by Callie Hart
We didn’t count on the floodwaters loosening the soil, though. There was no way to know the storms that hit Seattle recently would unearth her, disrupting her final resting place.
Sloane and Michael exchange a wary look. They both know what this means, too. They found my sister. They found Lacey.
******
SLOANE
I’ve seen Zeth angry before, too many times to recall, but this time it’s different. This time his anger is tinged with a pain he usually tries to tamp down and forget about, but now he’s being forced to face it head on, and it’s more than he can bear. My beautiful, wild Zeth. Still so torn apart inside by grief that he can’t even say his sister’s name. I’m still mad at him, yes, but I’m also hurting so bad for him right now.
“No doubt they found more than a partial print on her,” Michael’s saying somewhere in the distance. “We all touched her. Every last one of us helped lower her into the ground.”
“I’m the only one with a criminal record. My fingerprints are the only ones in their database.” He sounds stunned. None of us ever thought we’d be faced with this problem. We’ve tiptoed around the subject of Lacey because no one really wants to deal with the fresh, brightly burning pain of her loss yet. Not even me, who knew her so briefly. I loved her, though. It was impossible not to. The indignity of her body being dug up by a Labrador is significant; it feels as though we’ve disrespected her in the worst way, allowing her remains to be now poked and prodded at by a forensic team as well.
“And so Lowell just somehow managed to find out about this and came back here?” I say. “It makes no sense. This isn’t her jurisdiction. A murder has nothing to do with drugs. Not necessarily, anyway.”
Mason says, “She said she has homicides in this area flagged. She thinks they’re all linked to some motorcycle gang over in New Mexico who deal weed.”
Zeth laughs bitterly. “The Widow Makers don’t deal weed. Maybe they used to run it from state to state every once in a while, but not in a long ass time.”
For a moment, we all sit in silence, mulling on the information we’ve just received. Lowell’s trying to pin Lacey’s murder on Zeth. Ironic that he’s killed a fair few people in his time and yet Lacey, the one person he didn’t kill, is potentially going to mean trouble for him. Perhaps Lowell knows Zeth isn’t responsible for Lacey’s death, and perhaps she doesn’t. Either way, she’ll bend every rule and limbo under red tape until she finds a way to make the charge stick.
“What have you told her?” Zeth demands, crossing the room toward Mason. The kid leans back into his chair, eyes full of steel, jaw set. He’s determined not to show fear.
“I told her about Michael,” he says. “I said I thought he was probably doing a lot of your dirty work for you.”
Michael laughs. “Charming.”
“I don’t know, man. I had to tell her something. She’s convinced something illegal’s going on at the gym, like you might be dealing drugs or guns there or something. She told me to stick around after hours as often as I could and eavesdrop on any meetings you might have.”
“And how did that work out for you?” Zeth’s lips are pressed together, turned white from the pressure he’s applying to them. This version of him is an echo, a ghost of the man he was when we first met. He’s still so shut off sometimes, so stern and stoic when interacting with the outside world, but he’s a million times better than he used to be. The wall that stood between him and the rest of society has been deconstructed for a while now; it’s strange and unpleasant to see it go back up again so easily now.
“I told her the truth—that you don’t have meetings there. She didn’t believe me, though. She wanted me to stay later. Go over there every day. She’d know if I didn’t show up. That’s why she called today. She knew I was at the hospital instead of at the gym.”
“And where does she think you are now?” Zeth asks.
Mason rubs his chin with his fingertips. “Who the fuck knows. She’ll know I’m not at the gym, and I’m sure she’ll know I’m not with Millie. She’ll probably think you’ve figured me out and you’re about to murder my ass,” he says, glaring accusingly at up Zeth.
God, if he’s trying to ingratiate himself with the man, he’s really not doing a great job. He has a point, though. “Why don’t you just take Mason back to the hospital?” I have no reason to think Zeth will listen to me, he rarely does, but it would be better for everyone involved if he does just this once. “Lowell wouldn’t expect you to let Mason go if you were to find out that he’s been watching you for her. She’ll expect you to hurt him and make him disappear. Take him back to the hospital and she’ll be none the wiser.”
