They kill, p.27
They Kill, page 27
The rain was still coming down when Sierra pulled into the faculty parking lot. She looked for Mandy’s Mustang and was relieved when she saw it there. She had to park on the other side of the lot, and when she got out, she slipped the knife into the back of her leggings and concealed it beneath her blouse. It wasn’t the most comfortable way to carry a knife, and as wet as her blouse would be, when she walked into the building where their offices were, you’d be able to see the blade through the cloth. But she couldn’t simply carry the knife onto campus, not unless she wanted to get shot by security.
She saw a woman walking across the street toward the faculty lot then, huddled beneath a black umbrella that looked like it might be blown away by the wind any moment.
It was Mandy.
Sierra felt a certain grim satisfaction upon seeing her. Encountering her here in the lot would save her time. But that was all she felt. Was this what Corliss had told her about? Was this her true self, all cold, ruthless calculation? Or was she merely suppressing her emotions in order to do what she had to? She wasn’t sure one was better than the other.
She hurried toward Mandy and met the woman on the edge of the faculty lot. This was pre-Corliss Mandy, hair up in a tight bun, conservative business attire, blouse buttoned all the way to the throat. The woman radiated icy control but now that Sierra had gotten to know sex vampire Mandy – in so many ways – she could detect the raging sexuality barely controlled by the woman’s carefully maintained persona. She doubted even Mandy was aware of it.
Mandy stopped and looked Sierra up and down, frowning with disapproval.
“What have you done to yourself? You look like you’ve been wallowing in mud like a pig!”
“It’s not mud,” Sierra said.
Mandy leaned closer to inspect the stains on Sierra’s clothes, and at that moment lightning flashed, followed an instant later by a deafening crack of thunder. The storm was becoming violent, deadly. Sierra knew just how it felt.
She leaned toward Mandy without a word, and before the woman could react, Sierra kissed her. Mandy stiffened in shock, but then Sierra put her arms around the woman and slid her tongue between her lips. Mandy resisted for several more seconds before her body relaxed and she began kissing Sierra back. These weren’t gentle kisses either. They were passionate, almost desperate kisses. Sierra wasn’t certain given the rain, but she thought Mandy might be crying.
Sierra reached behind her back and drew her knife.
* * *
She left Mandy where she lay. The woman deserved better than that, but Sierra didn’t have time to give it to her. She ran back to Randall’s Town Car, got in, and roared out of the faculty parking lot, swerving around Mandy’s body. She turned onto the street.
Three down, one to go.
She looked at the car’s dashboard clock.
5:12.
Jeffrey and Marc would be heading for Temptations to eat dinner, might already be there for all she knew. She pressed the accelerator to the floor and raced through the raging storm toward Electronics Emporium. On the way, she couldn’t resist driving past ArtWorks. It was a relief to see the building intact and to know that Karolyn was inside, alive and happy in her work. She prayed she’d be able to keep her that way.
* * *
Sierra didn’t have time to fuck around. She pulled up to the curb in front of the store and started honking the horn.
Stuart’s manager, Alton, stepped outside to see what the hell all the commotion was about. Sierra rolled down the passenger-side window.
“Can you tell Stuart to come out here, please? It’s an emergency.”
Alton frowned doubtfully, but he nodded and went back inside. A moment later, Stuart came out. He stood in the store’s doorway to keep out of the rain, but given the way the wind was blowing, it didn’t help very much.
“Sierra? Whose car is that?”
The accusation in his tone was subtle but unmistakable to Sierra. What Stuart really wanted to know was if the car belonged to a man, and if so, why was she driving it?
“That’s not important right now!” Sierra had to shout to be heard over the wind and rain. “Hurry up and get in the car!”
Stuart looked taken aback by her words, and why not? He was used to giving commands in a relationship, not taking them. But after a moment’s hesitation, he dashed through the rain, opened the Town Car’s passenger door, got inside, and closed it behind him. Once in the car, he tried to reassert dominance.
