Killer Instinct (12 page)

Chapter
Twenty-Seven

I’M SILENT THE WHOLE WAY
home. I don’t know what I remembered, but something happened in that house, in that bedroom, and I was there to witness it.

I go straight to my room, ignoring Mom’s worried looks, and close my door.

I don’t go down to dinner, and at nine o’clock Mom brings me a bowl of tomato soup. “Want to talk?”

“No.” I take the soup and note my hands are still shaking.

Mom glances down at my garbage can. “Lane, did you throw up?”

“Yes.”

“Are you sick?” She feels my head.

“No.” Whatever happened to me in that house scared the living shit out of me. “I don’t ever want to go back to Four Buchold Place again.” I don’t care that the Decapitator has ties there. I’m done.

She nods. “Okay. You don’t have to.”

“Thank you.”

“I found out your uncle owned it first and then sold it to your father. That’s how it ended up getting willed to you.”

Maybe Seth should’ve willed it back to my uncle. Because I don’t want it.

“I also found out how Seth died.”

Murder? Decapitation? Or something equally sinister I’m sure.

“Colon cancer.”

“Oh.” This strikes me as odd. Such a normal way to die.

“I’ll arrange to get it sold. We’ll put the money in your college account. Sound good?”

Sounds
more
than good.

Concern gentles her already troubled expression. “I’ve never seen you like that before. It worries me.”

It worries me, too.

“Don’t feel like you have to do your Saturday shift at Patch and Paw.”

“I want to.” Corn Chip will be there this weekend, and I definitely want to see him.

Mom gives me a long look. “I don’t know what you remembered, but please,
please
feel free to talk to me. Okay?”

“Okay.” Absolutely not.

“Are you stilled pissed with me?”

“Honestly, I’ve done nothing but relive Four Buchold. I haven’t had time to think about you. But now that you ask. Yes, I’m still pissed.”

“Fair enough. Do you want to talk?”

“No. I want to be left alone.”

“I’ll be in my office if you need anything.” She grabs my garbage can and heads out.

I sit for a while, staring at the parmesan grated on top of the soup. Eventually I eat it, even though I’m only mildly hungry, and go to bed. I sleep like usual, like the dead, with no dreams.

• • •

I don’t see my mom in the morning and wonder if she planned it that way. Maybe she really
doesn’t
know how to deal with me and would rather ignore the whole thing.

Either way, by ten a.m. I’m playing with Corn Chip in Patch and Paw’s side yard.

I throw the tennis ball. He goes after it and brings it back. Happy. Clueless.

I give his scraggly gray ear a rub right where I know he likes it best. He leans in to the rub, proving he does, indeed, prefer it there the most.

“I don’t know what I’m going to do,” I tell him. “My life is a little too weird right now.”

Flashbacks. Messages from a serial killer. Lies.

“Tell me about it,” Dr. Issa comments.

I glance over my shoulder to see him standing behind me. He has a way of sneaking up on me. I don’t care for it at all.

Quietly he approaches. “Do you know what’s going on with Zach?”

“What do you mean?”

Dr. Issa tucks his hands in his lab coat. “Have you seen his lip?”

I nod. “He said he fell.”

“Did he, now?”

“Down some stairs,” I provide.

“There are no stairs in our father’s condo.”

“He said outside.”

Dr. Issa shakes his head. “There’re no stairs outside
or
in.”

I wait. I really don’t know what he wants me to say. We both know Zach’s lying.

“He’s not telling the truth.” Dr. Issa confirms my thoughts.

“I see.”

Dr. Issa glances back to the building like he’s making sure no one’s listening. “I don’t know how much Zach has shared with you, but . . . he’s had a pretty hard couple of years. When our mom died, he really went over the edge. But he’s been doing so well lately. Being your . . .
friend
has made him happy.”

Friend.
I catch the emphasis. “I’m glad.”

He glances through the fenced side yard to my keyed Jeep in the parking lot. “Zach told me Belinda did that.”

“She did.”

“I’m 99.9 percent sure she busted Zach’s lip.”

Corn Chip nudges my hand and I give him a pet. “Why are you telling me this?”

