Holly

July 30, 2021

At ten o’clock, Holly is rolled into Kiner Memorial’s ninth-floor conference room in a wheelchair. She doesn’t need it, but it’s hospital protocol; she has another eight hours of blood-pressure and temp checks before she’ll be released. Waiting for her are Izzy, Izzy’s partner, George Washburn, the plump-cheeked District Attorney, and a sharp-dressed man of about fifty who introduces himself as Herbert Beale of the FBI. Holly assumes he’s there because of the kidnapping aspect, even though there’s no Interstate angle. Bill Hodges told her once that the Feebs always like getting involved in high-profile cases, especially when they’re winding down. Gluttons for TV time, he said. Barbara, Jerome, and Pete Huntley are also attending, by Zoom. Holly insisted.

The plump-cheeked man rises and approaches Holly with his hand outstretched. “I’m Albert Tantleff, the Upsala County District Attorney.” Holly offers him her good elbow instead of her hand. Smiling indulgently, as if at a child, he bumps her elbow with his own. “I believe we can dispense with the masks, since we’ve all been vaccinated and the air circulation in here seems very good.”

“I prefer to keep mine on,” Holly says. It’s a hospital, after all, and hospitals are full of sick people.

“As you like.” He gives her another smile of the indulgent variety and returns to his seat. “Detective Jaynes, your show.”

Izzy—also wearing her mask, perhaps in deference to the guest of honor—powers up her iPad and shows Holly a photograph of a bloodstained earring in a plastic evidence bag. “Can you confirm that this is the earring you used to cut Rodney Harris’s throat?”

Agent Beale leans forward over his folded hands. His eyes are as cold and blue as ice chips, but there’s a faint smile on his mouth. Possibly of admiration.

“Yes,” Holly says. She knows what she must say next, thanks to Pete. “I acted in self-defense, being in fear for my life.” Thinking, I also hated that crazy piece of poop.

“So stipulated,” DA Tantleff says.

“Do you have the other earring?” Izzy asks.

“I do. In the top drawer of my desk at the office. I could show you a picture of it, only the Harrises took my phone after they tased me. But Penny has one, I emailed it to her. Has anyone talked to her yet?”

Barbara says, “I did. I called her.”

Tantleff whips around to look at the screen at the head of the conference table. No indulgent smile now. “You were not authorized to do that, Ms. Robinson.”

“Probably not, but I did it anyway,” Barbara says. Holly feels like applauding. “She was so worried about Holly. I told her she was all right. I didn’t tell her anything else.”

“What about the refrigerator?” Holly asks. “Were there…” She trails off, either not sure how to finish or not willing to.

“There were many cuts of meat, both in their fridge and in the freezer,” Izzy says. “There’s no doubt they’re human. There are still patches of skin on some of them.”

“Oh my God.” That’s Jerome, who’s sitting with Barbara in his writing room. “Oh my fucking God, really?”

“Really,” Izzy says. “They’re being DNA tested as we speak, this went right to the head of the line. There were also seven tall dessert-type glasses which the county coroner says probably contain human brain tissue as well as dura mater and bits of tendon.” She pauses. “Plus what he believes to be whipped cream.”

Silence. That’s right, give them time to digest it, Holly thinks, and clamps a hand to her mask to keep from bursting into gales of horrified laughter.

“Are you all right, Ms. Gibney?” Izzy’s partner asks.

“Fine.”

Izzy continues. “We also found meat sticks—you know, like Slim Jims or Jack Link’s—which may or may not be human, and a large Tupperware container of small meatballs. Any or all of these items may once have been a part of Bonnie Rae Dahl. The DNA will tell us. The Harrises also had a small auxiliary freezer in their pantry. There’s a lot of meat in there, too. Most of it looks like ordinary steaks, chops, bacon, and chicken. At the very bottom, however…” On her iPad she shows them the picture of a frozen roast. “We don’t know what this is for sure, or where it came from, but it’s sure not a leg of lamb.”

“Jesus Christ,” Tantleff says, “and I have no one to prosecute.” He shoots an almost accusatory look at Holly. “You killed them both.”

From the conference room TV screen, Pete Huntley speaks up. To Holly he looks better, but he also looks like he’s lost a fair amount of weight. Maybe thirty pounds. Holly thinks it would be good for him if he keeps it off, but she guesses he won’t, human nature being what it is. “What’s wrong with you, Tant? They were cannibals! They probably wouldn’t have had time to eat her, but they sure as fuck would have killed her.”

“I didn’t mean—”

Izzy’s phone rings and this time Tantleff’s accusing glance is directed at her. “I thought we agreed all phones would be silenced while we—”

“I’m sorry, but I really have to take this. It’s Dana Aaronson with the forensics team. I asked him to call if they found anything particularly… Hello? Dana? What have you got?”

