Disturbance (34 page)

He went no further than that, and did the rest of his work in silence. There was a balance to be found, especially with someone experienced with abuse. He knew, from Quinn’s long lectures on the Legend of the Glorious and All-Powerful Nick Parrish, that Parrish had suffered torture and sexual abuse as a child—as had Quinn and Kai although Kai’s and Quinn’s had been at the hands of their stepfathers, with their mothers turning a blind eye. Parrish’s mother had been actively involved, a partner in the abuse.

Donovan reminded himself that all three had long-standing acquaintanceships with pain, providing fuel for their rage.

“Donovan,” Parrish said, “I have a question for you.”

Donovan waited.

“Do you have my cell phone?”

“You didn’t leave it back at the warehouse?” Donovan asked, letting a mixture of suppressed anger and a little
anxiousness creep into his voice. “You know those things can be traced by the police, don’t you? It’s like having a locator button on you.”

“No, I didn’t leave it in the warehouse. I had it with me this morning. As for the locator—how would anyone know its number has anything to do with me?”

“For starters, Quinn—”

“Knows nothing about this particular phone.”

“Well, that’s a relief. But what about the man I spoke to—”

“The Moth who guards your child? Utterly loyal to me.” He paused. “I do hope you find it. If I’m not in contact with him within a certain time frame, well, I’m sure you understand what might happen.”

Donovan shrugged. “Whatever. At this point I’m more interested in staying out of prison.”

To emphasize his supposed lack of concern, he moved toward Kai. “How’s the head?”

“Hurts.”

Donovan looked at the wound, put some antibiotic on it, and bandaged it again. He changed the bandage on Kai’s arm as well. “So far, no sign of a bad infection. You’re lucky. But we’ll have to keep an eye on it—streams up here can have some nasty bacteria in them.”

Kai shook his head. “I hate it here. I want to go home.”

“That’s not going to happen,” Parrish said. “But we’ll find a better place to live.”

“You like it up here,” Kai said, making it an accusation.

“I know you want to live in a city. We’ll do that.”

“What about my mom?”

“I told you, I sent someone to take care of her. He’ll take her to live with Donovan’s little girl. There will be people there to take care of her until we can all be together.”

“One big happy family?” Donovan asked.

“The idea doesn’t appeal?”

“Not something I’ve ever tried. As you know, I prefer solitude.”

“What about when you were a kid?” Kai asked.

“It was usually just me and my mom,” Donovan said, trying to figure out what Kai was really asking. Did he still think of himself as a child who needed Violet? Or was he curious about Donovan’s own childhood, comparing notes?

“How is she these days?” Parrish asked.

“Why ask a question you already know the answer to? It can’t be because you think I don’t know the answer.”

“That’s right. She’s dead. Questionable circumstances, as I recall.”

Donovan said nothing.

“Was she mean to you?” Kai asked, frowning.

“She did say something terrible to me once. She told me I reminded her of my father.”

Parrish gave a crack of laughter, then groaned. “Oh, that hurt.” He slowly rose to his feet. “Let’s get going. First order of business is to find that bitch and kill her.”

Donovan turned off the heaters and said, “Why bother with her? Why not just get out of here, then go after her again later?”

“Yeah!” Kai said.

“No,” Parrish said. “I’ve waited too long already. She’s not going to leave here alive.”

Every backpack—each fitted for the
person who would carry it—had a name stenciled on it, and Donovan picked up his and put it on. It was the backpack that he had especially prepared when he and Quinn were gathering supplies. Now he was the only one who donned a pack.

Parrish, who had been pocketing extra ammunition for his rifle, raised his brows. “A tent and bedroll?”

“If we don’t find her by nightfall, are you going to want to drive off, taking a chance that she’ll find help? She knows the stream comes to the road, she knows any road up here will eventually take her to other people, rangers if no one else. She may not have food, but there’s plenty of water.”

“If we haven’t found her by dusk, we will come back here.”

“Seriously? You think she’s going to stay close to this cave? Because otherwise, you’re talking about tracking her and then doubling back and losing ground.”

