She checked the street again. Empty.
In the bedroom, behind the window, Valerie hugged Serena as they separated for the night. Kasey saw Serena return to the great space behind the front door, and she ducked as Serena peered through the sheer curtains out to the street. Serena opened the door and stepped out on to the wooden porch, where she carefully studied the house and shadows around her. Kasey huddled behind a trash bin, hiding. When she peered past the bin, she saw Serena go back inside and heard the sharp click of the deadbolt. Inside the house, the lights of the living room went black.
A moment later, in the other room, she saw Valerie reach for the light too. The entire house was dark. Valerie and Callie were alone.
Kasey let fifteen minutes pass before she pushed herself off the wall and weaved across the narrow street. She eyed the parked cars as she passed quickly in and out of the glow of a street light. Flurries blew down in a cold rain and bit at her skin. The roar of the lake got louder, as if it were a large animal out of sight on the other side of the sand.
She avoided the front door. On the west side of the house, she spotted a twisting wrought-iron staircase that led to the upper floor. She limped toward it, not caring about the tracks she left in the snow.
When she tried to climb, she found the metal steps slippery with ice. She put a hand on the railing and dragged herself up step by step. The effort exhausted her, and the openness of the iron frame made her light-headed when she looked down. By the time she reached the top, she had to stop to let her vertigo subside.
She looked down at her feet. Drops of blood dotted the snow like cherries.
Kasey tugged the sleeve of her coat over her hand and punched the small chambered window near the doorknob. The window shattered with a low, musical crash. Glass sprayed on to the floor. She bent down to the broken window and listened for noise from the floor below. When she heard nothing, she reached through the hole for the doorknob, undid the lock, and let herself inside the house.
The attic level was dark and cold. Nails hung down like teeth from the wooden beams in the ceiling. The unfinished floor was littered with boxes and equipment. Through the shadows, she spied a staircase leading to the ground floor, and she stepped carefully over broken glass to reach it. The stairs were pitch black, and she felt for a handrail and didn't find one. She held her breath and put her foot blindly on the first step. Then the next. She swayed and thought she would fall. Her eyes adjusted and she could see the outline of a dozen steps below her, but she froze with every footfall as the wood squealed in protest. She didn't know if the noise would carry through the closed door below her. To her, it sounded loud.
Kasey reached the bottom step and waited. She felt warm air on the other side of the door. Silently, she turned the handle and pulled the door open. She could make out the shapes of leather furniture in the great space. Another handful of wooden steps led to the carpet. She heard wind sucking air up the chimney with a rush. The front door and the wall of windows leading to the porch were on her right. So was the bedroom where Valerie and Callie were sleeping.
She made wet tracks to the door. She undid the lock and opened it, giving herself an easy escape to the street, and she thought about going through that door and walking away. Go back to the car. Drive. Start a new life. But it was too late for that. She had already lost Jack. And Bruce. She wouldn't lose Callie, too.
Kasey stared at the closed door of the bedroom. No light shot under the crack between the door and the carpet. She listened for breathing inside and heard nothing at all. The gun was heavy in her hand. She wondered if she would have to kill again and hoped it didn't come to that. She was tired of death. Tired of killing. Nothing had gone as she'd planned and dreamed.
She reached for the knob and opened the door silently, pushing it inward. On the wall to her right, in the gloom, she saw a twin bed and the humped outline of a body. She took two tentative steps until she was fully inside the room. She lifted the gun and crept toward the bed.
With blinding brightness, the overhead lights burst on and turned night to day.
Kasey squinted involuntarily and thrust her arm in front of her eyes. When she lowered her hand, she realized that the bed was empty. The outline of a body was just pillows lumped under a blanket. When she looked at the opposite wall, she saw someone sitting in an easy chair by the window, staring at her, a gun in her hand, pointed at Kasey's chest.
It was Maggie.
'Put the gun down right now, Kasey,' she said.
Kasey backed away toward the bedroom door, but as she did, she felt another gun, this one in the back of her skull.
'She said put it down,' Stride said. 'It's over.'
Kasey heard the thunder of boots everywhere around the house. On the porch. In the yard. In the great space. There were police at all of the windows. Faces. Guns. She stood, paralyzed and trapped, and felt Stride reach round and peel the gun away from her fingers.
'Serena saw you coming, Kasey,' Maggie told her, getting up from the chair. Her voice was hard and sad. 'She called ahead to arrange a welcoming party.'
'Oh, my God,' Kasey murmured. 'Oh, God, no.'
Stride yanked her hands behind her, and she felt him clamp cuffs tightly round her wrists. He pulled her on her heels out of the bedroom. She let him drag her, and then she couldn't feel her legs anymore or support her weight. She toppled backward into Stride's chest. Her body collapsed in on itself. She felt him holding her under her shoulders and easing her on to the floor, and when she stared at the ceiling, she saw all of their faces going in and out of focus as they looked down at her. Stride. Maggie. Police in uniform.
Somewhere in her head, she heard Stride say, 'She's lost a lot of blood. Get an ambulance down here.'
She tried to get up, and hands gently pushed her down. The room spun and floated lazily away from her, carrying her down a river. She watched bodies come and go in a blur of motion, and among all the people crowding around her, she saw a new face. Valerie Glenn. Serena was behind her in the brightly lit living room, holding Callie. Kasey saw Valerie staring at her the way a mourner stares at a grave, and she wanted to say something, wanted to explain, wanted to scream, but she was lost in the fog.
Valerie said aloud, 'Does anyone know what her child's name was?'
Jack, Kasey wanted to say. It was Jack. He was my baby, and God took him away from me. Don't you understand? Doesn't anyone hear me?
'Jack,' Maggie answered for her. 'It was Jack.'
Valerie nodded. Kasey saw her squat down beside her. Her face was inches away, and her skin emanated the fresh smell of a mother holding a child. She put a hand on Kasey's cheek and caressed it, feeling the dampness of her blood and sweat. Valerie was crying. Kasey realized she was crying too.
'I'm sorry for what happened to Jack,' Valerie murmured in her ear.
Kasey tried to speak again but heard only the wheeze of her own breath. The metal of the cuffs gnawed at the small of her back. She closed her eyes, but she could still feel the touch of Valerie's hand, and she felt it there, soft and warm, until the sirens drew near.
Chapter Fifty-eight
First day. Last day.
Stride sat in a folding chair in the long grass behind his cottage on the Point, watching the angry lake waters in the early morning. Red clouds on the horizon marked the glow of dawn, but it was still more night than day. His leather jacket was zipped to his neck, providing meager protection against the cold and wind. His hands were in his pockets.
He waited for Serena. He didn't want to be inside as she packed the last of her things and loaded them in her Mustang. It was one thing to know she was leaving, another thing to watch her go. Sooner or later, he would have to go back home, after she was gone, and face the emptiness she had left behind. That could wait until later. He would be working until midnight, catching up on everything that had gathered in his absence, postponing the moment when he returned to a house where the only thing that lingered was her scent.