by Rachel Caine
I don’t break stride passing him. From behind me, he says, “We’ll be talking, Mrs. Royal.” That’s just spite, and I don’t dignify it by looking back at him. I keep going, and as soon as I pass the door frame, I feel a weight lifted. I take in a sharp breath, filtered by the fresh scent of the coffee I’ve just finished, and I dump the cup and go in search of where they’ve put Sam.
He’s still closeted with another officer, and when I look around for Mike Lustig, he’s nowhere to be found. I don’t much like that. I don’t like that he’s abandoned us here to fend for ourselves. I find a seat and wait, watching the door and watching the clock hands crawl. Sam’s conversation goes on at least twice as long as mine does, and it’s nearly six when he finally appears. He doesn’t look bothered, and he’s finishing coffee. He downs the rest in a gulp and tosses the empty cup, then stops beside me. “You okay?” I ask him.
“Nothing I can’t deal with,” he says. There’s a storm circling behind his eyes. I wonder what the cop said to him. Must not have been pleasant.
“Where’s your friend Mike? Fat lot of good he did us.”
“Yeah,” Sam says. “He had to leave and go back to the scene.”
“So what did he tell you, if he told you anything?”
“To go home,” Sam says. “And forget this ever happened.” Go back to Stillhouse Lake, I’m sure he means. Hunker down, guns at the ready, for my husband to come for us. But when I try to imagine that, I can’t see us managing to defend ourselves. I see Melvin appearing, like some evil spirit, behind us. I see him killing Javier and Kezia. I see Sam dead on the floor.
I see me and my kids, alone against the darkness that is their father. And I am not confident that I can save them.
“We can’t just give up,” I say. “Let’s take a look at what we got first. Will Lustig tell us what they find in the basement up there?”
“Maybe,” Sam says, which doesn’t fill me with enthusiasm. “I might have burned a bridge on that one. We’ll see. No, don’t apologize.” I’ve already opened my mouth to do just that, and I shut it, fast. “I’d burn every bridge I ever built to get to Melvin. Understand that.”
I wonder if he includes the bridge that we’ve so carefully built between the two of us. I think I understand Sam, most of the time. But when it comes to this . . . maybe I’m fooling myself. Maybe, despite everything he’s done for me and my kids, despite the fact that I’ve allowed myself to be open and vulnerable around him, and he’s shown every sign of appreciating that . . . maybe, ultimately, if it comes to a choice between me and getting to Melvin, he’ll step over me to get a grip around my husband’s throat.
Fair enough. I might just do the same thing. Probably best we don’t discuss it.
There’s a gauntlet of uniforms around, but we aren’t blocked on our way out. Our car is still there in the lot, and still locked. Sam lets out a held breath as we turn onto the main road, and he accelerates—within the speed limit—heading south. “Right,” he says. “Let’s get the hell out of here. Where we headed?”
“Next town over,” I tell him. “Let’s stay local, but not right under their noses. Find us a motel.” I start to say something midpriced, but then I stop myself. That’s my natural inclination, but if Melvin’s been alerted to this event, he and Absalom will be looking for us. It’s a small pool of choices in this area. They’ll try everything cheap and anonymous first. “Find us a bed-and-breakfast. Something off the beaten path.”
He nods and tosses me a pamphlet. “Grabbed it from the gift shop in the hospital,” he says. “Should be some ads in there.”
6
CONNOR
Officer Graham told me, Never tell about this, and I haven’t. Not because I don’t know Officer Graham was a bad guy—I know that. He scared the hell out of us. He hurt us when he dragged us out of our house, too.
But I’ll never tell because of what he gave me. I know Mom would take it away, and I’m not ready for that to happen.
I leave the phone Lancel Graham gave me turned off. I tried to use it back in the basement in that cabin where he was holding us, but there wasn’t a signal. I turned it off and removed the battery when Mom found us because I didn’t want it ringing, and I didn’t want anybody tracking us with it.
I don’t really know why I haven’t just thrown it out, or buried it, or told someone I have it . . . except that it’s mine.
