Breaking the Cycle Read online

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  Kate parked her squad car in front of the house – no, make that a mansion. She peered through her windshield at the towering red brick Georgian. A woman had called 911 to say that she had fallen down a staircase. The dispatcher had managed to find out that she was alone in her house except for a baby before the woman apparently passed out. The phone line was still open, but there had been only silence for the last five minutes, the amount of time it had taken for Kate to arrive.

  Her shift was almost over, so this would probably be her last stop of the night. She expected to go in the house, do whatever she could to help the woman, and wait for the ambulance that had already been summoned. Kate jogged up the front walk, knowing that every second counted, mentally reviewing her CPR training as she went. She rang the doorbell, not expecting anyone to answer, but hoping it might jar the woman into consciousness. She yanked at the door handle, but it was locked tight. Looking through the glass panel, she could see a curved staircase and a marble floor, but no body. If the woman had fallen down these stairs, she must have crawled somewhere else to get to a phone.

  Kate raced around to the side of the house and found herself at a French door leading into a kitchen. It was dark, but she could make out what looked like a leg sticking out from behind an island. She rattled the door, but this one was locked too. Without hesitating, Kate drew her gun and used its butt to knock the glass out of one of the panes. She reached through the jagged opening, unlocked the door, and pushed her way through. She paused for a second to find the light switch, and when she hit it, the room lit up like a lightning bolt.

  As Kate sprinted around the island, a body took form – a woman lying on her side, her leg twisted underneath her in an awkward angle, her arm thrown out in front of her, inches from a cordless phone. But what made Kate gasp was the woman’s face: a swollen lump of clay, blood streaming from her nose and mouth. Kate dropped to her knees, fumbling for the woman’s neck, feeling for a pulse that was just barely there.

  She jumped when the woman’s eyes fluttered open. “Help me, please.” The words were barely a whisper.

  “An ambulance is on the way. Just hold on. I’m right here with you.”

  “My baby. She’s upstairs.” The woman went into a spasm of coughing, blood flying from her mouth. “My neighbor, Jackie. Her number’s by the phone. Call her. She’ll come…” There was a soft sigh and then the woman’s eyes closed shut.

  Kate squeezed the woman’s hand, not knowing if she would hear her words. “I’ll call her as soon as the medics come. I won’t leave until she gets here. Is there anyone else to call – your husband?”

  The woman’s eyes flew open and Kate saw the terror. “No, no. He can’t know I called you.”

  Kate cradled the woman’s face in her hands. “Did he do this to you? You can tell me. You can trust me.”

  A tear escaped from the woman’s eye, rolling down her cheek, mingling with the blood and turning it a light pink. “I can’t. I can’t tell anyone. He’ll kill us.”

  “Us?”

  “Me, my baby. He’ll kill us both.”

  “I won’t let that happen. We’ll find you a safe place.”

  The woman made a gurgling sound, half laugh, half cry. “You don’t know who he is, do you?”

  Kate looked away, racking her brain. The dispatcher had given her the name registered to the address. Melanie and Charles Martin. Charles Martin. There had to be a thousand Charles Martins. And then it hit her. Isn’t Carl a nickname for Charles? Could it be Carl Martin – the Chatham County District Attorney? She turned to the woman. “The D.A.?”

  There was just the slightest nod, and then the woman’s whole face crumpled as she began to sob. “I won’t file a report. I’ll just say I fell down the stairs. You can’t protect me. No one can.”

  Kate didn’t know what to say. With a sigh of relief, she heard the ambulance siren wailing as it careened up the driveway. “Help’s here. Just hang on.” She lay the woman’s head gently on the floor before she got to her feet and raced to the front door, throwing it open. “She’s in here! Hurry! You’ll need a stretcher.”

  She waited for the medics and then led them into the kitchen.

  “Jesus, what happened to her? I thought she fell down the stairs.”

  Kate met the medic’s eyes. “That’s what she says.”

  The medic shook his head. “Right.” He turned to the woman, and Kate watched as he and his partner went to work. It took them just a few minutes to have her strapped onto the stretcher and ready to move.

  Kate led the way out of the kitchen, down the hall, and through the front door. She watched as the medics loaded the woman into the ambulance and then took off, tires squealing, sirens blaring. She stood for a moment before she turned and walked back to the kitchen, looking for the neighbor’s phone number. When she located it, she called, and heard a groggy voice answer on the other end. Kate explained what had happened.

  “Just give me a minute to get dressed. I’ll be right there.”

  Kate hung up the phone and made her way up the winding staircase, noting the distinct lack of blood anywhere on the steps. In fact the only place she had seen any blood was in the kitchen. When she got to the landing, she began to search the bedrooms. The third door she opened led her into the nursery, decorated in candy-cane pink, looking as pure and innocent as the baby herself, curled up and sleeping soundly in her crib. As Kate looked down at the sleeping child, she whispered a vow. “I don’t care who your father is. I’m going to find a way to protect you and your mother.”