by J C Paulson
Unless he had been there.
She patted her lips with a napkin.
“If you’ll excuse me for a moment, I need to use the washroom. Be right back,” she said, as lightly as she could manage.
Suzanne took her purse, and slowly walked away toward the bathroom and out the front door.
She frantically searched for her phone, which she had indeed turned off, and fumbled to turn it back on. She had to call the police.
Come on, come on, she yelled mentally at her phone. And then Dom was at the door, and right behind her. A few feet away.
Suzanne took off, running down the road leading to the lake, where she hoped trees and brush would hide her until she could reach someone on the phone. Too late to turn back to the restaurant. How could I be so stupid? she asked herself. Quelle idiote. She thought she was being so clever with the washroom excuse. He had clearly realized his mistake the moment he said it.
She heard his heavy breathing, his running footsteps, and knew Dom was right behind her. In her heels, she couldn’t outrun him, so she kicked them off; but the gravel ripped her feet. They were bloody and torn in seconds.
Terror fuelled Suzanne’s legs and lungs. Then she saw a way out: not a cabin, but a house on her right, and she headed for it. Knocking madly at the door, she realized with a sinking heart no one was home, and she was making a lot of noise which Dom would certainly hear.
She dashed off the porch, turned right toward a clump of bushes, and hit what felt like a wall. Delacroix had come around the corner. He caught her around the middle, knocking the wind out of her, and tore the phone out of her hand, throwing it far from reach.
“What did you tell them?” he hissed in her ear. “What?” he insisted, grabbing her mane of hair and pulling her head back.
“Nothing,” said Suzanne. “I didn’t know. Until right now.”
“You didn’t see anything?”
“No.”
“You did. You saw me in the back yard. I know you did. You must have. You’re lying. I heard you banging on the door. You called the police. They were there that night. Don’t fucking lie to me.”
Suzanne stopped talking. She had to think. Fast.
*****
Two cruisers screamed up to the restaurant and the officers surged inside. There was no sign of Suzanne or of Delacroix.
“Was there a couple here, a little while ago?” asked Adam. “Dark, petite woman and dark man, slender, tall?”
“Yes, sir,” said the wide-eyed maitre’d. “They ordered, had some wine and salad, and suddenly left.”
“Did you see which way they went?”
“No, I’m sorry. I wasn’t watching them. Their car is still here, though. I thought perhaps they might come back.”
“Thanks.”
Adam raced back to the cruiser and got on the radio. “They’re here. Somewhere lakeside of the Hole in the Wall restaurant. Get out here.”
Before Adam could put the radio back in its slot, he saw a very familiar car drive by, with a beautiful redhead and an enormous black dog inside. It was headed for the lake.
*****
Delacroix dragged Suzanne down toward the water, spewing fury.
“Fucking bitch. You should never have called the cops. You wouldn’t be here now. You should never have married that fucking bastard. I’m going to show you. You’re going to see what that was like. I’m going to fucking kill you. Fuck you. Kill you.”
Suzanne realized he was insane with anger; he wasn’t making any sense. Which fucking bastard should she not have married? All she could do was fight back, as well as she could.
He dragged her, a hand twisted in her hair, an arm around her neck, backward to the water’s edge. Suzanne couldn’t kick him, and could barely breathe, but she managed to reach up and over her head to claw his cheek. He screamed, let go of her hair and hit her, hard.
It was enough, a second of furious inattention. Suzanne spun away, and started running again — until he caught up with her, tripped her, and sent her sprawling. He yanked her toward the water again and forced her face into the lake.
This is it, thought Suzanne, even as she struggled. I’m going to drown.
But he pulled her face out of the water, dragged her back to the shore and began to tear at her clothing. He ripped her blouse, pushed up her skirt. With what was left of her breath, she screamed — until Delacroix’s hands closed around her throat.
The scream reached Adam’s ears. He had sent James and Lorne in other directions, and was jogging down the road, looking everywhere; now he started to run. A moment later, he came through the trees to see Delacroix straddling Suzanne’s pelvis.
