Grave Misgivings

by Kristen Houghton

  “Since I am not the one who is killing her, I should say that if she dies, she dies. But her death would be a travesty. This woman didn’t deserve this type of death; no one does.”

  “You’re carrying a shovel. Why did you come here?”

  “To undo a wrong.”

  I see him looking around with some type of a hand-held device that I know is a thermal scope. I had intended to buy one for my own use after reading an article on how an infrared scope was used by the Los Angeles County sheriff’s department to find a lost hiker. The trouble was I couldn’t afford it and decided that it had to wait. It seems that the Eliminator doesn’t have the same money problems; he has all the latest equipment of the spy trade. “Your companions are scattered all over the island and that’s good. Good for me, good for you,” he looks at me with

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  those cold eyes, “and good for her.” He holsters his gun and I take a quick look all around me.

  There’s no one that I can see. Will and the others are not in sight. I’m alone and I need help now;

  I don’t give a damn if it’s a hit man or the devil himself who helps me. I feel a desperation

  verging on hysteria.

  I take a deep breath. “I can’t stand here talking with you; we’re wasting precious time. We have to find her. My God! She’s going to suffocate!” He doesn’t move. I need to get his attention. “Victoria!” He turns and faces me. “When you were in my brownstone you mentioned a woman named Victoria. You felt responsible for her death. How did she die?” I say this quietly watching his reaction. “You said you didn’t kill her but that she died because of you.” When I say this I see his hands grip the shovel hard. “Don’t let this woman Jennifer die because of you. Please, help me find her. I know that’s why you came here, I know there’s more to you than just being a killer.”

  The Eliminator advances toward me and smirks. “You misjudge me, Cate. I am an assassin; that’s all I am. I said I do quick kills but I also do torture and take body-part trophies when necessary to prove a kill. Don’t nominate me for sainthood; I am no more than a cold-blooded killer.” I have my hand on my gun but I see something in his face that makes me know I have nothing to fear from him. His jaw is clenched with determination and his eyes hold an intense anger in them. But just for a brief, very brief moment when I said the name Victoria, I saw a look of sadness, a vulnerable emotion of which I didn’t think he was capable. It quickly passes but that look gives me an edge and I continue to press my point.

  “You said you came here to undo a wrong. All right, then let’s do that, let’s undo that wrong, whatever it was, together. Don’t tell me what it was, I don’t have the time to find out. Just help me find Jennifer’s grave before it’s too late. I’ll help you all I can but I don’t know where to look. Tell me what to do.”

  “Look for a fresh grave,” is all he says as he begins to walk away from me again. I look around. The rain has made a mud-field of the surrounding area and I don’t know where to begin. “Wait! They all look fresh! The rain,” I am panting with fear for Jennifer’s life as I approach him, “The rain makes everything look as if it is all freshly dug up.” I hear that bastard Edward saying, “The rains washes everything away.” This burial was planned for a rain-soaked day.

  The Eliminator turns again facing me and his cold blue eyes look directly into mine. I don’t know what he sees there, my fear for Jennifer, my desperate determination against the odds, but he sees something and my instinct tells me that that something is all I need to gain his help.

  “No, you wouldn’t know, you’re not trained to look for new graves. I am.” He looks around and points toward a corner lot. ”Look, see that one over there by those stones? That small mound of earth on the side?” I strain to look and see what looks like a ball of mud slightly higher than the ground around it. Is that the grave? I start to run over to the muddy mound but he grabs my arm and stops me.

  “That’s not the one you’re looking for; that grave was dug a few days ago. The mud is packed down but it’s hardened. It’s fresh but not as of today. I’m just showing you an example. The ground always tells secrets, you just have to know what to look for.”

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  “How will I know if a grave has been dug today? How will I know it’s fresh?” I am having trouble breathing because I know Jennifer won’t be breathing if I don’t find her within the next thirty minutes. Marc Croft patiently explains and it seems to me as if he’s wasting precious time.

