Page 19 of Jake

“You have come a long way, grasshopper.” Jake was still laughing when they entered the hospital with the suitcase they’d gotten from the Lane residence. “I think I like this more assertive you. You’re kind of scary and sexy at the same time.”

“Don’t get used to it. I’m all spongey on the inside.” He was too. Malleable and scared, happy and ready to take on the world, all at the same time. “I have no idea if I will ever be assertive, as you said, but I do feel better about myself. And where I am in my life.”

Tyler was sitting in the hall when they arrived on the floor. He looked beaten and exhausted. As soon as he saw them, Tyler got up and hugged them both, crying about how much he appreciated them coming in. Forrest said he’d go get them something to eat and some coffee. When he was gone Jake sat next to the elderly man.

“The doctor just came by. He wants to talk to me. I asked him to wait until you were here.” Jake said that was fine, he’d be there for him. “Thank you. As I said before, I know that we didn’t see eye to eye on things, but I’m certainly glad you came in. But I really have something to tell you. Something that I fully regret now.”

“Its fine, Tyler, really. I’m glad that I could be here for you. You are my father-in-law regardless of the other things going on.” He nodded but said nothing. “Have you had any more information from the police?”

“No. I mean sort of indirectly. My attorney is keeping tabs on things. Telling me what they find out and what they’re doing. Carol was last seen at the mall, trying her best to get someone to let her use your credit cards to buy herself some clothing.” Jake told him he’d heard from one of the stores earlier and had forgotten about it. “She’s a monster.”

“She was never violent like that when we were together. I mean, she has a hell of a temper, but she’s never hurt me.” Tyler pulled a file out of a briefcase and held it. “Tyler, they’ll find her. She’ll get some help and it’ll be all right.”

“I want you to read this. Tonight if you can. It’s about Carol, and just one of the few things that we did to keep her out of prison or worse. When she was sixteen she killed a man and his wife. They were in front of her at the movie theater, just waiting in line like the rest of the people. But they bought the last tickets for this movie that she wanted to see.” He handed him the file. “Carol told them to give her one of their tickets. She explained to them, in a calm voice I’m told, that she wanted to see it and that they both didn’t need to go in at the same time. That if they didn’t hand over one of the tickets she was going to hurt them. The man, he told her that he and his wife had been saving for this event for weeks and that Carol wasn’t getting their tickets. Then he turned his back on her.”

Jake opened the file. He nearly closed it again when he saw the pictures. They were in color glossy eight by tens. Jake turned to the second photo of the crime scene, and then looked up at Tyler when he continued.

“She broke his neck. Just jumped up on his back and twisted his head until it snapped. Do you have any idea how much strength it takes to do that?” Jake said he thought it would take a lot. “Yes. To break a person’s neck fatally it would take the equivalent of a person hitting a windshield while not wearing a seat belt. And an upper body strength to turn the head with enough force to just snap it.”

“And you’re sure that she did it?” Jake was told to go to the next picture. “Christ, Tyler. I had no idea.”

Carol was on the back of the man in the first photo, her hands wrapped around his head in a way that he’d seen on television. He looked up at Tyler, asking him about the woman. He looked away before staring at him.

“She was four months pregnant. Carol hit her so many times in the face that she was only identified by the tattoo that was on her ankle. There wasn’t much of her head left. Carol had used a brick, one that had been just laying there when she’d gone into her rage.” Tyler leaned back, his body spent. “Then she took the ticket from the woman’s dead husband’s hand and proceeded into the theater. As if nothing had happened. Those pictures, they’re from a camera that some shop had outside because of a robbery. Otherwise, we might never have known the extent of her violence that night.”

“What did you do, Tyler? I’m sure you had this covered up. How did you make that happen?” He cried again, telling Jake how sorry he was. That he shouldn’t have done anything, but she was his child. “What did you do?”

“I paid them. All of them. Millions of dollars to keep her out of prison. I should have just let her go, let her get the help she needed.” Tyler looked at him again. “Then she met you and I thought.... Well, I had hoped that you could fix her for me.”

~~~

Forrest reached out to Jake again. There wasn’t any connection. It was as if he was walking into a wall every time he tried to contact him. Driving around town didn’t help Forrest find him either. He was turning down the main street near the hospital when he thought he saw him walking. Parking the car, he got out and nearly sobbed with relief when he found him sitting on a park bench near the river.

“Jake? Jake, are you all right?” Nothing, not even an acknowledgement that he’d spoken to him. Touching his fingers to his arm had him turning, but still no words left his mouth. “Jake, I’ve been looking for you.”

“He wanted me to fix her.” He nodded, not entirely sure what Jake was talking about. “He knew what sort of person she was long before I met her. He knew this, Forrest, and let her marry me.”

“I didn’t talk to Tyler, Jake. I don’t know what happened. I came back with coffee and sandwiches and you were both gone. The nurse said you’d walked away and Tyler went to see his wife.” Jake nodded and stood. “Tell me what’s going on. Your mind is a jumble of thoughts right now.”

“Carol. She really is a monster.” Forrest walked with him, not interrupting him, hoping to get an idea what was going on. “She killed a couple for a movie ticket several years ago. I have the file. Or I did have it.”

“The one on the chair where you were sitting at the hospital?” Jake nodded. “I have it. I saw the pictures and didn’t want to leave that on the.... Are you saying that Carol did that? Killed those people?”

“Yes. And their unborn child too.” Forrest stopped walking, his head trying hard to wrap around what Jake had just said. When he caught up with him, Jake was still talking. “...looked it up and it said that it would take a grown man with a weight of about two-fifty to do something like that. But there she was, leaping on his back and turning his head like he was nothing more than a twig. Then she bludgeoned the wife to death.”

Jake stopped moving, and Forrest nearly ran into him when he turned around. He looked terrified, like he was fearful that Carol would do the same to him. Forrest said his name again and was glad when he started walking back the way they’d come.

Jake didn’t speak during the rest of the walk. Nor did he talk on the way home. When the car stopped, Jake got out and walked to the house and went inside. Forrest pulled out his cell phone and called his friend at the morgue. He asked him about the murders.

“I remember that. A younger couple, not even in their mid-twenties I think.” He asked what he knew. “Nothing much. The bodies came in one night while I was just leaving work, and before I came to work two days later, they were gone and no one was talking about it. And no matter who I asked no one spoke about it.”

Pay off. Forrest knew that it happened more often than not with the rich and stupid. He even had a name for it. Bloody cash. He’d never actually known anyone that had had it done to them, nor a family that had been paid off. But a lawyer didn’t get far in this business without encountering it at least once.

He asked his buddy to see if he could dig anything up. It had been about fourteen years, so maybe enough time had gone by to get someone to loosen up a little. As he made his way into the house, he wasn’t surprised to find Jake sitting in the dark living room holding a glass of some sort of amber liquid in one hand and the house phone in the other. Taking the phone from him, Forrest put it on the cradle. He sat across from him and waited. He didn’t have to wait long.

“Tyler killed himself about an hour ago. First he killed Belinda, then himself. He left a note, telling the world that he could no longer live with himself and that he had disowned his daughter. That was all, just that.” Forrest asked him if he was all right. “I’m not sure, really. I never cared for Tyler; Belinda was all right, nice to me when I’d go to events at their home, but I didn’t know her well. The doctor told the police that he’d just informed Mr. Lane that Belinda had no brain activity, nor was there going to be any quality of life for her other than in a nursing home hooked up to machines for the rest of her days.”

“I’m sorry, Jake.” He nodded. “What are you going to do now? I’m sure that there will be questions for you. And then there is the added fact that Carol is still out there.”

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