Richard Montanari: Four Novels of Suspense: The Rosary Girls, the Skin Gods, Merciless, Badlands

by Richard Montanari

“Wait!” Jessica screamed. She made her way quickly across the debris-strewn basement with relative ease, considering the shadow and the clutter. No barked shins, no stubbed toes. It was as if she floated. But by the time she reached the young woman, the young woman was already depressing the plunger.

  You don’t have to do that, Jessica said.

  Yes I do, the girl dream-replied. You don’t understand.

  I do understand. You don’t need it.

  But I do. There is a monster after me.

  Jessica stood a few feet away from the girl. She saw that the girl was barefoot; her feet were red and raw and blistered. When Jessica looked back up—

  The girl was Sophie. Or, more accurately, the young woman Sophie would become. Gone were her daughter’s roly-poly little body and chubby cheeks, replaced instead by a young woman’s curves: long legs, slender waist, a discernible bust beneath the ragged V-neck sweater with the Nazarene crest.

  But it was the girl’s face that horrified Jessica. Sophie’s face was drawn and haggard, with dark violet smudges beneath her eyes.

  Don’t, sweetie, Jessica implored. God, no.

  She looked again and saw that the girl’s hands were now bolted together and bleeding. Jessica tried to take a step forward but her feet seemed frozen to the ground, her legs leaden. She felt something at her breastbone. She looked down to see an angel pendant hanging around her neck.

  Then, suddenly, a bell sounded. Loud and intrusive and insistent. It seemed to come from above. Jessica looked at the Sophie-girl. The drug was just taking hold of the girl’s nervous system, and as her eyes rolled back, her head tilted upward. Suddenly, there was no ceiling above them, no roof. Just the black sky. Jessica followed her gaze as the bell pounded through the firmament again. A sword of golden sunlight split the night clouds, catching the sterling silver of the pendant, blinding Jessica for a moment, until—

  Jessica opened her eyes and sat upright, her heart rattling around in her chest. She looked at the window. Pitch black. It was the middle of the night and the phone was ringing. Only bad news made the trip at this hour.

  Vincent?

  Dad?

  The phone rang a third time, offering no details, no comfort. She reached for it, disoriented, frightened, her hands shaking, her head still throbbing. She lifted the receiver.

  “H-hello?”

  “It’s Kevin.”

  Kevin? Jessica thought. Who the hell is Kevin? The only Kevin she knew was Kevin Bancroft, the weird kid who lived on Christian Street when she was growing up. Then it hit her.

  Kevin.

  The job.

  “Yeah. Right. Okay. What’s up?”

  “I think we should catch the girls at the bus stop.”

  Greek. Maybe Turkish. Definitely some foreign language. She had no idea what these words meant.

  “Can you hang on a sec?” she asked.

  “Sure.”

  Jessica sprinted to the bathroom, splashed cold water on her face. The right side was still slightly swollen, but much less painful than it was last night, due to an hour of ice packs when she’d gotten home. Along with Patrick’s kiss, of course. The thought made her smile, the smile made her face hurt. It was a good hurt. She ran back to the phone, but before she could say anything, Byrne added:

  “I think we’ll get more out of them there than we will at the school.”

  “Sure,” Jessica replied, and she suddenly realized that he was talking about Tessa Wells’s friends.

  “I’ll pick you up in twenty,” he said.

  For a minute, she thought he meant twenty minutes. She glanced at the clock. Five forty. He did mean twenty minutes. Luckily, Paula Farinacci’s husband left for work in Camden by six, so she was up. Jessica could drop Sophie off at Paula’s and have just enough time for a shower. “Right,” Jessica said. “Okay. Great. No problem. See you then.”

  She hung up, threw her legs over the side of the bed, ready for a nice, brisk nap.

  Welcome to Homicide.

  20

  TUESDAY, 6:00 AM

  BYRNE HAD BEEN WAITING for her with a large coffee and a sesame seed bagel. The coffee was strong and hot, the bagel fresh.

  Bless him.

  Jessica hurried through the rain and slipped into the car, nodded a token greeting. To put it mildly, she was not a morning person, especially a six-o’clock-in-the-morning person. Her fondest hope was that she was wearing matching shoes.