“Sloane’s right,” Michael adds. “That way we could use him to feed her the information we want her to know and nothing else.”
“And have him coming into the gym every day? Around you and now my fucking girlfriend? I don’t think so.”
“So what? You’re going to kill him? Right in front of me? You’re not even going to consider sparing a stupid kid’s life? He was only acting to protect his sister, Zeth.”
Mason’s eyes flash with anger—he clearly doesn’t like being called a stupid kid—but he refrains from saying anything. Probably the smartest thing he’s done since he walked into the room. Zeth turns his full attention on me for the first time since he walked in with Mason.
“You’re the one who told me what he’d done, Sloane. You’re the one who called me the moment you heard him on the phone with Lowell.”
“I know. I was worried about the DEA, though. I was worried about your safety. Turns out this wasn’t a fresh, pressing issue. You’ve known about it for a while. And I never wanted you to hurt him, Zeth.” I take a deep breath, knowing my next argument is going to either fall flat or make him flip out. I have to say it, though. I don’t want Mason dead and in pieces, floating in the Sound just because he had the misfortune to be caught up in our nightmare through no choice of his own. “Think about it,” I say. “Really think hard about what you would have done for Lacey, Zeth. Wouldn’t you have made a deal with the devil in order to keep her safe? What would you do now to bring her back? You’d bargain with Lowell. You’d bargain with anyone and everyone, and you know it. So let Mason go. Let him take care of his sister, and we’ll work out this Lowell thing on our own. It’s the best way. It’s the best way for all of us.”
Zeth stares at the wall. Specifically, he stares at a small, framed picture of a seaside boardwalk that seemingly has no bearing or relationship to Seattle whatsoever. I’ve thought about that picture a lot; there are other pictures on the walls in the warehouse, but they all seem to be contemporary art pieces. Swooshes and slashes of color, running into each other, overlapping and contradicting. This photograph, complete with its masses of people crowding the boardwalk, vendors selling hotdogs, arcade in the background, sign lit up despite the stark, pale wash of the blue sky overhead, is the only sentimental object of its kind. Zeth looks away.
“Lowell won’t just stop calling him,” he says. “She won’t just forget that he’s her inside source. It’s not as easy as letting him go so he can take care of his sister, Sloane.”
“Then, shit, I don’t know. Why don’t you tell him what you want him to say to her? That way she thinks she’s getting what she needs, and Mason’s in the clear. There’s a way to manage the situation without anyone dying.”
“I, for one, like the sound of that plan,” Mason adds.
On the sidelines, literally at the very edge of the room, Michael keeps his own council. I have no idea which plan he thinks is more beneficial over the other, but he watches the scene unfolding before him with sharp, intelligent eyes, the slightest glimmer of curiosity flickering over his features. Mason doesn’t even spare the man a sideways glance; he must know his fate rests solely in Zeth’s hands. He’s the one who decides whether Mason lives or dies. In the past, I know how Zeth would have handled this. He would never have listened to the woman he was sleeping w
ith. He would have shut down the threat without a second thought and moved on to deal with Lowell herself, and there would have been no debate. Things are different now, though. After everything we’ve been through, Zeth knows I’m not just some naïve, uninformed girl that makes decisions on a whim, without any real thought.
He cracks his index finger knuckle, followed by his middle finger and then he stops. “Fine.”
That’s all he says. I’m waiting for him to follow up his one word response with a list of caveats, as well as a series of threats that would make even the most hardened criminal’s hair stand on end. He leaves it at that, though. He wants to go; I can see how badly he wants to smash his fist into something right now, and he’s undoubtedly feeling robbed of the opportunity. Mason slowly, cautiously gets to his feet. “So I’m good to go?”
Zeth grunts. He jerks his head toward the door, his face stony and unimpressed. “You’d better, before I change my fucking mind.”
