All The Pretty Dead Girls (40 page)

“I’m sorry I didn’t get back to you earlier,” Ginny was telling Father Ortiz. “But I haven’t been myself.”

That was putting it mildly. Two days ago, she’d awoken in her living room, dazed and uncomprehending. She seemed to have missed a day—or at least a night.
The last thing I remember,
she’d thought to herself,
is sitting at my desk writing—and then someone was at the door…

But nothing after that.
I guess I must have dozed off here,
Ginny told herself.
How unlike me.

She looked around the house. Everything was tidy—tidier than she usually left it. The coffeemaker was washed and cleaned, rather than sitting with a black sooty mess from the day before, the way she usually found it in the morning. And it was late—almost noon—why did she sleep so
long
?

She walked around the house. The guest room was neat, the bed made. So was her own bed. “Now I know I did not make my bed,” she said out loud. “I never make my bed.”

The living room, once she walked back in, had the vague scent of cleaning fluids. On closer inspection, she saw that her rug had been scrubbed. It was cleaner in one section than it was elsewhere.

“Something happened here,” she said to herself. “Only I can’t remember what it was!”

For two days—two whole days—she walked through her life as if in a dream. She knew something was wrong—but to probe her mind too much was painful. It physically hurt. And she was scared, too—of what, she wasn’t sure. But she was scared.

The worst part was that she couldn’t write. All that momentum was out the window. She sat and stared into space. She didn’t return calls. Not even when Father Ortiz left a message saying it was “vital” that he speak with her.

Finally, she forced herself to sit back at her desk and try to write. A call from her agent had spurred her into action. Her editor wanted to take a chapter with him to read over the Christmas holidays. Ginny stared down at her computer, but still couldn’t bring herself to write anything.

Then she pulled open her top drawer.

A notebook.

“I don’t remember this,” she said, pulling it out and opening to the first page.

My handwriting. When did I write this?

The date at the top…two days previous.

The day she’d lost partially…those missing hours.

And then she started to read.

She read the whole account Sue had given her, as if she was hearing about it for the first time. Parts of it she couldn’t believe—but when she reached the last page, she remembered everything. All of it.

The gunshot. The blood. Joyce Davenport.

And that horrible creature of darkness that Sue had become.

For twenty minutes, all Ginny did was cry and shake.

Then she was on the phone making flight arrangements to Senandaga.

“I barely made it in,” she told Father Ortiz now, driving her rental car through the first flakes of furious snow. “They were worried the blizzard would close the airport, but it held off just long enough.”

“It is God’s will then,” Father Ortiz said. “Ginny, I am so glad to hear from you. We were worried.”

“I know everything,” she told him. “I know about Sue Barlow. She came to see me.”

“Bernadette felt certain she had,” Ortiz said. “Please hurry, Ginny. Tonight…tonight Sue is being consecrated to her father. She will be asked to officially accept her destiny.”

“Where should I meet you?”

“How far away are you?” Ortiz asked.

“Half an hour.”

Ortiz gave her the address of Perry Holland’s apartment. “We will wait half an hour for you, but no longer. Bernadette has just heard from her lookout. People are arriving at the dean’s house.”

Ginny told him she’d drive as fast as she could, given the snow. She snapped her cell phone shut. Perry Holland. He wasn’t crazy after all.

Hang on, Sue,
she thought.
You’re not completely lost to us yet. You could have killed me. That’s what a true evil nature would have done. Killed me, and enjoyed it. But you spared me—and you had to know my memory would come back.

In fact, Ginny suspected, Sue was likely counting on it.

Sue sat in a room upstairs, listening to people arriving below. Laughter, loud voices, classical music playing in the background. Dean Gregory was offering everyone who came through the door a cocktail or a glass of wine. If Sue didn’t know better, she might really think there was a Christmas party going on downstairs.

“This was the eldest son’s room,” she said all at once to Joyce Davenport, who was fixing her makeup in a mirror. “The one who died not long ago. An overdose. He’d been living in a homeless shelter on Long Island.”

“Marvelous, isn’t it?” Joyce turned to face her, a broad smile on her face. “Like a Shakespearean tragedy. Those boys were offered so much—and fell so low.”

“After what they saw in this house,” Sue said, no emotion in her voice, “they were shattered for life.”

Joyce approached her. “They were weak. Just like their mother was weak. You did right in eliminating her, Sue.”

Sue let her eyes move past Joyce and find their reflection in the mirror across the room. She felt numb. Her mind didn’t seem to work the way it once did. Her emotions felt turned off. She was like an observer, not a participant, in her own life.

“They’re all gathering downstairs,” Joyce said, “waiting for you. This will be quite the ceremony. The beginning of great things for you, sweetie.”

“My grandparents?”

Joyce nodded. “Seated in places of honor.”

“Yes,” Sue said. “I can see them.”

And she could. Her grandmother was done up with her best jewelry and a dress of black satin. Her hair was piled on her head. Beside her, Granpa smoked his cigar, his ascot tie proudly puffing out of his jacket. Sue could see them clearly. They were being greeted by the guests as if they were a king and queen.

That’s what Granpa had wanted. That’s why he had allowed his daughter to be raped by the devil.

In Sue’s mind, she saw several of her grandfather’s colleagues from the law firm, their wives on their arms. They stuck close to Granpa, hoping to bask in his glow.

“All of my grandfather’s success,” Sue said, “that was part of the bargain, wasn’t it?”

