Mystery Writers of America Presents Vengeance

by Lee Child

  Her heart fluttered again, doing an odd triple beat. The tightness in her chest turned like a vise.

  “What is it?” Richard reached for the mask hanging on the oxygen tank.

  June waved him away, her vision blurring on her hand so that it seemed like a streak of light followed the movement. She moved her hand again, fascinated by the effect.

  “June?”

  Her fingers were numbing, the bones of her hand slowly degloved. She felt her breath catch, and panic filled her—not because the time was here, but because she still had not asked him the question.

  “What is it?” He sat on the edge of the bed, his leg touching hers. “June?” His voice was raised. “Should I call an ambulance?”

  She looked at his hands. His square fingers. His thick wrists. There were age spots now. She could see the blue veins under his skin.

  The first time June held Richard’s hand, her stomach had tickled, her heart had jumped, and she’d finally understood Austen and Brontë and every silly sonnet she’d ever studied.

  Love is not love which alters when it alteration finds.

  This was the feeling she wanted to take with her—not the horror of the last twenty years. Not the sight of her daughter lying dead. Not the questions about how much Grace knew, how much she had suffered. Not the thought of Danielle Parson, the pretty young girl who could make it through the day only with the help of heroin.

  June wanted the feeling from the first time she had held her child. She wanted the bliss from her wedding day, the first time Richard had made love to her. There were happy times in this home. There were birthdays and surprise parties and Thanksgivings and wonderful Christmases. There was warmth and love. There was Grace.

  “Grace,” Richard said, as if he could read her mind. Or perhaps June had said the word, so sweet on her lips. The smell of her shampoo. The way her tiny clothes felt in June’s hand. Her socks were impossibly small. June had pressed them to her mouth one day, kissing them, thinking of kissing her daughter’s feet.

  Richard cleared his throat. His tone was low. “You want the truth.”

  June tried to shake her head, but her muscles were gone, her brain disconnecting from the stem, nerve impulses wandering down vacant paths. It was here. It was so close. She was not going to find religion this late in the game, but she wanted lightness to be the last thing in her heart, not the darkness his words promised to bring.

  “It’s true,” he told her, as if she didn’t know this already. “It’s true what Danielle said.”

  June forced out a groan of air. Valentine’s Day cards. Birthday balloons. Mother’s Day breakfasts. Crayon drawings hanging on the refrigerator. Skinned knees that needed to be kissed. Monsters that were chased away by a hug and a gentle stroke of hair.

  “Grace saw us.”

  June tried to shake her head. She didn’t need to hear it from his mouth. She didn’t need to take his confession to her grave. Let her have this one thing. Let her have at least a moment of peace.

  He leaned in closer. She could feel the heat from his mouth. “Can you hear me, wife?”

  She had no more air. Her lungs froze. Her heart lurched to a stop.

  “Can you hear me?” he repeated.

  June’s eyes would not close. This was the last minute, second, millisecond. She was not breathing. Her heart was still. Her brain whirred and whirred, seconds from burning itself out.

  Richard’s voice came to her down the long tunnel. “Grace didn’t kill herself because she caught me fucking Danielle.” His tongue caught between his teeth. There was a smile on his lips. “She did it because she was jealous.”

  IT AIN’T RIGHT

  BY MICHELLE GAGNON

  It ain’t right, is all I’m saying.”

  Joe just kept walking the way he always did, shovel over his shoulder, cigarette clinging to his bottom lip.

  “You hear me?”

  He stopped and turned, lifting his head inch by inch until his eyes found my hips then my breasts then my eyes. A dust devil whirled away behind him, making the bottom branches of the tree dance like girls on May Day, up and down. He stared at me long and hard, and I felt the last heat of the day seeping into my skin and down through my bones, reaching inside to meet the cold that burrowed into my stomach early that morning.

  “She’s dead, ain’t she?” With his free hand, Joe scratched his belly where the bottom of his T-shirt had pulled away.

