The Devil You Know (17 page)

I dig deeper and find the phone at the bottom of the bag. Dial. Wait. It rings only once before Dad answers.

“Oh, thank God.” The words rush out of his mouth as if he's been holding them there in reserve. “Cadie, where are you?”

“We just reached Gardner,” I say. “We've been on the river since—”

“Are you okay?” The underlying note in his voice isn't
anger. Or even worry. It's fear like I haven't heard it since just before Mom died. Even though he knew she was dying, he was afraid. For her. For himself. For all of us.

“Yeah, I'm fine. What's up?”

I can hear the wrongness in the way the line goes quiet except for the soft inhalation he always takes just before he's about to say something I don't want to hear. But I also hear a tiny hitch in his breath, and fear bubbles up inside me. “Cadie, Lindsey is—The rangers at O'Leno found Lindsey Buck's body this morning.”

“Her body?” His words make no sense at all because finding a body means Lindsey is dead. “What?”

“She was left in the woods,” Dad says. “Tied to a tree with a clothesline and shot, um—she was shot in the head.”

“But she texted me and said she was—oh, God.” I sit down hard on the dirty toilet seat as the tumblers align in my head. Tied to a tree. Like Jason Kendrick. Shot in the head. Like Brian Patrick Clark. By someone with a gun.
Don't give him your heart. He will break you.

“Cadie, are you safe?”

“I don't know.”

“Just tell me exactly where you are.” Dad's voice is calm now. Comforting. And I explain that the landing is down a small dirt farm road off Route 17 between Zolfo Springs and Arcadia. “I'll come get you. Stay put, okay? Promise me.”

Lindsey is dead.

“I promise.”

This time when the line goes silent he's gone, and almost immediately I want him back. I want him to promise me in return that everything will be okay when it feels like my life has broken free from its own gravity and is spinning wildly away from me. But it will be okay. I will wait right here in this bathroom stall until it's safe for me to leave.

Except there's someone knocking on the door, and a lady's voice asks if I'm almost finished.

“Just a second.” I grab Noah's bag, and the contents spill onto the bathroom floor. Lying amid the shirts and shorts is another phone with a pink rhinestone case.

Lindsey's phone.

My heart is beating so hard and fast that I can hear the blood rushing in my ears. Feel my body pulsing with it. What do I do? I can't stay in the bathroom, but I don't want to go out there. The lady knocks again, and my time is up.

I stuff Noah's clothes back in his bag, shove both his phone and Lindsey's in my pocket, and throw the latch on the door, stepping into a world that's grown too bright. Matt stands beside the door. His clothes are clean and dry, and his still-damp hair curls around his ears. There's a little spot of sunburn peel on his earlobe. He looks too
much like Noah, but I'm scared and I don't want to be alone. Exposed.

“Cadie, are you okay?” he asks.

I'm alive and Lindsey is dead. I'm so far from okay that I don't even remember what it feels like. “No.”

“I know today was tough with the rain and all,” Matt says. “But—”

“Lindsey is dead.”

His mouth drops open for a moment. “What?”

“They found her body in the woods at O'Leno.” Those particular words coming from my mouth spin surreal into real, and tears start sliding down my face at a pace I can't control. “She was tied to a tree like Jason, but she was—” I draw in a shuddering breath. “God, Matt, I promised Mrs. Buck nothing would happen to Lindsey. I promised.”

“Shit.” He plows his fingers through his hair. “I should have seen this coming. I should have—shit, Cadie, I should have known better.”

I wipe my face with the sleeve of my T-shirt. “We need to call the police.”

“We need to get the hell out of here.” He reaches into the pocket of his shorts and pulls out the keys to the Cougar. “Now.”

“Where is, um—where is he?” I can't even bring myself to say Noah's name. My stomach twists as I think about
the night in the cemetery. About last night. How good he was at pretending, and how thoroughly I fell for it.

“He's in the bathroom,” Matt says. “I say we leave now and call the police on the way back to High Springs, okay?”

“My dad told me to wait for him.”

“Do you really think he'd want you here alone with Noah?”

