You’re a bad person.
You’re cowardly. Weak.
Nobody can trust you.
Maybe if he hadn’t been so focused on Ben. Or Julia. Or on thinking his wife was having an affair. Maybe he would have seen it: her desperation to save Josh. Maybe he could’ve stopped it. But he’d missed it, and now he had no idea what to do.
No matter what, he’d lose something: his wife or his integrity.
Nate raced up the road toward the location Kia had texted him. He turned right to cross the bridge and was greeted by flashing lights as he parked next to the hiking path that led to the bottom of the waterfall.
He followed the path along a series of sharp switchbacks. The clouds were rushing like freighters through the sky. It was colder here, the air saturated with moisture from the waterfall’s spray. Small pellets of freezing water dashed against his head. The light quickly turned gray as the woods closed around him.
Nate had always loved the woods. When he’d lived in Seattle, surrounded by so much pavement and tall glass buildings, he’d missed the cool, peaceful beauty of the forest, the sharp call of crickets and the gentle murmur of the leaves rustling in the wind. Now, of course, everything was dying, the plants saturated, the ground muddy. But the evergreens still kept their glossy coats, even in the deepest depths of winter, a reminder that life continued around us, even in the darkest season.
Now he could hear the distant thrum of the waterfall pounding over the rocks. He could never hear that sound without remembering Robbie’s suicide, the temporary grave his body had found in the river.
Something prickled up the skin of Nate’s neck and he stopped, looked around. He felt a pervading sense of menace, something dark descending. He heard voices and saw Kia standing next to a few uniforms. Dr. Kathi Morris, the pathologist, was bent over a body on the ground among the trees about fifty feet from the path.
Nate greeted them and bent to look at Beatrice Flores as he pulled a pair of latex gloves from his pocket and slipped them on. She looked younger in death than she had in her mug shot, her eyes closed as if she were sleeping. Her skin was tinted a bluish color, patches of lighter skin marbling through the dark.
“She was found by a woman walking her dog,” Kia said quietly. She nodded at a pale elderly woman and a small dog being attended to by paramedics farther along the path.
“Overdose?” Nate asked.
“Most likely.”
“It’s a strange place for it.” Nate turned to Dr. Morris. “How long has she been out here?”
“A few hours,” she replied. “Rigor mortis is established around her neck and jaw but less marked elsewhere. So I’d say three to four hours. Livor mortis is on her right side, but she was found flat on her back, indicating she was dumped here.”
Nate pinched the bridge of his nose. His bruised fingers throbbed.
Kia looked at him curiously. “You okay?”
Nate nodded. He had to get a grip.
“Can you check the back of her neck?” he asked Dr. Morris. “See if there’s a puncture wound.”
Dr. Morris wrapped an arm around Beatrice’s shoulders and heaved her onto her side. The girl’s long hair slid over her face. Nate knelt and scooped it off her neck, gently tucking it behind her ears.
They peered closely at the skin on her neck.
“There,” Kia said. She pointed at a tiny drop of blood that had formed just above one of her vertebrae. She met Nate’s eyes. “Just like Martinez.”
“We’ll need a tox screen,” he told Dr. Morris. “See if it’s the same thing that killed Mr. Martinez and Ms. Williams.” He turned to Kia. “Did you question Ben this morning?”
“I couldn’t; he was asleep and the doctors wouldn’t let me in.”
“Let’s arrest him. We need his statement.”
Kia frowned. “We can’t do that. There hasn’t been a shred of evidence linking Ben to Martinez. No DNA, hair, fingerprints, nothing. Only Martinez’s girlfriend’s word that she saw Ben’s name on the phone. That’s not concrete enough. And you know we’ll never get through a grand jury with just circumstantial evidence.”
Nate made a frustrated sound at the back of his throat. Emma had told him Ben was involved, but he couldn’t tell Kia that without telling her everything else.
“He’s gonna flee as soon as he can.”
