Bitter Falls

by Caine, Rachel

  Up until Melvin’s death, there’s real speculation that I’m one of his secret admirers, which makes me have to step away from the laptop so I don’t punch the screen. I drink a little bottle of bourbon from the minibar, and when I feel calmer, I go back and keep reading.

  Gwen’s right; I need to pay attention to all this. I can’t defend myself if I don’t know what’s coming.

  After the media circus that erupted due to Gwen’s appearance on the Howie Hamlin Show, and the subsequent trouble we found in Wolfhunter, the tone of the posts changes again.

  They really, really hate me now. I’m a traitor to the memory of all the victims, and to the families. But most of all, I was there when Miranda was killed. And just like they assume about Gwen, my proximity to evil is enough to convict me in their message board courtroom. If I was there, I was responsible. The fact that I was shackled at the time, and had no possibility of saving her . . . that doesn’t matter.

  They’re going to run with the idea that I shot her myself, and that the FBI—specifically, my friend Mike Lustig—covered it up. That’s going to be their last podcast episode, of course, not their first. I’m sure every enemy I’ve ever made, from grade school on up, will be given a microphone to set the stage for my culpability before they get down to real facts. They’ll build their case carefully, if completely wrong.

  Gwen’s right that I need to get myself locked down for this. Just reading these posts has made me feel achingly tense and devastatingly uncertain. Even when you know better, it’s hard to see so many people agreeing about your guilt. It feels like a losing battle from the start.

  I click away and skim through the other posts. Lost Angels doesn’t spend all their time targeting Gwen and me, of course; there are remembrance posts for lost loved ones. Casual conversations. Discussions about the worrying popularity of true crime books, movies, shows, and podcasts. Sanity, in the midst of pathological hatred.

  There are also, ironically, speculation threads about other serial killers and killing sprees. Some are hashing over old cases. Some are genuinely trying to connect dots. Trying to do some good.

  On the fourth page of threads one catches my eye: a post about missing young men. That’s unusual enough to make me look closer. The poster has the thinnest of evidence. Sketchy logic. But something makes me slow down and read more carefully. The writer is piecing together disappearances from all over the southeast, and I know one of those names.

  Remy Landry.

  What the hell?

  I back up and read the whole thing again, and as I do I feel a cold shiver run up my spine. Yes, the evidence is thin, but he could be right. There may be something going on here. His conclusions are bullshit and have to do with Satan worshippers, but these cases do seem, on the surface of it, to have common links.

  I pick up my phone and call Gwen. I get voice mail, and I read her the pertinent parts of the post. Then I say, “Could be that Remy’s just one victim. If this proves out, you could be looking at half a dozen connected cases. Maybe more. So . . . watch yourself. Because if this is correct, if there is somebody out there picking young men off and making them disappear . . . they know how to get to people quietly. Call me.”

  I shut down the laptop and lie awake, staring at the ceiling, until I finally give up and flip on the TV and get another overpriced miniature bottle of liquor.

  13

  GWEN

  The Gospel Witness Church isn’t exactly the megachurch I’d envisioned; the South normally goes in for massive structures in their houses-of-holy, but this is a modest, cheap clapboard chapel that’s clearly in need of repairs and a fresh coat of paint. The message sign board out front that faces the street is sun-faded and antique. The message spelled out in black slide-in letters says BEHOLD! I COME QUICKLY! and I have to snort-laugh at the double meaning that was probably unintentional. This doesn’t look like a place that has a sly sense of humor, at least not at Jesus’s expense.

  It’s late afternoon when I pull into the mostly empty parking lot; it’s also a Friday, which means there’s probably no evening service, since Pentecostals lean toward Sundays and Wednesdays, though there could be Bible study or other classes this evening. If there are, they’re not popular.

  I slide my rental car into a parking space off to the side, near a cluster of bushes losing their leaves. Opening the car door slaps me with a blast of chilly wind. I don’t have a coat; I hadn’t needed one for Louisiana. I duck around to the trunk and open my suitcase to find my blazer jacket. Under that lies my gun with the trigger lock in place, and the ammo stored in a separate locked box. I open both, load the gun, don the shoulder holster, and ease the Sig Sauer into a comfortable position. Jacket on after. I grab my purse and lock the car as I leave it.

