Brian Freeman - The Voice Inside

Her moods swooped up and down; her meds seemed to have no effect. The art she used to escape wasn’t nearly enough. She began to lash out at him, the way she had in college, and she spent less and less time with their daughter. When she held the girl, her face grew empty and pained. Eventually, the doctors would tell him it was postpartum depression, magnified by her existing mental illness, but by then, it was too late. The baby sucked up all of Rudy’s time and love, and Hope herself seemed incapable of giving any love to either of them.

He thought it would pass with time. He didn’t realize how volatile the situation had become. And how dangerous.

Not until the November night that changed everything.

Hope had come home late from an exhausting shift at the ER. She found Rudy holding Wren in the nursery, and she flew into a rage, screaming obscenities, telling him that he loved his daughter more than he loved her — and it was a difficult accusation to deny, because it was true. He tried to calm Hope without success. Wren began crying and was inconsolable. Eventually, he put their daughter in his wife’s arms to give the two of them time to be together. He’d always believed that Wren had magical healing powers. If the little girl could make him happy, then she could do anything at all.

Rudy slept. He slept until the middle of the night. He didn’t know what awakened him, but maybe it was the sudden silence. Wren was crying, and then she was not. Hope wasn’t in bed. He got up and called his wife’s name, several times, louder and louder, and she didn’t answer. A feeling crept over him, like a foreboding of evil, strong enough to make it hard to breathe.

He went to the nursery and crossed the river into hell.

His girl, his angel, his perfect daughter, was blue. In that instant, he could physically feel God reach into his chest, remove his heart, rip it to pieces, and tread on it. He wailed. He bellowed. He went to Wren to revive her, but she was gone, her life suffocated by nothing more than a bunny pillow that lay next to her. He held her, sobbing, pacing back and forth.

Wren was dead. Rudy felt as if he had died with her.

Only then did he notice the blood on the floor, trickling in little ribbons downhill from under the crib.

He went around to the other side and found Hope on her back, arms and legs spread wide. She had a terrible, wicked grin fixed on her face. Her eyes were open, lifeless but still staring at him. She had a kitchen knife clutched in one hand that she’d used to slice open her own throat in a grotesque U from below one ear to the other.

Thirty years had passed since that moment, and yet he could still recite every detail of that scene from memory, like a photograph. His dead daughter in his arms. His dead, murdering wife on the floor.

And on the nightstand next to the crib, a digital clock showing him the time.

3:42 a.m.

The strange thing was, the tears stopped when he saw Hope on the floor, and they had never come back. Every emotion drained out of him, like Hope’s blood. He couldn’t feel pain. He couldn’t feel anger. He wanted to cry for his daughter; he wanted to feel rage at his wife. Instead, he felt nothing, and nothingness was far worse than grief. From that moment forward, he’d lived his life in a kind of void, and when the void became unbearable, he’d tried to kill himself. Four times he’d tried, but each time he had failed, as if God didn’t want him.

Day became day, month became month, year became year, melting away like spring snow.

Twenty years passed that way.

Twenty years of numb, interminable, empty time.

Until the numbness finally stopped.

It stopped nine years ago, on April 1, in a coffee shop in the Ferry Building. It was luck or fate or destiny or whatever else people believed in. He’d never been to that coffee shop before or since, but his brother, Phil, had been late to pick him up for the Giants game, so he’d ordered an iced latte from a chatty barista named Nina Flores. It was Nina’s birthday. She was a sweet kid. Hispanic. Cheerful. Fluffy pile of brown hair. So perky it was annoying. She talked and talked, about her job, about school, about her parents and siblings, about her best friend, about her birthday. She showed him childhood photos made into buttons on her T-shirt. She sang “Happy Birthday” to herself.

Nina was an ordinary girl, but for Rudy, she was also a thunderbolt. Nina woke up the monster in him. Seeing her brought Hope back to life, like an evil ghost in Rudy’s head, and he knew that ghost had to be destroyed.

By the time Rudy finished his coffee, everything had changed for him. He’d found his path to revenge because of that girl in the Ferry Building. He became nothing but cold, implacable anger. After twenty years of emptiness, he finally had a purpose and a plan.

Rudy had smiled at Nina as he left, but he was already considering the next steps in his strategy. He’d paid by credit card; he wouldn’t make that mistake again. He had to be careful; he had to choose, observe, think, and anticipate, but those were his best skills. Even then, he’d known Nina would be the first, but she wouldn’t be the last. There were many others, and he knew exactly where to find them.

Nina Flores, Rae Hart, Natasha Lubin, Hazel Dixon, Shu Chan, Melanie Valou. Dying one by one in the years that followed.

Do you remember them, Hope?

And he wasn’t done. Oh no.

The time in San Quentin was only a temporary delay, caused by a detective who refused to play by the rules. Jess Salceda hadn’t beaten him; she’d cheated. Now Rudy would show her what happened to those who got in his way.

He put his hands behind his head and waited. His senses were hyperalert, although he knew he was being impatient. Maybe it wouldn’t be today. Maybe it would be tomorrow. Or the next day. But finally, finally, he heard the sound he’d been anticipating. Footsteps. Boots on the concrete walkway, coming closer. Coming for him.

He saw the bulky prison guard stop directly outside the bars. The guard called to him in a growly voice. “Cutter?”

“Yeah, what is it?”

“You have a visitor.”

Frost had hoped never to see Rudy Cutter again, but there he was. The guard shackled him to the metal table in the small interview room. Cutter, who was wearing jeans and a loose blue smock, studied Frost on the other side of the table the way a tiger sizes up prey. There had been a moment during the murder trial when Cutter looked back at the gallery with the same stare. Frost had never forgotten those eyes, so empty and brutal. It had taken everything in Frost’s power not to jump across the railing in the courthouse and strangle Cutter with his bare hands.

He felt the same way now.

“Rudy Cutter,” Frost said.

“Hello, Inspector.” Cutter didn’t say, I was expecting you. He didn’t need to gloat. The message was clear in the way he held himself. This man knew exactly why Frost was here.

Frost slid the evidence bag with the watch out of his pocket and put it on the table between them.

“This came from you, I assume,” Frost said.

Cutter didn’t say anything for a long time. He leaned forward to study the watch. The contrast of the expensive, sparkling jewelry with the drab, oppressive surroundings of the prison room was striking. Even under a dusty fluorescent bulb, the diamonds and rubies shined.

“It’s beautiful,” Cutter said finally. “The Swiss are very talented. How much do you think a watch like that is worth? Ten thousand dollars? More?”

“I have no idea.”

“Well, it’s so unusual you’d think it would be one of a kind,” Cutter said. He paused, and his eyes narrowed. “But we both know it’s not.”