A Dark and Stormy Night: Stories of Virtue Falls

by Christina Dodd

  “You’ve convinced me!” Jessica’s sweet tone sent Bradley on alert.

  The bitch was after something.

  She said, “One last thing — you are a huge community supporter of your little town of Virtue Falls.”

  “Virtue Falls has given me so much more than I can ever repay. The landscape and the people have been continual inspirations for my painting, and you can view their influences in the images I paint.”

  He realized right away Jessica was after a different answer, for she leaned forward, her eyes sparkling, “Can you tell us how the earthquake has affected the town and the people?”

  “Earthquake?” He glanced at his wife. “There’s been an earthquake?”

  Vivian was staring up at one of the studio monitors as she held her phone to her ear, and she looked so shocked he knew it was true.

  Jessica leaned back, satisfied to have surprised him on camera. “A massive earthquake with an accompanying tsunami.”

  This clip, he realized would be broadcast over and over as part of the world’s reaction to the horrific event, and he decided to give them their money’s worth. So he took charge of the interview. “How big?”

  “Eight point three.” She frowned. “Or eight point one. The points keep changing.”

  “What’s the epicenter?”

  “Two hundred miles off the coast.”

  “Oh, God. What time?”

  She floundered now, uncertain of her stats. “Last night at … around seven pm.”

  “That’s good.” Briefly, he shut his eyes and nodded. “That means most of the tourists were off the beach.” He looked back at Jessica. “Loss of life?”

  “Twenty-seven in Seattle, mostly from falling bricks and debris, and the number continues to grow.” She realized she’d lost control of her own show, and she resented it. “A couple of injuries in Forks, and one death from a heart attack.”

  Bradley ran his hand through his black hair and destroyed the artful arrangement. “What is the word about Virtue Falls? Do you know?”

  His intensity pushed Jessica a little further back in her chair. “No, we’ve got reporters in Seattle and in Forks, but I’ve heard nothing about Virtue Falls.”

  “My wife’s calling home right now…” He looked at Vivian again.

  She shook her head.

  “…And not getting through.”

  “Cell service to the whole region has been disrupted,” Jessica said.

  “That close to the coast, it’s iffy even in good times. But apparently the land lines are down, too.” To Vivian, he said, “What about flights? Can you book us on the next flight to Seattle or Portland?”

  Vivian nodded — she was already on it. “Boise,” she mouthed to him.

  He stood. “Look, I hate to rush off, but this is important. Virtue Falls is my home. We’ve got to get to the airport.” He turned to the camera. “This is the part of the broadcast where I’m supposed to invite you, the viewers, to come and meet me, but as much as I hate to disappoint my fans, my wife and I have to go wait for a flight. Please forgive me. When the crisis is over, Philadelphia is the first place I’ll come back to visit.” Taking Jessica’s hand, he shook it. “Thank you so much for taking the time to speak to me and for giving me the earthquake news. I need to go render aid where I can. I need to check my studio, my art.” His voice caught on real emotion.

  His studio … he’d had it built especially to house his private works, for those early paintings he had carefully collected and hidden away. With extra reinforcement for exactly this occasion.

  The engineer had assured him it would hold up. Surely it would hold up. Surely it would.

  This VIRTUE FALLS chapter takes place after chapter fifty-five when Mike and Courtney Sun ride over to Virtue Falls Resort so Mike could hand Garik the long-hidden evidence from Misty Banner's murder. I wrote the scene to show Elizabeth's changing feelings for Garik and to foreshadow her growing ability to relate to the people of Virtue Falls and make new friends. Again, this was cut to eliminate words.

  Courtney sat in the resort’s great room, on an antique bench she’d dragged into the middle of the rug, and scrutinized the open beams that formed the ceiling. “Do you think this place is safe? I know Mrs. Smith had it retrofitted, but I mean, it’s old. Really old.”