  The sound of the horn’s beep will probably alert people inside, if they’re paying attention.

  I try the church’s main doors. They’re locked. Always-open doors in city churches went out of favor about the same time that serial killers and drug addiction became front-page news; can’t really blame them for scheduling the faithful. I go around to the side. There’s a worn wooden door with a push-button, cracked doorbell and a sign that says OFFICE.

  I ring.

  The door opens, and a very young white man with a very short haircut says, “Hello, can I help you?”

  “I’d like to talk to the pastor, please,” I say. “Is he here?”

  “No ma’am, I’m sorry, he isn’t available.” He starts to close the door. I put a hand on it, but I make sure to keep myself looking meek. Well, as meek as I can.

  “I just—I just really need to talk to someone,” I tell him. I channel the woman I used to be, back when my name was Gina Royal: hesitant, uncertain, submissive. I change my body language. I thicken my voice and make it more timid. “Please. I really need his help!”

  It’s a scam, and I’m slightly ashamed to use it, but it works. The young man’s eyes widen, he opens the door wider, and he looks over his shoulder at someone I can’t see. He must get permission, because he steps back.

  I give him a grateful smile and go into the office. It’s suffocatingly small, crowded with a battered old desk. A clunky, ancient desktop computer takes up much of the space on top. Cheap metal utility shelves hold stacks of paper and printed materials. There’s an avocado-green landline telephone perched on the desk’s corner that dates from about the same period as the computer, and a collection of porcelain angels occupies the rest of the available space. The gray carpet underfoot feels threadbare, and looks worse.

  The desk has no one behind it, and I realize it must belong to the young man facing me; there’s another narrow doorway to my right, and beyond that a slightly larger office with a nearly identical desk, minus the angels and computer.

  And an older man rises from the chair behind it as I go that way.

  “Ma’am,” he says, and extends his hand not to shake mine, but to indicate the visitor chair set opposite. “Sorry about that—we were just closing for the night. I’m Pastor Dean Wallace, how may I help you?”

  I’m reading him the second I see him. He fits the southern-pastor profile: dark hair swept back in a stiff style that hasn’t been popular anywhere else since the 1980s, milk-pale skin, a sober dark-blue suit. No tie, but then, he’s not at the pulpit today, so this must be his version of Casual Friday. He seems to be genuinely welcoming, if a little frustrated at staying late. I sit down in the visitor chair; it’s a stiff, wooden thing with no comfort but a lot of structure. I’m careful to keep my jacket from gaping to show the gun, and I fold my hands primly in my lap. Body language is everything when you’re trying to play to preconceptions. “I’m sorry, could we . . . shut the door?” I only meet his gaze in fast glances.

  “Ma’am, I’m about to head home,” he tells me, and I can see he’s a little doubtful. “Maybe we could take this up tomorrow . . .”

  “It can’t wait,” I tell him. “Please? I promise, I just need to talk for a few minutes. It would
mean so much to me.”

  I think I might lose him, but then he nods and forces out a smile. “All right,” he says. He steps around me and goes to close the door, and I have a chance to study him as he passes. The light’s not great in here—the window faces east, so darkness has already descended on this side of the building, and there’s only a single, weak desk lamp illuminating the room. He has a jowly face that falls naturally into an expression of disapproval; he’s fighting to look engaged, and I think he’s telling the truth that he’d like to be out of here and on his way home.

  I don’t know what I think about him. Not yet.

  He looks at the young man in the other office and says, “You go on home, Jeremy. I’m fine here, I’ll be along shortly. Tell your ma to keep dinner waiting.”

  “Yes sir,” the young man—his son?—says, and the pastor closes the door. He looks around and, as if realizing how dim it is, turns on an overhead fixture. That’s too bright, and it reveals shabby carpet curling in the corners, dust on shelves. He goes back to his desk and regards me from the safety of the barrier between us.

