by Joy Fielding
Press. Ring.
This is Charley Webb. I’m sorry…
She returned to the bedroom, trampling several legal-size sheets of paper beneath the soles of her sneakers as she walked. Lowering herself slowly to the floor, as if she were sliding through a vat of thick honey, she began gathering the papers together, returning them to Alex’s briefcase. Pinnacle Books, she read, the words pulsating off the page like a strobe light. Charley Webb. Her book contract, she realized, knowing how elated seeing this would have made her even a few short hours ago.
Press. Ring.
This is Charley Webb. I’m sorry…
She was sorry all right. Sorry she’d ever met with Jill Rohmer. Sorry she’d allowed herself to be seduced by thoughts of riches and fame. Sorry she’d lent a sympathetic ear to Jill’s admittedly horrifying history of abuse, while all the while Jill had been laughing behind her back, plotting with her brother—her beloved brother, was it possible?—to do her children harm.
How could it be?
Press. Ring.
This is Charley Webb…
Charley returned to the living room, moving marginally faster now, and retrieved the bag of groceries from the floor near the front door. She carried the bag to the kitchen and removed the several cans of chicken soup, deciding maybe a little soup would make her feel better. Somehow she managed to get the can open and the soup into a cup. Then she put the cup in the microwave oven and turned it on, watching the automatic timer count down the seconds until the soup was ready.
Press. Ring.
This is Charley Webb. I’m sorry…
This is Charley Webb. I’m sorry…
This is Charley Webb. I’m sorry…
She carried the soup into the living room and sat down on the sofa, the aromatic steam drifting toward her nostrils. She took a tiny sip of soup, felt it hot against the back of her throat. If she could only manage to keep it down, she was thinking, as she tried her number yet again.
Press. Ring.
This is Charley Webb…
“Where are you, for God’s sake? Why aren’t you picking up?”
She pictured her mother looking around in confusion, wondering where that strange wolf whistle was coming from. Damn it. She should have changed it to a traditional ring. Why hadn’t she changed it?
She pictured her children: sweet, sensitive Franny with her big, sad eyes and sharp, analytical mind; rambunctious, carefree James, with his boundless energy and enthusiasm. How could anyone think of hurting them?
She thought of the e-mails she’d received.
I’m coming, the last one had stated ominously. Soon.
Had Bram sent them?
She remembered the photographs of children she’d found in the night table beside his bed. They’re just some neighborhood kids I was thinking of painting, Bram had told her. Was that what they were? Potential portraits? Or were they potential victims? “No. Please, no.”
Her beautiful, lost brother, who’d spent much of the past decade in a drug-fueled haze—was he really capable of hurting anyone other than himself?
Press. Ring.
This is Charley Webb. I’m sorry…
How many times had she let him down? How many times had she disappointed him, scolded him, turned her back on him? He was the youngest, the most beautiful, and by far the most vulnerable of the four Webb children. His sisters had somehow managed to channel the pain of their childhood into something productive, but Bram’s pain had been relieved only by alcohol and narcotics.
Charley remembered her mother showing her how to hold Bram when he was an infant. She recalled the instructions to rock him gently, never imagining hers would soon be the only arms to do so. She pictured him hanging on to the indifferent skirts of a succession of nannies, the tears in his eyes glazing over, then eventually drying up altogether. She remembered the cruel taunts of the other children that chased him home from school, the crueler admonishment from his father to “take it like a man.”
Press. Ring.
This is Charley Webb. I’m sorry…
She’d abandoned him, too, Charley acknowledged silently. Fled to Florida upon her graduation from college, determined to make a name for herself, her total self-absorption allowing little time to worry about her dissolute younger brother. Eventually Bram had sought her out, driving his ancient MG down to Miami, where he’d rented an apartment and, when he wasn’t too stoned, attended a few art classes. In one of those classes, he’d met Pamela Rohmer. And through Pamela, her sister, Jill.
Jack and Jill.
Was it possible?
Charley pressed the REDIAL button again, and listened to the ring, bracing herself for the unwelcome sound of her own voice.
“Hello?” she heard her mother say instead. “Hello? Is somebody there?”
Charley’s breath caught in her throat. She’d reached them. They were safe.
“Nobody’s saying anything,” her mother continued. “I don’t think I’m doing this right.”
“Mom!” Charley yelled, the word an explosion. “Mom? Listen to me!”
“Charley?”
“Where have you been? I’ve been calling you for hours.”
“We were at the Magic Kingdom. It was so crowded there, I guess I didn’t hear you whistling. I tried calling you earlier, but I kept getting your voice mail.”
“Is that Mommy?” Charley heard a small voice ask.
“Franny?” Charley cried. “Is that Franny?” Her daughter was there. She was unharmed.
“Well, of course it’s Franny. Here. I’ll let you talk to her. I have to lie down for a few minutes. My stomach’s been acting up off and on all day.”
Charley heard the phone exchanging hands. “Where are you, Mommy?” Franny asked. “Are you almost here?”
“Not yet, sweetie. But Alex will be there soon. So I need you and James to sit tight, and not go anywhere until he gets there….”
“James isn’t here,” Franny interrupted.
