“Fair enough.” Maddie held up her hands in capitulation. “As far as we know, your father was never up here anyway. I can’t see Todd hanging around with him. That was probably a weak trail to head down. What about other people in Dustin’s life? Did he look up to a teacher ... or maybe someone else he thought of as a father figure?”
“I can’t think of anyone he looked to as a father figure,” Harris replied. “There was someone he gushed about being really smart right before I heard about his arrest. I thought he was talking about Todd, though.”
“Could he have been talking about someone else?”
“I guess. I ... .” Harris trailed off, movement at the edge of the woods in the backyard catching his attention.
“What’s wrong?” Maddie asked, the hair on the back of her neck standing on end as her scalp started tingling. Something had happened, changed, in the last few seconds. She had no idea what. It was serious enough for her inner danger alarm to ding, though.
“I’m not sure.” Harris remained seated as he stared at the tree line. “I thought I saw someone back there. Your grandmother doesn’t hang out in the woods, does she?”
Maddie shook her head. “No. She’s with her Pink Ladies. They executed some sort of operation to make Harriet Proctor’s car smell like rotten fish last night. They’re feeling good about themselves. There’s no way my grandmother is in the woods.”
“Who else would be back there? Nick is at work, right?”
“He is.” Maddie licked her lips and tilted her head as a familiar buzzing filled her busy mind. A split-second later, Olivia popped into view. It took everything Maddie had not to jump out of her skin as she tried not to react to her mother’s sudden appearance.
“You have to get out of here, Maddie,” Olivia announced, her expression earnest. “It’s not safe for you here.”
Maddie had so many questions rolling through her head, she didn’t know where to start. “Um ... .”
Harris remained focused on the trees and didn’t look in Maddie’s direction.
“There are people in the woods, Maddie,” Olivia insisted. “Two men. I don’t know who they are. I don’t recognize them.”
“Two?” The question was out of Maddie’s mouth before she could think better about it.
“Two what?” Harris asked, distracted.
“Two men,” Olivia agreed, her eyes wide. “They’re coming toward the house and they’re not alone.”
“Who is with them?”
“A woman. Actually, more of a girl. She’s young and blond. She’s been crying. They’ve got her wrists tied and I think she’s been mistreated.”
“That has to be Chelsea White,” Maddie noted, pressing the palms of her hands to the table as she began to stand. “I need my phone.”
“Who are you talking to?” Harris asked, legitimately curious. “We’re the only ones here, right?”
“Not exactly.” Maddie didn’t have time to explain it to him. “I’m a psychic for a reason, Harris. I have a few tricks up my sleeve. Watch the tree line. Tell me what you see. I need to place a call.”
“To whom?”
“Nick.”
“Why?”
“Because two men are in the woods and they have Chelsea White with them.”
“How can you possibly know that?”
Maddie strolled to the counter and grabbed her cell phone. “I will explain it to you later. I ... .” She trailed off and frowned. “I have no service. I always have service. Check your phone. Do you have service?”
Harris dug in his pocket, alarmed enough by the turn of events to take her at her word. When he came back with his phone, he merely shook his head. “I always have service, too. I don’t take that as a good sign.”
“There are devices that cut off cellular service,” Maddie explained. “I think that’s what we’re dealing with here.”
“So ... what do we do?”
“They’re here for me. You don’t have to do anything.”
“I’m not my brother.” Harris was firm. “I’m not going to let them hurt you ... or leave you. That’s not who I am.”
Maddie smiled despite herself. “I hoped you would say that. I think we have an advantage in this particular situation.”
“How so? We don’t know who is coming after us.”
“No, but my grandmother is the one woman in the world who still has a landline.” Maddie forced a tight-lipped smile even though her heart rate had picked up a notch. “The phone is in her apartment. And guess what? I’m guessing our friends don’t know you’re here.”
Harris was flummoxed. “So ... what? You want me to hide in your grandmother’s apartment and call for help?”
“That’s exactly what I want.”
“No. I’m not leaving you.”
“I’m not asking you to leave me,” Maddie stressed. “I’m asking you to hide in my grandmother’s apartment, make sure help is on the way, and then step in if things get out of hand. If we handle things correctly, they won’t get out of hand.”
“That seems like wishful thinking to me.”
“I’m the wishful thinking sort.” This time the smile Maddie mustered was genuine. “It will only take Nick and the others a few minutes to get here. We might be able to unmask two killers in that amount of time. How can you not think this is a good idea?”
Harris scowled. “You’re making sense ... although I don’t like it.”
“There’s no reason not to try.”
“Fine. If you get attacked, though, I’m coming out swinging. I’m warning you now.”
“I can live with that.”
Nineteen
“Here’s something,” John said to the quiet office. He’d been reading messages for what felt like forever, most coded so they were hard to figure out. When he finally stumbled across something actionable, it caused his blood to run cold.
“What?” Nick asked from his desk. He’d moved to his own computer to start running searches and was unhappy with the brick walls he kept running into.
