Authors: Catherine Palmer
His brow furrowed over his blue eyes. “Ana, do you see me? Samuel Nathan Hawke. Have you listened to who I am? Do you remember the name of this building? Haven. Protection is what I do. It’s my mission. My life is built around providing protection and healing and hope.”
“Hope…”
She spotted Flora in the corner, head against the wall. “Hope is fragile, Sam. It’s hard to catch. It’s even harder to keep.”
“Let me help you, Ana. At least let me protect you. Please trust me that far.”
She closed her eyes for a moment, grateful for the darkness that eased the buzzing in her head. “All right.” She sighed in surrender. “Take me home.”
“Hold my hand.”
She stiffened. “No, I don’t—”
“Hold my hand, Ana. I’ll keep you safe. I promise.”
Swallowing hard against the knot of fear in her throat, she took his hand. His large, warm fingers wrapped around hers. Protection. Or control? Safety. Or danger?
Breathing hard, she followed him through the metal detector and out onto the sidewalk. Night had descended over the street, the stars invisible above the haze that blanketed the city. Music pulsed from open car windows. Where had those cars been when the boys attacked her? Now the low-slung vehicles slid by, teenagers sunk down in the seats, black lights flashing across the dashboard. Someone yelled out a foul name, and Ana jerked.
“He’s not talking to us,” Sam said, moving against her down the sidewalk. “There’s a girl in a car up ahead.”
As he spoke, the girl stuck her head out of her own car window and shouted back at the boy. Then she honked and sped off, tires squealing. A truck rumbled by, another car, a boy on a bicycle.
“There it is,” Ana said, instinctively squeezing Sam’s hand. “The store. That’s where it happened.”
He slowed his pace. “They came out from the alley?”
“No, from the overhang there.” She shuddered at the memory of the two teenagers who had accosted her. “The taller one had a knife. They told me to go inside the store. Said they wanted to teach me a lesson.”
Sam was silent, staring at the plywood board bolted across the door and the broken glass on the sidewalk. Someone had spray painted graffiti on the wall beneath the window—gang signs, Ana supposed. She wondered if Sam had ever noticed this place, even though it was just down the street from Haven.
She let out a trembling breath. “They told me not to come back to their hood. They wrestled me inside the building. I fought and screamed, but they pushed me down. Then I kicked one of them, and he let go.”
“The bigger one?”
“With the peace sign, yes. And then the stranger came and told them to leave me alone. That’s when I realized I was free. So I ran to the door.”
“Did they come after you?”
She thought for a moment. “I don’t think so.”
“I wonder if your purse is still inside.”
“They would have taken it.”
“Maybe not. It’s dark, and they weren’t out to rob you. You know that, don’t you, Ana? Rape is not about physical desire or attraction.” He spoke in a low voice, serious but gentle. “It’s about control. Power. Soldiers—the victors—it’s what they do, especially in guerrilla warfare. Paramilitary troops in the Third World. It’s why women suffer so much during wartime—civilians and female POWs. Men want to prove their dominance. That’s what those two were doing this evening with you, Ana.”
She nodded. “I know. I understand it.”
“It’s because you’re different. You’re a woman, educated, white, wealthy—and you’ve come into their territory. They’re frightened of you in some way. You represent a lifestyle they’ll never know.”
“Terell said it was a setup.”
“Maybe, but I don’t think so. I suspect it was a crime of opportunity. You walked by, and they acted out of instinct.”
“But there were no cars. No people. The street was suddenly deserted.” She swallowed. “Sam, those two guys knew who I was. The taller one told me he didn’t want reporter ladies sticking their noses in his business.
Reporter—
he said that.”
“Are you sure?” Sam was frowning, his face a pale yellow and his eyes green in the streetlight. “He used that exact word?”
“Oh, maybe not.” She shook her head. “It’s fuzzy now. But it seemed like that was his focus. He didn’t like it that I was a reporter nosing around where I didn’t belong.”
