Paradox

by Catherine Coulter

  She said nothing, which was very unlike her. He said immediately, “I know those staples are really hurting you, Lissy. I’ll be as fast as I can. Then you’ll feel real good again.”

  She could have wished him luck, but she didn’t. She stayed quiet.

  He turned off the interior light, got out of the Chrysler with a tire iron in his hand, and quietly closed the driver’s door behind him. He walked to the mouth of the alley and stared up and down the street. The frigging town was dead.

  His sneakers made no noise as he walked to the back door. He eased his tire iron between the door and the frame and pushed down. Old Lady Kougar still didn’t have an alarm, but the door held. He bet she’d installed a dead bolt inside. He pulled out the tire iron, repositioned it for more leverage, and pushed down with all his weight. The wood splintered and the door flew open, then stopped again. She’d put a chain on the door. No problem, he was ready for that. He pulled out a metal cutter and snapped the chain. He picked up the tire iron and pulled out his flashlight. He stepped into the back storeroom, filled with unopened boxes of cough medicine, toilet paper, condoms, shampoo, hemorrhoid cream . . . everything the citizens of Fort Pessel could want or need.

  He knew the prescription drugs were in locked glass cabinets behind the pharmacy counter, about twenty feet away from the back storage room. He clutched the tire iron in his right hand, his flashlight in his left, and made his way into the store. It wasn’t as dark out here as in the closed-in storeroom, what with the large windows across the entire front of the store and the streetlight on the corner. He turned off his flashlight and walked to the counter, paused a moment, listened. Nothing. If Old Lady Kougar hadn’t moved them around, he knew exactly where the pain meds were. He unlatched the small gate separating the customers from the pharmacy. His hand was on the gate when he heard a voice from his nightmares.

  “It’s over, Victor. Lay the tire iron on the floor and put your hands on your head. Do it now.”

  Savich. Victor couldn’t believe it, wouldn’t believe it. It was Lissy, mimicking Savich to make him nuts.

  “Now, Victor. I don’t want to shoot you, but I will.”

  It wasn’t Lissy. Victor jerked around and threw the tire iron where he thought Savich was standing. He heard it strike a shelf, sending merchandise flying to hit the linoleum floor and scatter.

  “Victor, you took your shot, and now it’s over. Hands on top of your head. I won’t tell you again.”

  Slowly, Victor lifted his arms and tried as best he could to lace his fingers on top of his head and keep hold of the flashlight. He whispered, his voice a croak, as if he hadn’t spoken in a long time. “How? How could you possibly know I was here?”

  “After Lissy’s crazy attack on Cindy Wilcox in Winslow, how can you be surprised?” It was her voice, a voice he knew as well as Savich’s. It was Agent Sherlock. She’d shot him in the ankle, tried to cripple him. He thought of Cindy in Winslow and the mistakes he’d made, that Lissy had made—no, it was his fault. He’d been a fool. He’d let Lissy down by flirting with the little waitress, even following her home. Had he expected Lissy would let him have sex with her? He didn’t know now, hadn’t known then.

  Sherlock walked from behind an aisle of hair care products, Savich from the cold medicine aisle. They were here together, the two people he hated and feared most in the world.

  Victor, how can they be here? Sure, there was that fiasco in Winslow, but how did they know we’d be here tonight, in the pharmacy?

  Lissy hadn’t stayed in the car. She was here, hiding behind him, whispering in his ear. Victor was terrified she’d be hurt. He willed her to keep quiet. He whispered out the side of his mouth, “I don’t know. You know they’re smart.”

  Sherlock said, “What did you say, Victor? I told you, we went to Winslow and spoke to Cindy. She told us you yelled she’d kicked you in the staples. We knew it wasn’t you with the staples. She kicked Lissy. We knew you’d want pain meds for her. You needed them for yourself, too, didn’t you?”

  A high, manic girl’s voice screamed out of Victor’s mouth, “Victor, you puking loser, you brought them here. You should have killed that little bitch, and we’d be safe.”

  Savich said, “Victor didn’t want to kill her, Lissy, only you did. And you failed. Victor’s not the puking loser, you are. The little waitress won, Lissy.”

