“I know!” Anne said. “You’re safe, though, honey. No one can hurt you here.”
“That was a bad dream,” Vince said. “Do you want to tell us about it, sweetheart?”
Anne stiffened and shot him a look, but Haley nodded her head. She wanted the memory of it out where grownups could look at it and reassure her that she would be safe.
“Was someone trying to hurt you?” Vince asked.
Haley nodded. “The bad monster was chasing my mommy!”
“That’s a scary dream,” Anne whispered, stroking the girl’s hair.
“Does the bad monster have a name?” Vince asked.
“Bad Daddy!” Haley said.
“Does Bad Daddy have a regular name?”
“Bad Daddy can’t get you here, honey,” Anne said.
“I don’t like bad dreams!”
“Me neither. I hate bad dreams. I had a bad dream tonight too.”
Haley looked up at her, surprised. “You have bad dreams too?”
Anne nodded.
“Why?”
“Because a bad man tried to hurt me,” Anne said, “and I was so afraid.”
“Were you little like me?”
“No. It happened just last year.”
“And you were still afraid?”
“Very. And I still get afraid when I have a bad dream. But when I wake up I remember that I’m in a safe place, and that the bad man can’t hurt me again, and then I don’t feel afraid anymore.”
“What if the bad daddy came here to get me?” Haley asked.
“We won’t let that happen, Haley,” Vince said. “Anne and I will look out for you. Bad Daddy can’t come to our house.”
She seemed to mull that over for a moment, not quite sure she should believe such a claim.
“When is my mommy coming?”
Anne’s heart was as heavy as a stone in her chest. She looked at Vince. Was this the time? Was there ever a right time? Did she do it now when Haley was already feeling vulnerable and frightened? Or did she tell the white lie and wait another day?
“Mommy isn’t coming, sweetheart,” she said, a mix of dread and relief churning inside her. She wasn’t keeping a terrible secret anymore. She was telling a terrible truth.
Haley’s eyes grew rounder. “Why?”
“Your mommy was hurt very badly, Haley. Do you remember when that happened? You were hurt and so was your mommy.”
“The bad daddy came,” she said, soberly. “Bad Daddy hurt my mommy.”
“Yes. Your mommy was hurt too badly, and the doctors couldn’t fix her, and she died.”
“But when will she come back?”
“She can’t, sweetheart. She can’t come back.”
Anne watched the little girl try to process the information. How could Mommy not come for her? Mommy had been there for her every day of her life.
“I’m so sorry, honey,” Anne said, her own tears brimming over the barrier of her eyelashes.
She had been an adult when she had to accept the truth of her mother’s death. And even though logically she had known that death meant an end to the terrible suffering cancer had brought her mother, Anne’s own pain and grief had still been overwhelming. It still was overwhelming at times.
“But I want my mommy,” Haley said, two big tears rolling down her cheeks.
“You don’t have to be afraid, Haley,” Vince said softly. “You’re here with us, and you’re safe, and we won’t let anything bad happen to you.”
“Bad Daddy hurt my mommy,” she said, and she started to cry softly, going into Anne’s arms for comfort.
Anne held her close and rocked her. She had always been protective of the children in her care when she was a teacher. Mendez had called her a tigress with cubs. But that paled in comparison to what she was feeling now for Haley.
Maybe it was because she had so much in common with the little girl—having been a victim, having lost her mother. Or maybe it was just the time of her life or the fact that she had been thinking so much about becoming a mother. But as she held Haley Fordham and promised to keep her safe, Anne felt a bond forming inside her like nothing she had ever felt before.
She wasn’t going to let anyone harm a hair on this child’s head. If the bad daddy or anyone else wanted to get to Haley, he was going to have to come through Anne first.
And no tigress would have anything on her.
52
“You’re a lucky bastard,” Campbell commented.
With the exceptions of Vince and Hicks, the guys had gone back to their desks after the brainstorming session to try to put a dent in their paperwork and check messages that had come in during the day regarding other cases they were working.
“How so?” Mendez asked.
“You don’t have to hear it from a wife how you’re never home, you work too much, or you pretend to work too much but you’ve probably got a girlfriend on the side.”
“I don’t know how anybody has time for a girlfriend on the side,” Mendez said. “I don’t have time for a girlfriend right in front of me.”
“Tony wouldn’t have a girlfriend on the side,” Trammell said. “That arrow is way too straight.”
“Right,” Campbell said. “Tell the truth. Did you really pop Steve Morgan because he screws around on his wife?”
“I hit him because he hit me,” he said, staring down at his pink message slips.
His mother was cooking dinner on Sunday. His victim in a domestic assault case wanted to talk to him. ADA Worth wanted to prep him for trial for a case he had worked six months prior.
Sara Morgan had called.
A little rush of something went through him. Excitement? Nerves? What was he—fourteen years old?
The call had come in at 7:20 P.M. No message.
He wasn’t supposed to go near Sara Morgan or any other Morgan. The boss hadn’t said anything about phone calls. But he didn’t want to make the call from his desk with the peanut gallery sitting all around.
Stupid. It wasn’t like he was involved with her. He wouldn’t have any trouble being completely professional. Yet he still had the feeling he would hang up the phone and the chorus “Tony’s got a girlfriend” would fill the air.
He wouldn’t get the chance to suffer, as it turned out. Dixon walked into the room and pointed right at him.
“Tony, come with me,” he said. “Someone just tried to run Milo Bordain off the road.”
The rain was coming down in sheets. On the country road to Bordain’s ranch, there was little in the way of light. Sizzling road flares put out by the deputy who had answered the call, and the red and blue lights atop his cruiser, gave warning to slow down.
