Chapter 41: ... and On

A funeral is a hard thing to look forward to under the best of circumstances. This one was no exception. The service was a simple memorial with the four caskets, each with a picture of the deceased. Apparently not everyone had been notified of how they had died as several people tried to complain that the caskets were closed. My mother took them aside and explained about the accident and fire. Shannon's could have been open if we had wanted to spend the several thousand dollars for the reconstructionist to try to repair enough of the damage to her face for her to pass inspection with makeup. We'd all been with her when she died and felt no need to go to that extreme. Especially since the other three would still be closed, and locked in case any of the family had a morbid streak. The reception afterward was a different story altogether. It started out somber and serious; we had been warned that it would by Pastor Keen. In the absence of any other religious figures in their lives we had asked him to perform the service and he had agreed. He suggested that we all pick a few anecdotes from our past times together to share. Mark's skiing accident the previous year had been a great one for getting the ice broken. Apparently, such accidents seemed to run in the family. That got the women started on the care and nurturing of the wounded male.

Then there was Tom's mastery on the grill; apparently that was a family legend all its own. That led to someone asking if Karen had told anyone the secret to her tuna salad. A quick glance around the room told me that there were a couple of people that knew about it besides me, and apparently they weren't telling.

"Actually she told me," I said. The most immediate response was from my mother.

"What? She told you, and you didn't tell me! That's it; you're going back to the orphanage tonight!"

After that things went pretty well. My parents spent time circulating amongst the visitors and making sure that everyone understood how the estate was going to be handled. The grandmothers had been briefed in advance and agreed to meet with Mom at our house Sunday morning after church; she would take them over from there, alone. No one else was invited until after the two matriarchs had been through the house. After that each of the family would be allowed to select one or two personal items from each Mark, Shannon, Tom, and Karen, to remember them by. Other items could be tagged by anyone who wanted them and if more than one person wanted the same thing, they would be award by random drawing. The grandmothers were handling the drawings for us and if anyone complained they got nothing.

Lists would be distributed to everyone showing who had drawn what items. If there was something someone wanted that they didn't get, they had one week to trade between themselves. All items traded had to be signed off by both parties. At the end of one week the items would be packed up and shipped to the new owner's home. Anything not tagged as wanted would be disposed of later, either given to charity, or perhaps to a friend or co-worker that wanted something to remember them by. Allison already had Shannon's half of the heart necklace I had given her for Valentine's Day. One of the younger cousins, Aubrey, a girl two years younger than Shannon, asked about it, saying that it was something that seemed very special to Shannon. Allison had taken her aside and talked to her about it.

Allison told me later that Shannon had told the girl that it was from someone special but would never tell her who. Aubrey was certain that it was actually from another girl and that's the reason Shannon wouldn't say. She confided to Allison that she had had a crush on Shannon and that was the reason she wanted it. They talked for some time and then Allison showed her that she had the other half of the necklace. It was a small lie, technically she had the other half of an identical necklace and I had the missing halves of both of them but it served the purpose. Tears and hugs were exchanged, and Allison suggested that perhaps Aubrey would like the antique porcelain doll that had held a special place on Shannon's shelf for as long as Allison had known her. When Aubrey agreed, Allison went off to find both my mother and the girl's grandmother, and then returned a short while later with the news that the item would be tagged for her. Grandma didn't seem surprised but I think the rest of the family was going to be in for a surprise in a few years.

Sunday went without a hitch. Dad shuttled two visiting families to the airport and it looked like we were finally going to be able to relax. I should have known it was too good to last. Around seven PM the cops showed up.

There were two of them. That wasn't so bad, but one of them Allison and I knew from our work on the Vegas problem. I should have known he would be involved in the search for Roxy. He seemed to be the group's chief troubleshooter and I couldn't help but wonder if he had also set the fire that had killed her cousins and their parents. He was in uniform, the one in plain clothes I didn't know, yet. I planned to correct that very soon. But I'm getting ahead of myself.

"Good evening Mr. Matthews," the voice said when my dad answered the door. "I'm Detective Charles, this is Officer Andrews, we're with the Clark County Sheriff's office, I wonder if we might have a word with you?"

"Clark County?" Dad asked. "I've never heard of a Clark County in California."

"Clark County is in Nevada, Mr. Matthews, we're from Las Vegas."

"Las Vegas? What could you possibly want to talk to us about?"

