I put a hand on his shoulder to remind him of Isabella’s presence.
Declan seemed reluctant but handed her to Stephanie. “Just wanted to help. What’s going on here?”
Stephanie looked at me, then Cody, then back at Declan. She carried Isabella inside without saying a word, the little girl fussing the whole way.
I looked Declan straight in the eyes. “Hurting Stephanie more than you already have, that’s what’s going on. Forget the text and get out of here.”
Declan pointed at the house. “Those are my girls.”
“Were.” I shook my head. “No more. Whoever sent the text is using you.”
Declan’s eyes seemed to darken. “You moving in on my wife?”
I didn’t mean to step toward him. I didn’t mean to rear back my fist. And I definitely didn’t mean to smash it into Declan’s forehead.
But I did.
He stumbled backward and tumbled onto his hands and knees.
Cody gripped me from behind.
Declan swung his head up. “I’m going to own you, Haas.”
I struggled against Cody. “How do you know my name?”
My friend tugged me back. “I didn’t see one punch already, I can’t unsee more. Got it?”
“Where is he? What’s he planning?” I pointed at Declan’s face. “Is it you?” I bit my lower lip and cocked my head. “Tell me it’s you.”
Declan wiped his nose. “Steph’s got a thing for crazy cops—good to know.” He looked past me to Cody. “Tell your friend that I’ll be back to take back what’s mine.” He winked at me, then turned and walked away.
I stared at Declan, analyzing his walk, the shoulder broadness, what his voice had sounded like. The slightest variance here or there would change this man into that white-faced conductor. But . . . I just couldn’t say for sure. How many men were six feet tall with a smaller, fit frame?
Cody let go of me. “I’ve been thinking the same thing, but it’s just not a match. It isn’t him.”
“Then why did the conductor track him down?” I rubbed away the pain in my fist. “If he knew to come here, then the conductor knows we’re here.”
“Not like that’s a surprise.”
I squared my shoulders. “No more waiting. We’re going after him again . . . in our way, on our terms.”
Cody leaned back, palms facing the sky. “’Bout time, Haasy.”
“It’s time we meet who I suspect are the original members of the string—or the two who are left.”
“Two left?”
“Anita Postma and my chief.”
18
SUNDAY, 4:45 P.M.
A bead of sweat dripped off Jackson Renfroe’s nose. He wiped his sleeve over his face. Good thing he was wearing his navy uniform. Would help conceal the splotch. Would this stupid meeting ever end? They’d talked details for months. They were all professionals. They’d planned security for events before. Why was a day-of meeting needed at all?
“Chief Renfroe, are you okay?” Anita Postma said.
He gained a smile. “Better than ever.”
“All right—anyone have anything else?”
Good golly, woman—wrap it up.
“On behalf of Trenton University, thank you for bringing Ivan home,” Postma said. “We cannot wait to host a show the world is going to remember for a long, long time. We’ll see you in a few hours.”
Ivan’s crew was dismissed. Postma remained at the front of the conference room, shuffling papers, while Renfroe remained seated.
Couldn’t she just get out of here? He wanted the conference room to himself just for a while, a quiet place to shut off and think and down as many painkillers as possible. His back hadn’t stopped throbbing ever since he woke up from his drugged-up stupor, forced to stay on campus by some lunatic behind the screen of his phone.
The pain from the incision was nothing compared to what the device inside him could do. Why wouldn’t the conductor just tell him what he wanted?
“Chief, you don’t look well at all.”
“I said I’m fine.”
She walked over to him, leaned down, and put one hand on his back.
Renfroe flinched, and so did Postma.
“What is wrong with you?” she said. “What’s happened?”
Renfroe laughed painfully. “You’d never believe—”
“He’s got you too,” Postma whispered.
He froze and craned his neck to her. “You know. The conductor?”
“You’re not the only one,” she said.
