I try to quiet my nerves. Maintain my game face. Which means I shouldn’t—I can’t—I won’t—think about Trey. Or Cassie. Or most especially, Butch. And the fact that Sebastian had been telling the truth about him. Agent Hopkins had confirmed it for me after group. Yep, him and his roommate. Caught ’em red-handed.
I’d waited twenty-three years to turn my rock—to expose the worms writhing beneath it—and I’d done it for a liar. I’m sorry, Jared. Because a lie of omission is still a lie.
“You know about the picture too? I guess they tell you everything.”
My nod is curt, sharp as a hatchet. “That’s how treatment works. It’s called the containment model.”
“And I’m the one who needs containing?”
“Well, yes. Considering what happened last night, don’t you?”
“It didn’t have anything to do with Sasha. Or sex. Or—”
“What did it have to do with then?”
“I told you in group. We just went for a walk. It’s not like we were out painting the town…” Something about the slight upturn of his lips bothers me. Like an itch I can’t scratch. “Butch suggested it. He said he needed to clear his head, that they never check our rooms after lights-out anyway.”
Game face, Evie. Game face. “You disabled your GPS device.”
“Those things are always breaking down. You know that.”
“Your PO said they inspected it down at the station. It was working fine.” He shrugged. “And the picture you had? It was of your stepfamily, right? You and Sasha. Your mother and her father.”
“It’s not what you think.”
“Tell me, what do I think?”
“Probably that I was up in my room jacking off to teenaged Sasha. That I’m obsessed with her or something.”
I held off on confirming his suspicions. But I couldn’t not think it. I’d seen the letter in his file. The victim statement from Sasha herself. The way he’d followed her around like a puppy. Cute at first, her kid stepbrother. Then, he became something else entirely. Sneaking in and peeking at her in the shower, claiming it was an accident. Dedicating that creepy song to her—Depeche Mode—every weekend. Following her and her boyfriend. Watching her like she was under his microscope, the only one in the room.
“So, what were you doing with it? Your parole agent said it had been partially destroyed.” Desecrated. That was the word Agent Hopkins had used. Then, he’d added, I’m no therapist, but the guy’s got anger issues.
“Destroyed?” Sebastian gives a sarcastic snort. “Yeah, like my life. Here lies Delacourt’s dignity.” He makes the sign of the cross. “May it rest in peace.”
Rest in peace. The words echoed back, taunting me from the past in Trey’s gravelly voice. Just before he’d dropped me at Port in a Storm to fend for myself, he’d caught me staring at his tattoo. At the letters he’d inked above my mother’s name.
“You like it? I added it on myself this mornin’. Go on. Touch it.” The thought had disgusted me, but I’d figured if I didn’t do it myself he’d make me, and that was worse. Way worse. So I’d traced the angry R with the tip of my finger, knowing I’d scrub it raw the instant I got inside. “You know she wasn’t never at peace. Ain’t no such thing, Evie. Not in this world.”
My heart thrashes in my chest, beats against my ribs like the desperate wings of a wild bird. Because I know it in an instant. It’s not a memory. It’s a feeling, an instinct. How wrong I’d been and for so long. I want to scream it until my throat goes numb. Until time shatters and my thirteen-year-old self can hear me. As sure as I’d known Arlene Allcott was dead the moment Trey had coaxed me out of the bathroom that day—rest in peace, Mom—I know Cassie wasn’t.
Butch
May 9, 1994
Four days before I killed her
I woke up at one in the afternoon, totally hungover, to the blare of police sirens. So loud and so close, they got inside my head, driving out my eyeballs, splitting my skull in two. I stood up too fast, and the room went spinning like those tops Jesse used to play with. Round and round and round she goes, where she stops nobody knows. The rhyme made me think of Gwen—her tongue in my mouth, her hips grinding on mine—and the room got still again. My back ached. Hell, my teeth and skin hurt too. Like I’d slept in a tub of acid. And I nearly bit it on the single Doc Marten I’d kicked off right in front of the bed. Apparently I’d been too drunk to take off the other shoe, because it was still on my foot, unlaced. I hobbled to the window and pulled back the curtain. When the sun streamed in, I felt like a vampire. Blinded and half-dead.