"We're looking for a young girl, a runaway; she was last seen at a church in this area. We talked to some of the people at the church this morning and they remember seeing the girl with your family?"

"That's odd," Dad said. "We've only been to that church once and we didn't really introduce ourselves to anyone, I'm surprised anyone knew who we were." He was still blocking the door so I couldn't see who they were yet. "I'm sorry officers, I didn't mean to be rude, but we've had a long weekend. Won't you come in?"

As soon as my dad stepped aside and I saw who it was I felt a wave of rage flare through me. In my mind I saw a razor-edged knife slicing neatly across the throats of two sleeping girls.

"Bastard!" Jamie screamed, and my own rage suddenly felt like a candle in a forest fire.

It was all I could do to keep a straight face. "Jamie, behave yourself," I warned. "I agree with you a hundred and ten percent but we can't afford to let on that we know anything at all about what is going on, or who he is. We can't do or say anything that will raise their suspicions. Please Jamie? Our time will come."

"Find a way to touch them."

"Touch them?" I asked. "Why?"

"Remember the bank? The only reason I got to him was because he touched you."

"Really? I didn't know that."

"Thank you, Mr. Matthews. Actually, they didn't know who you were, but they recognized your friends, the Davises, from the paper and said they were sitting with you and the girl. We found out you were handling funeral arrangements and that's how we found you. I'm sorry for your loss, a tragic accident."

"Thank you, Detective Charles. Yes, it was a very tragic thing, they died that same night. Tom had been undergoing treatment for cancer and the doctors had just declared him clear. That's why we were in church. We're not really church people but we wanted to thank God personally for answering our prayers."

"I understand. Getting back to the girl, how did she happen to be sitting with your family?"

That was my chance and I jumped on it.

"It was my idea," I said, extending my hand. "James Matthews, pleased to meet you, officers." It was all I could do to make myself touch Andrews. "I saw her sitting alone in one of the pews, no one seemed to want to sit near her, probably just the way she was dressed, but you would have thought she was carrying a contagious disease. I asked her if she would like to sit with us. She agreed but then she got up and left just before the service ended."

"Yes, that's what we heard," Andrews said. "Someone said she was hiding in the restroom and your daughter and the Davis girl were trying to talk her out."

Something in his tone and the way he referred to Shannon really pissed me off, I caught his eye and held it, "Her name was Shannon, Officer Andrews," I said with some heat. "Since you went to the effort to look it up I would appreciate a little more respect when you speak of her."

Oh, he did not like that! I could see it in his eyes and Jamie caught it too.

"Ooh, that pissed him off!"

He held my stare until Charles nudged him.

"I'm sorry," averting his gaze, "I didn't mean to be disrespectful."

"Liar!" Jamie said.

"Jamie..." I warned.

Charles then asked, "What can you tell us about the girl, Jimmy? May I call you Jimmy?"

"I'd prefer James, thank you." Andrews had a semi lost look on his face and Jamie provided me with a look at his current daydream. I saw myself in a chair with my hands handcuffed behind me to the seatback. Then Andrews' fist smashed into the side of my face and the chair tipped over. It was hard not to wince at the image but I kept my concentration on Charles.

"Nothing."

"Excuse me?" He said.

"I said I can't tell you anything. Shannon and Allison went in to talk to her. She was hiding in the ladies room after all, so I couldn't very well go in. Anyway, she said she was waiting for the crowd to clear out. Someone was supposed to be picking her up, but they were going to be a while. She said crowds make her nervous and if the people saw her just hanging around they would think she was up to something. Considering the way they were treating her, I could understand why she would think that. I thought about offering her a ride, but since she was obviously underage I thought it would look bad if she was seen getting into my truck. Then we left."

"That's it, you just left her there?" Andrews asked. As his concentration shifted back to me his little daydream fantasy evaporated.

"What else was I supposed to do?" I tried to look him in the eye but he was looking at Allison. Several times his eyes shifted back and forth between us. At first I thought he was just watching for her reaction but as I spoke his little daydream rebuilt itself.

I did my best to concentrate on what I was saying. "If she was in trouble the church staff was certainly more able to help than I would ever be and if we weren't there she would be free to approach them without attracting attention."

In Andrew's mind I was sitting up in the chair again, blood streaming down my face. He glanced at Allison again and in the daydream she was suddenly bent over the table with her hands behind her and her pants around her ankles as he raped her in front of me. It was getting really hard to concentrate on my answer.

