Gingerly, she laid her ear against Reed’s chest, the place where his own scars lay. She could never guess from its strong, reassuring rhythm that Reed’s heart had nearly ceased for good. Tonight, she didn’t need to hide behind the noise of the television or radio. She listened to the steady drumming of his heartbeat and imagined she could hear it say her name.
21
Reed rolled over in the morning, expecting to find Ellery weighing down her side of the bed, but instead, a sixty-pound barrel-chested, hound-scented mound of fur stared back at him. Reed squinted and plopped his head back down on the pillow. “Good morning,” he said to Bump with a sigh. The dog wagged and slurped Reed’s elbow in return. Reed ran his palm down the sheets where Ellery wasn’t, figuring she must have gone out for an early run. Unlike his previous lovers, Ellery did not linger in bed.
He’d been naïve, he supposed, a romantic sop who figured his love and tenderness could erase her years of PTSD. She’d survived Coben by divorcing herself from all physical sensation, by pretending it was some other body he’d tortured with his farm tools. Sex had always been mechanical, she had explained to Reed, whenever she’d bothered to attempt it at all. She never allowed herself to feel anything—not even, she’d confessed to him once in the darkness, when it was just herself alone in the privacy of her bedroom. It was hard not to feel fury when she said these things. He fantasized about walking into Coben’s cell on death row with a gun and ending him forever. The knowledge that this wouldn’t fix anything—that the damage was unending—only made Reed angrier somehow, and anger wasn’t what she needed from him.
Figuring out what to do instead wasn’t always easy. Ellery was playful and generous in bed as long as he was on the receiving end; when it was her turn, she had difficulty permitting him to take the lead, relaxing, and letting him make her body feel things. He’d learned to ease into lovemaking with her, gently retreating and advancing like the overlapping waves of a slowly rising tide. The tsunami of her pleasure when he got it right made his patience worth it every time. He stroked the bed again, missing her and the intimacy he’d hoped to be sharing with her on this trip.
Bump repositioned himself under Reed’s hand, stretching his legs luxuriously as he settled in for a massage. “You are no substitute at all,” Reed informed him, offering a last scratch or two before rising from the bed. He checked his messages and found two key developments. First, the Philadelphia PD had answered his inquiry about the gun recovered from the shed at the old Stone house. It was registered to someone named Dale Goodwin, who lived on East Lombard Street in Baltimore. They’d followed up at that address and found Dale’s widow, who said she hadn’t known the gun was missing. Her husband had kept it in a shoe box in the closet.
“Baltimore,” Reed mused to himself. The deceased housekeeper, Carol Frick, had lived in Baltimore before moving to Philadelphia. He wondered about the timeline and whether there could be a connection.
The second message he had was from Sarit:
TULA NEEDS NEW SHOES FOR THE START OF SCHOOL. DO YOU THINK YOU COULD TAKE HER? THEY NEED TO HAVE STURDY RUBBER SOLES—SOMETHING BASIC LIKE GRAY OR NAVY THAT WILL GO WITH HER UNIFORM. BUCKLE PREFERRED OVER VELCRO, AND NOTHING THAT ROLLS, LIGHTS UP, OR MAKES NOISE.
He was aware, dimly, that Tula like most growing children had already burned through eleventy-billion pairs of shoes, but not one pair of these had been purchased by Reed. Sarit simply cared more, as evidenced by the detailed instructions in her email. This request then, he decided, must be a trap, a test designed for him to fail so Sarit could score points in the coming custody war. Your Honor, her father can’t even manage her a single pair of shoes for school. It’s clear she should be in Houston with me.
This was how he found himself later that morning, not at the station with Ellery mucking through Stephen Wintour’s child pornography, but at the local mall with Tula and Ashley. Ashley had tagged along only when it became clear Tula wouldn’t go without her. It was perfect, really—the girl kept Tula engaged picking out shoes while Reed sat in a chair with his laptop, trying to make a timeline of the events he’d uncovered so far:
The gun was stolen in Baltimore, exact date unknown.
One month prior to the murders of Trevor Stone and Carol Frick, someone set Ethan Stone’s car on fire at the university where he works.
Trevor Stone and Carol Frick were murdered in the Stone home in Philly seventeen years ago.
Two years later, Teresa Stone married Martin Lockhart. Two years after that, Chloe was born.
Chloe was kidnapped not far from what would have been the anniversary of the murders at the Stone household.
Reed frowned at the bullet points on his list. Carol had a third child, he remembered. There was Lisa and Bobby and a teenage daughter who died in a car accident some weeks before Carol herself was killed. Reed made a note to find out the precise date.
“Daddy, look at these.” Tula crashed into his lap, forcing him to put aside the computer. “Aren’t they awesome?”
He regarded the pink sneakers on her feet. The had blue flames on the sides and blinking lights around the edges. “They are spectacular.”
“Show him what they do,” Ashley prompted.
Tula stomped her foot and a rocket noise came out of the shoe. “Blast off!” she cried, leaping into the air.
“Those are impressive,” Reed said. “I don’t think they will work for school.” Sarit would have his head.
“Aw, I don’t want boring old stupid shoes,” Tula complained, kicking at the floor.
“Maybe we can find some in between,” Ashley told her. “I’ll help you look.”
Reed opened his mouth to thank her when he noticed Ashley’s ancient pair of Chuck Taylors. They were worn and dirty, and the sole had started to separate on the left one. “Why don’t you find a pair for yourself?” he said, nodding at her feet. “You have school starting soon, too.”
Ashley’s face flushed the same shade as Ellery’s did when she was embarrassed. “Thanks, but I didn’t bring the money.”
Didn’t have the money, Reed guessed. He knew that cancer treatment sent many families into bankruptcy. “It’s my treat.”
The girl cast a longing glance at the rows of shiny sandals and bright white sneakers. “No, that’s okay. The ones I have are still good.”
“It’s a thank-you,” Reed clarified. “For looking after Tula.”
Tula grabbed her hand and tugged. “Come on. I’ll help you look,” she said, and Ashley relented with a grin. Reed took out his computer again and began to search for any information on Carol Frick’s daughter. What he found instead surprised him: Carol’s husband, Vincent, had not been killed in an accident as described by Lisa. He had been shot to death in a mugging attempt on the streets of Baltimore several years prior to the murders at the Stone household. Reed added this to his timeline. He didn’t know yet what to make of the disparate events, but the Frick family’s recurring tragedy seemed like it had to be deeper than a run of bad luck. Dead father, dead mother, dead daughter. Trevor Stone was the odd one out in this pattern. Maybe Carol the housekeeper had been the target all along.