The One I Left Behind (25 page)

“Yesterday’s paper,” Reggie said. “Where is it?”

“I don’t know. It was on the table. The last time I saw it was when you were reading it.”

Reggie looked through the kitchen trash, but the bag was empty.

“You took the trash out?”

“There was fish in there. I didn’t want it stinking up the kitchen.”

Reggie went out through the front door, down the steps, nearly tripping over this morning’s edition of the
Hartford Examiner,
which was wrapped in a blue plastic bag, tossed onto the bottom step. Reggie hurried across the driveway, where she found the tall, green wheeled can beside the garage. She opened the lid, and there, on top of the white bags, was yesterday’s paper, the lead story neatly cut out of it.

So either someone came into the house, cut out the article, and gave it to Vera, or it was Lorraine. Or maybe her mother had sneaked downstairs and clipped out the article herself, writing the warning at the bottom like some kind of sibyl.

None of those possibilities gave Reggie a warm, glowing feeling.

Shit.

Her mind circled back again to Lorraine, and she told herself she was an idiot for even considering it. Still, the doors had been locked, and Reggie knew she hadn’t given her mother the newspaper. But why would Lorraine do it? To threaten Vera? To keep her quiet? That would only make sense if . . . if Lorraine was Neptune.

“Impossible,” Reggie said out loud as she tossed the newspaper with the cut-out front page back into the trash can. She looked down at the article in her hand with its ominous message penned in blue ink:

REGINA WILL BE NEXT

She was about to head back inside and make some coffee when she heard a car coming up the driveway. It was a dark sedan, and as it pulled up right behind Reggie’s truck, she recognized the driver. Detective Levi.

“Morning,” Reggie said as he got out of his car. She tried to keep her face bright and cheerful, and not let any of the morning’s anxiety show through. She stuffed the cut-out article with its neatly written warning into the front pocket of her jeans.

“I was hoping I’d catch you,” he said. “When I spoke to your aunt yesterday she told me you were on your way back.”

Reggie nodded. “What can I do for you?”

He pulled a small notebook out of his jacket pocket and flipped through it. “I understand you and Tara Dickenson were close?”

“For a while when we were kids.”

“Not so much now?”

“Last Saturday was the first time I’d seen her in twenty-five years.”

“So you don’t know anything about her current friends, family, a boyfriend?”

Reggie shook her head, looked back toward the house to see Lorraine watching them through the kitchen window. “The only family I ever met was her mom. She talked about aunts and cousins, but I don’t know any of them.”

“Her mother passed away two years ago. And I can’t seem to find any other family.”

“Did you check places she’d worked—the hospital, the hospice agency? Someone there might know something.” Christ, it was ridiculous, Reggie feeling like she needed to do his job for him.

Evidently he didn’t approve either. He gave her an annoyed look. “Of course. Those individuals have already been interviewed.”

“I’m sorry I can’t help you,” Reggie said. She touched the piece of newspaper in her pocket and thought briefly of showing Detective Levi. But what good would it do? He’d probably put them under constant surveillance, have a cop following Reggie wherever she went, and what were her chances of finding Tara then?

“If you don’t mind, I need to get back inside. My mom just got up and I’ve got to go get her cleaned up and fed.”

“Just one more thing for now, Ms. Dufrane. I understand you and Tara were close back when your mother was taken?”

Reggie nodded, felt a lump in throat. If he asked what had happened to their friendship, she’d just give him the standard line—
people change, grow apart, we went to different schools.

Detective Levi cleared his throat. “Can you tell me about Tara’s reaction to the Neptune killings?”

“Her
reaction
?”

“See, I was going through old notes and I discovered that Tara was caught breaking into one of the victims’ apartments—Ann Stickney. The officers who questioned her seemed to feel she was a little—obsessed—with the Neptune case.”

Reggie stiffened. “We were all a little obsessed, Detective. It was a small town, a lot smaller then, and it was the biggest thing that had ever happened to any of us.”

Detective Levi nodded and closed his notebook. “Did you know that Tara spent some time in a psychiatric hospital? Just after high school.”

“No, I—like I said, we lost touch.”

“Apparently her mother found her trying to cut her own right hand off.” He studied her face, watching her reaction.

