The Guilty hp-2 Page 22

  Sounded like Justice Waverly was getting frustrated and taking it out on his poor desk.

  "No, now I wouldn't want that," Waverly said. "I'll answer any appropriate questions in order to help whatever story you're writing. But I won't go into tangential matters that are none of your business. So to answer your question, yes, I do remember the deaths of the Roberts family and the tragic passing of Pastor

  Rheingold. He was a pillar of this community."

  "Would you say the Roberts family was a pillar of the community?"

  "Shoot," he said. "John Roberts just moved his family down to Hico a few years back. He had some relatives down here got along pretty good, but I can't say they had as much influence as Pastor Mark."

  "I read the news reports of the fire. You're sure it was electrical?"

  "Goddamn right I am," Waverly said. "And I hope God's green ears don't hear you insinuating we didn't give that fire a thorough investigation."

  "No, I'm saying you're awfully defensive."

  There was silence on the other end again. Then Waverly spoke.

  "We turned that house inside out. There was nothing left.

  Not a doll, not a picture album, nothing. An entire family was destroyed in one night, I assure you it was a monumental tragedy. We didn't find any reason or need to pry more than we already had."

  "So you're admitting the investigation wasn't handled as thoroughly as it could have been."

  "I'm saying injury was bad enough without adding insult."

  "Unless the insult and injury would have been to your town."

  "I'm sorry, Parker, you've lost me there."

  "Let's see if you can follow-at the Roberts's funeral, the priest made a statement making it clear there were remains unaccounted for. That one or more of the coffins the Roberts family was buried in wasn't full. Do you follow that?"

  "I have nothing to say about such idiotic rumors. And if you don't mind me saying, I don't see how this has any relevance to your murders in New Yawk. "

  "I'll get to that," I said. "Now whose remains were never found?"

  "This has nothing to do with you," said Waverly.

  "Whose remains, Justice? I can be on the phone to Mike

  Sellers in thirty seconds, and based on your lack of cooperation he can have those graves dug up in less time than it takes for you to stir your cream and sugar."

  "You arrogant prick," Waverly spat. "Just who do you think you are? Do you have any idea who we are, what this town is? We have a thousand residents. You live in a city of millions, where nobody gives a shit about anybody else.

  Do you have any idea what something like this could do to our county?"

  "Without the legend of Brushy Bill Roberts, your town dies," I said. "That's a fact. And by covering up a murder investigation, it will do the same thing."

  "Who said anything about murder?" Waverly said. There was concern in his voice. It was trembling. He knew something.

  "Whose remains were never found?"

  "I don't have to talk to you?"

  " Whose, Justice?"

  "The son," he gushed. "William Henry. We found a piece of femur we believe was his, but…"

  "But what?" I said.

  "But we weren't sure. So we buried it."

  "You buried an empty coffin?"

  "It wasn't empty!" Waverly said. "There was a femur bone inside! Besides, the boy's body was nowhere. Either he died in that fire or he disappeared off the face of the earth. We figured his remains being too burnt up to find was a more likely scenario."

  "Only those remains turned up alive in New York, pulling the trigger of a Winchester rifle four times, killing four people."

  "Listen, Parker," Waverly said. "You don't know what it's like here. You don't know what this would mean to our township and its residents."

  There had to be something else going on. Hico stood to prosper hugely if it was revealed Brushy Bill Roberts was, in fact, Billy the Kid. Waverly was hiding something else.

  "What was Pastor Rheingold doing in that fire?" I asked.

  "Strange that he just happened to be at the Roberts home the night it goes up in flames."

  "Enough!" Waverly said. "You got your damn story.

  Rheingold has nothing to do with it. Goodbye, Mr. Parker. I hope you sleep well tonight."

  Waverly hung up. Sleep was the last thing I would find that night.

  43

  Mya stirred. Not because her body awoke naturally. Not because sunlight from the outside had forced it, or because she had to pee, or any other number of reasons why nature might interrupt one's slumber.

  No, Mya awoke because of the knife point she felt digging into her side.

