The Bone House (52 page)

    
'Just
do it.' Reich squatted and found a fist-sized clump of earth that had frozen
into jagged edges. 'Here.'

    
'I
wish there was some other way,' Pete said.

    
'Hit
me. Hard. You only get one try.'

    
Pete
reared back with the rock and swung his gloved hand into his friend's forehead.
The frozen spikes cut through Reich's skin, erupting in blood. Reich stumbled
back at the force of the blow and nearly fell. He staggered. Pete dropped the
rock and reached for his friend, but Reich shrugged him away.

    
'Get
the hell out of here.'

    
'Can
you make it to the bar?'

    
Reich
touched his hand to his cheek, where the warm blood was already freezing. He felt
his words slurring as he tried to talk. He tasted copper on his lips. 'Just go.
I'll join you as soon as I can, and we'll finish this. It's for Nettie and the
boys, remember?'

    
Reich
stayed where he was, bleeding in the field, until Pete climbed the shoulder and
drove away. The car disappeared, its tail lights winking out, leaving Reich
alone. He was losing blood fast. He took two clumsy steps toward the bar, which
looked impossibly far. Briefly, he wondered if it would be better to lie down
among the broken cornstalks and give himself up to the winter. He had a vision
of his future, and it wasn't pretty. He had been the one to cross the line
tonight, and there was no going back.

    
Even
so, he quashed his doubts and marched for rescue like a wounded soldier.

    'I
saw what was left of him, Sheriff,' Cab said. 'The two of you didn't just kill
him. You tortured him.'

    'Torture
is burning to death,' Reich replied. 'I've seen it happen to people I considered
my enemies, and I didn't even wish it on them.'

    'I
saw the broken bones. The bullet holes.'

    Reich
shrugged. 'I don't regret what I did. Sometimes you have to take justice into
your own hands.'

    'Peter
Hoffman regretted it, though, didn't he?'

    'Pete
got soft,' Reich said. 'He got old. The booze took over.'

    'Or
maybe he finally realized the two of you had become the monsters you were
trying to destroy.'

    'We
did what we had to do,' Reich said.

    'If
you're so sure about that, why kill Hoffman to cover it up? Why not tell the
world?'

    'People
like you don't understand,' he snapped. 'They don't appreciate the tough
decisions that others make for them.'

    Tresa
pulled away from Cab and marched toward Reich through the wet ground. She swept
the red hair from her face. 'You son of a bitch,' she hissed.

    'Tresa,
stay out of this,' Reich told her.

    'All
this time I thought Harris was alive. That made it OK. And now I find out you
killed him. You bastard!'

    'This
doesn't concern you.'

    'Who
else knew?' she demanded. 'Did my mother know?'

    'No
one knew. Look, Tresa, you were a kid. Your father was dead, and Harris was
there for you. That doesn't change what he did.'

    Tresa
pushed in close enough to spit in Reich's face. 'You're always right, aren't
you? You're right about everything. You didn't believe me about Mark either.
You wouldn't listen when I told you that nothing happened between us. Instead,
you had to go about ruining his life.'

    Reich
wiped his face with his free hand. 'I'm sorry you had to find out about Harris,
but if there's one good thing to come out of this, at least now you know what
kind of a man Mark Bradley really is.' He jabbed a finger at Mark across the
dark space between the graves. 'He wanted you to think Harris Bone killed your
sister, didn't he? Now you know that's a lie. He was the one out on the beach
with her. He was the one who killed Glory.'

    Tresa
shook her head. 'You stupid macho jerk. All of you. You. Troy. Peter Hoffman.
Everybody.'

    She
walked toward Mark. Reich shouted to stop her, and Mark put his hands up to
warn her away, but Tresa put herself squarely between

    Mark
and the sheriff, in the path of his gun, and spread her arms wide, if you want
to kill him, now you'll need to kill me, too.'

    Reich's
face pulsed with fury and frustration. 'He's as evil as Harris was, Tresa.
Don't be fooled.'

    'You're
the evil one,' Tresa said. 'You're the one who murdered an innocent man.'

    'What
the hell are you talking about?' Reich growled.

    'Don't
you get it?' Tresa screamed at him. 'Harris Bone didn't kill his family. It
wasn't him. He didn't start the fire.'

    Gary
Jensen heard Katie in the hallway.

    His
shoulders swiveled, and his eyes flicked away. That was Hilary's chance. She
charged from her knees and leaped across the space between them, driving Jensen
backward into the wall. Her knee spiked into Jensen's groin, and he doubled
over. She dove for his gun hand, but he swung the butt of the gun and caught
her on the bottom of her chin. The impact of metal on bone ricocheted in her
brain. She staggered backward, tripping on the bed and falling as her left leg
gave way beneath her.

    Jensen,
still bent over, aimed the barrel at her chest. Hilary was dizzy, but she saw
his finger slide over the trigger. Just as he fired, she heard a shout and saw
a blur of motion. Amy threw herself into Jensen's body, and as they collided,
the gun went off with a deafening blast. The bullet tore into the wall over the
bed, blasting through Sheetrock and kicking up a cloud of white dust. Amy and
Jensen toppled on to the floor. They rolled over each other into the doorway,
and Amy clutched Jensen's gun arm with both hands, holding it down. Jensen
pummeled the girl's kidneys with his other fist, and Amy, who was still weak,
lost her grip. Hilary climbed to her feet as Jensen broke free. She dodged
sideways just as a second bullet narrowly roared past her ear, so close she
felt a searing heat on her hair.

