Skin Privilege

by Karin Slaughter

  'That's not-'

  'What were you doing with all this stuff?' he asked, indicating the chemicals, the beakers. 'You were planning on leaving me holding the bag while you skipped town with that fat wife of yours.'

  Valentine's fists clenched. 'Don't you dare bring Myra into this.'

  Bart said, 'Al and I kept this town in line, kept the good people away from the bad, for thirty years. You didn't give a shit about right and wrong. You just offered it around like candy.'

  'Money is money, man.'

  'At what cost?'

  'Them fistfuls of cash I was giving you every week didn't seem to bother you none.'

  'Like I had a choice,' he snapped back. 'You were nothing but a little pissant before you married into that family. Then all of a sudden you're the big man in town, waving your dick around like you're somebody special. All you ever were was a fuck-up.'

  'Like it was my bright idea to throw Boyd through the fucking hotel window!' he yelled. 'What about that, Fred? Another one of your grand gestures, just like the schoolteacher you torched on the football field. She's what started this shitstorm in the first place.' Valentine looked pleased with his point. 'You and your foolish ways, thinking you'll scare people off like in the old days, and all it ends up doing is throwing gasoline on the fire. And here I am, trying to clean up your mess. Who's the fuck-up now?'

  'You know why they kept me around?' Bart demanded. 'You ever ask yourself why they didn't give me a one-way ticket to the swamp? It was because they didn't trust your skinny little ass as far as they could throw you.'

  Valentine chuckled. 'If you know them so well, then you know how they feel about family.'

  'I think they'll be glad to get rid of you, is what I think.'

  I think that I'm the only one standing between you and death right now.'

  'Get over by the sink,' Bart ordered. 'Both of you.'

  Valentine started, 'Hold on now-'

  Bart shot him in the leg.

  'Shit!' Valentine screamed. 'Jesus Christ, what the hell are you doing?'

  Bart reached down and picked up the shell from the bullet. 'I said both of you get over by the sink.' When Lena didn't move, he kicked her chair. 'There are worse ways to hurt you than with a bullet, darlin'.'

  She got up, moved toward the sink.

  Valentine held his bleeding leg, fuming, 'You think you can get away with this?'

  'I think I'm gonna have an awful lot more bullets to dig out of your body down at the morgue if you don't get down in front of that sink and cuff your hand through that pipe.'

  'You think you can go back to the good old ways? There's too much money now, Fred. They're gonna put you in the ground.'

  'Shut up,' Bart ordered, kicking Valentine in the leg right where he'd just been shot.

  'Fuck!' Valentine screamed, his knees buckling as he fell down.

  'You, too,' Bart said, waving the gun at Lena. 'Get down on the floor.'

  She knelt slowly. 'I never told anyone it was you in the car,' she said. 'I kept quiet the whole time.'

  'I know, hon,' Bart said. 'That was really good of you.'

  'Let me go,' Lena begged. 'Let me and Sara go and neither one of us will say anything.'

  Bart flashed his nasty little teeth. 'The funny thing, Lena, is if it was just you, I'd believe it. I really would. But the doctor lady out there won't lie. She may give it a good try, but no way she can keep a secret.'

  'She will.'

  He shook his head. 'Jake, reach down there and pull that cuff through the pipe.'

  'You son of a bitch,' Valentine muttered, grabbing Lena 's arm and passing the cuff through the bend in the drain.

  'Tight now,' Bart instructed. 'Tighter.'

  Valentine made the cuff so tight his wrist turned red. 'They will find you,' he warned Bart. 'They will find you and rip your intestines out through your asshole.'

  Bart was over by the stove. He turned up the burners, as high as they would go and used the butt of the gun to knock the knobs off the stove. Satisfied they couldn't be turned down, he got the ceramic mugs and put each one over the open flame.

  'You're gonna die for this,' Valentine warned. 'You think you can get away with killing me? I'm a fucking general in the Brotherhood of the True White Skin. Vengeance will rain down upon you like the wrath of the one white God.'

  'Yeah, yeah,' Bart said. 'And you're gonna get ass fucked by the biggest, blackest cocksucker in hell.' He lifted his foot and kicked Valentine in the face. Bart's angle was off, but the bottom of the sink was right behind Valentine. His head slammed against the cast iron, an ominous crunch sounding from his skull. He slid down the sink, blood dripping from the back of his head.

