Fury (Blur Trilogy Book 2)

by Steven James

  She came closer to the camera, until just her face was visible.

  Nicole waved to her. “Merry Christmas, Mrs. Byers.”

  “Merry Christmas, Nicole.”

  “Hello, LeAnne,” his dad said.

  “Jerry. How are you?” Deep concern laced every word. “Daniel said you were—oh, I can’t believe all this is even happening.”

  “I’m feeling a lot better than I was last night. Thanks to your son.”

  “More like thanks to the doctors,” Daniel corrected him.

  His dad directed his attention to the screen. “I understand Daniel spoke with you earlier, filled you in on everything?”

  “He told me about Dr. Fromke, and this maniac, Hollister, who stabbed you, all of it. It’s unfathomable. Do we know how many people Dr. Fromke killed at that barn?

  “They’re still not sure. We have to be careful not to jump to conclusions, but my deputies are following up on the names carved into the wallboards to see how many of them are of missing persons. Daniel noticed seven names that were all apparently done with the same knife. We’re checking into those first.”

  She let that sink in. “I can’t believe I ever trusted Dr. Fromke. That any of us . . . And Ty Bell shooting those wolves? And then going after Nicole? What happens to him now?”

  “Wolf poaching is a serious enough crime, but trying to attack her like that takes things up to a whole different level. He’s over eighteen. He’s looking at some serious time.”

  “Was Lancaster involved at all?”

  “Doesn’t look like it. Ty just let Hollister use his dad’s hunting cabin.”

  “The same place he used as a base to go out and shoot the wolves.”

  “Exactly.”

  “And he confessed?”

  “Nicole recorded it all.”

  Daniel’s mom shook her head in disbelief. “And what about this Malcolm character?”

  “I haven’t met him yet. You’ll have to ask Daniel about him.”

  Daniel hadn’t heard from Mr. Zacharias since yesterday evening, but no bodies were found in the charred remains of the Traybor Institute after the gas leak explosion, so it didn’t appear that he’d been inside it when it blew.

  At least they were saying it was a gas leak.

  Daniel didn’t buy it.

  The timing was just way too suspicious.

  “I’ll introduce you,” Daniel promised his mom. “The next time he shows up.”

  If he ever does.

  No—he also wanted to talk to you about your “gifts,” remember?

  He’ll be back.

  His mom asked about the lighthouse and while Daniel answered her, his thoughts wandered back over everything that’d happened.

  This morning, after he’d told his story to the police, some officers from Bayfield went up to the lighthouse and recovered the bones from the cellar.

  Then, just an hour or so ago, a forensics specialist from UW-Superior reported that her preliminary findings indicated that it was the skeleton of a female between the ages of ten and fourteen. They were doing more tests, but it looked like the story Jarvis Delacroix had written in his journal checked out.

  They were going to do some DNA tests this week to determine if the girl was related to Daniel, but in either case, it looked like at last, after all these years, she was going to finally get a proper burial.

  After Daniel finished summarizing things for his mom, she turned her attention to his dad again and asked him once more how he was doing.

  He assured her that he was fine, then said, “Daniel told me about your talk with him the other day.”

  “My talk?”

  “You said that you left to protect us, that you were afraid of what was happening with you.”

  “We don’t need to discuss any of that right now, Jerry, we—”

  “Listen, I want to protect you, LeAnne. That’s what I signed up for back when we got married.”

  “I should’ve done more to help Daniel.” She lowered her gaze.

  “None of that matters right now. I’ll do whatever it takes to make you—both you and Daniel—feel safe. Trust me.”

  “I do. I just don’t want to hurt you.”

  “Being apart hurts more than being together ever could.”

  A pause settled between them.

  He said, “When you come back we’ll give things another shot, okay? We can make this work. I know we can.”

  She brushed away a tear, but didn’t reply.

  “Oh,” Daniel said, “I just remembered that Nicole and I are supposed to be meeting up with Kyle and Mia in the lobby. We’ll be back in a few minutes. C’mon, Nicole.”

  Carrying her sketchbook, she joined him and they slipped into the hall.

  “Good idea,” she said. “Give them some privacy.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Hey, listen, I think I understand most of what’s happened—or at least why it has—but I need to ask, did you ever figure out why you went sleepwalking with that knife?”

  “No. Not exactly, but it might have had something to do with my subconscious sorting through dealing with the carved names in the wall.”

  “That makes sense. And Dr. Fromke? Do you know why he helped Hollister?”

  “Maybe because of their history together, maybe for the challenge of it all, or maybe just because he’s crazy.”

  “I’ll vote for that last one.”

  “No kidding.”

  They passed the elevator bay and he said, “Anyway, leaving my dad and mom alone gives you a chance to open some Christmas presents.”

  “Presents plural? As in more than one?”

  “They’re small. You’ll see.”

  “Where are they?”

  “On their way.”

  When they were almost to the lobby a husky man came striding toward them.

  Daniel recognized him right away: it was the detective who’d been asking him questions when he woke up in the psychiatric hospital on Sunday morning.

