The Serial Killer's Wife (33 page)

T
HERE
WAS
A
gate blocking the entrance to the U-Store-It, We-Protect-It facility just off the highway. This was a standard gate, and to open it one needed to use the standard ten-digit panel beside the gate. You could reach out the driver’s-side window and punch in the numbers.
 

When Todd pulled up to the gate, he said, “Please tell me you know what the code is.”
 

Elizabeth hadn’t remembered there being a gate here before. Or maybe that was wrong; maybe she did remember there was a gate and forced herself to forget. All that was written on the key was the number 49, and from the look of the panel hanging just outside of Todd’s window, four digits were required.
 

“Elizabeth?”
 

She closed her eyes, took a breath. “Try zero three two one.”
 

Todd lowered his window and stuck out his hand. His fingers punched the numbers. Nothing happened.
 

“Any other guesses?”
 

Her eyes shifted to the dashboard clock. It was just after eleven. The last picture she received informed her she now had four hours left. She’d hoped the numbers she’d given him would work—it was her and Eddie’s wedding anniversary, the first day of spring—and now she was at a loss.
 

Until she thought again about Matthew and said, “Try zero six zero five.”
 

Todd punched in those numbers. This time, the chain-link gate in front of them began to roll back. Powering back up his window, Todd said, “How did you know that?”
 

“It’s a date. June fifth. Matthew’s birthday.”
 

Todd drove them through the gate.

•
   
•
   
•

T
HE
STORAGE
FACILITY
was broken up into six long cinderblock buildings. Of course, they weren’t buildings at all, just rooms ranging from small to moderate to large. Elizabeth couldn’t remember how big the facility had been years ago, but it appeared as if they had expanded. Each section was clearly marked, each door’s number visible. They found 49 two rows back, halfway down.
 

When they pulled up to the door—it was a moderate-sized unit, the door the kind you had to lift up—Todd turned off the Prius.
 

“Ready?” he said.

She wasn’t. Ever since they entered the facility her body had begun to tremble. For the last three days they had been working toward something, and that something was right here beyond this door. Or so she hoped.
 

Elizabeth remembered coming here with Eddie once. They had just gotten married. They were still in that phase of their marriage where they liked to take risks, even if it was something done in public. One evening they had come to pick up a few things and Eddie had closed the door and taken her in his arms and kissed her hard. They had ended up making love in the storage unit, nothing at all romantic, both of them on their feet while he took her from behind, but the thrill of it all—the fact that this wasn’t a safe place, like their apartment—was the fun part. And now that she thought about it, strangely enough it had been the only time Eddie had been spontaneous like that, almost reckless, knowing that on the off chance they were caught they might get arrested. Maybe that was the only time she had been spontaneous and reckless, too.
 

Beyond that storage door were, supposedly, her husband’s trophies. The pieces of flesh and bone he had cut off each of his victims. Saving them for only God knows what. Saving them for his own perverse pleasure.
 

And now here she was, the serial killer’s wife, ready to enter this storage unit and retrieve the things that had forced her to come here in the first place.
 

“Yes,” Elizabeth whispered finally. “I’m ready.”

•
   
•
   
•

O
UTSIDE
THE
HYBRID
,
the world was quiet except for the rush of traffic on the highway just beyond the facility. Nobody else appeared to be here. They were alone.
 

They stood in front of the door, neither saying a word. Todd looked at her. She looked back at him. He nodded, and she reached into her pocket and extracted the key. It was such an innocuous thing, so simple and insignificant, yet right now it carried a mighty power. Once, long ago, she had had a key just like it (so had Eddie), and that was how she had recognized this one so easily.
 

“Wait,” she said, looking up from the key and staring at the black 49 painted on the door.
 

Todd shifted impatiently beside her. “What?”
 

“It’s been five years. Who’s been paying for this place? I mean, without monthly payments they would have taken this place away. Maybe they already did. Maybe when we open this door—
if
the key even works—all we’ll find is a slew of cardboard boxes holding books or some college kid’s furniture.”
 

Todd gestured at the key. “Guess there’s only one way to find out.”
 

After another moment’s hesitation, Elizabeth crouched down and inserted the key into the lock. She was certain nothing would happen when she turned it, but it turned easily. She heard it click and then heard the melancholy groan of metal as the springs holding the door down sighed. She stood back up, bringing the door with her, the wheels along the metal rails screaming out in the dark. Then she stepped inside, reaching out to the left where she remembered the light switch was, and flicked it on.

CHAPTER 60

S
TORAGE
UNIT
49
was completely empty except for a metal box on the ground in the very center of the ten-by-twelve foot space. It may once have been shiny, but over the years dust had accumulated and covered the lid of the box with a nice, even layer.
 

Elizabeth began walking without even realizing it. She went straight to the box. She only stopped when she was standing directly over it. She thought about the fingers in the box, at least four if not more, and the ghosts of Eddie’s victims waiting here in this cold and dark place, just waiting until someone like her came along to find the fingers. Were they watching her now? She lifted her gaze and looked in the corners, but all she could see was more dust.
 

“Elizabeth? Are you okay?”
 

The question was absurd but one that needed asked. After all, she had suddenly become a statue, just standing here inches away from the thing she had been searching for these past three days.
 

