'You bastard. What do you want?'
'I told you I have special plans for you.'
'What plans?'
'This is school, Kasey,' he said. 'You have to pass a test.'
'Let me go. Don't do this to me. Don't kill me.'
He fingered the buttons on her shirt and idly popped the first three and spread the fabric apart. His hand pressed on her chest and felt it rise and fall. 'Maybe I won't need to kill you. Maybe we can leave together. Both of us. Would you go with me?'
She grimaced. 'Go where?'
'Away.'
'What if I did?'
'Are you saying you'd stay with me?'
'To save my life?' she stammered. 'Yes.'
Slowly, he undid the rest of her shirt and let it hang open. 'You forget, you can't lie to me. I'm just like you.'
'Why ask if you won't believe me?'
'Because I like to hear you say yes. I like it when you're scheming and ruthless. What would you do if we went away? Would you plot to kill me? Would you spend every minute looking for your chance?'
'You know I would,' she snapped. There was no point in a charade. She wasn't going to change the outcome.
'You may be the most exciting woman I've ever met,' he said with admiration.
He laid the flashlight at his feet. From inside his pocket, he pulled out Kasey's knife. She sucked in her breath. He extended the thin strip of elastic at the base of her bra. Dragging the rusted point of the knife against her skin, he sliced through the elastic and nudged the cups of the bra apart, baring her breasts. In the cold, her rose nipples puckered into rocks. He bent down and covered each nipple with his mouth in turn and sucked on it. She felt her breasts releasing milk.
He licked his lips, tasting her. 'I hear breast-feeding gets a woman horny. Is that true?' He straightened up, stroking the globes of her breasts with his hands.
'Don't touch me.'
'I can't stop,' he said.
He reached down to the button at the waist of her jeans and undid it. Her jaw hardened with fury as he slid the zipper down. She shunted her knees tightly together and made it hard for him to strip her. He paid attention to her clothes, not to her, and when she saw her chance, she took it. She jacked her knees into the air, dangling from the pipe above her, which groaned and sank two inches, pulling slack from the noose and nearly strangling her. Her knees caught her tormentor solidly under the jaw and snapped him backward, where he tumbled off the long desk and landed in a crash on the floor. The flashlight rolled away and went black. She hunted for the swaying table with her feet and caught it before it wobbled out of her reach. With a gasp, she eased on to the table and let go of the pipe. The rope remained taut, and she struggled to inhale.
Below her, she heard him moving slowly and painfully. Getting up. Limping. Hunting through debris for the light.
'That was a mistake, Kasey,' he growled from the darkness. The teasing in his voice was gone. Only the cruelty remained. She didn't care.
The light went on again, but it was dimmer. He climbed back on to the desk, and she could see his face. Blood trickled from his mouth. His eyes had narrowed into dots of fury and coldness. He reared back and drove his right fist underhanded into her abdomen. Her body doubled over with pain, and the rope grew more constricted, and air flooded from her lungs. Each breath felt labored as she tried to suck in oxygen. She thought she would gag and choke on her vomit.
'I was going to leave you like this to wait for me,' he told her. 'But not now. The test just got much harder.'
He drew out a key from his pocket and reached up and undid the handcuffs from each of her wrists and let them clang to the floor. Kasey dropped her arms back down to her sides. She didn't know what he was doing. Why he was freeing her.
Then he got down from the desk and dragged it away from her, and she understood his plan. She stood on the table with only its shaky base propping her up. The noose dragged on her neck, pushing her head forward. If the table fell, she would hang herself.
He breathed heavily and tended to the blood on his face. 'How long can you hold on to the pipe, Kasey? Five minutes? Fifteen?'
She didn't talk.
'I have to leave, but I'll be back soon. Can you hang on until then? Or will you just give up and die? I'm giving you a choice, Kasey, but remember, if you fail the test, your family dies. It's not pretty, but those are the stakes. Understand?'
She didn't say anything.
'Do you understand?' he repeated.
