Epilogue

The Following Spring

 

“COULD IT BE?” Connor sunk down in the hot tub until the near-scalding water was level with his chin. He closed his eyes for a moment, breathing in the perfection. But who wanted to keep one’s eyes shut with the view he had before him? His eyelids fluttered up, a curtain rising to reveal the stunning beauty of the unspoiled Pacific Northwest—calm blue-gray waters, pine-covered bluffs, a sky made dramatic with huge banks of clouds working in harmony with a late-afternoon sky that was cornflower blue. The hue was one that could only come from the refraction of light and the play of shadow.

“Could what be?” The man next to him, Jimmy Dale, gazed toward him with wondering hazel eyes.

“Could we have finally hit upon one of those rare, perfect moments? The kind we wish we could freeze and just remain in forever?”

Jimmy smiled. “Could we be like Jim Croce and put time in a bottle?” He laughed and nudged Connor. “I know you’re old enough to get the reference.”

“Yes, I am. No shame in that though. I’m just glad to be here. It’s moments like these that make me realize just how fortunate I am, despite all that’s happened. And plus, it also just brings home the fact that the happiest moments are often the smallest ones.”

The landscape before him blurred a little, becoming a collage of blue, green, brown, white, and gray as he reflected on the last few months of his life.

Glad, though, didn’t begin to describe his gratitude at being where he was right now, next to this new man who may or may not hold the key to future romantic bliss. Even more, he was simply grateful he still had a life to hold on to, to fill with hopes, dreams, joy. He was amazingly thankful that he had a daughter to hug and joke with, who was, at this very moment, inside the house, doing her own creative thing.

Miranda had found her way.

Jimmy moved closer, and Connor slipped an arm around his shoulders. Two plastic wine glasses with a nice sauvignon blanc rested on the cedar border of the tub.

Jimmy Dale wasn’t someone with whom Connor thought he’d ever be a match. And who knew? Maybe he wouldn’t. They’d only been seeing each other for a couple of weeks, and, shocker alert, they’d met online, something that for both of them would have seemed too nightmarish to even contemplate as recently as a few months ago.

But Connor was a great believer in intuition. And while Jimmy wasn’t exactly GQ cover model material, neither was Connor. Jimmy was bearish, balding, perhaps a bit too hairy for most. At first glance, one wouldn’t think hunk. But Connor had allowed himself a second and then a third look—and so on—and had found the man to be remarkably easy on the eyes. There was something about Jimmy—the twinkle in those eyes, the way his lips turned up just a bit more on the right side when he smiled, the small gap between his front teeth he hated but that Connor thought made an interesting face even more so. He looked good to Connor, and that was all that mattered.

So what if he was a little heavy? As the saying went, there was just more of him to love.

If Connor had learned anything from the horrors he’d just lived through, it was that he should peer deeper than the surface when encountering someone new.

And, as much as it seemed to go against the grain, he realized he needed to try to return to trusting his heart as much as, if not more than, his head.

That was why Jimmy was here now at Connor’s simple but sufficient cabin on Orcas Island, a place Connor refused to let bad memories spoil. Yes, he’d agreed to marry Trey here and they’d had an amazing and romantic time before it all went so horribly bad. And yes, he knew even that good time had been all a ruse. But the place didn’t belong to Trey or Bruno or whatever name had ended up on that demon’s tombstone. It belonged to no one, not really.

When Connor, after grieving the loss of his home in Seattle, thought about where he might now live, the first thought that came was Orcas Island. It was quiet, stunningly gorgeous. Peaceful. Untroubled and unspoiled.

He’d been more than ready to put the hustle and bustle of a big city behind. It seemed like, more and more, Seattle was becoming a smaller version of San Francisco, with its outrageous prices, traffic, and crowds. Connor realized he no longer needed that kind of excitement.

Orcas Island was a dream come true—a safe haven, even if it did have some bad associations. But life was all about what one focuses on. He could whine about one weekend here with Trey and let it spoil everything for him. Or he could accept that bad things happened no matter where we were.

Orcas represented serenity.

He’d shared a lot of his past trauma with Jimmy. When he first told Miranda about meeting him her reaction had been “Are you out of your fucking mind, Daddy? You’re going out with someone you hooked up with online? Have you not learned a thing?”

Ah, dear daughter. Never one to mince words…

But the truth was the thing he and Jimmy shared—the man who called himself Trey Goodall but whom the world now knew as Bruno Purdy—was the impetus for bringing them together rather than keeping them apart.

