Her Mother’s Grave

Chapter Seventy-Two

Josie fell and fell until she stopped with a thud on the landing they’d just cleared. The back of her head ached, and her right wrist throbbed. Searching around her in the dark, she realized she’d lost the flashlight. It must have broken on impact, because not even its beam was in sight. Feeling her way along the wall, Josie found the railing and pulled herself to her feet. Pain shot through her left ankle, and she stopped for a moment to try and listen over her thundering heartbeat for Sophia. Then she felt the cold, steel circle of a gun barrel against her cheek, and Sophia’s icy voice in her ear.

“Don’t move.”

Josie put her hands in the air even though she wasn’t even sure that Sophia could see her. She blinked several times, trying to acclimate her eyes to the absolute darkness of the stairwell. High above them on one of the upper flights of stairs, a thin shaft of moonlight crept in through one of the broken windows.

“If this is about your secrets,” Josie said, “no one is going to hear them from me. I’m only interested in stopping Lila.”

“Oh, this is about my secrets all right, but not the ones you think.”

Josie shifted her face fractionally, nudging the barrel of the gun back slightly toward her ear. She could just make out Sophia’s angry glittering eyes in her periphery. “You sure you know how to use that gun?” she asked.

Sophia pushed the barrel hard into Josie’s cheekbone. “A rich old lady, living alone? You’re goddamn right I know how to use this.”

Josie didn’t doubt her. “What is Andrew going to think if his mother kills the chief of police?”

“He’s going to think I had no choice. Don’t you worry. I’ll cover this up just like I covered up Belinda’s murder. Except this time, the secrets will stay buried.”

Josie felt a cold shock go through her. “What are you talking about? You killed Belinda?”

“Of course I did,” Sophia spat. “She was a whore, pretending to be my friend while she screwed around with my husband.”

Playing for time, Josie asked, “You said you left the courthouse long before she died. You had Andrew. Did you know then that he was Belinda’s?”

“I didn’t know anything. I was blissfully unaware of what a disgusting pervert my husband was. Did you know he screwed every young woman who came into that courthouse? I think he even had an affair with Lila, but I could never prove it. I had no idea what he was doing. Belinda and I were good friends. Great friends. I trusted her, and I believed him when he told me he was trying to be a father figure to her.”

With each word, Sophia dug the barrel of the gun deeper into Josie’s cheekbone. Josie lowered her hands slowly and tried to shift away from Sophia, but she clamped a hand down hard on Josie’s shoulder. Josie had to keep her focused on her story and not on the gun she was holding to Josie’s head.

“You really believed your husband was trying to help Belinda because she was a foster kid?” Josie asked.

Sophia humphed. “I was young and stupid. I loved my husband, and I wanted to believe him. Then Belinda disappeared for a few months, and when she came back, she started seeing that teacher, Mr. Todd. She was more reserved those days, but we were still friends, so she confided in me—every detail about her relationship with Todd. I didn’t think there was anything to worry about between her and Malcolm.”

“But then Andrew came along,” Josie said. She tried to take a step, and Sophia, lost in tales of the past, moved with her.

“Yes, Malcolm came home and said he had seen a little boy who was up for adoption and fallen in love with him—would I adopt? We could do for this little boy what no one had done for my good friend, Belinda. Well, I met little Andrew, and I just fell in love with him. I was living the dream. A full-time mother. No more typing and getting coffee for these asshole judges and lawyers. Answering phones and filing. So tedious and boring.”

“If you didn’t know that Belinda was ever even pregnant, how did you find out about the affair?” Josie asked. The barrel of the gun had slid slightly, and she could feel Sophia’s hand tire with the effort of holding it up for so long.

“It was Valentine’s Day, 1984. Malcolm was working late. I put little Andrew into the stroller and walked him in the cold over to the courthouse. Pushed him right up to Malcolm’s chambers’ doors, and then I heard them. I heard them… screwing. I hid in the stairwell and looked through the window in the door, waiting to see who it was. Imagine my shock when Belinda walked out of Malcolm’s office, looking rosy-cheeked and satisfied with her buttons done up wrong.”

So Belinda had broken off her affair with Lloyd and Damon Todd’s father to pick back up where she’d left off with Malcolm Bowen.

Sophia lowered the gun to Josie’s waistline as she spoke, reducing the pressure and seemingly taking some pleasure from getting it all out at last. “I didn’t confront them. What would be the point? I hustled the baby home, put dinner on the table, and tried to get on with my life. But I just couldn’t forget.” She paused for a moment, taking herself back. “A few weeks later, I visited the courthouse during regular hours and ran into Lila. She could tell something was wrong immediately, so we went outside for a smoke break, just like old times, and I told her that I had seen Malcolm and Belinda. She said that she suspected he was probably screwing her before she’d disappeared too. Two years he was carrying on with that girl. That nobody. We had only been married for three.”

“So you decided to take matters into your own hands,” Josie prompted as, distracted by her memories, Sophia let the gun fall to her side. Relief flooded through Josie at having the barrel of the gun finally pointed away from her. She dared not make a move and break the trance. Noah and the cavalry would be there any minute.

