The Laughterhouse

CHAPTER FIFTY-ONE

I drive through town, reaching intersections and having moments where I have no recollection of even driving there. I get caught for ten minutes in boy-racer traffic but I just don’t care. Cars are tooting and cars are weaving in and out of the flow of traffic. My eyes are half-closed and all I want to do is get home and fall into bed. My head is hurting a little and massaging it isn’t really helping. Schroder’s car is an automatic and thank God it is, because if I had to spend mental energy on changing gears I’d break down and cry. When I do make it home I leave Schroder’s car in the driveway.

I still have my keys, other than my car key, which is somewhere with my car back at the station. I fumble my way inside and the only food I can find is a loaf of bread in the freezer that has been there since last year. I make a few slices of toast and eat it while staring out the back window toward the spot in the ground where I had to bury my cat after some psycho killed it the day after I got out of jail. I force the toast into my body to stem the hunger pains. It’s too late for coffee, too complicated to make it anyway, so I settle for water. I reach into my pocket for the painkillers the nurse gave me for the dog bite. I take two of them and tip the rest down the sink, not wanting to risk another addiction, not wanting to hide the symptoms in case there is something wrong inside of me. I can see my reflection in the window, I can still see the hospital room, I can still see my wife wired up to medical equipment like something in a science fiction movie the same way she was three years ago. I sat by her side and held her hand for the five minutes I was allowed, waiting for her eyes to open knowing they wouldn’t-and they didn’t. I finish the toast and head to the bedroom.

I climb into bed. I switch off the lamp and close my eyes and wait for the pills to take effect, feeling the absence of Bridget strongly tonight. The medical equipment, the tubes, all that science keeping her alive. Close-she was so close to being back. What’s the next step?

Sleep. That’s the next step. Tomorrow I’ll figure out the rest.

I hear the footsteps outside the front door before the knocking. I look at the alarm clock and see that I’ve been in bed for two minutes. I close my eyes and wonder if I can just ignore it, then decide that I can’t, even though I give it a good try. I pull the pillow over my head but the knocking doesn’t stop. It’s like I have a woodpecker inside my skull. I guess at quarter to three in the morning, it must be important. Then the idea hits me that it could be a reporter or, worse, a psychic. The woodpecker confirms whoever it is they won’t be ignored. I throw on some clothes and head into the hallway, dragging my feet and almost tripping over them. I can barely keep my eyes open. The knocking stops when I turn on the outside light. I’ve only been in the dark for two minutes but the light hurts. I put one hand against the wall to stay balanced.

“Who is it?” I ask.

“Theodore Tate?” a voice asks, and I recognize that voice, and my first thought is it’s somebody from the hospital, that they’ve come to tell me in person what they should have told me over the phone. Only I get the feeling that’s not where I know the voice from.

And it’s a bad feeling.

“Yeah?” I ask, a little more awake now, but not too much more.

“It’s Caleb Cole,” the voice says, and the response makes my stomach clench and I take my hand off the wall and straighten up. “If you don’t open the door in the next five seconds I’m going to dump a dead girl on your doorstep for you to deal with.”

My cell phone is still in the bedroom. I don’t have a weapon. All I have are two arms that I can barely hold up and eyes that blink open for split seconds rather than blinking closed.

“I mean it,” he says.

I reach out and unlock the door. I swing it inward and, like he suggested, he’s holding on to Katy Stanton. He’s also holding on to a knife. The view wakes me up.

I take a few steps into the hallway and he follows. No matter what happens, it’s time I moved and got an unlisted address-over the last year serial killers, madmen, lawyers, reporters, and also my parents have been showing up at my door. He kicks back with his foot and closes the door behind him. He doesn’t give it quite enough power and it doesn’t latch, and it swings back open an inch.

“I wish I’d never helped you with your car,” I tell him. By helping him I helped him move on to his next victim. I helped him make his way to kidnapping Stanton and his kids.

He opens his mouth to say something, but he can’t seem to figure out what that should be. He closes it, and gives a small acknowledging nod. “Turn on the light,” he says.

I reach out and flick at the light switch. The hallway comes to life.

“Now what?” I ask.

“You have somewhere to sit down?”

I nod. “This way,” I tell him, and I turn around and start walking.

“Don’t try-”

“Yeah, I know,” I tell him. “You said already.” I lead him through to the dining room. “Here okay?” I ask him.

“Sure. Sit down at the opposite side of the table.”

