Out of Time (Nine Minutes #2)

by Beth Flynn

  “How long were you in there?”

  “Almost three hours,” Guido said seriously. “I checked everything and everywhere. The attic, the walls, the mattresses.” He paused. “I also made sure nobody would notice the search. You know I know how to handle this kind of thing without causing attention, right?”

  “Yeah,” was all Grizz said.

  “This is all that was there.” He handed the book over the desk to Grizz.

  It was a Bible. Grizz opened it and saw the inscription on the first page. The name Guinevere Love Lemon was neatly printed in what was obviously a child’s handwriting. Kit’s handwriting.

  “You went through the entire fucking house and this is all you found of hers?”

  “That’s it. There wasn’t a framed picture, a stuffed animal, an old report card, or a drawing. Nothing. My ex-wife used to keep all her kid’s drawings on the refrigerator. They were all over our house. It’s like Kit never existed. Her old bedroom was set up like an office or something. Didn’t even have a bed in it. Guess when she left, they really cleared her stuff out. You remember when I got her guitar at that garage sale, a lot of her stuff was out there with it. That was, what? Five years ago? Guess Delia just got rid of everything.” Guido shrugged. “Well, except for a few things. There are a couple of mementos in the back of the book.”

  He nodded at the Bible that was now sitting on Grizz’s desk.

  Grizz leafed through the pages and pulled out what was stuck between them. He stared at the picture and stiffened. It was a picture of Kit when she was young. He looked on the back. It wasn’t dated, but he knew it was during that time when she wasn’t being fed properly. He could tell by the hollowness in her cheeks. Her big brown eyes stared back at him. She had dark circles beneath them.

  This was the only picture Delia had kept of her daughter?

  Grizz then looked at the other item tucked in with the picture. It was several pieces of paper, some notebook paper, some copy paper, folded in half and held together with a thin paper clip. He unfolded them and read the handwritten note first. It was three pages long and written in neat script on notebook paper. He skimmed the first couple of paragraphs, then set the papers aside. Next he turned his attention to the four pieces of paper attached to it with a paper clip. Something on one of the pages caught his attention. He squinted in concentration, his brows furrowed.

  “The note explains it,” Guido said. “You have to read the whole thing, though.” Guido grimaced. Shit. Maybe it wasn’t such a good idea to tell Grizz he’d read it.

  Grizz reread the handwritten note. Finally, he murmured, “This is beautiful. This is fucking beautiful.”

  The letter and documents sure explained some things. It also tied in with what Steven Marcus had told him all those years ago. Marcus, the scumbag who’d been abusing his kid. The boy Kit used to babysit. Marcus had come clean about what he had on Delia, but he didn’t mention this. Maybe he’d never looked into it because it wasn’t as big as Delia’s real secret. Or he’d never found it because the note explained Delia had just received some of this recently.

  Grizz folded the pieces of paper back up and tucked them, along with the picture, back into the Bible. Handing it back to Guido, he said, “Hold on to this for me. Keep it in a safe place.”

  Then he leaned back in his chair and laughed. “Delia,” he said out loud. “You clever, fucking piece of shit.” Then he laughed harder.

  Chapter Sixty

  2000

  Ginny silently watched Tommy as he drove them back to Carter’s.

  “Don’t say it, Ginny. That asshole had it coming.”

  She didn’t say anything. Didn’t know what to say. She’d seen Tommy mad before. She knew he’d nailed a grown man to a fence when he was sixteen. She’d seen him beat the daylights out of those two men at Razor’s. But she could honestly say she’d never seen him show any violence to anybody, not once since she’d married him. Why had he behaved so harshly to Joyner? Why the last minute decision to crush the man’s hand? Was it anger that had been pent up for years and the stress of the last few days that all just made him explode?

  She didn’t know what to think, but she did know one thing for certain. If it wasn’t obvious before, it was obvious now that he was his father’s son.

  They had talked over dinner. She was still curious about his conversation with Grizz before the execution. She knew she was asking him to repeat himself, but it was important to her to know Grizz died peacefully. Not with any pent-up anger in his heart.

  They’d arrived back at Carter’s to find Jason was still out back helping her with the animals.

  “He doesn’t even know you left,” Casey said. She gave Ginny a questioning glance. She was curious about Ginny’s last statement before they left for dinner.

  “I’ll tell you about it later,” Ginny said, slinging her purse on the counter. “It’s a long story.”

  “I’m gonna see if they’re hungry.” Casey slipped out, leaving them alone.

  “So you won’t be coming home with me and Jason tonight.” Tommy said quietly.

  It was a statement, not a question. She didn’t answer him.

  “Ginny, please, honey.” He turned to her. “I know you can’t come home tonight. Maybe you won’t come home this week. But I need to know our marriage is good. That this is just time you need to yourself to absorb all of this. Please, Gin—you’re not concerned about our marriage, right? We have a solid marriage, right?”

  She just stared without saying anything.

  “When you come home, I’ll tell you the rest,” he promised. “And I think we should consider moving. We can even leave Florida. Start fresh somewhere new. How about the Carolinas?”

