Murder of Innocence (Murder Is Forever) Read online

  Susan curls into a ball and uses her hands to protect her head from the worst of the punches. Crystal lands a few more blows against her ribs and her stomach, then straightens up, huffing. “You’ve seen too many movies,” Crystal says, standing over Susan. “You think you can just rat out your people and get away with it? Life don’t work like that around here. Quit helping the FBI or you’re going to get yourself killed.”

  Crystal and the others walk away, leaving Susan lying on the ground. She spits a glob of bloody saliva into the gravel and rolls over onto her back. She decides it’s not worth getting up.

  She’s just going to close her eyes and fall asleep right here.

  CHAPTER 23

  SUSAN WAKES UP TO bright artificial light.

  She blinks and looks around, trying to figure out where she is. She’s in a hospital room, that much is obvious, but she can’t remember how she got here. She tries to sit up, and her ribs ache with pain. The memory of Crystal Black attacking her in the parking lot floods her brain.

  She wants to break down and cry, but she’s too tired to even do that.

  If this isn’t rock bottom, she thinks, I don’t know how much more I can take. I don’t know how I can keep falling.

  Her mouth feels as dry as cotton, and she looks around for something to drink. With perfect timing, a nurse walks in with a tray of food.

  “How are you feeling?” the nurse says with a smile.

  “Like I had too much to drink and someone beat the shit out of me,” Susan says.

  “Sounds about right,” the woman says, offering her a cup with a straw sticking out. “I’ve got the business card of a state trooper if you want to file charges.”

  What good will it do? Susan thinks. “No, thanks.” She sits up and takes a drink of water. “Anything broken?” she asks.

  “Nope,” the nurse assures her. “You’ll have some aches and pains for about a week, but there’s no permanent damage. You’ll be fine and so will the baby.”

  Susan stares at her. “Excuse me?”

  The nurse looks sympathetic. “Did you not know about the pregnancy? I hope it’s good news.”

  Susan collapses back onto the bed, unsure how to feel.

  “I’ll have the doctor check on you in a few minutes,” the nurse tells her. “Is there anything I can get for you?”

  Susan faces her. “Can you give me some documentation confirming I’m pregnant?”

  When she’s alone, Susan breaks down and cries. After a few minutes, she wipes away her tears and places one hand on her abdomen.

  “It’s okay,” she says. “Daddy’s going to do right by us. Don’t you worry.”

  CHAPTER 24

  Miami, Florida. May 1989

  MARK CAN SEE PALM TREES from his window at the FBI’s Miami office. Sunlight pours in, a sharp contrast to the gray skies he just left behind.

  He can’t believe how fast the transfer occurred. The Bureau had everything lined up in two weeks. There was a flurry of packing, and before he knew it, a moving truck was parked in front of his house.

  Everything about his new life in Florida is different. For most of the time he’d been in Pikeville, he’d worked in a tiny office by himself; here, he’s in a huge office with more than thirty agents. Before, he covered an expansive rural area with hollows hidden in the woods, abandoned coal roads snaking through the hills, and dozens of small communities with populations in the hundreds or even dozens. Now he’s working in a major urban area with a dense population, diverse demographics, and completely different crimes.

  Home life is different too.

  Kathy is smiling again.

  They took the kids to the beach over the weekend and everyone had a ball building sandcastles and getting knocked over by waves. Kathy looked like she’d shaken off her depression overnight.

  Mark is glad to be in Florida if for no other reason than the temptation of Susan Smith isn’t available to him. It’s just a matter of time, he hopes, before the whole thing becomes an unpleasant but distant memory.

  The phone ringing on Mark’s desk jolts him out of his thoughts.

  “Hey, buddy, how’s the Sunshine State treating you?”

  “Hi, Glen,” Mark says, trying to sound at least somewhat glad to hear from his old partner.

  Glen says he’s calling to see when Mark will be back in Pikeville. He has to return in order to wrap up work on various investigations, principally the chop-shop case. Mark says he’s scheduled to be there next week.

