It had rained hard for many days and nights without reprieve. The long-overdue rain that had initially been welcome, cleansing and refreshing, now felt oppressive and claustrophobic. California didn’t do much weather. But when she did, she did it to death.
Iris felt a moment of panic when she walked into her house and found it empty and eerily quiet except for the relentless rain. Then she remembered that Marge was going to have her great-nieces come over to play with Brianna.
Iris knocked on Marge’s door and was greeted with squeals of laughter, high-pitched screaming, the aroma of food cooking, and two frazzled older women.
“They’ve been having a ball,” Marge said, resting her fingertips on Iris’s arm. “And so have we.”
“We bought Brianna the cutest clothes and toys,” Rose said. “Just a few things. How long are you going to keep her?”
“Her grandparents will be back tomorrow. I think it’s best to take her over there.” Iris dialed a number on Marge’s telephone. “I should call Kip. Could you get Brianna, please? She probably wants to talk to her daddy.”
Iris listened to Kip’s phone ring and ring. “Pick up, Kip.” After many rings, the answering machine clicked on. She was chilled to hear Bridget’s voice still on it.
“This is the Cross residence. Please leave a message for Bridget, Kip, or Brianna at the tone. Have a great day!”
Iris was so stunned, she forgot to speak. “Kip? Kip, pick up. I know you’re there.”
He finally came on the line. “Bring my daughter home.”
“Kip, she’s fine here. She’s playing with some little friends, having fun and laughing. You have to agree that this is better for her than being cooped up in that house.”
“She needs to come home.”
“Here she is, Kip. You’ll see she’s fine.”
Brianna bounded into the room, her hair which Rose and Marge had arranged with ribbons and barrettes, flying behind her. It was the first time since Bridget’s death that Iris had seen the child so carefree. “Daddy! I went shopping with Marge and Rose, and they bought me the Barbie doll I wanted, and now I’m playing with Alissa and Kayla.” Brianna held the receiver with both hands, intently listening. “But I like staying with Aunt Iris and Rose and Marge.”
Marge handed Iris some crayon drawings that Brianna had drawn.
Brianna jammed the phone in Iris’s direction. “He wants to talk to you.” She was out of the room in half a second.
“Kip, can’t you see that she’s better off here for now?”
“Bring her home, Iris.”
“Why?”
“I told you why.”
“She’s safe here. I’m taking her to the Tylers’ tomorrow. You have my phone number.” Iris hung up, shaking her head.
“He wants her to come home?” Rose asked. “And what—sit in that house like a prisoner or worse? What’s wrong with that man?”
Iris looked at Brianna’s drawings.
“I’ve got a roast in the oven,” Marge said. “You’re staying for dinner, of course.”
“Thanks, Marge. I’d love to.” Iris frowned at the drawings. They were variations on the same theme of Brianna’s other efforts. Two showed Slade Slayer standing over Bridget, holding a gun. A tiny figure lurked in the background. One was of the turquoise and white Cross house. Someone with a fuzz of hair, probably Kip, was peeking out a window with bars over it, like a jail. Behind another barred window was the tiny figure with dark hair that Brianna drew to symbolize herself. A gigantic Slade Slayer loomed next to the house. The drawings were crude, appropriate for a five-year-old’s skill level, but the inherent messages were clear.
“Doesn’t take much to interpret this one,” Iris commented.
“They’re kind of creepy, aren’t they?” Rose said, looking over Iris’s shoulder.
Iris looked more closely at one of the drawings of the crime scene. “It’s interesting. These recent works are more detailed than the ones Brianna drew when she was at her grandmother’s. Look here. Slade Slayer’s hands have five little lines for fingers. On the early ones, she drew blobs for hands. The fingers are black, but the feet aren’t black.” Iris pointed there. The feet were nothing more than L-shapes with five little lines at the end of each L to indicate toes. A black line was drawn under each foot with a loop drawn over the first toe, in a crude rendering of a flip-flop sandal. “She used the flesh-colored crayon for the feet.”
“The murderer was wearing black gloves,” Rose exclaimed.
“Let’s ask Brianna if that’s what she meant,” Marge suggested.
“I don’t know if we should,” Iris said. “She seems to be engaged in some free-flowing subconscious thing. I don’t want to hamper it by drawing attention to it.”
Marge folded her bony fingers around Iris’s arm and led her toward the kitchen. “Why don’t the adults have an aperitif?”
“Great idea,” Rose said.
As they walked past the living room windows, Iris noticed a green Range Rover pull up in front of her house next door. “Oh, no.”
“Who’s that?” Rose looked out the window. “A friend of yours?”
“Hardly.” Iris expected to see Evan, but Summer got out of the Range Rover’s driver’s door and started walking to Iris’s front door.
Iris walked onto Marge’s porch and called, “Summer, I’m over here.”
Summer was wearing trousers with suspenders over a skin-tight, black turtleneck sweater. The high collar accentuated her breasts. She waved at Iris and walked down the sidewalk and up Marge’s front path.
“Hi,” she breathed. “Aren’t you sick of this rain?”
Iris was in no mood for small talk. “Isn’t that Evan’s car?”
“He’s letting me borrow it.”
