Redemption Road: A Novel (37 page)

What about the feelings in her chest?

She risked a glance, but Adrian’s eyes were closed, his face tilted up so wind lifted his hair and streamed it backward. She felt a moment’s connection; and that was the thing, she decided, the one thing she knew for sure. Adrian had a story, and she was going to hear it, to know what and why and if anything remained of what she’d once thought to love.

“Tell me the story.”

“When we’re not moving,” he said. “Once we’re still.”

“Okay.” She frowned and felt the road through the wheel, the hum of rubber, and the movement of old springs. “Then tell me one true thing.”

“Just the one?” Humor rose in his eyes, a flash quickly gone.

“It’ll do for now.”

“Fair enough,” he said. “I’m happy that you came.”

“That’s it?”

“It’s the truth.”

She let him have the moment and the silence that followed. It was his game, and she’d agreed to play. Tomorrow, after all, was time enough for reason. Not to say they didn’t play things smart. They stayed off the main roads and watched for cops, passing like ghosts through one small town and then another. After a final, long stretch of empty road, he said, “This’ll do.”

He meant a low-rent motel, lit up in the night ahead. Elizabeth slowed the car, then turned into the lot and drove past a dozen old cars brushed with road dust and red neon. The motel was low and long, with an empty, concrete pool and lime stains seeping from the mortar. “What town is this?”

“Does it matter?”

They were on the edge of something small, but there were a hundred towns like that in the coastal plains, some of them wealthy, most of them poor. This felt like the latter. “Get us two rooms.” Elizabeth parked in front of the office, dug some bills from her purse, and handed them over. “Try for something in the back, preferably at the far end. I’ll be back in a few minutes.”

Adrian took the money but didn’t move. Pale blue doors stretched off to the left. Ten feet away, an ice machine rumbled and clanked. “Where are you going?”

“Do you trust me?”

He looked at the motel, frowned.

“Twenty minutes,” she said, and waited until he got out of the car. When he was gone, she drove into town and found what she expected to find: silent streets and shuttered buildings, small men passing bottles in brown paper bags. There were no restaurants, so she bought beer and food at a convenience store that smelled of fried chicken and sweet tobacco. When she took change from the woman behind the counter, Elizabeth asked, “What town is this?” The woman named the town, and Elizabeth visualized a map in her head. Halfway to the coast. A lot of empty space and skinny roads. The name sounded right. “What’s here?”

“How do you mean?”

“I don’t know. A college? Industry? When people think of this place what comes to mind?”

“Hell if I know.” The woman used her teeth to draw a cigarillo from the box. “Not much around here but poor people and swamp.”

*   *   *

When Elizabeth returned to the motel, she entered the lobby and inquired about room numbers from the old man working the desk.

“You mean the scarred fella?”

“Yes.”

He looked her up and down, then shrugged as if he’d seen it all. “Nineteen and twenty. Left side around the back.”

“May I use your phone?”

“I got phones in the rooms.”

“I’d rather call from here.”

“Long distance?”

“Maybe.”

A mean glint rose in his eyes, so she put $10 on the counter and watched the bills disappear.

“Ten dollars buys five minutes.” He pushed a rotary phone across the counter and shuffled into a back room.

Elizabeth dialed a number from memory and got the hospital switchboard. “I’d like to inquire about a patient.”

“Are you family?”

Elizabeth played the police card, offering her name and badge number, and telling the woman what she wanted. “Mr. Jones is in ICU. Just a moment.”

The phone clicked, and an ICU nurse answered Elizabeth’s questions. Faircloth was alive, but critical. “A stroke,” she said. “A bad one.”

“Jesus. Faircloth.” Elizabeth pinched her eyes. “When will you know if he’s okay?”

“I’m sorry. Who are you again?”

“A friend. A good one.”

“Well, we won’t know anything until tomorrow, at least. Even then, it’s more likely to be bad news than good. Is there anything else I can tell you?”

Elizabeth hesitated because she was hurting for Faircloth, and because the next part was slippery.

“Ma’am?”

“Yes, I’m sorry. Do you know anything about a man found beaten on the roadside north of town? Early forties. Thickset. Uniformed officers would have called it in or transported him directly.”

