“She died last year of cancer. Now she works with the detective, Robert King.”
“Robert King,” he said. “Yes, I know about him. He was also a DEA agent.”
Dani nodded.
He leaned in, smiling. The shadows across his face seemed to brighten the teeth, enlarging them and making the grin all the more wolfish.
“Clever girl. You took an undercover job in order to learn more about these people.”
“I did.”
“Where did you insert yourself?”
“Melandra’s Fortunes and Fixes,” she said. “Melandra is his landlady. He lives in the apartment above the shop.”
“And Lou is seen with him often?”
“Yes.”
“If we were to go to this shop now, would we run into Louie Thorne, perhaps?”
She hesitated. If you go to the shop now, you’ll run into Piper.
Dmitri walked around her chair, disappearing from her periphery. “You have beautiful, delicate fingers, Miss Allendale. Do you use these to write your stories?”
Instinctively, she closed her hands into fists.
Until a cool grip pried them open.
“No,” she breathed. Her pulse quickened in her throat, pounding so hard all thought was obliterated.
“No, you don’t use these for writing? You must be even more talented than you look.”
The men in the dark laughed. Her index finger was pulled away from the rest of the hand.
“I haven’t seen her in the shop,” Dani said. “I haven’t seen Lou Thorne anywhere. I swear.”
“But she is seen with the people who live there, and work there, correct?”
She sucked in a sharp breath, blood pulsing in her temples.
“Please,” she breathed. “I don’t know where she is.”
“I don’t believe you,” he sighed into her ear.
That was when the real pain began.
23
Lou opened the padded mailer and removed one of the VHS tapes. She put it on the marble top of her kitchen island, then removed the other, placing them side by side. Even after all these years, she recognized the handwriting. These black letters on the white label were undeniably her father’s.
For Lucy, one label said.
For Lou-blue, read the other.
Lou-blue. Her heart clenched in her chest. She saw her father’s face in her mind, complete with his scruffy jaw and confident smile. The last time he’d called her that was the night he died. He pressed her hands to his jaw and forced her to look into his moonlit eyes. Louie, Louiiiie. Oh baby. Do you trust me?
That stupid cover song from the ‘60s that he loved so much. And she suspected it was the real reason for her name. She’d been told it was after her aunt and after her mother’s grandfather Louis. But she only had to hear the way he came alive to that song to formulate another theory.
Lou gathered both tapes up in one fist and crossed to the closet. She stepped in, shut the door, and breathed in the dark.
She waited for her compass to offer direction. She knew what she needed was rare, but she would find one.
The darkness thinned. The firm wooden wall of the closet softened. The world dissolved around her and she moved through it.
Musty, stagnant air greeted her. Dust tickled her nose as she entered the room.
Not a room, a pawn shop, recognizable by the rows and rows of electronics sitting on moonlit shelves. Some were coated with dust. Lou inched toward the front of the store and looked out at the quiet street. A few lazy cars rolled by, one with a missing taillight, another riding on a donut spare. A car slammed on its brakes to spare a darting cat. Then the street was dark again.
In reverse letters, Lou saw Hillsboro Pawn stuck to the window with opening hours listed below. She checked her special German watch and found that she would be undisturbed for many hours, assuming the owner was at home snug in his or her own bed.
Lou searched the dust-covered shelves for what she needed. She saw game systems and laptops and electronics far too modern for her task.
But behind the counter, she found what she was looking for. A surveillance camera reviewed the gravel lot behind the pawn shop as well as the storefront and street. Three raccoons took turns diving into the oversized dumpster, reviewing its contents with greedy hands.
Beneath the television was a VCR.
She pressed eject, and a tape slid from its rectangular mouth. The screen went to static, or the ant race, as Aunt Lucy liked to call it.
Lou considered the two tapes in her hand. She decided to watch the one given to King first. She knew its history at least, that he’d been instructed to deliver it to Lucy on behalf of her father, years after their estrangement.
For some reason, Lou felt an aversion to watching the other tape—the one addressed to her.
The idea that her father might have something to say to her after all these years…
She settled into the dusty computer chair and pressed play.
For a moment, it was only an office. Her father’s home office as she remembered it, back in the Tudor house they shared before Angelo Martinelli spilled her father’s brains across their patio.
A photo of Lou and her father at the beach was taped to the wall. Lou, seven or eight, was tucked under his massive arm. Lou still had that photograph in her apartment, hidden in her pillowcase. Beside that was a photo of her mother in a rose garden, her smile bright and practiced.
She wore a yellow halter dress and lipstick as red as the rose pressed to her cheek.
It hurt Lou to see it.
Beyond the mostly clear desk and curtained window rested a baseball mitt with a worn ball inside. He’d played on their work league, but also threw the ball around with Lou in the evenings when the weather was warm enough for her mother to leave them to it.
Her father appeared on the screen, coming around the camera—it must be some sort of tripod setup then—and took an empty seat in front of the desk. Lou’s heart lurched. He was younger than she remembered, or perhaps it was only that she’d grown.
He ran a hand through his hair and seemed as though he was trying to compose himself.
