VIVI’S SOFT-SPOKEN words continued to ring in JD’s ears as she pushed her car up Riverside Drive through darkness and rain, high beams on, fast as she dared go in a neighbourhood with so many joggers and kids.
She knew she was overreacting. Chances were Vivi was fine. She’d used the phone without permission, which was against house rules, and was being scolded for her naughtiness. That was all.
No, it wasn’t all.
“I’m sorry I haven’t called,” Vivi had begun as JD rose from her seat at Rainey’s and headed for a quieter place in order to catch every word. “I haven’t had the chance,” the girl said. “But Gemma is out now, shopping, and I need to talk to you about something.”
“You can tell me now,” JD had told her, backing into the swing doors, taking the call outside Rainey’s, phone to ear, car keys in hand.
“They won’t tell you. They say I’m lying. But Tia —”
The girl stopped cold, and JD heard why. A background noise, a door thudding shut. And now Vivi was whispering, “Oh no. She’s come back. I have to —”
And then Gemma’s voice, distant but growing louder with every stride, “Vivi, I told you, damn it —”
The girl squealed as if she’d been grabbed, the call disconnected, and JD had been racing to her car, pressing redial as she went. Nobody at the Vale home had picked up.
The trip took longer than she wanted. She had called Leith hands-free as she drove, telling him what was happening. He told her Dion had been in touch and was close behind her, and that more cars were on their way.
JD had failed Tia, and was damned if she’d fail Vivi now, too. She arrived at the home, her veins buzzing with anxiety. A sharp turn into the driveway, skidding on loose gravel, nearly hitting Gemma’s Mazda that sat nosed against the garage door. She left her car and jogged to the front door, banged on it with her fist, too impatient for doorbells. “Gemma? Mrs. Vale? Police. Open up.”
She heard voices inside. A muffled shouting? Like an angry person trying to bottle her frustration. Then the door flung open and Gemma stood dressed for the outdoors in a furry winter coat, hood dropped back, jeans, boots on her feet. She was flushed, blinking, irate. But not outwardly frantic. Not homicidal. “Yes?”
“I was talking to Vivi on the phone.” Calm, unflustered, even polite, JD knew she came across as a whole lot more professional than she felt. “It sounded like she was in trouble. I don’t know what this is all about, but I need to see her.”
Gemma’s eyes rolled back in an apology of sorts, implying this was nothing but a silly misunderstanding and she regretted JD’s wasted trip. “Yes, Vivi is in trouble. She’s not allowed to use the phone in my absence, and she knows it. That’s all. We’ve talked it over and reached an understanding.”
“Sure. Still, I need to see her. Once I’ve seen her, then we can talk about your house rules.”
“I’m on my way out, actually. I’m sorry, but I need to get to the store before it closes. You can come back in a couple hours.”
“Ma’am,” JD barked, still professional but no longer polite. “If you won’t let me in, I’ll arrest you. You have to confirm for me that she’s all right, then we’ll talk, then I’ll leave, then you can go get your groceries. Get it?”
The woman turned and walked back into her house, leaving the door wide. JD took the open door as permission to follow. With Vivi nowhere in sight, her hackles were starting to rise.
Down a half-flight of stairs toward the front of the house, Gemma had entered what looked like an office with a computer desk and leather sofa. She shut the door behind JD and sat at one end of the sofa, and JD assumed she was supposed to sit at the other.
But sitting down wasn’t going to happen. “Look, Gemma —”
“No, you look,” Gemma said. “I have to tell you this. Before you talk to Vivi. You have to understand something about that child. Did Zachary tell you she’s a genius? Did he also mention she’s a manipulator? No, I’m sure he didn’t. We’ve both worked hard to protect her against herself. She likes Zach. She likes all men. But she doesn’t like me. Sometimes I think she hates me. I don’t know why. I’ve given her nothing but love all these years.”
“Fine, we’ll talk. Just as soon as I —”
Thump.
From somewhere on the other side of the house.