  “It’s safe.” Margaret stood in the doorway, leaning on her walker, an old woman who looked in equal parts angry and frustrated. “I only wish God would stop putting it to the test.”

  Courtney laughed and leaped to her feet. “Well said.” Going to Margaret's side, she walked with her to her chair and helped her sit. “I’m getting tired of all the tests, too.”

  “I believe that in the early part of the twentieth century, lumber was cheap, logs were large, and the Smiths owned a sawmill,” Elizabeth said, and glanced up at the ceiling, too. The logs were still vibrating. “So, in my opinion, the Virtue Falls Resort was over-built and will stand through much worse.”

  Courtney returned to the bench. “Do you know that?”

  “No.” Elizabeth didn’t exactly know what to do with someone like Courtney. What to say. How to entertain her. Courtney looked like the girls Elizabeth had modeled with, the ones who had no ambitions beyond fame and fortune.

  But Courtney wore old jeans, dirty running shoes, a loose, long-sleeved t-shirt, and her hair was disheveled by the wind and the bicycle helmet. So maybe it didn’t matter what she looked like. Maybe it mattered how she behaved.

  She seemed cheerful and breezy enough when she said, “Might as well agree to not worry, huh? Anyway, I guess that’s why God gave me long legs, so I can run away when another shake comes.” Courtney had freckles on her nose, too, big ones, no make-up, and she grinned like a kid without a thought beyond the moment. “When Mike suggested we ride over, I was all aquiver. I always love to visit Mrs. Smith—“

  Margaret nodded benignly.

  Courtney continued, “— And I’ve been dying to meet you, Elizabeth. Add in the chance to see Garik again, and ka-ching! He was a babe in high school, and he’s still a babe. If you don’t mind me saying so, of course.”

  “As you wish. He’s not mine.” Although after his outburst in the truck, that didn’t seem strictly true. Because it felt as if he had at last handed a piece of himself to her … and at the same time, he had withdrawn.

  “Sure. If that’s your story. But when the two of you got out of that truck, you were both dripping with emotion. When I was eighteen, I spent a year doing the acting gig, and believe me, I recognize dripping when I see it.” Courtney swung herself around to face Elizabeth straight on. “All of us girls in high school wanted to date Garik. He was so tormented, like Angel.”

  “Angel?”

  “In Buffy the Vampire Slayer. You know, a vampire doomed to love a slayer…”

  Elizabeth stared at Courtney in bewilderment.

  “Buffy was popular when we were in high school. On TV.” Courtney frowned at Elizabeth. “Don’t you remember?”

  “Yes. I’ve seen the show. But vampires don’t really exist.”

  “When you’re a teenage girl, you hope they do. Garik always had rumpled hair, like he’d just rolled out of bed, and he was handsome, and he brooded.” Courtney put her hands behind her on the bench, leaned back, stretched out her long legs, and looked, for all her unkempt appearance, like a fashion model promoting the healthy outdoor life. “Oh, man, and when Mrs. Smith was accused of killing his father, Garik hardly left her side.”

  “He was a great support to me,” Margaret said.

  “Sheriff Foster accused Garik of doing it, and Garik insisted he had.” Courtney patted her chest over her heart. “Mrs. Smith’s knight in shining armor. I almost swooned.”

  “He is a sweet and loyal lad.” Margaret leaned forward to emphasize her words. “But it was my gun and my fingerprints were the only ones on the holster. So the jury decided I was the perpetrator, and I had killed Garik's father in self-def
ense.”

  Elizabeth nodded. She knew the truth. She knew how to keep her mouth shut about the truth, too.

  Courtney seemed oblivious. “But wow. We girls knew Garik was trouble, and all that angst made him seem like dark chocolate with a chewy tortured center.”

  “So he was a vampire and a piece of chocolate?” Elizabeth didn’t know whether to laugh or cry.

  “Yes, and all of us girls wanted a bite.” Courtney smacked her lips.

  “Logically,” Elizabeth said, “none of that makes any sense.”

