Remembrance (The Mediator #7) (26 page)

Fuming, Becca threw her glasses into some nearby milkweed, disturbing a pair of butterflies, which took off into the air in indignation. “Why don’t you ask her, if you really can communicate with ghosts . . . which, by the way,
I
highly doubt?”

“I already told you, the dead aren’t known for their logical reasoning skills. Lucia will barely speak to me. And I’m pretty sure when Father Dominic tried, she tossed him down a flight of stairs.’ ”

Becca blanched. “Oh, my God. Wait, he—”

“Yes. Father Dominic is also one of us—and it almost got him killed. See why being a mediator isn’t all it’s cracked up to be? Lucia’s dangerous, Becca—not because she’s evil, but because she’s afraid. Afraid for you. Now you’ve got to tell me why, so I can keep her from hurting anyone else.”

Becca shook her head hard enough to cause her hair to whip her cheeks.

“I can’t. Don’t you see? I told Lucia about him, and she
died.
”

“Him?” I was confused. “Him who?”

“
Him
,” she whispered. Her eyes weren’t only tear filled anymore. They were fear filled. “He killed her, just because she was going to tell them what he did to me. If I’d done what he said and not told anyone, she’d still be alive today. That’s why it’s all my fault.”

And then I did understand. Of course.
Him.

Wasn’t there always a
him
? I had a
him
. Why wouldn’t Becca, as well?

Only Paul Slater was just a manipulative creep, not a child killer.

“Becca, it’s okay.” I laid a hand on her non-injured arm. “You didn’t do anything wrong. Tell me who it is. He can’t hurt you any—”

“What are you talking about?” She wrenched her arm away. “Of course he can. He made what happened to Lucia look like an accident. He could do the same to you or me just as easily.” Her voice was ragged from tears and desperation. “Do you think I haven’t been hearing it my whole life, practically? ‘Accidents happen.’ But what happened to Lucia was no accident. I can’t prove it, but I know.”

“Then tell me. Tell me so I can fix it.”

“You
can’t
.”

“I can, Becca.”

I heard a bell ring, and beneath the breezeway, students began to file from their classrooms, switching from first period to second. I hoped Becca didn’t notice.

“I can’t bring Lucia back to life, Becca,” I whispered urgently. “But I can maybe bring her some peace, and help you live the life you deserve. But only if you help me.
Please
.”

She wasn’t looking at me. She was staring off at the fountain, fingering the horse pendant around her neck.

“He had to have spooked that horse on purpose, then rode after Lucia and killed her when she was far enough away from the group that they couldn’t see.” Becca’s tears spilled down her cheeks and onto her white uniform blouse. She made no move to wipe them. “She was a good rider, the best of us, but her horse was scared of snakes—all horses are, but hers especially—and if someone left something across the trail that looked like a snake—” She shuddered. “That’s how I think he did it. Then all he had to do was follow her . . . and . . .”

“Why, Becca?” I asked. “Why would he do that to Lucia?”

She nodded, aware of the tears now. She’d lifted a tissue from the pack I’d given her to dab at her eyes and blow her nose. “That’s why it’s my fault. It was so stupid. It just slipped out. She saw that I had a candy bar, and she wanted to know where I’d gotten it, because we weren’t supposed to have candy in school, and like an idiot I said
he’d
given it to me. And then she said she wanted candy, too, and that she was going to ask him for some. And then I realized what I’d done, because of course he’d told me horrible things would happen if I told anyone. So I got scared, because I didn’t want him to do to her what he’d done to me, even if afterwards he did give me candy. So I told her that she couldn’t say anything to anyone about it, not even him, and she wanted to know why, and so—”

“You told her.”

“Y-yes.”

I should have been used to it by now. It was so tragically ubiquitous, you’d think it would fail to surprise me.

But even now, sitting in one of the warmest, sunniest, most peaceful places on earth, touted all over the Internet for its beauty and highly meditative benefits, as I listened to the laughter of my stepnieces and the sound of hymns playing inside the basilica, I felt suddenly cold.

This must have been what it was like for Jesse, living in the valley of the shadow of death. Cold, dark, and no sunlight ever to warm him. I fought an urge to reach for my cell phone and call him, just to hear his voice. I couldn’t do that in front of Becca. She had no one to call.

