The exit man, p.24
The Exit Man, page 24
Zoe was no longer sleepy. Painting a picture for me had woken her right up. Gotten her blood pumping. And mine.
“What I don’t get,” I said, sitting down next to her on the sofa, “is how you subdue them enough to be able to work the helium in. What do you do, conk them over the head with something when you get to their place?”
“Nope, I take a page right out of Keith’s playbook,” she responded, a devilish grin forming on her face. “I slip them a roofie at the bar or restaurant.”
“Doesn’t that risk them crashing their car while you’re following them to their house?”
“It’s always a possibility, but that’s why I whisper, ‘Let’s get out of here,’ pretty much immediately after drugging them. They may start to feel a little sluggish behind the wheel, but they manage to make it to their destination. There have been no car crashes, thus far at least.”
“Man, you are taking some real chances.”
“Oh, and picking off fellow support group members one by one isn’t taking chances? You know better than most, Eli, that you have to take chances to accomplish anything worth accomplishing.”
“Yeah, I guess I just don’t… I’m sorry, but I’m just not sure if what you’re accomplishing is… warranted.”
“What the hell does that mean?”
“I mean, do these guys all really deserve to die?”
Zoe bit her lower lip and shook her head. I readied myself in case I had to block a slap or a punch to the face.
“Do they deserve to die?” she said through her teeth. “I guess you’ve never been raped, Eli.”
“What happened to you is awful, and you’re right, I can’t imagine what it must feel like to go through something like that. All I’m saying is you don’t know the whole story behind each of these other cases, what these men may be doing to try to change their lives and make up for their horrendous deeds.”
“I don’t need to know the whole story. These men were all convicted of first or second degree rape, with no appeals. It’s not like they were innocently walking down the street, accidentally tripped, and somehow had their dick pop out of their pants and penetrate a girl or boy they landed on.”
“What if you found out one of the men you’ve killed had, say, I don’t know, started taking medication that stabilized him, and that he had profoundly apologized to and been forgiven by his victim or victims? Maybe he even started volunteering at a church or a shelter or something.”
“I’d say too bad he hadn’t started taking that medication before he brutally violated any innocent people.”
“That’s it? So then you’re all for capital punishment of anyone and everyone who commits a violent crime? Just kill’em all?”
“I had always taken the same liberal stance you’re taking now, Eli. That was before I got raped. Should the government be putting to death every single rapist and violent criminal out there? Probably not. But if a person or someone they love ever ends up a rape victim, and that person decides to put their life on the line to get revenge, I say more power to them.”
“But you weren’t the victim of any of these men you’re snuffing out, and neither was anyone you love.”
“And now I don’t have to worry about any of us becoming one.”
“So is it vengeance, or a preemptive strike?”
“Call it whatever the hell you want. All I know is it feels right… just like your exits feel right.”
“So then, tell me, where does it stop?”
“I don’t know – when I get it all out of my system. Where does it stop with you?”
CHAPTER 26
When you start dating a woman on the heels of her shooting her ex-fiancé, you have no real right to act incredulous if she later goes on a killing spree.
Especially when you, yourself, taught her how to use the weapon.
While I wasn’t at all pleased about the way Zoe had decided to express her fury over having been raped, it was good to see that her murders had yet to interfere with her suicide work. She hadn’t botched any exits or even stumbled slightly with a client since starting her vigilante ways nearly two months earlier.
Still, I knew it was only a matter of time before a slip-up in either arena would send the ceiling crashing down on both of us. Whether she got caught seeking vengeance or administering mercy, it wouldn’t take long before all eyes would be on me, the boyfriend who, it just so happened, had a day job with direct and regular access to the lethal gas in question. Even if Zoe ended up not uttering a word to implicate me, the tangible and intangible evidence had me pegged at least as an accomplice.
Perhaps the most emotionally taxing aspect of all this was knowing that Zoe and I were likely on the outs. It’s very difficult to sustain a romantic relationship when one of the partners starts committing homicide. Up to that point, I had seen us growing as a team who specialized in a noble and humane form of killing, but apparently she felt the need to commit more severe crimes. We clearly wanted different things.
I didn’t know what to do next. A break-up would be exceedingly complicated. And there was no couple’s therapy for what we were dealing with.
As confounded as I was, I couldn’t help being a little impressed by her bold attempt to single handedly wipe our corner of Northeast Oregon clean of sex offenders. If Zoe had been a heroine in a movie I was watching rather than my girlfriend in a life I was living, I would have been rooting for her all the way. She made a damn sexy underground superhero, and I’m sure the film would have portrayed her targets in a way that made me forget they might have been deserving of forgiveness and a second chance.
Had this been the cinema, I’d have been digging into a vat of popcorn and shouting at the screen, “Get’em, Rape Girl – send those bastards straight to hell with your helium kiss!” I might even have bought the special director’s cut DVD when it came out.
But I wasn’t buying this. This didn’t end with me just getting up out of a theater seat and going home to masturbate to a dark celluloid dream. This was me pushed through the screen, forced to pick up all the pieces of debris that our heroine had left in her wake.
