We each drank a beer, and I was glad Austin had said yes to the offer of alcohol. After the revelation of the memory Emmett had shared, I needed something so that I could look both boys in the eyes. It was the pain Emmett had felt, the instantaneous regret even as he made the decision, that was so awful. I’d made some fucked up choices in my life, but never with the coldly calculating brutality I had felt in Emmett. It was how much it hurt him, though, and the fact that he did it anyway, in spite of the pain, that shocked me. There was a relentless drive in Emmett towards self-harm, and it masqueraded as self-protection. That was a nightmare combination.
“Now that you know I’m not possessed,” Emmett said, his voice still carrying a trace of irritation, “and you’ve stolen some of my beer, is there anything else you want?”
Austin glanced at me as he tilted the bottle at his lips.
“I’ve got something to tell you,” I said.
“Jesus Christ,” Emmett said, smirking as he played with the hem of his shirt. “If you two want a three-way—” Austin choked, sputtering beer as he coughed, and Emmett continued, “—you’re dead out of luck. Too bad you didn’t ask a few days ago.”
“Makayla isn’t—” I paused. I knew what I needed to say, but I also knew how angry Emmett was going to be, and I thought of that memory, and the way he had kissed me in my sleep, and that hopeless mix of fear and desire.
Austin, glancing at me when I didn’t continue, leaned forward and said, “What happened with Makayla?”
“She told me you were going to be suspicious,” Emmett said, fixing me with a direct look.
“She’s dangerous,” I said.
“She said you’d say that.”
“Let’s not get started like this,” Austin said, still wiping beer from his chin. “You tell us your side. What did she say?”
Emmett’s face was serious, but as he started talking, an unconscious smile spread across his features. It moved the way dawn moves: imperceptibly, with a slow, steady radiance that transforms everything by degrees. “She called me. After two years, she still remembered my number. I was sitting in your truck, Austin, waiting for Vie to come back with my keys, and my phone rang. I didn’t want to answer because I didn’t recognize the number. I thought it was somebody wanting to ask me questions—Stroup-Ogle, I guess, although I didn’t really think of her name at the time.
“Something made me pick up that call, though. It was like fate, you know? Destiny. If I hadn’t answered—Vie, Austin, you guys saw me. I was . . . I was fucked up. Maybe I would have done something stupid. Maybe I would have just felt miserable. But I answered that call, and I—” He broke off. By now, the smile was in full force, suffusing every perfect line of his face with light and energy and happiness. “I knew what her breathing sounded like. She remembered my phone number, but I remembered her breathing. That’s crazy, right? Maybe you think I’m making it up.” He paused and looked at each of us.
“We believe you,” Austin said, holding both hands palm out, as though placating a child.
“I said, ‘Kay,’ and she said, ‘Em,’ and I started crying. She said, ‘Will you come to the hospital? I need you.’ That was it.” Emmett wrapped his hands together, squeezing his fists until the knuckles turned white, his face a mask of remembered pain and happiness. “She needed me. Me. I was the one who screwed everything up. I was the one who let her be taken. And I’m the one she wanted, I’m the one she needed. I don’t even remember walking into the hospital. It’s like a movie when they cut out parts and it just jumps around. One minute I’m in the truck, and the next I’m next to her, and in spite of the dirt and the scratches and the damage, it’s still her. It’s still Kayla. I mean,” he wiped his face, and I was surprised to see that his cheeks were wet. Surprised and viciously, unexpectedly jealous. “I mean,” Emmett continued, his breath roughened by emotion, “it’s like a miracle, right?”
When I opened my mouth, Austin shook his head at me. “It’s amazing, Emmett. We’re really glad. We’re really happy for you.”
I opened my mouth again, and Austin gave me another shake of his head—this one exasperated, as though saying, How stupid are you?
“Did she say what happened to her?” Austin asked.
“This guy took her. One of those survivalist types. She only knew that his name was Jonathan, and he had her in a cabin up in the Bighorns. The things he made her do—” Emmett shivered, smearing the now-drying tears across his cheeks with the palm of one hand. “Play dress-up, pretend they were married and going on fancy vacations, keep house. She said he made her do other things, too. You know, really messed up stuff.” He fixed each of us with a glare. “Not that I care about that.”
Austin nodded. “What about Hailey?”
“That’s how they escaped. Vie, remember how River took Hailey? We were sure he’d killed her, just like he’d killed all those other people.”
“I remember.”
“Well, I think he wanted to kill her, but Hailey got away from him. They were somewhere outside of town, in the breaklands, and she ran. River couldn’t keep up, or he lost her in the ravines, and eventually Hailey made it to the highway. She would have been fine except the guy who picked her up and offered a ride was this same creep, Jonathan. It was like a present dropping into his lap. He knocked her around and took her back to the cabin where he had Kayla. Remember that guy back east? Where was it—Philadelphia? Cleveland? Something like that, anyway, and he had three girls he’d kidnapped locked up for twenty years.”
I traded a glance with Austin. “I don’t think—”
“Vie,” Austin interrupted, “why don’t you get us some more beers?”
“You get the beers. Listen, Emmett, I’m not saying—”
“Vie.”
“What?”
“Get the beers. Now.”
Grumbling, I crossed to the mini-fridge and retrieved three bottles. As I walked back, I heard Austin say, “So how did they get out of there?”
