The FBI Thrillers Collection Books 6-10 - Catherine Coulter [608]
“I wouldn’t call this surviving,” Elsa said, and Savich continued to hold her hand as the bitterness flowed through her.
He said, “I would. There’s something else, Elsa. These people who hurt you, they’re calling me, they want to kill me. They’ve also threatened my wife, and my little boy. I desperately need your help to protect them.”
Her hand fluttered a moment, then settled again. “It’s been a horribly painful time for me, Agent Savich. I don’t know if I can ever think about what happened. I don’t want to face those monsters again.”
“Elsa doesn’t need to be tortured with this again, Agent Savich,” Mr. Bender looked ready to muscle Savich out the door. He said, “Listen, she’s gone through enough. We’re sorry about the threats to you and your family, but Elsa can’t help you. We’d like you to leave now.”
Savich didn’t look away from Elsa. “I imagine the doctors told you that when you begin to remember what happened, it’s important not to block it out again. Remembering it, talking about it, will only lessen the pain. Tell us about it, Elsa, tell us and you can send it into the past, where it belongs. You survived. Never forget that you survived.”
To Savich’s surprise, Elsa said, “Jon was in the past. And yet he’s here now. Isn’t that strange?”
Savich saw Mr. Bender flinch, heard him say, “I’m not going anywhere,” but Savich had no idea if she understood his words.
“We have children ourselves, Agent Savich, Jon and I. But I can’t talk about what they did to me, I simply can’t.”
“I don’t need you to, Elsa, although I’m convinced it would help you.”
Elsa said, “The fact is, I’ve remembered almost all of it.” She heard her husband’s quick indrawn breath, but didn’t pause. “The girl Claudia called him her sweet pickle. He was a filthy old man with a hacking cough. She tied my hands behind my back in that dirty old van, told me that he wanted to see her with a woman and that he picked me because she’d told him I looked like her, like I could be her mama and wasn’t that the coolest thing? Then he told her to pretend she was diddling her own mama. The old man blindfolded me and then the girl started.” She began to cry quietly. She swallowed hard and whispered, “The oddest thing is that I didn’t feel the pain in my eyes until later, in the emergency room.”
“You were in shock, a good thing.”
“I suppose it was.” She lifted her glasses only enough to lightly daub the edge of a monogrammed white handkerchief to her eyes. She straightened her glasses again and said, “It doesn’t hurt so much anymore when I cry.”
Jon Bender said, “Tell them about the farmer, Elsa.”
“The farmer who found me. He visited me in the hospital every single day, brought me roses. He’d sit by my bed and tell me about how he grows barley and oats. Jon came late that night, and three days later, he brought me back here, to our old home, only I can’t see what they’ve done to it since I left.”
“Ask him, Elsa. Simply ask him.”
Jon Bender looked like he wanted to burst into tears. He said, “I didn’t do anything, Elsa.”
“Good.” For the first time she smiled a little. “I hate fussy things. I’m glad you left it clean.” She let Savich ask her questions for several minutes and gave the best description she could of Moses and Claudia. She agreed to talk to a sketch artist later in the day. She told Savich about how Claudia did indeed look like her daughter. She smiled toward her ex-husband. “Jon, give them that photo of Annie throwing the beach ball. Remember, I sent you a duplicate? The resemblance is really quite striking.”
While Mr. Bender was gone, she said, “Tell me more about your boy, Mr. Savich.” Her hand still rested comfortably between his.
“His name is Sean, and he’s a pistol.” He watched