Chapter 63

63

Jenna drives home from Catherine’s, her headlights piercing the darkness along the dirt road, remembering that Easter night. She’d been in a murderous mood when they left. She dropped Jake at the train station—she didn’t want his company, and he didn’t try to change her mind. Then she went home and thought about it and put together a plan.

Jenna drove to Dan’s house. Dan’s car wasn’t in the driveway. Wearing latex gloves from her cleaning cupboard, she snuck into his garage through the unlocked side door. Dan’s car wasn’t in the garage either. He’d gone out for a drive, she thought, because he’s sick that way. She knows about his creepy habits. She used a small flashlight she’d brought—she’d deliberately left her cell phone at home—to collect the disposable coveralls and booties she already knew were there. Then she drove to Irena’s house. As expected, her car was parked on the street, and her house was dark. Jenna parked her own car farther down the street, out of sight of Irena’s house, and, careful not to be seen, located Irena’s spare keys in the back, under the planter. Then she drove Irena’s car to her parents’ house, arriving shortly before eleven, and, killing the headlights, pulled in and parked at the end of the drive.

The night was dark and still. Probably no one would see the car parked here, but if they did, it would be Irena’s car they’d see, not hers. She hadn’t wanted to risk anyone seeing her own car, her Mini Cooper, anywhere near the place that night.

She got out of the car and stared at the house for a moment. There was a faint light coming from the master bedroom. Jenna walked to the backyard with her canvas bag of gear. There, she took off her shoes and jacket and pulled on the disposable coveralls, an extra pair of thick socks, and the booties. Once she was suited up, the hood pulled tight against her face, no hair escaping, she felt a strange sense of invincibility. She took the electrical cord she’d brought with her and went back around to the front and rang the doorbell. No one came. She rang the bell again. And again. Finally, she could sense lights going on, over the stairs and in the front hall, filtering out through the living-room windows to her left, and at last her mother opened the door, as she knew she would.

For a moment, her mother stood there, not getting it. Maybe she didn’t recognize her with the hazmat suit covering her completely, even her hair, and changing her shape. Her mother didn’t understand what she was here to do. And then she recognized her, and she knew. The look on her face. She backed up, turned and stumbled toward the living room. But Jenna was right behind her and brought the electrical cord up fast around her neck before she could even scream. She held the cord tight, dragging her mother farther into the living room, trying not to make too much noise, squeezing hard until her mother finally stopped struggling and sagged against the cord. It took longer than expected. Then she lowered her to the floor. Jenna felt nothing. She went back and quietly closed the front door. Then she returned to the body and struggled with her mother’s rings, wrenching them off. It was difficult, with the gloves. She heard her father calling from upstairs.

“Sheila, who is it?”

There wasn’t time to remove the tricky diamond studs from her mother’s ears. Jenna moved quickly into the kitchen through the back of the living room, avoiding the front hall where her father would come down the stairs. She put the electrical cord and the rings down on the counter and withdrew the carving knife from the knife block. “In here,” she called, hoping he wouldn’t look inside the living room first. If he did, she would improvise. She would chase him down.

She stood like a statue in the dark kitchen and waited for him. She remembers grabbing him from behind as he passed by her and slitting his throat in one clean stroke, the blood spurting all over her hand. The rest is a bit of a blur—it was different from killing her mother. Something in her took over. By the time it was done, she was panting with effort, exhausted, and covered in blood. She sat on the floor for a minute, resting. She knew what she had to do next, and she had to be quick.

She grabbed a garbage bag from under the sink and put her mother’s rings and the electrical cord inside. Then she walked down the hall and upstairs to the master bedroom. She rifled through the jewelry box, then decided to take everything, dumping its contents into the bag. She emptied their wallets and threw them to the floor. She left a bloody trail behind her, pulling open drawers, trashing the place as she went, upstairs and down. She went into the study, but left the safe alone. Last of all, she took the box of family silver from the dining room. Then she went out the back door in the kitchen to the backyard, which verged on a ravine. She knew no one could see her—it was pitch dark and the other houses were too far away, blocked by trees. She placed the box of silver in the canvas zip-up bag she’d brought. Then she stripped off the bloodied disposable suit and the booties and the thick socks and placed them carefully in the plastic bag, along with the electrical cord and the jewelry, cards, and cash, removing the gloves last of all. She wiped her face and hands thoroughly with wet wipes, then placed those in the garbage bag as well. Then she placed that bag inside the canvas bag, put on her shoes and jacket and a fresh pair of latex gloves, and made her way back to Irena’s car. She drove back to Irena’s, moved the canvas bag into her own car, and returned the keys.

On the way home, she got rid of the evidence. Somewhere no one would ever find it. She hid the canvas bag on a farm property along the same isolated country road she lives on. She buried it in the ground where a concrete floor was going to be poured for a new outbuilding sometime in the next day or two. It was a stroke of good fortune that she already knew this because she’s acquainted with the woman who owns the property, and she had mentioned it to her.

Now, every time Jenna drives past that building, seeing it go up—it’s progressing nicely—she feels a sense of satisfaction.

They will never find the evidence. She’s the only one who knows it’s there.

Catherine and Dan did not kill their parents, but Ted and Lisa don’t know that for sure. Jenna smirks as she drives. If she wanted to, Jenna could tell Ted and Lisa things—things that were actually true—that would make their toes curl. Those earrings, for example—the ones they found in Catherine’s jewelry box, the ones she “borrowed”—Jenna knows her mother was wearing those same earrings the night she strangled her. She had long enough to notice them while she had the cord around her neck. She knows Catherine must have taken them off their mother’s body that night. She wonders what Ted would think of that.

And Dan—does Lisa not wonder about her husband’s compulsion to drive endlessly after dark? Where does she think he goes? Does she never try to call his cell? What does she suppose he’s doing? Classic serial killer behavior, if you ask me, Jenna thinks to herself.

It’s too bad Audrey didn’t die from the poison she put in her iced tea that Sunday morning, sneaking in the open back window while Audrey was out, but in the end, Jenna thinks, it doesn’t really matter.