Callie's Christmas Wish Read online

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  “Simona,” she said with an irritated chop of her hand. “Call me Simona.”

  * * *

  With so many new experiences bombarding her, Callie took the precaution of jotting down the password before she forgot it. Years of inbred caution had her reversing the digits, however. That done, she logged on and opened the oldest file.

  She thought she’d seen the full spectrum of family tragedy. As she worked her way through the computerized case files, she realized she’d barely scratched the surface. Her throat got tighter as she read family histories that included everything from mass murder to honor killings to kidnapping and rape.

  A number of the seventy-three women currently residing at the center had lost every living relative to war. Others had suffered pain and humiliation at the hands of vengeful husbands or fathers or brothers. Two girls barely into their teens had been sold into sexual slavery and experienced appalling degradation before escaping their captors by hiding in a dung cart.

  Yet when Callie accompanied her boss to lunch, they entered a room filled with lively chatter. The meal was served buffet-style in what must have been the original owners’ grand salon. The fare was hearty lamb stew fortified with green peas and couscous, the preferred drink a fragrant apple tea. The women present appeared to be primarily Middle Eastern and African, with a sprinkling of Europeans. They sat at tables of four or eight. The clusters appeared cultural for the most part, with the Muslims in modest robes and hair covered by veils or scarves, the others in more flamboyant dress.

  One sat alone. Head down. Shoulders hunched. Head scarf covering her hair, her very pregnant belly evident even under her loose robe. She refused to look up even when Simona stood and called for attention. Pausing at intervals to allow the translators to keep up, the director introduced the newest member of the staff. After a flurry of smiles and welcomes in several different languages, the women got on with their lunch.

  Callie waited for a lull in the director’s conversation with the woman on her other side to nod discreetly at the solitary diner.

  “Who’s that?”

  Simona followed her glance. “We call her Amal, but we don’t know her real name. She washed ashore in Greece a month ago, we think from a boatload of Syrian refugees that sank off the coast. If so, she was the only survivor. She won’t...or can’t...tell us anything about herself or her life before she arrived here.”

  “Is she due soon?”

  “Nikki Dukakis, our nurse-practitioner, thinks it could be within the next few weeks. We don’t have facilities here for a nursery, so she’ll move to another center when she leaves the hospital.”

  How sad, Callie thought, and how frightening it must be to give birth in a strange land surrounded by people you don’t know and can’t communicate with, only to be shuffled from one facility to another. She couldn’t help remembering the plaster cast of the pregnant woman in Pompeii and felt a wrenching hope this mother-to-be would find a safe harbor for herself and her child.

  A number of the residents came up after lunch to welcome her, some shyly, some with warm smiles. Callie then sat in on the two o’clock group session conducted by one of the mental-health techs. Despite having to work through an interpreter, the tech did a very credible job getting the women to participate.

  At four o’clock Callie walked into the beginning English class feeling nervously inadequate. She soon found she didn’t have to worry. The seven women and one teen in the class were eager to learn, and the teaching aids included very basic flash cards, picture books and whiteboards. The youngest class member, named Sabeen, had a wide gap between her front teeth and seemed to take special delight in repeating sibilants like “sleep” and “snake.” With each whistle, she’d giggle, slap her palm over her mouth and set the colored beads at the ends of her hundreds of tiny braids to dancing a merry tune. Having read her case file only a few hours ago, Callie could only marvel at the kidnapping victim’s resilience.

  Simona had indicated the staff were welcome to eat dinner with the residents, although most preferred a little separation after their long days. Night duty rotated among the paid staff and involved either sleeping at the center or remaining at home, close to a phone.

  Since it was Callie’s first day on the job, she opted to have dinner at the center. She shared a table with a woman from northern Iraq whose husband and three sons had been beheaded by ISIS last month. A former university professor, she spoke English and kept the conversation focused deliberately and exclusively on Callie. Where she was from. Where she’d gone to school. Why she’d come to Rome. Why the United States had invaded her country, then plunged it into chaos. Well aware she had to earn these women’s trust, Callie answered as honestly as she could.

  The night air was cold and brisk when she walked back to her apartment, accompanied by dark-haired, dark-eyed Nikki Dukakis. The nurse-practitioner lived only two streets over and invited Callie to have dinner the following evening with her and her husband.

  “Simona is coming, too,” she said. “And Carlo, if he has returned to Rome. My Dominic is with the Greek Trade Commission. He does business with Carlo, which is how I came to work at the center. But I’ll do my best to keep them from talking trade embargoes all night.”

  She waved a cheerful goodbye at the corner, and Callie climbed the stairs to the third floor. Fumbling off her glove, she activated the scanner and let herself into the two rooms that were already beginning to feel like home. Her first order of business was a hot, steamy shower. Her second, snuggling into warm pj’s. Her third and most important, calling Joe.

  “Hey,” she said when he picked up. “How’s Zurich?”

  “Cold. Snowing. Traffic pretty much at a standstill. But I got done what I needed to.”

  “So you’re going to fly back to the States tomorrow?”

