by H. P. Bayne
“I will. Thanks.” Sully checked the time on his cellphone screen. He’d decided not to risk driving Emily’s car. One taillight was burned out, and getting pulled over was not an option. Dez might be done by now with whatever he was doing with Lachlan and could pick him up.
“You need to go,” Snowy observed. “I should go too—if you wouldn’t mind seeing me to the door. I’d rather not be alone here after all that activity a few minutes ago.”
Sully led her back toward the front door and returned her subsequent embrace.
“It was good to see you,” she said. “You take care of yourself, and make sure to call on us if you need help.”
“I will,” he said. “Thank you.”
She released him, but continued to hold him in a narrow-eyed gaze.
“I understand your need to find answers and a way out of this half-life you’re living,” she said. “But be certain the truths you are after are ones you can handle.”
She left without awaiting a response.
16
Dez waited in the rear parking lot of a defunct business in the warehouse area, keeping to his spot behind the wheel as he waited for Sully.
A few minutes passed, and Dez was considering calling his brother again when he finally saw him jogging over from the direction of the riverbank—without his dog.
“Where’s Pax?” Dez asked as soon as Sully had put his belongings in the back and dropped into the passenger seat.
“I couldn’t take Emily’s car because of the taillight,” Sully said. “And I decided I didn’t want to be anywhere near Mom and her questions until you were there to help me field them.”
“You realize the questions are only going to be worse once she sees me, right?”
Sully’s discerning gaze covered Dez’s face before drifting to the rest of him. “You don’t look as bad as you did last night. The swelling’s gone down on your head, and your eye’s not as black as we thought it might get.”
Dez checked out the eye in the rearview mirror. “It’s still black underneath,” he said. “Mom’s going to ask.”
Sully smirked. “I could go in first, sneak out some of Eva’s makeup for you. Bit of foundation, maybe some lipstick and mascara, you’d be a whole new you.”
Dez was about to backhand Sully in the gut when he remembered the injury. He settled for a light smack to the back of his brother’s head.
“If you’re finished being a dipshit, I’ll fill you in on the meeting Lachlan and I just had,” Dez said.
“Who was it?”
“Paul Dunsmore. You remember Paul. You almost drowned in his basement.”
Sully rolled his eyes. “Yeah, I remember. How is he? What did he tell you?”
“He’s good, and he had a few interesting things to say.” Dez filled Sully in on the meeting, detailing Paul’s involvement in the Circle and the man’s thoughts on Lowell. “He’s willing to give us a hand, be our eyes and ears inside the Circle.”
“Is that safe?”
“Probably not, but nothing feels safe to me anymore. One thing in his favour, anyway: His father is among the founding members, and being one of the richest men in town, he holds some clout around there. Any murderous Circle member would think twice about going after Paul if it means upsetting his father.”
“Okay, so—”
Dez cut in. “Hang on. One more thing you should know. The masked man in the Blue Room you talked about? Paul thinks it was his father.”
Sully’s head snapped fully toward Dez. “What?”
Dez nodded. “Paul says his father is basically Lowell’s partner, and that he’s been investing heavily in LOBRA from the start. He said Ray Dunsmore is a hands-on kind of guy. He would have wanted to be there to see the experiments in action.”
“Hackman told us all he knew about the guy in the mask was that he was an investor,” Sully said. “What Paul told you makes sense. And if it was Ray Dunsmore, I get the mask thing. What they were doing was wrong on multiple levels. If anyone found out what he was involved in, he’d be finished.”
“I know. It does make sense—as much as anything makes sense to me anymore. How about you? You get everything out of Ravenwood?”
“Yeah, and I got more than I bargained for. I ran into Snowy.”
“Snowy? You mean the Lockwood patient who looks like an owl? The one you thought died there?”
“Yeah. It turns out her son helped her escape. Terrence Waters, the guy who—”
“I remember him,” Dez said. After the playground fight with the war vet, Dez would have a hard time forgetting. “He’s her son? Did you see him too?”
