was one of the lucky ones. He had to get out of bed and comfort these people.
He’d tell her that, if only he could get his eyes open.
“We’ll ask around, if you’d like.” She leaned close. “We’ll find out about the little boy.”
Paul’s brain fuzzed but he forced his eyes open. The world seemed to go all soft focused on him, and suddenly the riot of curls swirling around her head fascinated him. She had his right hand held tightly, so he reached his injured left hand unsteadily toward her, lifting the blue sling away from his body. His fingers closed over a handful of corkscrews. He felt the grit, saw how dirty it was, and still it was soft and silky.
He stared at the hair he held. “Pretty.”
He saw something other than compassion flash in her eyes. She pushed his hand away roughly and stepped away from his bedside. He knew it was rough because it made his sprained wrist hurt like crazy. Of course, breathing made his sprained wrist hurt like crazy, too, so he couldn’t be sure if she’d meant any harm.
“We’ve got to let you rest,” she said. “Do you think you can remember the words carved on that sign? It might give us a place to start searching for Juanita. If you can tell us, we’ll get out of here.”
“How many times do I have to tell you, no. I don’t remember the words.” Paul struggled to control himself. His temper had always been his Achilles’ heel. “I think it was Spanish, but I’m not sure. I told you the phone rang before I got a good look at it and, after the call came, all I could think about was getting to that building.”
Something nudged his memory. He hated to admit her badgering had actually shaken loose an answer. “Natio… I remember that word because I thought it meant ‘nation.’ I speak some Spanish, but I don’t read or write it well.”
O’Shea made a movement so sudden it jarred Paul. O’Shea thumbed through his notebook. “It didn’t say,
“Plague of blood?” Paul asked. “Where did you get that?”
O’Shea yanked his head out of his notebook. “Plague of blood? That’s what pestis ex sanguis means?”
“Yeah, it’s Latin.”
“And how would you know that?” Collins demanded. “Have you heard the words ‘plague of blood’? They mean something to you?”
“Well, yeah, sure.” Paul shrugged, which also hurt like crazy. Maybe when Detective Collins had shoved at his sprained wrist, she hadn’t been all that rough.
“We thought it might be some kind of rap group. We didn’t pay much attention to it,” O’Shea said. “We’ve just started investigating Juanita Lopez’s disappearance. She’s been missing almost a week, but she wasn’t reported right away, then we had a forty-eight-hour waiting period. What does it mean?”
“The plague of blood, “Paul said, slightly more alert. “The first plague God sent to Pharaoh when Moses asked him to ‘let my people go’… that’s it!” Paul sat up straight and his ribs punished him for it. He groaned and sank back onto his bed. “
“The message Pravus told you to give to the gang?” O’Shea asked.
Paul nodded.
“You said ‘first plague,’ “ O’Shea mentioned warily. “Weren’t there…?”
Paul spoke into the silence as he saw O’Shea and Collins remembering the Bible story. “Ten.”
“The ten plagues of Egypt.” Detective Collins’s knuckles turned white on her notebook.
Paul arched his eyebrows. “You know the Bible, Detective Collins?”
“I know the Bible.” Her jaw tightened until Paul thought it might crack. “I know it very well.”
Paul tried to control the pounding of his heart as he thought, one by one, of the plagues. “Then you know we need to brace ourselves for a plague of blood.”
CHAPTER FOUR
Blood. Everywhere. Blood and the smell of death.
“I s’pose he used the blood to get our attention.” O’Shea crouched down and reached his pen out to lift the hand that lay on the edge of the fountain.
“It worked.” Keren watched the victim bob faceup in a small cemented pond within walking distance of the Lighthouse Mission.
It was the kind of park where you stepped around the discarded condoms and kept a wary eye out for used needles. One of its efforts toward beauty was in this modest fountain, twenty feet around and sunk into the ground like a little pond with its simple joyous spray of water.
The fountain was obviously circulating the same water over and over, because blood spurted into the air in a hundred fiery arcs. The bright crimson rainbows bled down on Juanita Lopez, who lay in some kind of white dress floating on the water. From here they could see the dress was marked with drawings.
“The ME concurred with Morris on the Latin,” Keren said. “She knew from med school that
O’Shea stared at the paintings on the woman’s dress. “Still no sign of that wood carving Morris got?”
“Nope, and we’ve questioned everyone.” Keren had been frantic to track down any clue, hoping there was still time to save Juanita. “We’ve had city crews on that bomb site ever since it happened.”
“That mess is the only reason we aren’t swarmed with press out here. They’d have a field day with this, regardless of its connection to the explosion. But when they connect the two, we won’t be able to take a step without reporters dogging us.”
“Let’s try to keep them away from it if we can.”
“I’ll talk to the ME’s office and the CS unit. They’ll work with us, but headquarters is another story. They can’t keep a secret, and the mayor’s office leaks like a sieve.”
“We can’t keep this under wraps anyway.” Keren looked at the body, the young Hispanic woman, her dress, long sleeves floating out like the wings of an angel, long skirt with no waist, just loose all the way to the gathered neck. “No way this is a onetime deal.”
O’Shea pulled his notebook out of his breast pocket. “Did you interview the gang members who were in that house with Morris?”
“We’ve got detectives and two FBI agents from the local office finishing up questioning them in the hospital. It doesn’t look like any of them know who set that explosive. Their enemies are all more the guns-and-knives type. I talked to a few before you called me over here.” It wasn’t even noon yet and she’d already put in almost a full day. “Now I know how a dentist feels.” Keren pulled her blazer close. “I spent all my time pulling teeth. Not a cop- friendly crowd.”
Keren wished she’d worn a coat instead of her gray wool blazer. It was a warm summer morning, but she couldn’t stop shivering. “If you’re checking for a Latin scholar, try a Catholic priest, an old one who used to do the Latin Mass.”
O’Shea shook his head in disgust. “Yeah, we were slow on that carving above her door.”
This was their case. O’Shea was the primary. Between the two of them they had nearly thirty years on the force, and both of them had missed it.
Keren reviewed the facts. “Juanita Lopez. Missing. Female. No sign of a struggle. No sign of anything wrong at her place, except for a few words carved into a sign, hung over her front door in the hallway. In that ratty building, no one was even sure if the sign was new. Coworkers reported her missing. No one had seen her for four days. Even so, we didn’t list her until forty-eight hours after they called.”
“A lot of them turn up on their own, Collins. Most of them. You know the drill.” O’Shea watched her intently. She suspected it was to check her for any sign she was a wimp.
“And then that call to Morris and the explosion. And now this.” Keren shook her head. They had come up with nothing. Keren had spent Wednesday at the site of the explosion; this morning she’d questioned witnesses, including Morris, who was due for release from the hospital tomorrow. Nothing. She’d hoped some of the gang
