Greg Iles - Blood Memory

“Yes. I didn’t want you to think I was ignoring you. We can’t speak for long, I’m afraid, but we should get together soon. I’m sure you’ve been going through some difficult times since our last conversation.”

“I have,” I admit, my hands already shaking.

“That’s only to be expected, Catherine. Have you been having dreams? Flashbacks? Anything like that?”

“All of the above. I found out this morning that I was sexually abused as a child.”

“I suspected that when you were a medical student. Dr. Omartian was twenty-five years your senior, after all. There were other signs, too. We can discuss all this, but I’m afraid it will have to be at a later date.”

“My grandfather killed my father.”

Silence. “Who told you that?”

“Grandpapa. He says he caught Daddy molesting me.”

“Why would he tell you something like that after all these years?”

“I was on the verge of discovering it anyway.”

A pause. “I see.”

A pair of headlights flashes out of the dark and blows past the gas station. The glare doesn’t touch me for more than a second, but being illuminated at all makes me shiver. “You know the task force is hunting you?”

“Yes.”

“They think you killed the victims in New Orleans.”

“Yesterday you thought that yourself.”

He’s right. I’m not sure what I think now. I only know that as I speak to this man whom the police and the FBI believe killed five men in brutal and premeditated fashion, I feel calmer than I have in days.

“Do you still believe that, Catherine?”

“I don’t know. If the murders are true sexual homicides, I don’t think you did it. But if they’re something else…maybe you did.”

“What else would they be?”

“Punishment.”

A long pause. “You’re a perceptive woman.”

“That hasn’t helped me much.”

“It may yet.”

“What was the video equipment for? The stuff the police found in your secret apartment?”

“Public education. I’ll speak to you again soon, dear. I have to move now.”

Separation anxiety pierces me like a blade. “Dr. Malik?”

“Yes?”

“Someone tried to kill me tonight.”

Silence.

“Was it you?”

“No. Where did this happen?”

“In the middle of nowhere. An island in the Mississippi River.”

More silence. “I can’t help you with that.”

“Do the murders in New Orleans have anything to do with me? With my life in Natchez?”

“Yes and no. I have to go now, dear. Be careful. Trust no one. Not even your family.”

With one click he’s gone.

I’m still holding the phone to my ear when a black Expedition wheels into the parking lot and blinks its headlights three times. I stay where I am until Michael Wells climbs out.

“Cat?” he yells. “It’s Michael!”

“Over here.” Keeping my back against the wall, I push myself erect with my legs and walk toward the Expedition.

Michael looks worried as I approach the Expedition, but then he smiles. “Every time I see you, you’re in your underwear.”

“Seems that way, doesn’t it?”

He reaches into the vehicle and hands me a T-shirt, a pair of warm-up pants, and some slippers about five sizes too large for my feet.

“Thanks. Do you have a towel or something? I don’t want to ruin the pants. I’ve got a lot of blood on my leg.”

He opens the passenger door and helps me up onto the seat. Then he bends over the ragged hole in my thigh. “Damn. I’ll have to suture that when we get back. For now we’ll just clean and cover it.”

From a paper bag on the floor he takes a bottle of Betadine, soaks some gauze with it, and presses the soggy ball into my wound. After a few seconds, he removes the gauze and squirts half a tube of Neosporin into the hole, then covers it with a large Band-Aid.

“Most of my patients need a Tootsie Pop after this.”

“Do you have one?”

He reaches into his glove box and, with a magician’s flourish, whips out a chocolate Tootsie Pop. This actually brings a smile to my lips.

“How about we get the hell out of here now?” he says.

I nod gratefully.

Michael shuts me into the passenger seat and gets behind the wheel. As I pull the clothes over my underwear, he makes a three-point turn and skids back onto the highway, headed north.

“How did you get down here?” he asks.

“In my car. It’s on the other side of the river.”

“Do we need to get it?”

I would like to have my car back. But to get it, we’d have to cross the ferry at St. Francisville. That’s the only way across the Mississippi River between Natchez and Baton Rouge-other than the ferry at Angola, which is used only for prison business-so it’s an ideal ambush site for whoever was trying to kill me on the island. If the gunman waits for me near my parked Audi, he risks being caught if I bring the cops back with me. But the ferry is a choke point with plausible deniability. If I push my luck and try to cross there, he could get lucky.

“No. I’ll get it tomorrow.”

“Okay. Take it easy now. I’ll have you back in Natchez in an hour.”

I recline my seat and take a few deep breaths. With the air conditioner on, I feel like I’m resting in a suite at the Windsor Court.

“I don’t want to pry into your business,” Michael says, “but what the hell happened to you today? You sounded bad when you called my office this afternoon.”

“I got some bad news.”

“Okay.”

He doesn’t ask for details, but I don’t see much point in holding back the rest of it. “Just before I called you, I found out that I was sexually abused as a child.”

He nods slowly. “I thought it must be something like that, when you asked about repressed memories. I’ve been reading up on the subject today. You got me curious.”

I’ve been in this vehicle less than five minutes, but already my head feels fuzzy. “We can talk about it,” I murmur. “I just need to rest my eyes for a little bit.”

“Cat? Wake up!”

I blink awake and look around. I’m sitting in a truck in a brightly lit garage

“Where are we?”

“My house,” Michael says. “In Brookwood.”

“Oh.”

“I wasn’t sure where you wanted to go. I tried to ask you, but you wouldn’t wake up. I stopped by my office for some sutures, then brought you here. Let’s get that cut stitched up. Then I’ll take you to your grandfather’s house.”

Nathan Malik’s words come back to me like a brand burned into my brain: Trust no one. Not even your family. “I don’t want to go there.”

“You don’t have to. I’ll take you wherever you want to go. Or you can stay here. I’ve got three extra bedrooms. It’s up to you.”

I nod thanks but say nothing. I don’t know what I want to do. I definitely want my leg stitched up. It hurts like hell, and stitching means local anesthetic. At least I hope it does. “Did you bring some lidocaine?”

Michael shakes his head. “Nah. I figured anybody who can free dive to three hundred feet can handle a couple of stitches without breaking a sweat.”

He looks serious, but after a few moments of eye contact, he reaches into his pocket and brings out a vial of clear liquid.

“The magic elixir,” he says with a smile. “Let’s do it.”

Michael sutures my leg while I sit on the cold granite of his kitchen island. The gleaming room reminds me of Arthur LeGendre’s kitchen, only there’s no corpse lying on the floor. Michael’s house was built in the 1970s, and until Mrs. Hemmeter sold it, the decor was original to the house. Avocado green appliances and heavy brown paneling like that in my old bedroom. Michael has totally redone the place, and with surprisingly good taste for a bachelor.