Havoc by Shannon McKenna

21

Cait heard voices raised in another part of Demi’s house, dragging her attention away from Fiona’s virus literature. She’d been studying for hours, having decided to let Mace go off with his brothers to strategize for the virus recovery without her. Aside from what she’d already given them, she didn’t have much more to contribute, so it made more sense to stay here and correlate data from the articles with Dad’s research notes and journal. She was more useful focused on her area of expertise.

Besides. She trusted him. And that made a difference.

But the argument was loud enough to break her concentration bubble.

“…have to take care of it! I already called them, and the packages are ready! The restaurant is closed all weekend for the wedding. Come on, Mitch, I’ll be fine with just one guy for my escort. And Clint’s around here somewhere, right?”

“Clint’s asleep. There’s only Harris, and he’s not enough to cover Fiona and Cait. Eric and Anton and Mace were crystal fucking clear on that point, and they keep hammering it in, just in case anyone gets sloppy. None of you moves from this house without a two-man escort, and none of you gets left behind without a two-man guard. End of story. There have been three abductions, not counting the failed attempt on Cait. I can’t believe we’re even arguing about this. Seriously, Demi?”

Another voice spoke up. Fiona. “How about if I go, as the second escort?”

“No fucking way,” Mitch said. “That’s not how the Trasks define you, Fi.”

“I’ve got all the same needle-sticks that the boys have,” Fiona wheedled. “Plus I’m as bad-tempered as a hungry grizzly, I’m trained in martial arts, and I’m armed to the teeth. I pity the fool who fucks with me, and all of you would, too.”

“I’m sure you could kick my ass without breaking a sweat, but that’s not the point,” Mitch said. “It’s your boyfriend who worries me.”

Cait spoke up from the corridor. “Where do you guys want to go?”

Elisa turned to look at her. “It’s Demi’s pie run,” she explained. “She takes pie to all the elderly shut-ins every week. There are five of them on her list right now. There used to be more, but three of them died these past few months.”

“I got a new one last week,” Demi told her. “So it’s six.”

“It’s Demi’s community service project.” Fi held up a forestalling hand before anyone could speak. “And I promise, I’m not being sarcastic or belittling when I say that, okay? That’s just the way my voice naturally sounds.”

“I’m not leaving Cait alone with just Jim Wong, either,” Mitch said.

“What if I came along?” Cait asked. “What if we all came? Take the big van. Then you’d have a full complement. More, even, if you counted Fiona.”

“Aw, hell with it, I’ll just come, too.” Clint’s voice was longsuffering as he stomped heavily downstairs. “God knows, I might as well. No one can get any sleep around here, with all this squawking going on.”

“Sorry I woke you, Clint,” Demi said.

“Whatever. Let’s go. If we hurry, maybe I can even catch a nap after. All together now. One big happy family. Where’s the pie-box?”

“Already loaded into the back of the van,” Demi said. “Thanks, Clint.”

So all four women piled in with Clint, Mitch and Jim Wong, and Cait soon found herself on an odyssey of social calls to Demi’s octogenarian and nonagenarian friends. It took quite a while, since every recipient got a social visit. Demi dragged Fiona along with Elisa and Cait at first, but after only two visits, Fiona hunched low in her seat and insisting on waiting it out.

“I can’t deal with them,” she muttered. “I’m a bride tomorrow, and it makes them go bananas. They pinch my cheeks, for fuck’s sake. Pretend I’m not even here. I’ll stay out here with the boys and watch for drones.”

So Cait was the one who drew the attention of the oldsters. She was teased and fussed over and offered coffee in virtue of being the new sweetheart of that youngest Trask fellow, and isn’t he so handsome, and aren’t you just sweet and so pretty, too, etc., etc. That was the theme for the women. The old men were more reserved.

Her social energy was drained by the time they got to number six, which she recognized as the Kettle River Trailer Park.

