A Grant County Collection (77 page)

The secretary said, 'Reverend Ward?' and Lev stuck his head in the room. 'Do you know where Paul is? He has a visitor.'

'Chief Tolliver,' Lev said, entering the room. He was drying his hands on a paper towel and Jeffrey assumed he'd been in the bathroom. 'Is something wrong?'

Jeffrey sized up the man, still not completely certain Lev didn't know exactly what was going on. Rebecca and Terri had insisted he was oblivious, but it was clear to Jeffrey that Lev Ward was the leader of this family. He couldn't imagine Paul getting away with this kind of thing right under his older brother's nose.

Jeffrey said, 'I'm looking for your brother.'

Lev looked at his watch. 'We've got a meeting in twenty minutes. I don't imagine he's gone far.'

'I need to talk to him now.'

Lev offered, 'May I help you with something?'

Jeffrey was glad he was making this easy. He said, 'Let's go to your office.'

'Is this about Abby?' Lev asked, walking down the hallway toward the back of the building. He was wearing faded jeans, a flannel shirt, and scuffed cowboy boots that looked as if the soles had been replaced about a dozen times since they were made. Clipped onto his belt was a leather sheath containing a retractable carpet knife.

'You laying carpet?' Jeffrey asked, wary of the tool, which held an extremely sharp safety razor capable of cutting through just about anything.

Lev seemed confused. 'Oh,' he said, looking down at his side as if he was surprised to find the sheath there. 'Opening boxes,' he explained. 'Deliveries always come on Fridays.' He stopped in front of an open door. 'Here we are.'

Jeffrey read the sign on the door, which read, 'Praise the Lord and come on in!'

'My humble abode,' Lev told him, indicating the room.

In contrast to his brother, Lev did not have a secretary guarding his space. As a matter of fact, his office was small, almost as small as Jeffrey's. A metal desk stood in the center of the room, a rolling chair without arms behind it. Two folding chairs were in front and books were stacked around the floor in neat piles. Child's colorings, probably Zeke's, were pinned to the walls with thumbtacks.

'Sorry about the mess,' Lev apologized. 'My father says a cluttered office is a sign of a cluttered mind.' He laughed. 'I guess he's right.'

'Your brother's office is a little . . . more grand.'

Lev laughed again. 'Papa used to get onto him all the time when we were little, but Paul's a grown man now, a little old to be taken over the knee.' He turned serious. 'Vanity is a sin, but we all have our weaknesses.'

Jeffrey glanced back out into the hall. There was a short corridor opposite the office that held a Xerox machine. He asked, 'What's your weakness?'

Lev seemed to really give it some thought. 'My son.'

'Who's Stephanie Linder?'

Lev seemed puzzled. 'Why would you ask that?'

'Answer my question.'

'She was my wife. She died five years ago.'

'Are you sure about that?'

He turned indignant. 'I think I know whether or not my wife is dead.'

'I'm just curious,' Jeffrey said. 'You see, your sister Mary came in today and told me she has a daughter. I don't remember anyone mentioning that before.'

Lev had the wisdom to look contrite. 'Yes, that's right. She does have a daughter.'

'A daughter who ran away from her family.'

'Genie – Terri – that's what she likes to go by now – was a very difficult teenager. She had a very troubled life.'

'I'd still say it's a bit troubled. Wouldn't you?'

'She's straightened up,' he defended. 'But she's a proud girl. I still have hopes for a reconciliation with the family.'

'Her husband beats her.'

Lev's mouth opened in surprise. 'Dale?'

'Cole put her in a box, too, just like Abby. She was about Rebecca's age when he did it. Did Mary ever tell you that?'

Lev put his hand on his desk as if he needed help standing. 'Why would . . .' His voice trailed off as he obviously began to realize what Cole Connolly had actually been doing all these years. 'My God,' he whispered.

'Three times, Lev. Cole put Abby in that box three times. The last time, she didn't come out.'

Lev looked up at the ceiling, but Jeffrey was relieved to see it was to try to staunch the tears in his eyes instead of to break into spontaneous prayer. Jeffrey gave the man some space, letting him wrestle with his emotions.

