by Lisa Gardner
“We’ll start at the beginning,” Quincy said. “It would appear that someone is seeking revenge against me for some perceived wrong. We don’t know who, but as you suggested, Kimberly, process of elimination should be able to tell us more. For now, what we do know is that this person has been planning this for a long time. At least a year and a half, more likely two years.”
“Eighteen to twenty-four months?” Kimberly was genuinely shocked.
“We think he started with Mandy,” Rainie said. “Maybe targeted her through an AA meeting. Things progressed from there.”
“Her new boyfriend,” Kimberly filled in. “She mentioned something once, but I didn’t pay much attention. Boyfriends … There were a lot of them.”
“It would seem that he positioned himself to be someone very special,” Quincy agreed. “They dated for months. Mandy trusted him. Maybe she even fell in love.”
“But the accident,” Kimberly protested. “She’d been drinking, she was behind the wheel. She’d done that kind of thing before. What did it have to do with him?”
Rainie spoke up. “We think he was with her that night. According to one friend, Mandy may have started drinking early in the evening. I’m not sure I trust the ‘friend,’ however, so Mandy may have still been sober when she met up with her boyfriend, and he was the one who got her intoxicated. Either way, our mystery man tampered with her seat belt so it wouldn’t work. Then, he got in the vehicle with her, strapped himself in so he’d be all right, and … and either let nature run its course or physically helped her hit the telephone pole.”
“He was with her when she crashed?”
“Yes.”
“Oh my God, he killed that old man!” Kimberly slapped a hand over her mouth in horror. She didn’t know why, but somehow that was worse. Mandy was Mandy. She’d built an entire lifestyle on poor decisions and high-risk behavior. When her mother had called her the morning after the accident, Kimberly hadn’t even been surprised. Instead, she remembered thinking, finally, as if part of her had been waiting for that phone call for years. Mandy was always on a course for heartbreak and disaster. That poor old man, however, had just been out walking his dog.
“She didn’t die, though,” Kimberly said after a moment, pulling herself together. “Mandy didn’t actually die. Not then. Shouldn’t that have panicked him?”
“Even if she came out of the coma, what would she know? What would she remember?” Rainie shrugged. “Her body might have recovered, but her brain …”
“So he was safe.”
“I think things pretty much went as he planned.”
“But what about Mom? I can see Mandy being sweet-talked, but not Mom. Definitely not Mom.”
“Think of the circumstances,” Rainie countered. “Bethie’s just buried her older daughter. She’s feeling lonely, struggling to cope. Then we have this man, Tristan Shandling, who dated your sister for months. Consider all the things he could have learned about your mother from Mandy in that amount of time. Her taste in music, food, clothes. Likes, dislikes. It becomes a pretty simple equation. Vulnerable, grieving mother. Well-informed, charming man. I doubt she had a chance.”
“I think he went a step further to gain Bethie’s trust,” Quincy said. “I think … I think he might have pretended to have received an organ transplant. From Mandy.”
“What?” Both Rainie and Kimberly stared at him.
“The last time I spoke with Bethie, she asked me about organ donation. Was there any chance the recipient received more than just tissue? Couldn’t he maybe get some of the person’s habits or feelings or soul? At the time, I dismissed it. It was only today when I had to wonder why she asked.”
“My God,” Rainie murmured. “Elizabeth gave permission to terminate her daughter’s life just weeks ago, and now here comes this man, claiming to have part of Mandy inside of him.”
“It’s very clever,” Quincy said.
“It’s the domino theory,” Kimberly declared. “He started with the weakest one—Mandy. Got to her, then used the trauma of her death to get to Mother and now … now—” She looked at her father and knew his grim face was a match for her own.
“Shit!” Rainie abruptly bolted off the sofa, staring at them both wildly. “The frame-up, Quincy. What we were talking about earlier. Even if it’s not perfect, it doesn’t matter—it still gets the job done. Think about it! Bethie’s been murdered. As her ex-husband, you’re already on the cops’ radar screen, give them a few more lab results and you’ll be their number one man. There you go. Mandy’s death to access Bethie, Bethie’s murder to lead to your arrest, and then boom—Kimberly’s all alone. It’s perfect!”
