His confidence did give Troy pause. Palmer was smart. He wouldn’t allow a search if there was anything to find. Troy had to ask though, out of perverse curiosity, “Would you care if she was dead?”
Palmer’s head snapped up. “What the hell kind of question is that?”
“Just curious.”
“I would care if anyone died, some more than others, but yes, if you want to know, Amy would be on my list of people I’d particularly care about. She was always a nice person.”
“Is a nice person. Is. Why would you say was?” Troy was starting to think in the past tense too and it scared the shit out of him.
Palmer rubbed his forehead. “Look, is there a point to this visit? I said was because I haven’t seen her in twenty years or so. I have no idea what she’s like now. That’s more your field of expertise. Ever heard that the first suspect is the husband?”
“Or the ex-boyfriend.”
“Your point is damned clear. I’m just wondering—if your theory is valid and it isn’t—why I waited so long to do whatever it is you think I did. Explain your thinking. Twenty years is pretty ex.”
Troy really wished he hadn’t asked himself the same question. He stood there, feeling like an idiot, but then again also like an idiot if he didn’t at least explore this possibility.
He said before he turned to leave, “I don’t know, but if you did, I’ll find out.”
* * * *
Amy’s disappearance was growing to be more and more of an issue. A lot of things bothered him since his heart attack that he might have accepted with greater equanimity before he’d been reminded of his own mortality.
George stood in the glare of the porch light, and then lightly rapped on the door, wondering what the hell he was doing.
Alicia Hahn answered but there was a chain and she peeked through cautiously, her hazel eyes inquiring when she realized who it was. “George. How are you?”
What the hell are you doing on my doorstep?
Not said out loud, but there in her expression.
“I’m fine. Sorry to just show up like this, but can we talk for a minute?” He wasn’t even sure what he was going to say. He was usually much less impulsive. Actually, almost never impulsive. One of his greatest faults was that he thought over everything again and again.
There were all kinds of people in the world. The action figures who went after it, the meek who would inherit the earth, and the ones who ponder, who should have wishy-washy tattooed on their asses.
A “W” for each cheek. That was him.
Alicia nodded and opened the door wide, but she looked puzzled and he didn’t blame her. His purpose was unclear to him, too. Her place was nice enough, though modest, he saw as he stepped through the door, and she’d been watching a movie, which she quickly switched off. The sudden silence gave for an awkward pause and she asked in a strained voice, “Would you like something to drink? Tea or coffee?”
He would, but preferably a beer. He needed to tone it back in that department anyway. “No, but thanks. I came to talk about Jon. Do you mind if I sit?”
“Of course not.” She perched on the edge of the sofa, not quite sitting on it fully, trying to look comfortable but not really pulling it off. He chose a chair across that was only adequate for his weight and creaked in protest.
“About Jon Palmer?” she inquired.
“Troy is my cousin and Jon is my friend. Yes, Jon Palmer. I know you are sleeping with him.”
She colored.
That was blunt for him but he’d been under a bit of stress lately. He tried to smooth it over by adding, “Nothing wrong with that, you’re two consenting adults, I’m not here on a mission over morality. I just want to ask you a few questions because I’m worried about him.”
“All…right. Worried why?”
He folded his hands and gave his best professor pose, the mentor that might—or in his case, might not—inspire confidence. “On a scale of one to ten, where would you rate his stress level?”
“Twenty.”
No hesitation. At least she was willing to be honest.
Very slowly, in measured tones, he stated, “You do realize he thinks he’s seeing his stepfather.”
“I realize that someone looked in my bedroom window when Jon was sound asleep next to me.” Her tone was defensive and she stiffened her spine. “And yes, he told me.”
“He blames Larimer for his mother’s death.”
“I’m fairly sure everyone in Black Lake knows that.”
It was a hell of a conflict, being best friends with someone who could just be a serial killer. George contemplated how to put it delicately, couldn’t come up with an answer, and just said, “Alicia, I like you. Your relationship with Jon, as someone who knows him well and has for a long time, is probably not a good idea. He’s on the edge, he’s at loose ends, and he returns to town and suddenly a young woman is dead.”
He didn’t mention Jon so conveniently finding the body. There was loyalty and there was loyalty. He was doing what he could right at this moment.
“Are you implying that he—”
“No.” He cleared his throat uncomfortably. “I’m not. It all just makes me uneasy, that’s all. If Larimer is here, it’s because of Jon. Your involvement with him is ill-advised. Just my opinion.”
The horror in her eyes was so obvious he wondered if his advice would have the opposite effect and she’d immediately go to the cabin.
She probably would.
He rose, not at all sure what he accomplished. Maybe he’d made things worse. “I’d better go.”
There were no effusive thanks for him stopping by, but then again, he really hadn’t expected any, he thought as he walked out to his crappy car.
As a psychologist he was sure Jon Palmer was losing it, one minute at a time. She really didn’t need to be there for the fallout, and he’d made an effort to warn her.
Right now, he needed a cold beer and a remote in his hand. As much as he’d wanted to accomplish in his life, he’d had to come to the conclusion a long time ago, that he was just a simple soul.
