Shocking True Story (36 page)

We walked over to an ancient light table.

“Was used at the local newspaper during its cold type days,” Raines said of the glass-topped oak relic.

The manila envelope marked with the case number assigned to Mrs. Parker's murder was opened. A pair of tweezers was used to pull the paper from its holder. It appeared blank. It was in the shape of a goose egg, about the same size.

Raines flipped it over. I saw the writing as clear as could be. It was
Kevin Ryan
. On top was the word
Ishes
.

The night cop lingered for a moment, so Raines spoke.

“The name is clear, an exact spelling and a modified approximation of Mr. Ryan's signature. We're not sure about the meaning of the source of the word on top.”

“The man wrote that, too,” I said. Without moving his head, Martin Raines turned his eyes to mine. “
Ishes
is part of
Best Wishes
,” I added.

The Shantung Rag had been a piece of scrap paper on which Wanda-Lou and I had practiced signing our names on during the weeks she stayed with us. She had told me that my scrawl was not authorly enough. I needed to work on it. So, we played around on paper that Valerie had in a pile next to her graphic arts supplies.

“Can we call Wanda-Lou Webster from your office?” I asked. “I know it's late, but I think we'd better talk to her.”

“Wanda-Lou Webster, the famous author?”

I cringed at his quick observation. “That's the one.”

“April loved her book,” he added.

♦

THE PHONE RANG SIX TIMES when Wanda-Lou's machine finally kicked in.

“
Hi, I'm either writing another blockbuster book or giving a seminar. Be sure to watch Maury on the fifteenth. I'll be on the panel. Leave a message and be sure to leave your address to get on my newsletter mailing list....”

“Wanda-Lou, it's Kevin Ryan. Are you there? Pick up, dammit.”

A groggy Wanda-Lou got on the phone. “Kevin, it's late...got a seminar to give in Las Vegas tomorrow evening...what is it?”

“Wanda-Lou, you know Jett Carter? The gal you sent out to my house? The big fan?”

Wanda-Lou hacked into the phone. She needed to quit smoking while she still had lung function.

“Are you still mad at me for that?” she asked.

I told her I wasn't, though she was another in the long line I would like to kill.

“Did you give her anything other than my address?”

“Don't think so.”

“Think! Think again!”

Wanda-Lou took her time. So many seconds passed I was afraid she had fallen back to sleep.

“Well?”

“I gave her the address....”

“How did you give it to her?”

“I wrote it on that card we were messing with when we did our signatures. God, Kevin, who would have thought that my signature would be more important than yours?”

I hated that woman.

“Bye, Wanda-Lou.”

I hung up. Jett Carter had planned it all from the beginning. She had gone after me and my family. She had done so for a reason. I just didn't know what it was.

“Martin, this whole thing with Mrs. Parker's murder was a total setup, everything from Hop Sing to Shantung Rag.”

Raines stared at me as I turned to leave. His look of confusion was overwhelming.

“Who in the hell is Hop Sing?” he called out.

I disappeared into the hallway. My heart pounded harder with each step. Each beat was a terrible and unnecessary reminder: I had a date on a bridge.

Early Morning, Friday, November 1

THE TACOMA NARROWS BRIDGE knew no time of day when cars ceased crossing its mile-long span. But at midnight, that Friday night after Halloween, it was quiet. A bread truck lumbered across and a spotty stream of moviegoers drove home to the peninsula. The bar crowd would drive across at two. And during the week, the commuter traffic would pick up as early as four a.m. for the men and women who worked at Boeing plants in south King County.

I saw Val's tuna-can car and my heart sank lower as I pulled into the little park that commemorated the day when high winds rocked and rolled the first bridge into Puget Sound's treacherous Tacoma Narrows. A used condom stuck to my shoe and I scraped it off on the curb. For a second, my mind was diverted from the troubles that I was about to face.

I was terrified of heights. I could barely stand on a ladder without breaking out in a sweat. When Cecile and Gina invited Taylor and Hayley to walk across the bridge that summer, I had been horrified. I couldn't stand
driving
across it. I could not imagine
walking
across it.