“Delacroix!” he boomed. “Hold it right there or I swear to God I will shoot you.”
In a flash, Delacroix stood up, dragging Suzanne with him and pulling a handgun out of the back of his belt. He trained the weapon on Suzanne’s temple.
“Welcome to our party, Detective. What do you want to do now?”
“You’re going to drop the gun, Nick. Now.”
“No. I don’t think so.”
“None of this is Suzanne’s fault. We have you on evidence. We have eight cops surrounding you. Give it up. No one has to die here.”
A car skittered on the gravel, slid across the grass. Grace had found them.
“Who the fuck cares if we die? If she dies, if I die? Or maybe your girlfriend?” Delacroix gave Grace an obscene stare as she got out of the car. “Not my type. Happy to shoot her, though. Or, say, you?”
Hell, thought Adam. Suicide by cop? God help me. In the same instant, he realized Grace was heading for Suzanne and the killer.
“Grace! Stop! Get back. He’s armed, for God’s sake. Grace!” Adam shouted.
Grace turned to him, eyes black with fear. She turned and opened the passenger door; Bruno bounded out and headed straight for Delacroix, murder in his eyes.
When he reached the man who held his person captive, he lunged and sunk his teeth into his leg. Delacroix didn’t react. For a moment, it was as if he felt nothing. He lowered the gun from Suzanne’s head and shot Bruno. The huge dog fell to ground with a thump, whimpering. Then he was silent.
Suzanne did not scream. A new jolt of adrenalin crackled through her veins, carrying fury instead of fear to her brain. In a split second, she elbowed Delacroix in the stomach and wrestled the gun from his still-lowered hand. Spinning around and away from him, she held the firearm with both hands and trained it on Delacroix’s forehead.
“You fucking bastard,” she said, in a low, menacing tone. “You killed Sherry. You killed her, you killed her dog, and God knows how many other women. You were going to kill me, and you killed Bruno. I want to know why. Talk. Or I will shoot you.”
Adam wondered if, in Delacroix’s mind, being shot by a woman was different from being shot by a cop. Would her threat carry some weight? But he didn’t say anything. He just stood there, snarling.
“Suzanne,” Adam said, in as even a voice as he could muster. “Don’t do it. We’ve got him. Don’t do it. You don’t want to go to jail over this sick fucker. Please, Suzanne.”
“No. I’m going to shoot him if he doesn’t confess right now. Maybe I’ll shoot him anyway. For revenge.”
Adam spied Lorne Fisher creeping along the shore behind Delacroix and Suzanne. He had found them, had managed to come around from behind. Thank God. Did she see him?
Keep her talking.
“We have enough evidence, Suzanne. We’ve got him. I swear to you. Please put down the . . .”
He didn’t get the last word out. Lorne pounced out of the brush and in a second was all over Delacroix, pushing him down, grabbing his arms and pulling them behind him. Adam closed in on Suzanne, and held out his hand for the gun.
“I swear, Suzanne,” he said. “We will avenge you, and the other women. Please.”
Suzanne stared at Lorne holding Delacroix for several seconds, then dropped her arms and handed Adam the firearm before crashing to her knee
s.
A second later, Lorne pushed Delacroix’s face into the sand as Adam cuffed him. Grace dove toward her friend, touching her bruised face and hugging her. Suzanne, her body turned to stone by shock, was weeping and calling Bruno’s name in a one-word litany.
Grace, by now shaking so hard she couldn’t walk either, crawled over to Bruno and saw he was breathing. The bullet had gone into his hindquarters, and he was bleeding; but he was, so far, all right.
“He’s breathing, Suzanne,” Grace called to her. “He’s alive.”
Suzanne collapsed, and Lorne Fisher, having given custody of the killer over to Adam, caught her for the second time. But this time, he sank to his knees in the wet earth, pulled her into his arms, cradled her against his heart and did not let go.
*****
Three officers dragged Dominique Delacroix, of the many names, into a cruiser, as he swore and spat and squirmed. James called an ambulance.
Adam plunged toward Grace, who was sprawled in the sand hugging Bruno and sobbing.
