Shoeless Child Read online

  Shoeless Child

  A Novel

  J.A. Schneider

  Publisher Information

  Shoeless Child is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author's imagination and are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, institutions or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Copyright © 2017 J.A. Schneider.

  All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce, store in a retrieval system, or transmit this book, in any part thereof, in any form or by any means whatsoever, whether now existing or devised at a future time, without permission in writing from the author, except in the case of brief quotations in critical articles and reviews.

  For more information about the author, please visit http://jaschneiderauthor.net

  Books by J.A. Schneider

  The EMBRYO medical thriller series, 6 books

  Homicide Detective Kerri Blasco Police/Psychological Thrillers:

  FEAR DREAMS

  A sensitive woman fears insanity. Intuitive Detective Kerri Blasco tries to unravel the truth of what really haunts her…

  HER LAST BREATH

  Mari Gill woke to horror in a strange bed next to a murdered man, and can’t remember the night before. Detective Kerri Blasco battles her police bosses believing Mari is innocent…but is she?

  WATCHING YOU

  A serial killer texts his victims first – but how does he get their phone numbers? Detective Kerri Blasco vows revenge. He comes after her.

  SHOELESS CHILD

  A little boy has seen a horrific murder but is too traumatized to speak. Detective Kerri Blasco struggles to connect with him…

  For Bob, always...

  Shoeless Child

  Title Page

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Chapter 47

  Chapter 48

  Chapter 49

  Chapter 50

  Chapter 51

  Chapter 52

  Chapter 53

  Chapter 54

  Chapter 55

  Chapter 56

  Chapter 57

  Chapter 58

  Chapter 59

  Chapter 60

  Chapter 61

  Chapter 62

  Chapter 63

  Chapter 64

  Chapter 65

  Chapter 66

  Chapter 67

  Chapter 68

  Chapter 69

  Chapter 70

  Chapter 71

  Chapter 72

  Chapter 73

  Author’s Note

  About the Author

  1

  Don’t cry, don’t cry…

  His chest hurt too much to cry anyway. Breath wouldn’t come, just a high, mewling sound like a terrified kitten fleeing a mad dog. His bare feet thump-thumped and his bloodied pajamas stuck to his skin, freezing, hurting.

  He kept seeing Mommy, lying there. He wanted so much to scream into the night, but knew it would give him away. The man with the gun was after him. His mouth opened wide in a frantic, silent howl and tears streamed his cheeks…

  “Go Charlie,” Mommy had gasped. “Run.”

  Shaking uncontrollably, he still felt the man’s hand catch his jammies and snatch him up but he’d fought, scratched at the raging ski mask and wriggled free, run out and down the dark stairs hearing the heavy feet thundering behind him. Where to hide? For seconds he’d banged and cried on the apartment door downstairs, but the music was loud in there; nobody coming but the guy in the mask.

  Run!

  Mommy said the super should’ve fixed the stairwell bulb but he didn’t, and just when the man was on the stair behind he stumbled, grunting bad words. Charlie raced the rest down to the foyer, then out to the sidewalk. It was empty, no one to help, just the streetlights too far apart that Mommy worried about.

  A cold rain was starting. Charlie shivered uncontrollably.

  “I see you, little shit” came from behind, and Charlie knew he was cornered. Then – idea – he ran like Mommy said he should never do between two parked cars into the street, and kept running, crouching on the traffic side from parked car to parked car until he couldn’t breathe anymore. He felt his heart exploding. Trembling, he ducked way down behind a van.

  Was mommy going to die? So much blood…get help Charlie…

  Headlights bore down on him, getting closer, bigger, hugely glaring. In terror he pressed tight to the van; its fender glinted as a car and then a cab swooshed past, missing him by inches.

  The street grew dark again. Quiet. His blood pounded in his ears.

  Shaking, he peeked out. Four cars away, he saw the man’s dark shape near their stoop. He’d stopped running. His black hooded head turned right and then left and he paced a little, pumping his gloved hands like he was punching somebody. Then he made up his mind and ran the other way.

  Charlie’s round, frantic eyes watched him go, then lifted to the curtain in their third floor window. It hung crooked and reddened from where Lauren had fallen against it, blood gushing from her chest. Mommy bleeding next to her had cried to him when he ran out, distracted the man.

  She wasn’t dead, she needed help!

  Someone shouted. A man’s voice and then another’s, laughing. They were coming out of the bar at the corner, half a block away. Run! Tell them Mommy needs help!

  With a high moan he took off running, faster than he’d ever moved in all the running and tumbling he’d done in the park at the other corner. Over asphalt, back onto the sidewalk letting himself cry now, howling his huge, wet balloon of frantic terror-

  “Whazis?”

  Rough hands grabbed him, swept him up painfully to a grizzled, smelly face. “What a catch! Whatsamatter sweetums, you want your mommy?”

  The man’s free hand squeezed Charlie’s pee-pee. He struggled, tried to scream louder but was panting too harshly; his fear had exhausted him.

  A hand that felt like sandpaper clamped hard over his face.