“We can’t arrest him when there’s no evidence he committed a crime. And you heard Dr. Morris; this girl has only been dead a few hours. Ben’s been in the hospital all that time. He didn’t do this.”
Nate pressed his fingers into his thighs. Hard.
She was right. So why had Emma implicated Ben?
More important, why had Nate believed her?
“We still have to question him,” Nate said, thinking fast. “He has a track record of making and dealing drugs. At the very least, maybe he knows who’s behind all of this: the murders, the drugs, the prescription fraud. It’s all tied together, I can feel it. Head back to the hospital and question him. See what he knows.”
Kia studied him, her face disapproving. She knew he was hiding something. He waited for her to challenge him, to ask what was going on, but she just shook her head and slipped her plastic gloves off with a snap. She tucked them in the trash bag at the edge of the crime scene and disappeared up the path without another word.
The CSIs had already roped off the area, little yellow evidence flags waving in the breeze. Nate stepped carefully from one to the next, trying to piece together the scene. The person who’d dropped Beatrice’s body had clearly tromped through the woods with her, rather than bringing her down the path.
Nate followed the broken branches through the woods for a good half mile. Whomever it was had been strong. Strong enough to carry a body this far through dense brush and trees. Although it didn’t look like the body had been dragged. Maybe two people had been carryng it? Eventually Nate emerged from the forest onto the road. Wheel marks were traced into the gravel. Nothing that could identify the vehicle, but definitely enough to indicate a car had been parked here.
Nate turned his flashlight on and took his time sweeping the area in a neat, precise grid. He didn’t stop until he reached the makeshift blanket beside the road, where all the evidence had been collected, tagged, and laid out. There, already bagged and tagged, was a black-and-white poker chip. Nate picked up the baggie, turning it over in his hand. The initials engraved on the back were JH.
“Shit. I think I know who this belongs to,” he called to a CSI. He held up the bagged poker chip. “Mind if I take it to question the owner?”
She nodded. “Sure, let me check it out.” She jotted something in the evidence log.
Nate walked quickly back through the woods to Beatrice’s body. He flashed back to another body. For years he’d used regret over Robbie as a stick to beat himself with. Now here he was, standing on the edge of a forked road, choosing between right and wrong once again.
Nate blinked, seeing Josh’s smiling face in his mind.
You’re a good guy, Daddy…
How could he look Josh in the eye and say he was one of the good guys if he let Emma continue down this path? What she was doing was wrong, and he couldn’t cover for it.
He wanted to be the man his son thought he was. More than that, he wanted to teach Josh to be good, to do better than him, to respond courageously to every challenge. Maybe it would still result in heartache and tragedy, but at least he’d be doing the right thing.
He fingered the chip in his pocket, deciding to call Lieutenant Dyson and tell him everything. But first he had one more question for Emma about the owner of this chip.
He snapped off his gloves, threw them in the trash, and slipped the evidence bag into his pocket, his knuckles brushing against the tin of toothpicks he kept there. He pulled it out and opened it, extracted a toothpick, and rolled it between his fingers. After a moment, he slipped the toothpick and the tin into the trash bag.
Nate knelt and squeezed Beatrice’s hand.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered. “I’m going to make this right.”
Nate’s phone rang, and he straightened and answered it, his shoes crunching on gravel as he moved closer to the water. The waterfall hissed in the distance.
“Nate?” Kia sounded out of breath, as if she was running. “Ben’s not here.”
“What? What do you mean, not there?”
“One of the doctors said he left around lunchtime. He wasn’t under arrest, so they couldn’t hold him. Nobody knows where he’s gone!”
CHAPTER 39
I RETURNED TO JOSH’S ROOM, rage and anxiety swirling in my belly. Everything was unraveling like a cheap sweater. How could Nate do this to me? To Josh? How could he think there was any choice at all?
Moira was sitting next to Josh reading a book, the gentle sound of his snores filling the room. Her phone was playing Christmas songs, which reminded me it was only three days away. It certainly didn’t feel like Christmas.
