Never Flinch (Holly Gibney #4)

Chapter 17

1

It’s early Thursday morning— very early—but everything is ready to roll. Holly has always considered herself an organized person, but she’s in awe of Corrie Anderson, not least because the woman is so young; her learning curve must have been zero to overdrive in a matter of weeks. Some of the credit has to go to Kate, of course. She picked exactly the right person.

Holly drives her employer around to three local radio stations before the sun is up. Kate drinks coffee in amounts Holly finds frankly terrifying—she herself would be bouncing around the room and climbing the walls.

Because Holly can’t drive a standard shift (Uncle Henry offered to teach her, but as a teenager she was far too anxious to even try), she takes Kate around Toledo in her Chrysler, using her trusty GPS to get her from station to station. At each one, Kate makes the same points: DOOM is obviously bogus, the local powers that be, including the police, know it’s bogus, but they’ve canceled her event anyway. Why? To shut her up. And if they can do it in Toledo, they can do it anywhere. To anyone.

The morning shows really are zoos, but Kate excels at the high-pressure banter these shock jocks specialize in. When one female caller (the morning shows also specialize in callers-in) accuses Kate of putting her own audiences at risk, Kate says, “Maybe they’d rather risk back-alley abortions? Risk their kids getting suspended from school because they come in wearing hightop fades or Mohawks? Risk having books the fundamentalist God-botherers don’t like banned? Maybe let them decide what’s risky, what do you think, caller?” And when the caller ventures the opinion that Kate is a high-riding bitch, Kate ventures her own opinion that the caller should put on her big-girl underpants and quit making decisions for other people.

In other words, it’s all Kate, all the time.

2

Back at the hotel, Corrie has a list of phone interviews, almost two dozen in all. She suggests that Kate should do the in-depth ones— Huffington Post , NPR, PBS, Slate —before they get on the road to Buckeye City.

“Once we’re rolling,” she says, “you talk while I drive. You should be able to knock off the nine I’ve starred. Ten minutes each, ninety minutes in toto .”

“Are you sure I can do them while we’re on the road? I fucking hate it when the service drops out. You’d think, if we could put a man on the moon—”

“Coverage should be five bars all the way. I checked.”

Holly’s admiration for Corrie continues to go up.

“Make your points and move on. ‘They’re trying to muzzle me, to flush my First Amendment rights, let the people decide if they want to go, quit the bullpucky.’ Hammer on those. Don’t get sidetracked. Every time I poke you in the arm, wind it up.”

Kate looks at Holly. “When I’m Madam President, this woman is going to be my chief of staff.”

Corrie blushes. “I just want to protect your tour.”

“ Our tour. The Three Female Musketeers. Right, Holly?”

“True, Boo,” Holly says.

Corrie: “We’re still registered at the Garden City Plaza.”

Kate: “And still in my name?”

“Yes. Holly said it would be best, given what’s happened, if you don’t look like you’re ducking and covering.”

“Goddam right.”

“You can do the rest of the calls from there.” Corrie shakes her fists in the air. “This could work.”

Kate takes Corrie’s list and starts making calls. Her energy seems unabated. Holly goes back to her own room, takes three minutes to finish packing, then starts going through Jerome’s list of activist churches. He’s added more details overnight. Kate’s stalker may not be here, but she might well be.

Jerome writes that some of these churches have organized under the collective banner of AOG, standing for the Army of God. Three of them—two churches in Tennessee and the one in Alabama—warranted police involvement because of FACE violations, the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances. Protesting was fine; shouting insults at the women entering was also fine (although in Holly’s opinion it shouldn’t be); pictures of dismembered fetuses were okay; blocking the entrances and showers of blood, fake or otherwise, were not. Following various links embedded in the news stories, Holly discovers that since Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health , those three clinics have been shuttered anyway, so she supposes the pro-lifers can chalk that up as a win.