Officer Graham said, This is from your dad, and it’s just for you, Brady. Nobody else.
My dad sent me something, and even though I know I should get rid of it, I can’t. It’s the only thing I have from him. I sometimes imagine him standing in a store, looking at all the phones and choices, and finding one he thought I’d like. Maybe that’s not what happened, but that’s how I imagine it. That he cared. That he put some thought into it.
It’s lucky that it looks almost like the cheap phone I already carry. They’re both disposables, but I’ve learned to tell them apart by touch—the one Mom gave me feels a little rough under my fingers, and Dad’s feels as smooth as glass. They use the same charger. I keep both of them charged up by putting one under the bed charging when I’m carrying the other one.
But I don’t turn Dad’s on. I just keep it off, with the battery in my pocket, ready to go.
I’ve just taken Dad’s phone out of my pocket—not to use it, just look at it—when Lanny leans in the door of my room and says, “Hey, did you go in my room?”
I’m already feeling guilty, and the second I hear her voice it feels like there’s a spotlight on me, bright white and very hot. I drop Dad’s phone and watch as it spins across the floor and up against her foot. My mouth goes dry. I’m scared to death that she’s going to immediately frown and say, This isn’t your phone—where did you get it, and it’ll all be over, and everybody will be mad that I didn’t turn it over first thing, and they’ll all give me those looks again. The ones that wonder if I’m really like him.
But all Lanny does is snort, say “Way to go, Butterfingers,” and kick it back to me. I pick it up and jam it into my pocket. My hands are shaking. I shove Mom’s phone, still on the charger, into the shadows under the bed with my foot. She hasn’t seen it, I can tell. “Did you go in my room or what?”
“No,” I tell her. “Why?”
“My door was open.”
“Well, I didn’t do it.”
Lanny crosses her arms and looks at me with that frown that means she’s not buying it. “Then why do you look guilty?”
“I don’t!” I tell her, and I know that makes me sound guilty. I’m not a very good liar.
“Did you take something? Because you know I’m going to look!”
I don’t think. I just get up, shove her back, and close the door. It locks, which is good, because she immediately starts jiggling the knob.
“I’m not talking to you!” I yell at her, and I lie down on my bed.
I take my dad’s phone out of my pocket and turn it over and over again in my fingers. The screen’s dark.
I stare for a long time before I reach in my pocket and get the battery out. I open the back and slide it in, then put my finger on the “Power” button. Lanny’s gone away, probably to complain to whoever cares that I’m being a brat. Normally that would be Mom. Normally.
I press gently on the button, but not enough to actually make it start up. What happens if I turn it on? Will Dad know? Will he call me? Why did he want me to have this at all?
But I know why. Because he can track the phone if it’s on. He could find us, and Mom, and I can’t do that.
But it takes time, part of me says, the part that memorizes all the risks and tells me what’s safe, and what isn’t. He won’t be able to track you if you just turn it on, check it, and take the battery out again. It’s not magic.
That might be right. It’s probably right. I could turn it on and see if he called me, or texted. That would be okay, wouldn’t it? I wouldn’t have to read anything. Or listen to a voice mail. I’d just check.
I brush my finger over the button, again. Hold it a little longer this time. Not long enough, I think, because when I let go, the screen is still dark.
And then it buzzes in my hand, like something about to sting me, and the screen lights up and spells out HELLO in bouncing letters, then SEARCHING FOR SIGNAL.
I can’t breathe. My heart hurts, and I lean forward like someone’s already punched me in the stomach, but I can’t look away from the screen as it fades, and comes back, and it’s a clunky little collection of icons almost too small to see, but I can tell that there aren’t any phone calls. No voice mails.
No texts.
I select the CONTACTS icon. There’s one number programmed in.
Dad’s number.
I should stop right now. I should stop and give this phone to someone else. An adult, not Lanny, because Lanny would just bash it with a rock. If Mr. Esparza and Ms. Claremont have Dad’s phone number, maybe they can find him before he hurts someone. Before he finds Mom, or Mom finds him.
