Chapter 18 #2
Bonnie hugged her son’s neck, just in case. “Love you, babe. Give the girls a hug for me when you get home. I’ll be late.”
Christine thought they held themselves together beautifully, until the elevator doors closed with the four of them inside, and Sam waving them off. Then Diane folded over herself saying, “Ohmygodohmygodohmygod, we’re suspects!”
“We’re not,” Bonnie said. “He might think we know something or saw something. He was fishing, sure, but there’s no way he thinks we did it.”
“You did not instill enough fear into that boy when you were raising him,” Christine said.
“We probably should’ve given him daily beatings,” Bonnie replied.
They exited the elevator and the building and were crossing the parking lot in the cold air to Christine’s car.
But they didn’t get right in. Christine unlocked it, then turned to the others.
“It’s getting dark. And we have to face Jeff.
Or rather, I have to face Jeff. I think you two should go home and let me handle this.
Bonnie, do you have Mr. Terrence’s phone? ”
“In my bag,” she said. Because what wasn’t, really? “But we won’t let you face him alone.”
“Absolutely not,” Diane said. “But um…maybe we should have weapons.”
“I have a gun in a lockbox in the guest room closet,” Christine said. She reminded herself the key was on the small keyring that hung just inside the lake-facing glass doors. “I’ll say I have to change or something and go get it as soon as we arrive.”
“I’ll grab a knife from the big set on the counter,” Bonnie said. “Surreptitiously, behind my back, when he’s not looking.”
They both looked at Diane, then Christine snapped her fingers. “Decorative marble rolling pin on the wall near the fridge. Probably heavier than that fire extinguisher was.”
Diane nodded. “I just hope we don’t need them. Christine, your sofa’s white, your drapes are white, your throw rugs are white. It’s just not a good setting for…you know.”
“You’re right, Diane. Murder would definitely clash.” Her voice trembled at the thought of Jeff’s blood all over the furniture. “But it’s not going to come to that. We’ll give him the phone, he’ll give us whatever he has on Bonnie—the video, I presume—and we’ll go our separate ways, forever.”
“That’s right,” Diane said. “This is a simple exchange. He has as much to lose as we do.”
So Christine drove the girls to her lake house, a half hour away on the smooth, deep blue shores of Otisco.
When they pulled up, it was fully dark, and stars were blinking in the blue velvet sky.
The dock light was on, reflecting off the water’s surface like a miniature moon, and the asymmetrical lake house’s every light was on.
The warm yellow glow was vaguely reassuring.
Christine pulled into the driveway but not under the carport. That was his car’s spot.
They got out, Bonnie from the back seat.
“I’m leaving the keys in the car,” Christine said. “In case anyone has to make a run for it.”
They walked side by side onto the lakefront deck. She glanced left and saw the boat had been lowered from its hoist into the water. As if Jeff were planning a night cruise. “The boat key is on the third post, hanging from a nail,” she told the girls.
“For God’s sake, he’s not going to try to kill us,” Diane said.
“I know, but just in case.” Christine had been sure when she’d said it, but now that they were there, and it was dark, and Jeff was inside waiting, she was shaking.
Diane squeezed her hand.
Through the glass doors, Christine saw her husband relaxing on the sofa. He wore tan shorts, his legs were extended and wide as he leaned back on the white sofa. He gave them a wave and motioned them in.
Christine slid the glass door open and stepped through.
Her friends came in behind her and slid nearer the kitchen, where their weapons of choice were located.
They didn’t pick them up, just moved a little bit closer to them.
The open floor plan gave Jeff a full view of the kitchen, despite that he sat in the living room, so he would see if they did anything suspicious.
“Why don’t you all come on in and sit so we can talk?” he asked. “I know this isn’t pleasant business, but there’s no reason for it to be hostile.”
“I just have to change first,” Christine said, glancing to the hook near the door where the key to her gun-box was. Only the key wasn’t there.
“No, you don’t have to change at all,” Jeff said. “Not for this.”
Bonnie gasped and Christine turned to see that Jeff was holding her gun and pointing it at her. “Get in here. Now.”
Bonnie and Diane moved into the living room without their weapons. Christine sat on the end of the sectional farthest from him, and her friends perched on the matching chair, Diane on its edge, Bonnie on its arm.
“I want the phone,” he said.
Bonnie dug in her bag and pulled it out. “It’s right here. Intact, nothing’s been done to it.” She leaned forward, holding it with an outstretched arm.
Jeff snatched it from her, hitting her hand with his unnecessarily hard. She drew it back and winced. “What’s the code?”
