“We got to go,” he said after Martin opened his eyes.
“What? Where?”
“It’s a surprise.”
And now they were here, sitting in the car outside somebody’s house in North Carolina. Martin checked the clock.
Six a.m.
He’d slept for more than half of the ride. Ethan had insisted on driving because, “I know where I’m going.”
“Where the hell are we going?” Martin asked when he awoke.
“You’ll see when we get there.”
“But we’ve been driving for almost three hours. We’ve both got to go to work tomorrow.”
“Call in sick. It’ll be worth it, trust me.”
NOW
“YOU KNOW WHAT this means?” Cynthia said. She stared excitedly at the candy wrapper.
“Yeah. It means there was a litterbug down here before us.”
“No. Think about how deep we are. Do you think anybody else has been down this deep? Besides, there hasn’t been any other garbage down here. If it was a litterbug, we would have seen a napkin or water bottle or something else before now.”
“How do you think it got here, then?”
“I think it floated in. Martin, I think we’ve found our way out.”
THEN
THE HOUSE WAS dark. Either the owner wasn’t in or was asleep.
“What are we doing here?”
Ethan got out of the car without answering. “Come on.” He buttoned his jacket to his neck to stave off the cold.
Martin reluctantly followed Ethan’s lead, past the squeaky fence, through the overgrown front yard.
“Do you know somebody here?”
Ethan knocked hard on the door. A light came on.
“No, but you do.”
Martin’s heart started to pound. “My father? But how did you—”
“It doesn’t matter.”
Ethan didn’t have time to explain that he had stolen the photograph from Martin’s bedroom (which Martin apparently never missed, or never mentioned, anyway). He didn’t have time to tell Martin that while he was fucking Poppy’s friend, Dallas was giving him Frank Campbell’s address.
That would lead to questions about how he knew Dallas, and maybe to more about his fake ID. Martin still didn’t know Ethan’s real age, and Ethan preferred to keep it that way.
The lock on the front door clicked.
And even if Ethan answered Martin’s questions, he still didn’t know how Dallas had gotten the address. He didn’t know that Dallas had cracked into the records for the Department of Motor Vehicles, searched old files (that had been cataloged, stored, and probably forgotten) until he found a name and a face that matched Frank’s. Nor did he know that Dallas had then used his driver’s license number to get his social security number, and his social security number to get bank statements, tax returns, medical statements—anything that could verify the man’s current residency.
Dallas followed this up by matching a phone number to the address and placing a phone call under the guise of a telemarketer to confirm that he hadn’t moved. Ethan didn’t know this either.
And he didn’t care. All that mattered to him was that he had the address.
“What do you want?” Frank said, the door cracked only as far as the security chain would allow it to go. He had put on some weight since the photograph was taken, and he compensated for the hair he lost from his scalp by growing in a thicker mustache. His undershirt was stained with sweat, his sweatpants wrinkled but clean.
In one quick motion, Ethan kicked open the door. The chain snapped. Frank was knocked off his feet. Ethan stepped in, shouted for Martin to follow, to close the door. Then he kicked Frank in his stomach and, grabbing him by the shirt, dragged him back to his feet.
“Do you know who that is?” Ethan shouted at the old man.
Frank snarled and swung at Ethan’s head. But Ethan stepped out of the way and Frank stumbled into a swing that hit nothing. At the same time, Ethan opened his jacket and pulled out a gun that had been hidden underneath—tucked into his pants.
Martin watched the events unfold from several steps away. He was shocked by the sight of the weapon. He could hardly move. His head was pounding.
“That’s your son!” Ethan said once Frank had righted himself. “Martin. The one you abandoned. Remember him?”
“Uh, Ethan, where’d you get the gun?”
“Same place I got the BB gun. Now can we focus on what we’re here to do?”
“What are we here to do?”
“I don’t have a son,” Frank said, spittle flying from his lips as he hissed out the words.
Martin recognized Frank. He knew his father was lying, and that hurt. The anger he’d felt at Gunshot Pop’s boiled back up, became something deeper and darker and more powerful now that he was confronted with the man who had abandoned him.
“You fucking liar!” Ethan hit Frank’s jaw with the back of his fist, knocking the old man to his knees. “That’s for what you’ve done to him! Learn to take responsibility!” Then he hit him again. And, after one swift kick to the groin, Frank rolled into a ball and howled with pain.
Ethan turned the gun so that the barrel was facing toward him and offered it to Martin. “Here you go. The moment you’ve been waiting for.”
Martin looked from the gun to Ethan’s cold, calculating eyes. “You want me to shoot him?”
“This isn’t about what I want. It’s about what you want. It’s about revenge. Christ, Martin, it’s about everything we talked about.” Frank tried to stand while Ethan was speaking, and he kicked the old man again in the balls.
“I can’t do that.”
“Why not? It’s just like shooting the BB gun at strangers. Just aim and pull the trigger.”
“But –”
“But nothing! You have to do this. I didn’t put all this effort into you to watch you fail now.”