In Idaho, members of Christ the Everlasting Redeemer lay down in front of a drag parade, while other members “blessed” the parade marchers with seltzer water. Instead of calling the seltzer water “blessings,” the judge called it “third-degree assault.” Also in Idaho, just a month later, members of the same little church were arrested for vandalizing a library that was rumored to be a meeting place for pedophiles belonging to the Q organization. In upstate New York, a women’s clinic was firebombed. No one died, but two patients and a nurse were badly burned. The investigation ongoing, so far no arrests made.

Jerome’s note about the Wisconsin church is brief: Real Christ Holy, Baraboo Junction, Wisconsin. Google Brenda’s Bitches . Because Kate is still on her third call—Holly can hear her through the open door—she does just that.

The most informative article Holly finds is on a website called Religion Good he’s certainly the right age.

Kate’s voice goes away. Thoughts of the next stop—her own hometown—go away. She’s having one of those moments she lives for: the hard click of things coming together. It was a woman in Reno, not a man, but… what did Corrie say? “Bright red hair that couldn’t be natural.” And later the police found the wig .

Corrie pokes her head in the door. “Kate’s finished. With this round, at least. Are you ready to go?”

“What exactly did the woman in Reno say to you? Can you remember?”

“I’ll never forget it because I thought I’d be blind for the rest of my life. She said, ‘Here’s what you have coming.’ Then something from the Bible about not usurping the authority of the man.”

“Come here a second.”

“She’s waiting, Holly, we really have to—”

“This is important. Come here.”

Corrie comes. Holly shows her the article. “This crime in Florida—felony assault downgraded to a misdemeanor—fits the MO of the woman who threw fake acid at you. If it was a woman.” She spreads her fingers to make the photo of the quartet going up the courthouse steps bigger. She taps Christopher Stewart. “Could this be the person who attacked you in Reno?”

Corrie looks for a long time, then shakes her head. “I don’t know. It happened so fast, it was raining, and if it was this man, he was wearing women’s clothes as well as a wig. A skirt, or maybe it was a dress. So I can’t—”

Kate comes in. “Want to get going, ladies. Come on, come on, come on.”

“Holly thinks she might have found the woman stalking us. Only if she’s right, it’s a man.”

“Which wouldn’t surprise me,” Kate says. “They’re usually the dangerous ones.” She takes a quick look at the picture on Holly’s tablet, then says, “Not bad-looking.”

“Think back and look again, Corrie.”

Corrie looks, then shakes her head. “I can’t tell. I wish I could, Holly, but—”

“We have to roll,” Kate says. “Do your sleuthing in the Buckeye, Hols. If this dodo is after me, he might already be there.”

3

On the way to Buckeye City, Holly has a flash of inspiration. She pulls into the parking lot of a Shoney’s and calls Jerome. He answers, but in the background she hears loud, echoing music. Lots of honking brass.

“ I’m at the Mingo! ” he shouts. “Met Sista Bessie! They’re rehearsing ‘Twist and Shout!’ Fantastic! Barb’s singing with the group! It’s—” He’s interrupted by a flurry of drums.

“What?”

“I said you won’t believe how good she is! They all are! I’ll send you a video!”

“Okay, but I need you to do something for me! Can you go somewhere quiet?”

“What?”

“CAN YOU GO SOMEWHERE QUIET?”

A few seconds later, the music is muted. “Is that better?” Jerome asks.

“Yes.” She tells him what she needs, and Jerome says he’ll see what he can do.

“And send me that video. I want to see Barbara doing the Twist.”

4

Holly would dearly love to stop by her cozy little apartment and throw her road clothes in the washer. Put some fresh ones in her suitcase. Perhaps drink an espresso at her kitchen table in a bar of sunshine. Continue to research the Real Christ Holy Church of Baraboo Junction, Wisconsin, and possibly watch a video of Barbara onstage at the Mingo, dancing and singing.

Mostly she’d like to be by herself.

On the drive from Toledo, she finally gave in to the conscious acknowledgement that she doesn’t like Kate much, Kate with her one-track mind and her somehow tiresome zealotry. She still admires Kate’s courage, energy, and charm (the latter mostly deployed when she needs something or someone), but on that two-hour drive she also faced the fact that Kate is her employer rather than her client. I hold her towel , Holly thought, and what a miserable thought it was.

