The Children and the Blood (15 page)

“Anything about that seem off to you?” he asked.

“Besides the fact she looks like she’s coming down from a world-class bender?”

A grin flickered across his face at Malden’s typical acerbic humor. “Besides that, yes.”

“Seems pretty straightforward to me. As much as can be, anyway.”

Harris shook his head, setting the folder down. “Did you see the way she reacted when you mentioned the diary? I’d swear she’d never heard of it before.”

“You did read the part about mental instability, right?”

“Yes,” he answered tiredly. “But I still can’t get over this sense she…”

He grimaced, uncertain what he was trying to say.

“Is probably trying to play us,” Malden finished. “Junkies’ll say anything, John. You taught me that. Remember the guy on Gibson Street? Exactly like her. Covered in blood from that bar fight and still swore on the Bible he’d been home sleeping the entire time.”

Harris sighed. “Something just seems off.”

Malden gave him a smile. “Come on. Let the feds handle it. She’s their mess to clean up anyway.”

Harris nodded, though his heart wasn’t in it. The addict on Gibson had been one thing. Clear, obvious, simple. This felt like none of those things, and no matter how many times he read the report, he couldn’t manage to convince himself otherwise. Something was wrong here.

And he had no idea what it could be.

*****

The sports car roared down the interstate as though the distance ahead was an insult.

Hours before, they’d left town at the speed of light, and now the highway signs displaying distances to larger cities were finally starting to look familiar. Swiftly calculating based on the miles to Salt Lake City, Cole eased his foot from the accelerator and sighed in relief. It wasn’t as bad as he’d feared. They actually weren’t that far from Monfort.

From the corner of his eye, a white car in the rearview mirror looked like a cop, and he tensed. The sedan rolled by, and the old man driving it didn’t turn from the road as he passed. Exhaling, Cole worked to calm down, while trying not to think about LoJack and all the other tracking devices out there. But those things took time. If he was lucky – insanely lucky – they’d be able to leave the vehicle and get to Travis’ before the police had the chance to hunt the car down.

He glanced at Lily. The girl looked perpetually worried. Her life had shattered less than a day ago and thus far the situation hadn’t improved. Trembling, she watched the world outside the window as though waiting for it to bite her.

“Lily?”

She flinched, and then looked at him fleetingly before returning her wide-eyed gaze to the highway.

“You knew that man was bad,” he said, half-questioning.

She didn’t respond.

“What’d he look like to you?”

“Same as the others,” she answered, her voice barely audible. She tensed as a minivan passed.

He grimaced, fighting the urge to return the pedal to the floor. Miles from Lily’s home, and they still found the two of them. The bastards really were everywhere.

The highway dragged on, with every mile potentially hiding a police car. Eventually, the Rio Dulce river twisted into view to the west, hinting that they were finally nearing town, and when road signs finally started to advertise exits to Monfort, he took the first off-ramp onto the old state highway on the outskirts of the city. In the seat next to him, Lily turned her gaze to the floor, looking for all the world like a smaller version of her sister.

Shaking his head, he pushed away the pain of the memories of last night. He’d gotten the kid out. That was worth something. And like his parents or Lily’s father, lingering over Ashley’s death wouldn’t fix the fact she was gone.

At the intersection of the ramp and the old highway, he paused. Far to the right, a group of storage buildings lurked. He almost turned toward them before realizing that, in the middle of the day, staff would probably be monitoring the property. A bright red sports car wouldn’t go unnoticed for long. To the left, a construction site waited. Bulldozers hulked by dirt piles and massive cement pipes, but for the moment, the workers appeared to be elsewhere.

He went left. Service roads, barely more than tracks through the dirt, circled the construction site. Glancing around, he turned off the state highway and, when they were out of the sight of the main road, he pulled over and then shut off the engine.

“Come on,” he said to Lily.

She climbed out without a word.

Circling around the car, he took her hand. Giving her what he hoped was an encouraging smile, he started toward town.

Scraggly grass covered the ground beyond the construction site, interspersed with clumps of dry bushes. Their shoes crunched over rocks and dirt as they crossed the seemingly endless distance to the city, and when they finally drew near Monfort, he and Lily were so coated in dust, he doubted anyone would have recognized the kid even if they saw beneath her hood.

