by Lisa Jackson
Oh, for the love of God, get over yourself, that nasty little voice in her head warned. You know as well as anyone that you’ve been living a lie most of your life. In fact, “Annette,” you thrive on it. You loved spying on the others, seeing their secrets play out, writing them down. It makes you feel better about yourself, right? Makes you feel superior? When all your life you’ve felt like a faint shadow in your sister’s wake?
She knew that much about herself and decided, since she was keyed up after the meeting in the cavern, and the campers as well as Nell were asleep, that it was time to write in her diary again, make note of what had been said in the cave and the fact that Monica wasn’t in her bed. It seemed her fears about the escaped prisoner were unfounded, at least for the night.
Good.
But where was Monica? Why hadn’t she shown up at the cave? Why had Jo-Beth been late? Annette didn’t believe for a second that it was because of monthly cramps. No, Jo-Beth was too tough. So where had she been? And why had Reva arrived a few minutes late and breathless, too? It didn’t make sense. Annette intended to write down every little thing that had happened, along with her suspicions about what was going on beneath the surface. She knew that Monica had been seeing Tyler and had heard bits and snatches of a late-night campfire conversation between Monica and Bernadette. They had kept their voices low and between the rumble of the surf, crackle of the fire, and someone snoring in Jayla’s cabin, Annette, lurking behind the rough bole of a giant fir tree, had only heard partial sentences.
“I’m . . . about six weeks . . . more like eight. I’m not sure. . . .”
“. . . false alarm . . . late.”
“. . . cycle . . . on the dot . . . infirmary . . . can I?”
From what she could gather, Monica was pregnant, and the father? No doubt Tyler Quade, Jo-Beth’s boyfriend. So it was odd and very, very interesting that Monica was knocked up.
And now she didn’t show up to the meeting?
Was it related?
She’d have to find out.
Annette fished in her hiding spot for her diary, feeling around the small niche, and came up empty.
What?
Quickly, she ran her fingers over the space again.
Nothing!
Panic started to swell in her chest. Her most private thoughts were on those pages and all the secrets . . . ? No, no, no. The diary had to be here! She’d just misplaced it. Holding her breath, her heart beating faster than a hummingbird’s wings, she found her flashlight, clicked it on, then waited. Nell didn’t move. The kids in the other room didn’t so much as stir. Good. Frantic, trying to keep herself calm, she shined the tiny flashlight’s beam into the crevice and found it empty. Her pen wasn’t even in there. Telling herself to stay calm, she stealthily shined the yellowish beam around her bed, flipping back the sleeping bag. Nothing. Under the cot, no sign of the diary, just dirt, sand, fir needles on the solid, old floorboards, no holes where the diary could slip through to the ground.
Oh, no!
It couldn’t be gone.
Could not be!
She had to have misplaced it. That had to be it! However, as she quietly searched through her jacket pockets and backpack and bag, she found nothing, and the dawning realization that the diary was really and truly missing made her realize she hadn’t lost the damned thing. Someone had taken it.
Oh, God.
It wasn’t fair!
She was in love with her sister’s boyfriend.
She’d seen what probably was a ghost.
A girl had gone missing, maybe a second one.
A maniac killer was on the loose.
And now, the one thing she held dear, her private thoughts all locked away in a diary, had been stolen.
Annette wanted to scream with fear and fury, but she stayed still and lay awake in the dark.
CHAPTER 26
Averille, Oregon
Now
Lucas
“I’m tellin’ ya, man, I saw her. Elle. Big as fuckin’ life,” Caleb insisted from the passenger seat of Lucas’s Jeep.
Lucas didn’t believe him. The man was three or maybe four sheets to the wind. “And you’re sure it was Elle?” he asked as they made their way through the back roads to Caleb’s house.
“Aren’t you listenin’?” Caleb smelled like a brewery and looked as if he could use a shower, fresh set of clothes, haircut, and . . . well, the list went on and on.
“At the spit by Crown Creek?”
“Yes! I told ya. Where the damned creek dumps into the ocean.”
“Let’s go see.”
