Shivaree (12 page)

The Judge moaned, pulling Ruby’s mind from California back to Conroy. Ruby turned toward the sound, and as her eyes focused on the old man before her, she wondered if that wasn’t exactly what had happened. Maybe this was her hell.

Her father’s eyes were open and fixed on her, foolishly still seeming to be begging her for mercy, but in Ruby’s stilled heart, there was no mercy to be found. “Can’t forget the best part now, can we, Daddy?” She let herself ride on a wave of magic to his side, never taking her eyes off him as she opened the drawer of his nightstand. She pulled out the bottle of colloidal silver, and unscrewed its lid.

“Open wide, Daddy.” He shook his head, trying to resist, but he couldn’t. The days of his ability to refuse her ended when she first forced him to taste her blood. After that, she was the mistress of his will. His lips slid open, as his eyes widened in fearful anguish. She tilted the bottle over his mouth and poured, fascinated by the popping sound as the silver burned his tongue and then his throat. “Swallow,” she commanded as he choked on the burning liquid. He did as she told him, leaving her to savor every moment of his pain. She waited until his body stopped spasming, until his last whining moan silenced itself. She ran her finger along his quivering jawline. “Might as well finish this bottle up, no?”

TWENTY-TWO

Night fell quickly over the Dunne farm. The mass of trees to the west was just tall enough to block out the setting sun, so the sky seemed magically to shift from pink to plum to black in mere minutes once the sun had been hidden away. Corinne sat on the Dunnes’ porch, rocking calmly on the porch swing, pushing herself back and forth with the tip of her right shoe, the movement absentminded, unconsciously synchronized to a choir of croaking frogs. The Dunnes knew she was waiting there for their son to return, but they hadn’t offered to turn on a light, and with the way Ava reacted to simple questions, Corinne was a bit wary of making a full-on request, let alone risking committing the crime of turning it on herself. Just as well, Corinne told herself; the porch light would only attract bugs.

She focused on the stars she could make out beyond the porch’s overhang, wondering if any of them might grant power to her wishes, but knowing she’d long since given up on wishing. This was to be her new life, a chance to put the past behind her. She’d hoped to find a family here, one to make up for the one she’d never really had. She tried to be optimistic, chalk the bad first impression up to nerves, but it looked like the Dunnes were going to be just as much a disappointment as the family she’d been born into. And what about Elijah himself? Was he, too, bound to be another letdown?

The Elijah she’d known in Korea had been so gentle, so thoughtful. There, an ocean away, he’d been a spinner of simple, wholesome dreams. A home, a family, companionship. They’d sat together beneath these same stars, holding hands. The words they’d shared were warm, early imaginations of what their life together could be. The silences between them, for there were many, were comfortable, intimate, a wall built around them, unlike the hostile taciturnity of the Dunne household, a wall that kept them apart. Still, Elijah seemed to feel comfortable in this environment, though she couldn’t for the life of her imagine the man she’d known overseas being so. Was the man she’d come to marry some kind of quisling, or had she just filled in the blanks herself, turning him into a man she could feel safe with? So odd that she’d find happiness with Elijah in a war zone, but that a single day in this backwater town could threaten their relationship.

Corinne felt as if she’d found herself in a play with a whole team of characters she’d never heard of. She pushed the thought of the beautiful Ruby aside. The woman was probably a cousin, or even just a friend of the family. Corinne comforted herself with her certainty that if Ruby had any interest in Elijah, Elijah would never have chosen Corinne over her. No, they faced real issues; Corinne was not going to entertain petty schoolgirl insecurities now. These friends of Elijah whom she’d never heard one word about until they’d been found slaughtered. The old doctor on the train had warned her that his friends were the rowdy type. Still she couldn’t help but feel the type of behavior that gets your headless body strapped to a church steeple must have gone beyond boisterous.

Corinne had experienced enough of this kind of man, all whiskey sweat, and wadded, losing racing forms. Physical strength used to intimidate, to overpower.

The scent of gunpowder rose to her memory. All right, she, too, had secrets she would probably never share, but there were thousands of miles between her and the skeletons she harbored.

A flicker in the trees, the beams of headlights pulling around the corner. She held up her arm to shield her eyes, relieved to see that it was the Dunnes’ truck pulling up the drive. Gravel crunched beneath the tires, the sound prodding Corinne to rise. The swing groaned as she abandoned it and headed across the porch. She waited at the top step, until the sight of the truck door opening spurred her on. She wanted a moment to get Elijah alone. To speak with him privately before his parents could cut him off from her.

