The Leaving Part 65

Why so many pictures of one horse?

He spread them out on the kitchenette table and started to compare.

And saw a blur of sorts in one that wasn't in the others.

A reflection in the mirror behind the horse.

He picked up his camera and took a close-up shot of that section of the photo. Then zoomed in on it on the camera display screen.

A man's face took shape.

Lucas said, "Gotcha."

The skin on his hip pulsed.

AVERY.

The funeral was fast, small, and private. Avery thought Max deserved more, bigger-some actual fanfare-after waiting so long for a proper good-bye.

She'd grabbed Woof-Woof when they'd left the house, shoved him in her purse, not even knowing why until they were in the church, the first five rows of pews filled with family and friends she hadn't seen in ages. Now it was the part of the service where people were coming forward and taking a flower from a basket and placing it on top of the coffin. She couldn't will herself to get up, had to let people past her in the pew, brushing against her knees.

It would look bad, her not putting a flower on.

Emma did it.

Sam, too.

All the returned kids did their part.

She didn't want to be ornery or melodramatic.

She just didn't want to do it.

Flowers? What was the point?

She slid Woof-Woof out of her bag and waited until the line was gone, most of the flowers resting in a scattered pile on top of the casket. Then she got up, walked over, and put Woof-Woof on top.

Feeling her insides crumble, she turned and walked down the long aisle-whispers, whimpers, wails from the people there-and past Lucas and Ryan, two dark suits in the back pew-and out the church doors. Lucas had found a clue last night; and Chambers had told him that with some luck, some digital finesse, and some facial recognition software, they might actually ID their captor. So that was something, at least.

Lucas had followed her out.

"I thought I'd feel better," she said. "Closure and all. I thought my one greatest wish was to find Max."

"And now?" He stood beside her on the church steps.

"Now I want what you want," she said.

"To find him," Lucas said. "To find me."

"Those are different things," she said. "They have to be. Anyway, I found you. You're right here." She started down the remaining steps. "Come on. There's someplace I want to go to honor Max way better than what they're doing in there."

They were the only teenagers on the pirate tour boat, and they were overdressed. At first that felt kind of ridiculous but then it seemed no one else noticed or cared-maybe just a.s.sumed their younger siblings were there among the (mostly) boys and (handful of) girls, gathered around the pirate who was teaching them some basic pirate vocabulary. A few kids were lined up to get bandanas and scars painted onto their faces.

"Is it me or are those scars a little too realistic?" Avery said as they sat on a sunned-hot black leather bench along the side of the boat.

This ship's flag had a winking pirate face on it of the Big Beard variety. The pirate dude had the kids all saying Arrgh and was telling them it wasn't loud enough. They tried harder and Avery laughed.

All the kids were roaring "Yo ho ho!" when Lucas kissed her.

Scarlett

With her first funeral under her belt, Scarlett felt strangely alive.

Maybe it was morbid but all through the service she hadn't been able to fight a nagging feeling of- It couldn't be excitement.

No.

Maybe just awareness.

Of the blood in her veins.

The air in her lungs.

The synapses firing in her brain every second of her existence.

There was something magical about her.

Something magical about everyone.

The scene itself-the small coffin, the way Max's mother just locked eyes with the coffin through the whole Ma.s.s, like staring down an ene my-had been borderline unbearable.

Tammy, who'd foolishly worn mascara, had wept silently the whole time.

Then Avery and that stuffed dog . . .

Scarlett had had to look away.

But none of it could stop her from looking up at the stained-gla.s.s windows-angels on high-and thinking about how Max, at least, had been loved.

That was what mattered.

When her phone lit up in the church parking lot afterward, it seemed right that there'd be news. She called Chambers back and he filled her in.

They'd arrested the old princ.i.p.al. They'd found him-disguised but not by much because who would even think to look for him?-among the crowd at the memorial yesterday; they'd spent twenty-four hours trailing him, to see if he might lead them anywhere interesting.

He hadn't.

Now he was in custody and they'd gotten at least a few more answers-were able to explain a few more things.

Like how he'd selected the six of them, specifically, because he'd been right there with them-showing them a mural of a zoo scene on the cafeteria wall while their parents did paperwork-when it happened. He'd seen exactly what they'd seen-blood, fear, mayhem-when they'd huddled with him by that slightly misshapen giraffe on the wall. He'd seen it in their eyes that they would never be the same.