  “And what’s your name, young lady?”

  He probably means that to be complimentary, but I have to control the urge to bristle. It’s a diminishment; I’m not that damn young. “Gwen,” I say. I don’t volunteer a last name.

  “Well, Gwen, you can talk to me about what’s troubling you, and we can pray about it. Would that be all right?”

  I wait until I’ve heard the door shut to the outer office. His son’s gone now. It’s just the two of us. I relax my posture, open it, tilt my head up, and look him right in the eyes. The scared little wife is gone, and I see him sit back in his chair in surprise. “You might not want to pray with me after we talk, I’m afraid. I spoke with you on the phone early today. About Remy Landry. You hung up on me.”

  He looks like I’ve punched him, and his eyes go so wide I can see white all around. He’s scared. That’s a surprise. Somehow I’d expected him to be aggressive. He rallies and makes a run at that a few seconds later as he stands. “You need to go,” he says. “Right now, ma’am. I don’t mean to be rude, but I’ve got nothing to say about that.”

  “I’m not going anywhere,” I tell him, and when he tries to head for the exit, I scoot my heavy chair back until it blocks his path and, as a bonus, holds the door firmly shut. “Not until we have a conversation about Remy. If you want to get home to your dinner, let’s do this quickly.”

  “Who are you?” he barks, and his hands are in fists now. I watch him carefully. I stay seated. It’s not likely he’s going to come at me, but he’s trying to loom and intimidate. He’s not very good at it. “You got no business here in the house of the Lord, coming in here with lies!”

  I produce my private investigator identification and show it to him. “I’ve been hired by Remy’s family,” I tell him. “And that gives me business with you, because Remy was a member of your congregation. Why wouldn’t you want to help us find him, Pastor?”

  He doesn’t like that. It’s his turn to bristle, and also to retreat. I sit calmly and let him decide what he wants to do. His glare doesn’t disturb me at all.

  “I’ll call the police,” he says, and makes for his desk. “You’re trespassing.”

  I don’t answer. I just watch. He picks up the receiver, punches in a couple of numbers, and then eases the receiver back onto the cradle without completing his call. That tells me quite a lot. “You really need to leave,” he tells me. “Right now. I’m asking you.” His moral authority is melting like butter in the summer.

  “Remy Landry was a member of your church,” I say. “And you owe it to that young man who put his trust in you. He’s been missing three years. His parents deserve answers.”

  “I don’t know where that boy might have gone! Why, he might have just run away. You don’t know what these kids get up to these days, all the drink and drugs . . .” His voice trails off because I’m not responding. And I can hear the hollow core of what he’s trying to say. He doesn’t believe it himself. “You’re not going to find anything here to help. I’m sorry for his folks, I truly am. But I don’t know anything. I’d have told the police if I did.”

  “Are you sure about that?” I lean forward, hands clasped. “Because it sounds to me like you have something you need to get off your chest, Pastor. Do the right thing. You want to, I can see that. You know how much his family is suffering. And you know God doesn’t want that to continue when you have the power to help them.”

  He sinks down in his chair as if I’ve cut his legs out from under him. “I don’t know,” he says. It sounds weak now. “I don’t know where he is.”

  “But you do know something,” I say. “Maybe about the girl he met at this church. Carol.”

  It’s like I’ve stuck a red-hot pin in him. If he was scared before, he’s definitely terrified at the sound of that name on my lips. Enough that his lips part, but he doesn’t have an answer for me.

  “You know who I’m talking about, Pastor. She’s very conservative. No makeup. Long hair that she doesn’t cut. Very plain clothes.” I take a leap of faith. “You’re protecting her, aren’t you? You think if you talk to me about Remy, you expose her to danger.”

  He lowers his hands and takes in a deep breath. “Who are you?”