  “Just ’cause she’s dead don’t mean she should be put down like this.”

  He looked past me toward where the road met the hill and dove behind it, wheat tips glowing pink in the twilight. “What else we gonna do with her?”

  We stared each other down while the shadows crept in and heat eased into darkness like air escaping a balloon. Night surrounded Joe’s head, digging under his cheekbones and into his eye sockets, carving out the face that had been so handsome years earlier that I swore he could’ve been in pictures.

  I turned and shuffled back to the house, kicking up pebbles and dust with my sandals, crossing my arms against the cold that radiated out like there was a snowball growing inside me.

  He was gone a long time. The six o’clock news came and went, then Wheel of Fortune and Jeopardy!, and me checking the clock every five minutes, getting up from time to time to peer through our fading curtains. It was always so quiet at night, I swear the TV was the only thing keeping my head screwed on my shoulders.

  Law & Order was on when he finally came in, bolted both locks, and went to the sink without so much as a word. Joe washed his hands for a long time. I stared at the screen, trying to figure out why some girl was crying over someone who from the look of things she hadn’t much liked anyway. He plunked down beside me and made the same sigh as his beer when he popped it open.

  “So it’s done, then,” I said.

  “Yep.”

  And that was the last we spoke of it. But once that cold burrowed inside me, it seemed dead set on staying. It got so I couldn’t watch Joe standing in a towel with the mirror steamed up, shaving in that slow, careful way he did everything without wanting to sock him over the head with something. I kept washing his clothes and making his dinner, but when he entered me I stared up at the ceiling and endured his gasps and cries without a word, both of us pretending there wasn’t another person lying there with us, when both of us knew there was.

  Winter made it better somehow, made it so I couldn’t imagine her trying to claw through the roots and soil to the air. I knew she was done then, that she wouldn’t be able to come after us, at least not till spring. I figured maybe we’d move, head to the city like we always said we would when we were young and such things still might just happen one day. I had almost put it out of my mind, even managed a smile for Joe when he showed up with a new scarf and mittens in my favorite periwinkle, when lights pulled into our driveway. The police didn’t say much, just probed our eyes while they asked, Ever hear what went on over there? Any word on who she was seeing? Joe did most of the talking, smiling a little too large, taking so long to answer you could practically hear him sounding it out in his mind before the words left his lips. I thought, Always so handsome in those uniforms, so shiny. Then I caught myself twisting the dish towel around and around my hand.

  “She’s the type,” I heard myself saying.

  “What type, ma’am?” One of them was eyeing me now, the older one with the small mustache.

  “Loose—you know. She’d head off with any Tom passing by—since the day she was born, dead set on getting outta here. I heard her say once she wanted to go to Vegas, see the lights.”

  “Vegas, huh.” The two of them looked at each other and nodded, slapped shut their notebooks, and waved their way out the door. Joe leaned back on the couch again and started flipping through channel after channel: knives slicing meat, kids swinging on ropes, women cleaning their kitchens. He went through all five hundred twice and I saw he wasn’t stopping anytime soon, so I got my new mittens on and went outside fo
r more of that quiet I was always complaining about.

  It was cold and crisp and the moon shone flat on the field with a strange dead light, all gray and unnatural. I started down the road without really thinking, ’cause if I had been I would’ve said to myself, Sadie, the cops just been here and this ain’t no way to behave, but something about the moon and the quiet erased those thoughts and suddenly I was there. It looked the same as all the other fields. This is why they put up markers, I thought, tapping my feet to keep out the cold. Otherwise no one knows where you last set foot on earth. I tasted the salt before I knew I was crying and was suddenly on my knees tearing at the snow, periwinkle blue pounding at the crust then throwing handfuls of cold past my legs. It should be red, I thought, I’ll dig down until I see some red…

  And then Joe’s hands were on my shoulders, and he was carrying me in those arms that looked too thin to hold anything heavier than a shovel, and I woke up in my bed, sun warming the curtains and the smell of coffee sneaking under the door.