  Victor looked ready to explode with rage. Or was it Lissy? Savich needed to get Victor back. “Victor, we know you came for the meds, but you also came back for the money, didn’t you? We know you have some money, but you don’t have all of it. Where did you get your stake?”

  Victor answered him. “None of your business. Lissy still hasn’t told me where her mom hid the money, so I had to come find it. But I had enough to take care of your kid before I killed Ryan.” Victor stared at Sherlock. “And you, of course. How did you know I was in his room? I didn’t make a sound. How?”

  Sherlock said, “We had a plan in place if the alarm system went down. My part was to go to Sean’s room, and there you were, standing over Sean with a gun and a knife. I wanted to shoot you in the head, Victor, but unfortunately I didn’t. If I had, Octavia Ryan would be alive. A huge error in judgment on my part.”

  Savich said, “Someone paid you to murder Octavia Ryan, didn’t they? And here she was one of the few people in the world who cared about you and helped you. Was it Lissy who told you to take the money to kill her? Was it Lissy who told you what to do and you did it? Tell us yourself, Lissy, tell us why he did that.”

  Lissy screamed, “That bitch called him weak, a psycho! That bitch called me a Lolita! Victor always wants to please me—well, usually—but I don’t control him. No, never. Yes, that cow saved us from prison, Victor knows that. He only did what he had to do to get us out in the world again.”

  Sherlock said, “Lissy, we already know Victor didn’t hate Octavia Ryan. He killed her because he was paid a lot of cash to do it. Tell us who paid you.”

  They heard Victor’s voice, lower, deeper, with threads of bubbling madness. He laughed. “You’re wrong about all of it. That bitch deserved it.”

  Sherlock said, “She saved you from life in state prison, and you murdered her and dumped her into Lake Massey. That’s pretty cold, Victor. How did she deserve that?”

  Victor shrugged. “I only did what I had to do, and besides, I had to prove to Lissy I could do it. She even bet me I couldn’t, but she was wrong. I rowed Ryan out and told her I wasn’t the loser, she was. She was the one being manipulated, not me. She didn’t want to believe me, but then she did. She started crying, and I whacked her to shut her up.”

  Then Lissy’s voice. “I wanted to shoot the cow, but Victor wouldn’t let me. See, Victor does what he wants.”

  Victor’s voice again. “I really don’t like guns, Lissy, you know that.” He blinked, focused on Sherlock. “I don’t want to go back to that psycho jail. Lissy hates it, really hates it, and her staples hurt all the time. I had a hard time getting her pain meds there.”

  Lissy yelled, “I won’t go back there, Victor! I won’t, I won’t. I’ll die there. The staples, they hurt so bad! Give me the pills, now!”

  It was hard for Sherlock and Savich to get their brains around Lissy and Victor talking back and forth, ignoring them both.

  Then Lissy screamed at Savich, “You should know, you bastard, you kicked me in my stomach, screwed me all up! It’s your fault, all your fault! You threw Riley your gun, and he killed my mama!”

  Victor threw the flashlight at Savich and ran for the storeroom, pushed the door open as Savich’s bullet struck the wood six inches from his head. “Stop, Victor!”

  He kicked the door shut behind him and ran out the back door to the Chrysler, jerked on the door handle.

  “Victor, stop right there,” Sherlock shouted. She was standing in the mouth of the alley, her Glock aimed at him.

  Victor whirled around, but it was Lissy’s high, wild voice screaming, “You bitch! You’re fast, a
ren’t you? Well, I’m going to shoot you right between your eyes, soak that red hair in your blood!”

  Victor pulled Sala’s Glock from his pants and shot once toward her as he ducked behind the Chrysler. Sherlock hit the ground and rolled.

  “Lissy, stay behind me!”

  “No!”

  Savich couldn’t believe it, Victor was running straight at him, firing in a frenzy, screaming in Lissy’s high, mad voice, “You killed my mama! I’m going to send you to hell where you belong! Die, you bastard!”

  Savich took aim as bullets began spraying wildly around him.

  There was a single shot, and Victor froze. He turned back to see Sherlock walking slowly toward him, her gun trained on center mass. His brain was cloudy. Lissy was crying. She screamed at him, “We can’t die, Victor! We can’t, we can’t!”

  Victor fell against the car and began a slow slide.