Perhaps I’d have felt differently had Zoe worn a custom-fitted Lycra onesie that hugged her contours whenever going after the bad guys. But as things stood, I wasn’t at all down with her mission.
We had it out several times over the next couple of days, with neither of us budging from our respective position. Whenever I’d toss up that I was worried about her and that she was jeopardizing our entire operation, she’d counter with how I was being selfish, how I was only worried about myself and my clients. Whenever I’d point out that some of the men she was targeting may be working hard to rehabilitate and may have families, she’d lambast me for portraying such monsters as victims. I tried to convince her that soon enough she’d get killed or caught. She accused me of being a control freak intent on keeping her under my thumb. I accused her of being delusional. She threw a plate at my head.
Hey, all couples fight.
I guess I just wasn’t comfortable ending a relationship with a woman so quick to fling stoneware, and so adept at murder.
Eventually we came to a compromise on the whole hunting down sex offenders thing. Realizing there was no way Zoe would quit cold turkey, I insisted she at least cut down. No more than one rapist every two months. She agreed. I also instituted a “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy – to keep me from prying and to keep Zoe from reminding me she was mental. In addition, I told Zoe that as long as she continued doing what she was doing, I would no longer supply her with helium, and asked her to return the last tank I had given her. If and when she got caught taking out one of her personal targets, I didn’t want any subsequent police searches turning up a tank tied to Jubilee and me. Zoe initially protested this last condition, but eventually signed off on it.
Once the parameters were set and we were on the same page, things went relatively smoothly – as smoothly as things can go when you’re trying to curb your girlfriend’s homicide habit so that her suicide work doesn’t suffer. From what I could tell, Zoe was holding to her side of the bargain. She seemed to always be where she was supposed to be over the next few weeks, and didn’t show up with any scratches or bruises or black eyes – the kinds of injuries I envisioned a registered sex offender inflicting on a woman alone in a room with him. I noted no suspicious behavior, not secretive sneaking, no contradictory statements or stories when she reviewed her day for me during dinner. The two exits she administered during this period went well, at least by her account. I couldn’t check with the clients directly.
But cracks soon started to appear. Zoe began exhibiting a shorter temper. She snapped at me one night for having boiled rather than steamed the string beans. Gave me an earful for the way I folded her laundry. Elbowed me in the ribs when I tried to initiate sex. (Granted, I shouldn’t have tried to initiate sex the same night I botched the string beans and the laundry.) When she wasn’t irritated, she was distracted, disassociated. I asked her on several occasions if something was bothering her, if she needed to talk, but she’d just shake her head and continue staring at the TV or her laptop or the carpet.
Some nights she’d go to bed late and wake up numerous times before angrily giving up and getting out of bed for good before dawn. Other nights she’d retire early and sleep in until noon, occasionally calling students to cancel lessons. I couldn’t tell if her rapidly fluctuating temperament was due to my having imposed rules on her deadly little initiative and slowing production, or if the strain from the initiative itself was wreaking havoc on her hypothalamus. I wasn’t sure if she had struck again since we had come to our agreement. She’d been given the green light to gas one target every two months, and with about five weeks having passed since our big talk, it was entirely possible she’d already used her token. I couldn’t ask. She couldn’t tell.
Zoe started staying at her house a few nights a week, explaining that it was easier for work. She didn’t indicate what kind of work. Though I was a little hurt by her decision, I felt some space would be good for both of us. She’d feel less supervised and smothered, and I’d suffer fewer internal injuries.
Sure enough, Zoe’s spirits quickly lifted. The trouble was, I didn’t like why – or what I assumed to be the reason. I may have agreed to look the other way while she got her kill on, but promising to sit idly by is much easier than the actual sitting. A part of me had hoped that having found out about her secret slayings and expressing my disapproval would cause her to cease carrying them out. Unfortunately, external validation had little hold on her.
I couldn’t prove that Zoe’s suddenly elevated mood was due to her just having dispatched a bad guy, for I didn’t know if she, in fact, had. But that didn’t stop me from believing it. I was like a jealous husband, convinced that some other man – albeit it a dead one – was responsible for my wife’s new smile.
But it didn’t take long for Zoe’s glow to dim. Within days she returned to her irascible, distracted state. Though it was no joy to experience her agitation and figurative absence, I preferred it to exuberance fueled by what was surely a mounting body count.
I couldn’t ask. She couldn’t tell. But I could step in and say something if her lack of presence ever negatively affected a company-approved exit.
Unfortunately, I soon got my chance.
“Where is your hat?” I asked Zoe one evening after she’d returned to my place from the home of a client named Alice Newhook (liver cancer).
“What are you talking about?” she asked, annoyed by my brash greeting.
“Your hat – the one you always wear and tuck your hair up into whenever doing hood work – where is it?”
“Oh, that. I guess I must have taken it off and left it in the car. What’s the big deal?”
“The big deal is that I found the hat in question on my dresser… while you were out.”
