by Rachel Caine
I just nod. I don’t know what to say. I can’t lie to Javier, I can’t. I finally put my mug down and say, “I’ll go talk to her.”
He seems relieved, and I hate the guilt that digs its claws into my guts.
I knock on the master bedroom door; I know this cabin like my own home, I’ve been in and out of it a hundred times over the past few years. Kez calls out to come in.
She’s sitting cross-legged on the bed, propped against pillows. Her laptop is open. She glances up at me, and I’m struck by the bruises, the bandages still in place on her head. “I’m fine,” she says, probably because of the look on my face. “Did he contact you?”
“Yes,” I say. “He sent me a map. I’m supposed to be there tomorrow.” I take the burner phone out and show it to her, and she studies it intently. “Kez. Please stay here. I’m begging you, please.”
“Can’t,” she says. It sounds utterly certain. “And don’t tell me about why it’s smarter. I know I can’t stay here. For one thing, he’s afraid of me. He came after me, Gwen. And whether he killed Prester or not—or had him killed—he used Prester’s death to beat me with, again. He wants me here. So here is where I can’t stay.”
“What about Javier? Are you going to tell him?”
“I’m sending him on an errand,” Kez says. “We’ll be gone when he gets back.” She looks absolutely sure about this. And she nails me with a look that sears me like a laser. “Don’t you even think about leaving me behind. You just showed me the map. You think I can’t remember it? You think I won’t follow you? It’d be a whole lot easier if you’d just accept that I’m going to use you to get to him, Gwen. Because he’s going to be after you.”
“I’m your bait,” I say. She nods. Oddly, that feels . . . better. Cleaner. “Then you should come separately.”
“No point in that,” Kez says, and closes her laptop. She puts it away. “He’ll be tracking that phone you have. He’ll know you came here, and he’ll know by now that I can’t let this go. He can’t afford me as a loose end. If I stay here, he’ll clean up after himself, just like he did that couple up on the road who had video of his car. This bastard’s been doing this a long time, that’s my guess. He knows how to dead-end a trail.”
It was Sam’s guess too. MalusNavis, a shark gliding under the surface, coming up only to take his prey. Sheryl was his prey. Now I am. Only I won’t vanish without a trace. I’ll leave a hell of a mess.
Maybe he’s getting sloppy at last.
“We should go if we’re going,” I say. “Last chance, Kez. Stay.”
She just shakes her head, says, “Let me take care of this first.”
I stand in that room as she walks out and tells Javier that she’s got a bad headache, and the doctor’s called in a prescription for her at the pharmacy in Norton; she sounds normal, calm, exactly as I’d expect. She tells him I’m going to stay with her, just in case. I hear them kiss. I hear her tell him she loves him.
And Javier grabs his keys and leaves. I left my husband and kids while they were sleeping, and that was incredibly hard. But at least I didn’t have to lie to the ones I love.
When I hear the front door close, I step out. Kez is standing silently, staring at the door, and the expression on her face is so wounded. So raw. Fragile and strong and fierce all at once.
She drags in a breath, and it looks like it hurts. “We need to get moving,” she says, and heads for the gun case. She takes out two shotguns and hands them to me, grabs a duffel bag, and fills it with shells. I watch in silence as she packs what we’ll need—food, water, more weapons.
“Kez—” I finally say.
She doesn’t pause as she puts two hunting knives in the bag. “Let’s go kill this son of a bitch before anybody else has to die.”
21
SAM
When I wake up that morning at nearly ten, everything feels normal. Peaceful. The house is quiet, and I’m a little hungover from the sleep medication. Gwen’s side of the bed is empty, but that isn’t unusual.
I yawn, head for the shower, get myself ready for the day.
The first hint I have that something isn’t right is that the coffeepot isn’t full. Gwen is a creature of habit; she always puts on coffee, but the machine is cold, the pot is empty. I stare at that for a few seconds, then start it up and head straight for the office.
I fully expect to find her there sitting behind her desk, immersed in work.