  After a knock-knock, Joe came in holding my favorite mug, steam licking his face, and he kind of smiled at me. He put the mug on the table and smoothed my hair back and said, “I know you didn’t mean to do it. I made you, and I’m sorry.”

  We were fifteen again, and he was the only boy in the world for me, movie-star handsome standing on the side of the quarry, beads of water glowing on his skin before he dove in and came up laughing.

  We were twenty, and married, and I was pregnant and he had a decent job, and we were moving to the city soon as we saved enough money.

  We were thirty, still happy even though none of the babies had worked out, and his job was the same, and I had trouble breathing in summertime.

  We were forty, and even though we had each done a terrible thing, he still bought me mittens and lied to the police and brought me coffee in the morning. And I thought to myself, This is a good man. And I said, “Let’s move to the city.” And we never spoke of it again.

  SILENT JUSTICE

  BY C. E. LAWRENCE

  Bless me, Father, for I have sinned.”

  Father Aleksander Milichuk pressed his fingertips hard against the sides of his forehead in an attempt to stop the throbbing in his right temple. Another Monday morning, another migraine on the way. He really needed to back off on the Sunday-night drinking at McSorley’s. He wasn’t as young as he used to be, as his mother was so fond of reminding him. Maybe she was right; he was nearing forty, and these days just a couple of drinks could bring on a wicked headache. He took a deep breath and cleared his throat.

  “How long has it been since your last confession?”

  “Three weeks.” The voice on the other side of the confessional was a breathy tenor, the voice of a young person.

  “Is it a venial sin or a—”

  “A mortal sin, Father.”

  Something in the man’s tone made him lean forward.

  “And what was this sin, my son?”

  The answer came in a low voice, barely audible.

  “Murder, Father.”

  Father Milichuk sat up very straight on his narrow bench, his mind snapping into sharp focus. He was no longer aware of the throbbing in his head. Panicked, he tried to think of a response, but his tongue was dry as paper and stuck to the roof of his mouth. There was a rustling sound from the other side of the confessional, as though the man were removing something from a plastic bag. Crazy, improbable thoughts darted through the priest’s head. What if he brought a gun with him? His knees shook as fear flooded his veins. Say something! He tried to remember if he had ever heard this voice before.

  “Aren’t you going to give me penance, Father?” The man’s tone was patient, weary.

  The priest was very good at identifying voices and was certain he had never heard this man’s voice before.

  “Uh, yes, of course,” he sputtered finally. “Say twelve Hail Marys—” He stopped, stunned by the feeble inadequacy of his response.

  The man on the other side of the booth chuckled sadly. “That’s all?”

  “H-have you confessed your sin to the police?”

  “I’m confessing it to you.”

  “Yes, I know, but—”

  “I don’t want to go to prison.”

  “Who did you—kill?”

  “It doesn’t matter. I took a life; that’s all I’m required to tell you. Give me absolution, Father. Please.”

  “It’s just that—”

  “Please.” It was half entreaty, half threat.

  The priest looked at the lattice of shadow cast by the metal grille between them, crisscrossed like miniature prison bars.

  “All right,” he said. “But—”

  “Deus meus, ex toto corde paenitet,” the man began, “me omnium meorum peccatorum, eaque detestor, quia peccando…”

  He finished his flawless Latin recitation with a final “Amen.”

  “Now will you give me absolution?”

  Father Milichuk could see no way out of it. Crossing himself, he began to recite the familiar litany.

  “May our Lord Jesus Christ absolve you—”

  “In Latin, Father—please.”

  The priest crossed himself again. His head throbbed, and his palms were sweating.

  “Dominus noster Jesus Christus te absolvat…” The words seemed to stick in his throat. He coughed and managed to complete the prayer, crossing himself one final time. But he failed to find the usual comfort in the gesture; it felt futile, desultory.

  “Thank you, Father.” The man sounded genuinely grateful. Whatever else he was, the priest thought, he was a true Catholic who believed in the power of absolution.

