Read Thread of Deceit Online

Authors: Catherine Palmer

Thread of Deceit (10 page)

Hunching over, she scanned the entries. La Ceiba was a popular tag, it seemed. Ana found several hotels and spas in Mexico, a lodge in Costa Rica and a luxury resort on the Amazon, all named after the tropical tree. Had Flora’s parents worked at one of these hotels before coming to the United States?

As Ana stared at the computer screen, her confusion only grew. Flora’s mention of La Ceiba could mean any number of things. A hotel, a condominium, a town, a tree. It could mean a place in Mexico, Costa Rica, Puerto Rico, Honduras, or on the lengthy course of the Amazon River.

Frustrated, she turned over the information in her mind. Had little Flora, who hid in the dark corner of a downtown St. Louis activity center, come all the way to St. Louis from Central America? But that region was half a continent away.

Mexico seemed the most likely place the child might have lived. Ana found she could sympathize with those who crossed the border, as her own mother had done so many years ago. Young Guadalupe had been carried across the Rio Grande on the back of a
burro—
a man who helped people enter the United States illegally. Guadalupe’s father had worked long hours in a pants factory in Brownsville, eventually earning U.S. citizenship for himself and his family. And his daughter had grown up to fall in love with the eventual CEO of that very company. Bob and Guadalupe Burns’s marriage had created the perfect melting pot American family. And their daughter, Ana, felt profound gratitude for what they had provided. She deeply loved her parents, despite her reluctance to return home to them.

Why had Flora said the name La Ceiba? Or had Ana misunderstood the child’s softly spoken words? Maybe Flora really had been speaking of the silk-cotton tree. What if Flora had asked Ana about the ceiba in hopes that she might find such a tree here in St. Louis?

Heart aching, Ana pushed away from her desk. How could she ignore the fear in Flora’s brown eyes? How could she blindly turn away from her suspicions about Terell Roberts and his behavior at Haven? Even if her forebodings proved unfounded, could she write about lead paint without focusing on the children who would suffer its consequences?

Ana thought of Carl Webster’s threat. Do it his way, or he had ten other reporters eager to take her place. Focus on the paint and ignore the children, or get out. Get out…go back to the home she had fled, the parents who blamed her, and the cottage…the cottage where she had failed to protect her sister. Go back to the reality of the emptiness in her life. Face the hopeless darkness.

Ana hovered on the cusp for a moment—craving escape, clinging to security, yet hearing the unspoken cries from the children who beckoned for her help. Then she understood, because her dead sister’s voice cried loudest of all.
Save us, Ana, save us.
And she would.

Rising from her desk, she shouldered her purse and started for the door to the stairs. This evening’s run would do her a world of good.

Chapter Six

E
thelou Childers crossed her arms and stared at Sam through half-lidded eyes. He realized this was not a good sign.

Lulu, as the kids called her, knew the city of St. Louis as well as she knew an aria from
La Bohème.
She could sing jazz and opera, and she could rap alongside the toughest of the boys. She taught tap and ballet, and she could back a sassy teenage girl into a corner and hammer her into shape with a few choice words. Lulu’s straightened black hair was swept up into a tight dance mistress’s chignon, while her dark, muscular biceps sported muted blue tattoos.

No one messed with Lulu.

“What’s this reporter really after?” she snapped, her full lips pursing into a sneer. “She sounds like trouble to me, honey.”

At the regular Thursday night meeting of staff and volunteers, Sam had decided it was time to update everyone on the many uphill battles the center was facing. Bathroom repairs had fallen behind schedule. Someone had gotten a knife past the metal detector when another boy had substituted for Raydell Watson at the front door. A gang had sprayed graffiti on an outside wall that volunteers had just plastered. And then there was Ana Burns.

“Miss Burns says she wants to write about our lead paint situation,” Sam replied. The meeting had not gone well thus far, and the matter of Haven’s problems being splashed across the
Post-Dispatch
only added to the tension in the group. “I gave her a short interview, and she talked to one of our donors. So I’m hoping that’ll take care of it. But I can’t guarantee what she’s going to write about us.”

“She’ll be back here before she writes anything,” Raydell Watson predicted. Though paid only a token wage, the teen attended every meeting and participated as though he were a full-time staff member at the center. “She ain’t gonna drop it. I know her kind.”

“Yeah,” Terell said. “She told me the editor assigned her a whole series of articles to write. Like a couple weeks’ worth, or something. She’ll be back.”

Sam scowled down at his clipboard. “Well, nobody better talk to her without seeing me first. We’ve got to minimize the potential damage from this.”

“Lead paint,” Ethelou scoffed. “Who wants to read about that?”

“Head pain?” Granny looked up from the mound of pink crochet work on her lap and blinked behind her thick-lensed glasses. “I think I’ve got some aspirin here in my purse, Ethelou. Just you hold on a minute.”