“You don’t have to keep holding the knife against her,” I say, looking at the blade that has taken so much from so many over the last few days. “I’m not going to try anything.”

“Sit down,” he repeats, “and we’ll see what happens.”

“Have you drugged her? Or is she asleep?” I ask, taking a seat.

“She’s fine,” he says, also sitting down. He rests her across his lap. “You’re the one who found Octavia?”

I nod.

“How?” he asks.

“I went there to talk to Tabitha and she didn’t answer the door.”

“So you broke in?”

“Listen, Caleb, I’m way too tired and not in the best of moods, so how about you just tell me what you want?”

“You’re not the only one who’s tired.”

“Yeah, but I’m the only one not holding a knife to a girl. What do you want?”

“Right now I want you to tell me why you went there.”

“Because you sent Ariel Chancellor a letter saying that Tabitha was the one who put Victoria Brown into a coma.”

He thinks about this, nodding slowly the entire time. “That was stupid of me,” he says.

“You’re right,” I tell him. “And not just that, but this,” I say, spreading my arms, “all of this is stupid. You’re hurting all the wrong people.”

“No. I’m hurting the right people. So far nobody innocent has died.”

“What in the hell is wrong with you? Four people have died,” I tell him. “Three of them were only doing their jobs, and the fourth-you didn’t even know him.”

“Well, they shouldn’t have done their jobs as well as they did,” he says. “And that other asshole should have kept his dick in his pants. What is going to happen to Tabitha now that you know what she did?”

I shrug. “It’s out of my hands,” I tell him.

“Do you want her to go to prison?”

“No.”

“Why?”

“Because it wouldn’t serve any purpose,” I tell him. “What she did was-”

“Illegal,” he says. “She almost killed that woman. In a way, she did. And you want her to get away with it because it’s revenge.”

“That’s not it at all,” I say.

“Isn’t it? Then why?”

I don’t have an answer.

“It’s the same with the others,” he says. “For me. It’s the same kind of revenge.”

“What about Brad Hayward? What about his children. They deserve your revenge too?”

He doesn’t have an answer.

“There’s nobody left in my life,” he eventually says.

“And her?” I ask, nodding toward Katy. “You’ll hurt her for revenge?”

“If I have to. But if you help me out that won’t have to happen.”

“Help you how?”

“Did you kill the man who killed your daughter?”

“He fled the country.”

“Did you kill him?”

“No.”

“I don’t believe you.”

“I don’t care what you believe.”

“You’ve killed three people,” he tells me. “I’ve killed five. They were all bad.”

“I’ve killed one,” I tell him, though technically it’s four. “You’ve killed six. One of them was a police officer. He was a good man.”

“I know,” he says, “and I regret that. I really do, and I’ve paid for it. We’re not that different, you know. People who do bad things, we make them pay.”

“Lower the knife,” I tell him. “We’re sitting at opposite ends of the table.”

He lowers the knife.

“We are different,” I tell him, not liking the comparison. “Very different.”

“Maybe. Maybe not,” he says. “If it’d been your daughter, you’d have done the same thing to James Whitby.”

I don’t give him any indication either way, but yeah, of course I would have. Only I’d have found a different way of doing it. Nobody else would have suffered. Nobody would ever know what had happened.

“It wasn’t just James Whitby who killed Jessica,” he says. “It was all of them.”

“So what do you want from me?” I ask, knowing there’s no point in arguing.

“You know what was done to James Whitby as a child? It’s all in the transcripts from his court case after Tabitha Jenkins.”

“I know his mother fucked him up,” I say. “I know James Whitby never had a chance in life because of her. I know she’s a candidate for worst mother of the century and that you want to kill her.”

“Not anymore.”

It’s not the answer I’m expecting. “No?”

“No,” he says. “I don’t want to kill her. I want you to do it for me.”

I almost laugh at the suggestion, but of course he’s being serious. “Come on, Caleb, there’s nothing in your file to say you’re nuts. Why would you think I would do that?” I ask, and I look at Katy as I ask the question, and at the knife, and I have a pretty good idea about what’s coming up, and it’s bad.

“You want to do it because Mrs. Whitby’s as responsible as anybody,” he says. “You can’t tell me with all that’s happened that she deserves to be walking around free? That she gets a get-out-of-jail-free card? That’s not fair. It’s not fucking fair!” he says, and he slams his hand down on the table. Katy doesn’t move. “I was hoping you’d see it from my point of view. I was hoping it wasn’t going to come to this,” he says, and he puts the knife back against Katy’s throat.

