Garden of Darkness (20 page)

So I called Graham.

I had no choice.

Of course I felt guilty. I was using him, but there were more important things going on here. I’m not a user. I hate users.

I asked him to pick me up downtown, in the grassy area between Betty’s Breakfast and the river.

“I’m at school,” Graham whispered. “I can’t pick you up until after three.”

“I’ll be waiting.”

I disconnected and looked at my watch. Almost one. That gave me two hours to kill. I was tempted to go to the café and get something to eat, but somebody might recognize me. I went to a gas station instead, where I bought a bottle of orange juice and a box of cookies.

It cost more than I’d expected. How much was a bus ticket to Minneapolis? Without looking to the right or left, I paid, grabbed my stuff, and headed out the door.

People stared.

Bloody hell.

I’d never been paranoid about being stared at, but suddenly I felt exposed and threatened. I hurried across a grassy open area to a cluster of trees. Once there, I dropped my gear and sat down in the shade. I dug out my sunglasses and slipped them on. I instantly felt better, and could suddenly understand why movie stars wore big glasses and thought nobody would recognize them.

I fell asleep.

Don’t ask me how I did it. How can a person sleep after witnessing what I’d witnessed? Sometimes I wonder about myself.

One minute I was watching for Graham’s black car; the next someone was shaking me by the shoulder.

I snapped to attention, still on the ground but sitting up straight.

Graham Stroud stood over me.

My throat was dry. I swallowed a couple of times and wiped the back of my hand across my mouth. I got to my feet.

He picked up my empty juice bottle and tossed it in a nearby trash container. “What’s up? You’re the last person I expected to get a call from.”

He wasn’t the friendly Graham I’d known before our last encounter. This Graham was aloof and suspicious. He didn’t want to be there.

“Claire . . .” That’s as far as I got. I didn’t think I’d have to tell anybody or talk about it. I figured the whole town knew. Wasn’t that the way small towns worked?

My bottom lip began to tremble. Pretty soon my whole body would be joining in.

“What?”
He was still annoyed, but the annoyance was tinged with a hint of concern.

I shook my head. Why had I called him? I needed time by myself. Time to let this settle. But I’d thought I was okay.

“Kristin?” The irritation was gone. Now he sounded worried, and he wasn’t going to let it go.

I pulled in a deep breath and spit out the words: “Claire’s dead.”

I felt and saw his shock.

“When? How?”

Now that I’d gotten the news out, I felt a little more in control. “She was killed. Just like the other woman.”

He frowned. “Coyotes . . . ?”

That brought me around. “Do you honestly think coyotes are doing this? That’s bullshit.” Then I remembered who his grandfather was. And his
dad. Jesus, his dad! Careful. Graham might know something. He might be in with the rest of them.

What did that mean? Was I losing my mind? The whole damn town couldn’t be involved in some huge cover-up and conspiracy. Could it?

Be careful. Don’t say too much.

Yes. I had to be careful.

I glanced toward the street. Cars were driving past slowly. Watching me? A few people were milling about. Watching me?

“Can you give me a ride? To the campsite where we stayed last night?”

He glanced around. “What about Ian and Stewart?”

“Gone. Went home.”

I could see him trying to figure out what I was still doing in town.

“I thought I’d stick around a little longer,” I explained.

He knew I was up to something, but probably decided this might be a bad time to push it.

We got in his car and headed out of town, to the campground where the recent horror had taken place. We were approaching the last turn when I suddenly felt sick.

Could I do this? Could I go back there?

I pointed and gave him verbal directions. We didn’t go near the restroom, but we could see a few cars in the distance. They weren’t finished with the crime scene.

At the campsite I shot ten minutes of footage to replace some of what I’d lost. I could tell our stuff had been gone through; things weren’t exactly where they should have been. The Barbie sleeping bag that I’d bitched about less than twenty-four hours ago was still there. I grabbed it. That was followed by Claire’s bag. “Need one of these?”

Graham looked at it in horror. “Was that hers?”

