The decoy

Chapt 29

Chapter Twenty Nine

They sat in the same diner eating steaks and looking forward to the pie.

"You know everyone we talk to tells us what a great guy Paul Vail was," Grace said and she put a small piece of steak and a few peas onto her fork and then chewed it slowly as she spoke.

"It didn't make sense that he would take money and hide it like that. If he was an honest man then this whole thing made no sense.  But if he found out his wife was sleeping with Cory Pezzo then it changes everything. Maybe this was pay back "

            "That's the way I see it too," Sebastian said, "His wife was pushing to sell the business. When she couldn't get through to her husband the seller, she started to work the buyer. She started sleeping with Cory Pezzo and then pushed him to make a better offer. All the while working her husband to sell but then he finds out that she was sleeping with Pezzo and Vail got a new plan."

They were quiet for a few minutes. Eating and thinking.

Then Sebastian said, "I guess when Vail realized his perfect life was not so perfect he pushed back. He took the money from Pezzo and hid it in a bank in Mexico. Then he found another buyer. He was probably planning to sell to Harbord and then take all the money and run off to Mexico. He told Starr he was in for a promotion because he needed someone to look after things as he planned his escape. But someone must have gotten wind of it and killed him. It seems less likely it was Cory Pezzo.

Rappelo seemed to really believe that Cory Pezzo had nothing to do with Paul Vail's death. He said Pezzo was just an accountant. He was here to buy a business for his associates and launder their money.

The best bet now is that Jessie realized her husband was going to leave with the money and she had Starr kill him. That way she took full ownership of the business. Then she gets a better offer from Harbord and sells it to him. That leaves Pezzo screwed so he kills himself

She used her husband and she used Cory Pezzo and of course she probably used Cam Starr to do the murder. The funny thing is we have the whole plot worked out but we have nothing on Starr."

Grace said, "Maybe Cory Pezzo killed himself because he loved Jessie Vail. Maybe when he realized she was just sleeping with him to get a better offer on the business he killed himself.

The way things are right now we have two dead bodies and we still can't stick it on Starr or Jessie.'

Grace didn't finish her steak. She left half of it. Sebastian speared it onto his plate and finished his and hers.

"We still have to prove who killed Paul Vail. That's what I came here for."

They were both quiet as they considered the situation and then she asked,

"Why didn't you ever call your mother?"

There was a short silence. She tried again.

"I'm a mother, Sebastian. Like I told you if my son disappeared I would never stop looking. I might go on with my life eventually but I would always be looking.

Every day when I drove to work I would look at the kids as they pass. I would glance into cars that drove by. I would watch children holding their parents hands in the grocery stores.  I would talk to boy scouts selling apples at the mall.

And if my son got free of that monster, if he was somehow able to get back to me then I would need him to do it right away. I couldn't stand to think he would choose to find a life without me. That would be unbearable. It's one thing to have a child taken away but it is much worse to think they would choose to stay away.

I think it's tragic. I think your mother knows how old you are. I think she has cried at every birthday throughout the years and waits with a cake for you to return and blow out the candles.

She must pray that somewhere her son is now a man and the worst part is that her prayers have come true and yet you sit here and you haven't called her. Why don't you take her out of the misery that her life must be.

I have heard about your childhood. I know how you escaped the torture; now tell me why your mother still lives with it. Why don't you call her Sebastian?"

Sebastian put down his fork and sipped his coffee.

"I don't know if I can keep her safe," he said, "That's what holds me back now.

Every day of my life I of think of her and consider picking up the phone but I'm still afraid of Deacon Hill and that red headed cop and I'm most afraid that they will find my mother.

Every day that I lived with him, he asked about my family. I told him a string of lies to keep her safe but he made me know that if I misbehaved she would be punished too. He always threatened to kill me and then he always added that he would find my mother as well.

And although I escaped and I think Hill died. I am not sure that he did. There is still one more chapter to my escape from Hill that I haven't shared.

This may not have ended."

Grace looked at him and tears were welling up in her eyes.

"Contact her. Make her safe if you can but for god's sake you need to let her know her son is alive."

            Sebastian said, "I know. And I will. There is more though.

Even though I was just a kid I was aware of what had happened to others like me. I knew what the Stockholm syndrome was. It happens to people who are captured and they are completely dependent on their captures. Eventually they give in and try to please the person who has tormented them. I understood how those kidnap victims could become pawns.

I tried to be careful. I thought I could play along but still maintain my values but I was living day to day. Every day that I didn't get beaten and tortured was a victory. For a while it felt like I was a spectator watching my own life.

He wore me down. I was just a kid and eventually I felt like all I could do was try to make him happy.

All that time I had tried to please him. I had surrendered. I think I would still be with him if he hadn't tried to use me as a lure to capture and torture others. That was what brought me out of my hypnosis and made me realize that I had to get away from Deacon Hill and that terrible life.

When I escaped I felt dirty. It was four years of living with a monster. I was his tyro, his protégé and at times I accepted that role. At first just to stay alive but slowly I became his creation and after I escaped I spent years erasing Deacon Hill. I couldn't live with people. I couldn't go back and blow out candles at a birthday party. Not after living that life. Deacon Hill was a part of me. He still is.

I felt like I had to wash him off of me. I had to cleanse his influence from my life. I lived in cars and on the street because I didn't deserve to be with people. I left the country because I needed to be as far from Hill or the ghost that he was, as possible and I never went near Las Vegas because he might still be there and even if he wasn't there it would remind me that he had been a part of me for four ugly years.

Being here and meeting you has allowed me to talk about it. You tell me to call my mother and I think that maybe I can. I eat with you and play with your son and I sleep with you and I finally feel human again. I finally feel that Deacon Hill was something that happened to me but is no longer a part of me.

I ran away from that ranch more than a decade ago and I finally feel that I might have escaped for good.

I realize now what I need to do. It is you Grace, your world has brought me back.

Even after I escaped I never stopped running from Hill. I have been running from him for ever.  I never wanted to lead him close to my mother but having known you these few weeks has made me think that maybe I will be able to stop running now."

Grace stared across the booth at Sebastian who had stopped eating now.

"What happened after you drove away with that girl. Why are you still running?"