“I want you to be careful. And I want you to watch out for Zach. He may seem okay, but he’s still pretty fragile.” Dr. Issa brings his brown eyes from the parking lot to mine. “I don’t want him sliding back into his old life.”

“Seems like Zach’s fairly levelheaded.”

“I don’t want him sliding back into his old life,” Dr. Issa repeats, this time with more emphasis.

I get it. I’ll pay Belinda a visit later.

• • •

And that’s exactly what I do after work. I park my Wrangler and walk right up to her door, just like she did to mine.

I ring the bell.

Her dad answers. “Yes?”

I flash him a bright, un-Lane-like smile. “Hi! I’m a friend of Belinda’s. Is she home?”

Her dad smiles back. “Yes. Belinda!” he shouts.

A couple seconds later she steps into view.

“Hi, Belinda!” I channel the cheerleader not in me. “I’m going to the mall! Want to come?”

She narrows her eyes and I innocently blink.

“That sounds like fun,” her dad encourages. “You don’t have any plans, Belinda. Go on.”

Thanks, Dad
. Now she doesn’t have an excuse.

I blink again, maintaining my smile, knowing she can’t get out of this.

She plasters on a grin matching my own. “Sure. Let me just get my purse.”

“I’ll drive!” I volunteer.

As we climb into my Wrangler, her dad waves from the door. “Be back by eleven!”

He closes the door and both our grins fall away.

“What do you want?” she spits.
“Bitch!”

No, I’m having none of that. I elbow her in the throat, and while she gags, I slowly pull away. I’m fully aware I’m driving and this isn’t the smartest of moves. I’m fully aware I’m filled with rage that has just a little bit to do with her and everything to do with the built-up stress and tension over Seth, the Decapitator, and my mom’s lies. Yes, I’m fully aware of these things and really don’t care.

“Here’s the thing,” I start. “I don’t much care for people who mess with me or my friends.”

She makes a grab for me and I dodge it, swerving in my lane, overcorrecting, and then following up with a pop to her nose. “That’ll stop bleeding in a little bit.” I shift into second, open my glove compartment, and hand her a couple of McDonald’s napkins. “Word of warning. Don’t leave a mess in my Jeep.”

She presses the napkins to her nose and shoots me a glare. “You’re insane.”

Oh, Belinda, you have no idea.
“So here’s what you’re going to do. You’re going to cough up the money to get my Jeep fixed and you’re going to leave Zach alone.”

She makes another grab for me, succeeds in yanking my hair, and then lets out an evil giggle.

I shove her head into the dash. “Oh, look; you fell.”

Belinda scowls at me through teary eyes.

“Mess with me anytime. I’m always up to the challenge.”

Someone honks at me, and I realize I’m hovering over the white line. I slow down and pull off to the side of the road.

“What do you want?” she sobs.

“Little slow, are we? I already told you. Fix my Jeep and leave Zach alone.”

“Take me home,” she whines.

“Why? I’m just getting started.”

Her eyes widen in fear, and
that’s
the exact look I’ve been waiting for.

She goes for me again, like the stupid girl she is. I grab her knee and work my thumb beneath her patella.

“Okay!” she screams. “Let me go!”

I press a little further just to make a point and, well, to hear her scream again. “Do we have an understanding?”

Through tears, she nods.

“Say it,” I command.

“Fix your Jeep. Leave Zach alone.”

I put my Jeep in gear, circle her block, and let her out at a 7-Eleven. “Get yourself cleaned up and walk home. I’ll send you the bill for the Jeep.”

She opens the door and stumbles out. “I hate you.”

“Good.” I reach over, close her door, and drive off.

Oh my God, how exhilarating. How unbelievably adrenaline charged . . .

My cell buzzes and snaps me back. I check the text display.
GREAT JOB. LOVED WHAT U DID TO THE GIRL.

My gaze jumps to the rearview mirror right as my cell buzzes again.
DON’T WORRY. I’M LONG GONE BY NOW.

Again I pull over to the side of the road.
WHO IS THIS?

JAMES DONNER IS NOT THE DECAPITATOR.

& U’RE NOT MY REAL FATHER. HE CAN’T BE TEXTING ME FROM
THE
GRAVE.

AH, CATCHING ON R U?