“We don’t know,” Christine said. “We’ve never known.”
“Bullshit,” he said. “Then how did you know about Dan?”
“We didn’t—”
“You punched him in the face at the club, Chrissy. You knew.”
“There was a photo,” Diane said. “Dan Fitzpatrick, you, and—”
“And a third man we didn’t recognize,” Christine interrupted. She sent Diane a look that tried to convey, “Don’t admit to knowing anything more.”
“Yes,” Diane agreed. “You were on a dock in front of a boat. That’s how we knew you knew Dan.”
Jeff frowned at them. “So you haven’t copied the contents of this phone anywhere?”
“If we had you’d know,” Christine said. “I’m assuming whatever’s on there is incriminating. If we found something like that, we’d have already given it to the police.”
“Sure you would, even with the next mayor in the photo with us?”
“Next mayor?” Bonnie asked, pretending she didn’t know.
Jeff nodded. “Former Detective Sterling. Speaking of police, how much have you told your son the detective, Bonnie?”
“How much do you think?” she asked.
Christine scowled at her. This was no time for the newly feisty Bonnie to test her feistiness.
The oven beeped. Come to think of it, it smelled really good in here. Christine frowned at Jeff. “You’re baking?” she asked.
“Just warming,” he said.
“You figured out how to use the oven?”
“Always knew how. Just liked you doing it for me.” He kept the gun on her.
“As a matter of fact, little wifey, why don’t you go get my snack for me like a good woman, huh?
Wait on me a little bit.” He wiggled the gun barrel at her.
“All the years we’ve been together, this’ll be the first time you acted like a woman should. Go on. Fetch.”
Christine looked into his eyes but something in them had changed. They were as cold and lifeless as snake’s eyes and she felt their chill all the way down her spine. “Are you going to kill us, Jeff?”
“I have to kill you, Chrissy. You know too much.”
Behind him, Bonnie was doing something inside her beach bag, but Christine didn’t know what.
“You know about Phil, and Dan, and you know about me. So I gotta do what I gotta do. Then I’m taking all your money and all my money, and I’m moving to a place where I can have all the little girls I want.
” He smiled slowly. “I want you to know that. It gives me pleasure to make sure you know that.” He cocked the weapon.
“Now get me my treat. And then we’ll go for a nice boat ride. ”
Christine got up, put her back to the gun barrel and marched into the kitchen, feeling as if a bullet might pierce her spine at any second.
She opened the oven, and saw there on a cookie sheet, standing fat and perfect, with blueberries bursting and their juices running down the sides, that perfect, beautiful muffin Bonnie had made.
Her lips spread in a slow smile. She used an oven mitt to remove the sheet, then got a small plate from the cabinet, and used a spatula to move the muffin onto it. “Do you want a glass of milk with that?” she asked sweetly.
“Whole fat,” Jeff said. “And not one word from you about how the way I eat is going to kill me.” He mocked her, saying the words she’d said to him a hundred times in a whiny, high-pitched tone.
“Not one word,” she promised. She poured the milk, and then carried the small dessert plate and the cold glass into the living room and placed them on the coffee table in front of him
Bonnie saw the muffin, widened her eyes, and looked at Diane. Diane frowned, as she’d never seen the muffin before, but when Bonnie shifted her gaze to the confection then back to Diane’s eyes again, she got it.
Jeff took the warm muffin and bit into it, devouring a third of its mass in one bite. “Damn, Bonnie. You’re a helluva cook. Now, why don’t you tell me what you did with Big T, huh?” He shifted the gun, pointing it at Bonnie. “Nobody can find Phil Terrence. What happened to him?”
Bonnie backed away, holding up a hand in front of her face. “You saw what happened if you have the video. You know I didn’t mean it.”
“I don’t have a video.” He laughed low. “Dan had one, but I never saw it. He told me what was on it.”
“You didn’t see it?” Christine asked. “Oh, well then let me fill you in. Bonnie bashed Mr. Terrence’s brains in with a frying pan.” She was being mean, hoping he’d shift that gun barrel away from her friend and point it at her instead. “He got exactly what he deserved.”
Jeff kept the gun on Bonnie, though. “Yeah. But what did you do with him?”
Christine averted her eyes, but then he thrust the gun in Bonnie’s direction, and she let out a terrified squeak.
Christine blurted, “We dumped him in an open grave.”
“What?” He shifted the gun to her again, which was what she’d wanted. “Explain.”
“What’s to explain? We put him in the bottom of an open grave and shoveled a layer of dirt over him. Next day, a coffin was lowered into the hole and it got filled in. Would you like a map so you can go lay flowers?”