The Intersection of Purgatory and Paradise (21 page)

A shadow moved across the light shining under the door.

Someone else was in the house.

Forgetting about being careful, Christopher crossed the landing fast toward the stairs, keeping his back to the wall. He didn’t carry a gun anymore, and he silently cursed himself for letting go of the habit. He had a cell phone, but there was no way he could use it and keep his attention focused on the door. He needed to buy some time, put some distance between himself and whoever had broken in.

He cursed when a floorboard squeaked beneath his feet. There was a loud shuffling sound inside the far room. Whoever was inside knew Christopher was there.

Before he could make a decision, the door burst open, and a slender figure with short brown hair ran out, ducked low and ready to tackle anything in his path.

Christopher moved to the side to avoid impact, grabbed the intruder by the shoulders, and turned his momentum toward the wall. The intruder bounced off the wall and rolled onto the floor, groaning and covering his head with his hands. “Wait!” he yelled. “I’m sorry! Wait!”

Christopher stared down at the boy, his heart rate finally slowing down as the adrenaline began to fade. “Nate? What the hell are you doing here? It’s not safe to be up here.”

Nate Marshall scurried backward. “I’m sorry! I thought the house was empty, that you and Mr. Heavy Runner were staying in town!”

“We are. Aside from the safety thing, it’s still breaking and entering if the house is empty.”

“I’m sorry!” Nate cried again. “I couldn’t stay at home! My dad wants to kill me!”

Christopher stared at the boy, then offered him a hand getting up. He didn’t want to make any assumptions. Kids tended to exaggerate, and what might sound like horrible abuse often turned out to be a weak threat to ground a child for the weekend. On the other hand, two of Nate Marshall’s teammates had been slaughtered like animals over the last week.

“It’s not safe up here. Let’s go downstairs to the porch and talk about it, okay?”

“It’s safe,” Nate said, rubbing his forehead where he’d hit the wall. “I’ve been here since yesterday.”

“Yesterday? Did you run away?”

He shrugged and shoved his hands into the pockets of an enormous pair of jeans.

“Being up here for a day doesn’t mean the steps are safe. Go down, slowly. I’ll come down after you’re off the last step. If you don’t want me to call your dad and the police, you’re going to stay at the bottom and explain yourself.”

Nate went down the stairs, and Christopher stayed back not relaxing until there was a reasonable distance between them.

“Now step over to the parlor,” Christopher said, nodding toward the small sitting room.

“Parlor?”

Christopher pointed. When Nate was several feet from the base of the stairs, Christopher started down. Nate shuffled into the parlor and took a seat in the center of an ancient love seat.

“Okay,” Christopher said, sitting in a faded wingback chair. “I’ll give you ten minutes to convince me I shouldn’t have you arrested.” He made a show of checking his watch. “Tell me what’s going on.”

“My dad’s going to kill me,” Nate said again. “Can I trust you? I mean, you’re gay too, so it’s not like you’re going to freak out about it.”

“You don’t have a choice,” Christopher said. “You talk to me, or you talk to the sheriff.”

“Even gay cops are overbearing jerks, then?”

Christopher tapped his watch.

“Fine. Whatever. Caleb and I weren’t friends. I mean, we were together. Like you and Mr. Heavy Runner.”

“Dating?” Christopher asked. “Lovers?”

“We couldn’t exactly ‘date,’ but we….” Nate eyed him nervously. “We hung out a lot. We were going to leave together, get the hell out of here and go someplace else, but my dad caught us. He was so mad. He chased Caleb out of the house, and he beat the shit out of me. It was over Christmas break, so at least I didn’t have to worry about school.”

“This last Christmas? Before the tournament in Helena?”

Nate nodded. “He told me if I ever saw Caleb again, he’d kill him. Not that I ever had the chance. I was grounded for forever. He drove me to my games so I wouldn’t be able to sit with Caleb on the bus. He drove me to school after the break, too. I thought things would be fine once school started. I knew we’d have to be more careful, but I didn’t think things were over. But when school started again, Caleb wouldn’t talk to me. He wouldn’t even look at me. Everyone always teased him, but he used to shrug it off. After we got back to school, he was different. And then a week later, he was gone. He stopped coming to school, stopped going to practice.”