The office is dark and empty. I turn on the lights, and I go around to look at her laptop. It’s closed, and when I put a hand on it, it’s ice cold. She hasn’t been working here.
I find the phone lying on the living room coffee table on my way to the garage. It’s just sitting there, exactly in the middle, as if she wanted me to notice.
That’s when I start being afraid. Really afraid.
I know her passcode, and I enter it. I get it wrong twice, force myself to calm the fuck down and do it right one last time.
She’s left it open to a video file. I don’t want to play it. I don’t.
But I press the screen, and Gwen’s face fills it. “Sam,” she says. “I know you’re worried right now. I know you’re wondering where I am and what I’m doing, and I wish to God I could tell you. But I’m doing this for you, and for the kids. I have to. It’s MalusNavis, the one from the boards. He’s going to keep coming after our kids if I don’t do this, and . . . Sam, I can’t let that happen. He hurt Kez already. I can’t let him get to you, or Lanny, or Connor.”
I pause it, because I can’t get my breath against the fury that’s igniting in me. Don’t you dare, Gwen. Don’t you goddamn dare. I’m shaking all over, and I know the anger’s just a cover for what I’m really feeling.
Fear.
I listen to the rest.
“I love you so much, Sam. You—you’ve made me whole, after all this time. You’ve made me realize that I don’t have to be afraid, because you’re here. Because you care. That’s your gift, and I value it so much. I know you want to do this with me, but Sam, please understand . . . there is no one I trust more than you to protect our children. I need you to do that for me. I’m asking you, I’m begging you . . . please keep them safe. For me.” She smiles. There are tears in her eyes, and my anger’s gone now, drowned in those tears. All I have left is fear. “I’ll come back if I can. I love you always.”
She glances at something, and I realize she sat just here in the same spot as she made this video. She was looking at the clock. I check the date and time stamp.
She made it just before nine this morning. She did it while I was asleep, while the kids were asleep. This was a plan. I remember her suggesting the sleep medication last night. She was going to take it herself. Clearly, she didn’t.
She wanted me out of the way because she knew I’d damn well stop her.
I go through the rest of her phone with trembling fingers. I see the texts sent from an unknown number, and it’s like being plunged into a lake in winter; no wonder she looked so strained last night. So closed in. The pictures of us are threats, implicit but very real.
I go through her emails. Nothing there. I open her photos. Pictures of the kids, of me, of us.
And then, suddenly, a picture of a driver’s license, and the face hits me like a punch. It’s Tyler. But the name on the license says Leonard Bay, and he lives on Beacon Street, here in Knoxville. It takes me a second to recall that Gwen said she ran into and chased down a homeless guy who’d mailed Melvin’s letter to her. And had a letter from MalusNavis as well. My stomach clenches even before I put it together.
Leonard Bay is just a false identity. And suddenly I know it’s all connected. Tyler played that part so well I never even thought to put it together with the sad, self-destructive young man I talked off the bridge. The kid who’d needed my help when he was drowning in despair.
A malus navis is Latin for a navigational beacon. Beacon Street. Dr. Dave said that he thought MalusNavis lived on the coast. A navigational beacon on the coa
st.
A lighthouse.
My mouth’s gone so dry that my throat clicks when I swallow. My muscles ache from how hard I’m clutching the phone. I type in pharos.
Pharos is Greek for lighthouse.
Tyler Pharos. Leonard Bay. MalusNavis. They’re all the same person.
I have fucking been played, and so has Gwen.
The hell of it is, as enraged as I am, I somehow can’t direct it against the young man standing on that bridge, pressed against the railing. I’d sensed something real there. Something very dark and terrible.
Maybe the person I ought to be angry at is me. I should have put this together. Would have, if I hadn’t been focused on projecting my feelings onto the blank slate of Tyler’s loss . . . if he even has a dead sister at all. That, too, could have been a lie.
