Lights Out

by Jill Cooper

  I could do it.

  I limped, step by painful step, until the generated lights of the hospital pulled me closer.

  The woman at the emergency desk passed me a clipboard, acknowledging that I looked exhausted with some mundane comment. I couldn't remember her name, but she was a local. The thing was they were always locals.

  I didn't want to fill out the paperwork.

  I had to do something now. Everything was all jumbled and I couldn’t focus. The pain in my leg was excruciating.

  Focusing, I filled in all the spaces with false information and handed it back to the woman.

  I breathed deep; I had to do something to control my pain. But I didn't want to seem weak or out of it. I sat down in the stiffly padded chair, waiting for my turn to be called.

  The waiting room wasn't extraordinarily packed. In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if everybody was there just to stay warm.

  I leaned forward, trying not to jostle my leg too much. The relief from just sitting for a moment weakened my resolve.

  If I had my way, everyone in that room would be dead soon. But first, I needed help.

  The doors rushed open at the end of the emergency hall. A stretcher pushed by two men rushed in. Someone was calling out something about hypothermia and falling in the lake.

  I shifted my gaze to the figure on the stretcher. The person had an oxygen mask on their face. Who was it? How would I know? Was it Karen? Could it be Karen? How many people had fallen into the lake that morning?

  Maybe that's where my dissatisfaction came from. Maybe my sense of incompleteness stemmed from the fact that Karen had never died.

  My sense of purpose had been so tied to myself spiritually and soulfully that the fact that she hadn't died had been sensed by something deeper inside me.

  My disillusionment faded with the exhaustion. Adrenaline pumped through me.

  I had to get to her. I had to complete what I started. If I could just kill Karen, I would be able to find peace. I was so close, I could taste it. I could kill her and that whole damn town and be the better for it. The town deserved to die–they’d voted in a corrupt man like Condran and never looked back, never investigated what happened on his watch.

  But how would I get close to her? They still hadn't seen me. I needed to get out of there. I needed to think.

  And if I was really going to minimize the town into a flat hole next to a lake, I needed to say one last goodbye.

  A pair of crutches leaned against the wall by a man with a white cast. His head lulled to the side as he slept.

  I could borrow the crutches. I could bring them back when I returned. No one would know. As I limped past, I grabbed the crutches which were a little too long for me. But I would be able to use them and move much faster. Carefully I hobbled through the door.

  The emergency room doors that hadn't stopped working.

  The cemetery was only a few football fields over. I could make it there and back in twenty minutes. Graying light shadowed the sky. I could see. I didn't need the lights from the hospital. The clouds above us were just barely lightening. It was going to be another stormy day.

  I only slipped a few times as I made my way to the cemetery. My tears never reached my chin in the cold wind.

  Crunching through the wrought iron gate, I made my way to the smallest grave there. So small, it held something so big.

  When I reached his headstone I knelt on the snow, uncaring that my knees were wet from the packed snow. Tears coursed down my cheeks, the chilling wind slicing over the newly dampened area.

  "I'm trying. I'm trying to avenge you. Trying to make it all worthwhile. I promise. This will all be worth it. And then I can let you rest. And then I will see you again soon. Sooner than we both know. At least I hope so." I reached out my hand and touched the chilly stone.

  I missed him so much. I'd never even had a chance to get to know him, but I sure missed the chances that Clyde and I longed for. Changing diapers in the middle of the night, bottles in the car ride. I resented the fact that I hadn't had any sleepless nights because of a baby. Instead my sleepless nights had run toward the grieving and sobbing and uncontrollable sadness that sheered me in two.

  I leaned forward, placing my face on my forearm as I rested on the headstone. "Clyde, where did we go wrong? What did I do to deserve this?" The litany wasn't new. It was almost like a calming lullaby I'd never been able to sing.

  Images of my life with Clyde flashed before my mind. The predawn morning I remembered when we found out we were pregnant, I'd wrapped up the pregnancy stick in a piece of aluminum foil and given it to him at the dinner table. He had teased me for days that I had tried to feed him urine.

