by Emery Hayes
“Is this a social call?” he asked. He was smiling, but there was no joy or amusement in his face. The man’s eyes were turbulent and bottomless.
She went with the truth. She kept her voice steady, strong, unrelenting. “No, not at all.” Her pace even, she trod closer to the house so that King had to adjust if he wanted to keep his eyes on her. He put his hands down on the railing and watched. “I’ve come for the girls, Dr. King.”
He watched her a moment longer, that smile like a bleeding wound, and then nodded.
“I wanted Enrique to come,” he said. “You’d think he’d come for his children, right? I thought he would.” And his voice was full of censure and rose and fell like the ringing of a bell. The Christmas lights, strung among boughs of holly from the veranda railing, twinkled first red, then green.
“He asked me to get them.”
“Really?” King was surprised. He thought about her words, then shook his head. “No, Enrique is a man first, a doctor second. Father doesn’t even make his top-five list.”
And King seemed to find that offensive.
“He didn’t come to you, did he?” he asked.
“Where are the girls?” Nicole returned.
“Enrique wouldn’t do that.” He shook his head, and that smile reappeared. “You almost had me. Hope sparked.” His face twisted at that. “I hate it, you know? Hope. Keeps us fighting even when there’s nothing left to believe in.”
“What do you believe, Dr. King?”
“That Enrique Esparza is a coward. That my daughter will die, and very soon. She will die never knowing a single day of normal.” His mouth opened, and Nicole suspected it was laughter that fell from it, but it was sharp and cutting and hurt her ears. “That’s not much, huh? A father should want more than normal for his only daughter, right? But I would die to give that to her.”
“Would you kill for it?”
Tears streamed from his eyes, and he nodded.
“It was easy. Too easy,” he said, but he gasped and his words were fragmented.
Nicole’s worry for the Esparza girls increased.
“Who did you kill, Dr. King?”
“Are you worried about Isla and Sofia?” he asked.
“Someone should worry about them,” she said.
“Yes.”
“Because Dr. Esparza doesn’t?”
“And that’s a shame. Perfect girls in every way. Healthy and smart, beautiful girls. Beatrice would have changed the world.”
Past tense.
“You know Beatrice is dead,” Nicole said.
“I do.”
“Did you kill her?”
“I loved her,” he said. “She gave up everything for my daughter.” His composure broke with a short, wrenching sob, and then he continued, “She wanted to help Violet as much as I did.”
“How did she die?” Nicole persisted.
“Loving the world and everyone in it.”
“And Violet?” The girl who would never make snow angels. The Gatlings had confirmed Etienne’s story.
“Hanging on.”
“But without Beatrice—”
“My Violet will die.” His hand shook, and he spilled some of the amber liquid from the glass. “It’s a no-win situation. Seems like it was that from the beginning.”
He turned and threw the glass, and it landed in the snow, far left of where Nicole stood. He hadn’t been aiming for her, but her hand twitched anyway, and it was with controlled thought that she kept her arms at her sides, her gun holstered.
Behind her, she heard the crunch of tires on snow, the sharp whine of rubber tread searching for traction, as a department Yukon turned the bend and came into view. Nicole didn’t turn but kept her eyes on King. She knew, though, the sound of the department vehicles, the feel of backup.
“Your cavalry,” he said. “It’s too late, you know.”
“We’re coming inside,” she told him. “For the girls.”
He looked down on her, his eyes for the first time deep, calm, reasonable. “They want to go home. I called, but Enrique wouldn’t come.”
“Mrs. Esparza came,” Nicole said, and took another step toward the front doors.
“Yes, but only for Beatrice.”
“She took Beatrice but not her youngest daughters?”
“Beatrice is a fighter. She’s a Joan of Arc. And she wouldn’t leave.”
The clouds seemed to part then, a moment of shining clarity came to King’s face, and he shifted so that he could look down on Nicole and connect with her gaze.
“I loved Beatrice. She was beautiful, heart and soul, and I used that. For Violet.”
“And when she refused to cooperate?” Nicole pressed. “What then?”
“I decided to take what I wanted. I’d been doing it all along; it wasn’t a big jump.”
“The Rohypnol.”
“Yes. You should have seen the look in her eyes. I had betrayed her. I had used her. And in that moment, she realized it.”
“What happened then?”
“She ran. Before I could get the sample. Not that it would have mattered. Enrique wasn’t selling to Magellan.”
“Who was the highest bidder?”
“Who cares? It wasn’t us.”
He swallowed and choked, a wet cough that caused his nose to run. “I loved her.”
“Beatrice?”
“Yes, but I killed her. She had what Violet needed and she wouldn’t give it to me. And so I held her in my arms and looked into her eyes, and I crushed her windpipe.”
With that, King reached behind his back and pulled a gun from his waistband. Nicole watched as time slowed. The tug on his pants as the barrel of the gun resisted, caught in his belt. The big hand contracting around the cold metal. The wide arc of King’s arm as he raised the pistol—from this distance she thought a Sig Sauer. It was a smooth motion, completely without hesitation. The ripple of muscle from neck to shoulder to arm, and then the squeeze of the trigger.
