We Begin at the End(105)

Inside the King house she walked through the rooms, gun in hand. Photos on the wall, Vincent and Walk, their backs to the water, the kind of carefree smiles she herself had never known.

She climbed the stairs and checked each bedroom. Only moonlight to guide her. She saw a closet, Vincent’s clothes, so few. Three shirts, a pair of jeans, heavy boots. She thought of the making of a murderer, if it began long before birth, cursing the parents’ genes, the fatal bloodline. Or maybe it slowly crept, too many knocks, too many scars. Vincent King might have once been good, but a child’s blood did not wash from your hands. And thirty years amongst the most flawed of men, it would take the strongest to survive intact.

There was no bed, just a mattress on the floor. No furniture in the room, no paintings or television or books.

Just a single photo, taped to the wall.

A photo that took her breath, for the girl looked just like her. Blonde hair and blue eyes. Sissy Radley.

She left the house and walked the mile, climbed the trails that rose high above the town lights. She stopped halfway, every muscle ached, air pained her chest like her body did not want her to go on amongst the living.

As she crested the final hill she saw the light, the late service. She had been once before, sat with the half dozen for no other reason than she could not sleep.

Little Brook Episcopal.

She walked up the road, alongside the picket fence, came to the door and listened to the heavenly music. She dropped her bag for a moment, leaned against the wood, the long day almost over. With nowhere left to go she made her way to the small grave where her mother lay, beside Sissy, in the part of the cemetery reserved for the most innocent. Duchess had asked they be together again.

She stopped dead.

He stood there, tall against the precious night. Behind him the land fell away, the sheer cliffs and endless sea.

*

At Ivy Ranch Road Walk headed up the path and knocked.

Brandon looked like shit, said nothing, just stepped aside as Walk went into the house. It smelled bad, takeout cartons everywhere, beer cans, thick dust on every surface. A stack of fitness DVDs, Rock Hard, Brandon sucking in his stomach on the cover.

Brandon’s eyes looked glazed as he sat down at the kitchen counter. Walk thought of Star, how she’d knocked him back one too many times, and maybe that was why Brandon had let his fist go that night.

“I know what you did,” Walk began.

And that was all it took.

Brandon cried, the dam burst, he cried till his shoulders shook. Walk watched him, the confusion building.

“I didn’t mean it. I’m sorry. You have to believe it, Walk.”

Walk said nothing, just listened as the story broke between sobs.

“I reached out, like you said. I offered to take him out on the boat. Fishing or something, whatever. I wanted an end to it. But then I thought about it, how he scratched the Mustang. I knew it was him. Who else would do that? At first I was going to report it, but then everything with Star happened. It was supposed to be a joke. To get him back. We weren’t even far from shore.”

Walk breathed, the confusion passing, just sadness left. “You pushed him in. Milton.”

Brandon cried more, coughed like he was retching up the memory. “I waited for him back at the dock. I just wanted to show him. Make him swim back. Just a joke. And then he didn’t show, so I went back. But he was gone, Walk. He was gone.”

Walk sat with him, called Boyd and waited, told Brandon what to say. Be honest. You’ll sleep better at night.

He watched them take him, Brandon doing the walk with his head bowed low, only breaking once more when he glanced up and saw Milton’s old house across the street. It might’ve been karma, the cosmic forces Star used to talk about. Walk didn’t have long to think it over, because Dee Lane called his cell, and she told him she’d seen someone break into the King house.

“Did you get a look at them?” Walk said, breaking into a run.

“It looked like a girl.”

He ran all the way to Sunset, with the weight gone he moved light and fast. He was sweating when he made it to the door and hammered it hard.

Round back he saw broken glass.

He traced her steps, her counterstroke, he knew he was too late for what would come. On the mantel he found the photo, barely recognized the boy he was, but in Vincent and Star he saw only smiles, a snapshot of time he could no longer call back, no matter how hard he tried.

And then up the stairs. And he too stopped still when he saw it.

Maybe Vincent could move on from the cell, the warden, the men and the chain-link fences. But he’d never leave the little girl behind.

*

She watched him a long time before she took those steps.

“I was waiting for you,” Vincent said.

Duchess stepped nearer, slowly set down her bag and pulled out the gun. It was heavier than she remembered, right then she could barely hold it up.

He looked at her like she was the last child, the last good thing in his world. She saw he had laid flowers on the graves, like he had a right.

He saw the gun but did not seem alarmed, instead his shoulders dropped and he breathed out steady, like he had been waiting on the final end to a lifetime of endings.

He stepped back as she stepped forward, again and again, until she planted her feet and watched the moonlight behind him.

Music from the old church carried.

“I like this song,” he said. “There was a chapel … at Fairmont. I always liked this song. Earth’s joy grows dim, its glories pass away.”