Bliss House: A Novel

by Laura Benedict

  “There’s clotted blood around the door and step in the back,” he said, coming to stand a few feet behind DeRoy.

  “Have you injured yourself, Mr. Lee?” Lucas said. “You look pretty healthy to me.”

  DeRoy shrugged. “Neighbor kids. They play rough with each other.”

  Lucas opened his eyes wide, in mock surprise. “If you have injured children in your trailer, they could need medical attention. We can be of some help.”

  A scowl creased the other man’s features for the briefest of moments before the calm returned. “I don’t let those kids in the trailer. They’re my sister’s kids, and they like to play tricks on their old uncle DeRoy sometimes. So, no worries.”

  Lucas pointed at the trailer. “Captain, did you hear any sounds of distress inside?”

  “I believe I heard some whining. Like someone was in some kind of health trouble. Could definitely have been a kid.”

  “Fuckers. Too lazy to get a warrant?”

  Lucas shook his head. “Really, man. We just came to invite you to come in and answer a few questions pertaining to the death of Nick Cunetta, a local lawyer. He wasn’t your lawyer, by any chance?”

  “See, all you had to do was ask,” DeRoy said. “No, he wasn’t. Don’t know him. You can go home now.”

  “That’s a great start. You’re a helpful guy, Mr. Lee. Now . . .” Lucas didn’t bother to finish his sentence. A cruiser, its lights and sirens going, turned into the trailer park. He smiled. “Great. Our invitation has arrived. I promise we won’t step on your yoga mat.”

  The first of the three troopers to enter the trailer for the search came back to the open front door. The look on his face told Lucas it wasn’t good news.

  “We’re secure, sir. But you need to come inside.”

  Lucas glanced back at the trooper standing beside the cruiser in which DeRoy Lee was sitting. “Keep him here until we see what’s what.”

  Inside, the trailer was spartan and much cleaner than its grubby outer structure implied. The walls were painted a cheerful yellow, the furnishings were light oak and of the assemble-it-yourself type but with lean, stylish lines. They’d apparently caught DeRoy Lee in the middle of a leisurely meal: a plate of bacon, eggs, and peanut butter toast sat on a restored antique trunk that served as coffee table, beside an open book lying spine up: Dream It! Be It! 7 Steps to Personal Growth Through Dream Analysis. The television blared an episode of a TV psychologist’s talk show. It didn’t surprise Lucas that he’d lied about doing yoga when they arrived. The guy was obviously vain about his habits.

  “There’s nobody else here?” Lucas addressed the trooper who had led them in.

  “I wouldn’t say that.”

  The air inside the trailer was thick and humid, barely chilled by the rattling air conditioner in the front room. It stank, too, and not just of bacon, mold, and peanut butter.

  An acrid slaughterhouse smell. Blood.

  Instinctively, Lucas felt in his front pocket for the handkerchief he always carried. He didn’t yet take it out, but it was there, ready.

  They walked through the kitchen and down a short hallway whose walls were lined with carefully trimmed magazine images of elaborate sunsets and tropical beaches populated by shore birds and nearly naked teenage girls. The pictures were sensual but naively tame, like a preteen boy’s idea of sexy. That didn’t jibe at all with Lucas’s idea of what a killer would have on his trailer walls, but he didn’t have time to dwell on it.

  Before he even got inside the bedroom at the end of the hall, Lucas could see Randolph Bliss’s body slumped over the edge of the bed as though it might fall onto the floor at the slightest touch. Blood covered the sheets and had soaked into the room’s thin striped carpet. From the impressive size of the wound covering his back, and the physical matter on the wall behind him, it looked as though he’d been shot in the stomach or chest, then had tried to lunge forward, toward his attacker. But his heart and brain had stopped, and gravity had frozen him in his place.

  The captain gestured and the trooper went to the body to check for signs of life. A party of flies danced above the judge’s head.

  “Best thing that could’ve happened to the son-of-a-bitch,” the captain said. “He would’ve had to spend the rest of his life in solitary, if he’d made it out of county at all.”