  They rode into the city in silence, Kevin Byrne respecting her space and waking ritual, realizing he had forced the shock of the new day upon her unceremoniously. He, on the other hand, looked wide-awake. A little ragged, but wide-eyed and alert.

  Men had it so easy, Jessica thought. Clean shirt, shave in the car, a spritz of Binaca, a drop of Visine, ready for the day.

  They made the ride to North Philly in short order. They parked near the corner of Nineteenth and Poplar. Byrne put on the radio at the half hour. The Tessa Wells story was mentioned.

  With half an hour to wait, they hunkered down. Occasionally, Byrne flipped the ignition to start the wipers, the defrosters.

  They tried to talk about the news, the weather, the job. The subtext kept bulling forward.

  Daughters.

  Tessa Wells was someone’s daughter.

  This realization hardwired them both into the brutal soul of this crime. It might have been their child.

  “SHE’LL BE THREE NEXT MONTH,” Jessica said.

  Jessica showed Byrne a picture of Sophie. He smiled. She knew he had a marshmallow center. “She looks like a handful.”

  “Two hands,” Jessica said. “You know how it is when they’re that age. They look to you for everything.”

  “Yeah.”

  “You miss those days?”

  “I missed those days,” Byrne said. “I was working double tours in those days.”

  “How old is your daughter now?”

  “She’s thirteen,” Byrne said.

  “Uh-oh,” Jessica said.

  “Uh-oh is an understatement.”

  “So . . . she have a house full of Britney CDs?”

  Byrne smiled again, thinly this time. “No.”

  “Oh boy. Don’t tell me she’s into rap.”

  Byrne spun his coffee a few times. “My daughter is deaf.”

  “Oh my,” Jessica said, suddenly mortified. “I’m . . . I’m sorry.”

  “That’s okay. Don’t be.”

  “I mean . . . I just didn’t—”

  “It’s okay. Really. She hates sympathy. And she’s a lot tougher than you and me combined.”

  “What I meant was—”

  “I know what you meant. My wife and I went through years of sorry. It’s a natural reaction,” Byrne said. “But to be quite honest, I’ve yet to meet a deaf person who thinks of herself as handicapped. Especially Colleen.”

  Seeing as she had opened this line of questioning, Jessica figured she might as well continue. She did, gently. “Was she born deaf?”

  Byrne nodded. “Yeah. It was something called Mondini dysplasia. Genetic disorder.”

  Jessica’s mind turned to Sophie, dancing around the living room to some song on Sesame Street. Or the way Sophie would sing at the top of her lungs amid the bubbles in the tub. Like her mother, Sophie couldn’t tow a tune with a tractor, but she was earnest in the attempt. Jessica thought about her bright, healthy, beautiful little girl and considered how lucky she was.

  They both fell silent. Byrne ran the wipers, the defroster. The windshield began to clear. The girls had yet not arrived at the corner. Traffic on Poplar was beginning to thicken.

  “I watched her once,” Byrne said, sounding a little melancholy, as if he had not spoken of his daughter to anyone in a while. The longing was obvious. “I was supposed to pick her up at her deaf school, and I was a little early. So I pulled over to the side of the street to grab a smoke, read the paper.

  “Anyway, I see this group of kids on the corner, maybe seven or eight of them. They’re twe
lve, thirteen years old. I’m not really paying them any mind. They’re all dressed like homeless people, right? Baggy pants, big shirts hanging out, untied sneakers. Suddenly I see Colleen standing there, leaning against the building, and it’s like I don’t know her. Like she’s some kid who kind of resembles Colleen.

  “All of a sudden, I’m really interested in all the other kids. Who’s doing what, who’s holding what, who’s wearing, what, what their hands are doing, what’s in their pockets. It’s like I’m patting them all down from across the street.”

  Byrne sipped his coffee, threw a glance at the corner. Still empty.

  “So she’s holding her own with these older boys, smiling, yakking away in sign language, flipping her hair,” he continued. “And I’m thinking: Jesus Christ. She’s flirting. My little girl is flirting with these boys. My little girl who, just a few weeks ago, climbed into her Big Wheel and went pedaling down the street wearing her little yellow I HAD A WILD TIME IN WILDWOOD T-shirt is flirting with boys. I wanted to cap the horny little pricks right there.

