Chapter Twenty-One
Twenty-One
“What do you mean, Marin Haggerty?” I asked, trying to keep my voice steady and my hands from violently shaking Porter by the neckline of his shirt.
“I went to visit Abel, and when I left, there was a note on my car. It said to meet her at Old Navy.”
“At Old Navy? Are you kidding me?”
“No, it said Old Navy, so I drove there and waited outside.”
“And…? !”
“What?” he protested, like I was being unreasonably impatient. “She walked up to me and we started talking.”
“What did she look like?”
“I don’t know. A regular person. Sort of pretty, blonde, a little awkward. She seemed nervous.”
“And you’ve never seen her before?”
“No. I saw the picture from when she was a kid that Dominic had, but I’d never seen her in person.”
“And you’re sure it was her?”
“Who else would it be?”
I moved on, not wanting to overplay my hand. “What did she say?”
“She asked why I was visiting Abel…We just talked. It wasn’t weird. She said it was hard for her to visit her father. I assumed she wanted me to help bring him messages. She was nice and she seemed scared. She didn’t seem psycho or anything.”
“Okay, but how did it go from that to this?” I pointed with gusto to my mother’s body in the trunk.
“I thought it was cool, okay? Are you happy now? I thought I could bring her over and the guys would totally lose their shit. I wanted to impress them. I know. Don’t say anything. I know it was stupid.”
“And dangerous. You understand that, right?”
“Yessss.” He elongated the word, frustrated with my completely justified frustration.
A motorcycle revved it’s engine obnoxiously from a few streets over and it reminded me we weren’t alone in the world.
“We have to get out of here. I’ll take care of this. Take my car, the keys are inside. Go home. Your parents’ house. I don’t care what you have to say to them. You need to go home. I’ll call you when I’m done.”
Porter nodded.
“What about her house?” I asked. “Do we need to worry about that?”
“I used gloves. I found cleaning supplies under the sink. I cleaned it all up, I think.” His face begged for me to agree that it was probably good enough.
“And she was alone? There was no one else there?”
He shook his head.
I guess Gustus picked a good day to get out of the recliner. I hoped wherever he was, he was with enough people to give him a good alibi.
“Okay,” I said. “Wash up in the bathroom and then go. Do you understand?”
He nodded again.
“Go,” I ordered. He turned around and went inside without a word. Porter—speechless. That’s how I knew it was bad.
- - - - -
I drove two hours north to a pond in New Hampshire that I found on Google Maps by scrolling around the screen and not creating a record of searching for it.
I wrote down the directions, then turned off my phone.
I avoided any toll roads. I pulled over to pick up pieces of scrap metal I saw along the way—a discarded bumper, a piece of rebar, a rusty pipe-like thing, and a loose chain I saw hanging off a pasture gate.
I dragged the metal pieces and the body through the woods from the road to the edge of the pond. It took me three trips. I used the chain to attach the bumper to Reanne’s neck. I shoved the rebar and the pipe under her shirt and then snaked them through her pant legs.
The water was murky, full of slimy overgrown plants. At least it seemed unlikely anyone would be looking to swim there. I dragged her in as far as I could manage, thankful she hadn’t used her time in prison to bulk up. Then I made sure she sank to the bottom.
I didn’t know if it was smart. I didn’t know if her body would surface two hours later.
I didn’t know if it was a great fishing cove and some local was going to hook her eye socket the next morning.
I only knew it was the best I could do given the circumstances.
I’d spent a lot of my life thinking about killing and absolutely not enough time thinking about what I would do after the fact.
I had to hope it was good enough, but I was confident the plan was a hell of a lot better than the kiln.
I texted Porter a few times once I was closer to home, but he didn’t answer. I hoped that meant he was asleep. He needed it. I brought his car to a twenty-four-hour self-service car wash and did my best to clean it. Then I went home and did my best to clean myself.
The sun was starting to rise by the time I turned onto Porter’s street. I pulled up in front of the house, but I didn’t need to knock on the door to realize there was a problem. My car wasn’t in the driveway. Porter hadn’t gone home.