They parked on a hill next to a singlewide trailer, which seemed to have sunk into the hillside itself, it was so overgrown with ivy and foliage. Fiona got out, to Cait’s surprise, and followed them to the door.

“What? You changed your mind? You’re doing this one?” Cait asked.

“This is Glenna Visser’s house,” Fiona said. “She fished Anton and me out of the river when Anton got shot. She wrapped us up in blankets and bandages, offered us whiskey, and drove us toward the hospital. I’ll do Glenna’s pie run any day.”

Cait glanced at the river, rushing nearby, swollen with spring runoff. It was very near to the trailer. The three of them walked up the steps and through a narrow passageway on the porch, piled with junk. The forest seemed like it was trying to reclaim the place, and no one was pushing back against the forest very hard.

Three big dogs burst into a chorus of barking as they rang the bell, and a heavyset, smiling woman in a tracksuit with long, thick gray hair came to greet them. She hugged them and invited them into the cramped living room while the dogs capered and leaped and licked upon them. “Can I get you girls some coffee?”

“I’ve drunk so much already, I think I’m floating away,” Cait said.

“Yeah, you’re actually our final stop,” Demi said. “We always save the best for last. I brought you a piece of lemon meringue, and raspberry chiffon.”

“Best news I’ve had all day,” Glenna said. “Momma used to go nuts for that coconut cream and banana cream pie that you brought to her. You’re such a sweetie.”

“Her mom, Georgia, loved my pies, too,” Demi explained to Cait. “She died last year. I loved sitting in the back yard, outside Georgia’s campervan, trading recipe tips.”

“Hah,” Glenna said. “Like Momma could have taught you anything about cooking.”

“I take my tips where I find them,” Demi said. “I learned a lot from Georgia.”

Cait gazed out the window in the gathering twilight. There was the campervan that Demi had talked about. She leaned toward the window and studied it, a prickle of unease shivering up her back. It was a Volkswagen campervan. Tan, with wooden accents.

“Glenna? Your campervan outside,” Cait said. “How long have you had it?”

Glenna paused to consider. “Ah, let’s see now. Ten years? No, twelve. Because Momma moved in with me twelve years ago, and that would’ve been right after I got the campervan. She wouldn’t before, because she needed to have that little bit of privacy and independence, or she would have gone nuts. So yeah. Twelve years, it’s been.”

“May I ask where you got it?” Cait asked

Glenna looked suddenly worried. “Why, hon?”

“My dad had one just like it,” Cait admitted. “He was here, around that time. And he and his van disappeared in this area about fourteen years ago.”

Glenn’s eyes widened. She looked nervously at Demi and Fiona. “Oh, dear. Does that have to do with, uh…”

“The Prophet’s curse,” Fiona said. “Yes. It very well might.”

“I had to ask,” Cait said. “I’m just looking for clues about my dad.”

“Well, I got it from my daughter’s lying, no good ex-husband,” Glenna said. “He owed me a bunch of money for back rent. If he stole the damn thing, it ain’t my fault. It’s a piece of shit anyhow.”

“I’m not accusing anyone,” Cait said. “I just want to see if it’s the same one my dad had. Even if it is the same campervan, it’s not like I want it back, so don’t worry.”

“Oh. Well, okay. Do you want to see it now?” Glenna looked worried. “It’s an unholy mess in there. Momma was a slob and a hoarder even before she got all stove up with her back. She left the place real bad, but I haven’t had the heart to touch it since she passed.”

“I couldn’t care less about that. I’m just looking for clues. It’s probably not even his campervan. But…if you wouldn’t mind?”

“Nah, I don’t mind, but don’t let the mess scare you. Or the mice.”

Demi, Fiona and Elisa followed them quietly out the back door, making no comment, and made their way after Cait and Glenna across the tangle of thorny vines and overgrown grass. The campervan was sunk deep in a snarl of brambles. Glenna wrenched the door open with some difficulty, and beckoned to Cait to enter. “There’s not a lot of space to move around,” she said apologetically. “Momma was a real packrat.”

