“We’re locked in this room.”
“Why did you let him lock us up?” Jane said, still sounding stunned.
“He had a gun,” Perri said after a moment. “And a Taser.”
“You think he would use it on you?”
“On you.”
Jane trembled.
“I can reason with him,” Perri said, trying to calm her. “I know him better than anyone. He won’t hurt me. Or you. But we have to get out of here.”
“You said we’re in a house? On the street?”
“Yes. I think it belongs to the man who called nine-one-one after the crash.”
“James Marcolin? I talked to him. Why is he in this?”
Perri bit at her lip. “I think…I think if Cal was in the car with you when you crashed, he was forcing you to drive here. After what you and David found. It’s the simplest explanation.”
“I wasn’t just trying to get away from Trevor…I was being brought here.” She sharpened her focus, pushed the haze away. “James Marcolin’s involved in this mess with Cal. So…it must be… If Cal was in the car and Marcolin heard the crash, he must have come down, gotten Cal out, then called the police.”
Perri shuddered. “If he left our son to die…” Her hands closed into fists.
Jane took a deep breath, rallying her thoughts. “If he was bringing me here, it was to get rid of me. Or threaten me. If my mother is in on this, she’s receiving and sending money for him through her charity, then…my mother… They won’t hurt me if my mother’s involved…” Her voice drifted off, unsure.
Perri studied the room. A small utility room, washer and dryer and cabinets, a dog’s food and water bowls in the corner of the tiled floor. Cal had opened the door and gestured them in, saying to her, “Just stay with her, please, for a minute,” as if he didn’t have a gun in his hand.
“Cal,” she had said. “Let’s talk this through. Calmly. Please.” She had told Jane she was still in love with him. She felt sick at the thought.
“Keep her quiet and calm. We’ll talk when I’m back. And don’t try anything.” Then he bolted them in. What kind of place had a utility room you could lock from outside? Someone had imagined needing to keep a prisoner in this house.
If he was going to kill us, Perri thought, he could have done it at the lake house. But of course he wouldn’t want DNA or blood left at the house. He wouldn’t ever want the police coming to that house.
Perri stood up. She looked in the cabinets. Powder detergent, softener sheets, a stick of stain remover. A spray bottle of cleaner to treat stains: a weapon. She started to read just how bad it would be to get it in your eyes.
“Jane, we may have to fight. Do you understand?”
Jane nodded. She took the spray bottle from Perri. “We’re not negotiating with them,” she said. “If they come back here, it’s to kill us or to take us somewhere to kill us.”
“Jane, this is Cal.”
“He’s not who you think he is. He killed my father, or he knew about it. He left David to die.”
“He must have thought David was already dead.”
Jane pushed her in the chest. “Stop with the excuses! He walked away from him to protect himself. No matter what you think.”
“Maybe he was unconscious and Marcolin took him up to the house.”
“And he never told you?” Jane said. “He was here when you arrived at the crash site, wasn’t he?”
“Yes.”
“Did you see his car?”
She blinked. “No. No. We took my car back that night. I was in no shape to drive, he drove us.”
“He isn’t the man you loved. That man doesn’t exist anymore.”
Perri’s breath came in hard, sharp spurts. Jane turned to the door, the spray bottle in hand, waiting. She would go for the eyes.
60
THEY MET AT the site of the crash. Cal Hall arrived first, Laurel Norton second. She parked along the street and hurried down the hillside, found him standing where the decline became much steeper, watching, staring at where her daughter’s car had crashed two years ago. The gun was in her purse, but the purse was open and the strap on her shoulder. She couldn’t go up to him with a gun in her hand. But she could reach it fast, even fire through the leather if she had to. She steadied her breathing as she reached him. She didn’t like standing so near the cliff’s edge.
“Is there ever a day you don’t think about it?” he asked her. His voice shook slightly, but he took a deep breath, like he was in a yoga class.
“No,” she answered. “Where is Jane?”
“She’s safe. But she knows about the money you’ve moved for me.”
“No one will believe her about anything once she’s in the hospital, Cal. Please. We just have to drive her there, check her in. It’s a way I can keep her safe and keep her out of…trouble. Until I make her understand.”
“You haven’t been able to manage the problem, Laurel.”
“We agreed.” The fear was plain on her face. “You would build up this Liv Danger threat, you would frame Perri and make her disappear and Jane would go into the hospital and then we could be together.”
“We could stage it so that Jane gets blamed for Perri,” he said.
“I am not doing that to my daughter. No. She has suffered enough. I have suffered—” But then he grabbed her blouse, dragged her farther down the hill, and then his shove sent her over the cliff’s edge. She managed to get her hand on the gun, but he moved too fast and fear froze her. One moment she was on solid ground, the next there was only air and gravity. She smashed along the oak branches, tried to grab at one of them with her free hand, felt her fingers break with the force; then she fell from branch to branch and hit the unforgiving earth. She looked up at where she had stood a few seconds ago, whole and unbroken, and she saw his distant face peering down at her.
But he loved her. He loved her. They were in this together. She still watched, unable to scream now, just a harsh-breathing wheeze. His face vanished from the edge.
She tried to call for help. Move her hands. She flailed; nothing seemed to work. Something was very wrong. She wasn’t even sure her mouth opened. But her eyes could close, she felt them, the darkness coming over her. Were her eyes closed? She thought of Brent, sweet, foolish Brent, and Jane, who was neither sweet nor foolish and now…the fear. Not for herself and the beckoning dark. But for Jane.
61
TREVOR DROVE THE truck along the same route he’d followed that fateful night two years ago. He zoomed past one of the grand houses. He saw Laurel’s red Volvo parked along the road and he slowed, then turned onto the hillside itself, looking for Jane, aiming the truck toward the cliff’s edge. He set the parking brake. No sign of Laurel. No sign of Jane. No sign of the men Laurel had looking for Jane, to cart her off to the mental hospital. This was a waste of time.