“Hi Lucy,” he managed at last. “If you’re watching this, then you’ve met my friend, Robert. We work together at the DEA. I asked him to find you because I didn’t think I could find you myself.” He laughed. “I didn’t think you’d let me find you. I’ve been trying for about a year now, and you aren’t returning my calls. I deserve it after how I treated you. I’m sure you’d prefer that I let this go. But the truth is, I can’t. I need your help.”
He looked down at his hands, then reached up to scratch his jaw. Lou had forgotten how often he did that when he wasn’t sure what to say, either to Lou herself or often her mother.
“It’s about Louie, my daughter.”
He licked his lips and stared into the camera as if expecting it to respond.
“She’s like you, Lucy. Not with shadows, at least not that I’ve seen. Her gift”—he searched the back of his hands again— “if that’s what we should call it, seems to be tied to water. She goes into it and disappears. It’s been…hard on us.”
He leaned back in the chair, resigned. “Forget about us. She’s scared, Lucy. She doesn’t understand what’s happening to her. She can’t control it. And I don’t know how to help her. I know your gifts are different, but I feel like they must come from the same place. You don’t owe me this. You don’t owe me anything, and I have no right to ask for your help after the things I said to you at Gram’s funeral.”
He looked directly into the camera, and Lou was shocked to see the tears standing in the corners of his eyes.
“I don’t expect you to forgive me for the way I treated you. I know it’s bullshit to be asking for your help now after everything. But this is my kid. I’d do anything for her, and she needs help.”
He sighed and fell back against the chair.
“Do you still believe in karma? You used to talk about
that a lot. Well, it’s my karma that I should have a kid like this after what I did to you.”
His face reddened. “You have no idea how hard it is feeling like I can’t protect her. I can’t even help her. I’m scared for her, Lucy.”
He wiped at the corners of his mouth, pulling his lips into an exaggerated O.
“You don’t have to see me. You don’t even have to talk to me. But please, please, I’m begging you. Talk to her. I don’t want her to feel alone like you did. I know I’m part of the reason you felt so alone, and I’m sorry for that. But I’m begging. I’ll do anything you want. Anything in the world. Just help her. Please, help her.”
Another long stare at his rough knuckles. Then he favored the camera with a weak smile. “I love you, Lucy. And I hope you can forgive me.”
Her father rose from the chair and after a close-up of his arm and his white shirt, the camera cut.
Static burbled on the screen for the five seconds while Lou sat there, thinking, remembering.
More than a decade separated that night and this one, but Lou thought she knew the rest.
Lucy had responded and promised to help. She’d heard that much from King, the messenger who’d been sent to deliver the tape to her aunt, and from her aunt’s own mouth.
But no sooner did Jack work up the courage to tell Lou that help was on the way, he was killed.
Lou removed the tape from the deck and put it beside the other. She considered the unwatched tape, curiosity rising in her. Was this second tape made before or after the plea to Lucy? There was only one way to find out.
Lou lifted this second tape to the rectangular mouth of the VCR. She hesitated before inserting the new tape. She pressed play.
Another introduction of a blank desk before Jack appeared, settling into his seat as he had before. However, this Jack wasn’t in his white shirt and pajamas. This Jack still wore his bulletproof vest and badge.
“Hi Lou-blue,” he said, offering the camera a weak smile.
“If you’re watching this, that means I’m dead. Isn’t that how these videos start?” He smiled at his own joke. But the smile didn’t stick. It faltered first at the edges and then disappeared altogether.
“No parent wants to leave a video like this behind for his kid, but if I do end up dying, you deserve some answers. I don’t want you living your whole life with questions. So, I’m going to tell you what I know now, while I can.”
He leaned back in his seat.
“I asked the law office to deliver this to you when you’re eighteen. I suspect that you’ll be with Aunt Debra, but I hope not. If they honor my will, you’ll end up with Lucy. I know custody courts don’t always honor the deceased’s requests. So, I just hope that whoever you end up with, takes good care of you. If that doesn’t happen, I’m sorry.”
She did take good care of me, Lou thought, unsure what kind of life she would’ve had if she’d been raised by her mother’s pretentious sister. In some ways, Debra was worse than her mother. Lou couldn’t imagine what her life in the 1% lifestyle would have been like. How Lou with her father’s dark complexion would have fared in Debra’s pristine, blonde world.
“Anyway, if you’re eighteen now, you’re probably heading off to college in the fall.”
He straightened with pride.
“Maybe you’ve got friends or boyfriends. I hope you still love books.”
He smiled.
“I bet you do.”
That’s about the only thing you’ve gotten right so far, she thought.
Again the humor didn’t stick. “I want to apologize for not being there for you, Lou-blue. For every birthday I missed. Graduation—”
Which I spent burying a knife in the throat of your traitorous ex-partner Gus.
“When you get married or have kids of your own—”
“Slow down now,” she grumbled.
“I wanted to be there for all of it. And if you’re watching this, that means I wasn’t. I won’t be. I’m sorry.”
He ran his palms down the front of his pants.