  “Victor, no!” But the words came out of Victor’s mouth in a gasp, then dwindled into a low whisper of sound.

  The Glock fell to the ground. He grabbed the car door, but his fingers were wet with his own blood and slipped. He fell to his knees, then onto his back.

  Savich came down beside him, applied pressure to his chest, but he knew it was no good. Victor looked up at him. He was wheezing, gasping for breath, his throat filling with blood. But it wasn’t Victor, it was Lissy who whispered, “I wanted to kill you first, shoot you right between your eyes. Victor should have done it, but I let him try to steal your little kid. Stupid, but sometimes I had to let him have his way.”

  “Lissy, where is Victor?”

  Victor felt his blood spreading over his chest, into his chest. Blood filled his throat, bubbled up to pour out of his mouth. Where did all the blood come from? He didn’t really hurt. He felt immensely tired, and he knew, he knew. “Lissy?”

  I’m here, Victor, I’m here. I’ll never leave you. Her voice was soft in his ear.

  “I know,” Victor said, turned his face against Savich’s blood-soaked palm, and died.

  Savich slowly rose. He held Sherlock against his side. “Victor and Lissy, they died together.”

  Sherlock slipped her Glock back onto her belt clip. How could Victor make his voice sound like Lissy’s? A high young girl’s? They’d heard her, and she was Lissy, she knew they’d both swear to it. She handed Savich a handkerchief. “Wipe your hands while I call our agents at the Smiley house.”

  As Savich wiped Victor’s blood off his hands, he heard Sherlock say, “It’s over. Victor’s dead.”

  They waited together in the alley beside Kougar’s Pharmacy beside Victor’s body.

  And Lissy’s.

  71

  * * *

  WILLICOTT, MARYLAND

  FRIDAY MORNING

  Ty pulled her Silverado into the Corsica driveway at 7:30 a.m., too early for Lynn Corsica to have left for the library. Charlie answered the door wearing jeans and a T-shirt, sporting a bad case of bedhead. “Chief! Agent Porto, what’s going on? Is something the matter? Let me get my gun!”

  Ty grabbed his arm. “No, it’s all right, Charlie. Sorry we’re here so early without calling, but I need to speak to your mom.”

  “My mom? But—”

  “Didn’t you tell me your mom is the smartest person you know?”

  “Well, yes, but—” Charlie heard the urgency in her voice, stopped. “My mom’s in the kitchen, making me and my dad blueberry pancakes.” He added over his shoulder as he trotted away from them, both Ty and Sala on his heels, “Dad’s still in bed. He had a late night, some sort of infestation on his prize bougainvillea.” Ty knew Mr. Corsica owned the largest nursery and landscaping company in these parts, so there was no need to explain.

  This was Ty’s first visit to the Corsica home in a very long time. It was a ranch-style 1980s-vintage split-level set in the middle of a large lot surrounded by oaks and maples, and, of course, superbly maintained flowers and trellised roses in boxes, no doubt thanks to Mr. Corsica’s business.

  “Chief Christie—Ty!” Lynn Corsica, a spatula in her right hand, was walking out of the kitchen toward them, her feet bare, her blue bathrobe flapping around her legs. She stopped and gathered herself.

  “Mom, Ty wants to speak to you.”

  “Yes, of course. All right. How can I help you, Ty?”

  Ty quickly introduced Sala then drew out a photo she’d printed from a website and handed it to Mrs. Corsica. “Do you recognize this woman?”

  Lynn Corsica looked down at the publicity photo, a head shot of a beautiful dark-haired young woman who looked both serious and kind. “I don’t think so.” She cocked her head at Ty. “Why did you think I would recognize her?”

  “Mrs. Corsica, I’d like you to subtract fifteen years from the woman’s face, change the hair color, maybe blond or light brown, and imagine she has blue eyes. Take away the makeup. Focus on her eyes, the shape of her mouth.”

  Mrs. Corsica studied the photo. “She looks about thirty in this photo, so I have to picture her at fifteen?” She studied the photo some more, frowned, then slowly, she raised her head. There was wonder in her voice. “It’s Albie Pierson, isn’t it?”

  “Yes, I believe it is,” Ty said. “Her family wasn’t here long enough for her to be in a yearbook, but I hoped you’d remember her. Can you describe her?”