“Yeah.” I rolled it up, belted it, and handed it to Graham. He did the same to the other two. We collapsed the tents, then threw everything in the trunk of his car.

I took the camera and retraced the path I’d taken early that morning in the dark. Later I could make some adjustments so the footage would look like night and be a more accurate portrayal of the actual event. Or I could come back at night.

No.

Maybe.

No.

I held the camera low and moved through the dry grass. Dead leaves rustled under my feet. I was aware of Graham hanging back but following. Through a small valley, up the hillside, and there it was.

Close enough.

The body was probably gone by now, but a few cops were keeping an eye on the place.

I zoomed in.

Yellow tape was strung around the whole building. Television news teams were shooting an on-site report, using the brick restroom as their backdrop. A couple of men in dark suits wandered around the building, tablets and pens in hand.

“Detectives,” Graham whispered, coming up behind me. “We should go. Before anybody sees us.”

We backed up. Bent at the waist, we ran down the hill until we were out of sight.

My camera stopped. I checked the meter and realized I’d used the whole tape. And the battery was almost dead and had to be recharged.

“I need to go to a discount store or drugstore.”

He checked his watch. “I have to be at work soon.”

Graham knew Kristin was using him for transportation. At the same time, her friend had just died, so he could hardly be a jerk about it.

On the way back into town he stopped at a discount store called Big Bargains.

Inside, she quickly cruised the aisles. He watched her remove a three-pack of videotapes from the metal hanger and examine it.

“That what you’re looking for?”

“Maybe.” She grabbed another one, then cruised the aisles a little more, grabbing this, grabbing that. Reading the label on a pack of gum.

Graham had stolen a few things in his life and he knew what it looked like. That air of distraction. The pretense of being interested in something you had no interest in while your heart was hammering and your mind was in overdrive. But he didn’t do that kind of crap anymore.

She wasn’t even good at it.

He saw her slip one of the video packs under her shirt, tucking it into the waistband of her jeans. Didn’t she see the damn cameras everywhere? And she was a cameraperson. Kinda funny, when he thought about it.

She returned the gum to its hanger, then retraced her steps to the videotape area. She put the remaining package back. “I can get them cheaper somewhere else. Let’s go.”

He glanced up and saw a man he figured was a store detective moving in their direction. The guy had that look about him: a hard jaw and a gaze that held no mercy.
This is just the way it is, kid.

Graham grabbed Kristin and pulled her close so only a few inches separated them. He slipped his hand under her shirt, felt the crinkly edge of the wrapper, and pulled the tape package from her pants. “I think you forgot something.”

The detective hovered in the distance. Now
he
was pretending acute interest in something he had no interest in.

Anger flashed in Kristin’s eyes. She compressed her lips in a straight line. “You asshole.”

“I think you mean ass-
saver.
”

He let go of her, grabbed the pack, strode to the checkout, and placed the tapes on the black belt. He normally didn’t have money, but he’d cashed his museum paycheck last night. He wasn’t going to have much left for gas and food now.

Kristin was pissed.

She left the store ahead of him. He wasn’t worried about her taking off, because all of her stuff was in his car. That was where he found her: standing at the passenger door, arms crossed, glaring at him.

“You didn’t have to do that.”

“They were watching you, idiot. You’d be sitting in a back room waiting for the cops to come if I hadn’t paid for this.” He tossed the bag at her. She caught it.

“Nobody was watching me.”

He let out a snort and shook his head. “Okay. If that’s what you want to believe.”

“I don’t usually do stuff like that. I’ve never stolen anything before.”

“No shit. That was pretty obvious. What the hell were you thinking?”

“I have to have videotape.”

God, but he was sick of people dragging him into their bullshit.

“I know you’re using me. I know you’ve done that from the beginning. To get to my dad. To get to Old Tuonela. A ride. What else do you want? My shirt? ’Cause I can give you that.” He reached up and tugged his long-sleeved T-shirt over his head. He threw it at her. It hit her in the chest and dropped to the ground at her feet.