You’re killing him if you do that. I don’t like the voice in my head. It’s quiet, but it’s firm. And it sounds like me, but grown up. If they don’t shoot him the second they see him, they’ll take him back to prison. Back to death row. That means killing him. You’d be the one doing it.
I don’t like it, but the voice is right, too. I don’t want to have to think about how I was the reason my dad got killed, put down like a sick dog. Because this time, I would be the reason if I turned over this phone.
He trusted me not to do that. He trusted me.
I’ve had the phone on too long. I quickly press and hold the “Power” button until the screen says, in cheesy waving letters, Goodbye, and little pixeled fireworks go up, and the whole screen goes black. I pull out the battery. My hands are shaking.
I didn’t send him a message. I didn’t call him. I didn’t do anything wrong, but I feel sick and light-headed and I’m shaking all over like I’ve caught the flu.
I almost fall off the bed when Lanny knocks on the door. It sounds super loud, but it isn’t, I realize in the next second. She’s being nice. She says, “Hey, Connor? I’m going to make Rice Krispies treats. The kind with peanut butter and chocolate, your favorite. You want to come help me?” There’s a beat of silence. “I’m sorry, Squirtle.”
I desperately want my sister right now. I want to not feel so alone and out of control. So I shove Dad’s now-inactive phone back in my pocket, open the door, and give her what I’m sure is a totally dumb smile. It feels fake on my face. “Okay,” I say, then shut my door behind me. “As long as I get the first three squares.”
“First two.”
“I thought you were sorry.”
“Two says I’m sorry. Three says I’m stupid.”
It feels all right. Everything should feel all right here; Mr. Esparza is outside on the porch, reading a book, and Ms. Claremont is getting ready to go to work for a few hours. The house is warm and friendly and full of smiles.
I feel like I’m the one who’s wrong, like the phone in my pocket is a bomb just waiting to go off and destroy everything.
I look at Ms. Claremont as she picks up her bag. She gives me a quick, wide smile that fades when she looks at me closely. Lanny’s moving to get stuff out of the kitchen cabinets, so her back is turned, and I’m not trying to look happy anymore.
“Connor?” Ms. Claremont keeps her voice low. “You okay?”
I could do it. I could take the phone out of my pocket and hand it to her and confess everything, right now. This is my chance.
But I think about the documentary I saw on YouTube about a man strapped down on a table in prison, and poison put in his arm so he died, and I think about my dad.
And I say, “I’m fine, Ms. Claremont.”
“Kez,” she tells me, again. She’s said that the last four times. Maybe she really means it.
“Kez,” I say, then force another smile out. “I’m okay. Thanks.”
“Okay, but if you’re not, you know I’m a call away, right?”
My fingertips tap the phone in my pocket. “I know.”
7
GWEN
Sam’s tourist pamphlet is worth its weight in gold. There’s a perfect candidate for our stop for the night, and when I check the folded paper map, I find that it’s about twenty miles away—far enough to be off the radar, and couples oriented enough to be the last place Melvin—or Absalom, for that matter—would look. Desperately charming, I think.
When we arrive there, we find that’s exactly the right description. It’s lovely and neat and perfectly trimmed, with a small parking lot. It’s too dark to see beyond the lights mounted outside, but I imagine the mist rises heavy in the mornings to give the whole place a magical look. It looks like a typical B and B sort of establishment, an expensive hobby for retired financial analysts who sink a fortune into renovating an old but magnificent house in the middle of nowhere. They’ve certainly spared no expense, I find as we walk inside: it’s clean, gracious, full of well-kept antiques. It smells of fresh oranges.
The lady standing behind the antique counter is not what I expect. Midthirties, I think. She’s of Indian extraction, wearing a truly lovely sari of royal blue trimmed in ornate gold, her hair drawn back in a neat bun, and she smiles with real welcome. “Hello,” she says. “Welcome to Morningside House. Are you looking for a room?” Her voice carries a slight, crisp midwestern accent, without any trace of a southern drawl. There’s a very slight shadow beneath the smile, a little wariness in her eyes. I wonder how hard life has been for her here in deep redneck country. Very, I imagine.
