What Doesn’t Kill Her (30 page)

Phillip frowned. “I thought he mentioned that his mother was Jewish. And I believe his father was Catholic.”

“I believe you’re right. You think religious differences might constitute a mixed marriage in this madman’s mind?”

His host gestured with an open hand. “Being Jewish is also an ethnicity.”

“Hadn’t thought of that.”

“Ethnically, I’m Jewish myself.”

“But not by religion?”

“No. Christianity is a better fit for me. But being raised a Jew has been helpful in my profession—I have a better grasp on the Old Testament, for example, than most Christians.”

“Interesting,” Mark said, but felt they were getting off the track. Still, Phillip was a godsend as a resource for Biblical interpretation.

“For the sake of argument,” Mark said, “let’s say you’re right. These families have in some way broken God’s law, and he’s going to fix it. How does he find these sinful families? Does he stalk them? If so, for how long?”

“Theology is my business, Detective. I’m afraid you’re going well beyond my skill set.”

“Right. Right, I’m sorry. Well, there’s another Bible verse to explore. This one is only implied, but it’s there.”

“Which is what?”

Realizing he might be revealing confidential police information, Mark nonetheless told Phillip about Levi’s eye having been carved out by the killer.

“ ‘If thy eye offend thee,’ ” Phillip said. “There are any number of interpretations of that one.”

“I’ll just bet. Listen, are you up for digging in yet tonight? Or should I come back tomorrow?”

Phillip glanced at his wristwatch, then shrugged. “We could spend an hour or so, yet tonight. I’m up for that if you are, Detective. But if I may be frank? You look a little tired to me.”

“I could use some coffee,” Mark admitted.

“I’ll make some,” Phillip said, rising. The lipless smile managed to seem pleasant. “Give me five minutes. You just relax… if you fall asleep, I’ll nudge you awake.”

Alone in the living room now, Mark got up, stretched, walked around a little. He would need that coffee. At the mantel, he paused at the framed photos.

He started at the left end, working his way right. The photos went back decades, to Phillip’s childhood, probably, although Mark didn’t recognize a young version of him in any of them. First in the row was a family portrait, everyone blond, their attire conservative, not unlike Phillip’s preferred fashion now. The man and two young boys in shirts and ties, the woman and a girl in long, high-neck dresses. They stood in a yard, in front of a white crackerbox, not unlike the anonymous midcentury modern houses in the Sully family’s neighborhood.

The next photo was just the kids, the three of them in a park, sitting on a playground bench in their Sunday best, not playing despite the setting. They rarely seemed to smile in these oddly joyless pictures. The family in these photos seemed to consist of two adults and three little adults. Nothing like his own family’s smile-filled photos.

A shot at the end of the mantel stopped him cold—was this portrait of a blond young man in his twenties that of a pre-disfigurement Phillip? It might have been Phillip—it was hard to tell, though the thin-lipped straight line of his non-smile seemed to foreshadow the lipless future.

Yet there was something familiar about this face, something that had nothing to do with Phillip. He had seen that face before.

Where?

Then he had it—
this was the face Jordan had drawn, the face she kept magnet-pinned to her refrigerator,
and in a flash he knew why she did that, and in that same flash he knew exactly who Phillip was, and in the next moment, he broke a very old promise.

He said, “Oh shit.”

He was going for the pistol on his hip as he spun, and there Phillip was, and he was swinging something, it was blurring toward him, though the bold signature
ALBERT BELLE
told Mark exactly what he was being hit with, before the world exploded in shiny, tiny stars against a black background, as if a firecracker had gone off inside his skull.

He crumpled to the floor. Though the pain centered in his head, his body burned as if his every nerve ending had fired simultaneously.

“Sentimentality,” Phillip was saying, from somewhere in the room, “is not a sin, but it’s probably a failing, particularly for a man with my calling.”

Mark tried to get to his feet, but couldn’t make his legs obey. His eyes were half open, the world a distorted blur.