“My car keys?” He dug around in his pocket and made contact. He tossed the keys. She didn’t catch, and they went skittering across the blacktop to vanish under a car.

Oh, shit.
She was crying. Not making a sound, just standing there while tears tracked down her cheeks.

“I saved your ass in there.” He jabbed a finger in the direction of the store, but his words were hesitant. He didn’t know that much about girls. There had been his crazy, nutty mother and the calm and level Isobel. “I saved your ass in there,” he mumbled.

She bent and picked up his shirt, clutching it to her in a ball. Then she turned and haltingly looked around for the keys, her movements jerky and awkward.

“I’ll get them.” He dropped to his stomach and reached under the car, stretching until his fingers snagged the metal loop of the key chain. Above him, he heard her gasp.

He reversed and shoved himself to his feet.

Her eyes were wide. “What happened to your back?”

He grabbed his shirt. “Don’t you know it’s not polite to ask those kinds of questions?”

“Somebody beat you.”

He turned his shirt the right way, stuck his arms in the sleeves, then tugged the neck opening over his head and pulled down.

“Your dad?” She looked extremely worried about that. “It was your dad, wasn’t it?”

“No.” He smoothed his shirt, wondering at the burst of adrenaline and anger that had driven him to remove it. He never let anybody see him with his shirt off. “Evan would never do anything like that.”

But he thought about the other morning when Evan had tossed the food on the floor, when he’d grabbed him by the throat. For a second Graham had thought his father was going to kill him. His uncertainty must have shown on his face.

“Did he?”

“No.”

“Swear?”

“I swear.”

“Because if he did, you can’t protect him. Physical abuse is unacceptable.”

“I know, I know. It wasn’t him, okay? It happened a long time ago.”

Everything had shifted. He hardly knew her, yet they always seemed to climb on some emotional teeter-totter whenever they were together. This weird, volatile shift and trade-off.
Your turn to lose it. No yours. After you, please. I insist. Yo u lose it first. I’ll lose it second.

He tried to remember what Isobel looked like and sounded like and smelled like. It was hard.

Chapter Thirty

Kristin had no place to stay. Taking her to Old Tuonela was out of the question after what she’d witnessed there, so Graham took her to his grandfather’s house. Not the best arrangement, but better than her sleeping in the park or on the street or in the woods.

While Alastair was at work, Graham and Kristin cooked scrambled eggs and toast. Scrambled eggs were Graham’s specialty.

“This is a bad idea,” Kristin said between bites of food. “My staying here.”

Graham popped open a can of diet cola and slid it across the table to her. “He never goes in the basement. I swear. You can sleep down there tonight, then use my car tomorrow after you drop me off at school. You’ll at least be safe here.”

“Just one night.” She took a drink of cola. “Then I’ll figure something else out.”

“What?”

“I don’t know.” She shrugged. “Something.”

They finished eating.

“Do I have time to take a shower?” she asked.

“If you hurry.”

While Kristin showered, Graham paced and kept peeking out the front curtains, hoping Alastair didn’t come home early. Once Kristin was finished he took her down to the basement and helped her roll out her sleeping bag in the corner near the freezer.

“He won’t come downstairs,” Graham told her again. “If he does, hide here.” He opened a door to show her a small closet lined with shelves that had probably held jelly and canned stuff at one time.

It smelled like damp cement and rotting wood. Cobwebs clung to rafters and lights. He was sure she’d rather sleep in a tent if it weren’t for a murdering psycho roaming the streets.

Kristin looked at the sleeping bag without enthusiasm. “Thanks.” She sounded exhausted. Now that she’d showered, her hair was darker and her skin seemed paler. Her eyes were puffy, with circles under them.

“I’m going to go back upstairs,” he said.

She grabbed his arm. “Stay here until your grandfather gets home.”

She tugged him down until they both sat on the sleeping bag, cross-legged, face-to-face. She was wearing a different shirt: a thin black T-shirt with really short sleeves. He could see part of a tattoo poking out. Red and black.

“Stay and talk to me for a while. Tell me what’s going on with your dad.”

“There’s nothing going on.”