Authors: Kevin O'Brien

The Last Victim (29 page)

BOOK: The Last Victim

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Bridget turned and walked into her office. Zach followed her, then stopped in her doorway. “What’s going on?” he whispered. “I mean, I know you’re upset about what’s on the news, but why take it out on me?”

She sat down at her desk and shuffled through some papers. “I’m busy, Zach.”

“You know, you started acting strange last night, when I told you I was going to talk with Cheryl. Is there something you’re not telling me? Some secret between you and Cheryl?”

Bridget glanced up for a second and shook her head at him.

He stepped into the office and closed the door behind him. “I didn’t get very far with Cheryl today. When I started asking her about Mallory Meehan, she became hostile. Do you know what that’s about?”

“I haven’t a clue,” she said, focusing again on her paperwork.

“On the drive back here, I started thinking about seeing you in Salem. You called Cheryl from a pay phone there. Why?”

“Not that it’s any of your goddamn business,” Bridget growled, looking up at him again, “but I wanted to tell Cheryl about Fuller’s death. They were close in high school. I thought she should know he’d died. Does that answer your question? Now would you leave me alone?”

“God, talk about hostile. You’re almost as bad as Cheryl.”

“Did you do anything last night—after I left the funeral home?” Bridget asked. She tapped a pencil eraser against her desktop and waited for him to start spinning some lie.

“Yeah. I ran into another guy from the
Examiner
. He was covering the funeral—though I didn’t see him there earlier. Just as well, he’s kind of a creep. Anyway, he talked me into having dinner with him—at a Denny’s.”

Bridget stopped tapping her pencil. She just stared up at him.

Zach sighed. “I had a Coke and a taco salad, ninety minutes of dull conversation with this jerk, and after that, I went home with a case of indigestion. That’s it, that was my night. Why do you ask?”

Bridget sat back in her chair. “Can you give me a physical description of this
associate
you had dinner with?”

“A physical description of Sid the Slime? Well, um, he’s about thirty years old, skinny, pale complexion, reddish hair. Not the best-looking guy in the world—”

“How did I describe the man who was bothering Eric last night?”

“Red hair, pale . . .” Zach trailed off. “Oh, Jesus, was it Sid? You were talking about Sid? My God, when I ran out to the parking lot with your brother, I was looking for some red-haired
stranger
, not someone I
knew
. And I didn’t even see Sid until later—after you drove away.”

“I spotted you two in the parking lot at Denny’s,” she said, still a bit uncertain she could trust him.

“Well, no wonder you’ve been acting so weird toward me tonight.” He let out a stunned little laugh. “Oh, Bridget, I’m sorry. I didn’t make the connection at all. And Sid Mendel fits your description to a tee—right down to interviewing unsuspecting kids to get a scoop. Sounds just like him. I thought we were looking for some anonymous
stalker
, not this slimeball I work with.”

“Sid Mendel’s his name?” Bridget asked.

Zach nodded. “Yeah, he’s a jerk. But he has seniority over me at the newspaper. He—”

“Do you know where he lives?” she interrupted.

“No, but I could get the address from work. I can call now. I’m sure someone’s there.”

Five minutes later, Bridget headed out of the office with Zach. She stopped by Shelley’s desk and asked her to tell Brad that she would be picking up her sons at his house in an hour or so. “After you do that, go home, Shell,” she said. “If you need me, call me on my cell. I’m on my way to hunt down a certain waiter. I owe him a gratuity.”

“Hey, Sid, it’s me, Zach Matthias,” he called into the intercom. Sid lived in a new semiswanky apartment complex in the old Waterfront District.

Zach had gotten Sid’s home phone number and address from another reporter, who was working late at the newspaper. Then he’d phoned Sid from Bridget’s office. Sid was entertaining some friends, but he’d told him to come on over.

“I brought a friend,” Zach said into the intercom. “Can you buzz us up?”

“Yeah, man, cool. Room for one more.”

The front door buzzed, and Zach held it open for Bridget. They rode the elevator to the eighth floor, then headed down the gray-and-burgundy-carpeted hallway to Sid’s unit, 813. Bridget could hear rap music playing and people laughing on the other side of the doorway. She didn’t care that the son of a bitch had company. If he could crash her husband’s wake yesterday, she could crash his stupid little soiree tonight.

Brad rang the bell, and a moment later, the pale, thin man with red hair swung open the door. He wore jeans, a suit coat over a black T-shirt, and brandished an old-fashioned glass with some blue-colored cocktail in it. He grinned at Zach. “Hey . . .”

