The Lost: Book Two, The Eddie McCloskey Series (The Unearthed 2) (28 page)

Hollis’
s
breath stank. His eyes savage.

“Don’t fucking move. Don’t even fucking breathe, Mister Eddie.”

The knife pressed harder against his stomach. “You expect to get away with this?”

“Didn’t your mother ever tell you to mind your own goddamned business?” Hollis sounded genuinely interested in the answer. “You go around involving yourself and this is what happens.”

Hollis cuffed Eddie’s arm and surprised Eddie with his strength.

“You’re fucking done,” Eddie said. “You realize that.”

Hollis moved his head side-to-side. “The hell I am. You’re not gonna do shit.”

Eddie’s stomach bottomed out. Hollis spoke like he had an ace up his sleeve.

Hollis said, “I’ve got Ana. If you get in my way, she’s fucking dead.”

There was no guile in the old man’s eyes. Eddie knew he wasn’t bullshitting. It also explained why Ana hadn’t been with Jim and Tony a few minutes ago.

So Hollis had Ana somewhere. In a place where he could kill her. Where she couldn’t be found unless Hollis led them to her.

It was no bluff. She was in danger.

“I see the wheels turning in that thick head of yours,” Hollis said. “Don’t even think about it.”

The smart thing would be to let Hollis go. Let him kill Marty Kindler.  The choice between Marty Kindler and Ana Lovsky was no choice at all. Kindler was a two-bit confidence man, who’d run his father’s Mill into the ground and now looked to make his money by fabricating this elaborate paranormal hoax. Ana was just a sweet young woman, smart but innocent. Probably had never hurt a fly in her life.

The pain gripped Eddie now just as tightly as Hollis did. “If I let you walk, do you give me your word Ana will be okay?”

“So long as you let me finish my business.”

Eddie let out a sigh. Hollis was a son of a bitch, but he seemed to have an old-timer’s sense of honor. Ana would be safe if he let the guy go.

“One thing,” Eddie said. “How’d you get Bernard to …”

Hollis chuckled. “Barely had to do anything. Bernard’s a navel-gazing sad sack piece of shit, and a sorry excuse for a friend to my son. All I did was remind him he was.”

“How?” Eddie was seeing stars now the pain was so bad.

“He cried himself to bed every night, so I just wrote some words on a window.”

Eddie had no idea what Hollis meant. “All this because these guys made fun of your boy?”

“They lied. They covered up how bad Tessa was to him. Then everybody blamed him for weakening the ice because he was a fat ass. Now everybody talks about the bitch like she was a goddamn saint while my boy had to leave town.”

Eddie’s legs were getting weak.

Hollis said, “Michael wasn’t man enough to set the record straight, and that’s on him. But that doesn’t mean I can’t.”

“So you kill these guys over that?”

Hollis relaxed his grip. “My boy may be a chicken-shit little pussy, scared of his own shadow, but he’s still my boy. And these pricks ruined his life.”

Eddie sucked in a deep breath. The conversation was over. He had everything he needed. Motive, method, confession. The only problem was this psychopath had Ana over a barrel, and there was no way Eddie would trade Kindler’s safety for hers.

And the pain …

The festivities raged on. People were now sprinting across the ice. It might have been cracking but nobody would have heard a thing because the band was playing so loudly. Everybody was drunk, Whitmore didn’t have enough cops on the payroll, and nobody would give Mitchell Hollis two looks.

What had Jim said about Ana earlier, right before the fight? She was around somewhere. That meant she’d come to the lake. So Hollis had grabbed her recently, maybe very recently. That meant Ana couldn’t be far.

The smart thing would be to let Mitchell Hollis go and do murder. Hollis would go free in exchange for Ana’s safety.

It was the smart thing to do. The expected thing.

Which was why Eddie did the opposite.

O
n
solid ground, Eddie was no match. He’d used up everything he had fighting the townies and now he was grappling with a mean old son of a bitch who was tough and he had one working arm.

Good thing there was a sheet of ice only a few feet away.

Ice scared Eddie to death. He’d almost drowned in an icy lake just like this one all those years ago. But he fought the fear and decided to level the playing field.

Eddie dug his feet into the snow, grabbed Hollis with his good hand, and pushed off the ground with his toes.

Hollis wasn’t expecting it.

They lost their footing and toppled down the slope of the beach. Hollis tried to right himself on the ice, but Eddie turned and twisted blindly, and the old man went down again. Eddie tried to get to his feet but slipped halfway up

His bad shoulder smacked against the ice.

The pain robbed Eddie of his sense of place. All he saw was a black, starry sky above. Then he saw Hollis only four feet away and remembered he was in the middle of a life-and-death situation. The old man was trying to get up but seemed to be in terrible pain. One hand clutched a hip, and his knees were hiked up to his chest.

“Got you, fucker,” Eddie said.

There was a stretch where Eddie thought it was over. The old son of a bitch was down, hopefully with a broken hip or something. Someone would see them sprawled on the ice like that, realize they were both hurt, and get help. With help would come the cops. With the cops would come some kind of justice.

But it wasn’t over. Not by a long shot.

Hollis started to get up with renewed vigor.