“Those family photos should probably go,” Phillip said, thoughtfully. “That one you were admiring is from back when I was Brad Slavens. I was Brad a rather long time.”

On his back, Mark tried to roll to one side, vaguely aware that Phillip was pushing on him, then pulling at something. The detective’s right hand managed to find its way to his hip holster, but the gun was gone.

He fought to keep his eyes open, which were swelling shut at an alarming rate, his vision filling with a curtain of blood. His face burned so hot that he thought Phillip might have set him on fire after hitting him with that bat.

Reality came back with a painful vengeance as the bat crashed down into his ribs. He actually felt them splinter. The pain burned like spreading flames. His breathing became a ragged, labored thing, not unlike Phillip’s.

His host brought the bat down on Mark’s leg, crushing his shin, pain exploding through him again, white-hot and everywhere.

Mark tried to roll into a ball, but could not. Again the bat, this time on the other side, struck Mark’s ribs. Breathing was impossible now. Short, tortured gasps, each weaker than the last. To his surprise, the pain settled into the background. Still there, powerful, constant, but not at the forefront of his consciousness. That honor went to Jordan. He loved her so. On the floor, helpless, life leaking quickly away, he fought against the worst agony of all.

That he would never see her again.

Stabbing pains all over his body brought him back. He was in his car, in the driver’s seat, with no memory of getting there. Barely able to see, yet looking through the windshield, he somehow knew the Equinox was perched atop Ninth Street’s notorious Suicide Hill. Car running… but not in gear?

The driver’s side door opened. Mark, eyes nearly swollen shut, could still make out the hideous countenance of Phillip Traynor.

Mark’s broken lips somehow carried one word out to his tormentor: “Why?”

Phillip ignored him, leaning way over him, jamming something in next to the detective, and the engine began to race.

The driver’s side door closed, and a moment later, the passenger side opened. Phillip leaned in again. He took Mark’s chin in his hand.

“I
will
possess her again,” Phillip said, his noseless breathing audible over the engine noise. “She is my reward, you see, for serving a merciful God.”

“You… sick… fuck,” Mark moaned, trying to move, not moving.

Phillip laughed, jammed the gear shift into drive, and jumped clear.

The Equinox roared down the hill toward Lake Erie. In the forties, Suicide Hill became famous for cars hurtling down its steep incline and intentionally flying into the lake. So many times had this happened that the city fathers installed concrete pylons at the foot.

Speeding down the hill, Mark helplessly hoped that cross traffic might stop him before he hit bottom—getting broadsided would be better than crashing into those concrete pylons! At this hour, though, no other cars were around, just the Equinox making its inexorable journey.

Too many things were broken in him, the pain too great, for him to move his legs to get to the brake pedal. He looked down at the gear shift… if he could just put the car into park. That would slow it down, stop it dead.…

His hands would not move. He felt glued to the seat. The speedometer read over eighty now, the concrete pylons waiting, unmovable, practically beckoning him.

His cell!

If he could just get to the phone, it might be charged now, and he could warn Jordan, save Jordan. He saw the thing, sliding back and forth across the passenger seat, as if playing keep-away. With all his remaining strength, he reached for it. His fingers touched the cell, barely, then it slipped away.

When the Equinox slammed into the concrete, Mark was aware of the sound of tearing metal, breaking glass, and his own pitiful scream, a scream so weak even he couldn’t hear it. Hardly feeling the sharp shards tearing at him, Mark was thrown backward when the airbag exploded in his face, hitting him with nearly as much force as had Phillip’s bat, a lifetime of minutes ago.

The last thing he said, before blackness took him, was “Jordan.” Soft as a whisper, urgent as a prayer. Heard by nobody at all.

Jordan sat in the ER waiting area next to Captain Kelley, Mark’s boss. Kelley had called her about Mark’s accident and asked her to join him at the hospital. He’d told her nothing more than that Mark was still alive. It had still been dark when the Vespa took her to top-rated Cleveland Clinic on Euclid.

