by Craig Larsen
“You don’t have any right to judge him,” Sara said. “You don’t have any idea what he’s been dealing with.”
“What’s a kid like that got to deal with, Sara? He’s too busy making ends meet to look in a mirror, let alone to get his arms around a girl like you.” Again, Hamlin’s derisive laughter rattled through Nick’s consciousness. Standing up from the bench, he approached one of the windows and peered back into the candlelit dining room. Jason Hamlin was holding his glass of wine over the table, leaning back in his chair to flaunt his mirth. His teeth were dazzlingly white beneath his silver mustache, his rigid shoulders square above the back of the chair.
“His brother was murdered last month,” Sara said, biting the words off as venomously as she could.
Nick watched the smile fade from Hamlin’s face. The man could have won an Oscar.
Jillian looked at her daughter in surprise. “Last month?”
“Wait a minute,” Hamlin said. “What did you say his name was? Wilder?”
“Yes. Nick Wilder.”
“His brother wasn’t Sam Wilder, was he?”
“Yes, he was.”
Hamlin shook his head. “I’ll be damned. His brother was working for a company I’m about to take public. Matrix Zarcon. I remember the day he got killed. Stabbed to death by that bum. The Street Butcher, right?”
“So you should give him a break.” The outrage was gone from Sara’s voice.
“I should say so,” Jillian agreed.
Hamlin took a large gulp from his glass, considering it pensively before setting it back down. “You’re a fool, Sara.”
“You’ve had enough to drink now,” Jillian said.
“No,” Hamlin growled. “I mean this seriously, Jillian. Sara. You’re a fool to seduce a boy like that.”
“I don’t think this is any business of ours,” Jillian said.
“You and I both know this kid’s nothing more than the flavor of the week, ” Hamlin said. “The only difference is this time you’re playing nurse to a wounded, lovesick child. Mark my words, Sara. No good will come of it.”
Outside, Nick turned from the window. He left the porch, walking away from the house into the freezing rain.
Sara found Nick on the beach an hour later, after the rain had let up. The sky had emptied, and a huge round moon was hiding behind a few gigantic stray clouds, searing their edges fiery white. “I was worried about you,” she said, approaching him, taking him gently by the hand. “You’ve been gone for a long time. You just vanished.”
“I needed some time to myself,” Nick said. “Time to think.”
Sara looped her arm under his elbow. “You look better,” she observed.
Nick realized that she was right. At least temporarily, the fresh air had cleared his head.
“Why don’t you come inside? It’s getting late. It’s been a long day.”
Nick continued walking along the beach, as though he hadn’t heard her. Hamlin’s words had hit their mark, and Nick wasn’t able to stifle his growing insecurity. “Why do you stay with me, Sara?”
She didn’t respond. She tightened her grip on his arm, pulled him closer to her.
“Your stepfather is right,” he said. “I’m a total mess.”
She stopped, twisting him around to face her. Circling him with her arms, she slipped her hands beneath his shirt, caressing him. “I’m yours, Nick,” she said. “No one else’s.” She found his lips with hers. The last thing he saw before he began to kiss her was her eyes, sparkling, radiant in the moonlight. She had the most beautiful eyes, Nick thought, that he had ever seen.
They were walking up the lawn, halfway back to the house, when they heard Hamlin and Jillian’s voices, raised in anger.
You can say what you want, Jillian, but you know as well as I do that there’s nothing to this. She doesn’t love him. I don’t even know what she sees in him.
You’re a sick man, Jason.
Why, because I don’t want Sara dicking around with some asshole?
Listen to yourself. You’re jealous, aren’t you?
She’s your daughter, Jillian, I’d have thought—
Exactly. She’s my daughter, Jason. My daughter.
Sara wrapped her arms around Nick once again. “I’m glad you’re here,” she said. “You might not understand this. But I’m really glad you’re here.”
The scrape of a door being unlatched echoed across the lawn, and a bright yellow light spread over the grass nearly to their feet. A large silhouette filled the door frame. “Is that you?” a male voice asked.
“Yes, Todd,” Sara said.
“Catharine’s got the room made up, Ms. Hamlin,” Todd Wheeler said. “The third bedroom on the hallway—the one with the double bed—like you asked.”