  “Excuse me,” he said to Daniel, “but can I have a word with you?”

  CHAPTER

  SIXTY-FIVE

  “I’m Detective Poehlman. Do you remember meeting me in Duluth?”

  “Yes.”

  The detective faced Nicole. “And you must be Nicole Marten—ou visited Daniel at the hospital under the guise of being his sister.”

  “What do you want?” Daniel asked.

  “May I speak with you in private, Daniel?”

  “About what?”

  “It has to do with . . . well . . . how you left the hospital in Duluth.”

  “I already told the whole story to the other officers. Malcolm Zacharias helped me. Now, we’re on our way to meet some—”

  “It’ll only take a minute.”

  Daniel glanced at Nicole, who shrugged slightly.

  “What is it?” he said.

  “In private, if you don’t mind.”

  “Nicole stays with me. What do you need to know?”

  “Well. Alright.” He held up an iPad. “We’ve been reviewing the security video footage of you leaving the hospital. There was no one there with you, Daniel.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean you were alone when you left the building.”

  “Mr. Zacharias was there.”

  “No.” The detective shook his head. “I have the footage right here.”

  “Show me.”

  Detective Poehlman finger-swiped to the video.

  The footage was grainy and there was only movement in the distance, so it’d obviously been filmed from the other end of the hall, but there it was: the video showed Daniel open the door to his room in the psych ward, then pass into the hallway.

  Alone.

  That does
n’t make sense.

  The next section showed him round a corner and dart toward the cafeteria, alone. Finally, an external camera had caught him leaving the facility and sprinting away from the property on the road bordering the park beside Lake Superior.

  Alone.

  All alone.

  No. That’s not possible.

  Either you’re going completely crazy or someone edited that video, changed the footage somehow.

  “Then how did I get to Beldon?”

  “You stole a car,” Detective Poehlman answered.

  “I don’t know how to hot-wire a car.”

  “Then perhaps the keys were in it. Look at the video.”

  Daniel watched the footage as it showed him rushing toward the sedan, climbing into the driver’s side and then, a few moments later, taking off.

  “That can’t be. I climbed into the passenger’s side. I distinctly remember that. I know I did.”

  “There was no one with you at the hospital, Daniel.”

  “What about the night security guard? I heard him talking with Mr. Zacharias.”

  “The guard on duty that night says he didn’t speak with anyone.”

  “He’s lying.”

  “And why would he do that?”

  “I don’t know.”

  You never actually saw that guard talk with Mr. Zacharias. You just heard them from the other side of that maintenance closet door. You could have imagined it all. But then—

  “I saw Mr. Zacharias,” Nicole said to the detective. “At the Traybor Institute. I was there with Daniel. He’s real.”

  “What did you see?”

  “One of the guards, the officers, whatever, was the man who’d driven into the snowbank.”

  Detective Poehlman consulted his iPad, obviously fact-checking something. “The man Daniel and Kyle helped get back on the road Friday night?”

  “Yes.”

  “And you’re sure it was the same person?”

  “Well, I . . . I mean, I didn’t see the guy that night, exactly—he didn’t get out of the car, but Daniel told me he was the—” She hesitated, perhaps realizing that she was inadvertently making the detective’s case for him.

  “What are you going to believe, Daniel?” Detective Poehlman asked. “Your memory or the evidence?”

  That’s a good question. Your memory or—

  Kyle and Mia passed through the automatic doors and entered the lobby. Kyle was sipping from a can of Dr Pepper. Mia took longer than she needed to stomping snow off her boots, muttering something about wishing she lived in Florida.

  “Kyle can prove it,” Daniel said to the detective.

  “Sure.” Kyle joined them. “I can prove it. Prove what?”

  “You heard Mr. Zacharias, remember? I was talking with you on the phone while I was on my way to Beldon and then I handed the phone to him. He was driving. He told you he was with me.”

  “Yes. Absolutely. I remember.”

  “Really?” Detective Poehlman asked.

  “Yeah, why?”

  “I’m just . . . Well . . .” The detective’s phone rang and he checked the screen. “If you’ll excuse me for a second.”

  He stepped away to take the call, but Daniel heard him say, “He’s awake? Okay, I’ll be right there.”

  He hung up and finally stopped trying to convince Daniel that Mr. Zacharias hadn’t been there to help him. “Thank you for your time,” he told them. “I do want to follow up on a few things, though, Daniel. There’s still the matter of the car that we need to clear up.”

  After he’d left, Mia asked, “Who was that guy?”

  “A detective,” Nicole said.

  “From where?”

  “You know,” Daniel replied thoughtfully, “I didn’t ask.”

  “So, what was that all about?”

  “He has footage from the hospital in Duluth. It shows that it was just me leaving—Malcolm Zacharias doesn’t appear on it at all. But I know he was real.” He faced Kyle. “I let him speak to you on the phone, anyway. That proves it.”

  Kyle was quiet.

  “What?”

  “Well, I mean I spoke with someone. It could’ve been the guy from the snowbank. I’m not really sure.”

  “Who else could it have been?”