  “I need your help when you’re here,” Glen says. “Dealing with Susan.”

  Mark groans. The last thing he wants to do is deal with Susan.

  “She’s absolutely gone off the deep end,” Glen says. “She’s got some crazy scheme in mind about catching a dirty cop in Illinois that might actually work if she can get her shit together long enough to make it work. She has no money, can’t see her kids. She’s calling me nonstop for help, asking about you, wanting to talk to you. She’s been spreading some pretty wild rumors up here.”

  Mark closes his eyes and squeezes the bridge of his nose. “You know you can’t believe half of what comes out of Susan’s mouth,” Mark says, practically parroting what Trooper Neil Whittaker once told him—although, in reality, Mark had found that Susan was always honest with him.

  “I know, I know,” Glen says. “I’m just telling you you’ll need to talk to her when you’re in town. Try to rein her in some. I know she was a big help to you. I want to work with her.”

  I’ll bet you do, Mark thinks. “I’ll talk to her,” he says. “Just don’t give her my phone number down here, all right?”

  “Oh,” Glen says, “was I not supposed to do that?”

  Mark’s heart sinks. For the rest of the day, his stomach clenches whenever his phone rings. When he finally heads home, he feels like he’s dodged a bullet. But when he walks into the townhome they’re renting, he spots a familiar sight: Kathy on the telephone.

  “It’s Susan,” Kathy says, handing the phone to him. “She wants to talk to you.”

  CHAPTER 25

  Eastern Kentucky. June 1989

  WHEN MARK AND HIS family left Pikeville, the spring bloom had only just begun, and most of the trees had still been bare. But now, as he steers the Ford Tempo he rented at the airport in Huntington through the winding roads, the hills look beautiful, lush and green.

  Mark hadn’t realized how much he’d wanted to get out of Kentucky until they’d left. Now that he’s back, he feels like he’s returned to a bad dream.

  It feels like he’ll never be able to truly escape.

  Mark couldn’t sleep last night, knowing he would have to confront Susan when he got here. Ever since her phone call, he’s been wondering if her claim of being pregnant is true or another of her wild stories.

  He plans to go straight to the FBI office and get a few hours’ worth of work done before heading to the hotel room Glen’s booked for him. Mark and Kathy haven’t sold their house yet—doing some repairs on it is one of the things Mark needs to take care of while he’s in town—but there’s no furniture in it anymore, so he can’t stay there.

  “Hey, buddy,” Glen says when Mark walks in. “Welcome back.”

  Glen’s cheerfulness at seeing him is completely insincere. They’d barely tolerated each other when they worked together; they’d certainly never been buddies. Frankly, Mark had been hoping Glen wouldn’t even be in the office when he arrived, but no such luck.

  “Susan was here earlier,” Glen tells him. “She left something for you on your desk.”

  Mark picks up the slip of paper: a medical report confirming her pregnancy. Mark studies the paper, aware that Glen is staring at him, watching to see his reaction. He’s certain Glen looked at it. In fact, he’d put money on Susan having told Glen that the baby is Mark’s.

  Mark puts the paper down, feigning indifference, and opens his briefcase. “Do you have transcripts from the chop-shop hearings?” Mark asks, acting as if the document hasn’
t fazed him.

  “Sure,” Glen says, clearly disappointed that Mark doesn’t want to talk about Susan’s news.

  A few hours later, Mark packs up his briefcase and heads to the car. Glen booked him a room at the Landmark Hotel, one of the few decent places in town, and he makes the short drive there.

  Once in his room, Mark pulls off his tie, loosens his collar, takes his pistol off his belt, and hides it in the bedside drawer next to the Bible. He kicks his shoes off and lies back on the bed. He had wanted to go for a run, and he still needs to eat dinner, but he feels dog-tired and considers just going to sleep.

  Before he can do anything, though, there’s a knock on his door. “I know you’re in there,” Susan calls.

  When Mark opens the door, she stalks in, then turns on her heel and faces him. She is wearing cutoff shorts and a V-neck shirt that exposes the gold cross she always wears. She looks fatigued herself, her eyes watery, maybe from drinking, maybe from drugs.

