Thrust (13 page)

He waited for her to rail at him.
 

He wouldn't lift a finger.
 
He wouldn't so much as back a step away.
 
God might not have been watching but he was certainly listening in, waiting for the whimpering.
  

"Hello," she said.

Now the hallucinations came into play, as Stacy stepped up behind her mother and smiled at Chase, her mouth still drawn into that thoughtful smile.
  

He blinked and she broke into a loose tapestry of colors and reformed again, the pink barrettes growing brighter.
 
The rust-colored splash of blood over her right ear remained, and her dead, forgiving gaze pinned Chase in place.
 

"Are you all right?" Annie Singleton asked.
 
"Mr. Chase?"

"Yes," he whispered.
 
The world blurred and he kept blinking, the six-year-old girl splintering and coming back.
 
It took him a while to understand that he was crying.
 

So here's the mother of the little girl you killed, or helped to kill anyway, and Stacy is right there staring at you too, and you don't lift a finger, and you wait for your end.

"Mr. Chase?
 
Grayson?"

"Ms. Singleton…let me—"

"Call me Annie."

The shivering grew worse as he spoke her name, his tongue having trouble framing the word.
 
"Annie." Chase knew he sounded like a frightened boy.
 
How the hell was he ever going to survive prison?
 
They'd be pulling trains on him every five minutes.

She reached out and took his hand across the table, patting him, rubbing her thumb against his knuckles.
 
Friendly, all of it just part of the set-up for when she let him have it with both barrels.
 
He tightened his belly, trying not to flinch and failing.

Stacy came around and stood next to him, jerking his attention so that he had to look.
 
She was trying to smile but couldn't pull it off.

"Please," he said.
 
"I'm sorry."

Annie Singleton continued stroking his hand, the way his mother used to do when she read to him at bedtime. His pulse battered in his wrists and an awful knot formed in his chest, stabbing.

So, was this how it goes?
 
After everything, you crap out from a heart attack?

"It wasn't your fault, Grayson," Annie Singleton said.
 
"You don't deserve to go to prison.
 
That's wrong."
 
The lines around her eyes weren't wrinkles after all, but matted scar tissue.
 
Her grip grew firmer.
 
"I don't blame you.
 
Do you understand?"
 

Everybody always asking him if he understood.
 
What would happen if he ever said no?
 

"My daughter's death was not your fault.
 
It was that bastard who did it.
 
He tried for years to kill me and Stacy, a bit more every day, and this time he tried to finish the job.
 
He fed her hamburgers and ice cream as if that's what makes a good father.
 
Joe would've taken her away and he would have ruined his own little girl.
 
Do you know what I'm saying?
 
Do you?"

He wet his lips, the pressure easing from his heart.
 
"Yes," he said.
 

"Gray, you have to focus on me.
 
I'm going to tell you some important things.
 
You have to listen."

"All right," he said.

"Are you listening?"

Everybody always thinking he was deaf.

"Yes."

Her voice was so casual, almost detached, that Chase had a difficult time following the depth of her words.
 
It was like she was reading poetry to him, swinging into the sounds of the stanzas but not allowing herself to reach inside and spew up everything that was there.
 

They were talking about a dead girl, and there were people out in the parking lot holding up signs calling him a murderer, a hero.
 
A few of the more creative folks actually carried tiny cardboard coffins and set fire to his books.
 
They flung burning pages in the air and let the soot sweep into the breeze.
 
His sales were at an all-time high.

Annie Singleton was right.
 
He had to concentrate.
 
He stared at her, gathered himself.

"I came here to warn you," she told him.
 
Stacy nodded, the barrettes flapping in her bloody hair.
 
"You have to watch out for Joe."

"He killed his friends over the truck heist."

"Yes, and he's done a lot worse.
 
He's sharp and he's cruel but he's not motivated or smart enough to be anything besides a low-class hustler.
 
He's got animal instincts that keep him mostly out of harm's way."

"Is the mob after him?"

"No.
 
Killing his partners cleared him with the local underworld for his stupid blunders.
 
They keep him around to do petty crap.
 
All his real troubles, he finds on his own."

"He's good with a knife."

"It's all he knows," she said.
 
"But he only knows a little of it.
 
His grandfather was a marine who taught him four or five moves when he was a kid.
 
He's practiced them his whole life."

"But never learned anything else."

She nodded.
 
"Like I said, he's not motivated.
 
But he can hold a grudge."

Almost everybody could, no matter the reason.
 
"And he's got one against me."

"It's what he has to keep him going, all this goddamn poison.
 
Stacy was the only thing he ever cared about, in his own twisted way."
 

She'd been doing well, up until now, but now heat and heartbreak worked their way into Annie Singleton's face.
 
She clomped her cane for emphasis as she spoke, as if crushing her ex-husband's windpipe.
 

She dropped her head back, took a breath, and fought to keep control.
 
Her shoulders heaved, as if she might break into a sob, but she didn't.

"He hated me for keeping Stacy from him.
 