  2

  Kerri Blasco charged through wet, glistening traffic with her siren wailing. The day had been one of those gray, depressing November slogs, it was Monday night, and she’d just been called to her second murder. Only Monday! Don’t people ever take a break? She was feeling bad, almost crying bad. The mill, her partner Alex called it. The never-ending awfulness of working in Homicide.

  She was wishing she had a puppy.

  Had she ever been that upbeat person of her college days, studying psychology and criminal justice? Oh, she was going to fix the world, make it a better place…right. Just this m
orning, trying to crawl out of bed, she and Alex had talked about taking a break from the NYPD grind, spending a weekend in Vermont in some cozy, romantic bed-and-breakfast. So what if they’d missed the foliage? Picture a roaring fireplace in an eighteenth century restored farmhouse. Then when they got back, they could talk about her getting a puppy.

  “Would Gummy tolerate it?” Alex had mused as he pulled on his shirt. Gummy was Kerri’s getting-plump tabby cat, who could jolly well take up residence on Kerri’s kitchen counter and cabinet tops, where she liked to perch anyway. The puppy would of course run all over…

  “Dogs need tons of love,” Alex the practical one cautioned. “Whereas Gummy’s fine if you keep her bowl filled and skip a day seeing her. With a dog, wouldn’t you feel torn on double shifts, long nights when you can’t go home?”

  Damn, damn, Kerri knew all that. She’d just been spewing in that emotional, wistful way of hers - and face it - thoughts of puppies and Vermont B&Bs were what helped keep her sane; now raised her up half a notch as she approached the crime scene…

  Oh boy.

  Greenwich Street was ablaze with police activity. The whole stretch between Moss and Baker streets had been cordoned off by a barricade of blue-and-whites. Lights were on in the apartment buildings and a crowd had gathered, under umbrellas and shivering in jackets over rumpled sweat bottoms. It was a few minutes after ten.

  Kerri parked her Tahoe behind a squad car. The rain was biting cold, drumming down harder after two previous days of rain. Damn…

  Her sense of sadness washed over her again, but she was in the street now and she smothered it. Pushing stray strands back into her dark blond ponytail, she badged her way under the crime tape and past uniforms – one of whom saluted her and smiled.

  “Glad to see you back.”

  “Thanks. Missed the fun.”

  The building was a long brownstone, four stories, its foyer busy with uniforms and squawking radios. Two cops in front she recognized: McBride, potbellied in the last year of his hitch, and his younger partner, Ortiz. She asked them to bring her up to speed.

  “Two women,” McBride said. “One homicide, the other shot, badly wounded.”

  Ortiz called over a dark-haired, tearful young woman. “This is Gina Wheat, super’s daughter, friend of the wounded victim Rachel Sparkes. The attack happened in Rachel’s apartment. The deceased was her friend.”

  “I love Rachel,” wept Gina, early twenties in jeans and a skimpy top, wiping smeared eyeliner. “Is she okay? Where’s Charlie?”

  “Who’s Charlie?” Kerri asked.

  “Her little boy. Please, where are they - how are they? No one will tell me anything.”

  Kerri glanced up at uniforms on the stairs, plainclothes people on the third floor landing. She felt her energies return; unzipped her navy parka. “Where’s your father?” she asked the girl.

  “On the roof, fixing a leak.” Gina pointed to the elevator with a hand-scrawled OUT OF ORDER sign. “Broken for days. Its housing on the roof’s what’s leaking.”

  McBride’s heavy face looked impatient. “You said he’s coming down.”

  “He will.” Gina started to cry again. “He’s very upset. It’s just…the neighbor on four’s screaming about water coming in.”

  Kerri steered her back. “Do you know of anyone who would have wanted to harm Rachel or her friend?”

  Gina shook her dark curls. “Rachel? No! She’s the most gentle soul you could imagine.”

  “Did you observe anything unusual in the past forty minutes?”

  “No, I was out, just got back.”

  “I’ll need you to give me the names of people in Rachel’s life, anyone you can.” Kerri fast scribbled Gina Wheat’s contact info. She lived with her father, the building’s superintendent, in one of the two first floor front apartments. “The smaller one.” Gina pointed again. “Door’s over there.”

  Seconds later, Kerri headed for the stairs.

  3

  “It’s bad in there,” said Ricky Betts on the landing. At twenty-nine, the sweet-faced athlete looking forward to the NYC Marathon was the youngest detective in their squad. “Brace yourself, you’re just back from-”

  “I’m okay, thanks,” Kerri breathed, pulling on latex gloves and crime scene booties. Yeah, I’m fine, she thought. The nightmares are easing, shrink said give it time. A recent case had been so bad…

  The door to the crime scene was open, and partly in slivers. The chain had been crashed through and hung from unmoored screws. Inside the small living room, Kerri saw her fellow detectives Tom Connor and Ray Zienuc, kneeling and gloved, going over a woman’s body. She was young, dark-haired, slumped against the window drape with her eyes still wide and terrified.

