The Cruel Ever After (32 page)

Slowly, with the immense weight of loss pressing down on her, she picked up his weapon and walked back into the woods. Nolan was unconscious when she reached him.

“No,” she cried, crouching down next to him. “Can you hear me?” His cell was open. “Hello?” she said, pressing it to her ear.

“This is 911 dispatch. Who am I talking to?”

“I’m a friend of the man who called you. He’s unconscious, and he’s lost a lot of blood.”

“We have a unit on the way.”

“How long?”

“A few minutes.”

“Tell them to hurry.”

She tossed the cell onto the dirt, moved up next to him, and cradled his head in her lap. “Hold on,” she whispered, bending over him, kissing his forehead, her cheek pressed to his. She smoothed back his wiry gray hair. “Please, God,” she whispered, her voice shaking, “help him hold on.”

37

The next few hours were a blur. When the paramedics arrived, sirens wailing, they immediately called for a medevac helicopter to transfer Nolan to Regions Hospital in St. Paul. Smith and Chess were pronounced dead. They started Nolan on an IV because he’d lost so much blood and moved him to a stationary board before transferring him to the van. They drove him back to an open field, where the helicopter landed a few minutes later. Jane asked if she could go with him, but the police had already arrived and wanted her to stay at the crime scene to answer questions.

Sitting in a police cruiser, talking to an officer from the Dakota County Sheriff’s Office, she’d explained everything she knew. Her first concern was Mia. The officer radioed back to his dispatcher and gave him the information and told her an Amber Alert would be issued. Jane figured that it was probably too late, but there was no reason now not to do it.

The more she talked, the more she realized how much she didn’t know. For example, she had no idea how Nolan had managed to find her. If someone had been following the truck, she was positive a man like Smith, a professional assassin, would have noticed it. She also didn’t have Smith’s real name or any credible information about who had hired him, other than Chess’s wild notion about a foreign cabal formed to hunt down antiquities stolen from the Baghdad Museum—and the people who took them. Whatever the case, others were involved locally, specifically the men who had been staking out her restaurant, but Smith had given an order to get ready to leave—and the order to get rid of Mia. If Smith was the head of the snake, with him gone, the rest would scatter.

Sergeant Kevante Taylor from the Minneapolis homicide unit arrived half an hour after the Dakota County Medical Examiner truck had driven in. By then, Jane was sitting alone with her back against a tree, watching the crime scene unit take pictures, gather evidence, draw maps, take blood samples and generally investigate the scene. Taylor knew more of the story than anyone else. She spent another hour with him, filling in all the gaps in his information, walking around the taped-off perimeter. He still wasn’t convinced that Chess hadn’t had a part in Dial’s and Beck’s murders, but by then, Jane no longer cared.

Standing by the ME van a while later, Jane watched as Chess’s lifeless body was zipped into a body bag for transfer back to Regina Medical Center in Hastings. Once he was gone, there was no reason for her to stick around. Taylor offered her a ride back to the marina, where she’d left her car. In response to her question about Irina Nelson, he said that several officers had been dispatched to the houseboat. That was as much as he knew.

On her drive back to Minneapolis, Jane tried to determine if there was anything else she could do to find Mia. Was there a stone she hadn’t turned over? Was there a question she hadn’t asked?

It was going on four in the afternoon when she passed through downtown Minneapolis heading for St. Louis Park and her brother’s house. Smith had given the order to “get rid of the girl” three hours ago. There was no reason to believe that Mia was still alive, and yet Jane couldn’t let go. She had to think of a way to break the news to her family without removing all hope. The Amber Alert was, to quote an oft-used cliché, like closing the barn door after the horse was already gone, and yet it was something they could hang on to, at least for a little while. In the end, Mia might have been a loose end that, with one quick comment, Smith had tied up, but Jane would never believe it until she was forced to.

She had won the race against the clock enough times before that she’d felt, deep down where she truly lived, that she’d be able to beat it again and bring the little girl home. If Mia really was gone, it was too enormous to even contemplate, let alone believe. Yet she would, of necessity, need to become the messenger of the worst news her brother and sister-in-law would ever receive. She turned on the radio, found some rock music, and turned the sound up to ear-shattering, hoping to blast all thought from her mind.

