Triptych

CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX

Angie had vomited at some point, but the gag had kept most of it in her mouth. Judging by the acrid smell in the trunk she had managed to urinate on herself as well. Her head was pounding, and her body ached so badly she couldn’t move without moaning in pain. Her hands and feet were hogtied behind her. Even if she had been able to move, she had nowhere to go, no way of helping herself. She was completely powerless.

She tried to concentrate on breathing, keeping herself oriented so that she wasn’t sick again. This was hardly her first concussion, nor was it the worst, but the darkness in the trunk made it difficult to keep from panicking, and every time the car stopped for a traffic light or stop sign, she could not calm the fear that burned in her chest like acid.

The car slowed again, and she tensed, listening to the tires crunching against a gravel road. They were off the pavement now. Angie had no idea how long she’d been in the trunk. She hadn’t seen who had hit her on the back of the head, but she knew it was Michael. His laughter still rang in her ears. It was the same laugh he’d given the night of Ken’s party when he’d shoved her into the backseat of her car.

The girl.

There had been a girl tied to the pool table. Blood and bruises had riddled her small body. Jasmine. It had to be Jasmine.

The car rolled to a slow stop. Angie counted the seconds. At twelve, a door opened. The car shifted as weight lifted from the front seat. The door slammed. Footsteps crunched against gravel. The passenger side door opened, then closed hard as if it had been kicked shut.

Twenty seconds. Fifty. A hundred. Angie had given up counting by the time she heard the key scrape in the lock of the trunk.

She was blinded by sunlight. Angie squeezed her eyes tight against the pain. The fresh air was like heaven, and she opened her mouth wide around the gag, flared her nostrils, desperate to breathe it in.

A shadow blocked the sun. Slowly, she opened her eyes. Michael was smiling down at her, the ragged scratch Jasmine had made down his cheek three days before looking like war paint.

“Have a nice nap?”

She strained against the ropes.

“Settle down,” he cautioned.

Angie barked out a “fuck you,” around the gag.

He unsheathed a long hunting knife, warning her, “Don’t try anything,” as he sliced through the ropes behind her back.

She moaned with relief as she stretched her legs as much as she could. Her hands were still tied behind her back, but at least she could move.

“Get out of the car.”

Angie struggled to sit up. Michael slid the knife back into the sheath and pulled out his service weapon. He pointed it at her head and she stopped moving.

“Slowly,” he ordered. “Don’t think for a minute I won’t shoot you.”

The rope bit into her wrists as she pressed her palms flat against the floor of the trunk. After several attempts, she managed to push herself up. She threw her legs over the side of the open trunk. Groaning, she forced herself out, tottering as her feet hit the ground, but somehow keeping her balance.

She stood up straight, looking around, trying to get her bearings.

“That was pretty impressive,” he said. “I’d forgotten how limber you are.

She wanted to rip his eyes out with her bare hands.

“Look around,” he told her. She saw rolling hills and snow-capped mountains looming behind a rustic-looking cabin. “You can scream all you want, but no one is going to hear you.”

He pulled down the gag and she gulped for air. Her nose felt broken, and when she spit on the ground, a clot of blood mixed with chunks of food from breakfast.

She screamed like a banshee.

Michael just stood there as she doubled over from the exertion, her lungs rattling in her chest. She yelled until there was no air left in her lungs, nothing in her mind except the sound of her own screams.

He asked, “Finished?”

She lunged for him and he brought up his knee smack into her chest. She buckled to the ground, gravel shooting sharp pains through her legs.

He pressed the Glock to the side of her head, put his face a few inches from hers. “Remember this, Angie: you’re second-string here.”

Jasmine. “Where is she?”

He yanked her up by the hair, dragging her toward the cabin. Angie struggled against him, pulling the ropes as she bumped against the stairs. “Let me go!” she screamed. “Let me go, you fucker!”

He opened the front door and pushed her inside. “Get in there.” He grabbed her arm and threw her into the bathroom.

