Max knocked on the half-open door to Michael’s hospital room, then stuck his head inside when he heard the old man answer.
“Max, my boy!” he said with a warm smile. “Come on in, I want to show you something.”
Max pulled up a chair next to Michael’s bedside. Each time Max visited him, the Carressa Industries CFO was in good spirits despite having lost his left arm below the elbow in the explosion. “I finally have an excuse to not go to work,” Michael had told Max in his typical tongue-in-cheek fashion. If only Max could borrow some of that bottomless joy.
Michael held his phone up for Max to see, on its screen a picture of a prosthetic arm with a gold hook for a hand. “This one is made by a guy in Belgium. Nothing says ‘classy yet humble’ like a simple artisan prosthesis. I could have gone with the diamond-encrusted hook, or the hand made of white rhino horn. What do you think? Does it bring out my eyes?”
“It’s nice,” Max said with as much enthusiasm as he could muster, which was none at all.
Michael took a good look at Max for the first time since he’d walked in, then frowned. “Holy shit, boy. What the hell happened to you?”
Max swallowed hard as he felt something begin to unravel inside him. “Lydia was hurt in that toy store accident today.”
Michael’s face contorted from mild to deep concern. “Jesus Christ. I’m so sorry. How is she?”
“Some debris hit her in the head and knocked her out for a while, but she’s awake and okay now. Well, she’s asleep at the moment, but it’s normal sleep. The doctors say she’ll probably be fine.”
Michael put a comforting hand on Max’s slumped shoulder. “You have shit for luck, you know that?”
“It’s not bad luck. Someone is coming after us.”
“If you think that’s true, you should go to the police.”
“We don’t have any real evidence. They won’t believe us, and we don’t trust them.” Max rolled up his shirtsleeve, running his fingers over the Julia fractal tattoo. “The Julia set of equations changes drastically with only small perturbations in variables—it’s chaotic. But there’s an opposite set, which repeats and doesn’t change when the variables change—the Fatou set.” He rolled up his other sleeve and looked at the Davis-Knuth set—the twin dragon. Their vulnerable children. “Val thinks she can deal with it herself, but I don’t think so. Not this time.”
“Why don’t you help her then?”
Max’s throat tightened as tears built in his eyes. His hands fell to his lap. “I can’t help her,” he said, the words like little razor blades in his mouth. “She’s so angry. I can’t convince her to prioritize saving us over hurting our enemies, and I’m losing her. She asked me why I’m not angry like she is. I’m not angry because I’m scared. I’m losing her and I’m scared.” A sob worked its way up his throat. “I’m scared—”
Uncontrollable sorrow spilled out of him, and he buried his head in his hands and cried like he hadn’t done since his mother died twenty years ago. Everything he’d been holding in came out—the pain of those poor people who’d died in the Thornton Building explosion, the devastation of Michael’s horrific injury, the shameful brutality he’d leveled on his own wife in their bedroom after the memorial service, the humiliation of having those pictures of her and Sten dropped in his lap when he’d had no clue, his terror at Lydia and Simon’s brush with death, his exhaustion with the unending chaos of his existence. He couldn’t face his painful life without her. She was the glue that held him together, the piece of his soul that grounded him in this world. Now he felt himself coming undone, reverting to the man he’d been before he met her, the one who’d existed in a black hole of despair, eager to die.
Without another word, Michael pulled Max toward him, and Max sobbed into his shoulder.
* * *
Parked on the side of the street, Val watched Aaron pull into the driveway of his McMansion-style house in Bellevue. Her whole body trembled with anger as she jumped out and stalked to Aaron as he got out of his car.
Idly sipping a cup of coffee, he did a double take when he saw her walking toward him, then yelped when she grabbed him by his lapels and slammed him against the car, coffee cup flying out of his hand.
“Where is she?” Val growled into his stunned face.
“W-who, Lacy? She’s probably in the house—”
“The woman you’re fucking on the side. Eleanor. Where is she?”
He gawked at her for a moment, probably deciding what was more important to him—keeping up the façade of his happy marriage or his physical well-being. Val jerked him toward her and then shoved him into the car again, to make the decision easier for him.
“I don’t know!” he spit out. “She’s gone. She said she had to leave, and didn’t tell me where she was going.”
“Don’t fucking lie to me. She just killed a bunch of people at the toy store in Seattle, so obviously she’s not gone.”
“She did what?”
Val’s fists tightened against his lapels. “What does she do in Bremerton on Saturdays? Where does she go when she’s there?”
“I don’t know. I’ve never met her there before.”
“How do you contact her?”
“I leave a message on an answering service, and then she calls me back.”
“Call her now. Tell her to meet you somewhere.”
