Val leaped out of the car when she heard the shrieks. Anna stood paralyzed in the bathroom doorway. Red arterial spray over everything. On top of the sink was a box. On top of the box was Billy’s head. The autopsy would later find the work had been done with a hacksaw, begun, at least, while the victim was still alive. A slim wire ran into Billy’s mouth, attached to a miniature recording device — the kind police make informants wear — which was now broadcasting from somewhere near the top of Billy’s throat. The box was on top of the sink so the head could look at itself in the mirror. Billy’s surprised eyes, frozen open in a look of eternal terror, gazed at the reflection, where someone had written in blood, “How smart are you now?”
Anna came flying out the front door and fell to her knees with dry heaves. Val ran and met her in the middle of the yard. She struggled to understand Anna’s hysterics. The message eventually got across.
“We have to call the police!”
“You’re right.” They ran to the car and Anna reached in her purse for a cell phone. It rang in her hands. They both jumped.
Anna apprehensively put the phone to her head. “Hello?”
It was her sister-in-law, Janet. Screaming.
“Calm down, I can’t understand—”
“They killed everyone!”
“Who?”
“They shot Rick….”
Her brother. A punch in the chest.
“…I found him on the kitchen floor. And they shot Randy. And Pedro
Janet’s collapse somehow spurred Anna to get it together. It was the Rick in her. “I’m coming over….”
“I’m not at home. It’s not safe,” said Janet. “You and Billy need to hide.”
“Billy’s dead.”
“Oh, my God!”
“Just found him,” said Anna. “We’re at the house.”
“Get away from there!”
Anna looked across the front seat at her friend. “We’re not safe here.”
Val started shaking and fumbling with the gear shift.
Anna opened her door.
“What are you doing?”
“Something’s started that I can’t tell you about. You need to get out of here. But don’t call the police.”
“What about you?”
Anna looked toward the driveway. “I’ve got the Trans Am.”
Her friend sped away and nearly took out the stop sign at the corner. Anna kept her sister-in-law on the phone as she ran up the driveway, juggling her purse, digging for keys.
“Where are you?”
Janet looked around the pay phone outside a truck stop on I-95. “Flying J.”
“Don’t move. I’m coming over.” Anna revved up the Trans Am and screeched backward into the street.
Janet was still sobbing. “Rick told me there was nothing to worry about. Just said not to speak to anyone without a lawyer.”
“What are you talking about?”
“The indictments today. Didn’t you hear? It was on the news.”
“Indictments?”
“We all got one. This was only pot for Chrissake! Rick promised nobody gets rough over that. Just coke.”
The picture snapped into focus.
Anna vividly remembered the day it all began. It was windy down at the municipal marina. The women wore scarves. They loaded picnic lunches while the guys argued over their new knots. Rick and Billy had just bought the sailboat. The wives were against it at first, but the idea grew on them as they thought of all the time the couples would be spending together. They imagined raising kids.
That’s when the strangers approached. They started talking to Rick and Billy from the pier, complimenting the vessel. The women didn’t like the men, didn’t exactly know why, just didn’t. The guys hit it off.
After that, the other men always seemed to be hanging around the marina when the couples came back from sailing. Rick and Billy started going out for drinks with their new friends. Then phone calls at the house where Billy would go in another room and close the door. The husbands developed a sudden interest in night fishing.
Anna knew something was up, so Billy got the shoe boxes down from the attic and showed her the cash. “It’s just pot….”
That was five years ago. Rick and Janet got a bigger house, and another place in the Keys they rented out. Billy got a gambling habit and another lease on the duplex.
Rick changed. He became smart with money. They were living well, but not spending nearly what was coming in. Rick was putting it somewhere. Billy changed, too. Cocaine, the dog track. Then the women from the bars that Billy always swore were the very last time. Finally his temper, which steadily grew worse and spilled into phone arguments with the guys from the pier.
Rick tried talking to him, and Billy said he’d change. He changed into a liar. Rick didn’t know what to do. From time to time, he passed money to his sister on the side.
Now the indictments…
“What are we going to do!” Janet yelled in the phone.
The Trans Am squealed around a corner. “Stay calm. I’ll be right there.”
“I can’t take it anymore!” Janet leaned weeping against the pay phone. Truck drivers heading into the coffee shop couldn’t help notice the drama. That hot little number in distress who obviously needed a knight.
A man in a Pennzoil cap walked up from behind. “Ma’am, is everything okay?”
Janet jumped and screamed. “No! Get the fuck away from me!”
