Wicked Fix (47 page)

I gazed out the Jeep window. The storm had torn

down some of the old wild grapevines that grew on the

cemetery gate where Reuben's body had been hanging.

They reminded me of the rope he'd hung from.

"... about whatever it is," I finished uneasily.

"So start the Jeep, please. We can think much better in

my kitchen than we can in . . "A cold, dark graveyard,

I was about to say.

But Ellie didn't let me.

"I can't," she confessed. "We're out of gas."

"There's a gas can in my cellar," I said, summoning

patience I'd never known I had.

"We'll just walk home, and ..."

Ellie wasn't listening. She rolled down

her window, looking at the cemetery gate. The night

air was damp, fragrant with cedar and the tannic smell

of the wet leaves lying thickly everywhere after the

rain.

"Ellie," I began. She turned and gazed at me, then

back at the grape foliage now dangling haphazardly.

"All those vines," she said simply, and then it hit

me:

Such a small thing, unremarkable. So innocent.

Until you knew. "The trellis," I said numbly.

Ellie nodded. "Willow said Reuben used to climb a

trellis to Mike Carpentier's room. Like the trellis on

Mike's cottage now."

"Mike's daughter, Molly," I said slowly, "is the

age Mike was back then."

"And he's fighting vermin at the cottage. He'd

have rat poison, and traps."

"The trouble he was in," I said thoughtfully. Everyone

in Eastport would know what it was; they always

did. But not me, because I was from away.

"Drugs," Ellie replied. "Marijuana, some heavier

stuff. You can bet he's not doing it with Molly around,

but it might be he's still got connections."

Right; Mike had mentioned that he didn't get

stoned anymore. And I'd already come to the conclusion

that the tranquilizer in Reuben's system didn't

have to be what Victor had prescribed. Now I tried

imagining it.

"So what if Mike's going along as peacefully as

always, but then the ex-wife comes home, finds out

Reuben's been at the cottage. That he was pestering

Molly, that he invaded her room. Hears from Mike,

maybe, about the scalpels at Victor's place."

"And she doesn't react the way Mike did," Ellie

picked up the theory. "For her it's not enough just to

send Reuben packing because, for one thing, she's got

to go back out to sea on the merchant vessel, won't be

here to help protect Molly."

"Maybe she wants to be certain Reuben won't try

anything like that again," I agreed. Battle to the death,

Anne had said. Take care of things; pick up the pieces

later. Maybe I should have taken her words a bit more

literally. "And Mike could have known that Reuben

was blackmailing Victor from Reuben himself, when

he was up there."

"She hatches a plan that includes duping Reuben,"

Ellie said. "Later throws a few curveballs in your direction,

thinks maybe she can get you scared."

"Stopped by the side of the road that day to check

me out," I agreed, "see if I had any inkling about her,

which of course I didn't. And now the boat's back out

to sea, which is why we haven't thought of her; she's

not around. And why there haven't been any more

mean tricks. But ..." Before Heywood died and Terence

was attacked.

I stopped: big problem. "Only she's not around, is

she?" I finished. "Anne went back out to sea before

..." Before Heywood died and Terence was attacked.

A hand thrust in through the open window, seizing

Ellie's hair. A knife gleamed.

"That's right. But you two have figured out way

too much. Why couldn't you let it go? If you had, I

wouldn't have to do this."

It was Mike Carpentier, eyes alight with purposeful

malice. So much for my thinking that I could

tell when people were lying to me. Now I saw Ellie's

throat move as she swallowed hard, and an ooze of

blood showed at the knife edge.

"The three of us are going to drive downtown,"

Mike said.

"We can't," I said quickly. "We're out of gas."

Mike sighed in a way that suggested tolerance

strained to the breaking point.

"Out," he ordered me, and although I have never

been much good at taking orders, I followed that one.

At his instruction, I took the gas can from the trunk of

his Escort where it sat with some sandbags, a coil of

rope, flares, a blanket, the standard set of tire-changing

equipment, and a big water jug; as usual, he was prepared

for anything.

I emptied the gas can into the Jeep. "I should

think," Mike said as I replaced the filler cap, "you'd

have learned to be ready for emergency situations like

this one. Running," he finished scornfully, "out of gas

twice. Hand me that rope."

"Yeah, silly me," I said, thinking about the revolver

locked safely in the box down in my cellar as I

obeyed.