  “If the airport stays open. Your turn. How was your first day?”

  “Exhilarating. Exhausting. And really, really humbling. These women have been through so much, Joe. I spent most of the day waffling between a burning desire to help and questioning whether my puny skills are up to the task.”

  “They are. How’d you get along with il Drago?”

  “I’m on probation until I prove I’m not just another do-gooder Carlo foisted on her. Which might be kind of tough, since I hope to do good and Carlo did foist me on her.”

  “Like I said this morning, my money’s on you. Hang on, I’ve got another call.” He returned a few seconds later. “Sorry, I need to take this. I’ll call you back.”

  “That’s okay. I’m pooped. I’ll talk to you tomorrow. Good night, Joe.”

  “Night, Pansy Eyes.”

  * * *

  Her voice lingered in Joe’s mind as he reconnected with the caller he’d put on hold. “Yo, Frank. What’s up?”

  His Defense Intelligence Agency buddy didn’t waste time on chitchat. “A report just crossed my desk I think you should know about.”

  “I’m listening.”

  “Someone’s been making inquiries about the place you had me check out a few days back. Very casual, very innocuous inquiries. They were buried deep in a flurry of other chatter.”

  “And?”

  “And up until these queries surfaced, we were pretty sure we’d taken this particular someone down.”

  Joe’s stomach went tight. “Can you give me details?”

  “Not over an open line.”

  Joe vowed instantly to depart Zurich within the next hour, snow or no snow. If he couldn’t fly out, he’d either drive or jump a high-speed train to whatever airport was still open. Once there, he’d charter an executive jet if necessary.

  “I’ll see you tomorrow.”

  He cut the connection and stood for a moment, hefting the phone in his palm. The ink had barely dried on the deal he’d cut
with Callie. No wrapping her up in cotton wool. No ignoring mutually agreed-to boundaries. No unilateral decisions...except in extraordinary circumstances.

  The problem was, he didn’t know how extraordinary these circumstances might be. Serious enough for Frank Harden to contact him, certainly. And troubling enough for Joe to pull out all the stops to get back across the pond. Until he was in possession of some cold, hard facts, though, he couldn’t see worrying Callie. Besides, this was obviously not something that could or should be discussed over the phone.

  Refusing to admit he was rationalizing, he stabbed a speed-dial number and connected with the on-duty controller at his twenty-four-hour operations center. “I need out of Zurich tonight and into DC tomorrow. Any way you can work it.”

  “I’m on it, boss.”

  By the time he’d thrown his toiletries in his shaving kit and stuffed his spare clothes in his carryall, the controller called back to confirm the Zurich airport was still open.

  “You’re in luck. Flights look iffy for later tonight, but right now they’re keeping the runway plowed and the planes deiced. I got you on Lufthansa leaving for New York in two hours and the shuttle from there to DC. You’ll have to hustle to make it.”

  “I’ll make it.”

  Chapter Nine

  Callie got up early enough the next morning to make a quick cup of coffee. Just one, though. What she really wanted was one of those sinfully rich white-chocolate espressos at the little café she’d discovered yesterday.

  The air was still crisp and cold. Bundled against the chill, she wove through the backpacking school kids and early shoppers. The scent of hot, strong coffee and fresh-baked pastries welcomed her when she ducked inside the café. While she waited for her croissant and espresso in its elegant, silver-handled glass, her gaze roamed the framed black-and-white photos. There was Sophia Loren again, and Jack Kennedy. And a helmeted general in jodhpurs and a low-slung holster.

  Patton? Could that really be Patton?

  Her glass in one hand and the croissant in the other, she tried to edge past the stand-up counter crowd for a closer look. She was almost there when one of the patrons closed the lid of his computer and turned to leave. She jumped back to avoid a collision but sloshed some foamy white chocolate on his sleeve.

  “Oh! Scusi!”

  The man muttered something that didn’t sound too complimentary under his breath and grabbed a napkin to dab at his jacket sleeve.

  “I’m sorry,” Callie said in English. “I hope it didn’t get in your laptop.”

  He jerked his head up and stared at her with unfriendly eyes. Then he turned on one heel and shouldered his way unceremoniously through the crowd.

  “Ohhh...kay,” she said to his back, “And no, I didn’t splash hot coffee on my hand and burn myself, but thanks for asking.”

  Shrugging off the incident, she enjoyed the croissant and what was left of her espresso, then headed for the center.

  * * *

  Her second day on the job turned out to be even busier than the first. She sat in on another group therapy session at nine and attended an occupational assessment workshop at eleven. With the aid of a translator, a job placement specialist gently probed a sad-eyed, stoop-shouldered young widow for possible employment choices.

  Callie joined a table of three women at lunch. Although English wasn’t their native language, all three spoke it with varying degrees of proficiency. One, the victim of a vicious disfigurement by a jealous husband, hid the gaping hole where the tip of her nose had been cut off behind a veil. A native of Bangladesh, Leela had contacted an IADW outreach worker after that same loving husband had driven her out of their home with a whip.