“No way, man!” Caleb’s little piggy eyes rounded in his flushed face and he shook his head violently. “I want nothin’ to do with that! Take me back to my fuckin’ truck.”
“You walk back and get it. When you sober up.”
“No way. You can’t do this.”
“You’re lucky Monty called me and not one of the more by-the-book officers who would have loved to run you in for being ‘drunk and disorderly’ or some other charge. There were quite a few violations.”
“Didn’t do nothin’ wrong! I just saw a fuckin’ ghost and had a drink or two.”
“Or seven or eight,” Lucas said as one tire hit a pothole and the Jeep bounced. Caleb hit his head where he’d already cracked it getting into the Renegade.
“Ow! Sheeeit. Damn it, Dalton, be careful!” Jaw set, red cap square on his head, he rubbed his forehead and stared out the windshield, where the rain was coming down in sheets.
“And you should be careful talking to reporters.”
“Wha—?” Caleb said. “What reporter?”
“The woman you were talking to.”
“That li’l thing? A reporter?” He let out a disgusted breath. “Nah.”
“You think she was talking to you because she was interested in you?” Lucas asked with a skeptical lift of one eyebrow.
“Maybe.”
“When pigs and cows fly.”
Lucas found the lane cutting into the acres that Caleb had inherited. The sparse gravel drive wound through fields spotted with weeds and Scotch broom, and separated from the drive with a wire fence stretched between steel fence posts decorated with old hubcaps showing varying degrees of rust. Lucas said, “She was playing you, trying to get information.”
“You don’t know nothin’.”
“I know that Kinley Marsh is always working an angle.” He’d felt lucky in the fact that he’d avoided talking to her by hauling Caleb out the back of Spike’s before the reporter could ask any questions. She’d been at the bar, talking to Caleb, leaning into the older man as if she were interested in him. It was no wonder that Caleb, at his level of drunkenness and with his inflated ego, had thought she was flirting with him. When Lucas strode into Spike’s and taken stock of the situation, Kinley’s focus had shifted. She’d obviously recognized him, zeroed in on him, and tried to ambush him by introducing herself.
“Detective Dalton!” she’d said, pasting on a winning smile. “I’d like to talk to you.” She’d stuck out a small hand. “Kinley Marsh with the NewzZone, out of Astoria. You’ve probably heard of it.”
“No,” he answered, giving her hand a quick shake, then hustling Carter off his bar stool.
“I’d just like to talk to you about the bones that were found on the beach. The skull.”
“No comment.” He said to Carter, “Come on, Caleb. You’ve been cut off.”
Carter glowered at the barkeep, who had been filling a short glass with soda from his bar gun. “For Christ’s sake, Monty. What the hell’s going on? You called the cops on me?”
Monty shrugged. “It’s for your own good.”
“How’s that?” Caleb had eyed Lucas hard and realized he had no choice in the matter. “Oh, man,” he’d whined as he nearly fell while Lucas kept urging him toward the back door.
“I’ve left you messages,” Kinley had called out, trailing after Lucas and Caleb as they passed four video poker machines, screens glowing brigh
t. Caleb had nearly knocked a woman’s drink from an unoccupied stool.
“Hey!” the blonde had shouted, her overly made-up face a mask of fury. “Oh, for the love of—! Look what you did! And I was on a winning streak.”
“Sorry,” Lucas had said automatically.
“Well, watch where you’re going!”
“Not goin’ anywhere,” Caleb had protested, but Lucas had hold of him by the collar and forced him out the back door to the gray afternoon, where rain had started to pepper the pockmarked parking lot.
“Excuse me, Detective!” Kinley wasn’t one to give up. She’d followed them outside, a short thing in jeans and an oversized jacket, staring up at him belligerently, her chin jutting forward. “I’d like a word or two with you. Not only are you investigating the skeleton that washed up on the beach, but your father owns Camp Horseshoe, where it was found.”
“It was in the cave,” Caleb had said petulantly. “Didn’t I tell ya? And not a skeleton, just a fuc—effin’ jawbone!”
“But a skull was discovered later.” To Lucas, she’d asked, “Have you been able to ID it yet?”
