Neighborhood Watch (22 page)

“I’ll do that, Mr. Morris,” Spier said, seizing the umbrella.

“Let me have your flashlight,” Teddy demanded. Spier handed it to him.

Steven Del Marco crumbled to his knees beside his wife, his eyes wide with disbelief, while Teddy carefully examined the wound. He checked Angela’s eyes.

Kristin, who had turned away to catch her breath, looked back slowly.

“How is she, Teddy?”

“Unconscious. I don’t know what sort of damage has been done by this blow to her

head.” He examined the rest of her body as best he could. “I don’t see any other trauma, but I don’t want us to move her until the paramedics arrive and we place her on the stretcher carefully,” he said.

“What should I do?” Kristin asked.

“Go get some blankets and a hot, wet towel,” he said. “Steven, are you all right?” he asked the gaping man who had taken his wife’s hand into his. He was swaying and

gasping audibly, but he nodded, his eyes fixed on his wife.

Kristin hesitated for a moment, deciding whether to go into the Del Marco house or her own. The rain continued to fall around them relentlessly. However, she concluded it was better not to alarm Angela’s children and hurried to her own house. When she returned with the blankets and towel, she saw Stark was back, holding an additional umbrella over the fallen woman and the two men and directing the beam of his flashlight down.

“What did they do to her, Teddy?” Kristin asked as he draped the blanket over her and began to carefully wipe away the blood from the wound. He shook his head. Steven Del Marco had broken into a chanting of her name.

“Angela . . . Angela . . .”

“Check around here,” Spier told Stark and gestured toward the woods and bushes behind them. He then looked at Kristin. “Someone obviously struck her and did God knows what else,” he replied coolly.

“Who? How?” Kristin wondered aloud.

“They didn’t get in through the gate, so my guess is through these woods or . . . I told the board this was a concern of mine,” he added, gazing toward the water.

“What?” Kristin asked. Talking kept her calm.

“Someone coming over the water,” he said. “Like some covert operation,” he added.

“We can do just so much,” he muttered. “Just so much.”

Stark shouted for him and he moved into the darkness.

“She’s been out here like this for more than two hours,” Steven Del Marco said as the realization struck him. “I waited so long to call. I waited . . .”

“Where’s the ambulance, Teddy?” Kristin asked, looking back. She understood that

every passing moment was precious.

As if on cue, the sirens could be heard in the distance.

“There’s no one at the front gate to let them in,” Kristin cried. “Mr. Stark!” She stepped through the bushes toward the lake. “Mr. Spier!” Where were they? She stumbled on

some rocks and caught herself on a tree trunk. It was too dark. “Mr. Spier!”

Kristin stepped forward again, the inky lake just discernible in the darkness. She recalled Angela’s joke about a creature from the dark lagoon. Some creature got to her, all right.

“Mr.———”

“Right here, Mrs. Morris,” Stark said. He was literally inches away. She gasped as he stepped out of the shadows. He could have been here earlier, she thought. He could have been the one.

He had something in his hands.

“The ambulance,” Kristin said breathlessly. “I hear it, but you two are here. No one is there to let them in,” she said.

“We left the gate open in anticipation of that, Mrs. Morris. We have procedures to handle any sort of emergency,” he said. “Found this down by the water,” he said directing his light to what was in his hand. He held it inches from her face. It was Angela Del Marco’s panties.

Kristin tried to swallow, but couldn’t. She glanced at his dark face and thought she saw a tight smile on his lips. Without comment, she turned away, terrified, and fled through the darkness, back to Teddy just as an ambulance and a police patrol car pulled up.

10

THE RAIN NEVER LET UP. The paramedics worked swiftly, loading Angela onto the

stretcher and into the ambulance. Two detectives from the sheriff’s office joined the state highway patrolman who had initially responded to the dispatcher. By now the bubble

lights and noise had drawn many of the residents of Emerald Lakes out of their homes.

Some gathered with umbrellas and looked on from across the street, adding to the funeral atmosphere that had fallen over the housing development.

Phil Slater and his board members were clumped together in front of the ambulance, Phil remaining in his car, the others standing by with umbrellas. Everyone watched and waited as the paramedics shut the ambulance door and started away.

Teddy put his arm around Steven Del Marco.

