by AJ Lange
"Feel better?" Gavin set the phone instructions aside. He wouldn't call Dom with Matt listening in. He may be fucked nine ways to Sunday as far as this investigation was concerned, but he didn't have to take his partner down with him. He would call him in the morning.
Matt nodded, glancing at the phone on the nightstand. "No cell service?"
Gavin grunted. "Dead." He stretched, absolutely not noticing the way Matt's eyes tracked his movements when he lifted his arms high overhead. "I'm going to jump in the shower."
He beat a hasty retreat, nerves jumping. Shit shit shit, he groaned to himself. He didn't know what was wrong with him; he felt as nervous as a virgin on prom night. It wasn't like they hadn't just spent the previous two nights together; hell, they had even had sex. But that had been angst and worry and anger, mixed with passion and old regrets. This was different; this was them getting too comfortable with each other, slipping into familiar patterns of behavior. This was Gavin remembering what it meant to love Matt, and being unprepared to go there, at least not yet.
When he left the bathroom after his own shower, the room was dark and he slipped quietly into the empty double, the one closest to the sliding glass door of the balcony. Matt immediately rolled out of the adjacent bed and slid in beside him.
"Nice try, asshole," he groused sleepily, draping himself over Gavin's chest, tucking a knee between his legs.
Gavin carefully wrapped his arms around Matt's warm back. He nuzzled his still-damp hair. "You need your sleep," he murmured. And I need to protect my goddamn heart.
"I can't sleep without you."
The words were muffled against his neck, and Gavin held him a little tighter. Me neither, he thought. "Night, Matt."
"G'night, Gav."
The second the phone registered a charge the next morning, it began to buzz, text message after text message coming through, then the voicemail alert ringing wildly.
All were from Dom.
Gavin dialed in and listened, jerking up in the front seat, fear rampant on his face.
"Gavin?" Matt's voice was alarmed and he grabbed Gavin's arm. "What is it? What happened?"
"Gina," Gavin managed to say, heart constricting, pulse beating hard against his throat. "Gina is missing." He jammed his thumb, frantically trying to hang up on his voicemail so he could call Dom. "God, Matt," he said, voice shaky.
Matt's fingers were tight around his forearm, nails biting into the skin. "Gavin, look at me."
The line was ringing in Gavin's ear. "Pick up, Dom," he murmured.
"Gavin," Matt urged, both hands clasping Gavin's warm skin. "Melanie Bodine is dead, she died the night we heard her at the cabin door."
Dom's phone went to voicemail and Gavin swore under his breath, hanging up and dialing it again. Matt's words finally registered as the line began to ring again. "What do you mean? How could you know that?"
Matt's blue eyes were somber, icy. "Because I buried her."
Chapter 10
July 1, 1993
Matt watched the DeLuca family car pull away from the camp parking lot with trepidation and no small amount of fear. The twin red taillights glowed, eerily reminiscent of eyes in the early morning darkness, and he shivered.
“Are you ready, Matthew?” Asked his father.
Matt nodded, picking up his bag. He followed his father to the truck, eyes cautious, movements careful; his father had driven the delivery truck to pick him up instead of his gleaming silver Mercedes. Matt swallowed back the nausea forming in his gut, stomach rolling with nerves and bile.
Antonia and Angelo DeLuca had dropped he and Gavin off at the bus terminal the day they left for camp; Matt had assumed he would be riding home with the DeLuMatt as well. No one had been more surprised than he was when Ben deposited the two teenagers in the parking lot and Matt had looked up to find the tall, arrogant figure of his father striding purposefully toward him.
He bit his lip, remembering the way he had flinched when his father had gripped his shoulder, and the way Angelo had laid a restraining hand on Antonia DeLuca’s forearm. Matt forcibly relaxed his shoulders, summoning forth a memory, the hot black rubber of an innertube on the lake, floating idly next to Gavin and drinking icy soda. He was there again, in his mind, he could hear the buzz of a horsefly, feel the sweat prickling on his upper lip.
