by Keri Lake
Slipping the gold around my neck is a reminder of the day I took it off, about a year after Nora went missing. Seemed silly to wear the necklace that said sister, when my sister was no longer around. My father walked in, as I set the necklace down on the dresser. At first, I felt embarrassed that he’d caught me removing it, but those feelings quickly turned to animosity and a steadfast belief that it was the adult thing to do.
“No point in wearing it,” I said to him.
“Maybe not.” He strode across the room and lifted the small infinity charm into his palm. “But I wonder if she’s taken hers off. See, while you look at it as pointless, from your perspective, she may just as well be viewing it as purpose. A reason for living. For fighting. For wanting to come back home.”
Tears fill my eyes as I stare down at the charm in my palm. I squeeze it in my hands and close my eyes, hands clasped together in prayer. I stopped going to church years ago, but I believe God is patient with those of us who can’t seem to get our shit together. He has to be.
Nora, if you’re out there, watch over him. Protect him. And bring him back to me. And, God, please don’t take him yet.
My body is yanked backwards, knocking the breath out of my lungs. A hand slaps across my mouth before I can let out a scream, while another arm bands tight around my body, crushing me against the intruder.
“Shhhh. Don’t scream.”
Voss’s voice adds to the terror already shooting through me, and I do exactly the opposite and scream into his big palm. Wriggling and kicking, I fight to get away, clawing at his arm. Defense moves I studied on Youtube flash through my head, while I make a poor attempt to bend his thumb backward.
He wrenches his hand out of my grip, but quickly braces me again. “Nola! I’m not going to hurt you. There’s something I need to tell you. Something I haven’t told you.”
Ignoring him, I keep on with my struggle, stomping on his foot, digging my nails into his arm, squirming against him.
The man is iron and steel. Immovable.
I scream again and feel his breath on my ear.
“I can help you find your son.”
I freeze. Hard breaths expand and shrink my chest faster than I can suck the oxygen from them, making me feel dizzy.
But his words. His words have rendered me almost paralyzed.
He lowers his hand from my face, allowing more air to steal away the urge to pass out.
“How?” I don’t actually believe him, but then, I’m so desperate, I can’t dismiss him, either.
“Jonah was right. I’m not who you think I am.”
A part of me always believed that myself, but I don’t tell him so. “Who are you?”
“My name was Barrett Voselick. I grew up about thirty minutes north of here. Forest Glen area.”
I knew that area to be wealthy, made up of extravagant mansions. We sometimes drove through there when we were younger, to admire the monstrous homes with equally spacious property, often surrounded by gates and high cement walls.
“Remember, I told you about my uncle and grandfather?”
“What do they have to do with Oliver?”
“Everything. I’m pretty sure it was my uncle who took your son.”
“Why? Because of you?”
“In part. But also because of you.”
Me? What the hell would I have to do with his uncle? “Why? How would I know him?”
“Because he’s the one who took your sister, Nora.”
The sound of her name on his lips hits me like a hammer to the chest. Everything inside of me is cold and numb. I have to will myself to stay on my feet, and maybe Voss senses this, as he half carries me to the bed, allowing me to sit.
“What did …. What did you say?”
“I have reason to believe this is a vendetta. That he lured me here to stage his revenge.”
“Revenge for what?” I don’t want to ask, because I already sense that, in the next few minutes, I’m going to find out exactly what happened to Nora. The possibility that she ran off, that she escaped, will be crushed beneath whatever Voss tells me. A quick glimpse of his face, pinched and troubled, tells me it isn’t good. It isn’t what I hoped for all these years. It’s exactly what Mother feared most.
“I tried to help her escape. My uncle intended to kill her. He’d planned to eliminate the evidence by burning her alive.”
Hand slapped over my mouth, I choke back the urge to throw up and breathe hard through my nose. I don’t know how many blows one person can take before suffering a heart attack, or a stroke, but the dizziness, the numbness, the surreal feeling that this is all a dream leaves me wondering if I’ve already reached that point. If I’m just one breath away from my body giving out on me. It’s worse than my mother feared. So much worse.
“I managed to knock him out,” Voss continues, drawing me out of my temporary paralysis. “Scooped up Nora and carried her out of the house, into the woods behind our property. She was … so cold. He’d given her drugs, and I’m pretty sure he gave her too much at once. We hid from Carl in the trees, and I tried to keep her warm. Gave her my sweatshirt, but I couldn’t …. I couldn’t keep her warm enough. And she started to shake, and her eyes rolled back. Tried to keep her talking to me. I could hear Carl looking for us in the woods. Taunting us out of our hiding spot. But I couldn’t leave her to get help and risk that he’d find her.” Brows pinched together, he lowers his gaze from mine, and I catch the bob of his throat as he swallows. “She died in my arms.”
My chest tugs with a sob, and I cry for my sister. The terror and pain she must’ve endured in those days we couldn’t find her.
“You …. You never called the police? You never reported it?”
For the first time, I see what I surmise as shame in Voss’s eyes.
