Twist of Faith

by Ellen J Green

  Ava was dead.

  CHAPTER 30

  The woman’s face was frozen into a scowl, though the expression was softened by her large brown eyes. She wore dark pants and a gray sweater covered with a black trench coat, keys dangling from her fingers.

  “Who are you?” she asked again.

  Russell had never met her, but he knew this had to be Ava’s aunt, Marie. Even in everyday clothes, she looked like a nun. “I was a guest of Ava’s. She left early this morning and never came back. Have you seen her?” His eyes landed on the bright-red scratches on one hand and the bandage on the other.

  “I was coming over to check the house. See how things were going over here. Where’d she go this morning?” she asked.

  He crossed his arms, tucking the envelope of photographs behind him. He didn’t want her questioning what he was taking from the house. “I’m not sure. She was gone when I woke up.”

  Her face twisted slightly. He wasn’t sure if it was the thought of Ava waking up with a man, or just his presence that she found distasteful. “You must be Marie, Ava’s mentioned you.” He tried to smile. “Did you fall?” He pointed to her hands. The keys dangling from her fingers. “Those scratches look painful.”

  “Cleaning this morning in the church. Must have been the vents. Cleanliness is next to godliness, they say.”

  He knew he could stand on the porch and question her for an hour and all he was going to get were clichés and simple random, meaningless words strung together. He needed to get past her, to the bar. “I’ll keep trying to call her”—though he felt her cell phone in his pocket pressing against his leg. “Maybe she’ll turn up later on. Have a good day.”

  In one swift move, he darted down the steps and to his Jeep. He clicked the door open and was in the seat before Marie could even turn around. As he pulled away, he saw her on the bottom step, her hand raised, as if she needed to ask him one more question. Too late.

  The sun was setting by the time he crossed into Philadelphia and was heading north on Fifth Street. Northern Liberties was one of those areas of the city that kept changing. Gentrification followed by abandonment and crime, then regentrification, had left many streets an uncertain mix. The W&K bar fit in perfectly. Poplar Street was busy, dotted with restaurants, hipsters, flourishing businesses, and lights. But this bar had a flat sign, barely lit. The outside reflected the abandonment-and-crime era, with the barred windows and door complete with a buzzer.

  He pressed it and waited, wondering if the owner had a camera homed in on the patrons outside. He heard the click and pulled the heavy green metal door open. The room was dated, drab. An older, familiar crowd kept them in business, he realized as he scanned the back of seven gray heads at the bar. A man nearing seventy who was a dead ringer for Nikita Khrushchev stood behind the counter, leaning against the wall, talking to a patron.

  Khrushchev’s heavy eyebrows went up when he eyed Russell, but he said nothing until Russell leaned in. “What can I get for you?” The accent. It was the same as the message on Ava’s phone.

  “Anything on tap?”

  Khrushchev shook his head.

  “Then a bottle of Rolling Rock.”

  The thought of drinking anything made his stomach turn, but he had to order something. He sat at an empty seat at the other end of the bar and waited. Khrushchev made his way down to him slowly. His left leg was lame, leaving him to walk with an uneven stride.

  “Russell.” He held out his hand. The older man shook it hard and started to walk away. “How long have you been here? In this neighborhood?”

  “Opened in seventy-two. Good year.”

  He took a sip from the bottle. “Changed some, huh?” Khrushchev nodded. No time for stupid small talk, he started to turn away again. “I’m a friend of Ava Saunders.” Russell looked down. “I really hope you can help me. Have you seen her today?”

  He turned and faced Russell, both palms on the bar. “I have not seen her today or any other day. I never met her.”

  “She’s gone. Disappeared, and I know she told me she called you. I thought she might have come here in person. I’ve looked everywhere.”

  Khrushchev didn’t move. “You a cop? You look like a cop.”

  Russell nodded. No sense lying. “I am. In New Jersey. And she’s not in trouble or anything. She’s my friend. She left early this morning and never came back.”

  “Maybe she went shopping? Ladies love to shop.”

