Deceived

by Julie Anne Lindsey

  “My dad came home from Japan to see me.” I raised an eyebrow, realizing he hadn’t been in Japan at all. He’d been somewhere looking for the man who watched me. No wonder he came back when I told him about the ribbon. He told me he’d be working nearby now. Pft. Of course he would. This was where the psychopathic killer was.

  “I saw him the night he came to check on you. I received a stern warning about proximity.” Nicholas looked puzzled. “He was home from D.C.”

  “Has anyone in my life not lied to me?” Something else came to mind. “The nannies?”

  “Field agents, Bureau employees, miscellaneous secretaries.”

  “Of course.” I felt like a balloon with a pin in it. “The agents were the unfriendly, all-business ones, and the secretaries were the paranoid and antsy ones,” I guessed.

  “Probably.” He laughed.

  “They were all crappy nannies.”

  “Yeah, they would be.” He smiled a sad smile. Then his eyebrows rose. “Earlier, what did you say about a car and cigarette butts?”

  I reached for the box of tissues he’d placed on the floor near my head. “I told you about it. Every morning at the apartment I woke from my dream to a loud engine with a squealing belt.” I waited for his light bulb to go on. “We’d leave for school with new cigarette butts piled on the mat outside our door.

  “Also, there was a ribbon in my locker.” I described it to him completely and remembered he was right again. I hadn’t told him about it. I’d told my dad. Nicholas listened intently as I described it and told him about telling Dad.

  “I was at your apartment recently. I didn’t see any butts.”

  “Pixie got mad and kicked the mat full of them down the walkway.”

  “I need to see that ribbon. It could have prints on it. How much did you handle it?”

  “Tons. I kept pulling it out of my bag, plus I looked at it a lot when I first got it, trying to figure out how it had gotten into a locker I’d only just received.” I didn’t want to think of the way it made me remember my mom. A precious memory had been planted to taunt me. My hands fisted in my lap.

  “May I see it?”

  “I gave it to Dad when he visited.”

  “Okay. You took a picture for your dad with your phone? Can I see your phone?”

  “Uh, you took that phone, remember? Now I have this.” I twisted the new phone in the air.

  Nicholas groaned. “Gah. I’ll run back and get it. I need to talk to cleanup anyway, see if they dusted your locker. I’ll send them to look for your mat and maybe locate some butts from there. Forensics is amazing. You never know about those guys.” He jumped to his feet and stuck his head through the door. “Is Agent Smith still on the line?” Only then did I realize I’d never said goodbye.

  Nicholas caught my panic. “He’s on the line now with the team. You can talk to him anytime you’re ready.”

  He took a step across the threshold.

  I jumped up. “You can’t leave!”

  “I won’t be long.”

  “You won’t be right back.” I’d climb onto his back if I had to. No way was he leaving me. “We drove for at least two hours to get here. That means four hours of travel time alone. I’m coming.” I picked up my purse and turned for the door.

  “Elle.” His voice was stern. “You’re not going anywhere near that town. The answer is no. Do you hear me? No.” The Marine stood before me, towering over me, shoulders squared, commanding his men.

  Not this one.

  I shoved past him and called for Sara before he could stop me. He had better reflexes than that. I supposed he wasn’t used to being ignored when he put his mind to something.

  At the sound of his sister’s name, he flopped his giant body onto the couch. “Now you’ve done it.”

  “Everything okay?” Sara smiled warmly.

  “Peachy,” Nicholas grumbled.

  Sara’s smile broadened. “What’re we up to?” She shut the door behind her.

  “Elle has something back in the valley that might provide a clue. I want to go and get it.”

  “Excellent.” She had a twinkle in her eye.

  I recognized that look.

  “But … ” Nicholas stopped her, mid-twinkle. “She won’t stay here.” Heavy emphasis on she. It sounded like a dirty word. Their eyes focused in on me, appraising, maybe wondering what it would take to sway me.

  I had no price. Sara started by trying to comfort me into staying. She played on my need for security, my desire not to be alone or in danger for once. “I’ll be right here the whole time.”