“No, he was apparently keeping watch outside. Anyway, he had to go into hiding because of Lowell.”
“Because of the break-in at the Black Fox?” Dez asked. “He thinks Lowell wants to kill him over that?”
“Probably more that Terrence can point police toward Lowell in Betty’s murder,” Sully said. “And Snowy told me Lowell already tried to kill him.”
“How?”
“I don’t know. I didn’t get to talk to him. He wasn’t all that eager to have Snowy speak with me in the first place, given our family connection to Lowell. I think I managed to convince her there’s no love lost there.”
An idea occurred to Dez, one he wasn’t sure he wanted to put out there. He did anyway. “I was thinking, you know how police are looking into the possibility of the judge killer being ex-military?”
“It’s not Terrence,” Sully said. “He told me once he doesn’t have it in him to kill anymore, and I believe him.”
“He’s also a man who was under significant threat from a member of the Circle.”
“Yeah, but a different member,” Sully said. “It was Lowell he was worried about, not the judge.”
“I know. I’m just saying it’s something we should keep in mind.”
“Okay, I hear you.” Sully paused, and Dez could sense something within the silence—something Sully wasn’t sure how to say. “There’s something else Snowy told me, about the prophesy Harry had that led to what happened to Aiden. I think we need to talk to Mom about it. Do we have time to go over there now? She’s still at your place, right?”
“Should be, yeah. What about this prophesy? What did she tell you?”
No way Dez was waiting until he was all the way home before hearing the details. Not when it came to this.
Sully didn’t argue the matter. “Harry called it ‘second son.’ The prophesy involved the second-born son of a member who takes down the Circle. Harry saw the man standing over Circle members, some dead, others injured. The survivors ended up in prison.”
“And this man, that was Aiden?”
“Possibly. The man’s face was in shadow. Harry couldn’t identify him.”
“Hold on. So Harry didn’t know who the guy was, but Lowell killed Aiden anyway? What, just in case?” The thought of it, of Lowell holding his little brother under the waters of the Kettle Arm, all because of some goddamn prophesy—let alone one without any real detail—got his stomach knotting and blood boiling.
“Snowy said Harry zeroed in on Aiden later on, but she didn’t have any more detail than that.”
“It’s a good thing Harry’s already dead,” Dez growled. “If he wasn’t, I’d fucking kill him.”
“No, you wouldn’t,” Sully said. “Anyway, it wasn’t really his fault. He couldn’t control the things he saw or the way he voiced them. He was basically in a trance when they came. Snowy said he felt really guilty the rest of his life because of Aiden.”
“Good.”
“Dez.”
“Okay, okay. But he’s still the starting pistol in this whole thing. If it wasn’t for him getting this thing going, Aiden would still be alive.”
“Harry might have seen what he did, but it was Lowell who chose to act on it. Orders or not, he made the choice.”
“I know that, Sully, all right?” Dez had snapped the words, and he ended by taking a deep breath, searching
for calm in a world that had stolen it from him. “Sorry. It’s not you I’m angry with.”
“I know. I get it.”
Dez blew out one more breath, but the tension abated only a little, his fingers still tight enough around the steering wheel to make his knuckles sore. “Guess we’d better get going.”
“I was thinking,” Sully said. “Harry could still be around somewhere. If I can find him, I’m hoping I can get more detail on those visions. Maybe he could even show them to me.”
“But you haven’t seen him for a couple of years, right? You thought maybe he and Betty crossed over or whatever.”
“Maybe they did. Maybe they didn’t. I won’t know until I look.”
“One thing at a time,” Dez said. “Let’s deal with the Gerhardt mess first. If we’re going into Lockwood tomorrow, I don’t want our attention divided.”
Sully nodded. “I hear you. Okay, we’ll deal with the whole prophesy thing later. Maybe we should hold off then on talking to Mom about it.”