  Bart knelt down and checked Valentine's pockets, the gun aimed at Lena 's chest.

  'Don't do this,' she begged. 'Please don't do this.'

  He found Valentine's cell phone and broke it under the heel of his cheap shoe. He told Lena, 'I really am sorry, darlinY

  'Yeah,' Lena said, thinking if her hands were free she would choke the life out of him. 'Look, no problem. I understand.'

  Bart shook his head, a faraway look coming into his eyes. 'You're just like your mama was. You know that?'

  Was. Lena felt her throat tighten, all the fight draining from her body. 'What happened to her?' she asked. 'Please. I've got to know.'

  'She was one of the good ones that crossed over, honey.' Bart stood, checked the mugs on the stove. 'She's in a better place now.' He indicated the room, the situation. 'I hope knowing that brings you some peace.'

  'Peace?' she echoed. 'Are you fucking kidding me? You think you're doing a favor killing me?'

  Bart tossed the gun onto the kitchen table. 'I'm sorry, baby.' He opened the door and closed it softly behind him.

  'Fuck!' Lena screamed, kicking Valentine in the leg. He moaned, rolling to the side. She saw the top of his head where his skull had been caved in. The bald spot was on display now. The bottom of what could only be a red swastika was tattooed on his scalp.

  'Sara!' Lena yelled, knowing there wouldn't be an answer. 'Sara!' She leaned out as far as she could, looking past Clint's lifeless body. Sara was still propped up against the wall, her eyes staring vacantly back at Lena.

  Lena dragged Valentine's arm through the pipe, groaning from the exertion. He was deadweight; she might as well be cuffed to a boulder. Pushing and pulling, she managed to get him inside the cabinet, his elbow looped around the bend in the pipe. He was saying something, begging her to stop, to help him, but Lena ignored his pleas, bracing her feet on the sides of the cabinet, gripping his hand in both of hers, pulling as hard as she could without dislocating her shoulders. When she'd dragged Valentine into the cabinet as far as he'd go, she reared back from the sink and kicked the pipe with all her strength.

  'Help!' she yelled, kicking the pipe again and again, her foot slipping and pounding into Valentine's shoulder. 'Help!'

  ' Lena…' Valentine whispered, his hand reaching out to her. 'Please…'

  Lena started coughing as a fine mist filled the room. She had bent the pipe but it held in place – it was the only fucking thing Hank had ever replaced in this falling-down piece of shit house. She screamed in fury, kicking at the pipe until her foot was so badly bruised she could hardly lift it.

  'Help!' she tried again, knowing even as she yelled that no one was coming. Bart had shot the gun twice and no one had bothered to ride to their rescue. This was a working class neighborhood. No one was home in the middle of a Friday morning; at least no one who would care.

  The gun. Lena saw it sitting on the table against the wall. She lunged for it, her arm nearly popping out of the socket. She couldn't reach the table. Lena rolled onto her back and kicked out her feet, trying to loop them around the leg of the table so that she could pull it over. She grazed the metal with the toe of her shoe, then stopped as she heard a bottle break. A plume of white smoke erupted over the table. The liquid dripped to the floor, sizzling like bacon as it ate through the lin
oleum. What was she thinking? She'd just released more chemicals into the air. And what would Lena do if she managed to get the gun? She couldn't shoot a weapon in here. Fumes were already filling the air. A spark from a gun could blow up the whole house.

  'No-no-no,' she panted, sitting up, trying to make herself think. 'Oh, God, please.' She jerked the cuff one more time and screamed in pain. Her wrist was bruised and bleeding. It hurt so bad that maybe it was broken. 'No,' she whispered, coughing around the word. Her lungs shook in her chest. She felt as if she'd inhaled cotton. Lena coughed to clear them, but nothing would work. She reached up and turned on the faucet, cupping her hand underneath and bringing the water to her lips, her eyes.

  So many years she had sat in this house praying to God that she wouldn't die here, that she could somehow get out of this awful town and make something of herself, yet here she was, trapped in Hank's house, living out her worst nightmare.