I sat on the other side of Josh and watched him sleep. After a moment, Moira put her book down. She looked at me, then down at the floor, and took a deep breath.
“I know we haven’t always seen… eye to eye, Emma,” she said. “I just wanted to apologize if I’ve ever come across as, well, cold.”
I didn’t answer, so Moira continued. “I was on my own for a long time after Matt had the stroke. Nate helped out more than I really should’ve let him. Maybe I relied on him too much.” She fiddled with the corner of her book, her eyes on her lap. Finally she looked up. “When your child is small, he needs all of you. Everything. But as he grows he needs you to be separate from him, otherwise he’ll feel like he’s taking something from you. Sometimes I worry I didn’t let Nate go soon enough. I wanted him to be a son first and a husband second, and for that I’m so sorry.”
She swallowed. “I want you to know I respect how hard you’re fighting for Josh. He’s still small and he needs someone fighting in his corner.”
“Thank you, Moira. I really appreciate that.”
Katie came in to check Josh’s temperature then.
“It’s spiking a little bit,” she said, looking worried.
“Is he okay?”
“He’s fine,” she reassured me. “Temperatures tend to increase during the first few days after immunotherapy. But we’ll keep an eye on it.”
I leaned my head on the edge of Josh’s bed. Moira picked up her book and continued reading. The gentle noises of the hospital washed over me: rhythmic beeps, the soft murmur of doctors talking, the swish and squeak of tennis shoes on linoleum. Before I knew it, I was asleep…
… I was running through a maze. The walls were built of iced evergreen shrubs that towered above me in a wintry forest, so high it blotted out the sky.
Snow swirled in chaotic currents; a snow globe that had been shaken. It landed on my eyelashes, freezing my tears into icy drops on my cheeks.
I ran through the maze, turning this way and that, pulse pounding as I tried to find a way out. I turned a final corner, emerging into a small, confined square. At the center of the square was a short wooden platform.
Knotted above it was a hangman’s noose.
I stumbled backward and ran away, boughs ripping at my hair and clothes. I finally turned another corner, but again I was in that same square. The hangman’s noose mocked me.
Again and again I ran away, but every time I emerged at the same place. And then I realized.
It was the only way out—
A sharp ringing pierced my consciousness. I jerked awake, grappling for my phone.
“Hello?”
“Where is he?” Nate shouted.
I scurried out of the room. “Who?”
“Ben! Your goddamn brother. Where is he?”
“He’s in the ER.”
“No, he isn’t! Kia went to question him and he’s gone. He walked out.”
Icy needles prickled down my back and up my arms.
I leaned against the corridor wall. A clown bustled past, busily tying balloon animals. Behind him strode a cluster of doctors, deep in consultation.
“I have no—” I stopped abruptly.
The warehouse. That’s where the drugs were. That’s where Ben would go.
We reached the conclusion at the same time. “He went to the warehouse, didn’t he?” Nate said.
Adrenaline surged through me. “No!”
But Nate had already hung up.
I hurried to the accessible bathroom and locked myself inside. I dialed Gabe on the other phone with shaking fingers.
“You need to get to the warehouse. Now,” I hissed when he answered. “I’ll meet you there.”
“Already on my way. Ben called. Said to meet him there ASAP.”
My mind stuttered. Ben had called him?
“Nate’s on his way there right now,” I said. “We need to move everything. Fast.”
* * *
I STRODE down the hall to Josh’s room, peeked in. Moira was still reading her book. Josh’s cheeks were flushed, but he was sleeping soundly. With a last glance in the room, I went to the nurses’ station.
“Can you check on Josh again?” I asked our nurse, Katie. “I need to run out to my car.”
She nodded, and I hurried toward the elevator.
Outside, night was descending, and tiny flakes of snow were just beginning to fall. Cold wind buffeted my cheeks and snaked beneath my coat. I hurried across the parking lot to my car, my shoes slapping against the wet pavement.
The warm lights of the hospital quickly disappeared as I drove as fast as I dared up the mountainous road and over the bridge, turning down the road that wound along the river’s edge in the direction of the warehouse.