  “One, you’ll see marks of dirt packing to conceal the grave, probably quick packing as the killer wanted to get out of here as soon as possible. He wouldn’t take the time to police his brass.” Police his brass—it’s a military term as well as police slang for cover your tracks, hide the evidence. I’ve heard Will use it. “Two, look for a disturbance in the surrounding area; deep drag marks, grass or vegetation moved around, a scattering of stones or gravel in one area. Those are the signs of a fresh digging. If you look you’ll find where he buried her.”

  “What about tire marks from a truck? The coffin had to be driven from a boat to here.”

  To answer he points to all the crisscrossing tire marks in the soft ground. “Too many to follow. Not all the marks you see are for coffin delivery.”

  I begin to sweat and panic. “Everything looks the same to me.”

  As I’m talking he’s looking around, methodically canvassing the area, missing nothing. He is wasting so much time! Suddenly he points and says very quietly, “It’s in that plot by the two crosses. Come on.”

  “Are you sure? How do you know it’s the right grave?”

  He looks at me with his cold, steel-blue eyes and says softly. “I know.” I guess when digging graves is part of your business, you pretty much do know a fresh grave when you see one. I don’t question him again, just silently follow at a run to where he’s pointing.

  The ground is soft with rain. My feet sink deeply into the wet soil and make a sucking sound with each step. Oh God, oh God, oh God! Shit! Goddamn it! I’m screaming prayers as well as curses in my head. Jennifer, please be alive! Please let that bastard Edward have drugged you enough so that you don’t wake up and know that you’re inside a coffin! Don’t let him have drugged you so much that you’re already dead! Please be alive!

  The plot of land is small and, as I get closer, looks as if someone had recently packed it. Throwing his backpack on the ground, Marc Croft points out covered up drag marks leading up to the plot. At the grave site he begins to dig the soft wet ground. Down on my knees I begin to scoop mud with my hands forcing myself to dig carefully making every dig count. Without missing a beat the Eliminator says, “There’s a trowel over by that marker to your left. Get it. You’ll dig faster.” I turn, see it, and slip and slide my way over to it in the mud. Back at the grave I dig frenziedly with both the trowel and my hands. Time and the digging seem to be going in slow motion.

  “I don’t think it’s too deep,” he says. “As soon as I get her out you’re going to have to call those cops you came with for help.”

  “My phone, I can’t. I dropped the phone down a slope into a trench back there.” I point to the area where it slipped out of my hands. He looks at me and shakes his head but continues digging.

  “We’ll have to use mine then…if it’s necessary. The police and I aren’t exactly a good mix.” He’s like a machine digging robotically. I’ve never seen a man work as non-stop and fast as he is working. My hands feel numb and I taste blood where I bit my lip in my frustration.

  “She’s about three or four feet down, no deeper. I can almost guarantee it. He’s not the type of person who would take the time to do a proper job.” The way he says proper job, as if he

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  has firsthand knowledge of just how deeply to dig when burying a person, sends chills through

  me.

  A pile of mud is building next to his side of the plot. The Eliminator is methodical. H
is pile of mud grows slowly and steadily. I dig like a dog going after a groundhog, flinging mud and stones everywhere and I feel as if I am sinking into a mud hell. Then, without warning the rain-soaked ground where I’m kneeling gives way. I fall hard, deep into a muddy hole. A sharp pain shoots through my right knee as it hits something hard. Marc Croft comes over to my side and pulls me up one-handed out of the mud-filled abyss with no effort whatsoever. He pushes me aside to peer into the hole then begins a renewed marathon of digging. “Get the trowel, dig with me. There’s something in here.”