Martin looked at his father—sweating, moaning.
“He abandoned you!”
“I can’t.”
“He hurt you and your mom. He damaged your family in ways you’ll never know. And who knows how many people he’s hurt since then. Look at him! He hasn’t changed.” Not like Ma. Bitch. “You can’t let him get away with treating people like that.”
Trembling, Martin shook his head. But what was just as scary as the idea of killing this stranger was the anger deep inside, knotting his stomach, telling him to take the gun. “I don’t have it in me.”
“The hell you don’t.”
“I—”
“Take it!” Another kick to Frank’s balls.
Martin’s hand moved toward it, slowly, several inches, and then fell back to his side. He shook his head more fiercely. He was trying to convince himself he couldn’t as much as he was Ethan.
“If you don’t, things could get ugly.”
“What do you mean?”
Frank tried to move, and Ethan kicked him once more. “Stay down, you old fuck, or next time it ain’t gonna be my foot I use.” Then he redirected his attention to Martin. “Someone’s going to look for Diane eventually. When they get around to checking her apartment, they’re going to find that bitch’s cold, dead body on the living room floor.”
The murder had been easy to pull off, he explained. He’d visited Diane’s apartment several nights before and, much like he had done here, had forced his way in when she opened the door. She didn’t have a chance to scream before he sliced her throat, the blood spilling over his gloves as she fell to the floor.
“Nobody’s going to believe I killed her.”
“Why not? By now, everyone knows about how she betrayed your trust, about how you tried to strangle her. Listen, it was for your own good. In case you lost your nerve when we got here.” He took a step closer. “Take it. Do what we came here to do, and I’ll make sure nobody finds Diane’s body.”
Hesitation. Anger. Confusion. Fear. Then Martin’s fingers wrapped around the handle of the gun and the demons in Etha
n’s head howled, clamoring with excitement.
This was his moment of justice. For all of the abuse Norma had put him through, he could now purge himself of the pain by living vicariously through Martin, by enjoying the delicious—however removed—taste of revenge.
Ethan let go of the barrel. “Now finish it.”
Martin placed both hands around the handle, one finger on the trigger. It was heavier than the BB gun but otherwise didn’t feel that much different.
“Think about all the injustice,” Ethan whispered.
Martin aimed, the barrel trembling.
Before he could fire, Frank leaped onto Ethan, much faster than Ethan would have expected he could. They rolled on the floor until Frank got one solid shot in on his nose, then pounded his fist into Ethan’s balls.
Martin kept a bead on his father the whole time but couldn’t fire. Not until Frank stood, facing him, stepping closer like he was going to reach out and take the gun away. Then what? Kill both of them? Turn them in to the police?
His finger snapped down on the trigger, moving as if independent of his hands. Three shots went off before he knew what he had done.
The old man slumped down the side of a chair, blood soaking his undershirt, leaking out of a hole in his forehead.
Killing his father was easier than he could have imagined. As smoke trickled from the gun, it took with it the pain of being abandoned, of feeling unwanted by his own flesh and blood, and, surprisingly, the throb of the hangover. He felt better than he thought he would, and Martin could think of no other way to describe it than cathartic.
Perhaps it was also a sort of awakening because he was no longer mad at Ethan for killing Diane—he understood why he had to do it. (Besides, he had almost done it himself, not that long ago.) But, oddly, there was still something nagging at him, as if something had been left unfinished.
And Ethan could tell. He struggled back to his feet and wiped away the blood from his upper lip with the back of his right hand. “That felt good, didn’t it?”
“Yeah,” Martin said, breathing slowly, letting the smell of gunpowder linger pleasantly in his nose.
“Better than shooting the BB gun.”
“Yeah.”
“But there’s something else, isn’t there?”
Martin looked down at his father—the stranger—whose blood was now dripping down his oversized belly onto the hardwood floor. He could see bone and something fleshy that might have been brains through the hole in the forehead. But it didn’t disgust him the way he thought it might.
“Or should I say someone else?” Ethan asked.
“You could say that.”
“Who is it?”
“You know who it is.”
NOW
THE DELUSIONS MARTIN had suffered while alone in the darkness, and the fear that had accompanied them, had faded hours ago.
They were certainly nothing to worry him now. He and Ethan had come down here for a reason. Now that he and Cynthia had found a way out . . .
He backed away from the ridge, told Cynthia to do the same.
As she did, Martin thought, She’s still beautiful. Bloody. Dirty. But as beautiful as ever. The same anger he felt for his father, he felt again now. Beautiful as ever. Perfect as ever. But she doesn’t love me. . . . Or does she?
He put a hand on Cynthia’s cheek and leaned in to kiss her. Her eyes opened wide with surprise. She took a quick step back. “What are you doing? We need to focus on getting out of here.”
No. She doesn’t.
“I’ll never be good enough for you, will I?” He’d exercised control, caution, discretion the entire time he’d been in the cave. Cynthia didn’t know how he had grown since she’d last seen him. It was time to show her.
