Blood Memory by Margaret Coel

Author:Margaret Coel
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Penguin Publishing Group
Published: 2010-03-01T05:00:00+00:00

17

A bright morning, light glowing through the gauzy curtains, the walls of the hotel room a soft golden color, and the sound of the telephone screeching through the muffled noise of traffic on the street below. Catherine stared into the room and tried to recall where she was, every part of her heavy with sleep. A dull ache crept through her head. She reached for the cell on the nightstand.

Bustamante’s voice burst into her ear, jarring her wide-awake. “We may have some good news,” he said. “How soon can you get here?”

“What are you talking about?” She sat up and pushed the pillow between the headboard and her spine.

“We may have the gunman in custody. I need you to come down here right away.”

The cell felt cool and inert in her hand. Whoever had wanted to kill her was in police custody, and for a moment, the possibility of normality flashed in front of her. She could return to the town house, go to the newsroom every day, walk Rex whenever she felt like it. But not yet, she realized. Not until she was certain. She told Bustamante she would meet him at police headquarters in forty minutes.

Catherine parked in the garage near Civic Center, and walked along 13th Avenue. A block away was the city and county building, a great expanse of white stone and columns that looked over Civic Center Park. A couple of blocks ahead was the beige brick building of the Denver Police Headquarters that resembled a fortress abutting the sidewalk. It was already hot, the morning sun bathing the pavement and reflecting off the brick, and the heat added to her sense of queasiness and the persistent aching in her head.

Inside the lobby, she waited at the counter while the policewoman tried to calm a Hispanic woman weeping into a wad of tissue and clutching the hand of a little girl with black braids and scared, brown eyes. After several minutes, the woman wandered over to the blue plastic chairs in the waiting area, pulling the little girl behind her, and Catherine told the policewoman that she was there to see Detective Bustamante.

Catherine took the last vacant chair. The Hispanic woman sat across from her, face buried in the black hair of the little girl gathered on her lap. There were several other women with children, but most of the people waiting were men—young men and older men, black and brown and white men—sprawled on the chairs, staring into space, arms crossed over their chests. Others sat hunched forward, elbows propped on thighs, studying the floor. The air was filled with odors of perspiration, tobacco, and the sense of hopelessness.

In the alcove behind the counter, the elevator doors parted and Nick Bustamante stepped out. Catherine watched him scan the waiting area before his eyes settled on her. She got to her feet and walked over. “I didn’t recognize you at first.” He stuck an arm between the sliding doors and ushered her into the elevator.

“But then you did,” she said.

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