“Oh, yeah. Everyone’s talking about that.”

“What are they saying?”

The nurse told her, and Elizabeth may or may not have said good-bye. She hung up the phone, walked into the night, and sat for long minutes in the car. Crybaby was still alive—the best possible news—but William Preston was not. He spent an hour in surgery, then died on the table, beaten to death, the nurse said, by an as-yet-unidentified person.

But, that was coming.

Elizabeth turned the key and felt a hot wind on her neck.

When Olivet told his story that was definitely coming.

*   *   *

Adrian sat on the edge of the bed with his back straight. He was worried, but not about normal things. He was going to lose her, Elizabeth, who, other than Crybaby Jones, was the only person alive who’d kept faith in him during the trial. He’d find her face first thing in the morning, front row as they led him in, shackled. He’d look for her, too, at day’s end. A final glimpse before they took him away. A nod that said,
Yes, I believe you did not kill her.

But, that was a long time ago, and there were other issues, now. Olivet. Preston. He’d seen the way she looked at him, his bloody hands. She wanted him to be the same. He wasn’t.

“What do I do?”

He was talking to himself, the room, the ghost of Eli Lawrence. Nobody answered, so he waited for the sound of her car beyond the glass, and only as it came did Eli finally speak.

Stand tall, boy.

Adrian closed his eyes, but felt the room around him. “She saw what I did.”

So?

“You saw how she looked at me.”

You’re only what prison made you. You already told her that.

“And if she doesn’t believe?”

Convince her.

“How?”

Eli didn’t answer, but Adrian knew what he would say.

Tell her the truth, son.

If she’s all you have left, then tell her everything.

Adrian thought that made sense but had no idea how to do it. She’d think him delusional or untruthful or both. It was all so jumbled and fragmented: the things that were real, the things imagined. How could she possibly believe that, for years, his waking hours had been worse than the worst nightmare? She couldn’t. She wouldn’t.

A minute later, she knocked on the door.

“You came back.” He smiled, trying for a joke as he stepped aside to let her in.

She put a bag on the dresser, and bottles clanked. Something was different. She was stiff, unyielding.

“What?”

“Officer Preston is dead.”

“Are you certain?”

“He died in surgery.”

Adrian tried to get his head around that. The beating had been about Crybaby and past hurts and blind rage. He’d not meant to kill the man, but he wasn’t sad about it, either. “Is this where you arrest me?”

“If that was the case, I wouldn’t be here alone.”

“Then, what?”

“Give me your hands.”

She stepped closer and took his hands. The skin was split, but the bleeding had stopped. She held the crooked fingers, looked at the swollen knuckles, the stippled nails.

“About Preston—”

Elizabeth shook her head, stopping him. “Take off your shirt.”

He looked down, ashamed.

“It’s okay. Go ahead.” She released his hands, and his fingers were clumsy on the buttons. Elizabeth kept her eyes on his face, and when the shirt came off, she guided him to the lamp. “It’s okay,” she said again; but he flinched when she touched the first scar, tracing its length, and then touching a second. “So many.”

“Yes.”

He knew what she’d find if she took the time to count: twenty-seven on his chest and stomach, and untold more on his back and legs. When she put her hands on his hips, he said, “Please, don’t.” But, she gentled him like a child, then turned his back to the light and traced a scar that ran from left shoulder blade to right hip. “Elizabeth—”

“Be still.”

She didn’t rush. Her fingers followed one scar, then another, a journey that twisted across his back and left him naked in his soul. How long since he’d been touched without pain in its wake? How long since the simplest kindness?

“All right, Adrian.” She touched him a final time, both palms cool and flat on his skin. “You can put it back on.”

He slipped into the shirt, small tremors still moving in the muscles of his back.

“You want to tell me about it?” She meant the scars, so he turned away, not just because she’d doubt the story, but because that’s what prison had taught him. Don’t rat. Don’t trust. Keep your shit together. Elizabeth seemed to understand, sitting on a narrow chair and leaning forward, her eyes intent, but still soft. “Your scars didn’t come from fights in the yard.”

She didn’t make it a question.