“Why is he doing this?” Renfroe groaned and leaned his head back. “I don’t know what I’m supposed to do. Tell me. He told me to go about this evening as if everything were hunky-dory, or else he’d get clicky with a detonator . . . mail my remains to Vegas.”
Postma put both hands on her chest and bared her teeth.
“What’s he told you? What’s he planning? Please, Anita.”
She leaned down to his sitting level. “I don’t know. He’s had me pull strings, make arrangements, taken half of my savings.” She looked as though she could murder Renfroe, but her anger wasn’t directed at him. “All I know is that he’s angry. Angry at something that happened twenty years ago.”
“What happened twenty years ago was nothing but success,” Renfroe said. “It put this town on the map, exploded enrollment, created a career no one’s topped—tell me what’s horrible in that?” He leaned forward. He knew what was horrible in it.
Postma looked away. “Enough. We know there’s more.”
Renfroe exhaled hard. “Where’s Iseman? He has to be a part of this.”
“I don’t know. I’ve called a dozen times, texted, emailed. I haven’t seen or heard from him since we were on the court.”
“What does the conductor want? What does he know about that day?”
Postma sat and rested her forehead against her palm. “What do we know about that day, really?”
Renfroe put aside what he wanted to say and allowed himself to think through that day of fate without his normal guilt and shame. Suddenly he felt as though he had been transported back twenty years, when his chest was bigger than his gut, his wife had yet to leave him, and his hunches never seemed to fail him. “We met Ivan, what, a month or two before at auditions. Unassuming. Broken English. But we both knew there was something special there.” He fast-forwarded to the event. “It went flawlessly . . . then the aftermath was dizzying. Media. Cameras. Mail and invitations. Ivan went viral before viral.”
“So what then?” Postma said.
Renfroe took off his hat. “Remember the weeks and months after all the press?”
“A nightmare,” she recalled. “Musicians of every kind trying to hitch their wagons to Ivan. Parents wanting him to mentor their kids to fame.”
“That was the better half of it. There were threats about Ivan’s citizenship, money-grubbers and ‘family members’ demanding access to him, sleazy lawyers planting stories to net a chunk of Ivan’s change.”
Postma furrowed her brows. “Remind me, the stories.”
Renfroe looked at the floor, then sighed. His sweat was making a comeback. She was getting too close. “There were so-called relatives, scammers pretending to be agents, the defamation claims . . . It was a lot.”
“Which story, if true—if what we thought was a lie then but turned out to be real—would be most devastating?”
Renfroe swallowed hard. He should tell her. It’s not like he’d actually seen the act—he’d only seen them walking together. It may have never happened. He had the capacity to be wrong. “There was a mother who brought in a boy. Said Ivan gave him his autograph and invited him backstage. Said no one went with them, and . . .” Renfroe’s voice shook. “Ivan asked the boy to step into a closet with him.”
Postma covered her mouth.
He didn’t tell her the rest.
A pounding on the door drew both of their gazes. They shared a glance. Didn’t see anyone through the door’s little wi
ndow.
Postma walked over and opened it. There was a letter on the ground but no one in sight. It was addressed to Jackson Renfroe and Anita Postma, and in the “from” column was just one word.
Conductor.
Listening intently from a dusty closet in the tiny English classroom, which was in the oldest and moldiest building on campus, I watched the time on my phone flick to 5:15 p.m. The small wooden door leading into the classroom, which had been designed for eight students or so, remained closed.
Everything had gone smoothly thus far with zero hitches in my plan—Cody and I had found Jackson Renfroe and Anita Postma on campus, and with the help of Stephanie, we’d crafted and delivered a cryptic note in the voice and cadence of the conductor.
But plans never unfolded the way you envisioned them. Like side-blown wind that pushes rain under your umbrella, something always changed, a variable no one could plan for.
The classroom doorknob twisted, and someone walked inside. No, two someones.
“Where is he then?” a woman asked. Postma.
“You know he’ll show up,” Renfroe responded.
