The Leaving(18)

Ah.





Her mother’s name was Tamara.


“Can I call you that?” Scarlett dared as they walked toward the car. She’d worn a new dress out of the store and felt like an impostor. “Tamara?”

“No.” Tamara unlocked the car. “You may not.”





Lucas


A handful of people in FORENSICS shirts were taking photos and swabs near where Lucas’s father had fallen.

Died.

Lucas watched from the kitchen window, where he’d been studying a map of Opus 6 that hung on the wall, and started counting stones, then gave up. He couldn’t even begin to estimate how many there were, or how many hours it had taken his father—and by the looks of his brother’s muscles, him, too—to cut and shape and place them all.

When Chambers turned up, Lucas stepped outside. “I wasn’t sure I’d see you again.”

“Well, they’re letting me hang around for the time being.” Chambers stood on the front steps facing out to Opus 6. “Professional courtesy because of my history with the case. I’ll be acting as the liaison between you all and the FBI, generally facilitating things.”

Lucas nodded. He was wearing a T-shirt Miranda had left in his room for him, and shorts and boxers borrowed from Ryan. The decal on the shirt had two purple fists meeting in front of a triangle and read WONDER TWIN POWERS ACTIVATE! He had no idea what it meant.

“So what can you tell me about the tattoo?” Chambers turned to him.

“Nothing.”

Lucas had taken a photo of it with the phone Ryan gave him; he wanted to be able to study the image without craning his neck. The doctor who’d done his physical had glimpsed the top edge of it above Lucas’s boxers in spite of his hopes to keep it secret.

“Think you did it yourself ?” Chambers raised one eyebrow. “From the photo the doctor sent me, it looks kind of DIY.”

“People do that?”

“Apparently.”

“No idea.” Lucas shook his head. “Anybody else have one?”

Chambers said, “Don’t know yet.”

They stood there, as if waiting for something to happen, like watching the wind. It was too nice a day for a murder investigation, and Lucas wished he could go surfing or ride a Jet Ski or anything but this.

Chambers probably felt that way, too.

“What did you mean the other day,” Lucas said, “when you said The Leaving ruined your life?”

Chambers gave him a look. Like, really?

“What? I want to know.”

“My sad tale?” Chambers pushed his shoulders back, stretching. “You can probably guess.” He took a pack of gum from his pocket and slid a piece out.

“You were so focused on the case that you neglected your wife.”

“Ding ding ding.” Offered the gum to Lucas, who declined. The detective put a piece into his mouth before he said, “And daughter. Don’t forget the neglected daughter.”

“And now they are . . . ?”

“Wife is remarried. Daughter is in college. ‘Estranged,’ I believe, is the word.”

“And you?”

“I’m here with you, so what does that say?” Chambers shrugged. “And paying for college like it’s some kind of penance.”

“Did you know my father well?”

“As well as I knew any of them, I guess.”

“Was he crazy?”

“Nah.” Chambers shifted his gaze from Lucas to the middle-distance of Opus 6. “This all probably kept him sane.”

The whole place was, on the one hand, extremely disturbing. Because what kind of crazed person would do all that? But there was something . . . calming about it, too.

“Are you going to charge me?”

“Waiting for the autopsy report,” Chambers said. Then he turned and said, “You’ll let me know if you think of anything? The tattoo?”

Lucas nodded and Chambers left. Lucas went inside and watched from the kitchen window until the forensic team also left, then he went back out to explore parts of the grounds he hadn’t walked yet. The map of Opus 6 on the kitchen wall showed a large stone at the highest point, and Lucas imagined that was meant to be the final piece put into place—whether as a gravestone or something else. Now that top swirl of stones seemed to look particularly . . . empty.

He wondered whether the final stone was here somewhere, waiting.

Walking across a plain of stones down by a shaded area at the back of the lot, flattened and arranged just so, Lucas came to a bridge—one large, flat stone—over a passageway. Looking down before crossing, he felt a sort of vertigo—different from the carousel spins. Which maybe made sense, considering how his father had died, but was there something more to it?

Something wrong in his brain?

Something that would never heal?

Everything was too quiet.

He half missed the news vans.

Half wanted reporters to ask him questions that would maybe inspire answers.

He’d show them the tattoo, see if it led to anything. Since it was no longer a secret anyway.

Had it been forced on him? Or on all of them?

Had he done it himself ?

Which was worse?

At the end of his tour—having given up on finding the centerpiece stone—he ducked through a long, deep tunnel, came out the other end, and saw something shining past a cluster of thirsty bushes. Pushing through some brush, he spotted a shabby, old RV with a ray of sun reflecting off the side-view mirror. It didn’t appear at all road-ready.