  “And then I watched one of them light a joint, and my fucking heart stops. I actually heard it wind down in my chest like a cheap watch. I’m ready to get out of the car with my cuffs in my hand when I realized what it would to do to Colleen, so I just watch.

  “They pass it around, casual, right on the corner, like it’s legal, right? I’m waiting, watching. Then one of the kids offers the joint to Colleen and I knew, I knew she was going to take it and smoke it. I knew she would grab it and take a long, slow hit off this blunt, and I suddenly saw the next five years of her life. Pot and booze and coke and rehab and Sylvan to get her grades back up and more drugs and the pill and then . . . then the most incredible thing happened.”

  Jessica realized she was staring at Byrne, rapt, waiting for him to finish. She snapped out of it, prodded. “Okay. What happened?”

  “She just . . . shook her head,” Byrne said. “Just like that. No thanks. I doubted her at that moment, I completely broke faith with my little girl, and I wanted to tear my eyes out of my head. I was given the opportunity to trust her, completely unobserved, and I failed. I failed. Not her.”

  Jessica nodded, trying not to think about the fact that she was going to have to deal with a moment like that with Sophie in about ten years, not looking forward to it at all.

  “And it suddenly occurred to me,” Byrne said, “after all these years of worry, all these years of treating her as if she were fragile, all these years of walking on the street side of the sidewalk, all these years of staring down the idiots watching her sign in public and thinking she was a freak, all of it was unnecessary. She’s ten times tougher than I am. She could kick my ass.”

  “Kids will surprise you.” Jessica realized how inadequate it sounded when she said it, how completely uninformed she was on this subject.

  “I mean, of all the things you fear for your kid: diabetes, leukemia, rheumatoid arthritis, cancer—my little girl was deaf. That’s it. Other than that, she’s perfect in every way. Heart, lungs, eyes, limbs, mind. Perfect. She can run like the wind, jump high. And she has this smile . . . this smile that could melt the glaciers. All this time I thought she was handicapped because she couldn’t hear. It was me. I’m the one who needs a freakin’ telethon. I didn’t realize how lucky we are.”

  Jessica didn’t know what to say. She had mistakenly summed up Kevin Byrne as a streetwise guy who muscled his way through his life and his job, a guy who ran on instinct instead of intellect. There was quite a bit more at work here than she realized. She suddenly felt like she had won the lottery in being partnered with him.

  Before Jessica could respond, two teenaged girls approached the corner, umbrellas up and open against the drizzle.

  “There they are,” Byrne said.

  Jessica capped her coffee, buttoned her raincoat.

  “This is more your turf.” Byrne nodded toward the girls, lighting a cigarette, hunkering down in the comfortable—read: dry—seat. “You should handle the questions.”

  Right, Jessica thought. I suppose it has nothing to do with standing in the rain at seven o’clock in the morning. She waited for a break in the traffic, got out of the car, crossed the street.

  On the corner were two girls in Nazarene school uniforms. One was a tall, dark-skinned black girl with the most elaborate network of corn-rowed hair Jessica had ever seen. She was at least six feet tall and stunningly beautiful. The other girl was white, petite, and small-boned. They both carried umbrellas in one hand, wadded-up tissues in the other. Both had red, puffy eyes. Obviously, they had already heard about Tessa.

  Jessica approached, showed them her badge, told them she was investigating Tessa’s death. They agreed to talk to her. Their names were Patrice Regan and Ashia Whitman. Ashia was Somali.

  “Did you see Tessa at all on Friday?” Jessica asked.

  They shook their heads in unison.

  “She didn’t come to the bus stop?”

  “No,” Patrice said.

  “Did she miss a lot of days?”

  “Not a lot,” Ashia said between sniffles. “Once in a while.”

  “Was she the type to bag school?” Jessica asked.

  “Tessa?” Patrice asked, incredulous. “No way. Like, never.”

  “What did you think when she didn’t show?”

  “We just figured she wasn’t feeling good or something,” Patrice said. “Or it had something to do with her dad. Her dad’s pretty sick, you know. Sometimes she has to take him to the hospital.”