  That man could make me laugh.

  Before.

  As my stomach grew, he would wrap his arms around me and feel me and the baby in his arms. We had so many plans. So many dreams.

  But they were gone. They were gone and that was something I would have to accept.

  Or not. I could completely demolish the entire city. All of it. Everyone who ever had anything to do with it. Then I would feel better. Then I would feel complete. Even Clyde would have to go. My anger at him reared up and I realized that maybe that's what I needed. I needed someone else to hurt with me. Why not my baby's daddy?

  I leaned forward and kissed the top of the headstone. "I'll see you again soon."

  My grief seemed to fade, focusing itself on the pain in my leg. At the hospital, I didn't have any other choice. I was going to succeed in my mission. I was going to complete the task I had given myself.

  Karen was going to die. Or I was going to die trying.

  Karen was still groggy when I crept into her emergency room. The nurses were all busy with other people and other tasks. Which wasn't surprising, it wasn't a hospital that was known for its service. I grabbed a blanket and shook Karen.

  A wheelchair stood off to the side, I pushed it over by the bed.

  Karen was coming with me whether she wanted to or not. Even with my leg hurting, I was still able to yank her from the bed, she was such a slight little thing, and pulled her into the wheelchair.

  Her head bobbed about, her eyes half slid open. I didn't really care how cold she felt to the touch. I yanked the IV from her arm.

  The blanket around her was just to keep her tied to the chair. I could care less if she was cold or not. I couldn't kill her there. Had to get her to the library basement. That's where the rest of my plans would be.

  "Come on, Karen, we have a job to do."

  I could almost taste success.

  Chapter 23

  Clyde

  He drummed his fingers against the desk and peered back at Officer Jonathan Drake’s face. Tired, hungry, and worried out of his mind, Clyde didn’t have time for this. “Listen, how much longer is this going to take?”

  Clyde needed to get out of the police station. He needed to head out and find Terri before things got worse.

  Jonathan typed on his computer and kept his nose tucked down low, as if avoiding Clyde’s eyes. “Just another minute or two. Need you to read over my report.”

  Clyde sighed and shifted for what seemed to be the one-hundredth time. The crammed police quarters were quiet except for a few officers, Clyde was thankful no one had locked him in an interrogation room.

  His eyes swept across the soda machine and over to two officers heading his way. They glanced at each other and there was something in their eyes he didn’t like. They were shifty and Clyde was as sure as the day is long, they were talking about him.

  Sonofabitch.

  He stood from his seat. “I got to go check on some things. I’ll come back and sign it in the morning, Jon.” Clyde slid his winter parka back on and at that very moment, Jonathan grabbed his hand.

  “’Fraid it can’t wait until morning.” The look in his eye was total suspicion. Clyde never should’ve called him. The police were going to scrutinize him. Of course they were. Why had Clyde let his conscience do this?

&nb
sp; Because it was the right thing to do, but now Clyde was stuck.

  He was going to be stuck in the station forever while Terri did God knows what. “Listen—.”

  The two officers caught up to him. “Mr. Mitchell, we have a few questions we’d like to clear up. You’re going to have to come with us.”

  Clyde ran his hands through his hair. Would he ever get out of this? If he couldn’t name Terri to vindicate himself, how would he ever clear his name?

  How could he save her? For now, that’s all he could think of. Terri needed saving and Clyde was the only man for the job.

  *****

  The interrogation room wasn’t much bigger than a ten by ten cell. A light swung overhead and Clyde slid into his seat. He recognized Mark Briggs from the coffee shop by his work. Often, they nodded hello to each other as the officer stopped in for his morning pick me up.

  “Look,” Clyde splayed his fingers. “What do we have to do to clear this up?”

  “That’s what we want too, Clyde.” Mark drew out his name in annoying fashion. “But it isn’t going to be easy. There’s a lot to go over.” He nodded his head toward his partner.

