Good Girl, Bad Girl(97)

“Please don’t say that.”

“That’s why you couldn’t penetrate her.”

“No. No.” The handcuffs rattle against the frame.

“You could have called an ambulance. You could have kept her alive. You could have saved her.”

Snot is running from his nostrils, over his upper lip to his mouth.

“Tell them I’m sorry.”

“Who?”

“Her parents.”





51




* * *





ANGEL FACE




* * *



The weeds reach as high as my knees: nettles and creeping thistles, daisies and dandelions. My feet seem to be taking root like I’m just another unwanted plant, caught between cracks in the broken concrete.

Nobody has gone in or out of the Coach House Inn for the past two hours. Skirting the fence, I duck through a broken gate and approach the main doors. I’m holding a two-foot length of steel pipe, which is hollow yet heavy, keeping it tucked under my arm. The keypad is covered by a plastic milk bottle, cut to form a rain shield. My fingers punch out the code and I nudge the door open, listening.

I cross the foyer and follow the corridor, retracing my steps from the other night, feeling the stickiness of the carpet beneath my feet. The door to the lounge is open. There are beer bottles spread across the table and cigarettes crushed into ashtrays. I try to remember which room belonged to Felix. I look for a padlock. Find it.

Kneeling before the door, I slip a bobby pin from my hair and bend it back and forth until it breaks. This one is harder to pick than Jodie’s locker. My fingers grow sore and sticky with sweat. I wipe my hands and begin again, listening as I hold down the pins, being directed by the clicks. One more . . . one more . . .

The lock falls open. The door swings inward. The room is as I remember—the bed, the rumpled sheets, the soiled mattress, the camera on a tripod. Clothes are strewn across the floor. It reminds me of another room, in another house, where I lived with Terry’s body, watching it bloat and discolor and leak.

Swinging the metal pipe, I shatter the camera, sending shards of broken plastic and glass pinging off the walls like fists full of thrown gravel. The tripod buckles. I tear at the sheets and punch holes in the mattress and rip at the clothes. Breathing hard, I pause, looking at the destruction, feeling dissatisfied. How does this hurt him?

Emptying my mind, I study the room, searching for hiding places. I’m good at this. Nobody is better. Dragging the mattress to the floor, I lever the metal pipe between the narrow horizontal slats, tearing out nails and splintering the wood, exposing the floor beneath. Crawling inside the bed base, I tap at the skirting board, listening for a hollow echo. Silverfish, dead and living, tumble or scurry as I search the carpet for signs of wear or disturbance or concealment. Nothing.

I start again, walking up and down the room, taking small steps. The floor creaks under my right foot. Dropping to my knees, I peel back the carpet, revealing a loose sheet of plywood that covers a gap between the beams. Lifting the board away, I discover a shoebox. Inside the shoebox is a package, double wrapped in tape. I tear open one corner with my teeth and recognize the contents. Crystals. Ice. Meth. There’s something else wrapped in an oily black rag, heavy in my hand: a pistol with a long narrow barrel and brown polymer handle. It looks old, like it should be in a museum.

I test a button and a compartment slides from the handle into my other hand. Bullets are pressed inside, one on top of the other.

I’ve held a gun before. Terry had one. He used to clean it on the kitchen table, taking it apart like a puzzle and wiping down each part with solvent and oil, using a cut-up T-shirt and a brass rod for the barrel.

One day he grabbed my wrist and made me pick it up. I didn’t want to touch it.

“Go on,” he said. “Feel how heavy it is.”

I took the gun in both hands.

“Put your finger on the trigger.”

I did as he asked.

“Point it at me.”

“No.”

“Aim it just here.” He tapped the center of his chest.

“No.”

“Point the fucking gun. I’m a bad man, remember.”

I shook my head.

“Do it! Now. Pull the trigger.”

My hands were trembling.

Terry sighed in disgust and took the pistol from me. “There’s no bullet in the chamber, you idiot.” He showed me how to release the magazine and rack the slide and clear the chamber.

“Next time I tell you to shoot, you better follow my fucking orders.”

I rewrap the pistol in the rag and tuck the bundle into the waistband of my jeans, where it rests against the small of my back. Then I replace the empty shoebox and the plywood and the carpet, before taking the package of drugs to the bathroom, where I rip it open, spilling crystals into the toilet bowl. Most of them sink, while others float on top like soapy scum. I flush. Water swirls and disappears. I flush again. “Bye bye.”

Voices! They’re here!

Edging across the floor, I press my cheek against the door. Keeley. Tuba. Felix. They’re in the hallway, getting closer.

“What time is the memorial?” asks Tuba.

“Three o’clock.”

I left the padlock lying on the floor. What if Felix looks down . . . ? If he sees . . . ?