“No comment.” Not wanting to get into it with her, Lucas had opened the passenger door of his Jeep and forced Caleb inside. The bigger man bumped his head getting in and it hadn’t improved his already bad mood. “Hey! What the fuck?”
“You’ll live,” Lucas had assured him and, leaving Kinley standing in the rain, had climbed into his Jeep. Through the open window, he’d added, “Call the station. Talk to the Public Information Officer.”
“I tried that!” she’d yelled after him, only to reach in her pocket for her cell phone.
Lucas hadn’t waited to see if she would follow him and luckily she hadn’t. He’d spent most of the night before nursing either black coffee or a beer while reading over all of the statements and reports in the missing persons’ cases of Monica O’Neal and Eleanor Brady, going over every detail that was online, which wasn’t complete, while waiting for the actual paper records and evidence to be hauled out of the basement, where the archived cold case information was kept. There had been no file on Dustin Peters, the drifter, as no one had bothered to file a report, at least not in Neahkahnie County or the State of Oregon, and the records for Waldo Grimes were all pertaining to his prior arrests.
Still, Lucas had scoured all the law enforcement databases, as well as the Internet in general, for information on all four of the people who seemed to have vaporized into the air that summer.
He hadn’t learned much more than he’d already known, but he’d barely slept since first hearing about the jawbone that Caleb Carter had discovered. He felt the ache in his bones from lack of sleep, sensed a headache coming on, and as he glanced at his reflection in the rearview mirror he noticed that the crow’s feet at the corner of his eyes were more pronounced, the one day’s worth of beard stubble working its way to two.
And he was irritated and grouchy, didn’t want to deal with Kinley Marsh or anyone else from the press. Not now. Not until the media could be of some help solving the case. Of course he knew he’d have to deal with Kinley and other reporters at some time in the future, but it wasn’t going to be today.
Over a slight rise and Caleb’s home came into view. The single-storied house squatted in the middle of the clearing, its sagging roof covered in moss, the siding made of graying wood that had never seen a paintbrush, the porch covered in leaves and old furniture, including a washer and dryer circa 1965 or so. An open garage had been built at a ninety-degree angle from the house, and trucks in various states of dismemberment—hoods up, tires missing, dents visible—stood in attendance. Past the house, near a dip in the land where a huge puddle had collected, a lonely windmill missing several blades turned unevenly in the wind.
“Here ya go,” Lucas said, and with a grunt, Caleb opened the passenger door and rolled out, his boots landing with a squish in the soggy grass. “Sleep it off.”
“Fuck you, Dalton.”
“I could still arrest you.”
“Shit.” Caleb turned too quickly, nearly fell, then righted himself and headed a little unsteadily for the house.
“You’re welcome,” Lucas yelled, and thought he heard another “fuck you,” before he reached across the passenger seat to pull the door closed.
He hit the gas, leaving Caleb to his own devices as he backed onto the highway, then headed to the old access at the south end of Camp Horseshoe that led to Crown Creek and the spot where Caleb swore he’d seen Elle. The usually locked gate was wide open. Lucas drove through and parked his Jeep at a wide spot on the overgrown road, then squared a hat on his head and made his way to the old bridge and the spit. The wind was up and brisk, heavy with the scent of salt, the rain pouring from dark clouds as they scudded inland.
He thought of what he hadn’t told Maggie earlier in the day, the information he’d kept to himself for twenty years, information about a man who’d gone missing. Not that it was relevant, or at least he’d told himself that over and over again, but he should have given Maggie the full account anyway, rather than just starting the story, leaving his own part of it out. Hell, he was a police officer now, a damned detective, and the information still didn’t seem to have any bearing on Dustin Peters’s disappearance.
That day he’d come upon Peters grooming the palomino mare outside near the stable, the horse tethered to the fence where Naomi and Leah had been perched on the top rail . . . there was more to it. Naomi and Leah were talking to Dustin, watching him work, Leah’s ever-present cat slinking along the fence line in search of a mouse hiding in the clumps of dry grass that grew near the posts.
Lucas remembered the day. Vividly. It was the afternoon before Elle had disappeared, a hot, muggy day, the air laden with the promise of a storm that had been forecasted.
