Free The Story Teller by Margaret Coel Page B

freshener.
    “You sure, Vicky?” Steve asked, placing an arm lightly around her shoulders. Glancing up, she saw the worry behind the focused gaze, the hint of vulnerability that had made her trust him, had ensured they would become friends that day thirteen years ago when she had bumped into him on the steps of the North Classroom building and dropped her books and papers. Hehad scooped them up, apologizing all the while, when she was the one at fault.
    She nodded, and he guided her toward the draped wall as the investigator yanked on a cord. Slowly the drapes parted against a wide window. On the other side, a figure bundled in white sheets lay on a gurney. Only the face was visible.
    Vicky gasped. Her vision was filled with the dark face, the mashed cheek, the eye lost in a lump of flesh, the bulge above one ear. With all the outrage, she recognized Todd Harris.
    She spun around, past Steve and the investigator, and ran out the door and down the corridor toward a door with the small sign: W OMEN. She barely made it to the row of white enamel sinks before the retching began, shuddering and violent, as if her insides had erupted. Nothing came. She hadn’t eaten since breakfast, a fact for which she was grateful. After a moment she turned on the cold water, splashing it over her face. Anger gripped her shoulders and tightened the muscles in her chest, like some force of memory passed to her by the ancestors. Another of the
Hinono eino
slaughtered. Another broken body of a warrior. And for what reason? When would the slaughter stop?
    She dipped her face into the water cupped in her hands, allowing the cool wetness to run along her neck and down the front of her T-shirt. Finally she pulled some paper towels out of the holder and began blotting her face. Her hair was wet; a clump had worked loose from the barrette and fallen over her cheek. She pushed it back, surprised at the face that peered at her from the mirror, at the horror in the eyes.
    “I’ve got to ask you a few questions,” Steve said as she stepped back into the corridor. He was leaning against the opposite wall, hands stuffed into the pockets of his slacks.
    Vicky held on to the edge of the restroom door—solidand certain in her hand. In an instant Steve was at her side, leading her past the viewing room—the door closed now—and into a larger room with a conference table in the center. The investigator was already seated on the far side. Steve pulled out a chair and waited until Vicky sat down before claiming the place beside her, saying something about it never being easy the first time. She caught the note of sympathy in his voice.
    “I’ve seen death before,” she said, her own voice trembling with anger.
    Producing a small spiral notebook and pen from inside his blazer, the detective asked, “Who is he?”
    “Todd Harris,” Vicky said, then repeated what she’d told him earlier on the phone, adding Todd’s address and the fact that he was a graduate student at CU-Denver. The detective’s pen looped across the page, making a scratchy noise. She told him Todd’s grandparents lived in Denver.
    Steve stopped writing. “They’ll have to identify the body.”
    Rifling through her bag, Vicky found the little pad with Annemarie’s scribblings. She slid it along the table. “They’re old people,” she said.
    “We’ll send a car.” Steve nodded toward the investigator who lifted herself out of the chair and sidled around the table toward the corridor.
    “There’s something you should know.” He turned sideways toward Vicky after the investigator was gone. “This has all the markings of a drug murder.”
    “What!” Vicky pushed her chair back and jumped to her feet. She started pacing around the end of the table, down the other side, and back—a full circuit. “You’re wrong, Steve,” she said, retracing her steps. “Not Todd.” She stopped, placed both hands on the table, and leaned toward the man who sat quietly watching her. “You