Blood Trust - Eric van Lustbader [31]
Soon enough he reached the topmost level, and walking to the gray late-model Ford, he pulled the passenger’s side door open and got in.
“What the fuck?” Willowicz said. “This McClure bastard is going to screw everything up.”
SEVEN
JACK EXPERIENCED Emma’s laugh as another breath of cool air on his cheek. He no longer bothered to wonder whether he was losing his mind, whether the ghostly visitations or whispered voice were real or figments of his guilt-ridden brain. The truth was she knew things he didn’t, things he couldn’t know.
—Emma, where are you?
“Who knows? I’m in twilight, neither light nor darkness.”
—Shades of gray.
“Not even that. Everything is just gray … unchanging gray.”
—I’m so—
“Don’t say it, Dad. Don’t say you’re sorry. We’re both in a different place now.”
—I wish that were so.
“There is peace here, total and absolute, but it’s just out of my reach.”
—I don’t understand.
“I don’t either. But it’s why I’m here, in this place, close to you, unable to reach you. I feel like Sisyphus.”
—Cursed to eternally roll the stone up the hill, only to lose control of it, seeing it roll down to the bottom and trudging back to try again.
“Yes. But that doesn’t mean I’m not learning.”
Jack was surprised.
—Learning. In what way?
“I can see things now—see them clearly, in a way that was impossible to do when I was alive.”
—Your perspective has changed.
That odd breath of a laugh. “There is no perspective here, Dad, just as there is no time. Everything just is. You’re so involved in criminality it became an obsession of mine. I studied every text I could find on human criminality, but it wasn’t until now—to put it in life’s terms—”
—Terms I’ll understand.
“If you like. Anyway, I can see now that the criminal personality—Dad, you’ll really like this—is formed from two sides of a coin, both terribly dark. On one side, criminality is born of misdirected resentment, a logic, if you want to call it that, of self-destruction. Remember how you and I were drawn to the paintings of Paul Gauguin? At one point, his beautiful, mysterious work was the only thing we could agree on. You know why, Dad? Because of his philosophy. He wrote, ‘Life being what it is, one dreams of revenge.’ An Impressionist painter wrote that! Can you believe it?
“Anyway, the other side stems from being totally self-absorbed, like the Roman Emperor Nero. What the hell, the little prick inherited virtually limitless power before he had a chance to grow up. To him, no one outside of himself was real—what happened to them didn’t matter in the slightest, so murder, rape, torture, and mayhem were beneath his notice.”
Good God, Jack thought. This can’t be happening. And yet, he couldn’t help himself …
—Where is she, Emma?
“Where’s who?”
—You know. Annika. Where is she?
“You swore you never wanted to see her again.”
—That was almost a year ago. A lifetime.
“Even if I did know, Dad, I couldn’t tell you. I’m not your guide through this darkness.”
Did she know? Jack wondered. And then realized he had said it out loud.
“Jack?”
He almost cracked his neck, turning around so fast. Naomi and McKinsey had reentered Twilight.
“We lost them,” she said.
McKinsey, looking around, said, “Does who know?” He couldn’t keep a smirk off his face. “Who were you talking to?”
Ignoring his comment, Jack told them about the fractured left eye socket that linked the murders here with Billy Warren’s.
“That exonerates Alli,” Naomi said with clear relief.
McKinsey shook his head. “Or it could signal that she’s not in it alone.”
“Don’t be absurd,” Naomi said. “You don’t know her.”
“In my experience,” he told her, “nobody knows anyone. Not really.”
Jack wanted to move in a more fruitful direction. “Look what I found.” He showed them the badge. “The manager was