“They’re talking about their big party,” John replied. “At first I thought they were planning a party for when Todd gets out of jail — or at least when they think he’ll get out of jail — but I found something that seems to suggest they’re talking about a party that’s supposed to happen very soon.”
“I found a few things, too,” Kreskin said. “Heaton, for example, has a sealed file from when he was a juvenile. I have a call in to unseal it, but I’m not sure the judge will agree. I went with Carter Andrews because he’s usually pretty fair, but I have to wait for word back. If Heaton did something bad enough to get a sealed file, I’m curious what it is.”
“Yeah, well, we might not have time to wait for that,” John said. “Whatever their big party is, they’ve planned it for today. That’s what Heaton wrote. He said they were going to visit a special girl and then everything would be set. After that they would have an even bigger party.”
“They said ‘special girl’?” Nick asked, shifting on his chair. “That seems specific.”
“It does,” John agreed. “They said special girl ... and they were going to dance on her grave. The thing is, they used an uppercase ‘G’ on ‘grave.’”
“Like Graves,” Kreskin deduced.
“Like Maddie.” Nick was already on his feet when the phone on Kreskin’s desk buzzed with an incoming call. “I’m going home to check on her.”
“Wait a second.” Kreskin held up a finger before answering his phone. His end of the conversation was short and succinct. He listened for a full thirty seconds and then barked out an order. “You stay right where you are and watch her. We’ll be there in five minutes.”
His expression was grim as he slowly got to his feet. “That was Harris Bishop. He’s with Maddie.”
“What?” Nick’s fury was palpable. “How?”
“I didn’t ask. He told us to come to the house.”
“Why?”
“Because Maddie is babbling
about two people being in the woods — although he doesn’t understand how she knows that — and she told him to hide in case whoever it is comes into the house. How much do you want to bet it’s Heaton and Smith?”
“And how much do you want to bet Olivia tipped off Maddie?” Nick challenged. “She’s in trouble. We have to get over there right now.”
MADDIE WAS NERVOUS BUT managed to maintain her calm demeanor as she positioned herself at the dining room table and waited for the people in the woods to make themselves known. She ignored the hints of movement at the tree line. She was sure whoever was about to pay her a visit wanted to draw her out of the house. She refused to play the game on their terms, though, and instead purposely positioned her back to the window so they could see she wasn’t watching – and waited.
She didn’t have to wait long.
Sam Heaton, a gun clutched in his hand, let himself inside the house. Since Maddie left the front door unlocked, it wasn’t difficult. He looked amused when he found her in the kitchen, seemingly waiting for him. The sinister grin on his face was chilling.
“Well, I’m so glad we’ve finally gotten the chance to meet.”
Maddie sipped her iced tea, blasé. “We met in court, in case you’ve forgotten.”
“That wasn’t the meeting I had in mind.”
“No?” Maddie cocked an eyebrow. “What sort of meeting were you hoping for?”
“Our original meeting was supposed to happen a year ago,” Heaton supplied. “It was supposed to be a special party. Todd got greedy, though, and he moved before he was supposed to. He has impulse control problems. What can I say?”
Maddie merely tilted her head. “You were working with Todd back then, huh?”
“Of course.”
“And what about your friend in the woods?” Maddie’s goal was to knock Heaton off stride. The way he reacted to the question, with a quick jolt, told her she’d done exactly that.
“What do you mean?” Heaton’s discomfort was obvious. “What friend in the woods?”
“Your friend in the woods,” Maddie repeated, refusing to back down. “You didn’t come here alone. You have someone else with you ... and that’s on top of Chelsea White, whom you have tied up. Why would you bring her?”
Heaton’s face drained of color. “What?”
“Chelsea.” Maddie pressed harder. “She’s been smacked around a bit, huh? Maybe mistreated in other ways. You really are a sick piece of work. She’s out in the woods with your friend.”
“How can you possibly know that?”
“I have friends, too.”
“Oh, yeah? What did your friend tell you?”
“All manner of things.” Maddie hoped she was coming across as strong and unbothered rather than nervous and edgy. She wanted Heaton to think twice before he tried to move on her. She only had to drag things out for a few minutes, and then Nick would be there and the odds would definitely be against Heaton. “I think it’s interesting that your friend is hiding in the woods. How come he let you be the one to put yourself at risk and break into my house?”
“I didn’t break in.” Heaton’s sneer was back. “Your front door was unlocked.”
“Fair point. You still trespassed. I didn’t invite you into my house.”
“Do you think that matters?”
“I’m merely curious,” Maddie replied. “I want to know why you’re the one who can be sacrificed and he’s not. That must mean he’s more important than you.”
“Excuse me? You don’t even know what you’re talking about.” Heaton’s anger flashed red and hot. “I’m the one in charge. I’ve always been in charge.”
Maddie had her doubts about that. “How did you even get involved with Todd? That night at the lake, he made it sound as if he and Dustin were working alone. I’ve had time to give it a lot of thought over the past year, and I think I’ve managed to work some things out now that I know it was four of you. Do you want to hear my theory?”
“Oh, by all means,” Heaton drawled. “I love to hear a good theory.”
