She took the big spoon she had been stirring with, tapped the side of the pot and laid it down. Cradling her sore arm against her chest, she headed back toward the bedroom she shared with her husband. He knew her arm was hurting, knew it would take a few minutes to dig out whatever it was that she was going to get. He could hear her clumsily rustling around for something.
He seized the chance to retrieve the poison from his pants and dump the entire contents of the container in the stew. He hastily stirred it, grateful that it seemed to quickly dissolve, and returned the spoon back to its place. He was standing by the back door when she returned with a blue piece of fabric draped over her good arm. He realized that it was a bathrobe of some type. It was thin and he didn’t need to be educated to know that it was high-quality and expensive. Going away gift my ass, he frowned. She stole this. She held it out to him while avoiding his penetrating green eyes. They’d always unnerved her, at least that’s what he’d heard her tell his father, and for a split second she seemed to hesitate, to waver.
She must have regained her bravado and, without waiting for him to take the robe, snapped, “Wrap her in this.” She tossed it at him and headed back over to the stove to stir her stew.
At the freshly dug grave, he gently cloaked Ruthie’s little body in his own shirt. “Brother is always with you, Ruthie,” he said quietly. He then wrapped Razor in Ida’s expensive bathrobe and snorted to himself as it occurred to him that even his dog was too good for Ida’s supposed going away gift. He gently laid his little sister in the very deep hole and placed Razor next to her.
“You were a good boy, Razor. You did the right thing trying to protect her. Now you can always protect her.”
He knew he wasn’t going to mark her grave for anyone to know where she was. Only him. He knew nobody would be looking anyway. It wasn’t like she was going to be missed. Like him, she hadn’t been born in a hospital. He doubted she even had a birth certificate. He wasn’t sure if he had one himself, though he guessed there was one somewhere, since he’d been enrolled in school. Do you need a birth certificate to go to school, he wondered? He didn’t know.
He stood over his sister’s grave and stared at the freshly compacted earth. It was missing something. He wandered off and soon came back with an oversized rock. The stone was heavy, massive really, and he had exerted an enormous amount of energy to carry it to her gravesite. He dropped it with a thud. He had chosen it because of its size and unique shape. He would remember it.
Falling to his knees, he began to weep. He never remembered crying even once in his life. Not even as a child, enduring horrific abuse that was tantamount to torture. He couldn’t comment on why his father hated him. He couldn’t figure why his stepmother hated Ruthie. He didn’t want to think about them, anyway. After he was finished, he’d never think of them again.
A low wail that didn’t sound human began to build, a cry that came straight from the pit of his empty stomach and found its way up his chest, through his throat and out his mouth, taking his soul and any semblance of light with it. The light that had been Ruthie.
He wasn’t sure how long he’d knelt sobbing at Ruthie and Razor’s grave. His eyes stung and he had a combination of dry and wet snot all over his bare arms as he tried to swipe away the grief. His sore back eventually brought him out of his mourning, the pulse of the sun reminding him of the lashes his father had inflicted a few nights earlier. He was physically and mentally exhausted, but his job wasn’t finished yet.
He was worn out, but somehow he gathered the strength he needed and headed out further to an even more remote location.
He had one more grave to dig.
He would bury them together, not for the same reason that he buried Ruthie and Razor together: to offer protection and comfort to one another. No, he dug one mass grave because they deserved to be dumped like garbage.
And that was exactly what he was going to do.
**********
“Kid? Kid, you need anything or have to use the bathroom?”
He’d fallen asleep and jumped when he was touched. It took him a split second to remember where he was. A car, now parked. The man who’d picked him up was looking at him, waiting.
The man nodded out the window. “I’m getting gas. You need to use the john or something?”
“Where are we?”
“Fort Lauderdale. Getting some gas and heading to Miami.”
He nodded his head, starting to sit up. He was sore. The last few days had taken a toll on him physically and he was feeling it.
