Undisclosed (19 page)

All that separated Dr. Evans’s home from Guaje Pines cemetery, located at the end of Range Road, was a thin wall of tall pine trees, large rocks and bushes. The whole area gave him the creeps and sent shivers up his spine. It probably didn’t help that he had heard stories of devil worshippers performing rituals in the cemetery on Halloween. It just wasn’t a place you hung around, not even in the day.
Get in, find out where dad is
and get out. Simple
, he attempted to reassure himself as he cut the engine to his bike and parked it beside the doctor’s car, which was tucked in tightly beside the house.

Travis made his way up the path to the large oak door at the front of the home, noticing a camera angled down at him. He rang the bell and cast a quick glance around. His nerves were on edge and he could literally feel the hairs rising on his arms as he stood waiting. Nobody answered. Pressing his hand and face against a paneled window alongside the door, he could see a dull light coming from within the house. Surely he would have heard the bell? He was expecting a visit, after all.

There was no movement inside the house. Travis rang the bell again; still nothing. Maybe it was broken? He lifted the large brass handle on the doorknocker and let it go. It struck the door and let out a deafening noise, enough to make his ears ring. Reaching for it a second time, Travis noticed the door was slightly ajar. Maybe the force of it had opened it, or maybe it wasn’t closed?

Pushing the door ever so slowly open, Travis leaned in. He could hear the faint sound of classical music playing.

“Doctor? Dr. Evans?”

No one replied. This wasn’t good. He checked the band around his wrist; still no indication of any Watchers. He paused before entering. The house was large. It was possible that he was out back, or upstairs. Travis couldn’t count the number of times his mother had come home and shouted up to him and he couldn’t hear her because he was listening to music, and their house was half the size of this. He stepped inside; the door creaked as it closed behind him.

* * * * *

“About time I got a taste of the action,” Ty said.

Lincoln laughed. “Ahhh, you going stir-crazy keeping an eye on all those monitors? Must be real hard.” He smirked, shoving a mag in the butt of his gun.

“I don’t mind that, but Jack thinks if I’m there he can call on me to stack shelves whenever he likes. Like, if I wanted to stack shelves I would get a job at a grocery store.”

In the rearview mirror Mason snatched a glimpse of Ty sitting in the back. “God, you whine like a little girl, maybe you should.”

Ty kneed the back of his seat.

Mason jerked forward. “Hey, watch the merchandise, this baby is—”

“Yeah, yeah, we’ve heard it before,” Lincoln cut in. Mason scowled. Lincoln pulled back the slide and loaded a round into the chamber, giving it a once-over before holstering it. He pulled a knife from beneath his coat, admiring it as it glimmered against the moon’s light. He shone the reflection into Mason’s eye.

“Hey, you mind not blinding me while I drive?”

Lincoln rolled his eyes and then turned his head over his shoulder. “You’re quiet tonight, Jayde.”

Jayde didn’t answered him. She was in the back looking out the window, her thoughts caught up in memories from the past.

“Jayde?”

She snapped out of it.

“What?”

“Is it just me, or does Travis have an uncanny resemblance to—”

Jayde cut him off before he could finish, knowing exactly what he was about to say. She swiftly changed the subject.

“Listen, Jack wants us to keep our distance tonight, so that’s what we’re going to do, and that means no trigger-happy moments,” she said. “Can you get us there faster? We’re already running late.”

“Not my fault we were sent on a wild goose chase that led to nothing,” Lincoln added.

“What if they show up?” asked Ty.

Jayde had already returned to gazing out the window, her thoughts drifting. They were still at least ten minutes from arriving.

“Man, I hope they show up,” Mason hollered, slamming his boot hard on the accelerator.

* * * * *

Travis’s resolution to be brave lasted as long as it took to reach the winding staircase that led up to the second floor, which was where he could hear the music. All the lights were out except for a faint shimmer that came from upstairs. Thankfully, it provided just enough visibility to prevent him from a certain fall. He clung to the banister and climbed the steps. At the top, he could see a door into what appeared to be a study, just slightly ajar. The light was coming from there, along with the music, which was now louder. He was only seconds from entering the room when he caught a glimpse of him; it was his feet that he saw first.

“No … No … NO.”

Travis dashed into the room to find the doctor spread out on the hardwood floor in a pool of sticky blood; all the color in his face had been drained. He raced over, bent down and checked the pulse in his neck. It was faint, but he was still alive.

“Hang in there, don’t you dare die on me.”

Travis was panic-stricken. He could clearly see that Dr. Evans had been shot in the chest. His shirt was drenched with blood, and there was no telling how long he had been lying here, how much blood he had lost or if he would even last until an ambulance arrived. He hadn’t even stopped to think if the person who had done it was still in the house. The only thoughts rushing through his mind were ones of saving him.

“Okay, okay.” He ran a hand through his hair, covering it in blood. “Ambulance.” He pulled out his phone from his pocket and before he could dial it, the doctor grabbed his arm and muttered something. Travis bent his head down, close to his lips. The doctor was mumbling words but he could barely make out what he was saying. He held the doctor’s hand in his, gripping it as he leaned in closer.

“… Twenty-five … two twenty-five … two twenty-five … ather …”

“Twenty-five what? Doctor, where is my father?”

The doctor squeezed his hand and then his eyes glazed over.

“Dr. … Dr. Evans?”

