by Jack Bunker
“Bullshit.”
“It’s true!” She pulls herself up and crushes her lips into mine as if lust will slap some faith into me.
I shove her back down onto the bed. “What else did you lie about?”
Her eyes flit away for a microsecond before staring back at me. If she were under interrogation, that would be a tell. It’s so quiet I think I hear her heart pounding. Or maybe mine. I can smell the salty tears on her cheeks. She finally takes a deep breath, girding herself for something tough. I hope it’s something resembling the truth, but I don’t expect it.
“I want to trust you, Nob, you’ve got to believe that. But trust scares the shit out of me. I can’t take getting burned again.”
She grabs me around the waist and hugs me there. I don’t push her away.
“You can trust me,” I say. At this point I’m thinking she doesn’t have much choice, but I don’t say so. Her timing seems suspiciously convenient. “Tell me what you’re hiding.”
Her eyes search mine, looking for some sign. Then resignation wins out. “Karl didn’t drug Ginger. And he didn’t turn on the gas.”
“Who did?”
“She did it herself.”
This is the last thing I expect to hear. “That’s not what the cops think.”
“She left a suicide note. I can show it to you.”
I open my mouth but nothing comes out, like my brain is flashing tilt. She hangs her head and takes a deep breath. Then she gets up and walks out.
I couldn’t have been more surprised if she’d told me she’d killed Ginger herself. The police already ruled suicide out because of the fingerprints, or lack thereof. There was no explanation for the drugs—no bottle, no baggie, no paper packet, not even a tissue with residue. And there was no note. Until now.
Sophia comes back with a piece of paper in her hand. She hands it to me, but I motion for her to drop it on the bed. If it’s got any prints besides Sophia’s, I don’t want to compromise them.
It’s a piece of bone-colored stationery. “Ginger Strain” is embossed across the top in dark plum, and across the bottom, her address. The handwriting has that same calligraphic style I noticed when I browsed through Ginger’s address book. If this isn’t Ginger’s writing, it’s an amazing facsimile. The message is short and simple.
Dr. Karl treats me like shit, and he knows me better than anyone. So what’s the point?
“Where did you get this?” I ask.
“I went back over there later that night, after Karl fell asleep. I was going to confront her, but she didn’t answer the bell. I snooped around and found the back door unlocked. She was already dead, still holding the pen. That was under her hand.”
I expect her to continue but she doesn’t. I look up from the suicide note. She’s staring vacantly into space.
“And?” My voice snaps with impatience, kicking her back on track.
“I knew exactly what she meant. I felt her pain. And I realized I couldn’t keep stuffing my own pain anymore. It was like a fog lifting. I looked at Ginger’s body, and I saw my own lying there. We were interchangeable. It became so clear. The charade was over. I couldn’t keep pretending that Karl’s betrayal wasn’t killing me inside. Ginger died because of him, and I knew that his love for me, our whole relationship, was a lie. My therapy was just another sexual conquest for him, another exercise in dominance. He made me think I was sexy, I was loved, I was willing. But the truth is he raped me. Just like he raped Ginger. Only she found a way to end the pain once and for all.”
She stares out the window as if watching a funeral pyre. “I knew he had to be stopped, but I didn’t know how. I sat there with her body for…I don’t know. It seemed like hours. Could have been five minutes for all I know. And then it just”—she gestures with her hand as a fairy might wave a magic wand—“came to me. One of those ‘ah-ha’ moments.”
She stands and grabs one of my shirts from on top of the laundry hamper. She puts it on to warm herself. I take a tissue and move Ginger’s note to my nightstand where it will be safer. Sophia comes back to bed.
“I took her pill bottle and wiped her prints off her cup so the police would think someone tried to fake her suicide. Then I turned the gas back on, locked the door, and went home.”
“Why go back the next day to find the body?”
“I knew my relationship with Karl would make them wonder what I was doing there, raise difficult questions.”
“You went back just to implicate Karl?”
“Yes.”
“Did you drug your own food, too? So we’d all think he was trying to kill you?”
