Into the Dark (28 page)

“Because you’re a good kid.”

“No. Every time I go to work, I’m trying to make up for what I did to Jimmy. Each time I help someone, I think maybe I’m balancing the scales. Maybe I won’t be judged so harshly when my time comes.

“But I’m finally able to accept Jimmy’s death wasn’t my fault. Now I’m here asking you to do the same.”

Sean cocked his head. His meaty hands released the laminate counter, and he turned back around. His tired eyes were red-rimmed. “What the hell are you talking about?”

“I’m asking you to forgive me, Dad. Do you think Jimmy’d want you hating me for the rest of your life?”

“Is that how you see it?” Sean stepped forward. His graying eyebrows knitted together to form a single line across his forehead. “That I hate you?”

“You blame me. I get it. But I’m asking you to give me a second chance.”

A long, shaky sigh escaped Sean’s open mouth. He leaned against a chair for support, looking every bit his fifty-seven years. “I never realized. I just assumed you felt the same as me.”

“Until now, I have.” Nathan pushed on, surprised by his father’s lack of anger. “But something happened to a friend of mine that made me realize I’ve got to do everything I can to heal our relationship. To earn your love again.”

“Nathan, I’ve always loved you. Not one day has gone by that I didn’t thank God you weren’t taken from me that night.”

“Then why—”

“Because I’m an old fool.” Sean fell into the chair and put his head in his hands. “You never should have been left to walk home in the first place. Don’t you know that?”

“I don’t remember.”

“That morning, I told you I’d pick you up at your friend’s. I got delayed at work, and next thing I know, I get a call from the police saying Jimmy was dead and you’d been beaten.”

Sean looked up at Nathan. His tears soaked into the wrinkles around his eyes. “I’ll never forget the way you looked when I got to the hospital. You still had Jimmy’s blood on you. You wouldn’t look at me.”

“All I remember is sitting in the back of the police car.” How the hell had he forgotten such important details? Was his guilt so strong he’d simply blacked it out?

“My God. I never realized.”

“What else am I forgetting?”

“At the hospital, I kept telling you I was sorry,” Sean said. “I told you I’d never leave you alone again, that everything was going to be okay. You still wouldn’t look at me. I knew then you’d never forgive me.”

“How could I have forgotten?”

“Doctors said you were in shock. Aunt Kay was with you more than I was, and she said you never wanted to talk about it. I thought if we just moved on, you’d be all right. You didn’t want to be around me, but I could accept that if it meant your having a normal life.”

“You were so standoffish,” Nathan said. “I thought you were angry with me and that it would be best for me not to bother you.”

“Fucking hell, I swear I never knew.”

“You thought
I
blamed
you
?”

“Why wouldn’t you? I blame me. If I’d done my job as a parent, Jimmy would be alive, and you wouldn’t have carried this burden with you.”

“Why didn’t you ever try to talk to me about it?”

“I didn’t want to make it worse. You were doing well in school and seemed adjusted. I figured I’d let you live your life and maybe one day, you’d forgive me.”

“All this time I’ve been simultaneously hating and feeling sorry for myself, and all I had to do was say something to you.” Nathan couldn’t believe he’d been so foolish.

“No, I failed you, again.” Sean pulled a worn, blue handkerchief from his pocket and wiped his eyes. “I got so swept up in my own guilt and pain, and I should have sucked it up and talked to you, been a decent father.”

“I’ve seen bad fathers, Dad. You aren’t one of them.”

“You grew up thinking I didn’t love you.” Sean slammed his hand down on the old table. “It’s a credit to your aunt you turned out the way you did.”

“Let’s call the blame even. We both could have done things differently.”

“I’m so sorry, Nathan. You and your sister are the best things I ever did.”

Nathan’s throat constricted painfully. His eyes stung as he struggled against the tears. “Thanks, Dad. I love you, too.”

Sean jumped to his feet and pulled Nathan into a bone-crushing hug. He held tight to his father, tears of gratitude finally trickling from his eyes.

“Why don’t you stay and watch the game?” Sean released him. “We can order a pizza and pig out without Aunt Kay on our asses about cholesterol.”

“On your ass, you mean. I’m in awesome shape.”

“You’re young. Give it another ten years.”

