Chapter Three – First Steps
The journey back to the station had been made in almost total silence, and Rae had been glad that Steve was doing the driving. If she had hoped for a few easy days before heading to Santa Barbara she knew now that she was going to be disappointed, and she guessed that Steve was feeling the same way. Texas would be heading home in two days and they had managed to get the type of case that would attract journalists like bees to honey if they weren't careful.
At his daily briefing, the media relations officer had mentioned the discovery of a young woman's body, but nothing more. Just as they'd hoped, the two line statement, put in a tiny out-of-the-way corner of the paper, had generated very little interest.
The first task when they arrived had been a cup of coffee, one of tea and a quick five minutes to gather their thoughts, but now they sat, Rae at the keyboard of her computer, and prepared to make the notes they would need for the missing persons division to begin their work.
"Ok, this is what we have, Jane Doe, very early twenties, blonde hair, green eyes …" Steve began to speak and Rae typed every word he said, but she didn't have her mind entirely on the matter at hand. She was still thinking about the new case, but as she could type missing person forms blindfolded she could also wander off into other places with ease. She thought that even though the victim had been stabbed ten times her murderer hadn't lost control, and Rae needed to talk it through with Steve. As the final words appeared on the screen in front of her she gave a sigh and her fingers rested on the keys.
They both scanned the document in silence and then Steve nodded, Rae printed it out, twice, once for each of them and sent it through the internal computer systems to the missing persons department. As they began to sort out their personal notes so that they could start the folders necessary to keep everything in order Cheryl came out of the Captain's office, noticed her two friends, and made her way towards their corner of the squad room.
"Hi, guys, I thought you were both off today."
For a second both Rae and Steve just looked at her, and then Steve spoke. "We picked up a murder last night that needed immediate attention, so here we are."
"Well, I'm just delighted that you are." Cheryl smiled. "Rae, thank you for the information on internet recruitment. I don't know if it'll help me or not, but if I ever need a new job."
"No problem, I know you'd do the same for me and, at the time, I wasn't busy, now, I'm not so sure." Rae paused for a moment her eyes scanning Cheryl's face and she could see that it was relaxed and at ease. "How's Martin?"
Martin Robertson had been friends with Rae since she had arrived in Los Angeles, and he had started going out with Cheryl almost two years ago. When the garage that Texas and Jesse had been held in exploded he had received a serious head injury, which had resulted in Martin needing extensive rehabilitation to help him cope with everyday life. Rae visited as often as she could, but since returning to work she knew that she had neglected him.
"Not too bad, but he misses you, Rae. I know you're busy, but if you could just pop in, it would mean a lot to him."
"I will either tomorrow or the next day. I could call him and let him know." Rae saw the smile on Cheryl's face and leant over to pick up her phone. Once she had dialled the number for the centre, which was attached to Community General, Rae relaxed and waited. "Oh, hi, could you put me through to Martin Robertson's room please…? Yes, I'll hold." Rae pulled a face. "Oh, yuk, Ode to Joy, I'll be humming it all day now… Hi, Martin, it's Rae."
As Rae began what would inevitably be a slow and possibly quite long call Steve and Cheryl moved a little further away so as not to eavesdrop. "Are you all right, you look like you'd rather be anyplace but here?" Cheryl looked at her former partner and friend of many years with concern.
"Yeah, in a way you're right, Jo goes away in two days and I have no idea when she'll be back, so I'd much rather be at home. This new case we picked up is nasty, we still have the Chief's sister's murder to sort out, and I think I'm getting too old for nights." Steve smiled as he finished talking.
"Ah, well, I can't do anything about the last one, but the other two, if you want me to look into any of the Master's murder let me know, and if you find yourself at a loose end while Jo's away my living room needs decorating, and Martin is thinking of taking up golf."
"Oh, ha ha," Steve's face contorted into a grimace, "I don't do decorating, and golf, well, as it's Martin, I might consider it." Steve paused for a moment, "But, thanks."
