After midnight, p.17
After Midnight, page 17
She pushed even harder, her exhausted arms burning from the effort. Jammed the pillow into her paralyzed son’s face, using one hand to apply pressure to the area of his nose and the other to apply it to his mouth.
She tried to guess how long he had been without air, but couldn’t.
She continued her grim task, red-faced and sweating, panting from exertion, desperate for this nightmare to be over. For her grisly task to be complete.
At last she stopped, exhausted. Then she straightened. Lifted the pillow off her helpless child’s face, the face of a monster.
He looked exactly the same as he had before she started. There was no bruising that she could detect, no blood, nothing to indicate he had been attacked as he lay defenseless in his bed.
Virginia glanced back at the door. It was still closed, and although she could barely see out the small, reinforced rectangular window from this angle, she knew no one was looking in at her, because if anyone had been watching, she would be in handcuffs right now.
She turned back toward Milo and leaned down over his face. Placed her ear as close to his mouth as she could manage, suddenly certain his eyes were going to spring open and he would snarl like a wild animal, like a wild animal that was ravenously hungry, and he would open his jaws wide, so wide that they would encompass his entire face, and his breath would be fetid, and rows and rows of jagged yellow shark’s teeth would arise out of blackened gums, and he would close his jaws around her head, and he would—
No. I won’t do this.
Milo Cain’s body was irreparably shattered. He was comatose and paralyzed. He could no more use his jaws to rip her head off than he could jump out of bed and dance to a medley of show tunes.
But she had to know he was dead.
She had to know for sure.
Because her terror continued to build.
She placed her ear against her son’s slack, half-open mouth. His lips were still warm, but that didn’t mean anything. They wouldn’t have had time to cool yet. She waited, getting her breathing a little more under control. Her heart continued to hammer in her chest like she had just run the Boston Marathon.
After thirty seconds she lifted her head. He wasn’t breathing. There had been not the slightest wisp of an exhalation tickling her ear.
To be certain, she grasped his wrist, the one still shackled to the bed rail, in her trembling hands and felt lightly for a pulse.
Nothing.
Milo Cain was dead.
She had succeeded.
And she had failed.
Because the feeling of pressure inside her head was still there, and it was just as strong as it had been while murdering her only son.
33
Milo waited for the darkness to overtake him, for his brain to snap off, for consciousness to disappear like the devil had flipped a switch.
It didn’t happen. He was alive.
And he was dead.
He watched through Virginia Ayers’s eyes as she examined his prone form, double-checking her homicidal handiwork. She leaned down and felt/listened for evidence of continued breathing. She felt his wrist for a pulse.
Seeing his own body unmoving in the hospital bed was jarring. He hadn’t been able to see himself since sometime before being shot last summer, and the way he looked now, pale and sickly, wasted, was in stark contrast to the way he remembered himself.
Not that he had ever been handsome. He had never been a big man; certainly had not been muscular or athletic.
But this…this pathetic creature lying dead in front of him/Virginia was something out of a bad horror movie. The figure was pale, with slack features and absolutely no muscle tone. It was one step above a skeleton, and the more Milo contemplated the shriveled body, the more he realized that particular comparison might reasonably be considered unfair to the skeleton.
But all of that was beside the point. He was still here. His body was dead but his consciousness lived on. Granted, he was—for the moment, at least—stuck inside the body of a frail geriatric murderess, but he had survived the worst sort of treachery imaginable, and would live (more or less) to fight another day.
How long he would be able to coexist inside this wretched excuse for a human being was debatable, but as long as he was able to think and to plan, he guessed he would be just fine.
In some ways, this situation was an improvement over his recent past. Now, instead of spending most of his time alone and lost inside the prison of his own useless body, he would be mobile, free to push thoughts and suggestions into unsuspecting passersby at will.
It was only a matter of time before the conniving, traitorous Virginia Ayers—Milo contemplated the murder she had just pulled off with a kind of paternalistic pride, not having believed Mommy Dearest capable of such…definitive, Milo Cain-like action—would meet up again with her daughter, The Evil Bitch Caitlyn Connelly.
It would likely happen sooner, rather than later. And when it did, Milo intended to be right here, comfortably ensconced in Mommy’s head, from where he would be able to finish off the beautiful pain in his ass once and for all. Eliminating Caitlyn Connelly was the only thing he cared about now, and the one thing he intended to accomplish.
It was the one thing he would accomplish.
Assuming, of course, the old hag didn’t get herself arrested for murder in the meantime.
34
Virginia tried to get her breathing—and her nerves—under control. She lifted Milo’s still-warm head and slid the pillow back under it. Then she stood motionless. She knew she was wasting valuable time, that she should be getting the hell out of there as fast as she possibly could without arousing undue suspicion. The amount of time it would take for someone to discover Milo’s dead body was limited, probably very limited, and every second wasted meant a greater likelihood of being caught and arrested.
But if she left now, she would arouse suspicion, she was sure of it. She was panting as though she had just stepped off a treadmill, and sweat trickled down her face in numerous tiny rivulets.