Just before five, she pulled up to the house her brother and his wife had recently rented in St. Louis Park. She turned off the motor and sat for a few minutes, her hands at the top of the steering wheel, her forehead resting against her hands. She wanted to be anywhere but here. Her emotional circuit boards had been fried by the crises of the last few days. She could move around, walk and talk like a normal person, but underneath it all she felt dazed, frozen. She prayed that the numbness would last a little while longer.

Before she got out of the car, she placed a call to Regions Hospital to see if she could find out any news on Nolan. She was told that his condition was listed as critical and that he was in surgery.

Sigrid answered the front door and let her in.

“Where were you?” she asked, calling up the stairs for Peter to come down.

“Could I have a glass of water?” asked Jane.

Peter came into the living room as she was about to sit down. “We’ve been calling you all day. What the hell is going on?”

She waited for Sigrid to return to the room and then said, “I’m afraid I’ve got some bad news.” She’d practiced the line but could hardly get it out.

Sigrid dropped the glass. Water shot up all over Jane’s jeans.

“What?” said Peter. His face flushed.

“I don’t want to hear it,” said Sigrid, pressing her hands to her ears, twisting away from them.

Peter grabbed her, pulled her next to him. “Tell us.”

Woodenly, Jane sat down. She told them everything that had happened. She didn’t cry. Her voice was composed. She explained about the Amber Alert—that the cops were looking for Mia. She tried to be a cheerleader for the idea that there was still something to hang on to. She was pretty sure that Sigrid started screaming at one point, but she kept on talking, the words themselves feeling like a buffer. If she could explain, if she could make sense out of it for them, everything would be okay … but the longer she talked—the harder she struggled to make sense of the senseless—the more confused she became. Eventually, she just stopped. In the middle of a sentence. The words dried up, and the tears came pouring out.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “I tried my best.”

By then, her audience of two was well past hearing.

38

Standing between the outer door and the inner door of the psych unit, feeling as if he were in an airlock on a space station, Steve Nelson waited for the nurse to come in and talk to him. She would need to know why he was here before he would be allowed in. It was a locked facility. Rules were rules.

He explained that his wife was Irina Nelson and that she had just been admitted. He needed to see her. While he had little clout, or money, Irina’s mother did—or had—and her lawyer had paved the way for him by calling one of the leading psychiatrists in Minnesota, Dr. Albert Darling, to head Irina’s psychotherapy team.

At the mention of Dr. Darling’s name, the nurse’s voice turned creamy. Did he want to see Irina in her room? Yes, it was a private room. Yes, she’d been served a late lunch, although she’d refused to eat. Of course, they would be happy to get him a cup of coffee. Make him a peanut butter sandwich. Rub his feet. Press his slacks and shine his shoes while he waited.

“Is the doctor still here?” he asked.

“I believe he is,” said the nurse, walking him down the hall toward his wife’s room. “I saw him in the staff lounge. I’d be happy to get him for you.”

Before she could scamper off, a fat man in an expensive gray suit came out of a closed door.

“Dr. Darling,” said the nurse, tugging on a small pearl earring. “This is Steve Nelson, Irina Nelson’s husband.”

Darling stuck out his hand. It was as limp as the proverbial dishrag. Steve took an instant dislike to him.

“Let’s talk in the conference room.” Turning to the nurse, he said, “Will you get me that bag?” Without waiting for a response, he pivoted and strode away.

Steve offered the nurse his thanks and walked erectly to a room across from the patient lounge. He didn’t like hospitals and he didn’t like doctors. Once they were seated at a long rectangular table, he said, “How is she? Is she awake? Is she rational?”

“She was fairly agitated when she was admitted to the ER. I ordered a sedative. For the moment, I’d say she’s resting comfortably.”

Leonard Zeller had called Steve and explained that the police had found Irina on her mother’s houseboat a few hours earlier. He detailed the state she was in, said that she’d been hugging a teddy bear, refused to give it up, and was making very little sense. The police had taken her to a mental health facility. Steve could visit her there if he chose.

Darling nodded to Steve’s desert camo pants tucked into his hot-weather, steel-toed combat boots. “Are you in the military?”

“Ex-military.”

“I see.”