Each vehicle gave the bridge a little bounce, an unnerving vibration that reminded me that I was one thousand feet above the chasm between the mainland and the peninsula. Water rushed below faster than anywhere in the world. Pity the boater without enough power to get out of its tremendous pull. Nobody went near the Narrows without an understanding of currents and the tides. At least, as far as I knew, nobody with half a brain ever did. The wind howled and flashing yellow lights warned motorists of excessive winds. An orange wind sock, full and erect, pointed to the north. I held onto the handrail. I looked only in front of me; never at my feet.

I saw them at mid-span. Four figures huddled against the rail. I knew who they were, of course, but if I had been a driver passing by I would have thought they were tourists with a bad sense of timing. The view from the bridge was more beautiful during the day, though nighttime lights off the bay and along the shore were charming. Tonight it only seemed sinister. No one called to me, though I was certain Valerie had turned her head to watch me approach. No one said a word. When I moved closer, I could see why.

Jett had taped my wife and daughters' mouths with wide patches of silvery duct tape. The glossy tape wrapped the circumference of their heads, like permanent hair bands hidden in the back of the hair. I could see the terror in their eyes. All had been crying. The salty residue of tears had dried in telling streaks on their faces. I could also see a knife in Jett's right hand.

She stood in front, the three members of my family in a row behind her. “You're right on time,” she said.

I was nearly out of breath from the walk. I stood a few feet from her and I told myself to remain calm.
Being calm will make this turn out all right
. Steady. Calm. Steady. “What's going on? Jett, why are you doing this?”

She didn't respond at first. And she didn't speak to me. Instead, she turned away, and told Taylor and Hayley to stand next to their mother and hold onto the rail facing off the bridge.

“Don't move until I say so.” Her words were sharp. Cold. Like a piece of steel stored in a freezer. “You too, Valerie!”

Jett stepped closer. She had a kind of bitter look that I would never have thought her capable. I had always believed, I had always told everyone, that Jett Carter was the rare success story. She had been through hell because of her upbringing, yet she had turned out normal. As I stood there, I revised the assessment.

“You don't care who your books hurt, do you? All you care about is your next advance, your next movie deal.”

“I always care about the people I write about.”

“Yeah, right. What you care about is that your next book is bigger than anyone else's. That's the bottom line.”

I tried to remain calm. I reminded her that I hadn't even written
Love You to Death
yet.

“How can you judge it when it hasn't been written? Jett, you were a victim of the crimes of your sister and mother. You didn't have a hand in them. I would never hurt you.”

She pulled the knife out in the open and flashed it down by her thigh. She wanted me to see it again. Not anyone else. Not the passing cars.

“I'm not talking about my mom's story. I'm talking about Austin's story.”

I looked at her blankly. I didn't know who she was talking about. I hoped for a second that this had been some bad misunderstanding. She had the wrong true crime author. Maybe she wanted Ross or the other Ryan?

“Who's Austin?” I asked.

Jett looked to the sky and shook her head in exasperation. “It figures that you don't know. Some great researcher you are. What did you tell me? You might write like a hack but you research like a fiend? Something like that, right, Kevin? For your pathetic information, Austin was Melinda Moser's son. He's my boyfriend. At least he
was
my boyfriend.”

Melinda Moser was the woman whose murder I had written about in
Murder Cruise
. I vaguely knew she had a son. He'd gone to the luau with his father and his murderous paramour that night they killed Melinda. But he was an infant, then, or so I recalled. Surely he wouldn't be more than twelve by now? I barely mentioned him in
Murder Cruise
.

Jett spat her words at me. “You made her sound like some kind of slut.”

“I hadn't meant to do that,” I said, inching slightly closer. I could see my wife and daughters shivering in the bitter combination of cold air and fear. I wanted to run to them and hug them, hold them against the wind and the terror from our supposed friend. I wanted to scoop them up to safety.

Jett was shuddering, too. She told me that she had met Austin at Maplewood when she lent him some of her books.

