Kelley Armstrong - Made to Be Broken

"I know I'm overreacting, but I lie down and… anxiety dreams, I guess. Even when I'm still awake."

Jack sipped his cocoa, giving no sign he understood. I suppose he'd exorcised all his demons years ago… if he'd ever had any.

"So, is everything going okay here, at the lodge?" I said. "I know it's not exactly four-star accommodations – "

"It's good." He took another sip. "Reminds me of summer vacations. When I was a boy. Cabin we used to go to. Nothing like this. Belonged to a friend of a friend. For a bottle, anyone could use it. A shack. No running water. No electricity. No forests and lakes. Just bog land. But for us kids? Fucking paradise."

He shifted, laying his mug aside as he eased back, braced on his arms. "Spent days tramping around. Broth ers and me. Build forts. Swim. Goof off."

"Sounds nice."

"It was. 'Cept when I'd get lost. Happened sometimes. Brothers took off. I couldn't keep up. Forgot I was there."

I laughed. "You weren't any noisier than you are now, huh? So you must have been the youngest, then."

I meant it as a casual comment, but hearing it, I realized it could sound like a question – an invasion of Jack's closely guarded privacy – and I was about to hurry on when he said, "Yeah. Four of us. All boys. I was youngest."

"Do you -?" This time I managed to stop myself.

"What?"

I shook my head. "Nothing. Just… I'm used to making conversation with guests, so I start blathering and prying. Sorry."

"Ask"

"Really, I – "

"Ask"

"I just wondered whether you ever go back and see them."

"No one to see. Brothers. Parents. Gone."

He could have just meant they were no longer in Ireland, but I could tell from his tone that wasn't it.

"I'm sorry."

He shrugged. "Been a long time. Gone before I left."

He reached for another cookie, realized it was the last, and broke off half.

"Quinn? He's got family. Parents. Some siblings. Nieces, nephews, what have you. Part of what I was saying. He wouldn't flip. Family. Friends. Job. Community. He's got too much to lose."

"More than we do."

"Exactly."

Quinn called late the next morning. He said he would send his results through the anonymous e-mail accounts we used, then call Jack's cell and tell him the message was there, to keep me from racing off to check my e-mail every five minutes.

His timing was perfect. One couple had already checked out, and the other had left for lunch reservations in Bancroft.

Quinn had found another case similar to Sammi's and Deanna's. Two months ago, in Michigan, another pretty teen had disappeared with her infant son. Like Deanna, she'd been in a group home.

"It seems the killer started with group homes," I said to Jack as I read. "But he ran into a problem with this second one. The girl was the grand-niece of a city alderman, who insisted on a police investigation. A cursory investigation, Quinn says, and already shelved, but I bet it gave our guy a scare. He realized that living in a group home doesn't necessarily mean you don't have any family, so he started being more careful. And he decided to cross the border.

"A week before Sammi disappeared, a girl in Barrie complained about a guy matching our description wanting pictures of her and her baby. The police fluffed it off as a random pervert. Barrie 's an hour north of Toronto. He switched to Ontario. Maybe he thinks our law enforcement isn't as sophisticated. Or he's afraid of the cases being linked."

"Could be."

Jack's tone was no more laconic than usual, but it was like a spritz of ice water, reminding me to slow down.

"No bodies have been found yet," I said. "The second girl disappeared on a walk, like Sammi. He seems to prefer quiet, private kill sites. But that could just be a response to circumstances. After he kills the girl, he's stuck with a crying baby. As great as it is to have similar cases, I'm not sure how much they'll help in narrowing down who's doing the killing."

"Got some ideas. Run past Evelyn."

Jack consulted Evelyn. I wasn't thrilled with that, but it was the fastest way to narrow down the list. From her, he got the names of two hitmen possibilities, with the more likely one having moved to Toronto recently.

"Great," I said as I cleaned up after the sunset canoe ride. "This week looks slow for guests, so I can take off and – "

"I'll do it."

My hands tightened around the paddle I was lifting into its berth. Something pricked my hand. I stared at the welling blood.

"Nadia?"

"Hmm?"

"I'll go after him."

"N-no." I fumbled the paddle into place and swiped my hand across my jeans. "You can't, not with your foot. I'll – "

"No, Nadia."

"I can – "

"Shouldn't."

I swiped my fingers again, harder, wincing. Jack caught my hand and lifted it into the dim light of the boathouse.

"Got a sliver."

I balled my fist. "I'll be careful. I'll do proper reconnaissance work and make absolutely certain this is the guy. You can come if you want, and I'll let you make the decisions. I just need to see this through."

"You will. It's him? I'll call. Bring you in. He's all yours."

I opened my fist and stared at the blood, my heart hammering. As much as I wanted to find Sammi's killer myself, he was right. Scouting didn't require my personal touch, and it was better if I stayed put for a little while.

When my hand started curling again, he pulled my fingers flat.

"Only making it worse. Come on. Get it fixed up."

Jack went to Toronto alone. When the guests opted out of the bonfire, I drove him to Peterborough and let him take my work car from there. He promised he'd check in with updates a few times a day. He called the next morning, then afternoon, then evening. He didn't have much to say, just, "I'm looking," "Found him," "Following him," "Cased his place." The calls were a waste of his time, and I knew he was only doing them for my sake, but I wasn't sure what would be more frustrating: his single-sentence updates or none at all.

As for the person he was following, I knew only that he was male. Before he'd left, Jack had sidestepped my questions with "tell you later."

Finally, Thursday afternoon, I heard the words I'd been waiting for: "It's him." Then, "Need you here."

"In Toronto? Sure, I can be there in – "

"No. On the move. Heading your way. Can you meet up?"

"You're coming back?"

"He is."

It took me a minute to decipher his shorthand: Sammi's killer was heading out of Toronto, coming this way. On the move. After another girl.

For a moment, words wouldn't come. All I could see was Sammi's corpse, streaked with dirt, staring up in outrage.

"You there?" Jack said.

"He's on the trail, you mean. Of another – "

"Maybe just hunting."

Hunting…

I took a deep breath. "Right. Okay. Um, so where -?"

"On the 401. Heading east. Just passing – " A pause, as if looking for signs. " – Oshawa."

"So should I -?"

"Get ready. Tell Emma you're leaving. Wait for my call."

The next ninety minutes seemed like nine hundred. Finally Jack called again. He was outside a restaurant in Kingston. His target was inside.

"Might be nothing," Jack said. "Different job. Meeting a client. Still… Thought you'd want to head out. Catch up."

"I do."

Two hours later, after quickly assembling a disguise, I was there. For the last thirty minutes, the target had been parked outside a community center, reading a news paper.

I'd left my truck in a grocery store lot a block away, and joined Jack in my work car parked beside a church. From there, we watched the target as he waited in his compact car, tucked between a minivan and an SUV.