by Elle Keaton
The other guys met them at the property. Adam found it much easier to go inside the house with all of them there. It was a weird relief to hear they were as horrified as he had been the first time he saw it. The only place that wasn’t full of hazardous waste was Gerald’s studio. Canvases were stacked neatly along the walls, and his workbench was clear and orderly, paints set out as if he had planned to come back and work the next day.
Adam was a bit surprised that the house hadn’t been broken into after the announcement of Gerald’s death. He supposed that anyone who might have tried had been put off by the mounds of trash and filth that stood guard. The pieces in the work area were nothing special: definitely the work of Gerald Klay, but nothing like what he’d created at his peak. Those pieces were safe in town at the gallery he had regularly shown at, or on collectors’ walls all over the world. Adam shut and locked the studio door with finality.
The rain, which had been light on the way in, turned into a sheeting sideways downpour. There was no way to stay dry unless you were actually wearing a ziplock bag. Everything dripped. The house’s eaves gushed because the gutters were backed up. The Doug fir and cedar branches that extended over the yard dripped huge, fat raindrops that unerringly hit the back of Adam’s neck every time he climbed the front stairs. The sky was dark, so it was difficult to tell what time it was. Adam was wet to the bone. He had, at least, worn waterproof boots, but the rest of his gear was not made for this weather. Ed and the guys seemed to be fine, decked out in the latest fisherman fashion. Don even had a huge yellow rain hat. Adam envied him.
Despite the miserable weather, no one suggested they leave. They all wanted to help. It was surreal. Sometime in the past eighteen years these guys had grown up. Adam was thirty or more years younger than most of them, but back in the day he had been the one making sure none of them drowned in their own vomit, that the ashes were out at the end of the night, and that no one had their car keys.
It had kind of started out as a joke— he was about twelve the first time his dad made his friends give him their keys. Someone they knew had died attempting to navigate the winding Fox Island roads after a long night drinking. A joke had become tradition, and somehow Adam had become the kid in charge.
And his dad wondered why he had wanted to go into law enforcement.
Buck, the car guy, came by a bit later. Adam led him to the outbuilding with the guys all trailing along behind them. Their excitement was palpable. Buck had, of course, already seen the cars, but this time he’d brought a camera and some other stuff he needed, as well as his big tow truck. Buck explained that appraising cars could be difficult, especially if they had already been restored or otherwise modified. These, however—and he practically shivered when he said it—had all original serial numbers. They could bring big money. The Pontiac a little less because of the damage to its soft top. As is, Adam could expect about $15,000. He about choked on his tongue.
Buck was in his element. The guys hung on his every word—this was better than watching Antiques Roadshow. The other two cars, as is, would probably bring between $35,000 and $55,000. Each. Adam heard one of the guys, Tim or Don maybe, groan. Buck winked at Adam. And yeah, Buck swung for his team. What the hell had happened to Skagit while he’d been gone? It was nice, but somehow unsettling, that the Skagit he had loathed all these years was no longer the miserable village he remembered. It had grown up.
Buck backed his flatbed tow truck down the drive. He, Tim and Don, painstakingly set the cars up to be transported. Adam felt like he was watching an archaeological dig, only with cars. Buck warned him that he would need to do a title search, and that could take a while. Even though the cars had clearly been on Gerald’s property for decades, Buck wanted to protect himself and Adam from lawsuits. Buck was a good guy, even if he was weirdly into cars.
Adam wondered how Micah was doing. After dinner yesterday, things felt oddly strained. He pulled his phone out of his pocket just as it buzzed.
> Hi. Wondering if you could stop by my house. This is Micah.
MICAH WAS WAITING for Adam on his front porch. While from a safety perspective his house was livable, it wasn’t inviting. The fire and water damage had been limited to the back of the house, mostly the kitchen and what Micah called the reading room, an enclosed back porch area. Unfortunately, the smoke damage extended throughout the house. Micah needed to bring a restoration company in for paint and all that other stuff.