Reggie coughed to cover up the gasp that had slipped out. The ornate bird tattoo over Tara’s wrist. She’d had it done to cover the scars.

“I’m sorry, but I’ve got to get inside,” Reggie said, head spinning.

“I’ll be in touch soon,” Detective Levi said. He got in his car and started to back carefully down the driveway.

She was heading back toward the house when she heard a strange shuffling noise somewhere behind her. Reggie turned, her body humming, jaw locked, her one ear listening as hard as it could.

The tree. It had come from up in the tree.

A squirrel jumping from branch to branch, maybe?

No.

She heard it again. The sound of something sliding across old creaky floorboards.

Something was inside the tree house. The old tree house was about ten feet up, and the rope ladder was swinging slightly, even though there was no breeze.

Reggie listened to what sounded like footsteps.

She turned back down the driveway, watching as Detective Levi’s car pulled out of sight. Shit.

Holding her breath, she walked slowly to the back of her truck, opened it up, and grabbed the biggest screwdriver she had from her toolbox.

Slowly she walked the twenty paces to the bottom of the tree house, her eyes on the framed window, where she saw no sign of movement. Her legs were rubbery and hollow-feeling, like the legs of a doll. She gripped the plastic handle of the screwdriver with its eight-inch blade tightly in her sweaty palm. Her heart pounded and her mouth went dry, the back of her throat having a strange chemical taste that she tried to swallow down. The rope ladder with its wooden slats rotted through in places was swinging gently. Above her came a dragging noise.

“Hello?” she called.

No answer.

She tucked the screwdriver into her belt like a pirate’s cutlass and started to climb. She tested each step tentatively with her feet, making sure she held tight to the ropes in case the wood didn’t hold. But the rope itself was frayed in places, and she wasn’t sure that was too sturdy either.

Stupid, stupid, stupid,
she told herself.
What if you fall and break your ankle now?

Or what if Neptune’s up there, waiting, knife in hand?

What good would a screwdriver be then?

An absurd thought came to her—maybe it was Tara. She’d escaped the serial killer and come to their old hideout to be safe. Tara, who’d supposedly tried to cut her own right hand off.
Don’t think about that now
. Reggie gripped the rope tighter.

Reggie got to the top and eased the trapdoor open carefully, just a crack, worried that she’d come face-to-face with a rabid raccoon. But that’s not what she saw.

There, about three feet in front of her, was a pair of men’s boots. They were moving in her direction.

Chapter 26

June 21, 1985

Brighton Falls, Connecticut

“C
OME ON, HOP IN.
It’s a heap of shit, but it goes.” Sid’s Mustang had a few patches of rust, but was a kickass car nonetheless. Reggie stood with her back to Monique’s Wish, grateful that Lorraine was still locked away in her room on the other side of the house. She’d taken to her bed since getting the news about Vera yesterday. Reggie gave the house one last nervous backward glance, knowing her aunt would never approve of her getting into a high school boy’s Mustang.

They hadn’t pulled out of Reggie’s driveway before Sid grabbed a joint from the ashtray. He tried, without success, to make the car lighter work, popping it in, waiting, then pulling it out, staring at its dead, cold surface and mumbling, “Fuck.” Finally, he leaned across Tara and got a Bic lighter from the glove compartment, which was crammed full of napkins, ketchup packets, and loose change. Sid lit up, took a hit, and blew the smoke out the window toward Monique’s Wish.

“Fuck!” he yelped again, for what Reggie realized could have been any number of reasons. Sid took another hit, then passed the joint to Tara, who took a long puff before handing it to Charlie. Tara had done her hair in punked-out spikes. Charlie said she looked like a berserk porcupine.

“No thanks. I’m fine.”

“Come on, Chuckles, it’ll do you good. Trust me. And all the great guitar players are total potheads, you know that, right?”

Charlie shook his head. “I said I was fine.”

“You’re not gonna narc on me to your pop, are you, cuz?” Sid asked.

“Of course not.”

Having Sid drive them in their search for clues about Reggie’s mother had been Tara’s idea.

“So I hate to be the bearer of bad news and all, but remember Reggie’s ankle?” Charlie had said the night before, when Reggie finally consented to go see what they could find. “How are we supposed to get to bars out on Airport Road?”

