Shadow Man

EPILOGUE

I HAD ANNIE buried next to Matt and Alexa. That way Bonnie and I can visit our families together.

It's a beautiful day. That California sun, the kind my dad loved best, is out in all its glory, tempered by a cool breeze that keeps you from getting too hot. The grass in the cemetery hasn't been cut yet this week, and it waves every so often, all thick and lustrous green. Looking across the cemetery, where the gravestones go as far as the eye can see, I can imagine this as the bottom of the ocean, covered with seaweed and row after row of wrecked ghost ships.

I see other people, single or together, young or old. They are visiting their own wives or husbands, sons or daughters, brothers or sisters. Some died peacefully. Some died in violence. Some were comforted, while others died alone.

Some graves have no visitors. They grow old and cracked with neglect. Though it is filled with memories of death and haunted by ghosts, it is a peaceful place. And this is a perfect day.

Bonnie has been planting flowers on Annie's grave by hand. She finishes, standing up and brushing the dirt off her palms.

"You done, honey?" I ask her.

She looks at me, nods. Smiles.

Elaina has started chemo. Alan is still coming to work. I've accepted that the outcomes of both are beyond my control. All I can do is love my friends and be there for them.

James had his sister's body reinterred. Leo bought a new dog, a Lab puppy he's been talking about for days. Callie is healing well, becoming grumpier and grumpier about her confinement to a hospital bed, a good sign. Her daughter continues to visit her, and Callie seems to be coming to a grudging acceptance that she now has to bear the title of Grandmother. She doesn't seem to mind.

Tommy and I have seen each other a few more times. Bonnie likes him. We're taking it easy, seeing where it leads.

It turns out that Peter Hillstead had been responsible for the death of at least twelve women over the years. Most were perfect crimes--in fact, we know about them now only because of his journals. He kept meticulous notes, just like his father. And like his father, he'd hidden his victims, picking women who wouldn't be missed, destroying their corpses when he was done with them. There was no evidence left of their passing, just--shadows. We still have no idea what other monsters he corresponded with and encouraged, beyond those we know about, or even if he did. I have learned to accept that this, too, is beyond my control. If they crawl out of their caves, I'll be here to slap them down. It turns out that Robert Street had known Hillstead for almost three years. He had participated only in the two most recent murders. To be honest, I don't really care. Hillstead is dead and gone, and Street will soon take his own place on death row.

Hillstead had used his position as a doctor and as an authorized therapist for agents to gain access to personnel records, which is what we think led him down the road to Callie's daughter. The Bureau had done a thorough background check on Callie; Marilyn hadn't escaped their scrutiny.

He'd seemed omnipotent at times in his ability to find out everything about us. In the end, it turns out that he was just smart. We were smarter, something I remain grimly smug about. I recognize the danger of this. The dark train is my own arrogance, one that could carry me off a cliff if I don't watch it. For now, I let it ride. Dragons are prideful, after all. The Hillsteads have the profilers in some kind of foaming-at-themouth tizzy. Something new and unheard of in a serial killer, blah, blah, blah.

I don't think he was all that different from any of the other killers I've hunted and caught. He made a mistake, just like they all do. However "perfect" he may have been, it was Renee Parker--his first--who reached out from the grave in the end, pulling him down into the earth with her. This brings me a feeling of tremendous satisfaction. The real ghosts of this world are just that, I have thought many times since: the consequences of our actions. The footprints of change we leave in our passage through time.

Consequences. They can haunt or harm us. They can also exalt us, and be a source of comfort in the night. Not all ghosts wail or weep. Some just smile.

Bonnie still isn't speaking. She doesn't scream in her sleep every night, but neither is every night peaceful. She is a beautiful child, smart, thoughtful, generous with her love. She is an artist as well, a painter. She churns them out, things beautiful and dark, and I recognize that for now they are her substitute for the spoken word. We've settled into a routine. Not quite mother-daughter, not just yet. But we are making progress, and I am no longer terrified. I am happy with the First Rule of Mom, ready to let it take me wherever it wants to go.

The ghosts of Matt and Alexa visit me in my dreams, and they are a comfort. I no longer have the nightmares.

"You ready to go?"

Bonnie takes my hand as an answer.

She is mute, and I am scarred, but the day is beautiful, and the future no longer terrible. I have her and she has me, and from there grows love.

And from love--life.

We leave the cemetery hand in hand, watched by our ghosts. I can feel them smiling.