  Lucas took in the bandage wrappers, bloody cloths, scissors, and other detritus piled on the bedside table beside a nearly-empty bottle of Jim Beam. The bandages had been applied to the judge’s neck. A plastic tumbler lay on the floor, not far from the judge’s outstretched arm, as though he had reached for it before dying.

  Lucas couldn’t help but think of the superior attitude the judge had taken on when interviewed in the hospital cafeteria. His smug little smile.

  Condescending asshole.

  “Anyone see a weapon?”

  “The guys are checking out the rest of the place,” the trooper said, standing up after checking the judge. “He hasn’t been dead too long. Rigor hasn’t relaxed yet.”

  “That’s just fine. Will someone please give dispatch a shout and get the medical examiner out here? Let’s get this ball rolling.”

  In the living room, the television host was shouting at one of his guests. Lucas left the trailer to a chorus of boos from the audience.

  Walking to the cruiser, he kept his eye on DeRoy Lee. Now there was a fucked-up guy. He’d gotten himself an innocuous job in a bookstore (and what was that about? how did that happen?), groomed himself like a West Coast health nut, and yet had not only continued his criminal ways but escalated them. No doubt the judge had made it worth his while.

  He nodded to the trooper monitoring the cruiser.

  DeRoy didn’t bother to get out when he opened the door. A sly smile lit up his clear gray eyes.

  “Where’s the weapon?” Lucas said.

  “With the person who used it.”

  “What kind of bullshit answer is that?”

  “The only answer you get until after I spend some quality time with my lawyer.”

  “Why the games, Mr. Lee? Is there someone who’s so worth your time that you want to spend the next few years of your life trying to convince the courts that you didn’t kill an officer of the court? I’m sure that will buy you plenty of cred in prison, but is it worth it? We already know about Nick Cunetta. Now it just looks like Randolph threatened to expose you, so you killed him. Quit wasting my time, and yours.”

  DeRoy grinned. “If I offer you that information now, it ceases to be useful to me.”

  “I already know who it was,” Lucas said.

  “Fuck me. Then you win.”

  “It was the kid,” Lucas said. “And he used his old man’s own gun.”

  DeRoy was silent half a beat too long.

  “Thanks.” Lucas stepped back from the cruiser.

  Now they just had to find that kid.

  Chapter 80

  Ariel awoke to moonlight coming through the tall windows across from the bed. For a moment she had no idea where she was, and then she remembered the comforting feel of the dog cuddled beside her. Now the dog was gone, and she was alone.

  Her cell phone vibrated beside her, bathed in a white puddle of light.

  There was a text message right on the front of the screen, waiting for her. Before she could talk herself out of it, she texted an answer as quickly as she could. When a response came back, she read it then lay down with the phone beneath her, her heart pounding against the screen.

  Chapter 81

  Rainey stood at the nurses’ station, waiting for permission to see Bertie. Lucas Chappell had called her cell phone just after 8 A.M. to tell her and Gerard they’d found Randolph dead. The sheriff had been to the hospital first thing to tell Bertie, and Rainey was worried about her. The nurse at the desk wasn’t being particularly helpful, and no one seemed to be sure if she would even be allowed to see Bertie. The events with Jefferson, plus the presence of a deputy outside Bertie’s room, had complicate
d things.

  It had been hard enough to leave Ariel at Gerard’s house. She’d roused Ariel briefly to tell her about Randolph, but wished that she hadn’t. Ariel’s face was drawn, and she looked as though she’d hardly slept at all. Yet she had insisted that Rainey go to the hospital; they were both relieved that Bertie was awake. Rainey wasn’t sure that the news that Randolph was dead had really hit either of them yet.

  Rainey trusted Gerard. She really did. They’d had a good talk, and while they hadn’t come to any conclusions about Bliss House and what to do about it, she didn’t feel quite as helpless as she had before. Her head was so much clearer, as though she were recovering from some long illness.

