“Not enough yet? How ’bout this? Before I left to go out west that summer, you gave me money from your secret savings stash so I could buy something from an old Indian man who had stuff to sell.”
“Where was it? My secret stash.” Her voice had grown raspy.
“Under the floorboards in your closet,” he said without hesitation.
She sat down across from him at the table, the box of pancake mix still in her hands. He’d thrown so much at her, verbally, that she was having difficulty processing it all. Everything he’d said had been right on the money, hadn’t it? Still something nagged at her, begging her recall.
Kendra again studied his face, again tried to remember her brother’s features in detail. What might Ian look like today? The shape of the eyes, yes, the eyes were round, they could be right. The nose, tilted at the end, but as she’d once told Adam, a common enough trait.
If indeed Ian was alive, how might his features have matured?
Time and again, Kendra had aged photographs on paper to determine what someone gone missing for years might look like now, as an adult. But could she mentally age the face of a child whose features she could see only in her memory?
Kendra knew faces. Did she know this one?
“Are you going to make those pancakes for me?”
She rose without answering and continued on with the task he’d given her, all the while concentrating on his features, trying to sketch the child’s face within her mind.
“By the way, whatever happened to the Flahertys?” He leaned back with the air of one who was right at home.
“They got divorced.”
“I can’t say I’m surprised,” he nodded, “since she was screwing some other guy every time old Mr. Flaherty was out of town on business.”
She turned to look over her shoulder at him.
“I used to watch that, too.” His tongue licked at the side of his mouth. “She could sure put on a show, that Mrs. Flaherty. Who’d have thought that Melinda and Mike’s mom was such a hot ticket?”
Kendra turned back to the stove.
“And the Cronins, across the street?”
“They’re still there.”
“Really? Well, that was a pretty desirable neighborhood, from what I recall.”
“If you’re really Ian, you’d know what happened to Zach.” She turned to face him. Would he know about the body Adam said had been found in the cave? And if so, would he know how it came to be there?
“Now, there’s a name I haven’t heard in years.” His eyebrows raised, as if genuinely surprised that she’d asked.
“What happened to him?” Kendra repeated.
“Like anyone cares what happened to Zach.”
“I care.”
“Do you?” he scoffed. “Why?”
“He’s family.”
“As if,” he snorted. “Zach was a dumb shit who knew nothing about anything and was never going to be anything other than what he was. A colossally dumb shit.”
“How can you say that? I thought you were friends.”
“Friends? Me and Zach? I couldn’t stand him.”
“Then why was it so important to you to spend a month with him every year? Two weeks out here, two weeks out there. You always looked forward to his visits.”
“Well, if anything ever made me feel like a genius, it was having stupid Zach around,” he sneered. “He knew nothing. I mean, nothing. Didn’t you ever notice how he watched everything we did, before he did it? Or how carefully he listened, to see how things should be said?”
“No, frankly, I did not.”
“Yeah, dumb question on my part. You never noticed him at all.”
“Why would I? He was years younger than me and was always pretty quiet, as I remember. Frankly, I never gave much notice to any of your friends. You were all so much younger. I was in college that last summer.”
He smiled with satisfaction at her use of the word you, but did not comment on it.
“That wasn’t the reason. It wasn’t the age difference. Admit it. He just wasn’t . . .” he sighed, “well, let’s call a spade a spade. He just wasn’t a Smith.”
“What are you talking about, he wasn’t a Smith? His mother was as much a Smith as my father was.”
My instead of our rankled, and he frowned, but chose to ignore it.
“His mother was a junkie, Kendra. A junkie whore who didn’t give a shit about him. She never did.”
“What?” Kendra’s jaw dropped.
“Never. Our dear Aunt Sierra shoved a great deal of her share of Grampa’s estate up her nose. I can count on the fingers of one hand the number of times I spoke with her when she wasn’t stoned.”
Kendra sank into the nearest chair.
