When the water was boiling, Lisa brought her tea into the living room. She took a seat on the sofa and patted the cushion for Purdue to join her. The boy galloped over and sat with his legs underneath him. It felt right to have a boy running around the house. Her eyes drifted to the mantel of their fireplace, which was where they kept their family photographs, just as Fiona had. Except Lisa had turned all the photographs facedown when she came back into the house. Seeing them was still too painful.
“I explored the house while you were gone,” Purdue told her. “I hope that’s okay.”
“Sure. It’s fine.”
He pointed at a copy of Thief River Falls on the coffee table. “I found that book in the bedroom upstairs. Is that yours? Is that the one about the boy who’s lost, like me?”
“Yes. That’s the one.”
“Can I read it?”
Lisa shook her head. “Not yet. It’s a little old for you.”
Purdue fidgeted on the sofa. He looked at the book and then down at his lap. “Well, I started reading it anyway. I read the first part, about the boy in the ground who’s talking to his mom.”
“I wish you hadn’t done that,” Lisa said.
“Does the boy die?”
“No. I told you he gets rescued.”
“What about his mom? She’s dead, right? Like mine. You didn’t say that in the book, but I figured that was it.”
“Purdue, this is not a book for kids. It’s a book for adults.”
“What happens? Who rescues the boy?”
Lisa shook her head and didn’t answer. She wanted to get away from the book; she didn’t want to dive inside the plot of Thief River Falls. Not now. Then she heard an echo of Willow Taylor’s voice in her head, and she realized she didn’t have a choice. The more she tried to get away from the book, the more she kept finding herself in the middle of it.
Do you ever worry about someone bringing your books to life?
“Listen to me, Purdue, that first scene takes place in a cemetery,” Lisa said.
“Uh-huh.”
“Does that mean anything to you?”
“Like what?”
She tried to decide how much to tell him. To get answers without scaring him any more than he was. “I talked to a girl who was in one of the town cemeteries two nights ago. That was the night you came to my house. She says she saw someone in the cemetery, and she thought they were burying a body. I was just wondering if that stirs any memories for you. You know, like the boy in my book who was put underground.”
His brow furrowed. “No.”
“Nothing at all?”
“I don’t think so.”
Lisa didn’t sense any deception from him this time. Purdue didn’t remember what had happened to him, and if he’d been injured — if someone had struck him — then the trauma had blacked out his memories. So maybe he’d been at the cemetery and maybe not. There was no way for her to be sure.
“I’m going to say a few names to you,” Lisa said, “and I want you to tell me if you’ve ever heard any of these names before.”
“Okay.”
“Fiona Farrell.”
Purdue shook his head. “No.”
“What about Nick Loudon?”
“No.”
She hesitated. “Denis Farrell. What about him?”
“I don’t know any of them. Who are they? What do they have to do with me?”
“Well, I don’t think they had anything to do with you. Not until two nights ago. After that, I’m not so sure.” Lisa reached into her pocket for the photographs she’d taken from Fiona’s house. She took the wedding picture of Fiona and Nick, and she extended it to Purdue with her thumb covering Nick Loudon’s face.
“How about this woman?” she asked. “Do you know her? Have you ever seen her before?”
“No.”
Lisa moved her thumb away from the photograph. “What about him?”
Purdue’s face changed instantly. He squeezed his eyes shut, as if he couldn’t bear to stare at the man, as if his picture brought back memories of blood and death. Lisa knew. She’d suspected all along, ever since she’d heard about the murder of Fiona Farrell, ever since she’d found out that Nick Loudon was missing.
“That’s him, isn’t it?” she asked softly. “The man by the river? The one who looked like a football player?”
Purdue nodded.
“He’s the one they tortured and killed?” Lisa asked.
The boy nodded again. He still hadn’t said anything.
Lisa had one more photograph in her hand. It weighed hardly anything, and yet it felt heavy. “There’s one more picture I want to show you, Purdue. I think this one may be hard for you to see, but I need you to look at it, and I need you to tell me if you know this man. If he was there by the water that night.”
Still the boy said nothing.
She took the picture, and she covered up Gillian’s face so that only her husband was visible.
Denis Farrell.
The county attorney of Pennington County.
She held the picture in front of Purdue’s face and watched terror crease his features, washing away his innocence, bringing back that night as if he were in the midst of it again. As if they were holding him as he struggled to escape.
He knew the face. He knew Denis Farrell.
“Purdue?” Lisa murmured as the silence stretched out. “You have to say it out loud.”
He pointed at the photograph with a trembling finger.
“Kill the boy.”
30
“It was this man?” Lisa said.
She got off the sofa and shoved the photograph back in her pocket. She found herself moving restlessly around the room, touching all the little objects that made up her past. “He was the old man in charge? He was the one who told the others what to do?”
Purdue nodded. “Yes. He found me by the water. He pretended to be nice, but he wasn’t. He asked me all sorts of things about who I was and where I came from, but I didn’t trust him. He said the police were going to take me somewhere safe, but then I heard him say it to the others. Kill the boy. He didn’t think I heard, but I did. He said it like an order, and then he walked away. He had a limp. I remember him limping when he left the others behind with me. That’s the last thing I remember.”
“Thank you, Purdue. I know that was hard for you.”
“Who is he?”
Lisa asked herself how she could describe Denis Farrell to someone who didn’t know him. Her judgment was colored by the fact that she’d never liked him. She resented the power he’d had over Danny and the way he’d tried to control both of their lives. Obviously, he’d done the same thing to Fiona. Denis expected the world to bow to him, and when it didn’t, he needed to lash out at whoever stood in his way. For most of the past twenty years, that someone had been Lisa. The weight of his grief had fallen on her.
Even so, she felt sorry for him. Deep down, he was a sad old man caught up in his grief, and she of all people knew that grief could change someone. Turn them into someone new, twist around their minds until they didn’t even recognize themselves. It didn’t excuse what he’d done, but she wouldn’t have wanted to walk in his shoes.
“He was Danny’s father,” she told the boy.
“Your Danny?”
“Yes.”
“But... why would he hurt that man? Why would he hurt me?”
“Because that man hurt his family, and he was angry,” Lisa said. “I understand that. I know how he feels. But Denis crossed a line, and now I have to find a way to stop him.”
“How?”