“I’ll take you to the hospital, Steven,” Teddy said. Steven nodded.

“We’ll use my car. Let me just check on the boys.”

“I’ll wake Jennifer and take her over here and stay with the boys,” Kristin told him.

“Unless there’s someone else you want.”

Steven just shook his head.

“You just take it easy, Kristin,” Teddy warned as softly as he could. “Remember, you’re pregnant.”

“One of us can stay with them, Mrs. Morris,” Spier said. He had been standing close enough to overhear the conversation.

“I’ll do it,” Kristin said sharply. “They’re going to be very frightened.”

“Suit yourself. Just trying to make things easier for everyone,” he said.

Phil Slater got out of his car and joined Teddy and Steven. They spoke for a moment and then, when Teddy backed out of Steven’s driveway, driving Steven’s car, Philip Slater followed. The groups of residents continued to mill about until the highway patrolman pulled away. The sheriff’s detectives remained to interview Spier and Stark and do what they could with the crime scene in this rainstorm.

Meanwhile, Kristin hurried back to the house to wake Jennifer. Nikki Stanley and Jean Levine met her in front of her house.

“What happened?” Jean asked first.

“Angela was attacked going home from my house tonight. Attacked and . . .” She shook her head.

“Attacked! How could someone be attacked here!” Jean exclaimed as if she were

challenging Kristin’s veracity.

“You’re right. It’s against the CC and R’s,” Kristin muttered, tears streaming down her cheeks.

“What?”

“Nothing. I’ve got to get Jennifer and go back to stay with the boys.”

“Can’t we do anything to help?” Jean asked.

“I don’t know. Nothing right now, I guess,” she said.

“But . . .”

“Obviously Kristin has things under control,” Nikki said.

“Under control? Right, under control.” Kristin shook her head and hurried inside to wake Jennifer.

“We’ve got to stay with Anthony and Daniel, honey. Their mommy had to go to the

hospital and Daddy had to go with Mr. Del Marco.”

Jennifer groaned. She remained half asleep and Kristin had to carry her to the car. Nikki and Jean and all of the residents had gone back to their homes, but Kristin saw the sheriff’s detectives were still at the scene, running a bright yellow tape around the area.

Jennifer woke up when they pulled into the Del Marco driveway.

“Why are we here, Mommy?”

“I told you, honey. We’ve got to stay with Anthony and Daniel until their daddy comes home from visiting their mommy at the hospital,” she said.

“Where’s Daddy?”

“He had to go with Mr. Del Marco.”

The boys were awake, but still in their beds, both too frightened to get up and wander about the house. They had heard the sirens and seen the lights and Steven had told them to just wait for Mrs. Morris.

“Where’s Mommy?” Daniel asked as soon as Kristin appeared.

“She’s had a little accident,” Kristin said. “She had to go to the doctor in the hospital, but she’s going to be all right.”

“I want Mommy,” Anthony complained.

“She’ll be here as soon as she can, honey. You guys want to watch television with

Jennifer and me? We can wrap ourselves in blankets and spread out in the living room.”

The two boys looked at each other and considered the offer. It was very late, even late for adults, and watching television at this hour was like forbidden fruit. They both nodded.

“Come on, sweetheart,” Kristin said lifting Daniel. “Jennifer’s already on the sofa waiting.”

They found Jennifer had fallen back to sleep. Kristin was grateful for that. She got the two boys comfortable and put on a movie. Ten minutes later, all the children were asleep.

She stared at the glowing screen, mesmerized by the light. Now that she had a quiet moment, she felt the full impact of what had occurred. It left her chilled. She had to wrap a blanket around herself, too. Suddenly, she was feeling her pregnancy. Her lower back ached.

This has to be a bad dream, she thought. It has to. I’ll close my eyes and count to ten and then . . .

She heard the door chimes and rose slowly.

“Evening, ma’am. I’m Lieutenant Kurosaka with the sheriff’s department and this is my partner, Detective Martin.”

Kristin nodded at the five-foot-nine-inch stout Japanese man with coal black hair now wet and shiny. He wiped his face dry with his handkerchief. Both he and his partner were soaked, but his partner looked a great deal unhappier about it. He was a much younger looking man, at least six feet tall, with strawberry red hair and a face peppered with freckles along the ridges of his cheeks and over his forehead. He had the kind of face that would look young until he was well into his sixties.