Animals, unsure whether it’s safer to run or safer to flee, will often freeze in place, not breathing, unbelieving, while they try to decide what their best course of action is. Mason is just like one of those animals, a rabbit in the headlights, as he no doubt tries to figure out if Zeth means what he’s saying or not. The stupid kid should be dashing for the door, and instead he’s standing in the middle of the room with his shoulders hunched, glancing from one person to the next.
“Are you waiting for an Uber?” Michael asks. “If you are, might I suggest you wait outside on the street? Maybe a few blocks from here? We have a slight health and safety issue here right now. And by that, I mean lingering here any longer than you need to is very bad for your health and your safety.”
“Understood.” Mason ducks out of the room and heads to the exit of the warehouse, not wasting another second. Zeth stares at the wall again. He flinches when the sound of the sliding metal door slams home, sending clanging echoes through the warehouse.
“I swear I’ll never understand why we just let that happen,” he comments. “At some point that kid is ending up in a shallow grave at the side of the road. It’s inevitable. He has no idea how this world works. Why it works the way it does.”
“He shouldn’t have to. He should just be able to take care of his family, and go to work. Instead, he has to deal with Denise Lowell, and all because he’s an easy target. She knows he has access to you, and she knows she can manipulate him. Do you think that’s fair?”
Zeth moves subtly, angling his body so that his torso and his hips are facing me. He won’t look me in the eye, though. At least he doesn’t, until he’s just about to vanish through the doorway, into the bowels of the house. “Nothing about life is fair, Sloane. If it were, serial killers and rapists would be riddled with ball cancer and charity workers would be winning the fucking lottery every week. Mason’s lucky. If I was Charlie Holsan, there’s no way he’d have just walked out of here in tact. He’d have had his throat slit and two guys would be in the process of burning off his fingerprints and pulling his fucking molars out of his head.” He doesn’t hang back to see what I might have to say to this. He storms off, out of sight, growling darkly under his breath.
“Isn’t that the whole point, though?” I yell after him. “Isn’t the whole point that you’re not Charlie Holsan?”
Chapter Nine
SLOANE
Morning light pours through the vast expanse of glass that forms the right hand wall of my bedroom. Miles away, Seattle is a faint blue smudge on the horizon, banded by the gunmetal grey of water in the far distance. The hour is early, must only be five-thirty, six, perhaps, and I’m gripped by the desperate need to pee.
I get up, flinging back the covers, unsurprised by the fact that the other side of my bed is still empty. Zeth slept at the warehouse last night. I gave him the space he needed, though what I needed was something else entirely. I needed reassurance and a strong pair of arms around me, holding me tight. I needed to be told I hadn’t just made the gravest of errors when I talked him out of killing Mason. Zeth didn’t agree with what I had asked of him, though; he was hardly going to be the one to comfort me and tell me everything is going to be okay, when he clearly believes otherwise.
I reach the bathroom just in time. It feels like my bladder’s about to explode, and my head right along with it. Man, I feel shitty. I feel worse than when I was gripped in the same flu bug half of St. Peter’s is now suffering through. Sure enough, when I try to stand up, the room spins like crazy, pitching and see-sawing, and without warning my stomach rolls. “Shit.” I drop down, managing to gather my hair off to one side just in the nick of time before I throw up, last night’s paltry dinner of cream cheese on toast making an unpleasant come back, spattering into the toilet bowl.
God, please, no. Please don’t say I’ve managed to catch a different strain of this thing. I wait there, hunched over the porcelain, waiting, biding my time, just in case I’m not done and I’m going to vomit for a second time. I don’t, though. My stomach muscles spasm, complaining bitterly as I get to my feet, but I seem to feel a little better. Could have been a one off, after all. It might not be the flu bug, returned with a vengeance to kick my ass. The antibiotics I took for my chest infection seemed to clear everything right up. More likely the cream cheese that’s been sitting in my refrigerator for weeks has finally upped and turned bad. I make a mental note to clear out the whole icebox in the next few days as I head back to the bedroom and swing myself back into bed. It’s a work day, but I’m not on shift until this afternoon. Better to rest and get as much sleep as I can before the madness of St. Peter’s later on. It’s a Friday—the emergency room is going to be packed full of drunks and reprobates, and I’m going to need every lick of strength I can muster to get myself through the night.
