“I’m going to take you away from this place,” I said.
Nothing.
“Is Susan Grace here?”
“Who?”
“Susan Grace Gulley, Mason’s sister.”
“Oh, no. Oh, no.” Almost a moan.
“Are you alone?”
“I’m always alone. I have to be alone.”
“We’re going now.”
“Going where?” An edge of panic. “Home?”
“Not if you don’t want to go there.”
“What’s that noise?” Cora crushed her legs more tightly to her chest.
I listened. From above came the renewed din of canine fury. Only then did it register that the dogs had briefly fallen silent.
“It’s all right.”
“You shouldn’t be here.” She blinked, and a tear trickled down her cheek. “You scare me.”
I realized I was braced, knees flexed, weight on the balls of my feet. Acknowledging that my posture might seem threatening, I straightened and stepped into the room.
“Cora. Listen to me.”
“I’m afraid.”
“Where are your shoes?” Calm, masking the turmoil churning inside me.
Cora didn’t answer.
“Do you have a jacket? A sweater?”
Her eyes flicked to the dresser, back to me, wide with alarm. And something else. An emotion so intense I felt chilled to the core.
“I’ll get it,” I said.
“No! No!”
I stepped to the bed and placed a hand on her shoulder. She recoiled as though burned with a poker.
“Father G will never hurt you again,” I said gently.
“Oh, God.” Again her forehead dropped to her knees. “They’re coming.”
“No one is coming.” Knowing my words were untrue. Hoke would be anxious. Snarly Hair would hear the dogs. Or discover Owen Lee’s key chain missing.
“I can’t ever leave.” Almost inaudible.
“Don’t be frightened.”
“They come when I’m frightened. I’m frightened when they come.” Spoken with a singsong lilt, as though chanting or praying.
I crossed to the dresser. Jammed the flash into my waistband and opened a drawer. Socks and undies. I bent to open another.
“Stop!”
My heart catapulted into my throat.
I whirled, expecting to see a Browning pointed at my chest.
There was no one in the doorway. No one in the room but Cora and me.
“Cora?”
The only response was the sound of agitated breathing. Cora had withdrawn so far into the corner I could no longer see her feet.
“Go away!” So loud it seemed to come from nowhere and everywhere.
Dear God! I hadn’t checked the bath!
On reflex, I slammed my back to the wall and slid to the doorway. Blood pounding in my ears, I yanked out my flash and aimed the beam into the dark little space. Saw nothing but a toilet, sink, and makeshift shower.
“Be gone!” At my back.
I whipped my head around, shoulders still flat to the wall.
The wretched lighting was transforming Cora’s body into a grotesque tableau of angles and shadows. Her chin was up and twisted sideways so hard the ligaments in her neck stretched taut as boards. Her fingers, tight on the quilt, looked like bone without flesh.
Sweet Jesus! Was she having a seizure? I scanned for an object I could safely place between her teeth. Saw nothing appropriate. I was heading into the bath when another shrieked command froze me in place.
“Leave!”
Impossible! An adrenaline-induced audio hallucination. Yet there was no mistaking. It was the third voice on the recording. And it was coming from the corner.
Mind struggling to make sense, I inched toward the bed.
“Takarodj el!” Spit with such force it practically blew my cap off.
Not wanting to see, unable to look away, I aimed the Maglite at Cora. The beam lit her pale oval face, lips stretched in a rigor sneer, eyes shining with something dark and menacing. A sensation deep inside me lurched and staggered.
Easy!
I assessed. Cora’s body was tense, but not in spasm.
More data bytes toggled. My last conversation with Ramsey. Depersonalization disorder. Dissociative personality disorder. Panicky questions from Saffron Brice. Which one, Mommy? Which one?
Saffron wasn’t asking which home Cora might visit. She was asking which Cora.
In that instant I realized the magnitude of my error.
“We are going.” Shrugging out of my jacket. “Now.”
“You will die,” bellowed the girl in a deep bass. It was eerie to hear a man’s voice coming from such a delicate mouth.