Finally, Lev asked, 'Who? Who else did he do this to?' Jeffrey didn't answer, but he was glad to hear the fury in Lev's tone. 'Mary told us Genie ran away to Atlanta to have an abortion.' Obviously, he thought he could anticipate Jeffrey's next remark, because he said, 'My father has strong feelings about life, Chief Tolliver, as do I. Still . . .' He paused, as if needing a moment to collect himself. 'We would never have turned our backs on her. Never. We all do things that God does not approve of. That doesn't necessarily mean we're bad people. Our Genie – Terri – wasn't a bad girl. She was just a teenager who did a bad thing – a very bad thing. We looked for her. I looked for her. She didn't want to be found.' He shook his head. 'If I had known . . .'

'Somebody knew,' Jeffrey said.

'No,' Lev insisted. 'If any of us had known what Cole was up to, there would've been stern repercussions. I would have called the police myself.'

'You don't seem to like getting the police involved in anything.'

'I want to protect our workers.'

'Seems to me you've put your family in jeopardy while you were trying to save a bunch of strangers.'

Lev's jaw tightened. 'I can see why you view it that way.'

'Why didn't you want to report that Rebecca was missing?'

'She always comes back,' he said. 'You must understand, she's very headstrong. There's nothing we can do to . . .' He didn't finish his sentence. 'You don't think . . .' He faltered. 'Cole . . .?'

'Did Cole bury Becca like he buried the other girls?' Jeffrey finished his question for him, watching Lev closely, trying to figure out what was going on in the other man's head. 'What do you think, Reverend Ward?'

Lev exhaled slowly, like he was having trouble absorbing all of this. 'We need to find her. She always goes into the woods – my God, the woods –' He made to go, but Jeffrey stopped him.

'She's safe,' Jeffrey said.

'Where?' Lev asked. 'Take me to her. Esther's beside herself.'

'She's safe,' was all Jeffrey would tell him. 'I'm not finished talking to you.'

Lev saw that the only way out the door was past Jeffrey. Though he would certainly win that fight, Jeffrey was glad the bigger man didn't push it.

Lev asked, 'Will you at least call her mother?'

'I already did,' Jeffrey lied. 'Esther was very relieved to hear she was safe.'

Lev settled back down, relieved but still obviously conflicted. 'This is a lot to absorb.' He had the habit of biting his bottom lip, the same as his niece. 'Why did you ask about my wife?'

'Did she ever own a house in Savannah?'

'Of course not,' he replied. 'Stephanie lived here all of her life. I don't even think she'd ever been to Savannah.'

'How long has Paul worked there?'

'About six years, give or take.'

'Why Savannah?'

'We have a lot of vendors and buyers in the area. It's easier for him to do business with them face to face.' He seemed a bit guilty when he added, 'The farm is a slow pace for Paul. He likes to be in the city sometimes.'

'His wife doesn't go with him?'

'He has six kids,' Lev pointed out. 'He's obviously home a great deal of time.'

Jeffrey noticed he misinterpreted the question, but perhaps in this family it was normal for husbands to leave their wives alone with the kids every other week. Jeffrey couldn't think of a man out there who wouldn't be happy with this kind of arrangement, but he was hard-pressed to think of any woman who would be.

He asked, 'Have you ever been to his house in Savannah?'

'Quite often,' Lev answered. 'He lives in an apartment over the office.'

'He doesn't live in a house on Sandon Square?'

Lev roared a laugh. 'Hardly,' he said. 'That's one of the wealthiest streets in the city.'

'And your wife never visited there?'

Lev shook his head again, sounding slightly irritated when he said, 'I've been answering all of your questions to the best of my abilities. Is there ever going to come a point when you can tell me what this is all about?'

Jeffrey decided it was his turn to give a little. He took out the original insurance policies from his pocket and handed them to Lev. 'Abby left these for Rebecca.'

Lev took the pages, unfolding them and spreading them flat on his desk. 'Left them how?'

Jeffrey didn't answer, but Lev didn't notice. He was leaning over his desk, tracing his finger down each page as he read. Jeffrey noticed the set to his jaw, the anger in his stance.

Lev straightened up. 'These people lived on our farm.'

'That's right.'