Thump, thump.
Like something softly but firmly hitting a window, sending faint reverberations through the structure.
“I locked her out on the balcony,” Gemma cried, chasing after JD. It was a confession, blurted out to get ahead of the situation as JD launched from the office to track the noise to its source. “Just so I could talk to you and explain. Don’t believe her. Don’t believe a word she says. You know what we think, Perry and I? We think she took Luna, did something with her. We’ve been trying to protect her, but it’s over. I’ve had enough.” Anger now was mixed with self-pity. “Put it to her. Get the truth out of that little girl.”
JD ignored the protests that followed her from room to room. She passed the dinner table, pulled back the drapes, and saw Vivi standing shivering, nose against the glass, as she gave it a final thump with her balled-up fist. Her eyes met JD’s and widened in relief.
“Christ,” JD said. She unlocked the sliding glass door and the noise of the river rushed in, along with the cold and cedar-scented air and one swift-footed little girl, not dressed for the elements, not dressed to be locked outside like this. Vivi flitted to safety at JD’s side and from there stared up at Gemma.
With Vivi at her side, JD watched Gemma, trying to understand. The woman’s face was flushed, but from what? The exertion of chasing a kid around the house, or shouting excuses? Or was it shame? Anger?
“I know it was the wrong thing to do,” Gemma said, and her voice shook. “I know how it looks.” She crouched to chide her daughter, and to JD it looked like bad play-acting. “But Vivi, I don’t want you telling lies to the police. We’ve talked about it, haven’t we?”
“It’s not lies,” Vivi said. She had grasped JD’s arm. “It’s what Tia saw.”
JD looked from the girl to the mother, who was overdue for arrest and a reading of her rights. The woman looked shaken and depressed, like a mother who had done her best, only to be disappointed time and again. Gemma knelt and held her arms out to the girl. “Why are you doing this to me, Vivi? Tell me.”
“You won’t listen. I’ve told you over and over, and you won’t listen.”
Gemma stood again, looking defeated. Then swiftly, with a sob, she pulled open the sliding door and slipped outside. The door zipped shut as JD was still blinking in surprise.
She didn’t blink for long. She threw the door open. The surrounding forest was blue in the dusky light, and Gemma stood leaning despondently against the railing. Was she going to do like Zach and threaten to jump? What was wrong with this crazy family? The house was built on a steep slope, and the distance from the deck to the forest floor below could easily be a killing fall.
But Gemma made no move to step onto the deck chair at her side and pitch herself overboard. Still in her furry coat, emotionally drained, all she wanted, she told JD over her shoulder, was a bit of goddamn privacy.
But privacy was not an option. JD had gone into suicide-prevention mode, even with no suicide threat per se. She told Gemma that she understood these were troubled times, and what they needed to do was first of all get Vivi warmed up. After that they should sit down and figure this out. She was so intent on talking sense into Gemma that she didn’t notice Vivi slip past till the girl stood at Gemma’s side, taking her mother’s hand, looking up at her, trying to comfort her.
Oh shit, JD thought. But she shouldn’t panic. She wanted to separate mother and child, but didn’t want to set off a chain reaction by saying so. Backup was on the way. She’d ease the two apart diplomatically. But even that was uncalled for, it seemed. Gemma had crouched down once again to talk to Vivi in soft tones. No longer play-acting. Begging for forgiveness, it looked like. Even when Vivi nodded and the two of them hugged, JD decided to shut up and let them make peace.
Even when Gemma wrapped her arms around Vivi, and Vivi buried her face in the fur of Gemma’s coat. But when Gemma rose, with the girl in her arms, and seated the girl on the railing, JD thought, What? “Hey,” she said.
“Gemma —” Vivi yelped, clutching the fur.
“I love you so much, Vivi,” Gemma said.
“Gemma, don’t,” JD said, lunging forward. The railing was cedar, green and slimy from perpetual shade and humidity, a terrible place to balance a child at the best of times. She grabbed at the woman’s coat with her left hand, tried to catch Vivi’s skinny arm with her right, but the girl’s arm was wheeling, trying to counter the pull of gravity.