“I’m not leaving without you, Cora.”
“I’m not Cora.”
I had no idea how to deal with depersonalization or dissociation. Or whatever the sweet fuck this was. Confront? Cajole? Commend?
“Who are you?” I asked.
“Elizabeth.”
“Go away, Elizabeth. I want to talk to Cora.”
“No one tells me what to do.”
“Go away and let me see Cora.”
“I act as I please.”
“Do you kill as you please?” Knowing priests view exorcism as battle, my adrenaline-pumped brain chose confrontation.
The leering grin lifted on one side.
“You killed Mason.”
“No loss. Meddlesome Mason.”
“Why?”
“He convinced the little cow to tell the world.”
“To record what was happening to her.”
“She’s pathetic. I protect her.”
“You dismembered Mason’s body and tossed it on the mountain.”
“Others do my bidding. I have the power.”
“You have only what Cora allows you.”
“Demon power.”
“Only a coward kills children.”
At that, Cora’s head began to corkscrew wildly. Her braids flew and saliva winged across her cheeks in silvery streams.
“Cora’s brother Eli. River Brice.”
The contortions grew more violent. Fearing injury, I shoved a pillow behind her head and quickly hopped back.
Several seconds of wild movement, then Cora’s chin leveled and the emerald eyes bore into mine. In them I saw pure malevolence. Spawned not by some dark presence in her soul. Spawned by a catastrophe in her brain.
Yet Cora believed the demon inside her was real. I had to get her away from this place. Away from Hoke’s destructive psychopathology.
“I don’t believe in demons,” I pressed on.
Cora hawked spit and hurled it in my direction. Missed.
“Not even a good imitation.”
Cora’s pupils rolled back, leaving a glistening white crescent low in each orbit.
“You are a caricature.” My palms were sweaty, my mouth dry. I swallowed. “A bad performance of what Father G expects you to be.”
Cora’s fingers hyperextended, then contracted into claws on the quilt.
“Let me talk to Cora.”
“Eriggy el!”
“Cora.”
“Cora is weak.”
“You don’t exist. Cora created you.”
“The cow is too stupid to create anything.”
“Come away with me.” Confrontation wasn’t working. I tried coaxing. “You can explain who you are.”
“Elizabeth Báthory.”
“There’s no need to shout, Elizabeth Báthory.” I knew the name. From where? My memory cells were far too wired to help. “We’ll go where it’s warmer.”
“Hagyjàl békén!”
As I turned to snatch my jacket from the floor, I saw the comforter shift. Still, I was a heartbeat too late. Cora was off the bed and on me before I could react.
Twisting my right arm high behind my back, she shoved me forward and down. My cap flew and my forehead slammed the concrete. Pain exploded in my skull.
; I saw black. Then a million tiny points of light.
My nose and mouth were mashed shut. My teeth were cutting the insides of my lips. I couldn’t speak, couldn’t breathe. I tasted blood.
As I struggled for air and coherence, a knee smashed down on my spine. Lungs burning, I struck out and back with both feet and my one free elbow. Though I’m strong, I was no match for Cora.
“Halj meg!”
I strained my neck in a frenzied attempt to lift my head. To free my air passages. Failed. Cora had me pinned.
It seemed like hours. In reality, it was probably less than a minute. I finally managed to shift one shoulder enough to rotate my chin. My cheek landed in blood pooling on the concrete. My blood. I feared I would retch.
“Cora.” I gasped.
Her body tensed. Then her fingers grabbed and twisted my hair. She yanked my head up, then smashed it down hard.
“Elizabeth.”
I felt her weight shift, then Cora’s breath hot and moist on my ear.
“Slut.”
“You’re hurting me.”
“Filthy bitch!”
“No. No more.”
“Whore!”
She jerked my head high. My neck vertebrae screamed. A flat-palm shove and my left temple slammed the concrete. She mashed down on my right temple with more force than I would have thought possible from someone her size. Something crunched in my jaw.
The tiny white lights winked.
