by Haylen Beck
Patrick remained seated, his jacket slung over the back of the chair. One hand on the table, a bulky watch on his wrist. Rolex, TAG Heuer, something expensive and ugly.
‘I want to talk,’ he said, a tremor in his voice. ‘Sit down.’
She should have said that she didn’t want to talk with him, but a possibility floated in her mind. So she went to the table, keeping two chairs between her and her husband, and sat down.
It was a large room, a bay window at one end, a net curtain shielding the interior from view. Large framed photographs lined the walls, sepia-toned Arizona landmarks and famous residents. A wedding photograph stood on the mantelpiece of the grand fireplace, a young Mrs Gerber arm-in-arm with her new husband. She looked happy. Audra supposed she must have been happy with Patrick once, though she could not remember such a thing.
‘What do you want to talk about?’ she asked.
‘What do you think?’
‘Do you want to help me? Or do you want to hurt me?’
He bristled, his handsome face darkening. ‘I want my children back.’
‘So do I,’ she said.
His eyelids twitched. A tell. Anger rising in him.
Caution, she thought. Beware.
‘You’re the only one who knows where they are,’ Patrick said. ‘I want you to tell me.’
‘Don’t,’ she said.
‘Don’t what?’
‘Don’t lie to me. Don’t pretend. We both know the truth.’
He watched her for a moment, then said, ‘What are you talking about?’
‘You want me to say it out loud?’
He lifted his hand from the table, made a fist beneath his lips, his college fraternity ring glinting. ‘Yes, I do,’ he said.
Audra fixed her eyes on his, faced his anger.
‘You’re behind this,’ she said. ‘You paid Whiteside and Collins to take our children.’
Patrick tightened his fist, shook his head. ‘Who?’
‘Stop,’ Audra said. ‘I give up. I don’t know how you pulled it off, but you did. You’ve won. Just tell me what you want, and you can have it. So long as I know Sean and Louise are safe.’
Patrick rubbed his temples with his fingertips. He leaned forward, put his elbows on his knees, breathed in hard.
‘You’re insane,’ he said.
Her voice shook as it rose. ‘For God’s sake, just tell me what you want.’
He slapped the table hard. ‘I want you to tell me where my children are.’
‘Stop it, Patrick, you know where—’
‘I don’t,’ he said, hitting the table once more. ‘You’ve lost your goddamn mind. Haven’t you seen the news?’
‘Only a little. They only just let me—’
‘They want your blood,’ he said. ‘All the networks, all the rolling news channels. Every single one, they have your face all over the screen, asking what you did with our kids. They know what you did before, the drink, the drugs, the craziness. How you ran from Children’s Services. They have it on constant rotation. That you’re a danger to yourself and to our children. There’s not a single soul in this country who doesn’t believe you’re a monster. That you hurt Sean and Louise. They’re calling me every minute of the day wanting a statement. They’re calling my mother, for Christ’s sake. What do you think this is doing to her?’
Audra let out a dry and brittle laugh. ‘Well, shit, I wouldn’t want to upset Margaret.’
Patrick sprang to his feet, his fists ready, took one step toward her. He caught himself, stopped, loosened his hands as he shook his head.
‘I just want my little boy and girl,’ he said. ‘Please tell me where they are.’
In the midst of all this, wherever their children had been taken, he remained concerned only for himself and his mother. He didn’t even have the sense to hide it, Audra thought, to pretend he really cared for them.
But if he really were hiding Sean and Louise, he would pretend to care. He was smart and manipulative enough to disguise his true desires.
Audra remained seated as the realization hit her: He didn’t know where Sean and Louise were. He didn’t know, because he didn’t do it. She felt the room chill, as the one hope she’d clung to since all this began crumbled away.
‘Oh God,’ she said, her hand going to her mouth. ‘If you don’t have them …’
He stood over her, flexing his fingers. ‘I’m going to ask you one more time.’
‘If you don’t have them, then who does?’ Audra placed a palm on each side of her head, began to rock back and forward. ‘Oh no, no, no.’
‘You have to stop this,’ Patrick said. ‘You’re the only one who can bring this to an end. Tell me where they are.’
