Fear Nothing (Detective D.D. Warren #7) - Lisa Gardner Page 0,145

box with Dad’s stuff. Kept it under my bed. Maybe Charlie took it afterward. I never thought to ask about my personal possessions after I was arrested. I never woulda been allowed to have ’em anyway.”

“But did you love him?”

She looked at me, her nose smashed, her eyes already swelling shut, her face a pulpy mess.

“Adeline,” she said seriously, “I don’t feel things like love. I can hate. And I can hurt. All the rest is a mystery to me.”

The water was up to her waist now. She reached down to the floor, picked up the knife she’d carefully selected and sharpened just hours ago.

“That’s not true,” I told her. “You love me.”

“But you are my sister,” she said, as if that should explain everything.

No more pounding. My condo, so quiet, as my sister handed the knife to me.

“I don’t know how.”

“Nothing to it.”

“Please . . .”

But my sister simply stared at me. Her last request, my one promise, as she lifted her pale forearm and held it out to me. This close, I could see thin white lines from previous blades. Like a road map, showing the way.

“Remember what I told you,” she said gruffly. “The instructions he gave to Mom. How to do it right.”

I remembered.

I found a thin blue vein, once again, picking my spot with care. Then, slicing down, slow and steady, while my sister’s arm trembled beneath me.

She sighed. Not even a gasp, but a genuine sigh, as if more than her blood was leaving her body. Maybe her rage. Maybe her pain. Maybe all those terrible appetites and horrible desires our father had beaten into her when she’d been too young to defend herself but still old enough to know better.

She raised her second arm. And I cut it, too. Then both arms slid down, into the bathtub, already turning pink as her life bled out into the water.

“I love you,” I whispered.

“She didn’t tell him that,” Shana mumbled. “Mom. Dad. She never loved him. But I did. But I did. . . .”

Her eyes drifted shut. Her head lolled back.

More sounds now. Knocking, pounding, Detective Phil shouting a final warning.

I checked my sister’s pulse. She was gone. No more prison cells for Shana Day. No more days left to dread. No more lives left to ruin.

One last task. I crossed to the bathroom door. Unlocked it. Least I could do given the state of D.D.’s shoulder.

Then, shedding my own clothes. Removing the silk bathrobe that hung on a hook near the tub.

I took up position next to my sister’s body, studying first the blade, then my own smooth white forearm.

My fingers trembled. Funny for a woman who couldn’t feel pain. Who would’ve thought?

And then . . .

Chapter 41

D.D. AND PHIL BURST INTO THE APARTMENT, guns drawn, Phil taking the lead, D.D. flanking him, her injured shoulder tucked protectively behind his form. The apartment manager was already fleeing down the hall. Hightailing it downstairs, where backup would quickly be arriving, as well as the SWAT team and any available officer in Boston.

First thing D.D. noticed was the stench of blood. Second thing she spotted was a green duffel bag on the edge of a king-size bed, in the room straight ahead.

“Bedroom,” she mouthed to Phil.

He nodded shortly, easing his back against the wall, then making a rapid advance.

“Jesus.”

Stepping around his shoulder, she spied Charlie Sgarzi facedown in a pool of blood. Whatever had happened in here, it certainly hadn’t gone according to the Rose Killer’s master plan.

Phil inspected the body more closely, then shook his head.

“Slit throat,” he whispered.

D.D. arched a brow. “You tell me, but doesn’t that strike you as Shana’s handiwork?”

Phil grimaced, arriving at the same conclusion. Shana Day, one of the most notorious female murderers in the state, had to be somewhere in this apartment, along with her sister, Adeline.

Now Phil gestured to a short hallway with two closed doors. He took the first, D.D. doing her best to provide cover with her one good hand.

Phil kicked in the door, revealing the walk-in closet. He conducted a quick search, covering the corners; then they were on to door number two. Master bath, D.D. thought. From inside, she could hear the sound of running water.

Phil tested the knob.

He gave a short nod to indicate that it was unlocked.

She resumed her flanking position.

Phil twisted the knob. Shoved hard on the door.

D.D. sprang inside, leading with Phil’s backup thirty-eight.

And there stood Adeline next to a bloody tub, a knife already arching over her bared