  Russell shook his head. “No. She asked for my help with something involving her grandfather, Ross Saunders. We were going through photographs last night. She wouldn’t just up and go shopping. Besides, she’s not the shopping type.”

  He held out his hand to Russell. “Walter. I’m not sure I should believe you, but I do anyway. It’s true I never met Ava in my life, but she did call. Yesterday.”

  “I heard your message back to her. She asked you to look at a photograph? That’s why I’m here. You’re the last person besides me that she talked to, I think.”

  Walter took a step back, his head tilted to the side. “She didn’t talk to me. She talked to Katia.” Katia had to be his wife. The K in W&K, he assumed. “Said Ross’s daughter died. Now her, I met. When she was just a baby. Too bad.”

  “And . . .”

  Walter didn’t like having his story pushed along. “And that she was going through her mother’s things. Found a picture of Ross and some friends. Wanted me to see it, to see if I knew where one of them was.” Walter leaned back. “Told Katia to have me call her back. So I did.”

  “You knew Ross pretty well?”

  Walter folded his arms in front of him. Russell knew this was a sign. People did it when he was pushing them too hard. Or they weren’t comfortable with the interrogation. It meant Back off.

  Walter hesitated. “He was a regular when he was working at Dubin Paper, down Delaware Ave. Lived on Fourth Street. Up a block or so. But he’s dead now too.”

  He took a bigger sip of beer. “When did Ross die?”

  “A year or so ago. He wasn’t living in Philly no more. Moved out to Harrisburg.” A customer at the other end of the bar called to him. Walter pushed up and limped away.

  “Walter, how’d he die?” Russell asked when the old man was back within earshot.

  Walter shrugged. “Fell and hit his head. Of all damned things. Survived Vietnam but killed by a bathtub.” He looked at Russell’s beer. “Is that it?”

  “No. Look at these for me?” He pulled the photographs out of the envelope and lined them up on the bar. Then he saw Walter’s face. “Oh, and a shot of Jack, please.”

  The old eyes scanned the images. “I knew them when they were older. Here they’re just punk kids. That’s Ross.” A heavy index finger landed on one boy. “This one is Loyal.” He picked up the photograph and held it closer to his eyes. “Little bastard. Always joking around.” He glanced up at Russell. “He’s dead too—killed in his house. Break-in or something. And this one”—he pointed to the third and last boy—“is Bill.”

  Russell had homed in on the photograph. “Bill?”

  “Bill Connelly. Father Connelly.” Walter laughed. “Never woulda known if he wasn’t wearing his collar. Come to think of it, he’s dead too.”

  Russell lifted the shot glass to his lips and swallowed the contents. “Let me have one more. How’d Bill die?”

  Walter poured Jack Daniel’s to the brim of the shot glass. “Died in the rectory, I heard. Not sure how. Natural causes. Was maybe five or six years ago.” Russell drank the shot. His stomach had calmed down, but the whiskey had set his mind on fire. All of them were dead? Within a relatively short period of time. “But you’re missing the fourth of the group. There was four of ’em all hung together.”

  “Who was the fourth? I didn’t see any pictures of anyone else.”

  Walter shrugged. “I think that was the one Ava was interested in. Name was Jack. Jack Quinn. Quieter than those.” He pointed to the picture. “And a little stupid—or maybe a lot
smarter, depending on how you look at it. I always thought underneath all that quiet he was a vicious little prick.”

  “Is he dead too?”

  “Never heard he was. Haven’t seen him around here for a few years, and I have no clue where he’s gotten to.”

  Russell stood up and gathered the pictures. “If Ava comes here, please, please tell her Russell is looking for her. And tell her I have her phone.” He pulled it out of his pocket. “I’m worried about her.” He took thirty dollars out of his pocket and put it on the bar.

  “Don’t need charity here.” He pushed back ten. “This is good enough. And if you’re around here, stop in, we like cops from New Jersey.” He half winked at Russell. “Thursdays Katia makes dinner. Pretty good, too. Sausage and onions, maybe?”