“But … but you can make bail, right?” Kimberly asked desperately.
Quincy was staring at Rainie. He looked stunned. “It doesn’t matter,” he whispered to his daughter. “Rainie’s right. The minute I become a lead suspect, they’ll notify the Bureau. And following standard protocol, the Bureau will place me on desk duty, ask for my creds and confiscate my weapon. Even if I stay out of jail, what will I be able to do to protect you? My God, he’s done his homework.”
“Who the fuck is this person?” Kimberly screamed.
Nobody had an answer.
18
Greenwich Village, New York City
Things got worse. Quincy wanted his daughter shipped to Europe. Kimberly yelled that she wouldn’t go. Quincy told her now was not the time to be arrogant. Kimberly started laughing, accused the pot of calling the kettle black, then her laughter dissolved into tears, which seemed to hurt Quincy more. He stood in the middle of the dingy TV room, looking stiff and uncomfortable while his daughter wept.
Finally, Rainie sent Quincy to bed. In the past forty-eight hours, he’d had four hours of sleep and he was no longer close to fully functional. Then she brewed a fresh pot of coffee and sat with Kimberly at the kitchen table. The girl was a chip off the old block; she took her caffeine jet black. Rainie found skim milk in the fridge, then a bowl of sugar.
“Don’t laugh,” she told Kimberly, as she added scoop after heaping scoop to the brew. “I hate for the caffeine to be alone in my bloodstream.”
“Has my father seen you do that?”
“Couple of times.”
“How disparaging were his remarks?”
“On a scale of one to ten, I’d rate them a twelve.”
“Oh that’s not bad. My grandfather’s comments would’ve hit fifteen.”
“Your grandfather’s still alive?” Rainie was surprised. Quincy never spoke of his father. For that matter, he never mentioned his mother, though Rainie had a vague memory of him saying once that she’d died when he was young.
Kimberly was blowing clouds of steam off the top of her coffee. “He’s still alive. At least technically. Alzheimer’s. He was hospitalized when I was ten or eleven. We used to visit him several times a year, but we haven’t even done that in a while. He doesn’t recognize any of us anymore, not even Dad, and well … Let’s just say Grandpa isn’t that fond of strangers.”
“That’s gotta be hard. What was he like before?”
“Tough. Quiet. Funny in his own way. We used to drive up to Rhode Island to visit his farm. He had chickens and cows, horses, an apple orchard. Mandy and I loved it. Plenty of space to run around, plenty of things to get into.”
“And your mother was okay with this?” Rainie asked skeptically.
Kimberly smiled. “I wouldn’t say that. I remember one day this hot air balloon comes crashing down from the sky. Some tourist outing or something. And this little guy is yelling at the passengers to grab the branches to help brake as the balloon plows through the apple trees then plunks down in the middle of my grandfather’s field. Mom comes rushing out, all excited. ‘Oh my goodness, did you see that? Oh my goodness.’ Then Grandpa comes out of the chicken coop, stands in front of the balloon holding five embarrassed people and gives them the complete up and down, never saying a word. The guide gets nervous. He holds out this bottle, g
oing on and on about how sorry he is and the tracking vehicle will be here any minute and oh yeah, here’s a bottle of wine for his trouble. Grandpa just looks at the guy. Finally, he says, ‘It’s God’s country.’ Then he walks back to the chicken coop. That’s Grandpa.”
“I like him.” Rainie said it sincerely.
“He was a wonderful grandfather,” Kimberly said. She added more astutely, “But I wouldn’t have cared for him as a father.”
They both returned to their coffee.
“Are you and Dad dating?” Kimberly asked after the silence had stretched on too long.
“That’s it, start with the easy questions.” Rainie sipped her coffee more earnestly.
Kimberly, however, had also inherited her father’s probing stare. “You’re pretty young,” she said.