“When my mother agreed to send Ian out to Arizona, Sierra told us all that was behind her. That she’d been off drugs for a long time. Why didn’t we know this? Why didn’t you tell us? And if she wasn’t treating Zach well, why didn’t he say so? Why didn’t we see it?”
“Are you crazy? You think Mom would have let me get within a hundred miles of the ranch if she’d had a clue of what was going on?” He laughed. “I liked it, Kenny. It was like nothing I’d ever experienced before. I could smoke more weed in the two weeks I was out there than I could get my hands on the other fifty weeks out of the year.”
“You were just a child. . . .”
“Right, and kids don’t do drugs?” He chuckled. “Please. Why do you think I went there, Kenny? To share quality family time with my beloved aunt and cousin? To keep the Smith family ties strong?”
Kendra stared at the stranger who sat across from her. She’d never suspected that her little brother had been involved with drugs. Had her mother known? Had that been one of the reasons Elisa had sent Ian for counseling that year?
“Sierra’s ranch was one happening place, let me tell you. No restriction, no rules. No one to answer to. We just did what we pleased, went where we pleased.”
“If that’s all true, I can’t believe that no one knew . . . that Zach’s father . . .” Kendra tried to comprehend how a child like Zach could have been left in such a situation.
He laughed out loud.
“Zach’s father? He could have been any one of a dozen men who stayed on the ranch from time to time.”
“But surely someone . . .”
“Someone like who? Zach never went to school, Kenny. Sierra didn’t even care enough about him to make the effort to make sure he got to school. She told Mom that he was being home-schooled. What a laugh.” He leaned across the table and said, very deliberately, “No one even knew he was alive.”
“How can that be?” Kendra held her head in her hands. “Surely, he had medical treatment at some time.”
“Holistic,” he told her. “There was a woman on the ranch who was part Native American. She grew herbs and treated everyone with some concoctions she mixed up.”
“But there were other children there, on the ranch.”
“From time to time, yes. No one ever stayed all that long. Except for Zach.”
“He was twelve years old that last summer,” she recalled. “How could he have lived for twelve years without someone knowing he was there?”
“There was no reason why anyone should,” he shrugged. “He was born on the ranch. He told me one time that he didn’t even have a birth certificate.”
“Poor Zach . . .” Kendra’s eyes filled with tears. “Why didn’t he tell us? Why didn’t you tell us?”
“Maybe he didn’t say anything because he was too embarrassed. And frankly, I think he might have been afraid of the consequences. His mother was, well, what she was, but she was still his mother, I guess.” He shrugged. “And I didn’t say anything ’cause, well, hell, Kenny, what do you think she would have done? Gone to court, gotten custody, probably send Sierra to jail.”
“If by she, you mean Mom, you’re damned right she would have.” Kendra’s voice shook with indignation. “She would have done all those thing
s. She would have fought to bring Zach out here.”
“Oh, and wouldn’t that have just been swell news for me,” he hissed. “No thank you. One Smith son under this roof was just plenty.”
“You would permit your own cousin to live like that because you didn’t want to share your home with him?” Her eyes widened with incredulity. “You were that selfish?”
“Yes,” he said without apology.
“Why did Sierra let him come here, then? Why did she let you go there? And why didn’t Mom ever know?”
“I don’t think Mom gave her much choice. And Sierra, she always cleaned up before she talked to Mom on the phone. I think the first time I went out, she was nervous. But she figured out real fast that I wouldn’t tell. She knew I liked it there.”
“I want to know what happened to Zach.” She repeated the question that had started the conversation.
“Let’s just say that Zach,” he appeared to choose his words carefully, “won’t be heard from again.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means, dear sister,” he grinned, “that our dear cousin Zachary has gone to that big Smith reunion in the sky.”
“How . . . did it happen?”
“You really want to know?”
She nodded.