“Did the football team practice at the same time?”

“No. But I always hung out to watch him practice. I never got the point of watching the cheerleaders until I saw him out there. The way he could move, the flips, the jumps, the tumbles…. He was amazing. Perfect.”

“Didn’t anybody talk about him leaving?”

Nate sniffled. “Yeah. I talked to the coach about it, and he said Caleb got beat up by some guys from the team, but since he wouldn’t testify against them and wouldn’t even tell the coach who they were, he couldn’t do anything. I tried to find him, I did, but his parents slammed the door in my face and called my dad. When you told me he’d overdosed, I panicked.” Nate took a deep, shuddering breath and buried his face in his hands. “I went to his house and found him. God, I was so relieved I wanted to leave that night. I’d missed him so much….”

“What happened?” Christopher asked, trying to keep his voice gentle.

“I tried to kiss him,” Nate whispered. “I touched his arm. And he freaked out. Eventually, I got him to talk to me, and he told me….” Nate swallowed hard and shook his head. “He told me I should find somebody else. He told me to leave, so I left. And the next day, he was dead.”

“Did you go back to his house?”

Nate shook his head. “My dad sat me down and told me Caleb shot himself. As if he would ever kill himself! My dad just sat there like he didn’t care! He actually had the balls to tell me he was sorry, but I shouldn’t have gone to see him! That’s when I knew,” Nate said, wiping at his eyes. It didn’t do anything to stem the flood of tears pouring down the kid’s cheeks. “That’s when I knew he’d killed him. My dad swore if I ever saw Caleb again, he would kill him. And now Caleb’s gone. And those fuckers…. When they heard about Caleb, they made jokes about it. They bragged about…. They bragged about hurting him. And everybody laughed. Everybody else knew except me. My dad fucking knew!” Nate cried, cramming his fists into his eyes.

Christopher shifted forward, ready to move in case Nate did something crazy. “So what happened to Jeff?”

“I told my dad the things Jeff said he’d done. I told him he bragged about it….”

“Use the word,” Christopher advised. “Trust me on this. Don’t try and water it down, because that just makes it hurt more. Let it out. Acknowledge it for what it is. Do it for Caleb’s sake, if nothing else.”

“Rape,” Nate sobbed. “Jeff bragged about raping him. He laughed about it. He said Caleb had been asking for it. When I told my dad, he wasn’t even surprised. He told me Caleb had filed a report after it happened, but when he talked to Caleb about it, Caleb changed his mind and said he made it up. But the way my dad said it, the way he described it—Caleb didn’t make anything up. Whatever my dad did, whatever he made Caleb say, he didn’t make it up!”

“I doubt he made it up. But he might have changed his mind about reporting it. Being raped is emasculating,” Christopher said in a cold, professional tone. “It’s humiliating, and it’s not the type of thing any man wants to admit. It happens to more men than you’d think, but most victims never tell anyone. At least Caleb trusted you enough to reach out for help.”

Nate shook his head frantically. “No. He told my dad what happened, because my dad knew! Caleb wouldn’t try to take it back, not when it would mean those assholes would get away with it!”

Christopher sighed. His entire adolescent life had been shattered when he’d come forward and told his caseworker his brother raped him. He’d been accused of lying too, and he’d been subjected to dozens of heartless interrogations designed to get him to confess to something rather than find out what actually happened. Their foster father had been a monster, but it was Christopher who’d been made to stand trial, over and over again. And when the constant questions and doubt had confused him, his fumbling train of thought sowed enough doubts in the minds of the investigators that they never looked into his allegations against his foster father. They didn’t want to risk destroying the reputation of a pillar of the community over some wild claims one troubled kid had made up.

He’d been tempted to agree with them dozens of times. If he’d told them what they wanted to hear, there was the lingering promise everything could go back to normal, that he could pretend Peter had never raped him. He could get his life back. For a kid whose entire life had been one long series of pain and misery, the promise of turning back time wasn’t enough of an incentive to get him to lie. But for a kid who’d had a decent life? Loving parents, a boyfriend who cared about him, good grades, and a future?