  “The rest?” Ginny shot him a look. “And now you have us moving? Tommy, we can’t just pick the kids up and leave. What about school? What about your job?”

  “We have enough saved to live comfortably until I get a new job. The kids will be fine. They’ll make new friends in new schools. Ginny, let’s sell this house, too. Let’s get rid of it all and start over. Please.”

  They were interrupted by Jason and the women coming in the back door. Jason walked out to the living room where they were standing.

  “Aunt Casey’s going to make me a grilled cheese,” Jason said, running to his mother and hugging her tightly around her waist. “You’re coming home tonight, right Mom?” He looked up at her, then over at his father. “You’re both going to come home, right?”

  Tommy looked at Ginny with a pleading expression.

  Ginny ruffled her son’s hair. “I don’t think so, sweetie. Casey has to head back to her job, and Bill is still going to be gone. Carter sure could use my help.”

  Jason was starting to protest when Casey yelled out, “Jason! Come help me with your grilled cheese!”

  With a shrug, he closed his mouth and headed for the kitchen.

  But Tommy wouldn’t stop wheedling her about coming home. Finally she’d had enough.

  “No!” she bellowed, so loud Tommy shot a quick glance toward the kitchen. No one came; they must have gone back outside to eat. “Stop asking me, Tommy. Do you realize I have not made a decision for myself in twenty-five years other than which bookkeeping clients to take on or what to make for dinner or where we’ll go on vacation? Stop badgering me. I’ll come home when I’m good and ready.”

  He was so shocked at her outburst, which was rare, that he actually took a step back and just stared at her.

  But she wasn’t done. “I have never made a significant or important choice for myself. Not ever. I didn’t choose to be with Grizz. He chose me.” She spat the words. “And I don’t even know what to say about the night I lost my virginity.”

  She said the last sentence in a hushed whisper as she looked toward the patio, then back at Tommy. “Yes, I got to go to college, but I always felt like it was on Grizz’s terms, not mine. It took a lot of convincing. I couldn’t go dancing unless Axel took me. I couldn’t do anything by myself.
And then, even after he got arrested, he told me to marry you. He guilted me into it. He told me that if I really loved him, I would do it. Don’t get me wrong, it was the right thing. At least I used to think that. Now I’m not so sure. But again, it wasn’t my choice.”

  She knew her words cut. She didn’t care.

  He knew she was right. There was always somebody, either Grizz or himself, influencing her. Even that day he convinced her to go back to Grizz after finding her at the church involved scheming on his part. He felt a quick stab of guilt.

  “If you really want to save our marriage, I’m telling you now you need to give me space.” Her tone was softer now, and she was gazing at him with those big brown doe eyes. “You have just presented me with a list of too-crazy-to-believe stories. Not to mention the knowledge that I’ve been duped over and over again for practically my entire life. And do I believe you about any of them? Honestly, I want to, but I just don’t know, Tommy. Do you understand me?”

  He could only nod.

  She started filling him in on some household things. Informed him of what she knew was on the schedule for Mimi and Jason. She was glad he’d taken the week off. It would help her to gather her thoughts guilt-free while staying at Carter’s.

  She thought of something then, but wasn’t sure if she should bring it up. Curiosity got the best of her.

  “Moe’s journal. Have you been reading it?”

  “A little.”

  “Anything I need to know?” she asked. “Should I read it?”

  “Honestly, Gin, I don’t know if you should read it. I don’t know what good it’ll do. So far, it’s nothing really bad, I guess. Not exactly nice, but hey. That’s life.” He gave a small smile. “She keeps talking to someone named Elizabeth.”

  “What?”

  “Elizabeth. Beats me. All the entries, they all start out the same. ‘Dear Elizabeth.’”

  “Did we ever know her mother or sister’s names?”

  Before Tommy could reply, Jason‘s voice came from behind them. “Just like the horse!”

  Ginny and Tommy turned around.

  “What?” Ginny asked him. “What horse?”

  “Elizabeth!” Jason said, nodding now. “That’s the name of the brown horse in the picture that’s in your bedroom. The horse has a little ribbon on it, like it won an award or something. The ribbon says Elizabeth. If you look real close, you can see it.”

  Chapter Sixty-One

  2000

  Alone in the house, Tommy sat in the bed he shared with Ginny. It had been a little over a week since she’d gone to Carter’s. She hadn’t come home yet. Maybe she would never come home.

  He couldn’t say he blamed her, especially after all the things he’d told her. They had done quite a bit more talking on the phone, but he still hadn’t told her everything. Ginny still didn’t know Jan had accused him of setting up Grizz all those years ago. But he wanted to tell her that in person. He needed to gauge her reaction. It wasn’t true and he needed to make certain she believed him.

  Tommy blew out a long breath and reached for the journal that had been sitting on his nightstand. Holding it, he studied the picture proudly displayed over Mavis’s chess set in the alcove in their bedroom. It was the picture Moe had given Ginny that first Thanksgiving, when she’d begged out of going to Blue’s. Ginny had kept it all these years, had it custom-framed and everything.

