Random Road

by Thomas Kies

  “What about Mrs. Webster?”

  Neither Lance nor Drew answered.

  Finally Drew took in a deep breath and sighed. “She was still alive, everyone else was already dead. One of us, I don’t know which one, had sliced her from here to here.” He moved a finger down his collarbone to the top of his swim trunks to show me. “She was bleeding, bad. She had her hands down there, trying to keep her guts in. She was on her knees, she begged me to help her. All I could see was those men using her over and over.”

  The rain fell on the backyard and the pool. No one spoke.

  Lance leaned down close to my ear again. “Drew finished her, one stroke and it was done. You know what the weirdest part was?”

  It could honestly get weirder?

  “When it was all over, Drew and I were standing there in the middle of those dead people…blood was splashed everywhere, our shoes, our clothes, the walls, the ceiling, the TV screen…and the skin flick was still playing. Those people on the big screen were still having sex, just like nothing had happened.

  “What about Jimmy Fitzgerald?”

  This time Lance sighed. For him, this might have been the saddest part of the story. He recalled, “I heard Jimmy say, ‘Holy Christ, holy Jesus Christ, what the fuck did you guys do?’ And then he said, ‘We got to get the hell out of here.’ Then he told us to gather up everyone’s clothes. We’d take their wallets and purses and get some cash out of this if nothing else. He said to bring the swords too, don’t leave evidence.

  “When we got back to our dock, where Jimmy’s boat was tied up, he made us strip down and hand over our clothes. They were soaked in blood. He was going to put everything, clothes, swords, in a canvas bag he had on the boat and tie an anchor to it. Drop it into the sound. Nobody would ever find it. Not ever.”

  “Two killers, two sets of bloody footprints,” I said in a low voice. “But three people were there. Jimmy didn’t do the killing and he steered clear of the bloodstains. Smart boy, that Jimmy Fitzgerald. Except he didn’t throw everything into the water like he told you he was going to. He kept at least one sword and gave it to his dad. I don’t think Drew had the chance to tell you, but the cops arrested Jimmy last night and found the sword. I think right about now, he’s ratting you boys out.”

  Lance jerked up quickly. I could see his face in the mirror, covered in a crimson cloud of rage. “That miserable son of a bitch kept one of the swords? That night on the dock, our dock, he told us he didn’t want to have anything to do with either one of us. He said we were meth-heads, that our brains were fried. He kicked us to the curb like we were garbage. He said we, we, were incompetent and stupid. And we were like brothers, Jimmy and me, like fucking brothers.”

  I looked over at Drew again. His misery was absolute. He’d heard it. Jimmy and Lance were like brothers. Not Lance and Drew.

  “Drew?” I quietly asked.

  When he looked at me, there were tears trailing down his cheeks.

  “Was it you who called the police and told them about the bodies in the Chadwick house?”

  “I couldn’t stand knowing that they were all dead, that she was dead, and lying on the floor, just up the road from here.”

  Lance’s left hand strengthened its grip on my shoulder and his right hand pressed the knife blade against my neck. “Now the only question that’s left, Miss Chase, is what are we going to do with you? You’re kind of a loose end.”

  I could feel the cold steel of the knife against my carotid artery. These guys butchered six people. One more certainly wasn’t going to make any difference.

  I worked hard to find a voice through my escalating terror. “If the police are talking to Jimmy, you know it won’t take long for him to give you up. The cops are probably on their way here now.”

  “Maybe,” Lance mused, “but once they get here, it’s not going to help us if you’re here telling them our story.”

  I was willing to try anything. “Take off now. Get a head start. Take my cell phone, disable my car. When the cops get here, I won’t say anything. They’ll already have Jimmy’s testimony. They won’t need mine.”

  Lance was grinning in the mirror, looking at himself, admiring his own reflection. “Yeah, the reporter won’t say anything,” he repeated sarcastically. “I can make sure of that. We’re going to take a boat ride, Miss Chase.”

  I involuntarily glanced at the dock where the powerboat was tied.