Instead of her apartment, she goes directly to the Garden City Plaza, pulling up at the check-in curb behind Kate’s truck. The autograph-and-souvenir speculators have for the time being been crowded out by Kate supporters and Sista Bessie fans. The supporters line the other side of the street, holding up a banner that reads WELCOME KATE McKAY! WOMAN POWER FOREVER!

Kate approaches them and Holly, getting out of her boat of a Chrysler and hurrying to her side, thinks, Here we go again .

Kate makes her come on, come on, come on gesture. The supporters cheer and the few right-to-lifers in attendance boo heartily.

What will Holly do if someone flashes a gun? Pull Kate down? Yes, probably. Throw herself in front of her, a human shield?

Good question.

Kate doesn’t hesitate in the lobby, just goes directly into the bar to get out of sight. Holly joins Corrie at the desk to do the check-in dance.

5

Chris arrives in Buckeye City at three PM. The Garden City Plaza has valet parking, but mindful of Deacon Fallowes’s instruction to leave as faint a digital trail as possible, he parks in a public lot two blocks away, paying cash at the booth for three days… although he fully expects to be either dead or in jail after tomorrow night.

He totes his two suitcases, the blue and the pink, to the hotel, and sets them down outside the revolving door long enough to rest his arms and shoulders. The doorman asks if he can help with them and Chris tells him he’s okay, thanks. He happens to look into the lobby, which is lucky, because McKay’s assistant and the bodyguard bitch are at the desk, talking with one of the clerks. A party of middle-aged women standing in line behind them are wearing Sista Bessie shirts that show a much younger Betty Brady and feature the slogan GIVE ME SOME OF THAT OLD SISTA SOUL.

“Are you in town for the concert?” the doorman asks.

“Yes, if I can get a ticket.”

“That might not be so easy. It’s a sellout, and the scalpers are having a field day. I hope you have a reservation here, because the hotel is full up.”

“I do.”

Chris sees McKay join Anderson and Gibney at the desk, and they head for the elevators. The Sista Bessie fans move up to check in. Chris grabs his suitcases and goes inside. He gets his credit card out of his wallet, hesitates, then puts it back. He also has an Amex card, courtesy of Deacon Fallowes, in the name of William Ferguson. “Strictly for emergencies and good up to two thousand dollars,” Fallowes said. “Use it only if they know who you are.”

So far as he knows they don’t, but some intuition, very strong, tells him to use the Ferguson card, and so he does. He tells the clerk that Mr. Stewart couldn’t make it, so he’s stepping in. “You can delete him from your check-in.”

“Very good, Mr. Ferguson.”

Room 919 is the sort of small box that hotel staff call a “ha-ha room,” but Chris supposes it was all Deacon Fallowes could get on short notice. It’s next to the elevators, and a busy chambermaids’ closet is across the hall. The only view is of a brick wall on the other side of an alley. Still, it’s nicer than most of the sleaze palaces where Chris and Chrissy have been staying. Nice enough to make him uneasy, thinking it’s better than he deserves.

His arms and back are achy from lugging his suitcases to the hotel. Chris gets the aspirin from Chrissy’s suitcase and takes a couple with a bottle of Poland Spring water from the little bar fridge. He lies down to wait for the pills to work.

Just fifteen minutes , he tells himself. Then I’ll find the auditorium where she’s supposed to speak tomorrow night. Figure out a way to do it, and I better figure right, because there will only be one chance .

But sleep has been hard to come by lately, and he falls into a light doze. Too often when his mind comes untethered—when it lets down its careful watch over the past, with its humiliations and hard decisions—he finds himself remembering his mother, who knew and accepted what she called his divided nature.

He never argued with her about that, but never believed there was anything divided about it. When he was Chris, he was Chris. When he was Chrissy, he was Chrissy. Mother bought Chrissy’s clothes for her at Outlets at the Dells, which was far enough away to keep what she called “our little family secret.” Those clothes were kept in the bottom drawers of Chris’s bureau under his bluejeans and tee-shirts, along with a Glitter Girls doll Chrissy named Eudora. Although Daddy knew about his son’s twin, Chris was forbidden to dress as Chrissy or sleep with Eudora until Harold Stewart had come in to ask if Chris had said his prayers and to kiss him goodnight. After that he could take Eudora from her confinement and become Chrissy.

