Speaking Evil

by Jason Parent

  “No worries.” Jimmy’s dimples returned. Just looking at them somehow made her feel a little less anxious. But she swallowed hard as she glanced at Link. He glowered at the two of them as if he hated them just for the sake of hating.

  “So,” Jimmy scratched his head again and blushed. “What exactly has our good friend Mikey told you about me?”

  “He told me all about what Glenn Rodrigues did to you both. I was still in school when you shot him, so I already knew about that. Seems to me like he got what he deserved.” She rested her fidgeting hands in her lap. “Other than that, not much else, really. Just that you were in here now, too, and he said you might be someone I could turn to if I ever needed a friend.”

  “Really?” Jimmy sat up straight. “Michael said that?” His body shook as he laughed. “That’s really cool of him after all that happened. Did he tell you anything about the Suarez gang or his kidnapping—”

  Tessa shot up from her seat. “Michael was kidnapped?”

  Jimmy threw his palms out. “Woah! He’s fine. Don’t worry. He’s back, safe at home. For a little while now.”

  Tessa slowly sat back in her chair, confused why Michael would have kept that from her, why, after all they’d been through together, he would feel the need to keep anything from her. “I guess I haven’t talked to him in a while,” she said, barely audible. She thought back to the last time she had seen him, when she’d tried to tell him about the screams she heard at night. Jimmy had come up then. “Oh crap.”

  Jimmy’s dimples vanished. “What’s wrong?”

  “I just remember I told Michael that you didn’t want to see him.”

  Jimmy’s entire face seemed to scrunch, freckles closing in on his nose from all directions. “Why would you do that?”

  Tessa studied her book, ashamed. “I don’t know. I guess I was upset. We don’t get to spend a lot of time together, and I was trying to tell him something important, that I was scared. All he wanted to talk about was Jimmy this and Jimmy that, and—no offense—I couldn’t have given two shits about you at the time. I wanted him to shut up and listen. Urgh. Michael can be so oblivious sometimes.” She looked up at him, pressing her lips together tightly. “I’m sorry. It was dumb. I’ll explain it to him the next time I see him.”

  “All right.” Jimmy frowned, then sighed. “I kinda owe him and would love to see him. He and that detective helped me out a lot, especially since I didn’t deserve it. Got me in here when I could have been looking at real time, maybe even tried as an adult. Mikey’s a good guy. That detective isn’t so bad either.”

  “Detective Reilly.” Tessa snickered. “Yeah, she’s all right, I guess.” She met his stare for a second then looked away, the conversation falling into awkward silence.

  He shrugged. “Well, I’d ask you what you’re in for, but somehow that doesn’t seem polite. Instead, I’ll ask what there is to do for fun around here. The doctors have just declared me fit to join the general population. I’m no longer likely to stab anyone with those dull, curved-ended scissors or snort jelly up my nostrils or whatever else they were afraid I might do in here.” He rubbed his hands together. “So, up for a riveting game of Yahtzee? I think I saw Monopoly on the shelf over there too. But if we play that, I get to be the car.”

  Tessa glanced again at Link, who was still staring their way. She faced forward, closed her eyes, and rubbed her temples. “You might have been better off where you were.”

  “What do you mean?”

  She leaned forward over the table, her face less than two feet from his. “Is it true what Michael said? Can I trust you? Are you a friend in here?”

  Jimmy shrugged and showed off his smile. “Look around. I don’t see anyone else our age in here. I think that makes us friends by default.”

  Tessa pouted. “But you don’t even know me.”

  Jimmy’s shoulders drooped. “I’ve done some pretty awful things. Whatever you’ve done, I’m no one to judge.”

  “I killed my stepfather.”

  Jimmy started. “I’m... sorry?”

  Tessa smirked. “Don’t be. He was a real asshole.” Her mirth was fleeting, drying up like a mirage in the desert. “A bully, like Glenn Rodrigues.” She tapped her crayon on the crossword puzzle book.

  “Anyway, it’s not that.” She sighed and spent a moment trying to figure out how to say what she wanted to say. “You’re not going to believe me. You’ll just think I’m crazy.”

