Deadly Obsession (A Brown and de Luca Novel Book 4) (15 page)

As soon as the lights went out, Joshua surged off his cot, smashing himself against Jeremy, who hugged him tight. Josh was shaking. Gosh, he must be scared.

Still holding his brother close, Jeremy moved toward the front door and looked out through the dingy glass. His mother was out there, standing in the rain and having an animated conversation with no one. She was slipping.

“Mom’s crazy, Jere,” Joshua whispered. “She’s
crazy.
I love her and everything, but—”

“It’s not her fault. Her brain is sick.”

“I know that, I just don’t want to be here. We’ve got to go, Jere.”

“Not yet.”

“Why?”

“’Cause I’m gonna try to talk to her first. Try to get her to take us back on her own.”

“But I want to go
now.
”

“We’ll have a better chance if we can get her to take us to a town. Look, if we run away and she catches us again...it might get bad.”

“You think...you think she’d hurt us?”

“I don’t think so. But just in case, we don’t want to do anything to upset her. We’re gonna do everything she says, and be respectful and nice to her. Just keep her calm until we have our chance. Understand?”

“I guess.”

“Just hang in there a little longer, okay, Josh?”

“Okay.”

“Here she comes, get back in bed now.”

Josh did as he was told. Jeremy’s eyes hadn’t adjusted to the darkness yet, but he could hear his little brother scrambling onto the cot. A hint of some musty scent floated into the air when he burrowed beneath the covers. Then the door opened and Marie came inside.

“Jeremy?”

“I’m right here, Mom.” He was already in the process of lighting one of the old kerosene lanterns on the mantel, feeling his way through the process. It didn’t take him long.

“Where’s Joshua?”

“He’s in bed. Let him sleep, it’s been a hard day for him.” Jere turned to face her and held up the lamp, so its glow spilled onto Joshua’s head. He’d turned to face the wall. Jeremy knew he was awake but hoped his mother would buy that the kid was asleep and not pester him.

He poured the last cup of coffee out of the stove-top percolator, set it on the wooden table and sat down. “Sit down, Mom. We need to talk.”

“My goodness, don’t you sound all grown-up?”

“That’s because I am. I’m graduating next weekend. You remember that, right?”

“Of course I do.” She sank into the chair, took the cup, sipped the coffee, but didn’t seem to be tasting it. “I’ve been trying to get them to let me out so I can be there, but they just don’t listen.”

“You’re not well, Mom.”

She sniffled. “I’m not as sick as they think I am.”

“Yeah. I can see that.” He knew it was better not to antagonize or challenge her, and he intended to do just what he’d told his brother to do. Placate her and try to keep her calm. “But I thought it was a pretty good hospital. When we visited you, it was peaceful there. Green and sunny.”

“It’s a prison. And they give me meds, and I can’t talk to your father anymore.”

Jeremy lifted his eyebrows, opened his mouth, closed it again, then whispered, “Is that who you were talking to outside just now?”

She met his eyes, then smiled. It was a wide smile, but not a happy one. It didn’t match the haunted look in her eyes. “Yeah. He came back. It’s been so long.”

“That’s great, Mom.” He reached across the table and put his hand over hers. “So how long do we have to hole up here, do you think?”

She pulled her hand away, shot a look in Josh’s direction.

“He’s okay,” Jeremy reassured her. “He’s sleeping. But he still has school. And I have graduation rehearsal and—”

“Do you want to be
dead
for graduation?” she shouted, jumping out of her chair and standing over him.

Josh sat up in bed and stared at her, wide-eyed, but Jere held out a hand, down low by his side, and tried to subtly tell him to be still.

“Is that what you want? Because if we don’t stay here, I’m telling you that’s what’s going to happen! The demon will get you.” She went to Jeremy in a single step and hugged him to her chest. He was still sitting in his chair, but his head was about level with her chin. He caught a faint whiff of sweat and wondered when she’d last had a shower, or a change of clothes or a decent meal. God, she was skinny.

“I can’t let anything happen to you. I can’t. I just can’t, baby.”

“I know, Mom. It’s okay. I know.”

She rocked him a few times, then reached back to pull her chair closer to his and sank into it, all without letting go of him. Her arm was still around his neck, and she laid her head on his shoulder.

