light was changing by the time he reached the Chaplin house.
A light went on upstairs. They’re home, Walker thought, sagging with relief. So I can go. OK then. Time to make that K turn and get going. But he couldn’t, quite. Instead he cut the motor and rolled into the long shadow of a utility shed. He had no idea what he was doing here. Maybe he just needed to think. With his captive halfway between out-cold and sleeping-it-off, he could sit here until he got strong enough to stop his inexorable slide into the past.
In fact, Walker’s heart was going downhill by noon today, long before Kalen recklessly rear-ended him and came out grinning as though there was no bad history between them.
Wade called. He’s sick of his brother’s love affair with Fort Jude society, so he let the machine pick up. ‘This just in. Jessie called, and she says . . .’ Wade’s voice filled the room; like everybody else in this town, he loved to beat those jungle drums. ‘She says a somebody Carteret just checked in at the Flordana. Young guy, she’ll tell me the rest tonight but, hey. Walker, he has Lucy’s eyes.’
Walker’s mouth dried out and his heart staggered. Stricken, he whirled in the beautiful space he had created, a soul circling the drain. Fuck you, Wade. Fuck you for dropping this on me.
Generally a strong person, Walker Pike plunged into grief for what was lost years before he even guessed what he was, or could conceive of becoming what he is. Grief drove him out of his perfect house, and although he never intended to come back to the Chaplin place, memory brought him here.
Don’t, Pike. Don’t be here. Get out of Pine Vista, fool.
He was fixing to scratch off when the other car approached. He tracked the headlights, troubled when the driver slowed down in front of Chaplin’s house. Not Chaplin, nobody he knew, not expected here. The driver cut the motor and coasted past silently. He stopped in a sheltered spot just beyond the house, as if, like Walker, he wanted to watch without being seen.
Him, Walker thought, without knowing who he meant or why it was so disturbing. Me.
He should leave, he couldn’t leave. OK then, wait the fucker out. A lurker had come into a place so specific to Walker that he could not bear to have him here. When he goes, you can go, he told himself. For years he’s tried to put all this behind him. He thought he had, but here he is. Tough as he is, driven and tightly controlled, Walker Pike understands why he’s here. Part of his past is hidden somewhere inside that house, a fixed destination point in his existential GPS. When she told him goodbye, Lucy left it here, like a magnet. He still felt the pull.
He slipped out of the car and sat down on the pine needles to wait. With Kalen passed out in the trunk, he could take his time. Hey, he was doing the asshole a favor. Let him sleep it off, wake up and get his shit together before you dump him in there among his people, no hard feelings, if you can manage that.
His domesticated brother was stoked about the extravaganza at the club: ‘Brad’s daughter is engaged, and I’m invited.’ In way it’s pathetic, how Wade hangs on what those surface-feeders think, maybe because it’s all on the surface.
And here you are, custodian of the so-called host. Wash the bastard’s face even if you despise him, comb his hair and get the vomit off his shirt. It’s his party, after all.
After a time, Walker saw Maggie and Al lock up the house and leave. Fine, he told himself. Now I can go.
Then the intruder’s car door fell open and Walker froze. The intruder got out of his Honda and headed for the house. Quick. Anxious, judging by the angle of the shoulders. Young, judging by the lean, unfinished look. Now Walker had to wait until the stranger finished doing whatever he came to do and left.
Then he could go.
Stupid, stupid. He fell into a tracker’s crouch and followed. Woulda-coulda-shoulda. The lurker snaked in through a back window and Walker groaned. Yeah, right. And you thought you could control your life.
He couldn’t leave until the creep came out.
In the still, dense night, lost years played behind Walker’s frontal bone like grainy film on a drive-in movie screen, scored by the dry needles of the Australian