She was asleep when I walked into our bedroom. I set my wallet and keys down quietly on top of the dresser, not wanting to wake her. She woke up so easily now, used to sleep like a stone, like the dead, and I'd known she had been worried about that, worried she wouldn't wake up when Victoria needed her, and the baby had spent her first few weeks sleeping in a cradle next to our bed, until my wife realized she now woke at a pin drop and moved the baby into her own white and yellow room across the hall. It was into that room I walked next, not as worried about any noise that I made, my daughter had inherited her mothers pre-maternal knack for sleeping through anything. In her crib, she was laying on her back, her head rolled to one side. I placed my hand on her belly; the fabric of her light green sleeper soft on my palm and fingers that splayed across, lifted and fell with her breathing. As I watched her for a moment, her perfect baby mouth moved with two quick sucking motions; one of the great mysteries of the world is what a baby dreams about, I know what my baby dreams about; food. I pulled the tiny quilt up over Victoria and turned to leave. Reaching the doorway, I paused and turned again toward the crib, leaning myself against the jam, not yet ready to leave my daughter. My wife's arm snaked around my waist, her hand coming to rest right over my heart. She pulled herself up against me, her breasts pressing against my back. I loved it when she did that, and she knew it. Resting her chin on my shoulder she whispered "Hey you" softly into my ear. "Hey yourself." I took her hand in mine, her fingers were cold. "Did you get the bad guy?" She asked, her ritual, especially when I worked late. I hung my head, looking at our intertwined fingers, trying to remember if I had or not, not being able to remember what the hell I'd been working on all day and half the night. "You know darlin' I don't even remem. . ." I turned toward her as I spoke; wanting my arms around her, that always made everything better, needing her liquid brown eyes to sooth away the day, but something was wrong. Her eyes were closed, there were bruises on her swollen face and her throat had red blotchy marks strung around it like a string of pearls. I grabbed her shoulders; a lock of hair fell into her face. She looked at me with her closed eyes. "You have to get him Nicky."
Jesus. I sat up, the bed sheets tangled around my legs and feet. Stupidly, I patted the bed around me, checking. I was alone, it had been a dream. Still not convinced, I leaned forward, staring through the open bedroom door, still so sure that a yellow and white nursery would be there. I rubbed the heels of my palms against my eyes until I saw colored sparks, and then just sat there, for how long I don't know, in my bedjust to have a faint suggestion of that feeling back. I began to wish I'd made photocopies of the diary; all I wanted was to be close to Kelly's spirit. Instead, I got online and did a search for The Thorn of the Rose, one of those fairy tale books I found in Kelly's house. I looked at the clock; it was still too early to go to the lab, so I headed for the bookstore. I couldn't read what she wrote, but maybe by reading what she read, I could capshould be enough. I grunted, not finding my own stupid humor funny. With a deep sigh I stood and headed for the shower.
I took longest, hottest shower I've taken since that crap with Nigel Crane a couple of years ago. He plagued my dreams for a long time, every night for over a year, but then, he wasn't a victim. I stood under the spray until the water ran cold, and even then stayed a few minutes longer, trying to find something, anything to make me feel normal again. I was beginning to miss myself.
After making a pot of coffee and mostly ignoring a piece of toast, my mind drifted back to the dream, to the moments just before I turned around, when Kelly was pressed up against me, our daughter sleeping peacefully in her crib. In those few moments, everything was perfect, I felt complete, it was something I'd never experienced before, and I replayed those moments again and again just to have a faint suggestion of that feeling back. I began to wish I'd made photocopies of the diary; all I wanted was to be close to Kelly's spirit. Instead, I got online and did a search for The Thorn of the Rose, one of those fairy tale books I found in Kelly's house. I looked at the clock; it was still too early to go to the lab, so I headed for the bookstore. I couldn't read what she wrote, but maybe by reading what she read, I could capture something of her.