Vivi’s scream was like a nail on glass. Outside a car was pulling up. Dion, at last. And thank god, Vivi had stopped yelping and seemed calm. Gemma had no intention of tossing the child over. No, she was clutching her in a bear hug. But why wasn’t she heeding JD’s whip-like warnings to back away from the railing and set the girl down?
Gemma continued to hold tight, and Vivi was silent, and JD had wrapped an arm around the woman’s shoulder to manoeuvre her and her captive as a unit away from that slippery fucking railing. And she was winning, finally getting through to the woman. Gemma was moving with her, co-operating, toward the sliding door, easing her daughter’s butt off the railing. JD heard the doorbell. She took a breath, knowing all would be okay — but her inhalation turned into a gasp of horror. No! The child was slithering sideways, so fast, so unbelievably fast. An arm thrust out, small fingers almost meeting JD’s, and with a final scream Vivi disappeared over the edge.
* * *
The scream ended abruptly but continued to drill at JD’s ears. Maybe her imagination had filled in the distant crack of bracken and bones. She didn’t look over the railing — it would be two seconds wasted — but told Gemma not to move a muscle, left her standing and sped through the house. She was out the front door, almost knocking Dion over as he tried the handle, pushing past him, telling him to call 911 and detain Gemma Vale, that Vivi had fallen from the balcony. “I’m going to find her. Go to the balcony and see if you can spot her for me. There’s a lot of bush down there. Be my eyes.”
She didn’t know the property well, and a false turn doubled her back. A gate led to a stone path that spanned the home’s north wall. The front yard was picture perfect, but out back the terrain was a brambly wilderness. The stone path ended and bushes surrounded her. And godforsaken darkness.
Her only flashlight was her phone, its light feeble, almost useless, but it revealed a path that switchbacked down the steep slope toward the river. She stopped to get her bearings, calling Vivi’s name. She bushwhacked toward the base of the house. Enormous foundation pillars supported the structure and provided the framework for the covered balcony from which Vivi had fallen. Light emitted from the window above and JD was remotely aware of shifting shadows and voices above. A man’s voice talking, a woman’s wailing.
She called out Vivi’s name again and was answered by silence.
She heard Dion hail her from above. She looked up and his silhouette shouted down that it was too dark, that he couldn’t see anything. A moment later he called, “Gemma says there’s a motion detector closer to the corner of the house down there. Try to activate it.”
JD did as he told her. The light flooded on. Bushes, brambles, and tree trunks glowed, but no child. What had Vivi been wearing? Purple sweatshirt, grey tights, bare feet. JD squatted and peered. Visible ahead between the criss-cross of foliage she glimpsed purple. She waded toward the colour and found what she was looking for on the forest floor.
Vivi lay face up, an arm twisted unnaturally at her side. Still and lifeless as a rag doll.
JD could feel no pulse at the child’s throat. Not at first. Then there it was, a healthy throb.
She told Vivi everything was going to be okay now, help was coming. The floodlight had timed out and switched off, but someone was approaching along the muddy path behind JD with a powerful light beam, and she heard a siren. She turned to signal a thumbs-up to the blinding, swaying light that marked Dion’s approach, then turned back to Vivi and let out a long breath.
* * *
When fire and rescue arrived with their equipment bags and gurney, Dion left them with JD and made his way back to the house to attend to Gemma. The rain was falling again, heavy drops that smashed down, gathered into guzzling brooks, drizzled off the eaves of the Vale home in curtains. Gemma was on the sofa where he’d left her. She seemed to be in shock, talking to herself. He stood and listened. She was crying for her husband and her baby Luna, and she was crying about Vivi, who she thought was dead. She also seemed to think it was JD’s fault, if Dion was understanding her right.
