Triptych

by Karin Slaughter

  Will made a disgusted sound in the back of his throat. She had to know that she might as well be speaking Chinese to him.

  “She spells her name correctly—the more common way—when she signs it. She probably changed the spelling when she hit the streets.” Angie kept talking and he couldn’t stop listening. “Postmark says she mailed it two weeks ago. There’s a stamp that says they returned the letter because she didn’t put enough postage on it. I guess the cross probably put it over the weight limit or maybe it got caught in one of the machines.” She paused. “Are you going to talk to the mother? This zip code isn’t far from here, probably about ten miles. I wonder if she even knows her daughter is dead.”

  Will turned around. Angie held the envelope in her hand, flipped it over to make sure she didn’t miss anything on the back. She looked up, saw him staring at her, and asked, “Will?”

  He told her, “If I could snap my fingers and make it like I’d never even met you, I’d do it.”

  She put down the envelope. “I wish you could, too.”

  “What are you doing with a guy like that?”

  “He can be charming when he wants to.”

  She meant Michael. “Was it before or after you found out he was using the girls?”

  “Before, you asshole.”

  He gave her a sharp look. “I don’t think you’ve got a right to be angry at me right now.”

  She gave in. “Yeah, you’re right.”

  “So Shelley’s a pedophile?”

  She smiled, like it was funny. “And a murderer.”

  “You think this is some kind of joke?”

  She leaned her elbows on her knees, giving that coy smile that said she was open to anything. “Don’t be mad at me, baby.”

  “Don’t put sex in the way of this.”

  “It’s the only way I know how to communicate with people,” she joked, something a psychiatrist had once told her. Will wasn’t sure whether or not Angie had slept with the woman, but the observation was dead-on.

  “Angie, please.”

  “I told you this was a bad night for you to be here.” She stood up and put the envelope in his hand. “Come on, Willy,” she said, pulling him toward the door. “You need to go home.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  FEBRUARY 8, 2006

  9:24 AM

  Angie remembered Gina Ormewood from Ken’s retirement party. She was a mousy woman who seemed oblivious to the fact that heavy makeup made acne worse and a hair stylist who charged less than ten dollars wasn’t exactly doing you a favor. If Angie hadn’t fucked the woman’s husband the same night, she probably wouldn’t remember a thing about her. As it was, she knew that Gina worked at Piedmont Hospital, which in a roundabout kind of way you could say was on the way to Angie’s work—if that was what you could call the strip in front of the liquor store on Cheshire Bridge Road.

  She had called the hospital to make sure Gina Ormewood would be there. The woman’s shift started in twenty minutes, but Angie didn’t have anything better to do than wait. When she got to the hospital, she was glad she’d come early. Cars were backed up into the street and parking space on the deck seemed to be unavailable. After a while, Angie gave up. She flashed her badge to the rent-a-cop standing outside the ER and parked in a handicapped space.

  There were a dozen people standing around the entrance of the ER, all with cigarettes dangling out of their mouths. Angie held her breath as she passed through the smoke. She hated cigarettes because they always reminded her of the burns on Will’s body. Someone had spent hours searing the flesh around the angles of his shoulder blades, creating obscene patterns along the lines of his ribs.

  She shuddered at the thought.

  The man behind the counter didn’t even look up when Angie stood in front of him. “Sign in, take a seat.”

  She slid her badge under his nose and he still didn’t give her the courtesy of making eye contact. “You need to talk to the hospital administrator if you want records.”

  She looked at his name badge. “No records, Tank. I’m here for Gina Ormewood.”

  He looked up then. “What do you want Gina for?”

  “It’s about her husband.”

  “I hope the bastard’s dead.”

  “Get in line.” Her words were automatic, but she didn’t lose sight of the fact that the man obviously hated Michael.

  Tank stood, taking her in with his eyes. Angie was dressed for work, which meant she looked like a whore. She was still a cop, though, and this guy wasn’t an idiot.