I wait to see what he’ll type next.

JAMES DONNER IS NOT THE DECAP,
he repeats.

PROVE IT,
I type back.

MEET ME @ 4 BUCHOLD PLACE & I WILL.

My hearts leaps to light speed as I read and reread the last text.
4 Buchold Place?
No . . .

CHOOSE NOT TO SHOW & I WILL HUNT U. I WILL HURT U. I WILL MAKE YOUR FAMILY SUFFER.

I close my eyes and spend a good solid minute just breathing, just calming my rapid-fire pulse.
I will hunt you.

Why?
Why me? He wants to meet me or give me something or, hell, I don’t know. If this is the only way, then I have to do it. I have to go. I have to find out who the Decapitator is and how this is all connected to me.

I will make your family suffer.

I think of the picture he took of me coming out of school. And of the one he snapped of Daisy. An image of my little brother flashes into my mind and shoots a searing pain right into my heart.
Justin . . .

I grab my phone and with a shaky hand type back,
OK WHEN?

Chapter
Twenty-Eight

AS USUAL I’M UP BEFORE
everybody else on Sunday morning. I’m sitting at our dining room table on my laptop, sipping my dark brew when I get a text.

R U UP?
It’s from Zach.

YES.

My phone rings and I answer it. “And here I thought I was the only one who gets up this early on Sunday morning.”

“I haven’t really gone to sleep,” Zach says.

Neither had I after the Decapitator’s contact.

“Belinda came to my house last night,” he continues.

Of course she did. The helpless female that she is. “And?”

“Although she didn’t come right out and say it, I got the distinct impression you’re the person who assaulted her.”

Assaulted?

Yes, I guess I did beat the shit out of her. Rewind the clock and I could’ve handled things differently. Talked to her. Hit her once, not multiple times. I’m irritated with myself for allowing my temper such free reign. “And what about what she did to you?”

“That’s none of your business, Lane.”

“I see.”

Neither one of us speaks for a while, and I begin to wonder if he’s hung up.

“You’re not . . . you’re not the person I thought you were,” he says finally, breaking the static silence.

“And what kind of person did you think I was?” I suppose now’s as good a time as any for him to see I have a dark side too, just like Belinda.

He pauses. “Unique. Intelligent. Quiet. Focused. Dry humor, even though you don’t show it to a lot of people.”

Hm. I’ve never heard anyone describe me before. It’s not half-bad.

“But not this,” he finishes. “I never took you for violent.”

Violent.
I’m not quite sure that’s the term I would’ve used. Deranged, maybe, but in an okay way—if that’s even possible.

“I don’t think we can be friends anymore,” he finishes.

Normally this type of thing doesn’t faze me, but an emptiness pangs inside me at his words. It occurs to me I should probably try to argue the point. . . .

“Don’t worry,” he goes on. “She’s not going to tell her parents. This will remain between the three of us.”

I
wasn’t
worried. It doesn’t matter anyway. Belinda never intended on telling her parents. This has always been about Zach, his pity, and winning him back. Belinda should get an Oscar for this.

“Say something?” he encourages.

“Why?” He just said he doesn’t want to be friends.

Zach sighs. “Good-bye, Lane.” He clicks off.

I sit for a second, thinking it all through. In my own twisted way I really thought I was doing the right thing. In hindsight I should’ve seen this coming. Of course she’d go straight to Zach and play on his emotions. What better ammunition against me? What better way to get him back?

This is ultimately what I wanted, though. To cut ties with Zach, with the drama. I never have done nor will I ever do drama. I’m a very black-and-white person. It’s either this way or that.

And that’s exactly how I prefer it. In my opinion it’s the only way a person can effectively function.

Yes, I convince myself of all this and refuse to acknowledge the empty pang that hearing
I don’t think we can be friends anymore
brought on.

I log on to my laptop and compose a news search on 4 Buchold Place. I concentrate on fourteen years ago. I would’ve been three the year Seth took me on that one afternoon. I dig around, doing my limited cyber-searching, coming up with of course nothing, and wish more than anything I had Reggie’s skills.

CALL ME WHEN U’RE UP,
I text her, and continue digging through cyberlinks.