I fall asleep immediately, my dreams heavy and intense, pressing in on me. I’m aware of the fact that I’m dreaming as I shift through the bizarre landscape of my unconsciousness, the way you might slip from room to room in a familiar yet almost forgotten house, turning all the door handles, trying to find the way out. It feels like many hours have passed when I wake later, covered in sweat, wrapped tight in the bed sheets, but the clock on the bedside table only reads eight fifteen. Downstairs, the sound of the kettle boiling lets me know Zeth is home. Zeth Mayfair, making himself a pot of coffee. How very domesticated of him. I still have to pinch myself sometimes; it’s strange imagining him here with me, living in this house, amongst my things, sleeping in my bed, cooking in my kitchen. Just existing here alongside me. It seems as though it shouldn’t be possible, in truth. Men like Zeth don’t settle. They don’t live out the white picket fence fantasy, reading the paper on a Sunday morning and walking the dog. They’re more likely to spear you straight through the heart with your white picket fence post and kidnap Fido.
Speaking of which…
Ernie, professional chaser of dust motes, purveyor of half-chewed socks, skids down the hallway, claws clacking on the polished floorboards as he slides past the open bedroom door, and barrels down the stairs onto the first floor, obviously having heard his master’s arrival as well. He yips and pants loudly down there, his claws still clacking as he assaults the man in the kitchen with kisses.
“All right, all right. Damn it, dog. Give me a minute.” Zeth sounds grumpy, but I know him all too well. He’ll be bending down to the tufty haired schnauzer, ruffling his fur and scrubbing him all over his body, letting him jump up to lick at his jaw and his neck. “You’re crazy, you know that?” I hear him say.
I’m about to get up and go down there myself when the stairs begin to creak, accompanied by the sound of heavy boots on antique Maplewood. I don’t know why, but I immediately pretend I’m still asleep. Pathetic.
Zeth enters the bedroom. I hear him put something down on his side of the bed, and then something on my side, too. The rich smell of coffee fills my senses. “Hey.” He touches me, placing his hand lightly on my bare shoulder. “You’re so bad at that, you know.” I crack
one eye open at him. There’s a tiny smile on his face. “You screw your eyelids shut really tight. I can tell you’re awake the moment I look at you.”
“Is that so? Well, maybe I’ve just been rudely awakened by a really loud intruder, and I’m trying to go back to sleep.”
“Are you?” He cocks his head to one side.
“No.”
“Then drink your coffee.” He’s definitely in a better mood than he was last night. Strangely, he appears to be in a good mood, which doesn’t make all that much sense. Still. I’m not one to argue. I pull myself up so I’m sitting, collecting the mug of tar-black coffee he’s brought upstairs for me, and I can smell how sweet it is as I lift it to my lips. Perfection. It’s amazing how quickly caffeine can kick start your brain. Zeth watches me drink, his eyes fixed solely on the point where my lips meet the ‘Baddest Motherfucker Alive’ mug—the one I know he finds hilarious, even though he’s never said anything about it.
He doesn’t mention last night, or the fact that Mason’s now loose, perfectly capable of telling Lowell that we know she’s using him as an informant, and there’s little we can do about it. Or that it’s my fault. He sits on the edge of the bed, looking at me as I drink my coffee, like an artist studies the object of his painting, not expecting me to say anything or comment on the fact that he’s observing me. He wants to be an outsider in this moment. He wants to pretend like he’s not here, that he’s somehow managing to oversee this quiet, simple moment where I relax in bed, taking my time to wake up fully, hair everywhere, weird lines from the pillows marking my neck and my shoulder.
