AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Beckett,” Samantha said. “That’s all you can think of. Bloody Beckett. Beckett’s no angel. He probably—”
“She came back to talk to you,” Quinn said. “To confront you, or, more likely, to counsel you. Victor was probably never up here at all. He saw her outside, and he left.”
“But he said—” Samantha began.
“No, he didn’t. I made that up. He saw you buzz her in, and he left. So she came back, and you didn’t tell the police about that. You didn’t tell Victor about it, either. You didn’t tell Beckett. You didn’t tell your parents. Because of what she came back to talk to you about.”
The electricity was fairly running along her arms now. Up the back of her neck.Her hair stood on end.That was what she was feeling.
All those antacids.
She didn’t let Samantha answer. “You were taking anxiety medicine. Medicine that Victor will testify he got for you, so you wouldn’t be on record having a prescription. If it’s a choice between testifying and being implicated in manslaughter, he’ll admit it.” She actually wasn’t one bit sure of that. She didn’t give Samantha a chance to think about it, though, just went on. “Because of that accident. Archerfield General Aviation Terminal, November two years ago. The beginning of the cattle egret migratory season. They travel in flocks, don’t they? Especially in the summer after inland floods, and that’s what happened that day. Sunset, a private jet coming in on visual approach to the runway, outside the permitted flight path. A flock of cattle egrets. They barely weigh a pound, but their wingspan is almost three feet. A perfect storm, in other words. Visual approach, fading light, and a bird strike through the windshield, so the pilot couldn’t see. You probably should have seen that jet coming in wrong and warned him off, but you didn’t, did you? He drove that plane right into the ground. Six people died, and two of them were kids. The grandkids of a Member of Parliament, and his daughter and son-in-law. His wife. And him, flying the plane.”
“It wasn’t myfault!”Samantha was standing stock-still, her face reddening. “He came in outside the flight path! I told him to pull up and go around correctly! I was cleared. I wascleared!”
“A fireball on the runway,” Quinn went on. “Blackened bodies. A Member of Parliament. An inquiry. Your job, that you were so proud of, that almost nobody could do. The job that meant your parents might finally not see you as a fuck-up. A disappointment. Even though you hadn’t made the grade for flight school and you weren’t a pilot. The job that might let you compete with your sister.”
“I didn’t—” That was all Samantha could say, it seemed.
“So you took Xanax, once the inquiry was over. Once they’d cleared you. You were so tense that it was hard to focus, and you knew somebody’d notice. Your job was at risk again, because you kept getting lost in the anxiety haze. What if it happened again while you were in that state? What if itwasyour fault, this time? So you took the pills. Not often, and you were terrified every time you had to resort to them. Air-traffic controllers aren’t pilots, and you know it, but they’re like pilots in one way. They’re randomly drug tested. You can’t even take an antihistamine while you’re working. But you figured, the average test rate is fifty percent. Only fifty percent of air-traffic controllers are randomly tested in a year, and you only needed a few weeks. Just a little while to get over this. You had to chance it, because you couldn’t tell them. You couldn’t tell anybody. Why didn’t you just ask for a leave? For counseling? Why didn’t you get help?”
“Because I—” Samantha began. “Because then they’dknow.Everybody would know! I just needed—what you said. I just needed some time. I’d have been fine!”
“And you told your sister,” Quinn said. “Or—wait. You didn’t. You’d never have confessed that to her. She found the pills, didn’t she? She was in your bathroom, at the party. Looking for something for a headache, maybe.”
“No,” Samantha said. “She was prying! They were in the back of a drawer. How could she have found them if she wasn’t prying? She always had to be better. She always had to be the best, the perfect one, even when she wasn’t anymore.Iwas! But no, she had to look. She had to come back and tell me she’d seen. That I should ‘get help.’ That Ineededhelp. I didn’t need help! I just needed—”
“Some time,” Quinn said. “You just needed some time. Abby left the party, but she couldn’t let go of what she’d seen. She couldn’t even wait until the next day. She’d always felt responsible for you, so she came back to talk to you, and you poured her some fizzy water with lime, because that was her drink, and dissolved a pill in it. Did you want to kill her?”
“No,” Samantha said.“No.I just wanted to … to show her. That it wasn’t that bad. That I wasn’t on some kind of major drug, like I may have tried back ages ago, when we were teenagers. I wasn’t that person anymore. I’m fine. I’m successful! It was just to take the edge off. It was just so I could do myjob.If she took one, and I told her later that she had and she was fine, she’d see that it was nothing. No big deal. Just to take the edge off!”
“So you gave it to her,” Quinn said, “and she got sleepy, or more likely, everything got fuzzy for her pretty fast. She was intoxicated. And instead of putting her to bed on your couch, you sent her out in her car? In a violent storm? Todie?”
“No! I didn’t! She insisted on going back. She insisted! She was going to drive, and I couldn’t let her drive. I was trying tosaveher!”
“You’re strong,” Quinn said. “You could have held her here. You could have called Beckett. You could have told him to come.”
“I went with her!” Samantha said. “I got in the car with her—I tried to get her to let me drive, but she wouldn’t, so I got in. I thought, at least I’m with her. I washelpingher, don’t you see? I wanted to help her!”
“Because you forgot about her antihistamine,” Quinn said. “That she took antihistamines in summer, when it’s so humid and all the flowers are out, and that antihistamines can interact with Xanax. Victor could have told you that, but you didn’t ask him. So she got even more erratic. She was driving slowly, though, because that’s what happens when you’re in that state. You thought, I’ll get her to pull over. Maybe you told her to pull over. To pull off the road.”
“I did.” Samantha was finally crying. “Idid.I had her pull off, and I was going to drive. It was going to be all right. I’d have to tell Beckett she’d had a—a bad reaction to something, that she was ill, but I could do that. He wouldn’t know. Nobody would know. I loved my sister. Ilovedher!”
“But she kept driving instead,” Quinn said. “And when you saw the boat ramp, you opened the door.”
“I knew we were going in,” Samantha said. “I tried to take the wheel. I tried, I was screaming at her, but she wouldn’t let go.”
“You opened the door,” Quinn said, “and as the car was going in, you spilled out of it. You’re trained to react fast, to keep your head, and you have the skill to do it. It took you a while to orient yourself in the water, though, and you thought you were going to drown. All that rain, the current, at night … you’d barely gone in at all, and you’re strong, and still, you thought you’d drown. You managed to find the shore, though, and to stagger up the ramp. Half drowned. Exhausted. And you didn’t go back for your sister.”
“I’d have died,” Samantha said. “Don’t you see? I’d have died, too. What good would that have done? She’d have been dead by the time I’d got to her, even if I could have done it. I’d have died, too, for nothing.”
“But you wouldn’t have had to live with knowing what you did. How has that felt, the past two years? Was it worth it?” Suddenly, Quinn was exhausted. Shattered. “How did you get home?”
“I …” Samantha gulped. “I walked until I came to a bus stop. Waited there under the shelter until one came. Rode it to the terminal, then took another one that I knew would get me home. I was cold and soaked, but everybody was cold and soaked.”
“A bus,” Quinn said. “I never thought of a bus. You were thinking, still. Which was why you didn’t wait for the police.”
“How could I have told them? How could I have told my parents? They’d see it like you. That Perfect Abby had died, and I’d lived. The wrong sister had lived. They already thought that. What would they think if they’d known? And Abby was the one! She was the one who drove into the river!”