“No, but I promised—”

“Come on, Cadie.” Matt looks over his shoulder at the door to the bathroom. He looks as freaked out as I am as he extends his hand. “I don't even want to be here alone with Noah. We need to go. You can explain it to your dad on the way. I swear.”

I slip my hand into his.

“Okay.”

Noah comes around the corner from the men's bathroom side of the building as we're driving out of the parking lot. I know because I turn around to look. I can't read his expression from this far away, but he doesn't run after us. He doesn't shout or kick at the dirt or throw something at the car like they do in movies. Noah just stands there with Molly at his feet, watching us leave him behind. A trickle of sentiment runs through the evidence against him. How can that boy—the one who touched me so gently, the one whose dog follows him around as if he's a god—be a killer?

Noah jams his hand into his jeans pocket as if he's going for his phone, and I remember it's in my pocket. I pull it out and press the button to wake it up. There's
nothing unusual about his phone. Useful apps. Sensible apps. Weather. Maps. Hiking. Camping. Paddling. Music. Photos. I touch my thumb against the photo gallery icon. I don't know why I want to look or what I expect to find. Maybe that one thing that proves all of this wrong. That will turn him back from monster to human.

The first image that comes up is one of me at the campfire party, standing by the beer trough in my dress and motorcycle boots. It seems like a lifetime ago. I linger over the picture a moment, wishing I could rewind time and go back to being that girl. Or even the one before her. The one who might have stayed home.

I slide to the previous image, and my heart lodges in my throat. It's Jason, tied to the tree, with his head lolled over to one side and tape on his mouth. It's dark around the edges and bright near the middle like it was taken at night with a flash—and it's close enough to see tears on his face. My eyes sting, and I slide away from the photo, not wanting to look any longer.

The next photo brings fresh bile into my throat. Same pose. Clothesline. Duct tape. But there is a tattoo etched on the man's chest in red and gold—a flaming Sacred Heart like the one in the psychic's vision—and a bullet hole in his temple. I've never seen this man before, but I would bet everything I own that his name is Brian Patrick Clark.

Dread rises up in me as I slide to the next image.

It's worse.

So much worse.

It's Lindsey.

She's posed just like the others, tied up and gagged with duct tape, but her dead eyes are wide open. I close my own but I can still see the negative image of her naked body behind my eyelids. Any doubts I had about Noah shrivel like paper in fire, my heartbeat goes crazy, and salty saliva fills my mouth. “Stop the car.”

“What?” Matt's attention turns from the road. “Cadie, what's wrong?”

I push the phone at him, and after a beat the car slows until we're stopped at the side of the road. The door groans as I fling it open and stumble a couple of steps to the grass, where I fall on my knees and vomit until there's nothing left inside me. I stay there a moment—eyes watering, nose dripping, tiny bits of gravel digging into the meat of my palms and the bony part of my knees—wishing I were safe at home in my room, imagining adventure instead of being trapped in this nightmare. A sob crawls up my throat and bursts out into the air, and all the tears I've been trying not to cry come out with it.

I feel Matt's hand on my back.

“It's going to be okay.” His voice is as gentle as his touch, and I let him help me to my feet. I'm crying so hard I can't speak as he guides me back into the car with his
arm around my shoulder. Matt fastens my seat belt and closes my door, then walks around the front of the car, his fingers pressing numbers on Noah's phone. Calling the police.

A couple of minutes later he gets in the car and negotiates the Cougar back on the road. “Noah is stuck at the landing without a car,” he says. “And the sheriff's department is sending a deputy. He can't hurt us, Cadie. It's going to be okay.”

“Don't they need to question us or something?”

“I gave them our names.” Matt steers the Cougar back onto the road, and we head north on Route 17. “The officer said they'd contact us if they need us to give statements.” He hands me back the phone, and I call home. There's no answer on the landline, but Dad is probably on his way so I dial his cell phone. It goes straight to voice mail.

“Hey, it's me,” I say. “I know I promised to wait for you, but I didn't feel safe. I'm on my way home.”

To the west of us lies the river we just paddled, as Matt and I head toward Zolfo Springs. If I never visit this part of the state again it will be too soon, and the anticipation of going home makes me cry all over again.

