These Violent Roots

by Nicole Williams

  I paused in the middle of reaching for the sugar. “You think he feels guilty for her death?”

  “Oh, knowing my son, I’m sure he probably feels responsible for that as well, but I was referring to what happened before her suicide.”

  The word was a sharp knife drawn along the throat of the unsaid. The unspoken.

  “What happened?” I asked softly, stirring more sugar than usual into my tea.

  The skin between Sue’s eyebrows pinched in the same way as her son’s did. “Noah’s never told you what happened that day in the park when Natalie was eleven?”

  I scoured my memory files, no recollection surfacing of some ominous event that took place in a park. “Maybe he told me and I forgot?”

  “It’s not the type of thing anyone would forget. Noah never will. Natalie never did.” Her voice changed, the implication in her words chilling. “Natalie was molested—raped—inside the restroom at the park just down the street.”

  My cup clattered against the saucer. I blinked into the dark contents, struggling to grasp the knowledge she’d given me. “Noah never told me . . . he never even hinted at . . .”

  “He held himself responsible for what happened to Natalie. God knows he still does.” Sue took a sip of her tea, eyes flooded with shadows of the past. “He was meeting some friends at the park to play basketball and Natalie begged him to let her come too. I was busy unloading groceries and trying to get dinner ready after work and too distracted to consider suggesting she help me peel the potatoes or whip up some brownies for dessert. He caved, as usual, and let her tag along. It wasn’t the first time she’d made a third-wheel of herself. We’d all been to that park hundreds of times leading up to that afternoon. Hundreds.”

  My throat burned when I noticed the shine her eyes took on, the struggle it was to keep herself composed.

  “Natalie needed to go to the bathroom, and Noah gave her permission to go by herself—the boys were playing ball less than a hundred feet away. Noah usually waited outside the restroom for her, but she was at an age where she was pushing for more independence and Noah was lured into the same illusion of safety we all were.”

  Sue absently added a spoonful of sugar to her tea, then another a moment later. As long as I’d known her, I’d never once seen her add sweetener to her drinks.

  “Ten minutes went by, maybe fifteen, before Noah realized Natalie wasn’t back from the restroom. It was quiet that day, only he and his friends and a couple of moms pushing strollers around the park, so he shoved right into the women’s side of the bathrooms.” When her teacup clattered against the saucer, she let go of the handle. I fought the bile rising up my throat. “He walked in on . . . he saw what that man was doing . . .”

  My hands splayed along the countertop as a sensation of spinning overwhelmed me.

  “Noah apparently flew into a rage, ripping the man off of her and beating him within an inch of his life before the attacker managed to escape. When the two of them showed up on my doorstep, Noah was covered in blood, carrying Natalie, his jacket draped around her. She wasn’t crying. Her eyes weren’t even vacant like his—they were dead.” Sue managed another sip of her tea before dumping the rest down the drain. “My golden ray of sunshine never shown another glimmer of light after that day, and my brooding boy never forgave himself for what happened. Their physical bodies endured, but their souls were gone. I lost both of my children in one afternoon.”

  I pushed my tea aside as well. “God, Sue. I can’t imagine . . .”

  “No one can. No one should.” She plucked a tissue from the box at the end of the counter, folding it in her hands.

  “Did they catch him?” I whispered.

  “Eventually. Years later.” Her tone sharpened. “After he molested and raped three other young girls.”

  We shared a long exhale that echoed hopelessness.

  “Natalie couldn’t remember so much as the color of the man’s hair following the attack. She had what the psychiatrists labeled disassociative trauma. Basically, she’d experienced such a severe shock, the only way for her brain to function was to block it out.”

  “I see that a lot in similar cases I’ve worked.”