About five miles from the mill, I saw a flash of blue lights. I braked abruptly. Police cars were blocking one side of the road. A crime scene crew was working behind yellow police tape.
I recognized Kia as I drove slowly past. Her short dark hair blew in the breeze, snow landing on her police jacket, her jaw clenched as she scowled at something on the ground.
I mentally cursed. Why did I have to live in such a small town?
A cop waved me around the roadblock. I kept my eyes fixed ahead, hoping Kia wouldn’t recognize me. But just as I thought I was clear, she turned in the direction of my car.
In the rearview mirror, I saw her staring after me.
I drove the rest of the way to the warehouse in white-knuckled terror that Kia would follow, my fingers gripping the steering wheel so hard they ached. I finally pulled over, parking in front of the broken chain-link fence, and got out. Nate’s cruiser was parked on the shoulder a little way down.
He was already here.
Gabe was waiting on the other side of the fence, stomping his feet to keep warm. There was no sign of Ben’s motorcycle, although that didn’t mean he wasn’t here.
I grabbed my hat and flashlight and got out of the car. Gabe held open the broken chain-link fence, and I ducked to get through. I stumbled, letting my body fall against Gabe’s. He lifted his arms to catch me, allowing me the second I needed to slip Violeta’s scarf into the pocket of his black parka.
“Thanks,” I said. “Have you seen Ben? We have to hurry.”
“No, I just got here.”
I put a hand on his arm. “That girl, Beatrice. She’s dead. Nate told me they found her body this morning.”
Gabe darted a glance up at the warehouse, looking worried.
“Do you think Ben…” I hesitated, leaving the sentence unfinished.
Gabe didn’t answer. I tugged at the thick wool of my scarf, nerves needling the skin at my neck and chest. The cold was already biting at my fingers.
Did I really think Ben was capable of murder? Yes. But Beatrice’s? It just didn’t make sense. And anyway, what could I do if he had?
That familiar feeling of helplessness washed over me in short, sharp bursts.
“Gabe?”
Gabe ran his fingers between his forehead and his
beanie hat. Tufts of blond hair stuck out underneath. His beard was thicker now, his eyes sunken and dark. “Ben’s a lot of things, but I don’t think he’s a murderer. Maybe she overdosed.”
I let go of Gabe’s arm, nodding. “You’re right.”
I flicked the flashlight on, and we crossed the parking lot, snowflakes igniting like fireflies in the beams. Our shoes crunched against the broken glass. Our feet seemed to instantly melt the snow, forming muddy little footprints.
The rumble of the falls sounded very far away now, the snow muting it, turning it to a gentle murmur. White drifted slowly from the leaden sky, covering the trees and the ground in a fine, glittering coat as we circled the building.
My phone buzzed from my pocket. I put a hand on Gabe’s coat to stop him. “Hello?”
“Emma, where are you?” Moira’s voice was loud, panicked. She was crying, hot, moist sounds hurtling down the phone line. “Something’s wrong. Josh’s temperature went up really high, and all the machines started beeping, and then he started having a seizure. The doctors rushed in and pushed me out of the room! I don’t even know what’s happening! Where are you?”
“Oh my God.” My blood curdled, her words piercing me like a twisting dagger. “Where is he now?”
“He’s still in his room.” Okay, I thought, not moved is a good sign.
“What’s wrong?” Gabe asked.
“Josh. He’s had a seizure.”
“Is he okay?”
“Who’s that?” Moira asked, sounding suspicious.
“It’s… Nate.”
“Well you both need to get here right—”
Suddenly the still air of night was ripped apart by the sound of a gunshot.
Gabe’s and my eyes met, and my entire body seemed to go completely numb.
“Nate!” I screamed.
* * *
I RAN like hell, scrambling over roots and pushing past the prickly bushes along the side of the building. Branches snapped and broke, slashing at my skin. Hard gasps stung my throat. The flashlight beam bounced along the ground in frenetic little jerks.
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