“Probably a good idea. But we can’t really hold off much longer on going back there.” He unfolded the driver’s side visor, scanning his reflection in its mirror, as if he might look different in this one than the rearview. He didn’t. “Damn.”
Dez met Sully’s eye. “What you said about Eva’s makeup? Maybe I really would look good in foundation.”
“Ow.”
“Stop being such a baby.”
Dez did his best to sit still in the SUV’s driver’s seat as Eva applied what she’d called concealer to his under-eye area. Sully had gone inside Dez and Eva’s to keep their mom occupied, and Eva was thankfully on a day off. She was also much cooler about Dez and his injuries than his mom was likely to be.
At last, Eva sat back to check out her work.
“How’s it look?” Dez asked, not sure he wanted to see.
“Much better.” Eva smiled coyly at him. “You look really pretty, actually. Wanna get in the backseat?”
Dez quirked up the side of his mouth and moved in for a kiss. He succeeded in a light lip-lock, but found himself shoved back when he tried to deepen it.
“Don’t,” Eva said with a smirk. “You’ll smear your makeup.”
Dez growled and turned to check out his reflection. It didn’t look as awful as he thought it would. Honestly, he could barely tell he was wearing makeup. The best part was the black eye was barely noticeable now. Eva had also touched up the lump on the side of his head, a bruise on his jawline and a few scrapes on his knuckles. It wasn’t perfect, but he was nowhere near as startling.
“Thanks, babe. That looks pretty good, actually.”
“I know,” she said. “I’m the best.”
Eva slid out of the SUV and Dez joined her, taking her hand as they crossed the driveway toward the front door. “I’m bringing Sully upstairs to check him out next,” Eva said. “Keep your mom busy.”
“I already checked him. I would’ve taken him to the hospital, but that’s not possible. Besides, it all looks good for what happened to him.”
“Yeah, well, I don’t trust your judgment. With guys, as long as things aren’t oozing green puss or spurting blood across the room, you figure everything’s okay.”
Dez shrugged. He figured he’d been careful enough, but no sense arguing with Eva. He’d only end up paying for it later.
They found Sully and Mara in the kitchen, Pax sitting flush against Sully’s thigh as if to show he wouldn’t allow any further separation.
Eva plucked at Sully’s sleeve as an indication to follow. “Come here. Something I need to talk to you about.”
Sully turned slightly panicked eyes on Dez as he stood from the table. It was clear he thought he was in trouble. Dez smirked, not about to tell him any different.
With Sully and Eva gone, Pax at their heels, Dez joined his mom at the table.
“What happened to your eye?” she asked.
Dez huffed out a breath. “It’s fine.”
Mara reached out for his face, and Dez sat back to avoid a touch that would smear anything. “It’s fine, Mom.”
“Okay, but I’d still like to know what happened.”
“Got in a bit of a scuffle. No big deal.”
Mara sat up a little straighter. “With Lowell?”
“No, we haven’t gone anywhere near him. Don’t worry.”
“Sully told me you two are planning on going to Lockwood tomorrow.”
Dez’s stomach dropped. “He told you that, huh?”
“I didn’t give him much choice. Something was clearly on his mind, and he’s never been very good at lying to me. I pulled it out of him.”
“Yeah, we’re planning to go. It’s a good in for us. Sully was going to go anyway. The way we’ve arranged it, I’ll be there too.”
“If they’ll let you in.”
“The front gates are open during the day, and they’ll definitely be open tomorrow. And my understanding is they’re having most of the events on the grounds, not inside. It’s supposed to be fairly warm tomorrow, so it should work out.”
Mara sat forward. “I meant the doctor isn’t likely to allow you to stick around once he sees you. And he will see you. You’re hard to miss, even in a crowd.”
“I’m going with Lachlan. Once Gerhardt realizes why we’re there, he should prove more cooperative.”
“I think you’re missing a very good opportunity,” Mara said.
“Which is?”