An idea flickered in her mind, the same one she’d had when she spoke with Mel.
‘A private detective,’ she said.
‘What?’
‘There’ve got to be some in Phoenix who could do it. Use your money. Pay someone to investigate Whiteside and Collins, find out what they’re after. You can do that.’
She looked up at him, her hands clasped in front of her.
He shook his head. ‘You crazy bitch.’
Patrick took his jacket from the back of the chair and walked to the door.
‘You won’t do it?’ Audra asked.
He reached for the handle. ‘Crazy bitch.’
‘Patrick,’ she said.
He stopped and turned, and she saw how old he’d become, how deep the lines of his face, how jagged.
Audra wiped a tear from her cheek and said, ‘You know, it took me far too long to figure you out. What you wanted with me.’
‘Now’s not the time,’ he said.
‘Seems as good a time as any,’ Audra said. ‘You remember I asked you? That one day I sobered up for Sean’s birthday. I asked you why you kept me around, drunk and drugged. You had our son. You could’ve just kicked me out. But you didn’t, and I had to almost die before I realized.’
He put his fists in his pockets, stared past her. ‘Realized what?’
‘You never wanted a marriage,’ she said. ‘You never wanted a family. You just wanted the appearance of it. To look normal. To make your mother happy. Once I gave her grandchildren, I was no more use to you. So you kept me doped up and out of the way. In the end, I was just excess baggage. And that left me with another question. See, I don’t remember taking that overdose. Yes, I hardly knew where I was most of the time, but I don’t remember making that decision. Did you make it for me, Patrick?’
Now he looked at her, hate in his eyes. ‘What do you mean?’
‘Did you try to kill me?’
‘Don’t,’ Patrick said.
‘Don’t what?’ Audra said as she got to her feet, her voice rising with her. ‘Don’t talk back? Don’t make you angry?’
Patrick took another step forward, threw his jacket on the floor, put his weight on both feet. ‘This is not the time for your fucking games, Audra. You’re going to tell me where my children are, right now, or …’
‘Or what?’ Now she took a step closer to him. ‘You’re going to slap me around? Give me bruises where they don’t show? Make me—’
The thick fingers of his right hand snapped onto her throat, squeezed hard, and he pushed her toward the wall, her feet skimming the carpet. Framed pictures rattled as the back of her head struck the plasterwork. She put her right hand flat on his chest. Let her fingers crawl up as his grip tightened, feeling for the place above his shirt collar. Pressure in her ears, behind her eyes.
He raised his left fist, let her see his hard knuckles. ‘You tell me where they are, or so help me God, I will—’
Audra’s fingers aligned, the tips forming a solid edge, and stabbed at the tender hollow between the top of his sternum and the bottom of his Adam’s apple. She followed forward from her shoulder, kept the pressure on his throat even as he pulled away. Before he backed beyond her reach, she curled those same fingers in, leaving the knuckles facing out. She pun
ched once and hard at the same spot.
Patrick’s eyes bulged as his hands went to his throat. He staggered back toward the table, his weight carrying him until his thighs met the wooden edge. Then he turned, sprawling over the tabletop, one hand keeping him upright, the other clawing at his throat.
‘Breathe,’ Audra said, moving away from the wall.
Patrick stared at her as he gasped.
‘Just breathe,’ she said, miming with her hands, circular movements like she was coaching a singer. ‘Big breaths, slow and easy. I learned that in self-defense class. Never had to use it before, but it’s good to know it works.’
Patrick lowered himself back into the chair he’d jumped from less than a minute before, his rage washed away. Now he looked like his true self: a weak and pathetic man in thrall to his mother.
‘Listen to me,’ Audra said. ‘Listen good. You don’t get to touch me anymore. Not ever. You don’t own me, or my children. We are not your possessions. You never really loved our children, but I do. Now, I’m going to find Sean and Louise. You can either help me or get out of my way. Which is it?’
He coughed, spat on the carpet. ‘You’re insane.’
‘Thought so,’ she said. ‘Get out, and don’t come back.’
He glared up at her. ‘You think I’m just going to back off?’
Audra pointed at the door. ‘Go. Now.’