  "Wake up, Mya," he said. She opened her eyes, the lids dry and crusty. Her hands were still bound, her wrists hurt like hell. She hadn't been able to wipe the moisture or makeup away. The last thing she remembered was following this man back to his hotel room, having a drink, feeling his lips on hers, and then nothing. There was no other pain, and besides her bonds she was otherwise unharmed.

  She was lying on the floor of some dingy hotel room. The bed was unmade. Ugly orange curtains dangled above her.

  The rusty air conditioner rattled, spewing a warm breeze.

  Under the bed she could see a small blue duffel bag, underwear and socks spilling out of it.

  By the foot of the bed, Mya saw what appeared to be a gun. Not like the kind she saw in the movies. This one was long. The barrel seemed to have some kind of wood finish.

  The boy noticed her staring and said, agreeing, "She's a true thing of beauty."

  Mya tried to squirm but it was no use. Her energy was gone. And a blade was ticking her ribs. If she bucked in the wrong direction, it could…

  "How you feeling?" he asked. Mya blinked. What was his name? He'd told it to her at the bar. Where he'd been charming, funny, handsome and sweet. Of course all of this was before he kidnapped her. "Nod once for okay, nod twice for not okay."

  Mya nodded twice, vigorously. She remembered his hands on her, her whole body tingling, feeling alive. She remembered his hands, strong and gentle, but then all of a sudden perfunctory, like they were only waiting to…

  And here she was.

  "You're not getting me, Miss Loverne. Nod once if you're okay, as in not hurt. Nod twice if you are hurt. Forget about your hands. Can you walk?" Mya felt the blade dig in. She tried to cry out, but the tape prevented her from emitting anything but a pathetic whimper. She felt saliva coating the tape sealing her mouth.

  She nodded once. That was all.

  "You had me worried," the boy said with a grin.

  William. His name was William.

  "We have a busy night ahead of us," William said. "Are you up for it?"

  Her first instinct was to try and scream. Or at least nod twice. But the knife made its horrible presence felt once again and she tilted her chin down once. A single tear streaked down Mya's cheek. The boy wiped it away.

  44

  After leaving the office, I called Amanda. We hadn't spoken the whole day, mainly because I'd been swamped with Justice

  Waverly, then presenting the information to Wallace, Evelyn and Jack. Then I began to prep the outline of a blockbuster story that would both force the reopening of the fire in Hico, but present new information proving that Billy the Kid had lived long after his alleged murder. It was too soon to claim that Athena Paradis's killer was Billy's great-grandson, or that

  I thought he was. I knew it was true, but had to be able to convince others. Truth required proof, however, and since he was still at large the only proof was four silent corpses.

  One thing was for certain, and Waverly had confirmed it, that William Henry Roberts was not among the victims who died in the fire.

  So if William did not die in that fire, why was there no investigation into his whereabouts? Hamilton County police department came up empty, and they moved mighty quick to assume the body had simply "burnt up." Even I didn't think they would be that c
areless. At least not by accident.

  Not a single newspaper report asked questions about the fire. They were too busy bemoaning the death of Mark Rheingold and four, less important, members of the Hico community. Everyone seemed more than happy to wash away any unpleasant memories and get on with their lives.

  That brought up another question. What was Pastor Mark

  Rheingold-a statewide institution, a man who made millions of dollars a year and had thousands of rabid followers-doing at the Roberts house the night of the fire? I searched every archive available but couldn't find anything linking Rheingold to the Roberts family. It was a pretty big coincidence that

  Rheingold paid a house call the night a four-alarm blaze

  Pinter, Jason – Henry Parker 02

  The Guilty (2008) burned everything to the ground.

  I dialed Amanda's line at work. It went right to voice mail.

  "Hey, babe, it's me, I'm heading home now. You're probably still at work, just wanted to know if we should plan to have dinner together. Anyway, give me a call back. Love you."

  Click.

