TWIN KILLER MYSTERY THRILLER BOX SET (Two full-length novels) Read online

  THREE TIMES A LADY

  A DANA WHITESTONE THRILLER

  BY JON OSBORNE

  COPYRIGHT 2013

  Other titles by Jon Osborne:

  KILL ME ONCE

  A GAME OF CHANCE

  For Jacob

  PART I

  CLEANING UP AFTER THE STORM

  “If this is normal, we have a serious problem in this country. The federal government ought to be embarrassed about what is happening. If local government tried to run things this way, we’d be run out of town.” – Benny Rouselle, president of Plaquemines Parish, Louisiana, commenting on the cleanup efforts following Hurricane Katrina in 2005.

  Chapter 1

  Chicago - 1981

  I’m standing in my bedroom, peeing my pants.

  I’m eight years old and fully aware of what I’m doing, but I can’t seem to stop myself. Warm, dull-yellow moisture seeps deep into the crotch of my tighty-whities. A hot rush of blood floods into my cheeks.

  “Disgusting, foul little creature…” my mother begins but I already know the rest before the words are all the way out of her pretty mouth. They’re the same words she speaks every time, delivered in the condescending tone she favors. There’s nothing new about this in the least. It might’ve been a different day, sure, but it’s still the same old crap – with the same crazy woman who’d lost her mind years ago. The same crazy woman the state has recently decided is a fit parent after all, even after the horrible thing she’d done to my little brother.

  My mother drops her gaze and studies my underwear some more, wrinkling her slender nose in revulsion. Somehow, this ugly action only makes her look even more beautiful. “You’re almost nine years old already, for Christ’s sake,” she goes on, shaking her head in annoyance and returning her stare to mine. “You do know what this means, don’t you?”

  My heart flips over inside my chest. Of course I know what it means.

  Doesn’t mean I have to like it, though.

  I close my eyes tight and breathe in deeply through my nostrils, wishing with all my heart and soul that I were somewhere other than my bedroom right now.

  Anywhere other than my bedroom.

  In my mind’s eye, I float away to my safe place. A large clearing deep in the verdant woods where I sit Indian-style on the ground beside a babbling brook and let the calming sounds of nature wash over me and soothe my soul.

  More than anything else, this imaginary world of mine is a nice place. A safe place.

  But my mother doesn’t like nice or safe places. Never has and never will. To prove this point for the millionth time in her life, she steps forward and jerks me physically out of my reverie, grabbing me roughly by the scruff of my scrawny neck and squeezing hard.

  “I asked you a question, you filthy little bastard,” she hisses through clenched teeth. Her licorice-scented breath rushes into my nostrils. More urine spreads across my crotch. “Answer me. You do know what this means, don’t you?”

  I look up at her with pleading eyes that are filled with tears as her sharp red fingernails dig even deeper into my tender skin and leave half moon-shaped marks that won’t disappear for at least an hour. I’m trying my best to connect with her on some sort of soul-to-soul level but I don’t have especially high hopes that it will work. Still, who knew? Maybe this time I could warm her heart and avoid the consequences. Maybe this time we could make a new start and try to love each other again. Stop being lunatics for a little while and start living normal lives again for a change. That wouldn’t be so bad, would it?

  The cold, hard look of detachment in her freezing green eyes disabuses me of this silly notion at once. Silly notions – among certain other things in our house – are luxuries she never allows.

  “It means a trip to the butcher’s shop,” she continues sharply when I can’t quite operate my swollen tongue properly enough to produce words. “Now get dressed.”

