“Two.”
“Two colleges. How many prep schools? Father and I both pulled strings to get you into good schools. He’s not an easy man, but he’s only ever wanted the best for you.”
“What’s good for me is good for him.”
“Just stop.”
Linc sank back into his seat and sighed, as if he didn’t care how upset she was. “I wish you’d start driving before someone rear-ends us.”
“I was proud of you for going to Owen and asking him to train you.” Grace was half crying. “I hope he does. I hope it works out. You can make a difference, Linc, if you’d stop feeling sorry for yourself and being mad at the world.”
“Who says I want to make a difference? Maybe I just want to train with Owen so I can look good.”
“He’d see through you in a heartbeat.”
Linc paused for a beat. “If you admire him so much, why don’t you marry him?”
“We’ve never had that kind of interest in each other.”
“Because you’re in love with a dead man.”
His sister reacted instantly, slapping him across the face.
In the darkness, his face stinging, Linc could see tears shining in her eyes as she turned back to the wheel and pressed her foot on the gas.
“Oh, shit.” He choked back a sob. “Shit, Grace. I’m sorry.”
“I’m not staying here. I’ll leave tomorrow. I have plenty to do back in Washington.” She was crying openly now. “Linc-my God, Linc. I love you. I don’t want anything bad to happen to you.”
“Nothing will, Grace. I promise.”
“I’m here for you. Always. Do you understand?”
Tell her. But he couldn’t. “I do understand. And you-I’m here for you, too.”
She smiled at him, tears still streaming down her face. “I don’t think anyone’s ever said that to me before.”
“I mean it. Grace-I really am sorry about what I said. About Chris.”
“Chris. My God, Linc. I did love him.” She sucked in a breath, slowing in the thickening fog. “We were just never meant to be.”
“Did he ever love you?”
“He loved Abigail.”
CHAPTER 22
I don’t want to think about death tonight.
I want to think about love.
I don’t want to think about violence.
Again. Love.
I don’t want to hear Abigail’s voice.
Love.
My heart bursts with a love so deep and pure and fulfilling that it alone is all I need to sustain me.
So few ever have this kind of love in their lives.
I don’t pity them so much as I stand apart from them.
Separate.
Alone.
Isolated.
All those words come to mind and yet don’t describe how I feel, because they imply loneliness and desperation. Incompleteness. But I am not lonely or desperate or incomplete.
Because of my love.
I love.
It’s not just a state of being but of action.
Love as a verb.
I’ve lied. I’ve misled. I’ve cried. I’ve killed.
Ways of loving. All of them.
I feel so free, writing in this stream of consciousness manner. Allowing myself to put aside all my inhibitions.
I don’t want to kill again but to say I won’t is to say my ability to love has weakened.
And it hasn’t.
It won’t.
Not ever.
CHAPTER 23
Wherever Mattie was, he’d be there through the night. Abigail didn’t like the idea, but who did? The warm day had turned cool with nightfall and the fog. If he didn’t have proper attire, a good blanket, water, food-if he panicked and got lost, or kept running in the woods-then anything could happen.
She watched Owen, crouched down on one knee, build a fire in his woodstove. She’d pulled a fleece throw over her as she sat in one of his fireside chairs, but he showed no sign of cold or fatigue. “If you’d climbed Cadillac and got whacked today, you’d be as wiped out as I am,” she said.
“You didn’t climb up Cadillac. You drove up.”
“I walked all over the summit. And it was freaking dawn. That counts.”
He looked back over his shoulder at her. “The only reason you’re shivering is because of what you have on.”
“Not enough?”
He turned back to his fire-building. “Depends on how you look at that one.”
She gave him a shove in the back with her foot. She’d left her wet shoes at the door. “You know what I mean.”
“You’re in the wrong clothes for charging through the woods in these conditions.”
“And you?”
He struck a match. “I’m fine.”
“Uh-uh. You’re in jeans. Jeans aren’t the best choice for cool, wet conditions. They’re not good insulators, especially when wet. See? Not bad for a city cop.”
The kindling and rolled-up newspapers caught fire, bright flames crackling as Owen shut the screen and leaned back on his outstretched arms, stretching out his legs. His toes were almost in the fire. He’d taken off his shoes, too. His feet struck her as casual, intimate.
They’d joined the search for Mattie, but the trail was cold, visibility marginal. Any sign of him-footsteps, trampled plants-ended after a few feet. He could be anywhere.
“Who knows about Mattie,” Abigail said. “I’ve never seen him in anything approaching clothing appropriate for a night out in the elements.”
“He could have supplies with him.”
“Or he could be shacked up with a friend, or hiding on some derelict pal’s clunker of a boat. He could have caught a ride off the island with someone…”
“Abigail-”
“I’m just saying.” She breathed out a sigh. “I don’t want to find him dead, Owen. No one does.”
“Do you have any clue what he’s up to?”
She shook her head. “I wish I did.”
“Think he’s your caller?”
“I don’t know. The caller supposedly wants to help-” She broke off. “Whatever Mattie’s doing, it’s not helping.”
“Your caller-whether it’s Mattie or someone else-isn’t helping, either. Just stirring the pot.”
“Good point.”
The local and state police and the two FBI agents had all departed from Ellis Cooper’s house. Ellis had pointedly refused to have any cruisers posted in his driveway, insisting to Lou Beeler that he wasn’t afraid of Mattie-that it wasn’t as if Mattie had done anything horrible-if he’d done anything at all.
“Ellis might as well have said I was bad luck,” Abigail went on.
“He’s upset.”
“Jason and Grace weren’t much better. But I only came up here after I got the first call. Maybe whatever Mattie’s up to has more to do with what the Coopers have going on than with me. The appointment, the sale of the house-they could be the catalyst.”
“Could be,” Owen said.
She slipped her arms over his shoulders and down his chest, leaning forward and touching her cheek to his. “You don’t care, do you?”
He grabbed her hand. “At the moment, no.” And in one move, he’d lifted her off her chair and over his shoulders, onto his lap, his arms circled around her. He grinned. “I had a feeling you wouldn’t put up a fight.”
“Fight? I’m injured.”
“I thought it was just a few scratches.”
She draped her arms around his neck. “It is. Traipsing over hill and dale after Mattie didn’t hurt my leg. It’s a little stiff, but that’s it.” She smiled, feeling the heat of the fire on her back. “I just didn’t want you to think I’m easy.”