“He loved me. He loved me for
me
. When you wrote that book and said those nasty things about his mother....” Jett started to cry, though she didn't give up her tears easily. I knew she had fought those same tears all her life. She had told me she was strong. Stronger than her mother and sister. Strong as anyone could be. I knew then that it was a lie. She was still a little girl. She held the knife up higher.

“I didn't mean to hurt him,” I said in my most soothing voice. “Jett, I'm so sorry.”

She stared at me, then down at the water for a moment. She looked as young as ever. She was thin, pale and forlorn. She was a wasted life. She had come to the end of her rope and it had been my fault. Jett Carter was going to take no prisoners that night.

“Austin and I planned on teaching you a lesson, until it happened.” She was fighting. She was trying to hold it in, but her tears came down in a torrent. She waved the knife around, her hand wavering like the wind sock atop the bridge.

I pleaded with her to tell me more. I hadn't a clue about what she was talking about. She seemed distant, oddly out of sync with the moment.

“Until what?” I asked. “Until what happened, Jett?”

She stiffened and stared hard at me. It was the first time in several minutes that I felt us connect. For a second, hope returned. I thought we'd be able to talk this out.

“Until you made him kill himself,” she finally answered. “Think about it, Kevin. Think about writing some of those ugly things that you do and then going on television and telling the world trash about someone's mother. Melinda was Austin's mother. She was not a saint, but she wasn't trailer trash either.”

I reached a hand out in compassion. “You're wrong. You need help,” I said softly. “Let me help you.”

The wild, tormented look returned to her brown peach pit eyes and she spun around and pressed the knife against Hayley's slender, pale throat. I heard a muffled scream from Valerie and I watched Hayley stiffen as she tried to pull her neck away. She couldn't move far enough. The bridge rail held her captive.

The knife glinted in the cold, faint light of the November night.

“You have been through so much,” I said. “Let my girls, let Val go, please. It doesn't have to be this way. You don't have to end up like your mother and your sister. Think about it. Think about where they are and why they are there right now.” I was begging Jett, but she was unresponsive. I implored. I urged. “Think of them.”

“I hate them....” Her eyes met mine as she spoke.

I thought I saw a tear in her eyes.
Was it the cold air? Was it emotion?
If she were feeling something, it would be a start. It would mean that she could be reached.

“I know that's not true, Jett.”

“You don't know anything. My mother sent me away after she made me—” She stopped and twisted the knife.

My adrenalin surged. I was so afraid for my daughter that I nearly panicked.
What to do?
If I jumped at her, Jett might drive the knife into Hayley's throat.

Jett hated me. I could see it in her eyes. She had the look of a person who had not one iota of time for me. I started talking. “Made you what?”

“It doesn't matter. You don't care. All you want is book material. Isn't that right, Val?” She turned to Val and studied her terrified eyes. “Isn't that what you told me? Let's see. Your exact words were something like, 'Kevin sees tragedy and murder the way others see new stock offerings.'”

Val made another muffled cry and shook her head. Her eyes were terror. But I knew that Jett was repeating her words with absolute accuracy. It was true that sometimes I had viewed the world that way.

“What did your mother make you do?” I asked.

“Do you see a TV movie here, Kevin? Do you see dollar signs again?”

I shook my head. “Please, tell me, Jett, what did your mother make you do?”

A tear fell from her eye. Then another. “My mother got my dad drunk the night he died...my mother made me go out on the bridge.”

For an instant, sympathy mixed with fear. I knew what she as going to say. The other figure that the witness had seen that night in Timberlake
was
Jett's mother. A car was running. The exhaust sending a soft plume of white into the air. It was Connie, who had set up her husband. Jett had been used as a tool.

“I'm so sorry. You were so young, you were so abused.” My words were meant to calm her, to win her over, though the effect was the opposite. “It wasn't your fault.”

She wiped her eyes on her coat sleeve. The Jett who had planned to kill me was back. She had pulled herself together. She would not falter. I could see that she had been fighting for control. And if I had hoped that her confession would ease her mind, soften her heart, I was wrong.

“I want you to climb to the top of that tower, Kevin,” she said. “You're gonna jump. You're sorry about your career. You're sorry that your shitty books aren't Number One.”