  Nicholas shook his head at her. His look said, amateur.

  “What if I come with?” she suggested, more bubbly.

  “No.”

  “I can wait with her in the car and … ”

  “No.”

  “Jim,” she called out of nowhere.

  Nicholas rubbed his eyes again and gave me a nasty look.

  I didn’t care. He wasn’t leaving me.

  “What about the pumpkin?” I tried to think of anything else that could help, since he was going back.

  “I dusted the pumpkin,” he mumbled underneath his hand.

  “What’s this about a pumpkin?” Sara chimed in, and Nicholas let out a long, throaty sound.

  “Of course, the pumpkin,” I whispered. He’d seen me with it. Knew it was mine. “That threat was meant for me.”

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  “Yeah, you guys got something?” Reeboks appeared. “Have you remembered something else, Elle?”

  “No.” I’d barely spoken and Sara was already delivering the entire situation to him.

  “Road trip?” He looked younger then. They obviously loved what they did. It wasn’t a chore. It was a passion. They grabbed folders, coffee, and keys. Ten minutes later, we pulled out of the parking lot.

  Two more agents joined us. All four of them seemed jazzed to get out of the office. Three stayed behind. Someone had to wait for forensics to report back when the school was cleared. Nicholas, Sara, and I rode in the SUV. I sat in back. Reeboks, whose name I learned was Jim, and his partner, Mason, rode together in a large town car behind us.

  Darkness engulfed the country roads. Moonlight filtered through treetops hanging overhead. The forests weren’t as beautiful as I remembered. Instead, the trees seemed like a foreboding killer’s playground. Inside the forest there were a million places to hide and watch. My skin tightened down my arms, raising the hairs on end. The tears had dried. Shock gave way to numbness. I’d mentally checked out of that horror.

  It was funny how I’d once compared my life to witness protection, back when Pixie left. I’d considered how I had nothing to leave or to lose. It was ironic, and yet, not at all. So as not to wallow, I searched for a silver lining. The Reaper had been too busy following us to kill in over a decade. Saving all the other potential victims made running worthwhile. The much smaller consolation was that my dad had been able to keep my mom from becoming one of his captives.

  “When was the last update from Special Agent Smith?” Sara adjusted her seat belt.

  Nicholas glanced in the mirror at me and then rolled his eyes toward his sister. “You call. He’s not speaking to me.”

  “What?” I leaned forward from the backseat.

  Nicholas sighed.

  I had no words.

  Sara snickered and curled one tiny hand around her nose and mouth to hide her pretty lips.

  “You talked to my dad today?” I gasped.

  “Uh, the way I remember it, he mostly talked to me, loudly.”

  “Good grief.” I leaned my head against the window at my side. “Hey!” I shot up again. “Your dad looked after me when I was small?”

  Sara nodded fervently. “Yep. He talked about you a lot. I kind of feel like I know you. For a while, I actually thought I had another cousin, Gabby, out there.”

  “Sure. What’s one more cousin?”

  My heart didn’t miss the fact that I was tied to this
family long before I ever met them. All these years, I did have a family. My heart swelled at the thought. I hid in the shadow of the backseat while I beamed at the idea of being a part of Nicholas’s family. I wished my mom was part of mine.

  I dozed off and on throughout the drive, comforted by the sound of Nicholas and Sara talking in the front. They were serious sometimes, discussing the case, and playful other times. Working together suited them. I struggled with how much of their conversation seeped into my dreams and how much was my mind’s adaptation.

  My dreams ran wild as we drove.

  I thought of Pixie in the California sun, seated on a beach, drawing a sunrise. I’d never been there, but I thought she’d love someplace like Venice Beach. There would be so much diversity to entertain her. In my dream, she was happy and not as gothic as she was in Ohio. I’d never bought that anyway. Her personality was more pink and yellow than black and gray. Like the way she always listened to music while hanging over the edge of her bed. She wore tiny pigtails and polka-dotted toe socks during movie nights in.

  Nicholas and Sara stood in the background keeping watch. Their voices came and went with the tide. I heard my name often. Occasionally, Pixie stopped to listen to them, too. I never took my eyes off her. My heart ached knowing she’d been in danger because of me. If I’d had any idea I would’ve lived in a cave across the sea where no one could find me.