“Yes, thanks,” Sam says, stepping up as she opens a register book. He scribbles down names, but in unreadable scrawl. “One room’s fine. Two beds.”
She gives us a quick once-over, reconsidering whatever her earlier presumption had been. “Ah. Well. Unfortunately, all my one-room arrangements have a single bed. But I do have a two-bedroom suite.” She lifts her hand to indicate the nearly empty parking lot and gives a sad little shrug. “I can offer you a substantial discount.”
She names the shockingly cheap price, and we pay it in cash, which she doesn’t seem to find too strange. She doesn’t ask for identification. She’s probably sick to death, I think, of people demanding to see her own. On impulse, I hold out my hand to her. She looks at it in surprise, then takes it and shakes. “Thanks for making us welcome,” I tell her. “This is a beautiful place.”
She brightens and beams as she looks around at the carefully tended room. “Yes, we like it,” she says. “My husband and I bought it five years ago. We spent two years renovating. I’m glad you like it.”
“Very much,” I say. “I’m Cassandra, by the way.” I choose a name at random, and it doesn’t escape me that it’s out of a Greek tragedy.
“Aisha,” she tells me. “My husband, Kiaan, is in the back—” She has to break off, because a door behind the counter slams open, and a small figure rushes out and skids to a halt when he spots us. A heartbreakingly cute little boy, with wide dark eyes and a shy smile that he immediately hides in the folds of his mother’s sari.
She sighs and picks him up with that automatic grace of mothers everywhere, then balances him against her hip. “And this is Arjun,” she says. “Say hello, Arjun.”
He utterly refuses this, with the stubbornness of a typical kid his age, but he stares at me and Sam with undisguised fascination. I wave to him, and he gives a little hand wave back before hiding his face again. But he’s still smiling. I remember that age so well, and it almost hurts. I feel the weight of Connor in my arms suddenly. The familiar pressure on the point of my hip. The soft caramel smell of his hair and skin.
The same door that Arjun burst through opens again, and it’s an older girl of about fourteen, willowy and wearing jeans and a pale-pink shirt. Her hair is worn long and straight in a shimmering curtain, held back with jeweled pins. She gives us a curious glance, then takes possession of Arjun. “Sorry, Mom,” she say
s. “He got away from me.” She looks resigned more than irritated.
“It’s all right,” Aisha says. “Please tell your father we have guests. And put on the scones.”
Sam looks at me and mouths scones, with raised eyebrows, and it’s all I can do not to laugh. We’ve been bedding down in crap motels and in the SUV, and this lush, fragrant place seems like heaven right now.
As the daughter disappears through the door again, Aisha leads us up two flights of polished steps to the second door, which she opens before handing me and Sam identical keys, dangling from silver tags that read MORNINGSIDE HOUSE. “I’ll send the scones up soon,” she tells us. “Have a good night.”
With that, she’s gone, closing the door with a soft click. I automatically shut the bolt—it’s a sturdy one, vintage—and then turn to look at what we’ve bought for ourselves.
It’s great. The sitting room has two comfortable sofas, old enough to fit the theme but with none of the stiffness I usually associate with antiques. There are lovely little tables and a modern flat-screen TV, two desks (a rolltop and a smaller flat one) with antique roller chairs at each. There’s a padded bench beside a large picture window that I’m sure will provide a spectacular view of the mountains come morning, but for now, I’m all too aware of the darkness outside, and the fact that we’re nearly visible from space in the illumination of the room. I pull the curtains, then turn to Sam with a smile. “So?” I spread my hands to indicate the room.
He’s studying the workmanship on a Tiffany-style lamp, all drooping, graceful purples and greens that mimic wisteria. “We lucked out,” he says, then straightens. Winces. Dumps his backpack in a wing chair near the fireplace. “This is amazing. And there are scones.”