  Russell knew how the man stayed in business. This bar was some version of a pub in England. Once you were welcomed, you were welcome. He stumbled out on the street, noticing that it had come alive. Northern Liberties had reinvented itself again into a Millennial Central. The cool place for the bar-hopping sort. None of them were pressing the buzzer on the old W&K, though.

  “Jack Quinn, I’m coming for you,” he said as he slid behind the wheel of his Jeep.

  CHAPTER 31

  Marie pushed the door open and walked into the living room. “Good God” escaped her lips as she surveyed the destruction of what was once an airy, creative space. “Ava, you’re going to hell,” she whispered.

  She took off her coat and threw it across the back of a chair. Now that her niece was dead, she’d come to remove any damaging evidence. To put things in order, close this chapter, if it ever really could be closed. Erase Ava’s existence—something she desperately needed to do after the scene in the woods. But this was too much. Claire had purchased the house, the one and only house she’d ever been able to own in her life, mostly because of Ava, and Ava had nearly destroyed it within weeks. Garbage and detritus were everywhere.

  Marie decided that minute that she had to clean all of it up, by herself, and that she had to do it quickly. It might take days and a dumpster, but she had no choice. She pulled herself up the stairs to Claire’s room to find an old shirt to change into. Once inside her sister’s world, she was mesmerized. It was untouched. Clean. Organized. The four-poster bed was neatly made, draped with a crinkled-silk mauve coverlet.

  Claire had been gone well over a month, but Marie hadn’t really grieved. There were times during prayer or Mass, or even just sipping tea in the kitchen, when she’d feel the tears on her cheeks and not even realize she was crying. It had all been so sudden, and the truth was that Marie was still turning the reality of the situation over in her mind every day, seeing only bits and pieces at a time. The whole of it would be too enormous to handle at once.

  The little Lavoisier-Saunders family had been small and was now even smaller. Marie’s world was closing in, and the closer it came, the more she saw that it was a disgusting mess. Anais had insulated herself with distance and disinterest. Her emotions poured out when solicited, but in general, she’d occupied her time with the company of the Lavoisier clan and gardening. Nothing else. The loss of her daughter was no doubt devastating, but she kept her grief tightly bound to her chest.

  And now Ava was gone too. She dropped onto Claire’s bed and wondered if anyone else had lain there since her death. The sheets were cool and wrinkled, probably just the way her sister had left them. She lay flat on her back and sobbed, then rolled over, shoved her face in the pillow, and let loose a month’s worth of anguish.

  When she was finished, she knew she had an insurmountable task in front of her. Clean this house and sell it. Ask for a transfer back to France, nearer to Anais. The United States experience had been filled with terror, running, lying, murder, scandal, upset. At first the confusion, the adrenaline rush, had been addicting. After a few years it became exhausting and enraging. And in the end it had nearly driven her mad.

  She pulled her sweater over her head and folded it on the back of the chair. Claire’s closet was still full—Ava hadn’t bothered to start sorting out these items, and Marie was glad of it. It almost seemed like her sister might come bounding in at any moment. She ran her finger over the garments hanging; nothing was appropriate. She sighed and went to the dresser. Perfume, hairbrushes littered the top. When she pulled out a drawer, she saw the book sticking out from under a folded shirt.

  The pages were filled with tiny print, some English, some French. A mishmash of random thoughts. Marie felt her eyes moisten. She flipped the pages quickly, mesmerized by the writing, the ink, the time it took to make each entry. It seemed most of it was done with the same black pen, the letters looping and curling into one another. She stopped, wanting to see what was consuming her sister’s mind in those months before her death. She ran a finger down the page and stopped.

  Ava came in late last night. Just the way she was looking at me got me upset all over again. Angry to be here, to be reined in. She had that old Polaroid picture of the house in her hand, demanding information about Quinn I don’t have. I should be doing more to protect myself but I can’t. I’m just so tired and I don’t feel any safer than I ever have but this time I don’t know where the threat is coming from. From inside my own family? I need Maman.