  I try to stand but my knee buckles and I fall back down. Crawling over to the trowel and back to the hole I begin digging again. Time seems to stand still again but in a few minutes I hear a thunk as the Eliminator’s shovel hits something solid. He grabs the trowel out of my hands and leaning into the hole begins to scrape the soaked earth from whatever is in there. I drag myself over and am instantly heartsick. The wooden box he’s found is not the Perfect Ruby Rest 0557; it’s a plain solid wooden crate. We have the wrong grave! “It’s the wrong grave, we’ve been digging the wrong grave! You said it was the right grave, you son-of-a-bitch, you said you knew! This is a goddamned cheap packing crate, not a coffin.” I struggle to my feet and stand on my left leg. “We have to find...” but the Eliminator isn’t paying any attention to me. He’s using the butt of his gun to break open the crate’s lid. “Why are you wasting time?!” I limp over to him, fall to my good knee, and grab his arm. “She’s going to die if we don’t...” He shoves me back hard and I land on my side in the mud.

  “She is going to die if I don’t get this lid off.”

  The box is square and looks old. Edward buried Jennifer in a plain crate that looks as if it held furniture. Of course, that new couch he had delivered last week! He must have kept the box just for this burial. But where’s the coffin? Why a box and not the expensive Perfect Ruby Rest 0557? Edward’s words “Too good for a backwoods girl” and “A coffin suited to her needs” come into my mind. But I can’t think about that now; I have to concentrate on getting Jennifer out of that crate. “Let me help you,” I say as calmly as I can. “Please, I can work with you and then we can...” But he doesn’t let me finish my sentence.

  “You want to help me? Stop talking and stay the fuck out of my way. You help is a liability and I don’t like liabilities; they mess up a job. I usually get rid of liabilities.” Subdued, my heart pounding, I kneel as close as possible to him without being in his way and watch breathlessly as the Eliminator works to free Jennifer. Hurry! Jesus Christ, please hurry up. It is all I can do not to jump in and break the lid with my fists.

  Without looking at me he says, “Take your off sweatshirt and the top you have underneath.”

  I’m stunned. “What? Why?”

  “I need the sweatshirt to wrap her in. She’s been underground; her body temp will be low.”

  “Okay, but why my top?”

  “The mud has seeped through the slats. She’ll have mud in her nose and mouth. You’re wearing a cotton top and I’m going to need something soft to scoop the mud out so she can breathe. Any more questions?” His voice is low but filled with anger. Not wanting to be a liability, I hurriedly take off my hoodie and toss it to him. “Now give me the top and come here.”

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  I hesitate, but only for a moment, then take off the lilac Stella McCartney top, a birthday gift from Melissa, and slide over to him. Feeling vulnerable in just jeans and a bra I kneel next to him on my uninjured knee. “You want to help? Then do exactly as I say and nothing more. Take out your gun, Cate, and don’t get cute with it. I can kill you with my bare hands if you try anything.” I do as he says. “Hit the wood with the butt of your gun, help me crack these thick wooden slats open.” Again I do as he says and begin to smash the butt of my Smith and Wesson against the slats. I see blood on his hand as a jagged piece of wood slices across his palm but he seems impervious to the cut. Through the small opening my gun has made, all I see is mud and grass that have slipped through the slim openings. The mud may have suffocated her. I keep banging that gun with all my strength like a hammer

  Then, suddenly, with a monumental effort, Marc Croft pulls a large piece of wood away and I see her. Jennifer Brooks-Warren, the beautiful woman Myrtle thought was a model the first time she saw her in my office, is lying in the crate, death and mud covering her. There is no movement.

  The wood creaks an unearthly sound as the Eliminator uses the trowel as a crowbar to loosen the other slats. Then he reaches inside and presses his fingers expertly against the pulse point on the side of her neck. He moves his fingers around to the other side of her neck and I draw in my breath waiting for what seems like an eternity. His shoulders sag a bit as he curses and wipes his bloody hand across his forehead. He sits back on his heels, closes his eyes, and lets the steady rain fall on his face.

  She’s dead. I sink back onto the ground and put my head in my hands. Jesus Christ! I couldn’t save her. Even his super-human efforts couldn’t save her. Dimly I’m aware that her body is being lifted out of the box. Oh God, Jennifer, I am so sorry, so sorry. I failed to protect you. I am so very sorry!

  She’s dead.

  Chapter 24

  “SHE’S ALIVE.”

  “Alive?” I scramble to my knees and look at Jennifer lying absolutely still, Marc Croft leaning over her. “She’s alive?”

