'Bullshit. These were all within the last year.'
Patrick looked at the ground. 'Maybe I just didn't want to…'
'What, get involved? Are you fucking kidding me?'
'Jess. If you could just-'
'You shouldn't be here, Patrick,' she said. 'This puts me in a really awkward situation. Go home.'
'My God, Jess.You don't really think I had anything to do with these, these…'
It was a good question, Jessica thought. In fact, it was the question.
Jessica was just about to answer when a crack of thunder boomed, and the power browned out. The lights flickered on, off, on.
'I… I don't know what to think, Patrick.'
'Give me five minutes, Jess. Five minutes, and I'll go.'
Jessica saw the world of pain in his eyes.
'Please,' he said. He was soaking wet, pitiful in his pleading.
Crazily, she thought about her weapon. It was in the hall closet upstairs, top shelf, where it always was. She was actually thinking about her weapon, and whether she could get to it in time if needed.
Because of Patrick.
None of this seemed real.
'Can I at least come inside?' he asked.
There was no point in arguing. She cracked open the storm door as a sheer column of rain swept through. Jessica opened the door fully. She knew that there was a team on Patrick even if she didn't see the car. She was armed and she had backup.
Try as she did, she just couldn't believe Patrick was guilty. This wasn't some crime of passion they were talking about, some moment of insanity when he lost his temper and went too far. This was the systematic, cold- blooded murder of six people. Maybe more.
Give her a piece of forensic evidence, and then she'd have no choice.
Until then…
The power went out.
Upstairs, Sophie wailed.
'Jesus Christ,' Jessica said. She looked across the street. Some of the houses still seemed to have power. Or was that candlelight?
'Maybe it's the circuit breaker,' Patrick said, walking inside, walking past her. 'Where's the panel?'
Jessica looked at the floor, hands on hips. This was all too much.
'Bottom of the basement stairs,' she said, resigned. 'There's a flashlight on the dining room table. But don't think that we-'
'Mommy!' from upstairs.
Patrick took off his raincoat. 'I'll check the panel, then I'm gone. I promise.'
Patrick grabbed the flashlight and headed to the basement.
Jessica shuffled her way to the steps in the sudden darkness. She headed upstairs, entered Sophie's room.
'It's okay, sweetie,' Jessica said, sitting on the edge of the bed. Sophie's face looked tiny and round and frightened in the gloom. 'Do you want to come downstairs with Mommy?'
Sophie shook her head.
'You sure?'
Sophie nodded. 'Is Daddy here?'
'No, honey,' Jessica said, her heart sinking. 'Mommy's… Mommy's going to get some candles, okay?You like candles.'
Sophie nodded again.
Jessica left the bedroom. She opened the linen closet next to the bathroom, felt her way through the box that held the hotel soaps and sample shampoos and conditioners. She remembered when she used to take long, luxurious bubble baths with scented candles scattered around the bathroom, back in the stone age of her marriage. Sometimes Vincent would join her. Somehow it seemed like someone else's life at the moment. She found a pair of sandalwood candles. She took them out of the box, returned to Sophie's room.
Of course, there were no matches.
'I'll be right back.'
She went downstairs to the kitchen, her eyes somewhat adjusted to the dark. She rummaged in the junk drawer for some book matches. She found a pack. Matches from her wedding. She could feel the gold embossed
Jessica and Vincent on the glossy cover. Just what she needed. If she believed in such things, she might imagine that there was a conspiracy afoot to drag her into some deep depression. She turned to head back upstairs when there was a slash of lightning and the sound of shattering glass.
She jumped at the impact. A branch had finally snapped off the dying maple next to the house and smashed in the window in the back door.
'Oh, this just gets better and better,' Jessica said. The rain swept into the kitchen. There was broken glass everywhere. 'Son of a bitch.'
She got out a plastic trash bag from under the sink and some pushpins from the kitchen corkboard. Fighting the wind and gusting rain, she tacked the bag around the opening in the door, trying not to cut herself on the shards that remained.
What the hell was next?
She looked down the stairs into the basement, saw the Maglite beam dancing about the gloom.
She grabbed the matches and headed into the dining room. She looked through the drawers in the hutch, found a variety of candles. She lit half a dozen or so, placing them around the dining room and the living room. She headed back upstairs and lit the two candles in Sophie's room.
'Better?' she asked.
'Better,' Sophie said.
Jessica reached out, dried Sophie's cheeks. 'The lights will be on in a little while. Okay?'
Sophie nodded, thoroughly unconvinced.
Jessica looked around the room. The candles did a fairly good job of exorcising the shadow monsters. She tweaked Sophie's nose, got a minor giggle. She just got to the top of the stairs when the phone rang. Jessica stepped into her bedroom, answered. 'Hello?'
She was met with an unearthly howl and hiss. Through it, barely: 'It's John Shepherd.'
He sounded as if he was on the moon. 'I can barely hear you. What's up? 'You there?' 'Yes.' The phone line crackled. 'We just heard from the hospital,' he said. 'Say again?' Jessica said. The connection was horrible. 'Want me to call on your cell?'
'Okay,' Jessica said. Then she remembered. The cell was in the car. The car was in the garage. 'No, that's okay. Go ahead.' 'We just got a report back on what Lauren Semanski had in her hand.' Something about Lauren Semanski. 'Okay.' 'It was part of a ballpoint pen.' 'A what?'
'She had a broken ballpoint pen in her hand,' Shepherd shouted. 'From St. Joseph's.'
Jessica heard this clearly enough. She didn't want to. 'What do you mean?'
'It had the St. Joseph's logo and address on it. The pen is from the hospital.'
Her heart grew cold in her chest. It couldn't be true. 'Are you sure?' 'No doubt about it,' Shepherd said. His voice was breaking up. 'Listen… the surveillance team lost Farrell… Roosevelt is flooded all the way to-' Quiet. 'John?'
Nothing. The phone line was dead. Jessica toggled the button on the phone. 'Hello?'
She was met with a thick black silence.
Jessica hung up, stepped over to the hallway closet. She glanced down the stairs. Patrick was still in the basement.
She reached inside the closet, onto the top shelf, her mind spinning.
He's been asking about you, Angela had said.
She slipped the Glock out of the holster.
