Mariah Stewart - Hard Truth

“But all these years… all those boys he hurt. All those families… God knows how many. It makes me sick just to think about it.”

“It makes me sick, too.” She swallowed hard. “Mike, he might have molested my brother, Rob, at some point.”

“What?”

“I think the reason Rob left home as soon as he graduated from high school, and never came back, is because something happened to him here. I can’t think of anything else that would have traumatized him so.”

“Did he tell you that Fritz…?” Mike asked slowly.

“No. I called him earlier to discuss it with him, but I had to leave a message.”

“You left him voice mail asking him if my brother molested him?”

“Yeah. That might not have been a good thing, huh?” She grimaced. “I’ve been questioning whether I should have done it since the second I hung up. Think it was a mistake?”

“The biggest mistake you ever made.”

She looked at him quizzically.

“You should have kept it to yourself, Lorna. Whatever it was you thought might have happened to your brother, you just should have left it alone.”

In her pocket, her phone began to ring.

“Don’t answer it,” Mike told her.

She took the phone from her pocket and glanced at the number. “It’s Rob.”

“Don’t. Answer. It.” He reached for the phone and took it from her hand, tossed it into the grass.

She stared at him for a long time, as it all began to sink in.

“You,” she said softly. “It was you. Not Fritz.”

“Hell of a time to figure it out, when none of your law buddies are here. Sorry, Lorna, but you are now officially a liability.” He took her by the arm, not forcefully, but firmly, and turned her in the direction of the barn.

Behind her, in the grass, her cell phone began to ring again.

Was it Rob calling back? T.J.? Regan?

It occurred to her that she would probably never know. There was no way Mike was going to let her live, knowing what she now knew.

“You’re forgetting, Rob knows it’s you, not Fritz.” She struggled to break free, and he tightened his hold on her arm. “If something happens to me, he’ll know, and he’ll tell.”

Mike’s laughter was harsh and loud.

“First, they’re going to have to find you. And that might take some time. Second, Rob’s not telling anyone anything. Ever. I made sure of that years ago.” He was still laughing as he dragged her into the barn. “Yeah, I tried out your brother. And he should have ended up like the rest of them, in the back woods. But he got away from me. Imagine that? That skinny little runt. Well, I told him what I’d do if he ever-I mean ever -told anyone what I’d done. Obviously, he never did, if you’re just figuring it out now.”

“What did you threaten him with?”

“I told him I’d kill everyone in his family.”

“I can’t imagine he’d have believed you had that kind of power.”

“Oh, he believed it.” He laughed again. “Your father made certain of that.”

“What does my father have to do with this?”

“He made me look like the most powerful man in the world.” He leaned down and whispered, “He died two days later.”

Lorna felt as if the wind had been knocked from her lungs.

“He died of a heart attack.”

“Yeah. Pretty good timing, wouldn’t you say?” Mike pushed her through the barn door and took the gun from his pocket. “Unfortunately, I can’t rely on lightning striking again, so I’m going to have to make my own luck.”

“You killed Jason.”

“Stupid-shit Jason, yeah, I killed him.” He shook his head. “Who would have thought he’d be up at that hour of the morning? And with his mother, no less? Damned bad luck on his part, looking out the window when he did.”

“He saw you with someone.”

“Unfortunately, yes, he did.” Mike spoke calmly, as if they were discussing the weather. “He came running out of that house, yelling at me, and what the hell else could I do? I dropped what I was carrying and let him chase me into the field, away from the house. I didn’t need a witness.”

“He saw you with one of your victims.”

“Well, the sky didn’t open and drop them into the woods, Lorna. They had to get there somehow.” He rolled his eyes. “Yes, I was carrying someone. And yes, he was already dead when Jason came out the back of the house. He saw me, saw what I had from the window, and came running outside yelling something about his sister. I guess he figured I’d killed his sister, too.”

“Did you?”

“No. Oh, I would have, I wanted to. She saw me the night she disappeared. She was running across the field and we all but smacked into each other. How ’bout those Eagan kids, eh? Always around at the wrong time.” He shook his head. “I grabbed at her-had her, too, but she managed to get away from me and she ran like hell.”

“Ran where?”

“Beats the shit out of me. Don’t think I didn’t try to find her. Searched for hours, but it was as if the earth opened up and swallowed her whole. I couldn’t track her, and the next thing I knew, she’d officially disappeared. I didn’t have a decent night’s sleep, I can tell you that, until I realized she wasn’t coming back.”

“Then where did she go?” Lorna’s brows knit together. “If you didn’t kill her, where has she been all these years?”

“I don’t know, and frankly, I don’t care. All I know is that the gods were smiling on me that night, because wherever she went, she obviously didn’t tell anyone what she saw.”

“You really think the gods had anything to do with that?”

He gestured at her with the gun. “Walk. Straight back.”

He was leading her to the door to the wine cellar.

“I don’t understand how you got those boys out here. I mean, you couldn’t very well pick them up on your bike and ride to the woods with a body over the handlebars.”

“Very funny.” He looked amused. “Actually, I used my mother’s car. She’d be sound asleep every night by nine, I’d be out of the house and cruising down the road by ten.”

“And Fritz didn’t notice? He didn’t care that you were taking the car and driving around without a license?”

“He was my brother, why would he tell? Besides, everyone around here drove before they had a license. It’s farm country. Everyone does it. The local cops would stop me once in a while, slap me on the wrist, and that would be that. Outside of town, I was never stopped. I’ve always been a good driver, never gave them a reason to pull me over. Didn’t speed, stopped at the stop signs, never jumped a light.” He grinned. “My driving record is perfect.”

“Where did Fritz think you were going, all those nights?”

“I always told him I had a hot date. I was pretty popular with the girls, maybe you remember.” He smirked.

Her face flushed, recalling her own crush on him, then realized the absurdity. He’s holding a gun on me, he’s going to kill me, and I’m embarrassed to remember that I used to have a crush on him.

“You would drive to the Purple Pheasant to pick up your victims.”

“It was the perfect feeding ground. They never checked ID. Actually, they welcomed the young boys. The younger the better.”

“The owner. You killed him, too.”

Mike nodded thoughtfully. “He was one sharp dude. He knew the guys who’d disappeared had all been in his club. It took him awhile, but eventually he realized he’d seen them all with me. If I’d been a little older, maybe I’d have been a little smarter. As it was, hey, I was fourteen, fifteen, sixteen years old. I didn’t hunt often, but when I did, I hunted well.”

Lorna fought the urge to throw up.

He stopped at the door to the wine cellar.