Rachael's Story

By Brenda Lorenz

Rachael's Story is about a young woman R.C.M.P. officer who resides and works on Vancouver Island. Her investigation into an unusual murder brings her in contact with a runaway boy, an old woman in the early stages of senility, a recluse and a coast guard captain that captures her heart.

• Language: English
• Publisher: BookBaby
• Release date: Feb 6, 2015
• ISBN: 9781483550275

Book preview

9781483550275

CHAPTER ONE

His hand around my ponytail yanks my head back sharply. A gun comes up in his other hand. Time passes in slow motion.

My eyes blink and tear. My teeth clench against the final moment.

A loud blast and it takes a second before I realize I am still alive, still thinking. On the floor to my right lays my assailant, twitching.

Yves moves towards me. I can read his lips.

‘Rachael, step away. Over here.’

I can hear nothing past the ringing of my ears. My feet slip on blood as I try to move.

I jerk awake gasping for breath, dripping sweat, my heart pounding. How many times will I have this dream, this nightmare? Eight months since this happened to me and it plays in my mind every day. All the counselling, therapy, meditation, even hypnosis and I still carry it with me.

I had been working undercover with the R.C.M.P. Yves, my saviour at that tragic moment, was my partner and lover.

Sit here; put your head between your knees. One hand helping me; his phone in the other hand ready to call in.

I hear that sentence buzzing in my head over and over. His French accent stronger with the stress.

The ensuing investigation into the shooting was another harrowing experience that left me feeling vulnerable and wondering if my career choice had been foolish.

At the end of it all I’d seen Yves only once. He was still undercover. When I met him on the street I was wearing a ridiculous blond wig, tight sweater and short hooker skirt.

I’m getting out. I said. Leaving the city. I’m afraid now. I’ve lost my nerve and my confidence for this. I wish you’d quit too. I can’t stand to think of you taking such risks anymore.

No, I’m too close. I’m really in there with them. It isn’t as dangerous for me as you think. If I left now, I’d have to hide. They’d know.

I’m going away and I’ll miss you. Tears were threatening.

Where will you go?

I’ve asked for a transfer to Vancouver Island. It’s been approved. I leave in three weeks.

We’ll see each other again once this is over.

I only nodded. I didn’t trust myself to speak. I felt my throat close ready for the tears. Not even a kiss goodbye. I just walked away and tried to forget.

I didn’t forget. It rustles around in my head and gives me bad dreams. Days I can push it away, block it out. Nights are so different. The trauma is always ready in my dreams, and sometimes Yves is there too. I do still miss him.

I get up and look out the back window. Cold rain pelts down. February on Vancouver Island has a lot of cold rain. As does November, December, January, March and April. It is a rain forest, after all.

Petey’s claws scrabble to get up on the hardwood. He comes and stands beside me and presses his head against my leg. He has been with me for a little over a month; his owner is in the hospital. Our R.C.M.P. drug squad had taken down a marijuana grow op and I’d brought the offenders guard dogs to the animal shelter. Somehow I came home with Petey making a promise to ‘dog sit’ for two months.

He looks like a mix of setter and retriever and maybe a few other things. At seven months he is full grown standing just above my knees. In reality he is still a playful pup who often wants to be held and cuddled. Me too, at the moment. Shivering, I crawl back into bed. Petey heaves a big sigh as he drops to the floor beside me.

Morning and it’s still raining, fat heavy drops on my way in to the station. The scent of evergreens strong in the air. I leave early to have a coffee with Janet, a social worker, my first island friend.

There’s a crowd in the Tim Horton’s donut shop. I get in line inhaling the sweet odours.

Grab me a coffee will you, nothing else, I’ll snag us a table. Janet says as she appears suddenly by my side.

How’s everything? I pass her a coffee and note her tense attitude. You’ve a big frown this morning.

Oh, it’s that one kid I told you about. The nine year old that’s going to school all black and blue.

I shake my head. I don’t know how she keeps her smile on sometimes. I remember. The last time you talked about him the parents were hanging up on you.

Exactly! Well, since then he’s been missing school. I want to set up an interview at the school, try for a disclosure and get a doctor to look at him. The guy at the kid’s house picks up the phone and starts calling me a fucking bitch and worse. I’m on my way to the school now and hope to see the boy. I bet he clams up again, insisting that he’s fallen or some other excuse. It’s impossible.

Why don’t you go to his house? I’ll go with you, take some attitude. See who he calls a bitch then.

Would you?

Sure, where’s he live?

A motel. Up near Bowser. Not far from your place.