Sam fell silent again.
“I need to go home,” she said. “My arm hurts.”
“Listen, I’d like to talk to the man who helped you out. See if he knows who attacked you. Maybe I can get your purse back. Would you mind waiting outside a minute while I go in there?”
“What? You’re insane. Those guys could be in there now, looking at us through the window.”
“Ana, I’m not afraid of two teenage boys.”
“With a knife?”
“Always bet on the Marine. I can handle them. Trust me.”
“You tell me that a lot, you know.”
“Get used to it. I’m one person who won’t let you down. Ever.”
He was studying her, and she looked away quickly, uncomfortable at the significance of his words. She ran her eyes over the door and the broken windows, remembering the attack and wondering if she would ever feel truly at peace with anyone. Then she thought of Flora’s poem.
Esperanza.
Hope.
Just keep on going,
Tenisha had urged her.
Don’t be scared.
“You can start proving it now,” she said. “Take me in with you. I want to meet that angel.”
“And you called me insane?” Sam’s grin carved dimples in his cheeks as he switched on a small, powerful flashlight that he had slipped out of his pocket.
“Stick with me,” he murmured. He pulled open the heavy door. Ana stepped into the cavernous room beside him and clutched his hand as he moved the beam methodically across the darkness. During her attack, the place had seemed empty. But she discerned several objects now. A chair and a table with one broken leg, a shelf leaning against a wall, a heap of crumpled fabric, old newspapers. But no humans. Maybe it had been an angel, after all.
“They took the purse,” she said. “It happened there—where the dust is disturbed on the floor.”
He shone the flashlight on the bare spot. “You weren’t far from the front door.”
“I fought them. Made them drag me every inch of the way.”
As she took a step toward the place, a hand grabbed her wrist and a deep voice growled, “It was
you.
”
With a gasp and a cry, Ana swung around. A shroud in gray rags stood next to her, a breath away.
“You was the one them boys drug in here.”
Before the words were out, Sam had set Ana behind him. Arms extended, he crouched, shining the flashlight beam on the figure. “Who are you? What are you doing?”
“Watch it, now! Watch it!” The creature blinked and threw up an arm to block the light. Long, graying hair. A toothless hole of a mouth. Charcoal skin with black moles scattered under the eyes. An odor so foul it could hardly be endured. And Ana’s purse over one arm. “You the police?”
“Tell me your name,” Sam demanded.
Ana looked around his shoulder. Layers of old clothing hung on the skeletal frame—a pink sweater, a man’s blue-and-white-pinstriped shirt, a sweat-stained green bow tie hanging loose at the collar. Khaki shorts held up with a length of yellow nylon rope. Knobby knees, gray from kneeling on the dusty floor. A pair of purple socks. And Ana’s sandals.
“You tell first.” A wrinkled tongue darted out to moisten the lips. “Who’re you? And the lady.”
“I’m Sam Hawke. I’m a director at Haven, the recreation center down the street. This is Ana.”
“I’m Glen.”
“Do you live in here?” she asked. “Did you help me?”
The dark eyes studied her, up and down, squinting in the light. “You the one they drug in here, them two boys, ain’t you? I seen what they was up to. I figured you was gonna get it, sugar. I didn’t do nothin’ but yell. Scared ’em is all.”
“I appreciate it. Very much.” Ana stepped out from behind Sam. “You…uh…you realize you’re wearing my sandals?”
Glen tipped up one foot and studied the shoe with its thin straps. “Well, what do you know about that?”
“That’s my purse, too.”
“Ain’t nothin’ in it.”
“I don’t care about the money. You can have that. And the purse. But I would like my keys. They’re on a beaded keychain.”
“I don’t got your keys.”
Ana noticed Glen’s furtive glance, and she spotted a long cord around his neck. A necklace of sorts. It was strung with keys of all shapes and sizes—old iron house keys, tiny padlock keys, and a row of gold and silver car keys. Ana’s hung on the far end of the necklace, still attached to her beaded key chain.
