Game (Jasper Dent #2)(43)

“I never thought I’d be back here,” Samantha said slowly, still staring down into her coffee. “This house. This town. Nothing’s changed, has it? I mean, there’s more crap in the house because she never throws anything away and there’s a Walmart now and the highway’s a little wider, but it’s still the Nod I grew up in. And this house is still…” She looked up at the ceiling, as though something lurked there.

“Still haunted,” Jazz said for her.

“Yeah.”

“He’s like a ghost, isn’t he? Even though he’s still alive?” He realized neither of them had said the name Billy yet. He wondered if she ever would.

Samantha nodded. “I hope you don’t mind—I’ve been sleeping in your room. It used to be mine, and I just couldn’t stand the thought of sleeping in his old room.”

There were three bedrooms in the Dent house—Gramma’s, Jazz’s, and a spare. The spare had been Billy’s, growing up.

“That’s okay. I’ll sleep in the spare. How long are you planning on staying?”

“Well, my return flight isn’t for two more days. Do you mind if I stay that long? It would be a pain to change it.”

“No, no, that’s fine,” he said with a swiftness that caught him off guard. More than the additional help with Gramma, he realized he craved the contact with Samantha. A Dent who had managed to escape the gravity of Billy and of Lobo’s Nod. “Stay as long as you want.”

“Those pictures on the wall in your bedroom,” she said hesitantly. “His victims, right?”

“Yeah.”

“I tacked up a sheet over them. Couldn’t sleep otherwise.”

“That’s okay.”

Samantha smiled a sad little smile. “I think this is where I’m supposed to get all parental on you or something. Make sure you’re all right. Ask you why you have those pictures right where you sleep.”

“To remind me,” he told her, thinking of the words—I HUNT KILLERS—he’d had tattooed on his body. “I guess it’s morbid, but…”

“Morbid?” A shrug. “Yeah, probably. But I get it. You grew up with him as your dad; I grew up with him as my brother. And with her, when she was just as crazy, but not as childlike. And with your grandfather.”

Jazz leaned forward. “Tell me about it,” he said, too intensely. He dialed it back. “I want to know.”

“About growing up here?” She shuddered. “I wouldn’t know where to start. And besides, you’re better off not hearing that crap. Trust me on that. I spent a big chunk of my life trying to deal with it, trying to understand it. And you know what? It got me nowhere, and it made me miserable. It was only when I started putting it behind me, started purging it, that I started feeling better.”

“Yeah, but you have something to purge in the first place. All I’ve got are fragments.”

“All these FBI guys and shrinks used to come to me. All they wanted to know was ‘What was it like growing up with him?’ ”

The same questions they asked him. The same questions—the same intrusions—he resented so much. Jazz loathed himself for putting Samantha in the exact position he hated occupying. But he couldn’t help it. He had to know. It wasn’t a matter of clinical or academic curiosity; it was self-preservation.

“Please,” he said, and he figured she knew all of Billy’s tricks, so he didn’t even bother trying to manipulate her. “Please.”

She slugged back her coffee and went to the counter for a refill. “Fine,” she relented as she sat back down. “Fine.” Checked her watch. “Mom should be asleep for a while. Fire away.”

Suddenly Jazz didn’t know what to ask. “Did you know?” he blurted out.

“Did I know he was killing all those people? No. I had no idea. I moved out two days after my eighteenth birthday. You don’t know what it was like. Small town. Before the Internet. Very isolated. Your grandfather was a terror. Drop your fork at the dinner table and the belt would come off. Mom was always scattered. Petrified of blacks, Hispanics, Asians, you name it.”

“How did you end up normal?”

“Normal? Ha. Maybe. I don’t know. I don’t know. I never felt like I fit into the family. And I had good friends at school, used to spend as much time as possible at their houses. And I realized early on that the way my family lived wasn’t the way other families lived. And I sort of… it’s like I sectioned off one part of my life from the other, put up a wall there so that I could live in both places when I needed to.”

“Yeah. Me, too. Compartmentalization.”

Samantha grinned. “So, you’ve had some therapy, huh? Good for you. Anyway, moved out at eighteen, left town, never looked back. I tried to stay in touch with Mom. Especially after Dad finally keeled over. I guess I didn’t think she was dangerous. She seemed like the least crazy person in the house. Which is saying something.”

“And when the killing started… you didn’t know?”

She shook her head. “No. No idea. Look, I’d cut myself off, okay? I knew he was getting married. Mom sent me an invitation, but I didn’t respond. I was surprised to get the invite at all. Mom really hated your mom.”