Heroes Are My Weakness: A Novel

THEO GAZED DOWN FROM THE turret. Annie stood on the beach, the ends of her hair whipping from beneath her red knit cap as she stared toward the cave. A rockslide a few years ago had blocked the entrance, but she still knew exactly where it was. He rubbed the thin white scar on his eyebrow.

He’d sworn to his father that he hadn’t meant to hurt anyone—that he’d only taken the pups to the beach that afternoon so he and Annie could play with them, but that he’d started watching TV and forgotten about them.

The military school he was then sent to was committed to reforming troubled boys, and his classmates survived the austerity by tormenting one another. His solitary nature, preoccupation with books, and status as a newcomer made him a target. He was forced into fights. Most of them he won, but not all. He didn’t much care either way. Regan, however, did, and she staged a hunger strike.

Her boarding school was the sister institution of his former school, and she wanted Theo back. At first Elliott had ignored her hunger strike, but when the school threatened to send her home for anorexia, he’d relented. Theo had gone back to his old school.

He turned away from the turret window and packed up his laptop along with a couple of yellow legal pads he was taking to the cottage. He’d never liked to write in an office. In Manhattan, he’d traded his home office for a library cubicle or a table at one of his favorite coffee shops. If Kenley was at work, he’d move to the kitchen or an easy chair in the living room. Kenley had never been able to understand it.

You’d be a lot more productive, Theo, if you’d stay in one spot.

Ironic words from a woman whose emotions could race from manic highs to paralyzing lows in the span of a day.

He wasn’t going to let Kenley haunt him today. Not after having his first restful sleep since he’d come to Peregrine Island. He had a career to rescue, and today he was going to write.

The Sanitarium had been an unexpected blockbuster, a circumstance that hadn’t impressed his father. “It’s a bit difficult to explain to our friends why my son has such a grisly imagination. If it weren’t for your grandmother’s foolishness, you’d be working at the company, where you belong.”

His grandmother’s foolishness, as Elliott called it, was her decision to leave her estate to Theo, and, in his father’s estimation, take away Theo’s need to have a real occupation. In other words, go to work for Harp Industries.

The company had its roots in Elliott’s grandfather’s button manufacturing business but now made the titanium pins and bolts built of super alloys that helped hold together Black Hawk helicopters and stealth bombers. But Theo didn’t want to make pins and bolts. He wanted to write books where the boundaries between good and evil were blazingly clear. Where there was at least a chance that order would win out over chaos and madness. That’s what he’d done in The Sanitarium, his horror novel about a sinister mental hospital for the criminally insane with a room that transported its residents, including Dr. Quentin Pierce, a particularly sadistic serial killer, back through time.

Now he was working on the sequel to The Sanitarium. With the background already established from the first book and his intention to send Pierce back to nineteenth-century London, his task should have been easier. But he was having trouble, and he wasn’t sure why. He did know he’d have a better chance of breaking through his block at the cottage, and he was glad he’d been able to bully Annie into letting him work there.

Something rubbed against his ankles. He looked down to see that Hannibal had brought him a gift. A limp gray mouse carcass. He grimaced. “I know you’re doing it out of love, pal, but would you mind knocking it off?”

Hannibal purred and scratched his chin against Theo’s leg.

“Another day, another corpse,” Theo muttered. It was time to get to work.





Chapter Nine

THEO HAD LEFT HIS RANGE Rover for her at Harp House. Driving it over the treacherous road into town to meet the weekly supply boat should have been a lot more relaxing than driving her Kia, but she was too wound up from waking that morning and finding Theo sleeping next to her. She parked the car at the wharf and cheered herself up thinking about the real salad she’d fix herself for dinner.

Several dozen people waited at the wharf, most of them women. The disproportionate number of older residents testified to what Barbara had said about younger families leaving. Peregrine Island was beautiful during the summer, but who’d want to stay here year-round? Although today’s clear, sunny sky and bright light reflecting off the water had a particular kind of beauty.

She spotted Barbara and waved. Lisa, bundled up in an oversize coat that probably belonged to her husband, was talking with Judy Kester, whose bright red-orange hair was as loud and cheery as her laugh. Seeing the Bunco women together made Annie desperately miss her own friends.

Marie Cameron hurried over, looking as though she’d been sucking on lemons. “How are you doing out there by yourself?” she asked as dolefully as if Annie were in the final stages of a terminal illness.

“Fine. No problems.” Annie wasn’t mentioning last night’s break-in to anyone.

Marie leaned closer. She smelled of clove and mothballs. “You watch out for Theo. I know what I know, and anybody with eyes could see a squall was coming in. Regan wouldn’t have taken her boat out in that weather, not voluntarily.”

Fortunately, the converted lobster boat that served as the weekly supply ferry was pulling up to the wharf, and Annie didn’t have to respond. The boat held plastic crates filled with grocery bags, as well as a spool of electrical cable, roofing shingles, and a shiny white toilet. The islanders automatically formed a bucket brigade to unload the boat, then reloaded it in the same fashion with the mail, packages, and empty plastic crates from the previous shipment of groceries.

When that was done, everyone headed to the parking lot. Each plastic grocery crate had a white index card attached with the recipient’s name printed in black marker. Annie had no trouble locating the three crates marked HARP HOUSE. They were packed so full she had to struggle to get them to the car.

“It’s always a good day when the ferry makes it,” Barbara called out from the tailgate of her pickup.

“The first thing I’m going to do is eat an apple,” Annie replied as she settled the last crate into the Range Rover.