“Is that what you think?”
“It’s what I know.”
Martin and Ethan had brought Paul because they needed a guide. They’d brought Gina because it’d be strange to bring Paul without her. But the plan had always been to get Cynthia alone—to fall behind the others intentionally, to make sure Cynthia had an accident, to make sure she never got out.
His hands locked tightly around her neck. She choked and pawed. He squeezed tighter. No amount of hunger or exhaustion could stop him from killing her.
“We had to stay together until we found a way out!” he shouted. “It was the smartest thing to do. Three heads are better than one. I guess that doesn’t matter anymore.”
Nor did it matter that Ethan went insane. Martin no longer needed him. The lessons he’d taught had forever changed him. Happiness was about control.
Taking what you wanted was happiness. Justice and revenge—they were happiness.
Strangling Cynthia meant all these things to Martin. With his father dead, with her dead, there’d no longer be anyone left to make him feel like a failure.
He’d almost forgotten how close he was to this freedom when he told Ethan he was considering calling off the trip. That would have been a terrible mistake, because now, in the wake of this new freedom, in spite of all the hardships he had to endure to get here, he could be the man he wanted to be. No longer would he settle for a second-rate job, a seat in coach because he couldn’t afford first class, a thirty-minute wait at a restaurant.
Now that he knew what he was capable of, he was as powerful as every god man had ever worshiped.
Suddenly, Cynthia stopped pawing at Martin’s hands. She was weaker than he was and would never get him to let go. She felt the ground around her, found a loose rock, and swung.
A sharp pain shot through Martin’s skull, and he screamed. Cynthia pushed him off her, swung the rock again, harder than she had when Martin told her to knock Ethan unconscious.
And the cave, the tomb that had been meant for Cynthia, would bury him instead.
DAWN
NOW
CYNTHIA HADN’T MEANT to kill Martin. She’d meant to knock him out. But she let only a single tear fall before taking off her helmet and jumping into the icy water. Her breath froze in her chest. Her heart almost stopped. Then, after she’d adjusted to the temperature, she filled her lungs to their capacity and dove.
The river had come in through a tight water-worn tunnel. Cynthia swam against the gentle current, regularly using one hand to check for pockets of air above her. She found them frequently enough to get oxygen when she needed it; only occasionally did the water’s surface meet the rock for great enough distances to make her fear drowning.
When the water spilled out into sunlight, she opened her eyes and climbed onto the nearest bank. Trees and shrubbery extended in every direction. The smell of the forest filled her nose. From the north, she could hear the roar of a busy road; but she was too exhausted and sad to walk to it just yet. Instead, she rolled onto her back, shivering until the tears came.
She’d loved Martin, even though she’d never told him. She’d wanted him to come with her to California, but he’d declined the offer. She’d wanted him to kiss her when they were lying on the rooftop of his mother’s house, but he didn’t do that either. So until he tried to kiss her in the cave, she had no idea how he felt.
And she had only stepped away from the kiss because it had taken her by surprise—that, and the mood was wrong. She wanted their first kiss to be romantic. She wanted to be wearing an evening gown with her hair pinned up, her face free of filth.
It could have happened that way, too—under a moonlit sky in LA—because what he didn’t know was that the screenplay she’d been reading in the van had a part in it for him. Since she was producing the film, she could guarantee him the role if he wanted it.
Maybe if I had kissed him in the cave . . .
She shook the thought away. She was certain, even if he’d lived, his grip on sanity had slipped too much to save him.
Finally the tears subsided, and she found the strength to hike to the nearby road. Rescue workers could be in the cave within a matter of hours, she guessed, hoping that Paul was still alive.
She
flagged down the first car she saw.
NOW
RESCUE WORKERS SPENT a week searching for the cavers. Ethan was the last to be found. He was nearly dead from dehydration, and they rushed him off to All Saint Hospital for immediate attention.
He’d later say he had seen the tongue depressor stuck in the wall. He’d found Martin’s dead body and the underground stream. But he didn’t know that the stream could lead him to freedom and had retreated into the cave, still searching for an exit.
Once he was better, Cynthia would prosecute him for attempted rape. In the meantime, she comforted Martin’s mom and sister. She told them the truth about what had happened in the cave only because she had to tell the police, and later went with them to Martin’s funeral.
The pastor spoke about how kind, generous, and loving Martin was, about how he was in a better place and how they would always remember him.
Since—and only because—it was a funeral, nobody disagreed.
Then, after the body was lowered into the ground, a stranger in a long black dress approached Cynthia.
“You should know that he loved you,” the stranger said. “I never wanted to admit it to myself, but he did.”
A tear rolled down Cynthia’s cheek, and she thanked the woman for telling her.
“I wanted to tell you I’m sorry for everything I did to keep you two apart.”
“What do you mean? Who are you?”
“I’m Diane. I was Martin’s fiancé.”
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A Reagan Keeter Box Set: Three page-turning thrillers that will leave you wondering who you can trust Page 55