At least his intentions were good.
Troy called when he was on his way home. His voice was hoarse. “I can’t stay here alone. No word from Amy. You up for company?”
Well, hell.
“Of course. Come on by.”
“Pizza? I’ll pick one up.”
According to his doctors his arteries were clogged anyway. “Sounds great.”
“Wait, are you supposed to eat that?”
“I think if I were you, I’d let me worry about me and you worry about your wife, and maybe both of us put it on hold for the evening. Amy will turn up, I’ll start eating an apple a day, and we can watch an action movie or something.”
“Baseball?”
“I have pay per view. Yeah, baseball is fine with me.”
Black Lake was quiet on an evening like this with a starlit sky and George drove slowly, thinking. About Amy, about the body at the farm, and about Jon.
So much of it clicked.
Chapter 15
At the end of the day I think that my mindset has always been strictly firm on one point. I am not a big believer in regret. An occasional apology is fine, and God knows I need to give more than a few, but I think regret is a useless waste of energy.
Say you are sorry, because at some level, on one point, you probably are. Sorry you got caught is a topnotch example.
Regret implies that you might do things differently given the chance.
No.
I swear I even tried the day I left the mortal coil to summon up a particle of regret and I could not find one.
I feel very little understanding for those who suffer from the affliction.
It went without saying that the assumption he hadn’t eaten was correct. Alicia was glad she’d stopped and picked up the simple supplies for spaghetti with meat sauce, nothing more than canned sauce and the noodles, plus an onion, some ground beef, garlic, and p
armesan cheese. Also a package of pre-made garlic bread, and she was ready to go.
He didn’t answer the door until she called out his name, balancing the grocery bags in her arms. Jon didn’t look surprised to see her, he didn’t look anything at all for the first few minutes and she wondered if he might have been asleep.
“I hope you don’t mind me making dinner.”
“Not at all.” He gestured her in. “Of course not.”
It wasn’t until she was in the kitchen, rummaging for a pot so she could start the sauce that he finally seemed to adjust to her presence and his smile finally surfaced, but it was forced, not his usual style. “I should have asked Troy to stay.”
The cupboards were nothing but shelves behind a curtain below the counter and Alicia paused and straightened. She’d seen them together before. Not good karma. “He was just here? Why?”
“It seems I am suspect number one since his wife is missing. I believe you talked to him on the phone recently so you already know that.”
When she and Jon were in bed together. Memorable conversation. He hadn’t really warned her either, just handed over the receiver.
And then there was George Walda warning her off. Her parents had told her not to marry Gary. She’d ignored that advice, too. What was it with her?
“Troy is jealous.” That wasn’t a leap. For heaven’s sake, Alicia knew Amy had been jealous of her. She was still wrapping her mind around that one. Amy, jealous of her? The homecoming queen, the head cheerleader…jealous of her?
“I kinda get that impression. There’s a deep skillet I haven’t used yet so you might like to rinse it out. I’m fairly sure mice frolic through here frequently.”
An inner voice suggested she was an idiot to come at all. She’d heard it when she left her house, she’d heard it at the grocery, and it was whispering to her now. Shutting it down, she looked him in the eyes. “Did you have anything to do with her disappearance?”
His answer wasn’t reassuring. “Amy? I doubt it.”
“Jon.”
“How can you even ask me that? If you thought so, would you be here?”
A valid point. Wasn’t it? She found the pot and did as he suggested, running it under the faucet, contemplating her answer. She set it on the stove and switched on the heat. “I believe you because, for one, you were asleep when that…that…thing looked in my window. I have other reasons as well.”
He watched her drizzle olive oil in the pan. “Like?”
It was her turn to be evasive. “Someday, I’ll tell you. Let me get this going. I brought some wine, too. Can you open it? Some for the sauce and some for the chef.”
He seemed willing to let the subject go. “I think there’s a corkscrew around here somewhere, but you may have to drink it out of a juice glass.”
In the end he found a wine glass on one of the shelves, tucked in the back, and she washed it because it was dusty, and considering her day, was happy to see the wine splash in as Jon poured her a glass. The sauce was simmering and did smell good. The wine was also mellow and fragrant.
“Let’s fuck.” She gazed at him over the rim of the glass. Not even she was sure where that came from. Out of her mouth apparently.
Jon was obviously taken off guard too. He looked off-balance. “What?”
“The sauce needs another twenty minutes.” She was dressed in her usual casual clothes but had deliberately changed into a barely-there bra and black panties, so as she started to shed clothes in his kitchen, she definitely had his riveted attention. “Now.”
“Fine with me.” He started to unbutton his shirt but then just stripped it off. The same went for the rest of his clothes.
They made it to the bedroom, but barely, and when he fell on top of her, she had the feeling they weren’t just yielding to an impulse, but that this had happened in some way before, that the fury of the way he took her and the way she wanted it wasn’t just them, it was something else. Somehow she found it exciting. His hands shackled her wrists. If she’d told him to back off, it would not have made a difference in the outcome.