  “Noah managed to put together a more definitive description for a sketch artist, but it never led to any plausible suspects or arrests.” Sue tucked the tissue into the pocket of her slacks and got back to wiping at the counter. “When the man was arrested and charged with the rapes of three girls a decade later, Natalie saw him on the news and everything came rushing back. She regressed, waking up screaming from nightmares, sleeping with all of the lights on, refusing to go out in public for weeks at a time. It was as if the rape had happened all over again a decade later, but this time, she never managed to put any of the pieces back together. She killed herself on the same day she’d been raped, inside the same restroom at the park a few blocks away. The only thing her note read was that she’d died a long time ago, but now she was finally at peace.”

  The lump in my throat was excruciating. I now understood why such a talented, beautiful girl had carried so much sadness.

  “I’m sorry you’re hearing this from me instead of Noah. I’m sure he had his reasons for keeping what happened to Natalie a secret from you.” Sue flashed me a sympathetic smile.

  “It’s kind of a relief to know. Why Natalie was the way she was—why Noah is the way he is. It’s easier to understand when you have the whole picture.” I wet my lips. “I’m sorry, Sue. So damn sorry.”

  “We’ve all paid for that afternoon, for what that man did. The innocent suffer, and the guilty go free.”

  “Not all of them go free. I prosecute and put away plenty of men like the one who hurt Natalie,” I replied.

  “And how many of them go free? How many of them serve sentences anywhere close to fitting the lifetime sentence they forced upon their victims?” Sue’s gentle voice quivered, her effect remaining flat.

  I nodded. “Too many.”

  “This monster had gotten out on good behavior from a previous molestation charge days before he attacked Natalie. He should have been in prison. Good behavior? What about the behavior he exhibited that wound him up in prison? What about the behavior they revert back to when they’re released?” She touched the thin gold chain around her neck, where an oval locket hung, worrying at the chain as though it were an old friend. “We’ve put man on the moon and cloned a mammal and we still can’t figure out a way to protect our children.”

  Her words hit me harder than I expected, and I found myself desperate for a distraction.

  “You want to help me water the garden?” Sue sniffed as she moved toward the slider leading out back. “I was in the middle of it when you arrived, and my busy bone is throbbing with all of this standing still.”

  I set down my cup and followed her. “You’re not the only one who keeps busy to stay distracted.”

  She plopped a giant sunhat on her head and slid into a pair of gardening shoes, waiting for me at the slider.

  “You must have been surprised when you found out what career field Noah decided to go into,” I said, exchanging my flats for the extra pair of lime green garden shoes she set aside for me. We walked outside together.

  “I was,” she replied, adjusting the dial on the hose nozzle so it was a gentle mist. “Then I realized it was his way of coping with what happened to Natalie. His father coped by drinking, me with my endless projects, and Noah by trying to fix the type of person who killed his sister.”

  Sue’s back was to me, but she must have anticipated the questioning patina my face took on.

  “I didn’t use the wrong word,” she continued. “That man killed my daughter. His hands might not have held the knife that cut open her wrists, but he was the instrument of her demise. He destroyed her when he forced himself on that beautiful child.”

  I grabbed a full watering can situated on the patio and sprinkled the potted plants while she started with the beds.

  “Noah pulled away after
Natalie’s rape.” Sue misted a row of rose bushes, smoothing the dying flowers instead of plucking them off. “From me, his father, his friends, everyone.”

  “Natalie?” I asked.

  The sprinkle of water connecting with flowers was the only sound for a while, then Sue exhaled. “Natalie drifted away from us all first.”

  She adjusted the dial to fill my watering can when it was empty. Sue’s backyard rivaled any master gardener’s; she grew everything from herbs and vegetables to flowers and greenery I couldn’t name a quarter of. Even at the end of the growing season, her garden was more vibrant than most at the peak of summer.

  “When Noah and you got married, I hoped he was making a turn.” Sue curved back to her roses when the can was full, one brow lifting at me. “But I’ve spent enough time around you two to realize Noah still keeps a large part of him closed off from everyone. He’s afraid.”