The rumble of the truck’s engine forced him back into the present, but he was in control now and calmly latched his seatbelt, staring out at the long dirt drive leading away from the camp. His nausea was better, a small pitch of acid in his stomach.
His father didn’t speak again until they were several miles down the old county highway. He slowed the truck and pulled into a short, gravel drive, an old barbwire fence halting further progress. He wore an odd smile and Matt couldn’t stop the chill that ran down his spine.
“You’re riding in the back, Matthew.”
“Father,” Matt started, but was silenced by the hard crack of knuckles against his mouth. He felt the blood trickle down his chin where his lip had split. He ignored it, climbing out of the passenger door and walking to the back. He scraped his hand across his face, palm coming away wet and red, and waited silently at the door of the truck.
The nausea was back and Matt knew he was going to vomit. He could hold it in though, long enough for his father to go back to the front, long enough to save him from further wrath. He steeled himself when the door swung open.
The boys in the back blinked at the sudden influx of light.
“Hey there, bro,” Drew said from the back corner. Matt wanted to believe the words were gentle, understanding.
He threw his bag onto the floor and climbed up after it. He ignored the tarp-covered mound in the center of the enclosed space and walked to the back, skirting his brother Micah’s feet where they poked out from underneath the edge of the tarp. He dropped into place beside Drew.
The back door slammed and the lock snapped into place. Moments later they were on the move again.
Micah’s eyes were closed, his head leaning against the refrigerated wall, rocking as the truck bumped along the rough road. “So, Matthew. Why don’t you tell us all about camp.”
Matt glanced quickly at the teenager seated next to him and Drew shook his head once, frowning. Play along, his eyes were warning him.
He cleared his throat nervously. Micah’s dulcet tones were the thing of his nightmares, rich honeyed words that sounded so smoothly sincere and loving, right before they cut into you, flaying you open. “It was interesting, I was a counselor.” He very carefully avoided saying it was ‘fun’ or in any way pleasant. Matt had learned long ago to keep any happy occurrences to himself, lest Micah or his father teach him the consequences of joy, or worse, force him to witness the destruction of whatever he had grown attached to.
Matt had never understood why Gavin was allowed to remain in his life, but he had long suspected Antonia DeLuca was at the root of it. He imagined her face now, her dark eyes and lightly freckled nose, crinkling when she laughed; the burnished chestnut of her hair glinting in the backyard summer sun. He longed for her, fiercely, the mother who was not his own. He counted the miles in his head, calculating the minutes until he could sneak away, go back to Gavin’s family. Pretend he was normal.
He jumped when Micah suddenly flung back the tarp at his feet, revealing the pallid, cold face of a girl, her bright blond hair tangled and dirty, bits of sticks and leaves embedded in the waves. Matt started to shake; he couldn’t look away from her eyes, the milky film of death covering them, her mouth frozen mid-scream.
He gagged, falling to his hands and scrambling on his knees to the other corner where he vomited, emptying his stomach. Hot tears ran down his cheeks and he swiped at them, mixing them in the blood on his chin.
“You’re cleaning that up,” Micah said drolly, flicking the tarp back into place. He leaned his head back against the wall and closed his eyes, a cruel smile playing on his lips.
Drew’s hand gripped Matt’s thigh ti
ghtly when Matt crawled back into place.
As hard as he tried, Matt could no longer remember the smell of the lake or the taste of grape Nehi. So he stared at the lump that represented the girl’s head under the black plastic sheeting, wondered who she was, and how long she had cried before they had shown mercy and ended her life.
When the truck rolled to a stop, and the back door swung open, Matt realized with a sickening dread that they were not parked in the Laurel driveway. They were in the woods at Camp Chitaqua, or near to it. It explained the uncomfortable ride, the lumbering truck swaying with each rut in the road. Matt had assumed his father was simply torturing him, making the ride home a meandering track, extending his fear and trepidation as long as possible.
Micah hopped from the back first, standing beside his father, as tall as the older man now. Matt eyed them warily as he stood.