“Yeah, I gotta go.”
He went around the side of the little gas station and let himself into the restroom. It smelled like crap but was surprisingly clean. His mind wandered as he relieved himself, memories rolling over him.
He’d returned to the house that night to find his father and Ida sitting at the dinner table eating stew. He reached up on the shelf and took down an old jelly jar, using the kitchen tap to fill it up. Leaning back against the counter, he drank his water as he watched them eat their dinner. Nobody bothered to offer him any. That was okay. He would’ve refused it anyway.
“Tastes like shit! How the fuck can you mess up squirrel stew?” When Ida didn’t answer, his father backhanded her across the face.
Taking his glass of water, he’d gone to his bedroom and shut the door behind him. He laid down on the bed that he’d shared with Ruthie, hugged the only pillow close to his chest, and fell immediately into a dead sleep.
He was awakened that night to the sound of violent vomiting and retching. The next couple of days were a blur as he tried to pretend to help his extremely sick parents. Keeping buckets by their bedside, bringing them liquids to drink. Liquids he had continued lacing with more poison from the barn.
He remembered the instant his father realized what was happening. He was trying to get out of his bed, insisting that his young son take him and his wife to the hospital. The boy wasn’t old enough to have a license, but he knew how to drive. He’d let his son drive their beat-up old station wagon to haul things around the property.
“You’re gonna drive us to the hospital, boy,” he said, voice laced with pain.
“No, I’m not.” He just looked at them, a small smile on his lips. “I’m going to watch you both die a slow and painful death. I’m kind of glad you never bought us a TV. This will definitely be much more entertaining.”
Bloodshot and pain-filled brown eyes met hard green ones as realization dawned. His father glanced around his bedroom and noticed his shotgun was not in the corner. It was gone. Even if it had been there, he wouldn’t have had the strength to get up and get it.
His father fell back onto the bed and turned to look at his wife. She was curled up with her arms wrapped around her knees, which were pulled up to her chest. She had heard the conversation and opened her eyes long enough to say to her husband, “We both deserve this.”
His father rolled onto his back and looked at his son, who stood at the foot of the bed, arms crossed, green eyes cold and staring.
“Shoulda known you were the devil’s seed.” Without waiting for the boy to comment, he added, “I loved your momma and thought I did the right thing by marrying her when she was pregnant by another man. Shoulda known you were evil when you killed your own mother, you no good piece of shit.”
Finally, an answer. Although it didn’t matter now. The man who’d raised him wasn’t his father. The man who’d raised him resented him for taking his mother’s life in childbirth. Another man’s bastard had killed the woman he loved and he was going to make that child pay. Had been making that child pay ever since.
In a way, he could kind of understand that. He almost allowed a stab of conscience in, telling him he should take them to the hospital. Maybe it wasn’t too late.
But then he remembered Ruthie. There was no excuse for what had happened to Ruthie. No excuse at all.
He stared coldly at the man he’d thought was his father. “I’m just sorry I didn’t do thi
s before you let her kill Ruthie.”
Then he went to the kitchen and made himself something to eat.
After they were dead, he loaded them both in the back of the family car and drove them out to the second grave. He dumped their bodies with as much care as he’d show a pile of old chicken bones and flung the dirt back in. He hurled the shovel in the back of the station wagon and drove back to the house.
He wanted to draw as little attention to the shack as possible. He would not burn it down, but he would give careful thought as to what it should look like if a family just up and left, taking only things they could load in their one car. He went to work, packing up what few pictures they had, their personal papers and clothes. He sneered when he saw a picture of his father as a boy. No. Not his father. His stepfather. He looked like a miserable piece of shit even back then. He tossed it in with the other things. He never came across a single picture of himself or his mother.
