The Killer's Wife

by Bill Floyd

  3.

  On the morning of August 14, he left the house at dawn, without taking a shower. He never went anywhere without a shower. I could tell from the twisted sheets on his side that he’d barely slept. He said he was going to run some errands, but he was out the door before I could think to ask where he would be. I had a throbbing headache, and felt like I’d slept too deeply. My thinking was scrambled, and I didn’t really start questioning how suddenly he’d taken off until after I’d had a shower and a second cup of coffee. I fed Hayden and laid him down for a nap in his crib. I made sure the baby monitor was in my pocket when I went downstairs.

  Before placing the water glass from my bedside table in the dishwasher, I found myself examining it closely, holding it up to the light, turning it this way and that. Randy had brought it up for me the night before. I realized I was looking for residue and thought: Residue of what? Would you know if you saw it? Do you really think your husband is trying to poison you? And if so, if you’re really entertaining such squalid fantasies, don’t you think it’s time to consult a mental health professional?

  Randy returned in the early afternoon, not too long past lunchtime. I’d made a couple of grilled tuna sandwiches and was about to suggest that he grab one from the serving board when I noticed his appearance. He was wearing his dark blue hooded rain jacket, but his clothes were wet all the way underneath, clear water dripping onto the foyer floor. His boots squeaked as he walked right past me and headed up the stairs without so much as a word.

  “You’re getting mud everywhere!” I yelled. I could hear the shrillness in my voice, but didn’t care. I’d become something of a shrew over the past five months; it was my only defense to his nervous indifference.

  No response. I heard a door slam, then the shower running. I held my hands up in exasperation, remembered I was alone, and dropped them trembling back to my sides. I went to the foot of the stairs to inspect the mess, and damned if it wasn’t worse than I’d thought. Clumps of wet grass, stray slick blades, and clumps of filth were stamped all the way up to the second floor. “Randy, damn it!”

  I went up the stairs in a raging fury, pausing only long enough to glance into Hayden’s nursery—he was awake but quiet, ogling the spaceship mobile that spun in the air over his crib—before following the muddy footprints into our bedroom. The bathroom door was shut, the shower going full blast. I knew I’d be in for it when I opened that door, because Randy’s insults were at their most lacerating when you intruded on his “personal space,” but it was obvious that I’d have to spend hours cleaning the carpets and I wasn’t really thinking clearly.

  The bathroom was a wall of steam. His clothes were in a filthy pile on the floor, and as I stood there, him yelling at me from behind the shower curtain to get out—“I’ll be done in a minute!”—I took in the condition of his outfit. It wasn’t just mud that had soiled the clothes. That was blood, I recognized it, large discolored patches on his jeans and the shirt he’d been wearing. I picked up the shirt, fascinated, all my choice irate advice on his cleanliness dying in my throat. The shirt had been a sky blue button-down, light cotton, now streaked with mud and spatters of crimson, all of it mixing together from the dampness. I could smell it, that rank copper odor.

  He flung the shower curtain open and snatched a towel off the rack. I stepped backward holding his shirt; when I realized I still had it in my hands, I dropped it quickly to the floor. Steam flooded out past me as I stood in the bathroom doorway. Randy was toweling himself furiously, and I saw that the towel itself was turning red now. He was bleeding from a long gash in his right cheek, and another along his left arm. He pressed the towel over his cheek and said in a low voice, “Get out. I’ll tell you all about it in a minute, if you’ll allow me five fucking seconds to get fucking dry first.”

  I backed out and he pushed the door shut behind me. I went numbly down the hall and stood over Hayden’s crib, cooing to him mindlessly, blocking out every racing thought in my head. I told myself I was so scared because I was concerned about Randy’s welfare. I told myself I was worried that he’d been seriously hurt.

  “I got into a shoving match with some asshole at Home Depot,” he said, standing in the hallway. I didn’t know how much time had elapsed. He was dressed in shorts and a T-shirt, pressing a wad of tissues over his wounded arm. I closed the nursery door behind me and pointed downstairs. Randy went ahead, and asked me to bring some bandages from the hall closet.