  I rub at my throbbing neck when she finally releases me from her viselike grip and do as I’ve been instructed while five feet away she taps a high-heeled foot impatiently against the wooden floorboards in my bedroom – the same bedroom I used to share with Timmy, though each and every last trace of my little brother has been erased now. No more of Timmy’s clothes or toys or bedding lying around. No toothbrush of his positioned next to mine on the cracked bathroom sink. Not so much as a hint that the little boy who’d starred in no fewer than three-dozen national television commercials when he’d been alive had ever been there at all. Because the same day Timmy died – the same day my mother had brutally murdered him – was the same day she’d sanitized our bedroom completely, along with the rest of our house, save for a single lonely picture she’d slipped into a gilded silver frame that now sat on a living-room end-table with a long-ago-wilted black rose stationed in front of it on a piece of her very best china. Where the videotapes of Timmy in his television commercials had gone was a complete mystery to me. Probably always would be. Who knew? Maybe she’d destroyed them. Just like she’d destroyed Timmy. I certainly wouldn’t put it past her.

  Just like she’d undoubtedly destroy me too someday.

  Like, maybe even today.

  Chapter 2

  Walking over to the corner of my bedroom on rubbery legs, I slide open the top drawer of my scarred oaken bureau before reaching in and selecting a fresh pair of Hanes, at the same time drifting back mentally to the day of the “accident”. That was what we called it around here, if the subject was ever spoken of at all, which, truth be told, didn’t happen very often these days.

  The accident.

  A funny way to describe repeatedly bashing your youngest child’s skull into the sharp edge of a porcelain bathroom sink and cracking it open like a ripe watermelon in sickening explosions of red.

  I shake my own head to banish the unsettling memory to the special place inside my brain that I reserve for such things. It simply wouldn’t do to think about that horrible day right now. Not with my mother standing so close. She’d sense it, like a rabid dog that has glimpsed a flash of bright red blood at a child’s pale white throat before succumbing to overwhelming, inbred instinct to attack.

  Still, had I been older at the time, I might have laughed at the absurdity of it all. Because decades before the empty political slogan would first be posited, I was the child who’d been left behind, both literally and figuratively. And I’d been left behind with a living, breathing monster. A monster with an almost-too-perfect body, a breathtaking face that could stop traffic clean in the middle of a New York City rush-hour and crystal-clear green eyes that could see right through my soul and recognize that I was a monster too.

  I have one leg out of my soiled underwear when my mother corrects me for the first time that day.

  “No, keep those ones on,” she says, clucking her small pink tongue against her perfect white teeth in exasperation. “It’ll remind you of the filthy little boy you’ve been here today and of the terrible sin you’ve committed in the eyes of God. I’ll be waiting for you out in the car. Don’t make me wait long.”

  With that, she pivots on her well-turned ankles smartly enough to put an SS soldier to shame and marches out of my room. The gunshot sounds of her clacking footsteps fading away down the long hall are followed a moment later by the slamming of the front door in the distance, giving my heart a terrible start.

  Ten seconds later, the car engine roars to life out in the driveway.

  When I’m absolutely certain she’s exited the house, I lift my left wrist and quickly check my Mickey Mouse watch, a gift from my mother on my eighth birthday that she insists I wear
at all times. A little something to prove to the people from the state how much she truly cares about me. How she’d never intentionally hurt me.

  How she’d rather die than lose another child.

  I fight back bitter tears at the utter absurdity of her lies. Because if the tens of thousands of dollars from companies such as Kraft and Kellogg’s and Pine-Sol hadn’t been enough to keep Timmy alive despite all the money that had been rolling in, what were my chances? Not good, to say the least. Like my mother always told me, I wasn’t worth one thin dime.

  Mickey’s arms are pointing out the hour and minute and I know that I only have about thirty seconds to get out to the car before my mother really blows her top. Patience might have been a virtue in the bible – which my mother reads and quotes constantly – but it sure as hell doesn’t play any part in her personal psychological inventory. Then again, where was the big surprise in that? All religious people were hypocrites, weren’t they? Do-as-I-say-and-not-as-I-do types?

  Sure as heck seemed like that to me.