“So Lucia said she was going to tell on him?”

“Yes,” Becca said, looking as wretched as it was possible for a human being to look. “She was like that, you know. She always took charge of things. Not really bossy, but . . . well, kind of.”

I thought of how Lucia’s hands had felt around my throat. Bossy was one word for it.

Becca’s eyes were overflowing. “I was so stupid. I remember feeling relieved. I remember thinking, ‘Well, Lucia will tell, and then everything will be all right.’ But instead—” She broke off.

She didn’t need to go on. I knew what had happened instead.

I reached out to lay a hand on her fingers, which were nervously shredding the tissue in her lap. “What was his name, Becca?”

She shook herself, seeming to come out of whatever dark shadow that she’d temporarily slipped into. “Wh-what?”

“His name. The man who . . . gave you the candy.”

“Oh.” She had to think about it. She thought for a long time, watching a couple of butterflies flit by. “Jimmy, I think. That’s what everyone called him. Jimmy.” She said the name apologetically, like it was a vulgarity she felt sorry for having been forced to utter in front of me.

“Do you remember his last name?”

“I’m sorry. I don’t . . . I can’t . . . He was tall. I remember that. But I can barely remember anything else about him.”

She did, but she wouldn’t allow herself to. She’d have blocked it out, along with his name, the way we all try to block out our worst childhood memories.

“That’s all right, Becca. Did you tell anyone—anyone besides Lucia—about him?”

Her eyes widened. “No, of course not. Not after . . . not after what happened to Lucia. I didn’t . . . I couldn’t . . .”

“I understand.” She didn’t want to be his next murder victim.

“I’d quit riding after that, so I wouldn’t see him anymore,” she said quickly. “He worked in the stables. I think he was some kind of handyman or something. He did other odd jobs, too, around the school.”

He. She wouldn’t say his name.

“I tried to avoid the stables as much as I could. But then one day after . . . it happened, Sister Regina Claire made our whole class go down there to lay a wreath for Lucia. And
he
was there. He came up and asked if he could speak to me and I had to say yes, you know, because it would have looked weird for me to say no. But I knew he couldn’t do anything, because they were watching. Anyway, he whispered that it was a shame what had happened to Lucia, and to her horse, and it would be an even bigger shame if I ever told anyone else about . . . about what we’d done, because then the same thing that happened to Lucia might happen to my parents, or Shasta—my horse.”

I felt a spurt of rage when she mentioned the horse, even though this wasn’t the first time I’d heard such a thing. Abusers often threatened to injure family members and pets in order to control a victim. They know that children worry more about loved ones than they do their own personal safety, and that pets are often as beloved as any human family member.

“What else did he say?” I asked, having a hard time keeping my voice steady.

Becca shrugged, picking at the bandage I’d affixed to her wound, attempting to peel it up from one side where the adhesive had come loose. “Just that he knew where I lived. He said it would be a shame if one day when my dad was driving to work, or my mom to the store, and their brakes didn’t work, and one of them had a terrible accident—”

I reached out and laid a hand across her fingers, stilling them before she could tear the bandage off completely, revealing the gouge marks she’d created earlier in the week.

“It’s all right, Becca,” I said, as gently as I could. “I completely understand why you didn’t tell anyone.”

“I should have.” Her voice was small. “If I had, Lucia would still be alive today.”

“Maybe,” I said, holding her hands more tightly. “Or maybe you’d both be dead.”

“That might be better,” she said matter-of-factly, looking down at the bandage. “That might be better than this.”

“No.” I held firmly to her hands, thinking of the shadows in Jesse’s eyes. “It wouldn’t. Trust me.”

“I’m a coward.” The tears fell again, hot and fast, dropping onto our clasped hands. “A stupid, weak coward. I made my parents sell Shasta. I told them I didn’t like horses anymore, which isn’t even true. I love them. I just . . . I thought Shasta would be safer living somewhere else. I even . . . this is going to sound crazy, but I still think I see
him
sometimes downtown, you know? I barely remember what he looks like, but I still think I see him, everywhere I go. And you know what I do when I think I see him? I hide. Even if it’s just behind a wall or a parked car. I’m so stupid!”

