The Darkest Joy (31 page)

He’s made up his mind just as I have.

“I think not, Fisherboy. As a point of fact, I like the idea of you taking us somewhere more private. I’ve always wanted to take a little sea voyage . . .” She gives a tittering giggle and her insanity slips down my spine like an ice cube.

Surprise lights on Chance’s face then disappears. I watch him build himself up for what has to happen and I grieve for him.

For me.

“No way.” His eyes shoot to mine and whatever he sees there causes him to step forward.

“Don’t,” Lacey says in a low voice of warning, dragging me back with a strong arm hugging the bottom of my rib cage and pressing the knife harder.

Another drop of blood joins the first. I see Chance track it with his eyes and a low sound of despair rips out of his throat.

“Don’t hurt her,” he begs, his voice cracking.

“Put the gun up, handsome . . . and see if you can save our Brookie. Like a
man
,” she invites in a baiting drawl.

I shake my head at Chance, taking a risk with the knife. I don’t care.

I don’t care
.

Lacey grunts with dissatisfaction. “Brooke, let your sperm donor fight for you. . . . if he’s man enough.”

Chance slams the gun back into its holster, his eyes burning with frustration, with rage.

There’s a sudden groan from the deck and all eyes move to Jake. His pale blue eyes instantly take in the scene, the ragged flap of skin waving off his skull like a flag of flesh.

Jake sees her holding me, the front of my blouse bloody, my eyes bulging in terror while a manic Lacey holds my life with the turn of sharpened metal at my throat.

His gaze silently meets mine. Our eyes lock, then his slide to something on the boat.

I follow it.

The gaff.

Our interchange takes seconds. Jake never sees Chance, who stands behind him. Jake’s given me the method.

I take it.

Chance knows what I’ll do before I move, watching the interplay and instinctively putting it all together.

“Brooke, no!” he bellows, moving forward. He doesn’t lose his footing because of the sea that rocks the boat underneath us but because of the blood that slicks the deck like a fine oil. He slips as I move under and away from the lingering presence of the blade, Lacey’s hands momentarily slackened by the surprise of the moment.

“Brooke!” Lacey shrieks as I dive for the gaff. My eyes hit on the brass brackets that hold it in tension pincer grips; the barbed and sharpened end is like an eye that winks at me. I
land chest first on the deck, my legs over the top of Jake’s, my arms outstretched.

I hear it before I feel it.

A meaty thwack sounds behind me as I crawl forward that last foot. Something tears out of my leg like a burning torch.

When the knife hits my upper thigh again, it feels as though a giant has punched me with his great fist.

I think it should hurt more.

My hand grips the smooth wooden handle of the gaff and I jerk it out of its brass guardians.

The knife exits my thigh in a sucking reverse pop and a flood of blood like a warm bath pours around me.

I ignore the shrieking agony of my body, turning just as Chance avoids a strike. Arching his back, he sucks in his stomach as the knife flashes toward his midsection.

Lacey moves in like a tornado of blades. Both hands now hold knives and she moves with a grace she shouldn’t possess.

That I didn’t know she possessed.

Her total focus is on Chance, the threat of me forgotten.

I move to my knees in a swivel that brings the momentum of that barbed point in a horizontal arc. I turn it like a baseball bat and hope for that perfect home run as I swing it toward her.

I hear the swish of air as it whistles past my position and sinks into her back. She cries out, looking at me for a shocked moment suspended in time.

The sun sinks behind Lacey, backlighting her in red, and Chance gets close, punching the knife from first one hand, then the other.

They fall with a dull clatter to the deck of a boat now soaked by blood.

Mine.

Jake’s . . .
hers
.

A shot thunders and echoes in the stillness of the marina, the sharp retort causing my ears to ring.

A perfect hole appears in her head and blooms like a horrible flower, spraying the bits of what made her Lacey over all of us like a gruesome and final rain.

I crumple to the deck, and as if in a dream, I see Clearwater straighten from his shooter’s stance as he yells to a team of suited agents and they swarm like bees around a hive.

But there’s no honey here.

Only blood.

And death.

I close my eyes and float into unconsciousness.

My eyes flutter open and I see a swinging bag, a snakelike IV line running to my taped and abraded arm.

A medic flashes a penlight in my eyes and I groan. Each sense awakens and suddenly I’m ambushed by the noise.

Sirens.

A hand encased in latex checks my pulse then pulls away.

“Hang in there . . . don’t you dare die on me, Brooke Starr.” Eyes like seawater in sunlight beseech me to stay. I close mine against the sensory overload.

“She’s lost a lot of blood . . .” I hear a voice say.

The ambulance rocks and jostles, tossing my limp body with the jogs and ruts in the road.

“Whatever she needs, take it from me,” I hear Chance say, as though from a great distance, his voice coming to me through the swamp of my consciousness.

I hear bits and pieces of their conversation: Nicked femoral. Low blood pressure. Shock.

Will to live
.

That phrase settles in. I think about it . . . floating on whatever the medics have juiced me with.

Do I want to live?

I feel my hand move and another one, warm and vital, grips mine.

I feel the heat of his lips move over my cool skin and it’s the most intimate thing I’ve ever known. I struggle to live and Chance’s lips hold me here to this life, pinned like a butterfly on a board.

His will is imposed this day.

The day I choose to live. For him.

