Never Come Back

Chapter Sixty-three

As I walked down the hallway, the prescription bottle in my hand, I heard faint laughter from the living room. It was Ronnie and Paul laughing. Together.

I came to the end of the hallway and stood in the doorway.

Paul saw the look on my face. So did Beth.

Ronnie noticed something was wrong with me as well. For the second time that night he said, “Sis, are you okay?”

“I stopped the bleeding,” I said.

No one said anything else. They were all looking at me, waiting.

Paul’s eyes were wide. He looked stiff and nervous again. He cleared his throat and said, “Maybe Ronnie needs to head to bed—”

“No,” I said. “He can hear this. He should hear this.” I held up the pill bottle and shook it. The pills rattled against the plastic bottle. “Digoxin, Paul? Do you take digoxin for your heart?”

Paul’s face remained frozen, a mask showing uncertainty and nervousness. His eyes ticked back and forth. If he tried to lie, if he tried to create some excuse—

But he didn’t. The mask crumpled. He lowered his head. His entire body was shriveling into the couch. He raised one hand to his forehead, as if he wanted to shade his eyes from a bright light.

“They’re my pills,” he said, his voice shaky. “But I didn’t give them to Ronnie that day. That was Gordon. He took the pills. He went to the hospital and did it. He made a flood upstairs. He had some plan—”

“But you gave Gordon the pills?” I asked. “Why?”

He lowered his hand to cover his eyes. I looked at Beth. She had scooted against the armrest of the couch. Then she stood up. She backed away from the couch. From Paul.

“Why would you cooperate with Gordon on something like that?” I asked, moving toward him. “What did he know about you that would make you do that?”

Paul was sobbing now, his shoulders shaking. He couldn’t have spoken even if he wanted to.

I said it for him.

“It wasn’t Gordon. It was you. You killed Mom, didn’t you?”

He didn’t show his face. He kept it hidden from us. He said something, something I couldn’t make out. It was muffled by his hand.

“What?” I asked.

He moved his hand aside and said, “She knew.”

She knew? What did she know?

“What did she know, Paul? What could Mom have possibly known?”

He said nothing more.

“Paul?” I said. “What? Did Mom know something… something about Gordon or you?”

“I was there,” he said. “Beth… that night…”

“Where were you?” I asked.

Beth supplied the answer. “Oh, Jesus. It was you. You drove the car that night. You were with Gordon, and you were the one who drove me to the bus station.”

I came farther into the room. I sat in the chair I had been sitting in before. I looked at Ronnie. He stared at Paul, his mouth open. He looked confused, angry.

“You drove Beth away that night. And Mom found out. And you killed her because… she was going to report you? Is that it?”

He didn’t respond.

“That’s why she changed the will before she died. That’s why she removed you as Ronnie’s guardian. She knew you drove Beth away. Who told her? Gordon?”

“Yes,” he said, his voice feeble.

“Why?” I asked.

“Because she wouldn’t give him any more money,” he said. “And he was a fucking bastard, and he wanted to make your mom feel rotten about me and everything else in her life. That’s why.”

“And when Mom found out, she cut you out of her life.” I looked at Ronnie again. “And our lives. But why did you have to kill her?”

Paul finally spoke. “She said she wasn’t going to, but she changed her mind. She’d been reconnecting with Beth. I guess doing that brought back a lot of the old feelings from when Beth… went away. The guilt, mostly. Your mom experienced a lot of guilt. She hadn’t fought hard enough to find Beth. She felt she could have pushed the police harder and made something happen. So she wasn’t going to let me off the hook. She was going to turn me in. Gordon too.”

“But after all that time?” Beth asked. “What could they do to you?”