“I’m aware of that.”
“How old?”
“Thirty-two.”
“Mandy was twenty-four when she died.”
“All the more reason not to let a silly thing like age hold you back.”
“So you are dating?”
Rainie sighed. “In the past, we have dated. What we are now … I don’t know. When Quincy wakes up, do me a favor and ask him.”
“How did you meet?”
“Last year. The Bakersville case.”
“Oh,” Kimberly said with feeling. “That was a bad one.”
“You could say that.”
“You’re the one who lost her job.”
“That would be me.”
Kimberly nodded with a freshly minted psych major’s knowing confidence. “I see the problem.”
“Great. Want to explain it to me?”
“Age alone wouldn’t be reason enough, but now you two are at different phases of the life cycle, which makes the gap even more extreme. You have to rebuild, which puts you back at infancy. He’s established, keeping him middle-aged. That’s a tough gulf to bridge. I think figuring out how to have a successful relationship in the face of such complex career issues will be the challenge of the new, dual-income generation.”
“You’re working on your thesis, aren’t you?”
“My thesis is on ‘Challenges of Modernity: The Growth of Urbanization and Its Impact on Disrupted Personalities,’ thank you very much.”
“Oh. Mine was on attachment disorder. You know, why good families can still breed little fucking psychopaths.”
Kimberly blinked. “Attachment disorder. That’s one of my favorite subjects.” She looked at Rainie more appraisingly. “I didn’t realize you were a psych major.”
“B.A. I never went back for my master’s.”
“Still, that’s pretty cool.”
“Thanks.”
They both returned to their coffee. After a moment, Kimberly said softly, “Rainie, could you keep talking? In all honesty, it’s easier to dissect your life than to think about my own.”
“I’m really sorry, Kimberly.”
“Who’s going to help me plan my wedding? Who will I call when I’m expecting my first child? Who will hold my hand, when I give birth to a baby girl and see Mandy and my mother in every curve of her face?”
“We’ll find out who’s doing this. We’ll find him, and we’ll make him pay.”
“And will that make things better? Look at you and what happened last year. You found the guy who did it. You and my father killed him. Are you better off?”
Rainie didn’t say anything. After a moment, Kimberly said, “I thought as much.”
Quincy dreamed. In his dream he was back in Philadelphia, walking through Bethie’s beautiful, ravaged town house. He held a pillowcase in one hand. He was trying to capture all the feathers and stuff them back in. Then he was standing over the bed, his hands now holding Bethie’s intestines, and trying frantically to pile them back in her body.
Don’t, his subconscious told him in his dream. Don’t let him win by remembering her the way he intended.
His dream spiraled backwards, his mind seeking happier times. Bethie, mussed hair, sweating face. No makeup, no pearls, but a smile that could light up a city as she lay in the white hospital bed and held out their firstborn child. Himself, touching their baby girl delicately. Marveling at the ten perfect fingers, ten perfect toes. Then touching his wife’s cheek. Telling her how beautiful she looked. And vowing that he would be a better father than his own dad had been. Fresh family. Fresh start. His heart, so big in his chest.
Bethie sixteen years later, coming into the family room with a dazed look on her face. She’d been cutting up carrots in the kitchen. The knife had slipped. She now carried her finger in her other hand. Himself, fresh from a California crime scene, twenty-five corpses found in a hillside, fifteen of them young women, two of them babies. Telling his wife, “Oh honey, it’s just a scratch.”
Bethie yelling, “I can’t take it anymore! How did I end up married to a man who is so goddamn cold?”
Time fast-forwarding. He was in Massachusetts, keeping watch on human bait, Tess Williams returning to her old house in the hopes that it would lure her homicidal ex-husband out of hiding. Everything going wrong. Himself now inside the house as shots erupted down the street. Telling Tess not to go near the door. Promising he would keep her safe. Jim Beckett appearing, and blasting him back with a close-range spray from his double-barrel shotgun.