She did not crouch like she had when she went to unlock and open the storage unit door. Instead she got down onto her knees, feeling the cold cement through the fabric of her jeans. She placed a finger on top of the box and drew it across from one end to the other, revealing the shiny surface below in one long line and creating a dollop of dust on the tip of her finger. She held the finger to her lips and blew it away, then reached back down to the box, finding the clasps on the front. She unclasped both, paused, and then opened the lid.
 

For a long moment she did not move. She did not breathe. She did not do anything but stare down at what was inside.
 

Behind her, there was slow and hesitant footsteps, and Todd’s voice saying her name in a near-whisper.
 

She felt her eyes beginning to brim and blinked rapidly but still one tear managed to roll down her cheek. She could not tell how far away Todd was, just how many feet, but she sensed him behind her, coming closer. She flipped the lid shut, took the box in her hands, and rose to her feet.
 

Todd stood less than a yard away from her. “Is that”—he swallowed—“it?”
 

She only nodded. Her mouth had suddenly gone dry and she could not speak.
 

“Good,” Todd said unsteadily. “So ... now what?”
 

She swallowed, found her throat wasn’t so dry anymore, and said, “Do you want to see?”
 

“Huh?”
 

“What’s inside.” She held up the box. “Do you want to see?”
 

He shook his head. “God, no. Why would I?”
 

“I want you to. You’ve come this far with me, you might as well see what’s in here.”
 

He hesitated. “Elizabeth—”
 

“Please. I want you to.”
 

He started toward her then, staring not at her face anymore but at the box. She had been holding it with both hands but now held it just with her left, balancing it right on the palm of her hand. As he was a step away, reaching for the box, she reached behind her with her right hand, grabbed David Bradford’s Glock that she had hidden in the back of her pants, and brought it back out swinging, connecting the weapon with the side of Todd’s face.
 

He went down with a startled cry, and she stepped forward and kneed him in chest. That sent him to the ground on his side. He groaned, tried to get back up, but she had the Glock trained on his face, the barrel’s sight on that spot just between his eyes.
 

“I never told you she was his girlfriend,” she said. With the box now tucked under her left arm, holding the gun on Todd with her right hand, she stepped back toward the open door.
 

“What”—Todd spat blood onto the cement—“what are you talking about?”
 

“Special Agent Julia Hogan. I never told you she was his girlfriend.”
 

Todd pushed slowly off his knee and stood up. “Elizabeth,” he said, holding his hands out to his sides, taking a step forward.
 

“Stop right there or I’ll shoot you.”
 

He stopped.
 

She said, “Everyone that’s seen you has died. First Van and Harlan, then my brother, then Foreman.”
 

“I’m not the bad guy here. I didn’t kill anyone. It was Clarence who did it. You know that.
Clarence
is the one.”
 

She took another step back, keeping the gun aimed. “Your main mistake? You were just too perfect. No man in his right mind would have stayed with me through all of this.”
 

“I didn’t have a choice. You said Cain told you to kill me. You talked him out of it, remember? The only way I was going to live was to come with you.”
 

She hesitated, thinking about it, remembering being back in the parking lot of Summer Ridge, swapping out her license plate with that pickup truck’s, and then there Todd was behind her, a bouquet of tulips in hand. He’d brought them to cheer her up, he later said, but right then, right when they’d been in the parking lot, Cain had called, a nice convenient coincidence.
 

Elizabeth stopped walking backward and thumbed the hammer back on the Glock. “Who is he?”
 

“Who?”
 

“Your partner.”
 

This entire time Todd’s expression had been a mixture of confusion and fear and pain. Now something in it changed, something almost imperceptible at first, until she could see the corners of his mouth curling into a grin. He began to lower his hands, bit by bit, and shrugged.
 

“Why don’t you turn around and ask him yourself?”
 

Something round and cold touched the base of her neck just then, and a ghost said, “Put down the gun, sis, or else I’ll blow your fucking head off.”

CHAPTER 61

F
OR
A
MAN
who was supposed to be dead, Jim looked good. He wore boots and blue jeans and a black long sleeve T-shirt. His hair appeared to have a certain texture, like he had recently taken a shower.
 

She took all of that in for an instant before her gaze shifted to what was really important: Matthew. Her son, dressed only in his underwear, that explosive collar around his neck, a piece of tape over his mouth. He was staring back at her, his eyes large and red from crying. He even tried screaming through the tape, pulling away from Jim, but Jim kept his grip on Matthew’s arm.
 

“Idiot,” Jim said to Todd. “How could you fuck that up?”
 

Todd walked forward, shrugging. He scooped the Glock up off the ground where she had placed it and grabbed the metal box from her hands and opened it. “Doesn’t matter now. We have what we need.”
 

“It’s all there?”
 

“Look for yourself.”
 

Jim glanced in the box and nodded his appreciation and then threw Matthew at her like he was nothing more than a piece of trash. Matthew came at her fast, tripping over his feet, and he almost fell to the floor before Elizabeth grabbed him.
 

“Enjoy the family reunion while it lasts,” Jim said. “Because it’s not going to last long.”
 

“What are you going to do to us?”
 

“Lock you in here. Drive away. Then in about five minutes”—he reached into his pocket, withdrew a cell phone—“I’m going to dial this and ... well, ka-boom.”
 

She was crouched in the middle of the storage unit, her son in her arms. After three days of being without him, she couldn’t let him go. Not now. Not after everything she had been through.