Charley felt her body turn to stone. “What?”
“James isn’t here,” Franny repeated.
“Where is he?”
“With Uncle Bram.”
Charley had to bite down on her lower lip to keep from screaming. “Where are they?”
“They’re still at the Magic Kingdom. James wanted to go into Pirates of the Caribbean, but the line was so long, and Grandma wasn’t feeling well.”
“Let me speak to her again.”
“She’s pretty sick, Mommy….”
“Franny, put your grandmother on the phone,” Charley snapped.
“What’s the matter?” Franny started whimpering.
“What is it, darling?” Charley heard her mother ask Franny.
“I think Mommy’s mad at me….”
“Charley?” her mother asked, returning to the line. “What…?”
“You left James with Bram?”
“Is that a problem? They were having such a good time, and I didn’t want to ruin it for everyone just because I wasn’t feeling well. Franny wanted to keep me company.”
“How long ago was that?”
“Not long. Not more than half an hour ago. Why? Is something wrong?”
“Yes,” Charley told her. “Something’s very wrong. We have to find James. We have to get him away from Bram.”
“What are you talking about?”
“I can’t explain it to you now. Have you talked to the police?”
“The police? Good God, no. Why would we…?”
“They probably came when you were in the Magic Kingdom. Hopefully they’ll be back….”
“Why? What is this about?”
“Alex will explain everything to you when he gets there. In the meantime, don’t let Franny out of your sight, and if Bram comes back with James, make sure you don’t let them leave.”
“You’re starting to scare me.”
“Don’t be scared. Just do it.”
“When will Alex be here?”
Charley
checked her watch, although it was a useless gesture. The numbers on its face refused to stay still. “In about an hour.” Was that right? How long had he been gone? She saw the piece of paper with his cell phone number lying on the coffee table. “I’ll call him as soon as I get off the phone. Just keep your eye on Franny. Don’t let her out of your sight,” Charley said, the same thing she’d told her brother this morning.
I’ll watch them like a hawk, he’d replied.
Was it possible he’d been planning all along to kill them?
No, it couldn’t be. It couldn’t.
Charley pressed the portable phone’s OFF button, then immediately pressed in Alex’s number. It scarcely had time to ring before Alex picked it up.
“Charley?” he said. “Were you able to reach your mother?”
“I just spoke to her. She’s with Franny at the motel.”
“Where’s James?”
“Still at Disney World. With Bram.”
Silence, then, “Okay, listen. At least we know Franny’s safe.”
“Where are you?”
“I’m almost there. And I’ll call the police and fill them in. Did your mother say anything else?”
“Franny said James wanted to go into Pirates of the Caribbean, and that there was a very long line.”
“Those lineups can take hours,” Alex agreed. “With any luck, they’ll still be standing there when the police arrive.”
“Do you really think so?”
“I think there’s a chance. How are you feeling?”
“A little stronger,” Charley lied.
“Good. I’ll call you as soon as I know anything.”
“Call me no matter what.”
“I will. Try to stay calm.”
Charley sat on the sofa for at least ten minutes without moving after Alex said good-bye. Everything’s going to be all right, she assured herself repeatedly. Franny was safe. Alex was on his way. He’d find James before Bram could hurt him. Everything would be okay.
Except nothing would ever be okay again. Not if it was true Bram had been Jill’s accomplice. Not if it was true he’d drugged her in an attempt to separate her from her children. Not if it was true he was as deranged and cold-blooded as Jill.
Could it really be true?
Could it?
It was one thing for Jill to fool her, and quite another to be taken in by someone she’d known literally his entire life. Her own flesh and blood. Sweet, sensitive, beautiful Bram. Yes, he was troubled. Yes, he was irresponsible. But he was also a loving brother and a wonderful uncle—no way was he a sadistic psychopath. No way could he ever hurt the children he’d doted on since the day they were born. No way would she ever believe that.
And why should she? she asked herself suddenly. Because Jill had said he was? Why would she believe anything Jill said to her?
Because she knew things, Charley reminded herself. She knew about Aunt Jemima and the blueberry pancakes. She knew about Bram’s decision to go to Disney World. How would she know any of that unless…unless someone had phoned her and provided her with all the pertinent information?
In the next minute Charley was on her feet, pacing back and forth across the room. “It can’t be. It can’t be.” And yet it was the only thing that made sense. Charley raced back into Alex’s bedroom, began rifling through his dresser drawers. What was she doing? What was she looking for? “There’s nothing here,” she said out loud, pulling loose T-shirts and sweaters from the drawers and dropping them to the floor, then careening toward Alex’s closet, and pulling open its door as she fell to her knees. “Just a lot of shoes,” she said, flinging them aside. It was then that she noticed a large stack of magazines pressed into a corner, and dragged them toward her. “No. Oh, no,” she said, staring at the top cover—a naked woman, bound and gagged, her body twisted into an unnatural position, her face contorted in obvious pain. The other magazines were even worse, the inside pictures growing increasingly graphic, the images more horrific with each flick of the page. Charley looked up, saw a shoebox on a high shelf. She knocked it to the floor with one swipe of her hand. Its lid fell open, the contents of the box spilling to the floor. Charley stood there crying as pornographic pictures of children fell about her head like ashes from a crematorium.