Cody, who’d been hiding in a classroom adjacent to this one, entered the room behind them and closed the door. “That’s for darn sure, Chief. Gun, now.”
“What is this? Caulkins?” the chief said.
I stepped out of the closet as Renfroe handed over his firearm. Cody and I had both changed into street clothes and were wearing our favorite lids to blend in. I was wearing rubber gloves and holding a box filled with tools.
“What do you want?” Postma said. “What is this?”
Cody met her gaze with a chilling stare.
Renfroe sneered and his body stiffened. “What do you think you’re doing, huh? We read the article. You both should be in jail.”
“The article was fabricated by the conductor, not that I care at all what you think.” I set the bag down and unpacked its contents: pliers, rags, a jug of water, and a corkscrew. Everything could be used for you or against you, and that was most definitely true of psychological warfare. “I’m going to break the conductor’s string. You’re going to help me do it.”
“Do you have any idea what he’s going to do to you, to everyone?” Postma said.
“He’s already taken everything from me,” I lied. “Do you have any idea what happens when a monster breaks your will? I have nothing to lose—but you two . . .” I set two chairs next to the chalkboard at the front of the classroom and forced them to sit.
Cody planted himself against the room’s only entrance.
I leaned close to Renfroe. “I imagine the conductor’s going to do something terrible to you if you help me.” I paused. “It won’t be half as bad as this.”
Postma scoffed. “Then you’re a fool.”
Renfroe was glaring at me. “Haas, you don’t know—”
“You disgrace everything it means to wear a badge,” I said. I turned my attention to Postma. “We don’t have time. The conductor is going to kill a lot of people if we don’t do something—tonight. What happened twenty years ago with the Celestial Orchestra? What does he want?”
The look Postma was giving me could burn off a couple layers of skin. “How dare you threaten me. I haven’t stopped trying to stop the conductor since he first looped me into this mess.”
“Good.” I kicked the tools I’d laid out, and both Renfroe and Postma flinched. “Don’t you see? The conductor created the string to manipulate us to his end—whatever that is. He’s even using the string against itself, keeping himself out of the dirty work. It’s his power. But it’s also our power. The moment we stop him, it’s over. This”—I pointed at the ground, giving each person solid eye contact—“is over. So help me end it.”
Postma spoke curtly. “I know he’s planning something terrible at the orchestra.”
That drew Renfroe’s gaze.
I remained still.
“He attended the original showing for the orchestra,” Postma said. “And something horrible happened. I don’t know what exactly, but he holds us responsible.”
Recollection formed in the chief’s eyes.
“There.” I nodded at him. “What do you remember, Chief? What happened that night?”
Renfroe grumbled. “Never answered to you and I never will.”
Without skipping a beat, I crouched and grabbed the pliers. Tossed a gag to Cody, who promptly closed the gap to Renfroe, stuffed it in his mouth, and forced him to bite.
“What are you doing?” Postma said.
“I’m sick of putting up with your sorry-sack abuse of your title, Chief.” I admired and air-tested the pliers. “Love your gambling, right? I imagine doing that without fingertips would be impossible. You could always have someone else do it for you, I suppose, but last I checked? You drove those people away.” I pointed at the chief’s badge. “You’re going to lure the conductor to us. Today. Understand?”
The chief laughed, but the fear in his eyes betrayed him. “You . . . scared . . . idle threat?” he said into his gag.
This time I allowed a chuckle. But I stared at Renfroe as if we were playing the final hand of the World Series of Poker. “Word on the street is you had a little operation last night.” I raised a brow. “Can’t be too comfortable. That’s why you’re going to help—because the conductor won’t detonate it with you near him.”
The chief glanced around with feverish eyes. “What do . . . know about it?”
Cody locked eyes with him and pulled down his gag. “Bring him to us and maybe you’ll live long enough to find out.”