He'll hate you too.
 
In a fashion, he's happy now.
 
He can give himself over completely to his malice.
 
Can you understand that?"

"Yes," Chase said, nervous that he could comprehend a sick fucker like that.
  

"This has given him a new purpose, something else to feed his fury.
 
It's why he does the things he does.
 
He loves chaos and mess.
 
He loves tension and pain.
 
He's got this long scar on his belly—"

"I saw it."

"Well, he did it to himself.
 
Because he was bored."

"Jesus."

She tilted her head, gave him a pitying look.
 
"Prison might be the safest place for you.
 
Fortwell
anyway.
 
He hardly has any friends, and none of them are there.
 
Don't do anything wrong to make them transfer you up to Hardwick or worse,
Arlingville
.
 
Joe's done time in both for his misdemeanors.
 
But now, because of this, he'll probably be going back to
Arlingville
for a longer stint.
 
At least five years they tell me.
 
He likes it there, I think.
 
Much better than on the outside.
 
It keeps him high-strung.
 
He doesn't know how to act in the world.
 
He never has."

This would probably be the only chance that Chase had to learn something meaningful about Singleton.
 
"He's going to make a run for me.
 
It'll give him something to do, thinking about it, for the next five years."

"Maybe you do understand a little about him," she said.
 

You could hear the traffic from the parkway buzzing by.
 
He wondered what it sounded like, the night of the accident.
 
Had
Arlo
Barrack listened to the shrieking metal smash-up?
 
Did he unlock the grille over the window and try to catch a glance of the dead girl as they bagged and dragged her off?
 
Is that why the man had taken such a dislike to Chase?
 

"What do I have to do?" Chase asked.

She gave him the same look that Ellis had, trying to decide just how sly Chase might really be.
 
"Kill him, of course.
 
If you can.
 
He has plenty of weaknesses.
 
He's stupid, like I said."

"He'll have five years to come up with a plan."

"He's only ever had one plan.
 
He'll come at you with a knife and he'll enjoy using it.
 
Don't give him the chance.
 
Get a gun and if you see him coming, shoot him in the head.
 
Don't hesitate."

He wanted to ask her another question but couldn't figure out how he might do it.
 
He glanced over at Stacy and saw that the girl was gone.
 

Annie Singleton said, "Go ahead and say it.
 
You want to know why I stayed with him."

"Actually," Chase told her.
 
"I want to know why you never killed him yourself."

"I tried once.
 
I thought I was being so slick.
 
He was selling coke and meth at the time and had a couple of ounces of each stashed under the closet floor.
 
I cut open the bags and mixed enough in a stew I made for supper that he would've
OD'ed
after a couple of bites.
 
That's all it would've taken."
 
The nervous energy started to grow inside her.
 
"I was doing too many 8-balls myself, wired pretty good.
 
I must've left out a sign.
 
Something, I don't know."

"He caught on," Chase said.

"Like I said, the bastard's got the instincts of an animal.
 
He must've smelled it.
 
Sensed it.
 
Stacy was sleeping in her bedroom and he got her up and stuck the bowl in front of her, just to see what would happen, what I'd do."

The agitation played across her, plucking her nerves.
 
He watched a shudder pass through her like an angry wave, starting with her left shoulder and going right across and out the other side.
 

She grabbed his hand again, held on tight and dug her fingernails into the sensitive under his thumb.
 
He appreciated the harsh feeling, so different from the cool detachment from the ice bath
drownings
.
 

"I begged him to leave her alone.
 
I threw myself down and crawled on the floor." Her voice drifted, depleted, becoming more vacuous.
 
"God, the look in Stacy's eyes.
 
She thought I'd gone insane.
 
He humiliated me in front of my little girl.
 
Finally he put the bowl out in the yard and poisoned the next door neighbor's chocolate lab.
 
You could hear it howling in agony for blocks."
 

Chase could see the haunted, guilty expression taking over her eyes and said, "You were terrified and you still made the effort.
 
You've got nothing to be ashamed about."

"I should've just picked up a gun and blown him away, but I was afraid.
 
I was so afraid!
 
I didn't want to go to jail.
 
I didn't want to lose Stacy.
 
And now—"

She paused and they stayed like that for a while.
 
Then she slowly, painfully, got to her feet.
 
He wondered what the ex-wife of a violent man who liked knives looked like beneath her clothes.
 
He imagined horrible lumps and knobs of scars protruding twisting across her body.
 

"But I'm not smart either, Mr. Chase, and that's why I stayed in the same apartment even after he left.
 
I felt relief and then got lazy and forgot he was still alive.
 
Don't make the same mistake.
 
Never forget about him."

"I won't," Chase said.
 
"Thank you for visiting me."
 

"I wanted to do something to help.
 
You won't ever see me again.
 
I'm moving somewhere he'll never find me.
 
He won't look.
 
He won't care.
 
He's done all he can do to me.
 
He took my baby.
 
He'll let me go, now that he has you."