His mother found acceptance easy. His father took refuge in ignorance.

Deacon Fallowes found his own way to acceptance, partly because he wanted to use the Stewart twins at some point (God would tell him when the time was right), but also because deeply religious people in every sect or faith can always find justification for what they want to do in one holy book or another. Deacon Andy found his in the Gospel of Matthew, chapter 19, verse 12: For there are some eunuchs, which were so born from their mother’s womb: and there are some eunuchs, which were made eunuchs of men: and there be eunuchs, which have made themselves eunuchs for the kingdom of heaven’s sake. He that is able to receive it, let him receive it.

“Do you understand that verse, Chris?”

He shook his head. “I’m no eunuch. I still have my…” He thought of how to say it without giving offense. “My manly parts.”

“Suppose we think of eunuchs as those who are both male and female. Do you understand if it’s put that way?”

Chris, then sixteen, said he did. He didn’t, really—it was so much simpler than that, no tortured syntax needed—but he wanted Deacon Andy to be happy with him… or as happy as he could be. If that meant wringing some necessary meaning out of the Bible, so be it.

Fallowes put his hands on Chris’s shoulders, strong and warm. Unlike Chris’s father, then dead for two years, Fallowes really seemed to understand. Not his mother’s understanding, which was kind, but in a fashion that suggested there might be a way to thread the needle.

“Tell me how the verse applies to you, assuming we make that one little change… which is, after all, just a slight modernizing of the King James.”

“Does it mean some have made themselves both male and female for the kingdom of heaven’s sake?”

“Yes! Very good.” Deacon Andy gave his shoulders a slight squeeze. “And he that is able to receive God’s Holy Word, let him receive it. Let me hear you say it.”

“He that is able to receive God’s Holy Word, let him receive it.”

“And she .”

“She that is able to receive God’s Holy Word, let her receive it.”

“Yes. Do what your heart tells you that you must receive. I will help you in that regard.”

“I know you will, Deacon Andy.”

“We’ll talk more about what God wants of you.” He paused. “And your sister, of course.”

6

Before his doze can deepen into real sleep, he sits up, goes into the bathroom, and splashes cold water on his face. Then he sets off to scout the Mingo Auditorium. There’s a crowd in front of the hotel. Some are wearing Sista Bessie Soul Power shirts. Some are carrying pro-life signs and waiting for an opportunity to jeer at Kate McKay. Chris knows jeering won’t stop her.

Nothing will stop her but a bullet.

7

Why does it have to be the Holman Rink?

The question keeps recurring to Trig, interrupting the work of his real life, which now seems more and more like a dream to him. His computer is on and there are contracts that need to be filled out and emailed to various companies; there are insurance forms and various indemnifications to be printed, signed, and sent off. But this month—the last month—his real work has been murder, as drinking was his real work before he joined AA. And, say! Did he ever really believe he could make the jurors feel guilty? Or that smug ADA? Or the stiffnecked, self-righteous judge?

It’s late in the game, too late to continue fooling himself, which is what he has been doing. There are jurors—maybe Gottschalk, or Finkel, especially Belinda Jones—who undoubtedly felt regret when Alan Duffrey was murdered in the prison-yard, and more regret when it turned out he had been imprisoned for a crime he hadn’t committed. But did they feel actual guilt, the kind you lose sleep over?

No.

Why does it have to be the Holman?

Because the Holman was alpha, and it’s only right that it should be omega. After his mother left—after she was gone , put it that way—some of the best and worst times he ever spent with his father

( alpha/omega )

had been in that rink, watching the Buckeye Bullets skate, and never mind that he couldn’t say anything right after a Bullets loss. Never mind that there had been that night when he had tried to comfort Daddy about the terrible referee that cost them the game and his father had pushed him into the counter, Daddy mopping up the blood afterward and saying, Ah, you baby, a few stitches will close that . His father, so sure about everything, never apologized. Never explained. When Trig dared—only once or twice—to ask about his mother, Daddy said, She’s gone, left us, that’s all you have to know, now shut up about it if you don’t want your ass busted .

