Dead Rise: An Alex Penfield Novel

by Robert W. Stephens

  Penfield listened to the words of the minister, but he didn’t believe them. Not for a second. Emma hadn’t been spared from evil, and he doubted she’d found peace. She was gone, and she wasn’t ever coming back. He thought about their last conversation. They’d argued, and it had been his fault. He never should have brought Atwater into the investigation. He never should have gotten involved himself.

  Yes, he’d told himself that it was better to go on the offensive than sit back and wait for another one of Atwater’s prophesies to come true. There had been another course of action, though. He could have just walked away and never looked back. That was the path he’d already been on regardless of the phone call. Everything he’d ever had was gone. He’d thought that he’d reached the point of ruin before Atwater’s call, but it had actually gotten worse. Now another friend was dead, and he was partially to blame.

  Penfield looked out over the cemetery. It was located in Smithfield, Virginia, which was the home of Emma’s parents. He remembered her telling him that during their brief romance together. She’d described Smithfield as a quiet and ideal place to grow up, but she’d always longed for something more. Now he thought she should have stayed here and found her own small piece of that stillness, but he understood the call to help others and to make a difference. The call was relentless sometimes, but it never paid you back. It was an ungrateful and cruel master that took everything until there was nothing left to give. Then it would somehow take more.

  Penfield had been to Smithfield many times, but he didn’t remember ever driving by this cemetery. It was located on a hill overlooking a small body of water. He’d overheard someone say that her parents had bought her burial plot beside the one they’d reserved for themselves. It hadn’t been something they’d ever thought they’d have to do. No parent expects to bury their child, but Penfield had seen it many times.

  The funeral service was attended by over two hundred people. Many of them were in the dress uniforms of the Gloucester County Sheriff’s Department. There were also over a dozen cops from the Hampton City Police Department where she’d used to work. Penfield recognized them since he’d worked there, too. He assumed some of them had spotted him as well, but no one came over to greet him.

  Penfield did his best not to fall into a pit of despair from which he might not ever be able to climb out. He tried to concentrate on the words of the minister. He hoped there would be something he might say that could help him make sense of this senseless act, but it didn’t work. The minister went on and on about God’s will being mysterious. It was a convenient excuse of the faithful, Penfield thought. Can’t figure something out? Don’t know why something so terrible would happen to someone so good? Don’t worry. God works in mysterious ways, Penfield muttered to himself.

  The minister continued to speak about Emma’s dedication to helping people, as well as her reward in Heaven for her good deeds on earth. The words were driving Penfield mad, and he wanted to scream out. He wanted to let the group know that the minister was lying. Yes, Emma had been a good person, one of the best he’d ever met. That didn’t matter anymore.

  Penfield couldn’t stop thinking about that warehouse where she’d been tortured, her head smashed in with a hammer. That was really her reward. Put your life on the line for others. We’ll repay you with a closed casket. The world hadn’t deserved her. That was the only real truth to this matter.

  “’Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted.’ Matthew five, verse four,” the minister said.

  Penfield made his way to the back of the large crowd. He spent the remainder of the service staring past the group and gazing at the water below the hill. The surface of the water was smooth, and Penfield could see the clouds reflected in it. They were moving quickly due to the strong wind. It was a beautiful sight, yet he had a hard time letting that beauty touch him.

  He thought back to the beginning of the case. It had all started with the water. A call from Atwater. A dream about Penfield’s body floating face down. Yet he was still alive, and Emma was dead. He doubted he’d ever be able to reconcile what had happened even if he lived another one hundred years.

  “’The Lord is my shepherd. I lack nothing. He makes me lie down in green pastures. He leads me beside quiet waters. He refreshes my soul. He guides me along the right paths for his name’s sake. Even though I walk through the darkest valley, I will fear no evil, for you are with me, your rod and your staff they comfort me. You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies. You anoint my head with oil. My cup overflows. Surely your goodness and love will follow me all the days of my life, and I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever.’ Psalm 23.”

  The minister concluded the service, and Penfield took one last look at Emma’s coffin. He then looked at her parents. Both of them had blank expressions. Their world had been destroyed, and he thought he knew the exact questions they were asking themselves. How do we move forward? Is there any way we can recover from this?

  Penfield turned from the crowd and walked down the hill to his car without saying a word to anyone. He climbed inside, started the engine, and cranked the heat to warm his body. The wind had been relentless on that hill, and the cold seemed to have gone all the way to the deepest parts of his bones.

  He didn’t put the car in drive. Instead, he just sat there and looked at the crowd as they slowly came toward the long, narrow road where everyone had parked. His phone vibrated on the passenger seat. It was Atwater.

  “Hello,” Penfield said.

  “I’m sorry I wasn’t able to make her funeral, Alex. I’m still trying to recover from everything that’s happened.”

  “How are you doing?”

  “The boy’s gone, if that’s what you’re really asking. I haven’t seen him since that morning in the hotel room.”

  Penfield paused.

  Then he asked, “Did we really see him?”