She breathed deeply, in and out, willing herself to calm down. And it worked. More or less. She tried to digest the implications of today’s ugly business. Virginia Ayers was a murderer. Another human being had died by her hands. Not even just another human being, which would be bad enough, but her own child.
She had crossed a line and could never go back. And it wasn’t like she expected to get away with killing Milo Cain. Quite the opposite. The minute a nurse or a doctor or a guard came in here and discovered Mr. Midnight’s lifeless body, prison staff would immediately become suspicious. The inmate/patient dying right after being visited by his mother—the same mother who had now come two days in a row after being absent for six months—would raise red flags in the head of anyone but the densest of idiots. And Warden Ciuffetti struck Virginia as a lot of things, but idiotic wasn’t among them.
An autopsy would be performed and Virginia had no doubt it would show Milo had been suffocated.
There would be only one suspect.
But none of that particularly concerned Virginia. She had taken the only action possible in a desperate attempt to protect her other child, and she knew that having done so, she would punish herself far worse every day for the rest of her life than the Commonwealth of Massachusetts ever could.
She would eventually be arrested, tried, and convicted of murder. She would serve out the rest of her days in prison. She might even become as notorious as Milo: the mother who cold-bloodedly executed her paralyzed and comatose son.
Wouldn’t that be ironic.
Whatever the ultimate consequences, she accepted them. Looked forward to them, almost.
But not now. Not yet. She had to see Caitlyn one more time as a free woman, had to explain to her what she had been trying to do and how desperately she had wanted to help.
To give Caitlyn one last hug and tell her she loved her.
That was all she wanted. Then Massachusetts could have her. They could exact whatever punishment they deemed appropriate and Virginia would not fight them.
But not yet. Right now, she needed to make her way out of Bridgewater State Hospital and get on an airplane to Florida as quickly as she possibly could.
She considered the pressure in her skull and its significance. The odd sensation had leveled off, exactly as Caitlyn described to her. It was distracting for its unusual nature but not particularly painful. It was like having a head cold without the coughing or the sneezing or the runny nose. The painful thing was what it signified: the presence of Milo Cain.
Virginia decided she could live with it. For now. She had no choice.
She took one last deep breath and let it out slowly.
Wiped the sweat from her face with her sleeve.
And turned around to find the guard leveling his gun in her face.
* * *
“Step away from the inmate,” he said quietly. His voice was clear and his gun hand steady.
“Excuse me? What’s the matter?” Virginia asked, wrinkling her brow, trying to look innocent, doubting she could pull it off. She didn’t think she could ever look innocent again. It was a wasted effort. She had been caught and that was it. There would be no seeing Caitlyn again until she was behind bars. Still, she had to try.
“I watched you remove the pillow from the inmate’s face, and then I watched you place it under his head. I’m not sure what’s going on here, but know what it looks like. Now step away. I won’t ask again.”
Virginia had no choice. She did as she was told, moving toward the side wall.
The guard eased up to Milo’s hospital bed. He shifted the gun from his right hand to his left but kept it pointed in Virginia’s direction. Then he reached down and placed the first two fingers of his right hand lightly against Milo’s neck, just under his ear.
For a moment nothing happened and then the guard’s eyes narrowed and he looked over at Virginia incredulously. “He’s dead. You killed him. You crazy bitch, you killed your own son. Nobody in the world is going to miss this sick son of a bitch, but you killed your own son.” He shook his head. “I guess now I know where he got it from.”
He shifted the gun back to his right hand and took one step toward Virginia. “Turn around and put your hands behind your back. You’re coming with me.”
Before she could comply, the man’s body jerked once and became still. It was as though he had taken a jolt of electricity. His eyes glazed over and his facial expression slackened and he said woodenly, “You’re free to go now, Ms. Ayers. Go straight to the exit and get out.”
Milo.
Virginia’s blood ran cold. Oh, God, I’ve made things worse. I tried to help and I’ve only made things worse. She prayed Milo wouldn’t force the guard to injure or even kill himself just for fun. Her eyes filled with tears and she was paralyzed by fear. She literally could not move. She thought of Milo’s useless body and recognized the irony.
Then the guard hissed, “I told you to leave, now get out!”
And Virginia had an epiphany. She had to do as she was told. She had to leave. The alternative was to disobey the guard/Milo and in doing so bring a bloodbath to Bridgewater State Hospital. Milo would force suggestions into the guard’s brain, ugly suggestions, and soon the killing would start, and it would come from a guard, someone unexpected, and by the time it was all over, it would be like Milo had wrought the apocalypse.
And it would all be Virginia’s fault.
So she began walking. She edged past the guard, who had lowered his gun and was now standing stock-still, like an appliance that had been unplugged. She tottered to the door, feeling like she might be sick to her stomach at any moment.
Looked back at the guard. He hadn’t moved a muscle as far as she could tell.
She opened the door and forced what she hoped was a look of composure onto her face.
Then she walked out into the hallway, closing the door firmly behind her.