  Lena choked back a sob. Jeffrey would figure this out. He wouldn't let a fucking dentist autopsy his wife. He'd get somebody from the state to look at the bodies. They'd see Valentine's broken skull. Maybe there would be enough of Lena left for them to see the bruises on the bottom of her foot, the bloody pulp of her wrist.

  Her wrist.

  Lena saw it then, saw the way out.

  She reached for Clint, trying to grab the leg of his pants, his shoe, anything she could hold on to. Her fingers weren't even close. She lay flat on her stomach, her arm stretched over her head as far as it would go, and kicked out her legs, trying to use her feet to pull Clint's body toward her. He was a heavy man, but she managed to clamp one of his feet between her own, inching him over until she was able to loop her shoe through the chain that connected his wallet to his belt. She tightened her abs, screaming from exertion as his body came closer. Lena sat up, reaching for him, finally able to grab the leg of his pants and drag him close enough to get to the knife on his belt.

  Lena looked at Valentine. He was staring at her, fear blazing in his eyes.

  She didn't give herself time to think, taking the knife and hacking it into his wrist. Valentine's mouth opened, but he didn't scream. He gave this kind of high-pitched whine that seemed to last forever. Lena tried to close her ears to it, hacking at the skin again, trying to reach the sweet spot where bone gave way to tendon. Her stomach turned as blood squirted into her face, repulsion almost overcoming her. The handcuff around his wrist was so tight that she couldn't rear back with the knife high enough for fear of dulling the blade on the metal. She stopped, trying to catch her breath, trying not to vomit. On the stove, she could hear gurgling as the liquid started to boil.

  'Please…' Valentine whispered. 'No, Lord, please…'

  She pushed away the remains of Valentine's broken cell phone, pressed Valentine's wrist as flat to the floor as it would go and placed the knife blade against his wrist.

  'No,' Valentine begged, his voice rising in register as he saw what she was going to do. 'Oh, God! Oh, God! No!'

  Lena stood up and pressed the sole of her shoe against the knife, the double-sided blade slicing into the rubber. She leaned her forehead against the counter for balance as she put her full weight onto one leg, crunching the blade into his wrist.

  'No!' Valentine screeched, his legs kicking out, animal sounds of pain echoing in the room.

  She grinded the toe of her shoe into the blade, bouncing her weight until the knife cut all the way through to the floor.

  The handcuff jerked up, Valentine's hand popping off his wrist like a loose tooth. The cuff was so tight that his hand wouldn't come out. Lena stood, his hand slapping against her leg. She gagged, the smoke thicker up high. Her eyes stung and she couldn't get her bearings.

  The mugs on the stove were white-hot, liquid boiling up. She tried to turn off the knobs but just the stems remained and she couldn't get them to budge. Smoke filled the room with rolling black clouds. In the distance, Lena could see Sara had managed to sit up. As Lena watched, Sara's mouth moved, but she made no attempt to stand, no motion to leave the burning house.

  Lena stumbled toward her, slamming against the table, knocking the matchbooks onto the floor. She looked down, saw that the red strike pads had all been peeled off, the matches unused. Her arm started throbbing and she realized she had put her hand in broken glass. There was a strange odor, then blinding pain. Acid. She had put her hand in the broken bottle of acid. Her mouth opened, but there was no breath in her lungs to scream as she jerked her hand away from the table.

  ' Lena…' Valentine called from behind her. 'Please…'

  Lena moved forward, away from his voice. She felt as if her own skin was dripping off the bones of her hand, but she pushed herself on, made her legs move toward Sara, even though every ounce of sense left in her body was screaming for her to go the other way.

  She coughed, gagging from the smoke, the heat of the enclosed room boiling her skin. He had set it all up so perfectly. The kitchen was a mad scientist's dream and every cop's nightmare.

  Lithium batteries. Iodine. Paint thinner. Lye.

  Some of the same ingredients used to make crystal meth were used in the bomb that brought down the Murrah Building in Oklahoma City.

  She had to reach Sara before the house exploded, had to get them both out of here and into the open air.

  'Sara!' Lena screamed, lurching down the hallway. She squatted in front of her, grabbing Sara under the arms and trying to pull them both to standing. 'Help!' she yelled, her legs cramping as she forced them both up the wall. The smoke was so thick now that Lena couldn't see. She felt tears running down her cheeks from the stinging chemicals. Something popped in the kitchen, like a champagne cork or a popgun. Lena swung Sara's arm over her shoulders, dragging her toward the front door. She could see the crack of sunlight coming through where the door hadn't quite shut.