Parrish stared at him so coldly and for so long, Donovan knew he had pushed him too far.

“Suit yourself,” Parrish said finally and smiled. It was not a comforting smile. “Kai and I will be warm and comfortable. Did you know that there’s a good chance of rain, Kai?”

Kai nodded. “You had me check the weather before we left the lodge.”

“You see, Donovan? I’m not as unprepared as you may think I am.”

“Are we going to be out in the rain?” Kai asked.

“Not if I can help it,” Parrish said. “Let’s get going.”

Donovan said nothing more. He made an effort, after that, not to openly question Parrish’s judgment.

“So, Donovan,” Parrish said when
they had climbed down from the cave, “you have tracking experience. Where did she go?”

He had expected this, and answered honestly, pointing out trampled foliage that would have been obvious to anyone. He was not especially comfortable having Parrish and Kai at his back, but as he suspected would happen, after about half an hour of following him, Parrish insisted on taking the lead.

“Kai, you’ll be behind Donovan. Keep your weapon out. Don’t take your eyes off him.”

Donovan watched Kai for the slightest sign of rebellion. He had been encouraged by Kai’s earlier anger with Parrish, but now he saw a look come into his eyes that put an end to any hope that his half brother might be turned away from worshiping Parrish.

“And Donovan,” Parrish said, “give your gun to Kai.”

If this was going to escalate to a pat-down, Donovan thought, now would be the moment to go for broke. He didn’t hide his wariness but handed over the automatic. Parrish watched him, then said, “I think I’ll also ask you to leave the backpack here. I don’t want to take the time to search it now, but I also don’t want to find out you’ve provided yourself with an extra weapon.”

Donovan opened his mouth as if to protest, then closed it. He shrugged and took off the pack, leaning it against a tree.

Parrish smiled. “All right, let’s get going. She can’t be too much farther ahead of us.”

F
rank had the maps with him.

Topo maps, creased and worn, maps he had thought of throwing away a dozen times or more. But once they had guided him to where he had found Irene, Ben, and Bingle, and brought them home.

Travis and Jack and Frank’s own dogs had been with him then, too. Along with Stinger Dalton, a pilot who had later taught Travis to fly. Stinger was in Hawaii this week and would undoubtedly be pissed off that he had missed being part of this second hunt.

They had laid the maps out at Stinger’s place and marked them up based on what they knew from various reports about where Parrish might have taken a group of searchers. Stinger had helped Frank to reason out where Parrish was most likely to be. The maps still bore those markings.

Even though he had not since been back to the area they flew over now, Frank thought he could have found it in his sleep. It had been, after all, a place of waking nightmares.

Frank looked down on the pristine expanse of white below him and saw it as he had seen it that day in May, a bloodied field covered with the remains of his colleagues and, as he had at first
feared, perhaps his wife’s as well. He shook himself. She had not died there. She was not, he told himself fiercely, dead now.

He glanced over and saw that Ben was looking pale. As hard as this was for Frank, it had to be a thousand times worse for Ben. “You okay?” he asked over his headset.

Ben shook his head no but kept staring down at the meadow.

The last time they had been here, Ben’s closest friend had been murdered. Ben had left on a stretcher, airlifted in this helicopter.

The vista below was beautiful and serene.

Everything changes
, Frank thought, and forced his mind back to the present.

Travis brought the helicopter as low as he could without allowing its downwash to disturb the snow. Even studying the meadow with field glasses, Frank could see no signs of human tracks.

They had already looked in another meadow, one Parrish had also been known to use. They had even explored the ridge between the two meadows. Travis had set the big Sikorsky down there, not far from where it had rested once before. They had trudged through the snow, looking for any sign that Parrish had come back here, even hiked up to a shallow cave, one of the places Irene had told Frank about after she was rescued. But the cave was clearly long-abandoned. Other than stretching their legs and giving the dogs a chance to get some exercise, nothing had been gained.

Travis’s voice came over the
headset. “Pappy just contacted me,” he said, referring to the dispatcher at their home base. “Looks like that storm is slightly ahead of schedule.”