'This one.' He held up one of the pages. 'Larry ran off. Cole told us he ran off.'

'He's dead.'

Lev stared at him, his eyes moving back and forth across Jeffrey's face as if to read where this was going.

Jeffrey took out his notepad, telling him, 'Larry Fowler died from alcohol poisoning on July twenty-eighth of last year. He was removed from the farm by the Catoogah county coroner at nine fifty p.m.'

Lev stared another second, not quite believing. 'And this one?' he asked, lifting the page. 'Mike Morrow. He drove the tractor last season. He had a daughter in Wisconsin. Cole said he went to live with her.'

'Drug overdose. August thirteenth, twelve forty p.m.'

Lev asked, 'Why would he tell us they ran off when they died?'

'I guess it'd be a little hard to explain why so many people have died on your farm in the last two years.'

He looked at the policies again, scanning the pages. 'You think . . . you think they . . .'

'Your brother paid for nine bodies to be cremated.'

Lev's face was already pasty, but his face turned completely white as he absorbed the implication behind Jeffrey's words. 'These signatures,' he began, studying the documents again. 'That's not mine,' he said, stabbing his finger at one of the pages. 'This,' he said, 'that's not Mary's signature; she's left-handed. That's certainly not Rachel's. Why would she have an insurance policy on a man she never even knew?'

'You tell me.'

'This is wrong,' he said, wadding up the pages in his fist. 'Who would do this?'

Jeffrey repeated, 'You tell me.'

A vein was throbbing in Lev's temple. His teeth were clenched as he thumbed back through the papers. 'Did he have a policy on my wife?'

Jeffrey answered honestly. 'I don't know.'

'Where did you get her name?'

'All of the policies are registered to a house on Sandon Square. The owner is listed as Stephanie Linder.'

'He . . . used . . .' Lev was so livid he was having trouble speaking. 'He used my . . . my wife's name . . . for
this?'

In his line of work, Jeffrey had seen plenty of grown men reduced to tears, but usually they were crying because they had lost a loved one or – more often than not – because they realized they were going to jail and felt sorry for themselves. Lev Ward's tears were from sheer rage.

'Hold on,' Jeffrey said as Lev pushed past him. 'Where are you going?'

Lev ran up the hall to Paul's office. 'Where is he?' Lev demanded.

Jeffrey heard the secretary say, 'I don't –'

Lev was already running toward the front doors, Jeffrey close behind him. The preacher didn't look particularly fit, but he had a long stride. By the time Jeffrey made it to the parking lot, Lev was already at his car. Instead of getting in, the man stood there, frozen.

Jeffrey trotted over to him. 'Lev?'

'Where is he?' he snarled. 'Give me ten minutes with him. Just ten minutes.'

Jeffrey wouldn't have thought the mild-mannered preacher had it in him. 'Lev, you need to go back inside.'

'How could he do this to us?' he asked. 'How could he . . .' Lev seemed to be working out all the implications. He turned to Jeffrey. 'He killed my niece? He killed Abby? And Cole, too?'

'I think so,' Jeffrey said. 'He had access to the cyanide. He knew how to use it.'

'My God,' he said, not just an expression but a genuine entreaty. 'Why?' he pleaded. 'Why would he do this? What did Abby ever do to anyone?'

Jeffrey didn't try to answer his questions. 'We need to find your brother, Lev. Where is he?'

Lev was too angry to speak. He shook his head tightly from side to side.

'We need to find him,' Jeffrey repeated, just as his phone chirped from his pocket. He glanced at the caller ID, seeing it was Lena. He stepped back to answer the phone, snapping it open, saying, 'What is it?'

Lena was whispering, but he heard her loud and clear. 'He's here,' she said. 'Paul's car just pulled into the driveway.'

Lena's heart thumped in her throat, a constant pulse that made it hard to speak.

'Don't do anything until I get there,' Jeffrey ordered. 'Hide Rebecca. Don't let him see her.'

'What if –'

'No fucking what-ifs, Detective. Do as I say.'

Lena glanced at Rebecca, saw the terror in the girl's eyes. She could end this right now – throw Paul to the floor, take the bastard into custody. Then what? They'd never get a confession out of the lawyer. He's be laughing all the way to the grand jury, where they'd dismiss the case for lack of evidence.