Gargantuan mansions edged the town on the northernmost side, and verdant grass surrounded each house, clearly showing where the mottled countryside ended and the property lines began. Tall wrought-iron fences sealed the manors away from the well-kept roads, and ornamental garden work screened the majority of the homes from casual view.

With a hesitancy he knew looked painfully suspicious, Cole crept down the street. His gaze swept windows and yards, searching for the first sign of a glowing person or someone who made Lily squirm. At this time of day, the neighborhood was quiet, and though gardeners occupied several yards, no one looked up as he and the girl walked by.

Travis’ house came into view around a curve of the street. An Italianate monstrosity complete with tower, the home had always reminded Cole of nothing more than an enormous version of the Addams family’s mansion, albeit with a better paint job. Motioning Lily to stay behind the bushes lining the fence, Cole walked up to the gates and then pushed the buzzer. A moment passed before the intercom hissed.

“Can I help you?”

“Is Travis home?”

“May I tell him who is calling?”

“Cole.”

For a brief moment, there was silence, and he struggled not to imagine glowing men rallying behind the manor doors. Then the gates swung open.

Taking Lily’s hand, Cole started toward the house, while the little girl watched the gates clank shut behind them. He didn’t look back, hoping his nervousness didn’t show through. The stone drive swept up to the mansion in a lazy curve, with trimmed bushes lining either side. Even though it was still technically school hours, Travis’ truck was parked in front of a garage the size of a middle-class home, next to several other vehicles Cole could only assume belonged to the guy’s parents.

At the broad double doors of the entryway, he paused, and then jerked his chin at the bushes nearby. “Stay down,” he whispered to Lily. “They feel wrong to you, I want you to run, okay?”

Her brow furrowed. “What about you?”

“I’ll be right behind you.”

She regarded him, and he knew she could see through the lie. If anything was off when that door swung open, he was probably toast. But maybe he could slow them long enough for her to get away.

“Lily…”

Face set stubbornly, she glared, but she slipped into the bushes.

He drew a steadying breath and knocked. A heartbeat later, one side of the double doors swung open, revealing a butler standing impassively beyond.

“Hi,” Cole said.

“You called for Master Travis?” the butler said, the tone somehow a statement while still being a question, with an ounce of accusation thrown in for good measure.

“Um, yeah. Is he here?”

Footsteps thudded on the stairway and before the butler had the chance to speak, Travis’ voice echoed through the foyer.

“Cole?”

Jumping down the last steps, Travis crossed the wide foyer and patted the butler companionably on the shoulder. “It’s fine, Preston. It’s Cole, for Pete’s sake. Just leave us alone and go polish something, will you?”

With a conspicuous lack of expression, the man turned and disappeared through the foyer archway to be lost somewhere in the house.

Leaning on the doorframe, Travis watched the butler’s retreating back with a grin. Cole’s eyes flicked down to Lily questioningly. She shook her head.

“I swear my mom’s got that guy wound tighter than a fake Rolex,” Travis commented as he turned to Cole. “She should be banned from watching the news. It just makes her crazy.” His grin widened. “So what gives? I thought you were out of town?”

“Huh?”

Travis shrugged. “They said at school this morning there’d been some sort of family emergency. Real middle-of-the-night panic kind of thing. So what’s the deal?”

For a moment, words escaped him. “My parents are out of town?”

Travis nodded. “Uh, yeah…” he said, clearly confused. “According to the school anyway. I mean, it’s not like I went to check or anything, but they asked for volunteers to take notes for you, so I kind of assumed…” He shrugged again. “What? They leave without you?”

Cole didn’t answer, trying to process the new information. With Vaughn gone… had Robert and Melissa been killed too? Had they run? They weren’t on the same side as the glowing men, whatever that meant, but…

What the hell was going on?

He pushed the thoughts away and forced himself back to the present. Travis wasn’t glowing and Lily didn’t feel anything off about him, or hopefully she’d already be running. They needed help, and he had to trust someone.