Mike waited, still ready to skewer Ellie, as I got

back into the Jeep. Then he ordered Ellie out, slipknot

ted the rope around her neck, and climbed into the

Jeep's rear cargo area very quickly before yanking her

back into the driver's seat.

"Now," he said, removing the rope. "Drive, and

no tricks."

"Wouldn't dream of it," Ellie whispered. The knife

was aimed at the back of her neck.

"You've been following us?" I managed as we

pulled away from the curb.

"Yes. I knew when you came to the cottage earlier

today that you must've put at least part of it together,

or why would you come back? And then when you

drove by my old house and sat there looking at it ...

then I was sure."

We hadn't been, of course, at the time. But he

hadn't known that. He gave us a lot more credit than

we deserved.

Unfortunately.

His conversational tone was more chilling than a

shriek. "I never meant to hurt you, Jacobia. I'm sorry

it's turned out this way."

Terrific. So maybe he would tranquilize me, too,

before he cut my throat.

"I only wanted to distract you, get you busy with

something else," he went on. "Send you off in another

direction."

"Right," I snapped back as a burst of anger

washed over me. "Somewhere like the hospital. That

rat trap could've broken my wrist, you know. Instead it

got my dog. Someone's pet cat could have walked right

into--"

I stopped, remembering the poor creature Molly

had been burying. "It's what he used," I understood

aloud. "Reuben brought her that pet to win her over.

The way he brought all those animals to you--to try

softening you up, I suppose--he brought the cat to

Molly."

All at once I figured out how he had kept those

long-ago puppies and birds from his parents' notice.

Ellie's voice told me in memory: Somebody wrung its

neck.

"He wanted to repeat history," Mike agreed

grimly. "With my daughter." He frowned suddenly.

"Turn at the next corner."

But just then the familiar rumble of Tommy Daigle's

jalopy came up behind us. Its horn erupted in the

loud ooh-ooh-gah that Tommy loved so dearly, and

that he sounded at the slightest excuse.

"It's the boys," I said. "Just let them go by, Mike.

They aren't involved. Put the knife down so they don't

see it. Ellie won't do anything, will you, Ellie?"

The jalopy's headlights glared in Ellie's rearview,

flashed high and low. The horn ooh-ooh-gahed raucously

again.

"Right. Especially since I'm aiming it at the back of

the driver's seat," Mike said, "and it's long enough to

go all the way through."

As we neared the corner, Ellie touched the brakes,

touched them again to slow for the turn. The jalopy

kept coming behind us and she tapped the brakes once

more.

"I want them to stay back," she explained, but

instead they followed us onto Sullivan Street. Ellie kept

touching the brakes all the way down the steep hill,

finally signaling for a right turn at the bottom. The

boys went the other direction.

The knife returned to Ellie's throat. "When you get

to the lot by Paddy Farrell's studio building, pull in and

park."

Wade's pickup sat by the Quonset warehouse out

on the dock. Beside it was George Valentine's red panel

truck. Hope rose in my heart as I spotted the vehicles.

But the men were nowhere in sight.

"Reuben victimized you," I said. "Did he hurt

you? Touch you?"

Mike laughed bitterly. "He didn't have to. He was

toxic at a distance, like poison gas. He just threatened

to touch me."

Ellie pulled in beside Paddy Farrell's building. "He

liked little boys?"

Mike blew out an impatient breath. "Being a boy

had nothing to do with it. It was power he was into;

that's a whole different thing. As to gender, Reuben

was an equal-opportunity victimizer."

He squinted up and down the street, saw no one.

"He didn't touch me. But he told me what he would do

to me someday," he went on. "And made me listen.

Said if I told anyone he was coming into my room at

night, he'd kill my parents."

He turned to me. "Night after night. Can you

imagine what that's like for a child, not to want someday

ever to come?"

He took a shaky breath. "He had no reason to be

the way he was. He was just ... broken. Someone

should have drowned him at birth," he said. "But nobody

did so I cut his throat," his voice grew chillingly

ecstatic, "and let his blood run."

There were lights on in the cannery building.

"Reuben's blood," he finished wonderingly. "All of

that blood."

His tone grew efficient. "Let me out first."

He kept the knife at Ellie's throat, beckoning her

from behind the wheel. On the sidewalk he kept the

blade hidden by his side, aimed now at Ellie's body;

"Walk with me," he said. "We're going in. You