Jeremy kept his voice very soft, very calm. “I just...you know, I don’t want Uncle Mason to be too worried.”

“He left you home alone. He never should’ve done that.”

“Mom, I’m almost eighteen.” Why was he reasoning with her? She wasn’t reasonable. Not by a long shot. But he couldn’t lose his patience. He had to be careful with her. “But that’s not the point. You said Uncle Mason is in danger, too, didn’t you?”

She nodded, her face still mashed into his shoulder.

“So shouldn’t we warn him?”

“Of course we should. But I had to get you two. That was first. I had to break out. I had to get a car. I had to save you boys, and then I had to find this place again. It’s been so long. Years.” She lifted her head and looked around the cabin. “I wasn’t even supposed to know about it, but I followed him once. I thought he was having an affair.”

It took him a minute to realize she was talking about his father again. She jumped around so much it was hard to keep up. He could see, though, why she might have been suspicious. His father had been a secretive man, always closed up inside himself. You always got the feeling that everything about him was an act. He was never genuine. You could almost feel him always trying too hard. But for Jeremy that had been normal. He’d decided at about the age of fourteen that his father didn’t know how to act like a normal person, so he faked it. He was always uncomfortable, always super-self-conscious. He was just awkward, that was all.

“Dad loved you, Mom,” he said, because it seemed like a good thing to say.

“He did. I loved
him
, too. That’s why I never told.”

Jeremy blinked. “Never told what?” He glanced toward the cot, wondering if Josh had fallen asleep. He doubted it.

His mother looked at him. “We do have to warn Mason, honey. We’ll figure it out tomorrow, okay? It’ll be easier now that you’re here. It’s hard for me to think, sometimes. I’m so glad I have you here to help me. So glad.”

“Okay, Mom. I’ll come up with a plan while I sleep, then, and we’ll talk about it in the morning. Okay?”

“Yeah. Okay.”

“You should eat something,” he told her.

She looked at him and smiled a little crookedly. “You’re growing up, you know that?” Reaching out, she ran her fingers through his long hair. Then she went still, and her eyes widened a little. “You look like him.”

“Do I?”

She nodded twice, then bent closer, peering into his eyes as if she was looking for something. “Don’t you be like he was, Jeremy. I won’t put up with it again. I’ll kill you myself.”

Jeremy’s throat went so dry he couldn’t answer her. Had she really just said that?

She squinted at him, hard, as if she was trying to see inside him, and it sent a chill right down his spine. For the first time he was afraid of his mother. Afraid she might actually hurt them. He didn’t say another thing, just got up and went to the cot where his kid brother was trembling under the blankets. He crawled right in beside Josh, on top of the musty blanket, and wrapped one arm around him.

“Good night, boys,” Marie called, sounding completely normal again. She went to the lamp and blew it out, plunging them into pitch-darkness. And then she moved around the room, and Jeremy braced himself, wondering what she was doing. Picking up a knife or a hammer to come at him with? To kill him because she thought he was like his father? And what the hell did that
mean
, anyway?

He shifted position a little, making sure he was blocking his brother’s head with one arm, in case she missed. Jeremy knew he had to get Joshua the hell out of here. If she fell asleep, he would do it. He had to. The kid could end up dead here. As soon as she slept, Jeremy thought. As soon as she slept.

As long as she didn’t kill him first.

* * *

We had coffee in the car, and it was good coffee. Moreover, it was
needed
coffee. Then Mason phoned Chief Cantone to get filled in.

That still slayed me. Vanessa as chief. The job I’d wanted for Mason but he hadn’t wanted for himself. It was almost too perfect, the way it had worked out. Like it was how things were meant to be or something.

You know, if you believed in that sort of thing.

Which I never had, even though I’d made my fortune writing about it. Until very recently, that is. Since Mason Brown had come into my life, everything I’d ever known, or even
been
, had experienced complete particle reversal. Is that a thing? I think that’s a thing. If it’s not, it should be. I wasn’t the same, is what I’m getting at. I didn’t know what I believed anymore. I was starting to think that maybe I’d been telling the truth the whole time, in some weird cosmic, karmic way. Not believing it, but spewing life-changing shit to the masses. And helping them.

Sometimes I wondered if I’d been used somehow. Which was both an honor and an insult. I was one pissed-off egomaniac. I had to work through that before moving on to what was real and what wasn’t, and what I made up and what I was...
given.