  “Drew, come here, get around back, get her by the neck.”

  The boy got up and moved fast, behind me. The steel blade of the knife vanished, replaced by the crook of Drew’s thick, muscular arm, pressed hard against my windpipe.

  Lance stood in front of me, looking me up and down. “You’re pretty, Miss Chase. I think we’ll have some fun with you before you go for a swim.”

  No. Gotta be a way out.

  Lance turned and led the way, still holding the butcher knife.

  Rain falling, we followed. I tried to walk but my legs didn’t work right. Drew half-carried me by the neck across the yard to the dock.

  Weapon, I need a weapon.

  I tried kicking my feet against the ground.

  Not working.

  I pulled at his arm.

  Too strong.

  We moved up the dock, got to where the boat was tied off. Lance hopped across onto the deck and turned. “Can you get her across okay, Drew?”

  “I got her.”

  He put his other arm around my waist and carried me onto the boat.

  I tried kicking him. All I got was air.

  Lance ordered. “Get her below and into the master stateroom. Use one of the lines and tie her up if you have to. I’ll cast off.” Then he stared right at me and held up the knife. “It won’t take long to get those wet clothes off.”

  Drew dragged, walked, carried me down the steps down to the lounge. The engines growled to life.

  I glanced around. Teak walls, padded benches, TV on the counter, small stove, refrigerator.

  Weapon, I need a goddamned weapon.

  Drew carried me through the galley. The table was littered with paper plates, a pizza box, empty beer bottles, a pack of cards

  The doorway ahead of us led to the bed inside the stateroom. Too big for the tiny room.

  Desperate, I flailed out.

  My hand found the neck of a beer bottle, smashed it down on the counter, rammed the jagged edge hard into Drew’s forearm. Hit bone.

  Blood splattered my face.

  Drew shouted, “Fuck!”

  His grip tightened. I couldn’t breathe.

  I stabbed the ragged glass into his arm, over and over. Every time, feeling it, hearing it hit bone.

  He roared and let go.

  I turned. Drew was between me and the steps up to the deck.

  The vessel’s twin engines growled and we started to move.

  Gotta get past Drew.

  His head was down, inspecting blood draining out of his torn arm, dripping onto the deck.

  Gotta get past Drew.

  Panic-stricken, I leaped forward, screaming, slashing at his face. He held up his hands and I ripped the broken bottle into the palms of his hands.

  He grunted, twisted and fell against the table, dropping onto a bench.

  Run.

  I dashed up the steps onto the deck and, without looking, hurled myself over the transom of the boat, throwing myself into the air, falling into the cold, bubbling wake of the twin engines.

  Underwater, swimming.

  When I surfaced, I saw we hadn’t gotten far from shore. A hundred feet from the dock.

  Behind me, the boat was still moving away from me, nearly invisible now behind the gray curtain of rain.

  That’s good.

  I kicked off my shoes and swam for the dock.

  The noise from the t
win engines suddenly changed. I stole a look behind me again. Lance had throttled down. The boat was turning. Coming back for me.

  I swam harder, adrenaline firing through my veins, swimming for my life.

  Too slow.

  The engines got louder, closer. Lance was accelerating.

  I reached out for the ladder of the dock and hoisted myself up, my heart pumping like a hammer against my chest, my lungs on fire, straining for oxygen. Running in bare feet down the dock.

  I saw the boat drawing up to the dock. Drew stood on deck with a towel around his arm. His chest and shirt were covered in blood. Lance was tying off the lines.

  Legs pumping, feet splashing, I sprinted across the yard, past the pool, up to the steps to the house, slid open the glass door to the kitchen.

  The maid stood at the counter, mixing something in a bowl with a spoon. She stared at me with wide eyes.

  Where was my phone? Where were my keys? In my bag, next to the table by the pool.

  I turned and looked through the glass door. Lance and Drew trotted across the yard.

  “What’s going on here?”

  I whirled. Becky Elroy stood in the kitchen doorway.

  “Call 911,” I screamed.

  “What are you doing here?” She shouted back, mystified at seeing me standing there, soaked and muddy.

