The Parker Trilogy Page 37

  “Yeah. You’ve said that. So, what is it?”

  You’re going to have to stop someone from committing the same mistake you have.

  “You mean . . .”

  Murder. Yes.

  “Who am I supposed to stop?”

  Curtis Ruvelcaba.

  “What? Curtis? That’s crazy. He’s in jail!”

  Exactly.

  Chapter Six

  As Father Soltera stood and gained his balance, he looked around again. They were surrounded by sparse woods made up of trees with dark trunks, reaching to limbs and branches that were utterly void of any leaves.

  A gray-white light was cast overhead, its rays cutting swaths through the branches before being mostly absorbed by the dense fog that blanketed the forest floor. In places, though, the light made it to the ground at straight angles. It was the heavy kind of light that one experienced on the gloomiest of days, when you didn’t even want to get out of bed.

  The woman he had just met, Michiko, had called this place The Hanging Forest. As if in testimony to this fact, there were dead vines everywhere, hanging from the tree limbs that bent toward the ground at the tips, as if they’d lost their leaves from the sheer burden of trying to grow in a place where Father Soltera sensed there were no seasons.

  The ground was a mix of nature’s relics: dirt, moss, rocks and dead tree branches, all begging to twist an ankle. He didn’t know why, but he felt like falling here meant never getting up again. The air smelled of burnt ash, wood rot and mildew.

  “I don’t like this place,” he said.

  Michiko nodded knowingly and motioned her head toward the path. “We should start moving. While there’s still light.”

  Father Soltera fell in step next to her. The path was wide enough for the two of them, but only barely so. They made their way in silence. He was not inclined to disturb the quiet of the forest, and evidently neither was she. For her, the silence seemed to be strategic; she constantly glanced from one side of the path to the next before scanning the forest ahead of them. Occasionally, she’d look quickly backwards, then begin the process all over again. For Father Soltera, though, his silence was almost instinctive. There were things out there, watching. He could feel them.

  The path curved to the left, around a tall ridge, before it turned right again and sloped downward into a thicket of ferns that had partially overgrown the path. They were alive, at least, but Father Soltera could also see that their leaves were tinged at the edges with a black inky substance. Alive. But dying.

  “Watch your step,” she whispered, taking her eyes briefly off the path to point out a twisted bundle of vines in front of him.

  He sidestepped it, and following her lead, whispered back, “How far do we have to go?”

  “Quite a way, still.”

  Over the next mile or so, the path continued at a slow incline before it peaked and cut between two large trees with trunks almost six feet wide, and leveled off again. It had been a while since Father Soltera had exercised this much and he struggled to keep up. After a bit, Michiko appeared to notice and slowed her pace.

  The fog receded from the next section of woods they entered, revealing the forest floor: dark brown soil and ashy soot littered with tiny, white sticks that made toothpicks come to Father Soltera’s mind before he finally realized what they were.

  Bones. They’re bones.

  Looking more closely, he could make out the bony shells of rib cages and joints strung with spiny protrusions, sharp and fine as piano wire, that looked like wings. Then, a little further along, he saw a tiny head with a curved beak.

  They’re birds.

  Even the fern trees had died off now, leaving only sparse pockets of dark-green moss creeping across the forest floor, and light green mold infesting some of the tree trunks.

  They kept moving and before long he saw something odd: tied on the branch of a tree up ahead there was a blue ribbon that, since there was no wind or even the hint of a breeze, was hanging straight down.

  “What—” Father Soltera began before Michiko put a finger to her lips.

  She froze. He froze.

  They were at the top of small hill, looking into a gully a quarter-mile down. From their vantage point they could see a number of paths coming into the gully from various directions. To Father Soltera’s surprise, there were more ribbons, tied to tree branches every fifty feet or so. Some white, others red, and a green one and a purple one near them that was not a ribbon but instead torn bits of cloth.

  “A shirt. Someone tore up their shirt,” Father Soltera whispered.