“Perfect,” Sara said.
Her voice faded into silence, and Nick realized that Hamlin and Jillian had ended their argument. He became aware of the sea lapping the shore behind them.
“Mr. and Mrs. Hamlin are retiring to their bedrooms now.”
“I’ll see them in the morning, then,” Sara said.
“Good night, Ms. Hamlin.”
“Yes. Good night, Todd. Tell Catharine good night, too.”
Todd Wheeler disappeared inside, taking the bright yellow light with him as he closed the door. Nick and Sara stood where they were, staring up at the moon fading in and out of the clouds, then continued toward the house.
chapter 32
The moon was red. Bathed in blood, it had fled to the horizon. When Nick opened his eyes, it seemed to be floating at the very edge of the empty sky, casting an orange, coruscating glow over the water. Nick kept his eyes trained on the shimmering disk, puzzled by its savage, gory color. It dawned on him that he had no idea where he was.
He sat up, expecting to find himself in bed next to Sara. Instead, he found himself in a narrow single bed beneath thick covers in a room he didn’t recognize.
It’s just a dream. The moon has never been this color before. Wake up, Nick. You’re having a bad dream.
His hands felt sticky, and he rubbed them on the bedspread, then threw off the covers and set his feet onto the floor. He was surprised to find himself clothed in his jeans and socks, wearing one of the T-shirts he had packed. Hadn’t he and Sara already undressed and gone to bed? His skull was throbbing where he had been bruised the night Sam had been killed, and he raised his fingers gingerly to his forehead. A wave of dizziness washed over him, so intense that he thought he might pass out, and he closed his eyes. When he opened them again, Jason Hamlin was lying next to him in the bed. Nick looked at him, becoming aware bit by bit that the man was dead. His throat was slit from ear to ear, and the bed was soaked in blood. Nick leapt from the side of the bed, stifling his own scream.
It’s just a dream, Nick. You’re having a dream.
When he looked back down, the corpse was gone. The bed was empty. He reached down, touching the sheets to make certain. They were dry. There wasn’t any blood. He straightened up and looked around the strange room. There was a desk against one wall and a dresser against another. A knit rug on the floor. He recognized the windows belonging to the Hamlin house and the view over the lawn, stretching down to Puget Sound. This was not the same room, though, where he had gone to sleep.
An image of the brown bottle filled his mind. The last thing Nick remembered was taking a glass of water from Sara’s hand and swallowing one of the pills, then lying down onto the comfortable double bed in the room that had been made up for them. He had wrapped his arms around Sara, burying his head into the cool, silken mass of her hair. He must have fallen asleep seconds after his head hit the pillow. He became aware again of the stickiness on his hands, and he wiped them on his T-shirt. Had he been walking in his sleep?
It’s just a dream, Nick. You’re still in bed with Sara. Wake up. Wake up, and everything will be fine again.
He took an uncertain step toward the door. It was open a crack. He could see its edge glinting in the
moonlight. Its painted surface felt cold and slick as he drew it toward him. The floor creaked, startling him, as he took a step into the hall. He stopped walking, listening. The house seemed to be humming. A quiet buzz filled the air, like the steady murmur that an old electric clock makes.
It was darker in the hallway. Nick waited until his eyes had adjusted, then took a hesitant step down the corridor that ran the length of the second floor. “The third bedroom on the hallway,” he said in a whisper, remembering what Todd Wheeler had said to Sara. His voice sounded so raspy and guttural he wasn’t certain that it belonged to him.
Nick was ten steps down the hallway when the corridor vanished, replaced by a vision of his hand on a doorknob. He was twisting the cold, painted knob, pushing the door open, entering a large, elegantly furnished room in the Hamlin house. The curtains were drawn back from the windows, and the moon was shining into the room through a myriad of small glass panes from the very peak of its arc, at the top of the sky. Hearing a rustling sound, Nick stopped, frozen where he was. When he looked down at his hands, he saw that he was holding a kitchen knife. Its blade reflected the silver rays of the moonlight with a sinister glint. The rustling sound resolved itself into someone moving beneath blankets. The shadows directly in front of him shifted, and Jason Hamlin’s silhouette became visible against the wall behind a large bed. Hamlin cleared his throat. “Sara?” he said, peering at Nick through the moonlit darkness.