"Jamie, please? I need to focus here." The vision faded and I continued my answer to Charles, "It was obvious she was upset, Detective, but I'm no crisis counselor. You said she was a runaway, seems like a lot of concern sending two officers all the way from Las Vegas to look for her? Couldn't you just alert the local authorities if you were looking for her?"

"Normally yes," Charles said. "But she's wanted for questioning in another matter. We tracked her to this area from a bus stop in Vegas."

"She seemed like a really nice girl; I mean sure she dressed like a Goth princess but you can't go by appearances. After all, anyone can hide behind nice clothes," I held Andrews' eye as I said the last part, then turned back to Charles, "and she sure knew her way around a bible. She even helped me follow along with the hymns. Are you sure you're looking for the right girl?"

Charles glanced at Andrews who seemed to be staring into space again. He was still looking at me but I could tell it wasn't me he was seeing. Fortunately Jamie didn't share his latest fantasy with me.

"I'm sorry for interrupting your evening folks," Charles said, standing up, "especially at a time like this. I'm sure it's been a tough weekend for you. Thank you for your help, if any of you should happen to see the girl again, please give us a call..." he handed my dad a card, " ... or call the local police and let them know. We'd like to get this cleared up as quickly as possible and get her back where she belongs. I'm sure you'll agree the world is no place for a young girl to be out on her own."

"No," I said, shaking his hand again. "It's certainly not. I'm sorry I couldn't be more help. Allison, can you think of anything she might have said to suggest where she was going?"

"No," she answered. "She just said someone would be picking her up later. We," she stopped, closed her eyes as if fighting back tears and went on, "I mean Shannon and I, we figured she was just one of those kids like we see at school, the ones whose parents don't really pay that much attention to what they do and can't be bothered to watch out for them. I mean, just look at the way they let her dress. It hurt to see her being so obviously neglected like that, but, like Jimmy said, what could we do?"

Charles voice softened, "I understand, Miss. Thank you anyway, I'm sorry about your friend." Then he turned his attention back to the whole group, and spoke up, "Good night folks, thank you again for your time."

Dad walked them to the door and as soon as it was closed let out a huge sigh. He then waited a few seconds then moved over to look out the front window. I heard the car start and he watched as they drove away before turning back to us.

"Wasn't ready for that," he said. "I can't believe they are still looking for her, they must really want her bad."

"Yeah, they do," I said. "You handled that really well, dad."

"Me? What about you? I was just kind of floundering through trying to get a grip, but you; you just waded in and took over like you'd been doing it for years, made it look easy."

"It wasn't easy," I said flatly. "Trust me. I don't know anything about Detective Charles, but I had to force myself to even touch Andrews." I could see the question forming in both their eyes, but Allison headed it off.

"You don't want to know," she said, then glanced at me and asked, "Could you excuse us for a minute?" Then she took my arm and pulled me toward the hall.

"It was him, wasn't it?" She asked when we were alone.

"Yes," I said softly, dropping my eyes from hers. "I'm sorry for putting you on the spot like that; I just didn't want them to use the excuse of not talking to you as a reason to come back later. Now they don't have that excuse."

"So why did you shake his hand?"

"Jamie wanted me to touch him. She said if I hadn't touched the guy at the bank she wouldn't have been able to do what she did there. It worked too, she showed me what he was daydreaming about while I was talking and it wasn't pretty."

"Yeah, I can imagine. Just the way he was looking at the two of us, you he wanted to hurt, me, well ... I feel dirty just thinking about it."

"Yeah," was all I could say.

"We need to tell Rebecca."

"No!" Jamie said and I agreed.

"And that will help how?" I asked Allison. "She won't be any closer to being able to do anything. There's still no evidence to use against him, or them, if Charles is involved."

"I don't think he is."

That was interesting. I passed it along to Allison. "Jamie doesn't think he is. She can explain it to both of us later. In fact, we've got a lot to discuss later, but for now, we'd better get back to mom and dad."

They were talking together in the living room when we got back.

"Are you sure the girl is safe?" Dad asked.

"As safe as anyone can be with these people after her. Even if they found her, unless they were willing to kidnap her by force they couldn't touch her. Her cover and documentation were handled by the FBI. Not to mention the changes we've made to her appearance; I think she could walk up and ask them for directions and they wouldn't recognize her."

He still looked skeptical but Mom spoke up, "It's true. She's been coming over after school to swim and hang out with Allison, and you'd never know it was the same girl."