Patricia Cornwell - Book of the Dead

“I hear you was spying on me and Shandy when we was in the morgue like you’re a damn two-legged Patriot Act.” He goes first, maybe assuming that is why she’s here. “You don’t know by now not to try shit like that on me?”

Foolishly, he tries to intimidate her when he knows damn well he’s never intimidated her, not even when she was a child. Not even when she was a teenager and he ridiculed — at times mocked and shunned — her for who and what she is.

“I already talked about it with the Doc,” Marino goes on. “There’s nothing left to say, so don’t start in on me.”

“And that’s all you did with her? Talk to her?” Lucy bends forward, slides her Glock out of her ankle holster and points it at him. “Give me one good reason why I shouldn’t kill you,” she says with no emotion.

He doesn’t answer.

“One good reason,” Lucy says it again. “You and Shandy were just fighting like hell. Could hear her screaming all the way out on the street.”

She gets up from the couch, walks over to a table, and opens the drawer. She pulls out the Smith & Wesson.357 revolver she saw last night, sits back down, slides her Glock back into her ankle holster. She points Marino’s own gun at him.

“Shandy’s fingerprints are all over this place. I imagine there’s plenty of her DNA in here, too. The two of you fight, she shoots you and speeds off on her bike. Such a pathologically jealous bitch.”

She pulls back the revolver’s hammer. Marino doesn’t flinch. He doesn’t seem to care.

“One good reason,” she says.

“I don’t got a good reason,” he says. “Go ahead. I wanted her to and she wouldn’t.” He means Scarpetta. “She should have. She didn’t, so go ahead. I don’t give a shit if Shandy gets blamed. I’ll even help you out. There’s underwear in my room. Help yourself to her DNA. They find her DNA on the gun, that’s all they need. Everyone in the bar knows what she’s like. Just ask Jess. No one would be surprised.”

Then he shuts up. For a moment, the two of them are motionless. Him standing in front of the door, hands down by his sides. Lucy on the couch, the revolver pointed at his head. She doesn’t need the larger target of his chest. He is well aware of that fact.

She lowers the gun. “Sit down,” she says.

He sits in the chair near his computer. “I guess I should have known she’d tell you,” he says.

“I guess it should tell you a lot that she didn’t. Not a word to anyone. She continues to protect you. Isn’t that something?” Lucy says. “You see what you did to her wrists?”

His answer is a sudden brightening of his bloodshot eyes. Lucy’s never seen him cry.

She continues, “Rose noticed. She told me. This morning when we were in the lab, I saw for myself — the bruises on Aunt Kay’s wrists. Like I said. What are you going to do about it?”

She tries to push away images of what she imagines he did to her aunt. The idea of him seeing her, touching her, makes Lucy feel far more violated than she would if she had been the victim. She looks a this huge hands and arms, his mouth, and tries to push away what she imagines he did.

“What’s done is done,” he says. “Plain and simple. I promise she’ll never have to be around me again. None of you will. Or you can shoot me just the way you said and get away with it like you always do. Like you have before. You can get away with anything you want. Go ahead. If someone else did to her what I did, I’d kill him. He’d already be dead.”

“Pathetic coward. At least tell her you’re sorry instead of running away or committing suicide by cop.”

“What good would it do to tell her? It’s over. That’s why I find out about everything after the fact. Nobody called me to go to Hilton Head.”

“Don’t be a baby. Aunt Kay asked you to go see Madelisa Dooley. I couldn’t believe it. It makes me sick.”

“She won’t ask me nothing again. Not after you being here. I don’t want either of you asking me nothing,” Marino says. “It’s over.”

“Do you remember what you did?”

He doesn’t answer. He remembers.

“Say you’re sorry,” she says. “Tell her you weren’t so drunk that you don’t remember what you did. Tell her you remember and you’re sorry and you can’t undo it but you’re sorry. See what she does. She won’t shoot you. She won’t even send you away. She’s a better person than I am.” Lucy tightens her grip on the gun. “Why? Just tell me why. You’ve been drunk around her before. You’ve been alone with her a million times, even in hotel rooms. Why? How could you?”

He lights a cigarette, his hands shaking badly. “It’s everything. I know there’s no excuse. I’ve been half crazy. It’s everything, and I know it doesn’t matter. She came back with the ring and I don’t know.”

“Yes, you do.”

“I should never have e-mailed Dr. Self. She fucked with my head. Then Shandy. Medications. Booze. It’s like this monster moved inside of me,” Marino says. “I don’t know where it came from.”

Disgusted, Lucy gets up, tosses the revolver on the couch. She walks past him toward the door.

“Listen to me,” he says. “Shandy got me this stuff. I’m not the first guy she’s handed it out to. Last one had a hard-on for three days. She thought it was funny.”

“What stuff?” Even though she knows.

“Hormone gel. It’s been making me crazy, like I want to fuck everyone, kill everyone. Nothing’s ever enough for her. I never been with a woman who can’t get enough.”

Lucy leans against the door, crosses her arms. “Testosterone prescribed by a dirtbag proctologist in Charlotte.”

Marino looks baffled. “How did you…” His face darkens. “Oh, I get it. You’ve been in here. That fucking figures.”

“Who’s the asshole on the chopper, Marino? Who’s the jerk you almost killed in the Kick ’N Horse parking lot? The one who supposedly wants Aunt Kay dead or out of town?”

“I wish I knew.”

“I believe you do.”

“I’m telling the truth, I swear. Shandy must know him. She must be the one trying to run the Doc out of town. The jealous fucking bitch.”

“Or maybe it’s Dr. Self.”

“Hell if I know.”

“Maybe you should have checked out your jealous fucking bitch,” Lucy says. “Maybe e-mailing Dr. Self to make Aunt Kay jealous was poking a snake with a stick. But I guess you were too busy having testosterone sex and raping my aunt.”

“I didn’t.”

“What do you call it?”

“The worst thing I ever did,” Marino says.

Lucy won’t take her eyes off his. “How about that silver-dollar necklace you got on? Where’d you get it?”

“You know where.”

“Shandy ever tell you about her potato-chip daddy’s house getting burglarized not long before she moved here? Burglarized right after he died, matter of fact. Had a coin collection, some cash. All gone. Police suspect an inside job but couldn’t prove it.”

“The gold coin Bull found,” Marino says. “She’s never said nothing about a gold coin. The only coin I’ve seen is this silver dollar. How do you know Bull didn’t lose it? He’s the one who found that kid, and the coin’s got the kid’s print on it, right?”

“What if the coin was stolen from Shandy’s dead daddy?” Lucy says. “What does that tell you?”

“She didn’t kill the kid,” Marino says with a hint of doubt. “I mean, she’s never said nothing about having kids. If the coin has anything to do with her, she probably gave it to somebody. When she gave me mine, she laughed, said it was a dog tag to remind me I was one of her soldiers. Belonged to her. I didn’t know she meant it literally.”

“Getting her DNA’s a fine idea,” Lucy says.