“I don’t know what you want, but it had better be important, I just got soaked running—”
Sierra laid his throat open with a single swift swipe of her blade. Blood sprayed the dashboard, Stuart’s eyes went wide, and he clapped his hands to his throat in a futile attempt to keep his blood inside his body where it belonged. He turned to look at Sierra, an expression of utter bafflement on his face, as if all the laws of the universe as he knew them had just upended.
“Sorry,” Sierra said. “But you are an asshole.”
She reached past him – getting even more blood on herself in the process – opened the door and shoved him out onto the sidewalk. He wasn’t dead yet, but she felt confident he would be in short order. She pulled the passenger door shut, put the car in drive, and pulled away from the curb, the Town Car’s rear end fishtailing on the wet pavement.
She glanced in the rearview mirror and saw Alton run out of the store and kneel next to Stuart. If she’d had any hope of saving Jeffrey without the cops knowing what she’d done, it was gone now. Not only had she left evidence at the scenes of her crimes – her murders – there now was a witness. One who could identify the vehicle she was driving. How long before Bishop Hill’s finest put out an all-points bulletin on Sierra Sowell, last seen driving a Lincoln Town Car? Not long enough, she thought.
She’d done what Corliss said she had to, so that meant she could save Jeffrey now. She picked up Grace’s phone and called his number. She wasn’t sure what she was going to say, but all she needed to do was prevent Jeffrey from driving away from Temptations while he was upset. She’d tell him that she needed his help. It was true enough. He’d met her somewhere and while she couldn’t tell him the truth – he loved her, but there was no fucking way he’d believe her insane story – it didn’t matter what she said, so long as she kept him away from County Road 25A and Courtney Marsh.
His phone rang a half dozen times and then went to voicemail.
“Hey, this is Jeffrey. I’m probably doing something amazing right now, but I’ll return your message once the excitement dies down.”
There was a beep and the phone began recording. She understood why Jeffrey hadn’t picked up. He was on the phone with her, the other her, the one from today, who instead of supporting her brother when he was hurting chose to lecture him about his lousy taste in men.
She spoke fast before the phone cut her off.
“Jeffrey, it’s Sis. Wherever you’re at, pull over now and wait out the storm! I can’t explain why it’s important you do this, but it is. Please do it! I’ll explain when I—”
Another beep. She’d run out of time. In more ways than one, maybe. What were the odds that Jeffrey would listen to her message before the accident? Zero, she thought. They’d been arguing on the phone not long before the accident happened. He’d be too mad at her to listen to any message she left.
She began to come out of the nearly emotionless state she’d functioned in since arriving in the past, and she felt despair take hold of her. She’d killed five people, and by doing so, she’d saved the lives of all those they would’ve killed in the future, but it hadn’t been enough to help her save the life of the person who mattered most to her in the world. But maybe, just maybe, that wasn’t true. Not yet, anyway. If the accident hadn’t happened yet, then it could still be stopped. She could stop it. If she could get there in time.
She had one more monster to kill, the biggest monster of all.
Lightning flashed, thunder cracked, and Sierra drove like a maniac as she headed out of town.
* * *
Courtney Marsh wished she had listened to her teacher. Mrs. Olivetti had practically begged her not to go out into the storm, but it hadn’t been that bad when her oboe lesson had ended. Yes, it had been raining, but the thunder and lightning hadn’t started yet. Mrs. Olivetti had checked her phone’s weather app, and she said the storm was going to get worse – a lot worse – before Courtney could make it back to Bishop Hill. But she’d believed she could beat the storm, at least that’s what she’d told herself. She had tennis practice tonight, and while Coach Balmer wouldn’t take them outside to practice in the rain, she’d have the team practice in the gym. They could work on their serves, practice backhands and lobs. You didn’t need a net and a regulation court for these things. She knew if the storm got too bad – like, apocalyptic bad – Coach Balmer would send the team a group text canceling practice. But Courtney had her phone out and resting on her Altima’s passenger seat, and so far, no text. Until she received one, she’d assume practice was still on.