“If you already knew where my hat was, then why did you ask me about it?”
“The bigger question, Zoe, is what, if anything, did you wear on your head during the job in place of the hat you left here?”
Zoe glared at me and shook her head, trapped between contempt and panic. “Don’t worry about it,” she muttered.
“Don’t worry about it because you wore a different hat? Or don’t worry about it because you just realized you fucked up and don’t want to have to think about it?”
“What the fuck, Eli? You’re really enjoying this, aren’t you?” She gritted her teeth.
“Yes, I’m really enjoying that you may very well have left strands of red hair all over the house and next to the body of the person you just euthanized. I’m really enjoying that your lack of focus – no doubt caused by the lovely work you are doing on the side – may land both our asses in prison!”
“Will you relax! Do you really think there’s going to be a homicide investigation of a 77 year-old woman with terminal cancer found dead in her bed with no evidence of forced entry or a struggle?”
“No, I don’t think there will be, but I do think there could be. That’s why we always, always, ALWAYS cover our tracks. It’s impossible to be too safe. Just assume that every exit scene will be analyzed by a crack CSI team.”
“That’s ridiculous.”
“No, what’s ridiculous is going in for an exit without being completely prepared and totally focused. It’s not even just about us getting away with the exit, it’s about doing the kind of quality job our clients deserve.”
“Enough with the lecturing already. I get it. I slipped up. It won’t happen again, okay? Satisfied?”
“I’m not even close to satisfied. You need to get your fucking head back in the game. The way you’ve been acting lately, I don’t know how comfortable I am sending you to another client.”
“Fine! It’s not like I begged you for the job! You’re the one who needed help, and I stepped in.”
“Yeah, and you’ve sure seemed to enjoy it – so much so, you decided to start doing a little extra work on the side.”
“That’s what this is really about. You just can’t stand me being independent, having a little power.”
“No, I can’t stand you being a murderer!”
“A murderer? Fuck you – I’m a hero! What you do is nice and all, comforting the dying, but I’m helping to rid the world of evil.”
“Oh, then why stop at local sex offenders? Why not go after terrorists? Despots? Corporate tyrants. Better yet, reality TV producers?”
Zoe inflated her lungs for an explosive retort, but then let all the air out and tried to hide a smile. It was difficult to tell whether my sarcasm had disarmed her or put some ambitious plans in her head. Was she entertained by my suggestion, or entertaining it?
Then she started to cry and I realized it was neither.
Moments earlier I wanted nothing more than to knock some sense into her; now all I wanted was to tell her everything was going to be okay. But I couldn’t lie.
“Let it out,” I said as I stepped closer and stroked her hair. “I can’t imagine the amount of pressure you’re feeling. You’ve got quite the complex schedule.”
Zoe pushed my hand away. “It’s not that,” she said, still crying. “It’s that I just now saw how you see me – as some psychotic freak. The way you speak to me, the way you mock me, I can see you think I’m out of my mind. It makes me feel kind of worthless.”
From hero to worthless in 30 seconds. A sharp and sudden plummet. I wanted her to come to her senses, not shatter against the rocks.
“That’s not my intention,” I said. “You’re hardly worthless – you’re fascinating. I just think you’ve let things get a little out of hand.”
“I don’t think I can stop,” Zoe responded. She started crying even harder than before.
“Yes you can. I know there’s a lot of fury driving you to do what you’re doing, but you can overcome it.”
“I can’t! You just don’t understand.”
“Then let me find someone who can help you.”
Zoe paused to regain her composure. “What are you talking about?” she asked. “It’s not like I can go to a shrink about this.”
“Why not?”
“Because they don’t keep secrets about dead bodies.”
“You don’t have to tell them the specifics, just tell them what happened to you, without mentioning Keith of course, and that you’re now experiencing uncontrollable rage.”
“You want to know what that will likely get me? Committed to an institution and plugged with tranquilizers. Especially with my history of ‘mood disorders.’ I’d be better off dead.”
“Zoe, we have money. I’m sure we can find a renowned psychiatr… specialist who doesn’t rely on putting patients away and turning them into zombies.”
“Have you ever seen a shrink, Eli?”
“No, but–”
“You don’t know how the mental health system works. I’ve been in and out of clinics most of my life, dealing with doctors and therapists who only care about sticking you with a nice clean definition from their DSM-IV and drugging you accordingly.”
“C’mon, there have to be some progressive practitioners who do things differently.”
“What do you think, Eli? I’m going to find someone who, with the help of some role-playing and Valerian root, will get me to come to grips with my past so that I can stop killing rapists and concentrate more on killing cancer patients? Everything is so far beyond fucked up right now, let’s stop trying to pretend it’s fixable.”
She had a point. But at least she acknowledged there was something wrong with whacking past sex offenders. The first step is admitting you have a problem.
“So what do you suggest?” I asked. “How would you like to proceed?”
Zoe flashed a look of surprise. “That’s the first time you’ve asked me that. You’ve been so busy giving directives.”
