Skeleton King Read online

  But that wasn’t the only thing that would end.

  Kendra’s career would also be cut short.

  If you notice anything at all…

  Brett’s eyes moved from Kendra’s pretty face, mostly covered in her obnoxiously large sunglasses and matted hair, to the call button on his phone.

  CHAPTER 15

  Kendra nearly shrieked when a hand on her shoulder jostled her awake.

  She had been having the dream again, the one that she hadn’t had for many, many years. What started as a memory of her moving with her father had quickly transitioned into the horrible feeling of dread and despair, of fear and anguish. To a different time, a different place.

  To the swamp.

  Her eyes snapped open, and it took all of her effort to keep her mouth clenched shut.

  It was only Brett, his pale blue eyes filled with concern.

  The next feeling that overcame her was one of confusion: even though she remembered leaving in the early morning, and Brett had told her that the drive wouldn’t take more than a couple hours, it was unexpectedly dark outside.

  A moment later, she realized that it was still hot out, intensely hot, even with the AC blasting. A second after that, she figured out that it was just her dark sunglasses that were clouding her world.

  She took them off and squinted into the sun.

  “We’re here,” Brett said in a soft voice.

  Here.

  Memories of the stacked bodies, of the files of the missing girls, came flooding back to her.

  Rickshaw County.

  Kendra sat up in her seat, stretching her legs out in front of her. Then she peered out the windshield.

  Brett had pulled his rental up to a small colonial house that reminded Kendra of a post-World War II home gifted to veterans, back when veterans were treated as heroes and not disposable instruments of war.

  The slat board siding was painted a pale blue, up to a white section on the second floor that was clearly an addition that had been added sometime in the past few decades. There was a faded American flag hanging from the wooden porch.

  Lacy McGuire lived here.

  Kendra’s mind immediately set to work, trying to imagine the scenario and circumstances under which little Lacy had been kidnapped. She recalled the file that Brett had sent her, and mentally noted that the girl’s mother had been committed, and that only her father had been home when she had been taken in the middle of the night. Based on how poorly her assumptions had fared her at the Black house, she put aside her initial inclination that the father was involved.

  The house had a large front door, a thick, heavy black one that was of new construction. It looked solid, and if she knew the type, it was nearly impossible to break into. In addition to looking undamaged, all of the many windows that flanked the front of the house seemed to be intact. She assumed that there was a side door, based on the way that the wooden porch wrapped around the left side of the house. Kendra made a note to check the construction of that one later.

  It was the topmost window, the one that was set back slightly from the original roof, embedded in the white addition, that stuck out to her. Squinting so hard that her headache threatened to return, she made out pale pink curtains that were only barely visible through the window; they had been pushed to one side.

  If she were to kidnap Lacy McGuire, this would be her preferred point of entry.

  Kendra nodded to herself, then turned to Brett, who was patiently waiting for her to say something, to come back out of her head.

  “Kendra,” Brett began, “it’s time that I filled you in a little more about what I know about this place… about Lacy and Peter McGuire.”

  Kendra nodded again, and listened intently to what her partner had to say.

  CHAPTER 16

  The door to the McGuire residence opened from the inside, and a stern-looking police officer in his late fifties held it open for them. Brett flashed his badge, but the man barely looked at it. Instead, his brow lowered as if to say, ‘yeah, I was expecting you.’

  The director.

  Kendra didn’t even bother showing her badge, and simply entered the home.

  As her eyes slowly adjusted to the dim interior, she allowed her other senses to take over.

  The first thing that hit her was the smell; it didn’t smell bad, per se, just a little musty, slightly stale—a clear indication that the doors had been pretty much closed tight for the past two days. The second was the sense of foreboding—it was as if the gravity inside was stronger, weighing her down.

  Her eyes became accustomed to the lighting change, and she took a step toward Brett, who was again giving her space, allowing her to work.

  He wasn’t a bad agent, but they both knew who did most of the heavy lifting in their partnership. But that was okay by Kendra, as the man did most of the work when it came to extra-curriculars, and besides, he served his purpose well. One of the things she appreciated most about Brett was that he wasn’t a pretender. He knew his role, and he filled it to a ‘T.’ His innate understanding of where he fit in this world not only made him a good partner for her, but was a driving force underlying him being the best agent he possibly could be.

  Still, despite all of this, he was only a good agent. Kendra, on the other hand, was a great one.

  C’est la fucking vie.

  The front entrance of the house was short, leading into an open area on their left that was clearly a family room. To the right was the kitchen, but it was hidden behind a wall, and Kendra’s eyes were drawn to the former.

  There was an exhausted-looking man sitting on the edge of the couch, his elbows on his knees, his face cupped in his hands. His hands were thin and bony, veins standing out on the back of them as if they belonged to an eighty-year-old and not someone in his mid-thirties. Kendra squinted, trying to focus in on his fingers.

  The door closed behind her and she cringed.

  “This is Peter McGuire,” the officer said.

