“What?”
She turned his hand so she could see his watch: 3:09 a.m. “Is this Chicago time?”
“You know I always change it when I land.”
She dropped his hand. “You need to go home, Jasper. I never want to see you again.”
He looked stunned.
“Live your corrupt life. Fuck over whoever you want. Keep your dangerous men happy, but remember I have those papers, and I can blow up your life, and their lives, anytime I please.”
“Don’t do this.”
“What I do is no longer your business. I don’t need you to save me. I’m saving myself.”
He laughed, then he saw she was serious. “I hope you’re right, Jinx, because if any of your shit blows back on me, I will not hesitate to tell them how to find you. You made your choice.”
“You’re damn right I did,” Jane told him. “And if anybody comes looking for me, I’ll use those papers to make sure you go down right beside me.”
Jane pulled back the privacy curtain. She slid open the glass door.
The cop had already turned around. His hand was on his gun.
She told him, “Tell the FBI they’ve got less than three hours to offer me a deal or there’s going to be a massive explosion in New York City.”
August 26, 2018
15
Andy felt the tip of her finger slip through the hole in her skin.
She had been shot.
She leaned her head back against the wall. She sucked in air through her teeth and tried not to pass out.
Edwin Van Wees was on the floor of his office. Broken glass was scattered around his body. Pieces of paper. Blood. The MacBook that Andy had used to find out about her mother.
Laura.
Andy reached out, her fingers brushing the edge of the burner phone. The screen was cracked. She closed her eyes, concentrated on listening. Was that her mother’s voice? Was she still on the phone?
A woman’s scream came from the other side of the house.
Andy’s heart stopped.
The second scream was louder, abruptly cut off by a loud smack.
Andy clamped her jaw shut so she would not scream, too.
Clara.
Andy couldn’t stay frozen this time. She had to do something. Her legs shook as she tried to push herself up against the wall. The pain almost ripped her open. She had to hunch over to stop the cramping. Blood dribbled from the bullet hole in her side. Andy’s legs shook as she tried to move forward. This was her fault. All of it. Laura had warned her to be careful and still, Andy had led them here.
They.
To kill Edwin. To kill Clara.
Andy’s shoulder slid along the wall as she tried to find Clara, to give herself up, to stop this awful mess she had made. Her feet got caught up on the rug. Pain sliced into her side. Her head bumped against the photographs that lined the hallway. She had to stop to catch her breath. Her eyes kept going in and out of focus. She stared at the pictures on the wall. Different frames, different poses, some color, some black and white. Clara and Edwin with two women around Andy’s age. A few snapshots of the women when they were younger, in high school, in kindergarten, and then— Toddler Andy in the snow.
Andy felt numb as she stared at the image of her younger self.
Was it Edwin’s hand she had been holding? The adjacent photo showed baby Andy sitting in Clara and Edwin’s lap. Laura had cut Andy out of their lives and superimposed her onto the stock photo of the fake Randall grandparents.
“Nice, right?”
Andy turned her head. She had been expecting to find Mike, but it was a woman’s voice. A woman she knew all too well.
Paula Kunde stood at the end of the hallway.
She pointed a familiar-looking revolver at Andy. “Thanks for leaving this for me in your car. Did you rub off the serial number, or was that Mommy?”
Andy didn’t answer. She couldn’t catch her breath.
“You’re hyperventilating,” Paula said. “Pick up the phone.”
Andy turned her head. The burner phone was on the floor behind her. In the stillness, she could hear her mother wailing.
“Jesus.” Paula stomped down the hall, scooped up the phone and held it to her ear. “Shut up, Dumb Bitch.”
Laura didn’t shut up. Her tinny voice was vibrating with rage.
Paula turned on the speakerphone.
“. . . touch a fucking hair on her—”
“She’s dying.” Paula smiled at Laura’s abrupt silence. She held the phone under Andy’s chin. “Tell her, sweetheart.”
Andy clutched her hand to her side. She could feel the blood seeping out of her.
“Andrea?” Laura said. “Please, talk to—”
“Mom . . .”
“Oh, my darling,” Laura cried. “Are you okay?”
Andy broke down, a strangled cry coming from deep inside her body. “Mom—”
“What happened? Please—oh, God, please tell me you’re okay!”
“I—” Andy didn’t know if she could get the words out. “I was shot. She shot me in the—”
“That’s enough.” Paula raised the gun and Andy went silent. She told Laura, “You know what I want, Dumb Bitch.”
“Edwin—”
“Is dead.” Paula raised her eyebrows at Andy, as if this was a game.
“You stupid fucking idiot,” Laura hissed. “He’s the only one who knows—”
“Shut up with your bullshit,” Paula said. “You know where it is. How much time do you need?”
“I can—” Laura stopped. “Two days.”
“Sure, no problem.” Paula grinned at Andy. “Maybe your kid will go into shock before she bleeds out.”
“You fucking cunt.”
Andy was rattled by the hateful words. She had never heard her mother like this.
Laura said, “I will slice open your fucking throat if you hurt my daughter. Do you understand me?”
“You dumb bitch,” Paula said. “I’m hurting her right now.”
Andy saw a flash.
Everything went black.
*
Andy was aware that something was wrong even before she opened her eyes. There was not a moment where it all came back to her, because she had never for a moment forgotten what had happened.
She had been shot. She was inside the trunk of a car. Her hands and feet were bound by some configuration of handcuffs. A towel was duct-taped around her waist to stanch the bleeding. The gag in her mouth had a rubber ball that made it hard for her to breathe because her nose was filled with blood from being pistol-whipped into unconsciousness.
As with everything else, Andy could recall the blows from the revolver. She hadn’t really blacked out. She had felt more as if she’d been caught between the edge of sleep and wakefulness. When Andy was in art school, she had craved that stasis because it was where she found her best ideas. Her mind seemingly blank but still working through the various shades of black and white she would elicit from her pencil.
Did she have a concussion?
She should’ve been panicked, but the panic had gurgled back down like water circling a drain. An hour ago? Two hours? Now, her only overriding feeling was intense discomfort. Her lip was split. Her cheek felt bruised. Her eye was swollen. Her hands were numb. Her wrists had fallen asleep. If she lay the right way, if she kept her spine bent, if her breathing remained shallow, the burning in her side was manageable.
The guilt was another matter.
In her head, Andy kept playing back what happened inside the farmhouse, trying to identify the point at which everything had gone wrong. Edwin had told her to leave. Could Andy have left before the front of his shirt was ripped open by the bullets riddling his back?
She squeezed her eyes shut.
Click-click-click-click.
The revolver’s cylinder spinning.
Andy tried to analyze Clara’s two different screams, the startled quality of the first one, the smack that had cut off the second one. Not a hand slapping or a fist punching. Paula had struck Andy with the revolver. Had Clara suffered a similar fate? Had she awoken dazed in her own kitchen, walked down the hallway and found Edwin lying dead?
Or had she never opened her eyes again?