Stone Cold Fox (90)

I backhanded her again, even harder this time, my rage building with every word she uttered. She fell to the floor. I wanted her to fight back. Give me a fight, Gale. Give me the real release I craved. The one that we both deserved. “You think this behavior surprises me, Bea?” She laughed. “I was expecting it. You’re an animal. And you’re cornered. Of course you’re going to fight. You tried to kill your own mother.”

“How did you find her?” I snarled, hunched over and ready to strike again.

Gale crawled over to her hideous green safe and opened it with my husband’s birth date, careful to smile at me as she did so. She tossed a file in my direction labeled VICTORIA OSTHOFF. It must have been there the whole time. I flipped it open, completely rapt with the material. Victoria Osthoff was a recent widow to an oil guy in Texas. Vincent Osthoff. Marriage certificate, a birth certificate, addresses to estates, bank account records, social security cards, but it was the photos that solidified everything.

She had found Mother.

She was older, yes. Her features now more feline in nature, an unavoidable side effect of the work on a woman of a certain age, no matter how well done. Fresh highlights. French manicure. Her perfect nose, sneering in superiority. Her eyes blazing with malice. It was her. She had never stopped her games. She just carried on playing them without me.

She didn’t come and find me after all.

Gale had found her.

“Your mother told me about Syl,” Gale said. “She always knew where you two were. She kept tabs from afar. When I found her and I told her what you were up to with the Cases, she was more than happy to work together. She told me what you did to her, told me everything. She frightened me, but she had the information I needed so I proceeded with her proposal, despite the fear. Because she’s the only one who could really take you down, from your rotten insides out.”

I inhaled sharply. “You ought to be careful, Gale. Your fear is warranted. You don’t know her like I do.”

“Clearly!” Gale exclaimed. “I thought she’d want to keep playing until we won. I really thought the only thing left for us to do was to have her come forward and tell the truth to the Cases about who you really are and where you come from, particularly East Eighty-First Street. I didn’t expect her to tell the entire truth, surely the woman wouldn’t want to incriminate herself about her own misdeeds, but I figured she would share enough. You know. To get you.”

“She is not your friend, Gale. She is not your teammate. She’s using you.”

“We were using each other!” Gale shrieked.

“Well, then where is she?” I cried out. “Tell me, Gale! Where is she?!”

“She’s gone. I don’t know. She didn’t want to tell the Cases anything. She said she didn’t want to see you. So our coalition was called off. Just as well. I’m on my own now, but I know enough to finish the job. I know enough about her, too. I’m just waiting to pull the trigger. With the Cases, the police, the law. You won’t escape it. Neither of you. The ones at the top are at the top for a reason. We don’t get burned, but we’ll burn the ones that try us. With pleasure.”

I was silent. Thinking. Weighing my options.

Because Gale was wrong.

Mother hadn’t left. She wouldn’t. It didn’t make any sense. Not without seeing me first and seeing this through, whatever this was. What did Mother want? Did she want me back? Or did she want to kill me? Either way, it was abundantly clear that Gale had no idea who she was dealing with. Not a clue or she wouldn’t be so pompous, so confident, so sure that she had me in her crosshairs. Mother was close by and had been for a long time. I had felt her presence growing since Collin and I had gotten engaged. It wasn’t paranoia, it was real. And she wouldn’t take off without finishing the job. Unlike me.

She was still alive.

Gale finally got up from the floor to sit on the couch, lurching into the cushions, pleased with herself. She thought she had me, like I wouldn’t fight for my life with everything I had. Like I wouldn’t sacrifice hers for my own. Gale thought she was in control, and it was laughable. She could incorrectly underestimate me all she wanted to, but she was a fool to underestimate Mother at all.

Mother was not gone if the job was not done.

Was she watching right now?

“I suppose I’d have nothing to say either if my own mother never wanted to see me again,” Gale droned on. “But in some ways you’re quite lucky, Bea. I do hope you’ve enjoyed the ride. After all, you’ve gotten much further than your average whore, haven’t you?”

I struck fast at Gale, like a cobra. I hadn’t been able to move that quickly in what felt like ages, but the will to harm her and the adrenaline to do it came together in that precise moment. I tackled her mightily; again she fell to the floor, and she screamed, just as I hoped she would. Was Mother watching now? I muffled Gale’s pathetic cries with an atrocious green sequin pillow from her hideous sofa, the weight of my stomach shoving into her own, making it harder for her to breathe. Do you see this, Mother? I tossed the pillow aside, wanting to do it myself, finally wrapping my hands around Gale’s neck, just as I’d imagined. I squeezed it so hard, her eyes bulged in horror, her legs kicked madly to break free. Are you proud of me now, Mother? I pushed my body into Gale’s even further, stealing all of the air from her body. She would not take my life. I would take hers first.