He carelessly threw everything he could into the old car, barely leaving room for himself to fit into the driver’s seat. He went into his bedroom and retrieved the brown bag that held the few things he’d set aside to take with him. It contained some clothes, along with thirty dollars and twenty-six cents that he’d scavenged from his stepfather’s wallet and Ida’s money cup, which he’d found hidden behind some dishes in the kitchen. He reached into his pocket, retrieving something he hadn’t known existed until he’d started cleaning out their personal items. It was a picture of Ruthie and Razor. It had obviously been taken at their house, but he didn’t know when or by whom. He never found existence of a camera when he was going through their belongings. He had no way of knowing where the picture came from and he didn’t have time to ponder it.
He looked at it again. Ruthie was sitting down in the grass and looking up and smiling. She was leaning against Razor, who had himself wrapped around her like a cocoon. Her knees were pulled up to her chest and she had her arms wrapped tightly around them. Her blonde curls were shorter then. The two of them looked happy. Like they had been romping in the tall grass and had taken a break to pose. He knew neither Ida nor his stepfather had taken the picture. If that had been the case, he was certain his baby sister wouldn’t have been smiling. He carefully returned it to his back pocket and continued his cleanup.
Hours later he stood in the middle of the little house, surveying it. He wasn’t certain, but he was pretty confident he’d loaded up the important stuff. It was the fourth of the month. The electric and water bills wouldn’t need to get paid again until the thirtieth. School was out, so he wouldn’t be missed until September. And even then, he was doubtful anybody would care. His stepfather wasn’t regularly employed, so he wouldn’t be missed, either. They had no phone to worry about.
Yes, it looked like the family that lived here decided to move with their most personal possessions. The small amount of mail they got could stack up for months in their little slot at the post office. Nobody would notice. And by the time they did, it wouldn’t matter. He’d be long gone.
He headed out to the chicken coop to set them free when he noticed laundry on the clothesline. He would grab those clothes and toss them in the car before leaving. After retrieving his brown bag and canteen, he carefully drove the family’s car to the nearest, deepest canal he knew. It was off the beaten path and he didn’t have to pass any houses or civilization to get there. It would be a long, hot walk to hitch a ride somewhere, but he only had a brown bag to carry and his canteen, which he’d filled with water.
Now, in the gas station restroom, he splashed cold water on his face and dried off. He reached into his back pocket before leaving the restroom and took out the picture of Ruthie and Razor. He would never hold her again. He would never hear her voice asking for a story. He would never wrap his arms around Razor’s neck and nuzzle his short fur. He swiped away the tears that had started forming in his eyes and returned the picture to his back pocket.
He’d taken a vow that day at Ruthie’s grave. No more crying. Ever.
He was starting to get hungry and decided to go back to the car to get some money. He would see what the gas station had in the way of food. Hopefully, they had some candy bars and soda pop. He’d tasted soda only once and was looking forward to the sugary drink.
He made his way around the side of the gas station and stopped dead in his tracks. The car he had been riding in was gone. He blinked to see if his eyes were playing tricks on him. They weren’t. That son-of-a-bitch drove off with his brown bag that contained his few items of clothing and all of his money. He had left his canteen on the front seat. Even that was gone.
The world was rotten and so was everybody in it.
Chapter One
2000, Two Days After Grizz’s Execution
“You’re saying you would rather see Leslie dead than read in some stupid magazine article that I’m Grizz’s son? That doesn’t sound like you, Ginny.”
Tommy tried to remain calm and focused, but he could see the life he had patiently waited for with the woman he loved evaporating before his eyes.
“Of course I don’t want Leslie dead! I’m just in shock. How could you and Grizz have kept this from me? I feel so stupid. Foolish.” Ginny crossed her arms and rubbed her hands up and down as if to ward off a chill. She wouldn’t, couldn’t, look him in the eyes. Not yet.
Finally, she stood, her voice quiet. “I can’t do this now, Tommy. I’m too angry. I cannot talk about this. I need to leave.”
“Look at me, Ginny.” He stood too, grabbing her by both shoulders. “Look at me!”