“There they are.” She pointed.
“Them are my keys. I need keys, because you never know. You might come up to a door someplace and be tryin’ to get in, and there you’d be without a key to unlock it.”
“Like my car door,” Ana said. “I can’t open it without those keys you have around your neck.”
“Them are my keys. Mine.”
Sam gave her a look that indicated it was a hopeless case. “What about her wallet? She’d like that back, Glen.”
“Yes,” Ana concurred. “It has pictures.”
“I seen ’em. You a real pretty gal.” Glen dug around in the pocket of the pink sweater and brought out a stack of treasures—Ana’s driver’s license and credit cards. “Look at you in this picture, smilin’ so nice. I want to keep it. Put it on a shelf. I don’t have pictures of nobody.”
“But I need the license in order to drive.”
“You have to give her the cards, Glen,” Sam said.
The bedraggled man studied the small plastic rectangles one by one, and then solemnly handed each to Ana. “I felt real bad about what them boys was doin’ to you. Them kids, they come in here and smoke their crack an’ all. And shoot up. They’s needles all over the place. Lucky you didn’t get stuck with one them needles. You’d get sick like me, and wither up, and all you’d have left is settin’ in the dark and wishin’ you was dead. You can’t eat, you can’t sleep, you all broke out in sores and coughin’ all the time and feelin’ like a old dried-up turnip. Them boys has probably all got it and don’t even know and is gonna wind up in here settin’ day after day and wishin’ they was dead. And they will be, too, just like me.”
Despite the foul odor emanating from the ragged figure and her instinctive revulsion to the hollow mouth and scrabbly fingers, Ana’s heart softened. “If you’re sick, you could get help, Glen. The health department runs clinics. They have medications. You could get food and blankets, too.”
“I don’t like to go out, sugar. I can’t leave my place here. All my stuff. Somebody’d steal it.”
Glen gestured toward a far wall, and Sam shone the flashlight on a little arrangement of sagging cardboard boxes, old lightbulbs, empty food cartons, a pile of tattered clothing and a couple of tin cans. Ana reflected on her own tidy apartment. She had worked hard to decorate it, with entire weekends dedicated to shopping for just the right light fixtures, pillows, sofas and solid wood shelving systems.
Recently, she had bought a new comforter, goose down, with a duvet cover that featured hand-crocheted lace around the edges and a coordinating dust ruffle. Perfect on her queen-size bed. But she was annoyed when her stoneware pattern had been discontinued before she’d had a chance to buy the complete set. Lacking the matching teapot, creamer and sugar bowl, she had felt bereft, as though life had conspired against her.
“I’m gonna put your picture up,” Glen said, studying Ana’s driver’s license. “I like how you got your hair done so pretty. I wish I could do something with my hair, but you know how it is. Things just get the better of you sometimes.”
Ana examined the matted locks, stuck with bits of dried grass and reeking with the need for a shampoo. “What would you like to do to your hair, Glen?”
“A nice cut, that’s all.” The tongue darted over the thin lips. “Well, you all go on home now. And stay away from them boys on the street, sugar. They gonna get you again, you know. Yeah, I heard what they said. They gonna try it, too.”
Ana reached for Sam’s hand. “What did they say?”
“They got to get you. Got to.”
“Why?”
Glen squinted. “Because.”
“Because why?”
“How should I know? I was just settin’ there mindin’ my own business. I ain’t nosy like some people.”
With that, Glen whirled around and headed off, Ana’s sandals going clickety-click on the bare concrete floor. Ana’s eyes met Sam’s. He regarded the ragged figure a moment longer. Then he slipped an arm around her shoulders.
“Terell was right,” he said, turning her toward the door. “It was a setup.”