  An awful scene, made worse by the chaos of multiple victims and the fact that the EMS had already been there, made a mess. Arterial spray had hosed the wall, the curtain, a beige armchair. Al Nunez, the CSU crew chief, was just closing the dead woman’s eyes and telling Zienuc, “the shot. Bled out in seconds.”

  More dark crimson pooled the rug about five feet from the body; doubtless where Rachel Sparkes had lain.

  Kerri took a deep breath and went to kneel by the others. “What’s the story?”

  “Double murder attempt, one dead,” Connor said, his long fingers gently examining the victim’s chest wound. Someone had cut open her soaked-red sweater and bra. “Killed this poor lady, badly wounded another just taken to Bellevue.” He glanced toward the front. “Picked the lock, crashed through the door chain. You saw?”

  “I saw.”

  “Sharp as ever - uh, sorry. Should you even be here?”

  “I’m fine,” Kerri said again, smiling thinly. Connor was kind, often funny and almost as emotional as she was…but he kept it in better. More than once, he’d told her she was too sensitive for Homicide. “Go back to Vice,” he’d say, “where nobody cries.”

  She watched him take an evidence bag from Nunez. “Alex decided keeping me on desk jockey duty was making me crazy,” she said. “Or making him crazy. Can’t have him losing it too, huh?”

  “Where is the dear boy?” Zienuc smirked, handing Kerri a wallet.

  “On his way, breaking laws.”

  With an ache, she started through the dead woman’s identification. Her name was Lauren Huff. She was twenty-four and pretty; lived uptown, worked at an uptown hedge fund. Her wallet was fat with pictures of friends, family who would have to be notified…so terrible. Cash was also there; credit cards filled their little leather slots. Had the killer even gone near the wallet?

  Kerri gripped it, picturing an awful trip to the morgue, trying to offer comfort to the grieving when there wasn’t any. She pushed the wallet back into Lauren Huff’s purse and got out her phone. Sucking in a breath, she texted Alex the number of Gina Wheat: I was rushed, she may have info.

  Alex Brand was their sergeant. Just minutes ago the big swoony cop had been following her down a different flight of stairs, griping about Dispatch’s call as they finished processing the first murder. “Hell, I thought we were done for the night. Were we really talking about escaping to Vermont?”

  Right now he was probably issuing canvassing orders from his Jeep which he drove like a maniac. Not that his driving was the problem; Kerri just liked being independent. In her Tahoe she could think. They sometimes bickered about that.

  She exhaled and looked up from her phone, again taking in the tragic, pretty face of Lauren Huff. A fierce anger rose in her chest.

  “So who was the target?” Her gaze went to the second pool of blood. “Looks like the killer shot Lauren first, sound right? Rachel Sparkes may have had that split second to duck, throwing his aim off.”

  “Either way, what was the motive?” Zienuc grunted, making room for a tech brushing fingerprint dust. He brooded at Lauren Huff’s body. “No sign of rape or burglary.”

  A bad, bad case, they all realized. No eyewitness so far, and no apparent motive; the opposite of the case Alex and Kerri had
just processed.

  She straightened, absently brushing her black jeans and gray crewneck with her gloved hands, realizing she’d just smeared dark fingerprint dust on her sweater. Oh, she wasn’t back to completely sharp yet, was she? Get with it, girl.

  “We processed that West Nineteenth murder,” she said with an edge, frowning around the room. “Nice when they’re easier. Neighbors say the dealer went nuts catching his girlfriend in bed with his pal. He insists somebody else used his gun, but his prints are on it. Clever fellow.”

  “Ha.” Zienuc stood, big, dark and brooding, glaring around the room too. Forensic people were dusting, covering the simple, precious possessions of a young mother and her child with what looked like heartbreaking black ash.

  “This place was so sweet,” he muttered. “Kayak oar on the wall. Community garden poster. Floor strewn with books and toys.” He picked up one book, Science Fun for Kids, flipped through it, then jerked a thumb to the small bedroom, its twin beds visible and pushed together like an L. “Same in there. More toys and a Spider Man poster. Lauren Huff was a visitor. These were no wild girls or druggies.”

  No, but it was a forensic mess, Kerri thought. Two victims, one dead, the other needing EMTs ASAP, and in doing what they had to do to save life, they’d pushed everything out of the way to make room. Their wet footprints and gurney tracks were visible on the thin rug, also littered with bloodied gauze and torn sterile paper packets. What was the forensic team going to find? The killer was in, out, bang, bang, no apparent motive, scene contaminated anyway.

  “Who called it in?” Kerri moved closer to photos in the bookshelves of a little boy, adorable at age two, three, four…

  “Actually, him.” Zienuc pointed to the photos.

  Kerri didn’t understand. Zienuc explained.

  The child had been crying hysterically in the street, getting attacked on top of this by some chicken hawk when men coming from a bar saw and intervened, called 911. “Held the pedo and tried to comfort Charlie – that’s his name - till the cops arrived. He’s at Bellevue too. We’ve found Rachel Sparkes’s Facebook and Instagram accounts. Every picture, practically – Charlie this, Charlie that.”