  She asked, “When do you think Gina will be in?”

  “You’re not going to mess with her.” He wasn’t asking a question.

  “I’m going to talk to her,” Angie told him.

  He kept his eyes locked on hers, as if he could tell just by looking at her whether she was going to be trouble. Working at a place like this, he probably had the instincts. “Give her another ten minutes,” he said. “She’s always early.”

  “Thank you.” Angie dropped her badge back into her purse and took the only seat available in the crowded waiting room.

  There was an older man and woman across from her who had probably been Angie’s age when they came in. The woman gave Angie a look of disgust. The man gave Angie one of interest. Jesus, the guy had to be eighty and he was probably wondering how much money he had in his wallet. His wife blew her nose into a well-worn tissue. She looked ready to fall over. Angie spread her legs wide and the man blanched. The wife looked like she was about to have a heart attack.

  Before they could move away, Angie stood up and went to the magazine rack. God, this place was depressing. The waiting room was a cesspit of germs and disease. Anybody who thought America didn’t have socialized medicine should spend a couple of hours in their local ER. Someone was paying for the uninsured and indigent to see a doctor, and it sure as shit wasn’t the uninsured and indigent. Hell, you were better off without insurance these days. You got the same crappy care but you paid less.

  She skimmed a Field & Stream then a Ladies Home Journal from the Christmas before last as she waited for Gina Ormewood to show up. Michael had gone too far yesterday. He’d grinned at her like a monkey while they worked through his Vice records and now she knew why. It was one thing to fuck with Angie—hell, she probably deserved it—but the fact that he’d gotten Will upset was unforgivable. Michael must have said something, let a few words slip that told Will he’d banged Angie. She worked with men all day, arrested the fuckers, even, and she knew how their little minds worked. A second couldn’t go by without them either thinking about sex or talking about it, and the fact that Michael had fucked Angie was very good gossip. He’d probably even told that turdball Leo Donnelly. The whole squad must know by now. No wonder Will felt humiliated.

  God, she had to stop listening to the girls so much. No one hated men as much as a prostitute. They spent hours talking about what lowlife scum men were, and then they had to go off with the first asshole who flashed a little green in their face. Angie had enough issues with men without starting to think about them like a whore.

  The doors opened and she glanced up as a couple of guys came in. She looked back at the magazine, not really seeing the fruitcake recipe. Her head hurt with thoughts of Ormewood, the disappointment on Will’s face, the way he had looked at her the night before when she’d gently pushed him out the front door. He must have been seething when Michael started bragging about it, telling the intimate details of his conquest.

  Angie flipped to a different page, a different recipe. If Michael was going to screw around with the one person Angie cared about, then she was going to give it right back to him. Nothing distracted a man more than trouble at home.

  “Robin?”

  Angie turned to the next page. Mother and daughter sweaters. How fucking adorable.

  “Robin? Is that you?”

  Shit. She looked up. John Shelley stood in front of her. He was beside a black guy whose hand was wrapped in a bloody bandage.


  Tank called, “Sign in, please.”

  “I’ll be back,” John told her. He took the black guy to the counter. Obviously, profuse bleeding moved you up the list because Tank took the guy right back.

  John was staring at Angie. “What are you doing here?”

  “Routine maintenance,” she said, indicating her lower half. “What’s up with that guy?”

  “Ray-Ray,” John told her, the asshole who wanted one on credit. “He cut his hand on a piece of metal sticking out of a car. Art asked me to bring him up.”

  “He gonna be okay?”

  “If Art doesn’t kill him first,” John said. He seemed at a loss for words, and blurted out, “You look nice.”

  She looked like a whore, but a compliment was a compliment. “I thought you were gonna stay away from me.”

  “Oh.” His face fell, and for a split second, she was reminded of Will—the way he could never hide his emotions from her, the way he sometimes wore his shame and disappointment on his sleeve.