  While I wrapped his arm in pads and gauze, he told me about how the jack-offs down at HD had let their inventory slide and so they only had a couple of bags of mulch left (apparently he’d gone out early in the pouring rain without a shower to get … mulch), and how this other asshole (“He looked like one of those Volvo-driving cock-smokers, you know the type.”) had challenged Randy’s right to the remaining supply. They’d exchanged words and things had escalated. “We got into it right there in the Lawn and Garden Center,” Randy said, wincing when I patted his cheek with a swab soaked in rubbing alcohol. “It’s probably a good thing the salesmen said they were calling the cops, or I’d have really let him have it. As it was, I think I might’ve broken his nose.”

  I opened a couple of Band-Aids. “This might actually need stitches.” The wound in his cheek was so deep it wouldn’t stop bleeding, and it made me woozy to look at it. I swallowed and held out the bandages. “Put them on yourself. If you can’t handle your anger any better than that, maybe you need to—”

  “What?” His voice had gone cold now as he plucked the bandages lightly from my fingers. “I need to what?”

  “I think you need to see somebody, get some counseling maybe.”

  He grunted and went and stood in front of the mirror in the front hallway, sloppily pasting the bandages over the gash. “You are so predictable,” he began, each word thick with resentment. “I get into a fight that some other asshole started, a fight where I was only defending myself, and you automatically assume the whole thing was my fault. I’m not going to let any jerk-offs push me around in the store, and I’m not going to let you talk down to me at home.”

  I tried to keep my words steady. “Randy, we have a child now. What if the police show up? What if the people at Home Depot got your license plate and they follow you here? What if they charge you with assault?”

  “But I didn’t start it!”

  “The police don’t always care about that. What if you got taken in and then it got back to the HR people at work? And what if they decided that when the next round of layoffs came around and they were looking to trim the fat, that they could use any old excuse anyone had given them? Don’t you think they’d come after you first? Without me bringing in any income, and with the house and the baby, we can’t afford for you to be out of work or in any legal difficulty right now. That’s all I’m saying.” It fleetingly occurred to me how stupid this argument was, given that I knew his story about the altercation at HD was bullshit.

  But if I didn’t keep talking, I might start thinking.

  He glared at me and then took a deep breath. “You are un-fucking-believable. I’m going outside.”

  He slammed the back door. I went and stood in the kitchen, watching out the window as he stalked out to his shed. The rain had abated somewhat but he still got wet all over again as he stood there, fumbling with his keys. Finally he got them out and opened the padlock while the silver drops fell past him. He looked back at the house and although I couldn’t see his eyes under his pasted bangs, I felt him marking me. He disappeared into the shed.

  After a few minutes, I went back upstairs to the nursery. It seemed like I stayed there for hours, caressing Hayden’s cheek, smoothing his down-fine hair, seeing his father’s eyes looking up at me.

  4.

  Randy didn’t return until it was nearly dark. We sat silently in the den, both of us mechanically eating a frozen pizza I’d made. I told him I wanted to watch the ten o’clock news to find out if the weather would clear; if so, I was thinking of taki
ng Hayden out to the park in the morning, to get some fresh air. Randy started in right off, arguing that he wanted to watch a baseball game. He’d never shown any interest in the sport before. I thought he was being obstinate, punishing me for my inquisitiveness or judgmentalism or whatever overbearing trait he thought I’d exhibited earlier while I was cleaning his wounds. Knowing I couldn’t handle another argument, I just took my plate and went upstairs and turned on the TV in our bedroom.

  The lead story on all the local news channels was the brutal slaying of an area high school student, Daphne Snyder. The police weren’t releasing many details as yet, but I recognized the park in the footage—it was where I’d been thinking of taking Hayden in the morning. The cameras panned past the swing sets and the jungle gym and the benches by the softball fields. Reporters stood and pointed behind them at that ugly gray block building where the girl’s body had been found. I’d utilized that very restroom before, and I saw it now in my mind, the grungy tiles and the skylights so filthy that you felt like you were underwater as you held yourself up off the seat. What a lonely place to die. I stared as the TV displayed a photo from Daphne’s yearbook, taken at her junior prom last spring, while the anchor read off more details of her short life. She’d been a pretty girl, her brown hair coiffed and shellacked for the big night but you could tell it would look just as fine wound up in a natural ponytail. An outdoor type of face with a kind, sad smile, like she knew something was looming on her horizon. Or maybe her date had just been drunk and acting stupid. I would never know.

