Page 54 of Nineteen Eighty

“But—”

“Stop trying to wrap your head around it, you’ll fail! Soren did what we asked, and everything was fine. He was fine, I was fine. We… well, I don’t know what we are, but it had nothing to do with Charles, did it? But he needed a reason. A fix. He needed to fulfill his disgusting need to kill.”

“How do we know Soren is really dead?”

Maureen coughed out a sound resembling a laugh. She thought it sounded like the laughter of a dead person. “I know. When you’ve grown up with a killer, you learn to appreciate his handiwork.”

“None of this makes any sense! Why didn’t the LaViolettes go to the police?”

“Have you even been listening? Soren has never fallen in line. Their family is even more clannish than mine. They expect everyone to play a role, and Soren refused. They let him live his life in obscurity, but they had to know about… about Alain…” Maureen rolled around, facing the corner, howling her agony into the plaster wall.

Seconds later, a heavy hand fell on her shoulder. It lacked warmth, but somewhere within him, Edouard meant this, this comfort.

“We should, then,” he said, gathering his wits again. “We should go to the police.”

“No,” Maureen said quickly. She wiped at her eyes and turned. “I mean, yes. Maybe. But first I need to see my sister.”

“Which one?”

“Colleen.”

“I’m coming with you.”

“Whoa, slow down, Maureen,” Colleen called after her sister, who sprinted in a dead heat toward the parlor. Edouard hung behind, wearing an unreadable look. “Tell me again what Charles did?”

“He did it again, Colleen! Hell’s bells, he can’t even help himself anymore, can he?”

Colleen reached for her sister, but Maureen ripped herself away. Her face was a portrait of streaky black streaks and a graveyard of tears. “What are you talking about?”

Edouard went to the bar and poured Maureen a drink. He handed it to her, backing away to give her space. Colleen was as confused by this odd tenderness as Maureen’s display, but she only had energy for one mystery.

“Charles,” Maureen managed through her hyperventilation. She wrapped her hands around the whiskey glass to stabilize them, taking a shaky sip. Edouard reached forward to steady her. “He’s done it again, Colleen. This time he’s gone too far.” Before she could explain, Maureen rolled to her side on the couch and lost herself to more sobbing.

Edouard cleared his throat. “We got a package today, Colleen. It seemed to infer—”

“No inferring!” Maureen screamed from the couch cushion.

Edouard set his lips with a short sigh. “It suggested that Charles had… had killed Soren LaViolette.” He reached into his jacket and withdrew the card so Colleen could read for herself.

She dropped it as she took in the last words.

Colleen stepped back, inhaling her gasp. “He did not. Oh, God. Charles, Jesus Christ.” If this was true, her brother had gone too far this time. Not like the first time wasn’t too far, but this… a LaViolette. This was someone who would be missed. Someone who, no matter what the LaViolettes might say in their cryptic note, would demand recompense.

But more importantly, this was someone Maureen had loved. Someone who had loved her in return.

“There was also a scarf, covered in blood,” Edouard explained.

“I don’t understand, how did they get a scarf with his blood?”

“Soren’s blood!” Maureen cried. “And they know everything, Colleen. They know more than us. They know everything and anything and everything!”

“Let me get her something from my medicine cabinet,” Colleen offered, but Edouard shook his head.

“This anger is hers. She should feel it, if she wants to.”

“The anger is only hurting her. She can’t hurt Charles with it.” Colleen closed her eyes, blowing out a breath. “No one can. Because nothing ever seems to hurt him. Not for long.”

“I’m going to the police.”

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