I don't know how many minutes passed before I could speak. "Who took the picture?" Crazy question to ask first, but that's what popped out of my mouth.
"Another nurse." Erika sat straight-backed and chin up, so poised. Looking at her, you'd never know her soul played in mud. "I slipped her the camera when we went in, told her my boyfriend was camera-shy. He still doesn't know the picture exists."
My boyfriend.
Sudden rage shot through my limbs, propelling me to my feet. I headed for the door like a freight train, thinking wild thoughts . . .
That Erika had won. After all the years of high school and even my wedding, she'd actually taken Mike from me.
That wait a few months and elegant Miss Erika would look as fat as me—and wouldn't she deserve it.
And that no one on earth should die a horrible death more than Erika Hollinger.
"He's fixin to leave you, Tully," Erika called after me. "I've got some big money comin to me real soon. And then we're goin away together."
I couldn't respond around the brick in my throat. I fled through the front door and banged it closed so hard her front shutters rattled.
Her laughter chased me as I stumbled down the porch steps.
The rest of that day was a blur. When Mike came home from work that night I was already in bed, lying on my side away from him. Pretending sleep with my eyes wide open. Before my pregnancy I'd slept so sound Mike could walk around the bedroom and I'd never know it. But not lately. Every night I was hot and restless. As for that night, I didn't sleep at all. While Mike soft-snored through those dark hours, I alternately cried, pled with him, and attacked him like a lioness—without moving or making a sound.
By the next morning my veins simmered. Not till Mike was about to leave for work could I even speak to him. Then it all boiled out of me.
"I know about Erika."
We stood in the kitchen, me leaning against the counter for support. Mike was in his blue factory uniform, his head freshly buzzed.
"I know she's pregnant with your baby—and don't you deny it, Michael Phillips. She showed me a picture of you with her at the ultrasound."
Mike's face paled, then reddened. I saw the telltale vein throb at his temple, the hardening of his square jaw. He thrust back his shoulders and glared down at me. "What are you talkin about?"
"You denying it when she showed me proof?"
"There is no picture!"
"Then what did I see?"
"Danged if I know, Tully! You've gone plain crazy."
"Michael. I saw the picture. You were there. Holding her hand." My voice caught on the last word. Tears filled my eyes.
He turned away, breathing like a mad bull. Wiped the back of his hand across his mouth.
"She says you're going away with her."
He snorted, shaking his head.
"Is it true?"
"Erika's a liar, and you know it."
"Is it true?" I smacked him on the shoulder.
He spun around, fist raised. I barely flinched. He'd hit me plenty times since we got married—a shock I'd never in my wildest nightmares expected. Every time I'd just wither, but at that moment I didn't care. He couldn't hurt me more than he already had. "What're you going to do with us both pregnant, huh, Mike?" My mouth pulled as I fought bitter tears. "Guess you'll have to pick which baby you want most!"
His steel blue gaze could have cut glass. His fist hung in the air, his lips open and drawn back. We faced off, shaken and toxic.
Just like that my anger drained away. I slumped over the counter, face nearly touching the Formica. I could smell old sponge from where I'd wiped up a spill. My body shuddered with a sob. I wanted Mike gone, and I wanted him in my arms. I couldn't believe this was happening. Not now, two months from the birth of our son.
A stream of curses flowed from my husband's mouth. He stomped away and punched the wall. "I'm not leavin you." Michael growled the words. "No way would I ever want to be with Erika Hollinger."
"You were with her."
He smacked the wall again. "I'll kill her for tellin you that."
Fine by me.
I raised my face from the counter and fixed him with a dull stare. "I don't even know if I want you anymore."
He opened his mouth, then shut it. The door slammed on his way out.
I stumbled to the couch, fell on it, and sobbed. Life as I knew it was gone. No way could it get any worse.
No way.