She listens, looking vaguely sick. The way Holly herself felt in the middle of the night, when she finally had to ring her call button, even though she knew how busy the nursing staff was. The nurse who came soothed her through the worst of the panic attack, then gave her a Valium from her own private stash.

Izzy ends the call. “Dana’s team has found over a dozen unmarked jars in the Harris bathroom. He thinks…” She clears her throat. “There’s really no way to say this except to say it. He thinks they may have been using human fat as a kind of lotion. Perhaps hoping to soothe their various aches and pains.”

“They thought it worked,” Holly says. And for all I know, maybe it did. At least for awhile. Human nature being what it is.

“Tell us everything, Holly,” Izzy says. “Start to finish.”

Holly does, starting with Penny’s first call. It takes over an hour. She only has one case of the shakes—when talking about how, as Emily was trying to put a bullet in her, she felt like a china figurine. She has to stop then to get control of herself. Izzy’s partner, Washburn, asks her if she wants a break. Holly says no, she wants to finish, and she does.

“I knew the gun was empty after five, Bill told me I mustn’t ever load the chamber under the hammer. She put the muzzle in the middle of my forehead. I let her because I wanted to see the expression on her face when she pulled the trigger and nothing happened. Her surprise was quite gratifying. Once I saw it, I reached through the bars, grabbed her head, and broke her fracking neck.”

It’s Pete who breaks the silence, with one word. “Good.”

Tantleff clears his throat. “According to you, there were at least four victims. Five, if you count Ortega.”

“Castro,” Barbara says, sounding indignant. “Jorge Castro. I found Freddy Martin’s Facebook page. He was Castro’s partner, and he was convinced—”

“You have no standing in this case,” Tantleff says, “so I’m asking you, with all due respect, to butt out.”

“You butt out,” Holly says. “Let her talk.”

Tantleff huffs but doesn’t protest. Barbara goes on.

“Mr. Martin has been convinced all along that Mr. Castro was murdered. He says Castro had relatives in Dayton, in Nogales, El Paso, and Mexico City. He’s never gotten in touch with any of them and Martin says he would have.”

“He was their first,” Holly says. “I’m sure of it. But speaking of relatives, what about those of the others?” She thinks Ellen Craslow’s Georgia kin won’t care much one way or the other, but Imani at the trailer park will want to know. Bonnie’s father will want to know as well as her mother. But it’s Vera Steinman she thinks of mostly, a woman who now has every excuse to drink and pill herself to death.

“No one’s been informed,” George Washburn says. “Not yet.” He nods at Tantleff. “It’s his case, in tandem with the Chief of Police.”

Tantleff heaves a longsuffering sigh. “We’ll give the investigation teams as much time as we can, but we can’t count on keeping this contained for very long. Someone will talk. There’s a press conference in my near future that I don’t look forward to.”

“But you’ll tell next-of-kin first,” Holly says. Almost insists.

Izzy answers before Tantleff can. “Of course. Starting with Penny Dahl.”

Jerome speaks up, and Holly thinks he may also be thinking of Peter Steinman’s mother. “Can you at least keep the cannibalism part out of it?”

Izzy Jaynes puts her hands to her temples, as if trying to suppress a headache. “No. There’ll be a private grand jury, but this will come out anyway. It’s too explosive to be kept secret. The relatives need to know before they see it in Inside fucking View.”

The meeting ends shortly thereafter. Holly is exhausted. She goes back to her rare-as-hen’s-teeth private room, closes the door, gets into bed, and cries herself to sleep. She dreams of Emily Harris putting the barrel of Bill’s pistol to her forehead and saying, “I loaded the last chamber, you nosy bitch. The joke’s on you.”

A nurse—not the one who gave her the Valium—wakes her at quarter past two that afternoon and says, “Detective Jaynes called the nurses’ station. She says she needs you.” She hands Holly a cell phone and a disinfecting wipe.

“I’m in the hospital chapel,” Izzy says. “Can you come down?”

Holly wheelchairs to the elevator. On the second floor she follows the signs to Kiner’s nondenominational chapel. It’s empty except for Izzy, who is sitting in a front row pew. Held loosely in one hand is a set of rosary beads.

Holly stops next to her. “You told Penny?”

“Roger that.” Izzy’s eyes are red and puffy.

“I’m guessing it didn’t go so well?”

Izzy turns and gives Holly a look of such unhappiness that Holly can barely stand to look back. But she does. She has to, because Izzy did the dirty job Holly should have done herself. “How the fuck do you think it went?”

Holly says nothing, and after a few seconds Izzy takes Holly’s hand. “This case has taught me a lesson, Gibney. Just when you think you’ve seen the worst human beings have to offer, you find out you’re wrong. There’s no end to evil. I took Stella Randolph with me. I knew I needed help with this one, and she’s the department’s mental health counselor. She talks to cops after officer-involved shootings. Other stuff, too.”