“He did kill me, Nob. Just like he killed Ginger. He killed us with betrayal. He sucked us dry, he bled us out, he emptied us. He took what little life our grandfather left behind, and he crushed it. God only knows how many other women he did it to.”
Now that the truth is out, she looks deflated, vulnerable. An abandoned child in an adult costume.
“I’m not proud of what I did. And I’m not happy about it either. I still loved him, no matter how much I hated him. But I knew he’d just keep on destroying other women’s lives if someone didn’t do something about it, and I didn’t see anyone else stepping up.”
Her eyes are all the more hypnotic in her sadness. She sits back and hugs herself, and I know she wants to be held; I just don’t know if I can do it and stay clear-headed.
“You were a cop, Nob. With my mental history, you know no court would ever take my word against his about what happened in those sessions, at least not beyond a reasonable doubt. He would have walked away scot-free. What would you have done?”
“I probably would have confronted him and killed him with my bare hands,” I say. “But at least that would have been a crime of passion.”
“Does it really make a difference?”
“Hell yes, it makes a difference. You didn’t kill him in a rage, Sophia. You orchestrated it step by step. You staged Ginger’s suicide to frame him for murder. You faked your own poisoning to lay the groundwork for an alibi. Then you shot him and rigged it to look like self-defense.”
Her eyes tear again. “If I had just confronted him, I’d probably be the one who got killed. Who would stop him then?”
I try to balance what she did against why she did it, but the scale keeps bouncing. I can’t begin to imagine the depth and breadth of the suffering that drove her to do it. The hurt and betrayal of her grandfather’s incestuous pedophilia, the turmoil of her parents’ explosive separation, the shock of her mother’s murder, the long estrangement from her only sibling, the treachery of Karl’s seduction, the agony of his subsequent philandering, the blow of discovering her sister’s corpse, and finally the chaos and guilt surrounding Karl’s shooting. With all she’s been through, it’s little wonder that the trauma of being bound and kidnapped had such little impact. But does any of that give me the right to withhold what I know from the police?
“I’m not sorry I did it,” she says. “I’m just sorry I lied to you.”
I pull her close enough to feel her heart racing. She’s not crying anymore. Maybe she’s all out. Or maybe the truth has set her free. I just know that I ache for her.
“It feels strange to finally have someone to trust,” she says. “It feels good.”
She turns her face to mine, and I see her lips quiver again. I want to quiet them with my own, but I’m afraid to. Afraid it’ll push me into a decision I’m not ready to make.
“Karl always told me I had to get those self-defeating demons out of my head,” she says. “I think they’re finally gone.”
That’s when the doorbell rings.
SEVENTY-THREE
I could really use my gun right now as I make my way to the door. I turn to find Sophia behind me, her eyes wide with fear. My first thought is that Cogswell and his boys have come back, though I doubt they’d use the bell. I motion for Sophia to take a seat on the sofa and be quiet, then head into the hall to peek through the peephole. To my su
rprise, it’s a cop.
He’s about my height but probably half my weight. His LAPD uniform drapes off his shoulders like it was on a coat hanger. If there’s a body in there, it doesn’t make much of an impression. He’s Latino, name-tagged Ramirez.
“Sorry to bother you at this time of night, sir, but we’ve had a report of shots fired in the neighborhood. Have you seen or heard anything unusual?”
“No. Nothing. You’d think I would have heard a gunshot.”
“It may not have happened today. Your neighbor found a bullet lodged in his refrigerator door.”
The shot that went off accidentally when Cogswell and I went over my railing.
“Looks like it came through his window screen,” he says, “from this general direction. No one seems to have heard it, and he was away for a few days, so we don’t know when it was fired. Have you heard or seen anything?”
If I tell the truth, I’ll have to implicate Vlad, which would be not only suicidal, but ungrateful. I could say that my own gun went off while I was cleaning it, but they’ll want to see it, and I can’t produce it. I could just deny any knowledge, but if the bullet pierced my neighbor’s screen, the lab may be able to nail the trajectory and figure out that the bullet came from my deck. There’s no good answer to the question.