"No problem, now, I have to go see if I can get a job through an internet agency because two shop assistants, a nanny and a cleaner have been killed and they all got their jobs online. What type of store should I go for?" Cheryl smiled as she spoke and waited for Steve's answer.
"Painting and decorating?"
This time it was Cheryl's turn to pull the face and then she turned and walked back over to her own desk. Steve drank a mouthful of coffee, resisted the temptation to spit it straight back out, and went to make himself another, hopefully hot one. By the time he had done that Rae was off the phone and ready to begin work again.
"How was he? Tea?" Steve hadn't got Rae a drink and so he picked up her cup.
"About the same, and no, thanks, I don't need another one. You know I try so hard to be patient and not speak for him, but sometimes it's really difficult, I don't think I ever realised just what a great job everybody did with me when I was in a similar situation to Martin." Rae sighed and, for a moment, went back in her mind to the time when she had been attacked by an animal rights protestor. The injury had left her in a coma, and for a long while she had been unable to converse normally, or hold a conversation with anyone, but no one who was special to her had deserted her, and she had gained the friendship of Texas during that time. Rae smiled, she was very lucky that she had been partnered with Steve, everything that she had in her life right now was a result of that.
"What?" Steve could see that Rae was looking at him and wearing an expression of happiness, but he could see a little sadness there too.
"Nothing, well, not right now anyway." Rae pushed her thoughts away, reached out for the pad she always kept on her desk and grabbed a metallic red pen from her pot. She pulled the lid off it with her teeth, turned the pen round and pushed it into the top. She opened her mouth, smiled and then began to talk. "I think this was premeditated."
"Ok, why?" Steve was instantly on alert, all his thought processes concentrating on the matter at hand.
"Because, even though she was stabbed ten times, it wasn't frenzied, there seemed to be a clinical brutality about it. The wounds to the feet worry me the most. They were obviously inflicted to stop her flight, and I really think that we should hold that back from the press."
"I agree on the press thing. I'm not sure about the premeditation. They could have stopped there to have sex, and then it got out of hand, he panicked, grabbed her clothes and ran." Steve was working things out as he talked. Part of him wasn't convinced that what he was saying was necessarily true, but he needed to put it into words, if only to have it shot down in flames.
"No, if it got out of hand I would have expected her to be strangled. He had a knife that's more likely to be premeditated. Amanda didn't say anything about finding any fibres from clothes on the body; I don't think what the victim was wearing was ever on that lot… I also think he'll kill again." Rae stopped talking; she could do without the high profile cases. A couple of winos in dumpsters would do her for a while. Nobody outside the department cared if they were solved or not and, if she was honest, a bit of anonymity would suit her just fine right now.
"Yeah, me too, which means we have to run the story, if only to warn other young women to be on their guard." As Steve finished speaking the phone on Rae's desk began to ring and he leant over and picked it up. "Detective Yeager's phone … oh, hi, no, this is Lieutenant Sloan, it's a joint case, right, thank you, no, we'll go, hold on." Steve put out his left hand, took Rae's pen from her and began to write on her pad. Without a further word apart from goodbye Steve put the phone down and turned to his partner.
"We have a possible positive ID on our Jane Doe; a lady called in, her cousin didn't come home last night, we need to go see her." Steve checked his watch it was almost six in the evening, and he knew that it would be after nine before they were heading home again. Picking up the phone once more he dialled a number that they both recognised. "Michael, it's me, I'm not gonna make it for dinner tonight, but Dad's coming as planned. I won't cancel it because otherwise Jo won't get to see him before she leaves for Texas… Thank you, that's great." Steve pressed the button down to give himself a dial tone, and then handed the receiver to Rae. With a sigh she punched in the number for Oak Place and waited.
