Read Baltimore [3.5] Broken Silence for Free Online Page B

double homicide,’ Daphne said. ‘Do you understand her?’
    Sophie listened again. ‘“She only wanted to see the ponies run.” Does that make sense?’
    Daphne shook her head. ‘Not yet. Heidi, can you ask Joseph to come in here?’
    Tuesday, December 24, 10:30 A.M.
    Joseph hurried into the barn, joined by Sophie’s husband, Philadelphia homicide detective Vito Ciccotelli, who baldly stated that his uber-pregnant wife wasn’t doing anything dangerous.
    Sophie pointed to Angel, who clumsily brushed the pony, tears streaming down her face. ‘Vito, she’s just a baby.’ She turned to Joseph. ‘Tell me what you know.’
    The others brought her up to speed, then held their breath as Sophie and Daphne approached Angel. Sophie began speaking Russian in a low, soothing tone.
    Angel froze. Then she backed away, shaking her head, crying harder. She covered her mouth with her little bandaged hands. Daphne put her arms around the child as she had in the interview room and rocked her while Sophie spoke in that same soothing tone.
    Finally, Angel whispered something back, and Daphne’s eyes shot to Sophie’s.
    ‘She says she can’t tell,’ Sophie translated. ‘That they’ll kill her sister if she tells.’
    ‘ Sestra means sister?’ Daphne asked. ‘No wonder she looked so scared when I told her the pony’s name was Sissy. Can you ask for her name?’
    Sophie translated and Angel closed her eyes, pursed her lips. Sophie added something earnest, and Angel opened her mouth. Again the others held their breath.
    ‘Lana. Svetlana Smirnova,’ she whispered.
    ‘Her family name would be Smirnov,’ Sophie said. She continued, urging on the child in Russian. ‘I’m telling her that you will find her sister and punish the bad people.’
    Daphne lifted Svetlana’s chin and nodded. ‘It’s true.’
    Sophie translated, then the child began to cry again. But she spoke through the tears, the words coming in a torrent, so fast that Sophie had trouble keeping up.
    ‘She says that her mother got sick. They came to the United States to go to the hospital. They went to see the ponies run . . . And to see the sea? Yeah. The sea. The nurse pretended to be nice, but she turned bad. She crashed the car and then . . . then the man came. He . . .’
    Svetlana turned her face into Daphne’s shoulder. She’d gone still again.
    Sophie touched Svetlana’s arm and asked a question. Another torrent of words rushed out, muffled by Daphne’s shoulder. ‘She’s saying that they shot her father with a gun. The man had the gun. Svetlana ran to her father and tried to get him up. She got blood on her hands. Her father told her to hide, so she did. But she could smell fire. She tried to find her way back, to find her father. She had to crawl and it was dark. She was afraid. She found the car but it . . .’
    Svetlana choked, burying her face, and Daphne rocked her a little faster. ‘Oh, Joseph, she’s shaking like a leaf.’
    ‘The car was set on fire,’ Joseph explained in a hushed tone to Sophie and her husband. ‘She was found sitting near it in the snow. It was dark and the firefighters nearly missed her. In her white coat, she blended with the snow bank. Ask why didn’t she talk to us?’
    Sophie asked. ‘She says the bad nurse came to her room. Told her that she had to keep her mouth closed. That she’d kill the baby if she told.’
    ‘I’ll get the surveillance tapes from the hospital,’ Joseph said. ‘Hopefully the cameras got the woman’s face. Does Lana know her parents’ names?’
    Sophie asked, then smiled ruefully at the answer. ‘She says they’re “Mama” and “Papa.”’
    ‘Ask her why her mother wanted to see the ponies,’ Heidi said. ‘And where they were.’
    Svetlana’s shoulders slumped and she shook her head dejectedly when Sophie asked.
    ‘She says the nurse told her mother about the ponies that run on the island, in the sand. The nurse lived there when she was little. They sometimes catch the