She fell into the tub, her head popping against the plastic wall. Michael still had his gun in one hand. With the other, he turned on the shower. Angie tried to stand, her legs slipping out from under her as the cold water beat down on her face.

“Take off your shorts,” Michael ordered. He squirted a glob of shampoo on her as she struggled to stand. “Get them off.”

Even if she’d wanted to, Angie couldn’t do anything with her hands tied behind her back. Michael seemed to realize this. He reached in and ripped open the top button of the cutoffs, then pulled down the zipper.

“Underwear, too,” he said. “Now.”

Her fingers were numb, the circulation cut off. Still, she managed to hook her thumbs in the waistband and pull down the shorts. She kicked them away with her feet.

“What did you do with the little girl?” she demanded, pushing down her panties. “What did you do to Jasmine?”

“Don’t worry.” Michael smiled, like he was enjoying a private joke. “She won’t talk.”

Angie lunged again, her head barreling into his gut. Michael fell back into the hall and the gun skipped across the wet floor. In one swift motion, he picked up Angie and threw her across the room. She landed awkwardly, reaching for the empty space behind her to break the fall. Her right hand twisted as her full weight pressed into the wrist and she heard a crack just as a lightning bolt of pain set her arm on fire.

“Get up,” Michael ordered.

Her hand was throbbing, needles running up and down her arm. She rolled to the side, sobbing. Oh, God, she had broken her wrist. What was she going to do? How was she going to get out of here?

She heard noises in the next room. Michael was gone. Where was the girl? What was he doing to Jasmine?

Angie pressed her face into the floor, forcing herself to her knees, then her feet. She leaned against the wall as her head started swimming, her vision blurring. She took a breath, braced herself, then moved away from the wall. Her wet underwear was wrapped around her ankle and she kicked it off as she limped into the outer room.

Michael was sitting on the couch, one leg crossed over the other, foot bouncing up and down. The Glock was on the cushion beside him. He knew she couldn’t get to it in time.

“Sit down,” he said, indicating the rocking chair by the fireplace. Carefully, she sat on the edge of the seat, trying not to fall back.

“What were you doing in my house?”

Angie looked around the room, which was about ten feet by twenty, a living room with a small kitchen at the back. She remembered the mountains outside, the stark isolation of the cabin. He had been right: no one would hear her scream.

She asked, “What are you going to do?”

He had that same smirk on his face, that smile she had seen the night of Ken’s party and taken for flirting. “What do you think I’m going to do?”

Angie could not stop her bottom lip from trembling. Her hand was going numb, dull throbs of pain ringing around her wrist. The rope was wet from the shower, somehow made thicker and heavier by the water. The skin felt as if it had been burned away.

She looked at the gun on the couch.

“Don’t be stupid.”

Angie cleared her throat, feeling like she had swallowed cotton. “John told me everything,” she said, wondering how hard she could push before Michael broke her. No one knew where she was. Will was probably still interviewing John Shelley, trying to get to the truth. If John had learned anything in prison, he was keeping his mouth closed. It would be hours, maybe days, before Will even thought to look for her, and when he finally did, there was no way he would know about this tiny cabin in the hills.

Michael asked, “What did John tell you?”

“About Mary Alice,” Angie said, praying she’d got the girl’s name right. “He told me what really happened.”

Michael laughed, but he wasn’t smiling. “John doesn’t know what really happened.”

“He figured it out.”

“John’s too stupid to figure anything out.”

“I told everybody.”

“Don’t lie to me,” he warned. “I’m being nice now, but we both know what I’m capable of.”

“Will. I told Will.”

He was scared of Will. She could see that in his eyes.

He asked, “Trent?”

“He’s my boyfriend.”

Michael kept staring at her, obviously trying to decide if she was telling the truth. Finally, he shook his head. “Uh-uh.” He didn’t believe her.

“It’s true,” she insisted. “I’ve known him all my life.”