"Hi, Sweetie, it's Mummy, can I speak with Daddy please?" Steve could hear Eliana's voice as it floated across to him from the receiver, then Rae pulled a face, put the phone down, picked it back up and redialled. "Every time she answers the phone now she hangs up before she goes to get anyone, so whoever is calling has to phone again… Jess? Hi, Honey, it's me, I'm gonna be here for a while, I thought I should just let you know… Yeah, but you know what it's like, sometimes I have no choice… No, we think we have an ID on the victim in the vacant lot, I'll tell you all about it when I get home… oh, well, alright … I love you, Jesse." Rae waited for a moment and then put the phone down with a deep sigh, ran her hands through her hair and seemed to step back into police mode. "Let's go then."
"Rae?"
"Leave it, Steve, just leave it." Steve, as Rae did with him, knew when it was best to say nothing, and so with a sigh he pulled his leather jacket off the back of his chair and followed his partner towards the stairs. Rae had grabbed her purse, the pad and a couple of pens in almost one single movement and was about five or six steps ahead of him before he had even drawn breath. There was nothing for it but to make sure that he had a chance to talk with her, if only for a moment, before they got to their destination.
The journey in the car had been quiet, but for reasons Steve didn't understand it wasn't a quiet he was used to. He had travelled with Rae when she had been very upset, furiously angry, scared, badly injured, even just asleep, but this was different. In the end he couldn't stand it any longer and, realising that they were only about five minutes away from their destination, he pulled the car into the side of the residential street and switched the engine off. The rain that had begun to fall just after they had left the station soon soaked the window and, as he turned to look at his friend, he could see she was watching the raindrops make their way down the windshield.
"Rae, what's the matter?"
Rae turned to face her partner. She knew if she didn't at least tell him some of what was troubling her it would be going round and round her mind as she was supposed to be interviewing and she couldn't let that happen. "I don't know. I spoke with Jesse, just as you did with Texas, to tell him I would be late, and he just wasn't interested. No, that's wrong, he wanted to be interested, but I got the feeling that however hard he tried he couldn't join me in my world."
"As if he is slightly out of time to the rest of us?"
"Maybe… It's so hard to describe accurately because if I think about it for too long I can just as easily convince myself that there is nothing the matter and I'm being paranoid because he starts back to work on Monday. That could be the case couldn't it? I know he's worried about it, I am too, and if I follow that train of thought then I'm sure there's nothing wrong that isn't perfectly normal."
Steve smiled at her. "If it helps any I feel the same. I can look at things one way and think that Jesse has been avoiding me, that he deliberately stays away from any situation where lots of people are involved, but if I turn it around I know that I'm busy, he's on medical leave and so hasn't been at Community General when I have, or Bob's, and we're neighbours, everybody knows you can go months without even speaking to your neighbours."
Rae nodded her head. "Thank you. I guess I'm just doing what Jesse did to me, wanting to over protect him, seeing strangers and dangers behind every tree." Rae paused for a moment. "While we're stationary, should we go over what we're going to say to this young woman?"
"That sounds like a good idea to me." Steve pulled a notebook out of his pocket and, as the rain continued to beat on the roof, an altogether different type of silence descended on the inside of the car.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Jesse had put the phone down from speaking with Rae and returned to the morning room. It was seven o'clock and his daughters were already in bed, Rae was going to be late home, and he was worried to find that he had no idea how he felt about that or what he was going to do until she arrived. It was as if his life was running out of control, and he had absolutely no idea how to apply the brakes, but in another way everything was in slow motion, and so he didn't need brakes so much as a kick up the butt.
Jesse looked down at his arm and could see the marks around his skin grafts. He had to admit that it was healing nicely, and Doctor South hoped that eventually they would merge in with the rest of his forearm. With a sigh Jesse leant forward and picked up the can of beer that was resting on the table, he took a long drink before replacing it on the small coaster that was waiting for it. He was so desperately tired; he felt that any minute he could fall asleep and not wake up for a week, but he also knew that there was no chance of that happening.
The ordeal that he'd gone through had, just as he'd known it would, taken its toll on him. First of all he'd been delighted to be home, even though his leg ached from the crush injuries he had received, his arm hurt and itched, and his brain screamed out to him that he should be dead. But gradually the feelings had begun to change.