  My chest squeezed, contemplating the torment Noah had gone through and felt compelled to keep hidden from me. His wife. Companion. Partner. The very person who should be counted upon to share his burdens.

  “Afraid of what?” I asked, staring at the pot of dahlias, wondering how something so beautiful could survive the malevolence that saturated the air.

  Sue turned down the fence, moving on to her next section of flora. “Failing someone else he loves.”

  My throat burned. “You think that’s why he’s so distant?”

  Sue crouched to tend to the next plant down the line. “I know it is. You see, one evil act creates a snowball effect, not content with the destruction it caused in that single moment. One seed of wrong takes root, sets it lines deep, and like a noxious weed, spreads its disease. Fifteen minutes in a public restroom has tainted the lives—ruined some of those lives—of innumerable souls.”

  I watched Sue fussing over her beloved plants that were on the cusp of dormancy and growth, feeling a newfound respect and understanding for this woman I’d labeled as cold and removed. It was as much a coping mechanism as it was a side effect of experiencing both of your children slipping away in their own ways.

  It wasn’t until she gently brushed her fingers across a white flower that I realized what kind of plant she was crouched in front of.

  “Clematis.” The word exploded breathlessly from my mouth as I took in the plant with wide eyes.

  “You know it?” she asked, moving from one bloom to the next, cupping each one as though it were a treasured possession.

  “Recently acquainted with it.” I kneeled beside her, examining the plant. It was three times the size of the one I’d seen at the Price household. “Let me guess, you received it as a gift shortly after the man who attacked Natalie died?”

  Her head turned my direction, surprise in her eyes. “How did you know that? It came the day after Robert Creeden died.”

  The watering can dropped from my hand. “Robert Creeden?” My mind reeled. Natalie Wolff’s name hadn’t been on the victim list associated with his record. “He’s the man who raped Natalie?”

  Sue’s posture stiffened, her infinitesimal nod answering my question.

  “When Natalie recognized him on television, she didn’t come forward because of the statute of limitations,” I said, more to myself than Sue as I connected dots I hadn’t known existed until moments ago.

  “She wouldn’t have come forward, regardless. As it is with most victims who are consumed by so much guilt and shame they forget their own self-worth.” Sue took a breath, her back trembling as she did. “Victims don’t speak up because, more often than not, they aren’t believed. They’re told their abuse is a fabrication, an elaboration, or a manifestation stemming from inappropriate behavior. Natalie was raped once by an evil man. She couldn’t stand the idea of another rape at the hands of an immoral system.”

  As Sue went back to preening a handful of dead leaves, brushing away a couple of dandelion seeds, my mind reeled with too many questions and too few answers. Why wouldn’t Noah have told me Natalie was raped by the same man I’d been assigned to investigate? Why hadn’t he told me about her assault in the first place?

  As the stirrings of the first panic attack I’d felt in weeks manifested, I forced my mind to make a detour. I let myself feel the oxygen fill my lungs before asking my next question. “Do you have any idea who might have left the plant for you?”

  “Of course I do.” The way she said it, the knowing tone, made my blood chill before she finished her thought. “Noah gave it to me.”

  The world spun one quick revolution, causing me to teeter from where I kneeled beside the gift my husband had given his mother following the death of the man who’d eviscerated his sister.

  A gift.

  A plant.

  A damning piece of evidence.

  His name tumbled from my lips, coated with both doubt and knowing.

  “He said it was for Natalie,” Sue continued, oblivious to my entire world imploding beside her. “So whenever I looked at it, I’d be reminded of her—the good memories.”

  Bracing my hands against the ground, I made sure I was steady before rising. “Sue, I’ve got to go.” My head swam with dizziness when I was upright, but the sensation passed.

  “Grace, are you all right?” Sue’s face flashed with concern when she glanced at me. “You’re white as these flowers.”

  “I’m fine.” I forced a smile to the surface, backing away a few steps.

