Callie’s Last Dance

“Then who killed him?”

Callie paused. “Tara Siegel.”

“Who?”

“She used to work for Sensory.”

“Where is she now?”

“Dead.”

“What happened to her?”

“I killed her.”

“That’s awfully convenient.”

“Tara might disagree with that comment.”

“Still, we have only your word on it.”

“And I’m the one you asked. Look, do you think I care if you hate Creed? If you’re determined to hate him, there are plenty of legitimate reasons. It’s just that killing your father’s not one of them.”

Emerson says, “Will you accept the position? It’s yours for the asking.”

“I’ll think about it.”

“We need to know by ten a.m. tomorrow.”

“What happens at ten?”

“We call Creed, to offer him the job.”

“Does Creed know Lou’s dead?”

“No,” Emerson said. “So if he tells you, act surprised.”

“Okay.”

“That’s it?” Annie said. “No thank you?”

“For what?”

“For giving you this opportunity.”

Callie laughed. “What do you want me to say? It’s a shit job.”

18.

IT ISN’T MUCH of a sandwich, but Callie gets it down, tosses the empty bottle of water in the trash, goes back to the laundry room. She removes the explosive disk from the dog’s collar, tosses it in her backpack, takes out a prepared syringe and injects the dog to deepen the dosage. Walks to the nightstand in the master bedroom, where she’d seen Angie’s sleeping pills on a People magazine earlier. She bites the top off the plastic medicine bottle and tosses it to the floor, scattering the tiny pills across the carpet. Then she tosses the magazine on the floor and rips several pages from it, puts two pills in her pocket, and two more on the hallway floor by the laundry room. She scatters the magazine pages, inspects her work, and decides it’s not quite right, so she wets a paper towel and dabs the pages and pills till they’re soggy.

The idea being the De Lucas will come home, find the dog passed out, see the sleeping pills on the floor, think the dog got into the pills and fell asleep. Angie will count the pills she can find and determine two are missing. She’ll want to take the dog to the vet, but Frankie will say, “Are you kidding me? Who’s gonna carry a hundred and thirty pound dog after drinking all day and half the night? Two pills is nothing! Let him sleep it off.”

With any luck, that’s what will happen. Callie will hide in the hall closet and wait for the De Lucas to come home. When they fall asleep, she’ll make her move. If they freak out over the dog, she’ll jump out of the closet, kill them, and manufacture the evidence she needs to convince Sal that Frankie was skimming money.

Since either development requires her to wait in the hall closet for what could be many hours, she goes to the powder room and pees, then enters the closet, removes some coats from their hangers, and positions them on the floor for maximum comfort.

She takes her position among the coats, covers herself with two of them, and runs through her mental checklist. Did I turn on any lights? If so, did I turn them back off? Check. Did I wipe down all the surfaces I touched in the kitchen and elsewhere? Check. What about the toilet seat? Yup, did that. What about the handle when I flushed? Yup, got that.

She reminds herself to wipe down both sides of the closet door knob after killing Frankie.

It’s pitch black in the closet. She closes her eyes. May as well catch a few minutes of sleep till the De Lucas arrive. When they do, they’ll certainly make enough noise to wake her up.

19.

TIME SLOWS TO a crawl when you’re lying on the floor of a coat closet in a strange house waiting to torture and kill the residents.

Callie’s trying to drift asleep, but something’s tugging at the edge of her awareness. Something that won’t go away, drowsy as she is. Something about…Something she’s forgotten.

The closet is pitch black, and has a musty odor from winter clothes that haven’t been worn for at least five months. She wonders about silverfish. Centipedes. Spiders crawling around her, possibly on her.

She doesn’t like spiders.

If she had her way, there wouldn’t be any spiders in the world. If she could somehow lock them all in a giant closet, and blow it up before they have a chance to…

And there it was.

The thing she forgot to do.

The thing Creed taught her all those years ago. The thing he made her always promise to have in place before getting into position.

An escape plan.

A second way out, in case something goes wrong.

She’d made herself a sitting duck.

No problem, she’ll just-

Her thoughts are interrupted by the rumble of a garage door opening. The De Lucas’ garage door. Which gives her what, thirty seconds? A minute to create an escape plan?

Not a full minute. No way.

The smart thing would be to stay put. In the eight years she’s killed people she’s needed an alternate escape plan exactly how many times?

None.

She chose the hall closet for two reasons. One, it contains winter clothes. Who comes home from an all-day Fourth of July party, dinner, fireworks, and checks their winter clothes?

No one.

Reason number two, it’s centrally located. The garage, laundry room, kitchen, dining room-are on one end of the house, the master bedroom and bath on the other. The foyer, powder room, and den are close by.

It’s the best possible location to hear anything happening in the whole house. The perfect place to hide and wait.

It’s ten-twenty at night in the middle of the summer. The De Lucas are tired and hot. They won’t open the winter clothes closet. And even if they did, she’s on the floor, covered up, with a gun in her hand. She could blow them away before the surprise registers on their faces.

She’ll be fine.

Unless Frankie invited his crew members over for a drink!

Half his gang was in town for Sal’s party. Why wouldn’t he have them swing by for some late night drinks, maybe run a little strategy session? The wives could chat in the kitchen, the guys could meet in the den or basement.

Callie shakes her head in disbelief. How could this have gotten past her?