“Caleb-”

“Phones these days, they are amazing things,” he says, confusing me with his change in direction. “You can do so much with them. Here,” he says, and he slides a phone across the table toward me. “It belongs to the doctor. I want you to have it.”

“I already have a phone.”

“Is it like that one?” Cole asks.

I look at the phone. No, mine is nothing like it. “Mine makes calls,” I tell him, “not much more.”

“Does it make video calls?”

I shake my head.

“Then take the phone,” he says. “You have thirty minutes. That gives you time to drive to Mrs. Whitby’s house and kill her, and when you do it,” he says, “I want to see it happen. I’ll call you in thirty minutes and you can show me on that phone what you’ve done, and it better be real, because if it isn’t, if I think she’s really still alive, I’m going to kill this little girl.”

“No, you’re not,” I tell him. “She’s just like your daughter.”

He puts Katy’s hand onto the table and holds the knife above it. He touches the blade against her finger.

“Don’t,” I tell him.

“You don’t believe I’m going to hurt her,” he says, frowning in disbelief as he shakes his head. “I can’t blame you, because this morning I’d have agreed with you,” he says, “but things are different now.” He starts to push down on the knife.

“I believe you,” I tell him, standing up, my legs no longer heavy and tired.

He points the knife at me. “Don’t move,” he says loudly, “don’t you fucking move. Sit back down.”

I sit back down. My legs are tight, ready to pounce, but they’re shaking too. “You don’t need to prove anything,” I tell him.

“You’re wrong. I’m alone in all of this. Tabitha wouldn’t help and she was a victim. You’ve gone through something similar and even you don’t want to help.”

He pushes the knife back against Katy’s finger.

“Wait, wait damn it. You’ve got it all wrong,” I tell him. “You’re hurting the wrong people-that’s why nobody wants to help you, and if you hurt her you’re. .” He starts to press harder on the knife. “Damn it! Listen to me! Don’t do this,” I say, starting to move again.

He looks up at me. “I’m telling you, if you fucking move I’ll kill her right now.”

I don’t sit back down, but I stay where I am, my legs against the chair. “Caleb-”

“I’m not fucking around here. Fuck, what is it with you people? You push and push and people don’t want to help, they don’t want to believe, so what else do I have?” he asks, his voice becoming high. “Huh? What else?” And before I can answer, he gives the answer he wants to hear. “Nothing. There’s nothing else. So this, this right now is your fault!”

He pushes down hard on the knife.

“Caleb, you don’t need to. .”

There is resistance.

“. . do this.”

There is a thud as the blade goes through her little finger.

“Jesus, Caleb!” I shout, banging my hip into the table as I start toward him. Blood is squirting up from Katy’s hand. She doesn’t wake up, she doesn’t even flinch. She isn’t just asleep-she’s been drugged, just like Melanie was this afternoon.

He puts the knife against her throat, and when he moves Katy moves too, and her finger goes with her. It’s still attached by some threads of skin that didn’t break at the bottom. “Don’t you fucking move,” he seethes, and I stop a few feet short of him, my hip sore and my blood boiling.

“You. .” I say, but don’t know what to add. There isn’t an expletive strong enough.

“Sit back down, sit back down or you’ll see what else I’m capable of.”

I move backward toward the chair, keeping my eyes on him, my hands hanging down by my sides. My legs hit the chair and I more fall into it than sit, the impact jarring into my head and almost waking the beast who has his hand on the headache button. I rest my arms on the table.

“Caleb. .”

He sees her finger is dangling, so he puts her hand back on the table and slides the knife across the remaining skin. I can’t look, instead I stare at my own hands with all my fingers intact. Stick a gun in those fingers and this would all be over. It’s an effort for me to stay still. An effort to do nothing while listening to the blade dragging across the table. But what can I do? Make a move? No. A guy willing to cut off the finger of a tiny girl, well, a guy like that is capable of anything. That’s his whole point.

“It’s done,” he says, and the finger has come free.

I don’t have the strength to say anything. I just stare at him. Everything I thought I knew has just changed. Earlier I was sure we were getting all the girls back safely. Now. . now I don’t know what to think.

He stands up and points the knife at me. Blood is dripping from Katy’s hand over the front of his shirt. There’s a gouge mark in the table and blood staining it.

“Thirty minutes,” he tells me. “I swear to God, when I call you in thirty minutes if Mrs. Whitby is still alive this little girl is going to run out of fingers, and it’s going to get a whole lot worse after that.”