Michael Baden - Skeleton justice

From the other room came the sound of Manny's outrage. "Oh my God! This is horrible!"

Manny pulled two sheets of paper from the printer and entered Jake's office, reading aloud. "Listen to this: 'The junta led by Videla until 1981, then by Roberto Viola and Leopoldo Galtieri, was responsible for the illegal arrest, torturing, killing, or forced disappearance of citizens who voiced opposition to the government. Critics claim there are documents showing Argentina's brutal policies were known by the U.S. State Department, led by Henry Kissinger under both the Nixon and Gerald Ford presidencies.'"

Manny looked up. "Isn't that outrageous? Nixon and Kissinger's foreign policy extended long after the impeachment. And there's more." Manny continued reading aloud, her voice rising with indignation at every ghastly detail-secret imprisonment, torture, mutilation, murder-of the Argentine government's brutality.

"Say that again." Jake suddenly cut her off in mid-sentence.

"'Some of the bodies were never found because they were taken far offshore and disposed of in the ocean,'" Manny repeated.

"No, not that. What you said before."

Manny flipped back to the first page she'd printed out. "'The government claims that about nine thousand people were victims of forced disappearances, but the grandmothers of the Plaza de Mayo estimate that nearly thirty thousand dissidents, students, and ordinary citizens disappeared between 1976 and 1983. The higher number includes children who disappeared with their parents, and pregnant women who may have given birth while in captivity.'"

Jake lowered his head and scrambled through the file folders on his desk, checking each one quickly and moving on to the next.

"What? What is it?"

Jake looked up and met Manny's eyes. "Victims one, three, and four were all born during the Dirty War. Victim two was born two years earlier. That's it. That's the connection. These victims-they're all children of the Desaparecidos."

"What are you thinking?" Manny asked. She and Jake were lying in her Murphy bed, with Mycroft curled at their feet. They didn't often spend the night at her place, even though Jake praised the coziness of her five-hundred-square-foot apartment: "Makes me feel like I'm sleeping in a casket."

Manny rolled over on the six-hundred-thread-count sheets and ran her finger down Jake's sinewy arm. Turning corpses over on a daily basis is good for the muscles, Manny thought. She read the deep recessed lines documenting Jake's thoughts. "I'm sure you're only thinking about how fabulous it is to be here with me, naked and alone."

"I was thinking about the blood." It never occurred to Jake to utter a judicious lie.

Manny flopped onto her back and looked up at the ceiling. "I love it when you ply me with romantic pillow talk. What blood?"

"The blood the Vampire takes. He went to all the trouble of collecting those samples, then abandoned them in that apartment in Brooklyn."

"He must be done with them," Manny said. "Because if he still needed them, it wouldn't have been hard to take them along when he left that place."

"Exactly. So if he was testing the blood samples, as I've always suspected, he now has his results. What's his next move? What's he going to do with this information?"

"I don't know. The note he left with Deanie told us to await instructions. He must be planning something."

Jake unexpectedly sat up and slammed his fist so hard onto the down comforter that three feathers shot into the air. "Well, I'm not waiting for him to act. I want to be one jump ahead, anticipating him."

Manny had been about ready to drift into blissful and much-needed sleep, but being in the presence of Jake when he was so excited was the equivalent of drinking three cups of double espresso-and infectious.

She sat up, too, and faced him across the rumpled covers. "But even with what we know now, or what we suspect, we still aren't any closer to understanding the Vampire's motivation. And without that, how can we anticipate his next move?"

Jake said nothing, eyes focused on the seemingly nondescript pattern of her new white-on-white silk comforter.

"Jake?"

No answer.

"Jake! You know something that you haven't told me."

He started, as if he just noticed that he wasn't alone in the bed. "Not that I haven't told you. It's something that just clicked." He grabbed Manny's hands. "If victims one through four are children of Los Desaparecidos, but the ones I talked to claimed no connection with Argentina, then how did three of them get here to New York? Even the businessman tourist from Chile claimed he was born in Chile. So, who took them out of their country? Who raised them?"

"They're all adopted," Manny said, catching his excitement and building on it. "But they don't know one another… They probably don't even know that they're adopted. Their adoptive parents concealed their true heritage-didn't want them to know their biological parents had been murdered."

"Maybe because-" Jake's grip on Manny's hands tightened.

Her eyes widened. "Because the people who adopted them were responsible for the parents' deaths. Were part of the junta. Why else keep the adoptions secret, when today everyone's so open about the process?"

"Adoption," Jake said. "We've just found where another of our puzzle pieces fits."

"The Family Builders adoption agency. They must have facilitated these adoptions. That's why Ms. Hogaarth left them money in her will."

"We have to talk to the director." Jake glanced around for Manny's phone.

She reached out and pulled him back. "It's three-thirty in the morning, Jake. We have to wait a few hours."

He flung himself back on the pillows and yanked the covers up to his chin. "I hate waiting."

Manny snuggled up beside him. "So do I."

Ten minutes passed in silence. The only light in the room came from the reflected glow of streetlamps far below. Mycroft snored gently.

"Are you asleep?" Manny asked.

"No."

"My mind's racing."

"Mine, too."

"There's really only one cure for this," Manny said.

Jake slid one leg over the edge of the bed. "You're right. I may as well get up and go to the office."

Manny twined her arms around his neck and yanked him back. "No! Not that!"

"Oh," he said, catching on. "Yeah, that works, too."

"Isn't that what you're always telling me?" Manny murmured. "Keep your mind open to all the possibilities."

"We have never handled international adoptions," Lydia Martinette said.

Jake sat across from the director of the Family Builders adoption agency, surrounded by the relentless good cheer of her office's happy family photos and precious children's drawings. Not liking the answer he'd received, he posed his question again. "This would have been late 1970s, early 1980s. Argentina." He was certain that Family Builders had brought the children of the Desaparecidos to New York. All he needed to do was make Mrs. Martinette comprehend.

"I understand the time frame, Dr. Rosen. You mentioned it before. But I'm telling you, this agency has never handled international adoptions. In fact, bringing foreign-born babies to the United States for adoption is antithetical to everything we stand for." When Jake had called the director at home at 8:55 that morning, demanding an interview at her office, Mrs. Martinette had been polite and helpful, but now her voice took on an edge.

But Jake was not deterred. "These names, Mrs. Martinette." He read the list of victims one through four. "Do they sound familiar? Did you place any of these children?"

"I'm sure we didn't, but if it will set your mind at rest, I'll look them up." She took the list from him and tapped the names into a database on her computer. After each search, she shook her head. "Not here."

Jake felt a rising tide of desperation. There just had to be a connection. Yet he believed Mrs. Martinette. He looked at a photo of a kid with stumps for arms surrounded by his new family. She found homes for kids like that. Her agency's reputation was stellar. He couldn't doubt her sincerity or her honesty. Still, he persisted. "How about Dr. Raymond Fortes. He's an OB-GYN specializing in fertility. Have you ever worked with him?"