“It was Lila’s idea,” Sophia explained. “She came up with a plan to lure Belinda out to a playground on the outskirts of Bellewood. She thought I’d just confront her, maybe throw a few punches. But when I saw her there, I just lost it. Two years. Right under my nose. Malcolm probably only adopted Andrew so he could get me away from the courthouse and they could carry on more freely. I hit her.”

“With what?” Josie thought she heard the sounds of cars over asphalt, but she couldn’t be sure. “With what?” she repeated.

“It was a bar from one of the jungle gyms; there was some storm damage and one of them had broken down. Belinda kept going on about how Malcolm loved her more than me, and that it was only a matter of time before he got rid of me. She would be eighteen in six months—all she had to do was wait, and then he would divorce me, take the baby, and start a whole new happy family. I didn’t even know that Andrew was her baby until that moment. The lies. My God, the lies. I picked up the bar and… I didn’t mean to kill her.”

“But you did. How did she get buried in Denton?”

“Lila took her. We put her in Lila’s trunk, and she said she would help me cover it up if I helped her with something else.”

“Helped her how?” Josie asked.

“She wanted money. She said her boss was… molesting her. She needed to get away. So I agreed. She took Belinda’s body and the money, and I never heard from her again. Until last month.”

“You didn’t give her money,” Josie said. “Your husband did. What did you tell him to get him to pay her off?”

“I told him everything. He had a choice: turn me in and become the judge whose wife murdered his underage mistress, or pay Lila and make the entire thing go away forever.”

“He chose his reputation.”

A loud bang sounded from below them, followed by shouts. In the moonlight, Sophia’s eyes gleamed with anger. She raised the gun back to Josie’s face. “What did you do? Who did you call?”

Josie didn’t answer. Instead, she turned toward the gun, knocking it out of Sophia’s hand and punching Sophia square in the face. Sophia stumbled backward, crying out as she fell. Josie dropped to her knees, searching frantically around the debris-strewn landing for the gun. One of Sophia’s hands clamped around Josie’s damaged ankle, making her cry out in pain. Josie kicked out, but Sophia had already pulled herself up and was looming over Josie. In her hand was the gun that Josie was searching for. She held it by the barrel, and before Josie had a chance to react, she brought it down hard onto Josie’s head.

The stairwell tilted, and Sophia’s shadowy form went out of focus. Josie tried to stand, but her legs wouldn’t work. Next thing she knew, Sophia’s hands were under her armpits, pulling her up the flight of steps she had just tumbled down. Josie willed her limbs to fight back, but there was no response.

She was dragged quickly through a side door, and the sounds of boots pounding along concrete and the shouts she had heard earlier faded. The moonlight was brighter on the third floor, but still, Josie couldn’t seem to get her vision to clear. “Stop,” she mumbled. But Sophia kept dragging her along; she was surprisingly strong. Finally she dropped her, and Josie rolled onto her back. A giant soft-flow dye machine loomed over her, a vast network of piping, nozzles, and pumps surrounding a massive cylinder so large that one would need a ladder to climb to the top of it. The tubular chamber had long since rusted, leaving a gash down the middle of it. Josie watched as Sophia slipped in and out of focus, poking her head into the jagged opening of the cylinder and turning back for Josie.

“No,” Josie said, her heart hammering. “I can’t…” she tried. “I can’t go in there.”

Sophia ignored her plea, dragging her closer and lifting and pushing her uncooperative body through the hole in the dye machine. The jagged metal edges of the hole scraped against Josie’s back, pinching through her jacket and T-shirt and painfully scraping away skin. Her arms and legs tried again to fight Sophia off, but Sophia seemed to be everywhere at once inside the cylinder, pulling her deeper into the darkness.

“I can’t…” Josie tried again.

Sophia laid her out flat on the cold rusted metal and lay down beside her. When Josie tried to speak again, Sophia clamped a hand over her mouth. “Now shut up,” she told Josie, “’cause we’re going to be here awhile.”

Panic burned through every cell in Josie’s body. She tried to get her bearings, to hold onto some piece of herself that understood that the darkness couldn’t hurt her—just as Ray had always told her—but she couldn’t. She was a young girl again, in the closet, spinning and falling through a dark abyss without end.

“I said shut up,” Sophia hissed, pressing her palm more firmly over Josie’s mouth. As Josie’s breath came faster and faster, her hands reached up, trying to pry Sophia’s hand away from her face. Sophia took her hand away momentarily, but all that came out of Josie’s mouth was a high-pitched noise—she was hyperventilating. Josie felt her arms being tucked against her sides, then she felt Sophia straddle her, pinning her in place and settling her weight across Josie’s middle. Sophia’s hand was across Josie’s mouth again. Josie’s chest burned with the effort of trying to take something more than the short, shallow gasps of sheer panic. With each moment that passed, she took in less and less air.

Finally, mercifully, she passed out.