  “Say twelve Hail Marys,” he began, “and—”

  “I will, Father—thank you. God bless you.”

  “God be with you, my son.”

  Before the priest could say another word, he heard the door hinges creak open, then the sound of rapidly receding footsteps on the stone floor of the church. Father Milichuk peered out through a hole in the carved design of the door, but the lighting was dim and all he could make out was the figure of a man dressed in dark clothing walking quickly away. Medium height, medium build; he could be anyone.

  One thing the priest was certain of was that the mysterious supplicant was a Roman Catholic, not Greek. His perfect Latin was spoken in the Roman way, and he had said “I have sinned” rather than “I am a sinner,” which was the Greek manner. But why had he come here? St. George was a Ukrainian Greek Catholic church; surely this man had a Roman Catholic church he attended regularly. The answer came to Aleksander Milichuk suddenly: The man had chosen a place where he wouldn’t be known. His own priest was bound to recognize his voice and would perhaps pressure him to turn himself in. Here, he was guaranteed anonymity.

  The priest sighed and leaned back in the cramped cubicle, which smelled of stale sweat and candle wax. He put a hand to his temple in an attempt to control the throbbing. What did it matter who the man was or where he was from? Aleks wasn’t a detective, and it wasn’t his job to hunt the man down. He felt the full weight of the sinner’s guilt upon his own shoulders. Perhaps that was what God intended—maybe he was doing his priestly duty now more than ever before, but the thought made him feel only more anxious.

  The rest of the day passed in a haze of meaningless activity. There were parishioners to call, schedules to arrange, events to discuss—choir practice, the Wednesday-night church supper, vendors for the annual Ukrainian festival. He wished he could drown himself in the barrage of mundane details, but all he could think of was the terrible secret he would be forced to carry to his grave. He considered the idea that the man was lying, but rejected that hopeful notion. Either he was telling the truth or he was the best actor in the world.

  Aleks gazed idly out the window, but even the sight of the white blossoms on the mimosa trees failed to cheer him up. He sat at his desk staring blankly, his head buzzing with apprehension. Normally he would now start writing his sermon for next week’
s service, but he was unable to concentrate.

  His secretary, the ever-intrusive Mrs. Kovalenko, noticed his mood.

  “Are you feeling all right, Father?” she asked, one hand on her plump hip, the other clutching a freshly filled teapot. Mrs. Kovalenko was a great believer in the healing power of tea, and she had the persuasive ability of a used-car salesman combined with a Mafia enforcer. If she wanted to serve you tea, there was little you could do about it. He had briefly considered firing her for the sake of his bladder, but Mrs. Kovalenko was not the kind of woman you fired, so he had resigned himself to frequent visits to the bathroom.

  “I’m fine,” he replied, but his heart wasn’t in it, and she continued to stand there studying him. “I just have a headache,” he added when she didn’t move.

  She shook her dyed blond curls and clicked her tongue, then she brightened. “A good cup of tea is what you need,” she proclaimed. “Straighten you right out.”

  “That would be nice,” he replied; at least it might throw her off the scent for a while. She had nagged him about his drinking in the past, but he had cut down recently—partly because of the headaches. She busied herself gathering the honey and cream, bustling about the office happily humming a Ukrainian folk song. He knew she didn’t speak a word of the language, but she liked to impress people with her knowledge of the culture, and had picked up a few songs and phrases here and there.

  “I just bought this tea last week,” she said as she poured him a steaming cup from the ornate ceramic pot, decorated with chubby, beaming angels. She had found it at the weekly yard sale on Avenue A and had presented it to him with great pride. Father Milichuk gazed at an especially porcine angel and sighed. He hated angels. The angel leered at him with a self-satisfied smirk; he yearned to smash the pot and erase the grin from its fat little face.

  He made a point of telling Mrs. Kovalenko how delicious the tea was. “What’s it called?” he said, taking a sip and smacking his lips.