I closed my eyes, and my brain sputtered to the start. Music hour at the Port with Gwen. Getting hammered on stolen tequila. After that, I couldn’t remember much. The rest was fuzzy white like an overexposed photograph. Except the one thing. I pushed it away, out to sea like a bloated body.
Lifting my eyelids took real effort—they felt stapled shut—but I did it. I looked outside. And I couldn’t imagine a worse feeling—the glare off the sidewalk, the flashing red and blue lights, the goddamned siren nobody bothered to shut off—or a better one. Trey Waters in handcuffs, dancing cheek to cheek with the hood of a cop car.
I put my forehead against the windowpane and stared. It felt warm from the sun. A wave of nausea came and went as Trey writhed and bucked like an animal in a trap, and the officer jostled him to the pavement. I forced my eyes to follow, grating against their sockets. I needed to see more. And when the girl’s face appeared on the other side of the glass, I screamed.
“Shh.” She held a finger to her lips. “Open your door.”
“Jesus Christ, you scared the shit out of me.” My voice was too loud for my own head. And that scream. My scream. It might as well have been a bullet.
“Please, Calder. Let me in. I’m Evie’s friend.”
I unlatched the chain, unlocked the bolt, cracked the door, and slumped back toward the bed, exhausted. The outside air felt cool as a compress. So I lay there, watching the slice of blue sky get bigger and bigger and smaller again as Cassie floated into my room and shut the door behind her.
“Are you sick?” she asked.
I started to nod, but my head was bowling-ball heavy. “Drunk still, I think.”
“Do you know who I am?”
“Cassie. Right?” She didn’t say anything as she walked over to the window, watching just the way I had. “What happened over there?”
“I don’t know. Trey told me to go to room 120…he wanted me to…to see this guy there. But I couldn’t do it, so I just hid out behind the motel for a while. And then I heard the sirens, and the cops showed up.”
When she turned back toward me, I saw her face in the sunlight. The split in her lip like a furrow in the ground. The blue kiss of a bruise on her cheek. How young she looked, but also how old. And the room started spinning again, so I looked away.
My eyes rested on the flesh-toned wall. It was the exact shade of the peach crayon, and it reminded me of Evie. I’d forgotten to take the picture she’d drawn. I felt impossibly, ridiculously sad. “Did Trey do that to you?”
“What do you think?” Cassie jutted out her hip, rolled her eyes.
“I think you’re in way too much trouble to act like a smart-ass.”
She paced to the dresser and back to the window again. I realized she was barefoot. “He’s gone,” she said, finally. “The cops are gone too.”
“You can’t stay here. Trey will make bail. He’ll be back.” Evie’s words, that cop at the Port—the pieces swam together in my pickled brain—it made sense now. She’d told him something about Trey. “And he’s gonna be pissed.”
“Who said I want to stay?”
She sits on the bed, and the mattress sways like a ship rocking beneath me. Something warm and sour oozes up my throat, and I swallow it.
“I feel so stupid,” she says. “Evie’s gonna
hate me. She tried to warn me about him.”
“She doesn’t hate you.”
“Did she say that?”
“Trust me. She doesn’t.”
“Can you talk to her for me? She likes you, you know. She told me you were her boyfriend.” Then with a smirk, she added, “You know, you’d make a really sucky boyfriend, Calder.”
I laughed at Cassie’s remark—and at Evie’s crush—to drown out Gwen’s shrieking, her finger pointed in my face, but it was too late. The body I’d pushed out to sea had floated back. And it pulled me under…
“I heard you asked Cherice to ride with you at the party. Is that true?” I’d been too drunk to lie.
“You were out of it. Totally whacked. I didn’t tell you to use that shit. What was I supposed to do?”
“Oh, gee, I don’t know. Not get some other girl—who clearly has the hots for you, by the way—to fill in for me. But I guess that was too much to ask. I get it though. You want to slum it with the hired help.” Her lips, loosened, let her lie slip out. But she was too far gone to realize. “Pity screw…poor little Cherice with the scar on—”
“At least she’s not a whack job like you.”