“No anchovies,” Nathan said as his father reached for the phone. “I’m not eating those stinking fish.”

“Pussy.”

Chapter Thirty-One

She’d gone into the tunnels with Madigan? To their special place? Didn’t she understand what he’d done for her? Or was Madigan’s interference clouding her judgment?

“You’re sure of this?” Julian asked.

“Positive.”

“And the hostage negotiator accompanied her?”

“That’s what I was told.” His informant blew a foul gust of smoke in his face. “Apparently, he’s her new champion. Fighting for her, even.”

Julian crushed the hundred-dollar bill he was holding. “I hadn’t foreseen this complication. Why was she there?”

“Maybe she’s grown a set. Or maybe she just wanted to see what you had planned. How should I know?”

“That’s what I’m paying you for, isn’t it?”

“You want me to leave another message?”

“No. I want you to find out if Emilie reciprocates this attention. If she has any interest in this man.”

The smoker took another drag. “You promised me I wouldn’t still be in this mess after you robbed the bank. I thought she was just your extra bit of sugar icing.”

“Do I look like I need to rob a bank? You’re a fool for ever believing that.”

“I still want my cut.”

“I’ve already given you plenty of cash.”

“Easy come, easy go. And that cash wasn’t half of what you originally promised.”

Julian had grown tired of the conversation. “Find out how Emilie feels about this negotiator, and I promise you shall have payment in full.”

The cigarette was smashed beneath the toe of a black dress shoe. “You’d better. I can always go to the cops and cut a deal.”

“Just do as I ask. You’ll be well taken care of.”

Julian slipped through the horde on the Strip, impervious to the shouts of the drunk and greedy. He’d anticipated Emilie to feel a rush of grief and guilt at her mother’s death, but after the initial shock, she should have been relieved. Grateful, even. Claire Chambers deserved to be eliminated. She had only cruelty to offer.

The gluttonous pig had begged for her life, growing so desperate as to plead for a second chance for her daughter’s sake.

Julian would have preferred a quick and easy end, but Claire needed to be held accountable for the years of misery afflicted on Emilie—all thirty-four of them.

The duct tape had muffled Claire’s screams. The woman’s face was streaked with tears and smeared make-up. Her cold eyes grew glassy as her body lost more blood.

“This is for Emilie,” Julian whispered as he sunk the knife into her stomach. “My ultimate gift to her before I bring us together for eternity.”

Claire had slowly blinked and then moaned in understanding.

“Yes, I am her Taker. And now you will pay the ultimate price.”

Chapter Thirty-Two

“Give me twenty minutes, and we’ll bust out of here early.” Jeremy dug through the teetering mound of papers on his desk.

“Don’t worry about me.” Emilie rubbed her pounding temples. She was too tired to care. She’d hardly slept, and when she did her dreams were of dark passages full of crying children. They pleaded for help while an unknown woman screamed in the distance. Emilie had woken in terror just before dawn. She had been the one screaming and begging for her life.

“You never said anything about the tunnels.”

“What did you want me to say?”

“How bad were they?”

She thought about the tattered baby doll. “Worse than I could have imagined.”

“Good thing you didn’t get a hair up your ass and go in alone then.”

“I don’t know what I would have done if Nathan hadn’t been there.”

Jeremy scrawled a comment on the report she’d just given him. “He’s good for you.”

“He is.”

Her phone vibrated. “Agent Ronson. Have you been able to release Claire’s body?”

“No. But I’ve got some information from the Louisiana field office. Can you come downtown?”

“I’m on my way.”

She hung up the phone. “I have to go to the police station.”

Jeremy closed the report. “I’ll take you.”

“You don’t—”

“Save your breath. Let’s go.”

Lisa stood at the teller’s counter talking with Mollie and Miranda. She glared as Emilie walked past. “Where are you both going? It’s only three.”

“Emilie has to go to the police station,” Jeremy said. “I’m taking her.”

“Sorry about your mother.” Lisa’s eyes were empty. “Such a tragedy.”

“Thank you.”

“The paper said police had proof the Taker did it. Is that true?”

The note had been withheld from the press. “Yes.”

“What’s the proof?”

“Emilie can’t discuss that, Lisa.”

“Of course.” A snide smile crossed her narrow face. “Well, at least you’ve got a sexy cop willing to protect you.”