The dry grass crunched beneath her feet. The air was still. The world around her, lit only by a spray of blue stars and the bright sliver of a new moon, seemed somehow dreamlike. Elijah climbed out of the truck cab, and closed the door behind him. He came around the front of the truck to meet her, stopping and looking down on her with tender eyes. Was his forehead creased with worry, or were the lines witnesses to his regret? He tilted his head, leaning in toward her. His lips found her. A gentle kiss that spoke of his caring. His beard tickled her, but she didn’t mind. His kiss had broken the evil spell that had fallen on her. Corinne felt her shoulders relax, and she went up on her toes, leaning into him. His arms tightened on her, tentatively at first, but then almost as if he were clinging to her for dear life.

He pulled back, but his calloused fingers touched her cheek, then cradled her jawline with great tenderness. Corinne watched silently as he struggled to find the words. “I’m sorry.” His voice broke as he spoke to her. He coughed. “I’m sorry.” He leaned down and placed a kiss on the top of her head, then another on her forehead. “What I did. Leaving you here like that. That isn’t me. Or at least I don’t want it to be me.” He tilted up her chin so that their eyes met. “Things will be different from now on. I promise. I just . . .”

“You just learned of the murders of very dear friends.” Corinne found herself making his excuses for him. She was so desperate for what he was saying to be true. For everything to be all right. For him to be the man she’d come to care for. For coming to Conroy not to have been a gross mistake. “Don’t shut me out,” she said. “I’m going to be your wife, Elijah. Your helpmeet. Let me share your burdens.”

As he nodded, his hand released her and fell to his side. “I want that. I do. I just don’t know where to start.” He began to turn away, but she reached out and caught ahold of his hand. He stopped, but still he looked away, seeming incapable of meeting her eye to eye. “Sometimes lately I feel like I’m two different people. There’s the man you know. The man I want to be. Then there’s the guy I used to be before I left here. A guy I don’t like very much. I came back here thinking he was gone, but he was just waiting here for me to get back. He’s here. Haunting me, like some kind of ghost.”

“Tell me about him,” she said, realizing that she was now clasping the hand she’d been holding between both of hers, tugging on him, unconsciously trying to lead him away from the house, away from his parents. She’d like nothing better than if she could coax him back into the truck, and get him to drive off again, only this time taking her with him.

He would not be budged. He shook his head. “No.” His voice came out harsh, then softened. “No. I’m ashamed. I’m afraid of seeing the way you’ll look at me if I tell you.”

“All right, then. Tell me about your friends. This Dowd and Bobby.” She felt a tremor pass through him as she said their names. “They weren’t good men, were they?”

“If I tell you about them, I’m telling you about me. All the things they done. All the things they’re guilty of, I’m guilty, too. I’ve done the same things they did.”

Corinne took a step closer, slipping her arm around his waist and leaning her head against his chest. “No. You’re different. You knew whatever it was you fellows were getting up to wasn’t for you. You got out. You served your country. You received an honorable discharge and a Purple Heart . . .”

“For being shot by a sniper while carrying garbage to a pit.”

“For being an honorable soldier who was wounded doing his part in the war effort.” She leaned back so she could see his face. “There are always going to be people who want to tear you down, minimize the good you’ve done in this world. Don’t let yourself be one of them.” She lowered her head, trying to decide whether she really needed to know the details of Elijah’s past, or if it would be easier to help him be the man he wanted to be by letting the secrets die. She made her choice and looked up to meet his gaze. “Okay. I don’t need to know. I don’t care who these men were. I don’t care what type of things you used to do together. That version of you. The man you want to leave behind. I want to help you leave him and his crimes, real or imagined, in the past. I want to help you be the Elijah I know. The Elijah I came halfway round the world to marry.”

Elijah’s gaze drifted up and away from her, as the yard behind them was illuminated by the sudden flaring of the porch light. Corinne glanced over her shoulder to see her soon-to-be mother-in-law standing in the doorway. “You two need to come on inside now,” Mrs. Dunne called to them. “I’ve held supper all I plan to.” Ava turned and walked away, but she left the door standing open.

Corinne turned back to Elijah, whose attention had once again focused on her. “I appreciate what you’re saying. I do,” he said. “And I want what you want.” He pulled her in for a quick hug before releasing her. “I just worry he might not be put down so easy.” Elijah took her hand and led her toward the house. Even before they crossed the threshold, Corinne could feel an angry pair of eyes settle on them.

“Come on now, get cleaned up,” Mrs. Dunne snapped at them.

Corinne didn’t know what she would be facing when it came to helping Elijah put his past behind him. And tonight, she couldn’t even begin to imagine that she’d ever feel at home in this strange place. But if their marriage were going to succeed, Corinne was sure of one thing: she and Elijah were going to have to work out alternative living arrangements.