It had happened so fast. I wasn’t sure what had come first. The slap across my face, Gwen’s hand hot with shame. The word, thick with spit, hurled from my mouth. Bitch! Or the shove. More of a ram, really. And harder than I’d intended. Because it had launched Gwen back against the window of the ’Cuda, the crack of her head terrible and satisfying.
“Butch? Are you asleep?” Cassie tapped on my shoulder, and I groaned. She sat cross-legged on the bed, and the dull drone of the television swarmed like a nest of hornets in my ears.
“Unfortunately not.”
“Well, you seemed kind of out of it for a few minutes. I turned on the TV. I hope that’s okay. It’s my favorite show.”
I recognized the theme song, and the blonde on the screen. “Charlie’s Angels?” I asked.
“My mom and I used to watch the reruns on Saturday mornings. That was before she stopped taking her meds and threw the TV against the wall.” Cassie had the gloomiest laugh I’d ever heard. “She thought it was sending her messages.”
“That sounds really messed up.”
“Who’s your favorite and why?” she asked, and I groaned again. “Oh, come on.”
“Jill,” I said. “Because Farrah Fawcett. Obviously.”
“So predictable. She looks kinda like that girl you were with at the party.” Gwen. Oh God. I need to talk to Gwen. “I like Kelly Garrett. I stole my last name from her, you know.” I roll off the bed and to my feet, ignoring the sudden rush of blood to my brain, the spinning room, the sick feeling. “Hey, are you even listening to me?” she asked.
“You’ve gotta go,” I told Cassie. “There’s somewhere I need to be.” I pulled on my other boot and concentrated on tying the laces.
“Where am I supposed to go?” For the first time, her voice quivered. And my heart seized up. But Gwen. Cassie’s not my problem. I need to talk to Gwen. “I’m scared of him…He’s killed people, I think. Or at least that’s what Evie told me.”
“Seriously? He’s not going to kill you. But I’ll drop you off somewhere if you want.”
“Will you take me to Evie? To that stupid Ship in a Storm or whatever it’s called?”
****
I took a long drag from the cigarette and let the nicotine work its magic. It settled my stomach and tamped down the frayed ends of my nerves until I felt like myself again. Not Hangover Butch, otherwise known as Run Over by a Truck Butch. But the Butch I needed to be—charming and persuasive and knight-in-shining-armor perfect—to win Gwen back. If that was even possible.
I’d dropped Cassie off at the mini mart near Port in a Storm. Truth, I’d practically shoved her out the door and hit the freeway like a bat out of hell, so I could be here for the school bell at three with a dozen red roses on my seat. I’d parked a block from the school so I could feel Gwen out, plan my approach. Because I’d fucked up. Royally. And this had to be good. Damn good.
That’s the problem with plans.
They always blow up in your face.
When Gwen walked out the double doors of Berkeley High, I caught my breath. Not because she was smoking hot, which she was. And not because Cassie was right. She did look a lot like Farrah. A blonde goddess. But because there was someone with her. He held her hand, and he smiled at her with the straightest, whitest teeth I’d ever seen. Like a goddamned toothpaste commercial.
Boom. That was the sound of my plan blown to bits.
Last night’s tequila came back up, and I was lucky to open the door in time, spewing it all on the pavement. A hot puddle of regret.
I leaned back against the seat and wiped my mouth on the sleeve of yesterday’s shirt, sizing up the competition. A pretty boy, that’s what he was. In a mint-green polo, khakis, and penny loafers. His jet-black hair didn’t move, even as Gwen’s was tossed by the wind.
In another life, I stayed in the car, reeking of humiliation.
In another life, I let Gwen go.
But in this life, I just couldn’t. I had needs I didn’t understand, and they demanded action. They drove me the way a parasite drives its host. Toward the only thing, the essential thing.
“Gwen!” I headed toward her, the roses in my hand. “Wait.”
“Calder?” Her mouth hung open, those lips that had once been mine parted in surprise. Or was it fear? “What are you doing here? I told you I don’t want to see you anymore.”