“Grace. Grace. Are you all right?” asked Adam. “What were you thinking? God, Grace. Don’t do shit like this, Babe.”
“I knew Bruno would help me find Suzanne. He would pick up her scent, and find her.” She shuddered. “We found you instead, but he did help save her. He did, Adam.”
It was not the worst idea Adam had ever heard. A K-9 would have come in handy, and as it was, Bruno’s attack on Delacroix let Suzanne get away. He saw Grace’s logic, as upset as he was. All of this was his fault, for telling Grace where they were going to look for Suzanne.
“How did she know how to get the gun away from him?” Adam asked. “That was incredible. Would she have shot him? Could she?”
“Her fiancé. Leo. Special Forces, killed in Afghanistan. He taught Suzé how to shoot. Looks like he taught her more than I know, about how to defend herself. Delacroix’s face looks pretty bad.”
“Still, Grace. For God’s sake, he could have shot you.”
He wrapped his arms around her, and they knelt, Grace shivering and Adam shaking, in the wet sand.
Sirens and lights announced the ambulance, and Suzanne and Bruno were both carefully loaded inside.
“Which hospital?” Lorne asked the paramedics, after allowing them to take Suzanne out of his arms.
“RUH,” one of them said, referring to the Royal University.
“Okay,” said Lorne. “Suzanne. I’ll see you there. Suzanne. Hang in there.”
Suzanne made an incomprehensible noise. The paramedics slammed the back doors shut, and screamed away toward Saskatoon.
*****
“The one time I couldn’t follow you,” Lorne said to Suzanne, much later that night. She had been thoroughly checked over; her wounds were dressed, and although she was bruised and beaten and torn up, she was more or less all right, the nurse assured Lorne.
“The one time. Did you trust him? Why did you trust him? What were you doing there?”
“What do you mean?”
“I — we — were out looking for Delacroix this afternoon. We thought you were safe. Grace told Adam you were at home, you were going to have dinner together. She told him, always, where you were. If you were on the move, I was right behind you. This wasn’t supposed to fucking happen. Why did you trust him?”
“I don’t know. We had coffee; he was supposed to be a client. He seemed nice.”
Damn. He should have gone into the coffee shop, to see who she was with. At the time, though, it seemed unnecessary; Suzanne was in public, with a theoretical client. And somehow, he had followed her home. Must have.
“He surprised me at Grace’s. He said Grace told him I was staying with her,” Suzanne continued. “They had been to the same party. He was part of the social scene. So, he seemed to be some kind of friend by association. Obviously, he lied.”
Lorne was quiet for a moment, looking at Suzanne’s scraped and bruised face. He realized that yeah, Delacroix was part of the social scene. How fucked up was that?
“Does it hurt?” Lorne asked a moment later, hand hovering over one of Suzanne’s bloody scratches.
“Yes,” Suzanne admitted.
“Where else are you hurt?”
“Several other locations.”
“I’ve never seen anyone as brave as you.”
Suzanne held out her hand. Lorne got up from his chair, sat on the side of the bed, and took it.
“My blue knight,” she said, softly. She reached up a hand and touched Lorne’s cheek. “I’m alive because of Adam, and Grace, and Bruno. And you.”
“No. You were your own hero.”
She lifted her head and kissed the cheek she was touching, simultaneously smoothing the troubled lines in his face. Lorne flinched, his body involuntarily and powerfully reacting to her touch. Suddenly he had his arms around her. A moment of confusion. Then he turned his face to look at her, and her lips touched his.
“Merci,” said Suzanne, against his mouth.
Chapter Thirty-four
Dominique Delacroix, shackled, stared at Adam.
Adam was hoping for a full confession, but Delacroix was completely crazed. Even so, he was not legally insane. The man knew what he was doing, Adam was certain. It was impossible to apply sane moral logic to a serial killer.
“You know,” said Delacroix, “it was easy. So easy. You won’t find the rest of them.”
Adam’s heart skipped. That was Delacroix’s final card.
“We’ll find them,” he said to the killer.