Renfroe jerked forward but remained seated. “He’s not going to fall for some ruse. He’ll see it coming.”
“No he won’t,” Postma said.
We all turned to her.
“I know how to lure him. I’m the ‘knot’ he started with. We’ve met in person four times. I can lead him to you if you can do what you say.”
Cody and I glanced at each other. We finally may have caught a break.
19
SUNDAY, 5:12 P.M.
Alec awakened leaning against a tree in a ravine, his stomach in knots. The whoosh of cars whizzing by meant he was somewhere in earshot of the freeway. He climbed up the hill with trembling limbs. Stopped for a moment to gather himself and calm his shakes. It didn’t help. Why couldn’t he stop quivering?
Markus, Cody, Janet—complete strangers to him twenty-four hours before—kept popping into his mind like a recurring dream, horrible images of the conductor doing terrible things to them. All because Alec had made a deal. A small, tiny deal. Paper—that’s all it included.
Alec had done his research on bestselling true crime, from Truman Capote’s page-turner about the brutal slaying of a Kansas family to Ann Rule’s insider piece on Ted Bundy. The story Alec possessed would shoot him into the stars among writers.
He wouldn’t just be a journalist. He’d be a New York Times bestselling author, equipped with exclusive details to a real-life deadly game fronted by perhaps the most irresistibly intriguing antagonist ever to have committed a crime.
But the deal slithered through his stomach like a black, poisonous creature.
Alec threw up, providing temporary relief to his gut. Then he climbed the rest of the way up the hill. After walking through a seldom-used trailhead parking lot, he found the freeway and flicked his thumb in the air.
Twenty minutes later, he was getting out of a car that belonged to a fellow student who’d given him a lift. Before him was Trenton University. The conductor had told him to stay on campus, most assuredly to report on whatever horrific act he’d planned.
But all Alec could think about were Janet, Markus, and Cody. All of them were doing the right thing while he had made a play for his career. He couldn’t take that back. They wouldn’t trust him even if he delivered the conductor to them in cuffs. The only way to help them now would be to sabotage the conductor by himself somehow.
Alec headed straight for the amphitheater. The
Celestial Orchestra was surely there already, dressing and prepping. The building would be filled with members of the string—members of the string with assignments. And if Alec could discover what those assignments were, then maybe he could stop whatever catastrophe the conductor was planning.
He flashed his Trenton press badge, nodded to a man in a red security jacket, and walked into the amphitheater. On any other day, this would be a dream assignment for him. But instead he felt as though he were stepping into an open casket.
The orchestra crew was spread out everywhere and looking sharp, adorned in fabric that created the illusion of changing colors with every movement. Some appeared orange, others red, blue, purple, changing from one color to another on cue with the rise and fall of their instruments.
Above them, the ceiling had been transformed into a mosaic of faces, people from all different countries. The photos clung to the ceiling in such a way that every face appeared to be looking toward the front of the amphitheater. The Celestial Orchestra wasn’t used to playing in such a small venue, so apparently they’d decided to add faces to the crowd in the only place they could.
Ivan had become quite the showman, with ego to spare—but it wasn’t the nasty kind. At least that’s what Alec had always thought of him. The man simply loved beauty, which he just so happened to spend endless hours creating in the form of music, synchronization, and performance. It would be a shame for people not to see it.
“Admiring the visitors above?”
Alec turned to find a girl no older than he, most likely a student, dressed in a purple shirt with the word “CREW” on the back. Her black hair was stunning in contrast with her fair skin and red lips.
“Interesting décor, for sure,” he said.
She looked surprised. “Wait, you don’t know, not even as a reporter guy?”
“Know?”
She grinned and gestured for him to follow, leading him down the center aisle and hoisting herself onto the stage. She let her legs dangle over the side and patted the spot next to her, so Alec hoisted himself up.
The girl pointed at the ceiling. “I just learned this today, but it’s so great you have to know. See how their eyes are turned?”
The String Page 19