  An uncle spoke with reporters from the front porch of the family’s home, saying that the girl’s parents were in no condition to take questions, although they appreciated everyone’s thoughts and prayers. An edge of hostility flashed in the man’s voice when someone asked him what should be done to the guy who did it, if he were caught. The uncle declined to go into details, “Because I’m a Christian, but God will have His judgment on this monster.” His voice cracked and the channel I was watching switched over to an impromptu news conference at the police station. The officer conducting the Q&A session deflected an inquiry into whether the killing might be related to any others. “We have a similar MO to some recent crimes, but really that’s all I can tell you right now.”

  When I looked away from the TV, Randy was standing in our bedroom doorway, arms folded, watching. I jumped a little and he turned to me with an understanding smile. His look held more actual emotion than it had in a long, long time. He spoke with patience and kindness. “So, did they say if it’s going to rain? Because I was thinking I could take Hayden out, if you want. I’ve been kind of slack, and I think maybe you could use some time on your own.”

  “No, that’s all right. You should go see the doctor—”

  But he kept right on talking, like I hadn’t spoken up at all. Maybe he was so used to that that he didn’t even notice it when I did. “Yeah, I’ll take him first thing in the morning, and you can sleep in. We’ll be back in the afternoon, and you and I can talk then. Right now, let’s get some sleep.”

  He might’ve slept. At first, I know I didn’t. Once Randy’s breathing seemed to become regular, I got up and went to Hayden’s room, thinking only of getting him out to the car and then driving as far away as possible, as quickly as possible, before I called the police. But when I got my son scooped up into my arms, Randy was right there in the hall, blocking my way. He said, “I can’t sleep, so I’m going downstairs to watch some DVDs. You want to come?”

  I shook my head. I went back to the bedroom with Hayden in my arms and sat there in bed trembling. When Randy came up with a glass of water for me, he stood and watched until I drank it all down. I didn’t know what else to do. I kept looking at those big arms, the ropy veins on the backs of his hands … I drank, and before long, I was asleep. The last thing I felt was how weak my own arms had become, and how I couldn’t hold on at all when Randy pried Hayden gently from my grasp.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  1.

  I came awake suddenly, to full daylight. It was the next morning, the first day Daphne Snyder’s family would awake to the realization that she was gone forever from their lives. Sitting bolt upright in the bed, gasping, my head thudded with a dense pain ten times more leaden than the worst hangover I could remember. The flood of ambient light through the curtains was so sharp I could barely see. Such utter silence, the house felt abandoned.

  “Oh, no,” I moaned, pushing my legs off the edge of the bed. I had to use the wall to hold myself up as I staggered down the hall to the nursery. Empty.

  Downstairs, I was so dizzy and nauseous that I barely made it to the sink before I threw up. I didn’t know what Randy had given me, but it was more powerful than the average sedative. Puking helped clear my mind, even though it didn’t sharpen my blurry vision; the edges of every object shimmered like sunlight on ice. Once I wiped the tears out of my eyes, I saw the note sitting on the chopping block, and what he’d used for a paperweight.

  Hon, he’d addressed it. Gone to take Hayden out for some fresh air and attend to some business. Be home later this afternoon. Call me if you want to talk before then. Love, Randy.

  And, placed atop the note, the key to his shed.

  Not that it was labeled as such, and I don’t know if I could’ve picked it out of all the others on his key ring. But there, sitting where it was, I had no doubts.

  I almost called the cops right then. I should have. I should have called them the day before, as soon as he’d dragged himself up the stairs, bloodied and soaked. When the operator or dispatcher (or whatever those people were called) answered, I could have said: “I don’t know if this will mean anything to you, say for example in the case that a girl was recently killed near my house, but …”