TWENTY-THREE

McAvoy took a swig of his bourbon and water. He wasn’t a drinking man by habit, but his afternoon with the Judge had left him on edge. Though the Judge’s medical problem appeared to be some form of anemia, guilt was what had consumed Ovid. Guilt and anger and the disappointment of finally learning he really wasn’t God after all. Ovid had spent two years and heaven only knew how many thousands of dollars locating Ruby after she left home. Watching his daughter die only weeks after getting her back had derailed the man.

McAvoy thought back to a day, eight, maybe nine years ago? A cold February morning. A heavy frost had descended on the town, painting it a shimmering white, and a yellow sun hung in a cloudless gentian blue sky. God had built that day for beauty, but man had found a way to mar it.

The Judge showed up at his surgery with Ruby in tow, the girl wearing a coat that was far too light for the cold snap that had hit Conroy. How old was she then? Thirteen? Fourteen? She was such a petite thing, he might have thought her younger, but there was no childlike exuberance in the way she carried herself. She came through the door, all hunched over and crumpled in on herself, her father following, on his face a look that spoke more of embarrassment than worry.

McAvoy led them into his consulting room and motioned for Ruby to take a chair. “What seems to be the trouble?” he asked, expecting any number of the usual ailments. He pulled his stethoscope around his neck and reached over to grab a tongue depressor.

Ovid snatched off the hat he’d been wearing, holding it with a white-knuckled hand. “She’s been vomiting. She isn’t bleeding,” he said, almost in a whisper, his dark eyes pleading with the doctor.

“
Not
bleeding?” McAvoy asked, not registering the full import of the situation at first. “Oh,” he said after a moment. “How long has this been the case? How long since your last ‘visit’?”

The girl looked up at him with reddened, terrified eyes. “A month or so now. Maybe two.”

“Is there a young man in your life?” McAvoy asked. The girl trembled. She looked at her father, then her eyes darted up to the doctor before returning to the floor.

“Yes, sir,” the child responded again, just staring down at her scuffed shoes this time. McAvoy sighed. He knew she was lying.

Looking back now, McAvoy knew that
this
was the first moment he’d failed her. He should have found a way to help. He should have taken her away from the Judge then and there.

Ovid leaned in toward the doctor, a worry line forming between his eyebrows. “You can fix this, can’t you?”

“We can send her away. Tell everyone she’s gone to boarding school up north, maybe Europe. The Catholics aren’t good for much else, but they do have facilities set up where she can give birth. They’ll see to it that the child’s basic needs are met, until it can be adopted or is old enough to cope on its own.”

“No.” Ovid began trembling, shaking even more than his daughter had done. “I cannot live with the thought of
it
out there. Alive. I am asking you to
fix
this. Not only for my sake, but for the sake of my father’s memory. Or have you forgotten your friendship with him?”

“I have forgotten nothing,” McAvoy said, a sudden anger causing his pulse to pound in his ears. That Ovid would turn him into an accomplice to his own sins infuriated him. Ruby fell forward out of the chair and at their feet. McAvoy knelt down and felt for her pulse. She was a strong, healthy girl. All of this had just proven too much for her young system. “Help me get her up.” The two of them picked up the birdlike girl without difficulty and lifted her onto an exam table.

The Judge ran both hands, fingers linked, over his head. “Will you do it? Will you fix this for me?”

McAvoy nodded, a weariness entering him that he hadn’t to this day been able to shake. “I will
fix
this, as you say, but let me warn you now, Ovid. Never again.” Ovid’s shoulders collapsed as he breathed a heavy sigh. The doctor looked Ovid over from head to toe, sickened by the relief that had flooded over the man’s face. “Shall I make sure the need for this type of procedure can never arise again?”

McAvoy watched as Ovid considered the possibility. At first his eyes opened wider, as if the doctor had presented the solution to a particularly vexing problem, but then his face went slack. “No.” He shook his head. “She’s my only hope of having a lineage. Leave her intact.”

“I wasn’t talking about her,” McAvoy said, his voice cold. “I was talking about castrating the worthless bastard who done this to her.” They looked each other in the eye as an understanding passed between them.

The doctor and the Judge had never spoken of the unpleasantness again. He’d told himself that the understanding they shared was enough to protect Ruby. Truth be told, he had no idea. Truth be told, he hadn’t wanted to know.

A tapping at the window startled the old doctor, pulling him back to the present. He saw Lucille on the other side of the glass. “Damned fool of a woman,” he thought, angry that she had alarmed him, as he waved her around to the front entrance. She hesitated, but then went to the front of the house.

He opened the door to find her fidgeting. “I am sorry for disturbing you, Doctor. I rung the bell at the back of the house, but you didn’t seem to hear me.”

The bell had stopped working months before. He’d never gotten around to having the darn thing fixed. Lucille looked over her shoulder. “It’s the Judge, sir. I’ve been checking in on him, every hour, like you told me. But he’s had a bad turn. I think you had better come.” She tossed another look behind her. “Quick, sir, please?”