For us.

And finally . . . for me.

I
can’t get over the humidity of Seattle. It clings to everything, even in September, when Alaska is cooling, the fireweed having only their tips crowned with purple flowers heralding autumn’s approach . . . the Seattle summer is just springing to late life. Whoever says it only rains in Seattle hasn’t been here.

It’s almost October and three months have passed since Lacey Colbert lay dying on the deck of my boat, true twilight descending as the blood of my cousin Jake and the woman I love mingling with that of the killer’s. Three months since Evan’s funeral.

One horrible month of Brooke hanging between life and death.

One month of her guilt coming full circle to finally release her from the tragedy of truth: that her best friend had loved her. Not in a healthy way, but in a deadly and obsessive way. To realize that Brooke could never have saved her family. That she’s not responsible for any of this.

One month of explaining, cajoling, and finally, understanding. Juilliard has admitted Brooke. Making the biggest exception of all time to admit someone that eschewed tryouts, regardless of the reason. Of course, there is no precedence. Brooke fought for the other survivors of the two murdered families as well. All three candidates will pull their own weight in a school filled with talent, without their respective families. It was Brooke’s catharsis . . . her redemption. Something good had to come out of the tragedy of death.

I slap the steel doors shut and lower the bar across the brackets that hold it, padlocking the doors together. I step away, the orange U-Haul logo covered partly by the lock, and turn to Brooke.

I watch her walk toward me, the storage unit mostly empty, but still holding some of her belongings saved from the sale of her family’s home.

She still moves with a slight limp. The physical therapist says she might walk smoothly again one day. Nerve damage can sometimes rectify . . . sometimes not.

Brooke is beautiful to me, scars and all. I have kissed each one as her solemn eyes watch me erase not the pain of the scars, but the pain of the past. I want Brooke to know that her wounds are tangible proof that she survives—lives.

Finally, she is. Living.

Brooke gives me that lopsided smile . . . so perfect it makes my chest constrict. I am just now beginning to stop beating the shit out of myself for not understanding soon enough, guessing, calling Clearwater myself. Finally, it always comes around to the same thing: Brooke’s life. I still can’t believe how it all happened.

She slides her arms around my waist, gripping me, and I kiss her head. “You okay?” I ask.

She nods. “Have you talked to Jake?”

I smile, thinking about that tough bird. He has a new scar to joke about. He likes to brag that his old ivory-topped cane that was used to bludgeon him with was a spit and polish away from looking good as new. It’s so Alaskan of him, I’d laughed—we repurpose everything. Apparently, even weapons used with intent to murder.

I nod at her question. “Yeah, he’s happier than a clam at high tide, keeping an eye on the boat.”

Brooke sighs, giving a little smile at my pun. “What about your house . . . and . . .” I press my finger to her lips.

“I told you, Tucker is house-sitting until I can move back . . .”

A smile curls her lips. “We,” she states, running her tongue on the lower part of her lip and I watch the small movement, an instant distraction.

The ownership in her voice makes every bit of me harden except my heart; it keeps beating, strong and sure—soft. For Brooke.

“Hell yes,
we
,” I answer, pressing my mouth to hers. She pushes back, her tongue sliding between my teeth and playing with mine. I forget we’re in the middle of the storage parking lot and attack her like it’ll be the last time I see her.

It won’t. But it’s a helluva excuse.

Finally, we break away, both our chests heaving, eyes locked on each other, and I laugh. “I can’t get enough,” I say, not minding the admission in the slightest.

She grins. “Me either.”

Then her grin fades. “We still need to stop by the FBI.”

We need to check in with Clearwater before we move to New York for the school term, beginning in September and finishing in May.

“Yeah,” I agree, reluctance thick in the one syllable.

I grab her hand and we move to my Ford Bronco, a mirror of Tucker’s but a khaki green that Brooke likes to tease me about. I stand by the original color scheme, defending it with its ability to tow nearly anything. Of course, that is after Tucker made a custom hitch, as those early Broncos were averse to towing. But no longer. I hitch the Bronco to the ten-foot U-Haul trailer and chain it.

Ready.

Brooke’s already in my Bronco and I can’t help but notice how gorgeous her eyes are . . . against the car’s baby-shit green. I give a low bark of laughter and she asks, “What?” Her brow furrows in a small frown.

Makes me want to kiss it away.

“I’m just thinking how hot you look in my car with all that green paint.”

“Huh . . . Yeah, get in here, clown.”

“Don’t you ‘clown’ me or I’ll put on a show . . .”

“No,” she says, wagging her finger as I rip open the car door and tackle her across the seat.

“Chance!” she squeals as I jerk her underneath me, the wide vintage seats perfect for my nefarious purposes.

I look down at her, my radar having already scoped out our isolation. We are the only ones in a narrow strip of asphalt that bisects the two low-slung rows of garage-style storage units.

“One for the road?” I ask quietly, my heart speeding.

Her lavender eyes darken, sparkling like jewels beneath me, and she nods.

I don’t waste time, unbuttoning a blouse so sheer a white Brooke had to wear a tank top underneath. I slip one thin strap off her shoulder and kiss the rounded top of the skin and she sighs. It’s such a lonely but contented sound I stop, looking into her eyes again.

“I never thought this was possible,” she says in a voice that holds hesitant wonder.