“You get the girl, Matthew. She was yours, anyway.” Micah was laughing, amused at a joke Matt didn’t understand.
“Micah,” His father, Isaiah, admonished. “You ruined the surprise.” His tone was jovial, eyes sparkling in the morning sun.
Matt swallowed a fresh wave of bile. He was nudged forward by Drew who bent over the girl’s head.
“Get her legs, Matt,” he said quietly. “I’ll get her head.” His hands were gentle as he scooped under the tarp, squatting and waiting for the youngest Laurel.
Matt cringed when he reached under the plastic, encountering the smooth, cold flesh of a leg, foot still encased in a sneaker. He steeled himself, grasping under the rigid knees and stood in tandem with Drew, lifting the body.
She was heavy, deadweight, and he struggled as they made their way to the back of the truck. He jumped to the ground, wincing when her legs hit the edge of the metal floor sharply.
Micah laughed again. “She can’t feel it, Matt,” he said, and Matt hated the nickname falling casually from those lips. Micah so rarely used it.
When he and Drew stood on the ground, they held the girl suspended between them, the tarp still blessedly covering her. Matt didn’t know if he could have maintained consciousness if he had to stare at her death face while he carried her through the woods. The last time he had fainted, he had woken up in a box, the smell of earth all around him. He couldn’t face that again.
He forcibly shook the darkness from his mind, hands slick with sweat against the girl’s legs. “Where are we taking her?”
Isaiah raised his eyebrows. An odd look of pride crossed his face and it sickened Matt. The bastard probably thought he was asserting himself, supporting their actions. Drew had always been better at playing their games, although granted, he had had more practice.
“Why don’t you decide her final resting place, Matthew? She is, as Micah so crudely phrased it, a present for you.”
Matt shifted, unable to continue holding her without resting her legs against his hips for leverage. He was throwing these clothes into the incinerator as soon as he got home anyway; he mourned the loss of Gavin’s Zeppelin t-shirt. He would have to find a way to make it up to him.
He cringed inwardly that he was so fucked up he was worried about a stupid t-shirt while contemplating the burial site of a girl his family had murdered. He imagined Gavin’s face: laughing, smiling Gavin, his lips slanting close to his last night in the cabin, wet from shared kisses, shining where Matt’s own tongue had darted out to taste him. If he focused on Gavin, he would get through this.
“The police will be all over these woods soon.” Matt’s voice was dead, as dead as the girl in his arms.
“Then I suggest you hurry and choose her final resting place, son.”
Matt met Drew’s eyes over the tarp. “There’s a valley, about fifty yards to the east.”
Drew nodded and they began the slow trek.
The valley Matt spoke of was encircled by tall pines, shaded from the brightness of the summer sun yet the light still filtered through the boughs overhead, rays touching the ground like the fingers of God.
“Beautiful,” Isaiah murmured approvingly. He clasped Matt’s shoulder and squeezed it with something akin to affection. “What a wonderful choice.”
Matt hated that his father’s words didn’t repulse him, or at least not nearly enough. His arms were aching, trembling from exertion when he and Drew laid the body gently to the pine needle-covered ground. Micah had a shovel slung across his shoulders and he handed it to Matt, but Isaiah intercepted it.
Matt noted the frustration that flickered across Micah’s darkly handsome face. It was there and gone in an instant. He shifted uncomfortably; he would need to tread very lightly here. The precarious balance of power in their family dynamic could not shift. He only knew how to survive in the current status quo.
“Mathew deserves the full presentation of his gift, Micah,” Isaiah said softly. He had a beautiful singing voice, a rich baritone that could rise joyfully in song, bouncing from the rafters on the old hymns he loved so dearly. The irony sickened Matt.
Isaiah nodded to Micah, clasping his hands in front of him and smiling beatifically down at Matt.
Micah hesitated, glancing sidelong at his father, the hint of irritation still evident in his coffee eyes. “I picked her for you, Matthew. There were so many to choose from, too,” he murmured. He warmed to his story, olive complexion flushing, stimulated with the recollection. “But she was special, sweet. I could tell she liked you, too. She followed you a few times around the camp, trying to get your attention.”
