“Well,” the lieutenant was saying, “we have foam, Mrs. Johnson. We can use that to get rid of the bees. We’ll go look at that fruit tree and assess the situation. We could also call a beekeeper to come and get them. That way, they wouldn’t be killed.”
“I want them killed!” Mrs. Johnson said, her voice high-pitched with fear. Her arms weren’t long enough to hold all the children who were now fully frightened and watching the firefighters with trepidation.
Cari knew the bees would be gone. They followed the queen, no matter where she flew. Leaning down, she made sure her knees weren’t dusty looking, or sharp-eyed Mrs. Johnson would see the patches on her jeans and ask a lot of questions that Cari didn’t want to answer. She straightened and saw the children dispersing from around the teacher, wandering about, not knowing what to do.
Mrs. Johnson had left them and went to the back door to watch the firefighters as they tramped through the house and out the rear door. It was then that Cari silently slipped back among them, no one having missed her presence under the circumstances.
Just as Cari got comfortable on her little bed in the corner of the nap room, she heard the door open and close, the clomping of heavy boots, the firefighters moving back near the front door and the nap room.
“Well?” Mrs. Johnson demanded. “Did you see them?”
“No, ma’am,” the lieutenant said. “They’re gone.”
“What? No! That’s impossible!” she said, hurrying past them, disappearing as she headed for the rear door.
Cari held her breath for a moment. The bees were gone! Relief made her sag, her small back against the corner of the two walls. She heard the click-clack of Mrs. Johnson’s low-heeled shoes echoing and coming closer and closer.
“They are gone!” she exclaimed to the firefighters. “Where did they go? Are they hanging around? Will they come back?”
“No, ma’am, they’re gone and we don’t know where they flew. That’s a swarm. In the spring, honeybees will swarm if their hive is too crowded. They’re harmless, really. When they’re swarming, they don’t sting anyone. They’re following their queen to a new home, is all.”
“So? They won’t return to harm the children?”
“They would never harm anyone,” the lieutenant said. “Now, it’s safe to let the kids out into the playground.”
“Heck,” one of the other firefighters said, “you might even use this as a teachable moment for the kids, ma’am. Let the children learn about bee swarms and why they happen?”
Mrs. Johnson curled her lip, glaring at the younger man. “Never! This was a dangerous situation to my children! I’m charged with their safety and welfare. I hate insects!”
The lieutenant shrugged and lifted his hand. “Come on,” he told his team, “we’re done here. You and your children are safe now, Mrs. Johnson.”
And so were her bees, Cari thought, staying silent, remaining the shadow that she was. When she got home this afternoon? She’d tell her parents what happened. They’d be proud of her for helping the queen and her worker bees to safety. But she could never tell the teacher what really happened. Not ever. Mrs. Johnson would not be happy, and Cari knew she’d get five minutes of detention staring at a corner if she was found out. Secrets were good.
* * *
When the dream ended, Cari opened her eyes, awake in the darkness of her bedroom in her San Francisco loft. Looking at a digital clock, the red numbers said 3:13 a.m. Ugh. Why did she have such a rich dream life? Most nights, she had happy dreams. Flights of fancy. But tonight? This one was different.
Sitting up in bed, she rubbed her face, pushing back strands of her black hair away from her face. At twenty-nine years old, her life was like a dream come true. She was a beekeeping consultant with an MBA and worked with countries around the world, showing them how to make beekeeping and the honey they made in their hives a commercial venture.
Because the bee populations around the world were nosediving thanks to pesticides, hive collapses, and loss of rural land for the bees to gather pollen from local flowers, they were in a crisis. A global one.
Cari worked for the state of California as their bee expert and was always busy with the farmers from the Imperial Valley, where so many crops grew. The many almond orchards thrived and all were dependent upon bee pollinators. That was where she came in, giving them sound, healthy advice on what beehives need in order to pollinate the crops successfully. No cutting corners, no use of bee-killing pesticides, she tried to get farmers to work with more organic and sustainable ways to grow their crops, as well as to protect the sagging honeybee population.
She saw herself as a Don Quixote tilting at windmills at times, because agriculture wanted to use pesticides. Now there was a global clash on using them, and billions of bees were dying off at such a swift rate, it would take a toll on how many crops would not be pollinated. No pollination? No food. Starvation could occur. Combine that with a horrifying loss of birds—another pollinator—every year, Mother Earth was in a real crisis, thanks to man.
She felt like a frontline warrior trying to help both types to not only survive, but thrive. There were many raptor rehabilitator activists and bird sanctuaries around the world fighting right alongside of her to protect all bird species, just as she was fighting to save bees.
Sighing, she got up, knowing that she’d never go back to sleep.
The phone rang. Frowning, she picked it up.
“Hello?” Who would be calling at this time in the morning?
“This is the sheriff, ma’am. Am I speaking to Ms. Cari Taylor?”
“Yes?” A frown creased her brow as she sat down on the edge of her bed. “Why are you calling me? What’s wrong?”
“Ma’am, your stepbrother, Dirk Bannock, just escaped from the prison. The officials from that prison called us about it. We’ve already contacted your parents, and now we’re letting you know.”
Gasping, Cari shot to her feet. “What? Dirk broke out? He’s on the loose?” Instantly her heart thundered in her chest, and she felt suddenly dizzy, abruptly sitting down, her one hand wrapping into the quilt cover across her bed. Was she still dreaming? This was a nightmare! It couldn’t be true!
Oh, God, if it was?
Dirk had entered her life when her mother married Blake Bannock, a civil engineer. He had a son from his former marriage, Dirk, when he married her mother, Nalani,
Terror ripped through her. She suddenly felt faint from the shock. “B-but, he was in for twenty-five years for murder!”
“Yes, ma’am, we know. We have an all-points bulletin out to all law enforcement, and we’re working with the prison directly to find and apprehend him.”
Pressing her hand to her chest, feeling the pounding of her heart, adrenaline racing through her, she whispered frantically, “But he promised to come after me! He threatened me in open court. He’ll kill me!”
“Yes, ma’am, we’re very well aware of that. We are sending a police unit over to your home. They will be on watch twenty-four hours a day.”
Her throat ached, and she squeezed her eyes shut, hot tears streaming out of them. “H-he said he’d kill me. You have to find him!”
“We’re doing our best.”