Cait stepped inside. Nothing was how she remembered it. The place seemed tiny, crammed with boxes. It smelled of dust, mold, and cat pee. Cobwebs draped everything.

She clambered through the boxes that were thick with dust. She tried pulling open the bathroom door, and staggered back, startled, as bottles and cans cascaded out.

Glenna pushed inside behind her. “Oh my goodness. I should’ve warned you. Momma never used it as a bathroom, she used the one in my house. She just used the one in here as a bottle drop.”

“It’s okay,” Cait murmured, looking around at the ghostly cobwebs. She felt like something was trying to talk to her. “Do you mind if I look in the front?”

“Be my guest,” Glenna said promptly.

Cait picked her way over boxes of yellowed paperback books, and looked into the front. And then she saw the rabbit’s foot dangling from the mirror.

She’d bought that rabbit’s foot for her dad at a souvenir shop on a trip to the Grand Canyon when she was nine. When she’d bought it, it had been a bright, neon orange. Now it was a bleached-out tan.

Memories filled her mind. She took a step forward and a mouse skittered out of a hole in the seat and disappeared down under the pedals. Garbage was heaped up in the foot-well of the passenger seat. Newspapers, flyers, coupons, fast food bags and cups and wrappers. The rabbit’s foot dangled there, trailing dusty filaments of cobweb.

She had a vision of her dad, driving on the highway, smiling his infectious grin at her. Flipping down the visor when the sunset light got in his eyes.

Get me my sunglasses, Kitty.

On impulse, she leaned over and twitched visor down. Dust and cobwebs tumbled down, along with something else, landing on the rotted seat cushion.

An envelope. Yellowed, stiff, brittle and warped. She picked it up.

It was a letter, addressed to Sara LaMott, Cait’s mother. Stamped, but never sent.

“Oh my goodness, honey. What have you got there?” Glenna whispered.

Cait’s voice wouldn’t work at all the first time she tried to use it. She coughed, and tried again. “A letter,” she croaked. “From my dad to my mom. He addressed it, but evidently he never had a chance to drop it in a mailbox.”

Glenna stared at the stained, warped envelope, eyes saucer-wide. “Well, I will be goddamned.” Her voice was hushed. “Looks like you’re the owner of this campervan after all.” She patted Cait awkwardly on the shoulder. “I tell you what, hon. I’m just gonna step outside and give you a little privacy to look at that letter. Call me if you need me.”

Glenna clattered and bumped her way through the campervan, while Cait tried to open the envelope and unfold the sheet of paper without tearing it. Parts of the folded paper had stuck together. She coaxed it open. Her fingers were cold and clumsy.

It was written in her father’s coded journal script, the one that only she could read. As she read, she could hear his voice again in her mind ear.

Sara, baby. I have to be quick. Things are crazy here. Don’t listen to anything they say about me. All lies. I’m being set up, but I’m going to fix it.

If anything happens to me, tell Kirill I played a shell game with the Bothell SB, and that MLB-2C-18 is in the toilet. He’ll know what to do. Take care. Give Kitty a kiss for me. Love you both. Tom.

Tears spotted the paper.She folded it up, tucked it carefully back into the envelope, and made her way out.

Fiona, Elisa and Demi were all waiting for her. They looked stricken. Glenna must have told them what she had found.

Glenna emerged from her back door. “Hey,” she called. “I don’t know about you girls, but this kind of thing calls for something stronger than tea, or coffee, or even pie. I’m thinking a nice stiff drink. Scotch on the rocks. Any takers?”

“Yes,” Cait said, her voice hollow. “Please.”

“I’m with you,” Fiona said.

“A woman after my own heart,” Demi added.

“I’m in,” Elisa said.

They crowded into Glenna’s tiny kitchen, and nursed tumblers of whiskey around the small table. The glasses from which they drank had cartoon characters decorating them. Glenna drank from a Bugs Bunny glass. Cait’s was the Tasmanian Devil.