Patrick got to his feet, coughed, and spat again. He lifted his jacket from the carpet and walked to the door. Without turning to look at her, he said, ‘You’ll suffer for this.’
‘I know,’ Audra said.
26
PATRICK LEFT THE room, and a moment later Audra heard the front door open and close, then a swell of voices as the reporters swarmed him. She looked toward the window that faced out onto the street. Through the net curtain she saw them, like crows on carrion. They hushed as Patrick said something, microphones and recorders under his nose. Then a roar as he finished, pushing his way through them.
Monsters, all of them. Ghouls seeking flesh to sell. Yet it was she who was painted as a beast. The killer of her own children.
Audra watched as Patrick fought his way to a car double-parked across the road, the reporters hounding him all the way. He blasted the horn to make them move, then a squeal of tires as he took off, the reporters dancing out of his path.
They drifted, their focus lost, huddled into smaller groups. Women fixed their makeup. Men fixed their hair. Cameramen and sound engineers fussed. Some moved to the diner across the way.
‘I’m a monster?’ Audra asked the empty room.
‘Are you?’
Audra spun around and saw Mrs Gerber in a doorway at the back of the room, one she hadn’t realized was there. She could see over the landlady’s shoulder that it led to the kitchen.
‘No, I’m not,’ Audra said.
Mrs Gerber looked at the carpet, a frown on her lips. ‘Did that man spit on my floor?’
‘Yes,’ Audra said. ‘Did you hear that?’
‘Yeah,’ Mrs Gerber said. She tapped the circular window with her fingertip. ‘Saw it, too.’
‘I’m sorry,’ Audra said, turning to leave.
‘Sorry? Don’t be an ass. Too many women apologize for the behavior of men.’
Audra didn’t know how to respond. She went to the doorway leading to the hall.
‘My husband used to beat me too,’ Mrs Gerber said. ‘Funny thing. Everyone thought he was the nicest man. I’d go out to the store and someone would say, oh, I saw your Jimmy yesterday, isn’t he just a sweetheart? But they didn’t know. Even when I wore sleeves too long for the weather, no one thought to ask why. They just thought he was the bee’s knees.’
‘I’m sorry to hear that,’ Audra said.
‘Stop apologizing, for goodness’ sake. People say the same about Ronnie Whiteside. He’s a good man, a war hero, all that. But I know what kind of man he is. I’ve seen it for myself.’
‘Tell me,’ Audra said.
Mrs Gerber exhaled, her small shoulders sagging inside her cardigan. ‘One night, not long after they closed the mine, I was upstairs looking out onto the street. Used to be a bar across the way, McGleenan’s, not much of a place. I watched Lewis Bodie stagger out of there, hardly fit to put one foot in front of another. Bodie got a payout from the mine for losing his job, same as a lot of the men around here, but he drank his up faster than most. He staggered right out of the bar and into Sheriff Whiteside. They talked a bit, and I could see Bodie getting agitated, and I remember thinking, just shut your mouth and go home, or you’ll wind up in a cell. Next thing I know, Sheriff Whiteside just belted him across the jaw. Bodie went down like a bag of sand, and I thought, well, he maybe had it coming. But it didn’t stop there.’
Mrs Gerber’s gaze went to the window, out onto the street.
‘Ronnie Whiteside laid into Lewis Bodie like he was ready to kill him. He beat him and beat him, and I could hear it, the sound of his fists and his boots, and Bodie crying and begging. And even when he went quiet, Sheriff Whiteside kept going. When he finally stopped, he just stood there awhile, breathing hard. Then he bent down, took Bodie’s wallet, and helped himself to whatever money he found there. And I remember thinking if it was anyone else doing the beating, I’d call the sheriff. So who do I call?
‘Then next morning I look out the window again, and there’s an ambulance from Gutteridge General outside the sheriff’s station. It turns out Lewis Bodie died in his cell overnight. And I never breathed a word of it to anybody. So now I hear you say Whiteside has your children. Him I could believe it of, but Mary Collins? Her with a sick child and all?’
‘That’s right,’ Audra said.
‘Everyone around here thinks Ronnie Whiteside is a good man. Same as they thought my husband was a good man. But I know different. Just tell me something.’