“Excuse me?”

“The black-haired hottie from the other day. The one who slugged that pencil-necked detective. He sure seemed into you.”

“That’s none of your business.”

“Hey, I think it’s awesome. About time you had a man back in your life. Although,” she looked down at her manicured nails, “isn’t that against cop rules? Dating a victim?”

Emilie squeezed her phone to keep from smacking Lisa. Was she fishing for information or just trying to screw up her life?

“That will be enough,” Jeremy said. “We’ve got to get to the station. Call me if you need anything.”

“She’s the Taker’s informant,” Emilie spat as soon as they were outside.

“Who? Lisa?”

“Yes. It’s obvious, Jeremy.”

“I don’t know.”

“You just don’t want to see the bad in anyone. I don’t have that problem. That bitch is a snake, and I’m making sure Ronson knows it today.”

* * * *

“Just lay it on me.”

Detective Avery and Agent Ronson sat across from Emilie at the small table in the conference room while Jeremy fidgeted on her right. “I know it’s going to be bad, so just get to it.”

“In 2004 a woman matching your description disappeared from New Orleans,” Agent Ronson said. “She’d filed a stalking complaint a month prior. Cops didn’t have much to go on.”

Cold sweat broke out across Emilie’s forehead. “What happened to her?”

“They found her body in a shallow grave in the Cane River Valley area weeks after her disappearance. Animals had dug it up.”

“Cane River. That’s thick Creole area and very historical. Old South.”

“He’s from that area,” Ronson said. “He took the victim back to the place he knew best.”

“Why’d he leave Louisiana?” Emilie asked.

“To keep the heat off him.” Detective Avery opened a manila folder. “Vic’s name was Marie Adrieux. Twenty-five, a French Creole from New Orleans. She was a grad student at Loyola and was putting herself through school waiting tables at a popular French Quarter restaurant. In 2004, she reported a stalking incident to the New Orleans PD.”

“What was the incident?”

“A man she once waited on showed up on her doorstep asking for a date. She declined and after that noticed him following her.”

“Did she give police a description?”

Ronson slid a composite sketch across the table. Emilie gasped. He was clean-shaven, but she recognized the eyes. They were the only distinguishing features. “He looks average.”

“Exactly,” Avery said. “Girl could only remember his eyes in detail.”

“What about his name?” Jeremy asked.

“Lawrence Dupart,” Ronson said. “An alias.”

“Two days before her disappearance she received flowers.”

“Casablanca lilies,” Emilie guessed.

“White jasmine,” Avery said. “Grows in abundance in the South. Adrieux called the police. They told her they’d check into it. Then she disappeared.”

“Where was she taken from?”

“Outside her apartment complex around eleven at night,” Ronson said. “She was just getting home from work.”

“Do you have a picture of her?”

Agent Ronson slid a photograph across the table. An attractive woman smiled back at Emilie. Her skin was light enough to easily see the freckles scattered across her nose. Her hair was a darker red than Emilie’s.

“I don’t see the resemblance.” Jeremy peered over her shoulder. “Same face shape, but Emilie’s hair is lighter. And she’s fair skinned.”

“It’s in the eyes,” Emilie whispered. Framed with thick lashes, Marie’s eyes were almond-shaped and green, just like her own. “Look into mine, and then into hers.”

“I agree,” Ronson said. “The Taker obviously saw the similarity between you two and latched on. Your necklace just fed into his delusion.”

“So you think he’s trying to replace this girl with Emilie?” Jeremy asked.

“Looks like it. He probably took her thinking he could get her to reciprocate his feelings and then when she didn’t, lost it,” Ronson said. “Based on the time between her disappearance and estimated time of death, the coroner believes she lived for at least three weeks after she was kidnapped.”

“He fled Louisiana and started a new life,” Avery said. “He either didn’t act on his compulsion or couldn’t find the right woman. Then he saw you.”

Emilie looked into the woman’s smiling face. She had been so young, her entire life ahead of her. “There’s more to it.”

“What do you mean?” Ronson asked.

“Josephine is the key.”

“Why?” Avery closed the file.

“I’m sure she was a child. Something happened to her. I don’t know how, but this all goes back to her. I feel it in my gut.”