Vanessa
Vanessa Powers bent down to her daughter’s level and unzipped her light jacket. She glanced down the hall of the elementary school. Kids wove in and out of classrooms, yanking off rain boots and sweaters and jackets, and hanging them haphazardly on the hooks that lined the wall. No one was paying attention to them.
“You’re going to do great,” Vanessa said, straightening Opal’s shirt. “I know it’s scary going into a new school, but you’ll make friends fast. You always do.”
“What if no one likes me?”
“There’s no way that will happen. Just be yourself.” Except she couldn’t fully do that. She hated to remind her daughter, hated that this was necessary, but she had no choice. Vanessa dropped her voice to just above a whisper. “Don’t forget to use your new name, though, okay?”
Opal nodded. “Katrin. I know.”
“Right. You got it.” Vanessa kissed her nose and helped her take off her jacket.
“When will I get to tell people my real name?”
“I don’t know. It’s not forever, though. I promise.”
“But how will this hide me?”
Vanessa pressed her lips together. She’d explained this in full detail to Opal more than once. When they were alone. Explaining it again in the busy school hall was not something she wanted to do. Too many people could overhear. She kept her voice as low as she could and leaned in, so that her lips were just inches from Opal’s.
“I’ve told you, honey. We have pretend names so that people won’t know who we really are. If they find us, they will try to take you away from me, and I can’t let that happen.”
“Well, I won’t let them take me.” Opal said it with such determination that Vanessa wanted to believer her daughter would have a chance if someone showed up and snatched her. But an eight year old against a grown man would surely not stand a chance.
“I know you won’t,” Vanessa said, “but we can’t let it even get to that point, okay?”
Opal nodded. “Okay. It’s like playing pretend all the time. I like pretend.”
“I know you do.” Vanessa got to her feet and checked her watch. They would be late if they didn’t hurry. “That’s why I know you’ll do such a good job.”
She took Opal’s hand and led her to the door.
With her hand on her shoulder, she said in a fairly loud voice, “Okay, Katrin, this is your new classroom.”
They walked to the front of the room and Vanessa caught the teacher’s attention.
“Oh, good morning,” the woman said with a glowing smile. “This must by Katrin, our new student.”
“It is.” Vanessa returned the smile and gave Opal a quick hug. She bent down one more time. “I have to get going. You know where I’ll be, and I’ll come right back here after school to take you home, okay? Don’t leave the room without me.”
“I won’t.” Opal ran walked slowly over to the corner of the room where the book shelf was. Several other kids sat on a small piece of carpet, reading. Other kids were at their desks or the white board, busying themselves before class started.
“You’re the new nurse, is that right?” the teacher asked.
“Right,” Vanessa said. “And I’m late for my first day. I’ll be back to pick her up at the end of the day.”
“Well, good luck, and we’ll see you then.”
With a final exchange of smiles, Vanessa hurried from the room. Down one hall, then after a right turn, she found the nurse’s office.
In the office, she found things as she’d expected. There was a cabinet with student medications on one side, a cot with a paper covering on the other. A desk sat against another wall, by the filing cabinets. After being hired, Vanessa had come to get an overview from the previous nurse. Where things were, the school policies, that sort of thing. Today, she’d be on her own, but after years of being a school nurse, she had plenty of experience. She was more worried about Opal and how she’d do as “Katrin” in a new school.
The morning started slow and gave Vanessa a chance to review the policies again and to file some paperwork. There was a steady stream of children who came in to take medications throughout the day, and she tried to memorize as many names and faces as she could, since these kids would be regulars.
Throughout the day, there were several tummy aches, a fever, which was also her first time sending a child home from school sick, and a sore throat. In the afternoon, as she waited for her student with the fever to be picked up, another student walked in. A boy in a dirty t-shirt and jeans.
“My head hurts,” he said when Vanessa asked him what was wrong. “And my arm and shoulder.”
“Okay, let’s take a look then to make sure your arm is okay.” Vanessa pushed up his sleeve to check his arm. “Where does it hurt?”
He pointed to his elbow, then a spot on his shoulder. The elbow looked fine, but on his shoulder was a deep purple bruise.
“How did you get the bruise?” she asked.
He glanced over at it and mumbled, “I fell at recess.”
Something in the way he said it put her on alert. “Fell doing what?” she probed.
“Umm, just running around.”
It sounded like a cover up, for sure. She’d have to make a note of it in his chart. If she had serious suspicions, there were people she had to contact about it.
Her mind wandered for a moment, back to LA. Sitting in a hospital, watching the doctor look at the bruises on Opal. He’d given her a stern look and asked, “Did you do this to her?”