Yes, a Sig. It blew cleanly through the man’s skull, and he was down. Dead.
Nicole walked the twenty or so yards to the body, her arm hanging at her side, her gun clenched in her fist, drawn as he’d drawn his. Blood sprayed the snow and was beginning to spread in a large puddle beside his head. She pressed her fingers to his carotid artery, but it was purely routine. There were no signs of life.
She heard the crunch of snow under boots. Lars wore Sorels, ankle-high, laced and double-tied. Distinctive because everyone else wore department-issued Martens, so she didn’t need to look up.
“Dead,” she said.
“Was that a confession?”
Nicole stood and turned away from the body, the house, and stared beyond Lars’s inquiring face.
He hadn’t bothered with the driveway once he saw King wavering on the balcony and had parked the Yukon on the lawn, several yards behind Nicole. His coat was open, his cheeks already at a full flush with the cold. His breath plumed in front of him.
The front yard rolled into fenced pastures and beyond that a copse of trees. Camera-ready. It could have been a backdrop for a commercial featuring a rough cowboy and cologne. She followed the winding driveway with her gaze, into the trees, and picked up its thread on the other side. Her deputies were arriving in a caravan of SUVs with bar lights turning and the department seal emblazoned on the front doors.
“He killed Beatrice,” Nicole said.
“Are we sure?”
“No.” She shook her head, bit down on her back teeth. “He held her in his arms, looked into her eyes, and ‘crushed her windpipe.’”
“He said that?”
“Exactly that.”
She ordered the scene contained and left Lars to wait for the deputies, who were only a breath behind them. The front doors were not locked and opened onto a foyer with a sweeping staircase to the right and a living room to the left. Empty. Her feet echoed on the marble tile as she advanced, seeking the back of the house. And that was where she found them—Isla
and Sofia and King’s own daughter, Violet, wheelchair bound and upright with the help of belts and a headrest. Someone had shoveled snow into the sun-room, and the girls were taking turns making snow angels while Violet watched, her eyes sleepy but, Nicole realized when the girl shifted slightly and hooked her gaze, stubbornly aware.
And then the back door opened and the cold air blew in, followed by a lanky teen armed with a shovelful of snow. He wore a down jacket, unzipped, and a blue cap over dark hair that was just long enough to get in his eyes. He’d already noticed her; his eyes flared and his mouth pinched. He dropped the shovel and demanded, “Who are you?”
21
Kenneth King, aka Excalibur, refused to sit down. He’d taken off his coat and thrown it on the marble counter top. His wool cap remained perched atop his head. They had taken the kitchen. Sofia and Isla were in the living room with Lars, where they sat on the couch, legs swinging, unaware of the activity going on outside—Nicole had drawn the curtains as uniformed officers secured the house and grounds. Violet King was with her nurse. The woman had been sleeping in an upstairs bedroom.
“Was your father distraught?”
“What?” Kenny turned on his heel and paced toward her. “You mean like upset? Yeah.”
“Why?”
He shrugged. “A lot of reasons.”
“Start with one,” she suggested.
So far, Kenny King was holding up. Frenetic energy hummed inside his wiry body, and she often had to ask a question twice before she broke through the white noise in his head.
“Violet,” he said.
“Your sister?”
“She’s dying. Has been since the day she was born.”
“And your father wanted to do something about that?”
“He was driven by it. Obsessed with it.”
“Your father mentioned she was declining.”
His eyelids fluttered, and Nicole remembered the smile on the young man’s face when he’d entered the kitchen with a shovelful of snow for the girls.
“She’s lived longer than the doctors thought she would.”
“What’s her medical condition?”
“Primary mitochondrial disease. It’s genetic. Lots of people look at her and think it must have been trauma at birth, but that’s not true. They think she can’t hear or see. But she does. Still.”
And Nicole remembered the look in the girl’s eyes when she’d first entered the room—alert, intelligent.
“How old are you, Kenny?”
“Seventeen.”
“How did you know Beatrice?”
“We’re friends.”
“You live miles apart.” With several states between them, it turned out. One of the first things Nicole had asked Kenny was his address: Kalispell, Montana.
“That doesn’t matter. We talk, Skype, FaceTime, see each other at least once a month.”
“Because your fathers were working together?”
“Yes.”
“Were you more than friends?”
“She was too young for that. But maybe, in a year or two—”
He sounded like he was repeating the promises of a dead girl. “We have some of the text messages you sent her, Kenny. I think you loved her.”
“No.”
“You wanted more than friendship,” she continued.
“Well, yeah,” he said. “Beatrice was beautiful.”
“But she didn’t want you.”
“Yet,” he insisted.
“You think she was going to change her mind?”
“Yes.”
“Do you know what she used as an icon for you, Kenny?”
“Excalibur,” he admitted.
“She thought of you as her King Arthur.”
“No, not me,” he said, and his tone had turned, become snarly. “That was my father.” He started pacing again. “It was more than just a play on our name. She really thought he was amazing.”