He let his gaze take in her body. She was naked below the waist, her legs braced apart so that she would not fall. He told her, “You need to remember there are a lot of different ways you can die.”

“The scar on Will’s face,” she tried. “It goes down his jaw to his neck.”

Michael shrugged. “Anybody can see that.”

“His hand,” she said. “He was shot with a nail gun. I took him to the hospital.”

Anger flashed in his eyes. He stood slowly from the couch and walked over to where she was sitting. Angie tried to lean back as he put his hands on either side of her, bracing himself against the arms of the rocking chair. His voice was a low growl when he asked, “What did you tell him?”

Fear tightened like a band around her throat. “Everything…” She heard the terror in her voice, knew he would hear it, too, but her mouth would not stop moving, the words would not stop coming. “John told me…and I told…I told Will…”

He was gripping the arms so hard that the whole chair seemed to vibrate. “Told you what?”

“That you knew Aleesha!”

“Fuck!” Michael pushed himself away from the chair so violently that it almost tipped over. Angie’s legs flailed as she scrambled not to fall. “God damnit!” He lifted his foot to kick over the coffee table but stopped himself at the last minute. Slowly, his foot went back to the floor, but his fists were still clenched at his sides and he shook with fury.

Angie stared at his back, breathless with fear. Carefully, she stilled the rocking chair, inched her way closer to the edge of the seat. The floor creaked as she shifted her weight.

Michael turned and backhanded her so hard that she slammed onto the floor.

Angie lay there. She couldn’t move. Her head was still echoing from the impact.

“Get up.”

He didn’t have to threaten her. Angie tried to sit up but couldn’t. She pressed her face to the floor and closed her eyes, waiting for the punishment.

Nothing came.

“My dad left me when I was ten.”

Angie opened her eyes. She must have passed out, missed something. Michael was at the kitchen sink. He took a metal tin out of one of the cabinets.

He said, “You know what that’s like?”

Angie didn’t answer. She watched him open the tin, check the contents.

“John thought he had it hard. He didn’t know what hard was.” Michael waved a bag of white powder in the air. He was back to being that guy again, that normal guy he projected out to the world so that they wouldn’t figure out what a monster he was.

He said, “This is good stuff. You want some?”

She tried to shake her head.

“You didn’t want that last drink, either.” He smiled like it was funny. “Remember that, Angie-Ken’s big party? I got you a drink.”

She couldn’t remember, but she nodded anyway.

“Roofies, baby.” He sat down on the couch, putting the tin on the coffee table between them. “You gulped down a mouthful of roofies.”

Rohypnol. He had drugged her.

Michael laughed at her expression. He took a razor blade and a small mirror out of the tin and tapped some of the powder onto the glass. Angie watched as he chopped the coke with the blade. “You ever have a kid?” he asked, not looking at her. “I bet you’ve had about sixty abortions by now.” He kept cutting the coke, businesslike. “My son has problems. You know that.”

Angie willed her body to move. She was gasping with pain by the time she managed to sit up. At least she had managed it, though. At least she was no longer lying helpless on the floor.

“He’s retarded,” Michael told her, cutting the powder into four lines. He took a rolled dollar bill out of the tin and inhaled one of the lines. He made an “ahh” sound, then told Angie, “This is some good shit. You sure you don’t want some?”

She shook her head again.

“Don’t like being out of control? That’s what you said at Ken’s party when I handed you that drink.” He chuckled. “You drank it anyway, didn’t you? Could have put it down, but you gulped it like a damn fish.” He held out the mirror, offering, “Sure?”

“You broke my nose.”

“Your loss.” He put the mirror back on the table.

“Just let me go.” She was trembling so hard she could barely speak. “I won’t tell anybody.”

“You can’t honestly think you’re getting out of here.”

“Where’s Jasmine?”

“You’ll find out soon enough.” He leaned his head back on the couch, studying her. “Don’t you want to know about John?”

“What about him?”

“Half that prison plowed John’s ass. I bet he has AIDS.”