Steve wasn’t sure what he saw and had no interest in pursuing his preconceptions.

“Tell me about your wife’s pseudocyesis,” said Darling.

“Her what?”

“Her false pregnancy.” He smoothed his mustache hairs with the tips of his fingers.

“Look,” said Steve. “We talked about it, her family and me. At first, we all thought she was having a real baby. She’s been through a lot since we’ve been married. I did three tours in Iraq. She’s been pregnant twice before. One ended in a miscarriage and one in a stillbirth. I was gone when she lost them, so she had to deal with it pretty much on her own. I know it took a toll. But she’s always been so levelheaded, so unflappable. I just didn’t see this coming.”

Darling continued to smooth his mustache. “Go on.”

“One day I came home and she’d bought this teddy bear, put it in the crib. She’d carry it around, diaper it. She acted like it was a real baby and got pissed when I didn’t play along. I thought she’d gone nuts. She’d lose her mind and start yelling at me when I referred to it as Smokey. You know? Smokey the Bear?
Only you can prevent forest fires?
I thought a little humor might break the ice, get her to see what she was doing. I get in trouble with my humor sometimes. Maybe I went a little too far.”

Darling didn’t respond; he just sat there, hunched in his chair.

“Anyway, I kept telling her that she had to see a shrink, but that got me exactly nowhere. She wasn’t the crazy one, I was. And I was selfish. A terrible dad. Uncaring. Mean. So I changed my approach. Started calling it marriage counseling. She still wouldn’t budge. This past Sunday, she told me that she’s romantically involved with some antiquities dealer from Istanbul, an American who lives there. She says she loves him. That the baby is his. What the hell was I supposed to think?”

“Do you want to participate in your wife’s psychotherapy?”

He sat up straighter. “I love Irina. I know that she doesn’t always believe that. I’ve had problems with her mother in the past, problems that have leaked over into our marriage. I was planning to leave again, this time for Kabul. I’ve been offered a job with a private military contractor. You may not understand this, but it occurred to me that if I went away, she’d be forced to get better, to deal realistically with the world around her. But I can’t leave. Not the way things are. I have to stick by her if she’ll let me.”

There was a knock on the door.

“Come in,” called Darling. He stood up and took a diaper bag from the nurse. He never said thank you, he just sat back down and watched her leave. He was either deeply preoccupied by weighty psychological issues, or he was a jackass. Steve favored the latter.

“Is that Irina’s?” he asked, recognizing the orange and fuchsia balloons.

“The officers who brought her to the ER said she refused to let go of it.” Darling set it on the table in front of him. “The bag was filled with diapers, toys, baby wipes, the usual. They didn’t see any harm in letting her take it when they left the houseboat, but when she was admitted to the mental health unit, she had to give it up. The unit doesn’t allow patients to bring personal items into their rooms. Someone on the staff makes a list of the items, and then everything is locked away. When I got here, I was informed that the bag contained something unusual.” He removed a fleecy scarf that appeared to be balled around something heavy. Removing the scarf, he set a statue on the table.

“Is it gold?” asked Steve.

“That would be my guess.”

It was a winged ox or maybe a bull, the size of a small kitten. The eyes were two iridescent blue gemstones. They looked like they might be sapphires. The horns were a whitish brown. Could be stone, or ivory.

“It’s old,” said Steve. “Most likely something Irina took from her mother’s gallery.”

“I’d like to give it to the police, let them figure out what to do with it.”

“Fine with me,” said Steve with a shrug. “Look, I’m happy to talk you, answer any questions you have, but right now I want to see my wife.”

“That’s fine,” said Darling, glancing at his Rolex. “We can talk more tomorrow. Her recovery will take time, but with love and support, and the correct therapy protocol, I believe she has a good chance of making it all the way back.”

*   *   *

Steve stood in the doorway, marveling at what a room on a psych
ward
didn’t contain. There was no bathroom. No clothes closet—no closet at all. The bedside table had no drawers in it and was attached by bolts to the wall. One long curtain was drawn over a large window. Staring for a few seconds at a square of metal mounted on the wall, trying to comprehend what it might be, he finally decided that it had to be a covered and locked thermostat. The patients couldn’t even turn up the heat if they were cold.