  Technically, I wouldn’t even have had to call 911, because we knew a cop: Todd Cline. He still lived in our old neighborhood; he’d been the one to drop all the disturbing hints about the Renault family after their murder a few years ago. Even though we’d moved, we still went to the same church—albeit much less frequently—where we often ran into Todd and his family. Todd Cline, with his requisite cop mustache and barrel chest and his soft-spoken manners. Todd Cline who’d told us that Trudi and Dominique Renault had suffered greatly at the hands of their killer, that he’d done some unspeakable thing to their eyes … The Renaults. Oh, God, Randy, no. I couldn’t have called the cops after I saw the news last night; he was hovering like a bodyguard by then. He’d have surely intervened if he found me leafing frantically through the church directory for Todd Cline’s phone number. But I could’ve fought, I could’ve not drank from the cup he proffered, I could have stabbed him with a kitchen knife and taken my son and driven all the way back home to Oregon …

  Too late now. I picked up the key and promptly dropped it again; my fingertips were numb. More lingering effects from—say it, you know it now, you know—whatever drug my husband had given me. The sound of it crashing to the countertop was disproportionately huge in our empty house, and adrenaline sent an icy aftershock through me. I grabbed the key and held it in my fist and read the note again. I opened my palm. I realized, with my stomach twisting anew, that for the first time in years, my husband was trying to talk to me. He was trying to have a meaningful conversation.

  2.

  The backyard was still damp from yesterday’s storms, but the sky was clear and the lawn sparkled, a field of diamonds in the morning light. Birds clustered around the feeder, flying off and realighting in tight orbits as I walked past them from the house to the shed. The whole world felt as numb as my tingling extremities. It took only about twenty steps to reach the shed, and I wondered at the gulf that I’d always sensed yawning between the two structures. Randy’s world, and the world we shared. Now he was finally going to open up to me.

  It was your basic ten-by-ten storage building, erected by a couple of kids the hardware store had sent over, hauling the entire kit in their flatbed. Just lumber and siding and two small windows
on either end, the glass papered over from inside. In all the time we’d lived in our new house, I’d never once set foot in there. I’d respected his privacy, his need to have his alone time. He’d often reminded me of how essential it was for his peace of mind. I put the key to the padlock and hoped in that last moment that maybe I was wrong, maybe it was simply a spare from work that he’d used to hold down his note, maybe he’d really suddenly developed an interest in being alone with our son, maybe—but it slid right in, seemingly frictionless. I left the padlock lying in the grass, then turned the knob and the door opened.

  Inside it was dark. Daylight barely penetrated the shingle paper he’d stapled over the windows, and I had to fumble for the switch. An overhead light came on, a naked bulb that flooded the space with a yellowish blur that somehow still left room for shadows. It smelled strange in there, but I couldn’t place the odor right off. Something medicinal, chemical … The light didn’t make the room feel any less claustrophobic. A single rolling chair on castors sat in the middle of the plywood planks that made up the flooring. I moved it to one side so I could get around. I left the door wide open behind me, and kept checking it, half dreading that Randy would come racing out the back door of our house, waving a knife and howling about Bluebeard’s wife.

  Nothing here was outwardly disturbing. Two big sets of shelves and drawers, blond unfinished wood with brass handles, were lined up against either wall, and then there was a full-sized closet or cabinet at the very back. Some sort of picture or drawing was tacked onto the double doors back there, but I ignored it for the moment, frightened of trying to take in too much at once. I opened the first drawer on my left-hand side, and my breath stalled in my throat. The drawer was full of ammunition, boxes upon boxes, several different caliber bullets. I picked one up and read: REMINGTON .357 HOLLOW POINT/50 COUNT. In the next drawer down were the guns themselves, six altogether, all of them holstered in leather. I didn’t recognize the caliber or the brands, only the ugly black look of them. Randy had told me he went shooting once in a while with some people from work. He’d never told me he owned a gun. The next drawer contained knives, again sheathed in leather slips so polished and oiled they felt supple to the touch. I pulled a few of them out. Randy was into variety: there was one with a long serrated blade; another that was shorter and hooked at the end; still another that was notched on one side and flat on the other, sharp enough that when I laid it down gently onto the countertop, it cut into the wood. I put the knives back where I’d found them. In other drawers were other tools I didn’t recognize: something like a suction cup and another silvery utensil that looked like it belonged on a surgeon’s tray; rolls of duct tape; a handheld component that featured a small screen and a GPS logo; a box of rubber gloves and a hairnet; and coils of thick rope, tightly wound, and set out in symmetrical stacks.