Ties That Bind (32 page)

“Look up at the stars, Sam. How can you
not
believe in a God?”

Sam shook her head and put the gun in the fanny pack, zipping it back up. “How do you explain all the bad stuff, Paul?”

“I can’t explain it. I have my moments. I wonder about it, too. But it has to be true. There has to be something.”

“Or maybe there doesn’t. And maybe we are all carrying around this guilt that is eating us alive. Or making us not eat. I think I’ve had enough of this guilt. I think it’s time for me to move on. And for the record, Paul? You never were a bad man. We let our emotions go, we had sex, and then I got pregnant. It wasn’t meant to be. We were too young to be married, and neither one of us was ready to be a parent. I, for one, am tired of atoning for the guilt. It’s time to start living. I suggest you do the same.”

“Sammy, you don’t understand. I can’t forget about you, but you’re poison for me. You destroyed my life, and you didn’t even know it.”

“Oh, hell no. You are not turning this on me. You’re the one who left. You went on a mission and I never heard from you again.”

“You think I did that lightly? Just left without any thought for you? I went to your dad, and he told me I should go.”

Sam felt a chill go up her spine. Her father had known about the baby?

“You talked to my dad, and he told you to just walk away?”

“It was the right thing, Sam. Your father is a wise man. I asked him about you and me, now, and he said it’s still not right. Even though I’m alone, and you’re alone, I still can’t have you. Because I’m not supposed to. I’m not supposed to want you, but you tempt me. You’re just like Callie. Like Eve tempted Adam, you have the—”

“What the hell? You talk to my father about me
now
? When? This is ridiculous. Get over it, Paul. I did. Did you just have a thing for the Montgomery girls, huh? Trash, I believe your friend Lind Harris called us.”

He didn’t speak, staring at her, his eyes almost invisible in the dark night.

“Tell me, Paul. Tell me the truth.”

Sam’s hand rested on her fanny pack, inches from the zipper.

“I don’t know what you want me to say.”

“How about a little honesty? How about some now? Just when have you been talking to my father?”

Paul was silent again, squirmy, almost like a grade-school child called into the principal’s office. She stared him down hard.

“Fine. Since you want me to be honest, I will. Your father comes to clean the seminary building every week. It’s one of his only outings. One of the ward ladies stays with your mother, and your dad comes to do service for the Lord. Is that what you want from me?”

“You lied to the police,” Sam said, incredulous that he had kept this information from her. “Why would you do that?”

“Because if you knew I was talking to your father, you wouldn’t come near me. I just wanted his blessing to finally be with you. I wanted him to approve. I guess I should have checked with you first, since you have all the answers. I have no idea what you expect of me, Sam.”

“Maybe, just maybe, for once in your life, you should have been truthful. You’ve been lying to yourself and everyone around you for years. It’s to the point where you don’t even know a lie when you hear it. I’m scared to think you are teaching young kids about religion. Because you sure as hell don’t seem to have a grasp on right and wrong.”

“Callie, I—”

“My. Name. Is. Not. Callie.” Sam knew she was flushing, though he probably wouldn’t be able to see it in the dark. “And I am done with this. Get on with your life. Find a nice Mormon lady. Follow your dream. Leave me and my poisoned apple out of it.”

“That’s Disney, Sam. Snow White, not the Bible.”

“It all means the same to me, Paul. It’s all one big fairy tale. But there is no happily ever after. And you’re no white knight. So please, leave me alone.”

She turned and headed toward her familiar route, the cemetery, leaving him alone with his guilt, this strange obsession with the past and two Montgomery sisters, and maybe a little bit of enlightenment. She felt the constant ache in her gut ease up. She’d been hurting herself, guilty, just like him, for years. And why? Because they were human?

She turned a few times to see if he had followed her, but he hadn’t. Slowly she began to feel the free flow of the night, and the air flowing through her hair. She relaxed as she ran, heading through the gates of the cemetery. She didn’t feel safe with Paul; that was for sure. His clinging to the past was more than a little weird, but she couldn’t see him running her off the road. He’d said he wanted her and knew he shouldn’t want her. And he’d called her Callie. What if he was really crazy?