“I wanted to. She told me that your dad was a police officer. But see, Carl, he made me …. He tried to make me an accomplice.” Eyes closing, he shakes his head. “I wouldn’t do it. I refused to let him hurt her. So, when he came after me, I knew he planned to kill me. I left Nora there, in the woods, and I ran toward this old bridge at the nature preserve, over the river. Carl found me there. I fought him, and I threw his limp body over the bridge. I was scared. Didn’t know what to do. Swore I killed him that day.”
“You don’t know for sure?”
“I held him down. Strangled him until he stopped fighting me. Stopped moving. And I pushed his body over the bridge. I watched him fall into the water. For the first time in my life, I felt … free.” He’s quiet for a moment, with an introspective stare, and I wish I were privy to the thoughts in his head. “I ran away that day. I couldn’t tell anyone because I was certain I’d killed him. Until I got a message from him a couple weeks ago.”
“What kind of message?”
“A game of chase. He invited me to hunt him down. Told me you were next.”
A chill skitters over my skin, springing goose bumps, and stirs a sickness in my gut. It occurs to me that nothing in the last few weeks has been coincidence. “You don’t work for Wall Street, do you, Voss?” I ask, but already know the answer.
“No.”
“What do you do?”
“Your instincts were right all along, Nola. I am a killer. An assassin for hire.”
Once again, the nausea in my stomach twists, and I push myself away from him. “Oh, God, I think I’m going to be sick.”
“I don’t kill innocent people. I’m hired to go after high-profile criminals. To gather information.”
“Are you like … FBI?”
“Maybe like a dark ops version of the FBI. We’re typically hired by the wealthy and corrupted, so I wouldn’t go so far as to say we’re all that good.”
“Who is this man, your uncle? What’s his name?”
“His birth name was Carl Jenson, but there’s no evidence to support he’s dead, or alive. If he is alive, he’d be in his forties by now. I’m fairly certain he’s behind The Sandman murders, though.”
“
The women? So … not Harv, then?”
“Not Harv. I have a feeling Beth and Harv are dead. Which is why I’m here.”
I can’t even bring myself to cry anymore. The deaths I’ve had to face over the last couple of months just seem to keep burying me farther and farther beneath the surface. “Why are you here?”
“You need to tell me of anyone associated with those two.”
“They’re … swingers. They could be associated with anyone. The guy is in his forties?”
“Nine years older than me. About forty-five.”
The only person who comes to mind is Dale, who’s in his forties, but he’s always been so supportive of me. I refuse to believe he’s capable of something so sadistic. Any time I’ve needed something, Dale’s always jumped in to help. “I don’t know. I’ll have to think about it.”
“You do that. And if you think of anyone, you’ve got my number.”
As ridiculous as it sounds, now that he’s told me what feels more like truth, my instincts are to trust him. The niggling feelings from before no longer beat at my skull, the way they do when things don’t add up right. Everything he’s said makes sense. “The watch. Denny’s watch. Why did you have it?”
“Carl likes to play games. He sent me on a scavenger hunt for the watch. It’s possible he murdered your husband, too.”
Hearing that stabs my chest with more panic. “Then, he’ll kill …. He’ll …. Oliver?”
“Not yet. I think he took Oliver for a reason.”
“Voss … can you bring him back to me?”
“Yes. I will. But I need you to keep this between us. Don’t say anything to Jonah, or Carl might just slip through my fingers before I can get to him.”
“And … how do I know … you’re telling the truth?”
He lifts the necklace from my throat and stares down at it. “Your sister had one like it. She was wearing it that night. As I held her, she kinda talked a little deliriously. Said if she ever saw her parents again, she’d tell them she was sorry. And that she loved you all.”
Eyes filled with tears, I shake my head. “Nora wouldn’t say that. Not to me.”
“You’re right. The word she used was lanu, or something. I thought it was her name.”
The sound of the word is an ice pick, chipping away at my heart. “She overdosed then—that’s how she died? No … beating, or burning, or drowning?” My nose stings with the threat of more tears, which I swallow back. “She died in your arms.”
“Yes. She seemed at peace. Like she’d fallen asleep and didn’t wake up.”
Tipping my head back, I close my eyes and imagine that. Imagine her dying quietly, peacefully in the woods, wrapped in his sweatshirt as he held her. It’s far more comforting than the thought that she burned alive, or died alone. “I won’t say anything. I promise.” My thoughts spin like a tornado, and I try to nab the bits he’s offered, to make sense of the confusion. “You think Carl is after me, then?”
“For the longest time, I didn’t know why. But I think he might be trying to recreate what happened that day.”
“With me.”
“I won’t let that happen. I couldn’t save your sister because I was a boy. A weak and frightened boy. I’m not that boy anymore, Nola. I won’t let him hurt you. Or Oliver.”
I’m overcome with hope and sadness, and a clashing of emotions that have my head aching, my eyes burning. Wrapping my arms around him, I pull him into me and kiss him. I don’t know why. Maybe because he’s the bearer of something. Some news that connects my son, my sister, and answers questions that have long plagued me. Or maybe the human connection feels nice. The momentary slip into something less dark.
The front door slams shut, breaking our kiss.