My first impulse is to leap into my truck and tear on out of here, find Gwen, and drag her home where she’ll be safe . . . but then I realize that I can’t. She trusted me to watch over our children, and with the threats in those photos, I can’t leave them alone. I can’t.
So I call Javier instead. I’m going to ask him if Gwen is there, but he beats me to the punch. He says, “Please fucking tell me that they’re with you.”
They.
Gwen, and Kez. I feel my heart sink. “They’re not there?”
“Kez left me a goddamn note. She says she and Gwen have to go finish this.”
“Call the station. Tell them that she’s missing and in danger.”
He laughs bitterly. “She is going to be so pissed.”
“Do you care?”
“Not if it saves her life. What is she thinking? Did Gwen talk her into this? I never should’ve left her alone so soon after Prester . . .”
“What happened to Prester?”
“He’s dead.” There’s a long pause on the other end. “Shit. I should have known she wouldn’t let it go. Not even with the baby.”
Kezia Claremont is not the kind of person who can live with letting other people die, and drop it. She was never going to drop this case, but now, with her partner dead, and the fact this asshole already tried to hurt her, put her unborn child in danger—no power on Earth could have forced her to sit back and relax. Just like nothing could keep Gwen from putting herself between her kids and the danger coming for them.
“Call the station,” I tell him.
“We have to go after them.”
“Did Kez take her phone?” He doesn’t answer. “She left it behind, right? We’ve got no way to find them, Javi. Putting out an APB is the best we can do. If we can stop them before they’re too far out . . .”
“Yeah,” he says. “I’ll do it.”
He hangs up. I think about it for a second, and then I text Dr. Dave. He lives in a lighthouse, I say. Or uses one for what he does. Where is it? Give me the state, at least.
I don’t get a response for about ten minutes. I don’t know whether he had a patient or he just likes to keep me waiting, but I’ve already checked the gun safes, and found that at least Gwen’s gone armed, wherever she’s headed. That eases a little bit of my dread. A grain of sand on a beach of trouble.
Dr. Dave doesn’t text. He calls. “Sam,” he says. “Delighted to hear from you. How are you? Not arrested, I see.”
“Fuck you,” I say. Feels good. “What state does MalusNavis call home? It’s somewhere with a lighthouse.”
“I genuinely do not know,” he says. “You finally looked it up, didn’t you? Navigational beacon. Hence, lighthouse. Hence, coastline. Very good. You can’t say he didn’t give you every chance.”
“You worked with him,” I say tightly. “You son of a bitch, you helped him.”
“Well, I gave him the wanted-poster template. And he needed help from a capable friend to make that Loserville forum post. You know the one.”
He’s saying, without admitting, that he either made the post on the message board implicating Connor, or he had it done. I want to wrap my hands around his throat and squeeze until the smugness pops out. But I manage to keep my voice even as I say, “Anything else?”
“I gave him the letter from Melvin Royal. I thought it might be helpful.”
“How did you get it?”
“Friend of a friend. One of Melvin’s little helpers died—natural causes. The friend found it among his personal effects. A police friend, I might add. I didn’t steal anything.”
Dr. Dave, covering his tracks. But he gave that letter to MalusNavis knowing it would be used against Gwen. Knowing it would make her unsteady, vulnerable, paranoid.
I don’t answer. My mind is churning, and so is my stomach. It’s not like Dave to talk to me on the phone. He’s being careful, but still.
It occurs to me he’s talking to me because he’s enjoying hearing me flail for answers. He’s not listening to my words. He’s drinking in my pain.
“Sam?” I can hear the pleasure in his voice. “Still there?” He loves the taste of this. And I know I should hang up. But I can’t. Not yet.
“Where is he? Just tell me, Dave.”
“In return for what?”
“Money.”
“I don’t need your pathetic little attempt at payoff. I make far more than you do. No, I need something else. Something better.”
“Like what?” The taste of death in my mouth. The knowledge that I’m making a deal with the fucking devil.
“You provide the documentation you have on me. We’ll be even then. And I’ll let it go.”