  “Gwen Proctor,” I tell him. I can see the name means nothing to him. Good. “Like I said: I’m just someone hired by Remy’s family to find out what’s happened to him. You’ve got a son, sir. I know you understand what kind of true horror they’re going through right now not knowing where he is, what he’s suffering, or even if he’s never coming back. You understand that they can’t move on. And I know that Remy was a good kid. You talking about drinking and drugs and how maybe he went off on his own—you know that isn’t true. You’re smearing his good name when you say it.”

  He’s looking down now, and his hands are clasped together so tightly it looks like it hurts. But he still doesn’t answer.

  “Pastor Wallace, you were that boy’s shepherd,” I say. “And Carol’s too. So if there’s anything you can tell me that can help me understand where to look for him—”

  “Forget Carol,” he says. “Please. I’m begging you to leave her alone. You could put her in so much danger just by mentioning her.”

  He seems truly anguished. It’s not an act. He’s pallid and sweating, and I want to ease up on him, but if I do I won’t get anywhere.

  “Remy mentioned to his mom that he was going to try to help her out. What happened? Did he run into people who were after Carol?” No answer. But I think I’m on the right track. Things are clicking together. “Was she on the run from an ex-boyfriend, is that it?”

  Some of the tension bleeds out of him, and he sits up straighter. I’m playing a game of blindman’s bluff, and I just got colder. “You’re right,” he says. “She was having boyfriend troubles. Remy never should have gotten involved. But that didn’t have anything to do with his disappearance.”

  He’s lying again. I switch gears. “She told Remy she had boyfriend troubles,” I say. The key to this game is sounding like you know what you’re talking about, especially when you don’t. “But you knew better, didn’t you? And you still do. Carol was never on the run from a relationship. It was bigger than that.”

  Warmer. Red hot. He looks so stunned that I know I’ve got my finger right on it, and he’s clearly really frightened of what else I might know.

  “Just let me talk to her,” I tell him. “I’ll keep her identity a secret, I’ll leave her completely out of my reports. Nobody will ever hear her name. It won’t even go in my notes.” When he convulsively shakes his head, I realize I’m going to have to give a little. So I say, “Pastor Wallace . . . I understand what it’s like to be running and hiding from people who want to hurt you. My husband was Melvin Royal. The serial killer. Maybe you’ve heard of him.”

  That name, he knows. His body language changes, but I’m not clear on what he’s feeling at tha
t moment. “You—you’re the one who killed him.”

  “Yes. I didn’t have a choice.” When I say it, there’s a split second of it flashing before my eyes: Melvin coming at me. Bracing my shaking hand on Sam’s shoulder and taking aim. Seeing him end, forever. It’s not as traumatic as it used to be, but it still holds power. “The point is, I’ve been hunted by his admirers, and by the people who hate him, and by others who just get their kicks out of hitting people when they’re down. I understand vulnerability in a way very few people do. So when I tell you I will protect Carol’s identity, I promise you this: I will protect it with my life. Just as you have.”

  He takes his time thinking about it. I let him. And I finally see him come to the correct—but difficult—decision. The fight goes out of him, and his shoulders sag. “I’ll ask,” he says. “If she won’t see you, then that’s the end of it. All right?”

  “Ask her now,” I say.

  “No ma’am. I’ll go to her, but you can’t come with me. I’m not going to risk her life like that.”

  I don’t move away from the door. “Then call her. Let me talk to her on the phone.”

  “She doesn’t have a phone.” He’s wavering, but starting to get his backbone assembled. “If she wants to talk, I’ll arrange for a meeting somewhere safe. But if she doesn’t agree, and she probably won’t, then you need to accept that and forget all about this.”

  “Would you?” I ask him calmly. “If Jeremy went missing, and someone could tell you where he’d gone? Could you possibly walk away and forget?”

  He looks away, but I see the muscles corded along his jaw. He’s not going to give me any more.

  So I move my chair back to where it was; there are still divots in the thin carpeting to mark the spot. I place my business card in the exact center of his old desk. And I say, “Thanks for your help, Pastor. I’m not the enemy here. If this young woman’s in trouble, I’m on her side, and I would never put her knowingly in danger. If that computer is current enough to have an internet connection, look me up. I’ll put myself on the line for her. That’s a promise.”