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“Yes, exactly.” I reached for him, wanting to comfort him, but he stepped back, a look of revulsion flashing across his face. My hands hung in the air, muscles straining to lift what had suddenly become so heavy.
“But that makes me hate myself. That I know you’re a murderer. And I can’t stop you!” he cried, jabbing at the ceiling, where Roy lay prone and helpless.
“Oh sweetheart, don’t think—” But he cut me off.
“And that makes me hate you as well. Because you did this to us. You ruined us,” he said. I didn’t try to say anything more. My chest felt like it was caving in on itself. “I never want to see you again.”
“No! Please! James!” I burst out but he kept talking, his body as straight as if he was iron-plated.
“I’m going to move far away and I’m going to change my name. And then I’ll try to forget all about you,” he finished, turning away.
“Please. . .”I moaned, clutching my stomach as if I’d been shot. But he never looked back. He picked up his backpack from the hallway and he walked out the door.
I never saw him again.
I didn’t kill Roy. I stopped dosing him and slowly, hesitantly, he regained his strength. It was tiresome as Roy was a whiny patient, taking his recovery as morosely as he’d taken his illness. I waited until he was well and then I left him. It felt anti-climactic, packing a suitcase and calling a lawyer as opposed to watching him die and then calling the undertaker. But every time I imagined killing him, I saw James’s pained face. I hoped he would come back to me when he realized that Roy was still alive. But he didn’t.
I’ve experienced some terrible times in my life. But losing my son was the worst punishment I could ever receive. My daughters knew not to mention James around me, that I couldn’t talk about him. Maybe I should have just confessed then.
That night, Ruth sat at her computer, her hands poised on the keyboard, waiting for a flash of inspiration. She had always prided herself on her investigation skills. It was one of the things that set her apart from other journalists and gave her an edge in the dog-eat-dog world of freelancing. Whether it was helping a woman find her World War Two boyfriend for a sentimental piece or locating a pair of cufflinks that had belonged to a convicted mobster for a crime website, Ruth had done it all.
That was why, ever since Daphne had told her she hadn’t seen her son in decades, Ruth had wondered if she could find James. It would be great for the podcast. Ruth could do a whole story arc about searching for James and if she found him, she might be the one to break it to him that his mother had confessed to murder. That was compelling stuff. Besides she could relate to James. She had also grown up with a single mother in a world that often felt chaotic and beyond her control. And Daphne’s actions had affected them both, in surprisingly similar ways.
But how could she find someone when she had almost no information? Ruth sat at the computer for ages and tried to frame a question,any question, to begin her search. She was looking for a white guy in his late sixties who lived somewhere in the world andmightbe using the name James. There was just no way.
Ruth imagined James, a pleasant family man, running errands and then coming home, flicking the TV on and seeing his mother and sisters splashed across the news. Would he tell his family? Probably not. Who wanted to share that shame? Instead, he would just sit there, alone and afraid that someone would find him.
Later, Ruth sat at her computer, still squinting at the screen. It was past midnight but the flood of press inquiries and article proposals had only increased with every episode, and it was hard for Ruth to wade through them. She was scared that she would miss a life-changing opportunity, that a single misstep might derail her, and this anxiety was making it hard for her to step away from the inbox. She was smoking a joint as she mindlessly worked her way through her emails, hoping that she might actually be able to get some sleep tonight once the weed kicked in.
Ruth sat back in her chair, studying her apartment for a moment. She didn’t like the idea of being forced out of this place, had always disliked moving after having no permanent home as a child. But maybe it would be a blessing to start over in a place free of the memories of Jenn and her run-ins with the Montgomerys.
Ashing the joint in an old Diet Coke can, Ruth opened a file on her computer and flicked through some old pictures, pausing at one with her father’s family. Ruth remembered the first time her father had introduced her to his family: his sister and brother, his daughter, his cousins. It was in a palatial home with tall gates and a driveway crammed with luxury cars. Ruth had felt intimidated by the house itself, much less the rich, discerning people inside who would be suspicious of an illegitimate child born of an affair with a secretary. But Richard had patted her hand and reminded her that his actions had nothing to do with her and that he was proud of her.
“This is your family too. And if you give them time, they’ll appreciate you just as much as I do. Ruth, today is the first step of your life as a Montgomery.”
“Thank you,”Ruth had murmured. A father. A family. It was everything she had ever wanted.
At the time, she had felt like Cinderella, plucked from the ashes and transported to the castle. But if it was a fairy tale, it was definitely the Brothers Grimm version. And nobody got a happy ending.
Chapter Twenty-Six
EPISODE EIGHT: 1981–2018
DAPHNE:And then the twins moved out. They did a year of fashion merchandising at college, dropped out, opened a boutique funded by me and then ran it into the ground. Then they got rich husbands from Florida and started having babies. And suddenly I was alone, just at the moment I was really aging. Sure, I was attractive, but not as beautiful as I used to be. But you don’t care about that, do you? No one wants to hear about how aging can be traumatic for a woman. Or how you go from being the most important thing in your children’s lives to a bit player. No. All you want to know was whether there were more murders.
RUTH:Well, were there?
DAPHNE:Yes. Honestly, I’m like a drunk who falls off the wagon. I had the money, I had the freedom, but I just kept doing it.
RUTH:Okay. So, who was it? Let’s get going.
DAPHNE:So impatient! How many murders do you people need? I guess you and your ghoulish listeners would say the more the merrier. There was one murder, just one, and then I retired until Warren Ackerman’s death. His name was Donald St Clair. I was in my mid-fifties, and he was a decade older. You could learn a little something from Donald, Ruth. All he cared about was his career and by the time I met him, he’d had three divorces, a heart attack that forced him into retirement, and children who never called because he’d never really been around. Careers are great and all, but if that’s all that matters to you, you’ll end up alone and afraid of getting stuck on the toilet.
RUTH:Okay, I’ll keep trying to live a happy, fulfilling life with mountains of student debt, rent I can barely afford, and a parent who will need home healthcare before too long. Thanks for the life advice.
DAPHNE:No need to be snippy, I’m just saying life isn’t all about money. Although it is a really nice distraction! But Donald St Clair was at the point where all he really wanted was a wife. We met in Hawaii in 1990, which is a great place to find rich old buzzards. Soon I was living in his Colorado mansion, which looked like that place inThe Shining.
[EDIT: DO NOT INCLUDE IN PODCAST]