Karen Rose - I’m Watching You

Judge Edmund Hillman, attorney Gerald Simpson, and rapist Clarence Terrill.

He looked down at the gun in his right hand, then at his left. Leah’s medallion. He’d worn it around his neck, on his own chain, since they’d removed it from her body at the morgue. He turned it, let it hit the light. Looked at the engraved initials as he’d done so many times before. WWJD. What would Jesus do?

He closed his eyes. Not what he’d done. Never what he’d done.

In the background droned the sound of his own voice, reading the transcript from Leah’s trial. He’d made the CD weeks ago, when he’d planned this final scene. He’d left it to play on an endless loop while he’d driven to Kansas.

These men must have heard it play ten, twenty times by now. Maybe more.

Then he’d driven to Kansas. That he’d killed Kaplan was a foregone conclusion. The man deserved to die. That he’d done it in such a blind, animal rage…

Then he’d looked into the eyes of that child. She’d seen him.

And he actually lifted his gun to kill her, too.

She’d said nothing, Kaplan’s child. She’d just stood there as he rose from the garage floor like a monster in a horror film, bloody and insane with the rage that had taken over his mind. She’d just stood there looking at him over her father’s car, her eyes wide and frozen.

He’d almost killed a defenseless child. A child who’d harmed no one. An innocent. And in that moment he knew what he’d become.

He’d become just like those he’d come to hate.

He’d lowered the gun to his side. Dropped the tire iron, then run to his van, and driven for miles before stopping to wash himself in the snow. There was red all around as he scrubbed and scrubbed. Finally, he got back in his van and drove the long hours back to Chicago, back to Kristen’s house, where he’d parked a block away, created a diversion, dropped off his final envelope and come home.

He was cold. He ached. But he still had a job to do. He always finished what he started. Heavily, he pulled himself to his feet and moved to switch off the CD player, feeling three sets of eyes watching his every move. Silence filled the room.

„I hope you remember Leah Broderick,“ he said. „She was my daughter. She’s dead.“

„I didn’t kill her.“ This defiant little moan from Clarence Terrill. He turned to look at the man who’d defiled his child. Unremorseful until the bitter end.

He lifted the gun and pulled the trigger and Clarence Terrill was defiant no more. He turned to Simpson who was sobbing, begging for mercy. „And you portrayed her as a whore, stripping away what little self-esteem she had left.“ Another shot, and Simpson went limp. „There’s your mercy.“ He turned to Hillman who could only stare back in terror.

„And you, Judge Hillman. I perhaps hold you at greatest fault of all. You swore to uphold the law, but you abused it. In the weeks that I’ve thought about this day, I planned to hold a mock trial where I would be the judge. But there’s no point to such theatrics. I’m finished.“ With no further ado, he ended the judge’s life with far more mercy than the man deserved.

He was so tired. But he had one more letter to write. He looked at the gun he held in his hand, smelled the acrid odor of discharged powder. Then he’d join Leah.

Saturday, February 28,

2:00 P.M.

Through all the horror of the past week and a half, Abe had never seen Kristen looking so fragile. She sat on her sofa, so pale. A phone call to Kaplan’s town sheriff confirmed that Kaplan was indeed dead. His wife had found him savagely beaten to death in his own garage. The local authorities had thought it a robbery gone wrong. But what had seemed the final blow to Kristen’s composure was finding out Kaplan’s wife had found her child standing at the garage entrance, in shock. What the child had seen, nobody knew because she’d withdrawn, saying nothing. But there were prints this time. Bloody prints everywhere. He’d cracked. Their killer had finally cracked.

Kristen was hanging on to her own control by a slim, fragile thread.

Gingerly he sat next to her, put his arm around her shoulders. But she didn’t melt into him. She sat rigid, staring straight ahead. „Kristen, what can I do for you?“

„I don’t know.“ Her eyes closed. „I am so tired, Abe.“

„I know you are, honey. But he’s made a bad mistake this time. We’ll catch him soon and this whole thing will be over.“ He rubbed her back with the flat of his palm. „We’ll go someplace warm and forget any of this happened.“

She said nothing and he groped for a new topic, for anything that would reanimate her face. She was scaring him. „The service was beautiful, wasn’t it?“ he murmured. „Sean and Ruth were so happy.“ If anything she stiffened. „I thought about my son today.“ She turned at that, looking up at him, her eyes so full of pain, it nearly broke his heart. „I guess you were thinking about your daughter. Savannah.“

„Abe…“

He cupped her face, gently sweeping his thumb along the curve of her cheek. Back and forth. „Then I thought about us, standing in front of the church, holding our child.“

But what he’d thought would give her ease had the opposite effect. She lurched to her feet and backed away from him, her eyes panicked. „Stop.“

Standing, he reached for her, but she took another few stumbling steps back. „Abe, stop.“ She closed her eyes. „I need to tell you something and I need you to listen because it’s hard to say.“

They were the same words she’d used last night, before revealing the truth about her child. His heart chilled and he slowly lowered his hands. „All right.“

She visibly schooled her features, straightened her posture and clasped her hands behind her back and all at once she was the woman he’d met ten days before. Her protective shields reerected. Untouchable. „I won’t have any more children.“

Her dispassionate words were a kick to the gut, sucking the air from his lungs. He could say nothing at first, then made himself breathe. „Kristen, I know you feel guilty about placing your daughter up for adoption, but that doesn’t mean you won’t be a good mother.“

Her eyes flickered wildly and for a moment he thought she’d laugh hysterically. But her control was secure and when she spoke it was calmly. „No, Abe, you don’t understand. I’m unable. I’m…“ She swallowed hard. „After the baby was born, they took her away and I thought my life was over. I’d given away something so precious… But I told myself that I was still young. I might have another someday. Then six weeks later I came back for the follow-up exam and they found I’d developed a growth.“ Her lips twisted, but her posture remained controlled. „Kaplan had done more than rape and impregnate me. He apparently gave me a nasty little STD that over the months of my pregnancy had become cancerous.“

His face must have shown his shock because she threw him a brittle smile. „Don’t worry. It’s all gone, along with half of my cervix.“

Abe blindly felt for the sofa behind him and sat on the arm. He drew a breath and searched for the words that she would believe. That he believed himself.

It doesn’t matter . Of course it did.

We can adopt . The irony there was just too much.

For a moment he grieved the loss. He’d never see her round and full with his child. He’d never splay his hands over her round belly and feel his child kick. He’d never stand beside her as she battled through labor. He’d never stand in front of the church holding his own child while his family and friends looked on in joy. All the things he’d watched Sean and Ruth do over the years. All those things he’d never do. They’d never do.