the house, there was a sense of presence in the room, as though someone or something had darted out of sight just before I arrived.
“Jake?” I said quietly.
He swallowed hard, looking like he was going to cry.
“Jake, who were you talking to?”
“Nobody.”
“I heard you talking. You were pretending to be someone else. Someone who wanted to play with you.”
“No, I wasn’t!” Suddenly he seemed less frightened than angry, as though I’d let him down somehow. “You always say that, and it isn’t fair!”
I blinked in surprise, and then stood there helplessly as he began stuffing papers into his Packet of Special Things. I didn’t always say that, did I? He must have known I didn’t like him talking to himself—that it bothered me—but it wasn’t as though I’d ever actually told him off for it.
I walked across and sat down on the couch near him.
“Jake—”
“I’m going to my room!”
“Please don’t. I’m worried about you.”
“No, you’re not. You don’t care about me at all.”
“That’s not true.”
But he was already past me and heading for the living room door. My instinct told me to let him go for now—to allow things to cool down and then talk later—but I also wanted to reassure him. I struggled for the right words.
“I thought you liked the little girl,” I said. “I thought you wanted to see her again.”
“It wasn’t her!”
“Who was it, then?”
“It was the boy in the floor.”
And then he was out of sight in the hallway.
I sat there for a moment, unable to think of what to say. The boy in the floor. I remembered the raspy voice that Jake had been talking to himself with. And, of course, that was the only explanation for what I’d heard. But even so, I felt a chill run through me. It hadn’t sounded like him at all.
I want to scare you.
And then I looked down. While Jake had gathered most of his things together, a single sheet of paper remained there, a few crayons lying abandoned around it. Yellow, green, and purple.
I stared at the picture. Jake had been drawing butterflies. They were childishly imprecise, but still clearly recognizable as the ones I’d seen in the garage this morning. But that was impossible, because he’d never been in the garage. I was about to pick the sheet up and examine it more closely when I heard him burst into tears.
I stood up and ran out into the hallway, just as he emerged, sobbing, from my office, pushing past me and running up the stairs.
“Jake—”
“Leave me alone! I hate you!”
I watched him go, feeling helpless, unable to keep up with what was happening, not understanding.
His bedroom door slammed.
I walked numbly into my office.
And then I saw the awful things I’d written to Rebecca there on the screen. Words about how hard everything was without her, and how a part of me blamed her for leaving me to deal with all this. Words my son must have just read. And I closed my eyes as I understood only too well.
Nineteen
Pete was sitting at his dinner table when the call came through. He should have been cooking or watching television, but the kitchen behind him remained dark and cold, and the living room was silent. Instead, he was staring at the bottle and the photograph.
He had been staring at them for a long time.
The day had taken a heavy toll on him. Seeing Carter always did, but this was much worse than usual. Despite the fact that Pete had waved away Amanda’s comment, the killer’s description of his dream about Tony Smith had gotten to Pete. Last night he had been determined to forget about Neil Spencer, but that wasn’t possible now. The cases were connected. He was involved.
But what use was he? An afternoon spent investigating visitors to friends of Carter’s inside had proved fruitless—so far, at least. There were still several to look at. The sad truth was that the bastard had more friends in prison than Pete had out of it.
So drink, then.
You’re worthless. You’re useless. Just do it.
The urge was stronger than ever, but he could survive this. After all, he had resisted the voice in the past. And yet the idea of returning the bottle unopened to the kitchen cabinet brought a sense of despair. It felt like there was an inevitability to him drinking.
He pressed his hand to his chin, slowly rubbing the skin around his mouth, and looked at the photograph of him and Sally.