She grabbed her stomach, fighting the renewed urge to vomit as she ran into the living room. Her eyes darted toward Alex’s collection of classic old movies, a few of which were still scattered across the floor. White Christmas, Casablanca, An Affair to Remember. She began tossing aside one cassette after another. What was she looking for?
Any idea where the tapes are?
None whatsoever.
You’re sure she didn’t give them to you for safekeeping?
Lawyers aren’t allowed to hide evidence, Charley.
What if you didn’t know what was on the tapes?
What if he did? What if he knew only too well?
“I’m so sorry, Bram. I’ve been such an idiot.”
Which was when she saw it.
It was at the very back of the shelf, squeezed between Lawrence of Arabia and Citizen Kane. A simple black cassette with three handwritten words printed on its side.
Jack and Jill.
Charley reached for it, her hand trembling, the delicate hairs on the backs of her arms standing at full alert.
Slowly and carefully, she removed the cassette from its carton and put it in the VCR, then pressed PLAY. Then she waited, her face only inches from the giant TV monitor. There followed several seconds of nothing but a blank, brilliant blue screen, and for a moment Charley thought whatever had been on that tape might have been erased. But in the next instant the blank screen was filled with Jill’s laughing face. The extreme close-up made a mockery of her normally delicate features, rendering her almost gargoyle-like, as if the camera had somehow managed to penetrate her soul. She was smoking a cigarette and blowing kisses at the lens. “What are you doing? That’s not my good side,” she was saying, her voice dissolving in a fit of girlish giggles. “I’ll show you my good side.” She lifted up her T-shirt to expose her naked breasts.
That was when Charley became aware of other sounds. A man’s whispered instructions, a child’s muffled cries. “Oh, no,” Charley moaned as the camera panned slowly to little Tammy Barnet tied to a cot, squirming and whimpering behind the blindfold that covered her eyes. “No. Oh, please, no.”
“Okay, Jill,” the male voice whispered seductively. “Now take the cigarette and press it against Tammy’s thighs.”
“Oh, God.” Charley covered her eyes.
“Make the brat shut up,” the man ordered sharply. “She’s starting to get on my nerves.”
“I want my mommy,” the little girl cried.
“You’ll never see your mommy again if you don’t stop blubbering.”
“Come on, Tammy,” Jill urged. “Be a good little girl. It’ll all be over soon.”
The little girl let out a sudden, bloodcurdling scream.
“That was just a love bite, silly,” Jill chastised, laughing.
“My turn,” the man said as Charley edged closer to the TV, the man’s voice drawing her in like a magnet. She watched Jill take the camera from his outstretched arms.
“Okay, big boy. It’s your turn to shine,” Jill said, aiming the camera at the man’s feet. The camera panned slowly up the man’s legs, resting a few seconds on the pronounced bulge at the crotch of his jeans. It then continued its languorous climb up his chest and neck until it reached his smiling face.
Alex.
Charley began rocking back and forth, unable to turn her eyes away as Alex proceeded to place a plastic bag over the child’s head. “This isn’t happening. This isn’t happening.” She scrambled to her feet, switched off the VCR before she could see more, then removed the cassette from the machine, her fingernails digging into the plastic as she tried to wrap her mind around what she’d just seen. But there was no time for trying to put it all together, to add up the hows and
the whys. None of that mattered now. Only one thing mattered: Alex had killed those children. He was Jill’s lover, her accomplice, her mentor.
He was Jack.
He’d killed those children, and now he was on his way to murder her son. “Move,” she commanded her legs. “Move.”
In the next instant she was on her feet and searching for her purse. She found it on the floor in the bedroom, and she tossed the cassette inside it, then fished around for her car keys. Except she wasn’t at home. Her car wasn’t here. And she was in no condition to drive, her stomach reminded her with a sudden surge of nausea. Clearly Alex had poisoned her. But when? Bram had made the pancakes; her mother had made the coffee.
Who wants orange juice? she heard Alex ask brightly.
Okay, no time for that now, Charley admonished herself. She had to do something. Alex had obviously been faking when he pretended to call the state police, which meant there were no officers on their way to rescue James. She had to reach her mother, tell her to call the local police. She returned to the living room and grabbed the phone, pressing in the number of her cell.
This is Charley Webb. I’m sorry I can’t take your call right now…
“Shit!” What was going on? Charley pressed 911.
“What is the nature of your emergency?” an operator asked.
“I need to speak to the police in Kissimee. There’s a man on his way to Disney World to hurt my son.”
“I’m sorry. You’ll have to speak slower. Your son has been hurt?”
“Not yet. But there’s a man, his name is Alex Prescott….”
“Your name is Prescott?”
“No. My name is Charley Webb. Listen to me. My son is in danger. He’s in Disney World….”
“I’m sorry, but you really should be talking to the state police.”
“Fine. Can you connect me?”
“No, I’m sorry. I’m not equipped to do that.”
Charley disconnected the line, pressed the number for information.
For what city? the recording asked sprightly.