Chapter 4
Deena
"The police in this town are idiots. That includes Ted Arnoldson, even if I was madly in love with him for two years in high school. And it for sure includes my ex, Mr. John Cotter himself. None of those five men would know a piece of evidence if they stepped on it—which is probably exactly what they do. You'd think with six murders in three years they'd ask for outside help. Hello, how about the State Police? Supposedly those guys know what to do with a crime scene. But nooo, the Amaryllis Police Department figures they've got to do this themselves. Egotists, every one of them. Worst of all Chief Cotter. And I'm not sayin that just because he used to be my father-in-law."
I positioned the last strip of five-inch-wide professional foil into place on Mary Harell's plain brown hair. I'd finally convinced her to go for a partial color—auburn lowlights. Dull Mary was about to become a new woman. She didn't want "that stripey look" I wore in my own hair. So I'd been careful to blend in the color.
Perfection, that's what I wanted for every client. That's why people kept comin back.
"Well, they'd just better find the killer soon." Mary had come in lookin pale, and her expression hadn't changed. Frankly it wasn't much different from the fear on everyone's face in Amaryllis. This was just too much. Nobody was sleepin at night, and pressure on the police was at an all-time high. A few days ago I'd have said that was good. Maybe Chief Cotter would finally allow some outside help in solvin these horrible crimes. Now the thought scared me to death.
But I had to keep up appearances.
"They will find him soon, if I have anything to say about it." I brushed auburn onto the last bit of foiled hair.
"What can you do?"
"Make noise, like I'm good at. Keep demandin the chief bring in the State Police. Make sure Trent Williams keeps coverin the case for The Jackson Bugle. Chief Cotter don't like lookin like a fool to the entire country."
Could I do all that now—really? Pursue the truth in this case and let the cards fall where I feared they would?
Mary fingered the smock I'd draped around her. "Trent's already in town. I saw him yesterday. Had an article in today's Jackson Bugle."
"I read it. Not much to it. As usual, police weren't talkin to him, and Erika's neighbors never heard a thing."
But for sure I planned to pump Trent for any new information. Amaryllis's most famous citizen always had time for Deena Ruckland. Fact was, Trent still had a thing for me. He and I had grown up on the same street, both without fathers.
We fell silent as I finished Mary's color. "If only just one of the murders had been outside of town in the county. That would have least brought in the sheriff's department for that crime. I swear I think the Closet Killer stayed in town on purpose."
I shut my mouth and put down my brush. "All right, Miss Beautiful."
Mary peered at her shiny head in the mirror. I looked away. Didn't want her to catch my eyes. Somehow, on this never-ending day, I'd managed to keep my voice even. Talkin's one thing I know how to do. That and hair. Everybody expects me to rattle on. But I didn't trust anybody lookin into my eyes that day. Sure as shootin the truth lay there.
"What now?" Mary shifted in her seat.
"You get to sit and let the chemicals process. I'll check on you in about twenty-five minutes." I handed her a stack of magazines.
Chin held
high, I pushed my rollin cart to the back room and sank into a chair. Alone, thank heaven. Patsy, the gal who rented a station from me in Deena's Cut 'n' Style, was off sick. I should clean up the materials on my tray. Stick the comb in Barbicide disinfectant. Wash out the color bowl. But I didn't have the energy. I could only slump and stare at myself in the small mirror on the wall.
Thirty-two, nothin. I looked a dried up and blown away forty-five, at least. My straight brown hair was too long against my shoulders and needed a cut. Maybe Mary was right about the "stripey" highlights. Suddenly mine just looked overdone. My skin surely needed a tan. Even my hazel eyes—usually my best feature—looked dull.
I couldn't keep this up. My nerves were about to unravel. Spool right out across the floor.
All my life I'd watched out for my little brother. Stevie was slow-minded and easy to push around. Which too many people in this town got their kicks doin, ever since he was little. God has a special place in hell for those people. Think they can make fun of the weak. Truth is, if they knew what I knew, they might not tease so much. Stevie was a simmerin volcano. You could only push a person so far. But over the years I'd been the only one who'd seen him explode—in the safety of home. It was like he bottled up all his emotion until he could let it out in front of me.