Himself thinking, Wow, I feel so hot, for someone who is so cold. Later, out of the hospital, paring back his work hours, trying to find some balance, picking up the girls for a weekend visit.
“How are you?” he asked Bethie.
“Better.”
“I miss you.”
“No you don’t.”
“Bethie …”
“Go back to work, Pierce. Who needs to be a mere husband, when you can play at being God?”
In his daughter’s two-bedroom apartment, Quincy jerked awake. He lay in the darkened room, watching threads of light from the closed blinds dance with dust in the air, listening to the sounds of the huge city below. “I’m sorry, Elizabeth,” he said.
Then he got up and went to the TV room, where the last living member of his family sat watching M*A*S*H. Rainie was by her side. Her short, reddish-brown hair contrasted with his daughter’s long, dusky blond locks. Her big gray eyes and wide cheekbones rebuffed Kimberly’s own finely patrician face. Yin and yang, he thought, and both so beautiful the sight of them nearly broke his heart. For a moment, he simply stood there, wishing he could stop time, wishing he could take this moment and hold it safe forever in his hand.
“Ladies,” he said. “I have a plan.”
19
Quincy’s House, Virginia
It was early evening on Thursday, and Special Agent Glenda Rodman had yet to return to bed from the night before when she looked at the security monitor and saw Quincy standing outside his front gate. She had slept two hours before receiving the call to come to Philadelphia last night, but that now seemed a lifetime ago. The two hours of sleep were the aberration. The rest of the time, touring the Philadelphia crime scene, then returning to Quincy’s home to listen to message after message promising sick, perverse death, was the norm.
They were up to three hundred and fifty-nine callers. Some Quincy had personally put in jail. Others simply hated feds. Still others were merely bored. Either way, word was definitely out that the thinly disguised ad circulating in so many prison newsletters contained an FBI profiler’s home number. Everyone felt compelled to call. Some, she had to admit, were more imaginative than most. One artistic soul had gone so far as to compose a death rap. It wasn’t half bad.
Glenda hit the button and let Quincy into his own property. The agent wore the same suit from the night before. His features were pale. On the camera, they were also hard to read. Whether he knew it or not, Pierce Quincy was a legend around the Bureau. These days, Glenda felt sorry for the agent. But she felt even more curious about what would happen next.
He knocked on his front door. She kindly let him in.
“I need to gather a few things,” he said.
“Certainly.”
“I’ll check in with Everett next, then I’m leaving town.”
“The Philadelphia P.D. aren’t going to like that.”
“My daughter comes first.” He disappeared into the master bedroom. Moments later, Glenda heard the sound of closet doors opening, as he began to pack a bag.
She wandered into his home office, not sure what to do with herself. It was interesting, she’d been in this house two days now and there wasn’t much here to give a sense of the man who technically occupied the space. Several of the rooms were completely empty. The majority of the walls were bare; the kitchen couldn’t feed a rat. The only room with any atmosphere was this room, the office, and she found herself coming here again and again, if only to escape the starkness of a vast, overwhelmingly white space.
Here was an old sound system that offered mediocre comfort in the shape of classical jazz tapes. A state-of-the-art fax dominated the corner of a beautiful, antique cherry desk. Gold-framed diplomas and academic certificates leaned against one wall, still not hung, but at least unearthed, while cardboard boxes were piled in each corner. The desk chair, black leather, was supple and distinctly expensive. Quincy obviously spent time in this room. Sometimes she caught a whiff of his cologne.
She sat in his chair, feeling like an intruder, as the phone once more began to ring. Following protocol, she let the answering machine pick it up.
“Hey baby,” a voice crooned. “Heard you were trying a new policy of accessibility. I dig that. God knows there isn’t anyone interesting to talk to in here. Bad break about your luscious daughter. Not so sorry about the frigid ex, though. Word on the street is that somebody’s got your number. The hunter has become the hunted. Don’t worry, Quince baby, I got my money on you in the prison pool. Hundred to one odds is just my style. You go, girl. Life hasn’t been this entertaining in ages.”
