Authors: Erica Spindler
C
hance and Skye waited. Claire's friend didn't arrive. Not that first morning or the next. He tried the number Claire left and got an answering machine. Afraid to leave a message, he had hung up, a ball of uneasiness in the pit of his gut.
Something had gone wrong.
Luckily, the storm had lasted a full twenty-four hours and did a fair amount of damage to the show, the worst being to the generator truck when lightning struck nearby. Since then, everyone had been scrambling around, making repairs, too busy to worry about whether Madame Claire and her daughter had returned.
Until a private investigator showed up, anyway, looking for them, asking questions and giving his card to everyone he spoke to. Eventually he was directed to Marvel, who brought him by the trailer.
Chance faced the two men, his heart thundering, his mouth dry. He pealed off exactly what Claire had asked him to, speaking mostly to Marvel, only reluctantly agreeing to answer the investigator's questions.
As he responded to the man's questions, he kept telling himself to go slow and not to fuck up. Claire and Skye were depending on him.
“So,” the investigator was saying, “you haven't seen the woman or her daughter since the other night?”
“No, sir.” Chance slipped his hands into his front jeans pockets, acutely aware of Skye hiding in the narrow wardrobe in back. “Like I said, Claire asked me to stay here and watch the place. She and Skye were going to stay with some friends.”
“Do you know where those friends live or their names?”
Chance shook his head. “She never said. I didn't think it was a big deal.”
“And you expected them to come back?”
Chance lifted his shoulders. “Well, yeah. They said they would be. I didn't think anything of it until this morning. I mean, the rain's stopped, so, you know, they should be back. So I checked around, and their stuff's gone.”
The investigator studied Chance a moment through narrowed eyes. Chance found something slimy about the man. And cold. He didn't like him, and he sure as hell wasn't about to turn Skye over to him. “You didn't think to check their stuff before this morning?”
“Nope? Like I said, I expected them to come back.”
“Of course,” the P.I. said sarcastically. “After all, you were good friends.”
“That's right.”
“But they didn't tell you they were going to take off? Even though you were
good
friends? Funny.” When Chance just stared stonily at him, the P.I. looked over at Marvel. “Mind if I take a look around?”
Marvel bristled, obviously not liking the man any more than Chance did. “Yeah, I do mind. The woman and her daughter are gone. Just like the kid said.”
“And you don't find that a little unusual?”
“Not in this business. Now, if you don't mind, this is private property and the kid here needs to get to work.”
“Sure thing.” The P.I. handed Chance his card. “If you see either of them, I'd appreciate a call. There'd be a thousand dollars in it for you.”
“A thousand bucks?” Chance widened his eyes, as if awed. “Wow, what'd they do? Rob a bank or something?”
The man laughed. “Nothing like that. A lawyer hired me to find them. About an inheritance. These are two very rich gals. They'll thank you for calling me.”
Yeah, right.
Chance wanted to puke at the bald-faced lie. Claire was scared out of her wits because someone wanted to give her money?
“If I see either of 'em, I'll call you first thing,” he said, pretending to study the card. “I sure could use a thousand bucks. Yes, I could.”
Chance caught Abner Marvel's eye. He saw that the old showman thought about as much of the P.I.'s story as he did. He also saw that his helpful-hayseed act might be stretching the limits of believability just a bit.
But Marvel didn't call him on it, not then or after the P.I. left. “No wonder they call those guys private dicks,” the showman said, stuffing the card into his pocket. “He sure was one.”
Chance forced a chuckle. “Do you think he was, you know, telling the truth about Claire and Skye having inherited money?”
“Could be,” Marvel said after a moment, thoughtfully. “Seems kind of weird, though, someone being so anxious to give away money that they hire a high-priced P.I.” Marvel looked Chance square in the eye. “What do you think?”
“Could be true. Though Claire never mentioned any kind of family money.” Chance shifted his gaze away guiltily. Something in Marvel's expression told him that his boss knew something was going on, that he knew Chance wasn't telling him everything.
Marvel cleared his throat. “Repairs to the gennie are just about done, I figure we'll be heading out at first light. If you want to stay the night here, it's okay. Claire and Skye still might be back.”
“Maybe.”
“If not, I'm going to need the trailer for somebody else.”
Chance's heart sank. “Yes, sir. I'll be out first thing.”
“There's a crew at the gennie now, I could use you there. I'll walk over with you.”
Chance nodded. He hated leaving Skye, he knew she was probably frightened. But there was nothing he could do about it. Taking one last glance toward the back of the trailer, he followed Marvel out the door.
For the rest of the day, Abner Marvel's final words rang in Chance's ears. He expected Chance to clear out of the trailer; he would be moving someone new in, probably in the morning.