“We’d have faced some trouble,” he said. “Real trouble. What do you think the police and the media would think of a story like that? What would people think here in Dover? You know, there’s no statute of limitations on kidnapping a child. And that’s really what we did. Beth was a minor. She didn’t know what she was doing. Children are entrusted to our care. We can’t just… cast them out. Leslie wanted to send me to jail. I went there that night to talk to her, to try to convince her that she didn’t have to do it. She sent Ronnie away so we could talk in private.” He wiped at his nose with the back of his hand. “I begged her not to do it. I really did. I told her that her whole family was back together again. She knew Beth. She had the two of you. I was still her brother. I told her that—I was still her brother. But she wouldn’t budge. Her guilt was so strong, her instinct to do whatever she could for you kids. She just… wouldn’t listen.”

I looked at Paul, the empty shell of the uncle I once knew. I thought that if I opened the front door and the wind blew in, it would turn him into scraps and whisk him away. He was gone. Whatever I once knew in him was gone.

“I was going to tell the police,” Paul said. “That day at the hospital, when I asked to talk to the detective alone. I was going to confess. I wanted to. I thought… I thought I couldn’t live with it all anymore. I wanted to get caught, to have it all over with. But I didn’t get my chance to talk to the police—you were there the whole time.”

“You didn’t have the guts,” I said. “You couldn’t stand up to Gordon.”

“No, I couldn’t. You’re right. I still can’t.”

“Still?”

“That night,” he said.

“What night?”

“We went to the diner…”

He didn’t finish his sentence. But I remembered what Gordon had said at Mom’s house—that when he broke into my apartment, he’d needed a little help.

“You kept me there at the diner while Gordon broke in and trashed my place. You still let him use you that way. You put all of us in jeopardy.”

“It’s just—” He stopped. “Once I did live with what I’d done, I realized I’d rather live with the guilt and shame than go to jail. I just couldn’t think about going to jail. You needed me. You and Ronnie. When your mom… when she was gone, I had a real purpose again. I was an uncle, almost a dad. I thought if I could be out here, I could do more good…”

“No,” I said. “I’m going to finish the job for Mom.”

I took out my phone and dialed Detective Post. As I had hoped, she was still at Mom’s house, wrapping up matters there. I told her where to meet us and what she could expect to find. She told me they would be there as soon as possible.

I wasn’t really worried about them hurrying. Paul wasn’t going anywhere—I’m not even sure he would have been capable of moving off the couch.

Beth remained on the far side of the room, as if afraid to come near Paul. And Ronnie—I turned to look at him. His face was blank, almost expressionless, except for the tears that ran down his cheeks.

I wanted to stop. I wanted it all to stop. But I had to know one more thing.

“How— Why did you ever get mixed up with Gordon in the first place? Why would you make those movies, or do any of those things?”

He didn’t respond, but I wasn’t going to let it go. I asked him again.

“Why, Paul? Why that?”

Still silence. I stood up and took a step toward him.

“Why?” My voice was a ringing shout. Ronnie jumped at the sound of it. But Paul didn’t move. He didn’t look up as he spoke.

“I was divorced,” he said. “My wife left me. You and Ronnie don’t remember your aunt Diana. But you do, don’t you?”

Beth nodded.

“She left me, Diana. She… eviscerated me when she left. She cheated on me. She just… gutted me. That’s the only way I can describe it.” He sniffled.

“So,” I said. “What does that have to do with Gordon?”

“I was vulnerable. Weak. Gordon was my brother-in-law. He was older. You have to understand, I knew him and remembered him from high school. That was imprinted on me. But Gordon wasn’t the same guy he was in high school. He wasn’t the big man anymore. His life was sliding when Beth was a teenager. He lost his sales job. Did you know that, Beth?”

Beth shook her head. “He changed jobs when I was about twelve, I guess.”

“He was let go,” Paul said. “He was a big talker but not much of a doer. A blowhard, and his bosses could see it. But I couldn’t really. I still saw him as that guy from high school. I fell for that memory. I was swayed by it. He took me down a dark path I shouldn’t have gone down.”

“What dark path?” I asked.

