“Everyone makes mistakes,” she can’t help but say. He snorts.
“Should have chosen me, Valerie, or at least for a little while.”
“Why are you home? Now?” He never bothered to come home for his son’s birthday, but…
“The anniversary, Valerie – our anniversary. I love watching you every year on the day Lily disappeared. You’re strangely radiant with grief, it’s quite bewitching. I wouldn’t miss that for the world.”
Valerie begins backing away as he comes closer. “What about Alek?”
“What about him? I’ll tell him you left. I’ll tell him you got tired of him, just like his mother did, that you were disappointed in him. He’s used to that. He won’t pursue it. Kid never sticks at anything, you know that better than anyone.”
“He’s not like he was. You wouldn’t know, you’re never home. You don’t know your own son.” A burst of hysterical laughter catches in her throat at the morbid domesticity of the argument, two parents in a tug-of-war over a child. “He’s not the boy you made anymore; he’s not your new wine.”
“Granted you’ve helped him settle down, it keeps him out of trouble, but even if you hadn’t made this ill-considered incursion into my space your time was coming to an end. I worry he’ll develop too much of a conscience if you’re around much longer and that’s an inconvenient thing. Best you be gone, let him think himself deserted once again.” He tilts his head, pondering. “Do you think you’re so fierce about protecting him because you failed Lily?”
She swallows, doesn’t answer that, instead says, “Where…”
“What?”
“Where’s his mother?”
Reid points to the far end of the cellar; Valerie can make out a worn pair of white sandals with wedge heels. Long out of fashion.
“Laura didn’t go willingly. She did love her boy.”
“Dad?”
Both of them whirl to find Alek on the landing at the entrance to the cellar, in answer to Valerie’s text to come home, sent because she couldn’t think of anyone else she needed by her. His hands are held up in a gesture of surrender. Behind him, Obadiah Tully stands – clearly Valerie’s act was unconvincing – his service weapon pointed at the boy’s back.
* * *
Alek is slow as he takes the stairs, not just because of the gun barrel that periodically pokes him in the ribs. He’s heard everything Reid and Valerie had to say, and seen his own reflection in the steel of the door, as if his father’s words have remade him into something shadowy. Destabilized. His stare moves from his father to his tutor, to the pedestals and shoes, the ceiling, the floor, the walls. He’s still processing everything he heard before Tully appeared and gestured for him to enter the cellar.
Tully’s footsteps have stopped, but Alek keeps going for some paces. He looks over his shoulder at the Sheriff. Tully’s face is a picture. He’s clearly never been down here, just like Alek, only his expression is one of realizing just how deep a hole he’s stepped into. Alek guesses Obadiah’s been happy enough to take Reid’s money to smooth things over, inconvenient investigations and the like, but he didn’t really appreciate what Reid was doing. Alek had no idea himself and now he wonders on which side of the line Tully will fall.
He stops by a pedestal, takes in the cheap purple patents; they’re eye-catching, not something he’s likely to forget even with no particular interest in footwear. His head tilts to the side and he reaches out to touch them. “Annie’s.” His gaze moves on, he points at a pair of knock-off Prada pumps in electric blue. “Ellie’s.”
Somewhere in the cellar, Alek thinks, Elaine and Sukie’s shoes also await. All the Howard Scholarship girls, the girls Alek didn’t see again. He didn’t bother with them after they’d seen his father, he’d wiped them away to salve his hurt boy’s pride. Abandoned them. He tries to swallow but it’s hard, like there’s a rock in his throat.
“Dad,” he says again, noting the kitchen knife Reid’s carrying. Alek feels sick. Sick and sad and pained. He says it again, as if it’s the only thought that’s in his brain. “Dad.”
“Alek. Terrible timing, my boy, as always.” Reid shakes his head.
“What you gonna do with them, Reid?” When Tully’s voice comes, it’s clear he’s made his choice; any hopes Alek had that the Sheriff might have chosen to help are swiftly gone. In the hole, Obadiah’s going to keep digging. Holes, Alek wants to remind him, don’t work like that.
“Well, my lovely Valerie here is going to meet with an accident – you don’t need to be around for that and probably best if he isn’t either. Obadiah, take Alek to the kitchen and sit with him until I’m done.”
“You can’t be serious, Reid. Kid’s not going to keep his mouth shut.”
“He’s my son and he’ll do what I tell him to.” Reid raises his knife, not in threat but more as a lecturer would a pointer or a cane: Attend to this, Tully, if you know what’s good for you.
Alek, standing between his father and the Sheriff, notices what the grown men have forgotten: Valerie. Reid’s got his back to her, Tully’s attention is on Reid with the sort of tunnel vision that’s rendered him one of the worst investigators Mercy’s Brook has ever had the misfortune to employ. But Alek can see her from the corner of his eye – clear as a perfect reflection – and he’s careful not to draw their gaze to her as she inches closer to Reid. Her footsteps are light, so light, but still there’s a whisper of her approach and his father seems set to turn.
Alek repeats, “Dad?”
Reid looks at him with irritation as Valerie unfurls the hand from her chest and raises the red shoe. Alek sees her rush forward, and he pivots, drops his shoulder and charges at Tully, who doesn’t even get a shot off, but tips straight back, his head striking the rise of the bottom steps. Obadiah’s eyes stay open, his stare uncomprehending.
Alek sits up, rubbing his shoulder. He hears the noise his father makes but it takes him a few moments to gather himself and look.
Valerie stands over Reid Howard, who’s on his knees, swaying, a red stiletto heel buried in the top of his head. He looks as surprised as Tully, although more outraged. Then he loses his grip on life and gravity takes over; slowly he flops face-forward onto the polished concrete.
* * *
As far as Mercy’s Brook is concerned, Obadiah Tully died a hero, saving Valerie and Alek from Reid Howard’s psychotic episode, before his own untimely demise. No bodies have been found in the grounds of the estate, and the Mayor is happy with that since he considers a graveyard of girls might be bad for the town’s morale and future economic prospects. Least said, soonest mended and all that, he says to Valerie and Alek, meaning, Keep your mouths shut and no one looks at your actions too closely. The hastily appointed new Sheriff keeps telling Valerie that they might never find anything more than the shoe collection.
Valerie keeps the red stilettos in a box in her cupboard. If she could, she would get rid of the memory of that day, but it’s like a golden key with blood on it that she can’t rub off. Some nights she re-dreams the moment in the cellar with its collection of pretty, bloody shoes; she dreams Alek is much smaller, younger, that he says “Daddy”, and Reid takes the boy’s hand in a way he never did in life.