  I needed a night to relax, unwind. Everything this past week had come so suddenly. All those deaths-deaths of people I knew. The NYPD was beside themselves at this point, and the newspapers hadn't pulled punches in their criticism. And though New York had arguably the finest police department in the country, it was also a city in which it was all too easy to disappear. I knew that firsthand. Sooner or later the net would close in on Roberts. We could only hope it did before that Winchester fired again.

  The Gazette' s sales had gone through the roof the last few days. The city hadn't seen such juicy copy in a long time, and people were buying up papers in droves. Between Athena

  Paradis's murder, the turmoil at Franklin-Rees after Jeffrey

  Lourdes's death, the NYPD wanting blood for Joe Mauser, and the societal fallout from David Loverne's murder, it was a gold mine for newshounds.

  Joe Mauser's death had been relegated to the back pages.

  A cop dying in the line of duty just didn't sell as many papers as a murdered pretty blond white girl. It was strange that this pissed me off so much, considering Joe Mauser's bullet had left a nasty scar on my leg. Just one year ago, Mauser wanted to kill me. I held no ill will toward the man. If someone had done to my family what he thought I'd done to his, I would have wanted blood, as well.

  I got off the subway and began walking toward our apartment. The summer sun was dipping below the clouds, the shimmering towers of NewYork fading into night. The streets began to fill as people straggled home from work. Finally, after over a year I felt I was becoming a part of this city. It hadn't been easy, thanks to assholes like Frank Rourke. Since the dog crap prank, my desk had been left alone. I had gone along with it, laughed it up, threw it in the trash and left it at that. If you let guys like Frank know they'd drawn blood, they'd grow addicted to the taste. I could bleed on my own time.

  I approached the apartment building and fished in my pocket for the key. I wondered if we should move to a safer neighborhood, live in a building with a doorman. Now that

  Amanda was living with me I wasn't completely comfortable with her walking home alone, especially since most days she came home later than I did. I had to take care of the woman

  I loved. Put her needs before mine. I was determined to prove

  Jack wrong. I could balance work and relationships. I didn't have to give in just because he did. Jack was a legend, but an old school legend. I was strong. I could make it work.

  As I turned the key in the lock, a voice broke the night and froze my blood. I recognized that voice, only now it was louder, angrier.

  I heard it again, turned around. Saw several pedestrians staring up, up at the rooftops, their mouths open in masks of horror. A man dialed his cell phone frantically. A woman grabbed her son and ran.

  Then I heard it again.

  "Henry Parker!"

  High above us, perched atop a four-story brownstone, illuminated by the moonlight, was William Henry Roberts.

  One hand was empty. The other held a knife. The knife was held to Mya Loverne's throat.

  "Mya!" I shouted. Her eyes were frightened beyond rational thought. Some sort of towel or cloth was in her mouth. I ran forward, then stopped.

  "Parker!" Roberts cried again.

  "Leave her alone!" I shouted, unsure of what else to do. I wasn't close enough to get to them. No cops were in sight.

  Fucking Carruthers had pulled off my security detail, and now…

  I called you, Henry.

  Mya.

  "This," Roberts said, his voice a mixture of pathos and breathless glee, like a man taking perverse excitement in reprimanding a dog. "This is what happens. I control information, not you, Parker. I give you history to write about. So consider this a present, Henry. From me to you."

  And with that, before I could react, before my weak legs could respond or my mouth could cry out, William pushed

  Mya off the roof.

  I shouted "No!" as her body plummeted out of view. The horde of onlookers gasped. Mya disappeared into the alley behind the building. I ran toward it, then heard the most horrible sound of my life. A terrible thump as something hit the ground.

  Then I looked up, and Roberts was gone.

  I ran as fast as I could, the world around me disappearing in a blur. I sprinted into the alley, then covered my mouth in shock.

  Mya was lying on the ground. Her eyes were open, staring at the sky. I could see a small pool of blood below her.

  I ran over and grabbed her hand.

  "No," I whispered, frantically checking her wrists, her neck, anything. I thought I felt a pulse. Weak, but there. I could hear 911 calls being made somewhere behind me.