Jeffrey said, 'Am I being clear?'

'Yes, sir.'

'Keep Rebecca safe,' he ordered. 'She's our only witness. That's your job right now, Lena. Don't fuck this up.' The phone clicked loudly as he disconnected.

Terri was at the front window, calling out Paul's movements. 'He's in the garage,' she whispered. 'He's in the garage.'

Lena grabbed Rebecca by the arm, pulling her into the foyer. 'Go upstairs,' she ordered, but the frightened girl wouldn't budge.

Terri said, 'He's going around the back. Oh, God, hurry!' She ran down the hall so that she could follow his progress.

'Rebecca,' Lena said, willing the girl to move. 'We need to go upstairs.'

'What if he . . .' Rebecca began. 'I can't . . .'

'He's in the shed,' Terri called. 'Becca, please! Go!'

'He'll be so mad,' Rebecca whimpered. 'Oh, Lord, please . . .'

Terri's voice trilled. 'He's coming toward the house!'

'Rebecca,' Lena tried again.

Terri ran back into the hall, pushing Rebecca as Lena tugged the girl toward the stairs.

'Mommy!' Tim grabbed onto his mother, wrapping his arms around her leg.

Terri's voice was stern when she told her son, 'Go upstairs now.' She spanked Tim on the bottom when he didn't move quickly enough.

The back door opened and they all froze as Paul called, 'Terri?'

Tim was at the top of the stairs, but Rebecca stood frozen in fear, breathing like a wounded animal.

'Terri?' Paul repeated. 'Where the hell are you?' Slowly, his footsteps traveled through the kitchen. 'Christ, this place is a mess.'

Using all her strength, Lena picked up Rebecca, half carrying, half dragging the girl up the stairs. By the time she reached the top, she was out of breath, her insides feeling like they had been ripped in two.

'I'm here!' Terri called to her uncle, her shoes making clicking noises across the tile foyer as she walked back to the kitchen. Lena heard muffled voices as she pushed Rebecca and Tim into the closest room. Too late she realized they were in the nursery.

In the crib, the baby gurgled. Lena waited for him to wake up and cry. What seemed like an hour passed before the child turned his head away and settled back to sleep.

'Oh, Lord,' Rebecca whispered, praying.

Lena put her hand over the girl's mouth, carefully walking her toward the closet with Tim in tow. For the first time, Rebecca seemed to understand, and she slowly opened the door, her eyes squeezed shut as she waited for a noise that would alert Paul to their presence. Nothing came, and she slid to the floor, grabbing Tim in her arms and hiding behind a stack of winter blankets.

Softly, Lena clicked the door closed, holding her breath, waiting for Paul to come rushing in. She could barely hear him speaking over the pounding of her own heart, but suddenly his heavy footsteps echoed up the stairs.

'This place is a pigsty,' Paul said, and she could hear him knocking things over as he went through the house. Lena knew the house was spotless, just like she knew Paul was being an asshole. 'Jesus Christ, Terri, you back on coke again? Look at this mess. How can you raise your children here?'

Terri mumbled a reply, and Paul screamed, 'Don't back talk me!' He was in the tiled foyer now, his voice booming up the stairs like a roll of thunder. Carefully, Lena tiptoed to the wall opposite the nursery, flattening herself against it, listening to Paul yell at Terri. Lena waited another beat, then slid to her left, edging toward the stair landing so she could peer downstairs and see what was going on. Jeffrey had told her to wait, to hide Rebecca until he got there. She should stay back in the room, keep the kids quiet, make sure they were safe.

Lena held her breath, inching closer to the stairs, chancing a look.

Paul's back was to her. Terri stood directly in front of him.

Lena slid back behind the corner, her heart beating so hard she could feel the artery thumping in the side of her neck.

'When's he going to be back?' Paul demanded.

'I don't know.'

'Where's my medallion?'

'I don't know.'

She had given him this same answer to all of his questions, and Paul finally snapped, 'What
do
you know, Terri?'

She was silent, and Lena looked downstairs again to make sure she was still there.

'He'll be back soon,' Terri said, her eyes flicking up to Lena. 'You can wait for him in the garage.'