  Kendra swore under her breath when the man on the couch looked up—she had wanted to spend as much time as possible observing him without him knowing. His eyes were rheumy, the rims red, as if he had spent hours rubbing them with sandpaper.

  “Thanks,” she muttered sarcastically over her shoulder.

  Realizing that her concentration was broken, Brett stepped toward the man, inviting him to his feet.

  “Agent Brett Cherry,” he said simply, extending his hand.

  Kendra spied his fingers: nails bitten to the quick, small dots of blood from hangnails peppering the thumb and index fingers.

  “Peter,” the man answered, his voice hoarse.

  “This is my partner, Agent Kendra Wilson.”

  Kendra nodded, and the man offered her a contemplative glance. She debated stepping forward and shaking his hand as well, but decided against it.

  Leave the small talk to Brett—he’s better at it anyway.

  “May we sit?”

  Peter nodded, then indicated the two chairs across from the couch. Brett sat, and then Peter returned to the edge of the couch. Kendra slowly made her way over to the chair beside Brett, her eyes scanning the interior of the house as she did.

  There was a stairwell behind the couch, a steep set covered in a dark brown worn carpet. She started to turn toward the kitchen next, but in doing so her gaze passed the man on the couch, and she realized he was looking at her with a queer expression.

  Still unsure of Peter McGuire at this point, she figured it best if she avoided upsetting the man further. So instead of grilling the man with her eyes, and casting doubt with her stare, Kendra made her way to the chair, trying her best to look forlorn, solemn.

  She sat, but while Brett was perched on the front edge of his worn leather chair, his body language mimicking Peter’s, she elected to lean back, to continue her observer role. It felt natural, of course, but it was also a ploy that Brett and she had wordlessly established long ago; kind of like the good cop bad cop routine, but neither were p
articularly ‘bad’—more like Caring Agent and Pensive Agent. It didn’t have the same ring to it, but it was far more effective for gaining information than the other, clichéd routine.

  “First off,” Brett began, his voice low and slow, “I—we—would like to express—”

  “Anyone want a drink? I’m making tea.”

  The voice came from somewhere off to their right, and was so unexpected that for a second Brett’s eyes went wide, his composure lost. Even Kendra felt her heart thud in her chest as her eyes whipped in that direction, expecting to see the officer that had held the door open. But that man was still near the door, and the voice had very clearly come from the kitchen.

  Unfortunately, the hallway blocked her view of the kitchen and of the man who spoke.

  A drink? Whiskey, please, she almost said, despite her surprise.

  “We’re fine,” Brett answered, drawing Kendra back to him. “Thank you.”

  And there it was, the stupid expression, the confused, puppy dog look on Brett’s face that was aimed at her. If there was one thing that she could do without in this world, it was that fucking look.

  Fuck off, Brett.

  When he just continued to stare stupidly, she eventually raised an eyebrow, and debated actually verbalizing her previous thought.

  Quit staring, you moron.

  “Suit yourself,” the man from the kitchen answered.

  Kendra turned again, thankful for the distraction from Brett, but when she focused on the man coming toward the couch, her mouth dropped open.

  “This is Father John,” Peter McGuire said, and Kendra gaped.

  The priest smiled at her and then took a sip of his tea.

  CHAPTER 17

  “Where are we going, Daddy?” Kendra asked from the backseat.

  Neither her father nor her mother answered.

  They had been driving for nearly two hours now, and she was hot, tired, and had to pee. And she was annoyed that for pretty much the entire car ride, she had been ignored.

  As she turned back to the window, she could feel her lower lip curling and her eyes start to tingle. She tried her best not to cry, but she eventually lost the battle. The landscape, a dull, sandy brown, slowly became watery until it regressed into a scene not unlike staring down at the beach with a lazy wave rolling over it.

  “Why?” she whimpered. “Why do we have to move again?”

  It didn’t seem fair—none of it seemed fair.

  She heard a sob that wasn’t hers, and she wiped her tears away and turned to the front seat. To her surprise, her father was looking back at her, and she realized that they were now parked.

  He was crying again. Her gaze darted to her mother, who was still staring blankly ahead as if in some sort of trance.

  “I love you,” he said. “Your mother and I love you very much.”

  Then why do we have to move?

  But her father’s words—not from today, but from what seemed a different era—kept her from speaking.

  Think before you speak, Kendra. Think, observe, then pick your words wisely.

  Repeating the same question would not get her an answer, or if it did, it wasn’t an answer that she would want to hear.

  “Please,” her father continued. He reached into the backseat, an envelope in his outstretched hand. “I need you to deliver this.”

  Confusion replaced the look of despair on her face.

  A letter?

  “Take it, Kendra.”

  She reluctantly obliged. It was light and thin even in her small hand.

  Her father turned his gaze toward the side of the road, and she followed it.

  A small white church sat in what appeared to be the center of nowhere, the cross that extended from the peaked roof seemingly glowing in the hot white sun.

  She turned back to her father’s tear-streaked face.

  “Please, just deliver the letter, Ken-Ken.”

  Ken-Ken.

  He rarely called her that anymore.