  “Yes, tomodachi. They did.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “Nor did they. Come. Let’s keep going.”

  “But—”

  “All will be revealed. In due time.”

  He was going to protest further but he couldn’t; she took off, walking at almost twice the clip, as if to avoid the question that he was forming in his mind.

  He followed, forcing himself to take longer, fuller strides, the weakness in his legs growing but not nearly as quickly as usual, as if his energy were being boosted somehow. As they descended into the gully, Father Soltera could make out that each ribbon color belonged to each path. But they intersected and crossed one another in places, some ribbons older and more faded than the others.

  The only real consistency to them was that they all headed deeper into the forest.

  As the tree tops, stark as they were, grew higher, the light from the dead-gray sky grew dimmer. There was a stillness there that was piercingly, almost overwhelmingly sad. And it spoke to a part of Father Soltera that dripped with depression from time to time, when the cancer got too hard or when he felt like his whole life had been spent not saving people but merely delaying their doom. He knew such thoughts were not healthy and most likely wrong, but it was possible, he knew, to be sad enough not to think straight anymore, and such a sadness could—

  Bodies. Hanging everywhere, some facing toward him with bulging eyes, others facing away, all their necks stretched. Some of them were deeply decomposed; others looked like they had just died. Father Soltera counted four to his left, two straight up ahead, and five more to his right. His feet froze in place. “My Lord . . .” His eyes filled with tears.

  Michiko looked at him. Their gaze met briefly before she quickly looked away. “I am sorry, tomodachi. Sorry that you have to see this.”

  “Michiko. What’s going on? What is this place?”

  “A final stop. A last resort. The end of a long walk.”

  “What walk?”

  “The walk of life that for some reason leads them to a walk through this forest. See there?” She pointed at the ribbons along the paths. “In many cases they made this walk still clinging to hope.”

  “Hope?”

  “Yes. That they wouldn’t do it. They tied the ribbons so that they could find their way out if they changed their minds. But this place rarely offers reprieves.”

  Father Soltera could not take his eyes off the bodies, no matter how hard he tried. There was one dressed like a businessman; he’d hung himself with his tie. Another was the body of a young girl; she’d used a sheet. A few others looked like people who’d simply gone on a stroll to the tree of their choosing, with a branch that was just high enough, from which they were suspended now and forever, just a few feet off the ground. They were all Asian.

  “Wait,” Father Soltera paused, “I’ve heard of this place. It’s in Japan, it’s by—”

  “Mount Fuji, yes,” Michiko said. “But there are other places just like it. In Peru, for instance, deep in the jungle. Very much off the beaten path, except for those who are led down it.”

  “Peru? Others?”

  “There’s one in the back woods of North Carolina, in the United States. Another outside of Devon in the United Kingdom, between two remote mountains. Gardens of death, each of them. The first used by witches that cut down and harvest the bodies for organs, the other by druids that b
oil the bodies to near nothingness before pouring the blanched flesh into the soil. In Peru, a group of indigenous cannibals feeds off the corpses, using their vomit and feces to fertilize the ground with evil. Regardless. Each of them feeds the enemy in their own way, you see.”

  His eyes as wide as some of the dead before him, Father Soltera felt sick. “Dios mio! How could this be?”

  A sad look came over Michiko’s face. “Because there is such a thing as loving too much, tomodachi, but there is also such a thing as not loving enough. A point in your life when you cannot even love yourself anymore.”

  Father Soltera felt dizzy. Michiko put a hand on his shoulder to steady him, and looking out over the bodies again she added, “It is a battle won by the enemy if he can get you to not love others. But if he can get you to not love yourself? This is his greatest victory of all.”

  When Maggie arrived at the White Memorial hospital, she was at a loss to explain the depth of her emotions. She was not here to see her mom or dad. This emergency wasn’t about Julie, as it had been when they were kids and Julie had taken a header off the top of the tall slide at school. She’d known Father Soltera only for a few days and yet for some reason, perhaps because he seemed to be an old soul like her, their bond had felt immediate. As if the universe had grafted them together for some purpose not yet fully revealed.