A slow smile spread over Delacroix’s face. “No. You won’t.”
Swallowing his anger, Adam let it go. He wasn’t going to make it if he started arguing with this wild-eyed bastard. He changed his tactics.
“Maybe it wasn’t so easy. Maybe you were good at it. Look how you found Deborah Clairmont.”
“Who?”
“The woman in Victoria Park, two years ago.”
“I didn’t ‘find’ her, detective. I fucked with her car. Saw her, followed her, cut her brake line. Easy.”
“How did you know it was Suzanne who contacted the police?”
“I heard her banging on the door. It had to be a next-door neighbour, or they wouldn’t have heard Sherry scream. And it was a woman’s voice calling Sherry’s name. Two guys live on the other side. Besides, I’d seen her before, when I went to visit.”
“Genius. But you didn’t do anything about her at the time?”
“I was a little busy.”
“Great idea to put diesel in Suzanne’s car. Everyone would think she did it, a mistake at the pump. When did you manage that?”
“Again, easy. I watched her house. She came home on Monday, and left her car out back for a few minutes.”
“But you didn’t kill her.”
“Cops everywhere. Besides, I wanted to talk to her. Maybe fuck her first.”
“How did you know where she was going?”
“I didn’t. Not for sure. She was either going to stay home, or head to her folks’ place, or stay at a friend’s. Sending out the tow truck that morning was a gamble, but it worked, eventually. I got her keys, and her cell number. Of course, she was staying at your girlfriend’s place. But I was going to catch up to her no matter what. I found her alone, didn’t I?”
He had done his leg work, Adam privately agreed.
“Women are so stupid,” Delacroix suddenly continued. “About cars. About not looking behind them. Women are so stupid about men. Always picking the wrong ones.”
“Like your mother.”
Delacroix’s eyes narrowed.
“Stupid fucking bitch. Why didn’t she get rid of him? It was all her fault. See? Women are stupid. So easy to suck them in. ‘Oh, you’re so pretty. I’d love to take you out for dinner.’ They fall for that shit every time. Even your little friend.”
“What I don’t get,” said Adam, although he did, “is why you didn’t kill the fucker. Your stepfather. He deserved it. It could have been self-defence.”
>
“No. She deserved it. It was her fault.”
“But you didn’t kill her.”
“She died.”
So Adam was right. Her death triggered Delacroix’s killing spree. His fury spilled out, and he murdered her over and over again.
“She deserved it, then. But did these other women deserve it?” asked Adam.
“Sure. They’re all the same. If they’re not yet, they will be someday.”
*****
“Why was Sherry different?” Crown prosecutor Sanjeev Kumar asked Adam, when they met a few days later. “She was stabbed, not strangled, and it took him a long time to get around to killing her.”
“Two things, I think,” said Adam. “He knew her in Winnipeg. They met through Sherry’s brother, Corey. Delacroix hadn’t been triggered yet, and they had an earlier relationship. His mother died two years ago, of natural causes, and he knew then he’d never get an apology from her, for marrying the violent man who became his stepfather. He would never feel her love. That was the trigger.”
“That’s the other thing I was wondering. Why was he killing women, and not fifty-year-old men? As I understand it, then, the answer is he blamed his mother.”
“Yes. She was emotionally unavailable to him, after his real father died.”
“Why did he kill Della, so soon after he killed Sherry?”
“Sherry and Della were ‘thick as thieves’ according to Della’s sister. She was likely the only one who knew about his relationship with Sherry, and the one who would have suspected him. He had to kill her, too. Plus, she fit his type, so she scratched the itch.”
“So he came to Saskatoon after his mother died to take on this dealership with his sister. And when Sherry came too, he started up the relationship again?”
“Yeah. She took him back; he hit her again. They broke up. He tried again, but by then she was seeing Don Dunlop. She got pregnant. She decided she’d had enough of both violent and married men, and tried to make a new start. Sherry Hilliard was a smart and brave woman, Sanj. She worked hard to get a good job, moved away from her toxic brother, tried to get away from bad relationships with men. She was trying to break the cycle.