Jesse knew he should be grateful that everything had turned out all right in the end. Jo and he had been found, they had both survived, although one FBI agent hadn't been so lucky. He had known the whole time he was in the garage that Rae would come for him, and in the end he had seen her looking down at him, compassion in her beautiful brown eyes and he had felt peace. But now he knew that something else was watching him other than her eyes, something was just waiting for him to slip up, to rejoin the human race and then it would destroy him. The trouble was he had no idea what. With a start Jesse came out of his thoughts as the sound of Anneya's cries suddenly seemed to explode from the baby monitor. Jesse checked his watch as he rose from his seat and was amazed to see that it was almost half past eight, where had the time gone?
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Alice Palmerton was, Steve thought, in her middle to late twenties, she had red wavy hair to her shoulders some of which was pulled back into two bands on each side of her head and then twisted into a knot of some kind. She was almost as tall as he was, probably about six foot he guessed, and dressed in a pair of blue jeans with stars on them and a t-shirt with Angel written on the front. They seemed to eye each other up for a moment, the cops and the nervous citizen, and then Steve showed her his badge, "I'm Lieutenant Steve Sloan, LAPD, and this is Detective Rae Yeager, you called us," and she sighed.
"Hi, I'm sorry, but there have been a few very strange guys around here lately. Won't you come in?" She stepped back from the doorway as Rae and then Steve entered a very tiny, but crowded hallway. "I guess the kitchen is the best place to sit, if you don't mind."
"Not at all." Rae smiled and followed the obviously nervous and worried young woman just in front of her. The hall opened out onto a large and airy kitchen, which had white cabinets, walls and floor, the counters though were black and spotless.
"Would you like to sit down?" Alice indicated a large stripped pine table with six high backed chairs around it. Steve waited while both his partner and his host made themselves comfortable and then he too sat.
"You called in the fact that your cousin didn't come home last night, does she live here with you?" Rae, as was the norm in these situations, began the questioning.
"Yes, we inherited the house from our grandmother, and as we have always got along really well decided that instead of selling it, which I think was what Grandma thought we would do, we'd live here. Jenna went to a club the other night, but she said she would be back, and she wasn't. She … she's never done that before, and I didn't know what to do. I … I thought maybe she met someone, y'know." Alice waited for confirmation, and when both Rae and Steve nodded their heads she continued. "I called her at work but she wasn't there and I got worried, and then she wasn't here when I got home, well …"
"You called, 911?" Rae smiled.
"Yeah, I hope that was ok."
"Of course, it's what we're here for. You said your cousin is called Jenna? Do you have a picture of her?" Steve's voice was a little lower than usual, he knew that the woman was very uneasy.
The girl nodded her head; got to her feet and disappeared through the door at the end of the room. Before either Steve or Rae could say anything she was back, and Rae's heart sank as she was handed a photo of a very beautiful girl whom she had last seen on a slab in Amanda's morgue.
"She's lovely isn't she?" There was no jealousy in Alice's voice, just an acceptance of fact. "She got her mom's beauty; all I got was my dad's hair and height.
"Alice, do you have anyone else around here that could come stay with you?" Rae's voice had changed, and she knew that what she was saying would forewarn the young woman that bad news was to follow.
"No … no, we come from out of town, why … why do I need someone to stay with me?" There were tears on her cheeks now and Alice scrubbed at them, but they carried on falling.
"Jenna was found on Friday morning, she was dead I'm afraid." Rae stopped talking. She knew from bitter experience that very little useful information was gained once a relative knew about a death, and so she quietly got to her feet and began to fill the kettle so that she could make a drink for them all.
For a while there was no sound but that of sobbing as Alice tried to take in the news that her cousin, friend and housemate had died. Rae found some tea in a cupboard and made a cup of it, hot, strong and sweet. Then she put it down in front of the distraught girl.
"Thank … th … thank you. Have … you got one?" She saw Rae nod and then she was lost to them again.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Mark, Jo, Michael and Daniel had finished a very pleasant meal and, following on from the success the previous night, were now sitting with the dominoes set out in front of them. It was clear that Mark had played many times in the past and so far no one else had gotten a look in.
