Lust, Money & Murder Read Online Free PDF

skin looked sallow. He had only been in jail a week, and he seemed like he had lost at least twenty pounds.
    “Tell them where you got the money,” she begged.
    “I’m not dragging you into this, baby.”
    “Please, Daddy! They’re going to put you in jail for twenty—”
    “It won’t make no difference.” Patrick reached up and pressed his hands to hers against the glass. “What I done was for you, honey. For your future. I don’t ever want you to feel bad about it. Ever.”
    The truth was, knowing that her father had been robbing construction sites to put her through Bromley all these years made her feel ill. Somehow she had known the money was coming from shady activity all along, but she had made herself believe his stories about his video arcade businesses he and his friends owned.
    He lowered his voice to a whisper. “You have to keep your mouth shut about that counterfeit money, sweetheart. Don’t never tell a soul. Promise me.”
    “But—”
    “Promise me, Elaine.”
    “I— I promise.”
    “Time’s up,” the guard said gruffly, stepping behind him.
    Elaine pressed her hands harder against the glass, desperately wishing she could touch him. She had a terrible feeling that this would be the last time she would see her father.
    “I love you, Daddy!”
    The guard guided him out of sight.
     
    * * *
    Elaine had no idea what would happen to her now. She knew her days at Bromley were numbered. She drove her father’s old pickup truck to school by herself every day in a state of utter despair. She avoided Ms. Prentice, as if delaying any contact with the woman would help.
    It’s all my fault , Elaine thought. If I hadn’t gotten mixed up with that stupid modeling agency, none of this would have happened . She wanted to destroy Ronald Eskew, but she could not think of a way to do it without defying her father’s wishes.
    Three days after she had visited him in jail, a student aid came to her world history class and asked her to come to the office.
    Elaine knew what was about to happen. As she walked down the hallway, she wondered how Ms. Prentice would feel knowing that her tuition all these years had come from the sale of stolen property. She shuddered at the thought.
    When she entered the office, Ms. Prentice was sitting at her desk. Her eyes were red and puffy. A wadded-up handkerchief was in her hand.
    “What’s wrong?” Elaine said, a feeling of dread descending over her.
    Ms. Prentice moved from behind her desk, gazing sympathetically at Elaine, sniffling.
    “What is it?” Elaine said.
    “Your father...” Ms. Prentice held both Elaine’s hands tightly. “He killed himself this morning.”
     
    * * *
    Elaine drove the truck home in a robot-like stupor.
    The words He killed himself this morning kept reverberating in her ears. But they didn’t have any meaning. They were just random noises.
    She glanced around the inside of the truck, at the fuzzy dice that hung from the rearview, at his leather work gloves, at the faded picture of herself at age eight in a cowboy suit, clipped to the sun visor.
    I knew I would never see him again , she thought, remembering the feeling she’d had at the jail. She laughed hysterically, her lower lip trembling. Then she began gasping for breath and almost ran off the road.
    When she pulled into the driveway at the house, she was only partially aware of what she was doing. She felt like she was in a dream, a nightmare, and that she was viewing herself from above.
    She watched herself unlock the front door. She watched herself walk through the small living room and go down the steps into the basement. She watched herself open the bottom drawer of her father’s beat-up metal desk and pull out the .38 revolver.
    Under her father’s orders, she had never touched the gun before, but it didn’t look very complicated to operate. She found the button that released the cylinders. Her fingers spun them around slowly—there were bullets in all six of the