Peggy Holloway - Judith McCain 02 - Portrait on Wicker Read online

  “But part of the responsibility is yours. I know you don’t run grown women. Okay, so what do you want us to do now? Yeah, right! Thanks a lot.”

  He threw the phone down just as Mackey came bouncing down the stairs. The bed creaked as Mr. Lessiter got up.

  “The judge says we’re on our own now, that he didn’t have anything to do with this…” His voice died out as they walked out and closed the door.

  I felt like I had been holding my breath forever. When I heard the car drive away, I slowly crawled out from under the bed.

  CHAPTER NINE

  I climbed the stairs and tried all the windows and doors all the way around the walkway that ran around the house on the top floor. I now wished that I had taken a key when Julia had offered it to me.

  Breaking a window to get in seemed to be my only option. Running downstairs, I looked quickly around, on the lookout for any cars. I picked up a piece of quartz the Reynolds’ had used around the flowerbed. The flowers were all dead but the stones were still there.

  Finding a good sized piece, I ran back upstairs. Outside of Julia’s bedroom, I hit the window with the stone. It broke into what looked like hundreds of pieces. Reaching inside, I unlocked the window, slid it open and climbed in.

  She wasn’t there. I took off at a run and found her in the master bedroom. She was lying on her side with her knees drawn up. When she heard the door open she looked over her shoulder and it took everything in me not to scream.

  She looked like she had been severely beaten. Her face was so bruised; if I hadn’t known who she was, I would not have known her. She looked at me through mere slits and grinned.

  “He couldn’t beat me enough to get it up,” she said. “Can you believe it? He couldn’t do anything.”

  “Oh, Julia,” I whispered. “Let’s get you out of here. Can you walk?”

  When she tried to stand, I noticed the bottoms of her feet were burned. She started crying and I thought my heart would break.

  “They did that with Mackey’s cigarette,” she said. “He’s alive after all, you know.”

  I don’t know if it was the adrenaline or what, but I picked her up and she felt like she weighed nothing. We heard a car door slam and looked at each other. My heart was beating about a hundred miles an hour. Gently putting her back on the bed, I went to look out the window.

  There was a young couple putting a beach blanket out by the canal in back of the house. They must have thought no one was home, since there were no cars in the driveway. It looked like they were ready to have a picnic, or sex, or both.

  Running back inside, I grabbed Julia. Throwing the slider open, I stepped out onto the porch that ran around the house and started for the stairs. At one point I tripped and almost dropped her. She hadn’t said anything for awhile and when I looked at her she appeared to have passed out.

  “Get out of here!” I yelled on my way down.

  The young couple looked shocked as they took in what they were seeing. They began gathering up their things.

  The boy yelled back, “What’s going on? You need some help?”

  “No, just get out of here. There are some bad men coming back, you don’t want them to catch you here.”

  They hurried up to us as I hit the bottom step.

  The girl turned to the boy and said, “We should help them.”

  Looking back at me she said, “Do you need a ride?”

  The boy handed the girl the keys and tried to take Julia but I wouldn’t let him.

  “No,” I said, “just get out of here.”

  I managed to get Julia into my car but I can’t for the life of me remember how I did it. White sand sprayed out from under the car as I floor-boarded it.

  As soon as I got on the bridge between Vilano Beach and St. Augustine, I dialed Dr. Anna on my cell phone. She answered after the first ring.

  “What’s going on, Judith?” She asked.

  “I found Julia. She’s in bad shape. She was at her beach house. Dr. Anna, they beat her up and burned her.”

  “Who did that Judith?”

  “It was Mr. Lessiter and, get this, Mackey. You remember him from the trial? He was the one they told us who was beaten to death in the shower in prison?”

  “Oh my God! So where are you headed now, Judith?”

  “I hadn’t thought that for ahead. Right now we’re just running. I waited until I heard them say they were going to get something to eat and I grabbed Julia and ran. It’ll probably be awhile before they get back, but right now I’m putting distance between us and them.”

