Stillhouse Lake Read online

  I owe her for that.

  I almost miss it when she says, "So, kids, what are you studying in school right now?" It seems like a safe question, and it should be, but as Connor opens his mouth I realize that one of his classes is Tennessee history, and I quickly interrupt.

  "Classes are going well."

  She sighs, and I can hear the exasperation in it. She hates this. Hates being so . . . vague. "And how about you, dear? Have you got any new hobbies?"

  "Not really."

  That's the extent of our conversation. We were never quite close, she and I, even when I was a child. She loves me, I know, and I love her, but it isn't the kind of attachment that I see in other people. Other families. There's a kind of polite distance between us, as if we're strangers who happened to end up together. It's odd.

  But I owe her everything, even so. She'd never expected to have to keep my children for nearly a year while the prosecution tried to build a case for my guilt. They called me Melvin's Little Helper, and my presumed involvement in Melvin's crimes rested completely on the testimony of one gossipy, vindictive neighbor looking for attention. She claimed she'd seen me help Melvin carry one of his victims from the car into the garage one evening.

  I never had. I never would. I hadn't known a thing, ever, but it was horrifying and maddening to realize that no one, absolutely no one, believed that. Not even my own mother. Maybe part of the open wound between us stems from that moment when she'd asked me, with such revulsion and horror in her face, Honey, did you do this? Did he make you do this?

  She'd never insisted it was a lie, never denied I was capable of atrocity. She'd only sought to find a reason for it, and that was incredibly hard to understand then, or now. Maybe it was the lack of attachment she'd had to me as a child, and I to her; maybe she could so easily believe the worst because she felt she'd never really known me at all.

  I will never, ever do that to my children. I will defend them with complete devotion. None of this is their fault.

  My own mother has always blamed me. Well, she told me at one point, you wanted to marry that man.

  The reason the trolls are so viciously devoted to my pursuit is that they really believe that I'm guilty. I'm a vicious, predatory killer who managed to evade justice, and now they're the ones who can administer the punishment.

  On some level I understand it. Mel swept me off my feet with romantic gestures. He took me to beautiful dinners. Bought me roses. Always opened doors for me. Sent me love letters and cards. I really did love him, or at least I thought I did. The proposal was thrilling. The wedding was fairy-tale perfect. In a few months, we were pregnant with Lily, and I thought I was the luckiest woman in the world, someone whose husband earned enough to let her stay home and lavish her children with love and care.

  And then, gradually, his hobby had crept in.

  Mel's workshop had started small: a workbench in the garage, then more tools, more space, until there wasn't room for even one car, much less two, and he'd built the carport and taken the entire garage as his space. I hadn't loved it, especially in the winter, but by then Mel had taken out the garage door, built a back wall, and added a door that he kept padlocked and dead bolted. Expensive tools.

  I'd never noticed anything that had sounded odd, except once. It would have been around the death of his next-to-last victim--he'd told me that a raccoon had gotten into the workshop from the attic and died in the corner, and it would take a while for the smell to air out. He used lots of bleach and cleaners.

  I believed every word of it. Why wouldn't I?

  But I still think I should have known, and in that, I understand the trolls' anger.

  My mother is saying something that, by the tone, is directed again to me. I open my eyes and say, "Sorry, what?"

  "I said, are you making sure the kids are getting swimming lessons? I worry that you're not, given the . . . the problems you have." My mother adores the water--lakes, pools, the sea. She's half mermaid. It was especially horrifying to her that Melvin disposed of his victims in water. It's especially horrifying to me, too. My stomach clenches when I even think of dipping a toe in the lake that I admire so much from a distance. I can't even take a boat out on that calm surface without thinking of my ex-husband's victims, weighted down and chained to the bottom. A silent, rotting garden, swaying in the slow currents. Even drinking tap water makes me gag.

  "The kids aren't really interested in swimming," I tell my mom, without the slightest inflection of dismay that she brought up the subject at all. "We do run pretty often, though."