But then he saw Bridget and the smile seemed to freeze. Sid took a step back from the door. “What the fuck—”

“Sid Mendel,” Zach said, with a hint of mock formality. “I’d like you to meet Bridget Corrigan. I believe you already know her sons.”

Bridget took a step into the airy foyer that led to a living room on one side and a continental kitchen on the other. The six party guests stopped talking to stare at them. The group ranged from a pretentious-looking, longhaired young man with a scarf swept over his shoulders to a starved-thin woman with a crew cut, T-shirt, jeans, and gothic eye makeup.

Sid’s place was decorated in black and gray with all sorts of techno-trash accents—including some tube lights and a couple of neon creations.

Sid backed up to the little minibar by the door. He let out an impish laugh. “So—Bridget, can I fix you a drink? Or would you rather give your nose a treat? Isn’t that your brother’s preference? Does it run in the family?”

Bridget heard a couple of guests laugh. She didn’t see who they were. She was glaring at Sid Mendel—and his smug grin. All at once, she had to wipe it off. All at once, she slapped him across the face.

She connected with such force that Sid reeled back into his makeshift bar. One of the guests screamed. A couple of bottles and several glasses flew off the table. They smashed on the floor.

“You stay away from my sons,” Bridget said steadily. “If you ever get near one of my children again, I’ll kill you.”

“Jesus Christ!”
a guest whispered. Someone else let out a fractured laugh.

Sid Mendel straightened himself up. Bridget saw the blood trickling from the corner of his mouth, and she realized she’d caused that.

Wiping his mouth, Sid took a step toward Bridget. “You fucking bitch,” he growled. He looked as if he might lunge at her.

“Hey, back off,” Zach said, suddenly stepping in front of him. He put his hand on Sid’s chest. But Sid tried to get past him.

“I mean it,” Zach warned, pushing him back into the minibar. Another couple of glasses sailed off the table. They hit the floor and shattered.

“You’re through, man!” Sid barked at him. “I’ll see they fire your ass, and I can do it! Don’t even bother coming in tomorrow. You’re toast, Matthias!”

“Good!” Zach shot back. “I can’t stand working for that rag—any more than I can stomach being in the same office with a slime-bucket like you, Sid.”

One of the party guests giggled.

Zach led Bridget out the door. He put his arm around her in the elevator. She was trembling. “I can’t believe we just did that,” she muttered.

“You were wonderful,” he whispered, giving her shoulder a squeeze.

Outside, on the brick-paved street by the apartment building, she broke away from him. Bridget started shaking her head. “I don’t think that was very smart of me,” she said. “Now I’ve made him really angry. He’ll be out for blood. He might not get near the kids, but he’ll do something to smear Brad. I don’t know what, but this is going to hurt Brad in the long run, I know it. I—”

“Incredible,” Zach said, stepping back from her. “I give up.”

She stared at him and blinked. “What?”

“Listen to yourself, worrying about your brother. You were protecting your kids. Sid had it coming. The son of a bitch deserved to get slapped—”

“You don’t understand the possible backlash—”

“How it’ll affect Brad? And the election?” Zach cut in, raising his voice. “Jesus, Bridget, listen to yourself! I’m not going to have a job tomorrow because of what just happened. And the only thing you give a damn about is Brad and this stupid election! You don’t care about me at all, do you?”

“Zach, no, I—”

“Where are your kids?” he asked.

“What?”

“Their father was buried this morning. But instead of being at home with them tonight, you’re at Corrigan-for-Oregon headquarters, working on your brother’s campaign.”

She gaped at him. “What makes you think you have the right to say something like that to me? You don’t know—”

“I’ve been in love with you for twenty-two years,” he replied. “That gives me some right. I might not have seen you for nineteen of those years, but I still thought about you, worried about you, and wondered what you were doing. I still replayed in my mind all the different times you talked to me in high school, and thought about what I could have said or done to make you care about me more. Now I realize there’s nothing I could have done, because I’m not your brother.”

Dumbstruck, Bridget stared at him.

Zach let out a sigh. “I used to watch you at Brad’s basketball and football games. And afterward, he’d go off with his friends, and you’d walk back to your car alone. There were a few times I came up and talked to you. But mostly I’d just watch and wonder how you could be going home alone. I’d think,
How could this happen? She’s the most remarkable person in this whole school.”