  Clyde’s blood pressure skyrocketed as the other officer left the room—what were they working on? What did they think they had on him? “Listen, is Jim Franklin around here? Because he knows me. We go back. He can help me clear this all up.”

  It was as if Mark hadn’t heard him or maybe didn’t want to hear him. “You lost your home tonight in arson,” he said as he shifted through a folder.

  “Yeah, I did.” Clyde couldn’t keep the defensive tone out of his voice. “Probably lost everything in that fire, but listen, Officer Franklin--”

  Mark nodded like Clyde’s statement was some sort of trivial matter. It sent his cheeks blazing with anger.

  “Not long after, Judge Condran’s house went up too. Took a while for the fire department to get in there, but it looks like he was killed before that. Fire was used to cover up the crime.”

  Clyde felt faint at the idea that Terri had done that—killed the old judge and set his house on fire. Did that mean she set their house on fire too? Damn it all, Clyde’s fingers twisted on top of the table. She might as well have set blaze to their marriage. That house was their life, all of their things, memories…Terri had killed people. Real people, so why did something like a fire really upset him? Even surprise him?

  Because it had been theirs. Since they married. Terri might as well have killed him.

  Mark glanced down at them and Clyde forced himself to relax. “Then Hank over at the storage locker. Sylvia in the woods around Grover’s lane. You called it in. Every one of these things, connected to you. And you just happened to find Sylvia?”

  “I…I was looking for Sylvia.”

  Mark’s eyebrows rose. “Why were you looking for her in a snow storm? You screwing her or something, Clyde?”

  “No!” Aghast at just the mention, Clyde pushed himself away from the table. “Hell no. I just…” Clyde sighed and rubbed her face. “Needed to talk to her. I was trying to find a way to her house, but it was blocked off. I needed to warn her.”

  Mark leaned forward and pointed his finger at Clyde. “You saying you knew someone was gunning for her?’

  Clyde nodded and reluctance creeped up his chest. The muscles restricted in his neck. “Phones were out. I couldn’t…I needed to get to her, but I was too late.”

  “Who was gunning for her? What do you know?” Lust glinted in Mark’s eyes. Nothing like this had ever happened in Sandpoint before and he’d want to close out the case.

  Fast. Clean. Claim all the credit.

  Clyde couldn’t trust that he’d do right by Terri and she was his family. Maybe she was lost and had gone off the deep end like a crazy person, but Clyde couldn’t just turn her in.

  Leaning back in his chair, he crossed his arms. “I want a lawyer. I don’t have to say anything else to you if I don’t want to.”

  Mark gritted his teeth and his eyes rolled around. “We’ll see about that, won’t we?”

  *****

  Clyde watched from the window, as Mark spoke to someone on the phone. With any luck, Mark would have been able to reach an attorney that would be able to make it into the police station during the storm. Pacing back and forth, the officer threw his arms over his head while he spoke.

  That was at least encouraging, but Clyde wasn’t happy to see the frustration. Nothing about this situation made him feel good at all. It was like being in a nightmare.

  As he walked over to the rear window, Clyde’s phone rang. He flipped it from his pocket and held it to his ear, trying to disguise the fact that he was talking to someone. He leaned against the window frame and gawked at the piles of fluffy snow.

  “Clyde?” It was Jay. His voice was raised; there was a slight edge of panic to his voice.

  “Jay, what’s wrong, buddy?” He tried to keep the conversation light, but Clyde stomach was in a free-for-all.

  “Karen…” Jay swallowed hard. “She fell into the harbor. Mitch Conway found her and took her to the hospital but…she’s not here. She’s gone. Someone took her. I know it.”

  Clyde’s worst fears were confirmed. Terri was still out there and still going through her hit list. “You call the police?”

  “Yeah, man. They’re on their way.”

  Gazing back out at the police station, Clyde saw the bustle of the officers beginning. He wasn’t going to be able to protect Terri much longer. Not unless he could get to her first.