  “I love her,” Nicholas said.

  “I love her, too. She’s perfect for you. Finally, a woman to balance you out. You know, our family hasn’t grown in at least two years.”

  “No, I mean it. I love her. The minute I saw the first photo of her, she had me captivated. I thought of a million ways to meet her. I needed to know her. I’ve never even heard of anything like that.”

  “Love at first surveillance photo? Sure, that happens all the time.”

  My dad appeared carrying a turkey on a white oval platter, moving in slow motion. He slammed the platter onto the table and drew his gun. I jumped and ran, looking for the danger and wondering what had caused his reaction. My dad wasn’t fierce. Dad was a marshmallow. I followed his gaze to Nicholas, seated in the chair beside the one from which I’d fled. Thanksgiving.

  “How much farther is this place?” Sara asked. A fog covered her words. “We passed the academy miles ago.”

  As far as I could tell, her question got no response. I imagined a dozen duplications of the Reaper, hidden behind the large trees near the road. They disappeared and reappeared as the SUV raced forward.

  “This must be the opposite of how Dorothy felt.” Sara didn’t seem ruffled at having to hold a one-sided conversation. “She arrived in an other-worldly place, right out of Kansas. Coming from D.C., I think I might’ve accidently arrived in Kansas.”

  A long line of curse words spilled from Nicholas. They seemed wrong. It wasn’t an appropriate response to Sara. Something had happened that I couldn’t see. Phones rang. They spoke.

  I drifted back into the dream. This time, I wasn’t at the beach, and Pixie was gone.

  I walked beside the river as it roared. The water burned. I needed to get through it to find Nicholas. I could hear him, but I couldn’t see him past the flames glowing all around me. Sirens raged in the distance. I hoped they’d hurry. I hoped they could see the inferno from wherever they were. Flames licked upward into the trees. My eyes fought to see through the incredible heat and light.

  “Elle.”

  My heart raced as I thought of all the things that might be happening to Nicholas just beyond my reach. I was going to lose him.

  My mind told me to keep trying. Keep looking.

  “Please,” I screamed. Then a breeze intermingled with the heat.

  Impossibly cold air blew against my cheek. A cool breeze couldn’t exist amidst the heat that engulfed me. It should’ve consumed me, not chilled me. I sat abruptly, willing my eyes to see, taking a moment to understand. It had been a dream. I was so thankful for that truth.

  Before me, a fire raged against the sky.

  “Elle. I’m sorry. It looks like we’re going to be camping here for a while.” Sara gave me notice of our change in plans. The team had to improvise.

  Two policemen approached us.

  I began to put things together. Both of the cars in our tiny caravan were parked on the side of the road about 300 feet from the little cottage on the river. Between us and the house stood two fire trucks, an ambulance, and several police cars. The cottage burned, completely destroyed, taking any hope of finding my phone along with it.

  I couldn’t hear the exchange between the policemen and the Marshals. Their words drowned in the roaring fire and the raging river. The sky was lit with embers. Gray and black smoke ghosted into the night. The smell was acrid. The upside, if there was one, was hope that the Reaper had accidently left another lead in the fire.

  The little cottage by the river was no more than a memory. My few belongings gone with it. I was devastated by the loss of photographs Nicholas had inside. There were so many of his family. I sank back, defeated, into the seat and closed my eyes against fear and anger.

  As it turned out, it truly was an all-nighter, just like Sara predicted. The sun was rising when a knock landed on my window, scaring me senseless. Jim held up one arm in surrender and the other held a carrier filled with coffee, balanced on a bakery box. I sat up and shoved the large black coat down onto my legs. The coat belonged to Nicholas. He stood beyond the door, rubbing his hands against his arms. He must’ve been freezing.

  I opened the door and got out to stretch. It was cold. I handed Nicholas his coat and grabbed a coffee from Jim. Jim patted the area next to him on some large rocks beside the road. I sat and watched my breath in the air as it wound around the pillar of steam from my cup.