“Three of you joined together first. You, Todd and whoever else is out there. I can’t quite figure out who it is ... although I know he’s the one watching Chelsea. I have a theory about that, too, but first things first.
“You guys probably got to talking over beers one night, let your inner darkness out when alcohol inhibited your common sense, and made what you thought were jokes,” she continued, an image flashing in her head that caused her to pause. “Daniel Smith? Really? I didn’t see that coming.”
The fact that Maddie managed to pull a name out of thin air unnerved Heaton. “How are you doing this?”
Maddie held her palms out and offered an exaggerated shrug. “Wouldn’t you like to know?”
“I believe that’s why I asked.”
“We all have our secrets, Sam.” Her smile was pretty but stretched. “You talked over beers, boasted a bit, and then you started conversing about your dark dreams. At first you thought it was just talk, but the three of you kept getting together and the talk grew darker and darker.
“Sarah Alden wasn’t the first girl you killed, was she?” she continued without waiting for an answer. “She was simply the first girl you hunted close to home. You went to other places first, other towns. You thought it would be easier to accomplish your goals in a town where people didn’t know your faces.
“That worked well for a time, but you weren’t getting the same rush after a few kills,” she said. “You wanted to hunt in Blackstone Bay because it upped the ante. People knew you here. You knew the victims. It’s more fun when you know the victims, right?”
“You’re a funny little thing,” Heaton muttered, a guttural laugh escaping. “When Todd first suggested we play a game with you, I thought it was a mistake. I remembered you as a boring little mouse who spent all her time following Nick Winters around like a lost puppy dog. I left for college when you were still in middle school. I didn’t realize how you … blossomed.”
“Todd knew.”
“He did, but he was always full of himself,” Heaton said. “You could never trust what he said.”
“Why keep working with him?”
“You know why.” Heaton made a tsking sound with his tongue. “Once we joined together, there was no breaking apart.”
“You had enough dirt on each other to ruin three lives if it came to it. That’s where Dustin came in, right?”
“Dustin was ... an experiment.”
“No, Dustin was set up to be the scapegoat,” Maddie countered. “You guys knew you would need someone to be a patsy if it came to it. You picked Dustin because he had anger issues and needed a father figure. You thought you could fill that void and mold him the way you wanted.”
“It worked, didn’t it?”
“Except for what happened at the lake,” Maddie pointed out. “That didn’t work.”
“Because Todd screwed it up,” Heaton snapped. “He was supposed to wait. We had a specific plan for you. You were isolated, fresh back in town, and we knew exactly what kind of game we wanted for you. Todd figured that he had dibs because you went to school together.”
“Todd tried to date me first,” Maddie pointed out. “There was a different game he wanted to play. When things fell apart, I became a target. He didn’t want you to participate in that game either. That was a game strictly for him and me. He took Dustin because he needed someone to control my grandmother, but Dustin failed and the plan unraveled.”
“Yes, well, Dustin wasn’t that bright.”
“I guess that’s too bad for him.”
“Oh, don’t feel sorry for him,” Heaton sneered. “He’s getting a deal. He’ll only spend twenty years in prison and then get out with plenty of life left to live.”
“You have a different plan for Todd, though, don’t you?”
“We didn’t have much of a choice,” Heaton answered, his free hand restless as it repeatedly balled into a fist before relaxing. “Todd had enough to
take us down. He agreed to sit tight, be patient, and wait for us to help him. It wasn’t an easy negotiation, but even an idiot like him realizes that none of us going to jail is better than all of us going to jail.”
“That’s why Smith is the prosecutor. He can tell you all of his strategy, and you can work together to build the weakest case possible. It’s a loss on his professional record but a win on the personal front. You need Dustin to play nice, too, though. That’s why you wanted him to agree to the deal and testify first. You probably told him that the best you could do was twenty years.”
“Pretty much.”
“By the time he realizes that Todd is out and hunting again, it will be too late. He won’t be able to say anything without screwing himself.”
“You’re smarter than you look.” Heaton’s grin was evil. “Honestly, if Todd had managed to curb his impulses for two freaking days, none of this would’ve happened. We had a plan for you and he ruined everything because he got impatient. I still don’t understand how Winters tracked you down that night.”
Maddie thought of her mother’s ghost. “He had a little help from a friend.”
“Who?”
“It honestly doesn’t matter.” Maddie wet her lips as she tapped her fingers on the dining room table. “So, what’s the plan today? You thought you would draw me into the woods by waving Chelsea as bait obviously. When that didn’t work, you had to change on the fly. Why is Daniel hiding in the woods while you have to do the heavy lifting?”
“I volunteered for this job,” Heaton replied. “I wanted some extra time with you, quality time. Todd is upset he won’t be around for the big finale, but he understands that you need to go before you can testify.”
“You set everything up to cast doubt on his guilt. Then, after taking me out, you plan to shelve your urges for a bit until things die down. Maybe go back to hunting in other towns even though that’s not nearly as much fun.”
“We have to do what we have to do.”
Grave Destiny Page 38