  Like in a dream, she reached over and unclicked her seatbelt with her free hand. Barely more than an automaton now, she opened the door next, and before a cognizant thought entered her head, she was standing on the hot sidewalk, squinting in the hot sun.

  Something was wrong here, very wrong, she knew that in her guts, in her soul, but she took a step toward the wooden doors nonetheless.

  One step, then two.

  Before she knew it, she was standing in front of the church, the huge wooden door looming over her.

  She turned back to look at her mom and dad in the car behind her. As before, her mother was staring ahead, but her father’s eyes were on her.

  And they were filled with a sadness so deep that she wasn’t sure she fully understood it.

  Kendra Wilson knocked on the door, her eyes still locked on the car. Her tiny hand made a barely perceptible noise, but less than a minute later, she heard the sound of old wood creaking. She turned back in time to see the door opening, a sliver at first, then a foot, then two. A priest with a short, dark beard looked down at her, his brown eyes kind, inviting.

  “Hi there, little one.” His smile faltered as he looked around her. “What are you doing here all by yourself?”

  By myself?

  Kendra’s head whipped around so quickly that she nearly fell.

  She expected to see her dad’s dark blue Toyota, her father still staring at her with his sad eyes.

  But all she saw was a tight, whirling dervish of dust.

  “Kendra! Kendra!”

  Her eyes slowly began to focus again, the blurriness fading in strips as if someone were systematically wiping Vaseline from a pair of reading glasses.

  And when they cleared, she saw only one thing.

  A square.

  A white square.

  I need to get out of here.

  Kendra didn’t know if she had said the words out loud or just thought them, but it didn’t matter. She struggled to hoist her body out of the chair, her legs feeling like cinderblocks.

  She stumbled toward the door, needing to grasp the wall at one point to prevent fall falling. Somewhere far away, she realized that the officer was staring at her, but she ignored him and pushed past.

  Both of her hands slammed against the door, and a second later, Kendra spilled out into the hot sun.

  CHAPTER 18

  “You should have told me! Brett, you should have fucking told me!”

  “I did!”

  Kendra’s head whipped back and forth.

  “But you didn’t tell me that the fucking priest would be here.” She struggled to keep her emotions under control, to force the hysteria that built inside her away.

  No confused look on Brett’s face this time; instead, she was greeted by genuine concern.

  “At least I thought I did…”

  Kendra showed her back to him and stared up into the hot sun.

  “No you fucking didn’t, Brett. You said that McGuire had called in a priest—that a priest was here… as in fucking past tense. Not here now!”

  She felt a hand fall on her shoulder.

  “Kendra—”

  Kendra whipped around, and the hand fell away. She was beyond controlling her emotions now—everything from the past few days came bubbling out like a deluge.

  “You fucking called the director, didn’t you?”

  Brett’s expression transitioned to defensive.

  “I—”

  But a ringing phone interrupted him. Kendra ignored the noise.

  “You fucking called him.” She ground her teeth. “I knew you would—I just knew it.”

  The phone rang again.

  Kendra waved a hand in front of her, barely resisting the urge to reach out and shove Brett.

  “That’s it! That’s the end of it, whatever the fuck we had is over now. I—”

  The phone rang again.

  “Answer your fucking phone!”

  Brett’s eyes widened.

  “It’s your phone!”


  Confused, Kendra put her hand to her pocket, feeling the outline of her cell phone inside. When it rang a fourth time, she finally felt the vibration.

  Still seething, she fumbled to get it out of her pocket. Then she held it up to her ear and shouted, “What?”

  When there was no answer, she realized that she hadn’t clicked accept and pulled it away from her head and mashed the green button, barely registering the words on screen: Unidentified Caller.

  “What?” she shouted again. This time someone answered.

  “Uh, Agent Wilson?”

  “What? Who is this?”

  “It’s Detective Tennison.”

  At the mention of his name, she immediately recognized the man’s gravelly voice. Kendra again turned her back to Brett and forced herself to breathe deeply, before exhaling through her nose.

  “Yes?”

  Her attempts to reduce some of the venom from her voice worked… a little.

  “I, uh, contacted your friend at the FBI? Agent, uh…” There was a pause, followed by the sound of crinkling paper. “Agent Grover?”

  “And?”

  “Well, some of the test results came back; not all, but some. Amazingly quickly, I might add.”

  Kendra waited, her hand squeezing her cell phone so tightly that her fingers ached.

  Fucking Brett, fucking priest, fucking Lacy McGuire. Fucking Christine. Fucking mater est, matrem omnium.

  “And—you’re not going to believe this—but Stephanie Black?”

  This time the pause was drawn out, and Kendra surmised that she would get no further information without responding.

  “Yes? What about her?”

  “Well, the DNA results came back and, well, she isn’t a Black.”

  Kendra wasn’t sure she’d heard correctly.

  “What?”

  “Stephanie Black had no genetic connection to either of her parents. Either she was adopted, or…”

  The words trailed off, drowned out by Kendra’s thoughts.

  Not related? Adopted? What the fuck is going on?