As she started to dig through an enormous macramé bag, Terell laid a hand on the old woman’s arm. He leaned across to explain, but Ethelou stopped him.

“It’s okay, honey, I’ve got myself a royal headache over all this nonsense anyhow.” She turned on Sam. “Look here, honey. I need a private room to teach my dance classes. I cannot and I will not do them outside on that parking lot. The kids’ll burn up out on that pavement, not to mention me. You just give us a bucket of paint, and we’ll slop it on ourselves.”

“That’s the problem, Ethelou,” Sam said. “Most of these walls are going to have to be repaired by a professional lead paint abatement company. And we don’t have the money to pay for it.”

“Well, if we had paint, we could do some of the rooms ourselves.” A strapping young man spoke around the last bite of a doughnut he had found in the center’s kitchen. “The ones that don’t have to be scraped, anyhow.”

Billy had come to Haven from New Mexico with his church youth group. The young people were the same age as many of the kids who used the center. Billy, his friend Caleb and the other volunteers worked many hours each day in the building. It pained Sam to think that if he couldn’t resolve the lead paint issue soon, all their labor might be in vain.

“We’ve had a little money donated already,” Sam assured the group, with a wink at Granny. “And the other day, Jim Slater pledged five thousand from his adoption agency.”

“But you said we only got two weeks to take care of this problem,” Raydell said. “Me, I got a bad feeling about it. I think we oughta do something.”

“Do what, Raydell?” Sam asked. “What would you suggest?”

The teen shrugged, and gave his dreadlocks a shake. “Just let her know not to mess with us. We ain’t gotta take nothin’ off of nobody.”

“Yeah, we do. The health department, anyway. We can’t get around them. The paint problem has to be fixed, or they’ll shut us down. And if Miss Burns wants to write about us, we can’t stop her. As she reminded me, it’s a free press, and she can put anything she wants in her article.”

“That stinks,” Raydell snapped. “Who does she think she is anyhow? She ain’t nothin’. I’ll show her.”

Sam heard this kind of bluster at the center so often, he had learned to turn a deaf ear to it. Instead, he focused on the determined woman who sat across from him. “Lulu, you’ve fought some battles in the past. How did you manage?”

“Hard work and lots of prayer. My husband ran off and left me to bring up our three children before the youngest was a year old. I raised them by working at the IHOP by day and singing in jazz clubs at night. When the kids got old enough, I took dance lessons at the YMCA. I taught myself to sing opera by listening to cassette tapes I checked out of the library. It wasn’t easy, but I did it, and my kids turned out all right.”

“There you go, then,” Sam said. “Hard work and prayer. That’s what we’ll do.”

Terell stood and stretched. “Just a sec, Sam. I need to check on something.”

Sam struggled to refrain from growling in frustration as his friend ambled away. It was just like Terell to take a lackadaisical attitude about the possible closing of the center. He had frittered away his NBA career and most of his money—and he didn’t even care. Would he also let Haven slide out of his grasp without a fight?

Sam certainly wouldn’t. He had invested his life in this place. His heart was here, and he wasn’t about to give up on it.

“Are there any more questions before we wrap up the meeting?” he asked.

Heads shook.

“Then I’d like to say a special thank-you to Caleb for the great work he’s done on the computer system. The screen lit up today, and I think I saw some words appear.”

Caleb looked glum. “It’s a piece of trash.”

“A rash?” Granny said. “Well, I believe I’ve got something for that, too, sweetie pie. Just hold on.”

As she rummaged in her purse again, Sam continued. “Ethelou, thank you for insisting that boys participate in the tap dance classes as well as the girls. I think we need to stick with that as long as we can.”

“Gregory Hines. He was a good man, God rest his soul. Just keep telling those boys about Gregory Hines.”

“Right.” Sam nodded. “And the construction crews are doing a great job with the main floor bathrooms and the wiring upstairs. Billy and all of you young people, thanks for that. And the crochet—”

“Excuse me for interrupting,” Terell said, returning to his chair at Sam’s side. “I’ve got a presentation to make. We’re up against this lead paint problem, as we all know. But I’d like to remind everyone—especially our leader—of something important.”

He pulled a small object from behind his back and gave it a shake. Sam recognized it at once.

“Why do you keep this in your desk drawer, Sam?” Terell asked.

A wave of emotions surged through Sam as he stared at his military beret. “You know why,” he said in a low voice.

“I know why you
say
you keep it there. But that’s not what it means to me. This cap is a symbol of who you are, Sam. You’re a leader. You’re
our
leader. God told you to find me after all those years. He told you to buy this building. And then He put you in charge of what we’re doing with these kids. Sam, you led your men through the desert of Iraq, and you’ll lead us through this problem with the paint.”