She tried to laugh at herself, but there was a sob in her voice. My heart wrenched for her as I remembered the word she’d carved in her arm.

“You’re not stupid, Becca,” I said. “You were a little kid who was traumatized and then did your best, given your limited resources, to protect yourself and the people you love.” I gently squeezed both her hands until, finding them finally still, I released them. “What I don’t understand, Becca, is if you kept thinking you saw him, why did you stay? Why didn’t you move away to New York with your mother, where you’d be safe?”

She blinked up at me as if astonished that anyone could ask such a silly question. “But what about my dad? He can’t leave because his company is here. So I have to stay here to make sure
he
’s okay.”

Of course. Indisputable kid logic. Becca could barely take care of herself, but she still considered it her job to protect her father from the man who’d killed her friend.

“Okay, Becca,” I said. “I get it. And I understand now why you feel as if you have to punish yourself by cutting your arm. But no more, all right? Jimmy will never be able to hurt you or anyone else ever again.”

She raised her tear-filled gaze to my face. “Really? Why not?”

“Because,” I said. “You’ve told me. And I’m a mediator.”

veintidos

In promising Becca that I was going to stop Lucia’s killer from ever hurting anyone else again, I may have been
slightly
overreaching.

I know that Becca had said she thought she’d seen him around town, and there was always a slim chance she had.

But I considered it more likely that this was a symptom of post-traumatic stress, her fight-or-flight response—and Lucia, clinging to her as always like a limpet—triggering a false alarm. Becca had probably seen someone who resembled Jimmy, and, unable to distinguish if the threat was real or perceived, her body had automatically reacted, heart rate, breathing, and stress levels rising as she’d tried to avoid him.

Enough of these kind of encounters, false or not, and anyone would start to lose it.

It was likely Jimmy had put as much distance between himself and the crime scene as possible in the nine years since Lucia’s death. There was approximately zero chance he was still in the area, and a less than zero chance that I was going to be able to track down where he’d gone . . . not without his last name, and a whole lot of luck.

And I don’t believe in luck.

It was right as I was thinking this that Becca looked up from the pile of tissues she’d massacred and squinted across the sun-bathed courtyard. “Is that Sister Ernestine?”

I followed her gaze. The nun was standing beneath the nearest breezeway with her arms folded across her ample chest, peering at us disapprovingly . . . or more specifically, peering at the triplets, who were still busy scooping coins from the fountain, their small bodies visibly more inside it than out of it.

Busted.

“Oh, yes,” I said breezily, giving Sister Ernestine a casual wave. “No worries.”

Wrong. Worries. Big, big worries.

Becca evidently sensed my unease, since she drew her hands from mine and asked, “You aren’t going to tell her anything about this, are you?”

“Not if you don’t want me to. But I do think you ought to tell your parents, Becca. You’ve been through something really terrible, and in some ways you’ve handled it really well, especially for someone so young—” I saw her puff up a little at the praise, like a flower soaking in the sun. The poor girl’s self-confidence was in ruins, and no wonder. She’d been living in terror for years. “But you really ought to be talking to a professional mental health counselor—”

She gave me a horrified look. “I
have
talked to one! You.”

“I’m not a professional, Becca. I’m still in graduate school. I’m just an intern here at—”

“But you’re a mediator!”

I glanced at Sister Ernestine. “Not so loud, okay? That’s supposed to be just between you and me. And I mediate for the undead. You’re alive, Becca.”

“I can’t.” She shook her head. “I can’t tell anyone else. I did once before, and it . . . it turned out to be a disaster.”

“Wait a second.” Sister Ernestine had decided my wave was a little too casual for her taste, and had begun to stride across the courtyard toward us. I wasn’t sure whom she was going to yell at first, the triplets or me. If it was the triplets, and the sister startled Lucia, she was going to be in for a big—and possibly painful—surprise. I needed to head her off at the pass before that happened, but I also needed to hear what Becca was about to say, because it sounded like vital information.

Fortunately Sister E wasn’t in the best of shape, and waddled more than she walked. It took her approximately forever to get anywhere.