A
s Sam raised his hand to press the buzzer on Ana’s apartment door, he realized he was sweating. He paused a moment to analyze that fact. In the course of a normal day, he perspired a lot. Haven’s air-conditioning system functioned poorly or not at all, and overseeing a basketball game, sorting out a spat, even racing up and down the stairs to check on groups of volunteers could call for a T-shirt change. Missouri summers, with their intense heat and cloying humidity, always made staying cool a challenge.
Sam tried to tell himself this was the root of the problem. He had parked some distance from the old brick house that had been converted into efficiency apartments, and strolling down the Sunday morning sidewalk had heated him. But the excuse wouldn’t hold water. It was the prospect of seeing Ana that dampened his palms and sent a rivulet of perspiration down his spine.
Crazy to stress out over it, he admonished himself. She was merely a woman without a car. She would need a ride to church, that’s all. And he had decided to show up at her door.
That was the problem. You didn’t just show up at Ana Burns’s door. She didn’t like surprises. She liked plans. Routines. Schedules. She wanted control and order in her life. She did not want a man she hardly trusted appearing out of the blue and butting into her life. He ought to head back downtown and go to his own church as he always did on Sundays. If Ana wanted to attend a worship service, she would phone a friend.
He should have given her a call earlier and set it up. He would have. But he knew what she would say. No. No, I don’t need a ride. No, I don’t need your help. No, I don’t want you.
So, he pressed the buzzer and waited. Her voice came on the intercom.
“Who is it?”
He rubbed a hand behind his neck. “Uh, Sam. Sam Hawke.”
Silence.
“What are you doing here?”
“I thought you might need a ride to church.” He studied the rows of windows overhead, wondering which ones were hers. “After that I could take you to pick up your car. You could talk to some of the kids at the center.”
“I’m not dressed for church. I wasn’t planning to go.”
“Is your arm too sore?”
“I don’t have a car, remember?”
Sarcasm—Ana Burns’s favorite dialect. The barred door hummed to indicate that he could enter.
“Come upstairs,” her voice said. “I’m in 2A.”
Sam stepped into the foyer of the old house, recalling that she hadn’t let him inside when he had dropped her off the night before. Now, the scent of lemon oil greeted him—freshly polished woodwork, gleaming oak floors, a shiny banister anchored by a large, carved newel post. A hallway lined with closed doors featured brass numbers neatly nailed to the wall. Each door had a knocker. He climbed the staircase, his shoes silent on the thick burgundy carpet. The first door to the left was hers. He knocked.
“You can sit over there.” She spoke as she opened the door and pointed to a couch slip-covered in creamy cotton fabric. Wearing a pair of gray running shorts and a pink tank top, she padded away in her bare feet. “I’m changing. Don’t move.”
“So, good morning,” he called after her.
“Not really,” she replied.
He sat gingerly, concerned that a wrinkle on her perfect couch would irk her. The living area had a softer feel than Ana herself conveyed. Lace curtains, downy pillows on the sofa, a tablecloth edged with thick twisted fringe. Everything in shades of white, cream, ivory and soft butter brought a cocoon to mind. This was Ana’s sanctuary, the quiet center of her world. Her haven.
On the table beside the couch sat three framed black-and-white photographs. In one, he recognized Ana as a little girl. Her large brown eyes gazed solemnly. She wasn’t smiling. In the second, her parents’ wedding portrait, the couple stood together inside an ornate chapel. Her mother, clearly Hispanic with the same brown eyes and angular figure as her daughter, carried a bouquet of white lilies. The father had broad shoulders and the radiant smile that Sam had seen only rarely on Ana’s face. The third picture featured two little girls, arms draped across each other’s shoulders, hair in pigtails, grinning at the camera. They must have been nearly the same age—about five or six, he guessed—and both were missing front teeth. One was Ana. The other must be the sister she had mentioned.
Sam could see the small round oak table where Ana ate her meals. Not big enough to entertain guests. Only two chairs. And the kitchen area beyond. Tidy, of course. Spotless white marble countertops. Large glass jars filled with flour, sugar and rice stood in a perfect row. Like the hallway outside, her apartment smelled of lemons and bleach and maybe a trace of ammonia. No floral potpourris or scented candles for Ana.