  “Come here,” she said, taking John’s arm and leading him out into the hall. They stood just inside the front door. Angie could see the smokers on the other side.

  She asked John, “You doing okay?”

  He was smiling now, almost hopeful. “Yeah. How about you?”

  “No,” she insisted. “Last time I saw you, you were in some trouble.”

  He nodded, looked down at his feet. Why did she always end up talking to men who looked at their feet?

  “It’s good to see you,” he said. “I know I said I was going to stay away, but it’s really nice seeing you.”

  “You hardly know me.”

  He smiled again. God, he had such a sweet smile. “I know about Stewie.”

  He knew lies, she thought. The first of many, if history told her anything.

  “You really look nice.”

  “You already said that.”

  John laughed. “I’m trying to think of something else to say.” He laughed again, not so much uncomfortable as really enjoying himself and her company. He looked down at his shoes again, and she saw that he had the prettiest eyelashes she had ever seen on a man. They were a soft, delicate brown. John was a big guy, almost as tall as Will, with a broader chest and a hell of a lot more self-confidence. Despite the cold weather, his face was tanned and there were golden streaks in his hair from working outside all day.

  She said, “You look nice, too.”

  He smiled, and again she got the feeling that there was nothing more he wanted to do than stand there and talk to her all day.

  What lies would she tell him? How long before she ended up taking John to a broom closet or a bathroom and screwing him, then hating him because he had fucked her? How long before she messed up his life, too?

  She asked, “What were you in for, John?”

  His smile dropped. His shoulders dropped, too.

  Angie had already read his parole sheet, but that had only told her the charges, not the details of the crime. “Tell me what you did.”

  “You don’t want to know.”

  “I had an aluminum siding salesman last night who wanted me to suck his toes and call him daddy,” she said. “You think you’re going to come up with something that shocks me?”

  “I made some mistakes.”

  “We’ve all made mistakes.”

  He shook his head. “I don’t want to talk about this.”

  “You were in a long time,” she noted. “Did you kill somebody?”

  He licked his lips, nervous. He was so much like Will that they could have been brothers. Hell, considering Will’s slutty mother, maybe they were brothers.

  John told her, “I should get back with Ray-Ray, make sure he’s not talking himself into any trouble.”

  Angie looked out the glass doors. Gina Ormewood was standing with the smokers, her blue nurse’s scrubs a stark contrast to the cigarette she was sucking on.

  John said, “It was real good seeing you.”

  “Take care of yourself.”

  He started to walk away, then stopped. “When this is over,” he said, spreading his hands out like there was a tangible thing between them. “When what’s going on is over,” he said, still being obtuse, “maybe we can go out to dinner or something? See a movie?”

  “John,” she began. “Do you think that’s really gonna happen?”

  He shook his head, but he still told her, “I’m going to hope it does, Robin. That’s what’s going to keep me going. I’m going to think about seeing a movie with you, buying you some popcorn, maybe holding your hand during the scary parts.”

  “It’d be cheaper if you just gave me the money to hold your scary parts.”

  He took her hand in his. She stood dumbstruck as he brought his lips to the back of her hand and gently kissed it. “Think about a movie you want to see,” he told her. “Something really scary.”

  Then he was gone.

  Angie leaned against the wall. She let out a stream of breath. Here was another perfectly sweet man she was ruining. Okay, he was a perfectly sweet pedophile and murderer, but glass houses and all that.

  Gina Ormewood passed through the sliding doors. She did a double take when she saw Angie, but kept walking toward the ER.

  “Hey,” Angie said. “Wait up.”

  Gina stopped but didn’t turn around. She said, “I just want to be left alone.”

  Angie walked around the woman to get a good look at her. Gina’s lip was split. Her left eye had a bruise that was painful to look at. No wonder the guy at the desk hated Michael.

  Angie asked, “What the hell happened to you?”