“There’s just no way! If Caleb really did take it back, why would my dad go after Jeff and Levi? He covered it up, he bullied Caleb into saying it never happened, and when I told him about Jeff bragging about it, he knew someone would find out what he’d done. That’s why he killed them! And now, there’s only two other people who know about it! Don’t you see? It’s just a matter of time before he comes after me, too!”

“Did you see what happened to Jeff Lowe?” Christopher asked, keeping his tone cool.

Even though his hands were shaking, Nate managed to meet Christopher’s gaze. “Yes.”

Christopher thought about the way Marshall had focused on him that morning, almost ignoring the bloody murder scene. At the time, Christopher had assumed Marshall was trying to be a jackass, but Marshall’s motivations were beginning to seem more sinister. If Marshall had killed Jeff Lowe, he might have planted the body in Doug’s garage to try and incriminate Doug and Christopher.

He could even have put Levi Campbell’s body along the course Christopher always took when he ran in the mornings, knowing he’d stumble upon it.

Christopher bit his lip, trying to calm the paranoid train of thought. There was no logical reason Marshall would be out to set him up, and if there had been, he would have dumped the second body somewhere it couldn’t help but be associated with Christopher. He could have put the body in Christopher’s car or out at Doug’s house again.

The placement of the body on the football field was too deliberate to be a coincidence, and the way the body had been taped to the goal post made it clear the killer had wanted it to be found there, wanted the significance of the placement to sink in.

“All right.” Christopher forced himself to smile. “We’re going into town, you and me. We’re going to go talk to Sheriff Daniels.”

“No one’s going to believe me! My dad’s a deputy!”

“Sheriff Daniels is a logical guy. He follows the evidence, and if your statement corresponds to the evidence, he’ll believe you. Either way, your father can’t hurt you in a room full of police officers.”

Nate looked dubious. “I doubt that. He might be shot if he does, he might get arrested, but I don’t see what’s to stop him from actually doing it.”

“Big metal doors, to start,” Christopher assured him. “And if he opened fire on anyone without being able to show it was a justified use of force, he would be arrested. It’s not like police officers are above the law. Almost every officer I’ve ever met takes their responsibility seriously.”

“My dad’s not that kind of police officer.”

“I don’t know what kind of police officer your dad is. But I know what kind of police officer Doug Heavy Runner is. I know what kind of police officer Sheriff Daniels is and what kind of police officer I am. We’ll keep you safe, and we’ll listen to you.”

Nate pressed his lips together tight. “Listening won’t bring Caleb back.”

“No, it won’t. Nothing will.”

Christopher took Nate out to his car and called Doug. It went straight to voice mail. Doug was probably busy going over Brittney’s preliminary report and the rest of the evidence collected from the murder scene Christopher had stumbled upon. “Doug, it’s me. I found Nate Marshall hiding out in the house about an hour ago. The kid’s scared shitless, and you need to talk to him. I’m bringing him straight in. I just hope you’re there when we show up. And if his father is there, keep it quiet. Keep an eye on him, but keep it quiet. Love you.”

Across the center console, Nate was staring at him, his eyes wide with disbelief.

“What?”

“You’re lucky,” Nate muttered.

“Luck’s got nothing to do with it,” Christopher said, starting the car. “If you think we just met, fell in love, and didn’t have to deal with any problems, you’re wrong. Every relationship’s got problems. You can either work through them, or you can walk away. Life is the same. You deal with the shit that happens, and you try to make the best of what you’ve got.”

Both of Nate’s eyebrows rose. “Or you walk away?”

“No. Caleb walked away. What good did it do?”

Nate grimaced. “He wouldn’t kill himself. I know he wouldn’t.”

“Then you’ll just have to take my word for it. I’ve dealt with suicides. It never, ever does any good. People are always angry and in denial after someone they love commits suicide.”

Nate sat back and buckled his seat belt.

Christopher watched him for a moment, half expecting him to roll his eyes or glare. But he just sat there, oblivious. Acceptance would come in time, Christopher knew, but until then, nothing he could say would make dealing with Caleb’s death any easier.

Christopher would have to remember to thank Doug when he saw him again—for having the strength to carry the weight of his secret so long and for having the courage to tell him about it. It was a burden that had helped Doug understand Christopher’s own issues and had helped Doug acknowledge Christopher’s pain without belittling or shaming him.