Afterward, he said, gasping for breath, “Oh shit.”
“What?” She smoothed his hair back, but her hand was shaking.
What had just happened was…overwhelming.
Jon looked truly stricken. “I feel like I just raped you. I just did what I wanted to do and didn’t think of you. We’ve made love before. You know that isn’t me.”
It had felt like that to her too, but on the other hand she’d been the one to say it. “I do know that. Jon, I suggested it.”
“Not that way. Did I hurt you?”
Oddly enough, she still wasn’t afraid of him. Maybe the episode made her less afraid. “No, I don’t think so.” It scared her more that she’d been really on board with it. She’d have bruises tomorrow on her arms if she had to venture a guess.
He rose on one elbow. “What the hell is going on? You would never say that. Let’s fuck. That’s not you at all. I wouldn’t normally respond to something like that either.”
“I don’t know.” She was shaken too. He was right. Normal Alicia Hahn would not ever, ever say it.
The dark woods, the childish laughter of the dead…
He caught her wrist and pulled her off the bed, then realizing what he’d just done, manhandling her, let her go at once when he steadied her on her feet. “As amazing as it smells in here, we can’t stay in this cabin. Get dressed.”
She scrambled for her clothes, tossed all over the place. “Where are we going?”
“I don’t care. Away.”
“My house?”
“No. He knows how to find us there.”
Back to Larimer. “Do you really think he’s stalking you?”
“I know he hates me.”
“Why didn’t he come for you in Chicago?” She found her panties and stepped into them, jerking them up over her hips. “It wasn’t a secret where you worked or that you had a family.”
He’d slipped on his jeans and shirt. “How would I know how his twisted mind works?”
“You did live with him for a few years.”
“And hated every minute of it.” He picked up his boots. “I’m going to start the car.”
That didn’t make a great deal of sense, but many things she thought ordered and reasonable didn’t any longer. “Let me put the sauce into a container so it isn’t wasted. Okay?”
He answered with one word. “Hurry.”
* * * *
The second motel room they’d shared was on a small lake, part of a resort that had gone into partial shutdown for the fall, and the view was very nice and the accommodations marginal. They’d eaten fried pike in the dining room and it was fine, but Alicia was subdued, and he could hardly blame her.
When she came out of the bathroom in her shorts and T-shirt, he was settled on the bed, arms behind his head. He was still fully clothed. He didn’t trust himself any longer. “I’m sorry.”
She said, “If you apologize again, I’ll strangle you.” Then her gaze softened and she dropped beside him, snuggling close. “What happened? Not just to you, but me as well.”
“I don’t know.”
That was true, but he had an uneasy suspicion that it was a reenactment of something that had occurred before. He wouldn’t have stopped, and that wasn’t him. She wouldn’t have liked if he stopped either, and that certainly wasn’t her.
But he had an idea.
“William Murray’s wife knew what he was doing but she never said a word until he was caught.”
That made Alicia go rigid. “What are you suggesting? William Murray? Who killed all those women a long time ago? His wife knew?”
If he hadn’t read every available bit ever written about it, he would be as horrified as she was but it wasn’t new news to him. “The documentation suggests she must have.”
She digested this information. He felt it percolating from her head down to her heart. “She liked it? Wanted him to be rough with her?
Thought it was normal?”
He pulled her closer, but gently, carefully. “I think that with human beings their deviant sexual behaviors are a mystery still to this day. What turns you on? For the love of God, some people like to be whipped and spanked. Maybe she was the product of a family that taught that the only acceptable way a woman could enjoy sex is if it is forced. I have no idea. It was a long time ago.”
“That’s sick.”
“You aren’t going to get an argument out of me there.”
“Black Lake is cursed, isn’t it?”
Yes and no. After thinking about it many sleepless nights, over countless cups of coffee, during every long commute to work, he’d come to the conclusion that something had taken up residence there, if you will.
Why not?
Find a more perfect spot. Secluded, with enough residents, but not too many, and glorious places to hide the bodies.
Match made in heaven. “Cursed is not the right word,” he explained, musing over the question and trying to answer it without scaring her half to death, though it sure gave him pause. He was finally relaxing. “Inhabited is what I would choose. Something moved in, and it doesn’t want to leave. When Murray died, it decided to find a new host.”
“You might want to even remotely explain what you are talking about.”
Her eyes were a true gold-green, and even though Connie was by far more beautiful in a classical way, he was so drawn in. He wanted her again, but not quite in the same way as before.
Thank goodness. When that had come over him…he hadn’t been sure that he might have been capable of backing off of what he wanted, and took, earlier.
The timbre of his voice deepened. “The second set of murders started a few years after Murray was hanged. For the next couple of decades according to the papers, it slowed down, but then they caught the culprit and sentenced him to life in prison. On the very day he died behind bars, someone was murdered in Black Lake. Once it was free, it needed a kill.”
“You serious?”
“It was waiting. Interred. Frustrated.” He was very serious.
Too serious. It made him sound like a lunatic.
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