Alone (Bone Secrets, #4)(49)

They’d faced each other down in the kitchen. For a long moment, he’d been slightly intimidated by the health and bulk of the youth standing up to his order to return the necklace, but he saw the hesitation in his eyes. Deep down he was afraid to defy his father.

“Give me the necklace,” he’d commanded.

“It is mine. It is all that is left of her. I have a right to it, Father,” he’d answered through clenched teeth. The hesitation in his gaze wavered, morphing into anger.

“I hold all the keepsakes. No one person can have them.”

“You are one person. Do you hear how you contradict yourself? Your rules are nothing but contradictions. They make no sense.”

“Give it to me now.”

The young man lunged, thrusting the necklace into the garbage disposal and hitting the button above the countertop. The gnashing sounds of metal shredding shrieked through the kitchen.

“No!” he shouted, lunging at the sink.

His son pushed him away. “If I can’t have it, no one can.”

The old man had frozen, staring into the malevolent eyes. He has to be put down. We can’t have one like him in our midst. “You shoved me,” he shouted over the din. It was the least of the man’s offenses but the most immediate.

The doubt and hesitation flickered in the young man’s eyes again. “I’m sorry, Father.”

The old man had shaken his head. It was too late; the actions with the necklace had sealed his fate. They all had to follow the rules.

He let out a long sigh, willing the memory of that other man to fade, tapping his fingers on the arm of his easy chair.

He had to take action again. He couldn’t lose face in the eyes of the few followers he had left. He needed to assert that he was still in control. He might be old, but he hadn’t lost his power. His bones ached on a daily basis, but with years came wisdom, right? In that case, no one was wiser than him.

Why was Jason striking out at him the way he had?

Sweat pooled under his arms. Had Jason discovered the shed?

Everyone had secrets. His were firmly locked away inside the shed and out in the forest. He wasn’t proud of his weakness; he’d worked hard to control his urges. Even the shed looked innocent to a casual observer, but with a little digging, his world could be turned upside down.

His grandson could destroy him.

He was physically too weak to make any changes in the shed now. It was a rare day when he could walk out there without panting for breath.

He needed to see Jason.


Leo ended the call with his father.

How dense could the old man be? Did he see nothing?

The elder was losing it. For someone who’d led people for decades, the man was no longer logical. Perhaps it was simply aging. Perhaps his brain was rotting from the inside. How else could you explain the man’s actions over the years?

Why did his father still shove Victoria Peres in his face? Anger burned up his throat. The woman was an abomination. Women shouldn’t do what she does. She pranced around the country, showing off her knowledge, speaking at colleges, speaking at national seminars. That was a role for a man.

He knew she’d failed in her marriage. No doubt she’d driven the man away with her unfemale aggressiveness.

Someone needed to use a heavy hand with her. Show her how an obedient woman should act.

He paced the small bedroom in his house. It should be his role. He had the right to show her how a woman should act. His father hadn’t stepped forward to take care of it. Didn’t that mean the responsibility fell to him?

Excitement shot through him, like a stimulant had been injected into his veins.

He wanted her to know that he’d snagged her skulls out from under her watchful eye. He needed her to know that she wasn’t the perfect woman she presented herself as. He wanted the satisfaction of seeing her fear him, admire him. His eyes closed. He could see her dressed in the flowing white dresses of the dead teens, her long black hair spread out on the ground around her, her skin a bloodless white.

He stopped and stared in the small mirror above his dresser. He had to give the stolen skulls to his father. But he knew where to find more. A lot more.

He wanted to send Victoria a message that she was being watched. What better delivery system than bones?


The pounding rain made the streets hard for Seth to see in the dark. Lack of street lighting simply made it worse. At least the traffic was light. At this late hour, few cars were on the road. Seth squinted and slowed his car, turning his wipers up to full blast. They whipped back and forth across his windshield, attacking the rain that dared to land upon the surface.

“I love this weather,” Tori said from the passenger’s seat. Seth wanted to look at her but didn’t dare take his eyes from the road.

“I didn’t know it could rain like this. This is crazy.”

“But being indoors while it rains like this gives you that cozy, safe feeling.”

Seth wanted to argue that they weren’t indoors, and he was feeling anything but safe driving on a road that he could barely see. His steering wheel gave a small shudder and he felt the tires hydroplane.

“Jesus Christ,” he muttered. The moment was gone before his startled brain could think how to react. He struggled to remember what to do when a vehicle hydroplaned.

Foot off the gas. Don’t hit the brakes.