Never Smile at Strangers (23 page)

ERICA WAITED FOR what seemed an eternity to leave her hiding spot against the big oak, worried that he might be waiting in the shadows close by, ready to spring. But once she was somewhat certain he’d gone, she jumped up and ran.

It had begun to storm and the sky was now a purplish-black. It was difficult to navigate the woods through the darkness. Branches tore at the bare flesh of her arms and legs, and pine cones ripped at her feet. But she kept running, oblivious to the pain. All too obvious to her was the fact that she had a good idea as to who was responsible for the missing girls and the dead body she and Guitreaux had found.

A wall of Spanish moss whipped into her face, temporarily blinding her, but she kept running. He wasn’t who they all thought he was and she had to let the detective know before someone was hurt. Headlights appeared as Erica cut through the tree line at the edge of the road. She reached the pavement and frantically waved her hands.

An SUV pulled onto the narrow shoulder and slowed to a stop. A bird shrieked from the near distance, then flew across Whiskey Road, its wings beating in the stormy night air. Running to the passenger side, Erica peered into the window.

“Mrs. Anderson!” she screamed. She opened the door and a bewildered, red-eyed Rachel stared back at her.

“I need your help,” she started, out of breath. “I know who he is.”

“Who
who
is? My God, are you okay?” Rachel exclaimed.

Erica looked down at her bloodied arms and legs.

“Yeah, I’m. . . I’m fine. I was just running through the woods because I saw—”

“It’s too dangerous for you to be standing out there. Come on, get in.”

She climbed in the truck and slammed the door.

“Okay, now slow down. Who are you talking about,” Rachel asked.

“I think I know who took Tiffany Perron and Sarah Greene! And who killed the guy in the woods!”

“In the woods? I don’t--”

“We found a body.”

“We--?
Who
found a body?”

“The man. Guitreaux and I—”

“Erica, you
must
slow down, Rachel said, talking slowly as though she were dealing with a crazy person. She put a hand on Erica’s shoulder. “Just take a second and gather your thoughts. Then tell me what’s going on.”

“Okay, okay,” Erica said, then took a few long breaths. Then she told Rachel what she had seen just minutes ago. Once she was done, she felt the need to clarify.

“Look, I’m not positive, but I’m pretty sure,” she said, her voice a little calmer. “If he’s the guy, he lives a quarter of a mile from here by road. Please, just take me there so we can know for sure.”

Rachel pulled a cell phone from her visor, hit a number on the keypad, then put the phone to her ear.

The SUV slowly inched forward.

THROWING THE STATION wagon into park, Haley jumped out of the car and ran to Erica’s front door.

The clouds in the sky were dark and menacing and seemed to loom too close to the ground. Fat rain drops pelted Haley so hard they felt like balls of hail.

There were vibrations coming from inside the house. Loud music. A surprised Pamela answered, a can of Miller Lite, its rim stained with red lipstick, in a well-manicured hand. Cajun music was blaring inside the house.

“What’s wrong,
cher
?” she asked, her eyes growing wide.

“I need to talk to Erica,” Haley said, out of breath. “Is she home?”

Her eyebrows arched. “She’s not here, darling. But yore gettin’ all wet. Come on inside.”

Haley shook her head. “Do you know where she is?”

“No tellin’, she goes off so often by herself. Probably in those woods even though we’ve warned her about them. When you find her please tell her she needs to be more careful. We worry about her gettin’ hurt.”

Haley ran back to the car. As she drove toward Whiskey Road, the windshield wipers protested, jerking and screeching as they stuck and unstuck from the windshield. There was a truck behind Haley, but through the clouds of rain and the sticking wipers she could barely make out its headlights.

Lightning leapt from the sky. Unable to catch her breath, Haley rolled the window down for some fresh air. Rainwater and the wet, sour scent of manure trickled in. To make things worse, the sharp odor of the bayou in the distance swirled into the station wagon and crawled up her nostrils.

Double yellow lines stretched on and on against the gray pavement and rain trailed down the windshield. Haley turned onto a dirt drive.

She wondered if she should have called the sheriff or Detective Guitreaux to tell one of them about Tiffany’s necklace. But it was too soon, right? Maybe her negative opinion of Seacrest was clouding her judgment. She wanted to think everything through before implicating the teenage girl in the disappearances of Tiffany and Sarah. . . no matter how appalling the girl was.

HE OPENED HIS eyes, but his vision was blurry, so blurry. Strands of hair tickled his back, and he felt fingernails trail across his neck.

He stiffened.

Was it a dream? Or had he passed already? What was—?

He blinked in the darkness. Slowly, his eyes adjusted and he saw his window. He was woozy. He wanted to close his eyes but he knew this was important. What was going on? Was he still alive?