  “Take her to Ocean Sands,” Dr. Anna said. “I’ll meet you over there.”

  “But that’s a Psychiatric hospital!”

  “It’s a hospital and a place to hide her, Judith. We don’t know who is involved in this and you can’t chance taking her to an emergency room.”

  “All right, you’re right. We’re coming up on I-95 right now. We should be there in about twenty to thirty minutes.”

  As I was speeding down the interstate Julia opened her eyes.

  “You’re going too fast,” She said.

  I looked down at the speedometer. I was going eighty miles an hour. I eased off the gas.

  “Where are we going?” She asked.

  “We’re meeting Dr. Anna at Ocean Sands.”

  “Does she think I’m crazy again?”

  “Of course she doesn’t think you’re crazy. You weren’t crazy then, and you’re not crazy now.”

  Julia had been taken to Ocean Sands Psychiatric Hospital after going into a coma due to the stress of her repeating nightmares. Mr. and Mrs. Reynolds had tried to stifle those dreams and wouldn’t let Julia talk about them. They were suppressed memories. We had both had them since we were three years old. They started after our kidnapping and after witnessing the murder of our parents.

  Julia had had her breakdown just after I had found her and our grandmother. Both Julia and I had gotten a lot of help from Dr. Anna Stevens at this hospital. I knew Dr. Anna was right about bringing her back there.

  She would be safe at Ocean Sands. The staff was top notch. They would keep confidentiality, which included not being able to tell anyone that Julia was a patient there.

  I drove by the cottages on the grounds of the hospital where Mimi and I had stayed eleven years ago, while Julia was a patient. I remembered all the long talks we had on the porch.

  When I drove up to the front door, I noticed Dr. Anna was waiting for us outside. She was pacing. I jumped out and hugged her.

  “We need a stretcher or wheelchair, Dr. Anna. She can’t walk. They burned the bottom of her feet.”

  “Son-of-a-bitch!” She yelled as she rushed back inside.

  As they were putting Julia on a stretcher, she faded in and out of consciousness.

  “Take her to PICU,” Dr. Anna said to the attendants.

  “What’s that?” I asked.

  “It stands for Patient Intensive Care Unit. That’s where we put her when she attempted to kill herself, remember? She’ll be watched twenty four, seven. They have all the emergency equipment to deal with just about anything.”

  While they were patching Julia up I followed Dr. Anna to her office where she ordered coffee, and I filled her in.

  When I finished, she said, “Thank God you both got out of there before they came back. What are you going to do now, Judith?”

  “I think I should call Tracy. John has enough on his plate, with Rosa about to deliver anytime, and now with Trudy staying there.”

  Dr. Anna stood up and gathered up the cups. “I’ll take these and drop them off on my way to check on Julia.”

  CHAPTER 10

  Tracy has always been a role model for me, since the first time I met her. She is an FBI agent. When I met her, she was posing as the housekeeper for Mr. and Mrs. Reynolds. I admired her and was happy when she and my uncle Mark got married.

  She was on her way here, to Jacksonville. She had called the local agent but wanted to be here hers
elf.

  I waited out front of Ocean Sands. When her rental car drove up my mouth fell open. Mimi was in the car too.

  “Mimi, are you well now?” I said as I hugged her.

  “I still have the little nagging cough you get at the end of a cold that seems to take forever to go away. Other than that, I’m fit as a fiddle.”

  I hugged Tracy and she said, “How is she, Judith?”

  Now that they were here, the tears started coming.

  “She’s in bad shape. They beat her and burned the bottom of her feet with cigarettes.”

  “Judith, the local FBI agents went to the house but they had cleared out already. They probably came back and found Julia gone and panicked.

  “We’ve got to keep this under wraps, even from the local police and the judges. I don’t know who to trust since it was a federal judge who told us that Mackey had been murdered. Of course, he could have been going by what he had been told.

  “This is probably the best place for both of you right now. Are you going to be staying here in the hospital or in one of the cottages?”