  She knew such thoughts were probably silly, but that did nothing to stop the sob that clutched in her throat as she walked through the sliding glass doors of the hospital to face whatever unknown reality awaited her in the ICU on the fifth floor. With the exceptions of births, hospitals were sad places no matter what, and he was such a sweet old man. Whatever had happened, he didn’t deserve it.

  She’d warned him that Luisa’s boyfriend was dangerous. Having never met Felix, Maggie could only rely on the words of others to gauge the level of threat he presented. In her time working at the shelter so far, she’d heard countless stories of merciless men with vicious intent, but most of them found their courage in a bottle or their bravado held in check once the police got involved.

  But Maggie knew from her experience with Michael, her ex-fiancé who had stalked her across five states, that this was not always the case.

  She rode the elevator up, standing next to a woman in a jacket and jeans, staring blankly at the buttons as they lit from one to the next. When the elevator doors opened she was facing a small lobby with three couches and two vending machines, one for food, one for drinks.

  A set of beige double doors to the left said “INTENSIVE CARE UNIT” in red stencils, with an assortment of warnings and chemical symbols. On the wall to the right was an intercom with a small sign over it that said “Push for Nurses Station.” She was heading straight for it when two men in suits, looking very detective-like, with stern faces and laser eyes, stood up from the large couch in the middle of the lobby.

  One was tall, about six-four, with graying brown hair and brown eyes, his beard stubble stark against his tan skin. The other detective was a shorter and balding black man, with a round middle and a friendly smile. “Ms. Kincaid?”

  “Yes,” she answered.

  “I’m Detective Ivy,” he said, shaking her hand. Then he motioned to the taller one. “This is Detective Hopkins.”

  Maggie shook his hand as well and asked, “Where is he? Can I see him?”

  “It’s family only, I’m afraid,” Ivy said.

  “Well. Have you reached his family?”

  Ivy looked frustrated. “Unfortunately, no. Not yet. We left a message at the church and we’re waiting for a call back. There’s the archdiocese office next, but that will just start a longer process. We figure the church staff locally is the best bet right now and—”

  “As his friend, that makes me the closest thing he has to family right now, don’t you think?” Maggie interrupted, hoping they wouldn’t ask her how long they’d actually been friends, since saying “two days” might not win them over.

  Hopkins joined in. “Yes. And maybe we can do something, considering the seriousness of the situation, but we need your help to jump on this right away.”

  Sighing, Maggie rubbed her hands over her face and stretched the skin over her eyelids. A headache was threatening to come on and that wouldn’t help. “Sure, okay.”

  “Let’s all grab a seat and go over a few things,” Hopkins said, motioning to the couches.

  She let the boys share the big couch while she sat on the small couch to their left.

  “How do you know Father Soltera?”

  Tell the truth but don’t do anything that keeps you from seeing him, she thought, then chastised herself a bit. Why did she feel this overwhelming need to see the Father?

  “He works with the women’s shelter I work at. Has for years.”

  Ivy nodded, and Hopkins started keying in notes on his cellphone. “Had he been there recently?” he asked.

  “Yes. He brought one of his congregants in who needed help. A young girl who’s pregnant.”

  “And her name is?”

  “Luisa. Luisa Martinez.”

  “Mm-hm.”

  “Do you—” Ivy tried asking.

  But Hopkins interrupted him. “And where is Ms. Martinez now?”

  It wasn’t the question itself, but the way he asked it that triggered that little switch inside of her that always warned of danger. The same trigger that everyone had but that—from being used so many times in her life already—Maggie was just a little more sensitive to. “At the shelter,” she said evasively.

  “I get that. But which one?”

  “The one I work at.” Then, for insurance, she added, “At least last I heard, she was there.”