Angie took deep breaths, coughed from the effort. Her wrist was throbbing with every heartbeat. The rope was tightening around her skin as it dried in the heat of the cabin.

“So, Tim, right?” He let out a short breath. “We got the diagnosis six years ago.”

Angie tested the ropes around her wrists, gently pulling to see if there was any give. “That must have been… hard.”

“It’s always about money, isn’t it?” He indicated the mirror on the table, the lines of coke. “That’s how I paid for it. Give the girls a little bump, let them help pay for my boy to learn how to tie his fucking shoes. State insurance won’t cover half the shit he needs. What am I going to do, let my child waste away in some home?”

Angie didn’t answer. Her mind processed his words, tried to make sense of them. Had Michael been selling dope to the girls, taking it in trade when he felt like it? He had been in Vice for at least ten years. His son couldn’t be more than eight. Tim had nothing to do with it.

“Then I had all that cash and nowhere to park it. Can’t put it in my account because Uncle Sam might get curious. Can’t leave it lying around because Gina might ask questions.” He pointed his finger at Angie. “Then, I figured, why not open up some accounts for my good old cousin Johnny? I already had his social security number from all that court shit my mom had lying around.”

Cousin. Angie didn’t know if Michael meant they were related or he was just using slang.

Michael said, “Wasn’t like I had to worry about him getting out.”

She felt her eyes wanting to close and fought to stay awake.

“Where are your questions, Angie?” The coke had made him more alert, talkative. “Come on, girlie. Ask your questions.”

Angie’s mind reeled. She couldn’t think of anything but, “You knew Aleesha Monroe.”

“Yeah, we go way back.”

Angie waited for him to figure out that she had lied before, but he was too wrapped up in his own story to take apart hers.

He said, “First day in uniform, I got a call to the Homes-got stuck in the freaking elevator. All the old-timers were busting a gut by the time they got me out, and there was Leesha, laughing right along with them.

At least, she was laughing until she recognized me.“ He wagged his finger. ”Nobody laughs at Michael Ormewood, Angie. Nobody laughs at him, and sure as shit nobody pushes him away.“

Angie felt a trickle of blood sliding down the back of her throat. She gagged at the taste of it.

Michael said, “She was a whore in high school and she was a whore fifteen years later. Bitch would suck off a dog for the swill in a spoon.” He was smiling again, that smile that said he was in charge. “What they don’t realize is you have to control it. Take it when you want it, not when you need it.” He meant the coke. “Don’t smoke it, don’t shoot it, don’t get too greedy.”

Michael was stupider than she thought if he believed he could control an addiction. She asked, “Why did you kill Aleesha?”

“She pissed me off. Tried to change the rules.”

“You didn’t want to pay her.” Angie had been around enough prostitutes to know the score. “Did Jasmine piss you off, too?”

“Jasmine…” He smiled. “I wonder what your boyfriend would think if he found out I stashed her up in Aleesha’s place while I drove him back to the station?” He watched her closely, seemed to be feeding off her reaction. “Remember when we were going over my reports? You were wearing that tight skirt up to your slit, flashing your tits every time you leaned over? She was in my trunk the whole time, Angie. The whole time you were rubbing up against me, she was in the trunk of my car, pissing herself thinking about what was going to happen.”

Angie parted her lips, let some of the blood drip out. One of her back teeth was throbbing. It was probably broken.

He had stopped speaking, and she wondered if the coke was starting to wear off. She couldn’t tell how much time had passed since he’d snorted the line. Maybe he was one of those people who had the opposite reaction to the stimulant. Maybe he was so in control of himself that it didn’t matter.

He was silent for so long that Angie felt her eyes closing, felt her body relax into some kind of sleep. Michael started talking again and she jerked awake.

“They all act like they’re so fucking good, but all it ever takes is one hit, one snort, and they’re hooked. They keep coming back, begging at your feet. All of them. Especially John.”

