A Darkness of the Heart Read online

After an hour, other volunteers had shown up. There were more than enough willing hands, and Zack, Taylor, and I said our goodbyes.

  On the way to the car, our daughter texted Vale Frazier. When she dropped her phone back in her bag, she said, “Change of plans. Would you mind dropping me at the production studios. There’s a dance rehearsal Vale thinks I’d be interested in.”

  “Fine with us,” I said. “Taylor, do you think Vale might like to come to dinner? We’ve got that gorgeous rolled prime rib your dad bought. If she’s vegan, we can change the menu.”

  “Vale is definitely not vegan,” Taylor said. “Friday night, I watched her devour an entire order of Twice Cooked Pork. Usual time for dinner?”

  “Yep,” Zack said. “Six o’clock. I have been dreaming of that roast all day.”

  By three the table was set; the vegetables were prepared; the prime rib was rubbed with minced garlic and covered in bay leaves. We were ready to boogie, but I needed to check in one last time. I picked up my phone and called Mieka. “Are you still at April’s Place?”

  “I am. We’re just about done with cleanup, and everything went off exactly as it was supposed to. Maddy and Lena had a blast doing crafts with the little kids, and Angela and I just enjoyed working together again and getting caught up.”

  “All is calm. All is bright?” I said.

  “All is calm. All is bright,” Mieka said. “Love you, Mum.”

  “Love you too,” I said. As soon as I ended the call, Zack appeared and handed me a martini. “For getting through the day,” he said.

  “The day’s not done yet,” I said. “But I’ll take that martini.” We raised glasses, took a sip, and had thirty seconds of bliss before Zack’s phone rang. He glanced down at call display. “Nick Kovacs,” he said.

  “Tell Nick ‘hi’ from me,” I said, and then drink in hand, I headed for the kitchen. I’d put the oven on to preheat and mixed up cornstarch and water for the gravy when Zack joined me. One look and I knew the news was bad. His shoulders were tight and his face was strained.

  “Trouble?” I said.

  “Yeah,” he said. “Exactly the trouble Angela warned the police about. They believe a man picked up Chloe Kovacs on Winnipeg Street.”

  My stomach began roiling. “But she’s okay.”

  “No. Chloe was walking along Winnipeg Street crying, with two fifties in her hand and her coat open, when the squad car found her.”

  My voice was dead. “Was she raped?”

  “She was sexually assaulted. There is no evidence of penetration, but someone ejaculated between her breasts and legs.”

  “Oh God. That poor child. Was she able to give the police any information about what happened?”

  Zack’s laugh was short and harsh. “Nope. All the police have is what I’ve told you, and the physical evidence. It was that asshole’s lucky day. He chose a victim whose cognitive abilities were scrambled by a car accident when she was seven years old.”

  “Zack, this doesn’t make sense,” I said. “Nick never lets Chloe leave the house without an aide.”

  “There was a slip-up. Apparently, the girl on duty got a call telling her there’d been a family emergency. She didn’t want to upset Chloe so she stepped into the kitchen and started texting, trying to learn more about the situation and find someone to take over her shift. While the aide was on her phone, Chloe walked out the door.”

  “How long did it take her to realize that Chloe was gone?”

  “I don’t know, but as soon as she understood what had happened, she called the police. Luckily, she was able to give the cops details that turned out to be useful. She and Chloe had been watching the telecast of April’s Place. Chloe wanted to go down there and help. She and the aide were getting ready to leave when the call came.”

  “And Chloe didn’t want to wait, so she set out on her own,” I said.

  “Yep.” Zack sighed. “And you know the rest.”

  “Nick must be out of his mind.”

  Zack nodded. “He is. He’s always blamed himself for the accident, and now this. You know what a big-hearted guy Nick is, but he’s ready to tear apart the creep who did this limb by limb.”

  “I understand that,” I said. “If it had been Taylor…”

  Zack’s face darkened. “Don’t even go there,” he said. “Anyway, Nick’s on his way over. He’s bringing Chloe. He won’t let her out of his sight. And I’m not about to let Nick out of my sight until he’s had a chance to get a hold of himself.”