"Are you sure you haven't played this for years, Grandpa, because you seem real good at it?" Daniel knocked his fist on the table as; once again, he was unable to go.
"You know I can't remember the last time I sat doing this, but it is fun. Oh, Jo, Honey, can't you go either?" With a smile Mark put down a double blank. He knew that he was in a very strong position once again, and so with a little self satisfied smile he waited for the Englishman to have his turn.
"I regret, Sir, Madam, that I too am unable to proceed." Michael very carefully banged his hand on the table and Mark grinned. Nobody but himself was able to go, and he only had one tile left. With a flourish he put down a blank paired with a six and shrugged his shoulders slightly.
"Daniel, I think that it is time for you to be gettin' ready for bed, an' make sure that you have a path from the door to the window an' back please." Jo looked at her foster son. He was a constant joy to her and she was going to miss him terribly when she flew to Texas on Monday. It had been arranged that she would wait until he had left for school, but by the time he got home she would still be in the air, and so as soon as she landed Jo had promised to call him.
With a shrug Daniel got to his feet. He knew that there was no point in trying to argue his way to a few more minutes downstairs because his mom had already told him that she needed to talk with his grandpa and he should do just as she told him.
"Good night, Daniel, and remember, Son, while your mom is away you are always welcome at the beach house, your dad too." Mark smiled and was pleased to see that his grandson did the same thing.
"I will. Thankfully, M will be here to do the cooking, otherwise I may have just moved in until Mom got back." With a laugh the boy wandered out into the hallway and up the stairs, his music blared for a while and then was shut off. It didn't mean that he was asleep, or planning to be that way soon, just that he had his headphones on, and was totally oblivious to the rest of the world.
Jo and Mark had listened with expressions of love on their faces until the music stopped and then almost simultaneously they turned to each other. "I think you want to speak with me don't you?" Mark could tell that Jo had things on her mind, and he wanted to help if he could.
"Yeah, I guess it is pretty obvious, huh? Mark, I'm still not sure I'm doing the right thing by goin' to Texas an' maybe stirrin' things up that are better left untouched." Jo had shown her father-in-law the letters that her grandmamma had left for her. It had been the opinion of Florence Walters that her son and daughter-in-law had been dead before the fire which destroyed their home and left two small children without parents. Jo had been completely unaware of this until she had finally ventured into the attic to begin clearing it. Before Steve came into her life Jo hadn't seen any point in turning the house into a home. It was still very much her grandmamma's house, but they were gradually changing things, and the first thing she had done once married and mistress of the house had been sort through some of the packing cases and boxes in the attic. There had been a suitcase that was addressed to her, and inside it had been an envelope which had contained the key to the East Wing. Rae and Jesse had found another envelope attached to the back of the dressing table in their bedroom at Oak Place, the house they rented from Jo.
The picture of Florence Walters which was over one of the huge majestic fireplaces in the library seemed to look down disapprovingly at Jo now. She felt that she was letting the woman down by not rushing straight to her old home to begin investigating the crime the woman had been sure had been committed.
"I know you don't want to go and leave Steve and Daniel behind, but I also know that you want to do what your grandmamma asked of you. Have you no idea why she thinks they were murdered?"
"No, none at all, an' I guess I don't really even know that she thought they were murdered. She said that she had always thought they were dead before the fire started. It could have still been natural causes couldn't it?"
"I don't think so, Honey, and if you're honest, I don't think you are seriously considering it either."
Jo smiled, "You know me too well. So, what do you think I should be lookin' for?"
"Well, I would go to the hall of records, see what you can find out there first. Try to see if there are any files on your parents, either before or after their death, whether you have access to them, things like that. I guess that the fire-fighters who fought the blaze will still be alive, it was only what twenty-five years ago or so? You could try to look up some of them."