  “I don’t know.” He shrugged. “It might’ve been you.”

  “Me?”

  “I can’t really say. You might have altered your voice, but what does it matter? You’re here, you’re safe. Your dad’s okay. Things are . . .” He seemed to backpedal. “Well . . . except for the car.”

  “What car?”

  “Yeah, I was gonna tell you, they found a sedan down the street from my house. Someone left it there. I mean, I’m sure it’s nothing, but my mom did say she heard it was reported stolen from Duluth.”

  But Mr. Zacharias didn’t abandon the car there. He drove away.

  Unless he didn’t.

  Unless you imagined it all and you left the car there.

  “Wait,” Kyle said to Daniel. “You spoke with Mr. Zacharias on Larry’s phone when we were driving back to Beldon.”

  “There you go.” Mia was busy shaking a few persistently clingy globs of snow off her boot. “There’ll be a record of it.”

  “Dr. Fromke destroyed that phone at the cabin,” Daniel noted.

  “But the phone company would have archives of the call, right?”

  “Not if Mr. Zacharias erased them. If he’s good enough to hack in and change security camera footage, I’m guessing he could alter or delete a few phone records, no big deal.”

  If he was real at all.

  Rather than taking things any further in that direction, Kyle chose to change the subject and asked Daniel how his dad was doing.

  “Better. Right now he’s talking with my mom. It seems like things might be heading in the right direction. I’m giving them some time to sort things through.”

  “You think she’ll come back?”

  “Yeah. I think she might.”

  “Huh—Oh.” Kyle held up his car keys. “The things you asked me to bring over are in the trunk. You want me to grab ’em?”

  “I’ll get them. Do you mind?”

  “No.” Kyle handed over his keys. “We’ll just chillify here, wait for you.”

  “Did you just say ‘chillify’?” Nicole asked.

  “It’s his new thingazoid,” Daniel explained.

  “Oh. Gotcha.”

  Since Daniel’s phone had been found covered in blood at the scene of his dad’s disappearance, it was still in the police evidence room, but he’d been using Nicole’s for the day to talk with his mom, and now a text came through.

  He showed her the screen. “No big deal,” she said. “It’s just Gina. I’ll text her back later.”

  He pocketed her phone again.

  Kyle told him where he’d parked, although with the size of the parking lot that probably wasn’t necessary.

  Daniel told Nicole he’d see her in a bit, and then headed out the door.

  The afternoon was fading away, the sun barely visible on the horizon.

  As he walked toward Kyle’s Mustang, he thought about all that had happened this week, how things were connected there, just beneath the surface, how all the puzzle pieces locked together in a way that he never would have guessed, but that made sense now when he looked back on them.

  He thought of Malcolm Zacharias, of Detective Poehlman, and—

  Nicole’s phone vibrated. He checked.

  A text: Answer this call, Daniel.

  While he was trying to figure out what that was about, the phone rang from an unknown number.

  Daniel tapped the screen. “Hello?”

  “Hello, Daniel.”

  It’s him.

&nbs
p; “Mr. Zacharias. What did you do? They have video footage that shows it was just me leaving the hospital in Duluth.”

  “How hard do you really think it is to change some footage at a state mental hospital?”

  “You’re saying you hacked in and altered it? That’s impossible.”

  “Not with the technology I have access to.”

  He knows you have her phone. How does he know that? Is he close by?

  Daniel scanned the parking lot, but didn’t see Mr. Zacharias anywhere. “But the video shows me going to the driver’s side of the car.”

  “The wonders of CGI.”

  “And the security guard—what’d you do? Pay him off?”

  “His daughter’s very sick. The money is going to a good cause.”

  “And I’m guessing the phone records are—”

  “Expunged. Yes.”

  Daniel didn’t know whether to feel angry or relieved talking with Mr. Zacharias right now.

  He glanced at the phone’s screen and saw that there really was a call coming through.

  Okay, at least this is happening right now.

  At least this is real.

  Daniel asked, “How did Hollister get away from you, anyway? I mean, he was a killer. You wouldn’t have just set him free from the institute and then let him go, right?”

  “He was more clever than I thought.” Mr. Zacharias left it at that.

  “And you didn’t know he would go to Dr. Fromke?”

  “I had no idea. I wasn’t aware of their connection to each other.”

  “But why did Dr. Fromke help him?”

  “That, I don’t know. And, unfortunately, from what I understand, he’s not being very forthcoming.”

  As they spoke, Daniel was turning in a slow circle, looking in every direction, but he didn’t see Mr. Zacharias anywhere. “But it looks like you got what you wanted. The institute was destroyed.”

  “Yes, it was.”

  “Did you do that? Did you blow it up?”

  “I wish I could take credit for it, but it wasn’t me.”

  Still no sign of anyone.

  “I need to ask you something, Mr. Zacharias.”

  “Yes?”

  “Which wolf are you?”

  “Which wolf?”

  “There’s this story my dad told me once—that there are two wolves battling it out inside everyone’s heart: one good, one bad. And the one who wins is the one—”