  She rose, letting the hose hang from her side. For a moment, I caught a fleeting flicker of the concern in her eyes I sometimes found in Noah’s. The brand that was tinted with pain.

  “After Natalie and Noah, I know when someone’s hiding behind that kind of assurance.” Sue approached me. “Is there anything I can do to help?”

  My heart pounded against my ribcage, feeling as though it were capable of cracking bone. “You already have. But I’ve got to get home now.”

  “I thought you had families you were meeting with today.”

  “I did. I do.” I slid out of the gardening shoes when I reached the patio and threw on my flats, knowing my flight didn’t leave for another six hours. “I just . . . I don’t know what to do right now.”

  Sue stopped following me, clearly well versed in dealing with erratic behavior. “I’ll say the same thing to you I used to tell my children when they weren’t sure what to do.” She stared at the sky, smiling as though she were seeing an old friend. “Consider what is right and wrong before you act. That usually clears up the fog so you can find your way again.”

  “Goodbye, Sue,” was all I could say before rushing through her slider, unable to stand in front of her another second with the revelation now in my possession. She’d lost one child. How could I confess she might lose another?

  I’d never been so thankful for paying the extra money to have a car wait. As soon as I crawled into the back seat, I instructed the driver to head back to the airport. Before we’d left the curb, I was already calling my next meeting to let them know I’d have to cancel. The interviews, the evidence, the endless files of information I’d spent sleepless nights scouring had all come to an abrupt head. I’d gone from no suspects to one in the span of a half hour conversation with my mother-in-law.

  I’d been too close to see it. Too comfortable to recognize the missing pieces I’d been seeking were sleeping beside me every night.

  Twenty-Five

  Everything was dark when I arrived home.

  The sky, the streets, the front porch—even the air swelled with darkness.

  I’d been unable to secure an earlier flight home, so I’d spent six hours in the Lincoln airport, steeping in the revelation I’d been plunged into. Doubt infiltrated every thought, despair tinting each one, anger weaving them all together.

  The attorney in me placated my disbelief by assuring that there wasn’t enough evidence to ascertain that Noah was, beyond a shadow of a doubt, the Huntsman. All I had were a couple of plants growing in the gardens of two victims’ families—circumstantial at best—
and a piece of dark history from Noah’s youth.

  As far as I knew, I was the only one who’d made the white clematis connection between the victims’ families. Despite confirming with the other families, I knew what I’d discover if I asked a simple question about a resilient plant.

  It was all that would be simple if I burrowed deeper into this lead.

  Parking the SUV on the street instead of in the garage, I made my way inside the home I’d shared with a stranger all this time, not knowing what I would say to him.

  How would I confront my husband with the accusation that he was the killer—the Huntsman? With accusation? Betrayal? Contempt?

  Would I say anything at all, or would I, as I had on countless nights preceding this one, climb into bed beside him and put the unsaid to rest at the same time?

  My mind was a cluster of unknown as I unlocked the front door and stepped inside the dark space. It was just past midnight, and I had no idea if Noah was home or still at work or engaged in one of his favorite hobbies—I supposed I could add killing pedophiles to his list of after-work activities.

  God, what a fool I’d been. My husband had been killing men for over a decade and I hadn’t so much as suspected him capable of jaywalking.

  I’d ignored his texts and calls that had started coming in earlier this evening. We usually shot off a message to each other when flying to let the other know flight numbers, arrival times, the standard information one shared with a spouse.

  We shared inconsequential details and segments of ourselves, hiding our true essence and deeper pieces—a hallmark of a relationship that lacked trust.

  Every light in the house was off. Even the usual slice of light cutting beneath Andee’s bedroom door was out. Opening her door noiselessly, I checked to make sure she was asleep. Her even breaths and her long, pale arms twisted around her pillow confirmed it.

  After sealing her safely inside, I didn’t make a sound as I prowled down the hallway, craning my neck to peek inside our bedroom. The bed was still made, Noah’s nightstand absent of his wallet and keys.