  “I gotta get out of here. Then, I’ll come meet you. I need you to do something for me, Jay. Need to see if anyone saw Karen and which way they went.”

  “They’re reviewing the tapes now,” Jay said, “to see who took her.”

  Clyde squeezed his eyes shut and let out a low long deep breath. It had taken a lot of guts for Jay to come clean and, and now it was Clyde’s turn. “I know who took, Karen, but you have to promise you’ll help me get her back, all right? You have to promise…keep your truck running, I’m coming to you.

  “Okay…” Jay’s voice strained and stuttered. “Okay, Clyde, just level with me. I won’t—I just want to save Karen.”

  Clyde took a shaking breath. Here came nothing. It all came tumbling out as if Clyde sat in a confessional—the baby and Terri’s unfolding psychotic break. And when it was over, he felt lighter.

  But he was still in the police station. He needed to get out, no matter how bad it looked.

  He cemented his resolve and pulled the interrogation room door open. On the other side Mark’s eyes widened. He lowered the cell phone from his year. “Your attorney can’t make it in, so we’re going to question you once she can get here.” He pointed to the open door behind Clyde. “Get back in that room while we wait.”

  “How about this, Mark?” Clyde zipped up his coat and took his hat from his pocket. “When my attorney can make it in, call me. I’ll come right over.”

  Mark opened his mouth to interrupt, but Clyde kept on talking.

  “You can’t hold me here unless you arrest me. You going to arrest me?”

  Mark crossed his arms. “C’mon, Clyde. It doesn’t have to be like this. Can’t we keep this friendly?”

  “This is friendly.” Clyde pushed past him and walked down the hall. Everyone stared at him. Some even stood from their desks to do so. Clyde’s cheeks burned bright and anxiety tightened his chest. This wasn’t who he was. He didn’t go around being disrespectful to the police. It just wasn’t him.

  But he just kept on walking. The things they must’ve been thinking about him, but Clyde couldn’t think about that then. He just had to keep on going.

  For Karen.

  Chapter 24

  Jay

  A trail of blood on the floor.

  It led from Karen’s room, out into the hall, but it quickly disappeared. Jay sighed with frustration. He should’ve been here sooner. If he had been the one to find Karen, none of this would’ve happened. Maybe if
he hadn’t been so angry, hadn’t stormed off, and offered to help her, all of this could’ve been avoided.

  But what was it his mom always used to say? Don’t have regrets for past choices, have resolve.

  Jay was resolved all right. He had to find Karen, save her, and if that meant Terri was arrested or killed, that was that. He felt sorry for the woman once, but that all went away when the murders started.

  Karen might’ve made a few wrong choices, but she didn’t deserve any of this.

  A group of nurses clustered together outside the nurses’ station. Their low whispers brought Jay near. One clutched her hands her chest, and appeared heartbroken. The others spoke in whispers as if a raised voice might disturb the uncomfortable calm.

  Worried about Karen? Maybe if they had worried about her over the last year, Karen wouldn’t have been so torn up inside.

  Maybe she wouldn’t be missing at all.

  “Excuse me ladies,” Jay sauntered up to appear casual, “did anyone see Terri Mitchell here tonight? She might’ve been hurt, wearing a big overcoat?”

  “Terri Mitchell?” The blonde nurse shook her head. “Pretty sure she hasn’t set foot in this hospital since….well, you know.”

  Only too well.

  The others shook their heads no, and Jay got the distinct impression he was interrupting a personal conversation. Maybe they were judging Karen even though she had been taken out of the hospital against her will — cold and sick. Jay had to find her.

  As he headed toward the entrance, a heavyset African-American woman gestured with her hand for him to come forward. “I saw the lady you’re asking about,” she whispered. “Her eyes ain’t right.”

  Jay stood up straighter and his pulse skipped. “Which way did she head? Did she have anyone with her?”

  The woman nodded. “She was pushing a wheelchair. Someone in the chair was covered up under heavy blankets. I just thought she was asleep. Nobody ever listens to me, anyway.”