I make a face like I’m having cramps. “Can you talk to some other neighbor and come back later?” I clench my teeth. “I’ve had the trots all night. I’ve got to get to the pot.”
He backs away like I’ve got TNT strapped to my chest. “Sure, mister. No problem.”
I close the door fast.
Sophia comes out of the living room. She heard the whole exchange. She puts her arms around my neck.
“You didn’t turn me in,” she says. She kisses me, her tongue hungry for mine. I can’t help but savor the pleasure for a moment before rejoining the real world.
“I’ve got to call Gloria.” I pull my cell from my pocket. Panic twists Sophia’s brow as I hit Gloria’s speed dial.
“What are you going to tell her?”
“Ramirez is going to come back sooner or later. I’d much rather talk to someone I know and trust.”
I reach Gloria in Glendale, where she’s investigating the severed head of a Salvadoran gangbanger that was found in a Dumpster behind an Armenian grocery on Pacific. She says she’s just winding up there. An hour later I hear her pull up outside. I expect her to knock, but when she doesn’t, I peek through the curtains and see her on the street talking to Ramirez and another uniform.
When she finally comes down the steps, I open the door before she can knock.
“Officer Ramirez is very concerned about your bowels,” she says.
“I’ve had a miraculous recovery.”
She walks past me into the living room where Sophia sits sipping a Pernod and soda. I have no idea how Pernod snuck into my liquor supply, but that’s where she found it.
“Drink?” I ask Gloria.
“I’m on duty. So why do you need a homicide detective for a property crime?”
“The shot was fired from my deck.”
“Why didn’t you tell Officer Ramirez?”
“I had to go to the pot.”
She gives me one of those looks you give to a child who denies eating the cookie through chocolate-covered lips.
“It’s a delicate situation,” I add.
I grab a glass. She’s on duty but I’m not, even if it’s four o’clock in the morning. I don’t want to take the time to get ice, so I pour myself a snort of the Glenlivet neat. Nothing like an unblended Scotch in the early hours to focus the mind.
“I wasn’t sure Ramirez and company would be up to it,” I continue.
“I’m listening.”
I grab another glass and pour a shot for Gloria. “On duty” means she won’t ask for a drink, but if it’s in front of her, she won’t waste it. The woman’s got a unique take on ethics; what can I say?
“It was Cogswell.” Her interest perks up. “The gunshot was an accident.”
“Accident?”
I hand her the unblended. She takes it without comment but thanks me with that coy curl of her lip.
“He was showing me his gun. I accidentally tripped and fell into him. It went off.”
Clearly skeptical, Gloria looks to Sophia, who sits stock-still, eyes glued to me.
“Why make me drive over here to lie to me?” asks Gloria. “You could have just as easily lied to Ramirez.”
“If Cogswell finds out I told the police, he’ll send his thugs back, and the next shot won’t be accidental.”
“Your friends shot a Sub-Zero, Nob. If we were in Beverly Hills that’d be a capital offense.”
“I know what you’re thinking, but you’re wrong. You’re thinking you can’t let this slide because it’s tied to Ginger’s murder. But the gunshot had nothing to do with that.”
“And you know this how?” Her eyes narrow along with her focus, her bullshit detector on full blast.
I hear Sophia take a sharp breath behind me. I don’t hear her exhale. I’ve hit the moment of truth, and she’s scared that I’ll tell Gloria that she tampered with the scene. I know Sam Spade would let the broad swing for it, but this is murkier than that. I think of the pain Nathaniel inflicted on Sophia. I think of the pain Karl inflicted on Sophia. Am I going to be the next to betray her? The only alternative is to turn my back, and that strategy hasn’t worked out very well for me in the past.
“Ginger committed suicide,” I say. “She left a note.” It hurts to see the trust drain from Sophia’s eyes.
Gloria bursts out laughing. I’m not sure what kind of reaction I was expecting, but this wasn’t it.