  “Call 911.” My voice howled with desperation.

  Suddenly the boys slid the glass door open, They were in the kitchen.

  Becky, seeing the blood-soaked towel on her son’s arm and blood dripping from the palms of his hands, shrieked, “What’s happening?”

  The boys glowered hard at me.

  Where do I run?

  “There’s a break-in at 32 Smuggler’s Road,” shouted the maid into her cell phone. “On Connor’s Landing. Yes, I’ll stay on the phone.”

  Drew glared at me with unbridled hatred. Then he turned and mumbled at Lance. “Jesus Christ, what are we going to do?”

  Lance narrowed his eyes, sizing me up. Then he glanced at his mother, at her horrified expression. “Let’s go, Drew.”

  The two of them turned and marched out the open door, disappearing into the rain. Moments later, I heard the purr and then roar of a sports car start and then accelerate down the driveway.

  Suddenly my legs had no strength in them. I needed to sit down. But first I had to get my cell phone.

  I looked at the two women. The maid still had her phone pressed to her ear, holding a meat cleaver with the other hand, watching me cautiously. Becky Elroy’s gaze moved from the blood spatters on her kitchen floor to my face.

  “You’re the contractor’s wife,” she hissed.

  “Close enough.”

  Holding my hands out in front of me, I was amazed at how badly they were shaking. I found enough strength to walk to the doorway, still open, and down the steps and into the cold rain.

  I staggered to the table under the awning by the pool house where Drew had left his laptop. Exhausted, I dropped into a metal chair. Water dripped from my hair and down my face.

  What was I trying to do? Get a story? Get a confession so Mike Dillon wouldn’t have to make a deal with Jimmy Fitzgerald? Show how smart I was?

  I’ve done some incredibly stupid things in my life, but most of them were fueled by too much alcohol.

  This morning I was stone cold sober.

  What about those two boys? They had every advantage, money, privilege, a good family. What went wrong? Drugs? A feeling of invulnerability? Pressure from their father? Undue influence from a bad seed like Jimmy Fitzgerald? A seductive teacher?

  There was no good reason for those six people to be dead. They were simply in the wrong place at the wrong time.

  I needed to call Mike Dillon. I reached down into my bag for my cell phone.

  My hands were shaking so badly that it took three tries before I could punch the number onto the screen.

  When he answered, I made an effort to calm my voice down so I wouldn’t sound hysterical. “Mike, it’s Drew and Lance Elroy.”

  “Genie.”

  “It’s Drew and Lance Elroy. They’re the killers.”

  “We know, Jimmy Fitzgerald told us. We just got the warrants. We’re on our way out there now to arrest them.”

  “They just took off.” The words tumbled out much too quickly. “They’re driving a gray Nissan 370Z convertible.”

  “Where are you?”

  “I’m here, at the Elroy house.”

  “Are you okay? Are you in any danger? I just heard someone made a 911 call from that address.”

  “I’m good. Their maid called that in. She thinks I’m crazy.”

  “We’ve already got a car at the bridge,” Mike said. “They won’t even get off the island.”

  Thank Christ.

  “Genie,” he said somberly. “I have some bad news.”

  Nobody likes to hear a cop say he has bad news. The fear that gripped me in its icy fingers only moments ago doubled down with a vengeance.

  “Genie, Kevin Bell was in a car accident about a half hour ago.”

  Oh, my dear God, no!

  “Is he okay?”

  Mike was silent for a heartbeat. Then…“Genie, I’m sorry. He’s dead.”

  Chapter Thirty-two

  Remembering the rest of that day is like trying to recall bits and pieces of a nightmare you can’t wake up from.

  One of Mike Dillon’s cops, I don’t remember which one, took my statement as we sat by the Elroy’s pool. The rest of them, faceless to me, swarmed through the house, looking for evidence. At Mike’s instruction, when we were done, the young officer offered to drive me home. I politely declined.

