Knife Edge (A Dead Cold Mystery Book 27) by Blake Banner (most inspirational books of all time .TXT) 📗

what it was, what had happened. He wouldn’t answer. He didn’t say anything. I came up beside him…”

She looked up at me. It was a kind of appeal, as though her face were begging me to tell her it had all been some crazy mistake.

“When I was beside him, I could see past…” She gestured with her arm, holding it straight out in front of her. “I could see past him, what was on the floor inside the shed. Lea…”

She squeezed her eyes and her lips closed tight and she covered her mouth with the fingertips of one hand again. “Lea was lying on her back. Her throat looked black. And then I realized it was blood. Her eyes… Oh, Lord! Her eyes were open, and her head was thrown back so she was staring at me. And Lee, Lee was at her feet. He was facedown, with…” She made a strange stabbing, pointing gesture at her back. “With the knife poking out of his back. There was no sign of Marcus. I’m sorry…”

She stopped talking and covered her face with her hands. I stepped inside the shed, recalling the photographs I had seen in the file. It was as she had said. Lea had been flat on her back, with her arms by her side, her head toward the door and a big, ugly gash across her throat. Lee was lying a couple of feet from her, kind of crumpled and twisted, with a knife protruding from his back.

Outside I heard a shuddering breath, then Dehan’s voice.

“What happened then?”

My memory is shaky at that point. I think I went hysterical for a bit. So did Brad. But he had at least enough presence of mind to call nine-one-one. Then there was a mad few minutes while we waited, both of us sobbing and wanting to go to them, but Brad kept saying, ‘No, we mustn’t disturb anything,’ and we were both calling out for Marcus, but there was no sign of him.”

I turned to look at them, from the blackness of the shed, framed brilliant against the green lawn. Dehan was asking, “When did you eventually find Marcus?”

She fiddled with her nails for a bit, with her eyes darting about the yard. Eventually she said, “I think I fell on the lawn. I remember sitting here,” she pointed to the grass at her feet, “and calling to Lea to please…” She bit her lip and a tear welled in her eye and rolled down to the corner of her mouth. “And Brad was running around the yard, looking at the trees and the flowerbeds, calling to Marcus. Finally he came, just before the police arrived, and just kind of blundered into the shed, saying, ‘This is the only place he can be!’ And there was a tarpaulin over at the back.” She pointed into the shadows where I was standing. “He went to it and pulled it back, and there was Marcus.”

Dehan asked, “Did he say anything?”

She shook her head. “No, not a word. He was huddled in the fetal position, with his arms covering his face and his eyes tightly closed. He didn’t move, or say anything.”

“What happened?”

“The police arrived, with the ME and an ambulance. They tried to get him to talk but the medical examiner said he was in a catatonic state which would probably pass in a few days. But it never did.”

I asked, “Where is he now?”

Suddenly her face was hard as rock. “In his room, with his nurse, and you cannot see him!”

Six

Dehan screwed up her eyes and sucked her teeth. She also hunched her shoulders and went up on her toes. When she came down she said, “What is it, about our seeing Marcus, that you want to avoid?”

Emma Mitchell turned and stared at her with furious eyes. When she spoke I noticed that her hands were trembling, but she spoke quietly.

“He is my son, he is all I have, he is hurt, damaged, and I am not going to allow you—or anyone else—to go barging in, dragging up that trauma…”

I interrupted her: “So he is not seeing a therapist.”

She stopped dead. Her mouth kept working but no sound came out. Dehan sighed.

“Dr. Mitchell, we are not here to cause you or your family problems. We want to catch the person who murdered your children and bring him to justice.”

She emitted an ugly bark that should have been a laugh but had all the wrong ingredients. “Oh, please! Don’t give me that New York’s finest bull, Detective. I happen to have a PhD in Sociology and I know very well how the New York Police Department works. Priority number one: close the case. It really doesn’t matter if you get the right guy or not. The objective is to make up the numbers so that your political masters look good!” Her voice was becoming shrill. “Priority number two: close the case! And it really doesn’t matter if you put an innocent person away—especially if he happens to be black! Because it is not about people! It’s about numbers! Numbers that make the mayor look good! Numbers that make the senator look good! Numbers that make your damned career look good!” Now she was shouting, stabbing with her finger, her eyes bright with angry tears. “But the last thing you give a damn about is the devastated lives you leave behind!”

Dehan stepped up to her and took hold of her shoulders in her hands. She spoke softly, kindly. “Hey, Dr. Mitchell. You want to get your head out of your books and come down on the streets from time to time. You haven’t got a monopoly on humanity. We’re all people, the victims, the criminals and the cops.” She jabbed a thumb at me. “This dinosaur is working cold cases precisely because he doesn’t give a damn whose toes he treads on or what politicians, red, white or blue, he upsets or even puts away. You don’t need to be