I’ll go report in and see what’s slated for the day.

Perfect, perfect! These guys scare me. I’d better start coming with you to Judo. Maybe take some assertiveness training.

I smile at her. Janet is best described as petite and dainty. I can’t imagine her heaving someone around. I am just a shade less than six feet and though I am not heavy, I am strong as hell. I work at it. I laugh as we walk out to our cars. She is fun to tease, always takes everything so seriously.

I head out for my first call the moment I get to the station. It’s a B&E and it is an interesting one. The house belongs to Matt and Becky Louten, it’s an expensive place sitting at the edge of a golf course. I did a lot of B&E’s when I was a rookie. They’re usually similar: electronics, jewellery and cash. This place looks like someone did a search.

Charlie, my sometimes partner, takes the lead on the questions. The husband says he retired a couple of years ago although he looks only fifty at most. He paces around the rooms in an agitated manner. He’s angry and I sense that he doesn’t want us there. Likely his wife made him call. She’s younger, maybe twenty five. I can tell Charlie thinks she is a sobbing whiner so I play the sympathetic listener.

The contents of the kitchen cupboards are spread over the counters. The food from the fridge and freezer is emptied onto the floor. All the sheets and towels are out of the linen closet, the bed is pulled apart, drawers empty. The couple came home from a holiday to this big mess.

No, officer, I don’t keep any cash in the house. They didn’t even take my jewellery, just dumped it out on the dresser. I feel sorry for her but Charlie is right, the whining voice is hard to listen to.

All right - what about your husband, does he keep cash here?

Uh, I don’t know, maybe in the den, Matt, where are you?

Stop shouting, Becky. What is it? A scowl at Charlie. You’ve been here over an hour for Christ’s sake. It’s just a break in.

We’d think that too except for the mess. It looks like a search. Did you keep any cash here?

Of course not, I use a deposit box if I ever need to hold cash.

Oh, do you? Becky looked stunned.

Back at the station I run them through the computers on a hunch. There are biker gang members retired here on the island. But nothing comes up. He’d been a stock broker and she’d worked for the same company.

I give Janet a call and we agree to meet after lunch at the motel where the boy lives. After a bag lunch, I start the drive up island to Bowser.

I work out of the Oceanside detachment near Parksville. The mid island cities comprise Nanaimo to the south, the biggest of the three cities, then Parksville about twenty minutes up island. Another ten minutes and you find Qualicum, a very pretty retirement community. Ten more minutes and you’re in Bowser – a gas station, a pub and a laundromat.

I jumped in with both feet when I got the transfer to the island detachment. I sold my apartment in North Vancouver at a much higher price than I’d paid. On the island I bought a two bedroom rancher sitting on a couple of acres. Whatever for, I don’t know. I haven’t a clue about gardening. The house is nice though, old and a bit run down but it has character and a huge front porch. That’s probably what attracted me; I fantasized sitting there with a mint julep. That hadn’t happened yet.

I pull in behind Janet on the old coastal highway close to the Seaview Motel. The Motel’s gravel driveway goes from the highway to the beach with five cabins on each side and one backing on beach at the end. We walk down the driveway under Janet’s big umbrella and I notice two units with cars parked in front and the end unit with a truck.

Which one?

It’s number six. It must be at the end backing onto the beach. Janet said.

What’s the boy’s name?

Kenny. I haven’t met the parents.

You talk, I’ll intimidate.

Good. Janet grins.

I knock, wait; knock again. A curtain moves. A third knock, Police, answer the door.

Janet, stop cowering, stand tall. I hiss.

She crosses her eyes at me and the door opens a crack. A pair of bloodshot droopy eyes look out and a wobbly smile says Hello?

I guess she’s about the same age as me, twenty seven. A drinking problem is visible in her sallow skin and rheumy eyes. Janet talks to her about Kenny missing school and the problems that would come up with the child welfare department unless there are changes made. I’m busy taking everything in, as usual. It’s a shabby old motel to start with and the litter lying around on decrepit furniture is a pretty sad sight.

He’s been sick - a cold. He’s better today; he’ll be at school tomorrow. The woman speaks very quietly to Janet. She seems afraid, looks back over her shoulder or down at her feet.

I push into the room past the woman dragging Janet behind me. No, he’s been away too much for a cold, and what about his bruises? How did he get those? I press.

What are you bothering her about the kid for? She takes good care of him. You two are just trying to make trouble. Mr. Wonderful obviously, strutting in from the kitchen. Exactly the person I expected to find, a bully and a drinker. His belly is just beginning to push past his chest.