Or so I'd thought.
For the past three years, since he turned twenty-three, Stevie had been livin on his own, with a steady job as janitor at the factory. He worked cleanin up durin the late shift, 3:00 to 11:00. He'd seemed to stabilize. Grow some confidence. When he came over to my place I saw no more of his temper. I thought he was growin up, learnin how to deal with his anger.
Until my brother showed up at my house two nights ago—the night Erika Hollinger was killed—covered in blood.
http://www.pulitzer.org/works/2010-Feature-Writing
2010 Pulitzer Prize
Feature Writing
The Jackson Bugle
Gone to Ground
What happens to a small, quiet Southern town when evil invades in the form of a serial killer?
By: Trent Williams
October 29, 2010
(Excerpt)
The population of present-day Amaryllis barely breaks 1,700. Even so, it is the second largest city in Jasper County, surpassed by Bay Springs seven miles to the west, with citizens numbering about 2,100. The entire county is home to a mere 18,000 people.
Before the Closet Killings the last murder on record for Amaryllis dates back to 1905, when a lumberman by the name of Jack Brown got drunk and shot his nemesis, Alton Wilkerson, during a fight over a woman. The woman's name has been lost to history.
While Bay Springs is small, it benefits from the confluence of four highways within its city limits. By contrast Amaryllis has a much more sheltered feel, nestled along bucolic Highway 528, which meanders 22 miles between Bay Springs and Heidelberg. County Road 27, an even smaller and less traveled route, forms the town's eastern border. A driver along the pine tree lined Highway 528 comes upon Amaryllis almost as if by accident. A curve in the road—and the town appears. Driving east from Bay Springs, after a few outlying houses, one sees a left turn onto Main Street—a blend of brick-paved road and old storefronts. The drugstore—complete with soda fountain—the bank and grocery store, the hardware store, two hair salons, and one family diner all front Main. There isn't an unknown face on that street, unless, of course, it belongs to an out-of-town visitor. Amaryllis has enjoyed, even thrived, in its anonymity.
Now its separateness has taken on an eerie, bone-chilling aura.
"Where you headed?" Shirley Ludden asks a stranger as she sets a glass of water before him in her Flower Café. "Glad you stopped in. We love to meet new friends." Shirley is a rotund woman in her fifties, quick with a smile and known for her patience and listening ear. Not to mention the best peach pie in town.
But in the past three years Shirley's smile has slipped. "It's hard lookin' at a stranger now," she admits. "Hard even seein' folks I've known all my life come into my place. With every man I serve I think, 'Is he the one?'" She lowers her eyes, giving her head a little shake. "Come to think of it, how do you even know it's a man?"
Chapter 5
Tully
The same day Mike said he'd kill Erika Hollinger he was almost an hour late coming home from work.
I was already in bed, not wanting to see his face. I lay on my side facing away from the door, my belly heavy and my feet swollen. I had to put a pillow lengthwise between my knees for any comfort at all. When 11:10 rolled around with no truck pulling in the driveway, my body tensed up, like it already suspected the worst. By the time the digital clock read 11:30 I knew where Mike was.
With Erika.
I started to shake. I knew my Michael. He may have been sleeping with her, but he'd hardly gone over there on this night feeling amorous. He'd gone to beat the tar out of the woman who'd outted him to his wife. Mike does not like being told what to do. And he sure doesn't like being found out if he's done wrong.
Why had I married him? Why hadn't I listened to my parents?
For a crazy minute I thought about calling the police. But that would only make things worse between Mike and me. At the time all anger over his infidelity was gone, and I just wanted my husband back. Safe. I did not want him going to jail for assault and battery of some woman who wasn't even worth the trouble.