Vanessa flushed and pulled the boy’s shirt sleeve back into place. “Some Tylenol should help the pain. Be more careful out there, okay?”
The boy nodded, took the pills, and left the office.
# # #
Hunter walked down the hall in the five-star hotel and stopped in front of room 319. He knocked and waited.
“Hunter Perrin?” came a voice from inside.
“Yes,” Hunter said. The door opened and Hunter stepped inside. He shook the man’s outstretched hand. “Jeremy Beale?”
“Yes.”
The man was dressed in a nice suit. Must have money, this guy. To choose this hotel and be wearing that outfit? He could certainly charge him full price without hesitating.
“Let’s get down to it, then,” Hunter said. He sat in the office chair and spun it to face Jeremy, who sat in the other chair. “A few things you need to know up front. My rate is $50k, and I’m worth every dollar, but I don’t kill just anyone. I guess I’m a kind of a hit man with a conscience. I only kill people who deserve to die.”
“Well, no worries there,” Jeremy said. “My ex-wife certainly deserves to die.”
“Ex-wife?” Hunter stood to leave. “I don’t kill women. Sorry.”
“Wait. Can I explain?”
Hunter looked into Jeremy’s pleading eyes. It was worth hearing him out. He’d come all this way, after all. Might as well see why the guy thought his ex shouldn’t live.
Hunter sat back down. “Let’s hear it.”
“We have an eight-year-old daughter, Opal. My ex-wife abused her. It’s been a horrible few years. I can’t tell you how many times I came home from working all day to find Opal curled up in a ball, crying. I’d talk to her and she would tell me things like ‘Mommy got mad and hit me.’ One time she said she threw her phone at her. She yelled at her constantly. You can’t imagine what it was like. At first, I just thought Opal was clumsy. She’d tell me she fell or banged into something. But when I saw Opal flinch when my ex raised her hand to brush her hair, I started to think something else was going on. And I was right.”
Hunter leaned back in the chair. “How often did you find bruises on her?”
“Seemed like every day there was a new one. Sometimes a cut. Opal blamed the neighbor’s cat, but I think it was from her mother’s fingernails. That wasn’t even the half of it, though. My ex is just mean. She was always ordering Opal around, telling her she didn’t do something right or that she was no good. I tried to stop it, but she’d threaten me, too. Said I’d never see my little girl again. So I just had to sit there and watch her treat my daughter horribly until the divorce went through.”
“And now?” Hunter asked. “Why don’t you use the court system to get her?”
“I am. But they take too long. And now my ex has disappeared with my daughter. I’m afraid that she’s going to take all of this out on Opal. That she’ll go too far or get into the wrong circles. I wouldn’t put anything past her. She’s used to living a nice life. I make good money, and I provided for them well. And now she has nothing. She threatened to sell Opal on the streets before when she wasn’t listening. What if she turns around and does something that horrible now to get money? Her coke habit isn’t cheap.”
“She’s on drugs, too?”
“Of course. She was almost always drunk. Then she got her wisdom teeth pulled and came back with fewer teeth, but a new addiction to pain pills. When the pills and the booze weren’t enough, she turned to the harder stuff.”
Hunter shook his head. “Sounds like a nightmare.”
“She’s a complete monster. That’s why I need your help. I have to save my daughter, get her away from her mother before something awful happens. I can’t wait on the courts, and there’s nothing saying my ex won’t just kidnap her and take off again even if I have custody. The only way I can really end this abuse is to have Vanessa killed. Then Opal will be safe once and for all, and will be with me, the parent who loves and treasures her. I miss her so much.” Jeremy’s voice shook as he said it.
He still didn’t like the idea of killing a woman. But this woman wasn’t worth his usual restraint. When Hunter was a kid, being hit by his drunk father every night, there was no one to save him. No one took his parents away or got him out of there. This was a chance for him to save this little girl. To do what he prayed for every night when he was a kid—for the abuse to stop. He could make a difference in Opal’s life. And he’d even get paid for it.
“I think I can make an exception this time,” Hunter said. “You pay me half up front. I find her, I take her out, you pay me the rest. Got it?”
Jeremy didn’t hesitate. He unzipped a duffle bag that had been sitting on the floor by the bed. He counted out $25,000 in large bills, then handed the bag to Hunter.
“How long do you think it will take?” Jeremy asked.
“You have no idea where she is?”
Jeremy shook his head.
“Could take a while then. Give me everything you have to go on.”
Jeremy handed him a folder. Inside were photos of Opal and Vanessa. But that was it.
“Only photos?”
“That’s all I have. If I had any idea where they were, I would have gone there myself to get Opal.”
Hunter nodded. “Then I’ll get to work. I’ll keep you updated on my progress.”