Tonight was as exposed as he’d ever been, planning a take in Emerson Bay. But he was sure, with the ease of the others as reference, that he could pull it off. It was the perfect way to lure Nicole into his world. The perfect way to introduce her to the thrill. Their pasts were too similar for her to be without the same needs as he. So when Nicole came up with the idea to scare one of her classmates by enlisting Casey to take her and dump her in the shed behind Coleman’s, he immediately understood the opportunity. He scratched his original plan to take the girl who worked at the high school three times a week—the girl named Stacey Morgan—who so perfectly fit the description of the latest request. He abandoned that original plan because even more perfect was the opportunity to bring Nicole to his dark and wondrous world. It was a world in which she would thrive, and he needed her there. He had unexpectedly fallen under her spell this summer. She was his perfect match, his exquisite accomplice.
He’d take Nicole’s classmate where he’d taken the others. Deliver her to the cellar under heavy sedation, the same way he’d delivered the others. He’d show Nicole his methods tonight. He’d show her his work and watch the reaction in her face and in her eyes and in the black pond that also made up her soul, so similar to his. Watch her transformation. And then, sometime in the future, when another request came, he would not be alone in his dark world but accompanied by the only person who understood him.
He pulled now into the parking lot. He wore the clothes Nicole had purchased from the Goodwill store, receipt-less clothing and shoes that would leave untraceable fibers and prints. He heard music coming from the beach, and voices from the group of people gathered around the bonfire. He parked across from the Jeep Wrangler, his headlights bright against the spare tire on the back. He turned off the lights and waited. His heart was going at a good clip and he found he was more excited than normal. It took fifteen minutes before Nicole’s text came. Casey pulled the burlap sack from the seat next to him, and grabbed the plastic zip ties. He scanned the parking lot to make sure he was alone. There was a pair of Porta-Potties off to the corner, which had been vacant for the past five minutes after three girls left them.
From the beach entrance, Casey watched the girl walk into the parking lot. She headed to the Jeep Wrangler and opened the driver’s-side door. With the burlap sack and zip ties in hand, Casey started the engine, his headlights washing Megan McDonald and her Jeep in a blinding white glow. She shielded her eyes from the high beams and never saw him coming until the headlights disappeared as the burlap covered her head.
CHAPTER 49
November 2017
Fourteen Months Since Megan’s Escape
It took half an hour to drive into West Bay. Megan gave directions from memory and Livia got the impression that while she busied herself this past week in the morgue, Megan, too, had been hard at work. The last few days had yielded a great discovery, and Megan was willing to share it with no one but Livia.
“Here,” Megan said, leaning forward in her seat to gauge her location. “Pull over here.”
Livia did so, pulling to the shoulder outside an undeveloped subdivision. Two red-brick posts stood next to each other, a long slab of pine hanging between them. Engraved in the wood and brightened by the lone remaining spotlight from three originals was the name of the subdivision: STELLAR HEIGHTS.
Livia pulled to the shoulder in the same spot Megan had skidded her car to a stop the other day when she fled Dr. Mattingly’s office. She listened to Megan tell the history of this abandoned development.
“Erected during the housing bubble,” Megan said, “Stellar Heights was meant to be the western expansion of East Bay. Big homes, wraparound porches, long half-circle driveways. So in came the bulldozers and pavers and back fillers. Up went this giant berm.”
Livia squinted through the windshield at the tall berm, covered by neglected trees and bearded with heavy weed growth that ran as far as her eyesight allowed. It encircled the Stellar Heights neighborhood.
“Up went the gates,” Megan continued. “Tall, black, cast-iron gates that would keep out the unwanted West Bay residents until they moved along, pushed out by wealthy expansion. In came the winding road meant to meander through the beautiful neighborhood. Seventy-nine custom homes were meant to fill this subdivision. Seventy-nine magnificent structures, each five thousand square feet. The builder managed to erect six before the housing bubble burst. No one was buying giant homes anymore. The credit crunch pinched all the people buying homes with the bank’s money. And when the banks stopped lending, the builder ran out of capital. So Stellar Heights, hidden from the world by the giant berm, was forgotten by all and sat abandoned for the last several years. Until a county ordinance a few months ago came through demanding the destruction of the six abandoned homes and the ghost town they sat in.”
Livia watched as Megan opened the passenger-side door and walked past the Stellar Heights sign and to the tall, black gate. Highlighted by the car’s headlights, Megan looked like a ghost floating toward the haunted town. She pushed the gates, which yawned open from the middle. The effect was dramatic and eerie, as if something sinister had just been released from within. Beyond the gates, through the mouth of the berm, blackness waited.
Megan sat back in the passenger seat and closed the door. “Let’s go,” she said. “I need to know for sure.”
“Megan,” Livia said. “Maybe we should call someone. Your dad, or someone to meet us here. If you think this is the place you were kept.”
“I don’t think. I know.”
Megan pointed forward, into the darkness of the abandoned subdivision. Livia thought of calling Kent Chapple to meet them out here. She knew he’d come in an instant if Livia asked. She thought of calling 911, but her mind stalled on what, exactly, she’d say was the emergency.
After a moment, she released the break and they slowly drifted past the gates and into Stellar Heights.
CHAPTER 50
August 2016
The Night of the Abduction
Nicole followed Casey as he drove from the beach parking lot. An odd thrill filled her chest from what she’d just witnessed. She knew Megan McDonald, at this moment, was terrified. And it served her right. Everything in her life had been handed to her. There had never been anything to challenge her or derail the perfect cadence of her life from grade-school star to high school princess and soon to college genius and medical-school scholar and eventually a physician who saved the world. No one should get everything they want in life.
So badly Nicole longed to be in Casey’s car, listening to Megan cry and plead. But they both agreed it was too risky. Surely, Megan would identify Nicole, even with the burlap over her head. Should Nicole talk or laugh, as she was certain to do, the ruse would be over. It was a better option to follow Casey to the old brewhouse where the club’s meetings had taken place. There, Nicole could watch from afar and muffle her laughs as Casey dumped her in the shed and slid the heavy latch down across the door. The same shed the club had used for Nicole’s initiation weeks before.
When they finally let Megan go, it would take the princess an hour to find her way out of the Cove, and though Nicole would never have the satisfaction of telling Megan she had been the one who organized the prank, she would certainly enjoy the aftermath. Matt could comfort her all the way to Duke.
“Where the hell are you going?” Nicole said to herself when Casey turned left at Junction Avenue and headed to the other end of West Bay. The old Coleman’s Brewery building was in the other direction.
She picked up her phone and called him. He didn’t answer.
CHAPTER 51