“She said that?”
“Yeah, she did.”
“So if he was King Arthur, what did that make you?”
“An extension of him, of course. You know, the sword of a knight is his pride or his shame.”
“And which are you, Kenny?”
“My father loved me,” he said. “That was one thing he was really good at, you know? He loved us.”
His voice wobbled with emotion, and Nicole changed the course of her questioning, drew him away from personal loss.
“Did Beatrice’s father love her?”
“Yes.”
“But?”
“He loves his work too. He was divided.”
“Were you here Christmas night?”
He nodded. “Bea came over to help with the girls. She was good at that kind of stuff—fixing their hair, telling stories—and she talked to Violet like my sister understood her, which she does.”
“Your sister wanted a sleepover?”
“She still believes in Santa. She’s thirteen years old, but really like five or six. She’s never had a sleepover or friends. Everyone needs a friend, right?”
“Right,” Nicole agreed, and then rocked his world further. “Your father confessed to killing Beatrice.”
“My father?” He froze.
Reality chose that moment to come crashing down on him. His shoulders shook. He sank to his knees, his head bent, sobbing.
Nicole called for the EMTs. She put a request through for the unit psych. Nicole needed to speak to Kenny. He needed to process. He needed a soft place to land. She stayed with him, occasionally laying a hand on his shoulder so he’d know he wasn’t alone. And she spoke, about the snow he’d brought inside for Violet and for Bea’s sisters. The looks on their faces when he opened the door and pitched in that magic. He had delighted them and he had wanted to—that look had been genuine in the young man.
Talk of the girls seemed to wind past his turmoil. He quieted and rose to his feet.
“I love my sister,” he said. “She’s pure, you know? Like I don’t think she ever thought a bad thing about anyone. She’s like no one else on this planet.”
“She loves you too. I saw it,” Nicole agreed.
He nodded. The emotional fog was clearing from his features.
“Why do you think your father killed Beatrice?”
He shook his head, confused. “Bea was it. Our last chance.”
“Was Beatrice Nueva Vida?”
He nodded. “I can’t believe she’s dead. I hear the words. I know what they mean. But that’s not Bea, you know? She was meant to live forever.”
“You and Beatrice have a lot in common,” she said. “You love your sister as she did hers. You were born to be doctors. Joaquin told me your father was preparing you for that the same way Dr. Esparza was preparing Beatrice.”
“Yeah. It’s expected, you know? Those who have been given much are expected to do much. Our fathers agree on that. They’re raising us that way. To do much.”
Contribute. Carry on the family name. Elevate it. The creed of the wealthy.
“Did Beatrice resent that?”
“No. Absolutely not. She wanted it. She saw how other people lived, a lot of them without the medical attention they needed. People die every day from need of an antibiotic or simple surgery. Beatrice wanted to change that.”
“Is that how you feel?”
But he shook his head. “She saw people as individuals. Their suffering. I see people globally. You can get stuck on the needs of the one. It’s better to meet the needs of many.”
He paced across the room and leaned back against the island. He crossed his arms over his chest. His nerves were jumping, and Nicole gave him the time he needed to regroup.
“Beatrice didn’t think about medicine the way her father does. For her, it was as much about listening to a person as examining them. It was more about how a person feels and less about what’s making them feel that way. She led with her heart, and medicine is science.” But he was smiling, and Nicole could tell that he’d liked that
about Beatrice.
“Sounds to me that Beatrice would have been a good doctor.”
But Kenny disagreed.
“She thought medicine should be a calling, but it’s really big business.” He shook his head in a patronizing gesture that irritated Nicole. “She just didn’t get it. Dr. E had something—something big—and Bea thought he should just give it away.”
“But there are problems with his super cell,” Nicole pointed out.
“There are always problems with great advancements. That’s why he wants it in the biggest, most badass lab available.”
“Your father’s company?”
“That’s just one option.”
“If Nueva Vida is so great, why isn’t it already in a badass lab?”
Kenny peeled himself off the counter and paced back across the room. Flurries had started again. He stood in front of the window and watched.
“My father’s dead,” he said. “And you think he killed Beatrice?”
“Yes. I’m sorry, Kenny,” Nicole offered, but the young man was looking for something else.
“He shot himself? Really?”
Nicole nodded, but she was staring at the back of Kenny’s head, and he wasn’t following her reflection in the window.
“I was there,” she said.
“Why? Did he tell you that?” He turned to her. “It wasn’t just Violet. He’s known from go that my sister wouldn’t live long.”
“He lost hope in Dr. Esparza’s cure.”
But Kenny shook his head. He wasn’t buying it. “Sometimes you can borrow time. The wealthiest can even buy it. That’s how Violet’s lived so long. It’s also what upset Bea so much—the disparity. Another kid like Violet, with the usual family resources, they get maybe two years. Five at the most. My father didn’t lose hope in Dr. E’s super cell; he lost hope that Esparza would ever sell it to him.”
“Your father extended Violet’s life expectancy because he got her the medical treatment she needed?”