Bridget started to reach out to him.

Frowning, Zach stepped back. “You know, tonight I felt great slamming it to that slimeball Sid. I didn’t give a damn that it cost me my job, because I got to do something with you, Bridget—make a difference with you. And God, you even let me put my arm around you in the elevator. I’ve waited for that for twenty-two years.”

She reached out to him. “Zach, I—”

He shook his head. “And when we got out here, you started talking about how this might hurt
Brad
, and how it was a mistake. You ruined it. And it was a great moment, Bridget. Why can’t you see that?”

Bridget glanced down at the brick pavement. She couldn’t answer him, because everything he said was so on target. She’d always put Brad before everyone else. Gerry—and God help her, sometimes even her sons—had to take a backseat to her twin brother. It had been drummed into her since childhood that her mission in life was helping Brad achieve greatness. She remembered her father in that hospital bed last week, urging her to make sure Brad won the election.

She felt tears welling in her eyes. “I’m sorry, Zach,” she whispered. “Everything you’ve just said is true—huh, except maybe the part about me being remarkable.”

“You are,” he said, gently taking hold of her arm. “It frustrates me you don’t realize that.” Bridget looked up at him, and he wiped her tears away. Then Zach kissed her on the cheek. He kissed her again, brushing his soft lips against hers.

Bridget kissed him back, and sank into his arms. She’d forgotten what it was like.

Zach parted his lips against her mouth. He held her tightly for a moment, then pulled back to look at her. The way he studied her face made her feel as if she were the most beautiful, desirable woman in the world.

“Twenty-two years, Bridget,” he whispered. Then he kissed her again, deeply, urgently. He pressed his body against hers, and she clung to him.

There was a loud scream, and they broke apart. The scream turned into high-pitched laughter as a young woman staggered down the sidewalk, hanging on to her boyfriend.

Still holding on to each other, Bridget and Zach watched the drunken couple disappear around the corner. The woman’s laughter began to fade.

Bridget rested her head on his shoulder. “You were right earlier,” she said with regret. “I buried a husband today. I really should be at home with my sons.” She gazed up at him. “Could you give me a lift to Brad’s house?”

Zach nodded. “Sure,” he whispered.

They started down the street together. Bridget didn’t want to let go of him.

On their way to Zach’s car, they passed an old Volkswagen minibus. There was a strange, reflecting snake cartoon on the air-freshener that dangled from the rearview mirror.

And there was someone sitting in the front seat.

But Bridget and Zach took no notice.

CHAPTER 20

He was sketching how her hands would look tied to the headboard.

This painting would be from God’s point of view—looking down from the ceiling of her bedroom. He’d used this viewpoint once before—in his vertigo-inducing portrait of a man falling to his death from a Portland apartment building, a favorite piece he called
Last Leap
.

He wasn’t sure what he would call this painting, but he’d started outlining Bridget Corrigan’s bedroom on his canvas. The overhead perspective was a challenge. All the photos he’d taken in her bedroom had to be rendered with a vertical viewpoint.

Still, the payoff would be worth it—a full, overhead image of Bridget lying on the bed. He would position her sons on the floor—one on each side of the bed, looking like sleeping cupids.

The piece would look like a stained glass window in a cathedral. He would paint her as part Madonna, part martyr:
St. Bridget and the Children
.

As he worked on the sketches of her wrists tied to the headboard, he stopped to scribble a note to himself:
Make flesh tones extra pale, almost translucent—like sunlight is coming through them.

The telephone rang. He sighed, put down his pencil, grabbed the cordless, and clicked it on. “Yes?”

“Do you want to be in on a job?”

He hesitated.

“It’s a disappearing act,” his cohort explained. “The subject is supposed to vanish. It means sticking a shovel and a bag of lime in the back of my minibus, then driving up to the mountains with somebody. Nothing fancy. No time for all your sketching, photographing, following them around, and preplanning bullshit. Still, there’s a few grand in it, and all you have to do is help me dig a hole for this guy. My shoulder’s been bugging me lately. I could use a helping hand.”

“Take a painkiller. I’m busy.”

“Are you sketching her again?”

He didn’t reply. He wandered over to the bulletin board full of photos of Bridget Corrigan—along with some he’d taken on the sly of her sons.

“Never mind,” his colleague said. “Forget I asked. You’re going off course again. I hate it when you get like this. It’s going to get you into trouble. The client had specific instructions about her. But you don’t care, do you? Sick fuck.”

