The Voice Inside

38

Rudy studied Frost Easton through binoculars. The detective’s head swiveled as he watched the hills and tracked the ridgeline. Rudy was too far away to be seen, no more than a dot on the hillside, and there was no sunlight to catch on the lenses of his binoculars. Even so, he wondered if the detective’s intuition told him he was being watched. He’d found that to be true with victims sometimes. Every now and then, one of them would turn for no reason, as if some instinct for self-preservation had alerted them.

Five minutes passed. They stared at each across the distance, invisibly. Eventually, Easton turned around and went back to his truck and drove away.

Rudy frowned. Seeing Easton here meant the police knew about Maria Lopes.

He wondered how that had happened and how far it had gone. Did Easton know why? Did he know about Hope and the other victims? If he did, then the game was up, and they would be coming for him. Regardless, Rudy had no intention of going back to San Quentin. Not again. He wouldn’t be locked up in a cell with Hope’s ghost. He wouldn’t wake up every night at 3:42 a.m. That road had come to an end.

The cold ocean air climbed over the peak, settling on top of him. Under his camouflage fleece blanket, he shivered. He’d built a nest for himself off the trail, on the eastern slope of the summit, where he was invisible to anyone hiking above him. He’d borrowed Phil’s Cadillac today, and the sedan was parked half a mile away in the parking lot of Skyline College. From there, he’d hiked into the hills that gave him a bird’s-eye view of Maria’s house.

Her new location had been easy to find. He’d stopped at the San Bruno library that morning and run a couple of Google searches and found a local website with Maria’s name, address, and phone number. In this case, it was a community theater group that had posted contact information for all their board members. There Maria was, living on Sneath Lane.

Now, hidden in the hills, Rudy could spy on her yard and her windows. He’d spotted her several times inside the house. She’d had coffee on the back porch and done yoga in her bedroom. Soon enough, she would do what she always did, assuming her daily routine hadn’t changed completely in four years. She would run. She ran every day, rain or shine. Seeing her now, he could tell that she still had the lean, wiry build of a runner. And she’d moved here, to the fringe of a park, where the running trails were literally outside her front door.

The cold didn’t matter. The fog didn’t matter. Not to a real runner. Maria would come, and he would be waiting for her.

I’m going to take another one, Hope. Watch me. There’s nothing you can do about it.

It was all a question of how much time he had. Sooner or later, the police would find him. He could measure it in hours, or he could measure it in days. It was a race between him and Frost Easton, and there was only one way to find out if Easton was getting close. Rudy dug in the backpack for his pay-as-you-go phone, and he dialed a number.

It rang once, and then a voice answered.

“Inspector Easton.”

Rudy took a breath. “Hello, Inspector.”

There was a long stretch of silence on the phone. He could hear the noise of traffic outside the truck. The detective was already back on the freeway. Finally, Easton said, “Cutter. Where are you?”

“I’m watching someone. Do you know who I’m watching?”

Easton didn’t answer. Rudy listened for a change in the vehicle’s engine. If the detective had figured out the truth, he’d be turning around. He’d go back to find Maria Lopes and scour the ridge. But he didn’t. The traffic noise didn’t change. Easton kept driving. He knew the name Maria Lopes, but he didn’t know more than that. Not yet.

Rudy thought, The library.

The guy with the motorcycle magazine had spotted him at the downtown library, and they’d found his search history.

“What do you want?” Easton asked.

“I thought we should talk,” Rudy said. “The way these things go, we might not have a chance to talk again. The next time we meet will probably be under more difficult circumstances. It’s easier now, when we both have time.”

“You have less time than you think,” the detective said.

“Really? I think you’re bluffing. I don’t think you know anything about me at all.”

“I know the victims are all connected to Hope,” Easton told him. “I know that punishing Hope for what she did to your daughter is pretty much the only thing that keeps you alive.”

Rudy waited a long time to reply. If Easton was taking a shot in the dark, the shot had landed perilously close to its mark.

“You can’t possibly understand my relationship with Hope, Inspector,” Rudy said. “I loved her. I still do, despite everything. You can hate and love at the same time. Hope was very complicated and troubled. I never saw the depth of pain she was in.”

“Then I guess you weren’t looking,” Easton said. “It’s right there in the self-portrait she did as a teenager.”

“It’s always easier to recognize things in hindsight, but you’re right. I should have seen it. I used to look at that painting on the wall and not realize that it was a cry for help. I suppose if you’ve seen the painting, that means you’ve seen Hope’s mother? Josephine?”

“I have. I showed her the photo of Nina Flores. She spotted the connection to Hope right away.”

Rudy felt another body blow. Was it possible? Did he know? There was only one other person in the world who would understand with a single glance why he’d chosen these women, and that was Hope’s mother.

“What did Josephine tell you?” he murmured.

As Rudy spoke, the wind gusted behind him suddenly, like the shriek of a witch. He wondered if the detective could hear it through the phone and whether he would put it together. The wind. The ridge. Maria Lopes and her house in the hills. Instead, Easton said nothing, not answering the question. The detective was baiting him to talk. To say more. Rudy couldn’t stop himself.

“Hope was always afraid that she was going to harm Wren,” he went on. “I think she was terrified of that even before she got pregnant. She saw something in the faces of other mothers. Contentment. Joy. Love. They were so happy holding their children, and she knew she would never feel the same way herself. It took me a long time to realize that. Far too long.”

Rudy closed his eyes. In his mind, he saw all their faces. All that terrible, infuriating joy.

“Of course, understanding what Hope did doesn’t make it less evil,” Rudy went on. The edge was back in his voice now, as sharp as a knife. “She gets no mercy for what she did. None.”

“Neither do you,” Easton replied immediately.

Rudy heard the rage thrown back at him. “I’m not asking for mercy. I know I won’t get any from you. Are you saying you want to kill me, Inspector? Is that your plan? Be honest. If I gave you the chance right now, would you put a bullet in the head of the person who cut your sister’s throat?”

He listened to the detective breathe. Slowly. In and out. Trying to wrest control of his emotions.

“I want to stop you, Cutter,” Easton said. “I don’t want you dead. I’d rather see you back in a box to torment yourself for the next thirty years.”

“Oh, you don’t need a box for torment, Inspector. Free men suffer, too. Sometimes the only thing you need for madness is a memory burned into your eyes. I have that.”

“I have that, too,” Easton reminded him. His voice was a low, bitter growl.

“You think you’ve seen it all, but you haven’t. There are plenty of other demons out there for you. Horror can always get worse. Don’t make this personal between us, Inspector.”

“Too late.”

The noise of the phone became dead air. Easton had hung up abruptly; the call was over. Rudy powered down his phone and took out the battery. He picked up the binoculars again and settled in to wait.

Evening would be coming soon. Maria would be running.

He’d wavered about his plans for Frost Easton, but now he knew what to do. No mercy. If Easton wanted to make it personal, then Rudy would oblige. The detective had no idea just how personal it was going to get.