  “Just barely alive, but she’s got a pulse.”

  Marc Croft has Jennifer on the ground and is gently but firmly cleaning the goop of mud and grass out of her mouth and nostrils with the soft material of my top. From a bottle in a holder he has attached to his belt he pours water over her face. Then he begins to do CPR. I kneel next to him and watch as he tries desperately to breathe life back into Jennifer’s still body. “Breathe, come on you poor foolish woman, breathe!” I hear him say, cursing. “Breathe!” Slowly and rhythmically he gives her mouth-to-mouth, trying to resuscitate her limp body. Speaking to me he says, “Know CPR?” When I answer yes, he simply says, “Good. Take over.” He gets his backpack and pulls out a monitor of some sort. Glancing at him I see him check two small paddles and some wires. He also takes out a syringe and a small bottle.

  I do chest compressions the way I’ve been taught, left hand flat on the chest, right hand pressing down on the left. One-two-three, one-two-three. Breathe, Jennifer, breathe! One-two-three. Marc Croft brings over the device he had in his backpack.

  “If we can’t get her heart to start pumping, we’ll use this portable defibrillator. Ever use one?”

  I shake my head no. “In your line of work you might want to learn. Get up now, I’ll take over.” I shakily move to the side to give him room and he kneels over Jennifer’s body. His hands, much bigger and stronger than mine, perform measured chest compressions. After what seems like an agonizingly long time, I hear a hissing sound coming from her throat. He pours just a bit of water in her mouth and it gurgles over the side of her lips as he turns her head to the side. She’s silent.

  “Wrap your sweatshirt around her shoulders,” he says, pulling off his own shirt and wrapping it around her legs. I see scars on his chest and back. He was tortured at some point in his life. Seeing me look at them he says, “Comes with the job, sweetheart.” Then he turns his attention back to Jennifer. “She was drugged before being put in the ground. I’m going to inject adrenaline. If it works, and in my experience it usually does, we won’t need the defib.” He fills the syringe with a clear liquid and expertly jabs her in the chest causing her to gasp loudly and open her eyes. Suddenly she begins to struggle, hitting awkwardly at Marc Croft. An unearthly scream issues from her as she turns in her struggles and sees the wooden box. “No, no, please, no-o-o-!”

  “It’s okay, you’re alive,” says Croft holding a thrashing Jennifer next to his chest. Turning to me he says angrily, “I think she was semi-conscious when he put her in that box. She knew what was happening to her.” Jennifer’s thrashing slows down and she begins
to sob. The Eliminator cradles her as if she were a child. “Shhh. You’re okay, you’re alive. Shhh. All over now.”

  Hearing this soft, kind voice issuing from an assassin makes me shiver. What a scene we make! Covered in mud and grass. Me in a bra and jeans, the muscled but scarred body of Marc

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  Croft, the man who was hired to kill Jennifer Brooks Warren, holding, rocking, and soothing his once-intended victim as if they were lovers. Time seems to stand still as I survey the unbelievable scene in front of me.

  Disembodied voices carry from a distance away and Croft glances around. “I see moving lights way over by the north side, Cate. That would be the cops. We need help with this. Call out to them. They’ll come. Walk forward so they can hear you. I can’t leave her. Go!”

  Pain shoots into my knee as I stand up and limp toward where Croft is pointing. They’re so far away their lights look like fireflies flickering on and off. “Help! Help us! Over here!” I yell as loudly as I can, waving my flashlight back and forth. “Help! Here, here!”

  I glance around at Marc Croft who has wrapped the sweatshirts around Jennifer more snugly and is holding her head as he dribbles water into her mouth. “Bring them over here, Harlow. Hurry!”

  Turning toward the lights I limp toward them as fast as I can, screaming louder and waving the flashlight in a wide arc. Suddenly I see one of the lights in the distance flashing a code back at me that acknowledges my position. They’re coming closer.

  “Over here! Over here! Please hurry!”

  “Cate?” Will’s voice comes out of the fog toward me. “You okay?”