Nick’s foot got caught on the long Oriental runner, and the hallway reappeared in front of him. He stood where he was, trying to catch his breath. His hands were damp with sweat, and he became aware again of how sticky they were. Deliberately, he lowered them and rubbed them on the thighs of his jeans and then the sleeves of his T-shirt, trying to clean them off. He wanted to turn on a light. He wanted to see his hands. He looked down the hallway, searching for the door to the bathroom, trying to remember which one it was.
His heart began to race in his chest as he reached for the white porcelain knob of the bathroom door. An image of his hand reaching down to pull open a drawer and then lift out a knife flashed through his mind. He hesitated, then grabbed the doorknob and pushed the door open, frantically searching for the light switch. The sink, too, felt sticky, just like his hands. His fingertips stuck to its surface, as though they were tacky with glue. He found the switch on the wall next to the sink, and the room was abruptly flooded with light.
The white tiled room was smeared red. Strawberry veins streaked the walls, interrupted with handprints the color of scabs. The sink was awash with drying blood. Nick closed his eyes.
You’re imagining this. This isn’t real. You’re still in bed. You’re asleep. Hallucinating.
He opened his eyes again, barely able to recognize his own reflection in the bathroom mirror. His face, too, was covered in blood. His clothes were soaked red. He looked down at his hands. They were stained, caked with drying blood and bits and pieces of sinew and flesh and gore, as though he had plunged his hands into the carcass of a dying animal. He began to shake.
Barely able to find the strength to turn the taps, he thrust his hands underneath the faucet. The water turned bright red, swirling down toward the drain like a fountain of blood. He grabbed the soap and tried to wash his hands clean. The more he scrubbed, though, the more blood was loosened from his skin, the more red the sink became. Finally, his hands clean, Nick splashed his face with water and rinsed the stains from his cheeks and forehead as well.
You murdered Sam.
He took a white towel off the bar next to the sink and dried his face. The towel turned red, as though it had been dipped it in paint.
And now who have you murdered, Nick: Sara?
Terror welled up inside him, taking his breath away. Had he murdered Sara? Would he kill everyone he loved? His brother first, now his girlfriend, too. He let the towel drop, then, leaving the light switched on, stepped back into the hallway. The floorboards creaked underneath his feet. He tried to move stealthily but couldn’t. He was panicking, certain that he had killed his lover. He had gone downstairs to the kitchen. He had taken a knife from the drawer. And he had killed her.
An image of Hamlin sitting up in his bed once again filled his mind, followed by an image of the man lying in a tangle of blood-soaked sheets, his throat slit from ear to ear. Nick stopped walking, straining to hear. The house had remained silent, but he was breathing heavily now, panting. The sound of his panic filled the corridor.
They’re all dead. You’ve killed them all, Nick.
“Shut up,” Nick heard himself say. His raspy voice echoed through the house. “Shut up, Nick,” he said more firmly. Then he walked to the door of the bedroom where he had gone to sleep with Sara. She was sitting up in bed when he pushed the door open, the blankets held to her chest, looking in his direction. She squinted as the light shone into the room from the hallway.
“Nick?”
It felt to Nick as if his legs would collapse underneath him. He was filled with relief. “You’re okay,” he said.
“Nick, my God,” she said. “What is it?”
“I think I’m having a nightmare,” he said.
Sara leapt out of bed, unable to mask her terror. “What is that, Nick? What is that all over you?”
Nick looked down at his freshly scrubbed hands. Thin red streams were trickling down his arms. Dried blood at his elbows had turned to liquid again in the water from the sink. His shirt and pants were covered with dark stains. “Do you see it, too?” he asked her.
Sara rushed to Nick’s side. “Have you hurt yourself? My God, Nick, what have you done? What’s happened?”
“I’m okay. I don’t know.”
Sara was fingering the bruise on his forehead. It hurt so much that Nick pulled his head backward, away from her. “All this blood.” Sara looked down at his shirt and then his jeans. “What happened, Nick? What have you done?”