'Yes,' she gasped.
'Good. That's good. Now hold on tight.'
Kasey knew what was coming. She watched him closely, but she didn't put her hands up immediately. She wanted blood flowing into her arms as long as possible to give her strength. Only when she saw him moving closer, his face dark and menacing, did she finally reach up and take hold of the pipe again. The freezing metal was like a flame. Touching it burned her, and she could barely hold on. But she had to hold on.
He swept the table from under her feet. Her legs dangled in midair. Only her grip on the pipe kept her suspended.
'If you survive the next few minutes, the rest will be easy for you,' he said, stroking the bare skin of her stomach as she twitched over the floor. 'I want you to prepare yourself while I'm gone, because your family is counting on you. You see, I'm going to bring someone here for you, Kasey. A new student for our classroom. And all you have to do to pass the test… is kill them for me.'
* * *
Chapter Forty-five
Serena slid inside the patrol car next to Denise Sheridan, who propped a cigarette outside the driver's window and tapped ash on the ground. When Denise wasn't smoking, she jammed the fingers of her other hand between her teeth and chewed on her nails. They sat in silence on the dirt road near the cemetery. Fifty yards away, bright lights beamed like white sunshine through the trees. Silhouettes of evidence technicians came and went, carrying plastic bags. They'd been searching and digging in the forest for an hour, making their way through frost- hardened soil toward whatever was buried below.
'I'm sorry it's come to this,' Serena told Denise.
Valerie's sister sighed. Her face was tight with anger and resignation. 'I knew we'd end up in a place like this sooner or later.'
A place like this. A place to dig up the dead.
Serena was just as happy not to be in the woods. She wasn't sure she could handle it when the searchers found what they were looking for. This was a case where she couldn't switch off her emotions. She had sacrificed her objectivity by getting too close to Valerie and too close to Callie.
'It's better than not knowing,' Serena said.
Denise shrugged. 'If you don't know, you can still hope.'
Snow gathered in a wet film on the windshield as they waited. When it became hard to see, Denise flipped the windshield wipers, pushing the slush aside and clearing an arc on the glass. Inside, heat blasted from the vents, keeping the car warm.
'How are you?' Serena asked.
Denise said nothing. She chewed her nails harder.
'Sorry,' Serena said. 'Bad subject.'
'Yeah.'
'Do you want to talk about it?'
Denise looked at Serena as if she was crazy. Then she shrugged, as if anything was better than sitting in silence as the shovels carved up the ground.
'I wasn't expecting a bomb to go off under my life,' Denise replied.
'What happens next?'
Denise took a pack of cigarettes out of her pocket and then scowled and put it back. 'When you've been married as long as Tom and I have, it's not like divorce is easy. There's a lot of practical shit standing in the way. Starting with the kids. Then again, I'm not going to do nothing. Some women can put on blinders and live with a crappy marriage, but not me.'
'What about Valerie?' Serena asked. 'If it's Callie out there in the woods, she's going to need your help.'
'Let her get help from someone else, not me.'
Serena hesitated. 'She's going to be alone.'
> 'Are you lecturing me?' Denise asked in annoyance.
'No, but Callie's her whole world.'
Denise took a photograph out of her pocket. Serena could see it was the picture of Callie that had been broadcast all over the country. 'What is it about wives married to shitholes? They always think having a kid will make it better. Like it's some kind of miracle cure. Valerie should have gotten a divorce, not gotten pregnant.'
Serena didn't reply.
'Don't get me wrong,' Denise added. 'I'm sick about Callie.'
'I know that. You don't hide it as well as you think.'
Denise frowned and put the photograph away. 'As long as you're prying into my secrets, what about you? What's up with you and Stride?'
Serena was caught off guard. 'What do you mean?'
'Oh, don't play dumb. I can see you two are having problems.'
Serena thought about making an excuse, but she realized that she needed to say it out loud. 'He slept with Maggie.'
Denise didn't look surprised. 'Well, they've been dancing around it for years. So what are you going to do?'
