Secluded Cabin Sleeps Six(95)

“It wasn’t just you,” he said now to Cat. “I was upset about a lot of things. Piper had left me. I just felt like I had to make a decision—between the past and the present.”

She nodded slowly. “And can they be separated?”

“I think so,” he said. “Maybe.”

She reached into her pocket and pulled out an old photograph—square and creased, faded. Henry slipped his glasses from his jacket pocket, and took the photo from her.

A slim man in a black suit smoked a cigarette, his dark hair slicked back. He leaned against some kind of stone ledge, a city behind him, palm trees dark in the gray background. His eyes were lidded, smile wan. The resemblance was uncanny; Henry could be looking at a picture of himself. The date stamp read November 1980, four years before Henry was born.

“Is this him?”

“Yes.”

“Where did you get the picture?”

“From his sister. She lives in Miami. She popped up a while ago in my relative group. We had lunch.”

“Love connection?”

“Not exactly,” she said. “But she had information about him that she was willing to share. In fact, unlike Marta, she was aching to get it off her chest. Henry, he was a bad man.”

“Bad how?”

“Do you remember the Miami Slayer?”

Henry shook his head.

“In Miami in the ’80s someone was breaking into the homes of single woman, waiting for them to return, then raping, torturing, and killing them. There were seven women in total between the year of 1982 and 1990 when the perpetrator was finally caught.”

Henry didn’t say anything. He wondered how much West could hear, if he was still on the line listening; he’d never ended the call, hoped it had transferred to the phone from the Bluetooth.

The photo in his hand took on a different energy, a kind of darkness emanating from it.

“Our father, Roy Alfaro was tried and convicted, sentenced to death,” said Cat, her voice strained. “He died in prison in a yard fight in 1989 in the Union Correctional Institution waiting for execution. The same prison that held Ted Bundy.”

The information landed like a punch to the gut. Henry felt physically ill, like he had in the bar. He drew in a breath, released it, willed himself to be solid.

“All those years as a young man, hanging around Miami, raping and killing, he was donating his sperm.”

The world was spinning. “Are you sure about this?”

“I’m pretty sure, yeah,” she said. “It’s what his sister told me. And my research confirms it. There’s no DNA evidence stored for him, the technology back then wasn’t what it is today. So we can’t one hundred percent confirm paternity. But his sister was a twenty-five percent match for me. So...”

The nausea passed and it was replaced by a flood of anger.

“Are you happy, Cat? You never gave up, you dug around and finally figured it out.”

His voice rang out in the night. She looked down at her feet.

“Let me ask you,” he went on. “How does this serve us? What good does it do us?”

She looked up at him with a frown. “It’s the truth.”

“The truth is overrated.”

“You would rather live your life not knowing where you came from?”

“Actually, yes,” he said. “I’d rather not have known this, Cat. It’s toxic. It’s poison.”

He was embarrassed when angry tears trailed down his face. He thought of Piper, of Luke, of the things his father-in-law had said. He swiped at his face, turned to the water. It churned, black and deep. He should just fall into it, let it wash him away.

“I’m sorry,” said Cat. She put a tentative hand on his shoulder. “Maybe you’re right. Just forget it. You’re a good guy, Henry. Whatever dark thing lived in his DNA, it hasn’t touched you.”

That feeling, the one he’d had since he was a kid, how he wasn’t enough, that there was something deeply wrong with him. It was a tsunami inside him, rushing, swamping, raging.

“Genetics,” Cat went on when Henry stayed quiet. “As much as they know, they don’t know even more. A gene for violence doesn’t mean you’ll be violent. A gene for cancer doesn’t mean you’re destined get sick. It’s complicated.”

“Cat,” he said, lowering his voice to a whisper. “Is it you? Are you behind the deaths of our half siblings, of Marta Bennet? That guy in Fort Lauderdale.”

She leaned on the concrete railing, pushing in close to him. He didn’t shift away from her. In fact, he wanted to take her into his arms and hold her, comfort her. He loved her because they were connected. More than that. He just loved her, even though she was broken.

“A few of us are okay, you know?” she said. “Like you. You’re living an honest, hardworking life. You’re contributing something, loving people, taking care of your family.”

Low risk, that’s what West called it. You don’t drive drunk. You buckle your seat belt. You don’t lie to people or steal from them. You don’t hurt anyone. You donate to charity, volunteer for a cause.

“Some of us are not,” she continued.

A big freighter drifted toward the bridge, a marine horn sounding, announcing its arrival to port.