“Could we, ah….see that letter?” Demi asked hesitantly.

“I would have to translate it for you,” Cait told them. “It’s written in the same code that my dad used for his journal.” She pulled it out, unfolded it, and read up to the part about the Bothell SB. How Kirill would know what to do. They pondered it silently.

“Cryptic,” Fiona commented. “What does he mean by ‘shell game’?”

“He played a silly game with me when I was a little girl,” Cait said. “You know when you move something around under a walnut shell, or a cup, to misdirect the eye of whoever is watching? He did that with me when I was a little. Taught me how to get rid of the marble, or the pea, or whatever it was, so that you always win.”

“Like the game street hustlers play to fleece tourists,” Fiona said.

“Exactly. MLB -2C-18 is the mutated virus, but who knows what he means about it being in the toilet. Maybe it’s just a reference to the fact that Kimball stole it.”

“Is there more?” Elisa asked.

“Just his goodbye,” Cait said. “Just ‘Give Kitty a kiss for me. Love you both.’”

“Kitty?” Fiona’s voice changed abruptly.

Cait was mystified by her tone. “Yeah, that was his pet name for me.”

Fiona, Demi and Elisa all looked at each other, horrified.

Then, to Cait’s shock, Fiona’s eyes filled with tears. She grabbed a napkin from table, mopping them angrily. “Shit,” she muttered. “I hate it when this happens.”

“What? What is it?” Cait asked. “Just say it!”

“Tell me what your dad looked like,” Fiona said.

“But…but I showed pictures of him to Mace,” she faltered. “And Mace told me he’d never seen him before. He was a black man, light-skinned, tall, built like a football player. He had some extra pounds on him, but he was tall enough to get away with it.”

“Did he have green eyes, with brown flecks in them? And dark freckles underneath of his eyes?”

Emotion zinged through her rattled nerves. “Yes, he did. You met him? Really?”

“Did he have front teeth that were broken? Missing teeth in the back?”

“No, his teeth were perfect,” Cait said. “He was vain about them. Used whitening strips, and everything.”

“Can I see the pictures that you showed Mace?”

Cait found the file of photos on her smartphone and passed it to Fiona. Fiona swiped through them one by one, her brows drawn into a scowl of concentration.

Then her face froze, and she put her hand over her mouth.

“What?” Cait begged. “Please, just say it. Do you recognize him?”

Fiona gave her a sharp little nod. Her eyes had overflowed again. “Yes,” she said thickly. “Yes, I knew your dad.”

“Then how could Mace not have recognized him, if you did?”

“He looked completely different than he does in these shots,” Fiona said. “When we knew him, he was thin and wasted, and his hair was all grown out and knotted up. His front teeth were broken, and his molars were gone, and that made his cheeks sink in. I don’t wonder that Mace didn’t recognize him. But I do.” She held up a close-up of Dad’s smiling face. “It’s his eyes. They’re just like yours. Big, with gold and green mixed. I stared into his eyes for almost a year. For hours at a time.”

Cait was baffled. “His eyes? A year? But…how?”

“I knew him by a different name,” Fiona said. “We knew him as Titus. Kimball brought him to live with us when he joined the community that last year. Titus was incapacitated somehow. He couldn’t talk, and could barely walk. He’d shuffle along if he was pulled. I thought maybe he’d had a stroke, or some brain damage from one of Kimball’s beatings.”

“Oh my God,” Cait whispered.

“I’m so sorry to tell you this,” Fiona said. “I know it’s terrible to hear. It was my job to take care of him. Kimball picked me out to do that. I spent that whole last year attending him. Feeding him, cleaning him. Keeping him alive.”

“That’s must have been awful for you,” Cait whispered.

“Well, yes. But we were accomplices. And I was sure that he was aware and alert in there. Not mentally incapacitated. We were cellmates, bound together by misery, and our mutual hatred of Kimball. But I felt like he was a friend, even though he couldn’t talk. I always felt like he cared.”