Sophia lets out a hysteria-tinged snicker. “What are you talking about, Nob?” Then to Gloria, “He doesn’t know what he’s saying.”
“That’s not unusual,” says Gloria.
Sophia turns back to me. “I was just kidding about the note. You know that, right?”
Gloria looks to me for an explanation.
“I can show you the note,” I tell her. “I’m sorry, Sophia, but you dealt the cards. The hand’s got to be played.”
Sophia’s green-gold Lana eyes turn as cold as a reptile’s. “I trusted you.”
“A lot of people trust me. Because I don’t tell lies.” Which is a lie, in and of itself.
SEVENTY-FOUR
The sun is just rising as I throw some beans in the grinder.
Gloria slips into some latex gloves before taking the suicide note out of the ziplock bag I’d put it in for safekeeping. She holds it obliquely to the light to see if there are any visible stains or prints. The lab will find latent prints with ninhydrin or superglue fumes, but beyond Ginger’s and Sophia’s, I doubt they’ll find any surprises.
I made Sophia tell Gloria what happened at Ginger’s that night. Now Sophia leans back against the kitchen wall, arms crossed dejectedly, eyeing me like a battered wife watching her husband guzzle down the bottle of Wild Turkey.
Gloria slips the note back into the bag and lays it on the table.
“This paints a whole new portrait of Karl’s murder,” she says.
“It doesn’t have to,” I say.
“What are you suggesting? I should let her go because you think her ass is hot?” Her gaze swings at Sophia like a tire iron. Sophia reacts like she’s been smacked.
“I’m just saying she tampered with evidence relating to Ginger’s suicide,” I say. “That doesn’t necessarily have a bearing on Karl’s death.”
“Sophia alleged he tried to kill her to cover up Ginger’s murder,” says Gloria. “If Ginger wasn’t murdered, Sophia’s claim of self-defense sort of loses its oomph, don’t you think?”
I think about the dust impression from the gun, but I keep it to myself. The police had their shot at the house. If they didn’t find it, less power to ’em. Besides, with no chain of custody, I doubt it would be admissible anyway.
I pour the grounds into the coffee
machine. “Have a cuppa, hear me out before you do anything precipitous.”
“Like making an arrest?”
Gloria’s thoughts are running parallel to mine, she just doesn’t know it yet.
“Do you think the public would be any safer if Sophia was locked up?”
Gloria doesn’t bother to answer. I pour her a cup of coffee and set it on the table then lift the bagged note and put it on the counter where it can’t get spilled on.
“No matter what you think, you’ll never make a murder case stick,” I continue. “But even if you could, justice would get screwed.”
“Is that so?” She’s playing hard to get.
“I don’t think Karl deserved to die for his sins, but I don’t think he deserved much better than that.”
“I should let her loose because she killed a jerk?”
“Karl’s is not the only corpse here, Gloria. Sophia shot him; there’s no disputing that. But no matter what happened that day, she’d already served a sentence before she even committed a crime. Will justice be done if she’s punished twice? Last I heard, double jeopardy is unconstitutional.”
“That’s absurd,” says Gloria. Even Sophia looks dubious.
“It’s relative. Karl raped Ginger just like he did Sophia, and Ginger killed herself over it. The man was her therapist. What if he drove her to suicide to cover up his own crimes? Wouldn’t that be murder? He’s hardly an innocent here. But even then, he didn’t start it all. Nathaniel Strain is guilty of that. He’s the reason Sophia and Ginger were in therapy in the first place. He’s the reason they were susceptible to Karl’s abuse. He’s the reason Ginger was neurotic enough to kill herself. And he’s the reason Sophia was angry enough to pull the trigger.”
“You’re really reaching,” says Gloria.
“Nathaniel Strain is the root of all evil here. He raped his own daughter when she was thirteen. He raped his own granddaughters when they turned the same age, and when Lana found out, he killed her to shut her up.”
“You can’t prove that, Nob.”
“You know it’s true. The man’s a multiple incest aggressor and a murderer, and he’s free as a bird. You going to let him get away with it?”