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CHAPTER 45
RAE
2009
Rae couldn’t stop touching Viv’s watch as an older male detective sat across from her in the interrogation room. Before the paramedics had checked her over, ensuring she and Lily were okay, Rae had slipped the watch onto her slender wrist, surprisingly comforted by its slight weight, like it contained a miniature version of Viv’s heart, beating and still alive.
After the paramedics had cleared her, the police had taken Rae to the station to give a statement. She was so tired she had fallen asleep on the way over, and she could barely keep her eyes open as the detective had her go over everything that had happened in the motel room with Mark. She couldn’t remember the detective’s name, but he had a monotone voice, making it even harder for her to stay alert.
“So, you had no prior knowledge of Mark Pendergrass staying at the same motel as you? Not before you saw him outside of your room?” the detective said.
“No.”
“Then why did you go to his motel room after the confrontation by the vending machine?”
Rae dug her nails into the palm of her hand, forcing herself to be awake and say the right thing. “I thought it was my room. I didn’t stop to look at the room number. I was too scared because I knew he just killed my friend, and the police were going to investigate him. I was afraid he’d try to kill me too.”
The detective squinted as he read over his own notes, the wrinkles around his eyes deepening. “We’re checking out his alibi and holding him. For now, you’re free to go back to your motel room.”
She was relieved, but she tried not to show it. “Will someone let me know if he’s released? And when I can go back to the condo?”
“Yes, someone will contact you.”
An officer drove her back to the Motel 6. As much as she tried, she didn’t get much sleep, not even after she took a long shower. She waited for a call that never came in the morning, and she didn’t want to check in for another day at the motel, so she drove over to a Panera for something to eat until she heard from the police. When noon rolled around, she still hadn’t heard from anyone, so she called them, and an officer told her the crime scene had been cleared. They didn’t have any updates on Mark yet.
It took every bit of her strength to drive back to the condo and walk through the door. There was dirt tracked all over the wood floors from the people who had been in and out of the home, and Rae had an urge to clean the entire place. She went to the kitchen, her heart aching when she saw Viv’s almond milk still sitting on the counter next to her untouched tea. She dumped the milk and cleaned the mug, and an emptiness in her chest threatened to swallow her whole.
Some pragmatic part of her brain told her she needed to get herself ready and do a live stream. She knew she needed the money, but she had no desire to do anything. The thought of tying up dolls for viewers online seemed absurd to her now. What did anything matterwith Viv dead? Another logical part of her reminded her the condo belonged to Viv. She would need to find a new place to stay, and she didn’t have nearly enough to put down a deposit for an apartment. Not in Albuquerque, where rent was so high. She didn’t have the energy to think about it.
She avoided looking at Viv’s bedroom as she walked down the short hallway to her own. She looked at the crib Viv had helped her set up in her room, and she felt like someone poured lead inside the center of her, in between each rib and over her heart, weighing her down. She curled up on her bed, too tired to cry. Somehow, she closed her eyes and fell asleep.
The next two days passed in a blur. She only left her bedroom to use the bathroom and occasionally grab a drink or something small to eat from the kitchen. The remaining time she slept. It was as if she hadn’t closed her eyes in weeks, and she welcomed the times when she could escape into the dreamless black of sleep. Other times, she’d wake up hyperventilating, the memories of Viv’s bloodshot eyes or Beth’s small lifeless form in her arms haunting her.
It was the end of another listless day when her cell phone vibrated next to her head. The police station. Finally.
“Rae Phalin?” a vaguely familiar woman’s voice asked.
“Yes.” She felt drugged as she tried to sit up in the bed. The waning, flushed light of dusk splashed across her bedroom walls.
“It’s Detective Kennedy. I’m calling about Vivien Dixon’s case.” There was a moment’s pause. “I wanted to let you know that we’re charging Mark Pendergrass but not for murder.”
“What?” Rae’s stomach suddenly hurt. “Why not?”
“I know this may be difficult to hear given everything you told us, but he didn’t kill your friend. We do have someone in custody for her murder.”
Rae was wide awake now. “I don’t understand. If it wasn’t Mark, who killed her?”
“We were able to pull clear footage from a neighbor’s security camera of a man entering the home, and we matched the person to Dean Berryhill, the ex-boyfriend you had described. He confessed this afternoon.”
The ball-gag guy? “That can’t be right.”
“It is, Rae,” Detective Kennedy said. “We found some pretty explicit messages he sent to her. He’d been harassing her for some time, although it appears she didn’t engage with him. And then he turned violent, which is often how these cases go.”
Rae didn’t want to believe it even as she remembered how poorly Viv had been tied up when she was strangled. Like it had been done by someone not skillful at using ropes.
“What about Viv’s car? And Mark’s threats?”
“The neighbor’s security camera did show Mark damaging Viv’s car, which he admitted to doing after she filed a PO against him. And he’s been charged for that as well as for his aggravated assault of you. It’s a felony charge.”