In response, he merely chuckled. He was staring at Bridget’s face in one of the photos.

“You know,” his cohort continued, “I watched her last night—making out with this guy. He practically had his tongue down her throat. She’s tainted goods. She isn’t exactly saving herself for you, pal. You still interested?”

“Doesn’t change my mind at all,” he replied, settling down at his draft table. “She’s still the perfect subject.”

He studied his sketches of her wrists tied to the headboard. Instead of tying her up with a rope, he decided to use the same type of cord with which he’d strangled his
Girl by the Red Sofa
.

“I give up,” his friend was saying. “You’re on your own, pal. When you get like this, it’s best just to stay the hell out of your way. I don’t want to know what you’re planning for her. When you’re through with her, I’m sure I’ll read about it in the newspapers.”

“Maybe I’ll let you see the painting,” the artist replied. He shaded in his sketch of her arms and hands. “Have a nice drive up to the mountains. Take care of that shoulder.”

The theme to
Rocky
blared over the speakers at the ice skating rink in Lloyds Center Shopping Mall. Bridget sat on a bench with Gerry’s parents, watching David and Eric skate. Mr. and Mrs. Hilliard, a sturdy, sporty-looking couple in their midsixties, had wanted to spend the day with their grandsons. They lived in Minneapolis, and there weren’t many other reasons to visit Portland in the future. The day’s itinerary included some skating, shopping, then dinner.

Gerry’s parents kept assuring Bridget that she didn’t have to come along—to the point at which she almost felt unwelcome. They still seemed a bit uncomfortable around her. Understandable, since their dead son had thrown her over for a blond, twenty-something cokehead. Moreover, the local papers and news stations weren’t exactly making it easy for them to ignore that fact.

Despite her in-laws insisting that she “just take the day off and relax,” Bridget came along. Zach’s remarks last night about abandoning her children to go work for her brother still gnawed away at her. But he was right. She didn’t want to go to campaign headquarters today. All her public appearances this week had been canceled. Her place was with her kids. Still, she really was a fifth wheel.

And after watching the boys teeter on the ice for twenty minutes, her mind started to wander somewhere else—to last night with Zach.

They’d kissed in his car—in front of Brad’s house.

“My dad’s staying with Brad and Janice,” Bridget had pointed out. “He’s probably watching us.” She’d felt as if she were in high school again; though she hadn’t done much making out in cars back then. Neither had Zach for that matter.

Between kisses, Zach had offered to follow her home, maybe even spend the night on her sofa downstairs. He didn’t like the idea of her and the boys being alone.

Bridget had assured him that they were fine. Brad had hired a pair of private detectives, who took turns parked outside the house from seven PM to seven AM. After three nights on the job, they hadn’t encountered any suspicious characters—just the occasional curiosity-seeker they’d chased away. So—she and the boys were perfectly safe.

Besides the timing wasn’t right for David and Eric to accept this man who clearly liked their mother as an overnight guest in their house.

But she liked that Zach was so concerned about her. Driving home from Brad’s with David and Eric, she almost felt giddy. She had to contain her elation around them.

As they pulled into the driveway, the detective on duty waved at them from inside his company car, a white Taurus. It looked like Phil instead of Scott; he was the taller and friendlier one of the two. Bridget felt safe.

Once they got inside the house, David stopped to give her a long hug, then played some games on the computer. Eric brought a Coke and a bag of Fritos out to Phil, then talked his ear off about
The Guns of Navarone
for ten minutes.

She told herself that they would get through this. It no longer mattered what Gerry had done to her. She could forgive him. Gerry and his girlfriend were dead and buried.

It was easy for Bridget to move on from all the heartache, because Zach Matthias loved her. It felt right. But this man who loved her was investigating the disappearance of Mallory Meehan. She couldn’t keep lying to him.

Bridget’s thoughts were interrupted by Eric’s cry.

“Hey, Mom! Look at me!” Eric cried, skating backward. He had his arms spread out to keep balanced on the ice.

Bridget waved at him. “That’s terrific, honey!”

Her cell phone rang. Bridget dug it out of her coat pocket and switched it on. “Hello?”

“Bridget, it’s me, Zach.”

She smiled and mouthed the word
sorry
to Gerry’s mother. “Oh, hi,” she said, getting to her feet. She stepped away from the bench.

“Are you busy right now?” he asked.

