A horn blasted and she jumped.
Philip’s Mercedes pulled up to the house, and the sight of an old woman driving it made her laugh. Ed was sitting beside Irma, a grim look on his face. In the back seat, Martha and Fergus looked serious and pale. Car doors slammed as everyone rushed from the vehicle.
Sadie waved. “You made it.”
“Barely,” Ed grumbled.
“Course we made it,” Irma said. “You think I woulda missed driving that?” She nudged her head in the direction of the car.
Ed scowled. “My sister beat me to the driver’s seat and refused to budge. We white-knuckled it the whole way.”
Irma swatted his arm. “I wasn’t driving that fast.”
“As long as you made it safely,” Sadie said, grinning.
She opened the front door and ushered them through to the backyard, where the others were waiting for Sam’s belated birthday party to begin. Captured by the sight and sounds of sheer joy, she hovered in the doorway, watching her friends and family.
She glanced at the photo of Sam on the wall behind her.
It was difficult not to feel guilty. Her son had survived while the others had not. She slept restlessly, haunted by nightmares and the urge to check on Sam. She must have gotten up at least eight times last night. Each time, she hesitated at his door, fighting the fear that when she opened it, he’d be gone.
He wasn’t gone… but he was different.
Sam was adapting to his missing finger and toe, and was mourning the loss of Joey, his imaginary friend. But he had other friends now, or so he told her. He often talked about them. Marina, Holland, and the others. He seemed oblivious to the fact that they were dead—had been dead all along. He told her that Cortnie couldn’t see them. She thought Sam was making them up so she’d feel better, but she had seen the bodies. Sarge had made them sleep in the same room.
It was Sam who had watched Sarge enter the numerical code on the keypad that led to the stairs, to freedom. He had memorized the four digits. The night he and Cortnie had escaped, Sarge had fallen asleep in his chair after supper. They crept past him and headed into the woods with no particular destination in mind, until Sam remembered seeing the signs for Cadomin Cave.
The rest was history. Or as Sadie believed, fate.
The trauma Sam had endured left him severely depressed. During the first few days, he was almost a stranger to her, cringing when she touched or hugged him, jumping at every loud sound, and fearful of any man who came near. Victim Services had told her that his behavior was common for abduction survivors. They said it would take time, that she had to be patient.
Then there were the nightmares that would leave him writhing, screaming and sweating so badly that she had to move him into her bed. Even worse were the triggers. She’d taken him to McDonald’s the other day and a teenager dressed as Ronald was there in full clown gear visiting the children. The instant Sam saw the clown he let out the most god-awful scream and started beating on Sadie with his fists until she took him out.
The doorbell rang, interrupting her thoughts.
“Nice house,” Jay mumbled when she let him inside.
“It’s a rental. For now.” She hugged him, catching him off guard. “Thank you, Jay.”
“Yeah, well… you’re welcome.”
She took a deep breath. “What’s going to happen to me?”
“You’ll be fine.”
“But I killed—”
“It was self-defense, Sadie. No jury in their right mind would convict you.”
There was an uneasy silence.
“I wanted to kill him,” she whispered.
“I know.”
She sighed. “What about the two extra… bodies?”
Jay looked as if he had swallowed something slimy. “His own kids. Ashley and Adam.” At her shocked expression, he added, “The bastard dug them up. He couldn’t let go of them.”
Sadie’s eyes fluttered shut. “And the boy in the car, the one I thought was Sam?”
“Holland Dawes. The boy Sarge took last year.”
Blue Adam. The boy who spoke with a lisp and loved marshmallows.
Her eyes watered. “Poor Holland.”
“He was dead long before the explosion, Sadie.”
She nodded. “I know. He was drugged, right?”
“An overdose of sedatives. Like the others. They fell asleep and never woke up.”
Sadie’s heart ached for the children. For their parents.
“You know,” Jay said uneasily. “I always wanted to ask you how you knew.”
“Knew what?”
“That the man who took your son was in Cadomin.”
She looked him in the eye. “Honestly? I didn’t have a clue. I’ve always been a big believer in fate. I asked Sam to tell me where to stop, show me a sign.”
“And what did he show you?”
“A crow, a sign about bat caves… I know that sounds hokey, but as soon as I saw them I just knew that’s where I was supposed to go. It was fate.”
“Fate.” Jay tested the word on his tongue.
She glanced at Sam’s photograph. “I’ve got to believe in something, otherwise none of this makes sense. I know what I saw, what I heard and felt. They were there. The children. I think their spirits were collectively strong enough to bring me there, show me signs, help me find them. And Sam.”
“You gave them peace.”
“So… what do we do now?” she asked.
Jay smiled. “That’s easy. You go out there and spend time with your friends and family. And your son.”
She crooked her head toward the door. “Why don’t you join everyone outside? I’ll be out in a minute.”
“I, uh, wasn’t planning on staying, Sadie. This is for family.”
“That’s just what you are,” she said, taking his arm.
Smiling, she led the old detective out into the sun.
After everyone except Matthew and Cortnie had left, Sadie stood on the deck and peered around the side of the house to the street in front. For a second, she could have sworn she saw a man dressed in black watching her.
She shook her head and he dissolved into thin air.
One day you won’t haunt me anymore.
It was a momentous task fighting the daily bouts of sadness, shame, fear and extreme rage that sometimes hit her at the most inopportune moments. She still dreamt of a scarred monster, of his hands touching her. She hadn’t told a soul about that part—not even Leah.
It didn’t take much to remind her of everything that had happened, and even the smallest thing, like seeing Sam’s book, had an adverse affect on her mood. She decided to put Going Batty away, for now at least. One day, maybe, she’d get it published.
Sam waved at her. “Mom! Watch this!”
He rode his new bike, the one she had bought for his birthday a lifetime ago. Cortnie had set up two small pieces of wood, creating a jump, and he rode up one side, lifted a few inches into the air and landed with a soft thud.
Her gaze was captured by a slow-drifting mist that glided across the manmade lake beyond the back fence. Her smile faded ever so slightly as she recalled the bizarre fog that had haunted the woods near Infinity Cabin.
The fog… and the children.
There was no logical explanation for it. For any of it. Over the past days she had come to accept all that had happened as an act of God. Or Fate. There was no doubt in her mind that Sam had been a conduit for the spirits of the dead children, that he had helped them reach out to her. And he had reached out on his own too. That’s why she’d seen him everywhere. He had sent the crow to her, knowing she would think of bats and the cave… eventually.