No Safe House (24 page)

“I just want you to know I’m looking out for you. If he’s not going to give a shit, I am.”

“Don’t worry about me,” Jane said.

“So why’d you go and see him anyway?”

“He had a problem he wanted me to help him with.”

Bryce twitched. “What kind of problem?”

“Just … something to do with his work. And this girl, a friend of mine. She ran into some trouble and it’s sort of connected to Vince. So I ended up at his place.”

Bryce twitched again and said, “What girl?”

“It’s a long story, Bryce. I just need some sleep.”

“I’m just curious. Was it Melanie? That one who got in touch with you?”

“No, not Melanie. Her name was Grace. Grace Archer. Her dad used to be my teacher, long time ago.”

“Oh yeah,” Bryce said. “You’ve mentioned him. The one who was nice to you. Isn’t he the one whose wife had all that weird shit happen to her back when she was a kid or something?”

“Please stop talking.” Jane tried to fold the edges of the pillow over her ears.

“Why’d this Grace chick want to talk to you? What was her problem and what did it have to do with Vince?”

Jane opened her eyes wide, threw her arms down on the bed, and said, “How come you’re Mr. Twenty Questions this morning? Jesus.”

He pulled his hand away from stroking her hair. “You don’t have to bite my fucking head off. I’m just trying to be interested.”

“Since when?” Jane asked. “You hardly ever ask me anything, except when it has to do with Vince and how you think he’s fucked me over. Well, that’s my problem and not yours, so you can stop worrying about it.”

“I know he doesn’t like me,” Bryce said. “He got something against musicians? Is that it?”

“The whole world doesn’t revolve around you, you know,” she said.

He stood. “Fine. Let me know when you’re not all PMSing and maybe we can have a normal conversation.”

“Oh, good one,” she said. “Every time I get pissed with you it’s because of that and not because you’re being a total asshole.”

He went back into the bathroom and closed the door. Seconds later, she heard water running in the shower.

It was going so well for a while there, she thought. But ever since they’d moved in together, Bryce had started evolving into a total douche.

Always asking her about Vince. What he did, how he made his money, whether he’d ever actually killed anybody. Did what Vince did freak him out, or at some level did he think it was kind of cool?

She looked at the clock. Nearly eight. She was supposed to be at her job at nine thirty.

God. A lot to accomplish in the next hour and a half
.

Maybe, if she lay here for just another five minutes, she wouldn’t feel so terrible. She hadn’t had much sleep. The events of the previous evening had left her unnerved.

Her thoughts were interrupted by the sound of a low-level buzz. She’d muted her phone, but it was still on vibrate, and sitting on her bedside table, it still made enough noise to be heard.

A text or an e-mail. Probably from work.

She reached over for the phone, looked at the screen.

Nothing.

She rolled over in bed, saw that Bryce had left his phone on the table on his side of the bed.

She wasn’t feeling particularly kindly toward him at this moment. Not kindly enough to let him know he had a message.

But then again, it might be something important, so she worked her way across to the other side of the king bed and reached for the phone.

It was a text message.

It had been sent by Bryce’s friend Hartley, one of the other members of the band, which was called Energy Drink.

If there was a worse name for a band, Jane couldn’t think what it might be. She worked in advertising now and had a feel for this kind of thing. But would Bryce listen?

She read the text.

It said:
GIG WENT GOOD. SORRY U HAD TO BAIL. HOPE YOUR FEELING BETTER. LET US KNOW ASAP IF YOU CANT MAKE IT TONITE
.

“I
think it’ll all come together before the day’s over, Unk.”

“You’re the best, Reggie. You’re the only one I should ever have talked to about this. You’re the only one I can admit to what a fool I’ve been. Trusting that boy. Eli. I gave him work, helped him out. His roommates, they threw him out, you know. But I saw something of myself in that boy.”

“He was no boy, Unk. He was a man.”

“I suppose, but … I don’t know. He was a kid who’d gotten the short end of the stick all his life. Parents never gave a shit about him. He’d had to fend for himself for a long time.”

“A little too well, you ask me.”