  The way Hopkins looked at her next, with irritation in his eyes, confirmed her suspicions immediately.

  This time Ivy managed to get his entire sentence out. “Do you know who might’ve wanted to do this to Father Soltera?”

  Since the question had steered the conversation back to where it belonged, Maggie took note that Hopkins looked frustrated. Looking at Ivy, she replied in a firm voice, “Most likely the man who threatened to do it.”

  Ivy raised his eyebrows. “And who would that be?”

  “Some guy named Felix. He’s the one who got Luisa pregnant.”

  “And why would that make him hurt the Father?”

  “From what I know, Felix wanted Luisa to get an abortion. He threatened her to get one, actually. She turned to Father Soltera for help. He intervened and then Felix threated him, too.”

  “What did he say?”

  “I didn’t speak to him personally. I only heard what he said.”

  “To whom?”

  “Luisa’s mother. She reported that he was looking for her, tossing around threats at her as well, you know, the usual macho bullshit when someone thinks people can’t protect themselves.”

  Ivy raised his eyebrows again. “Um. Well. Okay. What did—”

  “Luisa’s mother can give you the full story, but she told me that he first threatened her to tell him where Luisa was—”

  Hopkins was on it in a second. “Which was where again?”

  Maggie gave a faint, coy smile. “At the shelter.”

  His eyes flashed. “I know that, I meant—”

  “Damn, Bart. We’ll get that later. Let’s stay on point with this Felix guy.”

  Yes, Bart. Let’s do that, Maggie thought. But this wasn’t funny. Why was Hopkins so intent on finding out where Luisa was?

  “So. Felix?” Ivy continued.

  “Luisa’s mom wouldn’t tell him, so from what I understand, he went on a rant. Threatened to hurt her and then mentioned Father Soltera getting involved and how he was going to make him pay.”

  Ivy looked at Hopkins and then back to Maggie. “Go on.”

  “I talked with Father Soltera late last night.”

  “Where was he?”

  “On the metro.”

  “Where was he going?”

  “He didn’t say.”
/>
  “What did you discuss?”

  The power of dreams and faith . . . and, oh yeah, Latin translations, she thought. Instead she said, “Luisa’s safety. I told him what Felix said, too. He told me that Felix had already threatened him personally.”

  Ivy set his chin and nodded. “Do you know Felix’s last name?”

  “No. I’m sorry. I don’t.”

  “Anything else about him? Description? His usual whereabouts?”

  Maggie shook her head. “No. I think he’s got some sort of gang affiliation. But Luisa’s mom would probably know more.”

  “Or Luisa herself?” Hopkins slid in. Like a snake.

  “Perhaps.”

  “I’ll call the shelter. Hopkins, you call the station and dig up what you can on this Felix character, maybe get a unit to swing by Luisa’s mom’s house to see if she knows his last name.”

  Hopkins, looking frustrated, nodded but then stalled.

  Maggie froze for a second, then came up with a solution.

  Making her eyes big, she said, “Detective Ivy. Can I tell you about the shelter on the way in? Please. I really want to see Father Soltera.”

  Ivy cleared his throat. “Sure, Ms. Kincaid. Come on. Follow me.”

  He stood and began heading to the doors to the ICU. Maggie followed, feeling Hopkins’ eyes drilling a hole in the back of her head the whole time.

  Something was off with him. Very off.

  Chapter Seven

  Parker couldn’t stop staring at him. In shock, he instinctively took a few steps back. Then, looking around, not a little bit paranoid, he finally spoke. “How?”

  Napoleon smiled. “You know how, Parker. C’mon.”

  Parker studied him intensely, like one might a cell in a petri dish in science class. Napoleon was by the apartment’s living room window, its blinds partially open. His face was still tan, and his eyes were bright. He was wearing a dark-blue shirt over tan pants and brown shoes, his arms folded across his chest. He wasn’t glowing. He didn’t have wings.

  “Wings?” Napoleon asked with a laugh.