Rebecca’s fragile voice cracked on the recording: “I can’t! I can’t,” she repeated, sounding so helpless, “Please!”
“Rebecca, detach yourself!” Leonard’s voice was clear on the tape, in control. “He can’t hurt you!”
“No! Oh God!” Rebecca shrieked as if being defiled, violated. She began to choke. Her suffering, even if just recollections brought to the surface with dexterity by a doctor’s skilled coercing, was excruciating to bear witness to. Jack winced with every scream. The experience was real and heartbreaking.
“You’re safe, Rebecca. They’re just images!” Leonard’s voice assured, “I want you to move away from here. Go back, before this happened. How did you get here?”
The tape fell silent for a moment. Then Rebecca’s voice reappeared, but different, deeper, not her own. “Mi madre y yo tuvieron una pelea.” Jack recognized the deeper tone of her voice from the hospital. He watched Leonard quickly sift through his notes. He found the right page and began translating for Jack:
“…My mother and I had a fight.”
“Ella piensa que soy no más larga una virgen. Pero no es verdad. Estoy limpio. Es una fantasia que compuse.”
“She thinks I’m no longer a virgin, but it’s not true. I’m clean. It was a fantasy I made up.”
“Pienso que mi hermano lee mi diario.”
“I think my brother read my diary.”
“Me escondí debajo de mi tocador.”
“I hid it under my dresser.”
The tape went silent again. Only Leonard’s voice, “Rebecca? Rebecca? Can you hear me? Rebecca?”
“It’s raining,” Rebecca said, “I don’t want to go home. I’m scared.”
There was another long silence. Jack looked at Leonard, wondering if that was all there was. Leonard shook his head, there was more:
“Rebecca? Rebecca?”
“Trusted him…”
“Who, Rebecca? Who did you trust?”
“Lied to me.”
“Who?”
Rebecca’s started to choke on the tape. “Oh, God, please… No!”
“Who is trying to hurt you?”
“Catch her. Catch her! No! Stop!”
Jack clenched his teeth as Rebecca’s sobs grew so loud the sound on the tape started to distort.
“Rebecca, breathe! Breathe!” Rebecca started to calm down, her breathing slowed. “That’s it, breathe, deep breaths, good girl. Float past this. What do you see?”
“It’s dark. My hands are tied. Legs hurt. My hair is wet. Blood…my blood. Can’t move. Can’t move!” Rebecca grew hysterical again.
“Enough, shut it off,” Jack said.
“Not yet, it’s important. You must listen,” Leonard raised the volume on the player.
“Try, Rebecca, what is this place?” Rebecca sobbed, her emotion palpable.
“There’s a light,” she said sniffling, “a window.”
“Can you see out the window?” A brief silence.
“I see a road.”
“What else?”
“It’s getting dark. Church bells,” she said, her voice now soft as a whisper. Jack made mental notes of every word, every detail.
“Where are you? Can you see a location?” There was another brief silence. Again Rebecca’s voice was replaced by a lower, more raspy sounding one.
“Bendito es el fruto de tu vientre, Jesús. Santa Maria, Madre de Dios, ruega por nosotros pecadores, ahora y en la hora de nuestra muerte. Amén.”
Leonard put his glasses back on and scanned his notes, “…Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners now…and at the hour of our death.”
“The fruits of our labors…find Jesus on the hill,” Rebecca said in English, her voice groggy, hoarse.
“Rebecca? …Rebecca?” Leonard stopped the tape.
“She just kept rambling prayers after that.”
“What does it mean?” Jack asked.
“You’re the detective.”
“She never gives a name? Something specific?”
“In one of our sessions, she only responded to the name Carmen. She never names her attacker. But I believe she knew him.”
Jack’s legs had stiffened from sitting too long. He placed his hands on the armrests of the chair and pushed himself up. He took a few steps, deep in thought. Outside the window, the sun had set, the street lights were starting to turn on.
“Doesn’t amount to much more than chance,” Jack said finally.
“No. That’s too dismissive.”
“A bizarre coincidence.”
“There are no coincidences,” Leonard said firmly, a little frustrated.
“The mother, Laura, she knew the victim. They were friends.”
“Some believe there’s a synchronicity between birth and death, life and loved ones, remaining within the same circle, changing roles, learning, growing. Who are we to know these things?”
Jack turned to Leonard, “Why burden a little girl?”
“Perhaps Rebecca is God’s way of rectifying an oversight.”
Jack wondered, would God ever rectify the oversight on him? He wasn’t so narrow-minded as to think his life — and life as a whole — was some cosmic mistake, a random event. He honestly felt there was a plan. He just felt slighted, out of the loop about what that plan was. Jack took full responsibility for his lot in life, but some things were out of his control, and it was those events, the ones that were left up to the fates, that always seemed to land penny-head down. He could have used a little help then.
But what about innocence? If we’re all part of a bigger picture, then why allow harm to a child like Rebecca? Maybe it was a second chance to right a wrong? For Rebecca’s everlasting soul to find justice. Could it be possible? If she was working through emotional baggage that spanned lifetimes, then she had been given a second opportunity to understand it, learn from it, even grow. If so, then maybe there was a chance for Jack too. To learn from this life. Jack was intrigued, not just for justice — unprecedented, supernatural justice — but for all the other aspects the concept opened up. He started to feel something he hadn’t felt in a long time.
Hope.
“So what now?” Jack asked.
“If it is the same killer as the evidence suggests, then you have to dig deeper. Find Carmen’s killer, you’ll find Angelina.”
Jack turned from the window and moved to the table. He popped the tape from its player. Leonard didn’t protest. He grabbed Rebecca’s sketchbook. “I’m taking this too.” Leonard pushed his chair out.
“Jack, if word of our discussion, the nature of it, were to get out, it could… my practice would be—”
“Don’t worry. I have no intention of humiliating you. Or myself.”
CHAPTER 31
Laura held the tea bag between her finger and the spoon, squeezed the last ounce of flavor out, and tossed it into the waste basket.