“Of course, sweetie. Everything he’s ever wanted, he’s achieved.” Joyce drew close to her. “And that will be even more true for you, Sue.”

She laughed. “But what is it that I want?”

The door opened. In walked Dean Gregory, resplendent in a black suit and bright red satin tie.

“Are you ready, Sue?” he asked. “Everyone is here.”

She looked at him.
I killed his wife,
she thought,
but he remains at my command. He remains my dutiful servant.

“Why?” she asked. “What’s in all this for you, Ted Gregory?”

His pinched, weaselly face looked momentarily surprised as he exchanged glances with Joyce.

“Sue’s just wondering what comes next, I think,” Joyce explained.

“We will all know great glory through you, Sue,” Gregory told her.

“But how? What is the plan?”

Joyce laughed. “Well, it can go any way we choose. But I was thinking…” She smiled, her eyes dancing. “You’ll graduate top of your class here at Wilbourne, Sue. Then you’ll go on to law school, and be spotted by a promising politician as excellent advisor material. You’ll dazzle Washington with your charm and command of the facts, and be appointed secretary of state when that same politician becomes president. And then…well, Sue, how does the idea of being the first female president of the United States appeal to you?”

“President…of the United States,” Sue said.

“What better position for the Antichrist to hold? The leader of the most powerful nation on Earth?”

“What we will be able to do,” Gregory said, literally rubbing his hands together.

“And I suppose I’ll appoint you to the Supreme Court,” Sue said, looking at her dean.

He just grinned.

Sue sighed. President of the United States. It was her destiny. That young girl who’d once dreamed of working for social justice—she seemed like a figment of her imagination now. A vague, fast-fading memory.

It was a thrilling idea. Sue felt a rush of ambition surge through her body. President of the United States…

It’s good I can feel ambition. I’ll certainly never feel anything else.

She understood now why she’d never known love for a boy before.
Because the daughter of Satan cannot comprehend love. It is not an emotion that I can experience
.

And without love—well, then, ambition—greed—power—these things would have to take its place.

“All right,” Sue said. “I’m ready to go downstairs.”

She stood. Joyce was holding a red robe for her. Sue slipped her arms into the sleeves. She caught another look at herself in the mirror.

Her eyes were no longer blue. They had become as red as her robe.

Ginny sat in the backseat of Perry Holland’s car with Bernadette. Up front, Father Ortiz sat beside Perry. No one talked as they drove across town toward the Wilbourne campus. Bernadette was saying a Rosary.

Finally, Ginny spoke. “What are we expecting to find?’

“I’m not sure,” Father Ortiz said. “But it will be some sort of ceremony.”

“And you think we can just waltz inside and take part?”

“Hardly, Ginny. But you’re still a faculty member and the dean will see you. And Perry has a badge.”

“I’m going in,” Perry said. “The three of you will remain in the car.”

“Perry,” Ortiz said. “Bernadette’s parents have given their consent for her to join us. I have told them that her presence is necessary, and they trust me. Nothing can happen to the girl while she is under the direct protection of Our Holy Mother.”

“Still,” Perry told him. “You wait in the car until I give the word that it’s safe to go inside. Understood?”

“Understood, Deputy,” came Bernadette’s voice.

Ginny looked over at her. Such a small girl. And yet Ginny shared Father Ortiz’s conviction that nothing could happen to her.

It was the rest of them that she worried about.

She remembered all too clearly the monstrous thing that Sue had become in her living room. She’d seen firsthand the power—and the evil—that they were dealing with.

Perry pulled up to the college gate and showed his badge to the guard.

“I need to see the dean,” Perry explained.

“I’ll call him,” the guard said.

“Is that you, Tom?” Ginny called from the backseat. Tom O’Riley had been a guard at the gate ever since Ginny first started teaching at the college. She liked him; he liked her. “It’s me, Ginny Marshall. How are you, Tom?”

The guard peered in through the window and spotted her. “Oh, hey, Ginny. I’m great. What’re you doing in a police car?”

She smiled. “I just got back in from Louisiana and Deputy Holland was kind enough to pick me up in this snowstorm. I’m bringing my friends here to Dean Gregory’s party. The party
is
tonight, isn’t it?”

“Oh, sure,” Tom said. “There’s been dozens of people coming in all night. I had to check their names against a list…”

Ginny thought fast. “I’ll bet Ted didn’t have time to put my name on the list. I didn’t think I’d be able to get in with all the snow. I just called him a little while ago to say I could make it after all.”

Tom nodded. “Oh, that’s fine, Ginny. Besides, you can come on campus anytime you want. You’re faculty here.”

“Thanks, Tom.”

He pressed the switch and the iron gates swung inward. He waved them through.

“Good work, Doctor,” Bernadette told her.

Ginny smiled.

Cars were parked all around the dean’s house. Many had out-of-state plates. Connecticut, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, even a couple from Canada. The house was ablaze with light, from the top floor to the basement. The snow continued to fall, blanketing the campus in a soft whiteness that sparkled in the moonlight.

“Now stay here until I check things out,” Perry told them again, parking the car and turning off the ignition.

Ginny agreed to wait. There wasn’t much she could do anyway. What was she supposed to do—march up there and call them all Satanists and grab Sue by the collar?

She wasn’t quite sure what Perry could do either.

They watched him walk up the steps to the front door. None of them said a word.

The only sound in the car was Bernadette’s steady murmur as she whispered the prayers of the Rosary.