Run (19 page)

“Car accident, years ago,” she says, rolling the hose a little and moving to another plant. “It’s really kind of a sad story.”

I know without a doubt that she’s not going to make me beg for it. This watering woman lives for this kind of gossip. She pretends to be sad, concerned, but really she enjoys gossiping so much that she cannot hide the slight smile that curls the corners of her mouth.

“What happened?” I ask anyway.

She stops what she’s doing and shakes her head.

My heart is thumping, but I stand there casually. I want nothing more than to know everything I can about Alex and Marie Rader.

She tugs at the hose, stuck on a rock. “High school sweethearts, those two,” she says. “Promise rings and all of that. Alex is a couple years older. Marie was a competitive swimmer. Stanford University scouted her. Anyway, he takes her to a kegger out in Issaquah to celebrate her birthday and well, you can almost guess the rest.”

She doesn’t make me guess, of course. I have a hunch as to what will follow. And I see no need to ask what birthday Marie was celebrating.

“Anyway,” she goes on, “he got drunk and wanted to drive home. She insisted that he give her the keys but he told her to take a hike or something like that. I mean, not literally. Anyway, halfway home on the Issaquah-Hobart Road the car rolls and she ends up paralyzed. Waist down. Can’t have kids.”

The last three words are uttered with an extra dose of sympathy, to ensure that I understand that this lady next door is very concerned and definitely on Team Marie.

“That’s terrible,” I say. “So sad.”

She nods. “Yes it is. Beyond terrible. He married her out of shame or guilt or something. I don’t think he ever really loved her. Treats her like a doormat on wheels.” She stops herself and assesses me. Her eyes run over mine. “I don’t know what it is about you, but you’ve really got a way of making me open up. I feel like I’m really talking out of school here.”

A can opener could open her up. That is, just
looking
at one.

“You’re very nice,” I say. “The lady—Marie—she’s lucky to have you as a neighbor. Sounds like she could use a friend. You know, given all that she’s been through.”

She crosses her arms and pauses. She’s pretending to hold back. I wait only a beat.

“You don’t even know the half of it,” she says. “I’m not saying this to be unkind or anything, but you’ve got me going big time and I just can’t stop. Alex is a cop with the King County Sheriff’s Office. So you’d think he’d be more discreet.”

I’m not sure what she means and I’m not sure how to frame a question to ask. Of course, I don’t have to.

“He used to come and go at all hours of the night,” she says. She should be a newscaster. Or at the very least run some kind of online blog. Her strange clown-like appearance would undoubtedly make her a YouTube star. “Seeing prostitutes,” she goes on, no longer feigning to struggle with the shade she’s throwing on her neighbor. She hates him. That means I like her.

“Ladies of the night, or whatever,” she goes on. “My husband calls them sluts. I saw Alex Rader walk a girl into the house one time late at night. Looked like she’d had a drink or two. I bet poor Marie had to listen to them go at it all night. Frank—that’s my husband—says that I should cut him some slack because he’s married to an invalid and men have needs. That’s bullshit. Excuse me. But it is.”

Finally she’s done.

I’m not sure if I want to probe for more information or throw up into her fuchsia basket.

“Like I said, Marie’s lucky you’re here to watch out for her.”

She acknowledges this with a faint smile, which quickly fades with her next words.

“You can tell I don’t like him,” she says. “But really, Marie’s a doll. She deserves so, so much better.”

I need to get moving. I need to get into that house next door.

“Do you think it would be all right if I knock on her door and ask about Thor?” I ask.

She doesn’t hesitate. “Oh yes. By all means. Marie loves animals. She has a big koi pond in the backyard so she’d probably like to know, to make sure Thor doesn’t mess with her finny friends. Be nice for Marie to have some company. I was going to go over later, but I’m running out of time. I’m going on vacation tomorrow. Got to get these plants watered before I leave—don’t trust the kid across the street to do it properly.”

AS I TURN TO LEAVE, the smile that has been plastered on my face evaporates. Fuchsia lady gave me more than I hoped, but honestly, I didn’t think she’d ever shut up. The last thing I need right now is for Alex Rader to come home and find me standing in the neighbor’s yard getting a blow by blow of his sex life. I don’t believe for one minute that he was carrying a prostitute into the house. I have the feeling deep in my bones that the limp girl in his arms was one of his victims. I just don’t know which one.

Going up to the Raders’ door, I plant my knuckles under an old-fashioned grapevine wreath affixed to the bright white front door and knock four times. In my head I’m thinking of the names of the girls I’m certain Alex Rader has killed. Shannon. Leanne. Megan. The fourth knock is for my mother, whom I pray is still alive. I know that Marie Rader gets around with the aid of a wheelchair so I resist what would be my next inclination. I don’t punch the bell ten times to rouse her.

The knob finally turns and the door swings wide open. I drop my gaze to meet the woman in a wheelchair in front of me. She has blond hair. Her eyes are blue. I lower my flyer so that it is at her eye level.

“I’m sorry to bother you,” I say. “I’m looking for my cat.”

She eyes me warily.

“I saw you talking to Rachel,” she says. “I thought you might be selling something and I was going to point to the sign.” She indicates a little wooden placard next to the door.

NO SALESPEOPLE

I shake my head as I acknowledge it. “Sorry. I didn’t see it.”

“Everybody’s always trying to sell me something,” Marie says. “No, I haven’t seen any cat.”

I look past her to see if there’s anything I can glean from her hallway, though it passes through my mind that I might want to just grab the handles of her wheelchair and push her into the nearest chasm. I could so do that. If I thought she knew what her husband had been doing with those girls.

“How old are you?” Marie asks.

Her words catch me off guard.