  “I fell down,” Gina told her. She tried to walk away, but Angie blocked her path.

  “Did he hit you?”

  “What do you think?”

  “Christ.”

  Gina narrowed her eyes, finally recognizing Angie. “You fucked my husband.”

  “Yeah, well.” Angie knew better than to lie. “If it’s any consolation, I’ve had much better.”

  Gina laughed, then winced as her lip split open again. She put her hand to her mouth and looked at the blood on her fingers. “God,” she groaned. “Let’s go in here.”

  She pushed open the door to the women’s restroom and Angie followed. Gina was petite, maybe five-three in her sneakers and around a hundred pounds. Michael had at least eighty pounds on her. This was like kicking a puppy.

  “I met him when I was fifteen,” Gina said. She was leaning over the sink basin, looking at her split lip in the mirror. “He was interested in my cousin. She was a year younger than me. I thought I was protecting her.”

  Angie knew to let her talk.

  “He was so sweet,” Gina said. “I’d get these letters from him when he was in the Gulf, talking about how much he loved me, that he wanted to take care of me.” Her eyes met Angie’s in the mirror. “This is how he takes care of me now.”

  Angie rummaged in her purse. “They’re all sweet at first.”

  “You know that for a fact?”

  “Even got the blood-stained T-shirt.”

  Gina took a tissue from the dispenser and wet it under the faucet. “After Tim was born,” she began, “things changed. He started getting angry about everything. He didn’t want to touch me anymore. He’d leave the house at night, stay out for hours at a time.” She dabbed the tissue at her bloody lip. “Sometimes, he’d go away for the whole weekend. I’d check the odometer and he’d put five, sometimes six hundred miles on the car.”

  Angie found what she was looking for in her purse. “Where was he going?”

  “You get punched in the face enough times, you stop asking questions.”

  Angie told her, “Turn around.” She dabbed some foundation onto the sponge and patted it around Gina’s black eye. “This is Clinique,” she said. “If you go a little lighter than your usual shade, do a little blending with your finger, it helps soften the bruise.”

  “Did he hit you, too?”

  “N
o,” Angie answered, concentrating on hiding the bruise. The truth was, Angie had been too drunk to remember exactly what Michael had done. All she knew was that she had woken up the next morning in the backseat of her car with a deep bite mark on her breast and a pain between her legs that took a couple of weeks to go away.

  It wasn’t like this was the first time something bad like that had happened, but it was the first time it had happened with a guy from work.

  Gina said, “He told me he was with Ken.”

  “Wozniak?” Angie asked. Michael’s partner in Homicide. “What was he doing with Ken?”

  “He said they went fishing up in the mountains together.”

  Angie pressed her lips together, holding back comment. She couldn’t picture Ken with a fishing pole, and even if she could, Ken wasn’t exactly Michael’s kind of guy.

  Gina’s voice dropped to almost a whisper. “Was he rough with you?”

  Angie nodded. She used her fingers to tilt up Gina’s chin so she could check her handiwork in the light.

  “He’s a bastard,” Gina said, still whispering. “I just want to get away.”

  Angie added some more foundation. “You left him?”

  “Two days ago.”

  “Where are you staying now?”

  “With my mother,” she answered. “He told me he’d come get me.”

  Angie checked her again. Perfect. “Did you file a report?”

  She laughed. “You’re a cop. You know how useless that would be.”

  “That’s bullshit,” Angie told her. “You go to DeKalb County and file a report. They don’t give a shit if he’s a cop. They’ll take one look at you and run him in.”

  “And then what?” Gina asked. “What happens when he gets out?”

  “File a restraining order.”

  “Look at my face,” the woman said. “Do you think a restraining order is going to stop him?”

  She had a point. Angie remembered her days in uniform, recalled vividly how she had once peeled a bloody restraining order from the hand of a woman who had been beaten to death by her husband. He had used a hammer. Their kids were watching.