Swan Song (Julie O'Hara Mystery Series) (16 page)

I miss my horse,
Fitzie.
His whole name is Fitzwarren.
Crazy name, huh?
My parents bought him at an auction for my eighth birthday. He was eight years old, too.
Maybe you can’t teach “an old dog new tricks”, but Fitzie is really smart.
I taught him a lot of wonderful tricks.
I hate to think that he’s probably going to die while I’m in here.
Anyway, that’s the kind of thing I shouldn’t be thinking about. I’ve just got to adapt to being in here.
My friend says the time will go by faster if I do that.

But how can I stop thinking about you?
I close my eyes and pretend I’m with you.
It’s the only way I can go on.
Do you think about me, Dianna? About the time we had together?
Do you remember? Do you miss me like I miss you?

I’ll write you once a month!

Love,

Hoyt

Hoyt carefully folded the letter and put it in his shoe. He lay on his bunk, hands entwined on his chest, looking up at the dark gray cement ceiling. His mind projected Dianna’s warm face on the cold stone surface. He closed his eyes to see her better. When sleep came, she bent to kiss him, her dark hair falling around the two of them like a warm cocoon.

•

One day passed like another in a monotonous atmosphere punctuated by anger and brutality. Hoyt, as Benny had predicted, was not bothered anymore by the other inmates, who respected Benny and relied on him for answers to their legal questions. Even the guards stepped carefully around Benny…and Hoyt, by extension.

The fact was that Hoyt actually liked Benny. It was good to have a friend and he benefited from their conversations. Benny knew everything that was going on in the correctional facility, which the inmates called the “Department of Corruption”. He helped Hoyt navigate the sea of convicts and the men who guarded them.

Their relationship was only a problem when Benny began to touch him.

And then the actor took over…and the
real
Hoyt left with Dianna.

The weirdest thing to accept was that Hoyt was considered a “sexual offender”.

Because he was convicted under the Mann Act, he was automatically enrolled in the “Sex Offender Treatment Program” and forced to spend days at a time in group sessions with a dozen other men serving time for sexual offenses. Their slyness and their stories sickened him to the point of nausea. Being grouped with them shamed him.

Oddly enough, it was Benny who understood and helped him cope with the unfairness of the situation. If anyone knew what a naïve, straight-arrow Hoyt was, it was Benny.

“Just go along with it, Hoyt. You stay out of trouble, serve the minimum time, and you’ll be a free man. You won’t have to see any of that scum again. You’re not like any of them…you’re not even like
me
.”

Hoyt looked at him almost apologetically.

“Oh, it’s okay. I know the score, Hoyt. You can’t help it. You’re not wired to love me. It doesn’t matter; I love you, anyway. No matter what your circumstances are, having someone to love makes life worth living,” said Benny. “Write Dianna another letter, my friend.”

•

Dear Dianna,

Everything is upside down in here…right is wrong and wrong is right.
The ONLY thing that helps me keep it all straight is you.
I would lose my SELF without you.
I just do everything they say and be respectful, so I can get out of here in as few years as possible.
YEARS.
I can barely stand to write that!

Where will you be then?

My friend says I shouldn’t think of that, so I won’t talk about that anymore.

Have you been to the beach yet?
I used to go to Hampton Beach in New Hampshire all the time.
I wish I could go to the beach with you.
We never went anywhere - but that’s all right.
Someday we WILL go to the beach.
We’ll go everywhere, just you and me. PLEASE wait for me, Dianna.
I love you so much. I’ll hold you in my heart until I can hold you in my arms,

Hoyt

* * * * * 

Chapter 34

“I
t’s so sad to think of what happened to this young man,” said Julie. “These three letters are heartbreaking, Joe.”

“You said it. Worse, he sounds so
young,
like a teenager.”

“He
was
a teenager when he wrote most of these,” said Julie. “He was nineteen, I believe.”

“I can’t help thinking about something Betty said, something about ‘
Romeo and Juliet’
,” said Joe. “That’s what these two were like.”

“Not exactly,” said Julie, thumbing through the letters. “Remember, this was a lopsided love affair; Dianna was too young. I’m sure she cared about Hoyt, but her primary motivation was escaping from her father,” said Julie. “There’s nine more letters, Joe. Why don’t I read the next five and you read the remaining four. Let’s see if they’re all in the same vein.”

“Good idea.”

They split them up and began to read. A few minutes later, Joe said, “Whoa,” and laid a letter in front of Julie. “Look at this…”

Dear Dianna,

I want to write about all good things, but there isn’t anything good happening here.
A prisoner killed himself last night.
It happened in his cell and I didn’t see him - but news gets around. His name was Bernie or Barney, I think.
I saw him in the cafeteria the other day.

He should have been in a mental hospital. He yelled, ‘There’s a big rat!
He’s going to eat me!’
They got him settled down, but he must have acted up again later.
I heard they put him in isolation.
I don’t think he could obey the rules because I don’t think he knew what they were.

Anyway, he stuck a plastic knife in his neck.
I guess he thought it was better than being eaten by the rat.

Love,

Hoyt

“Oh-oh, that’s bad. He’s deteriorating,” said Julie. “The ones
I
have are all love letters. Were the letters before that one anything like it?”