He didn’t set Gemma straight. He didn’t tell her that Vivi was alive. He didn’t know what the status of the girl was, and whether she would live as long as the ambulance ride. The height she had fallen from was considerable, and the ground below peppered with boulders. Gemma was staring at him with anger, her mouth pale and her eyes bloodshot. “You cops always have to come along and fuck things up, don’t you?” she said. “Why did she come here? Why did she kill my little girl?”
Dion watched her, thinking she was mad. He had tried to get from her what happened, but aside from her muttering and crying she had told him nothing. All he could do was wait. Leith was on his way and would take over. If Gemma didn’t talk here, she would be arrested for questioning. If she refused to answer the questions, depending on what JD said, she could be charged.
He wondered if Gemma was right, that JD had somehow messed up, triggered an accident. He puffed out a breath of relief as he heard the front door open and Leith’s voice, talking to Perry Vale, who must have arrived at the same time. Vale sounded upset and Leith was doing his best to calm him. Dion joined them.
“What happened?” Vale was saying. “Where’s Vivi? Where’s Gemma? What happened? Who did this?”
Gemma rushed to her husband’s embrace. Her words were muffled, her face crushed against his jacket, but Dion caught much of what she said as he cajoled the story out of her. “She fell, Perry. I was trying to tell the policewoman about Vivi and her lies, and she wouldn’t believe me. I got upset. I went out on the balcony to gather my thoughts, and Vivi came out and tried to comfort me. I picked her up and hugged her. That’s all. And the policewoman kept shouting at me, as if I was trying to harm Vivi, and then she started grabbing at me, and she knocked against me, and Vivi fell.”
Outside the ambulance siren gave a loud whoop, then went speeding into the distance. JD would be accompanying the crew and staying with Vivi.
Dion had caught Leith’s silent question, Know anything about this? and gave the silent answer, Not a clue. Leith made the decision then to guide Gemma to the dining room table to get a full statement. No reason to arrest her at this point, no need to warn her. Niko Shiomi had arrived meanwhile, to assist, and she was given the task of escorting Perry to another room, the office or wherever a door could be closed, and remaining with him there.
Gemma waited in a chair by the dining room table. She seemed stunned beyond words. Leith left her there and took Dion aside to get what little he knew.
“Vivi had just fallen,” Dion told him. “JD told me to arrest Gemma, then rushed down to find Vivi. She didn’t have time to talk and didn’t say whose fault it was. I couldn’t get anything useful out of Gemma. I got my flashlight out of the car and went down to the back of the house. JD had already found Vivi, and said she was alive. I don’t know if she’ll make it, though. Fire and rescue had arrived and I wanted to get back to Gemma and preserve the scene. All JD told me when I was down there is that Gemma had lifted Vivi onto the railing and the girl fell. She didn’t say Gemma did anything wrong. She didn’t say she was at fault herself, either.”
“Clear as mud,” Leith said. Back at the table, he took a chair across from Gemma, and Dion sat at the end of the table, recorder on, pen ready, and the clear-as-mud story began to clarify. Gemma had pulled herself together and now spoke slowly and clearly, though Dion heard shades of outrage in her voice. “I had gone out to the store for a few grocery items,” she said. “But halfway there I recalled I’d forgotten my wallet in my other purse, and had to return home. When I walked in, I found Vivi on the phone, and she stared at me like I’d caught her with her hand in the cookie jar. Now you’re going to think I’m paranoid.”
“Go on,” Leith said. “I’m listening.”
Dion stopped writing to observe. JD’s job was at stake, and he couldn’t afford to miss the faintest twitch of deceit on this woman’s face.
“Vivi heard me coming,” Gemma said. “She set this up. She knew she wasn’t to use the phone in my absence, and she knew I’d be angry. As soon as she heard my car in the drive, she got on that phone and made that call, and got the police on the line, and I fell for it. Just like she planned, I got mad and yelled at her. So she’d have it on record that I’m a monster.”
“Why isn’t she allowed to use the phone?”