“Me. No offence to you, kiddo, but I think it’s far more likely Gerhardt will talk to me than to you and Lachlan, don’t you think? I’m a mother who’s buried two sons. I understand better than anyone what he’s been through. It could be what you really need here are kid gloves. And you, Dez, don’t own any.”
“I don’t like the idea of you going in there.”
“Tough. I don’t like the idea of the two of you going in there, but you are anyway. Face it, I might well be the best chance you have for getting answers out of that man.”
“You sure you can, you know…?”
“Hold it together around him?” Mara smiled. “Dez, if you can manage to keep your cool, I certainly can—even as much as I would like to throat-punch that asshole.”
Dez let loose a laugh. “That, I would pay to see.” His amusement fell away abruptly. “Are you sure about this?”
Mara folded her arms. “I’m sure my boys are going into a dangerous situation as a means to catch the man who killed my other son. That’s all I need.”
Dez studied his mother a long moment, then nodded. She’d never been weak, but he’d also never seen this level of determination in her either. This was a new Mara, one who wasn’t about to back down to a potential threat. What was more, she had a right to be there, too, front and centre when Lowell finally went down for what he’d done to Aiden.
“Okay,” he said. “But you stay close to me.”
“You, Sully, Eva and Kayleigh—you’re the most important people to me in the world,” she said. “If there’s a threat to any of you, close to you is exactly where I intend to be.”
17
Dez barely had time to find himself a comfortable spot on the sofa when his phone rang. Discomfort only grew as he saw Lachlan’s name on the call display.
“I swear, he knows the second I sit down,” Dez told Eva, next to him on the couch. He punched the talk button a little harder than necessary. “Yeah?”
“Crusty?”
Dez checked to make sure his mom and Kayleigh weren’t in earshot before voicing his thoughts. “I feel like I’ve been beaten by a bunch of nut jobs with heavy, blunt objects. Oh, wait, I was.”
“Done with the sarcasm?”
Dez sighed. “Yeah.”
“Okay. Then if it wouldn’t be too much trouble, I’d like it if you’d drag your delicate carcass over to my place. I’ve got some info you’re going to want to hear.”
“Can’t you tell me over the phone?”
“No point, because I’m going to need you to
drive me somewhere. And bring the psychic.”
Lachlan hung up without allowing a response, and Dez simply tucked the phone back into his pocket before gently rubbing at his eyes.
Eva slapped at his hand. “Stop touching your eye. You’re going to irritate it.”
“The rest of me’s irritated. Why should my eye get left behind?”
He found Lachlan on his sofa, the contents of a file in front of him on the coffee table.
“Christ, Braddock, you look like hell,” he said by way of greeting once Dez had let themselves in.
Dez ignored the comment. “Maybe you should start locking your door. You know, considering the reason for your concussion and all?”
“I always keep it locked,” he said. “But I knew you were coming and when, so I opened it for you. No sense me standing by the door like some loyal golden retriever until you got here.”
No doubt Lachlan’s logic made sense to him, and as far as Dez’s boss went, nothing else mattered.
“What did you want to see us about?” Dez asked.
“Speaking of ‘us,’ where’s—”
“Here,” Sully said, emerging from the entryway. “I just had to take off my boots. They were kind of dirty, and I didn’t think you’d want bits of riverbank on your rugs.”
“Good call. Sit down.”
Lachlan waited until the brothers had taken up spots on either side of him before launching into his find. “I know we basically agreed with the original investigation that the phone call to Eloise didn’t mean anything, but I thought I’d take a closer look anyway. You might recall it was her sister who phoned her, taking her out of the yard and enabling David’s disappearance. The sister’s name was Mariel Kisbey—Kisbey being her maiden name. She was quite young at the time, just nineteen.”
“Okay?” Dez said. There was a point here somewhere; Lachlan just wasn’t always great at getting to it quickly.
“I did some internet digging, and I found her obituary. By the time she died, you’ll be interested to know, she’d gotten married. Married name was Mariel Echoles.”