Whether that was encouraging or a sign of the seriousness of Mark’s condition, she could only guess. That was one of a thousand thoughts that careened through her mind as she raced through a chilly predawn city in a fresh sweatshirt and last night’s jeans. Was it the cold that made her feel so numb? No tears, though her heartbeat was accelerated, providing a percussive beat for her reckless ride through mostly empty streets.

Kelley had met her outside the ER, where he stood smoking. Despite the early hour, the commanding-looking captain was unmistakable, though she’d never met him before, impeccable in a dark gray suit and darker gray tie, a lanyard badge identifying him with photo ID.

Mark was in surgery, his condition critical.

The circumstances of the accident, as reported to her by Kelley, were mystifying to Jordan—she knew all about Suicide Hill, and its history of accidents and suicides, but how Mark—apparently in the middle of the night—had been at that location, speeding and losing control of the Equinox, made no sense. Unless… unless.…

She said to Kelley, “You said you couldn’t give me any details. I understand this is a police matter. Obviously that’s what it is.”

“It’s good you understand.” His half-hooded eyes in that African mask of a face had a brooding quality. This man could explode, and somewhere in there, his fuse was lit. Why?

She made an educated guess—ten years around mental patients gave her certain insights.

“You approved Mark’s off-duty investigating, didn’t you?”

He nodded.

The hustle and bustle of the ER, the dings of periodic bells, intercom voices, provided a backdrop of urgency as they sat enveloped in a bubble of quiet.

She asked, “Why would you do that?”

Fire flared in eyes that, momentarily, were not hooded. “What do you mean, Ms. Rivera?”

“I mean you either believed he was on to something, or you had a special regard… maybe even, affection? For Mark.” She shrugged. “Maybe both.”

Kelley shrugged. “He’s got a lot on the ball. Also, he’s impetuous. Naive.”

“Yet you let him poke around out there alone.”

He frowned at her. “What are you saying, Ms. Rivera?”

“I’m guessing you know all about our little support group spin-off team. Victims who’ve gathered together to, well… to do
your
job?”

“Ms. Rivera, I understand you’re upset—”

Calmly, she said, “You would never dream how upset I am. I might be upset enough to go to your superiors and ask why you allowed a young, inexperienced officer to go out by himself into harm’s way.”

Kelley shifted in the plastic chair. “I called you, Ms. Rivera, as a courtesy. Because I know you and Mark are friends.”

“That’s nice of you. And I think you do like Mark. He sure spoke well of you. Looks up to you. He lost his father at a fairly young age—not as young as
I
did, but… well.”

“What’s your point, Ms. Rivera?”

“My point is, I can be an adversary, Captain, or an ally. I’d rather be your ally.”

“I’d rather you were.”

“Good. Then stop fucking around and fill me the fuck in.”

He frowned, then smiled a little. “I could use another smoke.”

“Let’s step outside.”

“You say that like somebody about to give somebody else an ass whooping.”

“No. I just did that.
Now
we can talk.”

Outside, where it was still chilly, though the sun was climbing, Kelley exhaled smoke and said, “A witness said the car never slowed down—no brake lights. Said it looked like Pryor intentionally ran into the pylons.”

“
Suicide?
Well, that’s bullshit. Not Mark.”

Kelley shrugged. “He’s a sensitive kid. He may have blamed himself for the Levi Mills murder.”

“Mark was with me, Captain, just a few hours before this travesty happened. When he comes out of that operation, you’ll see. He’ll tell you. But for now, you’ll have to take my word for it.”

Kelley sighed. “I already do. That kid was happy. High as hell that he’d hauled that suspect in—Carlyle.”

She shook her head. “I don’t think Carlyle’s your man.”

“Ms. Rivera, you haven’t been in for the lineup yet.”