  “Who cares about logic?” Courtney asked.

  Courtney was right. Logic had nothing to do with the way Elizabeth felt about Garik.

  Since the day she had met him, she’d been enthralled. Since the day she had divorced him, she had stayed far away. And for good reason. Because she knew if they got together, they would be together. If she got close to him, if they got involved, she figured she would never again work up the strength of will to leave him. But right now, she couldn’t remember why she would want to leave him. All she knew was … since the divorce, she hadn’t met another man who interested her sexually or intellectually. Worse, she hadn't cared to look.

  “You have a funny look on your face,” Courtney said.

  “I was thinking … if Garik and I got back together —“

  “Praise the Lord.” Margaret crossed herself.

  “Ha!” Courtney crossed her ankles and looked as gratified as the cat that got the canary. “I knew you were dripping with emotion!”

  “I didn’t say we were going to get back together,” Elizabeth said to Margaret. And to Courtney she said, “We’re not drippy people, exactly. There’s been too much of that in our lives.”

  “Drama, you mean.” Courtney showed her flare for the theatrical when she tossed her hair back and forth like a shampoo model.

  “Yes,” Elizabeth confirmed. “Drama.”

  “But all that drama gives you something in common,” Courtney said.

  “Exactly.” Elizabeth considered how best to say this without giving undue hope to her listeners. “Garik is the only man I’ve ever cared for. It isn’t hard to imagine that without him, I would live alone forever and die a lonely, eccentric, crazy old woman surrounded by rocks and scientific journals.”

  “That’s not good,” Courtney said.

  “Indeed, no.” Margaret nodded wisely.

  “No, it’s not. But while living with him had been painful, separating from him almost killed me.” If Elizabeth hung around Garik, she would have to deal with the repercussions of all he had told her.

  But at least she would be sexually satisfied.

  Hm. One could not really rely on sexual satisfaction to be the primary motivator for a relationship. In fact, she and Garik had already proved that it couldn’t provide the foundation of a marriage. But the fact that sexual satisfaction was the first thing that popped into her mind perhaps meant emotions were not her only motivator.

  She needed to focus on what was important.

  And what was important was that the trip from town to the resort had at last given her what she wanted; she knew what events drove Garik to be the man he was, why he danced away from her questions, why when she pressed him for answers, he distracted her with kisses or impatience. She knew his secrets and even better, she knew why he had wanted to keep them hidden.

  The men stepped into the doorway.

  Mike grinned at his wife, and in a cheerful voice, he said, “Guess what, honey? Garik's going to give us a ride home.”

  Courtney blinked in obvious confusion. “We just got here.”

  “Well, we just need to go.” Mike walked over and offered her his hand.

  She looked at it, then up at him. “I was going to angle for a dinner invitation.”

  “Of course,” Margaret said. “We’d love to have you.”

  “See!” Courtney extended her hand toward Margaret. “If we ate here tonight, it would be the first time since the earthquake when we actually have a decent meal! Afterward, Garik could take us home.”

  Mike kept his hand out. “We have to go now. I’m afraid I left the burner on. You know, on the stove.”

  “So what? There’s no flame because there’s no gas. The gas mains are ruptured, remember?” Courtney closed her eyes, then opened them a slit and stared at Mike as though she could see him better if she barely looked. “This has to do with why you were so weird when you got home tonight, doesn’t it? Why we had to come out here on the bikes tonight.”

  “It’s time we took a trip to the city,” Mike said.

  “Seattle?” Courtney’s voice went up. “Now?”

  “No, Portland, and you always want to visit the city.” Mike was coaxing.

  “I do, but how do you propose we get there? The roads are—” Courtney shook her head. “No. That doesn’t matter. Why do we need to leave town? What have you done?”

  “He did me a favor.” Garik said. The tall, broad, ripped man held a shiny pink padded mailing envelope between two fingers. Unlike Mike, he wasn’t smiling, but looked stern, serious, austere, as if he carried the weight of the world on his shoulders, and carried it naturally and with all due gravity.

