Bennett waved his hand, as if it was nothing. “I lost my sister a long time ago.” Again, he checked his watch. “Can we get this over with? I’m late for supper.”
Landry walked him down the hallway. Butch took up the rear. He glanced back at Amanda and Evelyn. He gave Amanda an unwelcome wink. She waited until they disappeared behind the door.
Evelyn hissed out air between her teeth. She put her hand to her chest. She was shaking.
“Come on.” Amanda grabbed Evelyn’s hand. The other woman was resistant. Amanda had to pull her down the hallway. She pushed ajar the door to the lab just as the three men were walking into the morgue.
Amanda waited until they were inside before opening the door. She kept her knees bent, as if she was sneaking around. The curtains on the large picture window were still drawn.
Evelyn whispered, “Amanda—”
“Shh,” Amanda shot back. Carefully, she parted the drapes a few inches. Evelyn joined her as they peered through the window.
Pete Hanson stood with his back to the far wall. His arms were crossed. He’d struck Amanda as a very easygoing fellow, but there was something in his posture that indicated he was very unhappy.
Landry and Butch had their backs to the window. Hank Bennett stood opposite, the dead girl between them. He was looking down at the victim’s face.
Apparently, Evelyn was, too. She whispered, “That’s Jane Delray,” at the same moment Hank Bennett said, “Yes, that’s my sister.”
eleven
April 15, 1975
LUCY BENNETT
There was another girl in the next room. The old one was gone. She hadn’t been bad, but this one was awful. Constantly crying. Sobbing. Begging. Pleading.
She sure as hell wasn’t moving. Lucy could guarantee that. None of them moved. The pain was too excruciating. Too unspeakable. It took your breath away. It blacked you out.
At first, it was impossible not to try. Claustrophobia took over. The unreasonable fear of suffocation. It started in the legs like the cramps from withdrawal. Your toes curled. Your muscles ached to contract. It worked its way through your body like a violent storm.
Last month, a tornado had hit the Governor’s Mansion. It started in Perry Homes, but no one cared about that. The Governor’s Mansion was different. It was a symbol, meant to show businessmen and visiting dignitaries that Georgia was the heart of the New South.
The tornado had other ideas.
The roof had been torn off. The grounds damaged. Governor Busbee said that he was saddened by the destruction. Lucy had heard him say so on the news. It was a special bulletin cut between the replay of the top-forty countdown. Linda Ronstadt’s “When Will I Be Loved,” then the governor saying they were going to rebuild. A phoenix rising from the ashes. Hopeful. Certain.
Back when it got really cold, the man had started to let Lucy listen to the transistor radio. He kept it turned down low so the other girls couldn’t hear. Or maybe he kept it low special for Lucy. She would listen to the news, tales of the whole wide world spinning by. She would close her eyes and feel the ground moving underneath her.
Lucy didn’t like to think too much about it, but she could tell she was his favorite. It reminded her of the games she and Jill Henderson used to play in elementary school. Jill was good with her hands. She’d take a sheet of notebook paper and fold it into triangles. What was it called?
Lucy tried to think. It didn’t help that the other girl was sobbing so hard. She wasn’t loud, but she was consistent, like a kitten mewing.
Cootie Catchers. That was it.
Jill would slide her fingertips into the folded sections. There were words written on the inside. You asked who liked you. Who was going to marry you. Were you going to be happy? Were you going to have one kid or two?
Yes. No. Maybe. Keith. John. Bobby.
It wasn’t just the radio that made Lucy feel special. The man spent more time with her. He was gentler with her than he was before—than he was with the other girls, because Lucy could hear it.
How many other girls had there been? Two, three? All weak. All familiar.
The new girl in the other room should stop fighting back. She should just give in and he would make it all better. Otherwise, she would end up like the girl before. And the one before that. Nothing would get better. Nothing would change.
Things had changed for Lucy. Instead of the pieces of Vienna sausage and stale bread he’d shoved between her teeth in the early days, he was letting her feed herself. She sat on the bed and ate McDonald’s hamburgers and french fries. He would sit in the chair, knife in his lap, watching her chew.
Was it Lucy’s imagination, or was her body healing itself? She was sleeping more deeply now. Those first weeks—months?—she’d had nothing to do but sleep, but back then, every time she found herself nodding off, she’d jerk awake in panic. Now, oftentimes when he came into the room, he had to wake her.
Gentle nudge of the shoulder. Stroke along the cheek. The warm feel of the washcloth. The careful tending of her body. He cleaned her. He prayed over her. He made her whole.
Back on Juice’s corner, the girls would trade stories about the bad johns out there. Who to watch out for. Who you would never see coming. There was the one who stuck a knife in your face. The one who tried to put his whole fist inside you. The one who wore a diaper. The one who wanted to paint your fingernails.
In the scheme of things, was this guy really that bad?
twelve
present day
TUESDAY
The morning sun was just winking open its eye when Will raked back the passenger’s seat in Faith’s Mini. A body had been found, probably the missing Georgia Tech student, and he was wasting time adjusting knobs on a clown car so that his head wouldn’t press against the roof.
Faith waited until he was putting on his seatbelt to speak. “You look awful.”
Will glanced at her. She was wearing her GBI regs: khaki pants, navy blue shirt, and her Glock strapped to her thigh. “Thank you.”
Faith backed the car down the driveway. The wheels bumped over the curb. She didn’t say anything else, which was unusual. Faith tended to chat. She tended to pry. For some reason, she was doing neither this morning. Will should’ve been worried about this, but there were only so many burdens he could take on at once. His useless night in the basement. His argument with Sara. The fact that his father was out of prison. Whatever Amanda was hiding from him. That there was a dead body at Techwood. That he had kissed his wife.
Will put his fingers to his mouth again. He’d wiped off Angie’s lipstick with a paper towel, but he could still taste the bitter chemical residue.
Faith said, “There’s an accident on this side of North Avenue. Do you mind if I take the long way through Ansley?”
Will shook his head.
“Did you not get any sleep last night?”
“Off and on.”
“You missed a place on your—” She touched the side of her cheek. When Will didn’t respond, she flipped down the visor in front of him.
Will stared at his reflection in the mirror. There was a small strip of beard he’d missed with the razor this morning. He looked at his eyes. They were bloodshot. No wonder people kept telling him he looked bad.
“This Techwood murder,” Faith began. “Donnelly was the first responder.”
Will flipped up the visor. Detective Leo Donnelly had been Faith’s partner when she worked homicide with the APD. He was slightly annoying, but his greater sin was mediocrity. “Have you talked to him?”