Jagged bolts of lightning crisscrossed the sky, followed almost immediately by multiple peals of thunder. Courtney jumped in her seat, and the motion caused her to jerk the steering wheel to the left. Her car edged over the line, not much, and she quickly pulled back into her lane.
“You’re an idiot, you’re an idiot, you’re an idiot,” she said to herself, unaware that she spoke these words out loud. Between the frantic whap-whap-whap of the windshield wipers, the sound of the rain, and the now-regular bursts of thunder, she couldn’t hear her own voice.
This wasn’t the first time her drive for perfection – some of the other students at school might call it an obsession – had gotten her in trouble, but it was the worst. She told herself she should pull over to the side of the road and wait for the storm to let up. That would be the safe thing to do. The smart thing. And she prided herself on being smart, didn’t she? Smart was what it was all about. Smart was her ticket out.
Her parents had split up when she’d been a baby, and her dad left her with her mother. She hadn’t seen him in years, only talked to him on the phone on holidays – if he remembered to call. He lived in California with his new wife and kids. He was a physician, an ENT to be precise, and he sent regular child support, no problem there. Courtney figured he probably had an accountant write the checks for him. The problem was Courtney’s mom.
Her mother had worked to help support her husband while he was in medical school. The deal was that when he was finished, it would be her turn for college. She had her sights ultimately set on law school. But Courtney had come along during Mom’s freshman year of undergrad (surprise!) and Dad divorced her at the beginning of her sophomore year. She struggled along for the rest of that semester, but going to school, working, and being a single mother had been too much. She dropped out of college and never went back. She’d worked a series of low-paying, high-stress jobs, had dated a series of spectacularly useless men, and ended up with a severe case of depression. Courtney didn’t blame her mother for any of this. She’d caught some bad breaks and she’d done the best she could to deal with them. But instead of seeing a doctor and getting a prescription for an antidepressant, her mom had chosen to self-medicate. And her drug of choice was heroin.
She’d been able to hide her addiction for a while, was able to keep working and keep being a mother. But the more her body acclimated to the drug, the more she needed to get the same effect, and so on and so on. Now she was barely functional, was sick all the time, and she was living solely off the child support payments Courtney’s dad sent. And most of that money went to pay bills – if there was any left over after her mom bought drugs, that is.
Courtney had tried to talk her mother into getting help numerous times. She’d researched rehab programs on the internet, read articles on how to talk to a loved one who was addicted, what to say to get through to them. Every one of her attempts failed. Not only wouldn’t her mom listen to her, she became so angry that she barely wanted to have anything to do with her daughter anymore. She’d already overdosed twice, would’ve died if the EMTs hadn’t given her Narcan each time. Courtney knew it was only a matter of time before heroin claimed her mom’s life, before her long, slow suicide attempt was finally successful.
So Courtney worked her ass off at school, intending to get as many scholarships to college as possible, maybe even a free ride to the school of her choice if she was lucky. She planned to go to med school and become a doctor. Not because she wanted to be like her dad – although in truth that was a small part of it – but because she wanted to help people like her mom, and because she never wanted to have to worry about money again for the rest of her life. She’d seen firsthand what happened when one partner didn’t fully support another.
But there was more to getting into a good school besides academics, which was why she played oboe in the school orchestra and why she was on the tennis team. She wanted to make herself the most attractive college candidate possible. And that meant not missing a single fucking practice. No exceptions.
She wasn’t like either of her parents. She wasn’t a quitter. When she started something, by god, she finished it, and she wasn’t going to let a rainstorm, no matter how bad, keep her from—
A pair of headlights materialized out of the darkness in front of her, close and headed straight for her car. She barely had time to scream.
