Voices Carry Page 16

  “You said the court already knew her?”

  “Patsy had taken in a number of foster children over the years. Her niece worked for the county children and youth agency, and they had called upon Pats on a number of occasions to take in a child or two. So there they had me, and after all I had gone through, they didn’t want to force my parents to take me back. I think it must have been pretty clear what had been happening. No one believed for a minute that my arm was in a cast because I’d fallen down the steps. I think by the end of the trial, everyone, from the social workers to the judge to the reporters who covered the trial, was afraid of what would happen to me if I had to go back.”

  Crystal motioned for Genna to sit, then went into the kitchen, returning with the plate of eggs that she set between them.

  “So after the lawyers did whatever it was they had to do, I went home with Patsy, which was probably the best thing that ever happened to me. Patsy encouraged me to do everything. Everything that he had frowned upon, from reading books to going to the movies to roller skating and riding a bike. All those frivolous, unnecessary things that kids love to do. Every Sunday afternoon, Pats took me to the movies. The matinee. And we’d have dinner on the way home, always someplace interesting. Different types of cuisine, different kinds of restaurants. Some nights we’d sit in front of the television with a bowl of popcorn or bowls of ice cream and we’d watch movies. If it was sad, we’d cry together, passing the box of tissues back and forth. A comedy, we’d laugh until our sides hurt. And there was always music in the house. Patsy loves music! She has the worst singing voice you’d ever want to hear, but that has never stopped her from belting out whatever tune strikes her fancy at any given moment.”

  “She sounds wonderful,” Crystal said quietly.

  “She is wonderful. She loves life and shared that love with me. She took me to plays—Patsy loves the theater! We used to go into Pittsburgh a lot, but sometimes for a special treat, we’d take the train to New York and go to Broadway.”

  Genna pushed her eggs around on the plate with her fork.

  “I had the time of my life, and at the same time, I was rubbed raw inside, every day. Patsy taught me to laugh and to sing, made me feel like a whole person for the first time in my life. And yet, at the same time, I knew I must be terribly wicked. So terribly wicked that my own parents didn’t want me.” Genna ripped off a piece of toast, but did not raise it to her mouth. “So on the one hand, I had a wonderful home. A treasure of a foster mother, who loved me and who opened up the entire world to me. And on the other hand, well, I just knew that I didn’t deserve any of it.”

  “How did you ever resolve all that?” Crystal whispered.

  “With the help of a very, very good child psychologist. And a lot of work on Patsy’s part. I never could have survived it all without her. She was an angel.”

  “You were in therapy, too?”

  “From the time Patsy took me in, until I was a sophomore in high school. Pats knew right away I was going to need a lot of help, and she saw that I got it. She let me decide when I didn’t need help anymore.”

  The two women sat and stared at each other.

  Finally, Genna said, “It’s amazing, isn’t it, what they did to us? And yet here we are. We both survived. In spite of it all, they didn’t destroy either one of us.”

  “I wish I’d known your Patsy,” Crystal said.

  “So do I. I wish she could have been there for you, too, back then. Things might have been different for you. But you can meet her and know her now. I don’t know anyone whose life hasn’t been better just for knowing her.”

  Genna sipped at her coffee, thinking of the years that Crystal had spent growing up under their parents’ roof, and what it had done to her.

  For the first time in her life, Genna began to think that abandoning her had been the best thing her parents had ever done for her.

  John had expressed that very sentiment when he called the next evening, and Genna told him of her surprise visitor.

  “Your sister?!” he’d exclaimed. “Genna, that’s wonderful! I’m so happy for you! What’s she like?”

  “I don’t know for sure yet.”

  Taking the portable phone from the kitchen, where Crystal was doing the dishes, to the small balcony overlooking the woods, Genna told John about Crystal’s abuse at the hands of Brother Michael, and her decision to hide the fact.

  “She was how old at the time, Gen?” John asked softly.

  “Eleven or twelve, I guess.”

  “Can you imagine what she went through?”

  “I’ve been trying to. It’s all so complicated. I think about what I went through, then I think about what she went through. . . and I know that my road was ever so much easier than hers.”

  “Ironic, isn’t it?”

  “What’s that?”

  “That in the long run, leaving you behind might not have been the worst thing that they did to you.”

  “I was thinking that very thing last night. Crystal’s had a terrible life, a terrible time growing up, nothing like what I had with Pats. All those years of abuse, then being committed to a hospital for a while—”

  “What?”

  “Crystal. She said she’d had a breakdown, that she’d attempted suicide. . .”

  “I’m so sorry. She must have really been suffering.”

  That’s what she said about you. Genna bit her lip to keep the words in. How might John feel, if he knew that his own problems had been the topic of conversation only the night before?

  “Why did she come to see you, Gen?” John asked. “Why now?”

  “I think she needed to do this, to face me with the truth, regardless of what my reaction might have been, in order to get on with her life,” Genna told him. “I think it’s been torturing her all these years, and she couldn’t get past it.”