  Pulling my wet underpants back up around my waist with a loud elastic snapping sound, I slip my legs into a pair of dark blue shorts so that prying eyes can’t see my shame. Much like upsetting my mother, it’s never a good idea to embarrass her, either. There are consequences to that, too. Harsh consequences. Always have been and always will be.

  Shame properly camouflaged, I hustle down the long hallway past all the pictures hanging on the walls and lock our heavy wooden door behind me before double-timing it down the cracked walkway to our car.

  Climbing up into the back seat as quietly as I possibly can, I pull shut the door softly, clicking it ever so slightly and being very careful to avoid making any sort of unnecessary noise. Annabeth Preston isn’t the kind of woman who wastes her words. When she says that children exist to be seen and not heard she really means it. It isn’t just a silly cliché to her. Hell, she’d proved that much the day she’d split Timmy’s skull clean in two for the unforgivable sin of succeeding so wildly in an area in which she’d failed so miserably.

  And I know beyond a shadow of a doubt – know with every last fiber of my eight-year-old being – that she isn’t in the least bit afraid to prove it again.

  This time on me.

  Chapter 3

  In the backseat of our car – a 1978 Lincoln Continental that I’m charged with maintaining in the same sparkling condition as the day it rolled off the showroom floor – I wince at the excruciating memory of my little brother’s horrific death.

  Immediately after Timmy’s head had slammed down into the sink, his big brown eyes had filled up with blood, making him look a lot more like a deranged werewolf in a low-budget horror flick than a five-year-old actor who’d always seemed just as home in front of the television cameras as he’d been while playing with me in our beloved sandbox out in the backyard.

  I shift uncomfortably from the icky feeling of my soiled underwear as my mother puts our car in gear and backs out of the driveway, cursing her hateful jealously beneath my breath. Because – despite her many years of rigorous theatrical training at the prestigious Actors Academy in New York City – Annabeth Preston’s stage career had ended quite differently than poor little Timmy’s. Had ended with a pathetic whimper rather than with the ear-shattering bang to which she’d subjected my unfortunate little brother.

  In the end, there had been no shouts of encore! for my mother; no throwing of red roses at her feet; no breathless reviews in all of the city’s biggest newspapers extolling her unparalleled thespian talents. Instead, the last time she’d been on stage had been when she’d portrayed “Maid Marian” in an off-off-Broadway production of Robin Hood that hadn’t even completed its scheduled three-week run due to the laughably poor attendance.

  Ten years later – when I’d find myself sitting alone in a darkened movie theater and watching Faye Dunaway chill people’s blood with her deliciously evil turn as Joan Crawford in a big-screen showing of Mommie Dearest – I’d catch myself thinking that the famously bitchy subject of the iconic film hadn’t been all that bad of a mother. Not really. Not anything with which Timmy and I wouldn’t have been able to put up, at least. Because wire hangers were nothing to people like my mother. Child’s play, really. To me and Timmy, they probably would’ve felt like feather pillows swung good-naturedly at each other’s heads, just a little lighthearted playtime before bed for two highly spirited boys who had their entire lives stretched out in front of them in a shimmering path that was paved with gold and led directly to superstardom.

  Dreams, however – much like little brothers – had to die sometimes

  Chapter 4

  The oppressive heat inside our car makes it almost impossible for me to even breathe properly as my mother weaves her way deftly through the busy city streets with all the windows rolled up, pausing occasionally only to honk her horn angrily at another driver whenever they have the temerity to get in her way. I shake my head in exasperation at their utter foolishness. Idiots, every last one of them.

  Don’t they know that getting in my mother’s way is always a bad idea?

  Twenty minutes later, she finally pulls our boat-like car into the small parking lot on the west side of the butcher’s shop on Bishop Elder Avenue. Not counting me (which my mother seldom does), the butcher’s shop is the only thing my father has left behind following Timmy’s horrific death. And – as my mother is so terribly fond of reminding me – just one of the two commodities possesses any real-world value.