  “I’ll take Chloe so you can talk,” I said. “We have dozens of pictures of the kids yesterday out at the farm, and Chloe loves children.”

  “She goes to UpSlideDown, doesn’t she?” Zack said.

  “She and one of her aides are there a couple of afternoons a week,” I said. “It’s a nice atmosphere for her, and Chloe enjoys being with kids who enjoy the same activities…” I let the sentence trail off.

  “Who enjoy the same activities Chloe herself enjoys,” Zack said. “Considering UpSlideDown is targeted at preschool children and Chloe is fourteen, that’s a tough sentence to finish.”

  * * *

  —

  From the moment I met him, Nick struck me as a stoic who accepted hard luck as his due, but the assault on Chloe had shattered him. When he arrived at our door, I invited him and Chloe in and took his jacket. “Zack and I are so glad you knew you could come to us,” I said.

  Nick’s voice was a whisper. “I need help,” he said. His eyes remained fixed on his daughter. At Christmas, I always placed a dozen brass hand bells in varying sizes on a small table in the hall. Chloe had discovered the bells and, like every young child who visited, was ringing them carefully and with obvious delight. “Look at her,” Nick said. “What kind of animal would use her like that?”

  Nick always made certain Chloe was well groomed and smartly dressed, but that day her hair was damp and she was dressed haphazardly. My guess was that the police had taken Chloe’s own clothes as evidence and that, after she’d been bathed at the hospital, the nurses had dressed her in whatever they had on hand.

  I joined her at the table with the bells. “Hi, Chloe. It’s good to see you again.”

  Her face brightened. “Hi, Joanne. You and I had the same best at the dancing—the one where the girl turns into a bear.”

  I touched Nick’s arm. “Why don’t you and Zack go into the living room? I have an idea about something Chloe and I could do together.”

  Chloe tensed. “You’re not taking me away from my daddy, are you?”

  “No,” I said. “We’re all staying right here, so let’s get your coat and boots off. Now here’s my idea. We have two Christmas trees: a big one for the family room and a small one for the kitchen. After supper Zack and I are going to decorate the big one with our daughter, Taylor, but you and I could surprise Taylor by decorating the little one now. What do you think?”

  “I think yes,” Chloe said, then she looked at her father. “Do we have a tree, Daddy?”

  “Not yet.” Nick tried a smile. “We’ll get one soon.”

  “Now?”

  “In a while. Right now, I want to talk to Zack, but I promise we’ll get a tree.”

  Chloe’s smile was winsome. She held out her little finger to her father. “Pinky swear?” she said.

  Nick hooked his little finger through hers. “Pinky swear,” he said, and his voice was thick with emotion.

  * * *

  —

  I had two reasons for suggesting that Chloe and I decorate the small tree in the kitchen. The first was pragmatic. Nick Kovacs was the rock in his daughter’s life. He was crumbling, and for her sake and his own, he needed time to talk to Zack and pull himself together. The second was the human need to do something—anything—to alleviate another person’s suffering. When I imagined the confusion and terror Chloe must have felt in the minutes after she slid into the passenger seat of the stranger’s car, I wanted to weep. All I had to offer Chloe was a box of ornaments and a four
-foot fir tree, and although she was showing no sign of either remembering or reacting to her ordeal, the offering turned out to be a gift for us both.

  Chloe’s delight in stringing the lights and deciding exactly where to hang each bauble was infectious. It took us over half an hour before Chloe stood back, cocked her head, looked at the tree critically, and said, “Now it’s really pretty.” I was still kneeling on the other side of the tree when Chloe turned abruptly and flew out to the hall. By the time I caught up with her, she’d already opened the living room door and seen her father. She whirled around, her blue eyes wide with shock. “My daddy’s crying,” she said.

  I looked past her into the living room. Nick was sitting on the couch, his face buried in his hands, sobbing. Zack had pulled his wheelchair next to Nick and was leaning forward, stroking Nick’s back. Chloe ran to her father. “Why are you crying, Daddy? Stop it! Stop it!” Her voice, sharp with hysteria, rose and grew louder. “Stop it! Stop it! Stop it! Stop it!”