  She was about to text Gerard to see how things were going when she saw Detective Chappell come through the double doors across from the nurses’ station. As he headed down the hallway toward Bertie’s room, she called after him. To her surprise he waved her forward, indicating she should follow.

  Chapter 82

  Bertie felt grateful to have Rainey there to hold her hand and give her strength as Detective Chappell—the handsome dark-skinned officer—told her the Judge was dead. And where was Jefferson? They were saying Jefferson had killed his daddy. She prayed it wasn’t so. How could she bear to live without them both?

  It all had something to do with those strange appendages to Bliss House that had been only rumored to exist. Randolph had laughed at her when she’d asked him about them years ago.

  “Fairy tales,” he’d said. “Foolishness.”

  She wondered if he’d believed in ghosts at the end. She wondered if he was in Hell. If he’d hurt Ariel the way the detective said he had, that was where he deserved to be. Her years of loving him now felt strangely worthless.

  The detective refused to sit, saying he’d stay as long as he needed to, but that every available officer needed to be out looking for Jefferson.

  My love. My baby son, what have you done?

  But there was more death. Bodies in one of the underground rooms. A man and a woman.

  More death.

  Finally, Rainey spoke. “Bertie, I know this is hard right now. But it’s important. Last night, Ariel was trying to tell us about some kind of vision she had when she went into that room.” She described how Ariel had been certain she’d seen another version of the judge. A younger version who, while she watched, killed another man and drove a red-headed girl to throw herself over the balcony.

  “Just like Karin Powell,” Lucas said.

  They both looked at him.

  “Yes? That’s the implication, right?”

  “But Ariel also said earlier . . .” Rainey shook her head. “No. It couldn’t be.”

  “I told the Judge that Ariel thought she saw a man up there in the gallery too. Did she see something else?” Bertie asked. Her teary voice shook. She kept a wad of tissues pressed to her face.

  Lucas put a hand up. “Wait. You told the judge that Ariel saw a man with Karin Powell?”

  “Ariel didn’t know what she saw!” Taking her hand from Bertie’s, Rainey crossed her arms protectively in front of her chest. “She was half-asleep. Confused. She told me that when it was all over, she thought she saw Will, my husband. My dead husband.”

  “Oh, that poor precious thing,” Bertie said.

  After a moment’s silence, Lucas spoke: “It’s important that I’m clear. The judge believed Ariel saw a man up on the third floor balcony with Karin Powell? A fact that was never shared with us?”

  Bertie nodded. “I think so. It was the day I found that poor woman’s fingernail in Jefferson’s laundry. I gave it to Nick because I didn’t know what else to do. He was going to help me.”

  Bertie twisted her hands together, anxious. She thought she heard the detective whisper a curse word.

  “I was going to tell Rainey about it when she came over. I was going to tell her I didn’t think it was safe for her to have Jefferson at the house. My own son! He had something to do with that woman. And what if he killed her? What if my own son killed her? She needed to know!”

  Her chest was tight, but no! she wasn’t going to let them give her medicine that would knock her out again.

  Concerned, Rainey bent over her and smoothed her hair—which was a mess, Bertie knew. But she couldn’t think about that. It wasn’t a time for vanity.

  “Should I get a nurse?” Lucas asked Rainey. “I was afraid this would be too much for her today. But we have to know how Jefferson and his father were involved.”

  Bertie breathed deeply. I will get control. She was not going to lose her dignity, too.

  Poor Nick was dead. The Judge—a man so strong she thought he might live forever—was dead. And a monster. Her son had turned into a criminal.

  Mother Bliss had been on her mind ever since Rainey had moved into the house. How she had refused to talk about their time living there to anyone outside the family, except to make historical references, to properly place her family in the pantheon of Blisses who had owned the house for most of the past hundred years. She’d sold Bliss House when Michael disappeared, and never looked back. But he’d left one thing behind.

  “I’m all right,” she said, looking up at Rainey. “I’m all right.”

  “We can come back.” The uncertain tone in the detective’s voice told Bertie he didn’t really want to leave.