“And then…he died?”

Fiona’s face tightened. “Yes. In the fire, with my mother, and the rest. Kimball used your dad’s body to fake his own death. He’d taken Titus to a dentist in Portland and gotten Titus’s dental records switched out with his own. He murdered everyone at GodsAcre, just to fake his own death. They identified Titus as Kimball, and that’s why no one tried to hunt him down for thirteen years.”

“But how did you figure it out, after all these years?” Cait asked.

“I saw his broken teeth in the X-rays,” Fiona said. “After a year spent spoon-feeding him, brushing his teeth, putting straws in his mouth, I knew the shape of his teeth better than my own.”

Cait nodded. “He never spoke?”

“He had some kind of brain damage. He could only say one word, and he repeated it, over and over and over. Just ‘Kitty.’ I thought he was calling me that, but he wasn’t calling me.” Fiona sniffled, her eyes wet. “He was calling you.”

Cait put her head down on her arms and dissolved. Demi scooted her chair up and grabbed one hand. Fiona grabbed the other. Elisa leaned across the table and grabbed her arm. Glenna went around behind her chair and pressed a soft kiss to the top of her head.

“I’m so sorry, honey,” she said, her voice thick with tears. “I lost my momma last year, too. But at least I had her here with me to the very end. I know it’s not the same.”

“Demi and I both lost our mothers to that filthy son of a bitch,” Fi said. “We’re with you, Cait.”

Finally, Glenna sat down again, sipping her whisky. The silence was heavy, broken only by the tinkle of ice cubes in the glass.

When Cait could finally control her voice, she looked up at Fiona. “Thank you for taking care of him,” she whispered. “For caring about him. I’m…I’m glad he had you.”

“If it’s any comfort, we were real friends,” Fiona told her. “He spent that year with someone who cared. After the boys busted me out of GodsAcre, I missed Titus, and worried about him. I’m so sorry that I couldn’t have saved him for you. I’ll never forgive myself for leaving him behind. It felt like a betrayal.”

Cait gave up on words and threw her arms around the other woman. Fiona stiffened at first, but then her arms came up and wrapped around Cait, giving her an awkward pat-pat on the back.

Everybody’s eyes were wet. The knock on the door made them all jump.

“Yo, ladies,” Mitch called. “You’ve been in there forever. It’s getting dark, and we’re nervous. Let’s get back to home base before the Trask dudes freak out on us.”

“Yeah, we’ll be out in one moment,” Elisa called back.

Cait hugged Glenna, too. “Thank you so much,” she said brokenly.

Glenna squeezed her hard. “I didn’t do a thing, honey. As far as I’m concerned, it was your daddy who guided you here today, to find his letter. I’m just so glad that it was here waiting for you.”

Back in the car, as if from miles away she overheard Demi, Fi and Elisa, filling in Clint, Mitch and Jim Wong about the day’s revelations. She was floating apart, still listening to her father’s voice. She couldn’t face a big communal dinner, so Cait made her excuses and headed straight upstairs.

Mace wasn’t back yet, so she had some time alone. She kicked off her shoes and stretched out on the bed, exhausted. She felt empty and lost. Hollowed out.

Of course, she’d known better than to hope that her father could be alive. Logic and instinct and plain common sense dictated that he was gone forever. And yet, the bereft little girl inside her who missed her daddy had still hoped. Senselessly. Stupidly.

It broke her heart, to imagine him at the end. Beaten, broken, imprisoned in a failing body by a cruel and evil man. Only a frightened adolescent girl for an ally.

And then the fire. All she could hope was that he’d been unconscious from smoke inhalation before the flames got to him. Please, God. A shocking, unwanted image, now stuck in her mind forever. She sank into a light doze, exhausted.

Dad stood on a river bank. Water flowed between them, deep and swift and cold.

He was thinner than she remembered, his hair grown out long and bushy. But his eyes were bright, alight with urgency. He waved at her, called out to her, but she couldn’t hear his voice. All she could hear was the roar of the water.