Finally at 11:50 I heard the truck. The engine cut underneath the carport. Mike soon walked into the bedroom, breath puffing, steps agitated. I didn't need to see him to feel the adrenaline rolling off him.
My insides went cold.
He disappeared into the bathroom. I heard the door shut hard, the shower go on. His usual routine. When he came out five minutes later I heard the plop of his uniform onto the floor.
He crawled into bed, breathing still erratic. He had to know I was awake, but he didn't try to talk. He just tossed and turned. It was a long time before he fell into the even breath of sleep.
What had he done?
I lay rigid as stone, expecting the phone to ring any minute, cops to beat on our front door. But . . . nothing. Just hot, smothering silence.
The next morning when I managed to pull myself out of bed, Mike was already up. I could hear him in the kitchen. Like a robot I picked Mike's uniform off the floor to throw in the hamper. It was a one-piece jumper-like thing, and as usual he'd peeled it off half wrong side out. My eyes fell on the inside tag at the top—and my hands stopped. I stared at the tag. Pulled it closer.
It didn't look right.
This was an older uniform, with different words on the tag, in different letters. Michael had been issued three uniforms, all the same. Two to wash and one to wear. This uniform was the right size—but it wasn't the one he'd put on that morning. I'd swear to it. I'd washed those clothes so many times I knew every square inch of them.
Like the hand of fate, Mike chose that moment to walk into the bedroom. He halted just this side of the threshold, eyes moving from my face to the clothes in my hands. His fingers twitched. He tried to cover up the nervous gesture by scratching his elbow.
I held up the uniform. "This isn't yours."
"'Course it is."
"It's not the one you put on yesterday morning."
"Yes it is."
"No, it's not."
"Tully. Shut up."
I glared at him, the fabric hot in my hands. Where was his uniform? Why did he need to change it?
"Mike. What did you do?"
"Nothin."
"What did you do?"
"Tully, we ain't talkin about this. Now or ever."
"I want to know!"
In a split-second he covered the ground between us. Wrapped his fingers around my throat and squeezed. I dropped the uniform. Started to choke.
"You
hear me good, Tully." Rage contorted his face. "I came home at the regular time last night. Just like always. You got that?"
I couldn't breathe. Panic staggered through me.
"Tully!" Mike dug his fingers deeper.
My throat was caving in. Black dots swarmed over my vision. I tried to beg for my life but could only gurgle.
"Do you hear me?"
My head managed a nod.
Michael eased off. I pried my mouth wide and dragged in air. It skidded down my throat like fire.
"What time did I get home?"
I couldn't talk.
"What time?"
I panted hard. "Nor. Mal. Time."
"You see anything unusual?"
"N-no."
"You sure?"
"Huhhhhh."
"Tully!" He shook me.
"Yes!"
"Don't you forget it." Mike pushed me backward. I stumbled into the wall. "I'm goin fishin till work." He spat the words.
The world spun. I fell on the bed, chest heaving, tears hot in my eyes.
Ten minutes later I'd moved to the couch, not daring to speak. Mike stalked outside, carrying his fishing gear, but then returned. He snatched a cleaning rag from under the kitchen sink, wet it, and took it back outside.
What was he doing?
After a few minutes I heard him drive off.
My mind still shook. I touched my neck. If it bruised, how would I hide it?
The phone rang. I jumped. It had to be the police, asking about last night. I hesitated, then lifted the receiver and squeaked out a hello.
"Tully! Thank God you're all right." My mother's voice, all thick.
A dust whirl blew in my stomach. How did she know Mike had nearly choked me to death?
"Did you hear about Erika Hollinger?" Mom started to cry. "She was murdered last night, Tully, just like the others. They found her this morning in her closet . . ."
The phone slipped from my hand.
The next couple hours glazed by. My phone rang off the hook, rumors flying about the latest murder. It had been nine months since Carla Brewster. She'd been sixty-four. Erika was so much younger than all the other victims. Who would be next—a little girl?
Gone to Ground Page 3