“I’m eighteen,” I lie. “Why do you ask?”

She pushes back in her chair. “I was thinking about the time my cat was lost. I was younger than you. At least three years younger. I canvassed all the neighborhoods in the area, carrying a stuffed toy that resembled Abby.”

A sad look overtakes her face.

“You never found her,” I say, mirroring her expression. “Did you?”

She shakes her head. “No. She’d crawled into the undercarriage of the neighbor’s car. We found her remains coiled up inside. I think she froze to death.”

Marie had let her guard down and I knew it.

“I’m sorry,” I say. “I can tell you really loved Abby. I don’t know what I’ll do if Thor doesn’t come home.”

She nods understandingly. “I was making some ice tea  …  ” she says, leaving a pause at the end, a placeholder for my name.

“Tracy. Tracy Lee.”

“Would you like to have a glass, Tracy? Hot out there today.”

I suddenly feel sorry for her. Married to a monster. Confined to a wheelchair. Lonely enough to invite a stranger inside for a little company. She spins around and negotiates the living room with a speed and assuredness that I did not expect. Just because she’s in a wheelchair, doesn’t make her a complete invalid. Before I turn my attention to my surroundings I notice two more things. The parallel ruts worn in the carpet from her maneuvering from the living room to the kitchen and the formidable musculature of her arms. Her legs, hidden within dark-dyed jeans, are in comparison a pair of withered saplings, her upper body compensating in that same way a creature in nature adapts to its circumstances. Bats use sonar to fly at night. Cats, like my pretend missing feline, Thor, use their whiskers to negotiate tight spaces.

Marie Rader uses her arms and shoulders to get around.

I wonder if her heart and conscience have adapted so that she can ignore her husband’s serial killing. Or if she even has an inkling of the kind of man she married?

My survival adaptive behavior is my ability to look into another’s eye and flat out lie. No pulse increase. No looking away to the left. Just as bald faced as I can be.

I do it in her kitchen while she prepares the ice tea.

“Can I use your restroom?” I ask.

She looks in my direction and smiles.

“Certainly.” She points with that muscled arm of hers. “Down the hall by the bedrooms.”

I disappear and start soaking in everything I can as I make my way toward the bathroom. I look for any sign that my mother might have been brought here. I look out the window and see that the yard has an enormous pond, a former swimming pool, and I wonder if there is a trapdoor leading to a space under it. There is but a single photograph on the wall by the window of Mr. and Mrs. Rader, as they stand—or rather he stands—side by side at their wedding. The photo is of poor quality and I only hold it in my sights long enough to see if there is any similarity in his appearance and my own.

I let out a puff of air. Good.
There isn’t.
But when I study his face a little closer, I see something very familiar in it. I can’t place it though, and I don’t have time to process this right now.

Glancing back the way I came, I am glad to see Marie is out of sight, still fixing the drinks, and I hurry down the hall and twist a doorknob. It’s a bedroom. I scan it and it appears to be a guest room with a single bed and a dried floral arrangement on a nightstand. It also appears as if it has seldom, if ever, been used.

Of course not. They have no children.

Or at least Mrs. Rader hasn’t had any.

The next room along, the master bedroom, has two beds. I can tell which one is his and which is hers. The same parallel ruts join the furthest bed near the headboard. It looks so sad, so nothing.

I tread softly back to the bathroom I am supposed to be using, emerging from it a few moments later to find Marie literally parked by the door.

Got to admit, what she might know scares the life out of me, but I don’t show it. I smile weakly instead.

“Are you all right?” she asks.

I pat my stomach. “I’m fine. Just something I ate.”

She nods and I follow her back to the kitchen where she’s set two glasses of ice tea. I’m touched by her kindness. A lemon slice slinks into the bottom of each glass like a descending moon.

“Sweet tea,” she says.

My pulse is racing after that mini tour of the house. My stomach actually
is
upset now. I don’t know if I should tell Marie what I know or call the police. I decide neither is a good idea. I don’t trust the police. Alex Rader
is
the police. Marie Rader is trapped in a wheelchair, and I’m afraid if I tell her the truth she’ll have a heart attack or something. Instead, as I figure out what to do, we talk about my missing cat. We talk about her water feature, a swimming pool that apparently made no sense for a paraplegic, but suited her love of koi. She talks about her fine needlework. She tells me that she and her husband own property out in Issaquah. That piques my interest, but when I try to ferret out a few details I feel a wave of nausea flow through me. I shouldn’t have said that something I ate for lunch has made me ill. I just made one of my lies a truth.

“I need to use your restroom again,” I say, setting down the glass, but missing the table. I see it fall to the floor and shatter.

Then nothing.

Blackness drapes over me.

Chapter Sixteen

Cash: None.

Food: None.

Shelter: None.

Weapons: None.

Plan: Stay alive.

I OPEN MY EYES BUT I can’t see. I want to feel around, but I can’t move my arms and nothing touches my chewed-nail fingertips. I feel a vibration under my back, a kind of rumbling. I feel motion. I have no idea what happened. I play the last moments before everything went black. The lady watering her hanging flower basket. My “missing” cat. The wheelchair. The ice tea.

I’m in a moving car, I think. Whose car?

Turning my head to the side, I see that the space is larger.
A van
. I’m in
the
van that was in the Raders’ garage. There are no windows, but I notice a sliver of faint light at my feet. The door. The way out. I twist as much as possible but it is of no use. My body is a stiff board.

Maybe I am dead.

I take a deep breath and know that I’m alive. I’m also in trouble. Serious trouble. I refuse to panic. I try rocking my body, but I am too weak to do anything. When I try to use my hands to push myself upward, I feel the resistance of tape or ropes that have bound me into a cocoon.