  Marie read the entry over again to be sure she got it right. Ava had known about the Polaroid of the Owens house before Claire died. She hadn’t found it in a box like she’d claimed. The next entry started on another topic and never returned to Ava or the photograph.

  Marie closed the book, struggling to understand the implications. Ava said she’d been digging in Claire’s things after her death, found the picture and a baby outfit in a box in the storage area, been curious and gone to the house—never fully explaining how she’d located the house from just a little picture in the first place. The girl was on fire that day she’d returned from Chestnut Hill, weeks ago. Asking questions. But she’d apparently known about the photograph at least six months before that. Maybe she’d even been to that house before. Had Ava been testing her? To see what she knew? Was that possible?

  Marie grabbed the book and read the last entry, written the night before her sister’s death. Aux grands maux les grands remèdes. Que faire? Loosely translated, it meant Desperate times call for desperate measures. What to do?

  Marie bit the bottom part of her lip, already red and raw. She often did this when upset, anxious. She’d been drawing blood for three days without realizing it.

  “Menteuse,” she whispered. “Ava—you’re a liar.”

  CHAPTER 32

  Russell pulled up in front of the little yellow bungalow and took a breath. He had to think about his next move carefully. He hadn’t been able to reach Ava all day. What if whoever had tried to run him over had done worse to her? If he reported her missing or started the rounds of hospital inquiries, he’d have to make the rest of this case official—turn over the information he had about the photo and its connection to a five-year-old double murder. Withholding important evidence in a murder investigation, hindering prosecution, obstruction of justice were just a few terms that might apply to his abject stupidity since getting involved in this debacle. Prosecution might be preferable to looking like a fool if they simply laughed him out of the station—he didn’t even have the Polaroid of the house to hand over as evidence, and, he reminded himself, he’d never even seen it.

  A sucker for pretty green eyes. That’s what he was.

  He didn’t even open his car door when Joanne’s eager face was at the window, peering in, her expression holding fear and excitement at the same time. “This is it,” he muttered. “The pinnacle of my career. My trusty sidekick in a murder-and-missing-persons case.”

  She opened the Jeep door. “My God, you’re late. Get in the house now. I made coffee.”

  He’d been pondering what to do when he picked up the phone the day before, not even sure which number he was calling—the Prosecutor’s Office to report the whole ordeal or Joanne at
the courthouse. There was only a two-digit difference between the numbers. He heard Joanne’s voice at the other end and realized he’d made his decision without really making it.

  Her house was situated in Haddon Township on Center Street. It was clean and simple on the outside, so he was surprised the inside was cluttered with bric-a-brac and pillows. Joanne had set up a space for them to talk, and Russell took his assigned seat as directed.

  “So what do you need me to do? Anything?” she asked, pouring his coffee into a take-out cup. She smiled. “I came prepared with cups to go because I knew you’d be outta here two minutes after giving me my assignment.”

  “You’re right. Ava’s been gone a day and a half already. You know her better than anyone. Would she just take off like this, do you think? Without telling anyone?”

  Joanne shrugged. “The one thing I do know about her is that she operates alone, deep inside that little head of hers. I’ve only gotten a peek inside that brain and then the door slams shut. So, I have no clue. Possibly.”

  “I’ve gotten myself into a bind now, so I have no choice but to either sacrifice my career or keep going.” He sipped his coffee. “God help me, I’m going to keep going, work fast, and pray that she’s not dead.”

  “Dead?” she said, alarmed. “Who would’ve killed her?”

  “I’ll tell you this, if I find her squirreled away somewhere, I’m going to kill her myself. Here’s her phone.” He put it on the table. “It’s an iPhone 6. Can you charge it and go through everything? There’s no passcode. Incoming and outgoing emails, phone calls, any activity at all. If you find anything, call me?” He put the lid on his coffee and stood up. “I put an unofficial alert out for her car, so if certain friends of mine see her plate number, they’ll pull her over—”