  “Try me.” His words said one thing, but his narrowing eyes and pursed lips suggested he had his doubts at the ready.

  She picked at her fingernail, wondering how best to start. “Don’t look, but do you see the orderly to my right with the giant head?”

  “Woah.” Jimmy rocked backward. “That is a big head.”

  “I told you not to look.”

  “Right. Sorry.” Jimmy scooted his chair closer. Tessa winced as the back of it clacked against the table. He rested his forearms on the table edge. “Anyway, what about him?”

  “Is he still staring at us?”

  Jimmy started to turn his head.

  “Don’t look!” she said in a loud whisper.

  “Then how am I supposed to know if he’s staring at us?”

  “Well, look, but, you know... do it discreetly.”

  Jimmy pretended to stretch his neck, first left then right. “Yep. Staring right at us. You want me to say something—”

  “No.” Tessa reached across the table, grabbing his fingers before she knew what she was doing. They both stared at her hand around his. Embarrassed, she yanked it back. “Sorry, just... I’ll explain. Now, how about the guy to your right, the one with the bandages covering his face. Is he staring too?”

  Jimmy stood up, turned to his right, then walked straight up to the Bandage Man. Tessa nearly shrieked, biting on her knuckle to block it. She wanted to scream at Jimmy to stop. Her mind raced as she thought of all the horrors she might have just exposed him to, her wildest imaginations as vivid as if they were reality.

  But Jimmy passed the man and headed for a bookshelf, which he pretended to peruse before grabbing a copy of what looked like Time or People. He headed back to the table with the magazine rolled up in his hand.

  Sitting down, he said, “Yep, he’s staring too. And he looks mean as hell. Kinda gives me the creeps.” He wrapped his knuckles against the table. “Okay. Anyone else in here I should watch out for?”

  “Well, those two are the worst, but I don’t really trust any of them.” Tessa gave him the rundown of all the Ward C regulars, staff and patients alike.

  Jimmy listened as she spoke, guffawing a little too loudly when she explained why they called him “Dirty Terry.” He folded his fingers in front of him and lowered his voice. “You ready to tell me what this is all about?”

  “Are you in Ward C?”

  “As of tonight, I am.” Grinning, Jimmy almost looked proud. He must’ve been in Ward D, where they kept the dangerous and often violent patients. Ward C was for the still-crazy-just-not-violently-crazy residents.

  “Sometimes at night, I hear screaming. Kids are taken from their rooms, maybe adults from the other hall too. I know because they pass by my room. I don’t know where they take them, but sometimes they don’t come back.”

  Jimmy frowned. “We are in a mental hospital. Kids screaming at night has gotta be common.”

  Tessa felt heat rise up her neck. “Don’t you think I know that?” She looked away, hoping she hadn’t drawn more eyes upon them.

  Jimmy’s eyebrows pinched together and a slimy, flat worm of a smirk slithered on his mouth. “What are you thinking? That some mad scientist is performing experiments on people here like they do in the movies?”

  “I don’t know.” Tessa’s lips quivered. “I don’t know what’s happening, but I know I’m scared. Last night, I peeked outside my door as I heard them dragging someone down the hall—a kid I think, one of the younger ones—until his screams were cut off. I didn’t see who it was, but Nu
rse Francine—that’s the one you almost bumped into when you came in—spotted me at the door. She was acting really weird and talking funny. Today, too, and she’s usually really nice. I mean, she’s still being really nice, but it sounds... fake, I guess.

  “Anyway, she said it was Mitchell, who’s like eight or nine, who was screaming. I’m worried about him, and I’m worried about me. Link and the Bandage Man—that’s what the kids call them—haven’t taken their eyes off me since I came in here.”

  Jimmy leaned back, folding his hands behind his head as if he were completely relaxed and totally unimpressed. “Seems easy enough to check. We can just go talk to Mitchell and see if he’s all right.” He shook his head. “Except I’m not supposed to be talking to those kids, I don’t think.”

  “I can. I’ve been in with them for a long time, so they all know me. Francine says Mitchell is happy and playing, but I don’t know.” She pressed her index finger into the table. “You don’t think it’s weird that people are being taken from their rooms at night? The ones that don’t come back—are they being discharged at, like, two in the morning?”