That was not what Micah wanted to show him. He had a grubby backpack in his hands.
“Come in for a second,” Micah said.
They went into the living room. Adam winced at the acrid stench of burned wood and plastic. He was certain it was no good for Micah’s lungs. As if reading his mind, Micah coughed.
“I forgot about this,” Micah wheezed. “I stuck Jessica’s backpack in my dad’s study because the stupid cat kept trying to kill it. And I forgot about it until earlier today. I thought I’d see if there was something I missed in it. I mean, I looked the day she left it, and there was no phone or address book or anything, just clothes and a spiral binder. But now, I . . . think I found something important.”
Micah held up a little piece of plastic with 64 GB emblazoned on the side. A memory card. It could be nothing, but Adam’s gut told him it wasn’t. He ran back out to his car and grabbed his laptop. They loaded the memory card and waited while the machine recognized the JPEG files and tiny images popped up in lines extending past the bottom of his screen, an indication there were hundreds of photos on the card, if not more.
Adam had a kind of flash: Rochelle Heid’s body tossed aside like so much garbage. Jessica Abrahams, up on Mt. Baker. The Hispanic girl from earlier in the year.
“I want to throw up,” Micah whispered.
Kid porn. Maybe not babies, but young. Boys, girls, young kids and teens. They only looked at a few pictures, but it was more than Adam could stomach, and Micah had no business seeing this kind of sick shit.
“Okay. So. I need a plastic sandwich bag.” Micah found a box of them in the rubble of his kitchen, and Adam put the memory card inside. No doubt any fingerprints were useless, but he did it anyway.
Adam sent the memory card to Mohammad overnight from the local FedEx office. And yeah, that was going to seriously piss off SkPD, but they’d had their chance to go through Micah’s house and look for evidence. They’d done nothing more than pat him on the head and glance around.
The next thing he did was take Micah back to the Wagon Wheel and proceed to fuck him into the mattress. It was the only way Adam had to show Micah he was safe. If he stayed in Adam’s bed, nothing would happen to him.
Dark-of-night anxieties woke Adam up. What the hell was he doing? What was he thinking? He only needed to glance at the man sleeping next to him to realize he had no idea but that he’d do a lot to keep Micah safe. Jesus, his head was a dangerous place to be.
Thirty
THIRTY
Beautiful no matter what time of year you were driving on it, the Mt. Baker Highway in late November got its only color from the evergreens. The maple, ash, and birch trees all shivered in the gloom, stripped nude by the wind and rain. Occasionally the car passed stands of deciduous trees a bit more protected from the weather, with a few hardy red or yellow leaves clutching the branches for dear life.
The road curved with the mountains’ whims. When it was built, the engineers had followed the natural curves, the easiest route, except for the spots impossible to breach with mere human power, where they brought in blasters and dynamite. Brutal, deadly work.
The Skagit and Skykomish Rivers made their appearances, flirting with the winding road. The rivers gushed high, filling the banks, racing Adam and Micah to their grim destination. In summer there were sandbars and exposed rocks that an industrious person could go fish from, or a different kind of person could laze on in the sun.
Micah was being way too quiet, he knew, making Adam worry.
Adam wanted to look at the scene where J
essica had been found. Karol Abrahams was now grieving the loss of two family members. Personally, Micah thought no one would blame her if she didn’t mourn her husband. Rumor had it they’d had to sedate her after she viewed Jessica’s body.
Adam had asked Micah to come along while he went on his grim errand. The memory card unnerved Adam, Micah knew. Micah wondered if the card was why his house had been targeted. He knew that’s what Adam thought. Especially since Sara’s place had been broken into as well.
The spot where Jessica’s body had been discovered would surely be devoid of any physical evidence by now, between the passing of time and almost-nonstop heavy rain, but Adam still wanted to see it. He said he needed to look around and see what the killer might have seen. Why they’d decided that this was the spot. Had they known about it in advance? Had they panicked and dropped her body in the first convenient place? Had it been at night, or had they been brazen enough to dump her during the day?