Sometimes shared heartache and fear could be unifying rather than divisive. Jimmy had, just like Connor, aligned himself with the madman, and had also barely escaped with his life. Both of their brushes with mortality, their own and that of their loved ones, created a bond in the pair that no one else could duplicate. This was one of the main reasons Connor was confident their union just might be a lasting one.

After the initial shock of discovering what the main thing they had in common was, and wanting to flee that commonality, they realized that no one else could truly comprehend them the way they could each other.

Rather than a barrier, their relationship with the evil force who went by multiple names and identities was strengthening and actually life-affirming.

But Connor wasn’t rushing into anything. Not this time. Not ever again. He and Jimmy hadn’t even done more than kiss.

There would be plenty of hours and days to savor the humor and kindness of Jimmy Dale. If things continued as well as they had initially, those hours and days could morph into weeks and years.

He turned and kissed Jimmy’s warm lips, dueled a bit with his tongue. The touch erased so much bad—it was a bit of a miracle. In its place, there was goodness, hope, and maybe, just maybe, real joy.

And the possibility of love.

Somewhere, Connor felt, Steve watched them. He was not jealous because he would have left such pettiness behind when he’d exited the mortal coil. No, he’d share in Connor’s passion and excitement and would definitely approve. Connor believed that with all his heart.

Miranda? She would come around. Right now, she was cordial and cool toward Jimmy, but he’d made her laugh a few times, and Connor knew laughter was the key to worming one’s way into her heart.

He wished she’d come out and join them. Day was fading fast into a violet dusk and Connor would have liked to have shared it.

But she was inside, in a walk-in closet, with a laptop, a microphone, and a script for a podcast she was narrating and producing. On the basis of her bestselling father’s success and the news stories that had swirled around the country when everything came out, Miranda had gotten a contract with Wondery to produce her own podcast about the crime and her own brush with death.

All along, it seemed that this kind of work was her outlet and not writing horror novels, which was what she had struggled so unsuccessfully with.

Connor was happy for her. Even though she left her degree incomplete, she’d found her true passion. He was pretty sure this podcast debut, tentatively called Toxic, would lead her to a prominent place among the crowded field of true-crime podcasts. Her honeyed voice, her slightly dry delivery, and her passion for story were just a few elements that Connor was certain would bring her the recognition and creative outlet she deserved.

She had a unique story; that was for sure. And when that story was done, who knew? There were stories of lots of fucked-up people in the world she could chronicle under a name like Toxic.

Connor couldn’t wait to see what his talented daughter would do next. But in the end, career goals and success didn’t much matter because, last summer, he’d almost lost her. She’d put up a valiant struggle with an evil man who was superior to her in size and strength—and won. Resiliency and a powerful will to live had been on her side.

Bruno Purdy had been fished, a week after their battle, from the steel-gray waters of Lake Union, a bloated and bruised mess, impotent to ever hurt anyone again.

No one, Connor was sure, mourned him.

Now, he and Jimmy entered the cabin by the back door. Connor was thinking of whipping up dinner—a spicy black bean stew to be served atop creamy polenta with a Belgian endive and avocado salad on the side.

He’d been cooking a lot more lately and found the process satisfying, maybe even more than his writing, which he’d yet to return to.

Maybe he never would.

Writing “cozy” about murder had lost its appeal. Connor couldn’t imagine why.

Miranda, forever the slob, had left some of her papers scattered across the kitchen table. While Jimmy went in to take a shower, Connor sat down and began organizing her stuff into a neat pile.

He discovered it was the script she’d composed for the podcast.

The first episode began with:

 

He stands by her bed, holding her hand. Deep in his heart, he clings to the belief that despite her being unconscious she’s aware of his presence, his healing love, his gratitude at the sacrifice she’s made for him.

She’s hooked up to machines with beeping monitors displaying ever-changing data about her heart, her respiration, pulse—but none that can broadcast her soul, which is, and has always been, kind. Kind is the word he’s always thought of when his daughter, with her red hair and sunny smile, appeared in his mind. She’s always put others first, even when it harmed her.

This last thought causes the ball in his throat to expand, constricting. Tears rise in his eyes, spill over.

“You knew. You always knew.”

 

He looked away. He couldn’t read any more. He was certain it would be good, but it was such a hot touch to his pain—of all he’d lost and almost lost.

With the script in hand, he padded to Miranda’s bedroom and set it on her nightstand. “Do good, baby, do good,” he whispered.

He leaned in to the closet door, which had become her recording studio, and could hear the low drone of her voice, the peaks and valleys of her emotion, her laughter, breathlessness, and sighs.

He knew the mantle of storyteller may have just been passed.

And that was fine with him. He had other things to think about these days—new love, cooking, hiking, and making the most of the second chance he’d been given.