“We went out camping. He was going to take me to see this old Indian guy so I could buy some things. The third or fourth night out it got cold, so we started looking for some shelter. He went into a cave in the side of the hill.” He paused and looked up at her. “You’ll never guess what was in that cave.”
“Bees,” she whispered. “There were bees in the cave.”
“Bingo.” His brows raised in surprise. “Well, we always knew how smart you were, but I’d have to say, that was one damned smart guess. How’d you come up with that answer, just like that?” He snapped his fingers for emphasis.
“They found . . . remains. In a cave.” Her throat tightened.
“What?”
“They found remains that might be Zach’s.”
“When?”
“This afternoon.”
“This afternoon, eh?” He appeared thoughtful. “Well, how’s that for timing?”
“What do you mean?”
“Just that it appears the both of us have chosen the same moment to, well, to resurface.” He smiled charmingly. “Isn’t that something? Ian and Zach, together again. Who’d have thunk it?”
Chapter
Twenty-one
“Where have you been all these years?” she asked suddenly, her mind processing everything he’d said since he’d started talking.
“Here and there.”
“Why?” She searched for words. “Why did you—”
“Pretend to be dead?” He smiled, an “I’ve got a secret” smile, but still, offered no answer.
“Why didn’t you contact me before this? Why now?”
“Well, it isn’t as if I haven’t been doing my damnedest to get your attention.”
Kendra froze.
“What did you say?”
“I said, I have been trying to get your attention for, oh, it’s been almost two years, now.”
The hairs on the back of Kendra’s neck bristled. What was it that someone—Miranda, or had it been Anne Marie McCall?—had said?
I think this guy’s been trying to get your attention for a long time.
No, she shook her head slightly, still trying to deny the truth she’d been avoiding since she’d turned and seen him standing in the doorway. It was too terrible, too monstrous.
A wave of nausea washed over her, and her knees buckled. She turned back to the sink and gripped the edge of the counter so tightly her knuckles went white. The hum inside her head became a roar.
No.
“Do they still harvest the cranberries from the bogs down on the other side of the lake?” he asked, as if this were just another day.
“Yes.”
“We’ll take the canoe down later, after we have pancakes. Though I guess it’s way early for cranberries.”
“How did you know that Selena was out of town?” She turned to him suddenly.
“Oh, I broke into her house. I was disappointed that she wasn’t there—now there’s a woman I’d like to get to know better.” He smiled as if he were any normal man, expressing a normal interest in any woman, and terror reached toward Kendra’s soul. “Anyway, I listened to the messages on her answering machine, and I heard yours.”
“What is it you want?” Kendra’s heart was pounding, the buzz in her veins louder now, as disbelief and fear continued to swell within her.
“Right now, I just want a friendly reunion with my big sister.”
“Beyond that. There must be something more.”
“Ahhh, patience, Kendra. That can wait.”
“Where’s the real Joe Clark?”
“I don’t think you really want to know.”
She turned back to mixing the batter so that she did not have to look at him.
Whoever this man is, he’s severely unbalanced. But is he my brother?
How to gain the upper hand?
“Did you poison Selena’s dog?” The thought had not been considered until the words fell from her mouth.
“Well, I tried to.” He grinned sheepishly.
“Why?” Kendra’s fists clenched. “Why would you do such a thing to such a sweet animal?”
“That dog was a pain in my ass,” he stated coolly. “Every time I came around, that damn dog was here. Barking and running along the back of the stream, sometimes I couldn’t even get out of the canoe.”
“Where did you get the canoe?”
“From Father Tim’s.” He grinned again. “You know that he highly recommends communing with nature. He thinks it soothes and relaxes. Not that I doubt anything he says, mind you. I’d have been nowhere without Father Tim. Everything I’ve been able to accomplish, I owe to him.”
“And what, exactly, have you accomplished?”
He smiled serenely. “The stuff dreams are made of, Kenny.”
“Dreams, or nightmares?”
He shrugged. “One man’s dream is another man’s nightmare.”