  'Please, Sara,' Lena begged. 'Please help me. I can't lift you.'

  Sara's legs started to move in an awkward walk. Lena pulled her forward, yanked open the door. The sunlight was blinding. She could feel the handcuff and what was still in it banging against the door as she pushed Sara outside.

  They both fell in a heap at the foot of the stairs, but Lena did not let herself stay down. She grabbed Sara underneath her arms and walked backward, dragging her across the yard and into the street. They had reached the neighbor's sidewalk when the air changed. There was something almost like a vacuum sucking all the oxygen toward the house, then a violent pushing out as a blast of hot air shot past them. Lena did not hear the explosion until she was diving to the ground, using her body to cover Sara's. Then came the heat, an intense, horrible ' heat that burned her skin.

  Lena lay on top of Sara. Her body was out of adrenaline or whatever it was that had made Lena capable of getting them both out of the house. Somehow, she forced herself to roll to the side, falling onto her back.

  In the distance, a siren announced that help was finally on its way. Lena closed her eyes, let herself feel relief, then joy that she had gotten away. She struggled, sitting up, coughing up a spray of blood. Her hand was hurting so badly that she could barely breathe. She tried not to look at it, tried not to see the melted skin where the acid had eaten into her flesh. That was when she noticed the empty handcuff dangling from her wrist. She looked around her, traced their footsteps across the street. Nothing.

  Sara tried to sit up but fell back against the lawn. Up the street, Lena saw an Elawah County sheriff's cruiser take the turn on two wheels.

  'What happened?' Sara mumbled, pressing her fingers into her eyes. ' Lena, what happened?'

  'It's okay,' Lena told her. 'It's all over.'

  'Are you okay?' Sara asked, still a doctor even though she was flat on her back.

  The cruiser screeched to a halt in front of them. Lena struggled to stand as Don Cook got out of the car. Her legs wouldn't work, and her hand felt as if it was on fire.

  'What the hell is going on here?' the deputy demanded.

  Lena tasted blood in her
mouth. Her stomach clenched and she could barely speak. 'Fred Bart,' she told Cook. 'You need to find Fred Bart.'

  Sara had managed to sit up. She put her hand to Lena 's back, told her to take deep breaths. Lena tried to do this but the blood caught in her throat. She coughed, her body tensing from the effort.

  The last thing she heard was Sara screaming, 'Call an ambulance!'

  Then she passed out.

  MONDAY

  TWENTY-SEVEN

  Nick Shelton had not been entirely forthcoming when he'd told Jeffrey the Georgia Bureau of Investigation could only step in when the local law enforcement agency asked them to. There was one exception to this rule: when the local law enforcement was so corrupt that there was no other choice but for the state agency to come in and clean house. You didn't get more corrupt than trying to blow up a cop and a police chief's wife in a meth lab, and the state agency had swarmed into Elawah County like a pack of angry hornets.

  Jeffrey had been halfway between Coastal State Prison and Reece when his cell phone rang. He hadn't recognized the number, but knew the voice as soon as he picked up.

  'I'm okay,' Sara told him, not even bothering with the formalities. Her words had stopped his heart in his chest, because you didn't say you were okay unless you'd been decidedly un-okay before.

  Sara was calling him from the back of an ambulance; the siren in the background competed with her voice. She had laid out everything she could remember, from Valentine pulling the gun to Bart injecting her with something that had knocked her out. By the time she'd finished the story, Jeffrey's jaw was so tight that he could barely form words. He had been blowing smoke up Ethan Green's ass while Sara had been in mortal danger.

  He would never forgive himself for leaving her alone with Valentine. If the man was not already dead, Jeffrey would have found him and done the deed himself.

  Two hours later, when he had finally reached the hospital, Sara seemed more concerned about Lena than herself. She was worried about the plastic surgeon being good enough to fix the burn on her hand, scared an infection would set up in her lungs, sure that the pulmonologist didn't know what he was doing. She'd been almost manic, pacing back and forth as she spouted her concerns until Jeffrey had physically stopped her.