'You want me out of the house?' he asked. Lena quickly pulled back as Paul turned around. 'Why's that?'

Lena put her hand to her chest, willing her heart to slow. Men like Paul had an almost animal instinct. They could hear through walls, see everything that went on. She looked at her watch, trying to calculate how much time had passed since she had called Jeffrey. He was at least fifteen minutes away, even if he came with lights and siren blaring.

Paul said, 'What's going on, Terri? Where's Dale?'

'Out.'

'Don't get smart with me.' Lena heard a loud popping noise, flesh against flesh. Her heart stopped in her chest.

Terri said, 'Please. Just wait in the garage.'

Paul's tone was conversational. 'Why don't you want me in the house, Terri?'

Again, there was the popping noise. Lena did not have to look to know what was happening. She knew the sickening sound, knew it was an open-handed smack, just as she knew exactly what it felt like on your face.

There was a sound from the nursery, Rebecca or Tim shifting in the closet, and a floorboard creaked. Lena closed her eyes, frozen. Jeffrey had ordered her to wait, to protect Rebecca. He hadn't given her any instructions on what to do if Paul found them.

Lena opened her eyes. She knew exactly what she would do. Carefully, she slid her gun out of its holster, aiming it at the space above the open landing. Paul was a big man. All Lena had in her favor was the element of surprise, and she wasn't going to give that up for anything. She could almost taste the triumph she'd feel when Paul turned that corner, expecting to see a frightened child but finding a Glock shoved in his smug face.

'It's just Tim,' Terri insisted, downstairs.

Paul said nothing, but Lena heard footsteps on the wooden stairs. Slow, careful footsteps.

'It's Tim,' Terri repeated. The footsteps stopped. 'He's sick.'

'Your whole family's sick,' Paul taunted, pounding his shoe onto the next stair; his Gucci loafer that could pay the mortgage on this small house for a month. 'It's because of you, Terri. All those drugs you did, all that fucking around. All those blow jobs, all those ass fuckings. I bet the jism's rotting you from the inside out.'

'Stop it.'

Lena cupped the gun in her hand, holding it straight out in front of her, pointing it at the open landing as she waited for him to get to the top so she could shut him the fuck up.

'One of these days,' he began, taking another step. 'One of these days, I'm going to have to tell Dale.'

'Paul –'

'How do you think he's going to feel knowing he's put his dick in all that?' Paul asked. 'All that come just swirling around inside you.'

'I was sixteen!' she sobbed. 'What was I going to do? I didn't have a choice!'

'And now your kids are sick,' he said, obviously pleased by her distress. 'Sick with what you did. Sick with all that disease and filth inside you.' His tone made Lena's stomach tighten with hate. She felt the urge to make some kind of noise that would get him up here faster. The gun felt hot in her hand, ready to explode as soon as he passed into her line of vision.

He continued to climb the stairs, saying, 'You were nothing but a fucking whore.'

Terri did not respond.

'And you're still turning tricks?' he said, coming closer. Just another few steps and he would be there. His words were so hateful, so familiar. He could be Ethan talking to Lena. Ethan coming up the stairs to beat the shit out of her.

'You think I don't know what you needed that money for?' Paul demanded. He had stopped about two steps from the top, so close that Lena could smell his flowery cologne. 'Three hundred fifty bucks,' he said, slapping the stair railing as if he was telling some kind of joke. 'That's a lot of money, Ter. What'd you use all that money for?'

'I said I'd pay you back.'

'Pay me back when you can,' he said, as if he was her old friend instead of tormentor. 'Tell me what it was for, Genie. I was only trying to help you.'

Lena gritted her teeth, watching his shadow linger on the landing. Terri had asked Paul for the money to pay the clinic. He must have made her grovel for it, then kicked her in the teeth before she left.

'What'd you need it for?' Paul asked, his steps receding down the stairs now that he had found an easier prey. In her head, Lena was screaming for him to come back, but a few seconds later she heard his shoes hit the tile in the foyer with a loud bang as if he had jumped down the last steps in glee. 'What'd you need it for, whore?' Terri didn't respond and he slapped her again, the noise pounding in Lena's ears. 'Answer me, whore.'