Maisie knocks on his office door and pokes her head in. “You have a call on line one, Don.”

For a moment he doesn’t respond because Don is his real-life name, and more and more during these last days of the last month he thinks of himself as Trig. He supposes that even before Duffrey was killed and Cary Tolliver came forward, he must have been planning something like this, a spree , without letting his conscious mind know. It was certainly that way with the drinking. Once you meant to do it, you couldn’t let your conscious mind in on the secret. In AA they said slip stood for something lousy I planned.

“Don?” It’s Maisie, but she’s far away. Far, far away.

There’s a ceramic horse on his desk. He uses it for a paperweight. He touches it now, caresses it. His mother gave it to him when he was very young. He liked that old horsey. Loved it, really. Took it to bed with him (much as Chrissy took her Glitter Girl, Eudora, to bed with her). It was a horse with no name until his father said, Call it Trigger, because it looks like the one Roy Rogers used to ride . Daddy said, Roy Rogers was an old-time cowboy. So the ceramic horse became Trigger and Daddy started calling him Trig. Mommy never did, Mommy called him her little Donnie, but then she was gone .

“Don? Line one?”

He snaps to. “Thanks, Maisie. Off in the clouds today.”

She gives him a noncommittal smile that might say not just today , and withdraws.

He looks at the blinking light on his phone and wonders how his caller would respond if he picked up the handset and said, Hello, this is Trig, also known as Donald, also known as Juror Nine.

“Quit it,” he says, then takes the call. “Hi, this is Don Gibson.”

“Hi, Mr. Gibson, this is Corrie Anderson. Kate McKay’s assistant? We’ve spoken before.”

“Indeed we have,” Trig says, putting on his friendly Program Director’s voice.

“Thanks for getting us in tomorrow. A lot of Kate’s supporters will appreciate it.”

“Thank Sista Bessie, not me,” Trig says. “She was kind enough to cancel her last pre-show rehearsal.”

“You thank her for me, would you do that?”

“Happy to.”

“Kate is fine with working around Sista Bessie’s equipment. As for me, I just have a few questions about the logistics of her lecture tomorrow evening.”

“Happy to answer them, but first I have a question of my own. Could you come in tomorrow and sign a few papers? One of them is pretty important. It’s a Global Insurance form, and considering Ms. McKay’s… mmm… controversial stance on some issues… it should be executed before Ms. McKay goes onstage.”

“I have to be at the auditorium to take a delivery of Kate’s most recent book tomorrow at two. Twenty cartons, actually. Would two be okay?”

Actually, it wouldn’t. Too many people around.

“I was hoping you could come in around noon, because I have an appointment at two.”

The appointment is a lie, but Maisie will be gone to lunch at noon, and with Sista Bessie and her band having the day off, the auditorium will be empty. There was a delivery scheduled, but he canceled it. He also told Margaret, the kitchen lady, and Jerry, the janitor, to take the day off.

“Would that be possible?” He gives an embarrassed little laugh. “I don’t mean to be a pain in the butt, but no signature means no insurance, and no insurance means no lecture. I’m kind of out on a limb here, Ms. Anderson, because if Kate McKay gets canceled, who is going to get blamed?”

“Me, actually,” Corrie says, and laughs. “But I guess you would, too. Am I allowed to sign? Because if you need Kate’s signature, I better come over right now and bring her the—”

“No, no, your signature will be fine,” Trig says smoothly. Actually, as the Mingo’s Program Director, he can sign most insurance papers himself, and in this case there are no papers.

“I can do noon,” Corrie says.

“I suggest you park behind the auditorium. I can meet you there and take you in through the service entrance.”

“I’ll be Ubering. Not risking Kate’s new truck in a city I don’t know.”

“Thanks,” Trig says. “It’s a load off my mind.”

And if she brings McKay’s bodyguard along, so much the better .