FORTY-ONE

Sam entered the cemetery at a near sprint, pondering her ghoulish thoughts.

She’d tried to call Gage but had got his voice mail.

She knew he would call her back. She also knew he would tell her not to run alone, in the dark, even though she’d been doing it for years.

But this was one trip she had to make. She was here to see old ghosts. Safe ghosts. Here to talk to Callie one last time, before she put it all behind her.

It was time to move on and away from Kanesville, at least physically. She could visit. Susanna would need her. Her father … well, it was time to say good-bye. For good.

A thin, eerie mist rose out from among the tombstones, twisting and swirling up and around the entire cemetery and shrouding it in a light white net of tulle. Just enough to make it hard to decipher whether a shadow was a moving, writhing demon or a still tree. The temperature of the formerly hot night had dropped by at least fifteen degrees. Sam looked up at the sky. Fast-moving clouds obscured the moon.

She shivered as she surveyed the graveyard.

September fog was almost unheard of in Utah. Sure, nights might chill as fall wafted in, but it was rarely wet or cold or filled with the white mist that was so common in February.

And then there was the rain. Usually, the rains came in October.

Sam headed toward her familiar spot on the glistening, paved pathway—Callie’s “resting” place, except she no longer really believed Callie was resting. They might have placed her body there, but her spirit, her power, her electricity, was still following around those whom she’d cared about—or wanted to see hurt.

Sam shivered as the temperature seemed to drop even more. She felt Callie’s pain and fear. A charley horse in Sam’s right calf nearly caused her to fall, and she knew she had to stop running. But the eerie fog, the tombstones, and Callie’s voice in Sam’s head had raised the hairs on her arm.

She stared out at the dark night, shadows dancing in and out of the tombstones as clouds covered and then moved away from the moon.

She couldn’t see any living person walking among the monuments to the dead. But she felt a strong presence. It seemed as though someone was with her, walking next to her. Warning her.

Her cell phone rang inside her fanny pack. She jumped. She’d been staring so intently out at the landscape of gravestones that it caught her by surprise. She didn’t recognize the number on her caller ID. She answered anyway. Even if just to feel a little less alone and scared.

“Someone is here. Someone is trying to get into my house,” whispered an unfamiliar female voice.

“Who is this?”

“Bethany. I need help. You gave me your card. You said to call. Someone is trying to get in the door.”

“Bethany, hang up now and dial nine-one-one. Do it.”

“Okay,” the girl whispered, and the line disconnected.

What if someone—the killer—got to Bethany before she made the call?

Because Sam had no doubt now, if she ever had. Someone had murdered Callie and the other three teenagers. That same person had tried to kill Whitney. And something told Sam that he would be here soon, waiting to kill her, too.

He. Because she was “just like Callie.”

Sam quickly dialed 911, not leaving anything to chance. She told the dispatcher to get police on the way to Bethany’s house, and fast. Sam was on foot, and they would reach Bethany long before she could even hope to.

But if the killer was at Bethany’s house, why did Sam feel his presence here?

Because he gave up little pieces of himself with each murder, and they’re here, with his victims. He was losing pieces of his soul, and he never even knew it.

Sam knew she should have seen this coming. She also knew she should run, but she wouldn’t. He’d be on foot with no weapon but a rope or tie. She had a gun. The only question was, could she use it?

Her next call was to Gage. This time he answered.

“Where are you?” she asked, not bothering with a hello.

“Just headed to your house, actually. About a block away.”

“I’m in the cemetery. Someone is trying to break into Bethany’s house. I’ve sent the police. Make sure they follow through.” She rattled off the address, which was only a block below Kanesville’s cemetery.

“That’s minutes from where you are!” Gage’s voice sounded frantic. “What in the hell are you doing in the cemetery? Get out of there, now.”

“I was saying good-bye to Callie.” A shiver had crept into Sam’s voice, and she couldn’t control it. She felt like her legs were in cement, unable to move, to run. She had to face this, and whatever invisible force held her wasn’t going to set her free.