The volunteers began to clap as Terell set the beret on his best friend’s head. Unable to bring himself to speak again, Sam motioned Terell to close the meeting. After a round of sentence prayers and final words of mutual encouragement, the others filed out of the building. Terell wandered over to the main switchbox to begin turning out the lights.

As he watched his friend walk away, Sam reached up and tugged the beret from his head. Pressing it against his chest, he fought the rage that flamed like a wildfire through him. Against his will, he saw the face…the small face, dark hair, pale lips, large brown eyes.

Clenching his jaw, he fought the tears that welled. But this was one battle Sam Hawke could not win.

Friday morning, Ana parked near the entrance to Haven, opened her car door and stepped out onto the street. As though whisked beneath the open pores of a steam iron, she winced and drew in a fortifying breath. Humidity instantly plastered her white blouse to her skin. Heat pressed down on her head and radiated up from the pavement through her sandals and onto her bare legs. Her mouth dried out, and her normally straight hair began to curl.

As Ana crossed the street, she prayed that her determination wouldn’t waver. Defying Carl Webster, digging into Haven’s private business, investigating Terell Roberts and trying to uncover Flora’s secrets were bad enough. But walking down these inner city streets didn’t help her nerves, either. She tapped the side of her purse, taking some comfort in the can of pepper spray it held.

Nearing Haven’s entrance, she noticed two teenage boys sitting in the shade of the tattered green canvas awning. Shirtless, they wore baggy blue jean cutoffs that displayed their multicolored boxer shorts, muscled legs and enormous athletic shoes. Red bandannas capped their heads, while heavy gold chains and large pendants stuck to their sweaty chests. The boys watched Ana approach, and she was conscious of their eyes following her movement—staring at her legs, the hem of her cotton skirt as it grazed her knees, the heels of her sandals tapping the sidewalk. When a third boy emerged through the doorway, she tensed, paused and caught her breath. Recognizing him, she exhaled and stepped forward again.

“Hello, Raydell,” she said. Though the job was intended to rotate among the Haven helpers, the muscular, gold-toothed Raydell Watson had been on guard each time she visited. “I’m Ana Burns with the
Post-Dispatch.

“The reporter, yes, ma’am. I know who you are.” He eyed her from behind a forest of dreadlocks. “So, how you doin’ today?”

“Fine.” She signed the clipboard. “It’s awfully hot out here. Why don’t your friends go inside the building?”

He regarded the two on the sidewalk. “I can’t let ’em in. We don’t allow no gang colors, you know. They won’t give up their do-rags.”

It was her turn to stare at the two. They stared back.

“What you lookin’ at, lady?” the bigger one asked, a sneer curling his lip.

“Just wondering why you’d rather sit out here in the heat than take off those scarves and go inside.”

“Scarves.” The teen snickered. “Don’t nobody tell me what to wear. Nobody mess with me—’less it be a pretty lady like you.”

“Yeah,” the smaller one said. “Want some, pretty lady?”

Both laughed.

Ana shrugged off the prickle that ran down her spine. “I believe I’ll go on inside, Raydell,” she said. “There’s nothing in my bag that will set off the alarm.”

“That’s good, Miss Burns, but I can’t let you in.” The dark eyes narrowed. “Mr. Hawke. He don’t want to talk to you no more.”

She stiffened. “He told you to keep me out?”

“He said he don’t want to talk to you.”

“Well, I don’t want to talk to him, either. I want to ask him a question.”

Raydell glanced at the two boys, who were observing the conversation with interest. “Asking a question is the same as talking.”

“No, it’s not.” Ana searched her memory banks. “Talking involves conversational discourse in simple declarative sentences. But asking is interrogative. They’re two completely different things.”

“Still—”

“I’m going in.” She took an old conference badge from her purse, a favorite ploy. “I’m with the press, see? I have the right.”

Before he could stop her, Ana slipped through the metal detector. Her least favorite part of the entry process bounded forward as she stepped into the building. The German shepherd sniffed her up and down, his tail wagging as the current child on “Duke duty” led him around by a leash.

The building was cooler inside—but not by much. Ana wondered if the air conditioner was working. Did Haven even have a cooling system? As her eyes adjusted to the light, she noted the usual basketball game in progress. Through the broken window in the front office, Ana could see Caleb laboring on the archaic computer. Several children watched over his shoulder—evidently a new class that had formed to learn from the young man. She noted his obvious patience with the group of wiggly youngsters.

Down the row of classrooms, the doors stood ajar, presumably to help with air circulation. Jazz music and the pounding of hammers drifted out. A teenager rounded up a child whose hands were covered in blue paint. A ball of yellow yarn rolled across the floor. Granny’s crochet group, Ana thought with a smile.

A short distance away, Ana recognized a familiar figure watching the action on the basketball court. Surprised at first, she then remembered the conversation from the day before. Of course. Jim Slater had brought Sam his check for five thousand dollars.

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