35
Getting out of the prison was easy. Virginia simply retraced her steps to the front entrance and walked out the door. She kept expecting to be challenged by someone, for a guard to come around a corner and ask brusquely what the hell an old lady was doing walking around a supposedly secure penitentiary unescorted.
But nothing of the kind happened. The few people she saw—a couple of harried nurses while she was still in the medical portion of the facility, and then a couple of guards after that—paid her no attention whatsoever.
She wondered whether that was Milo’s doing or not. There was no way of knowing for sure, but her guess was that, while Milo wouldn’t hesitate to take action if necessary to ensure her escape—it was obviously to his advantage to do so—the Bridgewater State Hospital staff was so shorthanded and so overworked that unless she brandished a weapon and shouted “Death to the pigs!” everyone was so busy with their own duties, they weren’t about to add to their workload by worrying about one harmless old lady.
Ten minutes later she was out of the facility and sliding into the taxi, grateful she had paid the driver handsomely to wait for her.
“Where to now?” the bored cabbie asked.
She considered the question. Milo’s “suggestions” to the guard would only hold for so long, and when they wore off, it would take almost no time at all for someone to discover the dead body lying in Milo’s room. Shortly after that, the authorities would begin looking for her.
And she wasn’t quite ready to be apprehended yet. She had gotten a second chance from the last person in the world she would ever have expected to receive one, and even though Milo’s reason for granting it were obviously diametrically opposed to hers, she wanted to make the most of that chance.
Having Milo inside her brain was terrifying, but Virginia was starting to work through the fear and the horror and thought that maybe, just maybe, there was a way to deal with the situation.
First things first, though. She had to get out of here.
“Providence, Rhode Island,” she said. “T.F. Green State Airport.”
The cabbie suddenly looked a lot less bored and a lot more pleased.
Virginia had lived in New England her entire life until moving to Tampa last fall, and she knew that Green Airport was actually located south of Providence, in Warwick, Rhode Island. So not only had the driver made good money to cool his heels in a Bridgewater parking lot, he was about to collect his second decent-sized fare of the day.
The cab accelerated out of the lot and turned toward Interstate 495. Virginia turned in her seat and watched the buildings of the ancient Bridgewater State Hospital complex shrink away to nothing through the rear window, her nerves settling but her mind still filled with conflicting emotions.
And Milo Cain.
* * *
She had chosen Green Airport because she doubted the cabbie would be able to complete the roughly fifty-minute drive to Boston’s Logan Airport before Milo’s lifeless body was discovered.
Once that happened and the authorities began questioning her, she would never be able to hide her guilt. Nor would she attempt to. She was willing, even anxious, to accept the consequences of her actions. The time simply wasn’t right yet.
The scenery whizzed past as the cab sped south, crossing the line from Massachusetts into Rhode Island. Virginia barely noticed. All her attention was focused on what was going to happen, or what probably already was happening, back in Bridgewater. Once Milo’s lifeless body was discovered, the police would research Virginia’s recent travel history, and then would dispatch an officer to Logan to intercept her before she could depart.
Green Airport was almost exactly the same distance from Bridgewater as Logan was, just in a different direction—not to mention a different state—so while there was some possibility they would cover that departure point as well, it seemed unlikely, for a couple of reasons.
First, no matter what their suspicions, it would take the authorities some time to determine with certainty that Milo’s death following his mother’s visit actually was murder and not just an odd coincidence. This would make Virginia Ayers simply a person of interest and not a murder suspect. This would likely make a critical difference in how thoroughly they searched for her.
For a while.
But even more importantly, Milo Cain had brutally tortured and murdered at least a dozen people in the Boston area over the last decade, and been responsible for the murder of a law enforcement officer in Revere last summer. His death would not exactly bring tears to anyone’s eyes in Massachusetts. The initial reaction of the guard back at Bridgewater—nobody in the world is going to miss this sick son of a bitch—would be the reaction of police officials everywhere.
The murder would be investigated, of course it would, and Virginia would eventually face prosecution. But the amount of sweat equity expended by the authorities in tracking down Milo Cain’s killer could not help but be affected by their revulsion to his gruesome personal history.
It might not be right or fair, but Virginia felt certain it was true. So she tried to relax as the taxi cruised through the city of Providence. She remained frightened as hell of the specter inside her head but only slightly of the police.
Soon they would reach T.F. Green airport, and shortly after that Virginia Ayers—and what was left of Milo Cain—would be airborne, headed back to the Gulf Coast of Florida and whatever fate awaited them there.
36
Milo would not have imagined it possible after spending the last six months trapped inside a smashed and motionless body, but he was bored out of his mind. Back in the first phase of his life, before that fateful afternoon in Revere when everything changed, Milo had spent every day living on a razor’s edge.
For those existing on the fringes of society, life was sharper, clearer and more focused than for those comfortably ensconced in “normal” American society. “Normal” people’s senses had long since been dulled by their warm, safe homes, and their reliable cars, and their steady paychecks, and their fully stocked refrigerators and 401(k)s.