  "Yeah, the path around--" Lanny starts, and lightning-fast, I reach out and hit the mute button. She realizes her mistake in the next instant. She'd been about to say the lake . . . And even though there are thousands of lakes in the country, it's a clue. We can't afford even that much. "Sorry."

  I unmute.

  "I mean, we run outside a lot," Lanny says. "It's nice." It's hard for her not to be able to provide any details--the temperature, the trees, the lake--but she leaves it at that. Generic. My mother knows enough not to push. It's a sad fact of life.

  I've wondered before what their life was like without me; my own experience behind bars was hell, constantly burning with fear for my kids. I thought from the glad way they always greeted these phone calls that Grandma represented something peaceful in their lives--a vacation from the awful reality they've been shoved into. At least, I hope that's what it is.

  I hope that my kids aren't that good at lying, because that, too, is a Melvin Royal signature trait.

  Mom spins tales of Newport and the coming summer, and we can't reciprocate with what the weather will be like near us; she knows that, and the conversation is mostly one-sided. I wonder if she gets anything out of these calls, really, or if it's a duty for her. She might not have bothered if it had only been me, but she truly does love my kids, and they love her back.

  The kids' faces dim a little when I end the call and put the phone away until next time. Lanny says, "I wish we could Skype or something, so we could see her."

  Connor immediately frowns at her. "You know we can't," he says. "They'd figure stuff out from Skype. I see it on cop shows and things."

  "Cop shows aren't reality, dumb-ass," Lanny shoots back. "You think CSI is a documentary?"

  "Easy, you two," I say. "I wish we could see her, too. But this is good, right? We're good?"

  "Yeah," Connor says. "We're good." Lanny says nothing.

  Sicko Patrol the next day yields nothing much new, but then again, I've grown so accustomed to the general horror of it that I'm not sure if I'd recognize new if it bit me. I do some freelance editing work, then some freelance web design work, and I'm deep into an especially demanding piece of coding when a brisk knock strikes the front door. Despite my startled flinch, the sound reminds me of the way Officer Graham knocks, so I am cheerful when I head to answer it. Sure enough, as I check to see who it is, I see Lancel Graham's face.

  After the first rush of relief, I hope he hasn't misunderstood my warm welcome the other night, or seen it as an opportunity. I'm not in a place that needs romance. I had enough of that with Mel's letter-perfect seduction, his model-husband performance art. I don't trust myself that way anymore, and I can't bring myself to allow the lowering of barriers that comes with even the most casual of relationships.

  I'm busy thinking about that as I disarm the system and open the door, but that train of thought hardly even leaves the station. There's something different about him this time. He's not smiling.

  He's also not alone.

  "Ma'am." The man standing behind him is the one who speaks first. He's an African American man of medium height who has the build of a former football player, going soggy around the middle. He's got a sharp-edged haircut and heavy-lidded eyes, and the suit looks hard-worn and off the rack on its best day. He's got a tie on, too, a blunt, red thing that just slightly clashes with the gray of the jacket. "I'm Detective Prester. I need to speak to you, please."

&nb
sp; It isn't a question.

  I freeze in place and involuntarily look back over my shoulder. Connor and Lanny are both in their rooms, and neither of them has come looking. I step out and shut the door behind me. "Detective. Of course. What is it?" Thank God, I don't have to fear for the safety of my children in that moment. I know where they are. I know they're safe. So this, I think, must be about something else.

  I wonder if he's dug around and put the trail together to connect Gwen Proctor to Gina Royal. I hope to hell not.

  "Can we sit down a moment?"

  I indicate the chairs on the porch, instead of letting them inside, and he and I settle into them. Officer Graham lingers at a distance, watching the lake. I follow his gaze, and my heart speeds up with a kick.

  The usual fleet of pleasure craft is absent today. Instead, there are two boats out near the middle of the calm surface, both painted in official blue-and-white colors, with light bars on top that strobe slow, red flashes. I see a diver in scuba gear pitch backward over the side of the second one.

