Iris Johansen - Blood Game

“I’M ON MY WAY HOME,”Joe told Eve, when she picked up the call at the cottage two hours later. “I just left the precinct, so it will be forty minutes or so. Is everything okay there?”

“Yes, I’m working, and Jane is out on the porch with Toby. Have you eaten?”

“I grabbed a sandwich from the machine.” He paused. “Charlie Brand will take over surveillance tomorrow morning. I couldn’t get him tonight.”

“Good enough,” Eve said. “It will be like having a friend out there. Patty needs all the friends she has around her right now. I’ll see you soon.” She hung up.

Eve had sounded abstracted, Joe thought as he hung up. But then she was always abstracted when she was working. After the first measurements of the skull, she became totally engrossed in the process of turning clay into a perfect replica of the face of the victim. It was a combination of scientific exploration and sheer instinct and creativity. When she’d finished putting on her tissue depth markers, the skull resembled a voodoo doll. Then she started taking strips of plasticene and building up the spaces between the markers and lastly came the smoothing and working of the clay. She always told him that there was no such thing as perfection in forensic sculpting, but Eve came very close. He always thought that her instinct became almost magical as the face grew beneath her fingers.

At any rate, he was glad that she was doing something that would keep her mind off Jelak. The bastard was coming closer every minute and touching people they both cared about. Patty had been a part of their lives for years and that goblet was-

“He didn’t want Patty,” Nancy Jo said. “Eve is the only one he wants.”

That car swerved as he glanced at the passenger seat. She was sitting there, next to him.

“No!” He drew a deep breath, his hands tightening on the steering wheel. “I thought I was rid of you. What are you doing here?”

“You didn’t come back to the lake. I had to come to you.” She frowned. “It wasn’t easy. I didn’t know how to do it. Someone had to teach me.”

“Then you should have stayed there. I’m doing everything I can do.”

“He’s still alive. He still has my blood. And Daddy is getting impatient. I can feel it.”

“Then go get someone to teach you how to reach him. Your father is damn persistent. I’m not going to be able to stop him.”

“I know.” Her blue eyes were full of tears. “He won’t give up. He has someone following you right now.”

“What?”

“The blue Camry in the next lane. It’s someone he hired to keep an eye on you. He didn’t like it that you wouldn’t take a bribe.”

“You seem to know a lot about what’s going on.”

“I’m learning. I have to learn. No one is helping me… except her.”

“Except who?”

“The little girl.”

He stiffened. “What little girl?”

“The one who taught me how to come to you. She said I should get away from the place where it happened. She said if I was going to stay, I should go away somewhere and begin to heal.”

“She appears very knowledgeable about this kind of situation,” he said.

“Yes, she said it happened a long time ago for her. I liked her. She wasn’t like the others. She didn’t try to push me. She just sat with me and told me she knew what I was feeling. She was quiet, and yet she made me feel… good.”

“And does she have a name?”

“Of course. Bonnie.”

He had been expecting it, but he still felt the shock. “And when did she come to you?”

“The night after you came with that Megan person. Bonnie wasn’t like the others. She knew I had to stay.”

“Because of your father.”

“She said that if their need is too strong, then you have to help them.” She moistened her lips. “She knew how I felt.”

“Yes, she would.” He looked at her. “And you know why, don’t you?”

“She didn’t tell me. But I felt it. It’s Eve. She’s trying to save Eve, isn’t she?”

“Yes.” His lips twisted. “We’re all trying to save Eve.”

“Me too. Because if he takes Eve’s blood, then everything is going to change. He may be too strong. It will be harder to kill him.”

“What are you talking about? All this crap about blood making him stronger. You sound like Caleb.”

“It does make him stronger. I made him stronger. Not as much as Eve would, but I gave him some strength he would never have had.” She looked away from him. “And it’s not crap. Ask Seth Caleb. Make him tell you.”

“I’ve heard enough from him. He said that this cult group Jelak belonged to had certain beliefs. Even Caleb didn’t say they were valid.”

“Make him tell you,” she repeated. “He’s not what you think.”

“I have a suggestion. Why don’t you go visit Caleb and ask him to team up with you to go after Jelak? You seem to have similar thoughts on the subject.”

She shook her head. “There’s too much darkness all around him. I couldn’t get near him. I have to rely on you.”

“Great.”

“I don’t like it either.” She paused. “But I may be able to help you. I found out that I may be able to tell where Jelak is.”

“How?”

“I can feel him.”

He snorted. “Now you do sound like Caleb.”

“It’s true. I don’t know how he feels Jelak, but with me it’s the blood. It’s my blood in him that calls to me.”

Joe was silent. “Then do you know where he is right now?”

“No.”

“Then I can’t say that you’re a reliable source.”

“I’m the most reliable source that you have,” she said. “I thought I felt him last night. He was excited, and his blood was pounding. It went on for a long time.”

The time when he was killing Heather Carmello?

“I didn’t know about her,” Nancy Jo said as if he’d put the thought into words. “Not until you started thinking about her.”

“She’s not one of your buddies in the afterworld?”

“Stop being sarcastic. I don’t even know if we can have friends. I hope so. I hate being this lonely.”

“I imagine there’s some provision for them.” He paused. “What about Bonnie?”

“She was nice to me, but I think she wanted to rush me along so that I would be able to help Eve. Is Eve her mother?”

“Yes.”

“My mother died a long time ago. I only have my dad.” She added unevenly, “And he only had me. He’s not happy, and I don’t know how to help him.”

“I think you have to let him find his way himself.”

“I will not. I need to help him. I’ll find a way.” She looked at him. “Are you Bonnie’s dad?”

“No, I never knew her.”

“She knows you. She said I could trust you.” She glanced out the window. “The Camry has dropped back. They must know you’re going to get off the freeway here.”

“Why is your father having me followed? I’d turn any information I found in to the department.”

“He found out about the goblet that Jelak put in your cottage. He knows about Eve. He thinks that if he’s close to you, he may get close to Jelak.”

“Evidently, someone did take one of his bribes.”

“You can’t blame him,” Nancy Jo said fiercely. “He’s hurting. Someone has to help him.”