  “Not every being is created equal, Alex. Certain animals can hear things on different frequencies than humans can. Does that mean they made it up, that they imagined it?”

  “Is that what you really think? That we can see things on a different frequency?”

  “I don’t know how to explain it, not in a way to someone who has never experienced it. People are afraid of what they don’t understand. They refuse to admit that something they don’t know about can actually exist. Don’t let their fears make you question yourself. Trust in yourself. You saw that boy. I did, too. He showed us the truth. That’s the only way you were able to uncover it.”

  “So where is he now? Does he just go away?”

  “I don’t know. I suspect he’s still there. His energy is on that water. It will probably never leave. I think that’s why Bobby Tatum killed his father on that boat. I think they used it many years ago to take the boy’s body out to the bay and dispose of it. Bobby couldn’t live with his guilt, so he took his own life.”

  Penfield didn’t respond to Atwater’s theory. He’d come to a similar conclusion himself, but he didn’t feel like debating the investigation, at least not now.

  He sat there and continued to look at the people leaving the funeral. He saw Slater talking with to an elderly couple, but he didn’t recognize them. Maybe they were relatives of Emma’s. Maybe they were an aunt and uncle. Perhaps they were family friends. Penfield watched as Slater smiled and patted the older man on the shoulder. How could the man possibly smile after what he’d seen? Penfield asked himself.

  “Is this the last time we’re going to talk, Alex?”

  Atwater’s question snapped Penfield back to the phone call.

  “What do you mean?”

  “You’re going away, aren’t you?”

  “There’s nothing for me here.”

  “Where will you go?”

  “I don’t know. I have a friend in D.C. I’ll probably stay with him for a while. Who knows after that?”

  “You can’t run away from it, Alex.”

  “Run away from what?”


  “You were meant to help people. That will never change, wherever you are.”

  Penfield didn’t respond. He saw what happened when you put yourself out for others. You got nothing but pain in return.

  “Goodbye, Alex. Please take care of yourself.”

  Atwater ended the call before Penfield could say anything more.

  He thought back again to that night Atwater had called him. He’d known things that he shouldn’t have, but how? What was this strange connection the two men had with each other? Henry Atwater had found him as a boy, trapped in a wooden box and buried six feet under the ground. Now he was still finding him in a way. He was still trying to save him, but why?

  Penfield did his best to push Atwater out of his thoughts. It was time for him to leave and get lost in the world, but first, he had one more task left to complete. He turned the ignition off and climbed out of the car. He walked back up the hill, but he didn’t go over to the remaining group of mourners. Instead, he made his way over to a woman in a long, black coat. He’d seen her standing at the top of the hill and looking down at the funeral. At first, he’d thought she was there to visit a deceased relative of her own. Now he realized he knew exactly who she was.

  Penfield approached the woman. She turned to him as he stopped beside her.

  “Hello, Mrs. Tatum. May I have a moment of your time?”

  “I knew you’d be back.”

  She looked at Emma’s casket, at least that’s where Penfield thought she was looking. Then she turned back to him.

  “I’ll tell you everything,” she said.

  Chapter 32

  Punishment

  Twenty-Nine, November.

  Penfield stood in front of the tree and looked up at the limb where he’d found the cardboard box with Emma’s ear inside. He turned as he heard the sound of a car approaching. The dark blue sedan parked at the curb, and Sheriff Slater climbed out a moment later.

  Slater walked toward Penfield. They met just in front of Ben Hall’s gravestone. Slater looked down at the marker.

  “I haven’t been here since his funeral.”

  He turned to Penfield.

  “How long were you two partners?” Penfield asked.

  “Over twenty years.”

  “People don’t understand the bond between partners. Sometimes it seems like it’s even more intense than a marriage.”

  “You put your life in their hands. They do the same for you. That’s not what you had, though, is it?”

  “You spoke with my former captain. You know it wasn’t.”

  “Tell me something. Did you know what your partner was doing, and you just looked the other way until she came for you?”

  “I didn’t know.”

  “I guess that means you were either a lousy detective or you chose to be blind.”

  “I was good enough. I assume I still am.”

  “What does it matter? You’re out of the game.”

  “There’s something I figured out in these last few years. You’re never out of it, not fully.”

  “If you say so. Now you want to tell me why I’m out here? Why couldn’t we just meet in my office?”

  “I assumed you’d rather do it out here.”

  “Do what?” Slater asked.

  “There’s something interesting that happens when someone loses almost everything. I’ve seen it happen many times. People fight for that remaining piece of something. Maybe it’s a relationship. Maybe it’s something that is more symbolic than anything else. But the opposite can also happen. I’ve seen people just give up. You can literally see them break right in front of you, and they tell you everything.”

  “Just say it, and stop wasting my time.”

  “I spoke with Sally Tatum again. After you killed Wilton, I guess she felt like she had nothing left to protect.”

  “The woman’s under enormous pressure. A dead husband. Two dead sons. How fast did it all take place, just a few weeks?”

  “When I went to see her in that trailer, she kept calling you Lucas. Not Sheriff Slater. Why do you suppose that is?”