“Do we need to go back?”

“Not yet, but we probably only have another hour or so
before we should either go back or put her down and wait it out. She can fly in rain and is designed to survive a lightning strike, but that can still lead to dangerous amounts of damage. I don’t want to risk it.”

“I don’t want anyone to have to rescue us,” Frank said.

“Do what you need to do.” They had all been patient with him, Frank thought. Good about keeping him distracted during the long flight up here. And it was beginning to look as if he had guessed wrong about where Parrish was going. He had thought of this area as Parrish’s comfort zone, but nothing said Parrish would stay true to that now, especially once it had been discovered. In Parrish’s view, the recovery of remains from this meadow was undoubtedly a desecration of his work.

“Wasn’t there a place he used as an airstrip?” Travis said.

“Yes,” Ben said. “We started out from there … the last time. We hiked up here from there.”

“Would it still be there?” Jack asked.

“Yes,” Frank said. “It belongs to the Forest Service. They use it to land fire crews—he just took advantage of it.” He looked it up on the map, then gave Travis the coordinates.

“Okay. Let’s head back that way and check it out. We can look from there, and if I need to land until the storm’s over, it might do the trick.”

They reached the airstrip. It
was in a long, narrow valley, at a lower elevation than the meadows, and was free from snow. They let the dogs out again while Frank studied the maps.

Parrish had often flown his victims here in a small plane. That had been part of his M.O. Most killers who used the mountains for dumping grounds stayed close to roads—bodies are heavy, and it’s difficult to carry them far or bury them deep. Hiking any distance involves risking control over the victim, as
well as hazarding being seen by others. Parrish took that gamble, sadistically forcing his victims to hike with him and to dig their own graves.

But this time, Parrish had come here in a car, not a plane. He knew the roads—including rough dirt roads and roads open only for use by the U.S. Forest Service. He had escaped from these mountains on just such roads.

And he wasn’t alone. He had at least two helpers with him. But were his sons used to being in the outdoors?

If he was here, Parrish hadn’t arrived by plane, and he couldn’t have reached this airstrip by car. What places, near his old killing grounds, could he reach by car?

Frank searched the maps for roads that were accessible by a car initially traveling from the south. A great many, but far fewer coming into this part of the wilderness. Fewer still anywhere near this airstrip. He included fire roads and roads that would be officially closed to the public by now. He spotted one, not all that far away.

He saw Travis standing on a slight rise, staring toward the north.

Frank called to him. When he came over, Frank said, “Take a look at this map. How long would it take us to reach this road?”

Travis studied the map, then pointed toward the area of sky he had been watching. “See those clouds? I’m concerned about that storm. I know you don’t want to hear this, and I don’t even want to be saying it, but it might be better to just sit tight and let it blow over. Let me see what I can find out about it, because it’s definitely going to affect what we can safely do.”

He went into the helicopter. Frank followed him, and the others, seeing them, returned, loading up the dogs and strapping them into their special safety harnesses.

The Sikorsky S-58T was a giant, over fifteen feet high and about forty-five feet long. It had been fitted with turbine
engines and auxiliary fuel tanks. It could hold eighteen passengers, but the interior had been altered so that now—in addition to a crew of two in the cockpit, which was a separate area high above the cargo area—the cargo area had seats for ten passengers and carried two stretchers.

Donning their headsets again, Frank and Ben waited while Jack went through the start-up procedures and Travis listened to reports from local air traffic and studied weather radar.

There was a
whump
as Jack hit the ignition, and then the whine of the turbines began to build. The blades of the rotors
swoop-swoop-swooped
, ever faster—within twenty seconds, both the main and tail rotors were spinning at a steady speed.

Everything around them was a roar.

Travis’s voice came over his headset. “Lightning often arrives before rain, so keeping that in mind … if we leave now, we can probably at least fly over it and get back here before the storm hits. We could at least see if the vehicle is there.”

“Could you set me down if need be?” Frank asked.

“Depends on conditions at the time. If it’s safe to do that, sure. Depending on the road, I may even be able to land there.”