* * *
Jeffrey had stopped crying, but it hadn’t impaired his vision much. As hard as the rain was coming down, his wipers couldn’t keep the water off the windshield, not even at their highest setting.
It’s like the whole world is crying, he thought, and then laughed.
“Drama queen,” he said.
He’d been so fucking angry when he’d left Marc at Temptations, and he’d gotten even angrier after calling Sierra. He knew better than to talk to her about problems he was having with Marc. Sierra couldn’t stand him. Oh, she claimed to have nothing against him personally, said that she thought he was too jealous and insecure to make a good partner for him, that as his sister it was her job to look out for him. That there was truth in this, he had no doubt. He also knew it wasn’t the whole truth. Throughout their childhood, on into high school and through college, they’d been more than brother and sister. They’d been best friends. They’d both dated before, but neither of them had really gotten serious about anyone until Jeffrey had met Marc. Yes, their relationship could be volatile at times, but for the most part it was good, better than it ever had been with anyone else. Sierra felt threatened by how close he and Marc had become. Jeffrey saw Sierra a lot less these days, spoke on the phone to her more rarely. They still texted now and then, but they weren’t in almost constant contact like they’d once been. Jeffrey missed being close to his sister, but he thought a little distance would be good for both of them. They’d become too enmeshed over the years. They needed some space to be able to build their own lives. Since he’d been seeing Marc, she’d started dating a guy named Stuart. Jeffrey thought he was an ass, and he hadn’t been shy about telling her so. But lately, he’d tried to rein in his criticism of Stuart. If Jeffrey wanted her to lay off him about Marc, he had to do the same for her when it came to Stuart.
But as much as he hated to admit it, Sierra might be right about Marc. Jeffrey loved him, he had no doubt about that, but he couldn’t live with Marc’s jealousy any longer. He needed to have a talk with him. Not tonight, and maybe not tomorrow, but soon, once the emotional aftertaste of tonight had passed. He’d tell Marc he loved him, but if he wanted them to stay together, he would have to learn to handle his insecurities better, maybe see a therapist. Jeffrey would offer to go with him if it would help. Hell, maybe they could do couples therapy. Whatever it took. And if Marc tried and it didn’t work – or if he refused to even make the attempt – Jeffrey would know he’d done all he could and that it was time to move on. But if it did work, then he’d stay. He hoped it would work. He really did.
He felt calmer now, more settled, and as he began to think more clearly, he realized that he had done an extremely foolish thing rushing out into the storm the way he had. He needed to find somewhere he could turn around so he could head back to town. Or maybe he should find somewhere to pull over, somewhere he’d be far enough off the road so somebody wouldn’t come along, not see his car, and hit him.
That decided, he started to ease off the gas – and that’s when he saw the headlights emerge out of the storm’s darkness. It looked like the other driver had swerved over the centerline and was coming straight for him. Adrenaline surged through him. He gripped the steering wheel tighter and prepared to hit the brake and yank the wheel to the right.
But then he heard a sound over the thunder. It was…a car horn? And it was coming from behind him.
He saw headlights in his rearview mirror. This car was coming up on him fast. The driver swerved around Jeffrey’s truck, roared past, and headed straight for the oncoming car. Whoever was behind the wheel didn’t hit their brakes, didn’t slow down. If anything, it looked like they continued accelerating.
The crash was spectacular.
The sound of the collision drowned out the thunder, and the vehicles – a Lincoln Town Car and a Nissan Altima – spun on the wet pavement in opposite directions, tipped, and rolled.
Jeffrey slammed on his brakes and his pickup hydroplaned. For a sickening instant he thought he was going to lose control of his vehicle too, but he didn’t. He came to a stop fifty feet from where the accident happened, and he sat there, engine running, windshield wipers snapping back and forth, thunder booming, rain pounding on the roof of this truck. He tried to draw in a breath. It took a moment, and when he was finally able to pull air into his lungs, he did so in a ragged, sudden gasp.