    Jensen
tried to get up, but Amy threw her dancer's leg backward, landing her heel on
his wrist. His fingers went numb. The gun spilled from his hand and twirled as
it skidded down the hallway. It landed in front of Katie, who picked it up. The
coach threw an arm around Amy's neck and yanked the girl into his chest,
squeezing off her air.

    
'Stop!'
Katie screamed.

    She
stood over them, the gun in her hand. Jensen loosened his grip. Coughing, Amy
crawled away and pushed herself to her feet. Jensen stood up too, and fell
heavily against the bedroom wall. He looked bruised and beaten.

    Amy
limped for Katie and threw her arms around her neck. She hugged her roommate
with a smile of relief and then turned back toward Hilary.

    'The
two of you saved—' Amy began, but she never finished.

    Katie
lifted the gun and brought the butt down solidly on to the back of Amy's skull.
Amy took two shaken steps in confused disbelief, crumpled to her knees, and
pitched forward on to her face, unconscious.

    
'Katie!'
Hilary screamed.

    The
girl quickly aimed the gun at her.

    'Don't
move. Stay right there.'

    Katie
slid an arm around Gary Jensen's waist as he stretched his stiff muscles and
twisted his neck. She pressed a quick, passionate kiss on his lips. 'You OK?'

    'I'm
fine.'

    'Katie,
you're being a fool,' Hilary warned her. 'Don't trust this man. I don't know
what he's told you, but he's dangerous.'

    The
girl gave her a peaceful smile. 'You've got Gary all wrong.'

    'He's
using you.'

    'No,
he's protecting me,' she said.

    'Protecting
you from what?'

    Katie
stared at Amy on the floor, and the smile washed away from her face. 'From who
I was.'

    Jensen
checked his watch and tugged Katie's arm. 'The police will be here soon,' he
said. 'We should go.'

    'There's
something we need to do first,' she told him.

    Jensen
stiffened with unease, and Hilary tried to read his face. She realized for the
first time that she had it wrong. Jensen wasn't the one in control. He was in thrall
to this girl. It was Katie whose eyes betrayed a terrible detachment. It was
Katie who looked like fragile china, riven with cracks, ready to break apart.

    'Katie,
we don't have to do this,' Jensen said. 'Not now.'

    'We
don't have a choice.' 'Yes, we do. Forget about them. We can run.'

    The
girl's lips tightened into an angry line. 'I've been running my whole life. I'm
done with it.'

    'Give
me the gun. I can protect us.'

    'No,
you can't.' Katie kissed Jensen again and pushed him toward the bedroom door.
'Don't lose your nerve now. We've come too far. Go downstairs and grab every
alcohol bottle you can carry.'

    
'Katie,
stop.'

    'You
know what we've been through. It's just one last thing. Then it's over. Then
we're free.'

    Hilary
saw something in Jensen's eyes. Self-awareness. Self-hatred. He couldn't say no
to this girl. A man who had destroyed his first marriage seducing teenagers had
been seduced and manipulated himself.

    'Hurry,'
Katie told him, her voice insistent.

    Jensen
vanished toward the stairs without further protest. Amy remained motionless on
the floor. Hilary was alone with Katie. The girl cradled the gun loosely in one
hand and chewed a fingernail on her other hand. Her glasses slipped down her
nose, and she stared at Hilary through the rain-dotted lenses.

    'What's
this all about?' Hilary asked.

    Katie
shrugged. 'Glory saw me in Florida.'

    'Glory
saw yow?'

    Her
head bobbed. 'She started to remember everything. I knew she wouldn't let it
go. She'd tell someone. Gary didn't want me to do it, but I couldn't take the
risk. I had to stop her.'

    'You
killed Glory? Katie, why?'

    The
girl got a faraway look in her eyes. 'Everyone used to call me Jen back then,
but my father always called me Katie. That was my grandmother's name. I was
Jennifer Katherine. That's the only part of me I have left from those days.'

    Hilary's
throat went dry with despair. 'You're Jen Bone. Harris's daughter.'

    'I
was. I stopped being that girl that night in Door County. I thought I would
never have to be her again. Really. It was over and done. But then Glory saw
me, and it all came back to her. She remembered being in the garage that night.
She saw me light the fire.'

    'I
never wanted to believe it,' Tresa said. 'I convinced myself I was wrong, you know?
Everybody said Harris did it. He confessed. The thing is, I knew he would have
done anything for Jen. He must have known she did it, but he took the blame. To
protect her.'

    Cab
drew closer to the three of them, conscious of the gun in Reich's hand. He
didn't know how far Reich would go to save himself. When he studied the
sheriff's heavily shadowed face, he saw someone who was staring into the maw of
a black hole, the way Cab himself had done in the storm cellar. He wondered
whose face Reich saw looking up from the darkness. Harris Bone, screaming in
agony for his life. Or Peter Hoffman, staring into the eyes of his friend as
Reich shot him to death.

    'Sheriff,
put the gun down,' Cab said.

    Reich
ignored him. 'I don't believe this shit. Harris Bone was
there.
He
admitted it. This is another of your fantasies, Tresa.'

    'Jen
was with me that night,' Tresa went on. 'We were up late writing our stories
together. She was really keyed up. I'd never seen her so out of control. When I
woke up in the middle of the night, I saw that she was gone. I figured she
couldn't sleep, you know? Then I heard her come in. She was naked. She'd taken
a shower, and her hair was wet, but I could still smell it.'