  Even before I drove off Connor’s Landing, I could see the blue-and-red stuttering lights of police cruisers. On the other side of the bridge, two of them were parked at the side of the road while a familiar gray Nissan convertible was being loaded onto a flatbed truck. I didn’t see Lance or Drew. I’d been told they were already in custody.

  I went straight to Ruth Spence’s house in Darien. It was the first time I’d ever laid eyes on it. It was two stories, constructed of stone. Perfect for Aunt Ruth. Like most homes in this exclusive bedroom community, it’s tucked behind a high fence and quietly cocooned by trees and landscaping.

  Mike Dillon, bless his heart, parked his squad car behind my Sebring. He was there at my request.

  I couldn’t be the one to tell Caroline.

  He wore his uniform but respectfully carried his hat in his hand. When Ruth opened the door and saw us both there, she already knew something was wrong. Caroline was standing right behind her, eyes wide, fear already spreading across her face.

  I only vaguely recall what Mike said that day.

  He told us how around eleven o’clock that morning, Kevin was on the Merritt Parkway heading to New Canaan to return the rented BMW. Because of the rain, the conditions were slippery. Kevin, apparently while traveling at a high rate of speed, overshot his exit, lost control of the vehicle, and hit the stone overpass. For whatever reason, the driver’s airbag didn’t deploy.

  Mike assured us that Kevin died instantly. He told us how sorry he was and asked us if there was anything he could do.

  We thanked him and said that we’d handle everything from here. From the way he hugged me in the doorway, I knew he was telling the truth about being sorry.

  Then we all sat on the sofa in Ruth’s living room and held each other while Caroline cried it out. Ruth and I cried as well, but I think we were determined to stay as strong as we could for Kevin’s daughter. Now she was truly an orphan. First she’d lost her mother and now her father. She was utterly alone.

  When I left late in the afternoon, I promised to return later that evening.

  The depressing weather was lifting and pockets of sunshine strug
gled to find their way around the dark clouds. I drove home in a fog, numb and exhausted. When I got to my apartment, I picked up Tucker and held him so tight he must have thought I meant to crush him. He needed to be walked so I took him down to the waterfront where Kevin and I had been the first night we were together. That was so long ago and it felt so lonely.

  I’d fully planned that when I got back to my apartment I’d pour myself a vodka rocks. But I bypassed my kitchen and went into my bedroom instead.

  Kevin had made the bed.

  I sat down on it and thought about how we had both been in that bed only hours ago. How comfortable I’d been snuggled up next to his warm body…how happy and content I was. How alive and vibrant he was.

  I could smell him here…his scent.

  Then I saw the folded slip of paper tucked underneath my pillow. I picked up the note, unfolded it, and read Kevin’s handwriting.

  I love you…I’ve always loved you.

  I’ll love you for all eternity.

  Me.

  That’s when I started to sob…truly sob.

  No, I didn’t have that vodka rocks. My eyes might have been red but it was from crying. I was sober when I went to the newspaper and wrote up the story about Drew and Lance Elroy, the copycat burglaries, Jimmy Fitzgerald’s meth arrest, and Drew’s confession to me about the brutal mess that happened on Connor’s Landing. I can’t tell you if what I wrote that night was cogent or coherent but I know that Casper was absolutely delirious with joy.

  And then I wrote Kevin’s obituary. I insisted.

  ***

  I didn’t have a drink that night and I haven’t had a drink since. I’ve been sober for eleven months and twenty-six days. Yes, I attend AA meetings. You can’t be a drunken role model.

  Drew and Lance Elroy were tried and convicted of six counts of murder. Even though he was seventeen when he committed the crimes, Drew was tried as an adult. They were both sentenced to life.

  Jimmy Fitzpatrick testified against the Elroys in order to receive leniency. He got off with fifteen years. He’ll be out in ten.

  I’m officially Caroline’s guardian and I’m in the process of adopting her.

  Two weeks after his funeral, I sublet my apartment and moved into Kevin’s place. He had a four-hundred-thousand-dollar life insurance policy. He’d named me as beneficiary. That paid off the mortgage and gave us some breathing room.