  “Okay. I see your point. But if something funny really is going on, I think our best bet might be to stay as far away from it as possible.”

  Tessa’s eyes blurred as she drew a long breath. “That’s just it. I think I’m already deep in it. I saw them doing something I wasn’t supposed to see, or at least they think I saw them. I’m afraid that tonight or some night soon, I’m the one they’re gonna drag out of bed, and no one will ever see me again. It’s not like anyone would even miss me.”

  “That’s...” Jimmy chuckled and shook his head slowly. He let out a long sigh. “How the heck do I get myself into these messes? I just walked over to say hi to a pretty girl, and—”

  Tessa’s lip quivered again. “I’m sorry.”

  “No, I’m sorry. If you’re really in trouble, then you can count on me to help. All these people with power over us coming after one girl? That sounds like bullying to me, and as you’ve already noticed, I really don’t like bullies.” He leaned across the table, sliding his hand toward her folded arms. She didn’t flinch or pull away at his touch.

  “So?” He looked her straight in the eye. “What can I do to help?”

  Tessa ran her fingers through her hair and averted her gaze. “Where’s your room?”

  CHAPTER 5

  The mention of Carter Wainwright always conjured painful memories. Even Sam’s promotion to detective—a day she had thought would be the happiest of her life—had been tainted by her department’s Public Enemy No. 1. The killer cult leader had been unstoppable, his undeniable charisma luring lost souls, even at least one within her own department, to his sadistic cause. She wondered if there could be others still looking out for him, keeping hidden in shadow the most despicable and successful murderer her city, and maybe all of the country, had ever seen.

  Headlines had compared him to Ted Bundy and the Zodiac Killer, but Wainwright was more like David Koresh or Jim Jones blended with Leatherface from The Texas Chainsaw Massacre and topped off with a healthy helping of Jeffrey Dahmer. His face had been everywhere—on television, in newspapers, and in police files in more than a dozen states—yet he’d changed it like a chameleon. He’d popped up here and there to spread terror across North America with alterations to his appearance each time, like lighter skin pigmentation or a smaller nose. Born to a Liberian minister and an Irish missionary, Wainwright had originally looked as though he hailed from one of the Mediterranean countries. Back when Sam had followed his killing spree, he was like a slightly darker version of a young Fred Rogers right down to the cardigan sweater, except nobody wanted to be his neighbor. She’d never actually crossed paths with the monster herself.

  A car honked behind her, and she looked up from her dashboard to see the light had turned green. She crawled into the intersection and hit her left turn signal, which prompted another honk and an angry shout from the car squeezing by on her right. As she waited for a break in the oncoming traffic to complete her turn, Sam’s eyes blurred. She inhaled through her nostrils, steeling herself against the burgeoning grief as she remembered her mentor and friend.

  While Wainwright’s killing spree ran rampant through Bristol County, his primary opposition had been two Fall River detectives and partners, Bruce Marklin and Jocelyn Beaudette. Not long after, Special Agent Frank Spinney and the FBI had joined the fray. Wainwright came out way ahead in the war that had ensued, killing two of his adversaries and the career of the third.

  Yeah, Wainwright had eventually killed Bruce, but he’d done so spiritually a few years earlier when he’d killed Bruce’s partner. Jocelyn’s death had meant Sam making detective. She cringed at the bitter irony. Jocelyn had been the one who’d recommended her for promotion.

  After all these years, Sam could still see Bruce’s face when he’d called her into his office.

  “SHUT THE DOOR.” DETECTIVE Bruce Marklin didn’t look up at Sam as he spoke. His office, and Sam bet his clothes and breath, reeked of alcohol and cigarette smoke. His wrinkled shirt and bent collar were uneven as though he’d missed a button. One sleeve was rolled up to his elbow, and a light-brown stain flaked off the fabric. The sports coat and loafers that completed his typical California-casual look lay in a heap in the corner. His jet-black hair, usually slicked back, looked matted like the fur of a stray dog. The man looked like a bum.