Angie had to clear her throat a few times before she could talk. “Is that why you framed him?”

“That was Mom’s idea, but he got what he deserved. They all got what they deserved.” He glanced down at her. “Just like you.”

Angie felt her eyes wanting to shut again, her muscles start to loosen. She fought it off, biting her split lip until she tasted more blood, using the pain to keep her alive.

“Once you get a taste for it,” Michael was saying, his voice low, thoughtful, “you can’t do it the other way. You need that fear, the way they push against you, the panic in their eyes.”

Angie tested the rope again. The bones in her broken wrist shifted against each other, made a clicking sound that echoed inside her head.

“I got Johnny some credit cards,” Michael continued. “Got this place.” He meant the cabin. “You think I’m stupid, but I’m not.” He tapped the side of his head. “Think, right? What’s the first thing you do when you’re trying to pin down a perp to the scene? Check their credit card receipts: gas bills, hotel bills, all that shit. Place the perp close to the scene, right day, right time, bingo, you’ve caught ‘em.” He shook his head. “They won’t find nothin’ on Michael Ormewood, that’s for sure. Not in Alabama, not in Tennessee, sure as shit not in Atlanta. I’m just a family man, taking care of my poor retarded boy, looking after my wife, home every night in front of the tube.”

“You sold them drugs,” Angie said, thinking about all those girls she’d met on the streets, all those addicts who did anything to feed their addiction. A cop had supplied them. A cop had exploited their need and filled his own. How many had he raped? How many had he killed?

“I should be mad at you, but I’m not.” He rubbed his jaw, kept his eyes on her. “Stupid people let their emotions get the better of them; that’s when they make mistakes. I’m in control here, Angie. I’m the one who’s going to decide how you die.”

He stood up from the couch and she braced herself for more pain, but he went over to the fireplace, rested his hand on the mantel. Angie remembered being with Will three nights ago. He had stood at the fireplace in her house and she’d looked at his back, his strong shoulders, and wanted nothing more than to put her arms around him. She would never have that moment with him again. He would never know how she felt.

Michael said, “You don’t know what it’s like to have this dream in your head that you’re gonna have a perfect life, a perfect family, and then something like Tim happens and you feel like you’re just a fucking failure.”

She breathed in as much air as she could, tried to keep her thoughts clear. “How did it start?”

“You know about Mary Alice.”

“The other ones.” There had to be other ones.

“How far do you want to go back? Eighty-five? Ninety-five? Last year?” The smile was on his face again. “Hell, I can’t even remember which states they were in. Your boyfriend’s into that profiling shit, right? I guess he’d say I escalated when old Johnny got out. Took the gloves off because I knew when the heat was turned up, all I had to do was point the finger back at him.”

“They were just kids.”

“Believe me, they were a lot more experienced than they let on. Real mature for their ages.” He shook his head, as if he could not get over the irony. “Bunch of prick teases is what y all are.”

From out of nowhere, Angie felt shame welling up inside of her. How many of her mother’s boyfriends had said the same thing about Angie? How many times had she accepted their stuffed animals or their nice meals out or their pretty clothes and then been told she was going to have to pay for it with her mouth?

Michael told her, “Most of those girls have been drilled so many times they can’t even feel it unless you pound it into them.” He was looking at her again, appraising her. “You were exactly like Mary Alice. You know that? You tease me, let me kiss you, touch you for a while, and then you push me away like I’m not good enough for you.” He snorted his disgust. “You play it all innocent, but then when I’m inside you, I feel like my cock’s in a fucking vacuum.”

Angie stared at the gun on the couch.

“The whores are good for that. You can do anything to them, right? I mean, that’s what you pay for.” He had turned his back to her, his hands pressed into the mantel. Angie kept her eyes on the Glock, hoping the weapon wasn’t some kind of trick her mind had played on her. “All I wanted was to blow off a little steam with Aleesha before the game. And then she gets all uppity with me, chases me out of the apartment and into the stairway like I’m some kind of punk. I don’t pay for that shit. She kept pushing me and pushing me, and then she learned the lesson. Michael Ormewood does not pay.”