“Maybe a little more self-pity, but
nothing
as extreme as that. And here,” said Joe, handing her another one, “look at the last letter, Merlin, it’s even worse.”

Julie took the letter and began to read…

Dear Dianna,

I told you in my last letter about a man who killed himself.
We had another one last week.
Nobody can remember his name.
He was a drug addict - it was only his third day here. He was twitching and sweating – everybody could see he was sick.
He tore a strip off his sheet and hung himself from the smoke alarm in his cell. They found him in the morning.

He didn’t have to die – somebody should have checked on him.

I’m so tired.
I keep dreaming about Crazy Man with a knife in his neck and Sick Man hanging. In my dream, I’m in a long line of men marching past the dead men in their cells – but I’m the only one who looks at them.

I HATE THIS PLACE.

I’m sorry,

Hoyt

“No wonder Frank Wieland was so anxious to move,” said Julie. “The change in tone is frightening.”

Joe nodded, thoughtfully.

“It’s plain to see that he was traumatized by the deaths.”

“We need to see if he’s out of prison, Joe.”

He was already punching a number into his phone.

“Way ahead of you, Merlin.”

* * * * * 

Chapter
35

T
he killer watched himself getting dressed in the mirror over his dresser. He began to button his shirt, one by one, from the top down. In his mind, he spoke to his own image:

At least I stopped O’Hara from coming around. That was damn risky, but what else could I do? She was a much bigger threat than the detective, Garrett.

Lately, he’d been troubled by another loose end.

Several cars had passed by while he’d sat in the SUV that morning before Dianna came out of the condo. Because of the tinted windows, he didn’t think anyone could have seen
him;
it was his ride he was worried about. Besides Dianna’s Lexus, his SUV was the
only
other vehicle in that area…and it was parked right next to her car.

He fretted about it as he combed his hair.

What if some passerby remembered?

He had to get his nerves under control. He was worrying about nothing! No one had come forward about that and Dianna’s death was no longer front-page news.

I hope the hell it stays that way…

He took a last look, straightened his collar, and went out the door.

* * * * * 

Chapter 36

S
abrina Nolen hated taking prescription drugs of any kind and had eliminated all of them but her sleeping meds. In recent months, she had tried to wean herself off them by cutting them in half. Her attempts were unsuccessful. Although the half-dose induced sleep, it didn’t last through the night and she woke up. On one of those occasions, her eyes had popped open and Mike Menello was missing from her bed.

Presuming he was in the bathroom, Sabrina had waited patiently for him to come out so she could go get the other half of her sleeping pill. After a time, she decided to go knock on the door. To her surprise, he wasn’t in there. She thought he must be in the kitchen getting a snack, so she went ahead and took the other half of her pill and got back in bed. But the darkness of the house and the quiet began to bother her.

Was he out by the pool? Was he all right?

There was no way she could get to sleep like that! Aggravated, she’d gotten up and gone through the house looking for him, finally checking out the garage. The SUV was gone.

At one in the morning! The son-of-bitch was probably screwing around on her!

Sabrina had been angry about it, but the hypnotic pill had begun to take effect and she’d gone back to bed. In the morning, her head was cooler and she tried to trap him in a lie. He was sitting in the kitchen when she walked in.

“Good morning,” he said. “How did you sleep?”

“I slept
good,” she said. “How about
you
?”

“As a matter of fact, I had a headache that wouldn’t quit. I had to go out and get some Excedrin Migraine. I drove all around the place trying to find a drugstore that was open.”

Reassured, Sabrina had kissed him on the cheek and put the incident out of her mind.

Until she became his alibi for
another
night.

For the last week, Sabrina had delayed taking her medicine and pretended to be asleep. Mike had slept right through each night, unaware of her vigil. Last night, she had finally gone to sleep after taking her medication at two o’clock.

Now she awoke to bright sunlight slicing through the vertical blinds in her bedroom and striking her face. Mike was up and gone. Squinting and groggy, she swung her legs out of the bed and picked up the clock, trying to focus on the numbers without her glasses.

Twenty past ten.

How long am I going to do this? I can’t keep this up.

She pulled on her robe and her slippers and padded into the kitchen. The coffee was cold, so she dumped it out and made a fresh pot. She thought about Mike as she waited for it to brew.

It was a difficult situation because Sabrina was in love with him. But facts were facts. Mike had had an irrational hatred for Dianna Wieland and had blamed her for conspiring against him. Now she was dead and Sabrina was his alibi. The only problem was that she didn’t believe him.

She loved him, but Mike was a habitual liar. If she came right out and accused him it could end their relationship.

Sabrina poured herself a cup of coffee, added some cream and took it out to the table by the pool. She sat in the shade, her feet propped up on a second chair, cradling the cup in her hands.

One more night.
I have to know where he’s going.

•

It was a quarter to one in the morning and Sabrina was right behind Mike. She was inside the laundry room at the door leading into the garage, waiting to hear the outside automatic door close. The moment it did, she stepped into the garage and hit the door opener. She was counting on him not to notice the door rise again as he drove down the hill.

Mike exited the subdivision and turned right. Sabrina waited just long enough to put some space between them. He took another right at the light and she followed him onto Apopka-Vineland Road. Before long, they were on headed northeast on Interstate 4.