Terri's voice was weak. 'I used it to pay the hospital bills.'

'You used it to carve out that baby inside you.'

Terri made a wheezing noise. Lena dropped the gun to her side, her eyes squeezing shut at the sound of the other woman's grief.

'Abby told me,' he said. 'She told me everything.'

'No.'

'She was real worried about her cousin Terri,' he continued. 'Didn't want her to go to hell for what she was going to do. I promised her I'd talk to you about it.' Terri said something and Paul laughed. Lena pivoted around the corner, gun raised, aiming at Paul's back as he struck Terri across the cheek again, this time so hard that she fell to the floor. He grabbed her up, spinning her around just as Lena hid herself back behind the corner.

Lena closed her eyes again, her head playing back in slow motion what she had just seen. He had reached down to grab Terri, yanking her up as he spun toward the stairs. There was a bulge under his jacket. Was he carrying a gun? Did he have a weapon on him?

Paul's tone was one of disgust. 'Get up, you whore.'

'You killed her,' Terri accused. 'I know you killed Abby.'

'Watch your mouth,' he warned.

'Why?' Terri begged. 'Why would you hurt Abby?'

'She did it to herself,' he said. 'Y'all should know better by now than to piss off ol' Cole.' Lena waited for Terri to say something, to tell him that he was worse than Cole, that he had directed everything, put the idea in Cole's head that the girls needed to be punished.

Terri was silent, though, and the only thing Lena heard was the refrigerator kicking on in the kitchen. She peered around the corner just as Terri found her voice.

'I know what you did to her,' she said, and Lena cursed the woman's brazenness. Of all the times for Terri to develop a backbone, this was not it. Jeffrey would be here soon, maybe in another five minutes.

Terri said, 'I know you gave her the cyanide. Dale told you how to use it.'

'So?'

'Why?' Terri asked. 'Why would you kill Abby? She never did anything to you. All she ever did was love you.'

'She was a bad girl,' he said, as if that was reason enough. 'Cole knew that.'

'You told Cole,' Terri said. 'Don't think I don't know how that works.'

'How what works?'

'How you tell him we're bad,' she said. 'You put all these terrible ideas into his head, and he goes out and punishes us.' Her laugh was caustic. 'Funny how God never tells him to punish the boys. You ever been in that box, Paul? You ever get buried for seeing your whores in Savannah and snorting your coke?'

Paul's tone was a snarl. '"Go, see now this cursed woman and bury her – "'

'Don't you dare throw the scriptures at me.'

'"She hath rebelled against her God,"' he quoted. '"They shall fall by the sword."'

Terri obviously knew the verse. Her anger curdled the air. 'Shut up, Paul.'

'"Their infants shall be dashed in pieces . . . Their women with child shall be ripped up."'

'"Even the Devil can quote scripture for his cause."'

He laughed, as if she had scored a point off him.

She said, 'You lost your religion a million years ago.'

'You're one to talk.'

'I don't go around pretending it ain't true,' she retorted, her tone getting stronger, sharper. This was the woman who had hit Dale back. This was the woman who had dared to defend herself. 'Why did you kill her, Paul?' She waited, then asked, 'Was it because of the insurance policies?'

Paul's back stiffened. He hadn't been threatened by Terri's mention of the cyanide, but Lena guessed that the insurance policies added a whole new level to the equation.

He asked, 'What do you know about that?'

'Abby told me about them, Paul. The police know.'

'What do they know?' He grabbed her arm, twisting it. Lena felt her body tense. She raised her Glock again, waiting for the right moment. 'What did you tell them, you little idiot?'

'Let go of me.'

'I'll take your head off, you stupid bitch. Tell me what you told the police.'

Lena startled as Tim came out of nowhere, running past her, nearly tumbling down the stairs to get to his mother. Lena reached for the boy and missed, pulling herself back at the last minute so that Paul wouldn't see her.

'Mama!' the child screamed.

Terri made a surprised sound, then Lena heard her say, 'Tim, go back upstairs. Mama's talking to Uncle Paul.'

'Come here, Tim,' Paul said, and Lena's stomach lurched as his little feet tapped their way down the stairs.