  Courtney turned to Elizabeth. “I said Garik was trouble. Didn’t I say he was trouble?”

  Elizabeth nodded. “You did.” And Elizabeth had good reason to know Courtney was right.

  This scene took place after chapter seventy-six and was the moment when I let the reader into the murderer's mind, revealed his identity, and changed VIRTUE FALLS from a "Who done it?" to a suspense. Delving into a serial killer's brain is a gruesome, terrible experience for a writer and changed my perception of the world around me.

  In his time, he had watched a lot of women. Observed them. Scrutinized them. Seen them move from carefree and unaware to slightly wary to fearful to terrified. He flattered himself that he knew women as well as or better than any man in the world.

  He knew Vivian was worried. Not frightened. Not yet. But she wanted clarification, and she was concerned enough to make a move. So he watched her from his hiding place in the studio.

  She walked to the door that led to the storage room, a door that had always been there, that she’d never shown the slightest interest in opening … and she tested the handle.

  It turned easily.

  He had left it open. Why not? If she never tried it, it didn’t matter. If she did … then it was time that she knew.

  She glanced behind her, searching the shadows of the studio with her gaze.

  But it was midnight. The half-moon illuminated the canvases and paints, knocked to the floor by repeated earthquakes, the shiny hardwood shattered into hickory splinters, the tall stool stretched out like a fallen warrior. But not him. He knew how to remain quiet. He knew how to be still.

  She flipped on the light switch and stepped inside the long, narrow, windowless room.

  He waited long enough for her to move past the shelves filled with paint supplies and into the back end, where another door awaited her.

  Then he moved quickly and quietly to block her exit.

  He heard that second door open, the light switch click on — and Vivian's gasp. Swiftly he moved forward, the soles of his training shoes making no sound.

  Through the open door he watched her.

  She walked along the row of paintings, her hand pressed over her mouth, staring in wide-eyed fascination.

  She seemed not to understand.

  But he knew she did. Vivian was far too astute of an art critic not to know what she saw. She might reject it, but she knew. “What do you think?” he asked.

  She jumped. Violently. And with a satisfying gasp of terror. But predictably, she hid her fear and tried to appear … casual. “Bradley. You startled me. I didn’t expect to see you here tonight.”

  “Nor I, you.” He strolled in, hands in his pockets, head cocked, acting modest, inoffensive and unpretentious. He knew
she recognized the affectation; they had practiced it many times before. “What brings you here at this hour?”

  “Curiosity.” She flashed him a showman’s smile. “I knew how much you treasured the paintings you hid in here, and I wanted to make sure the earthquakes hadn’t damaged them.”

  “I take extra special care of these paintings. After all, these are my heart. My soul.” He strolled forward to stand beside her.

  “You’re very good with … faces.” Her eyes were fixed to his most recent work, and the color bleached out of her complexion, leaving stark lines of blush over her cheekbones.

  “Thank you. I am proud of this one: the woman in San Francisco and her young son. I had to add in the babysitter in the background … I wasn’t expecting her. She was a kind of bonus.” He stepped closer to Vivian.

  She edged away.

  He stepped close again, pretending this was normal behavior for them both. He pointed at the next painting. “This one is the girl in Vancouver. Her baby was a little young, but the girl was smarter than most. More suspicious. She had made plans to move back home, and I didn’t want to take the parents, too. So messy and out of my purview. So I couldn’t wait. I had to harvest her before the child had ripened. It turned out to be unsatisfying. I was sorry she’d ruined it with her rush. Now this one.” He pointed to a painting placed high on the wall. “I feel as if this is one of my masterpieces. There’s a depth of feeling here, almost of worship, and I used my tiniest brush strokes to illuminate her face and the face of her child. Don’t you agree?”

  Vivian moved with the broken movements of a robot, reluctant and unwieldy. “Why … why the children?”