“No, it’s okay. I can talk.” Actually, she had some noise competing with him. Gerry’s mother was shouting encouragement to the boys. And the music had switched from “Rocky’s Theme” to “Funkytown,” and the decibel level had gone up.

“I need to see you,” Zach said. “It’s important. Are you free right now?”

Bridget glanced over at Gerry’s parents. “Well, I’m pretty sure my in-laws wouldn’t mind if I took off for a couple of hours. What’s going on? You sound serious.”

“Yeah, something’s come up. Where are you? I’ll come meet you.”

“I was on the phone with the police in Eugene about an hour ago,” Zach whispered.

Bridget sat with him at a table in the Barnes & Noble café. The bookstore was just upstairs from the ice skating rink in the shopping center.

Hearing him mention in the same sentence
Eugene
, where Cheryl lived, and the
police
made something sink in the pit of Bridget’s stomach.

“What did the Eugene police want with you?” she asked timidly.

“I called Cheryl Blume’s house and started to leave her a message, when a cop picked up. He wanted to know when I last spoke to Cheryl. They were still trying to determine a—a time of death for her.”

Bridget couldn’t say anything. She numbly gazed at him and shook her head.

“They found her this morning,” Zach explained. “Or rather, her ex-husband did. Cheryl was supposed to pick up her kids yesterday, but she never showed. So the ex-husband went over to her house and found her in the bathtub. I guess she was watching one of those little portable TVs while taking a bath, and it fell into the tub.”

Bridget put a shaky hand over her mouth. She felt sick.

“Looks like she might have slipped stepping out of the tub, then knocked it in the water.” Zach shrugged. “At least, that’s what the cop said. But I don’t believe it. Do you?”

“No,” she admitted. “So—what did you say to the police?”

Zach sipped his latte. “I told them I met with Cheryl yesterday afternoon. According to this cop, I might have been the last person to see her alive.”

Bridget rubbed her forehead. She couldn’t pretend that Olivia’s and Fuller’s deaths were a coincidence. Someone had killed them. They’d killed Cheryl too. They were killing everyone who was at Gorman’s Creek that August afternoon twenty years ago.

She glanced down at the tabletop. She couldn’t look Zach in the eye. “Did they—ask why you wanted to talk to Cheryl?”

He leaned forward. “You mean, did I tell them anything about Mallory Meehan?” He slowly shook his head. “No, Bridget, I didn’t tell them anything.”

She kept looking down at the table. His hands, in fists, rested on the edge.

“Can
you
tell me anything about Mallory?” she heard him ask.

“I don’t know what you mean,” she muttered.

“Yes, you do,” he replied quietly. “Driving over here, I kept thinking about
Bobcats class of eighty-five forever
on the McLaren water tower. Mallory got four people in trouble for that. Then she disappeared at the end of the summer. Now three of those four people have died—all within a month of each other, two very convenient accidents and a suicide.”

He reached across the table and took hold of her hand. “Bridget, why did you call Cheryl the other day?”

She glanced around self-consciously. A couple of people were staring at them. “Please,” she whispered to Zach. “I—I already told you why I called her—”

“Yeah, to tell her about Fuller’s death. Why didn’t
Brad
call her? Cheryl and Fuller were more
his
friends than yours. You’re the one who went home alone from the school games, remember? Why didn’t your brother call her?”

“Brad’s extremely busy—”

“Bullshit,” Zach growled. “Don’t answer me like I still work for the
Examiner
. I got the ax, remember? I’m asking these questions because I care about you, Bridget.”

“If you really cared, you wouldn’t—”

“Why did you call Cheryl from a
pay phone
?” he pressed. “Why not call on your cell—or from your house? Was it because you didn’t want any record that you’d called her? Did you have a feeling Cheryl was going to die?”

“No!” Bridget yanked her hand away from his. She had tears in her eyes. “That’s crazy. Please, Zach, don’t ask—”

“Are you protecting your brother? Is that it? Did Brad and those three friends of his—who are
now dead
—have anything to do with Mallory’s disappearance?”

“
It wasn’t just them,
” she heard herself say. “
I was in on it too.
”

Zach numbly gazed at her. “What?”

“There were five of us,” Bridget said under her breath. “We killed her. At least, I’m—almost certain we did.”

He slowly sat back. He seemed to shrink a little in the chair. He looked at her as if he didn’t know her at all.

Bridget leaned toward him. She started to reach for his hand, but stopped herself. She didn’t want him to pull away. That would have killed her.

“Zach, please,” she whispered. “Can we get out of here?”