  At Carter’s, they’d both been shocked to hear Jason blurt out that Elizabeth was the horse in Moe’s drawing. It made sense; Jason loved that picture. He used to stare at it when he was younger. Of course he would notice the small ribbon they had overlooked for years.

  Tommy snorted to himself. The irony was them trying to live their lives as if there had never been a gang, and here they had a damn shrine set up in their bedroom. He shook his head and took a sip of the beer he had carried in with him. He sat back against the headboard and opened the journal.

  **********

  Moe’s Diary, 1978

  Dear Elizabeth,

  It wasn’t supposed to happen like that. She wasn’t supposed to be hurt. I promise she wasn’t supposed to be hurt. Wendy swore to me when I gave the signal that the coast was clear, somebody was going to come and kidnap her back and take her to the police station. They’d find out where she came from, and Grizz would probably go to jail for kidnapping. I wanted to get him back for what he did to me. That’s all. I didn’t want that man to do what he did to her. She didn’t deserve that!

  I think Wendy must have planned all along for the guy to torture her. When I went in her room the next morning to get the dog food, I didn’t have any idea she’d be there. She was supposed to be gone. But it was awful, Elizabeth. I thought she was dead! Then, when Damien found Gwinny, I wanted to die myself.

  I can’t believe that guy did that to Kit and then killed Gwinny, too. I didn’t mean for any of it to happen, Elizabeth. I swear it wasn’t supposed to happen like that. Wendy told me Grizz would get what he had coming to him. He was supposed to go to jail and she was supposed to go home. Wendy said it would be tit for tat.

  **********

  Tommy almost spit out his beer when he read the passage. “No way. No fucking way. I don’t believe it.”

  How had he not seen it then? Was he so absorbed in Ginny for so many years that he’d missed the obvious? He swiped his hand through his hair. Chicky must’ve figured it out, too. That’s why she didn’t want Grizz to know about the journal. Chicky was worried for someone. Who?

  Realization slowly dawned.

  He knew Wendy, the person responsible for setting up Ginny’s attack all those years ago. He knew exactly who she was. He heaved his beer at the wall, the shatter and fizz a welcome release. Elizabeth and her unnoticed ribbon crashed to the small table that was sitting below it, scattering Mavis’s chess pieces everywhere.

  Chapter Sixty-Two

  2000

  The woman looked at her watch as she threw some last minute things into her briefcase. She had an important meeting this morning and she couldn’t be late. The day was perfectly planned. Like a well-oiled machine, she meticulously organized each day down to the minute. Her planner was open on the kitchen counter. She took a minute to look at it as she sipped the last of her coffee. Work appointments were written in black. Family appointments were written in red. Soccer game, ballet recital, pick up her husband’s suits at the dry cleaners. No, she would take that off her list. His secretary could pick up his dry cleaning.

  After updating her list, she closed her day planner and tossed it in her briefcase. She put her coffee cup in the dishwasher, added some soap to the dispenser, and pressed start. She went to the refrigerator and took the crock pot out, carefully placing it into the warmer on the counter, and plugged it in. There. Dinner will be ready at six and I can make Cheryl’s ballet recital with time to spare. She carefully surveyed her kitchen. All cleaned up. The babysitter would be here when the kids got off the bus from summer camp. Her oldest was spending a week in Arizona with a high school friend that had moved there over the summer. The younger two knew the chores they needed to do when they got home. All she had left was to go back into the bedroom and get her shoes on.

  She smiled as she made her way there. She was happy and content. Her kids were healthy, smart, and talented. Stan was a great husband and father. He was a highly respected and sought-after surgeon who’d received job offers from around the world. Of course, she would never allow him to accept a job away from South Florida. She’d worked too hard to make her hometown exactly as she wanted it. Clean of the evil and corruption she’d known since she was a child.

  She felt enormous pride in the job offers Stan was getting, but this was home and always would be. She was a registered nurse by profession and had been a damn good one. She was certain that was how she’d caught Stan’s eye. After she’d become burned out by the emotional and physical aspects of caring for patients, Stan suggested she go into administration. She had been there ever since. With Stan
’s salary and success, she didn’t need to work, but she wanted to.

  She glanced around her beautiful and organized house and had to agree it had been the right career choice. She ran her home and her office with almost perfect precision.

  Shoes on and grabbing her briefcase out of the kitchen, she was getting ready to go through the door that led into the garage when the doorbell rang.

  Who could this be? It was eight-thirty in the morning. Probably Mrs. Kravitz, she decided. Yes, there was actually a real, live Mrs. Kravitz who lived in her neighborhood. Just like the nosy neighbor on that old television sitcom from the sixties. They had a new mail carrier who’d been occasionally transposing their addresses. Mrs. Kravitz wasn’t really nosy; she was just lonely and always used the excuse to return the mail in person instead of just sticking it in the mailbox. She opened the front door.

  “Hi,” was all he said.

  “Hi,” she answered, a little stunned. He never just showed up without calling. Was something wrong? Was his family okay? Was her family okay?

  “I need to talk to you.”

  “Not now, Tommy. It’ll have to wait. I have a meeting first thing.”

  “It can’t wait.”

  “What? What’s wrong?” He was acting very serious and it was starting to unnerve her.