Chapter 34
A female cop gathered my hair in her hands, pulling it into a low bun. “It’s better to have it this way,” she assured me, securing it with an elastic hair tie. “Trust me.”
One last tug on the straps on my vest from Pullman, double-checking it was secure, and I was ready.
Two SWAT cops would lead me to the door.
I would knock. Tommy would send out Daisy and Felix.
I would take their place. The wire would record our conversation.
My goal was to keep him talking and deescalate the situation.
They wanted Tommy to admit his crimes. What he had done to Hazel and Alex.
Then they wanted him to come out and surrender.
“It’s bulletproof,” Pullman reminded me. The vest felt stiff and uncomfortable. My arms looked tiny sticking out of it. “He may want you to take it off, but it’s better to keep it on, if you can. Please.” I nodded.
“We’re going to be listening to everything you say. If things get bad in there, if you feel unsafe, you’re to say, “I can’t believe this,” and then lead him to the window. Somewhere we can see you.”
I grasped the implication and immediately felt nauseous. I bent over, the vest pressing uncomfortably into my chest.
“Look at me, Rose,” Pullman said assertively. He took my face in his hands, holding it up. His thumbs brushed against my cheeks comfortingly. “I need some assurance that you can handle this.” His eyes were wide, concerned.
“I’ll try,” I whispered, and he let go of my face. I wiped my nose with the back of my hand. At that moment I realized I actually trusted him.
“Well, I guess that will have to do,” he said.
“Can …” I stopped and tried to catch my breath. “Can I speak to Will first?”
I didn’t know I was going to ask for it until the request came out of my mouth.
But then I realized it was what I wanted.
I wanted to speak to my sibling, a person who knew Tommy like I did, who’d get how absurd this was.
Someone who could understand what this felt like.
I wanted to hear my big brother’s voice.
Pullman and Newbury locked eyes.
“I don’t think that’s such a good idea,” Newbury said. “We need to get you in there as soon as possible. Sometimes in situations like these the suspect changes their mind and tries to renegotiate. We need to make sure that doesn’t happen.”
“Yes, okay.” I was trying to muster my resolve. It was my brother in there. I would talk to him, I would look at his face while he spoke to me, and we could figure this whole thing out.
The detectives led me out of the van and back to Tommy’s yard. Two officers, each holding a huge gun, walked with us. I briefly caught a glimpse of my parents sitting in another nearby van. They were both crying. Suzannah was sitting morosely in the back of an officer’s car.
“You ready, Ms. Dearling?” the closest SWAT officer asked as we approached the house. The two of them stopped when we got to the front door. The one on the right nodded for me to knock. My hand shook as I tapped it against the door.
There were a few seconds of nothing before the sound of a lock clicked and the door cracked open, exposing Daisy’s little face. She looked exhausted and scared. Someone behind her gave her a gentle push forward. She hesitated in the doorway.
“Auntie Rosie?” she called, her eyes wide as she looked between me and the officers at my sides.
“Hi, Daisy chain,” I said, keeping my voice light.
I bent down slightly. “Are you okay?” She nodded.
I could see Tommy behind her now. He had a gun in his right hand, his left holding Felix to his hip.
He made eye contact for a second, and I almost lost my resolve.
He didn’t look any different, not that I really expected him too. He still looked like my older brother.
“Go, Daisy,” he said. “Go to Auntie Rosie.”
“It’s okay,” I reassured her. “These are my friends, and they are going to take you to your mom.” Daisy stepped hesitantly out of the doorframe, and I gripped her shoulder, pulling her faster toward me. One of the officers scooped her up and moved her out of the way.
“Tommy,” I said very carefully. “Hand me Felix.”
Felix had a pacifier in his mouth, his head resting on my brother’s shoulder. Tommy stiffened, taking an involuntary step back. I reached forward, my hands outstretched.
It took a second of maneuvering. Tommy kept the gun in his right hand as he transferred the weight of his toddler into my arms. I turned my back to Tommy, handing my nephew to the officer behind me.
“There,” I said, very aware of the fact that I was standing between them and Tommy. “I’m going to go inside now. Please leave.”
I took a step inside and closed the door behind me.
“Rosie.” Tommy looked relieved. His shoulders sagged, and he took a deep breath. “Thank god.”
Tommy’s relaxed expression filled me with rage.
“What the fuck’s going on, Tommy?”
He ignored me, staring at my chest. “Wait, why are you wearing a vest?”
“Are you kidding me?” The words slipped from my mouth before I could stop them. “Why wouldn’t I?”
He looked surprised. “You think I would hurt you?” He seemed genuinely offended.
He took a step back, still clutching the gun.
Then he came quickly toward me. I braced myself—for what, I didn’t know—as his frame towered over me.
But he wrapped me tightly in a hug. I could feel the gun resting across my back as Tommy threw his arms over my shoulders.
I didn’t move. I just stood stiffly as he cried, too angry to comfort him.
Too scared to react. How different this hug felt from any other we’d ever had.
“I’m so sorry,” Tommy sobbed, his breath on my ear. “I don’t … I don’t know what to do.”
My hands were shaking so badly that I was afraid to reach up and touch him. Tommy seemed to sense my hesitancy. He pulled away. He looked like a wild animal. Skittish. My presence was no longer comforting. He went rigid, taking several steps back from me.
Was I afraid? A rational part of my brain understood that I was in danger. But still, the grief overwhelming me seemed more prominent.
“Sam Hopely saw you outside that night with Alex,” I said, willing my body to stop shaking. “In your bright orange shirt. She told Hazel, and then Hazel confronted you about it, didn’t she?”
He didn’t say anything, but I could see it on his face. The guilt. He didn’t deny it.
“How?” I croaked. “How could you have done all of this? How could you have kept silent this last week when you knew exactly what had happened? How could you have stayed silent all these years?”
I felt emboldened. I didn’t care who I was with. I didn’t care about the gun in his hand. I shoved Tommy in his large, hard chest. “How could you let Will go to prison for this?” I shoved him again.
“Rosie, I’m sorry. I never meant for any of this to happen.”
“Bullshit!” I yelled. “Murder doesn’t just happen, Tommy!”
I couldn’t stop myself. I had spent eleven years completely consumed by what had happened to Alex.
Every decision I had made, good and bad, had been in the name of Will’s innocence.
Tommy had seen all of it. He had let me do it, knowing exactly what had happened all along.
He had gotten to live his life. He went to college.
He got married. He had children. All while the rest of us suffered with the aftermath of what he had done.
And when faced with the opportunity to fess up—to admit what he’d done when Hazel had uncovered it—he had killed her too. He had to be a sociopath.
I remembered the wire taped to my chest and looked at Tommy. I watched him sink to the floor, still holding the gun as he slumped down in front of the leather sectional. Nervously, I lowered myself to the floor beside him.
“I never meant to hurt anybody,” Tommy cried. “I never meant for any of this to happen. I promise.”
“Tell me what you did,” I begged as I reached for his arm, gently grasping it. “Please.”
I had to know. After years of defending Will, of swearing up and down on every news station in the country that my brother was innocent.
After years of searching for suspects when the real one slept a room away from me.
After a week of searching for a sibling who had long since been dead. I had to know.
Tommy’s face twisted in pain as he reached out and stroked the side of my head.
“You’re going to hate me,” he said, and then he began.