He sat on the bed, so close their knees almost touched.

“Shanks are stabbing weapons. Most of those scars come from long cuts with a thin blade. Did Officer Preston do it?”

“Some of it.”

“And the warden.”

Again, it wasn’t a question; and he shied from the directness of her stare. He didn’t talk about the warden. That was primal. Even the guards spoke his name in a whisper.

“The warden tortured you.”

“How do you know that?”

“His initials are carved into your back in three different places.” She watched his face. He kept his eyes down, but felt the sudden flush. “You didn’t know that, did you?” Adrian’s head moved, and Elizabeth leaned so close he felt her breath. “What did they want from you, Adrian?”

“They?”

“The warden. The doctor. The two guards I know about. They tortured you. What did they want?”

Adrian’s head was spinning. She was so close. The smell of her hair and skin. She was the only person since Eli to ever care, and Eli had been dead for eight years. It was making him dizzy. The truth. A woman. “How do you know these things?”

“You have ligature marks on both wrists. They’re faint, but clear enough to someone who knows what they look like. Most of the wounds were stitched, which means the doctor was in on it. Otherwise, you’d have gotten word out through the infirmary. A phone call. A message. Whatever they wanted, they didn’t want you talking to anybody else.” Elizabeth took his right hand in both of hers. “How many times were your fingers broken?”

“I can’t talk about this.”

“That’s scar tissue under your nails, those white lines.” She touched a nail, and her hands were gentle. “I won’t take you back,” she said. “If you tell me your secrets, I’ll keep them.”

“Why?”

“Because I’m your friend. And, because there are larger things happening here. The warden. The guards. Whatever else is going on in that godforsaken prison. That doesn’t mean others aren’t looking for you—state police, FBI even. Killing a prison guard is like killing a cop. It’ll be worse even than before. You can’t go back. Not ever. You know that, right?”

“Yes.”

“Do you want to tell me what they did?”

“Don’t the scars tell you enough?”

“Can you tell me what they want?”

“No.” He shook his head and met her gaze at last. “I need to show you.”

24

Beckett went home at five in the morning. His wife was asleep, so he crept in quietly and undressed by the shower, nudging aside the ruined shoes, leaving his clothes in a heap. Stepping in, he let hot water sluice off the dirt and smell and traces of William Preston’s blood. Beckett had seen a lot of carnage in his day, a lot of beatings.

But this …

The man’s face was just gone. The mouth. The nose. When Beckett closed his eyes, he saw it again, the drag marks and the stumps of teeth, the spilled blood clotted with dust. Preston had been dead now for hours; and the death had catalyzed what was shaping up to be the largest manhunt Beckett had ever seen. SBI. Highway Patrol. Every sheriff’s office in the state. Dyer was talking to the feds, and literally screaming every time some bureaucrat dared a no. That was the dangerous heart of it. People were worked up, angry, eager.

And Liz was in the middle of it. The manhunt. The frenzy. She mattered in so many ways, and the world, it seemed, wanted her life ripped to shreds. The Monroe brothers. Now this.

“Jesus…”

Beckett scrubbed his hands across his face, but barely recognized himself. He felt sick in his heart, and not from the shattered face or the gray bones or the slick, vinyl bags birthed from beneath the church.

It wasn’t even about Liz.

He braced his hands on the shower wall, water beating down, but none of it hot enough or hard enough. He thought of Adrian’s trial and of all the women dead in that goddamn church.

It had to be Adrian.

But what if it wasn’t? What if the bodies in the crawl space were only five years old? Or ten? If Adrian wasn’t the killer, did that mean his conviction paved the way for someone else to hunt and kill for thirteen more years?

Nine women under the church.

Lauren Lester.

Ramona Morgan.

Beckett felt them like a weight, as if their souls were stone and steel and stacked eleven deep on the crown of his head.

“Sweetheart…”

That was his wife’s voice. Distant.

“Charlie?”

It was louder that time, cutting through the steam as the bathroom door swung open.

“Hang on, honey.” Beckett dashed water from his eyes and peered past the curtain. Carol was in the robe she always wore, her hair tousled from sleep. “Hey, baby.”