“You raped and killed all those women.” The words slipped out past her lips.
“Yes.” His blithe admission shocked her.
“Why?”
“I had to get your attention in a meaningful way.”
“You murdered seven women to just get my attention?” she whispered in horror. Her stomach lurched and she fought back another wave of nausea, bit back the urge to scream.
“Eleven.” He corrected her pointedly. “I killed eleven women to get your attention. There were four on the West Coast, would have been more, but you moved, and then I had to go to the trouble of finding you all over again.”
Knees knocking together, legs weakened beyond their ability to support her, Kendra slumped over the side of the counter, leaned over the sink, and lost her lunch.
He sat, watching calmly, until she had finished gagging. Choking and coughing, she ran the water in the sink until the mess went down, then soaked paper towels to wipe the sweat from her face.
“Are you finished?” he asked without emotion.
When she didn’t respond, he shifted in his seat and said, “I asked you a question. Are you finished?”
Still leaning against the sink, she nodded.
“Did you clean up your mess like a good girl?”
She nodded again.
“Sit down, Kendra.”
She slumped into the nearest chair, speechless.
“Well, I guess we’re going to have to talk about this after all, aren’t we? You know, I really hadn’t planned on it, at least not yet. Not today. I’d really just hoped for a pleasant reunion in my ancestral home.” He stretched his legs out to one side and rested his shoulders against the back of the chair.
“You just remember, this was your idea, okay? So if any of it bothers you, you have no one to blame but yours
elf. Then again,” he smirked, “all those cases you worked on with the FBI, I guess you’re not very squeamish, are you?”
He was mocking her and she knew it. He’d just watched her throw up in the sink.
“I mean, I’ll bet it takes a lot to gross you out, doesn’t it?”
“No,” she told him, shaking her head. “Anyone with a conscience—”
“Now, see, I just don’t think I have one. I guess that’s something you need to understand right up front.”
She looked confused, and he laughed.
“Hey, I don’t know why.” He shrugged. “Must have been something that happened to me when I was a kid. Maybe it was genetic, who knows? Maybe that was something that me and Sierra had in common. Nothing she did ever seemed to affect her either.”
His face hardened for a moment.
“But I can tell you,” he went on, “that I’ve never felt the least bit sorry for anything I’ve done. I can’t help it, Kenny. And it isn’t as if I haven’t tried. I mean, every time, I tried to feel something. Anything. But I don’t.”
“Nothing at all?” She barely recognized her own voice.
He shook his head. “Nope. Not sorry. Not upset. It didn’t even make me particularly happy.”
Looking up at her with blank eyes, he said, “I had a friend in ’Frisco. He’s the one who taught me how to do it right, where to apply the pressure.” He held up his hands, wiggled his fingers. “He liked to watch the light go out . . . you know what I mean?”
He didn’t wait for an answer, just kept talking slowly, his voice a monotone, his expression somewhat puzzled, as if for a moment he, too, sought understanding.
“He said that when he put his hands around a woman’s throat and squeezed, their eyes stayed open and he could watch the light go out inside them, and when it was happening, he was filled with peace. It made him happy,” he said softly. “I thought maybe if I,” he sighed, then shrugged, his moment of introspection gone. “Well, it really didn’t do much for me, you know what I mean?”
“Then why did you keep doing it?” Her voice was shaky, her eyes burning with tears.
“I wanted you to notice me.” He lit another cigarette, intently watched the match burn down before continuing. “I thought it would be fun, you know? You being the big compositor for the FBI,” his voice boomed importantly. “The press out there in California made such a big deal out of you, I saw your picture in the paper, and I saw you on TV and I said, Wow! That’s Kenny! Well, I have to admit, I was proud to be related to you. I told everyone that you were my sister, not that anyone out there believed me. But then I thought, well, let’s see just how good she really is. Let’s see if she can sketch me. Let’s see if she knows me.”
Until Dark Page 26