  "Mya, please, oh please God say something. Don't you dare die. Don't you dare. Please. "

  Then she blinked. Once, twice. Her mouth quivered. A noise came from her mouth, a small bubble of blood bursting over her lips.

  "Somebody get an ambulance!" I shouted, wiping away the blood. "Please!"

  "They're on the way," another voice yelled.

  "Don't you go," I said to Mya. "Don't you go. You're going to be fine." My eyes darted, hoping to catch a glimpse of Roberts, but the murdering bastard was nowhere to be found. I took Mya's hand. It was growing cold.

  I called you, Henry.

  "I know you did, and I'm here. Please, baby, please stay with me."

  "Henry? Oh my God…"

  I recognized that voice. I stood up, my footing unsure.

  Amanda was standing in the alley. Her face was white.

  "Oh God, Henry, what happened?"

  "Amanda…"

  I looked at Amanda. Her beautiful eyes. Those arms that had held me so close. The strong heart that had given itself to me. Trusted me.

  Just like Mya had trusted me years ago. And now Mya was lying, broken.

  No.

  Amanda stepped forward. "Henry, oh God, is she alive?

  Please say something. "

  "I…"

  I heard a gasp behind me. Mya's mouth was opening and closing. Another bubble of blood burst, coating her chin. I knelt back down and wiped it off. Not again. Not Mya. Not Amanda…

  "Henry, please…"

  "Get the fuck away from me!" I screamed, bolting up. My body felt ready to explode, and in my mind's eye I saw everything I touched, everything I loved, broken in pieces. I couldn't see Amanda. Not like this. Not like Mya. I'd already failed one woman. I couldn't do it again.

  "Henry, please talk to me."

  "Get the fuck out of here! " I yelled again, this time stepping toward Amanda, a fire in my eyes that I could see reflected via fear in hers. She stepped back. I stepped forward.

  "Get out of here," I said, panting. "Don't ever come back.

  Leave now."

  "No," Amanda said, tears flowing from her eyes. "Don't do this. I'm not Mya, I'm not…"

  "Get away from me, and never come back." She didn't mo
ve. "I said get the fuck away from me! "

  Amanda looked at me, crying, unable to say a word. Then she turned and ran into the night. And I turned back to Mya, took her hand. "Baby, don't leave me…it's Henry…please don't leave me…I'm here…"

  45

  Paulina Cole sat at her desk rifling through the transcription of an interview with a Republican senator she had just spoken to that afternoon. She didn't particularly like the man- primarily because she knew a great deal more about his predilection toward Guatemalan housemaids than did the voters-but he was a shoo-in for reelection and Ted Allen's instructions were to paint him in the most positive light. That

  Ted had contributed close to six figures toward his reelection campaign was not to be mentioned. Paulina had already picked out six good sound bites, thankfully all taken within some sort of context, and was in the midst of outlining tomorrow's front-page story.

  She was writing longhand when a sweaty, haggard James

  Keach appeared in her doorway. Keach staggered in, dropped into a seat across from her desk, his breathing hard, eyes frightened. It was the first time James had taken a seat without her express permission. Usually he stood by the doorway taking instructions. He didn't even think twice about plopping down, and it unnerved Paulina.

  "Jesus, James, what happened to you?" she said, allowing a hint of concern to creep into her voice.

  James looked up, as though startled to realize he was sitting in Paulina's office. He looked around, then locked eyes with her and leaned forward. James looked like he'd just witnessed something unspeakable, and would give anything to take it all back.

  "I was trailing Henry Parker," James said. "And…oh

  God…"

  "Spit it out."

  James Keach's body began to convulse with sobs. She felt panic well up, but the flavor of excitement, as well. Wherever there was fear was also a great story.

  "Mya Loverne," James said. "I was following Henry and…"

  For the next five minutes, James told her what he'd seen that night. The man atop the building. Mya's body hitting the ground. Henry Parker screaming, crying. The ambulances, the broken girl being sped away to the hospital.