  “Did you call her or talk to her during the day?” Jessica asked.

  “No.”

  “Do you know anybody who might have talked to her?”

  “No,” Patrice said. “Not that I know of.”

  “What about drugs? Was she into the drug scene?”

  “God, no,” Patrice said. “She was like Sister Mary Narc.”

  “Last year, when she took off three weeks, did you talk to her much?”

  Patrice glanced at Ashia. There were secrets entombed in that look. “Not really.”

  Jessica decided not to push. She consulted her notes. “Do you guys know a boy named Sean Brennan?”

  “Yeah,” Patrice said. “I do. I don’t think Ashia ever met him.”

  Jessica looked at Ashia. She shrugged.

  “How long were they seeing each other?” Jessica asked.

  “Not sure,” Patrice said. “Maybe a couple of months or so.”

  “Was Tessa still seeing him?”

  “No,” Patrice said. “His family moved away.”

  “Where to?”

  “Denver, I think.”

  “When?”

  “I’m not sure. About a month ago, I think.”

  “Do you know where Sean went to school?”

  “Neumann,” Patrice said.

  Jessica made notes. Her pad was getting wet. She put it in her pocket. “Did they break up?”

  “Yeah,” Patrice said. “Tessa was pretty upset.”

  “What about Sean? Did he have a temper?”

  Patrice just shrugged. In other words, yes, but she didn’t want to get anybody in trouble.

  “Did you ever see him hurt Tessa?”

  “No,” Patrice said. “Nothing like that. He was just . . . just a guy. You know.”

  Jessica waited for more. More was not forthcoming. She moved on. “Can you think of anyone Tessa didn’t get along with? Anyone who might have wanted to do her harm?”

  This question started the waterworks again. Both girls began to cry, wiping at their eyes. They shook their heads.

  “Was she seeing anyone else after Sean? Anyone who might have been bothering her?”

  The girls thought for a few seconds, and again shook their heads in unison.

  “Did Tessa ever see Dr. Parkhurst at school?”

  “Sure,” Patrice said.

  “Did she like him?”

  “I guess.”

  “Did Dr. Parkhurst ever see her outsid
e of school?” Jessica asked.

  “Outside?”

  “As in socially.”

  “What, like a date or something?” Patrice asked. She screwed up her face at the idea of Tessa dating a man as ancient as thirty or so. As if. “Uh, no.”

  “Do you guys ever go to him for guidance counseling?” Jessica asked.

  “Sure,” Patrice said. “Everybody does.”

  “What sorts of things do you talk about?”

  Patrice thought about it for a few seconds. Jessica could see that the girl was concealing something. “School, mostly. College apps, SATs, stuff like that.”

  “Ever talk about anything personal?”

  Eyes earthward. Again.

  Bingo, Jessica thought.

  “Sometimes,” Patrice said.

  “What sort of personal things?” Jessica asked, recalling Sister Mercedes, the guidance counselor at Nazarene when she attended. Sister Mercedes was built like John Goodman and had a perpetual scowl. The only personal thing you talked about with Sister Mercedes was your promise not to have sex until you were forty.

  “I don’t know,” Patrice said, getting interested in her shoes again. “Stuff.”

  “Did you talk about the boys you were seeing? Things like that?”

  “Sometimes,” Ashia answered.

  “Did he ever ask you to talk about things that you found embarrassing? Or maybe a little bit too personal?”

  “I don’t think so,” Patrice said. “Not that I can, you know, remember.”

  Jessica could see that she was losing her. She pulled out a pair of business cards and handed one each to the two girls. “Look,” she began. “I know this is tough. If you think of anything that can help us find the guy who did this, give us a call. Or if you just want to talk. Whatever. Okay? Day or night.”

  Ashia took the card, remained silent, the tears building again. Patrice took the card, nodded. In unison, like synchronized mourners, the two girls lifted the balled tissues in their hands and dabbed at their eyes.

  “I went to Nazarene,” Jessica added.

  The two girls looked at each other, as if she had just told them she had once attended the Hogwart School.

  “Seriously?” Ashia asked.

  “Sure,” Jessica said. “Do you guys still carve stuff under the stage in the old auditorium?”