She went back to get her own meager order from the dozen or so crates waiting to be claimed. She inspected the names on each one but couldn’t find hers. She checked again. NORTON . . . CARMINE . . . GIBSON . . . ALVAREZ . . . NO HEWITT. NO MOONRAKER COTTAGE.

As she searched for the third time, she caught the scent of Barbara’s floral cologne behind her. “Something wrong?”

“My groceries aren’t here,” Annie said. “Only the ones for Harp House. Somebody must have taken mine by mistake.”

“More likely the new girl at the grocery messed up again,” Barbara said. “Last month she forgot half of my order.”

Annie’s good mood vanished. First the break-in at the cottage and now this. She’d been here two weeks. She had no bread, no milk, nothing but a few canned goods left and some rice. How was she going to wait another week for the next ferry, providing the boat could even make the crossing?

“It’s cold enough for your things to hold in the car for half an hour,” Barbara said. “Come to the house with me, and I’ll give you a cup of coffee. You can call the store from there.”

“Could you give me one of your apples, too?” Annie asked glumly.

The older woman smiled. “Sure.”

The kitchen smelled of bacon and Barbara’s perfume. She handed Annie an apple and began putting away her own groceries. Annie called the clerk on the mainland who was in charge of the islanders’ orders and explained what had happened, but the clerk sounded more annoyed than apologetic. “I got a message saying you’d canceled your order.”

“But I didn’t.”

“Then I guess somebody doesn’t like you.”

Barbara put a pair of floral coffee mugs on the table as Annie hung up. “Somebody canceled my order.”

“Are you sure? That girl screws up all the time.” Barbara retrieved a cookie tin from the cupboard. “Still . . . Things like that do happen around here. If somebody has a grudge, they make a phone call.” She opened the lid revealing a waxed paper nest filled with frosted sugar cookies.

Annie sat down, but she’d lost her appetite, even for the apple. Barbara took a cookie for herself. She’d penciled in one eyebrow a little crookedly, which made her look slightly barmy, but there wasn’t anything crazy about her straightforward gaze. “I’d like to say that things will get better for you, but who knows?”

Not what Annie wanted to hear. “There’s no reason for anyone to hold a grudge against me.” Except maybe Theo.

“And no reason why feuds spring up. I love Peregrine, but it isn’t for everyone.” She held the cookie tin out to Annie, shaking it to encourage her, but Annie shook her head. Barbara snapped the lid back on. “I’m probably nosing in where I don’t belong, but you’re about the same age as Lisa, and it’s obvious you’re not happy here. I’d hate to see you leave, but you don’t have family on the island, and you shouldn’t be miserable, either.”

Barbara’s concern meant everything to her, and Annie fought the urge to confide about the forty-six days she still had to spend here and the debts she couldn’t pay off, about her distrust of Theo and her fears for her future, but she wouldn’t do any of that.

“Thanks, Barbara. I’ll be fine.”

As she drove back to Harp House, she thought about how much smarter age and debt were making her. No more trying to patch a living together with puppets and odd jobs. No more worries about a nine-to-five job conflicting with auditions. She’d find something with a regular paycheck and a nice, cushy 401(k).

You’ll hate it, Scamp said.

“Not as much as I hate being poor,” Annie retorted.

Even Scamp couldn’t argue with that.


ANNIE SPENT THE REST OF the day at Harp House. On a trip to dump the trash, she spotted something odd in front of the tree stump near Livia’s hideout. Two rows of short sticks had been stuck in the ground in front of the gnarled hollow at the base of the stump. Half a dozen strips of bark lay across the top like a roof. She hadn’t seen this yesterday, so Livia must have sneaked out today. Annie wished Jaycie would talk about her daughter’s muteness. The child was such a mystery.

The Range Rover disappeared later that afternoon, so Annie left in plenty of time to get back to the cottage on foot before dark. But since she’d filled both a plastic bag and her backpack with groceries from Harp House, she had to keep stopping to rest. Even from a distance, she could see the Range Rover parked in front of the cottage. That wasn’t fair. He was supposed to be gone by the time she returned home. The last thing she wanted was a battle with Theo, but if she didn’t stand up to him now, he’d plow her down.

She entered the cottage through the front door and found Theo with his legs propped up on the arm of her pink couch and Leo slipped over his arm. Theo dropped his feet to the floor. “I like this guy.”

“Of course you do,” Annie said. Two of a kind.

Theo addressed the puppet. “What’s your name, big guy?”

“His name is Bob,” she said. “And now that the second shift’s arrived—that would be me—it’s past time for you to go home.”

He pointed Leo toward the grocery sack. “Anything good in there?”

“Yes.” She got rid of her coat and went to the kitchen. Fully conscious that she’d walked off with his food, she set her backpack on the floor and put the plastic bag on the counter. He followed her, Leo still on his arm, something she found profoundly disturbing. “Put Bob down. And from now on, leave my puppets alone. They’re valuable, and nobody touches them but me. You’re supposed to be working today, not nosing around in my stuff.”

“I worked.” He peered into the plastic grocery bag. “I killed off a runaway teenage girl and a homeless man. They were torn apart by a wolf pack. And since the scene’s set in civilized Hyde Park, I have to say, I’m feeling pretty good about myself.”

“Give me that!” She grabbed Leo from him. The last thing she needed was Theo putting images of wolf pack attacks in her head.

First, I ripped out her throat . . .

She deposited Leo in the living room, then returned to the kitchen. The sight of Leo and Theo together called for retaliation. “A strange thing happened at the house today when I was upstairs. I heard . . . I shouldn’t say anything. I don’t want to upset you.”

“Since when?”