Wolfhunter River (Stillhouse Lake #3)(28)

We should run. Get away now. Run fast. Those instincts have served me well for years, but now . . . now they feel out of tune. We could run. Move. Change our names, again. But is it going to change anything for long? People will find us. They always have. They always will. And ripping away friends and normality from the kids might be the wrong move, again.

Sam comes out of the office and takes his seat at the table. I meet his eyes, and I see darkness. I don’t know what Melvin wrote, only that it was directed very specifically at him. I don’t know if I really want to know, or if he’ll even tell me. But the shadow passes, and he smiles at the kids, jokes about weekend plans, and eats his food.

I do, too, even though every bite tastes like tears and ashes.

We’re all trying so hard.

And I realize, as if I’m standing outside of the spotlight, looking in . . . that it can’t last.





6

SAM

They’re always going to come between the two of us. The ghosts. I don’t want to admit that, but right now everything feels raw and wounded inside me, and I’m angry. Melvin’s reaching out from the grave to drag me over knives again. And Miranda. Miranda’s out there, circling like a vulture. I know she’s coming for us.

For Gwen.

I flinch from thinking about Melvin and what I read in Callie’s notebook. Miranda’s not a welcome thought, but at least she’s safer. I never was Miranda’s lover. In some ways that’s worse. She’s a toxic, bottomless well of hate, but hate is emotionally seductive, and it brought the worst parts of both of us out in the open when we were together.

I never, ever want Gwen to know about the details of what I did, especially to her, during that time of my life. She knows enough without having to face the cold facts.

We finish dinner, do the dishes, pretend everything is fine for the sake of the kids until they’re both on the couch, a movie is playing, and the two of us can step outside onto the porch.

She turns and puts her arms around me.

“I’ll get started on the backtrace of the address in the morning,” she tells me. “I should have an answer in a few hours. Maybe even a name.”

I don’t say anything. Taking out my anger on some random guy Melvin hired to mail stuff seems . . . useless. But I know we need to find this out and stop whatever else is in the queue from reaching us. Once we have a name, an address, we can get the FBI into it. Maybe. But it feels like an empty crusade. He’s already won.

I can sense the lingering fear and worry in Gwen, and I bury my nose in her hair and breathe in the scent of her. It cools something inside me and warms me at the same time. Steadies me. It scares me a little, this reaction. I’ve known a lot of strong, capable women, but Gwen is a unique blend of need and independence. She can and will fight like a tiger for those she loves. We have that bedrock faith in common.

We stand on the porch, wrapped around each other, content to be silent for a while. Finally, I say, “I know you’re going to ask, but . . . I don’t want to talk about it. Not about the diary.”

“Okay,” she says. She understands that, I know. “But are you okay?”

I pull back and look at her. Fit my hands around her face and kiss her gently. “Not remotely okay. But that’s why I need the time.”

She nods, and leans her forehead forward to rest against mine. “I wish I could kill him all over again,” she says. “And then sometimes I wish . . . I wish I hadn’t killed him at all. Does that make sense?”

“Absolutely.” Killing someone isn’t like in the movies, something you shrug off with a quip and a drink. It eats at you, even when the person you kill unquestionably has to die. And there’s no way that her feelings about Melvin aren’t, at the very deepest level, still complicated.

Like mine about Miranda.

Jesus, I feel the ghosts crowding even closer, ready to tear the two of us apart.

Gwen pulls free and takes my hand. She leads me over to the two chairs on the porch, and we sit. There’s a corked half bottle of wine and two glasses; I pour for us. She sighs and takes a sip, gaze fixed on the dark lake rippling like black silk in the moonlight.

The porch lights are still off. By silent agreement we leave them that way.

“I’ve been thinking about the woman who called. Marlene. From Wolfhunter.” She takes a sip of her wine. “I’m wondering if I should go up there and talk to her.”

“No.”

“Sam—”

“No. Not now. Things are too dangerous, and she didn’t tell you why, did she? I’m not comfortable with you going off out of town, away from everything you know. You’ve got—” I almost say, You’ve got your kids to protect, but I stop myself because I realize that I’ve almost unconsciously taken a step back if I say it. As if they aren’t my kids now, too, to love and protect. You asshole, I tell myself. I can’t let Melvin drive that wedge. Or Miranda. Or my own deep-buried, visceral rage. So try to save it. “You’ve got too much at stake. If she was more specific about what she needed, you could try to send her some help. But if she wasn’t willing to do that . . . you have to think about yourself first.”

She takes a long drink, and finally shifts her gaze back to me. I don’t like what I see there. It’s as dark and quiet as the lake. “This is a change. You’re more paranoid tonight than I am.”