“She’s not going to respond. She’s gone—”
“Just do it!”
He gawked at her with wide eyes, not moving. He thought she was crazy.
“Eleanor just tried to kill me and my children at the toy store. She tried to kill Max with a bomb in the Thornton Building.”
“She couldn’t have done those things—”
“I will kill you before I let her kill us. So you’d better call her and tell her to meet you. Now.”
The only response he gave her was a slight shake of his head. He wouldn’t do it; he probably thought Val was angry enough to kill Eleanor, which was true.
With a snarl, Val slugged Aaron in the face. He pitched sideways and hit the ground. That’s what he got for protecting a murderer. She heard him groaning as she walked away. Max would never forgive her for roughing up his one friend. But she had to try any way possible to get Aaron to talk, her only tangible connection to Eleanor. Now she had none.
* * *
After the hospital discharged her mom, Val picked her up and went home. Leaving Dani to her own devices, Val ran upstairs to change out of her Santa photo-op clothes of a cashmere sweater with leggings and into her ready-to-kick-someone’s-ass outfit of jeans and a hoodie. She knew Eleanor took the ferry to Bremerton on Saturday evenings. If she staked out the ferry, she could intercept Eleanor, and make sure one way or another the woman never had another chance to hurt her children. If Eleanor thought she could rely on Val’s moral compass to give her an edge, she picked the wrong fucking opponent. No one hurt Val’s family and got away with it. Nobody.
As Val pulled on her boots, her cell phone rang—Stacey. She answered, the need to hear her friend’s voice, like a balm on her battered psyche, too strong to ignore.
“I heard a rumor in the news you guys might’ve been at that toy store collapse this morning. Please tell me it’s not true.”
“Yeah, it’s true.”
Stacey gasped. “Are you okay?”
“I’m fine. We’re fine. I mean, Lydia was hurt, but she’ll be okay.”
“Can I do anything for you?”
“Uh…” They used to make a great team when they ran Valentine Investigations together. They’d each take a piece of a case, split up to pound the pavement for answers, then regroup to compare notes and eat chocolate together. That is, before Val went and blew it all up by being a shitty friend.
“Just tell me what I can do to help,” Stacey pleaded. “I—I need to do something good.”
What did she mean by that? “You’re visiting your family for the holidays, that’s good.”
“It’s not enough.”
Val glanced at her watch. Shit, she had to go. She didn’t know exactly when Eleanor would board the ferry besides being sometime in the evening, and the window of opportunity was about to open. As much as she wanted Stacey’s help, she couldn’t put her friend in danger…Well, maybe Stacey could give her a hand in a relatively safe way.
“Meet me at the Seattle ferry terminal.”
“The ferry? Why?”
“I think someone rigged the toy store platform to collapse, and I think that same person is going to get on the ferry to Bremerton tonight.”
Stacey gasped. “Are you fucking kidding me? Why the hell would anyone sabotage a toy store?”
“Because they’re batshit crazy, that’s why. Listen, I have to go try to stop more people from being murdered by a maniac. You don’t have to help me or put yourself in danger—”
“I’ll see you there.” Stacey hung up.
Oh God. Val appreciated her friend’s help, but if another of her loved ones was hurt trying to help her, she didn’t think she could live with herself.
As Val ran down the stairs, she heard her mother ask from the kitchen, “Leaving so soon?” Dani held a cup of tea with her good arm, the other arm wrapped in a cast from fingers to elbow and propped on the kitchen table.
“I have to run an errand. I’ll be back soon.”
“Picking up Simon from your sister-in-law’s house?”
“No.”
Dani frowned at Val slipping on a shoulder holster. “Where are you going?”
“I…can’t really explain right now. It’s complicated, and I’m short on time.”
“Oh.” Dani stared into her tea, the pain of being kept in the dark plain on her face. “Maybe you should bring a knife. They’re less…loud.”
Val walked to her mom and put a hand on Dani’s shoulder. When Dani lifted her gaze, Val said, “I’m sorry, Mom. It really is a long story. But I want to thank you for what you did for Lydia today. If you hadn’t been there, she might have died.” Val choked up at the thought. “I can’t thank you enough. I mean that.”
Laying her hand on top of Val’s, Dani smiled. “We’re family. You would’ve done the same for me.”
No, Val wasn’t sure she would have. Not before that morning anyway. Now maybe.
“I’ll be back soon, I promise.” Val threw on a leather jacket over her hooded sweatshirt and headed for the carport.
“I love you, pumpkin,” Dani said as Val was walking out the door.
Val stopped and looked back. She didn’t know what to say. I love you, too, Mom. The words wouldn’t come out. It didn’t feel right yet. Val lowered her head and walked away. For that moment, it was the only response she could honestly give.