“Not to worry, Chucky, I’ve got it all figured out,” Tara had told him. “What we need is a chauffeur. A man with a set of wheels.”

Charlie had looked blankly at her for a second, then as if the name has passed through the air above them, he stepped back. “Oh no! No freaking way!”

“You have a better idea?” Tara had asked. “Come on, Charlie. Cousin Sid is perfect. He’s got a killer car, a criminal nature, and I’m willing to bet he’s got a sense of adventure. Plus, I hear he’s got a fake ID. He hangs out at those places. I can’t think of a better tour guide.”

“No,” Charlie had said.

“If you don’t ask him, I will,” Tara had said.

Charlie blew out an exasperated breath.

“Come on, Charlie,” Tara had said, cuddling up against him. “We need you. You’ve got crime-fighting genes.”

“Sometimes you really suck,” he’d told her.

“But that’s why you love me so much,” she’d said, kissing his cheek. He flushed.

T
ARA HELD THE JOINT
out to Reggie. “Try some. It’ll be good for you. It’ll slow down all the craziness in your head.”

Reggie reached for the joint and took a tentative little puff while they cruised through town. She’d never smoked pot before, never even tried a cigarette. Now here she was in the warm cocoon of Sid’s car, doing this totally criminal thing, and it gave her a rush; a sense of slipping out of her own skin and becoming something else entirely. It was a little like the way she’d felt with the razor blade in her hand. She coughed and sputtered as the smoke prickled her lungs.

Tara rolled her eyes. “You’re a total neophyte,” she said, and Reggie wanted to tell her not to bother showing off in front of Sid, ’cause he wasn’t exactly the type to be impressed by a big vocabulary.

“Tell me, Tara, does smoking dope bring you better in tune with the spirit world?” Charlie asked mockingly.

“Maybe it does, Chuckles, maybe it does,” she said, blowing smoke in his direction.

“What’s all this about?” Sid asked.

“Tara here talks to dead people. Sometimes they talk through her.”

“No shit?” Sid said, looking truly impressed as he turned to Tara. “How do you do that?”

“I don’t know,” Tara said, closing her eyes to think about it. “I guess it’s kind of like having a special antenna—”

“So now you’re an insect?” Charlie said.

“No, dumb ass,” Tara snapped. “I meant like a radio antenna. A super strong one that can pick up on far-off signals.”

“Can you do it now?” Sid asked.

She shook her head. “It doesn’t work like that. It’s up to the spirits, not me.”

Charlie laughed. “Riiiight,” he said.

Sid started singing, “I got a black magic woman, she’s got me so blind I can’t see . . .”

Before long, they were on Airport Road, driving past the barns used for curing tobacco, their red paint faded, and miles of white gauze netting supported on poles and wires, laid out like medieval tents to shade the sticky leafed plants. Reggie was remembering the flat tire, the sprained ankle. When the giant headshot of the candy cane waitress came up, she looked the other way and held her breath the way kids on school buses reminded each other to do when they were passing cemeteries. As if dead souls were floating around like puffs of smoke just waiting to be inhaled.

“The best cigar wrappers in the world come from right here,” Sid said. “But you never want to work in those fields, fuck no. I did it for a summer. Me and my buddy Josh. You get paid shit. It’s a hundred and ten degrees under the shade cloth, and the tobacco juice is so sticky it rips all the hair out of your arms. Nature’s Nair, man. Seriously.”

Sid rubbed at his arms.

“And fistfights every day, no shit. Some tough assholes there. Prisoners on daylong furloughs, Puerto Ricans bused in from the north end of Hartford, day laborers down on their luck. Some of those fuckers carried guns to work.”

“No way,” Tara said, eyes wide.

Sid nodded. “Totally,” he said.

Charlie made a disgusted chuffing sound and turned away from them, looking out the window.

Soon the road widened to four lanes and the farms gave way to low cinder block shopping plazas, cheap motels, and bars.

“So, what? We’re on some kind of lost-and-found missing-person mission or something?” Sid asked.

“We’re trying to find out what we can about Reggie’s mom,” Tara said. “Maybe track down some of her friends.”

Sid nodded, then glanced in the rearview mirror at Reggie in the backseat. “Tough fucking break, huh? Are they sure it’s your mom’s hand?”