“Jonah.” I slide my hands away from him, and wipe away the evidence of tears still hot on my cheeks. “You have to leave.”
Taking the nape of my neck, he draws me in for one more kiss. “Get some sleep. You’re going to need it.”
Striding past me, he slips out of the bedroom window, makes his way down the roof of the porch, and I just reach the window, as he leaps to the ground.
I want to believe him more than anything. More than my fears, or the voices in my head, telling me he’s wrong.
More than my doubts that I’ll ever see my son again.
8
Voss
Up the street, I make my way to my car, parked a few houses away from Nola’s place.
I couldn’t bring myself to tell her everything. I wanted to. For reasons that don’t make a damn bit of sense to me, I feel compelled to confess everything to this woman, to clean the slate and have her see me for what I truly am. A purging of sorts, letting all that shit from my past hit her like a dose of reality, a reason why she should’ve walked out of that elevator the day in the hotel and told me to fuck off.
Not even I can face that part of my history without wanting to swallow a bullet, so I’m fairly certain she’d have taken that harder.
When the time is right, I’ll tell her everything, what I was forced to do that night, even at the risk of her despising me for almost following through, but for now, she doesn’t need to know that part of my history.
I wasn’t lying about trying to save Nora, though. After Carl forced me on her, I stole a moment of weakness, as he laughed at me, mocking me. I’m certain, had it not rained the night I carried her out of that house, had it not been freezing cold and dark, I could’ve probably gotten the two of us to safety. But fate didn’t see it that way, and I blame myself for that. For being cursed from birth, to lose everything that mattered to me.
I didn’t know the girl. Didn’t know where she was from, but I’d resigned myself to help her—my single most objective having been: get her away from Carl.
I failed.
Not just her, but myself. Her father. Her mother, and her brother. But most of all, I failed Nola.
Won’t happen twice.
I’ve spent every evening the last couple days parked outside of her house, or at Harvey’s place, waiting for any sign of the white van to show up, but it hasn’t. He knows I’m watching closely now, and he’s undoubtedly waiting to make the next move. Between the police drive-by that happens a couple times a day, her brother staying the night, and me watching like a hawk, she’s pretty well guarded.
Tonight was the first time Jonah’s left her alone, so I stole the opportunity to see her.
To tell her some of the truth. Give her some of the answers I know she’s probably desperate for. How fucked up my family is, and exactly what she’s dealing with. A stab of pain strikes my skull, and with the heel of my hand, I settle the intense ache that threatens blinding pain.
I’d give anything for that metronome right now, to settle my head. It’s only the sound, itself, that puts me in a relaxed state. Unfortunately, the symbolism of what the metronome was, for me as a child, is much more ominous, and as I stare down the empty street, my mind slips into memories of the day I learned what it meant.
The same day my mother was murdered.
My fingers run over the keys to the simplified version of Mozart’s ‘Lacrimosa’ of the Requiem. It’s my mother’s favorite, and as she sits beside me, she sways, smiling, her palm against her cheek, as she follows the rhythm of the song.
When I finish, she leans in and kisses the top of my head, giggling. “That’s my boy! Soon you’ll be playing Chopin and Liszt!”
The deep clearing of a throat draws my attention to the doorway, where my grandfather stands with his arms crossed, eyebrows stern. Always so pissed-off looking.
“Time for the boy to practice scales.”
Every day, my mother leaves me to practice scales to the sound of the metronome. I don’t mind it. It’s an hour my grandfather doesn’t bother to hound me about chores, or studies. It’s an acceptable hour of relaxed play that I look forward to alone, while my mother helps Grandfather with his bookkeeping.
Setting one more kiss to the top of my head, my mother
pushes off the bench and sets the metronome to seventy beats-per-minute. Face downturned, she always looks disgusted about helping him with bookkeeping. As if it’s the worst thing he could ask her to do.
I don’t blame her. I’ve always hated numbers, myself.
“Nice and loud, Barrett. So we can hear you,” she says.
With a nod, I place my hands to the keys and begin to practice, while the two of them leave the room.
Minutes later, Carl appears, resting his elbow on the top of the piano. He’s just turned twenty-two. Thinks he’s hot shit, or something, always walking around with that smug grin. I try to ignore him for the scales, to make my mother happy, but when he starts to laugh, my irritation heightens, and I lose concentration.
“What do you want!”
“Ever wonder why they make you play these scales for an hour?”
“To practice,” I say, starting over.
“You’re as stupid as you look.”
“Then, why, if you’re so smart, huh?”
“How ‘bout I make you a deal? I’ll play your scales, and you go look?”
“What for?”
“It’ll make more sense if you just do it.”
I want to tell him to go to hell, but Carl’s never offered to do anything for me, and, admittedly, I’m curious. “Fine.”
He takes my place, sitting down at the keys. Carl isn’t as good as I am with music, but he’s been forced to practice scales far longer than I have, and he does so with ease. As he plays, I venture down the hallway toward where grandfather’s office door stands closed. It’s dark, but a small beam of light bleeds from the keyhole, and as I approach, the deep sound of grunting slows my steps. Taking a knee before the door, I peer through the keyhole.