He'd had a copy of The Leaving in his office when the kids had been vetted during kindergarten orientation. He'd wanted to read it after he'd been told that it had inspired the scientist running the experiment, a man he thought was named David Kunkel, but who had used an alias. Of course. It had never occurred to the princ.i.p.al how closely what would eventually happen would mirror the book.

Scarlett must have seen his copy of The Leaving and read the description. And her five-year-old imagination had taken it and run with it.

I'm going on a trip.

To the leaving.

Maybe it had sounded exciting!

Fun!

Maybe even back then she was fantasizing about getting away from her mother.

Now they drove home together, then went their own ways off the hall to change. When Scarlett came out in a tank top and shorts, her moth er was already out in the yard, sitting in a bright-green plastic Adirondack chair with another beside it. Beyond her, in the water, Scarlett saw the quick b.u.mp of a dolphin's arched body and almost gasped.

She smiled and opened the door. "What's with the chairs?" she said, going down the back stairs.

Tammy uncrossed, then recrossed her legs. "Thought those old loungers were looking kind of ragged and saw these on sale at the Home Depot."

"Not too shabby," Scarlett said, and she sat, head resting comfortably back. The parasailing people were at it again, the sail dragging slowly across the sky.

Maybe Scarlett would brave it someday.

Maybe it would feel sort of like riding in a hot air balloon.

Maybe it didn't matter if it did or didn't.

She'd start redecorating her room tomorrow, maybe order a poster of Christina's World, so she'd never forget how a single moment-any one, really-could be so perfectly its own.

"It is always now," she said, and her mother said, "Huh?"

Scarlett closed her eyes and the sun warmed her lids. "Oh, nothing."

Lucas

Ryan had finally gone back to working regular hours at the hotel, and Lucas met him there for his dinner break. They sat on the roof deck, at a canopied table on coasters that swung, and ate fish sandwiches and fries. Below, on the beach level, a live band had just started playing.

"We should be down there," Ryan said. "The girls coming in so far today have been hot."

"You rebound pretty quickly," Lucas said.

"Trust me. I'm reeling on other levels from the deception and all that. Feeling like an idiot in general. But I am not, by any stretch of the imagination, heartbroken." He looked down. "She gave me this shirt."

"Who is that, anyway?" Lucas asked. His brother's valet shirt was hanging on the corner of his bench.

"Mr. Magoo," Ryan said. "Some old cartoon character. She made me watch a bunch of clips on YouTube when I told her I had no idea who he was. He's this old nearsighted guy who keeps getting into sticky situations because he can't see and won't admit he can't see. But it always works out. She gave me another one, too. The Pink Panther."

"Who is . . . ?"

"He's this cartoon pink panther who was in the opening credits of these old movies about an incompetent detective." He shook his head. "This whole time she's been here, she's been mocking me for not seeing it."

"I'm really sorry."

According to Chambers her ident.i.ty was entirely faked. She only started to exist a few years ago. But with the combination of the photo Lucas had flagged-and ones that the others had, with the same man also in the distance, or reflected in mirrors or hidden in plain sight-they'd found the name of the man in the photo and identified him as Louis Immerso. He'd published a few papers in obscure journals years ago, about his success erasing his young daughter Lola's memories of abuse by an uncle, but then he'd gone off the grid.

Chambers was now in touch with Orlean's daughter-in-law, hoping for evidence that would connect Immerso with Orlean, confident Immerso fell under the category of obsessed fan.

Hoping, still, to find him.

Hoping he'd lead them to whatever organization had orchestrated it all.

Hoping, of course, to shut it down.

Kristen's diary had been similarly unhelpful. A chilling tale but not the best record of what had happened.

Ryan shook his head. "I feel like such an idiot for being so duped."

"Don't beat yourself up too much," Lucas said. "How could you even imagine that someone would do that?"

"Still." Ryan picked up his c.o.ke-in a large red frosted plastic cup-and drained about half of it in one long pull off the straw.

"Onward and upward!" Lucas ate a french fry. He was going to have to learn to cook ASAP.