“I’m making this video in case I’m murdered.”
Lou’s heart sputtered in her chest.
“I’ve gotten a lot of death threats over this case. They’re mostly from the Martinelli clan but a few are from unknown sources. I hope it’s bravado, but I know men like this. Sometimes revenge killings are a matter of honor, and they won’t stop until they’re done.”
He ran a hand through his hair.
“In the event that I am killed, I hope you and your mother aren’t hurt. If you are, I can only hope you’ll forgive me. It isn’t that I value my job over your safety. I hope you don’t think that. But this guy has got to be stopped.”
And he was stopped, she thought. The night I visited him in prison…
“If I’m killed,” he went on. “Please don’t be angry. You might be angry at me for a long time, or maybe you want to hurt the people who hurt me. But please don’t.”
Her temples throbbed.
“That isn’t the life I want for you, Lou. You’re smart. You love books. Maybe you’ll be a teacher or a scientist or hell, maybe you’ll be an astronaut.”
His face lit up. It hurt Lou to see it.
“But don’t be a cop. Stay out of law enforcement. Don’t go looking for revenge. What happened to me was my fault, and I would never forgive myself if I knew it led you down a path—or kept hurting you—after I died. I don’t know how you’ll do it. But I hope you’ll learn to forgive me.”
“I love you. I love you more than anything in this world. No matter where your life takes you, I hope you know that. No matter who you are today, I’m proud of you.”
He looked toward the ceiling with tears in his eyes. For a long time, there was only silence.
“Man, I want to see you grow up.”
Lou heard the clatter of keys and the sound of a door popping open.
“Jack?” a woman called out.
Lou’s heart skipped a beat at the sound of her mother’s voice. It was every bit as imperious and high-minded as she remembered.
His face twisted in surprise as he half lifted from his seat. He dabbed at his eyes, blinking rapidly.
“We’re back. Hurry up before it melts,” she called out.
“Dad? Where are you?” This was a small, mousey voice that Lou didn’t recognize at all.
The office door opened and there she stood. Lou herself, holding a cardboard carrier with two sundaes nestled in the cups. Lou walked up to her father’s side and showed him the treats, leaning into his leg with childish interest. She couldn’t have been more than eleven.
Her father looked frozen in his seat, obviously plastering on a bright smile for her benefit.
“Are you crying?” Lou asked, hesitating out of reach.
“Allergies,” her father said, turning up the wattage on his smile.
“Oh.” Lou didn’t look convinced. “Do you want the strawberry sundae or the hot fudge sundae?”
She remembered this night now. It was two, maybe three weeks before her parents were killed. She’d just started summer vacation, and it was already hotter than it should’ve been for June in St. Louis. The ice cream was for her A in English.
“Which has whip?” her father asked.
“Strawberry.”
“Strawberry for me then,” he said.
Lou turned and looked at the camera. She bent down and looked into the eye of it like a curious bird. Her shoulder-length hair fell forward like a curtain. “What are you doing? Are you making a movie?”
“I am.”
“Can I watch it?”
“Maybe,” he said. Jack stood from the chair, strawberry sundae in hand, and reached for the camera’s kill switch. “When you’re older.”
The static sprang up again. For a full minute, she let it run, unsure of what to do with herself. She barely remembered this life. Seeing it now was like seeing it as a show she’d loved once as a child and no longer remembered clearly.
Anger, fresh and bright, rose up inside her as static buzzed on the screen.
You could be alive if you’d done something.
“Lou,” a voice said.
The video flickered to life again. In the frame sat her aunt, as she’d looked the summer before she died. Lou looked around the pawn shop wearily, wondering if this was a ghost. Some kind of monster in the machine.
But it was her aunt’s face, sure enough. She was sitting in her Chicago apartment, in her favorite rocker with the African quilt slung over one side. But she was already sick. Her face held that yellowed pallor, and the cheeks had already begun to sink too deep.
“What you’ve just seen is the tape that the lawyers sent me on your eighteenth birthday. I watched it and decided not to give it to you. Now before you go and piss on my ashes, let me explain.”
It was as if the dead woman had known that Lou’s finger hovered over the eject button.
“This tape arrived eight months after Gus Johnson. I knew you were dealing with—your loss the only way you knew how. I thought the last thing you needed to hear after killing someone was your dead father telling you that he didn’t approve of vengeance. So, I held off. Rejection of any kind wasn’t what you needed. I stand by that decision. But now, here I am, reaping my own karma for that. Because I’m dying, and now I’ve got to make my own confession.”
Aunt Lucy sighed.
“If you’ve learned anything from watching these videos, I hope it’s that old people are fools.” She laughed. It was a dry, raspy sound. “We do what we think is right and hope others can live with the consequences. I don’t know what else to say, Louie. Forgive us both. I went to the lawyers, today actually, and gave them two letters. When you read yours, it’s going to make a request that you go see my friend Ani. I hope you will. Ani really helped me—”
The sound of breaking glass caused Lou to lean back in her seat. She ejected the tape and returned the screen to its surveillance position, by inserting the original tape again and pressing the start button.
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