Sometime under the boardwalk things had stopped making sense. It was like one of those sci-fi movies where some poor schmuck falls into a wormhole or whatever and ends up in a parallel universe where the Nazis won World War II and the Kardashians have talent. Bonnie tried to puzzle it out as she slammed the Jeep into reverse and skidded out from behind the McMansion.
Alan had called Pascal, or at least someone using Alan’s phone had called. Okay, start there. She already knew Pascal had one ally, the decoy in the tower. What if he had others? What if he was part of a team, a hit squad, and while she was messing around with him at the pavilion, his buddies were tracking down the Kirbys?
She had pegged him as a lone wolf. But the guy in the tower proved otherwise, didn’t he? Alan and his friends had sent a team to rescue Mariana Ortiz. Why couldn’t the Colombians have sent a team to exact revenge?
Say Pascal was part of a team. The other team members found the Kirbys. They called Pascal, using Alan’s phone, to tell him the job was done. Or they made Alan call for some reason.
Either way, Pascal had to clear out. He couldn’t wait around to finish her off. His partner amscrayed too. All of them heading for the Millstone County airstrip, maybe—she’d heard Pascal reserving the pickup on the phone. He hadn’t specified the number of passengers. He could have been arranging transportation for his whole team.
It had to be something like that. None of it rang true to her, but she could only assume her intuition was leading her astray. She’d proceeded on the false assumption that she was up against one man, when in fact she was up against three or four or God only knew how many. She never could have won. She could only let the Kirbys get killed.
And Des too. Her best friend. Her only friend. He must be dead with the others.
Rage seized her, and she made a silent promise to track down Pascal, no matter what it took. Track him to Chile, to that place in the mountains—what the hell was the name of it? San Alfonso. She’d seen pictures of his villa. She would recognize it again. She’d break in at night and shoot the bastard dead.
But it wouldn’t bring back Des. Or the Kirbys, formerly the Walkers. They were gone for good.
She pulled to a stop in front Des’s house. The lights were on, and the front door hung ajar. Not a good sign.
No neighbors had stirred. Whatever had gone down inside the house had been quiet, anyway. She could hope the killers took their victims in their sleep. No waking up, no final pleas or screams. Just a silenced round to each victim’s head. Like her parents, Tom and Rebecca, slain in the motel room while she listened from the tub.
Pascal’s Lexus wasn’t in sight. Her Jeep was the only vehicle parked on the street. She was almost certain the bad guys were gone. But she was through making assumptions.
She grabbed the Ruger carbine from the rear of the Jeep and approached the front door, making no sound, ready to let loose if anyone opened fire on her.
The door was swinging in the wind and rain. She pushed it inward and stepped across the threshold.
Nothing seemed out of place in the living room. She headed down the hall. The guest room was probably where it had ended for the Kirbys. Their bodies—all three of them—would be inside, sprawled across the bed, or possibly huddled in the bathroom if they had retreated in there to make a stand.
Panic room, she thought bitterly. What a stupid, stupid idea. Like you could stop Pascal or any man like him with a goddamn bathroom door.
She took a breath and entered the bedroom, tensing for the sight of blood and death.
The room was empty.
Bedroom, bathroom—empty.
The bed had been hastily unmade, and she could see the imprint of little A.J.’s head on the pillow. Otherwise, there was no sign that anyone had even been there.
“Weird,” she whispered, not getting it. She was still in that parallel universe, and things still weren’t making sense.
She began to nurse a small seedling of hope. Maybe Pascal’s friends had taken the family alive. She couldn’t imagine why. And she didn’t know where that would leave Des. Even if the Colombians wanted all three Kirbys for some unfathomable reason, they wouldn’t want him.
His bedroom was the next one down the hall. She knew if he was dead in that room, she would lose it, at least a little. She had trouble swallowing and realized the old expression was actually true—you really did get a lump in your throat.
Pushing past her fear, she entered the room. Des’s bed was mussed, but no worse than the Kirbys’. His chair was nowhere in sight, and neither was he.
She retraced her steps along the hallway and checked out the kitchen—nothing—and the den—ditto. When she opened the door to the garage, she was almost unsurprised to see that Des’s van was gone.
They’d cleared out. The Kirby clan and Des. He had to be driving; nobody else could handle the van with its customized controls.
Had the bad guys forced them to leave in Des’s van? No way. Even in a parallel universe that one wouldn’t fly.
She was shaking her head in confusion as she returned to the living room. When she glanced into the dining area, she saw a large, heavy sheet of paper torn from one of Des’s sketchpads lying on the table.
She took the paper in her hands. The sheets contained a few brisk lines of florid handwriting and a signature at the bottom.
Bonnie read the note, then read it again. And she understood.
She understood a whole lot of things.