'Same as you,' Serena said. 'I don't have a clue. But we don't have kids to worry about. I guess that makes it easier for me to walk away.'
'You think it would have been different between you if you had a baby? It wouldn't.'
'Maybe I wonder if I would have been different.'
Denise twisted toward Serena and pointed a finger at her. 'It's not a magic bullet, Serena. You'll never feel more vulnerable than when you have a kid. If you let it, the responsibility will kill you. If something happens, it can drive you insane.' She turned back and looked through the steamy windshield of the patrol car. 'Oh, shit.'
Serena looked too. Through the snow, she saw Stride coming toward them, his face weary and grave. Even in the cold, he had his sleeves rolled up, showing bare arms, tracked with dirt. He stopped in the glow of the headlights.
They both climbed out and met him. Serena saw Denise's jaw trembling. She was a sister and an aunt now, not a cop, and she didn't want to hear the news. Neither did Serena. She had known from the beginning that the odds were against a happy ending. That wasn't how child disappearances played out. You hoped for a miracle, but you steeled yourself for the harsh reality. Most kids didn't come home. Most kids didn't stay alive.
Stride's face was bathed in sweat. He wiped his forehead, leaving a trail of mud. His thick hair was wet and flat. He didn't make them wait.
'We found the body of a child,' he said.
Denise spun around and lashed out at the tire of her car with her boot and pounded both fists on the hood. 'Goddamn it!'
'Hang on, Denise,' Stride said, but Denise didn't hear him. She hit the car until Serena was afraid she would break the bones in her hands. Tears streamed out of her eyes and ran in glistening streaks down her face.
It didn't matter if you knew it was coming. It was one thing to cxpect the truth and another to hear it. It was one thing to be furious with Valerie and another to hear that her daughter was dead.
'Denise, wait,' Stride called.
Serena watched his face. Behind his sorrow, something was different. Whatever had happened was not what they had all expected. Something else was going on.
'Listen to me, it's not Callie,' he said. Denise's head snapped around. 'What?' 'It's not Callie in the woods.'
Her hands flew to her mouth. 'Oh, my God, are you sure? How can you be sure?'
'It's not a girl,' Stride told her. 'The body that was buried there, it's a boy.'
* * *
Chapter Forty-six
Valerie stood in the doorway of their bedroom. The hallway light cast a rectangular glow from behind her. Marcus lay in bed, asleep on his back. His breathing came easily and steadily. She stared at her husband and wondered how he could sleep so calmly when men were hunting for Callie in the ground, when her precious baby was cold and alone.
She knew the answer. Callie had never been his daughter. She was a stranger who had lived in his house. Someone else's child. The offspring of his wife's affair. He had known the truth from the very beginning.
'Do you really wish she'd never been born?' she asked.
He slept without answering.
She approached the bed and stood over him. He was a handsome man. Fit, strong, attractive. She wondered if he was really asleep or just pretending. Part of her wanted to scream and make noise, to force him to acknowledge her, but she didn't. They were beyond that. Beyond rescue.
Valerie undressed and went into the master bathroom and closed the door behind her. The marble tile was cold under her bare feet. She turned on the shower and waited as the water grew hot. She studied the reflection of her naked body in the full-length mirror. People told her she was beautiful, but they didn't understand how she could hate her body. They never saw that one brown nipple was slightly larger than the other. That her knees were ugly. That her stomach was a constellation of pale freckles.
She got under the water, which poured from the shower like rainfall, straight down over her head. It flowed through her blonde hair and over her shoulders and breasts and between her legs and over her feet and then swirled into the drain. She didn't move or wash her body with soap or knead shampoo into her hair. Instead, she stood straight, with her eyes closed and her arms at her sides and her face tilted into the spray. Her skin became clean and pink. She stood, not moving, until she had been there for so long that the hot water drizzled away and became cold.