“Come on in,” she said, “but, please be as quiet as possible. I have all the children sleeping on the living room floor.”

“Thank you.”

They shook their clothes off in the entryway. Kristin led them to the kitchen.

“I’ll put up some water for tea,” she said.

“Thank you. That’s very kind of you,” Kurosaka said.

“Yeah, thanks,” Martin parroted.

“We just have a few questions for you tonight. We know it’s late, but I figured while things were still fresh in your mind . . .”

“No, it’s all right,” Kristin said. “I’m glad you’re here. I won’t sleep. I need something to keep me occupied.”

“I understand,” Kurosaka said. He looked at the chair, but was too polite to just take a seat.

“Please, sit down,” Kristin said and searched the cabinets for Angela’s cups and saucers.

“We spoke at length with the development’s security people. You told them Mrs. Del

Marco was at your home earlier?”

“Yes. We were meeting to discuss the CC and R’s.”

“CC and R’s?”

“Covenants, Conditions, and Restrictions,” Kristin replied. “Our development’s

constitution,” she added.

Kurosaka flipped open his notepad.

“Can you pinpoint the time for us, Mrs. Morris?”

“Yes.” She turned and thought a moment. “Teddy and I had just finished dinner. I was making coffee when Angela arrived. We had agreed to meet about seven. She was ten

minutes or so early. She stayed until eight-fifteen. I remember it was eight-fifteen,” she said nodding.

“And then what?”

“Steven called looking for her about ten-thirty.”

“So, this happened sometime between eight-fifteen and ten-thirty?” Martin commented.

Kurosaka turned to him.

“No. It had to happen in a more narrow range of time, Carey. The woman was on her

way home. She didn’t linger in the streets for an hour and then get attacked. She had to have been attacked shortly after she left. It’s only a few minutes at the most between the two houses, so she was attacked about eight-seventeen, -eighteen,” Kurosaka pointed out.

Detective Martin glanced at Kristin and then shrugged, his face somewhat crimson with anger and embarrassment at the way Kurosaka had corrected him in front of Kristin.

Kurosaka either didn’t notice or didn’t care.

“Did you find anything else out there?” Kristin asked.

“Else?”

“Besides Angela’s . . . panties?”

“Well, it’s too dark for a thorough investigation. We’ll be back early in the morning.

Who found the panties?”

“I don’t know who actually found them. Mr. Stark showed them to me.

“I went looking for the two security guards because I thought they had left the front gate locked and the ambulance wouldn’t be able to get in when it arrived at the gate. Mr. Stark appeared with the panties in his hand.”

“Did he say where he found them?”

“Not exactly.”

“So as far as you saw, only those two handled the undergarment?”

“I only saw Stark with it,” she emphasized. Kurosaka smiled, appreciating her exactness.

She thought a moment and then, just as the tea kettle whistled, widened her eyes. “The papers!”

“Papers?” Kurosaka asked. Kristin turned off the range and then spun around to face him.

“When Angela left my house, she had our file. She put it under her jacket so it wouldn’t get wet. But I didn’t see the papers anywhere. Did you find them?”

“No, Mrs. Morris. We haven’t found any papers yet, but it’s really dark and hard to search out there now,” Kurosaka emphasized. “What were these papers exactly?”

Kristin poured the hot water into the cups.

“Our work revising the CC and R’s. Our suggestions, research, all of it,” she said

shaking her head. “You’d think the wind would have scattered everything all over the place.”

She served the tea.

“Thank you.”

“Thanks,” Martin said.

“We’ll look for them in the morning,” Kurosaka said. “We’ve got the area roped off.”

“Do you think you’ll find who did this?” Kristin asked.

“We’re going to try, Mrs. Morris. We’ll canvas the street tomorrow and see if anyone else might have heard or seen anything.”

“It had just started to rain,” Kristin said. “I went to the door with her and watched her start for home.” Her lips trembled so she brought the teacup to her mouth and sipped.

“You didn’t see a car go by or anyone else out there?” Kurosaka asked.

“No. But Mr. Stark said he thought the attacker came from the lake. He called it a covert operation,” she said. Everything that happened around Angela’s fallen, wounded body remained vivid in her mind: words, images. The scene was in a continuous replay every time she closed her eyes.