  Nick held his arms out, and Chloe threw herself into them. Nick held her tight. “It’s all right,” he said. “I’m fine now.” He sat back so she could face him. “See. I’ve stopped crying.” His daughter took a tissue from the box beside Nick on the couch and dabbed carefully at his eyes.

  I looked at Nick. “Why don’t Zack and I leave you and Chloe alone for a while?”

  Nick looked at his daughter. “Okay with you?”

  Chloe nodded and burrowed in closer. “We’ll be fine,” Nick said.

  Zack and I closed the living room door behind us and went to the kitchen. When he saw the tree, Zack’s shoulders slumped. “Chloe?”

  “She wanted it to be pretty.”

  He wheeled over to the tree. “And it is.” His voice broke. “Jo, did Chloe talk about what happened?”

  “Not a word,” I said. “If she hadn’t run out of the room in a panic, you’d think nothing had happened.”

  “She hasn’t said anything to Nick either. All he knows is what the authorities told him. He was working at the sound stage, and the police called and said his daughter was in Emergency at Regina General. When Nick got there, Chloe was off somewhere being examined, and he was sent to a waiting room. He had no idea what had occurred.”

  “And no one told him?”

  “You know how it is. Finally, he buttonholed a cop who told him a patrol car had spotted Chloe walking along Winnipeg Street, crying. They picked her up. She wouldn’t say anything, but her shirt was stained and she was terrified. The police suspected she’d been molested so they took her to the hospital. Chloe’s only physical injury is a scraped knee. The assumption is that she got that either when she was pushed out of a car or when she fell running away. There were no marks on her that would suggest she put up a fight.”

  I felt light-headed. “Zack, do you think Chloe even understood…?”

  He closed his eyes against the image. “I don’t know, and I wasn’t about to ask Nick. We’ve been through a lot together, but no matter what I said, I couldn’t get through to him. Finally, I told Nick he needed a doctor and I was going to call Henry.”

  “And Nick was all right with that?”

  “He didn’t say, but Henry’s on his way, and I’m relieved. I have no idea how to help Nick. It’s as if something inside him has broken.”

  “I don’t get it,” I said. “What happened to Chloe is beyond sickening, but Nick’s endured a lot and he’s always made it through. Was this just the last straw?”

  Zack shrugged. “That makes as much sense as anything. Nick’s had a tough life. His dad died the year Nick graduated from high school. They were close, but they’d quarrelled, and when his father died, they still weren’t speaking. Nick never got over that. His mother died of septicemia two weeks later, and Nick blamed himself for not taking her into the hospital earlier. Anyway, at the age of eighteen, he was suddenly head of the household, making sure his brothers stayed in line and the family business didn’t go under. When I met him, he had a problem with booze, but he joined AA, met the beautiful Krystal, and when Chloe was born, everybody thought Nick had found his happily ever after. Then the accident happened.”

  “But the accident wasn’t his fault,” I said. “You told me somebody blew a red light and hit the passenger side of Nick’s car. Why would he blame himself?”

  “Because Chloe wasn’t wearing her seatbelt. She had complained that the belt was too tight. They were two blocks from home, so Nick unbuckled the belt. When the light changed, Nick started across the intersection.”

  “And the fairy tale ended,” I said.

  Zack brushed my cheek with his fingertips. “You know what Stephen King says. “ ‘Life turns on a dime. Sometimes towards us, but more often it spins away, flirting and flashing as it goes: so long, honey, it was good while it lasted, wasn’t it?’ ”

  * * *

  —

  When Zack said that Henry Chan was on his way, I felt as if a burden had been lifted from my shoulders. Henry had been a godsend to me. At Zack’s request, before he and I were married, Henry Chan sat down with me and explained in layman’s terms exactly what paraplegia meant for Zack’s life and mine. Henry had been factual, and I had been sobered but not daunted. We had talked for over an hour, and I had made copious notes, but everything Henry told me could be summed up in the words I circled in my notebook at the end of our interview: “Don’t let anything slide.”

  I hadn’t. I had not hovered, but I had been mindful, and twice when I felt I was out of my depth, I had called Henry. Both times, he had come as soon as he could, assessed the situation, and suggested the steps that were necessary to get Zack and me through the crisis.

