I plow forward, calling my daughter’s name. Someone brutally murdered her friends. And now maybe they’ve dragged her out here.
My head spins with all that has happened. Michael showing up in our lives. Maybe an accident. One in a million, but still possible. Michael meeting Joni. Michael hiding his dark truth from her until he realizes she was my daughter. Michael trying to fix it by feigning memory loss, getting me to help him with the retrieval.
A terrible lie, but maybe understandable.
But it wasn’t true. Maybe Michael didn’t know who the true killer was, but everything else has been in his grasp. This has been a way to exact revenge. To ruin my life for being his therapist fifteen years ago.
Maybe he’s after all of us. He’s after the police, too.
One thing is for certain: he wants us to pay. Both of them do, Laura probably most of all.
I call for Joni again as I hoist myself over giant tree roots and scramble up rocks. The trees are thinning, the sky opening up. I check my phone again — one bar!
A twig snaps.
Off to my right, something is moving through the brush.
I panic, ducking to hide in the brush. I wait; watch.
A figure moves through the fir trees, coming toward me.
One arm hangs to his side while he uses the other to swipe at the branches in his way. My heart beats into my throat. I can hide, but any movement now and he’s going to see me. I choose instead to face him, and step to where he can see me more clearly.
“Michael.”
At first he doesn’t react, just keeps moving along with that strange, wounded gait. Then he focuses on me. His look of blank concentration morphs into sorrow. “Dr. Lindman,” he says.
“Don’t come any closer,” I warn. “Where’s Joni?”
He stops walking and looks around. “She . . . She was with me.” His voice has that light, almost boyish quality to it. The bewilderment makes him seem even younger, more innocent. Na?ve. “They came back from the hike and . . . Mr. Lindman was here. He just showed up.”
“Where is he now?”
Michael swallows. He looks at me and shakes his head. “I don’t know.”
It’s only now that I see the blood. It drips from the fingertips of his limp arm.
“What happened?”
“He . . . Everybody was here, and Mr. Lindman wanted to talk to me alone, but no one would let him. He had a hammer. Hunter said it was his, from his shed. Hunter tried to talk to Mr. Lindman, to calm him down. He approached him and . . . Mr. Lindman swung.”
I shake my head. My body is trembling. “No, Michael. I pushed you too hard too fast. You’re transferring things from your past to your present. Superimposing Paul on the man who killed your father.”
Michael shakes his head. “No. He beat up Hunter. Madison screamed and attacked him. He killed her, too. Joni ran, I ran. We tried the cars — he took the keys . . . What?”
“If you’re not delusional, then you’re lying and trying to hurt us.”
“I’m not. I’m trying to explain! We came up here for the cell service. It’s closer than getting to the road. Mr. Lindman chased us. I finally stopped and turned around to face him. And he hit me with it. With the hammer. I think my arm is broken.”
I don’t want to look, but I do. There’s a bend to the forearm that’s wrong.
I consider the gunshot back at the property. Between Starzyk and Paul? It’s the only thing that makes sense. But I squint my eyes shut and shake my head. “No. I don’t believe you.”
“Dr. Lindman, I promise you it’s the truth.”
My eyes fly open. “But where is Joni?”
“Maybe she went back up the trail to get better reception. Maybe she’s hiding. After I got hurt, I don’t know . . . I think I’m in shock . . .”
“Why did she scream?”
“She saw it all happen. Everything. She saw him. What he did to them. What he did to me.”
Still shaking, I open the keypad on my phone and dial 911. It takes a few seconds to connect, but the call finally goes through. Relief washes over me.
“What’s your emergency?”
“This is Dr. Emily Lindman. Two people have been killed. The killer is still . . .” The tears fall as I finish the sentence. “The killer is still here.”
I give the 911 operator the location. Or, someone does, someone in my body, with my voice, operating on her own.
“Ma’am? I’m seeing that there’s been another call, just a few minutes ago, from about the same location.”
“Who?” I’m frantic. “Was it a young woman? Joni Lindman? Hello—?”
But the call is lost. My battery is dead.
CHAPTER FIFTY-EIGHT
I make a decision and grab Michael by his good arm. He needs medical attention. The police will send an ambulance. “You need to get back down to the property.”
He nods, then looks up the trail.
I hear the footfalls and rustling brush before I see the person. Joni! My heart lifts as my daughter comes into view. When she sees me, she instantly bursts into tears.
She reaches me and falls into my arms, sobbing. I hug her tight, stroke her hair. Shush her.
“It’s okay, honey. It’s going to be okay.”
After a moment, the three of us make our way down. It’s a little easier going once the terrain levels out. I find a nice-sized stick as we near the edge of the woods and pick it up.
Once we reach the property, I tell Michael and Joni to get behind me.
“Paul?”
We’re met with silence.
“Detective Starzyk?”
But there’s no sign of my husband or the state police investigator. Only the vehicles that remain.
The door to the yurt hangs open. “Don’t look in there,” I whisper to the kids, knowing they’ve already seen it.
I steer them toward the rental car instead. We have to get out of here. Get away. I have no idea if Paul is still here. The police must be on their way by now. If we leave now, we might meet them coming up the long dirt road.
Paul has anticipated this. I reach for the door handle, and he jumps up from the seat and throws open the door.
Joni screams.
Paul looks like Paul, but he also looks like someone else. Almost unrecognizable to me. As if his skin is tighter.
He holds a bloody hammer. But as he pushes us back toward the yurt, I see a gun tucked into the waistband of his chino shorts.
“Dad, stop!”
“Paul,” I say. “What are you doing?”
“Get up to the house.”
“Paul, stop it. The police are coming.”
Talking to my husband this way feels like an act. Like we’ve decided to roleplay different people. This is real, though; my husband is actually holding a bloody murder weapon. There are two people inside. People he killed in cold blood.
I’ve been covering for Paul, but I’ve also been in denial. That it could ever happen again. That my husband is psychotic.
I guess there are a lot of things I’ve been denying.
My stomach rolls when I see the feet sticking out from behind the pickup truck; Starzyk is on the ground. He’s unmoving. The closer we get to the yurt, the clearer the view of the detective. I can see blood coming from his ears.