“Nonsense, it will be no trouble. There’s a spare bed in the room anyway and Christopher’s car bed is easy to move. This is not a party, you two. If your mom agrees, then you’re welcome for as long as she will let you stay. But if she wants you to come home, we’ll take you right away. She’ll probably be worried. And no funny business.”
“We promise, Mom,” Luke said and smiled at Ellie who nodded vigorously.
Luke’s mom grinned back at them and gave Ellie a hug. “You’ll be safe here, sweetheart.”
Luke’s dad made the call and after a little convincing, Ellie’s mom agreed to let her stay. She would gather some things for her and bring them over a little later. Luke’s dad pointed to him and said, “You, come with me for a minute. We need to talk.”
The conversation that followed was not what Luke expected. His dad was very worried about Ellie and he told Luke that if something happened, the gun would be in his sock drawer.
“Dad, I don’t…”
“Luke, I love you son. You may have to grow up a little quicker than you want. I know this is scary for you, hell, it’s scary for me, but you’ll do what you have to do, when you have to do it.”
“I’ve only fired it a couple of times with you at the range. Will you show me how to load it again?”
“Tonight, when your mother has gone to bed.”
Luke looked at his dad. He couldn’t remember a time when he seemed so tired. “Dad, we’re gonna be ok, right?”
His dad smiled weakly. “Yeah, we’re gonna be ok. The police are keeping an eye on things and I’ll watch over us too.”
“Ok.” Luke felt exhausted. He hoped the police would do what they said they could do. It just seemed like he and the other kids were doing better when it was only them dealing with the killer.
“Now, I don’t want you disrespecting that girl while she’s here. You get my meaning?” His dad grinned and Luke nodded, his face feeling hot all of a sudden. His dad did something that surprised him, then. He hugged him and said, “I’m proud of you son. I know you’ll keep her safe. Go on. Go be with her and make her feel better.”
The doorbell rang and his dad got up to answer it. It was Jaxon and Victoria to pick up Ellie. Luke heard his dad explaining the plan to them and they seemed to believe it was a good idea. Jaxon looked in and saw Luke watching and he turned back to his dad and said something Luke couldn’t hear. His dad closed the door and talked with them outside for a few minutes and then came back in looking pale.
“What is it, Dad?” Luke asked.
“Nothing.” But Luke could tell he was lying. It was something alright, and it looked like something big. His mother could see it too and she joined him in the kitchen where they murmured in low voices Luke and Ellie couldn’t hear.
Luke sat with Ellie who leaned into him and he closed his arms around her and stroked her soft, blonde hair.
“Thanks,” she said. “I couldn’t stand being alone in my house.”
“Your mom and your brother were there.”
“But I felt alone. My mom just wanted to yell at me.”
“I’m glad you’re here,” he said.
She kissed him softly on the lips, and then stared into his eyes.
“You know, my dad told me I wasn’t to ‘disrespect you’ while you’re here.”
She giggled. “Are you going to?”
“Depends on what you consider disrespectful, I guess,” and he smiled.
“Nothing you could do would make me love you less,” she said, a little smile on her lips, but her eyes were serious.
“I know,” he said in a whisper. He searched her face and was overcome by a desire to grab her and hold her as tight as he could. Never let her go. The feeling was so strong and so intense, it almost brought tears to his eyes. She must have seen it, because she grabbed him and pulled him close, holding on to him as if she would never see him again. They clung to each other like that for quite a while.
Chapter 38
On the ride back into the station, Jaxon remained quiet. Victoria had heard about the phone call, but when she asked him about it, he said the killer was just taunting him. He could tell she knew something else had happened, but she didn’t press him.
The fingerprints they had scanned into her cell phone of the boy had confirmed what they already knew. Quentin Jenson would never hack another computer again. Ever. The boys head had yet to be found. The dogs’ too.
When they were able to move the body and actually work on his computer systems, the FBI boys could do little with what they found. The Jenson kid had rigged the system to lock down if it was tampered with. Smart kid. Too damn smart. They had loaded everything up and taken it to Quantico to see if they were able to get anything useful out of it. It would take weeks and Jaxon did not have weeks.
Stopping by the Harrison house to pick up the Pemberton girl, they discovered the folks were thinking for themselves and Jaxon liked what he heard. If they could keep the killer guessing as to the whereabouts of the girl, it would buy them a little more time to track him down. The new message Jaxon got from the killer on the phone bothered him though, and he didn’t understand what was going on in the asshole’s head. The plan had changed. He was supposed to guess what that new plan was. Prick.
If he could think like a killer, then Smith would already be dead. Jaxon’s mind was not quite up to the task of sedating kids and then mutilating corpses, but he thought the killer might be gunning for the Harrison boy. It was just a gut feeling, and at this point, it was all he had.
“Are you going to let me in on the phone conversation?” Victoria said after they had been in the car for a while.
He told her.
“Is that all he said?”
He hesitated.
“Come on, Jaxon. What are you not telling me? I thought we were working on this together.”
He sighed and then coughed in his hand. “I got a little unprofessional with him.”
“And…”
“I told him I was coming for him.”
“So-I would probably have said the same thing.”
He paused again. “He told me Michael was nothing to him and I lost it. I started screaming at him and that’s when I told him I was coming for him.”
“Ah, Jaxon. I’m sorry.”
“That’s not all.”
She waited, staring at him.
“He turned off his voice altering device and let me hear his real voice. He said he told Michael I was coming to rescue him and I never showed up.”
She turned away and stared out the front windshield, silent. After a moment, he saw a single tear trace a line down her cheek.
“I don’t blame you, you know,” she said quietly.
“What?”
“I don’t blame you for what happened to Michael. I know you think I do, but I don’t.”
The air became like a dead thing in the car. Jaxon was having a hard time sucking it into his lungs.
“What are you talking about?” he said. “You left me. You said you hated me and you left.”
“I don’t think you remember things as clearly as you would like. I was out of my head with grief. I said things to lash out at anything and anyone around me. You did the same, but you decided to take all the blame and turn it into something you could hold onto. Something that numbed the pain, something that pushed me away. You drove me away.”
“You told me I killed Michael. You said that to my face.”
“I said we killed Michael.” Her voice broke. “We killed our son and I hated you for it. I hated you because I hated myself! We couldn’t stop it! We let him die and I hated myself.”
He pulled to the side of the road, angry drivers honking at them. He ignored them. “You wouldn’t look at me,” he said. “For days you wouldn’t even glance at me. Then when you did, I wished you would go back to ignoring me. I could see it in your eyes. Your baby-our baby was gone, and it was my fault. And the truth of the matter was, I knew you were right. I had let that monster have our son, let him take him away from me. I thought I was protecting him by going after the wrong madman, but in the end it was my mistake, my anger, my pride that killed Michael. And I hated myself.” He slammed his fist into the dash. “I still hate myself!”