  "A body was found in the lake early this morning," Detective Prester says. "Was hoping you might have seen something out there last night, heard something? Anything out of the ordinary?"

  I scramble to order my thoughts. Accident, I think. Boating accident. Somebody out at night, drunk, tips over the side . . . "I'm sorry," I say. "Nothing unusual."

  "You hear anything after dark last night? Boat engines, maybe?"

  "Probably, but that's not really unusual," I say. I'm trying to remember. "Yes. I heard something around nine, I think." Long after dark, which falls early behind the pines. "But there are people here who go out to enjoy the stars. Or do some night fishing."

  "Did you happen to look outside at any point? See anyone around the lake or on it?" He looks tired, but there's a sharpness behind that facade, one I wouldn't want to play around trying to avoid. I answer him as honestly as I can.

  "No, I didn't. I'm sorry. I was working really late last night on the computer, and my office window looks up the hill, not down. I didn't go outside."

  He nods and makes some notes in a book. He's got a quiet sort of confidence, the kind that makes you want to relax around him. I know that's dangerous. I've been lulled into underestimating police before, and I suffered for it. "Anybody else in the house last night, ma'am?"

  "My kids," I say. He glances up, and his eyes flash dark amber in the sunlight. Unreadable. Behind that disguise of the tired, slightly frayed, overworked man, he's sharp as a scalpel.

  "Can I talk to them, please?"

  "I'm sure they don't know anything--"

  "Please."

  It would seem suspicious not to agree, but I'm tense and anxious as hell. I don't know how Lanny and Connor will react to being questioned again; they'd been subjected to many, many interviews during the course of Mel's trial, and my own, and even though the Wichita police had been careful about it, it left scars. I don't know what kind of traumas it will tear open. I try to keep my voice calm. "I'd rather not have them questioned, Detective. Unless you think it's absolutely necessary."

  "I think it is, ma'am."

  "For an accidental drowning?"

  His amber eyes fix on me, and they seem to glow in the light. I feel them probing into me like searchlights. "No, ma'am," he says. "I never said it was accidental. Or a drowning."

  I don't know what that means, but I feel the pit open under me, I feel the drop. Something very bad has just begun.

  And I say, in half a whisper, "I'll get them."

  3

  Connor goes first, and the detective is gentle with him, good with kids. I see the gleam of a wedding ring, and I'm glad that he isn't like the cops back in Kansas. My kids had developed a real fear of police, and for very good reason; they'd seen the anger of the ones who'd arrested Mel, an anger that had only increased as the depth and breadth of his crimes was revealed. Those police had known not to take it out on small children, but some of it had spilled over. Inevitably.

  Connor seems tense and nervous, but he gives his answers in short, effective sentences. He hasn't heard anything except--as I'd said--maybe a boat engine out on the water around nine at night. He didn't look out, because it isn't unusual. He doesn't remember anything out of the ordinary at all.

  Lanny doesn't want to say anything. She sits silently, head down, and nods or shakes her head but won't speak until the detective finally turns to me in exasperation. I put a hand on her shoulder and say, "Sweetheart, it's okay. He's not here to hurt anybody. Just tell him anything you might know, okay?" I say that, of course, confident that she doesn't know anything, no more than Connor or I do.

  Lanny shoots me a doubtful look from a veil of dark hair and says, "I saw a boat last night."

  I am rooted to the spot in shock. I shiver a little, even though the day's air is warm, the birds singing. No, I think. No, this can't be happening. My daughter can't be a witness. A sick abyss opens at my feet, and I imagine her on the stand, testifying. Cameras flashing. Pictures in newspapers, and immediately, the headlines.

  SERIAL KILLER'S DAUGHTER WITNESS IN MURDER TRIAL

  We'll never get away again.

  "What kind of boat?" Detective Prester asks. "How big was it? What color?"

  "It wasn't very big. A small fishing boat, like--" She thinks, then points to one that's bobbing at a dock not far away. "Like that one. White, I could see it from my window."