Angie pressed her face to the floor, willing herself to endure this.

“Yeah, I let her get my temper up.” She heard his footsteps, could feel him standing inches from her face. “But, nobody really cares when a whore dies, right? Nobody cares about you.”

She squeezed her eyes shut. She had let him get into her head, let him have control, just like he wanted.

Angie said, “All that John had to do was tell them.” She took a chance, adding, “You’re his cousin.”

“Oh, sweetheart,” Michael tsked. “You actually think John would’ve had the chance to open his mouth in a courtroom?” He shook his head, telling her, “I’ve been playing with him all along, just tugging his strings whenever I wanted to.” He chuckled to himself. “Sure, I almost shit in my pants when I opened that toolbox, saw what he put in there, but that’s nothing compared to the shock I had planned for him. I was gonna have some wicked fun with that little girl, then lay it all back on Johnny’s door-or, more specifically, that shithole room he lives in.”

“It wouldn’t have worked,” she said, knowing that it probably would have.

“ ‘Hero cop catches serial killer in the act.” My DNA all over the room from holding the poor little dead thing in my arms. Cops busting in, seeing Johnny dead, me wailing in grief. I would’ve gotten a fucking promotion for killing that bastard. Do you know how much it costs to put a man on death row? I’d be saving the city twenty million bucks, easy.“

“They would’ve found out.”

“From who? All his friends? His loving family? His devoted, dead mother?”

“People would remember you.”

“Nobody remembers me,” Michael snapped, and she could tell she’d cut close to the bone. “John’s the one who always stood out. I was just in the background-always in the background. Nobody ever noticed me, and you know what? Now, the only thing they’re going to remember their precious Johnny for is being a killer.”

“But John’s not a killer, is he?” When he didn’t answer, she looked up.

Michael was standing in front of a closed door that she assumed led to a closet. He reached up, feeling along the sill at the top, and pulled down a key.

She saw the dead bolt. Her heart stopped mid-beat. “What are you doing?”

“Enough talking,” he said, slipping the key into the lock.

Angle’s leg muscles trembled as she forced herself to stand. She backed away from him, pushing toward the couch.

Michael read her mind. He scooped up the gun. “Move.” He used the muzzle to nudge her toward the closet. “Go on.”

Angie took small steps, the closet coming into view. It wasn’t a closet at all. Stairs led down to what must be a cellar.

“You fucked it all up,” Michael told her. “That little girl and me, we were having a real good time.”

The stairs got closer. If he put her in that cellar, Angie knew she would be dead.

“Move.”

She stopped walking and he bumped into her from behind. “Don’t do this.”

His breath was hot in her ear. “I’m gonna fuck you, Angie. I’m going to fuck every hole you’ve got.” He kept forcing her toward the cellar. “You sit down there and wait for me. Think about what I’m gonna do to you.

“No!” She dug her bare feet into the floor, pushed back against him. Her soles skidded across the wood. She tried to twist away, but he grabbed her by the waist, lifting her, closing the distance in two steps. She screamed “No!” bracing her feet against the doorjamb, fighting as hard as she could.

“Stop it!” he yelled, jerking her up again. Her legs swung wild as he threw her down the stairs. Angie careened against the walls as she fell. She landed in a heap at the bottom of the stairs, weeping from pain.

The overhead light flicked on, a single bulb illuminating what must have been a root cellar at one point. Jasmine was in a corner, curled up into a lifeless ball. Angie tried to go to the girl, but something held her back. She looked down, saw the shard of glass that impaled her upper arm. More glass stuck up like shark’s teeth where broken bottles had been cemented into the bottom stair.

The glass made a sucking noise as she tried to move.

“Think about it,” Michael called from the open doorway above. “Think about what’s going to happen to you.”

The light went out. The door closed. The bolt slid home.

She was going to die.