Three hours later my family’s getting up. Mom starts making breakfast, Victor and Justin read the funnies, and Daisy’s in the bathroom.

The all-American family.

Reggie calls. “Yes?”

“Okay, I’m going to information dump on you.” I tell her about the lies Mom has told, about the freaked-out memory I had while visiting 4 Buchold, and about being kidnapped by Seth when I was three.

“Whoa,” she mumbles.

“Reg, I need to know what happened in that house fourteen years ago. Can you help me? Can you shovel your way through whatever firewall there is and get the information? Police reports, FBI . . . I don’t know. But I need help. Something significant happened, and no one’s telling me what it is.”

“Okay. I’ll do what I can. Give me till noon?”

I blow out a relieved breath. “Thank you. Yes, noon is fine.”

I sit through breakfast with my family, but with Zach, the Decapitator, Reggie, Seth, Mom’s lies, and about a ton of other things it’s all I can do to halfway seem normal over bacon, eggs, and pancakes. It’s too bad, because bacon ranks fairly high on my favorite-food list.

By noon I’m incessantly checking my messages.

At one Reggie finally calls me.

“Your attention to time is one of the things that annoys me the most,” I bitch at her.

She totally ignores my sarcasm. “You’re not going to believe what I found. I had to dig deep. Some files were locked.”

I close my bedroom door. “Go on.”

“You were most definitely there. God, Lane, I’m going to send you a picture, and I don’t want you to freak.”

I wake my laptop and pull up my e-mail. “I’m ready.”

A few seconds later Reggie’s name pops up with an attachment. I open it . . . and freeze.

“Yes, when you were three”—Reggie starts talking—“you disappeared from your house. With your mom and stepdad both being connected to the FBI, there was an all-out manhunt for you. You were found some eight hours later at Four Buchold Place. You were mute. Sitting on that blood-soaked bed. Holding the blond woman’s hand. Staring into her dead eyes. She’d been stabbed twenty-nine times.”

Silently I stare at the picture, at the red-haired toddler—me—covered in the woman’s blood and clinging to her hand.

“They never found the killer,” Reggie quietly goes on. “And although you never spoke, they speculated you saw the whole thing.”

I finally find my voice. “Wh-where did you get this picture?”

“I hacked into the FBI. According to the report your mom received an anonymous tip that that’s where you’d been taken.”

“Mom knew about all this and she didn’t tell me?” She’d watched me freak in that bedroom and knew why. How
dare
she keep this from me.

“Your mom’s trying to protect you.” Reggie defends her.

“But she’d promised she told me everything. I believed her. How many more things is she keeping from me? It’s like I don’t even know her.”

Reggie sighs. “Want my two cents?”

“No.”

“Let it go. Don’t be mad at your mom and stepdad. They love you. If you had a daughter that had been through something so horrible, you’d probably do the same thing.”

No. I don’t think I would.

It all starts trickling back. The years of them carefully watching me, explaining away my emotionless self by saying I was simply different and unique. The years of them encouraging me to embrace myself and walk to my own beat. The years of counseling we all went to just to make sure we were healthy and happy.

They’d simply been assisting me in repressing the nightmare, watching, waiting for signs of remembrance.

Likely, their FBI psych department counseled them to handle it that way.

“You still there?” Reggie asks.

“Did my real father stab that woman?” Who else—it’s his house and he was the one who took me.

“No one has proof. To this day it is an unsolved crime.”

“Well, was he at least brought in for questioning?”

“Yes, but according to the reports, he left you in the care of that woman, stepped out for a grocery run, came back, and found the scene.”

The Decapitator’s first documented kill had been thirteen years ago, one year after this murder. “What month was this picture taken?”

Reggie takes a second to look that up. “September.”

The same month the Decapitator kills.

“I know you can’t tell from the picture and all the blood, but whoever stabbed that woman tried to saw off her arms, legs, and head,” Reggie tells me.

I get really still. This has got to be the Decapitator’s first attempt. Surely the FBI’s made this connection.

No wonder he’s been contacting me, following me. The Decapitator’s first attempt . . . and I was there to witness it.

Nature versus nurture: I never had a fighting chance. I’ve been ruined from both angles.