  "Can you recognize it if you see it again?"

  She's already shaking her head by the time he finishes. "No, no, it was just a boat, like a hundred other ones. I didn't see it real well." She shrugs. "Looked like every other one around here, honestly."

  If Prester is disappointed, he doesn't look it. Doesn't look excited, either. "So, you saw the boat. Good. Let's back up. What made you look outside?"

  Lanny sits for a moment, thinking, then says, "I guess it was the splash?"

  That gets his attention, and mine. My mouth goes dry. Prester leans forward a bit. "Tell me about that."

  "Well, I mean, it was a big splash. Big enough that I heard it. But my room faces the lake, you know, at the corner of the house. I had my window open. So I heard a splash when the engine cut out. I thought maybe somebody fell in, or jumped in. People go skinny-dipping out there sometimes."

  "And you looked out?"

  "Yeah. But all I saw was the boat. It was just sitting there. There was somebody in it, I guess, because after a couple of minutes the engine started up again. I couldn't really see them." She takes in a deep breath. "Did I see somebody dumping a body?"

  Prester doesn't answer that. He's busy writing in his notebook, fast scratches of pen on paper. He says, "Did you see where the boat went after the engine started?"

  "No. I shut the window; it was getting too windy outside. I pulled the curtain and went back to reading."

  "Okay. How long would you say you heard the engine run before it was turned off again?"

  "I don't know. I put my earbuds in. I fell asleep and they were still in. My ears were sore this morning. My music played all night."

  God. I can't swallow. I stare at Prester, willing him to say something comforting, something like, It's okay, kid, nothing happened, it's all just a mistake, but he doesn't. He doesn't confirm or deny. He just clicks his pen, puts it back in his pocket with the notebook, and stands up. "Thank you, Atlanta. That's real helpful. Ms. Proctor."

  I can't say anything to him. I just nod, like Lanny does, and we watch as he and Graham rendezvous back at the dust-filmed black sedan parked in our driveway. They talk, but I can't make out a word, and they're positioned so we can't see their faces. I sit down and put my arm around my daughter, and for once, she doesn't shrug it off and move away.

  I gently rub my palm back and forth across her shoulder, and she sighs. "This isn't good, Mom. Not good. I should have said I didn't see anything. I thought about lying, I really did."

  I think that's probably true; I don't see how what she saw advances the investigation
at all. She couldn't identify the boat, hadn't seen anyone to recognize, and telling Prester anything just means that he'll check us out in more detail. I pray that Absalom's work on our new identities will hold up. I can't be absolutely sure of that, and any scrutiny, any leaks could have dire consequences.

  We should get out of here before something happens. I think about that. I vividly imagine the flurry of packing. We have a fair amount of stuff now, and I can't ask my kids to continue to abandon everything they love; we have to take things, and that means more room than the Jeep can provide. We'd need something larger. A van, probably. I can trade for one, but my cash supply isn't unlimited, and my credit is carefully managed under my new identity, with only one card, and only to prop up the illusion. We can't just pull out at a moment's notice, drift away without a trace. It will take a day, at least, to get everything organized. I realize with a shock that for all my paranoia, I haven't considered this worst-case scenario: how to pull us safely and quickly out of this home, this place. A day's delay might be nothing to most people, but it could mean the difference between life and death to us.

  The Jeep--too small for an immediate evacuation--was a sign I'm putting down roots and getting comfortable, and it's the wrong time for that. Dammit.

  Lanny, I realize, has been watching me. Watching my face as I think this through. She says nothing until Officer Graham and Detective Prester are in the sedan and backing down the drive in a whisper of pale dust, and then she says in a dead little voice, "So I guess we pack, right? Just what we can carry?"

  I hear the damage I've done to them both in her flat intonation. She's become resigned to the terrible, inhuman idea that she can never have friends, or family, or even favorite things, and she's learned to live with that at the tender age of fourteen, and I can't. I can't do it to her again.