“You’re right. I know that. But I never thought, giving him some work, helping him out, that he would turn against me. Me and Eli, we’d sit and talk in the evening. I ended up telling him all about her. All these stories I’ve told you. Too damn much. One night, I guess I had a little too much to drink, and I told him what I’d done. Stupid, I was just stupid.”

“He paid for his betrayal, Unk. He got what he deserved.”

“Other than him, the only person I’ve ever confided in, is you. You know my secrets.”

“And you know mine, Unk.”

“You should have told me sooner. Just how much of a monster my brother was. At first I thought, after your mom died, raising you on his own would make him a better man, a good father.”

“A good father doesn’t expect his daughter to fulfill all the responsibilities of a wife. You’ve been the father I was meant to have, ever since you took me in when I was fourteen.”

“I’ve never told a soul, you know.”

“There’s nothing to tell. There was a fire in the barn. The man died. End of story.”

“About Eli, do you think he told Quayle it was me? When he tried to make the deal with him?”

“He told us no. If Eli had told Quayle everything, you’d have heard from him by now. I guarantee it.”

“I hate that man. There are no words. I hate him with every fiber of my being.”

“I know, Unk. He did a terrible thing to you when he took her away. But you got the last laugh.”

“I suppose.”

“Sit tight. This is the day we’re all going to get what’s coming to us.”

I
took three steps into the Koch apartment, leaving the door open behind me, stopped, and took the place in. I guess I was expecting a dump. After all, this was a father and son living over an appliance repair shop with no woman on the scene. I remembered, from when Stuart was my student, that his mother was absent. I never knew whether she’d walked out on them, had passed away, or what. Any efforts I’d made to get Eldon in for a parent-teacher night failed. Back then, I wrote him off as a father who didn’t give a shit, and I might still have been right about that. But after my most recent chat with Vince, I now knew who Stuart’s father was. It was possible he didn’t want to come in and discuss his son’s progress with someone he’d once grabbed off the street and tossed into the back of an SUV. Maybe he thought it was just possible I might hold a grudge against a student whose father had kidnapped me.

The apartment, though, was tidy. No dishes in the sink, no mess on the counter, aside from a cardboard takeout tray with
one coffee in it. There were no clothes tossed about here and there. An Xbox and games were tucked neatly on a shelf below the television. There were some framed pictures on the wall, one in particular that caught my eye, a Sears-style portrait of Eldon, Stuart at about three years of age, and a woman I presumed was his mother. They all wore the pasted-on smiles we adopt for those kinds of shots.

Maybe being here wasn’t such a good idea.

It wasn’t quite as risky as what I’d done the night before. Crawling through a busted basement window, wandering through a house of people I didn’t know, opening closet doors, snooping through every room. That was a new experience for me.

Stepping into an unlocked apartment without an invitation wasn’t quite as serious a transgression, particularly when you considered I was looking for someone who lived here. But if someone came up those stairs behind me right now, I’d have a tricky time explaining myself. I could tell them the door was open, that I wasn’t here to rob the place, but would they believe me?

Would Eldon take kindly to finding me here? It was a safe bet Vince wouldn’t.

I decided to call out one last time, loud enough, I hoped, to wake the dead.

“Stuart! It’s Terry Archer! Grace’s dad! I just came by to see if you were okay.”

Nothing.

I stood there another few seconds. Something made me reach over to the coffee in the takeout tray.

It was still warm.

There was a second cup on the table in front of the couch. I stepped over, wrapped my hand around it long enough to determine that it was as warm as the cup on the counter.

So someone had gone out for coffees, or arrived with them,
but then not hung around long enough to drink them. Did that make any sense at all? It meant there’d been two people in this apartment in the last few minutes, and that something had prompted them to leave so quickly they hadn’t bothered to take their drinks with them.

Or lock the apartment door.

Did this mean Stuart was alive? He’d shown up with two coffees—a peace offering for his father, maybe—but then they’d both immediately left? Maybe Stuart told his father what had happened, and they were on their way to the house he’d broken into last night?

God, I had no idea.

And I wasn’t going to learn anything just standing here. So I backed out of the apartment, stood on the landing at the top of the stairs, and closed the door.