‘What?’
Mrs Gerber stared at her from one doorway to the other, her eyes hard and sharp like blades. Audra realized that each of them stood on a threshold, and she supposed that should mean something. But she couldn’t think what.
‘Did you hurt your babies?’
‘No, ma’am,’ Audra said, holding her gaze.
Mrs Gerber nodded. ‘Well, then. You go up to your room and try to get a little sleep. I’ll bring you up some coffee later on, maybe some cake.’
‘Thank you,’ Audra said. ‘I’d like that.’
Mrs Gerber nodded once more and disappeared back into the kitchen. Audra went to the hall and climbed the two flights of stairs. As she approached her room, she noticed the door was open an inch or two. She remembered she hadn’t locked it, but she was certain she had at least closed it behind her. But it was an old house, the kind where floorboards creaked, windows rattled, and doors sometimes didn’t latch properly.
Audra entered the room, put her shoulder to the door to close it. She slid the chain lock into place, then went to the bed. Tiredness weighed heavy behind her eyes as she sat on the edge of the mattress and kicked off her shoes.
Only when she lifted her head did she see the man in the corner, the brown paper bag in his hand.
27
THE MICROPHONES SWARMED around Patrick Kinney’s handsome face.
‘Five hundred thousand dollars,’ he said, ‘for the return of my children. I realize at this stage the chances of finding them alive are slim. Even so, the reward stands. Whether to hold them or to bury them, I want my children back.’
‘Shit,’ Mitchell said, closing the laptop on which the news clip played.
‘Yep,’ Showalter said, his elbow on the desk, his chin in his hand. ‘We did not need that.’
Whiteside had stood behind them both to watch. ‘Doesn’t make any difference, does it?’
Mitchell turned in her chair, looked at him like he was an idiot. ‘It won’t help us find them, no, but it does mean the phone lines will be tied up with bullshit leads from idiots with dollar signs for eyes.’
‘Then you best call down to P
hoenix,’ Whiteside said, ‘get your field office to send up some more stuffed suits.’
Showalter smirked.
Mitchell got to her feet. ‘Thank you for the suggestion. If you’ll excuse me, I’ve got two lost children to find.’
‘Oh, come on,’ Whiteside said. ‘You know those kids are dead. When are you going to get out of the way and let Showalter and the state cops arrest that woman? She killed her kids, you know she did, she killed them and she dumped them out in the desert.’
‘No, Sheriff Whiteside,’ Mitchell said. ‘I do not know that. And neither do you. We won’t know anything for sure until Sean and Louise are found. I’ll be over in the town hall, if you need me.’
She exited by the side door, let it swing closed behind her.
Whiteside looked down at Showalter. ‘You know what that woman needs?’
Showalter grinned. ‘Yeah, I do.’
They both guffawed.
Across the room, standing in the corner with his arms folded, Special Agent Abrahms cleared his throat.
‘Quiet, Junior, the men are talking.’ Whiteside lifted the laptop from the desk, held it out. ‘Here, we’re done with your computer.’
Abrahms approached, extended his hand, reached for the laptop. Whiteside jerked it away.
‘Cut it out,’ Abrahms said. ‘Just give it to me.’
Whiteside handed it over. ‘Don’t cry, kid.’
Showalter snorted.
Abrahms took a step closer. ‘You’re a real asshole, you know that?’
‘Better men than you have called me a lot worse,’ Whiteside said, his voice lowered. ‘Anytime you want to have a serious conversation about it, just say the word. I’ll take you out back, show you just how big an asshole I really am.’
‘Go fuck yourself,’ Abrahms said, walking away. He sat down at the desk he’d commandeered when he first arrived, opened the laptop, started typing something.
Whiteside patted Showalter on the shoulder and lifted his hat from the desk. ‘Keep an eye on the kid. Make sure he doesn’t hurt himself with that thing.’
He exited through the side door, to the sound of Showalter’s chuckling. The sun hit him hard, and he plucked the shades from where they hung from his collar. He walked around the building, out onto the street. A few of the press people approached, questions in their eyes, readying microphones and recorders.