“But you still took her in. That was good of you.”
“At first Joe thought it was so great. See, he was the one who really wanted her. A frilly little daughter to dote on. But six months after she came into our lives, it was like I didn’t exist. All Joe saw was cute little Becky,” she added in a derisive tone. “He totally ignored me. And then she grew up. That cute little puppy turned into a wolf. A monster!”
“That all must have been difficult to accept,” said Blum in a supportive tone.
Atkins exclaimed, “It was impossible. Who was this stranger? What right did she have to come into our lives and take my husband away from me? What right? Oh she was so cute, so pretty. And I was what, a lump of coal?”
“Yes, I see that.”
“Well, Joe didn’t. Made me so mad. I wanted to kill him. And her!”
“But you talked to Mercy? You learned things about her?”
Atkins smiled slyly at Pine. “I knew that was her name. She told me it was. But then I spent years wiping that out of her memory, out of her life.”
“How did you do that?” asked Blum, keeping her gaze on Atkins. “It must have been difficult.”
“I had my ways,” said Atkins with a wicked grin. She mimicked a little girl’s voice again. “ ‘Don’t, Mommy, don’t do that. Don’t burn me. Don’t cut me.’ ‘Your name is Becky,’ I would say. ‘Becky. Only Becky. Mercy is dead, do you understand? Mercy is dead.’ Over and over and over. It finally got through. Finally. No more Mercy.” She smiled. “See, I won. I beat the little brat. She thought she was so smart. Well, I was smarter.”
“Did you have to make her forget anything else?” asked Blum.
Atkins’s features calmed and she looked down again. “There was one thing I could never make her forget,” she said.
Pine tensed and said, “What was that?”
“Eeny, meeny, miny, moe.” She glanced up at Pine. “Stupid nursery rhyme. She read it in a book we had. She went ballistic. She tore the book apart. She was screaming. Joe had to come in and hold her down. And she was only seven or eight at the time. I had no idea what the hell that was about. Crazy, stupid kid. Worst mistake of my life taking her in.”
Blum glanced at Pine, who had closed her eyes and looked away. Blum turned back to Atkins. “So the night Mercy escaped . . . ?”
“Idiot Joe forgot to lock the damn door. Before we knew it here she comes, running past the house. Joe had seen it on his TV screen. He went after her. But the moron didn’t take the gun. I remembered it, though. I went after her with it.”
“Because you couldn’t let her get away?”
“Of course not. We’d go to prison if she did.”
“But I don’t understand. If you had the gun, why didn’t you stop her?”
“Joe grabbed her but she slugged him, and he fell and hit his head on a rock. Blood was everywhere. He tried to get up but I think he had a concussion. He fell back to the ground and didn’t move. Mercy saw the blood and him lying there not moving, and she ran like a damn racehorse. I don’t think her feet touched the dirt.”
“What happened next?”
“I fired twice at her, both barrels. But she was already into the trees. I was going to go after her and finish her off. But then Joe came to, got up, and tried to stop me. He tried to take the gun away.”
“Why?” said Blum. “He must have known what would happen if Mercy got away.”
“He was soft,” Atkins said in a disgusted tone. “He didn’t want to kill her. He wanted to let her get away instead, if you can believe that. Said enough was enough. The idiot!”