He had to make a decision about Skye. And he had to do it fast. Before morning. Claire's friend wasn't coming. That was clear. But what to do with Skye was not.
His choices left him pretty much scared shitless.
All day he had thought about it, going over the situation, his choices. He and Skye couldn't continue with Marvel. She was a minor. Once Marvel discovered her presence, he would be forced to call Social Services, or maybe worse, that private dick.
The man had left a card with just about everyone, giving each the inheritance/reward story along with it. If any of the troupers saw Skye, they would kill themselves in an effort to get to the phone. Hell, Len and his cronies would sell their souls for a lot less than a thousand dollars. They probably already had.
Chance pulled the P.I.'s card out of his pocket. It was pretty fancy-lookingâon heavy paper with raised letters and metallic ink. The dick had been dressed pretty slick, too, with shiny leather shoes and a watch that had looked like real gold. The guy's card said the firm had offices in Chicago, Dallas and Los Angeles. Whoever had hired him was paying his firm good money.
Oh, yeah, this dick was costing someone big bucks.
Chance frowned. He had thought Skye's theory about the mob pretty silly the first time she had told him about it. Now he wasn't so sure. Could the mob be after Claire and Skye? If not them, who?
Chance ran his thumb over the card's raised, gold letters. He couldn't turn her over to the P.I. or allow one of the other trouper's to do it, either.
That left only one choice. Take Skye and run.
But if he and Skye left the carnival, her mother wouldn't be able to find her.
If
she even wanted to find Skye. Chance hated the thought, but as much as he wanted to deny it, he couldn't. Not completely, anyway. What if this whole thing was an elaborate scam on Claire's part? A way to dump her daughter?
He frowned. No way. If that had been the case, and Claire wanted to be rid of her daughter, she could have simply left. Simply let the P.I. find Skye.
No. Claire had been afraid. She had been terrified. For Skye. Claire loved her daughter more than anythingâhe believed that with every scrap of his being. She would never abandon her; she had believed her friend would come.
But something had gone terribly wrong. Susan wasn't coming. Chance swallowed hard, trying to stay calm, to coolly and rationally consider all his options. He kept coming back to the same thing. He had promised to watch out for Skye. He had promised to keep her safe.
He wouldn't leave her. He wouldn't break his promise.
Skye was frightened. And despondent. He had watched her grow more of both with each passing hour. Though they hadn't discussed it, she knew Susan wasn't coming. She was young and frightened, but she wasn't stupid.
The time had come to discuss it. Even though Skye was only twelve years old, they had to make this decision together. He had to give her a choice.
That night, he talked to Skye. Honestly. He laid their cardsâher cards, reallyâon the table. He wanted her to understand her situation. It was her life at stake, her future.
He gave her two choices. They ran together, tonight. Or they waited for Susan, or Skye's mother, as long as they could, then went to Mr. Marvel for help, taking the chance of Skye being turned over to Social Services or the private dick.
Skye understood. She made her choice.
That night, while everyone slept, Chance and Skye slipped away.
Horizon's End, Wisconsin,
1983
F
all came early to Horizon's End. Summer, it seemed to those who endured her long and bitter winters, made a brilliant but fleeting appearance, only to be swallowed by the cold once again.
True to form, only August fifth, and already browns, golds and oranges had begun to steal across her landscape. The nights had already dipped into the fifties and the day's zenith brought the mercury to a mild seventy-nine degrees. That wasn't to say there couldn't be another heat wave; one August had delivered seven straight days of ninety-plus-degree heat. That summer the weekenders, those who owned the million-dollar cottages that dotted the shore of Lake Horizon and who came from the city to escape just such heat, had complained bitterly. The locals had simply smiled.
Eighteen-year-old Griffen Monarch sat on the sweeping patio of the Monarch family's summer home, his father and grandfather's conversation swirling around him. Built and designed by a student of Frank Lloyd Wright's, the house emulated Lloyd's famous Falling Water at Bear Run. With an abundance of glass and natural stone, it crouched atop a hill that overlooked Lake Horizon, like a jewel nestled amongst the evergreen, maple and birch trees. A stone retaining wall circled the patio and beyond; except for a long grassy slope of land that led to the lake and dock, the surrounding property had been left wild. That property stretched a mile in every direction; the Monarchs' nearest neighbors were a good half mile beyond that, both similarly outfitted summer homes.
The family had come here every August of Griffen's life, to escape the choking heat and humidity of the city, to escape the crush of sweaty bodies and short tempers. The only thing that differentiated this summer from all the others was that in two weeks Griffen would leave for Evanston, Illinois, and his first semester at Northwestern, where he would study business, of course. In four years, after he had graduated with honorsâwhich he hadn't a doubt he wouldâhe would take his place as an officer of Monarch's, eventually replacing his father as president.