I bought a latte at the coffee stand just inside the entrance doors of the bookstore. "Hey! You're usual?" Marie, the girl behind the counter greeted me, recognizing me from all the times I'd been in before. Coming in had become a weekly thing, sometimes two or three times a week. When I was still on nights, I'd stop in on my way home, not really needing or wanting the coffee, or whatever magazine I'd pick up as an excuse, but needing the friendly face, the ego boost of the flirtation.
"Yeah, please." I smiled, but not the full wattage beam I usually gave her, not the one that always got me a free cookie to go with my coffee.
"Just get off work?" She asked turning and pouring the coffee, steam drifted up from the hot liquid in thick bands that cooled and dissipated just before they floated by her face.
"Yeah." I lied, not wanting to go into the whole shift change; I missed working with my friends.
The machine began to whirl and she turned toward me a little. Popping a hand on one hip she tilted her head to one side, and I guessed she was wondering why I wasn't flirting, or even talking. "Been a long couple of days." I told her. She nodded almost imperceptibly and looked back to the machine.
I paid for the coffee, and as I shoved the change into my pocket, she slid a napkin with a chunky chocolate chip cookie lying on top of it toward me. When I glanced up at her questioningly, she said: "For catching all those bad guys." When she said 'bad guys' my mind flashed on the dream, I could actually feel Kelly against my back, her arm around me, and her cold fingers in mine. I smelled the diaper pail, and the baby powder. "Hey" Marie said. "Where'd you go?"
"Uh, just trying to remember the name of the author of the book I need to get." I lied again and picked up the coffee, setting the cookie on top of the lid, and lifted the structure up just a little toward her in a kind of salute. "Thanks for the cookie."
I didn't know where to start. Where the hell do you find fairy tales for adults? Certainly not in the kids' section, I bypassed it, leaving behind me a group of toddlers sitting cross-legged on the floor in a semi-circle listening to a woman named Martha read them a story about a turtle named Herbert.
Mystery section? No. Romance? Maybe, but I decided to check there as a last resort. Men don't exactly feel comfortable browsing an isle of books with bare-chested men gracing the covers. Then I saw it. The Sci-Fi / Fantasy section. I turned down the isle, found the authors last name, all three books were sitting there, and I snatched them and headed for the cash register.
At home again, I set the latte on the coffee table; the cookie lay abandoned and forgotten in the passenger seat of the truck. Settling back into the cushions of my couch, I opened the first book, The Thorn of the Rose to the table of contents, the fourth tale listed caught my eye right away. A Prince of a Frog. Frogs. Had to be a connection.
I read the story quickly, devouring each word. In my mind I pictured the main character, the frog of course, as one of the one's I'd seen in Kelly's collection, a ceramic statue about three inches high, painted a shinny emerald green and wearing a golden crown dotted with red, blue and purple beads that were supposed to look like jewels. The plot of the story is inconsequential; a twist on the original version, instead of the frog turning in to a handsome prince with the princess' kiss, the girl turns into a frog, her true nature, and marries the frog prince. I read it a second time, slower, and half way through, I understood. The collection of frogs, the crowns, the fairy tales. She'd been waiting for her prince.
"Stokes." I said into my cell phone as I walked down the lab hall, headed to DNA to see if Mia had anything on the hairs from Kelly's pillow.
"Hey, it's Vega." He sounded tired, excited and pissed all at the same time.
"You find the ex-boyfriend?"
"Sort of. He's in Texas."
"Texas?"
"Yeah, I had a warrant for his house, based on the neighbors description of the car in front of the vics house, and our girl had a TRO on him."
"She did?"
"Yeah. He wasn't home."
"On his way to Texas."
"Yeah, but I didn't know that when I put out the APB on his car. Texas State Police called about an hour ago, they found him sleeping in the back seat of his car on the side of the highway. They've got him in custody, we're working on logistics of bringing him back to Vegas."
I'd reached the DNA lab and was standing in the doorway. "Ok, call me when you've got him, and his car." I clicked my phone shut, and looked at Mia. "Got anything for me?"
"Yeah. DNA. Ran it through the system, got a hit." She searched through a pile of papers and lifted one out. "Harry Webber mean anything to you?"
"Yeah." I took the report from her. "It does. Thanks."