  When Henry arrived, Chloe was reluctant to leave her father’s side, but Nick had promised his daughter he and Henry wouldn’t be long. They emerged from the living room in less than ten minutes, and Chloe immediately took her father to the kitchen to see the tree.

  When they were out of earshot, Zack touched Henry’s arm. “I’m not asking you to violate confidentiality,” he said. “But as Nick’s lawyer and his friend, I need reassurance. Right now, Nick is not the man you and I play poker with on Wednesday nights. He’s out of control. He wants to kill the guy who did this, and I don’t blame him.”

  “Neither do I,” Henry said. “I guess that’s why we have laws. Anyway, Gina’s visiting her mother in Foam Lake, so I’m on my own. I’ve convinced Nick to let me stay overnight with Chloe and him. I’ve already given him something that will calm him. I’m optimistic that once Nick is able to gather his thoughts, he’ll see that he has to pull himself together for Chloe.”

  “Would you and the Kovacs like to have supper here?” I said. “Taylor’s invited a friend, but I can text her.”

  Henry gave me a quick smile. “Thanks, but right now, I think the best plan is just to get Nick and Chloe home and back in their routine.”

  “Fair enough,” Zack said. “Call if you need me, and I’ll be there.”

  After Henry and the Kovacs left, Zack turned his chair to face me. “So what now?”

  “When I was in the kitchen with Chloe, I dumped our abandoned martinis, rinsed the glasses, and put them back in the freezer,” I said. “Care to start again?”

  “You’re not just a pretty face, are you?”

  I put the roast in the oven while Zack made the martinis. He handed me mine. “What shall we drink to?” I said.

  Zack sighed. “Damned if I know.”

  “Works for me,” I said. “Let’s take our drinks into the family room, put on the Brandenburgs, and light a fire. Taylor and Vale will be here for dinner at six, and everything is ready to go. I even uncorked the Shiraz.”

  The combination of Bach, a very dry martini, the warmth of a fire, and a moratorium on conversation was tonic. By the time Taylor and Vale arrived, Zack and I were able to be genuinely welcoming, and as it turned out, Vale was an easy person to welcome.

  With her auburn hair pulled back in a mid-height ponytail, her face
without makeup, and her grey-and-white J. Crew argyle sweater, she could easily have passed for the fourteen-year-old she was playing in The Happiest Girl. Vale was eager to see Taylor’s art and to meet her cats. When they finally joined Zack and me in the family room, the young women were glowing. Clearly, each had found the friend she needed.

  As we chatted in front of the fire before dinner, Vale was watchful, listening carefully, completely open to what was outside her but giving nothing of herself away. By the time we sat down for dinner, she seemed more assured, as if now that she knew us better, she could let down her guard.

  The rolled prime rib was succulent—almost worth what Zack had paid for it—and at first the conversation at the table was limited to compliments to the chef and expressions of pleasure at the excellence of the meal, but it wasn’t long before the pool of candlelight on the table drew the four of us together, and when Taylor said, “This is great—not just the food—all of it, but especially having Vale with us,” Zack picked up on our daughter’s comment. He turned his chair towards Vale. “Jo and I really are looking forward to spending more time with you,” he said.

  “I’d like that,” Vale said, “but I promise I won’t wreck your holiday by hanging around outside, pressing my nose against your window like the Little Match Girl.”

  “You’re not going home for the holidays?” Zack said.

  “No. My mother’s in New York, but she’s in rehearsal for a play, and I’ll be here working. Our cast and crew will get a couple of days off for Christmas, but not enough time to go anywhere.”

  “That’s harsh,” Taylor said.

  Vale shook her head. “Not really, I’ve been an actor since I was six. My agent says any actor under the age of twelve who can’t get a job at Christmas is either lazy or lousy.”

  “All those productions of A Christmas Carol,” I said.

  “I’ve been in three,” Vale said. “Once as Cratchit Child #6, once as Cratchit Child #5, and once as Tiny Tim. That role turned out to be my lucky break.”

  “How so?” Zack said.