“Don’t speak,” a voice next to him said, and a warm hand moved from his bicep to his chest, then down to his abdomen.

His heart jumped inside his chest. Big jumps, little jumps. He tried to pull himself up.

“Lay with me,” she whispered. “Please. I’ll give you what you look at in your magazines. . . but I’m the real thing.”

The cinnamon on her breath seared his neck. He felt her smooth skin against his. It was Allie. He was still alive. His skin turned to gooseflesh.

Beneath the cloud of cinnamon, he could smell her cosmetics and the tobacco on her breath. He could also smell something equally as foul. Vomit. He must’ve vomited in his sleep.

He stumbled out of his bed and pain sliced through his body. It was so sharp, he winced and doubled over. There was also something sticky beneath his feet.

Maybe God wasn’t ready for him, he thought. Maybe he was supposed to be on earth, in Grand Trespass. Maybe there was a reason for his existence after all and his work had yet to be finished.

Either that, or his mother had been right: He
was
pathetic. After all, how difficult was it to kill yourself? He carefully considered both conclusions.

Allie got up and stood in front of him. In a sliver of moonlight he could make out her naked body. “What’s wrong with you?” she wailed.

A memory droned inside his head. His mother’s long, cold fingers on his frightened skin. Invading, humiliating him. The memory was enough for a second wind. He staggered to his bedroom door and pushed it open. Then he stumbled toward the back door.

“Why’s the television in here, anyway?” she snarled. “That’s all I really
wanted
. To watch the fucking TV. It wasn’t about you. It’s
never
about you!”

He pulled open the back door and heard her bare feet on the kitchen floor. When she spoke next, her voice was sinister. “Quit ignoring me, you hear me, you sonafabitch? Just stop because I know what you did!” she screamed. “You killed those girls, you fucking freak! I
know
it was you!”

***

THE CLOUDS HAD grown thicker since he’d fallen asleep, and the outside world had taken on a somber grayness not unlike the cramped space inside his mind. A heavy rain now pounded against his body in a mad frenzy, mingling with the electricity that blared in his head.

He stumbled from the shed, back to the house with the old Army issue .45 his father had left behind. Over the years he’d handled it sparingly, but knew that one day he’d be forced to use it.

He looked up to see Allie glaring at him through the back window. She was wearing one of his t-shirts, her bare legs dark against the blue-white fluorescent lights of the kitchen. Her eyes looked wild, just as his mother’s had been late that one night.

He rounded the house and arrived at the front porch. Ian had taken the bait. He was now curled up on the second-to-bottom step of the porch, asleep for good. For a second, he felt bad for the cat, but he knew that what he’d done had been the right thing. The cat had been miserable, and had wanted an end to its wicked existence. That’s why it had trailed him all summer. Animals could sense unkind people, and this one had sensed unkindness in him. He stepped over the animal and, feebly, kicked opened the screen door.

He found himself face-to-face with his sister.

Her face screwed up as though she were ready to shout. But then she saw the gun and shook her head. “You’ve got to be fucking kidding me,” she said. But her voice shook, betraying her.

His eyes drifted in and out of focus. There was one Allie. Two. . . Allies.

He wondered about the longing that swelled inside of him, the uncontrollable desire to kill his sister. Was it evil? Or would God see it as an acceptable means of justice? Would God understand him at all?

Lightning ripped through the sky and rain battered the windows. He took a step forward.

Allie took a step back.

The roof began to creak, and Allie’s full mouth pulled into the shape of a square. She was crying but there was no sound.

Now
he
was the one in control. He looked into his sister’s terrified eyes, appreciating that she felt it too. With his left hand, he reached into his pocket and withdrew the polished stone.

She stared at the gun. “I won’t do it again. I. . . I promise. It was just a joke,” she pleaded. “It
all
was. I’m so, so sorry.” Her lips quivered, and he could see goose pimples on the bare flesh of her thighs. Her red fingernails flew in front of her face, and she wiped away tears.

Crocodile tears.

Lies.

“I said I’d tell them about what you did to the girls. But I wouldn’t,” she cried. “I couldn’t do that to you. I
never
would have. You’re my. . . my brother!”

He shook his head, and his vision blurred. When he spoke next, his voice boomed. “You made my life a living hell, Allie. Why the fuck would you want to do that? What have I ever done besides try to take care of you?”

“I’m sorry! I’m so sorry! Really!” she said, taking a timid step toward him, then thinking better of it, stepped back again.

Sheets of rain crashed against the living room windows and the screen door out back banged shut, opened, banged shut.

Now there were three Allies.