Matt clamped his teeth together, willing himself not to react. Micah would like nothing better than for him to fall apart right now, assuring the eldest Laurel of his gruesome place as favored son. He scoured his mind for memories of the girl, but he could only see Gavin’s face. It had been three weeks of bliss, days spent unencumbered by real life, and Matt had reveled in the freedom. He was horrified that his myopic focus may have contributed to this girl’s demise.
“Why did you kill her?” Matt asked, surprising all three of his companions. But it was a valid question; they typically kept their victims for days, sometimes weeks. Micah had had the girl less than a night.
“That was your fault, baby brother,” Micah chuckled. “You and that Neanderthal whose side you never leave.”
“Don’t you dare speak of Gavin. ” Matt’s hands balled into fists and a white-hot fury lanced through him, sickened with sudden terror.
“Easy, Matthew,” Isaiah soothed, stepping between his sons. “Let Micah finish.”
Matt forced himself to relax; he could feel Drew buzzing with nerves beside him. He darted a quick glance to his face but found he couldn’t decipher the message in his eyes.
Micah smiled down at him, and Matt wished, not for the first time, that he would hurry up and grow, grow taller than this sadistic son of a bitch standing in front of him.
So he could kill him.
He supposed that actually made him one of the family. He would cry if he had any tears left.
“As I was saying, that is your fault. I personally would have been very pleased to keep little Melanie Bodine—that’s her name, by the way—around for a while. She was most definitely a sweet piece of meat.”
“Shut up,” Matt shouted, rushing forward and shoving Micah hard. The taller boy stumbled backward, caught off guard, but he laughed uproariously and Matt whirled away from him, grabbing fistfuls of his own hair in anguish.
“Matthew,” Isaiah said sharply and Matt sucked in lungfuls of air, chest heaving. “Melanie was a beautiful child, a blessed gift to you from your brothers and I. You will not be disrespectful of that overture.”
“Yes, father,” Matt whispered.
“We intended for her to be your first, the angel that brought our lamb into the fold at last.” Isaiah laid a hand gently between Matt’s shoulder blades. “Unfortunately, your friend Mr. DeLuca has a way of worming himself into our lives and,” he paused, searching for the right words. “Well, let’s just say he has a way of muddying my best laid plans.”
/> Micah stepped in front of Matt, holding out the shovel once more. “When you became unavailable to assist me last night due to your little foray into the woods with your boyfriend,” he sighed dramatically, “well, I was forced to take matters into my own hands.”
Matt heard the subtle emphasis on the word boyfriend and winced inwardly, hoping his father did not catch the insinuation. He fidgeted anxiously, wondering if Micah had been at the window, what he might have seen.
“I did have a bit of a play with her first though.” Micah’s grin was malevolent and it sent chills down Matt’s spine. “God, it was divine intervention that she nearly stumbled across you all on her own.”
“Do not blaspheme,” Isaiah ordered coldly.
“Sorry, father,” Micah bowed his head once in deference.
Matt was dizzy, the sick knowledge of his brother’s twisted game with the defenseless girl tearing into his heart, pervading his mind with images he would never be able to escape.
“You could have saved, her, you know,” Micah mused. “I wouldn’t have interfered.” He leaned close to Matt’s head, his lips whispering the words against his temple. “You should have opened the door.”
Matt closed his eyes.
Isaiah’s hand rubbed soothing circles on Matt’s back. “And now it’s time for you to lay her to rest. You failed her in life. It is your duty, Matthew.”
Matt nodded numbly, stepping away from his father and his brother, taking the shovel from Micah’s hands. He walked to the center of the clearing and bowed his head. I’m sorry, he prayed, as he began to dig.
When he stood in the depths of the hole forty minutes later, arms held up to receive her body, Isaiah knelt beside the mound of shoveled earth and produced a long knife. Matt cringed when his father sawed a large lock of blonde hair from the girl’s head and handed it to him. “A souvenir for you, Matthew. To remember your mistakes.”