The Burying Place

A flash of flame erupted again.

At the speed of light, the brightness reached her eyes a millisecond before the shell detonated inside her brain. No mercy.

PART THREE SILENT SCREAM

Chapter Thirty-one

Valerie opened her front door on Wednesday morning and found her sister Denise standing on the porch. She cringed, watching the stony expression on Denise's face that covered up wounds of betrayal and humiliation. Valerie would have felt better if Denise had screamed at her, but instead, her sister marched past her into the house without a word.

'Where's Marcus?' she asked after Valerie closed the door.

'In Duluth. He had surgery this morning.'

Denise worked her jaw uncomfortably as if she had something caught in a tooth.

'Do you want some coffee?' Valerie asked.

'Yeah. Fine.'

They walked silently down the white hallway. Valerie retrieved a heavy mug and filled it with coffee and pushed it across the kitchen island to Denise. She sat on a bar stool and waited, but her sister didn't sit down immediately. Valerie could see Denise's eyes comparing the granite countertops and stainless appliances to her own shoebox kitchen. It was the same routine every time Denise set foot inside their house. Valerie knew the bitter envy Denise felt over the money she had. She felt guilty with every withering look.

'Look, Denise,' she began, but her sister held up a hand to stop her.

'Don't say you're sorry. I don't want to hear that.'

'Then what can I say?' Valerie asked.

'Right now, don't say anything.'

Denise stared down the vast, sloping backyard toward the lake. She pushed her hair back behind her ears and drank her coffee in silence. She wore no make-up. Valerie knew that Denise deliberately avoided looking feminine, and for years she'd assumed it was because of her job. Cops weren't girls. They had to be tough. Now she wondered if the real reason was to avoid comparisons with herself. To pretend that there was no competition between them.

'You've been selfish your entire life,' Denise announced in a harsh, angry voice. 'Everything came easy to you. You've never cared what I had to go through. I worked my ass off to get a tenth of what you've got, and you never worked for a damn thing, did you?'

Valerie said nothing to deny it or to protest. Denise believed it, and she deserved a chance to lay blame.

'I always wondered if you gave a thought to me and my life,' Denise continued, turning back from the window. 'I guess now I know, don't I? If there's something you want, you take it, and to hell with everyone else. Do you even have a clue what it's like to raise four kids and be on call every hour of the night and day and wonder if you're going to scrape up enough money to make this month's mortgage payment?'

'No. I don't know. You're right.'

'Well, maybe once in a while you could try to put yourself in someone else's shoes. That would be nice. Do you think I don't know that Tom and I have drifted apart? I've watched it happening for years. But guess what, sometimes life just grinds the love out of you. It sucks, but that's the way it is. I may have a crappy marriage, but it's my marriage. Not yours. Or at least it was until Tom decided that he preferred a fantasy with you to real life with me.'

'Don't blame Tom, please,' Valerie told her. 'This was my fault.'

'Do you think I need you to defend my husband? I know Tom. He wants to be the strong shoulder. And here you come all beautiful and weepy and lonely, and gosh, one thing led to another. Right? Is that what you were going to explain to me? Well, don't bother. Tom had a choice, and he made the wrong one. It doesn’t matter whether either one of you intended it to happen.'

'You won't let me tell you I'm sorry. You won't let me explain. I'm not sure what you want me to say.'

'Oh, am I making this hard on you, Valerie?' Denise snapped. 'Isn't that thoughtless of me. I should be more concerned with how you feel.'

Valerie didn't want to cry, because she didn't want her sister to believe it was another play for sympathy. But she cried anyway and wiped her eyes. 'I know you won't believe this, Denise, but I've always been jealous of you.'

'Oh, right.'

'It's true,' Valerie insisted. 'You've got these great kids. You're married to your high school sweetheart. You have this amazing job.'

'Don't patronize me.'

'I'm not. I just admire how strong you are. I'm not like that. I've been fragile my whole life, and here my sister is this cop, wife, and mother who can handle anything. Just once in my life, I'd like to have the courage to do the right thing and stand up for myself. To be strong like you.'

Denise shook her head. Her eyes were tired and hard. 'How could you, Valerie? How could you sleep with my husband?'

'It wasn't about sex,' Valerie told her. 'I don't care about sex. I never have. I just — I just needed to be close to someone. There's no explanation. There's no excuse. It may not matter to you that we never intended it to become physical, but we didn't.'

'I don't care.'

Valerie nodded and spoke softly. 'It didn't last long. A couple times, that's all. We both knew it was wrong. But you have to understand that Tom rescued me. I'm not sure I'd be alive right now without him. I was thinking of suicide again back then.'

Denise slammed her mug down, making a loud crack of stone against stone. Coffee spilled on the granite countertop. 'You are such a narcissistic little bitch. What do you want me to say? I'm so happy my husband saved my sister's life by fucking her brains out? You want to know what I really think, Val? I wish you'd gotten the balls and done it right. Tom's not your husband. If you needed to be rescued, you should have found somebody else to do it, or you should have taken a bottle of pills and gotten it over with.'

Valerie paled, and she looked away, not wanting her sister to see the body blow she had landed. She separated a few paper towels from the roll on the counter and wiped up the spilled coffee. As she did, Denise reached out and put her hands over Valerie's.

'I'm sorry,' she said.

'You don't have anything to apologize for,' Valerie replied. 'You're right. I was suffering, and I wound up hurting my own sister. I'm selfish, and I'm a coward.'

'Don't start with the self-pity.'

'What else do I have? The only thing I did right in my life was have Callie, and I couldn't even protect her.'

Denise pulled away in frustration. 'This always happens. In the end, it's always about you. And I buy into it. It's been that way all our lives.'

Valerie didn't know what to say. She rubbed the counter until it was dry, making sure the coffee didn't leave a stain.

'I have to ask you something,' Denise told her. 'As a cop and as a wife. I have to know.'

'What?'

'Is Tom the father?'

Valerie's eyes widened in shock.

'Don't play games, Val,' Denise continued. 'I need to know. Is Callie Tom's baby?'

'No.'

'Are you sure?'

'Of course I am.'

'Tom's not sure,' Denise said. 'He told me so last night.'

'He's not Callie's father.'

'How do you know?'

'I just know. I can see Marcus in her.'

'Did you have her tested?'

'Of course not. I couldn't do that.'

'So you're just guessing,' Denise said. 'I asked Tom. He said the two of you had sex not long before you got pregnant.'

Valerie shook her head. 'Marcus and I had sex, too. He was the last one.'

'That doesn’t make any difference.'