  “There are things that must be said,” she told him. “Those bodies in the basement. I don’t know who the woman is, but I think the man must be Michael, Randolph’s brother. There were times when I almost guessed. Randolph cried in his sleep sometimes. He had terrible, terrible dreams. Drenched the bed in sweat. He would never tell me what they were about.” She closed her eyes for a moment. “But I didn’t really want to know.”

  “Of course, one couldn’t know for sure,” Rainey said. “He fooled you. He fooled everyone.”

  “When Michael’s friends started calling, asking where he was, Mother Bliss—well, I didn’t know her as that then, just Mrs. Bliss—went up to Charlottesville. The police got involved, but it was like he just disappeared off the face of the earth. People were looking everywhere, and it was in all the newspapers for a while. It wasn’t until all that died down a few weeks later that they noticed his passport and several thousand dollars were missing from the safe at the house.”

  “If it is his body,” Lucas said, “that information will go a long way to identifying it, as well as lining out the circumstances. Maybe the girl’s, too.”

  “I didn’t think about her,” Rainey said. “I wonder who she was?”

  Bertie knew she was thinking about Ariel. What had Randolph done to that baby girl? What had he meant to do? Neither Rainey nor the detective had gone into specifics, and she’d been deeply grateful. The truth would come out soon enough.

  Detective Chappell looked at his watch. “I need to get moving. Our priority is to get your son safely into custody, Mrs. Bliss.”

  Oh, my God, my God, when will it end?

  “We just want to make sure he’s okay, get him somewhere so there’s not a chance for whatever has already happened to escalate.”

  “Escalate?” Bertie said. “You’re not going to kill him, are you? There’s such a thing as due process. Whatever he’s done, whatever Jefferson has done, he has to be given a chance to make it right!” She couldn’t look at Rainey. If her child had done something equally horrible, she would understand the need to take things slowly. “You have to gather all the facts.”

  Really, Roberta? The facts? It was Randolph’s voice in her head. No one judges on facts. Don’t be naïve.

  Rainey and the detective exchanged skeptical looks.

  “Of course,” Lucas said. “That goes without saying. But I need to know if there’s somewhere he might go to hide. Do you think he’ll stay around here? Do you have a vacation home somewhere? Friends who would hide him?”

  “I hope they wouldn’t,” Bertie said.

  He tried to reassure her again, but he could tell she was co
mpletely worn out. After he confirmed she’d given the fingernail to Nick for safekeeping—having pretended to put it in the garbage in front of her husband and Jefferson—he nodded and told her to get some rest.

  “I’ll be in touch,” he told Rainey. “We can talk more later today about your daughter. I’d like to interview her again.”

  When Rainey started to protest, he put up a hand. “Later. I still don’t want the two of you back at the house until Jefferson Bliss is found. I hope we’ll be done gathering evidence today.”

  “I don’t know about going back. Ever. It doesn’t feel safe.”

  Lucas didn’t comment, but closed his notebook.

  When the detective was gone, Bertie asked Rainey to come and sit beside her on the bed. Rainey took her hand again.

  “Bertie, I just don’t know what to say. I feel like our coming here has just meant one disaster after another. I’ve told Ariel I think we should sell the house if we can and go back to St. Louis as soon as possible. I’m afraid we’ve messed up everything.”

  Bertie was weak, but she squeezed Rainey’s hand as hard as she could.

  “That’s foolishness, honey. You and your little girl have brought love and sunshine into that house, and I wouldn’t trade you for anything. You belong here. Much more than you know.”

  “I loved it here, at first,” Rainey said. “But I don’t think I can keep Ariel safe here anymore, Bertie.”

  Bertie cautiously moved her other hand, the one with the IV needle attached, onto one of Rainey’s hands so they could both have something to hold on to. “I need you to be very, very strong when I tell you this.”

  Rainey almost pulled her hand away, but didn’t. She didn’t need any more surprises.

  “I mean it,” Bertie said.

  “Why are you trying to scare me?”

  Bertie shook her head. “I’m just telling you the truth. This is a terrible day for all of us, but I think everything needs to be out in the open right away.”