“You told Penny that Bonnie was dead, and—?”

“And then I told her why Bonnie was dead. What they did to her. I tried to be euphemistic… I think that’s the word… but she knew what I was talking about. Or what I was trying not to talk about. She just sat there for a moment with her hands clasped in her lap, looking at me. Like a woman attending a really interesting lecture. Then she started screaming. Stella tried to hug her and Dahl pushed her away so hard that Stella tripped over a hassock and fell on the floor. Dahl started to claw at her face. Didn’t break the skin—she would’ve if her nails had been longer—but left big red marks all down her cheeks. I wrapped her up in a bearhug to stop her doing that, but she went on screaming. At last she calmed down a little, or maybe she was just exhausted, but I’ll remember that screaming for the rest of my life. It’s one thing to bring somebody news of a death, I must have done it two dozen times, but the rest of it… Holly, do you think they were conscious when they were killed?”

“I don’t know.” And don’t want to. “Did she say anything about… me?”

“Yes. That she never wants to see you again.”

There’s a double row of houses that look deserted in the blaring afternoon sun. No one is moving on the cracked sidewalks. Jerome thinks Sycamore Street (where there are no sycamores) looks like a movie set that’s been used but not struck yet. Vera Steinman’s old Chevy is in the same place as when he last visited, with its bumper sticker reading WHAT WOULD SCOOBY DO? Jerome wishes he knew what to do, or what to say.

Maybe, he thinks, she won’t be home. The car suggests she is, but for all he knows, the car no longer runs and Peter Steinman’s deep-dish drunk of a mother may have no license to drive.

I should get out of here, he thinks. Just get away while I still have a chance.

He knocks on the door instead. He’s sure of one thing: assuming she doesn’t just slam the door on him, he must look her straight in the face and tell the best, most sincere lie of his life.

The door opens. Vera hasn’t dressed up for him because she didn’t know he was coming, but she looks perfectly okay in her white slacks and shell top. She looks sober, too… but of course she looked sober the last time he was here.

“Oh my. It’s Jerome, right?”

“Yes. Jerome Robinson.”

“I don’t remember much about the last time you were here, but I remember the doctor saying ‘That kid saved your life.’ ”

He doesn’t offer his elbow but puts out his hand. She shakes it firmly.

“I see by your face that you’re not here with good news, Jerome.”

“No, ma’am. I’m not. I came because I didn’t want you to hear it from anyone else.”

“Because we have a connection, don’t we?” She sounds perfectly calm, but her face is waxy pale. “Like it or not, we do.”

“Yes, ma’am, I guess that’s true.”

“No bad news on the stoop. Come in. And call me Vera, for God’s sake.”

He comes in. She closes the door. The air conditioner is still laboring. The living room is still a bit shabby but neat and clean.

“In case you’re wondering, I’m sober. I don’t know how long that will last, but I have resumed going to meetings. Three so far. And I went to my sponsor, prepared to grovel. I found it wasn’t necessary, which was a great relief. Is he dead? Is Peter dead?”

“Yes. I’m very, very sorry, Vera.”

“Was it about sex? Some twisted sex thing?”

“No.”

“Who killed him?”

“An old couple. Rodney and Emily Harris. They killed four others that we know of. You’ll be informed by the police. You can tell them I was here first. Say I wanted to be the one, because… well…”

“Because you saved my life. Because we have that connection.” Still perfectly calm, but her eyes have filled with tears. “Yes. Yes. Yes.”

She reaches behind herself, finds the arm of the chair in front of the television, and sits down. Only it’s more of a fall.

Jerome kneels in front of her like a suitor about to propose marriage. He takes her hands, which are dead cold. None of this was planned, he’s just winging it. Did she say they had a connection? It’s true. He knows that much. He feels that much. His voice is steady, and thank God for that.

“The Harrises were insane. Stuff will come out about what they did, bad stuff, but you need to know one thing.” It’s time for the lie, and it might not even be a lie, because he doesn’t know. “It was quick. Whatever happened to his body… whatever they did… happened afterward. He was gone by then.”

“To wherever we go.”

“Yes. To wherever we go.”

“He didn’t suffer?”

“No.”

Her hands tighten on his. “Do you swear to that?”

“Yes.”

“May your mother die and go to hell if you’re lying?”

“Yes.”

“How do you know?”

“Pathologist’s report.”

Her hands loosen. “I need a drink.”

“I’m sure you do, but don’t take one. Honor your son.”

Vera gives a shaky laugh. “Honor my son? Do you hear yourself?”

“Yes. I hear myself.”

“I need to call my sponsor. Will you stay with me until she comes?”

“Yes,” Jerome says. And he does.