  “Let me guess,” he says. “Glen Bell told you where I was staying.”

  “He booked me a room here too,” Susan says. “He wanted to make sure you didn’t ignore me.”

  That interfering asshole. Mark can just picture Glen laughing to himself as he set the trap.

  “Look, I just got into town,” Mark says, exasperated. “I was planning to call you. I’ll be here for several days. There’s plenty of time for us to talk.”

  “Okay,” Susan says, plopping down on Mark’s bed. “Let’s talk.”

  The medical report noted she was due in November, which means she’s almost halfway along now, but she doesn’t look pregnant to Mark. Then again, he can’t remember how a pregnant woman should look at this point. Of course I don’t remember, he thinks. I wasn’t around much when Kathy was pregnant. I was always working.

  “What are you going to do about our baby?” Susan demands.

  “Are you sure it’s mine?” he asks, then immediately regrets the question.

  She looks deeply hurt. “I know I don’t mean anything to you,” Susan says, fighting back tears. “But I care about you. I wasn’t screwing around with other people. This baby,” Susan adds, pointing to her abdomen, “is yours.”

  “Well, why weren’t you on birth control?” Mark says. “Jesus, Susan, how could you be so stupid?”

  “If you’re so goddamn smart, why didn’t you wear a condom?” Susan says. “Didn’t they teach you in the FBI Academy to wear rubbers when you fucked your informants?”

  “Go to hell,” Mark growls.

  They glare at each other for a few seconds, both shocked that their argument has risen to this level of hostility.

  Finally, calmly, Susan says, “We need to stop fighting. We’re having a baby. What are we going to do?”

  Hesitantly, Mark says, “I think you should have an abortion.”

  Susan stomps over to him and slaps him across the face. “I’m not having an abortion!” she shouts. “This is our baby. Ours. You think about that!”

  She storms out of the room, slamming the door behind her.

  Mark, his cheek stinging from the slap, paces around the room, his fists clenched. He kicks over a chair. He takes his suitcase and hurls it against the wall, spilling all the contents out. He leans over the bed and begins punching a pillow. He wants to roar but bites back his rage because he doesn’t want anyone in the hotel to hear him.

  Finally, he falls back onto the bed, his hands clutching his hair, wondering how he can get out of the mess he’s gotten himself into.

  CHAPTER 26

  SUSAN DIDN’T RETURN THAT night, but as Mark is getting dressed the next morning, she knocks on his door. As soon as he opens it, she barges in and stomps over to his suitcase.

  She pulls out a pair of his shorts and a T-shirt. “I gotta borrow these,” she says. “I barely fit in my old clothes anymore, and I didn’t bring enough clothes when I checked into the hotel.”

  She also says she needs to use his phone to call her sister because the one in her room isn’t working. He doesn’t believe her, but he doesn’t have time to argue. “I’m sorry, but I have to go. I’m due at the U.S. Attorney’s Office,” he tells her as he finishes tying his tie and holsters his gun.

  “You might not care about me,” she says, “but I’m going to make sure you care about this baby.”

  “Just shut the door behind you when you leave,” he says. “We’ll talk tonight. We’ll figure this out.”

  He drives the three hours to Lexington in a trance, but as he walks into the building, he puts up a façade of calm professionalism. On the inside, he is a nervous mess, his mind spinning with various options, none of which seem good. It is after five o’clock before he can head back to Pikeville, his stomach in knots.

  He hoped to have a few minutes in his room alone before Susan came calling. But she is already there. She never left. She is sitting on his bed, wearing his shorts and T-shirt, flipping through the TV channels.

  Susan’s eyes are bloodshot from crying; her hair is disheveled and greasy. Her complexion, once smooth and unblemished, looks blotchy. Mark tries to remember the pretty mountain girl he met in the clearing two years ago, the one with the bright smile and sassy personality. She’d looked like a young woman with a promising future ahead of her. Now she looks like a homeless person with no hope of bettering her situation.