  “I hate to play amateur psychologist, but it sounds to me that maybe she just needs for you to forgive her,” he said, “so that she can begin to forgive herself.”

  “That would be my guess, too.”

  “And have you? Can you?”

  “I think so. She was just a child then. She was only twelve years old.”

  “But you were a child, too,” John reminded her. “Why should she be held to a different standard?”

  “Crystal said last night that she’d never been as strong as I was, and she’s right.” Genna sighed deeply. “She was older, but she was never able to stand up to anyone. Not to our parents, not to the other kids in school. Not even to me. Crystal was the one who always ran from the fight. She never rose to the challenge. She always took the easy way.”

  “Except for this time,” John pointed out.

  “Yes. Except for this time.” Genna agreed.

  “Well, I guess it’s never too late to try to make things right.”

  “That’s pretty much what I told her. I know it wasn’t easy for her to come here and say the things she had to say. I admire her for that.”

  “Well, then, that’s a good start. Where do you go from there?”

  “I’d like her to stay with me for a while. I wanted to take her up to the lake to meet Pats.”

  “How does Pats feel about that?”

  “As you might expect. She can’t wait to meet Crystal and take her under her wing. You know how Patsy is, John. If she suspects you have a wound, she has to try to heal it. I was going to drive out there this weekend. . .”

  “That’s a long drive, Gen. Why not fly out and have Patsy meet you at the airport?”

  “Because I was thinking that we needed the time together, Crystal and me, but—”

  “A sort of sisterly bonding road trip?”

  “Yes, that’s what I had in mind. But as it turns out, Patsy is coming here, since she just couldn’t wait until the weekend. And besides, Crystal just doesn’t feel that she’s ready to be that close to the camp.”

  “I’d forgotten that Patsy’s cottage is so close. Does Crystal know how flattered she
should be, that Pats thinks that meeting her is important enough to leave the lake during bass season?”

  Genna laughed. “I told her. She’s nervous about meeting Patsy, but I think she’ll be fine.”

  “I’m looking forward to meeting her, too.”

  “I want you to meet her. Other than Patsy, I have no other immediate family.”

  “Well, it sounds as if the two of you are off to a pretty good start. I’m happy for you, Gen. I really am.”

  “Thank you. I can’t say that this hasn’t been difficult emotionally, but all in all, I’m really happy that she’s here. I never thought I’d see her again.” Genna blew out a long breath, then added, “Actually, if the truth were to be told, for a long time, I tried not to think about her at all. It just hurt too much.”

  “Well, maybe that’s one more hurt you can put behind you now.”

  “I’d like to think so.”

  “How long will she be staying?”

  “I don’t know for sure. She doesn’t have a job, and she doesn’t have a home, other than the halfway house she’s been staying in. I don’t know that she has a timetable, and frankly, I didn’t want to ask her. I didn’t want her to think that I was trying to figure out when she was going to leave.”

  “So she might be around for a while.”

  “I would say so, yes.”

  “Well, then, I’ll let you know as soon as we wrap up here. Maybe we can all get together then.”

  “You’re on. Now, tell me your news. What’s the latest with your mystery man?”

  “Nothing. Not a damned thing. I’m so damned frustrated. This guy has left nothing behind. No evidence at the crime scenes. Hell, we don’t even know for sure where the crime scenes are, because we still don’t know where these women disappeared from.”

  “But you still feel they’re all related, that it’s the same person. . . ?”

  “More than ever.”

  “Where is he taking these women? Is he killing them? Is he burying them someplace? What is he doing with them?” Genna thought aloud.

  “Those are the same questions we’ve been asking all along. And there still have been no ransom demands, no contact whatsoever with the families of his victims. Frankly, I’m beginning to think that these women are no longer alive. Where could you keep this many women captive, alive, for weeks at a time, without anyone knowing about it?”

  “You sound as if you’re not sure, though.”

  “I’m not sure about anything. I have the overwhelming feeling that he’s collecting these women in a systematic way, but we don’t know why. As if he has a list, or a game plan, and he’s following it. His actions just haven’t fit any pattern that I’ve dealt with before. Usually, this high degree of success would cause the perpetrator to get careless. But he hasn’t dropped a stitch. It’s just got us totally baffled. And we’re no closer to this guy than we were when he took his first victim.”

  “Sooner or later something has to break.”

  “Better sooner,” John told her. “We don’t know how many more women are on his list, or what will happen when he gets to the end of it.”

  13

  “Jennifer Duncan.”

  Just to say her name aloud brought a smile to his lips, so he said it again as he held her photo aloft, as if to pay her tribute. Which in a way, he was doing.

  “Jennifer Duncan.”

  Hadn’t she been his first, his first ever? He sighed, recalling that first time.

  The terror in her eyes had inspired him, causing the desire to swell within him to such heights that he’d barely made it to the appointed place.