  “Take a seat.” As he stared at Sam, his eyes flashed with that steel glint that unnerved so many of her fellow officers, a flicker of the intellect that should have made him a neurosurgeon or quantum physicist or even president, anything other than an underpaid cop in a city full of crime and criminals.

  But Sam would not be shaken, having stood her ground with many men both on and off the force, figuring what was one more. She kept her gaze even as she sat, crossed her legs, then folded her hands on her lap, as confident in her blues as any officer had a right to be. After a moment, Detective Marklin cleared his throat and flipped through a file on the desk in front of him. In that moment, Sam saw just how broken Jocelyn’s death had left him as he shriveled into the old man he’d become.

  Her superior officer’s gaze diverted, Sam took the opportunity to acquaint herself better with her surroundings. She’d never been in the office before and was surprised to see that, for a man so anal in his police work, his base of operations was as disheveled as he’d become. Files in manila folders and storage boxes filled the corners, papers jutting out of them as if haphazardly thrown together. His Harvard diploma hung crooked on the wall, its glass frame cracked. An unwrapped grinder sat on his desk, though it didn’t appear to have been touched, its roast beef shimmering with that on-the-verge-of-rotting rainbow hue.

  “I suppose you know why I’ve called you in here,” the detective said, flapping a hand as if her mere presence was an annoyance. He didn’t bother to look up from the file.

  “I wouldn’t make a very good detective if I didn’t,” Sam answered with a smile, then fearing that came off as glib, added, “sir.”

  Detective Marklin did look up then, eyebrow raised. He stared at Sam as if he were looking into her, searching for whether she was made of muscle and bone, grit and smarts, or just a whole lot of stuffing with window dressing. He grunted. “Well, I guess we’ll see about that soon enough, Reilly. You’ve had twice as many arrests as the average officer out there, and I have no doubt you’ve made the masculinity shrivel out of the balls of more than a few of them. But being a detective takes more than nabbing purse-snatchers and breaking up bar fights.”

  “I play nice with—”

  “Save it, Reilly. I’m submitting the paperwork for your promotion. The chief will, of course, have the final say. And lest you think otherwise, I’m not doing because of your record, your gender, or any other reason that might be going through that young, untested brain of yours.”

  He leaned forward, a vein in his forehead pulsating. A steely gaze had returned t
o his eyes, this time with a glimmer that almost looked maniacal, and he wasn’t backing down. “So, let me make this abundantly clear to you, Reilly... Sam, is it?”

  “It’s Samanth—”

  “It’s whatever I deem appropriate to call you, if you want to work homicides.” He slammed his palms against the desk. “This is my turf, and we do things my way, which means you do what I say when I tell you to do it.” He sat back in his chair, his boil dying down to a simmer. “How’s that work for you?”

  Sam sat up straight and didn’t hesitate. “Works perfectly, sir.”

  “You’ve shown great aptitude and probably deserve to make detective, but you weren’t my first choice or even my second. Metcalf and Rogers both have seniority. A dozen others understand precinct politics better than you do. But you don’t go in for that sort of thing, do you, Reilly?”

  “I—”

  “It was a rhetorical question.” He fixed his terrible glare on her, his mouth set into a scowl. “The truth of the matter is this—I do not want another partner.” He tapped his finger against the desk to emphasize each word. “I’m only recommending you for two reasons. One, Jocelyn—” Detective Marklin’s voice broke on his former partner’s name. He swallowed then cleared his throat. “Detective Beaudette would have wanted me to. She saw potential in you. Me, though, I think you’re an arrogant SOB, kind of like that fucking Fed you’ve probably seen taking up our precinct space with his holier-than-thou attitude.” He muttered something Sam barely caught, “A whole lot of good he’s been.”

  She kept her face expressionless even as she considered how many officers in the precinct thought Detective Marklin was an arrogant SOB. Figuring even a modest defense of her character might come off as too proud and offer affirmation to his opinion, she clamped her mouth shut.

  “To boot, you’ve got a chip on your shoulder as big as the Rock of Gibraltar. Think the whole damn world owes you something. Well, the world doesn’t owe you or me or any one of us a damn thing.” His eyes glazed over, and he looked past Sam. “Nah. We want something, we’ve got to do what it takes to get it.”