  “Simona says the doctors can fix my face,” she murmured in soft, very British English. “She says she will tell Prince di Lorenzo to arrange it.”

  “Which he will do,” one of the other women said with a smile. “He lives in fear of Simona, although he is twice her weight and so much older.”

  Weight, Callie agreed with. But older? Although she didn’t know his for sure, she would guess the prince was somewhere in his mid-to-late thirties.

  Her glance shot to the center’s director seated at a table across the room. With her snowy hair and lined face, Simona certainly looked to have some years on him.

  Leela followed her glance and said quietly, “She has suffered greatly, our Simona. Although she does not speak of it, it’s said her hair turned white overnight.”

  Callie was still digesting that startling revelation when the subject of their discussion pushed away from her table and gestured for the newest member of her staff to join her. Once in the hall, the director posed a curt question.

  “Are you qualified to conduct trauma therapy?”

  Callie had used a trauma-focused approach with some of the children she’d worked with. Getting them to expose their memories and fears resulting from abuse or other trauma required a delicate touch, however.

  “It’s been a while...”

  The tentative response sent an impatient flicker across the director’s face. A younger face, Callie could see now, than her white hair and the deep grooves creasing her cheeks would indicate.

  “Is that a yes or no?” she asked curtly.

  “Yes.”

  “Bene! I want you to work with Amal. Maybe you can connect with her. God knows none of the rest of us can.”

  “I’ll try my best.”

  “You do that. You do that.”

  * * *

  Callie had to conduct an extensive search for the pregnant woman. She finally found her tucked in a corner of the second-floor arts and crafts room. She was almost completely hidden behind an artificial palm that the center’s Christian residents had draped with handmade stars and silver tinsel. The small crèche under the palm reminded Callie of the purchases she’d made in Naples. She would take them out of their wrapping when she got home, she decided, and set up a little bit of Christmas in her apartment. Kate and Dawn and Tommy would just have to wait for their gifts. But first...

  “Hello, Amal.”

  The quiet greeting startled the other woman. She whipped her head around, her dark eyes frightened, and made an instinctive move to shield the clipboard in her lap. Callie caught just a glimpse of a pencil drawing on the top sheet of the paper before the loose sleeve of Amal’s robe covered it.

  One glimpse was enough. With hardly more than a dozen bold strokes, the woman had masterfully interpreted the clean, fluid lines of Michelangelo’s David.

  “Oh,” Callie breathed. “That’s beautiful.” She gestured in an attempt to overcome their language barrier. “Please, may I see it?”

  Amal’s arm remained firmly positioned over the sketch. The fear had left her eyes, but there was no mistaking the message they now conveyed. Ignoring the back-off signal, Callie did a quick scan of the room. The game table held a pencil and small pad for scorekeeping. She grabbed both.

  “I took a few art classes in school,” she confessed as she dragged a chair over and positioned it next to the stone-faced woman. “Mostly art history, although I do like to draw. Unfortunately I’m not very good.”

  According to Simona, their best guess was that Amal had survived the tragic sinking of a refugee boat from Syria. Callie didn’t know a word of Arabic. But she’d used art therapy with children many times in her previous job and knew it could cross generational barriers. She hoped it would cross language barriers, as well.

  “This is me.” She sketched a fairly decent female figure with longish hair. “This is where I’m from.”

  She added a quick backdrop of Boston’s skyscrapers, although she knew each stroke was a calculated risk. The US and its allies were waging an air war in Syria. Amal’s father or brothers or husband might have fought—might still be fighting—either with or against rebel
forces. Yet everything Callie had been taught, every nugget of experience she’d gained over her years as a counselor, dictated that she lay a foundation of honesty.

  “And this is you.”

  Flipping to a clean page, she stretched the limits of her artistic skills with a quick portrait of a figure wearing a head scarf. Then she held the sketch out to the silent woman at her side.

  “Where are you from?”

  Callie knew she risked alienation by pushing too hard. Possibly total and irrevocable shutdown. Yet the longer Amal hesitated, the harder Callie’s heart hammered. Finally the other woman reached for the pad, but her hand trembled so violently that she snatched it back.

  “It’s okay,” Callie said quietly. “You’re safe here.”

  She knew Amal couldn’t understand her. Knew, too, that platitudes meant little to a woman who’d lost everything. She held her breath as Amal retrieved the pad. Then slowly, so slowly, the other woman sketched a backdrop to the solitary figure.

  Despite the small size of the canvas she had to work with, the layers came together in stark, minimalistic detail. Bombed buildings. Piles of rubble. Children with eyes too large for their skeletal faces. Just as slowly, she added another rendering of Michelangelo’s David. Curly haired. Square jawed. With fierce eyes and a lethal-looking semiautomatic held waist high.

  “Is this...” Callie had to stop, pull in a breath. “Is this your husband?”

  Her question drew no response. The other woman stared down at the sketch for long moments. Then her pencil lashed out. Suddenly. Violently. Slashing from right to left so viciously that the paper shredded and Callie had to grab her wrist to stop the desecration.

  “Amal! It’s okay! You’re safe here. You and your baby. You’re both safe.”