Then the blackness won out.
—
I woke to a scene that made no sense.
Cora was in the big oak chair, one wrist and one ankle strapped to the wood. Hoke lay crumpled on the floor, eyes closed, a crucifix jutting at a deadly angle from beneath his Roman collar.
The memories after that are shredded images spliced together with yawning gaps in between. The incomplete puzzle as hellish multisensory nightmare.
I remember the dogs braying in fury. Hoke’s blood snaking the concrete to mingle with mine. Cora, wild-eyed, clawing at the leather-belt ligatures.
I recall an agitated male voice drifting down from above. Fragments of a one-sided conversation. “…done it again.” “No!” “I’ll hide her and I’ll cover for her when she’s hostage to the serpent. But…” “No…” “…Lord God commands thou shalt not kill.”
I retain the image of a man standing over me, all bone and muscle and dangerous scowl. The smell of his rubber-soled hiking boots.
I know I asked about Susan Grace.
I know I tried to rise but couldn’t.
In my mind I hear the boom of a door slamming tin. Feet pounding down stairs. Men’s voices shouting.
I see Ramsey holding a gun two-handed on Owen Lee Teague. Slidell’s face close to mine.
I feel fingers probing my hair. Soft fabric wiping my face. Hands lifting my body.
The rest of that night is a huge blank containing very few pieces. A fuzzy wool blanket tickling my chin. A wobbly ride with stars overhead and straps on my chest and thighs. Flashing red lights. The back of an ambulance. A wailing siren.
Thinking.
Thinking what?
Thinking nothing at all.
I never again saw any of those from Avery County. Grandma and Susan Grace Gulley. Granger Hoke. Cora and her hideous family.
Except for Strike, we all came through it. Even Hoke, though he’ll never audition for the Vatican choir. He lost a lot of blood and took a nick to the vocals, but Cora’s thrust with the crucifix missed all major vessels. When released, Father G would be swapping his hospital gown for a jailhouse jumpsuit.
Susan Grace was never in danger. That night she’d again lied to her grandmother in order to snatch a fragment of normalcy. A deputy found her drinking wine coolers in the woods with high school friends. Hoke said the notation on his calendar was a reminder to put sealant on his gutters.
I still marvel at the dramatic entrance choreographed by Slidell and Ramsey. At Slidell’s timing in nailing the truth.
Skinny had spent hours viewing security tapes covering the weekend Hazel Strike died. Footage from establishments near Strike’s home and the RibbonWalk Nature Preserve, where her body was found.
At 4:00 P.M., while I was legging it away from Hoke’s Browning, Slidell’s diligence paid off. Strike’s red Corolla appeared on camera at a gas station a quarter mile from the preserve. Riding in her passenger seat was Cora Teague.
From my texts Slidell knew I’d gone to Jesus Lord Holiness, then on to Teague’s store. Smelling danger, he’d contacted Ramsey, then burned rubber up to Avery.
I suffered a concussion and a hairline fracture of my right zygoma. No big deal, but I was compelled to stay two days at Cannon Memorial so night-shift nurses could shine lights in my eyes. When finally reconnected with my clothes, I filled my prescriptions and headed back to Charlotte.
Zeb Ramsey called while I was still on meds and too loopy to talk. I phoned him back a few days later. Thanked him for saving my ass. In more polite language.
Oddly, the call seemed to continue well past its shelf life. Just before disconnecting, I learned why. Ramsey surprised me by asking me out. Dinner sometime, you know the drill. Awkward. Or was it? I wasn’t sure what to think.
Turns out Ramsey’s full name is Zebulon. Apparently, I asked while under the influence of pain. Or painkillers.
Slidell made himself scarce once he learned that all I had was a head thump, unsightly skin loss, and a broken cheek. Partly busy with paperwork and interrogations. Partly furious with me for going all cowboy. His phrase. Couldn’t blame him. Rushing off on my own was a bonehead move.