  “Why don’t the three of us rent one of the cabins?” Mimi asked.

  After we were checked into a cottage, we put out luggage inside and walked over to the hospital and straight back to the intensive care unit. Julia looked a little better than she had since I first found her. They had cleaned the blood off her and she had what looked like a thousand bandages.

  When Mimi saw her, she gasped, “I’m madder than hell right now. As if you two girls hadn’t been through enough! When is it all of this going to end, damn it?” She ended in a coughing fit.

  “That cough sounds bad,” Dr Anna said as she walked into the room. “It’s good to see both of you. Wish it was under more pleasant circumstances.”

  She hugged Mimi and Tracy. “We’ve got Julia sedated so she can’t give you anything right now. Why don’t we go to my office?”

  It was getting late by the time we had caught up with everyone’s news. We decided to get something to eat in the fabulous restaurant there at the hospital. It was delicious.

  CHAPTER 11

  The next morning we arose early, anxious to check on Julia. She was still asleep when we got to her room, so we decided to go get some breakfast. As we were heading out of the room, Dr. Anna was coming down the hall.

  “Are you going to the cafeteria?” she asked. “I need some coffee.”

  After we were settled at our table with breakfast, Dr. Anna filled us in.

  “Julia had a rough night. She’s in a lot of pain and we’re keeping her sedated. I hope you catch the bastards that did this to her, Tracy.”

  “We sure will no doubt about it. When do you think we’ll be able to talk to her?”

  “It’s hard to say, at least a couple more days. I want her to sleep until she’s out of most of her pain. Can you tell me how you’re going to go about tracking these two men down?”

  Tracy drank down the rest of her coffee and slammed the cup down on the table. The three of us jumped.

  “I’m sorry,” she said, “It’s just that it’s so frustrating. We have to be so careful in our investigation. I haven’t even told my boss about any of this. He thinks I’ve taken a couple of week’s vacation.

  “The agent I had worked with in St. Augustine before, when we were investigating the kidnapping knows. I trust him. I told John Shepherd in New Orleans and that’s it. John is watching the Lessiter’s House, but it’s hard for him with his regular duties. Rosa is expecting a baby any minute.”

  “I think Mrs. Lessiter needs to be locked up anyway,” I said. “I think she was in the early stages of dementia when I lived there over ten years ago. And I told you about her coming after us with a butcher knife the other day.”

  “You’re right. In fact I already talked to John about her and he was going to check up on that. I’ll call him in a little while.”

  Dr. Anna looked at her watch. “I need to finish my rounds. I’ll talk to y’all later.”

  After she left, Mimi said, “I really don’t see any sense in hanging around here if we can’t talk to Julia. I think we should go shopping. Where’s a good place to shop around here?”

  Tracy and I looked at each other and busted out laughing. Leave it to Mimi to always find a reason to shop. We went to The Avenues, a new mall not far from Ocean Sands. Mimi insisted on buying Tracy and me some new clothes. We spent the next couple of days shopping and walking on the beach. Tracy took advantage of the heated swimming pool and swam twenty laps every morning.

  On the third day, Dr. Anna came by the cottage to tell us that we could see Julia. We were sitting on the porch having our coffee. Mimi and I had spent many hours on this porch when Julia had been a patient here eleven years ago.

  “She’s still in pretty bad shape,” Dr. Anna said, “but she is talking, or I should say complaining. I think she’s very upset with you for bringing her here, Judith.”

  When we got to Julia’s room she was telling a nurse to leave. Her face was still black and blue but she didn’t seem to have as much trouble opening her eyes.

  When she saw us she started crying so hard her shoulders shook. All three of us tried to hold her at the same time. I hugged her legs, Tracy hugged her middle and Mimi hugged her shoulders and neck. She was literally wrapped in love. After we finished hugging, Mimi handed her a tissue and she wiped her eyes.

  “Tell us what’s been going on, Julia,” Tracy said while wiping her own eyes.