Travis let out a sigh. He checked his pulse again—nothing, not even a faint beat. Travis ran a bloodstained hand over the doctor’s face, closing his eyes. He slumped down beside the body, which was blood soaked and now lifeless. The music continued to play as he stared ahead, his mind wandering aimlessly.
Who could have done this? They must have seen us talking
. His back was pressed against a solid carved oak desk. Looking down now at the sticky blood that covered his hands, jeans and T-shirt, he could smell it—salty, metallic and sickening. How would he explain this? It wasn’t like he could call the police; no one there was likely to believe him, not with his track record. His prints were everywhere—no doubt the killer had taken precautions to cover their tracks.

The killer!

Travis hauled himself up, bracing himself against the desk while he scanned the room. Papers were scattered, drawers pulled out as if someone had rifled through them searching for something;
maybe a botched robbery or an attempt to look that way? Unlikely.
Crossing to the other side of the room, he switched off the crackling music, which continuously played the same tune on what resembled an old 1900s gramophone. He listened intently for footsteps, anything that would indicate that the killer was still there. Maybe there was more than one? The silence was reassuring and yet it didn’t help the uneasiness he felt. Well, if he was going to go down, he might as well find what he could. Maybe there were files, papers, anything that could shed more light on the doctor’s involvement at the Lab, anything that might lead him to where his father was located or corroborate his reasons for being at the home.

He went over to the large oak desk, keeping a wide distance from the body, and began rooting through what remained of the papers scattered all over the desktop. On the far side of the room was a monitor that showed a grainy shot of the outside door. There had to be something, but where would he keep it? He saw the doctor’s lab card on the table, and he pocketed it—who knew if that could come in handy later? Certainly anything of any significance wouldn’t be left in plain sight. He began pulling at the drawers, which were locked. Strange, whoever had been here had not gone to the trouble of opening everything.

And then it happened.

Before he could find a key or figure out a way to open the drawers, the strap on his wrist lit up, its waves of white light pulsating outwards, and for the first time he saw what he hoped he would never see.

Chapter Nineteen

He was surrounded—red dots moved inwards, five of them. He shot a sideways glance at the video monitor; three dark figures were stepping inside the front door. Travis, beside himself, bolted out of the room. He moved so fast that he slipped on the blood as he passed the doctor, which nearly caused him to face-plant. He was within a few feet of the top of the stairs when he saw the figures already making their way up the stairs. In the darkness he couldn’t make out their faces, but he wasn’t going to stick around to find out. He dashed back into the office where the doctor lay and closed the door, locking it from the inside. He hit the lights and was enveloped in complete darkness. He could hear laughing and howling and several voices coming from different directions.

“Come out, come out, wherever you are.”

Walking backwards slowly, keeping an eye on the door, he could see a neon blue light creeping its way in from below the door, and he could hear the sound of footsteps echoing on the hardwood floors as they got closer.

In an instant the door exploded, sending splinters of wood flying like arrows in every direction. A cloud of dust filled the air. The sudden impact knocked Travis backwards. As he looked back up and towards the door, he heard:

“Trick or treeeeat!” In burst three individuals dressed in Halloween outfits. One was dressed in a half black and white checkered jester’s outfit with a skull for a mask, another looked like an escaped convict and wore a psycho clown mask with fire red hair that shot wildly out the sides, and the other looked like a voodoo skeleton draped in a black coat that reached his heels and a top hat on his head.

Before they could react Travis had spun on his heels and made a beeline towards the balcony doors at the far end. Partly covering the exit were long draped auburn curtains, thick and Victorian looking, the kind that would require a good amount of force to pull apart. As he reached for the curtains, a fourth figure jumped out from behind the curtain wearing a bloodied hockey mask, followed by a fifth made up like zombie. Both let out a high-pitched scream. It happened with such astonishing speed that Travis stumbled backward, nearly losing his footing. Laughter erupted from the other three behind him. The light of the moon shone in making it clearer to see. In its light they looked even freakier than they did under the strange blue glow that initially filled the room.

“What have we got here?” the one dressed like a voodoo skeleton said in a ghoulish voice, as he twirled in his hands a black cane with a skull on the end of it.

He kicked the body on the floor and bounced the end of the cane on the doctor’s chest, catching it in the air as if to check if he was alive.

“Well now, that’s a shame,” he crooned, “and I was so looking forward to this. Never mind, we’ve got the next best thing.” Something about the voice was familiar, but Travis couldn’t place it.

One of the two by the doors had jumped onto the table laughing and kicking the computer onto the floor.

Travis was backed against the wall, trying to catch his breath. “I’m afraid you came a bit late, you’ll all have to come back,” he wheezed.

“Oh really, why’s that?” the one in the psycho clown mask asked.

“We’re all out of candy.”

They laughed.

While Travis took a heartbeat to consider how screwed he was, the jester bounded over to Travis and brought his cane with a skull and jester’s hat down hard onto Travis’s head. He jerked away but it still caught him.

“Oh, why come back when we can beat it out of you like a piñata?” he cackled as he struck him again. This time Travis fell to floor, pain shooting through his skull as if someone had stabbed him with a hunting knife.

“Get him up.”

As though gravity itself had been switched off, Travis felt his body rise up off the ground, like a puppet on strings, his arms and legs flailing around. In the next moment he felt himself hurtling through the air before he crashed down on the gramophone. Large chunks from the cabinet jabbed into his sides, tearing at his shirt and ripping into his flesh. He felt excruciating pain in his ribs as he tried to get up.

“I said get him up, not throw him—though that was good.”

They roared with laughter.

Travis spat blood out of his mouth. “Deagan Kaine?” He turned his head towards them. Deagan pulled off his skeleton mask and bent down close to Travis, his breath washing over Travis’s face.

“Hey presto, give the kid an award.”

“But you’re not—”