“That guy was an idiot. He’d made the place pretty secure, but he chained Hailey and Kayla to the same piece of pipe. Kayla wasn’t strong enough to move it on her own, but with Hailey’s help, she was able to knock it loose and slide the chains off. They ran as fast as they could.”
“And when they found us?”
“Right, they ran straight out of the canyon, and we were there. That’s what I’m saying: a miracle.” Emmett hooked the bottle cap on edge of the table and hammered it off. He took a drink of the beer, eying each of us as though he’d won the lottery and wanted to rub it in.
“You don’t believe that, though, right?” The words popped out of my mouth.
Austin groaned, made a disbelieving face, and chugged his beer.
“What do you mean?” Emmett asked.
“I mean, that story is horseshit. She didn’t escape from a cabin in the mountains. She’s been living in New Jersey or New York, somewhere on the East Coast. She’s been fine.”
“Vie,” Austin said in a warning tone.
“What do you mean?” Emmett asked. “What are you talking about?”
“Vie,” Austin said again, the note of warning rising.
Ignoring him, I said, “She flew in on a plane just a few days ago. I saw her, Emmett. I saw her get off that plane dressed like she’d just gone shopping at the mall. She hasn’t been trapped and abused for the last few years. She’s been playing around, having a good time, doing whatever she wanted—”
The bottle of beer shattered against the wall of windows. The shards clinked and bounced against the hardwood floor, and the foamy, yeasty brown liquid sluiced over the glass. Emmett started to rise, and his bare feet squeaked against the floor. His legs straightened with so much force that when they bumped against the couch, it skidded backwards two inches.
“Get out.”
“Let’s all calm down,” Austin said, stretching his hands between us like he meant to hold us apart. “Everybody take a breath.”
“I’m not going to calm down,” Emmett said. “I’m not going to take a breath. You’re all right, Austin. I’m not mad at you. Vie can drag just about anybody into his shit before they even know what’s happening. But you,” he turned his gaze to me, “you are one miserable jealous fucker. I already told you I don’t want to date you. I already told you to move on with your pathetic life. Who do you think you are, coming here, trying to screw this up?”
“You whiny little bitch,” I said, scrambling to my feet.
“You say one more word about Makayla,” Emmett said, puffing out his chest and throwing back his shoulders. “Say one of those fucking lies once more, and I’ll beat in your face.”
“Try it. Try it, you spoiled daddy’s boy. If I take a swing at you, are you going to have your dad sue me too?”
“I don’t need my dad, not to deal with gutter white trash like you. Come around here again, and I’ll beat you so you can’t walk. Talk to me at school, and I’ll—”
“That’s enough, Emmett,” Austin said.
“Then get him out of here.” Emmett set his back to us and walked over to the wall of windows.
“Don’t walk away from me,” I shouted, but Austin grabbed my arm and hauled me towards the door. “Get the fuck off me, Austin. You’re blind, you stupid coward. You don’t even know who she is, and you’re going to let her use you. You’re so desperate, you’re so pathetic, you can’t think with anything but what you’ve got between your legs—”
Austin shouldered me out of the room and slammed the door. I cut off my ranting, and the sudden silence crashed against my ears with the dizzying sound of the surf. From behind the door came a tinkling crack of exploding glass and then a cry of inarticulate rage.
“Don’t say it,” I told Austin.
He smiled—a patient, if tired, smile, the kind of smile you might give after you’ve made your millionth wrong turn, but at least you’re with somebody you like—and squeezed my shoulder. “Probably a good time to go.”
“What in the hell is happening—” A man stomped up the stairs and paused when he saw us.
I’d never seen Emmett’s dad before, but it was immediately obvious that’s who this was. It was also equally obvious where Emmett got his good looks. Mr. Bradley had the same long, lean physique; the same tan complexion; the same delicate, refined features. His long fingers tightened on the bannister as he glanced first at Austin and then at me.
“Austin, are you here to see Emmett?”
“Just leaving, actually.”
“And this is?” His dark eyes locked onto me.
“A friend—” Austin began.
“Vie Eliot,” I said.
The look that passed across Mr. Bradley’s face was hard to classify. Part of it might have been fear, and part was certainly recognition. There was something else, though, too. Something that made me think of the way a cat’s tail swishes when its attention is completely focused on something. Something like a mouse, for example.
From inside the room came another crash of glass, and Mr. Emmett said, “I suppose I need to deal with my son. You boys get going.”
“Have a good day,” Austin said, grabbing my hand again and tugging me after him down the stairs.
Behind us, the door slammed open, and Mr. Bradley began shouting. Austin kept moving, his attention fixed on the stairs, but as we passed the second-floor landing, I stopped. One of the polished hardwood doors was open, exposing a room that most people would have called an office but in a house like this was probably called the library or the den or something along those lines. Bookshelves, their contents carefully arranged by color and size, lined the portion of the room I could see, and a massive elk hide stretched across the floor.
Two wingback chairs in maroon leather stood side by side, presumably facing a desk, and in one of them sat a man. A man I recognized by his broad, open face, by the smile that made everybody think he was their best friend, and by the cold, killer’s glint in his eyes. It was Lawayne Karkkanew: pimp, mobster, and murderer.