  Oh, and even now, if he closed his eyes, he could see it all, in sharpest detail. He’d been to the woods earlier in the day, had set the stage for the drama that would play out there when the moon rose high that night. He’d been so excited that he wasn’t certain he’d be able to go through with it, but the images he had fought all summer had become so strong, the urges so demanding, that they could no longer be denied.

  Sometimes, in his darkest times, just the thought of that first one, that first time, restored his spirit. After all, through them, had he not fulfilled his purpose?

  Had they not been brought to that place to tempt him? Was it not his job to purify them, to consecrate their bodies with his own? Once it became apparent to him that purification was the only way of saving them, well, what could he do? It was clear to him that he’d been chosen for that very purpose, the shepherd who would lead the children out of sin. Wasn’t that why he’d been sent there in the first place?

  And Jennifer Duncan, at age eleven, had been the first of the wayward to be taken under his wing, the first to be purified by the spilling of his seed.

  She’d also been one of the first to break the covenant. And one of the first to be taken.

  He stared at her photo, trying to decide which of his times with her had been the most memorable. The first, so many years past, or the last, just a few short weeks ago?

  Sadly, she’d been the first to be lost.

  He shook his head. He had simply miscalculated how long she could go without water.

  The others could thank her for forcing him to take greater pains with their care. It just hadn’t occurred to him that the extreme heat that first week would have increased her need for liquids. He should have thought of it, but he hadn’t at the time. He’d had so much on his mind. He had things under better control now, though, which was a good thing, considering his absences.

  He studied the photograph for one more long moment before slipping it back into the envelope. Someday, he’d take the time to put them into an album. He smiled at the thought of having so perfect a record of his finest hours, then laughed as he mentally titled the book which would surely be a thick one.

  How I Spent My Summer Vacation.

  14

  “. . . and this was Genna’s graduation,” Patsy was saying as Genna unlocked the door of her apartment to find Patsy and Crystal curled up on the sofa with a box of photographs between them.

  “For heaven’s sake, Patsy,” Genna exclaimed, “what are you doing?”

  “I’m giving Crystal the opportunity to share in her little sister’s growing up,” Patsy replied without looking up. “Now, as I was saying, this was graduation. . .”

  “From high school?” Crystal leaned over slightly to peer at the picture, still in the cardboard frame it came in.

  “From college. Genna graduated Magna Cum Laude,” Patsy told her proudly. “Of course, I have a larger version of this framed and hanging in the living room back home.”

  “College?” Crystal looked across the room at Genna. “You went to college?”

  Genna nodded.

  “Where?” Crystal asked.

  “Bloomsburg University,” Genna replied. “It’s just about in the middle of the state. Of Pennsylvania, that is.”

  Genna dropped her briefcase and walked toward the sofa.

  “What did you study?”

  “I majored in biology. Secondary education. I thought I wanted to teach high school.”

  “Did you?” Crystal asked. “Teach high school?”

  “For two years.”

  “Not nearly long enough,” Patsy muttered.

  Genna sat down on the end of the wooden chest that served as her coffee table.

  “No one in our family ever went to college, before you,” Crystal noted, then added, as if embarrassed by the admission, “I didn’t even finish high school.”

  “Why not?” Genna asked.

  “Because Daddy lost his church after. . . well, right after that whole business with Brother Michael. Mr. Homer was so upset about his brother—” Crystal turned to Patsy to explain, “Brother Michael was Mr. Homer’s real blood brother, I’m guessin’ you knew that. And Mr. Homer was a very important man in the church where Daddy preached. He just didn’t think it was fittin’ for Daddy to stay there after, well, after what had happened.”

  “So where did you go?” Genna
toed off her high heels.

  “First we went back to Kentucky. Daddy preached some down there, then we went to West Virginia for a while, then back to Kentucky again. We didn’t stay anyplace too long. That’s why I didn’t get to finish school. We just never stayed long enough in one place.” Her face clouded over and the drawl crept back into her voice. “And Momma was just getting worse and worse as time went on. Cryin’ all the time and refusin’ to go outside. Got so bad she barely even went to church anymore, and of course, that just infuriated Daddy no end.”

  “Your mother had a breakdown?” Patsy asked softly.

  “Yes. She wasn’t diagnosed by a psychiatrist, you understand. Daddy wouldn’t have stood for that—he was heavy into faith healing and didn’t put much stock in doctors in general.” Crystal added somewhat wryly, “But over the years I did come to recognize the signs.”

  “Genna said you’d been hospitalized yourself,” Patsy said with the same ease with which she’d comment on someone’s choice of clothing.

  “Yes. On and off for many years.”

  “And are you still under treatment?”

  “Patsy!” Genna turned to face her, surprised by her uncommon bluntness.

  “It’s okay, Genna. Patsy’s just trying to establish the rules. I appreciate that. Everything out in the open, right, Patsy?”

  “Right,” Patsy nodded, impressed by Crystal’s insight.

  “Yes, I am still under treatment. I’ve been living in a halfway house, but under supervision.”

  “Why? What do they suppose you might do if you’re not supervised?”