“You’ll find this hard to believe, but ever since Luna was born, Vivi’s been trying to make trouble for me, just in quiet little ways. She tried turning Perry against me, and I’m sure she did her magic on Zach, too. After Luna disappeared, it got even stranger, and I think I know why.”
Instead of explaining herself, she fell silent. She breathed through her nose, as if she didn’t trust her own mouth. Finally she said, “It’s horrible, but it’s true. I think she took Luna.”
“What makes you think that?”
Gemma was twisting a chunky gold ring round and round on her finger. “I have no proof, and I didn’t accuse her of it, but I think she sensed that I suspected her, and that came between us. She started saying she wanted to speak to you, to the police. She explained very reasonably that she was going to tell you what I’d done, and she wouldn’t say what, but I imagined she’d come up with something smart. And she’s a sweet girl, and you’d believe her. But listen to me. I haven’t done anything.”
She was pleading with Leith to believe her.
“So you walked in, and she was on the phone. Did you take the phone, hang up?”
“I hardly remember. I shouted at her. Yes, I must have taken it from her, or she hung up on her own. It rang a moment later, but I let it go to voice mail.”
She looked down at the table. “I even wonder … about … Tiago.” Her hands crept to her face and she was forming a mask of fingers again. Dion asked her to take her hands away from her mouth, and she did as told. “Tiago was a good kid,” she said. “He seemed happy with us, till lately. Perry and I both tried to talk to him, to find out what we’d done wrong, but he wouldn’t say. And now it’s so obvious to me. Vivi turned him against us, too.”
Leith asked her to go on with her narrative about tonight.
“After I caught Vivi on the phone, we had another talk,” Gemma said. “Vivi does this passive resistance thing. She’ll listen, and pretend, and be nice, but she won’t give an inch. Then the cop — Constable Temple, I mean — came to the door, knocked, and I could see where this was going. Vivi telling her lies before I had a chance to tell my side of the story. So I did it. I locked my daughter on the deck. Only for a moment, only so I could I explain myself. I let Constable Temple in, but before I could talk to her, Vivi banged on the glass. Constable Temple unlocked the sliding door, and Vivi came in, and I could see where it was going, how bad I looked. I went out on the deck. I was crying. Vivi came to my side. Whatever is wrong with her, I know it’s not her fault. It’s a disorder of some kind, emotional, mental, I don’t know. And she is a lovable girl, and I do love her. I love her very much.”
She described again the sequence as she’d told it to Perry. She had picked up Vivi to give her a hug, then JD had stepped in, and she was so pushy that she had jostled Gemma and made her lose her grip on Vivi, causing the fall.
Leith tried to wrangle more detail out of her, as he couldn’t understand how Vivi could flip over the railing. Gemma admitted that in hugging Vivi she had rested her bottom on the railing, only for a moment. And that’s when Constable Temple had reached out too aggressively and inadvertently knocked her arm, causing the fall.
Leith excused himself. He stood and went out to the balcony. Dion remained at the table with Gemma. He could see Leith looking at the patio furniture, the railing, leaning over and staring down.
Beside him, Gemma murmured to herself the usual lines. She couldn’t believe it. Just couldn’t believe this had happened. But mostly she was keeping an eye on Leith’s inspection of the deck, Dion thought. He heard a ping that he recognized as a phone, and turned to see Leith answer. For nearly a minute Leith spoke to whoever it was, then he returned to the room and told Gemma, “We’ll go downtown. Vivi’s in intensive care. You and Perry can check up on her, see how she’s doing. Zach’s going to be there, too, so listen to me. You’re all going to have to behave. And none of you will be seeing her without one of us in attendance.”
Dion’s eyes had been on Leith, but switched to Gemma at the words intensive care. And good thing, too, as he caught the jolt as she received the good news.
Vivi had survived.
He noted the ratio of reactions, just as before, when she’d been coping with unexpected good news. Less detectable this time, almost microscopic, but Gemma Vale’s relief at the good news was preceded — he was almost sure of it — by a split second of horror.