It took two weeks, but, working both ends, Slidell and Ramsey managed to patch together the story. Most of it came from Owen Lee and Fatima Teague, some from Cora’s out-of-state sisters, Veronica and Marie. Some from medical personnel treating Cora.
According to Fatima, Cora had her first “fit” at age fourteen, a few months before Eli died. She recalled that after her son’s death her daughter became increasingly temperamental and started “taking on airs.” As the older sisters moved away from the home, Cora’s moodiness intensified. For a while John allowed her to see a doctor, but, in Daddy’s enlightened view, medication made her worse.
Veronica stated that Cora was frequently anxious and afraid of ridiculously harmless things. Frogs. Coat hangers. A tree behind their house. Marie said Cora was often depressed, had trouble sleeping and a lousy memory.
The professional assessment, based on intense and ongoing psychiatric evaluation, beat the hell out of devils and demons. I had no doubt the diagnosis would stand.
—
I was lugging my sixth box to the curb when a familiar Taurus pulled into my drive. I straightened and waited for Slidell to lower his window.
“Riveting look.” Taking in my head scarf and dingy denim. “But Rosie already got the part.”
“I’m cleaning out the attic.”
“Converting to a nursery?”
“An office.”
“Face looks good.”
It didn’t. “Thanks.”
Slidell chin-cocked my haphazardly stacked trash. “You know those douchebags on the trucks won’t take big stuff.”
“I bribe them.”
“I’m a cop. Don’t tell me that.” Gruff, but with a level of civility that let me know he was no longer angry. “When are you leaving?”
“The eight-twenty flight tonight. Renovations start on the attic on Monday.”
“You got a minute?”
“Sure. Come on in.”
We settled at the kitchen table. Slidell declined a beer in favor of unsweetened iced tea. While delivering his drink, I did a discreet appraisal. Though a long way from buff, Skinny had definitely lost more weight. Workouts? Stress? The lovely Verlene?
“I gotta admit. I can’t get my head around the arse end of this shrinky gobbledygook.”
“Shrinky gobbledygook?” As usual, I anticipated the need of an interpreter for the conversation.
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“The kid killed three, maybe four people, yet she’s at some candy-ass hospital whining about her problems.”
“Cora has been deemed mentally incompetent.”
That drew a head wag and a whistly snort.
“She’s unable to understand the charges against her or to aid in her own defense.”
“She’s nuts, I get that, but—”
“She has dissociative identity disorder. DID.”
“That’s what I mean.” In his “pointing finger” voice. “You sound just like the shrinks. So, what? They saying she’s schizophrenic?”
“No. Schizophrenia is a mental illness involving chronic or recurrent psychosis. People hear or see things that aren’t there, think or believe things that have no basis in reality.”
“Yeah, yeah. The kid don’t have hallucinations or delusions. That’s what they been spinning. How about you explain what it is she does have?”
“Multiple personalities.”
“I thought that was just cheesy Hollywood movie crap.”
“It’s real. Dissociative identity disorder used to be called multiple personality disorder. It’s a condition in which a person’s identity fragments into two or more different ones. Each identity exists independently of the others, and each identity is distinct in specific ways. Tone of voice, vocabulary, mannerisms, posture, handedness—all the things we think of as making up a personality.”
“How many identities we talking?”
“A person with DID can have as few as two or three, or as many as a hundred or more. Statistically, the average is fifteen.” I’d spent hours researching the subject. “The usual age of onset is early childhood, so new identities can accumulate throughout life.”
“Who runs the show?”
“Psychiatrists call the main personality the host. That identity acts as a sort of gatekeeper. The others are called alters, and the transitions are called switches. Switching can take seconds to minutes to days. Alters can be imaginary people, animals, historic or fictional figures, and can vary by age, race, or gender.”
“So a guy can have a chick alter and a chick can have a guy?”
“Yes.”
“That why the kid sounded like a goddamn drill sergeant down in that basement?”
“Exactly. And on the audio recording. The voice we thought was a second man was actually Cora speaking as Elizabeth.”
“Jesus bouncing Christ. This is too fucked up.”