  “Gloucester isn’t as formal as you might expect it to be.”

  “Maybe so, but she clearly knows you. She told me about the day her son, Jimmy, died. She said she didn’t expect Lucas to show up. Seems like she knew you back then, too.”

  “I’ve known many of these people my whole life. Born and raised here. What’s so strange about that?”

  “Nothing. Nothing at all. Only you knew Sally a bit better than most.”

  Slater didn’t respond.

  “You’re not going to deny it?” Penfield asked.

  “I was a younger man then. I made mistakes. I’m sure you did, too.”

  “She told me about the affair. She told me Jimmy was your son. Did you know that then or was it only after Jimmy died?”

  “That kid wasn’t my son,” Slater said, and Penfield could hear the venom in his voice.

  “Why? Because of the way he looked?”

  “He wasn’t my son.”

  “She said she was working as a waitress in a bar to make extra money for the family. She said you and Ben would come into the bar after work. These things happen all the time. The woman’s husband has stopped paying attention to her. Maybe she never gets a compliment from him. Hell, maybe he even beats her. Then some other guy comes along. Doesn’t matter if he’s married, too. He starts telling her how nice she looks, how pretty she is, how she deserves to be treated so much better.”

  “It was a long time ago.”

  “Doesn’t change the fact that it happened. You and Sally had an affair. She said it lasted for more than a year. You got her pregnant. She knew it was yours because she hadn’t been with her husband for months. So she has sex with him one night when he’s a little bit drunk to try to pass the pregnancy off as his.”

  “That bitch actually came to me and said she expected me to leave my wife. Can you believe that? I’m going to leave my wife for Sally Tatum?”

  “She said she didn’t know when her husband began to suspect the kid might not be his. She said he just never took a liking to him. It didn’t really surprise her because he was such a bastard to all his kids, but he seemed to have even more resentment toward Jimmy. Then the kid gets this facial disease, and he feels like his family is cursed. Bill Tatum was a very superstitious man. His wife stepped out in sin, and now this boy’s deformity was the punishment. It’s pure bullshit, but it’s what he believes, and belief can be a powerful thing. Tell me what happened that morning when Jimmy died.”

  “You already know. The boy fell out of a tree. Broke his neck. He was dead the moment he hit the ground.”

  “Only his mother says that Jimmy didn’t die right away. He was alive when you and Ben got there.”

  Slater laughed.

  “Is this the point where you accuse me of killing him? You just said he was my son. Now I killed my own son?”

  “No. You didn’t kill him, but you saw who did. Bill confessed it all years later. He got drunk, and he beat the hell out of his wife. He tells her the truth while she’s lying on their living room floor. Says he told Bobby and Wilton to push their brother out of the tree. They didn’t want to do it, but they were scared of their father. They would do anything he told them to do, even if it meant killing their own brother. They waited for Jimmy to get high in that tree behind their house. Then Bobby pushed him off the limb. His friend, Buddy, was there, too. Maybe he just showed up, and he had no idea what was going to happen. Maybe they told him in advance, but these three kids watched as Jimmy fell to the ground. Maybe he would have eventually died from that fall, but he was still alive when Bill came out of the house. He was still alive when you and Ben got there, and you two just stood there and watched Bill smother Jimmy.”

  “Is that what she told you? She wasn’t even outside. She didn’t see anything.”

  “Why didn’t you stop him? Was it because he was getting rid of a problem for you both?”
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br />   “Fuck you. You have no idea what you’re talking about. This is all just hearsay and guesswork on your part.”

  “Did Ben know that Jimmy was really your kid, or did you tell him afterward? I didn’t know Ben anywhere as well as you did, but he seemed like an honest man. Maybe he wasn’t, though. Maybe he was willing to look the other way when it came to his partner,” Penfield said.

  “You’re gonna stand in front of the man’s grave and insult him like that? You’re lucky I don’t knock you out right now.”

  “I think you and Bill Tatum came to an understanding. Maybe it didn’t even need to be spoken. You’d pretend you didn’t see anything, and Bill wouldn’t tell your wife what you’d done with Sally. You knew damned well if you arrested him for murder the truth would all come out.”

  “You know what? Your damned story would be pretty amusing if this all wasn’t so serious. People are dead because some sick bastard decided he wanted to make people look like him. It’s time to end all this and move on.”

  “Sally knew all this time that Wilton was alive. He called her when the symptoms first started to appear. They both knew what it meant. They’d seen it happen before.”

  “So that just means she’s as guilty as he is. She sat back and watched her kid murder innocent people.”

  “You knew what Wilton wanted when he told me to tell you to confess. You knew exactly what he meant, but you did nothing.”

  “How was I supposed to know it was him? I thought he was dead. Everyone did.”

  “You knew this had something to do with Jimmy Tatum. How could you not know the moment Ben was murdered? You’d both looked the other way, and it came back to haunt you.”

  “You don’t get to judge me. You don’t have the right to stand there and act all superior to me, not after the things you’ve done. You talk about letting innocents die. What the hell did you do? How many died because you looked the other way with your partner?”