“Can we come in?” he asked.

“We?”

He motioned to Lily and she stepped out of the bushes. Confusion and surprise filled Travis’ face in equal measure as he looked between them. Bending slightly, he peeked into the shadows of her hood, and suddenly his expression changed.

“Holy–” His eyes went to Cole. “Dude, is that…” his voice dropped to nearly a whisper, “is that the kid from TV?”

Cole hesitated. “It’s not what you think.”

“My mom’s been watching that crap all day,” Travis continued, staring at Lily, who was inching behind Cole to hide from the scrutiny.

“Can we come in?” Cole repeated.

Travis tore his eyes from Lily and then he shrugged. “Yeah, sure.”

Shutting the door behind them, the guy looked between Cole and the girl again. “So what’s the deal? You into kids now or something?”

Cole gave him a flat look. “Very funny.”

Travis raised his hands defensively. “Sorry.”

“We need your help.”

For a moment, Travis looked tempted to make another joke, and then thought better of it. “Um-kay,” he answered. He glanced around and then jerked his head toward the marble staircase. “We can talk upstairs.”

Cole took Lily’s hand and followed as he wracked his brain to come up with a way to explain everything that didn’t sound psychotic.

He drew a gaping blank.

Travis’ room would have given Melissa a heart attack. Mountains of laundry covered the floor, while posters plastered every square inch of the navy walls. Dirty towels blockaded the bathroom and a massive television occupied a corner, complete with every video game console known to man shoved haphazardly into the shelving below. Speakers hung from each corner of the room, and an enormous brown leather couch took up one wall. Half-buried beneath the spiral stairway leading up to the tower, a few lonely textbooks huddled, nearly obscured by the wrinkled clothes barricading them in.

“So…” Travis prompted as he shut the door.

Halfway to lowering himself onto the couch, Cole paused and glanced at Lily, suddenly uncomfortable with the idea of discussing the nightmare of the past twenty-four hours in front of her. “You got a game she can play? Something nonviolent?”

Travis’ brow furrowed, but he headed toward the game systems. “Uh…” he said, clearly struggling to think of one. “I might still have that copy of Penguin Rally my Aunt Mauve forced on me last year.”

Digging through the games, Travis retrieved the disc and then inserted it into the console.

“Go on,” Cole told her. Lily regarded him suspiciously. “Please?”

She hesitated a moment longer, and then went.

Eyes tracking the girl, Travis came back and sat on the arm of the couch. “Okay, so…” he prompted again, impatience tingeing his tone.

“I watched her family get killed last night, Travis,” Cole said, trying to keep his voice beneath the obnoxiously cheery game music.

Travis’ eyebrows rose.

“After I went home yesterday, my parents brought over a counselor. You know how they do.”

Travis nodded derisively.

“Well, Melissa did her whole mothering act and told me to go to bed, but once I was upstairs, I heard them arguing. The counselor was giving orders and threatening them. He left, I went down to ask about it, and… they attacked me.”

“They
what
?”

“Melissa tried to pin me while Robert tried to smash my head in with a bookend.”

Incredulity filled Travis’ eyes, but the beginnings of a smile pulled at his mouth.

“So I ran,” Cole continued, ignoring the expression. “I took Robert’s car and went after the counselor, just to get some answers. But when I finally caught up to him, these other guys drove up. Vaughn – the counselor – he shoved me into some bushes, and then the others got out of their cars and started interrogating him.”

He paused. “They were looking for me. And then they killed him because he wouldn’t tell them where I was, and because someone called and ordered them to leave, so they didn’t have any more time for questions.

“Apparently, they’d been looking for her family too,” he said, jerking his chin toward Lily. “They wanted them dead, and last night, they found them. And when I overheard that, I couldn’t…” He swallowed, shoving down the memories. “So I followed their cars, but I was too late. Their friends had already started.”

Cole looked up at Travis. “They killed her sister, the one the news is saying did all this. And her dad, and everyone else. I managed to get the kid away, but not before they’d murdered all the others. But they saw me. I don’t think they got a good look at me, but they’re still trying to make everyone think I’m a monster in the hope someone will turn us in.