Maybe they’d come back. I decided to wait a few more minutes, but not up here at the top of the stairs. I walked back down, crossed the street, and got into my car. It was starting to get warm, so I turned the key far enough to let me get the windows down.

Sat there.

Pondered my next move.

If no one showed up here, I didn’t really have one. If Stuart’s fate couldn’t be determined, I didn’t know what else to do but proceed with the lawyer route. We needed to know where we stood, to be ready for anything that might happen.

I turned on the radio, listened to the news, traffic reports.

Wasted nearly ten minutes.

I was about to turn the key when my cell phone rang. I glanced at it, saw that it was
HOME
calling, and answered.

“Grace?”

“Hi, Dad. Did you find Stuart?”

“No, sweetheart. If I had, I’d’ve called you.”

“I thought, maybe, if you’d found him, but he was, you know … you’d wait till you got home to tell me.”

“I haven’t found him, one way or another. I dropped by his place, but there’s no one here. Not him, or his dad.”

“Okay.” She paused. “This is probably nothing.”

I felt a small chill run the length of my spine. “What, honey?”

“There’s this guy parked across the street, kind of down a bit.”

A chill instantly ran down my spine.

“Okay,” I said slowly, trying to keep the anxiety out of my voice. “What about him?”

“I was in my bedroom, looking out the window, but just through the crack in the drapes, you know?”

“Yeah.”

“So I don’t think he saw me.”

“What are you saying? Is he looking at the house?”

“That’s the thing. I’m not sure. But he’s kind of looking this way.”

I turned on the car. “Hang on,” I said. “The Bluetooth thing is kicking in. Okay, you’re on speaker.”

“Can you hear me?” Grace said.

“Yeah,” I said, setting the cell phone down on the seat next to me and pulling the seat belt across my body. I put the car in drive and hit the gas.

“You there?” Grace asked.

“I’m on my way,” I said. “Five minutes tops.”

“Like I said, it might be nothing. I’m just kind of on edge, you know? Especially after what you said. About my being a witness and all.”

“I didn’t mean to freak you out, sweetheart.”

“I know, but you were right. I might have seen something I don’t even realize I saw? You know? Or heard something?”

“Describe the car.”

“It’s just a car,” she said. “Dark blue.”

“What about the driver? Is there anyone else in the car?”

“Just the one guy. He’s just a regular guy.”

God. What was wrong with kids’ observational skills?

“White guy? Black?”

“White,” she said.

“Does he look older or younger than me?”

“About the same? It’s kind of hard to tell because he’s so far—Hang on.”

“What?”

“He’s getting out of the car, Dad.”

“What’s he doing?”

“He’s kind of looking around. Looking both ways on the street.”

I felt my heart starting to pick up speed along with the car. “Now that you can see him, how tall? My height?”

“Taller. And he’s got kind of browny gray hair, and he’s wearing sunglasses and he’s wearing jeans and a white shirt and a jacket. Like, a sport jacket. It’s kind of black.”

“Okay, that’s good,” I said. “You recognize him? You ever seen him before?”

“No, I’ve never—He’s crossing the street.”

“Where are you, Grace?”

“I’m in my room. I’m watching him from up here.”

“Is the front door locked?”

“Yeah. I locked it when you left. Like you said. And I turned the alarm on, too, so if he kicks the door in, it’s going to go
whoop-whoop
.”

I didn’t want that image in my head.

“Okay,” I said. “That’s good, that’s good. It’s probably nothing, okay? Probably nothing at all. I’m probably only four minutes away.”

I was coming up to a stop sign. I slowed, glanced both ways,
and blew through it. Coming the other way, a school bus. And standing in a cluster on the sidewalk, on my side, a bunch of schoolkids.

“Shit shit shit,” I said, easing my foot down on the gas a little harder.

“What is it?” Grace said.

“Nothing,” I said. “Don’t worry about me. What’s he doing now?”

“He’s standing in front of our house. He’s looking at the house!”

“Okay, okay, just calm down. You’re going to be okay. The house is locked. I want you to double-check that you turned on the alarm.”