Nick shook his head. “I don’t know.”
Sara backed away from him, her face turning white, her lips becoming two thin lines. Nick understood what she was thinking.
“I must have done it,” he said.
“My God, Nick.” Sara’s voice was a whisper. She hesitated, then, dressed in her panties and a T-shirt, pushed past him and ran into the hallway. She screamed when she saw the blood in the bathroom, then continued to run down the hallway. “Mom!” she shouted. “Mom!” Nick was right behind her when she pushed open the door to her mother’s room. Jillian sat up in bed, dazed and scared in the sudden light from the overhead lamp. “Mom!”
“What is it, Sara?” she asked. When Nick stepped into the room next to her daughter, she cried, “What’s happened? What is it? What’s happening?”
“Where is Jason?” Sara demanded.
Dazed, her mother pulled her blankets to her chest. “He sleeps in his own room, Sara. You know that.”
Sara didn’t wait for her mother to get out of bed. She pushed past Nick into the hallway and crossed to a room on the other side. The instant she switched the lights on inside, she began to howl.
“Get away from me! Get away! Don’t touch me!” she screamed at Nick when he tried to stand next to her. Nick took a faltering step into Hamlin’s room, then stood gaping at the corpse. Exactly as he had pictured, Hamlin’s head was nearly severed from his body, and the mutilated carcass was lying in a confused tangle of bloody sheets on his antique bed.
Downstairs in the house, lights were being switched on, followed by footsteps and voices. Seconds later, Todd Wheeler, his clothes pulled on and wearing his boots, was ascending the stairs two at a time. He marched down the hallway in their direction, his shotgun in his hand. The huge house seemed to quake beneath him.
“Call the police, Catharine. Now!” he shouted when he reached the doorway into Hamlin’s room. Then he took the butt of his heavy steel rifle, gripped it in one of his callused hands, and swung it across Nick’s face, dropping him like a puppet.
Nick woke to the roar of a helicopter de
scending on the front lawn. Its landing lights flooded the house through a multitude of small-paned windows, papering the walls and floors with a brilliant checkerboard. Nick’s first conscious thought was that he had been dreaming, and he imagined that he would be waking up into a better reality. Then he became aware of the rope wrapped tightly around his wrists, cutting into his skin, securing him to a large wooden chair. He tried to free himself, but his legs and arms were tied so tightly that his hands and feet were swollen. His blood could barely circulate. He heard voices behind him, and he tried to turn his head to see who it was. “Sara?” The voices behind him were silenced. “Sara, is that you?” He struggled against the ropes, tried to twist in the chair.
“He’s awake,” he heard Todd Wheeler say.
“The police are coming inside now.” This was Sara’s voice.
“Sara!” Nick shouted, helpless. Outside, he could see the helicopter touching down. Its motor began a slow, thumping decrescendo into a high-pitched whine.
Sara appeared in front of Nick. There was a look in her eyes he did not recognize. “I’m sorry, Nick,” she said. “We had no choice.”
“My face, Sara,” Nick heard himself say. He felt an intense throbbing in his jaw where he had been struck. After that, the room became a blur. Nick was only vaguely aware of the three uniformed policemen streaming into the house, of Stolie standing in front of him, reading him his rights. Stolie leaned down, shining a small flashlight into his eyes. A man dressed in white stood next to him and measured something out in a small vial. When he stuck a syringe into Nick’s arm, Nick tried to pull his arm back. He tried to scream. But he couldn’t move, and he couldn’t speak. He was floating, drifting away. The last thing Nick remembered was lying down on a cloud and being swept up toward a bloody moon. He didn’t remember the stretcher. And he didn’t remember the helicopter ride back into Seattle, buffeted by the approach of a cold front.
The chaos disappeared, and the frenzy of sounds vanished. From time to time Nick sensed someone standing next to him, or caught glimpses of a man flicking a syringe held up to a fluorescent light or examining a clipboard and whispering secrets to his shadow. That was all he was conscious of for days, until he finally opened his eyes, awake, in an uncomfortable bed in a green tinted room that smelled like disinfectant, his arms fitted securely into the tight sleeves of a starched white straitjacket.