The Mt. Baker Ski Area was out this way. It had been under a constant threat of bankruptcy when he was a kid, depending on whether the snow came early, late, or at all. Even so, many people in the county still depended on snowfall for their livelihood. There were weekend rentals and cabins on the way to the summit. A-frames just big enough for four people (or eight drunk ones) with small decks and hot tubs. They were packed when it snowed but largely empty the rest of the year. Sometimes they’d get mountain bikers, not much else.
“My family had a cabin up here.” Micah spoke for the first time in almost an hour. “I had forgotten.” He continued to stare out the passenger-side window. “It was in one called Glacier something, I think.” Just then a Glacier Creek sign flashed past. Adam gave him a questioning look.
“You want to turn in? Drive by it?” Adam asked. He slowed down. At the next driveway, he pulled in and turned around.
“It’s been ten or twelve years. Probably more. Maybe before I left for college? Um, it was at the back. At the end of one of the roads.” Micah waved generally. Adam continued to drive slowly along the main entrance road. The little cabins were scattered everywhere. This time of year there were signs of life, even if there was little snow for skiing yet. Holiday lights were up in some of the cabins. Decorative flags. Skis and snowboards leaning hopefully against porches or loaded on top of SUVs. “I think it’s down there. Yeah.” Micah pointed to the right.
At the end of the little spur stood a small A-frame much like all the others. Green metal roof, wood siding, front porch with a built-in hot tub. There the similarities ended. This cabin had no decorations; the front lawn area was overgrown, a massive tangle of native grasses and blackberries crowding the little house.
Adam pulled to a stop. “This it?”
“Yeah. I think. Pretty sure,” Micah whispered. He pushed the car door open before slowly jogging up the faint path, hands in his pockets, shoulders hunched against the cold and memories.
It was cold and probably going to dump more rain any minute, but he wouldn’t melt. Micah peeked in the front windows and then took a smaller set of steps down the side, heading around toward the back of the house. In five minutes or less he was back at the car.
“I … um, I think I need to make a phone call.”
Adam grabbed his shoulders, forcing him to sit down on the bumper.
“Are you okay? What’s back there?” Adam demanded.
“Everything is back there; nothing has changed,” Micah replied into the safety of his knees.
Adam drove quite a ways before Micah could get any kind of cell reception. Once they were stopped next to a drive-thru espresso stand, Micah got out and paced as he called his lawyer. Sure enough, it seemed the little cabin was his.
The rain stopped merely threatening and began to fall in fat drops. Driving back was going to be ugly. Micah clicked off his cell phone, turning toward Adam. “I feel so stupid. So, so stupid.”
Adam raised his eyebrow at him in question. “You want a hug? Or, I dunno, to punch someone?”
“Jesus fucking Christ, I am such a loser. I had no idea that I—I still own this. I guess. The lawyer has been taking care of it all these years.” Micah took a deep breath, trying to calm himself down. “They’ve been paying the taxes and everything. Even maintenance. Although it looks like they didn’t get their—my—money’s worth.”
“Fuck.”
“It’s been empty this whole time. This. Whole. Time.” He was still deciding between a hug or a punch, but leaning toward hug. “It’s like having a scab ripped off. I am so angry. I don’t want this. It was almost unbearable when Brandon and Stephanie came and helped me clean out the upstairs of the house. It took me almost two years to do that. To fucking throw away candy wrappers Shona had hidden in her room. To empty out my parents’ bathroom, where my mom’s shampoo that she used forever was, where my dad’s stupid electric razor was. I couldn’t even look at it. I still don’t like to go upstairs.”
The rage he felt was white-hot, scorching. Anger at himself, at his parents for getting killed, at everyone in Skagit who acted like he was a freak. The anger crawled across his skin, making him itchy and hot, his fingers curling into fists.
“So, mostly you want to punch someone. I get that,” Adam said quietly. “If it’s still so hard, why do you stay in that house?”