She shrugged him off. “No. I can’t look at you. I can’t believe the lies you let me live with all these years.”
“Ginny, I didn’t always—”
She interrupted him as something occurred to her. “Oh, no. No. Mimi is your sister! Our daughter is really your half-sister.”
This time she did look at Tommy, and what he saw on her face filled him with dread.
“Get out. You need to leave now,” she spat. He’d never seen Ginny angry like this. Never.
“We need to talk, Ginny. I’m not leaving. This is my home, too.”
“It’s not anymore.”
Ginny strode to the front door, hands shaking. “I have to pick Jason up at Max’s house. Don’t be here when I get back. I mean it, Tommy. I want you out.”
She picked up her purse and car keys from the little table that sat next to their front door, accidentally knocking over a framed picture as she did. It was a photo of the whole family—Ginny with Tommy, Mimi, and then-newborn Jason. She had just brought him home from the hospital and couldn’t remember a time when she’d been happier. Her friend, Carter, had taken the picture, presenting it to them in a homemade frame as a gift. She started to pick it up to set it back in place, then realized the picture was nothing more than a reminder of her fraudulent life. A life based on lies.
She left it face down on the little table and turned to look back at Tommy once more.
“You said you talked to Grizz right before he died and he said he was sorry. I don’t believe you.” Tears threatened, but she didn’t let them fall. “I only heard Grizz say he was sorry for one thing and that was twenty-five years ago.”
She slammed the front door behind her.
Backing out of the driveway a little too quickly, she sped off. Her shoulders shook as she drove and she gasped when, in her careless haste, she almost sideswiped someone. When she reached the stop sign, she looked in her rearview mirror. The vehicle she’d almost hit was a courier van and it was now pulling into her driveway. Doesn’t matter, she thought. Whatever it is, Tommy can sign for it.
She turned on her car radio, punched the button for her favorite station, one that played music from the seventies. “Nights in White Satin” by the Moody Blues was playing. She turned it off, took a quick right into a strip mall and found a shady parking spot under a tree. She put the car in park, draped her arms across the top of the steering wheel, laid her head down.
; And sobbed.
Chapter Two
Thirty Minutes Earlier,
Offices of Loving Lauderdale Magazine
“But the love story. That’s what I really want to play up. The love between the hardened criminal and the sweet, innocent girl. That’s what the readers want, a love story, and I need something to make the conclusion pop.”
Leslie cradled the phone against her ear as she spoke, trying to make her voice as convincing as possible. What she’d failed to mention—and didn’t intend to reveal—was that she already had her conclusion and, boy, would it pop. But did Ginny know?
She knew she was just pushing the envelope here, stretching the boundaries of this interview. She wasn’t just being nosy. She was being downright greedy. But she had to push.
“That signal he gave you,” Leslie prodded. “It must have meant something. Can’t you give me anything here, Ginny?”
Ginny’s sigh was audible over the speakerphone. “The only thing I can tell you, Leslie, is that I’ve spent three months letting you interview me and the real love story was right under your nose the whole time. You just didn’t see it. A story about a man who has loved me from the very beginning, from the first glance. The man who always was and still is my soul mate. That’s the only love story now. Yes, I loved Grizz, that’s true. But that story is over. Don’t romanticize it. I’ve built a new life with—”
That was it—there was no way in hell Ginny knew her husband was Grizz’s son. Leslie was certain of that now. Nobody was that forgiving. Leslie cut her off and went in for the final kill.
“She doesn’t know, does she, Tommy?” Leslie asked sweetly, knowing full well Tommy was sitting right next to Ginny. “You haven’t told her yet?” She tsk-tsked. “Well, I suggest you do so before she reads it in my article.”
But instead of the torrent she’d expected, there was nothing but silence. Leslie waited a beat, then two, for Tommy’s answer. There was no reply. She’d been disconnected.