  “Is this an official statement, Tracy?”

  “Nothing’s official yet since we don’t know who all is involved.”

  “Good. I’ll start at what I believe is the beginning. One day Mr. Lessiter walked into my art gallery. I didn’t know who he was, but he seemed to know me. Of course I realized right away that he thought I was you, Judith.

  “He called himself Calvin. He seemed so nice and polite. Jean took to him right away, offering tea. You know how he gets, Judith?

  “He bought a small painting and insisted on taking Jean and me to lunch. I thought it would be fun to let him think I was you, Judith. I told Jean to go along with me. You know I’ve always been attracted to older men?” She smiled over at Dr. Anna.

  “It’s because of my adoptive dad and what he did to me. So, when I have the attention of an older man, I mistake it for love, right Dr. Anna?”

  “You know it is Julia, but you also know just knowing it intellectually is only a small part of the healing process.”

  “I know. I remember.” She smiled at Dr. Anna.

  “Now, where was I? Oh yeah. So I started dating him and thought I was deeply in love. It was more like obsession. By the time I realized who he was, I was hooked, just as sure as if he had been a drug.

  “I wanted him so badly and at the same time I knew the whole relationship was sick. I didn’t really care at this point. I had trouble sleeping or eating. I could paint though.”

  She looked at Dr. Anna, “I’m sure you would love to analyze some of those paintings.”

  “I’ve seen them, Julia,” I said. “They are very disturbing.”

  “What did you think of the one of Mr. Lessiter?”

  “Someone had painted over it with black paint and left the paint to dry in one of your good brushes. Trudy recognized the hand.”

  “Oh, you met Trudy? She probably thinks I forgot about her. I did tell her I would help her. How did you get her out of there and into my condo?”

  “When I got to your condo, I found the letter you left me, ingenious place to hide it, by the way. I knew what you meant and immediately went to the Lessiter’s house.”

  “You shouldn’t have done that, Judith. He’s a very dangerous man.”

  “So is his wife. She got after Trudy and me with the butcher knife. So I got Trudy out of there.”

  “She can’t stay at my condo, Judith, he’ll find her there.”

  “No, no I left her at John and Rosa’s.”

  She breathed a deep sigh of
relief.

  Tracy looked at her watch. “We need to get back on track. What happened after you became obsessed with him, Julia?”

  “Oh, okay. I kept telling him I was in love with him and he would just smile. It was as if he enjoyed torturing me. He would disappear for weeks at a time and by the time I did see him I was afraid to complain.

  “He kept telling me he intended to put his wife in a home, divorce her and marry me. I decided to paint his portrait and when it was completed, I invited him over for dinner.

  “I thought it would mean something to him but it seemed to make him angry. After dinner I excused myself and, I’m ashamed to say this, I went into the bedroom and took off all my clothes.

  “When he saw me, he jumped up and picked me up and threw me on the sofa. I was so excited. I thought it was finally going to happen.

  “He put his knee in my belly and held me down and slapped me hard. My dad had always been very gentle when he had sex with me and that’s the way I thought it would always be with older men.

  “You would have thought that would have cured me of him, but it made me want to please him all the more. I had apparently offended him.

  “I finally found out where he lived and went to see him. Trudy was sitting on the front porch. I told her I was going to help her.

  “I was planning on helping her by getting Calvin to marry me. I thought if he had me, he wouldn’t need any more little girls.

  “He saw me and went ballistic. He told his wife to call the police and that he didn’t know who I was or what I was trying to pull.

  “I got out of there as quickly as possible. I thought I was finally cured but when he called three days later, I was on cloud nine.

  “He said he wanted to take me on a trip, sort of a pre-wedding honeymoon but I couldn’t tell anyone. I didn’t even let Jean know I was leaving. I was afraid he would try to talk me out of it.

  “On the way to the airport, I decided to tell Calvin that I was Julia instead of Judith. I then invited him to come and stay with me at my beach house in St. Augustine.