THE SKY OPENED wide and rain shot down so viciously Haley had to strain to see in front of her. But after minutes of searching, she finally found what she was looking for in Weston. Austin’s truck. The license plate reading LUVINBETH sat stone-like under the tumultuous sky, down a long dirt driveway, in front of a small house.

A bluish-white sliver of the moon peered down at the woods, competing against the cloudy sky, and reflected ominously off the overgrown front yard as the Landry’s station wagon bumped along the soaked gravel drive and pulled next to the blue Ford F-350.

Since she couldn’t find Erica, she’d decided to confide in Austin. He was intelligent and she trusted that he’d be able to shed light on the situation, help her make sense of it all. He’d tell her just where her logic about the necklace was flawed. He’d smile his crooked smile and everything would suddenly be better. At least she hoped so. There was really no one else in her life to turn to.

Not bothering to shut her car door, she ran through the rain toward the house. Thunderheads boomed above her as she dashed across the yard. Just before she reached the porch, lightning pierced the sky, illuminating a chain link fence on the yard’s perimeter.

The front door was open and a window at the front of the house appeared to be broken. A dull ray of fluorescent light glowed against a rickety porch, reflecting off shards of what appeared to be glass. There was also something on one of the porch steps. Haley gasped and jumped back. A dead cat lay curled up, the tip of its tongue clenched between its teeth.

Through the downpour, she could hear voices in the front room. Arguing.

Could Beth be in there with him?

She tried to remember if he’d mentioned her being in town. And, for the first time, she thought that it might have been a bad idea to come. After all, aside from the dreams she’d had of Austin and several weeks of small talk and a few rides home, she hadn’t really had any meaningful conversations with him. Not really.

But this was important and who else was there for her to talk to?

Biting into her bottom lip, she decided to knock. But she froze as she caught a glimpse of who was in the front room with him. Austin’s back was to her and Seacrest was facing him. They appeared to be having some sort of argument.

These two
knew
each other? Oh God—were they. . . sleeping together?

Were her eyes playing tricks on her?

She slowly backed away from the house, trying to process what she’d seen. Then she heard the roar of an engine. A moment later, headlights appeared. Someone was bouncing up the drive in an SUV.

She shielded her eyes and peered at the truck, her eyes stinging and her clothes soaked. Before it came to a complete standstill, the headlights blinked off. Someone jumped out of the passenger side and ran toward her.

Erica?

“What are you doing out here?” Erica gasped, her arms and legs covered in blood.

Haley was
really
disoriented now. Tears and rain streamed down her cheeks. She pinched her arm as hard as she could, instantly drawing blood. It had to all be a dream.

Please. . . let it all just be a dream.

THE HALOPERIDOL WAS making him nauseous. His head was suddenly too heavy for his neck, and the image of his sister’s tear-stained face faded in and out of focus.

“Please,” she pleaded, her voice soft. “Please don’t do this. I’ll change. I will. Really. Just wait. You’ll be
so
surprised at how nice I can be. How
normal
.” Suddenly she looked as though she were eight years old again, powerless and innocent. Free of their mother’s evil. Wanting nothing more than to catch crawfish and fireflies, and laugh at anything remotely funny. Sneaking into his room, not for sex, but because she loved him. . . looked up to him.

A cockroach dropped from the wall behind her and he shivered. “No,” he said, shaking his head. “You’ll never be normal.”

“I will. I cross my heart. I. . . I
love
you.”

His grip on the stone tightened. “Don’t say that to me!” he exploded.

“I do, Austin. I really do. You’re all. . . you’re all I’ve got,” she cried. “You’re all I’ve
ever
had. Mama was sick. I knew that. I hated her for what she did to you.”

Thunder crashed inside his skull.

She’ll trick you and kill you in your sleep. She’s my daughter. She’s me.

“I guess. . . I guess I just didn’t know any other way to act.”

“Fuck you!” he screamed, not certain if he was speaking to his mother or to Allie.
Or both.

Allie was bright—more intelligent than most. He’d recognized that when she was very young. But over the years he’d seen her use her intelligence to manipulate. Which was exactly what she was doing now.

He remembered, too, the animals. The ones his mother questioned him about. The ones that had been tortured and killed. . . then left staged in the backyard. Posed in odd, grotesque positions. He’d suffered horrible punishments for those animals even though he swore he knew nothing about them.

Strangely, it had taken him a while to realize it had been Allie. . . in a quest for power of her own. But then she’d grown a woman’s body and the dead animals were a thing of the past. She’d learned to be cruel in other ways.

Allie studied him now, terrified. The power had finally shifted.

Ice crept into his blood as he made his decision, and he whispered to himself. “God, please forgive me.”

Horror flooded Allie’s face as the stone tumbled to the carpet.

He walked toward her.