It was something Micah had thought about. Adam had left; why couldn’t he? But if he went somewhere else, he wouldn’t know anyone, and that seemed harder than being a freak in Skagit. Instead he’d stayed and wrapped himself in memories.
“I dunno. I’ve asked myself before, and the answer, I guess, is, it’s so much effort to change, to move. I’ve never been great at it. I was on suicide watch for practically two years. Brandon was over every day. Made me call him or Stephanie or they’d show up at the door. If I move, it’s like they are really gone forever. I don’t think I’m strong enough.”
He looked down at the cell phone clutched in his hand. “This was my dad’s cell phone number.”
He finally looked at Adam, seeing how wet he was. They both were, from standing in the deluge like idiots. Adam’s coat and jeans were beginning to soak through. Micah was freezing. Adam reached out and dragged Micah closer, his body heat mingling with Micah’s. Cupping Micah’s face with freezing hands, he pressed his chilly lips gently against Micah’s. A spark, an ember that had been slumbering, arced blue flame between the two of them. Adam kissed Micah like he had never been kissed before.
He didn’t know what was going to happen between the two of them in the future. He didn’t know where his own home was anymore, if he would keep his home in Skagit. He didn’t care when a big SUV drove slowly down the little road with its stereo throbbing loudly enough to wake hibernating animals. If they wanted to watch, he did not give one fuck. Micah shivered, hunching against Adam, chin resting on his shoulder.
Thirty-One
THIRTY-ONE
There was someone, or someones, out there dumping young girls’ bodies. Someone had ransacked and then set fire to Micah’s property. And Sara’s. There was the memory card with its devastating content. Gerald’s property was still a fucking mess, and he had to deal with those cars.
Also, suddenly there were people in Adam’s life who cared about him—more than the two he was used to. He had never had that before. Mohammad and Ida tried, but they had a lot of people to keep an eye on. Now there were grumpy old men, Sara, that irritating nurse Joey, and Micah. Whom he hadn’t even known he needed.
So, the man he maybe did give a shit about was right here in his arms kissing him with a passionate fervor, his breath hot against Adam’s cold cheek. He pulled back just far enough to tug Micah’s forehead down against his own.
“You are strong. Let me help you with this stuff, okay? Please? Also, we’re both freezing and more than a little wet.” Adam’s boots squished around his toes.
“Okay.” Micah smiled at him, his dimple popping. Adam loved that smile. He could admit to loving Micah’s smile.
They
got into the car, and Adam pointed it back out onto the highway. He still needed to drive by the crime scene, but the heat was blasting and the defogger worked. They wouldn’t catch cold in the extra ten or fifteen minutes this was going to take.
The rain graduated to a howling storm, and Adam reconsidered a bit. The priority was to get the still-shivering and pale Micah back to town. His lungs did not need this. There was nothing to see; he didn’t even bother getting out of the car, just pulled over where scraps of yellow crime-scene tape were flapping wildly in the wind and stared out the windshield for a few moments before concluding that the body had been dumped here out of convenience, not based on a plan. That meant lots of things, none of which he wanted to think about until they were showered and dressed in warm clothing. Or perhaps no clothing. He grinned, putting the car into drive.
Adam was reminded of his first big case. Not the details, but the unsettling feeling he was groping around in the dark, grasping for facts just out of reach. When he’d been at the police station, Lieutenant Nguyen had made it clear she was interested in his input, but she was not inviting Adam or his team in officially. Yet. He got it, he did, but he missed having another agent to bounce ideas off. He couldn’t talk to Micah about it. He’d caught himself missing Weir’s company, even if he was a brat.
Those who remembered him from before he ran away to L.A. thought of him as a weirdo. In Skagit he had always been Gerald Klay’s son.
Adam hadn’t been born until Gerald was in his late forties. Maybe Gerald had no idea what to do with a young child. His mom had left when he was an infant. How on earth had Adam survived to adulthood?
He’d begged his dad for cable. Hell, for a TV at all. Something, anything that would give him some common ground with the other kids, who had parents who took them to the movies and watched them play soccer or baseball.