Once I have no hold on Dr. Dave, I have no idea what he’ll do. What he’s capable of doing. But I don’t have a choice. “I give you my word.”
“Oh, your word isn’t good enough—why would you think it would be? I need you to bring it to me, Sam. In person. And I need to destroy it myself. Do I need to explain the consequences if you keep copies?”
He doesn’t, because I’m sure he’ll come after the kids. Connor, in particular. He knew exactly how to hit the kid where it hurt, and he’ll take great pleasure in doing it again, over and over and over, and seeing my son, my son, crumble.
Gwen and I are alike in this: neither one of us will let that happen. So I say, “Tell me where and when, and I’ll bring it to you. All of it. But you tell me right now where he is.”
“You can’t save her.” Dave suddenly sounds very serious. Very calm. “You don’t know who you’re dealing with. She’s dangerous, I give her that. But he will rip her to pieces. When I tell you I know that, believe me.”
It’s incredibly chilling, hearing that. But I can’t believe it. I can’t. “Just tell me.”
There’s a long pause. I want to shake the answer out of the phone. Then Dave says, “Virginia.” He hangs up. I let out a long breath and lower the phone. I stare at it, then I look at maps of the Virginia coastline. There are a lot of possibilities. Nine, at least, and that doesn’t count abandoned, nonfunctional lighthouses. If I’m even right about that much.
To make things worse . . . I’m almost sure he’s just lied to me. Dave doesn’t want me to stop this. Not at all. He wants me pinned and helpless and suffering. Dave always lies. I should have expected that.
But he’ll still require me to carry through with the bargain. He did, after all, give me an answer. He’ll just claim he was wrong.
I have nothing. Nothing but grief and rage and the very real fear that Gwen and Kez have vanished into the dark. Together, at least. But very, very alone.
I watch Gwen’s message again. And again.
But in the end, there’s nothing I can do now but wait.
I think that might kill me. I need to think of something. Anything.
I hear one of the bedroom doors open. It’s Lanny, coming out in her pajamas, yawning and shuffling and squinting against the morning. “Hey, Dad,” she says. “Is breakfast ready?”
I didn’t think about this moment. About what I was going to say to her, or to Connor. But I don’t have any choice.
I say, “Sit down, Lanny. I need to tell you
about your mom.”
I know full well it’s going to be a hellish day, but truth is all I can offer them now.
Truth, and love, and trust.
That’s what Gwen gave me.
22
GWEN
The impulse to check on the kids, check on Sam—it’s so strong and painful that holding it back is like touching a live wire. But Kez is right: we can’t take the risk. This man is a killer, we’ve seen that. And Sam can’t be part of this now, not if my kids are going to be safe and have at least one of us left to love and guide and protect them. But I don’t intend on dying, and neither does Kez.
We’re hunters.
Kez, of course, has thought ahead; she knows that Javier will do something to find us, and probably something like file a missing persons report. So she pulls off the highway an hour into our trip and takes a detour to an area I don’t know. It’s dark, rural, completely anonymous. There, in a beat-up, half-destroyed barn, we meet a tall, thin African American man in a Che Guevara T-shirt who trades my SUV for a small, hard-used Honda. “Can’t stay in your car,” she tells me. “They’ll put out a BOLO for the plate number. We need something completely different if we’re going to pull this off.”
No words are exchanged between her and the man in the Che shirt; they just exchange nods, and she hands him an envelope that I can only assume holds cash. I don’t know how she knows him, and I don’t ask either. Doesn’t seem like the time.
The Honda runs smoothly but rides rough, and the mileage on it looks high enough for it to have been to the moon and back, but it holds up through the night as we drive the still-busy highways, pulling over to grab sleep when we can.
“We need to talk about what we’re going to do,” I say, and she nods silently. “We can’t play his game, not completely. Just enough to make him think he’s got us. Maybe that will throw him off.”
“We play for now, or ours will get hurt,” she says. “Gwen. He thinks you’re guilty of something.”