"Yeah, I could, an' the cops too. I still know some people at the local station, so that might be a good place to start." Jo smiled and reached over to hug the older man sitting next to her. "Thank you, Mark, I knew you would help me. I am just gonna miss you all while I'm away." For a moment Jo was silent. "You know, before I met Steve I missed Texas so much, but I never felt I could go back, because of things that had happened, but now, even though I want to take everybody with me, I realise that the past can't hurt me, I can go an' investigate it, or not, as I choose, an' my life will still be here waitin' for me when I get back. That is a wonderful thing to know." Jo's words were full of hope as was her face as Mark took her into a bear hug.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
It had taken Alice over a half hour to calm down enough for Rae to begin talking with her once more. "Do I need to go and identify her … her…?" Alice stopped talking; somehow she couldn't continue and say the next word. Rae smiled, and the young woman got confidence from it.
"No, we can show you a photo or, if you really want to go see her, then we can arrange that too."
"Have you got the picture with you?" She saw both detectives nod their heads and so Alice squared her shoulders. "If it was the other way round I know she would be able to do this right away."
"Everybody is different, you may never be able to look at her body, there is no rule about this, and no one is gonna think badly of you if you can only deal with the photo." Steve spoke for the first time in a while, and the words seemed to surprise Alice.
"Oh, yes, yes, I think I can cope with the picture." Steve took the photo that they had brought with them out of the folder and saw that Alice's hands were gripping the edge of the table and her knuckles were white. He also noticed that her breathing was coming quickly and watched as Rae moved a little closer to her. Steve put the picture on the table, face down.
"When you're ready to look we'll look, ok? If you don't think you can do it we'll wait a little while, but we need a positive ID, and if you really can't then maybe you can let us have the name and address of her mom and dad and we'll get them to do it." Rae was speaking quietly and gently, but her words had the desired effect.
"No, no, they shouldn't have to do that, I'll do this, it'll be one of the last things I can do for her." Alice swallowed down her doubts and her tears, took a deep breath, reached out picked up the picture and turned it over. The gasp told them what they needed to know, but Steve still asked her the question he had to have an answer to.
"Do you recognise the woman in the photo?"
"Yes, yes I do. It's my cousin, Jenna Rebecca Palmerton."
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Matthew woke up with a start and took in the scene around him. It was mid evening, and the rain was beating on the window. He looked down at himself and saw the blood that covered his body, not again, where had it come from? Shaking almost uncontrollably, he got off his bed, stripped the linen off it and then headed for the shower. Dominic would be cross with him for messing up the sheets again, but it wasn't him, he just knew it wasn't. As the water pounded his back he tried to think back to the last thing he remembered. Dominic had wanted to go to a club, Matthew hated clubs, but he had agreed to go for a little while. Somehow he was there first, he was always there before Dominic, but as soon as Dom had arrived he'd disappeared. Getting out of the shower he padded across to his bedroom, it was a permanent dump, and Dominic wouldn't even come into it. Feeling brave Matthew turned and went to one of the other two bedroom doors and carefully opened it. Dominic's room was spotless, the double bed neatly made, with a dark silver-grey cover on it. The furniture was Japanese in design and there was a paper room divider which hid his computer equipment from Matthew's prying eyes.
For a moment Matthew just stood there, he would love to have a room like this, but Dominic worked and he didn't, so he guessed that he would always be able to afford the expensive things, while poor old Matt got the hand-me-downs. He turned, ready to go back into his own room, and for a minute his eyes lingered on the third bedroom door. Matthew had never been in there, and had no intention of starting now. When Dominic had a job in New York there had been a third bedroom that neither of them were allowed in, and it was the same here. For some reason though today he was feeling brave, or incredibly stupid and he walked over and just touched the door knob.
"Matthew!" Dominic was suddenly there, he must have gone into the shower straight after Matt. He turned without another word and disappeared and Matthew hurried into his own shabby, grubby little room and sank down on the unmade bed. He had a feeling that things were running out of control again, and he hated it when that happened. The third room, he was sure it had to do with the third room, and if that was the case control was something in very short supply.