  Still not speaking to me, she slams the Lincoln into park and exits the vehicle before walking briskly around the side of the car and flinging open the back door in a cacophony of groaning metal. She grabs me roughly by the underside of my bony arm and extracts me forcefully from the car before marching me directly up to the entrance of the butcher’s shop, digging in her sharp red fingernails once more and nearly tearing my right shoulder out of its socket in the process.

  My shoulder sings an exquisite, high-pitched song of pain as she produces a small silver key from the left-hand side of her lacy black bra and unlocks the front door before dragging me inside.

  An intense scowl darkens her gorgeous face as pulls me into the back to where the walk-in freezer is located, each one of her steps punctuated by the staccato report of her high-heeled shoes striking the freshly polished tiled floor. She’d had the tiled floors installed a few years prior for a variety of reasons, not the least of which was to simplify the task of cleaning up any spilled blood. And why not? There was always a lot of spilled blood inside this butcher’s shop, wasn’t there?

  Of course there was.

  And not just from the cows and pigs, either.

  Especially when the two of us were alone together inside.

  Chapter 5

  Finally letting go of my arm, my mother opens the freezer door and places her hands on her shapely hips before stepping to one side.

  I rub gently at the half-moon indentations in my skin and strain with all my might but am completely powerless to stop my gaze from drifting to the plunging neckline of her red Armani dress. A silver Tiffany heart necklace is cushioned between her ample breasts. The lacy black bra from which she’d produced the key to the butcher’s shop a few moments earlier supports perfect white globes. A small brown mole winks out at me from the left side of her chest.

  I blink rapidly in an effort to stop myself from staring but it doesn’t work. Not even a little bit. Even at eight years old, even I can see that my mother is a truly stunning woman. A real hot piece of ass, as I’ve heard the grease monkeys whisper to one another over at the gas station on the corner of Michigan and Elm whenever they fill up her tank for her. A real fine piece of machinery they wouldn’t mind checking under the hood.

  I sigh at the utter unfairness of the world. To be completely honest, though, my mother’s inviting cleavage could have caused even the most pious of the priests over at St Christopher’s to forget their vows of chastity for a moment and steal a quick peek,
which they do more often than is comfortable for me each and every Sunday morning while my mother and I sit in our preferred pew up front.

  “Eyes up here,” my mother says.

  I manage to tear my gaze away from her exquisite breasts long enough to lift my stare to hers.

  She gestures inside the cold space with a delicate hand, rattling the matching silver Tiffany charm bracelet that adorns her right wrist. Inside the freezer, huge chunks of bloody red meat are hanging from sharp steel hooks stationed all around the room.

  “Now, get in,” she instructs.

  I do as I’m told without question. Nobody ever questions Annabeth Preston. Not if they want to keep breathing, at least.

  Heart in my throat, I take my position in the “correction” spot in the center of the room that I’ve grown so familiar with over the years. The shiny metal floor beneath my feet has been worn dull from the sheer number of times I’ve stood there in the past. Three feet away, a matching black circular patch on the floor marks the spot where Timmy used to stand beside me. Unfortunately for us, we’d always been the kind of boys who’d required a lot of correction.

  “Now strip,” my mother orders.

  My cheeks flush even hotter than they did back in my bedroom. Still, I know far better than to protest, so I obediently remove my shoes and socks, then my shorts and shirt. The frigid metal floor beneath my bare feet freezes me in place as I hesitate and look up at my mother.

  “The underwear, too,” she prompts.

  Again, I do as I’m told. What choice do I have in the matter? What choice have I ever had? Embarrassment courses hot through my veins as I slip out of my Fruit of the Looms – which are still wet and warm from my earlier accident – balancing on one foot and then the other in order to accomplish the tricky task.

  Icy blasts of air give immediately birth to goose bumps that rocket up and down my spindly arms and legs. The soles of my feet go numb, painfully at first, and then as though they’d never been attached to my body at all.