She yelled at him. I can’t hear you, Dad! Say it again! Louder!

Dad cupped his hands, and yelled back. She still couldn’t hear. It drove her nuts.

She woke up crying in frustration, and curled up tight, squeezing her knees to her chest. As if the loss were fresh and new.

She wiped her tears away, and saw the silhouette against the open bedroom door.

“Hey.” Mace’s deep voice was very gentle. “You awake?”

“Yes,” she said. “They told you what we found at Glenna’s house?”

“Yeah, they told me.” He sat down on the bed, stroking her back. “I’m so sorry, Cait. I called Chief Bristol. He told us that your dad’s bones were claimed by a woman who said that she was Kimball’s sister. We could investigate, but I doubt we would track anything down after all this time. But the chief is willing to give it a try.”

She tried to blow all the tension out in a heavy sigh. “I understand. I didn’t expect to feel so awful,” she said. “It’s not like I thought I would find him. I knew he was gone. But even so, I wasn’t braced for this at all.”

“I get you. I’ve been there.”

She rolled onto her back, winding her fingers through his. “I was hoping for more than just confirming an awful tragedy. But I should have known better.”

“You did find more,” Mace said. “A lot more. You found his final undelivered message. You identified his murderer. You found the person who cared for him his final year. You’re about to find the lost vaccine he was trying to recover. You’re going to finish the job he was unable to do, and clear his name from all wrongdoing. And you also found…this.” He leaned down, kissing her gently. “You found us.”

“Yeah,” she whispered. “I did.”

“We made this great big deal about you going to the wedding tomorrow, but if you’re not in the mood for a party after what happened, we understand. You can sit this one out. No pressure, right?”

“After spending thousands of dollars on those beautiful dresses?”

“There’ll be other opportunities. I see fancy parties in our future. I’m not even sure if I can handle the wedding tomorrow, let alone you.”

“Yeah? Why? What’s wrong?”

He shrugged wearily. “It brings my shit all back, too.” His voice was bleak. “I dreamed about the fire every night, for years. I thought, if I hadn’t been so busy punishing Kimball by blowing up the cavern, maybe I could’ve gotten back to the Great Hall in time to stop him. Or found another way to get them out. I still hear them in there. Screaming.”

She squeezed his hand. She could think of no words that felt appropriate.

“But when we got there, it was too late. Now I find out that part of your heart was destroyed in there, too. Another thing that I couldn’t save. Another disaster that I can never fix. It’s just…fuck. You know?”

Cait sat up, electrified. “You weren’t responsible for that.” Her voice rang out. “Kimball was. And you scored major points against him. You buried his lab, you spirited away his bride, you foiled his plans, over and over, all down the line. And you were, what, fourteen? You’re not the bad guy in the story! You’re one hundred percent hero!”

“Just keep telling yourself that.”

“Oh, I will. And I’ll tell you, too. As many times as I need to, until it sticks.” She held out her arms. “Come to bed.”

Mace stripped off his clothes and slid under the covers. They wrapped their arms around each other.

“We should have a wake for your dad, after the wedding,” Mace said.

“Yes, thanks,” she said. “That’s what I want to do.”

“What about the party tomorrow?” His voice was tentative. “Do you want to put on a sexy dress, and dance all night long with a guy who’s crazy about you? If I had a daughter, I’d want that for her. From this world or from the next.”

She smiled, imagining her father’s response. “He’d have some things to say about that,” she said. “And they would make you laugh. He wouldn’t want anything else to be taken away from me. He’d want me to have all the good things in life. For real.”

“Yeah. Those good things are so damn real, sometimes I can’t even take it.”

“You better learn, because I got lots more real to dish out. A bottomless supply, big guy. Good things coming your way, forever.”

He stroked her hair. “I’ll never get enough of it,” he assured her.

“Then for God’s sake, kiss me again.”

He needed no more encouragement.