  “She was a pretty little thing, slight, fine-boned, with lovely blond hair like you said, and light blue eyes. She always wore her hair in a French braid, long, past her shoulders.

  “I remember clearly she was in the library the very first week her family moved into Gatewood. I gave her a library card myself. Such a sweet smile she had, and she was always very polite, listened when anyone spoke to her. I liked her.” She paused. “Then of course her whole family was murdered, and she disappeared. They couldn’t find her body, so people being people, some said she murdered her family, maybe she snapped because of sexual abuse, something like that. One of her teachers came forward to say she thought she’d seen bruises on Albie’s arms, but I knew none of that was true. I’d gotten to know Albie. I was also a rape counselor over in Bowie before we moved here. I would swear Albie had never been abused. That’s what I thought, anyway, but it didn’t matter much, since they never found her.”

  Mrs. Corsica looked down at the spatula in her right hand, dripping batter on the oak floor. “Look at me, keeping you standing here in the hallway. Come into the kitchen and have some pancakes and coffee.” She didn’t wait for an answer, turned on her bare heel and walked into a bright kitchen, its walls a pale yellow and windows looking out over a beautiful, manicured backyard, with more wildly blooming flowers planted along a white fence.

  She waved them to chairs, poured them coffee. “Charlie, you sit, too. We won’t wait for your dad. He was still asleep as of a few minutes ago.”

  She turned back to the stove to ladle more batter into a hot skillet. Ty wanted to get to Haggersville now, face down Susan Sparrow, tell her they knew she was Albie Pierson. But her stomach growled as Mrs. Corsica sprinkled blueberries on top of the batter. Sala grinned at her. They’d only had a quick cup of coffee before leaving the cottage.

  Soon they were all buttering pancakes, pouring maple syrup over them, and forking crispy bacon off a plate. As they ate, Mrs. Corsica said, “I haven’t thought of Albie Pierson in years. I used to wonder what happened to her, wondered if the monster who’d stabbed her family to death had taken her with him, killed her, and buried her somewhere. Then life happened, as it always does, and we all forgot. Where is she now, Chief?”

  “In Haggersville. Her name now is Susan Sparrow.”

  “You mean the Sparrows who own the Sparrow Crematorium?”

  “Yes, those Sparrows,” Sala said. “She married Landry Sparrow six years ago and has been there since.” He held out his plate for two more pancakes.

  Mrs. Corsica served him while her pancakes still lay uneaten on her plate. She said quietly, “Imagine, she’s been close by. I’m so glad she surv
ived. Tell me, are you going to arrest her for the murder of her family when she was fifteen?”

  “No,” Ty said. “She didn’t kill her family, no disagreement with you on that. I think it was a stranger, and Albie hid, knowing what he was doing, what he’d done. When she was sure he left, she took the cash out of her father’s safe and ran. I don’t think she was afraid of the police. I think she ran because she was afraid of the monster who’d murdered her family. We would like to speak to her about that day, and then about something else entirely.”

  Mrs. Corsica searched her face, then said slowly, “It’s all about those bones found in Lake Massey, isn’t it?”

  “Yes,” Ty said. “And who those people were.”

  “But what does it mean?”

  “As soon as we resolve this, Charlie can tell you all about it.”

  Sala sat back in his chair and sighed deeply. “Thank you, Mrs. Corsica, for the outstanding breakfast. We would appreciate your not mentioning anything we spoke of here to anyone, all right? You too, Charlie.”

  “No, of course not,” Mrs. Corsica said. “You either, right, Charlie?”

  Charlie nodded. “Chief Christie’s my boss, Mom. If I did, she’d fire my butt.”

  “Deservedly so,” his mother said, and sighed. “But I still wonder what it all means. The belt buckle, Susan Sparrow really being Albie Pierson, and all those bones.”

  “Give us another day. Thank you very much for confirming Susan Sparrow’s identity, and the breakfast was delicious.”

  They left three minutes later, waved to Mrs. Corsica standing in the open doorway, the spatula still in her hand, an older man now standing behind her, his hand on her shoulder. They walked to Ty’s Silverado, Charlie, still barefoot, beside them. “You know everything, don’t you, Chief?”

  “No, but we have a good start. Give us today, Charlie, to nail everything down.”

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