“It started small,” Paul said. “Gordon was receiving stolen property. I knew that. I let him store things at my house for a while, and he gave me a cut of the proceeds. I knew it was illegal, but I went along. Something about the sense of danger and recklessness made me feel alive again. Hell, I didn’t really care if I got caught or not. I didn’t care about anything then. I told myself I wasn’t hurting anyone, that I was a passive participant in those things. It was an excuse and a poor one at that.”

“I agree,” I said.

He smiled a little. “You sound just like your mother when you say that.”

“How did this lead to the night you drove Beth away?” I asked.

“Like I said, the things I did were small. Mostly. Once I helped Gordon with a stolen car.” He shook his head. “He didn’t tell me it was stolen. But I knew. I drove it for him, and another guy picked it up. By that point, I was starting to get worried about myself. I knew I needed to snap out of it. I had a job. I needed to get back to having a real life again. That car thing, it was a turning point in my mind. I told myself that I wouldn’t do that anymore, any of it. But then Gordon contacted me and asked for one more favor.”

“The movies?”

He nodded. “I didn’t know that’s what they were going to be doing that night. Gordon told me we were just going to be hanging out and drinking, that there would be women there. He dangled that in front of me. Women. I guess he knew what I desired deep down. Maybe I did need that.”

“Sex?” I asked.

“I was alone when Diana left. We didn’t have kids. I didn’t think I’d ever have kids. Being alone that way… I was lost. Empty. Believe it or not, Gordon’s suggestion of sex helped. It brought me along. I went along. I needed to. I wanted to feel… I don’t know…”

“Like a man again?” Beth asked. “Desirable?”

Paul looked at Beth. He seemed to be seeing her for the first time. “That’s right.”

“I’ve been there,” Beth said. “I didn’t respond to it the way you did. But I know how that feels.”

“I didn’t know they were going to be making a movie like that. I wouldn’t have gone along with it. I showed up and walked into the middle of that. That was… across the line. Disgusting. I took a stand, believe it or not. I told Gordon I was going to leave.”

“Why didn’t you?” I asked.

“He asked me to do one more thing,” Paul said. “He told me one of the girls needed a ride to the bus station, and he asked me to drive the car. I didn’t know it was Beth at first. I thought it was strange. Gordon rode in the back with the girl. He had her down low, a coat or something over her. I didn’t ask questions. I didn’t want to know. I just turned the radio on and drove, kept my eyes on the road.”

“Classical music,” Beth said, her voice small and hollow. “You were listening to classical music.”

“You didn’t know it was Beth at first,” I said. “When did you find out?”

“When she was gone,” Paul said. “Right after that, she was gone. I put it together. Gordon’s secrecy that night. The girl hidden in the backseat. I was an accessory to Beth’s disappearance. Or her running away. Whatever it was, I had played a big role. I’d helped it happen.”

“So why didn’t you come clean?” I asked. “Tell Mom? Tell the police?”

“I went to Gordon and told him what I knew,” Paul said. “I asked him where Beth had gone and told him we needed to make it right.” Paul sighed. “He had leverage over me. The crimes I’d been involved in. Even driving Beth away. He knew those things, and he threatened to use them against me.”

“You gave your niece away,” I said. “She was a kid. You couldn’t stand up to him?”

He didn’t answer me.

“Well?”

There was a long silence. When at last he spoke, he looked at Beth. “I’m sorry, Beth. But the truth is… it sometimes seemed Leslie would have been happier with you gone. And you seemed like you might be happier as well.”

Beth kept her composure, but I could see the hurt and regret in her eyes. Her top teeth bit down on her lower lip.

“That’s such bullshit, Paul,” I said. “You’re making excuses for your pathetic life.”

He turned to me. “It was pathetic. Is pathetic. I agree. I just hope you never get to find out how bad a life can get, Elizabeth. I hope you don’t find anything like that out at all.”