  My God, he thinks. I’ve ruined this poor girl’s life.

  Then another thought occurs to him.

  How am I going to stop her from ruining mine?

  Susan turns the TV off and Mark puts his pistol in the bedside drawer. He tugs off his tie and sits on the bed opposite her.

  “Well,” she says. “Are you ready to talk?”

  “Let’s go for a drive,” he says. “We always had the best talks when we were parked somewhere. Just the two of us. Alone.”

  CHAPTER 27

  THE SUN IS SETTING as Mark and Susan drive out of town. He parks on an old mine road about fifteen miles from Pikeville. The two of them have been meeting in places like this off and on for two years, first in a professional capacity and then in a romantic one. They make small talk for a few minutes, circling around the inevitable conversation. The night gets darker and darker, and soon the only light is coming from the dashboard. Finally, Mark decides that he can’t put it off any longer.

  I’ve got to face this, he thinks. “When the baby’s born,” he tells Susan, “we’ll do a paternity test to make sure it’s mine.”

  “It’s yours,” she says.

  He can’t see her face clearly in the dim light, but he can tell by her tone that she’s angry.

  “If it’s mine,” he continues, “I’ll talk to Kathy, and she and I can adopt the baby. We’ll raise it as our own.”

  Mark sees Susan raising her arm to slap him like she did last night. This time, he’s ready and catches her wrist. She thrashes against him, and he pushes her back into her seat.

  “You think I’m a bad mother?” she says, practically screaming. “You think I can’t raise this baby?”

  “You lost custody of your own kids to a drug dealer!” Mark says, unable to hold the words back. They’ve been headed toward this fight for a long time, and he decides it’s time to finally have it out.

  “I love those kids,” she says, sobbing. “It breaks my heart that I don’t get to see them.”

  “Susan, you’re a mess. I tried to help you, but no matter what chances you’re given, you piss them away.”

  “You tried to help me?” she says. “How? By getting me pregnant and telling me to get an abortion? Some help you are.”

  “Susan,” Mark says angrily, “what is it you want from me? What is it you think will get us out of this situation?”

  Susan takes a few seconds to catch her breath. “I don’t want out of this situation,” she says. “I want to be with you, Mark. I want you to be there when the baby is born. I want you to put your name on the birth certificate. I want you to leave Kathy and be with me. Take me to Flori
da. Get me out of this hellhole so I don’t ever have to come back.”

  As she speaks, her voice changes from aggressive to pleading.

  “We can be happy together,” she says. “I know we can. I love you, Mark, and I know you love me too. The passion we felt—that was real. We can be together if you’ll just follow your heart. Do what you want to do instead of what you think you should do. Can’t you see us together, walking on the beach, holding hands with our son or daughter?”

  “I already have that with Kathy and our kids,” Mark says coldly. “What you’re describing is a fantasy that will never happen. You need to step out of dreamland so we can have a real discussion about what to do.”

  “You asshole!” Susan screams. “You ruined my life! I did nothing but help you. I launched your career. I was there for you when your wife wasn’t. And you used me like a piece of meat you could just throw away!”

  “You used me!” Mark roars back, his fury surging to the surface. “You’re trying to entrap me. For all I know, you got pregnant on purpose. You planned this, didn’t you?”

  His words have the desired effect; she’s quiet for a moment. “You’re a bastard,” she eventually mutters, her voice cracking.

  “And you’re a fucking train wreck. You shouldn’t raise this baby. If it’s mine, Kathy and I—”

  “There is no way your whore of a wife is going to raise my baby.”

  “You of all people have no right to call my wife a whore.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean? Are you saying I’m a whore?”

  “Just leave Kathy out of this,” Mark says, balling one hand into a fist.

  “Or what? You’ll hit me? Go ahead,” Susan taunts. “Men have been hitting me my whole life. Go ahead and prove you’re no better than any other man I’ve ever known.”

  “Don’t think I won’t.”

  “Your wife was arrested for prostitution,” Susan says matter-of-factly. “If that doesn’t make her a whore—”