I get right in his face. Men don’t expect that from a woman even a cop. Happily I have about four inches on him.

What is your name, sir? I might be having nightmares but I still have plenty of grit when I’m awake.

Buddy.

I’d like to see your drivers’ licence, Buddy.

No way, this has got nothing to do with me.

Are you telling me you don’t live here?

I’m helping her to pay the rent is all.

Where are you employed then?

Never mind I told you it’s nothing to do with me.

Are you refusing to cooperate with a police officer?

I put my hand out palm up for the licence. He mumbles, digs his wallet out and passes his driver’s licence to me. I take my time copying it into my notebook.

Place of employment?

I’m looking for work at the moment.

Getting unemployment insurance?

No.

So you aren’t helping her with the rent you are living off her. There is a look of pure venom from him. I return the look. Janet whispers to the woman that she will call next week and passes her a business card.

Here’s one of mine as well. If you run into problems I don’t live far from you. I’ll put my cell number on the back. There’s places you can go if you need help. Both Janet and I can assist you to find those places. I figure there isn’t going be a call to either us or any agency. Her look of defeat tells all.

We’d like to see Kenny, is he here? I push.

No. He’s at a friends’.

I turn to Buddy, Wait here until I return in a moment.

We walk back down the driveway, both quiet, both somewhat depressed by the scene we’d just been through. Jesus! It’s always alcohol! Did you smell that guy? Bloody little bully.

Ninety percent of the domestic problems I have to look into stem from alcohol and drugs. Looking from the outside it seems so simple …. quit drinking, smarten up, get a job. She had bruises too. I could see she was trying to hide them. There was one at the side of her cheek and several on her arms.

I’m glad you told me, I’ll ask to see them when I go back in. I’d really like to see the boy, he might be badly bruised and that’s why he’s being kept home.

I’ll keep in touch with his school about his attendance daily.

You told her you’d call next week, is that in person?

If Kenny misses more school, it will be. Otherwise I’ll just phone and talk to her.

I’d like to come back with you. That guy made me mad. If the boy is being beaten, Buddy is the likely candidate.

Sure, I’m glad you were here today. But is there anything you can do?

I‘ll run his driver’s licence right now, see if he has any priors. I wrote his truck plates down too. It’s why I asked him to wait. ….How about later? Come for a drink to my place and then to the pub for supper?

Mmm. Sounds good. I’ll wait at your station around five.

I write up a file at the office of what I observed at the motel and the suspicion of Buddy’s implication in the bruises seen on Kenny’s mother, and those on Kenny. I’m sorry we didn’t get a look at the boy and I’m determined to go back and check on him.

*****

Petey is waiting by the front door as we come in. His excitement when I come home is always overwhelming.

I forgot you had this dog, how long have you had him? Janet tries to keep behind me as Petey bounces on his back legs like a kangaroo.

A little over a month. He’ll be with me for at least another three or four weeks. His owner had a hip replacement.

Wow, look at him go.

He has this routine he goes through when I come home even if I’ve only been out an hour. First he does a couple of circles around the living room. Then he goes through the kitchen down the hall and into the far bedroom his claws raking across the hardwood as he makes the turn to come back. He does this run at least five times at full speed. By the last run he has lost control and slams into the wall or anything that gets in his way. I’ve learned to keep things simple in the house.

When he finally stops, panting with his tongue hanging out one side of his mouth we are both laughing. He looks back and forth to us and I swear he is smiling.

Do you leave him in the house when you’re at work? Janet is looking around the floor as if expecting to find doggie deposits.

I’ve got a pet door in the kitchen. Bit messy in the rain but I didn’t want to confine him here for the whole day. There’s that chain link fence around the back garden. You know, keep the deer out.

She smiles at him and slides her coat off.

I’ll get us a glass of wine and I’ve got some Brie.

We sit in the kitchen with our wine. It certainly isn’t modern. It’s functional and that’s about all you can say for it. The turquoise counters are faded and marked and the checkerboard floor tiles are beginning to lift near the sink. The back door is sprayed with mud from Petey shaking himself and old beach towels are spread around the floor at the door. I push them around with my foot and pull some olives and cheese out of the fridge.

Whatever happened with that hypnotist I told you about? Did he get rid of your nightmares?

No. Maybe I don’t have as many.

What are they anyway? Do you find yourself out shopping with no clothes on?

I wish it was so simple.

I’ve got one where I’m driving down a mountain road but I’m in the back seat and I can’t reach the brakes. I just steer over the front seat. It’s a scary one. I get it maybe once a month.