She stepped out of her bedroom wearing a sleeveless beige dress and low pumps. She carried a matching purse on her uninjured arm. Her brown hair hung long and loose, softer than Sam had seen it.
She paused, one hip thrust out and her bare leg angled toward him, lean, tanned and perfectly muscled. “Man, you’re hot,” Sam said, coming to his feet.
“What?” Straightening, she crossed her arms over her chest and glared at him. “Hot?”
“Sorry, but it’s true. Caleb said it. Billy confirmed it. And you’re stuck with it. You are one hot chick.”
A grin twitched the corners of her mouth. “Well, for once, Samuel Nathan Hawke, you’ve left me speechless.”
He gestured toward the door. “Mind if I accompany you to your service this morning?”
“Do I have any choice?”
“You always have a choice.”
“Not always.” Her brown gaze touched his, then swept away as she stepped out into the hall. “Don’t make it sound so easy, Sam. Fixing the world. It’s hard, and you will never succeed.”
She continued speaking as they descended the stairs. “People don’t always have choices, especially children. Even if they might have a choice, sometimes they don’t realize it.”
“That’s why I’m there. To show them a different way.”
“You’re teaching them to play basketball and crochet hot pads.”
“That’s harsh.”
“Sorry, but kids like Tenisha and Gerald—and certainly Flora—need a lot more than that.”
“What do you suggest?” He followed her out of the old house and down the sidewalk toward his car. “You must have some ideas.”
“I know what might help, but it’s beyond what you could offer at Haven. The children need physical, psychological and spiritual healing. Even if they get that, it still might not be enough to alter the course of their lives.”
“Are you always this optimistic, Ana?” he asked, opening her car door.
“Just on the mornings after I’ve been attacked with a knife.”
Well, Sam observed as he rounded the car toward the driver’s side, this was going to be a fun little outing. He wondered if Ana ever really enjoyed herself. She took life so seriously—her job, her running, even her housekeeping. Though Sam knew he had the same obsessive perfectionist tendencies, the identical need for order and control, he also enjoyed each day he spent at Haven. He loved the kids, he admired and appreciated the volunteers, and he had a longstanding friendship with Terell. Peace flowed through him, and with it came a sense of hope and joy.
As he stepped into the car, Sam saw that Ana had leaned against the headrest and closed her eyes. Like a lean lioness, the woman radiated physical beauty. But something inside her was raw and painful, and he suspected that it arose from more than just the incident the night before. Ana needed to be healed in the same way the children at Haven did. Only she didn’t seem to realize it.
“You can’t truly change these kids’ lives, Sam,” she repeated softly. “But you’re trying to do some good things for them. If I can get my interviews and put the series together in time, I’ll show St. Louis what Haven is all about.”
“The power of the pen.” He started the engine and pulled the car out into the street.
“You’d be surprised what it can accomplish,” she said. “Last night, Gerald wrote a limerick.”
“No kidding?”
“It’s actually pretty good. And Sam, I spoke to Flora again. I found out something about her. That name she said—La Ceiba—it didn’t have anything to do with witchcraft. It’s her hometown. In Honduras.”
“Honduras?” His amazement that the child could have traveled such a distance was followed by the realization of an unsettling coincidence. “Jim Slater brought those two little orphan girls from Honduras.”
“I know. Odd, isn’t it? If I see him today at church, I think I’ll ask about the country’s immigration laws. Flora must have become separated from her parents. I imagine Jim could help us look for them.”
“Us?”
“You know you want to help her as much as I do, Sam.” Her focus slid across to meet his glance. “Flora gave me a poem.”
“You got a lot out of those kids despite all your protests. What did she write about?”
“
Esperanza.
Hope.” Ana raked her hair back from her face, unaware of the effect her striking profile and long neck had on Sam. “Flora saw me run into the building last night, and she asked what had happened. She had strange questions. She kept warning me—told me I shouldn’t come back to the center because it wasn’t safe.”