Eyes closed, Griffen rested his head against the chair back, the perfect blue sky and pillowy clouds reflected in the lenses of his Rayâ¢Bans.
He smiled to himself, his thoughts drifting to his plans for later, a date with a local girl he'd met just that morning at the Pack and Post in town. She was a real hayseed honey, but what she lacked in culture and education she made up for with an ass and pair of knockers that had just begged for a squeeze. He intended to give them what they begged for.
Some girls were just built to fuck.
Life had been good to Griffen; he acknowledged that. He didn't waste time on humility. Modesty was for losers. He was handsome and athletic and could haveâand had hadâany girl he wanted. He was brilliant, school had been almost pathetically easy, and any doors that couldn't be opened with his brains, charm or good looks, he had only to say the name Monarch, and open they did.
He had everything he desired, save for one. The thing he desired most.
His half sister. His Grace.
A butterfly landed on the arm of his chair. Ever so carefully, Griffen closed his hand around the delicate creature, trapping it. He stroked its velvet-soft wings a moment, then systematically plucked them off, thinking again of his half sister.
Not a day went by that he didn't think of her, not a day that he didn't plan for their reunion. For they would be reunited. He didn't have a doubt about that. It was inevitable, destined to be.
He narrowed his eyes. He hated that bitch Madeline for taking her from him; he hated his father more for letting her do it, hated him for his weakness. That day seven years ago, when he had returned home from school to learn that Madeline had stolen his Grace away, he had made a promise to himselfâthat someday, somehow, he would make both Madeline and his father pay for their stupidity and selfishness.
Smiling to himself, he rolled the still-twitching butterfly between his fingers. His body stirred. Sometimes, when he was fucking another woman, he would think of his revenge or picture his reunion with Grace, and he would pop off, right away, his orgasm almost unbearably intense.
Perhaps it would be that way tonight, with his milk-fed date.
His smile faded. But it might be the other way, the way it was when he couldn't picture it, and he would be left unfulfilled. And angry.
Those times his need to punish became so strong it burned in the pit of his gut. Those times he lost sight of all but the heat of his hatred.
At the mention of Grace's name, Griffen opened his eyes, though he didn't straighten. His father was whining about how it wasn't his fault that Madeline and Grace had gotten away again. Griffen curled his lips in distaste. Pierce whined like a girl. Or a baby. It made him want to puke.
Just as did his father's ineptitude. Grandfather was right to be angry. Furious. He was right to chew him out. Only a few nights ago they had celebrated Grace's certain return. Then his father had come back, tail tucked between his legs.
The P.I. had lost them again.
“For Christ's sake!” Pierce exploded, swinging to face Griffen and motioning toward the mangled butterfly. “Do you have to do that? Jesus, I would have thought you'd have outgrown that.”
Griffen laughed and swept the pieces off the table. Predictable. When confronted, Pierce turned his anger on someone else, anyone who might be nearâa member of the household staff, an employee, his son. Griffen found that tactic as weak and pathetic as everything else about his father.
“Outgrown it, Dad?” he murmured, his lips curving up. “And I would have thought you'd have found Grace and Madeline by now. It's been seven years.”
His father's face mottled with rage. “Someone keeps tipping them off. It wasn't my fault they slipped out of our grasp again.”
Griffen eyed his father with contempt. “Not
our
grasp, Dad. Yours. Your wife, your daughter. You're the one who let them get away in the first place.”
“Who did it?” Pierce said angrily, turning back to Adam. “Who tipped Madeline off? That's what I'd like to know. If it was Dorothy, I swear I'llâ”
Adam cut him off. “It wasn't. She's the one who found them in the first place. If not for her, we wouldn't have had any leads at all.”
Pierce scowled. “She's a soft, old fool.”
Like you, Father.
Griffen looked at his father, smiling thinly. “Maybe no one tipped them off. After all, Madeline's a psychic. Isn't that what you're always telling us? Maybe she
predicted
your detective's arrival.”
Pierce flushed at Griffen's sarcasm. “Don't discount her ability. That might be closer to the truth than you think.”
Griffen snorted with disgust. “Oh, please, Dad. Now you're trying to blame mumbo jumbo for Madeline and Grace having again slipped through your fingers.”
When Pierce started to retort, Adam slammed his fist onto the tabletop. “Stop it, both of you! I've had enough. I never want to hear mention of Madeline's so-called ability again. We three are the only ones who know about her delusions, and I want to keep it that way. The last thing we need is the press getting hold of that ridiculous piece of tripe and blowing it out of proportion.”