Jesus, this was too deep for me.

Mason was in soft conversation with Vanessa, so I fished out my own phone and called my place. Sandra picked up on ring number two, so I guess she wasn’t getting any sleep, either. “Hey,” I said. “Did I wake everyone?”

“No. What’s happening? Have you found the boys?”

I heard a plaintive “Mom” in the background, and then my sister said, “I’m putting you on speaker for Misty.”

“Okay.” I gave it a beat, then told her what there was to tell. “All we have is my gut telling me they’re somewhere near Parish.”

“Where’s that?” Misty asked.

“North of Syracuse, off I-81,” her mother filled in. “So where are you?”

“Parked at a gas station drinking coffee. Mason’s talking to the chief, and I’m talking to you. Have you heard anything from your end? Any tips leaking out to the media?”

“I’ve got every TV in the house tuned to a different channel,” Sandra said. “The Amber Alert is going off at least every half hour on one channel or another. All of the Binghamton and Syracuse stations are airing it on a crawl at the bottom of the screen. They’ll probably make it a custom graphic if it goes beyond tomorrow morning.”

“No rampant rumors we can follow up on? No speculation so wild it just might be true?”

“No, honey. They have almost no details. The police either don’t know anything or they’re keeping things to themselves.”

“If they are, they have a reason. Thanks, sis. How’s my dog?”

“Restless. It’s weird, Rachel, it’s like she freaking
knows.
”

“Well, she was there. She must’ve seen it happen.” I shook my head and muttered, “Bitch, leaving my dog inside like that. I find her, she’ll be lucky I don’t—”

I heard Misty swearing, and then the click as Sandra took me off speakerphone. “Insensitive much, kid sister?” she asked me.

“What? She tried to kill my dog.”

“She kidnapped the boys.”

“And I’m out looking for the boys. Aren’t I?”

Sandra sighed. “I’ll call you if we hear anything you can use. You call me as soon as you know anything, okay?”

“Yeah. Okay.”

“And be careful.”

“I will.” I disconnected and saw that Mason was ending his call at the same time. He looked up. We locked eyes. “What?”

“The car she stole has a built-in GPS.”

“That’s fantastic! Did they trace it yet? And if not, what the fuck are they waiting fo—”

“It’s been partially disabled. Marie must’ve realized. It’s pinging every now and then, but the signal is very weak and inconsistent. Last ping they picked up was more than three hours ago, near Syracuse. They’re just waiting for it to send out another.”

I closed my eyes, lowered my head.

“The car’s owner was a psych nurse. Her locker was empty and her car was gone when she got off her shift this morning. Another nurse reported her keycard missing when she arrived for work. And a security guard in the parking lot was found dead. His head was bashed in with his own nightstick.”

I looked up quickly. “She killed again.”

“Yeah. And she was on meds, presumably, when she did it. Meds she hasn’t had for an entire day now.”

“God, Mason, we can’t assume the boys are safe with her. Not with this.”

I clapped a hand over my mouth. That wasn’t what he’d needed to hear. God, how could anyone be so great at feeding people positive Pollyanna encouragement in print and so freaking
lousy
at it in person? I heaved a sigh, racking my brain for something we could do besides sit here waiting for a lead. And then I thought of something and blurted it out before vetting it first.

“Let’s get a map of the area.”

He sent me a puzzled look. “What are we going to do with it?”

“I don’t know, exactly, but I’ll figure it out. This is a gas station slash convenience store slash restaurant. They’ll have maps. Let’s get one.”

“All right.”

“All right.”

So we got a map. Then we unfolded it on a table inside the restaurant, and I got a red pen and made an X near the spot north of here, where I’d felt we’d gone too far.

He watched me, waiting. I got it now. I knew what to do, or else my imagination was making shit up and throwing it at me for lack of anything better to do.

“Are you...you know...getting something?”

I looked at him. He needed something to hang his hope on. So I nodded, even though I wasn’t as sure as my nod was. “We drive south until I sense we’ve gone too far, and then I mark that spot on the map. Then we head to a point dead center between the northern X and the southern X and we head east. Mark that spot, then try west and mark that one. Then we connect the dots, and we have a search perimeter.”