Face Value

11. Dead

  Much to my surprise, ( or should that be to my good fortune?) my second package from an unknown sender did not explode, and me with it, into a million pieces. But if it did turn out to be some kind of explosive, the confines of my car should diminish the blast radius. 

   I untied the violet ribbon from around the box and unfolded the piece of card stock. It was yet another note, completely in English this time. 

   You were too late but she came back to see you anyway.

 12.05.2002

   I was well past pondering who the "she" might be in the context of these strange messages. But for the life of me I couldn't see the connection between this perp and Nadine. The only relative she ever talked about was her deceased mother. She never spoke of any siblings or any close friends. She said that I, for all intensive purposes was her meilleur ami-- her best friend. 

  But this person knew intimate details about her life; about the rape. Something she even neglected to tell me. 

  'You were too late'... Too late for what? To save her; to stop that soldier from hurting her?

  Something like rage boiled up inside me as I reread the words. What did he expect me to be? A mind-reader; a psychic? I didn't know of anyone at that camp who would want to hurt her or anyone there who desired her so strongly--well apart from myself. 

  I would have done anything to prevent her attack if I suspected anything. Yet still, I couldn't brush away the guilt that I felt. It buzzed around my thoughts like a fly. I failed her; I swore to her, to myself and to my sergeant that I would protect, even with my life if need be and I failed to do that. I could still her screams in head, ripping through the premonition from the night before. I could hear the sheer terror in her voice. 

   I lifted the lid of the box and there was a familiar, small brown paper bag inside. I saw bags like this almost everyday in my line of work. The word 'EVIDENCE' was printed in bold, dark blue letters across the top of the bag. My pulse sped up by a few beats as I read the information scribbled in someone's sloppy handwriting. 

Agency: New York Police Department

The item number and case number were listed below that.

Date: 12.05.2002

Time of Collection: 11: 16 p.m.

Under 'Description of Evidence', the words written were: wool scarf, tan/beige. There was an address written for somewhere in Manhattan on the lower east side as the the location of collection. 

  I didn't know what I expected to see scribbled next to the heading 'Type of Offense' but I know that I didn't expect what I saw. My heart froze in my chest. I wanted to look away; to see anything but those few words, but the harder I tried, the larger the words seemed to appear. They jumped at me: HOMICIDE.

   Amelie's full name: Amelie-Nadine  Marie Durand was carefully printed beside the heading 'Victim', confirming my worst fear. 

  Nadine was dead...

  I let the words sink in, gripping the steering wheel tightly until my knuckles were bone white with the strain of it. My mind fought to wrap itself around the gravity of all this. Given the date, she had been dead for nearly fourteen years now. Something like fear lanced through me, spearing me in half and scrambling my thoughts. How did I not know about this? I wasn't working homicide when she was killed but I should have come across her file at least once. Or maybe I had and I couldn't remember what significance her name held to me. 

  She'd been raped and I hadn't known about it. I hadn't tried to stop it or console her or even get justice for her. Now she had been murdered... 
I wondered how she died, thinking of all the hundreds of possible causes of death that I could attest to and hoping that she had not suffered.

    The feeling of hopelessness; of uselessness weighed heavily upon my conscience but I forced myself to brush those feelings aside; to toss it into the farthest corner of my mind until there was a more opportune moment to deal with them. Unfortunately, knowing myself, there would never be an opportune moment. 

   I tore the seal of the yellow evidence tape that kept the bag closed. It spoke of a man's level (or a possibly a woman's but my gut was leaning toward my perp being male) of influence and power that he was able to acquire sealed evidence from a crime scene. I would like to think that my fellow brothers and sisters of the NYPD were incorruptible but what I was holding in my hand was proof of the contrary.

   Dried blood, now turned a muddy brown with time and decay stained the tan scarf in large circular blotches. I remembered the scarf; it was the one Nadine wrapped around her hair in my dream- or rather my memory of first meeting her. She hated getting sand in her because it was difficult to wash out so she never left without it while we were in Afghanistan. The fact that her mother had knitted it for her made it that much more sentimental. To think that she wore this everyday, even until the moment she took her last breath...
    I suppose now this all made sense: the journal, the scarf, the cryptic note attached to my first souvenir of sorts, that bad been hand delivered to me by Donald. Nadine was the trigger; the catalyst. Her death must have set an entire chain of events into motion that seemed to unraveling with me at the center.
But why now?
    Why wait until she'd been dead for almost a decade and half? And most importantly, why me; how did I fit into all this?
  

    This person couldn't possibly believe that I something to do with her death. I would never hurt her; I had no recollection of how I felt about her until a few hours ago but I was certain of that fact.
   However, this was the only motive that fit. Given the hostility in the notes, the sadistic henchman and the fact that he had kidnapped my wife, this person had to believe--and strongly at that, that I was connected to this in some way.
       But what did he hope that abducting my love and forcing me to remember Nadine would accomplish? The word revenge didn't seem sufficient for this. This plan seemed more carefully orchestrated and holding Alice hostage had to be of more significance. If her life was only to serve as compensation for my failure to save Nadine's, then he would have just left Alice's lifeless body in our apartment and not a man with a message. 

      He would not have asked me to come and find my wife if there wasn't something else that want me to discover. I felt like I was being held accountable for some offense but I couldn't fathom what evidence this person had to make such a claim.
       I shoved the scarf back into the box and threw it onto the passenger seat. Twisting the key in the ignition, the Dodge's engine roared to life.
      I was stepping right into the lion's den; I could feel it but somehow, I knew that there was no other way. I would have to play this game but I needed information first; information that given my current circumstances, I couldn't obtain very easily or on my own.
     But I happen to know someone who could give me what I needed and I knew just what it might take to force his hand.