By the time he pulls into a gas station, my whole body hurts and my eyes are thick and swollen. I lean my head against the window as Matt pumps gas, and I try to imagine my little brother's smile. Justin's true-blue eyes. My
mom's face. Anything to keep from closing my eyes and seeing Lindsey's lifeless stare. Anything to keep from thinking about how terrified she must have been just before Noah shot her in the head.

“Here.” Matt hands me a paper coffee cup as he drops back into the driver's seat. “Hot chocolate. Thought it might make you feel better.”

“Thank you.” The first sip scalds my tongue, but I'm so numb with sadness that I don't even care. The engine turns over with a growl and again we're back on the road. “Did you know he was capable of doing something like this?”

Matt sighs and takes a drink of coffee, his eyes fastened on the road ahead. Reflexively, I mimic the gesture and burn my tongue again. A tear leaks out of my left eye. When it reaches my chin, I use my shoulder to wipe it away. “My family—” he says finally. “We all knew Noah was capable of something like this, but we were fooled into believing he had it under control.”

“Had what under control?”

“On paper they call it antisocial behavior disorder,” Matt says. “He lacks impulse control. He lacks empathy. But what it means is that he's—well, he's a sociopath.”

“Why—” As if this nightmare couldn't get any worse, I feel like my brain just exploded inside my head; my
thoughts are a scrambled mess. “Why would you even hang out with him?”

“I thought—”

“You saw what happened to Jason,” I interrupt. “And you didn't immediately suspect Noah? Or maybe you did and failed to mention it. Either way, you just let Lindsey and me come along knowing Noah was dangerous. Why would you
do
that?”

“He's my cousin,” Matt says quietly. “My friend. He's been like normal for so long that I wanted to believe he was okay. And I wanted—I don't know. I wanted you around, even if you didn't like me the way you liked him.”

“Lindsey is dead and here I am.” I hold up my arms like I'm a game show prize. “Was it worth it?”

“Cadie, don't—”

“Don't what? Don't feel guilty because I dragged Lindsey into all this and your cousin murdered her? Don't feel like an idiot because I had sex with him? Don't feel too stupid for words that I'm still in the car with the guy who knew something like this could happen and didn't do anything about it?”

“Look, you think I'm not completely freaked out?” Matt's voice is sharp. He runs his fingers up through his hair, and his driving hand squeezes the steering wheel. “Do you think I want to admit that someone who lived in my house, ate breakfast at our kitchen table, played with
my little sister, and slept in the bedroom next to mine could actually kill someone? Fuck no, Cadie. I wanted to believe Noah was functional. And that if I was with him nothing would go wrong.”

“Yeah, well, it's gone light-years beyond wrong.”

“I know,” Matt says quietly. “I know.”

I turn away from him and look at the world rushing past the window as we drive in silence. The landscape appears the same as it ever was, but it's different now. Alien and strange. Or maybe that's just me. I drink more hot chocolate—no longer as hot—and silently ask my mom to set the world right again. Make this all a mistake. She doesn't answer, so I think about how she used to put colored marshmallows in my cocoa when I was small. Which is an odd thing to think about, but the memory floats warm and hazy through my brain.

“I swore the green ones tasted different.” The words sound like they're being said in my own voice, but it isn't until Matt gives a little laugh and asks me to repeat myself that I realize I've actually spoken aloud. He sounds like he's a million miles away from me and I feel woozy. As if I'm going to be sick. “Stop.”

Gravel crunches beneath the tires as Matt pulls the car off the road for a second time. My fingers feel thick and uncooperative as I fumble with my seat belt. Hanging over the edge of the door frame, I wait for my
stomach to convulse and for the sour burn in my throat, but nothing happens. I close my eyes, and the darkness is a relief.

“Cadie.” Matt eases me back upright. “Are you okay?”

“I'm just—” I blink. God, I'm so tired. “Matt, I want to go home.”

“Okay.” He nods as he reaches past me to pull the door closed, then strokes his hand down the back of my hair. It feels so nice that I want to burrow my head under his palm and maybe put my head on his shoulder. “I'll take you home, Cadie. Just …”