager goes off, I want to throw it in the fucking trash."

Sara stared at him, not trusting herself to speak.

"That's what I want, Sara," he repeated. "I wasn't thinking about the other. What you said-"

She stopped him, holding up her hand. There were footsteps on the stairs, two sets of them. Sara walked into her office, drying her eyes as she went. She tugged a Kleenex out of the box on her desk and blew her nose, then counted to a slow five, bracing herself, swallowing back the humiliation she felt.

When she turned around, detective Lena Adams and Brad Stephens were in the morgue, standing by Jeffrey, who by his look had managed to mask his emotions much as Sara had. All three of them had their hands clasped behind their backs the way cops do when they're at a scene so they won't accidentally contaminate anything. In that moment, Sara hated them all, even Brad Stephens, who was as harmless as a fly.