“You did? I—I don’t remember. I was so drunk, Gwen. Please. Just talk to me.”
I did remember, but I owed it to her to let her save face. After she’d hit her head—you shoved her, you asshole—I’d told her to get the hell out of my car. And she did. I’d told her we were through. That I hated her. That I never wanted to see her again. And then I drove away.
“You heard her, man. She doesn’t want to talk to you.” Pretty boy studied me for a moment, cocking his head at me. Narrowing his eyes. Like he was trying to figure out what the hell I was, the same way you’d examine a specimen in science class. Amoeba or protozoa? “Hey, what’s your name? Calder?”
“None of your goddamned business.”
“I know you.” Then, he spun to Gwen, his horse teeth bared. “Are you kidding me, Gwendolyn? This is who you’ve been hanging out with? Does your dad know?”
“I met Mr. Shaw. He knows me.” Pathetic. I sounded pathetic. So pathetic even Gwen tried to defend me.
“Russ, please. Calm down. You’re making a scene.” So this was Russ. In the flesh. “His family bought the house on Drury Road,” she said. “They’re in the oil business.”
“Bullshit. My dad’s security busted this loser last year for throwing rocks at our house. He’s an orphan. And the only money he’s got is a handout from a bogus lawsuit against our company.”
“Is that true, Butch?”
I had nothing to offer Gwen but the truth, so I ignored her. Instead, I stepped up to Russ, fists balled. “Your dad owns Y-Trax?”
It surprised me how fast the rage came. How it must have been there all along just waiting. The roses dropped to the ground, and I levelled Russ Conway with the hardest punch I’d ever thrown. In juvie or otherwise. His head snapped back, and he fell to his knees. But it wasn’t enough. I wanted him to fight back, needed him to. So I stood him up, and I hit him again. And again. And again. For Dad. For Mom. For Jesse. But most of all, for me.
“Butch, stop! Stop! You’re gonna kill him.” When I saw Russ’s blood spatter onto Gwen’s white jeans, I fell back in the grass, exhausted. Emptied. Like a party balloon the morning after. Deflated and barely hovering above ground. That’s the vessel rage leaves behind.
“I didn’t mean any of it, Gwen. What I said to you. What I did. I never meant to hurt you l
ike that. I just got carried away. I…I think I love you.”
If there’s one face of Gwen’s I’ll always remember, it’s that one. Because it was the worst. Huddled over Russ’s bloody pulp, she’d looked only at me. The real me. The real Butch Calder. And I sunk into the blue of her eyes and drowned there in her pity.
CHAPTER
THIRTY-ONE
Butch
January 18, 2017
Wednesday
I wait until Sebastian leaves Evie’s office, until he crosses the street. Just in case Young Butch finally wins a round and throws a punch that’ll drop him to his knees. If I screw up, I’d rather be here, by the tree—it seems fitting—and not at my workplace, letting Mr. Vinetti down.
Sebastian doesn’t know I’m coming, and he’s taking his time, so I don’t need to run. But I do. It feels good. Way better than it did in prison when I would lap the track for an hour, running with nowhere to go. Like a hamster in a wheel. It doesn’t take long before I’m right up on him, breathing hard with the cold air burning my lungs.
I spin him around by his arm. “What the hell, man?”
“I think you meant to say, thank you, kind sir, for saving my ass. Go on. Try it again.”
“You weren’t saving my ass. You were playing games.”
He must see Young Butch in here, chomping at the bit, bucking like a bronc, because he doesn’t smirk like I expect him to. “I planned on giving it back to you. I really did. But I must’ve lost it the day before somewhere between the house and—”
“You couldn’t just tell me?”
“Hoping to delay the inevitable, I guess. I was sure you’d look in the envelope. And then, you’d say the deal was off. You’d tell the cops about me.”
I shake my head at him, half-disgusted, half-amused. “But a baseball card? Seriously?”
“You have to admit, it was better than the alternative. All things considered.”
“Yeah. I’ll give you that.” As much as it pains me. “Where’d you disappear to that night anyway? You got a secret stash of sports memorabilia buried behind the building?”
Doctors of Darkness Boxed Set Page 58