Sounds like you need the hypnotist. Did I tell you there are guitarists that play in the pub on Wednesdays?

No – are they good?

Very.

Good looking? She lifts her eyebrows.

Finish your wine and we’ll go see.

CHAPTER TWO

Kenny hears shouting coming from the kitchen. Loud, louder, louder yet. This happens on a regular basis, sometimes it’s no more than shouting, sometimes much more. Especially if his mom answers back.

Why the fuck didn’t the kid go to school?

Because of the bruises, that’s why!

Ah hell, he hears things crashing around. Buddy is slapping her all right. He’d be next. He grabs a hoodie and crawls out of his bedroom window. Damn social worker.

Once Kenny tried to interfere but it had only incited Buddy. He’d grabbed a fry pan and started swinging at both Kenny and his mom. She’d needed stitches that time. Now Kenny just runs.

He drops down from his bedroom window and crouching low scurries past the kitchen window and runs for the woods on the north side of the motel. It’s dense, big trees, small scrub, wild berry vines and some narrow paths made by raccoons or deer. He goes to a large stump left from some logging show years ago. It’s a place he’s used before; finding shelter where part of the base has rotted away. Of course, it starts raining harder. He waits, it seems like a long time, but he knows it hasn’t really been that long. It’s cold and wet and dark under the tall evergreens. Shivering, he hunches miserably in the cold rain and worries about his mom. He runs through his times tables, recites what he can remember of a poem about poppies then goes to his cursing mantra. He strings all the bad words he knows together and chants them using Buddy as the cursee.

He’s a bugger, fucker, shit-assed, poo faced, dink head. Along with this he snaps his fingers and spits, for luck. One of the Indian kids at school told him that to spit and snap your fingers brought you luck. He needs luck.

After what seems an age he starts back towards the motel. It is too dark to see and with his hands in front he slowly goes step by step. Something brushes by him and he breaks into a run, whacks into a branch and scrapes his face. Swearing and spitting he tastes blood. Tears, rain and blood run down his face. He vows he’ll get a flashlight to keep in his room for next time and wonders what went past him. Too hairy to be a deer: too big to be a rabbit, probably a raccoon.

The truck is still there! Strange, he thinks, usually after one of his rages Buddy will take off. Go away to drink more somewhere and then come back as if nothing happened. Kenny squats down behind the unit next to theirs waiting for Buddy to go. After a long while he begins to wonder if Buddy is waiting for him to come back. Nope, he’d outwait him. If he just wasn’t so wet and cold. His hair is plastered to his head, his hoodie soaked through and his feet are sloshing inside his flimsy running shoes.

Kenny walks along the back of the units. There is only one on this side of the driveway that has anyone in it. Some guy with a neat car that never talks to any of them. The other side has an old guy in a unit who walks around bent over like he has a sore back. Neither of these are people he can ask to get out of the rain. They would probably take him back to his mom or call the cops if they found out Buddy beats on them. A foster home again. At the thought of a foster home he begins his swearing mantra in a whisper and looks up to see that he’s behind nice car’s unit. The bathroom window is pushed open. He drags a garbage can over and looks in wondering if it is late enough for the guy to be in bed. He can feel the heat coming through the window and decides to try it. Climbing in is easy enough, the bathroom layout is the same as their unit with the toilet right below the window. He has one foot on the toilet tank, and as he brings the other foot in his muddy shoe slips and he goes crashing down, taking the curtain and rod with him. One foot plops into the toilet. Yuck. He’s up and out of there fast expecting to hear someone shouting after him. It didn’t happen; nothing happened. He waits then slowly goes back in hoping the guy is out or a sound sleeper.

He creeps slowly and quietly to the front window. The guy’s car is there. Hell. Kenny tiptoes to the front bedroom, door open; bed empty. The back bedroom door is ajar and he pushes it a crack open and sees that the guy’s in bed. The bedside lamp is on, and so is the light by the front door. Enough light to make his way into the kitchen where his shoes start sticking to the floor. He pulls the fridge door open. Empty fridge. One orange which he pockets. In the light from the fridge he can see what he’s sticking to – everything that was in the fridge. It’s all over the floor, the cupboard doors are open and boxes are dumped out, some on the counter, some on the floor. What a mess. He opens the freezer door: a box of revels. He can see one on the bottom. A bag of peas mostly spilled out. He takes the pea bag and revel box into the bathroom and sits on the closed toilet. With his feet near the heat vent cold peas had never tasted so good.

A sound of footsteps on the gravel in front of the unit. He climbs up onto the toilet tank and when he hears the front door open