Iris searched her mind for a way that Evan might have come into contact with Summer. Then she remembered the day Summer had come to McKinney Alitzer and Evan had followed her out of the suite and into the elevator. Iris felt sorry for Toni. She not only fell for a louse but was thrown over for a bimbo. A double whammy. “So you and Evan are…” she started, even though she thought she already knew the score.
“He’s been helping me since Kip threw me out.”
It was wet and cold outside. Any civilized person would have invited Summer inside, but Iris felt like being a bitch.
“Look, Iris. I know you don’t like me, but I just had to make sure Brianna’s all right.”
Iris noticed her mother and Marge peeking at them through the dining room drapes.
“She’s fine. I picked her up from Kip’s last night. Thanks for letting me know about the situation there.” Iris recalled that Summer had considered the child’s well-being and she warmed to her slightly. “Do you want to come in?”
“Is Brianna here? Can I see her for just a minute?” Summer wiped her feet on the mat and stepped inside.
Marge, ever the gracious hostess, came to welcome her and offer something hot to drink.
“No, thank you,” Summer answered. “I just want to see Brianna and I’ll go. I miss her. I raised her since she was a baby, you know. I was with her more than Bridget was.”
Iris defended her friend. “You know that’s not true. Bridget was a wonderful mother.”
“Everyone talks about poor Bridget. What a tragedy. But I’ve suffered too. You don’t know what it was like to work for that woman.”
“Summer, I’m surprised Bridget put up with you as long as she did. When she fired you, you quickly found a way to get back in the house, didn’t you?”
Summer drew her eyebrows together in an overwrought look of confusion. “What are you saying?”
Iris was about to show Summer the door when Brianna ran out and flung herself onto her. “Summer!”
Summer dropped to her knees and enveloped the child between her arms. “I missed you so much, baby.” Tears ran down her cheeks. “Are you having fun?”
Iris scowled as she watched their interchange.
Brianna abruptly ran from the room, yelling, “I made you something! I’ll go get it.”
Summer, still kneeling on the ground, looked up at Iris. “My life’s been turned upside down too.” She rapidly blinked, squeezing large tears from her eyes.
Iris was unmoved.
Brianna ran back into the room, clutching a sheet of paper. “I drew a picture of you, Summer.”
The drawing appeared to be the patio of the Cross home. A large, light blue rectangle, drawn with no sense of perspective, represented the pool. Inverted Ls around it looked like the patio furniture. On one, a figure with long blonde hair, wearing a hot-pink, two-piece bathing suit reclined. One spindly, starfish-like hand was raised in a wave. A crude table was beside the lounge chair. On it was a glass of something brown with a straw in it and a little pink square next to it.
“That’s your Diet Coke,” Brianna explained. “And that’s your nail polish. See?” She pointed to the figure’s fingertips, which were each topped with a pink blob.
Summer grabbed the child hard and sobbed, “Thank you, baby.” She let her go and took the drawing. “I’ll keep it always.” She stood and stroked Brianna’s hair.
Marge’s great-nieces began yelling for their new friend from the back of the house.
“Gotta go,” Brianna importantly announced, and sped off.
Summer was wiping her face with her hand when Rose appeared with a tissue. Iris could always count on her mother to have a supply of tissues, no matter what the circumstances.
“Thanks.” Summer delicately dabbed the tissue against her face. “Well, I’d better go. Can I come see her again?”
Iris nodded, even though she was jealous of Summer and Brianna’s close bond. “Sure. You’re still at that hotel. The Château…”
“Bordeaux. Bungalow Five.” Summer sniffed and smiled, putting on a brave face behind her tears.
Iris felt a flicker of sympathy for the woman, even though she still wanted to slap her silly.
Summer raced back to the Range Rover in the rain, like a featured performer in a chipper diet soda commercial. Iris watched Summer’s bouncy buttocks recede and considered her dislike of bimbos. It was almost an instinctive thing, like a snake and a mongoose or a Crip and a Blood. But she was now beginning to wonder whether Summer wasn’t being dumb like a fox.
It took Iris a few minutes to realize she had awakened for a reason, that it was more than her subconscious churning too loudly that had made her open her eyes and blink at the darkness. It was hard to separate other noises from the rain, but something about the sound of her front door opening was like no other. She heard it on a visceral rather than aural level.
She threw off the goose-down comforter and layers of blankets and struggled to untwist herself from her long flannel nightgown before she managed to set her bare foot on the floor. She pulled open the bedroom door, which she had left ajar, and walked down the hallway, passing the room that Brianna was sleeping in on her right. She would have peeked in there but something else caught her attention. Moonlit rain was pounding on the porch outside the open front door. A small semicircle had been cut from the adjacent window.
She ran to Brianna’s room and switched on the light. Her bed was empty. Iris climbed on top of it, looking around and underneath, whimpering, her heart pounding, hoping that the child was hiding somewhere, knowing her hope was irrational but hoping anyway. She flung off the covers, finding a doll and stuffed dog but no Brianna. Crayons were scattered on the bed, as if Brianna had been drawing when she dropped off to sleep. The pad of drawing paper had worked to the end of the bed. Iris grabbed it. On it was another portrait of Slade Slayer in black with crudely drawn sneer and gun. The figure was wearing flip-flops, like in her other drawings, but in this rendering, each of the spindly toes was topped with a blob of hot pink.