“No way,” Sam said, his ire rising. “The kid sits there every day, and nobody bothers her. Haven is a lot safer than the streets.”
“Flora thought she knew who had attacked me. She spoke of two men. One named Segundo had blond hair. She called the other man Primero.”
“But you said a couple of kids did it.”
“That’s right, two teenagers in do-rags and—” She caught her breath and then grabbed Sam’s wrist. “I know who attacked me! I remember them now. The do-rags. One afternoon on my way into Haven, I saw them sitting outside under the awning with Raydell.”
“Raydell doesn’t hang with thugs.”
“They weren’t
with
him. Not like friends. They were sitting out there because he wouldn’t let them inside. They had refused to take off their headgear.”
“We’ve got a gang problem,” Sam said.
“They razzed me—‘Hey, pretty lady’—that kind of thing. I didn’t like it, but it wasn’t menacing. They were coming on to me the way men do sometimes. I didn’t think much of it at the time. Sam, I’m sure they were the same two guys who attacked me.”
“Then Raydell will know their names. He’ll be able to tell us who they are and where they live.” Sam gripped the steering wheel, hoping the thought that had just popped into his head was wrong. “I’ll talk to him this afternoon. Could be he knows more about the attack than he’s letting on.”
Ana glanced at him. “Do you think Raydell might have played a part in it? He wasn’t there, Sam. He was guarding the door. He even came to my writing class.”
“Yeah, to keep an eye on you. That’s what he told me, remember? He knew I was unhappy that you’d been coming to Haven and poking around in our business.”
“Raydell has always been polite to me. Last night he even wrote a rap.” She twisted the handle of her purse. “Although…the lyrics were pretty hostile, now that I think about it.”
“Ever heard a rap that wasn’t hostile?”
She smiled. “You’ve got a point there. But I don’t think Raydell would do something like that. You know he wants nothing more than to please you.”
“Exactly.” He frowned as he pulled into the church parking lot. “The first time Raydell stepped through the doors of Haven, he had just gotten out of juvie—juvenile detention—doing shock time for misdemeanor drug possession. He was tough and street-smart, and his mouth was filthy. But something clicked between us, and he’s been stuck like glue to me ever since. He’s the one who told me about the metal detector they were replacing at the city workhouse, and he helped us negotiate to buy the thing and install it at Haven. He loves his job guarding the door, but sometimes I worry about letting him stay there all day.”
“Door duty allows him to keep walking the line,” Ana said. “He can keep one foot in Haven’s world of regulations, discipline and security, and the other foot out in the old hood.”
Sam nodded in agreement as he climbed out of the car. “Right on target. I trust Raydell, and we rarely have an incident that he could have prevented. No guns and only one knife have made it past him. No drugs ever come in, as far as I’ve been able to tell. But he hangs out on the street most of the day, and people talk to him. Kids do sit under that awning sometimes. For all I know, Raydell could be keeping Haven clean with one hand and doing dirty deals with the other. If he wanted to scare you away, he’d have no trouble setting that up.”
Ana accompanied Sam in silence as they climbed the steps to the church sanctuary. He had always admired the old structure, home to one of the earliest denominations to settle and build in St. Louis. With its long stained-glass windows and quaint wooden pews, it reminded him of churches he had seen in Europe.
Ana greeted several people as she made her way down the aisle, and they knew her by name. It seemed like a friendly enough place, yet it was nothing like the bustle and noise that filled his own church every Sunday morning—people setting up microphones, eating doughnuts, drinking coffee, banging on a drum set, tuning guitars, herding children off to Sunday school. Many different racial groups populated the early service Sam attended. Later in the day, a Korean group met to worship, followed by a Spanish-speaking congregation. During the worship hour, a praise band led singing, drama groups acted out skits, the pastor gave a sermon. It was a veritable three-ring circus.