“Sam, get the hell out of there. Run to the first house. I’m on my way.”

“No. B-B-Bethany. M-m-make—”

“Goddammit, Sam, run!”

She shivered so violently she dropped the phone, and it landed on the hard cement. She reached down to pick it up, praying her body would obey her commands.

She could hear the sirens below the cemetery and prayed they weren’t too late. Her phone rang again. Somehow, she raised her hand to answer.

“The police are here. They want me to open the door. Should I open it?”

The frightened girl’s words snapped Sam out of her freeze. “Yes, look out the window. Make sure it’s the police. And then open the door.”

“I think this is nine-one-one calling me back,” the girl said.

“Answer it.”

Sam disconnected. Bethany was safe. Just one block away. Which meant the killer was on the loose.

Just one block away.

The phone rang again.

“He’s going to come here. He’ll be here. And I’ll be waiting for him,” she said into the phone, knowing it was Gage. And then she disconnected.

Through the eerie mist she could feel him.

It was almost over.

“Some cop you are, Sammy,” she said, and she heard his voice repeating those same words, only in her head.

She should have known it was him. She had known, somewhere in the back of her mind.

Now he was coming to get her. She could stay alive. She was a good enough shot.

FORTY-TWO

She waited for him to walk out of the fog.

And while she waited, new memories flooded her mind. Things she’d hidden in the back of her mind. And then all the memories started coming back. Sudden, like a landslide. Things she had held inside for so long that they’d never seemed real. Memories that she’d thought belonged to the scary
Nightmare Theatre
shows she would watch with her mother.

Sam saw her father up on a ladder every July, picking the peaches and adding them to his bucket, careful not to push too hard on the ripe, juicy fruit, lest he leave a dent or bruise.

She saw him feeding chamomile tea to her mother, patiently wiping her mouth when the liquid dribbled down over her lips and chin.

She saw him holding a baby bird that had fallen out of its nest, shaking his head gently as she sobbed. “The momma bird won’t take it back, Sammy. It fell out of the nest, and it’s too little to fly. I know it’s hard for you to understand, but the best thing for this bird is to put it out of its misery.”

“No!” Sam screamed out into the thickening fog and darkness. A mother bird would never take back a baby that had fallen from the nest? Was this true? It didn’t matter. They weren’t birds. They were humans, evolved, advanced—and sadly brutal.

She saw him holding a rope and leading Callie to the tree.

And she remembered. D-Ray hadn’t stayed. Amy hadn’t stayed. But Sam had been hidden in the small cherry tree just to the right of the peach tree. In a familiar, comfortable groove between two large branches, where her small bottom fit perfectly and no one could see her. But she’d had a perfect view of the yard, peering out from among the leaves and large, ripe cherries.

Sam had seen the whole thing.

Now she saw him talking to Paul. Telling him to leave her alone to deal with a pregnancy on her own. And Sam saw him in the seminary building, helping clean it. She didn’t need to be told this. It all fell into place now. Accessing the computer. Sending his message. Learning how to work a PowerPoint down at the senior center.

The flashes of memory were now painful, like lightning. Each jolt hit her as she saw the image of her father, coiling the rope around a crying Callie’s neck, screaming at her to own up to her sins, hoisting her up into the tree. Hanging her. Killing her. Crying out for vengeance. It all sparked through Sam’s mind, an electrical storm of memories.

He had killed Callie. He had murdered her, and Sam had blocked it out, ignored it—until Amy came back. Until three teenagers died.

This wasn’t some stupid kid game but a real, honest-to-God—ah, god—murderer. Serial murderer. Sam had never believed in recovered memories, but how could she have blocked this out? How could she have—

Because I didn’t let you remember. You were too young. I had to wait until you were older. Until you were a match for him.

Callie. No. Now it all made sense. It hadn’t been Callie speaking to her all these years but herself. Her own voice, her own memories, driving her to discover the truth.

Sam felt crazier than ever.

She heard a sudden sound behind her, like a foot breaking dried leaves, and whirled around, pulling her gun from the fanny pack faster than she thought possible.

She was pointing her weapon at the man who had given her life.