Harlan Coben - Gone for Good

"Positive."

We pretended to eat.

"I didn't kill Julie," I said.

"I know."

We pretended to eat some more.

She finally asked, "Why were you there that night?"

I tried to smile. "You don't buy that I was taking a walk?"

"No."

I put down the chopsticks as if they could shatter. I wondered how to explain this, here in my apartment, talking to the sister of the woman I once loved, sitting in the chair of the woman I'd wanted to marry. Both murdered. Both connected to me. I looked up and said, "I guess that maybe I wasn't really over Julie."

"You wanted to see her?"

"Yes."

"And?"

"I rang the bell," I said. "But nobody answered."

Katy thought about it. She looked down at her plate and tried to sound casual. "Your timing was strange."

I picked up the chopsticks.

"Will?"

I kept my head down.

"Did you know your brother was there?"

I moved the food around the plate. She lifted her head and watched me. I heard my neighbor open and close his door. A horn honked. Someone on the street was shouting in what might have been Russian.

"You knew," Katy said. "You knew Ken was at our house. With Julie."

"I didn't kill your sister."

"What happened, Will?"

I folded my arms across my chest. I leaned back, closed my eyes, tilted my head all the way back. I did not want to go back there, but what choice did I have? Katy wanted to know. She deserved to know.

"It was such a strange weekend," I began. "Julie and I had been broken up over a year. I hadn't seen her in all that time. I'd tried to bump into her on school breaks, but she never seemed to be around."

"She hadn't been home in a long while," Katy said.

I nodded. "The same with Ken. That was what made it all so bizarre. All of a sudden, all three of us are back in Livingston at the same time. I can't remember the last time that happened. Ken was acting strangely too. He was looking out the window all the time. He wouldn't leave the house. He was up to something. I don't know what. Anyway, he asked me if I was still hung up on Julie. I told him no. That we were history."

"You lied to him."

"It was like…" I tried to figure out how to explain this. "My brother was like a god to me. He was strong and brave and…" I shook my head. I was not saying this right. I started again. "When I was sixteen, my parents took the family on a trip to Spain. The Costa del Sol. The whole place was one big party scene. It was sort of like Florida spring break for the Europeans. Ken and I hung out at this one disco near our hotel. On our fourth night there, a guy bumped me on the dance floor. I looked over at him. He laughed at me. I went back to dancing. Then another guy bumped me. I tried to ignore him too. Then the first guy, he ran up to me and just pushed me down." I stopped, tried to blink away the memory as if it were sand in my eye. I looked at her. "Do you know what I did?"

She shook her head.

"I yelled for Ken. I didn't jump up. I didn't push the guy back. I yelled for my big brother and scrambled away."

"You were scared."

"Always, "I said.

"That's natural."

I didn't think so.

"So did he come?" she asked.

"Of course."

"And?"

"A fight broke out. There was a big group of them from some Scandinavian country. Ken got the hell beat out of him."

"And you?"

"I never so much as threw a punch. I hung back and tried to reason with them, convince them to stop." The shame flushed my cheeks yet again. My brother, who had been in more than his share of fights, was right. A beating hurts for a little while. The shame of cowardice never leaves. "Ken broke his arm during the scuffle. His right arm. He was an incredible tennis player. Nationally ranked. Stanford was interested in him. His serve was never the same after that. He ended up not going to college."

"That's not your fault."

How wrong she was. "The point is, Ken always defended me. Sure, we fought the way brothers do. He'd tease me mercilessly. But he'd step in the way of a freight train to protect me. And me, I never had the courage to reciprocate."

Katy put her hand to her chin.

"What? "I said.

"It's odd, that's all."

"What is?"

"That your brother would be insensitive enough to sleep with Julie."

"It wasn't his fault. He asked me if I was over her. I told him I was."

"You gave him the green light," she said.

"Yes."

"But then you ended up following him."

"You don't understand," I said.

"No, I do," Katy said. "We all do stuff like that."

I fell into such a deep sleep that I never heard him sneak up on me.

I had found fresh sheets and blankets for Katy, made sure she was comfortable on the couch, taken a shower, tried to read. The words swam by in a murky haze. I'd go back and reread and re-forget the same paragraph over and over again. I signed on to the Internet and surfed. I did a few push-ups, sit-ups, yoga stretches Squares had taught me. I did not want to lie down. I did not want to stop, to let the grief catch me again unawares.

I was a worthy adversary, but eventually sleep managed to corner and take me down. I was out, falling in a totally dreamless pit, when I felt a jerk on my hand and heard the click. Still asleep, I tried to pull my hand back to my side, but it would not move.

Something metallic dug into my wrist.

My eyelids were fluttering open when he leapt on top of me. He landed hard, knocking the wind out of my lungs. I gulped as whoever he was straddled my chest. His knees pinned down my shoulders. Before I could mount any sort of serious struggle, my attacker yanked my free hand to the side above my head. I didn't hear the click this time, but I felt the cold metal close around my skin.

Both of my hands were cuffed to the bed.

My veins flooded with ice. For a moment I simply shut down, just as I always had during physical altercations. I opened my mouth, about to scream or at least say something. My attacker grabbed the back of my head and pulled me forward. Without hesitation, he ripped off a piece of duct tape and covered my mouth. Then, for good measure, he started winding a fresh band of tape around the back of my skull and over my mouth, ten maybe fifteen times, as if he were shrink-wrapping my head.

I could no longer speak or cry out. Breathing was a chore I had to suck the air through my broken nose. It hurt like hell. My shoulders ached from the cuffs and his body weight. I struggled, which was totally futile. I tried to buck him off me. More futile. I wanted to ask him what he wanted, what he planned to do now that I was helpless.

And that was when I thought about Katy alone in the other room.

The bedroom was dark. My assailant was no more than a shadow to me. He wore a mask of some kind, something dark, but I could not see what, if anything, was on it. Breathing was becoming nearly impossible. I snorted through the pain.

Whoever he was, he finished taping my mouth. He hesitated for only a second before bouncing off me. And then, as I watched in helpless horror, he headed for the bedroom door, opened it, stepped into the room where Katy was sleeping, and closed the door behind him.

My eyes bulged. I tried to scream, but the tape muffled any sound. I bucked like a bronco. I kicked and flailed. No progress.

Then I stopped and listened. For a moment there was nothing. Pure silence.

And then Katy screamed.

Oh Christ. I bucked some more. Her scream had been brief, cut off midway, as though someone had turned off a switch. Panic took full flight now. Full, red-alert panic. I jerked hard on both cuffs. I twisted my head back and forth. Nothing.

Katy screamed again.

The sound was fainter this time the gasp of a wounded animal. No way anyone would hear it, and even if they did, nobody would react. Not in New York. Not at this time of night. And even if they did even if someone called the police or rushed to her rescue it would be too late.