Horseflies had buzzed around the mare. The horse was edgy as if she, too, sensed the coming storm. Her ears had been pinned back, her wheat-colored tail flicking. Heat had shimmered over the surrounding hills, the summer sun beating down, and Dusty, naked from the waist up, his jeans riding low on his hips, had been sweating, his hair at his nape wet and curling. His smile had been almost predatory as he combed the horse’s coat, his own muscles gleaming.
At the time Lucas had experienced a cold feeling in the pit of his stomach.
And it hadn’t abated over the years.
Dustin had been talking to Naomi, ostensibly about a trail ride scheduled for later in the week, but his gaze kept landing on Leah in her cutoff shorts, cowboy boots, and thick ponytail. She’d been awkward and coltish, long legs and skinny arms, but there was just the hint of a woman beneath her freckles and innocence.
Lucas had never noticed her blossoming womanhood until that second, when he, understanding male sexual needs all too well, had observed Dustin eyeing his sister.
Spying Lucas walking toward them, Naomi had scowled slightly, the corners of her mouth pinching. “What’s up?” She’d been dressed in tight jeans and a sleeveless pink T-shirt, huge sunglasses hiding her eyes.
“Nothin’. Just letting Dusty know we need help with the truck. It’s misfiring.”
Naomi’s eyebrows had drawn even closer together. “You need him now?” she’d asked, obviously seeing through his lie.
“Dad wants to run into town,” Lucas had lied. It had been so easy to bend the truth back then. “Magda needs some supplies.”
“We get deliveries.” Naomi’s lips had twitched in exasperation, and she seemed to glare down at him imperiously from behind her retro Jackie O sunglasses.
Lucas had held up both hands in surrender. “I’m just the messenger.”
“I’m done here anyway,” Dusty had said, his eyes narrowing on Lucas as he’d snatched his shirt from the ground, then untied the horse and had begun leading her through a gate opening to the corral at the back of the stable.
Naomi had clearly been irritated, but she and Leah had hopped to the ground. Naomi had shot him a dark look from behind her shades as
she’d dusted off her rear, then, with Leah in tow, had started heading toward the office and rec center.
Lucas had followed Dustin around the corner of the stable to find the cowboy allowing the mare to drink from a water trough while he’d begun pulling his T-shirt over his head.
Without another thought Lucas had jumped him, pushing the muscular man hard against the stable wall.
Bam! The back of Dusty’s head cracked against the graying boards.
“What the fuck, man!” Dusty had cried, the top of his head poking through the neck of his shirt, his arms still midway through the short sleeves. “Back off!”
Lucas had shoved the cowboy harder, pinning him against the rough, weathered boards, his forearm jammed firmly over the smaller man’s throat.
He’d felt Dusty’s Adam’s apple bob, seen him sweat.
Shoving his face to within an inch of the cowboy’s nose, Lucas had hissed, “Off-limits.” So furious he’d been spitting, he’d repeated, “Got that, Peters? Leah is off-limits!”
“Whoa, man—” Dusty had fought furiously to free his arms, but with his body pressed against the side of the wall he could only struggle and squirm futilely. “I didn’t—”
“Shut up,” Lucas had ordered, throwing all of his weight onto his forearm, his body shoved firmly against Dusty to keep him from breaking free. “She’s just a kid. Not even a damned teenager yet. So you just stay the fuck away from her.”
“You got it all wrong!” Dusty had choked out, his face red, his eyes bulging, his head finally emerging from the neck hole of his shirt. “I don’t give a shit about her. It’s your stepmother. Naomi. She’s the one. C’mon, man, you know how hot she is . . . sitting up there on the fence, watching me from behind those dark glasses. She wants it. I can tell.”
“Shut up.”
“I bet she’s got one wet, sweet pussy, doesn’t she?” His thick eyebrows had arched suggestively. “You know, right? She’s a real she-cat in bed.”
Lucas’s free hand curled into a fist and he struck swiftly, landing a hard punch in Dusty’s gut.
Smack!
“Oooph! Oh . . . gawd . . . Jesus, Dalton!” He’d gone limp.