Outside the shower, she shivered on the bath mat. She toweled herself dry but left her hair wet. She returned to the bedroom and stared at Marcus and felt nothing. She dressed again, not for sleep, but for the day ahead. A day when she would finally be free.
She was hungry, so she went downstairs. It felt odd to think about food now, but she hadn't eaten in hours. She turned on the lights in the kitchen and took a small bowl from one of the cabinets. Inside the refrigerator, she found a stalk of celery, a cluster of green grapes, an avocado, a Granny Smith apple, a lemon, and a cup of yogurt. She put the ingredients on the counter.
'This is called a Waldorf salad,' she said to her daughter.
It didn't matter that Callie wasn't really there. In her imagination, she saw her little girl in the high chair beside the kitchen island, smiling back at her.
'I use yogurt instead of mayo, because who needs all the fat and calories? And I add in half an avocado, because I like avocados.'
She separated a piece of celery, sliced off its frilly head, and carefully cut the stalk into half-inch segments, which she dumped in the bowl. She ran the grapes under the faucet, pulled off a dozen, and cut each one in half. She added them to the bowl.
'It's supposed to include walnuts, but I don't have any walnuts. Apples are crunchy enough, so I won't miss them.'
Valerie sliced the apple down the middle and cut away slices from the core. She tasted one and made a face. It was tart. Like an angel, Callie giggled at her mother and slapped the tray in front of her with tiny hands. Her blonde curls danced on her forehead. Valerie winked and diced the apple slices and mixed them in with the celery and grapes.
'Now for my top-secret ingredient,' she said.
Valerie ran the knife all the way around the black avocado and twisted the two halves apart. As she buried the blade in the avocado seed to remove it, her phone rang on the kitchen counter. She froze, her lower lip quivering. The noise went on, musical and insistent. When she glanced at the phone, she saw her sister's name in the Caller ID box.
'That's Aunt Denise,' she said with a strange lilt in her voice. 'I don't think we need to talk to her right now, do we? Not when we're busy making a salad.'
The phone went silent. Her smile cracked as she stared at Callie.
'There's plenty of time to call her back. We can call her when we're done here. OK? Now where was I? I think we're almost ready.'
She scooped half of the avocado out of its husk and cut it lengthwise into strips, which she dropped one at a time into the
salad. She pried the lid off the yogurt and spooned it into the bowl. She cut the lemon in half and squeezed juice over the salad. With a fork and spoon, she mixed everything together.
'Doesn't that look delicious?' she said. She took a forkful and tasted it. 'That's good.'
She sat down at the island and ate each bite of the salad slowly, staring at Callie as she did. Her daughter's eyes followed her. Callie made noises; she'd be talking soon, saying words. She memorized her little girl's face, her two new white teeth, her dimpled smile. She savored these quiet moments when it was just the two of them.
When her bowl was nearly empty, her phone rang again. She stopped with the fork halfway to her mouth. The horror of anticipation bled across her face.
The caller ID this time said Blair Rowe.
Valerie's eyes went blank. The phone rang and rang, and then the music ended. She snapped out of her trance.
'Isn't it amazing how everyone always calls when you're in the middle of a meal?' she asked her daughter. 'I think we'll just turn off that silly phone now. There really isn't anyone I want to talk to tonight. Other than you, of course.'
She switched off the power on her phone. When she bent over the salad bowl again, something dropped from her face and splattered on the counter. Tears. She touched her cheek in surprise. 'Look at that, I'm crying. Isn't that strange?'
Callie cocked her head with a serious expression on her face. It always looked to Valerie as if she was thinking about something very important.
'You're getting so big,' Valerie told her. 'And so beautiful. When you grow up, you're going to be a gorgeous young woman.'
She took her empty salad bowl to the sink and washed it and put it away. She returned the avocado half, the lemon half, and the celery and grapes to the refrigerator. Opening the chrome garbage pail with her foot, she slid the remnants into the trash and then used a paper towel to wipe the counter. She ran the knife under the sink and rubbed it with a sponge until it was spotless.
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