  “Some night.” Jim made nice with me. We’d never had a conversation before, unless I counted the interrogation twelve hours earlier.

  “Thanks for the coffee.” I tried to feel less awkward. I wrapped my arms around my knees and held my cup near my face for warmth.

  “I hear you’re somewhat of a connoisseur.” He smiled a half smile, tipping his cup. He reminded me of my dad.

  “Bad luck is another thing I am.” I rolled my eyes toward the charred remains near the river.

  “Not everyone thinks so.” He faced the cottage, smiling at the ground. For a minute I wondered if he was somehow related to Nicholas, too.

  “Well, what now?” I was prepared for anything.

  “Now we wait for forensics. We try to put a name to this guy. We keep you safe. I’ll liaison with your father.”

  “Tell him I’m sorry I lost it last night.”

  “We’ll make a pit stop at your old apartment.” Nicholas’s voice was like music to my ears. I smiled before I even looked at him. My eyes moved over his unbuttoned dress shirt. He hadn’t had a chance to change since the festival either. I saved his face for last. The crease between his brows showed pure determination, no sign of stress, agitation, or fear. He gave Jim an odd look. Jim left.

  “Are you ready?” His voice was smooth and confident.

  “Now?”

  “This is the best time we have until tomorrow when the students leave for school. No one will be up and about at this hour on a Sunday morning.”

  The man had a point. I slid into the passenger’s seat, and we set off for the scene of yet another crime. It only took a few minutes to arrive at my old place. It seemed like ages since I’d last been inside. On the ride over, I mentally tallied up a list of things I wanted to bring with me. Also a list of things I thought Pixie would appreciate having back. I was surprised to see the curtains were all burnt and the yellow tape was pulled off the stoop.

  When Nicholas opened my car door, I sucked in a few lungfuls of fresh air. At the river, the air stunk of burnt plastic and other unpleasant things. Outside the apartment, on the quaint cobblestone street, it smelled as pure and right as I remembered. The air tasted almost as refreshing as the coffee.
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  We walked side by side to the door. Nicholas gave me a look. His eyes narrowed and he pumped one hand slowly, palm down. I thought it meant to stay put while he went inside first. So, I waited. I knew the fallen tape wasn’t something he’d take lightly. After a few short minutes, he pulled me inside. I had time to get what I needed while he moved more slowly, looking for anything he’d missed before.

  The leather journal I’d used to keep tabs on Nicholas was lying on my desk. “I think I know how he found you at the river.” Nicholas appeared in my doorway. I held up the journal and waved it around.

  “Where was that?”

  “Here.” I pointed to my desk.

  “Is that where you left it?” His gorgeous face was pinched between the brows.

  “No, I kept it in my dresser.” I turned toward the mirror where my photos had been pulled off and reordered. The one that’d been forked was missing. All my things were neatly arranged in some strange pattern. By size? Age?

  “It wasn’t there when I came back that night. I know that book. I would’ve brought it to you. You write in it all the time. Sometimes even in class.” He gave me a disapproving look.

  Really? This is important now? Come on.

  “So, he’s been here again? Since the fire?” I pondered the question. “He took this, read it, and brought it back? Do you think he came here after he attacked me?” The questions mounted up. “Did he really think I’d come home? Why did he do that?” I pointed to the things on my dresser.

  “I don’t pretend to know how he thinks, but it seems he’s spent a lot of time here. Probably waiting for you.”

  He snuck a peek at me.

  I tried to look as if I was hearing the details of a case instead of my life.

  “You stayed away. I think that’s when he began to try to locate you. He wanted to know you so you’d be easier for him to find. Also, we made him mad. We faked a fire here when he hadn’t made one. We think that’s why he set the fire at my place.”

  I gathered up the suitcases I’d come with and put everything back in them, all the while considering Nicholas’s theories. I traded some of my blue jeans and hoodies for Priscilla’s designer things. I didn’t think she’d mind. I also filled a bag with Pixie’s art supplies and some things she had kept on display. I knew Nicholas could get them to her. I stacked the bags on top of one another and then looked for Nicholas.