Adam stood and strode to the stone retaining wall and for long moments looked out at the lake. Without turning, he said, “We need to stop assigning blame and start figuring out what we're going to do. I want my granddaughter. I need her. Monarch's cannot continue on its present course.”
He did turn then and Griffen saw his anger, his frustration. He bristled with it. “The International Design Festival in Milan was a joke. We won nothing! Not even an honorable mention! Dorothy is slipping. Her designs are passé, dated.” He swung around and pinned Pierce with his angry gaze. “My sister has lost her edge. So what, Mr. President, do you propose we do?”
Pierce shifted nervously, then cleared his throat. “I've done some checking around. There are a number of people availableâ”
“People?” Adam repeated slowly. “Available for what?”
“Designers. Gifted designers. Ones who could⦔ Pierce cleared his throat again. “Marcel Louckes from Tiffany's. Annessa St. Pierre fromâ”
“No. Never.” Adam strode across the patio, stopping before Pierce. Adam was the picture of health, robust and fit. He had kept his body strong and his mind keen. Adam Monarch did not let anyone or anything stand in his way.
Unlike his own father, Griffen thought contemptuously. His father was soft and weak. Only forty-one-years old and he had already suffered a major heart attack. Always afraid, he carried those silly little nitroglycerin tablets around with him.
Griffen despised him. He had modeled himself after his grandfather. Like Adam, he, too, would let nothing or no one stand in his way. Especially not his pitiful excuse for a father.
Adam towered over Pierce, his fury an awesome, palpable thing. “Don't ever again suggest hiring an outsider to be lead designer for Monarch's. We will never do that. Never! Do you understand?”
Pierce jerked his chin up. “What other choice do we have? Tell me that. Weâ”
“We get our fucking girl back! That's what. Jesus, you make me sick.”
Pierce launched to his feet, two bright spots of color dotting his cheeks. “How do you know Grace even has the gift? How? We haven't seen her since she was five. And even if she came home today, how do you know that she would agree to work for Monarch's someday? We know nothing about her. Madeline could have ruined her. Poisoned her mind against us.”
“Monarch's is her destiny. She would see that. And if, at first, she didn't, we would convince her. There are ways of convincing, you should know that. How much stock do you think she'll put in what her mother told her, when her mother is in jail? I think she'll grow quite accustomed to living in luxury, to having anything and everything she desires. She'll be quite willing to be one of us. In fact, by the time we finish with her, she'll hate her mother for taking her away from all this.”
Adam bent to look Pierce directly in the eye. “As for the Monarch gift, she has it. I know she does. And so do you.”
“I'm trying,” Pierce said, his small burst of defiance wilting. “I have tried. I divorced Madeline. I married again, I had another daughter.”
“A daughter who's dead now. Because that drunk of a wife of yours was too busy taking calls to watch our girl in the bath. Not that Grace could have been replaced. She had the gift. I saw it even at five, just as my father saw it in Dorothy when she was five.”
Griffen stood and crossed to the retaining wall, to the place his grandfather had stood only moments ago. Several sailboats skimmed across the lake, their bright sails billowed out in the stiff breeze. His grandfather was right; Grace couldn't be replaced. She was special. She had
the
gift. He, too, had seen it.
Grandfather had tested her. Simple tests, the way Dorothy had been tested at the same age. He had taken Grace to the studio and store, he had allowed her to choose both gems and finished pieces, he had provided her with many choices and closely monitored what items she was drawn to and what patterns and shapes and colors she put together.
She had always gone to the best, she had put items together in a uniquely beautiful way. And she had already been drawing at five. Not the scribblings and stick people of most children her age, but with tremendous detail and skill. Just as Dorothy had at the same age.
Griffen had read that Picasso's father, an artist and teacher himself, had been so overwhelmed by his thirteen-year-old son's talent that he had given young Pablo his palette and brushes and vowed never to paint again. Some things did not need to be taught and learned, some things were inborn. Some things were a gift.
Grace was Monarch's gift, its fortune.
His
fortune.
“If you were half a man,” Adam was saying, “Madeline never would have gotten away with her in the first place. If you were half a man, you would have found a wayâ¦any way, to take care of her. And Grace would be with us now.
“I want my granddaughter,” he continued. “I want my heir. I need her.
We
need her. I don't care what it takes, do you hear? I don't care if you spend our entire fortune getting her back. I would do anything to get her back.
Anything.
”
Griffen swung to face the two men. “Do you mean that, Granddad? Would you doâ¦anything to get her back?”
Adam looked him dead in the eye. “Yes, I would.”
Griffen nodded. “I'll find her, then. I'll bring her home, back to the family. And she'll never go away again.”