“How thoughtful,” John said tonelessly.
“We did what we could,” Eli said.
“Sure. And meanwhile, me and my brothers and sisters grew up living a lie.”
“You have nothing to complain about. Marta and I made sure you children had as many opportunities as possible. We even saved enough money to put you all through college so you could make something of your lives. Don’t be angry because you decided to waste yours.”
John’s face was stone. He glared straight back at his father, completely silent. Finally he said, “I was happy when I heard you had died.”
“I’m sure you were.”
“Why did you fake your death?”
“For the past thirty years I’ve been looking for Matheson, and, as I told you, Matheson has been looking for me. Quite recently he and his people somehow learned my new identity and location. They came after me. I had no choice but to kill myself.”
“But you didn’t really kill yourself. Whose body was in the coffin?”
“Remember those two men with us today?”
“You mean the ones who then tried to kill us? How could I forget?”
“I hired them to find a body, one that I could trade off as my own. They did. Let’s just leave it at that.”
“Whose body was it?”
“I don’t know, and quite honestly, I never want to find out. But it worked. At least it did until word got around to Melissa and she contacted the rest of you kids to come out for a funeral. That wasn’t part of the plan.”
“How did Melissa find out?”
Marta sighed. “We don’t know. But once she learned what happened and contacted me, it wasn’t like I could deny it. I tried talking her out of getting everyone together. I even went so far as to tell her I had recently had a stroke and it would be too much. But that made her even more determined to have a proper funeral. So she contacted the rest of you kids and had you come out, and that … that was where they were waiting.”
“Who?”
“These people,” Eli said. “They must have suspected I hadn’t really killed myself. We made it look as real as possible, but again, these people are powerful. They either got hold of a blood sample or what was left of the dental samples or something. They knew it wasn’t me. Or maybe they knew it was me and just didn’t care. But when you kids all came for the funeral, they were waiting to follow you back to your individual homes.”
“If they wanted us dead,” John said, “why not just kill us all at the cemetery?”
“Because they want me. They want Marta, too, but I think they were willing to risk letting her go for the time being. Until then, they had no idea where the rest of you lived. They didn’t know your names, what you did, any of that. But now they did. And they knew that once they started killing you off, one by one, it would draw me out.”
Everything happened too quickly then. Before Ashley knew it, John was charging forward, throwing his weight into Eli and sending them both into the hood of the Buick. Marta cried out in shock. Eli exhaled a large gulp of air as all of the wind was knocked out of him.
John, leaning over him, wrapped his hand around his throat. “You fucking bastard, you set us all up! You made us the fucking bait!”
Eli didn’t fight the hand gripping his throat. He just stared back up into John’s face.
Marta took a hesitant step forward. “John, please, let him go.”
John didn’t move, glaring back down at his father.
“Please”-Marta’s voice was near tears-“we didn’t want it to be this way. We never wanted it to be this way.”
Finally John relented, releasing his grip on Eli’s throat and stepping back. He said to Marta, “Yeah, and how did you want it to be?”
Eli lightly touched his throat as he pushed off the hood. “Had we done nothing, you kids would have become brainwashed soldiers. Either that or these people would have used you in some other way I can’t even begin to imagine.”
“You let Melissa die. You let her family die.”
“What would you have wanted us to do?”
“I don’t know. Warn her. Protect her. Anything than just let her die.”
“That wasn’t a viable option,” Eli said. “Besides, we didn’t think she would be the first one. We … we thought it would be you.”
Ashley expected John to charge his father again, this time with even more rage and fury. She expected him to throw a punch, to draw blood. But he just stood there, completely motionless, his hands balling into fists at his sides, before turning around and facing off toward the valley.
For the longest time no one spoke.
Marta said, her voice hesitant, “John?”
His back still to them, his voice soft and low, John asked, “Why did you even bother saving all of us in the first place if you were just going to let us die?”
“We didn’t plan for this,” Eli said. “We didn’t know what was going to happen thirty years ago. We did everything we could to save you. The rest of it … it’s all out of our hands.”
“But it’s not,” John said, turning back around, his eyes glassy with tears. “You could have done something. You could have warned Melissa. You could have warned all of us.”
“We can’t worry about the wrongs we’ve made. We can only focus on how to make those wrongs right.”
“By doing what? Melissa and her family are dead. Paul and David and Valerie and their families are either already dead or they’ll soon be. So now what do you suggest we fucking do?”
“Fight back,” Eli said.
“Who?” John looked at Ashley, then at his parents. “Us?”
“Do you see anyone else?”
“What about David?” John asked. “He’s only a couple hours away. We should call him. We should call everyone and warn them.”
“We can’t. As soon as a call would be made, these people would have our location. They’d be here within minutes.”
“So what do you suggest?”
“We go to David next.”
Even in the morning shadows, Ashley could see John’s face flush.
“But not to warn him, right?” When nobody answered him, John shook his head. “Of course not. Why would you warn him? He’s the bait.”
thirty-seven
By eight o’clock that morning, we learn that Valerie and Paul and their families have died.
Valerie, who lives with her husband just outside of Houston, became victim of a fire that mysteriously started sometime during the night. Fire crews were dispatched, but by the time they arrived on scene, the house was in blazes. Hours later, when the flames were extinguished, Valerie and her husband were found in what was left of their bed. It was believed there was a gas leak which caused the fire, and which probably stopped their breathing before the hungry flames managed to consume them.
Paul, who lives with his wife and daughter in Rochester, Minnesota, died in a car accident late last night. They were coming back from Paul’s daughter’s ballet recital. The roads were icy, and they hit a patch of black ice that sent them spinning through a guardrail and down an embankment. Their car rolled several times and landed upside down. Despite wearing their seat belts, all three passengers died before police and medical crews arrived on scene.
We learn this news from Marta, who has a jail broken iPhone and has been scouring the Internet ever since we got back on the road headed for Massachusetts. It’s where David works at the Medford Medical Center.
“If they’ve killed Paul and Valerie already,” I say, “what makes you think they haven’t already killed David?”
Marta says, “I haven’t seen any news on his death yet.”
“He and his wife split up, what did you say, earlier this year? As far as we know he lives alone. He could be dead and just waiting for someone to find the body.”
“He’s not,” Eli says.
“How do you know?”
Eli just gives me a look in the rearview mirror, and like that, everything falls into place.