“You’re dead, Eddie.”

Eddie’s head was spinning. He couldn’t formulate a response. But he did feel the ice shudder under him.

Crack
.

The memory of slipping through the ice as a youngster was fresh in his mind, like he was experiencing it all over again. Only this time, he wouldn’t be able to swim at all with his injuries and fatigue.

“Ge
t
off the ice!”

It sounded like Whitmore, the voice full of cold authority. A chorus of screams followed, then the reverberations of many feet scrambling over the ice.

“It’s breaking!”

The rock band stopped playing one-by-one and the sound from the stage died.

“Everybody off the ice now!”

Another dull thud. Eddie craned his neck to see what had happened. Mitchell Hollis had gone down again.

“Whitmore!” Eddie shouted. “It’s Hollis! It’s him! He’s got Ana somewhere!”

Eddie wormed around on the ice till he could see Whitmore. The cop was standing on the shore. His arm extended a long branch to Eddie.

But Eddie wasn’t thinking about himself. He was thinking about Ana. He had to make sure Whitmore had heard him.

“Hollis has Ana somewhere!”

Crack
.

Eddie felt an immense shift underneath him.

Wuhhhmmm
.

The whole lake seemed to move as if pulled by a sudden, powerful tide.

“Can you reach the branch, Eddie?” Whitmore asked.

“It’s Tessa!” some dumb ass shouted. “She’s here!”

Despite the fact that Eddie and Hollis were in serious danger, some idiots in the crowd started cheering. They’d come for a show and now they were going to get one.

The branch was out of reach. Eddie tried to gain purchase on the ice with his heel. But there was nothing. He couldn’t move.

“Eddie, stop moving!” Whitmore yelled. “The drop is steep!”

Eddie looked between his knees and saw the cop on the shore, reaching the branch a little farther.

Hollis groaned and started moving again. The ice popped and whirred. Eddie leaned his head back and looked around. Everyone else had gotten off the ice. It was just him and Hollis.

Eddie’s eyes found the old man in the darkness.

Hollis put one elbow under him and started to sit up. “Fucking drifter.”

Whitmore took another step onto the ice and extended the stick farther. But it was still out of Eddie’s reach. And Eddie couldn’t really focus. Each throb was too much. His head pounded like he’d closed it in the door a few times.

Hollis climbed to his knees.

The ice shifted under his weight.

“Eddie, come on, reach for the stick,” Whitmore said.

Hollis shook his head. “Fucking town. Fucking Kindler.”

“Eddie.”

Eddie blinked. Tried to get his bearings. Saw Hollis on his feet. He looked around. The crowd had lined the lake.

“Eddie,” Whitmore said. “Come on.”

Hollis didn’t care the whole town was watching him. He reached into the pocket of his winter coat and pulled out a hunting knife.

“Don’t fucking move, Hollis!” Whitmore said.

Eddie saw Whitmore draw his gun. Screams from the crowd.

Hollis pointed his blade at Whitmore. “Line of fire, pig. You wouldn’t dare.”

Eddie squirmed toward the stick. Everything hurt. Even thinking. He heard Whitmore say something about a riot gun but had no idea what the cop was talking about.

Hollis took one step on the ice.

“Somebody stop him!”

“Do something!”

“HOLLIS, DROP THE FUCKING KNIFE!” Whitmore screamed.

Hollis took another step.

CRACK.

Eddie saw the people on the other side of the lake run for safety, diving out of the line of fire. But there were too many people around. Whitmore couldn’t chance a shot.

Hollis kept coming.

“HOLLIS!” Whitmore shouted.

“Fuck you, pig.”

Hollis was only three feet away from Eddie. He brought the knife up and looked ready to lunge.

Eddie wormed around and looked at Whitmore. The lieutenant leveled a big gun that resembled a shotgun at Hollis.

The ice groaned, and he knew it was seconds away from breaking.

“Shoot the motherfucker,” Eddie said.

The deafening bang of the strange-looking gun punched through the air like it was bulldozing a wall.

Hollis went down hard.

And the ice broke.

Col
d
. Black.

Wet.

Pressure.

Eddie instinctively tried to paddle with both arms, but the broken clavicle didn’t cooperate. An involuntary gasp at the pain brought water into his throat.

He coughed and that made it worse.

He went down.

Through the ice, he heard a muffled din, like he was standing outside a nightclub. He couldn’t find the hole in the ice—it all looked the same to him.

He searched in the darkness and he saw another shape. He figured it was Hollis but couldn’t see. The pain had him delirious and the water was drowning him and he thought, for a brief second, he saw Tessa Lovsky.

Her long blond hair streamed behind her head and she was smiling at him.

He knew then he was going to die.

“Wak
e
up.”

His brother stood over him in what looked suspiciously like a hospital room. The ceiling lights made Tim’s bald dome look like a light bulb. He wore two days of stubble, which was weird for him.

“Wake up,” Tim said again.

When Eddie spoke, his words had that faraway quality, like he was speaking and then listening to the echo of his own voice.

“I am awake.”

“Open your eyes.”

“Give me a fucking minute.”

“Open them.”

“Why?”

Tim put a hand on Eddie’s shoulder. “I want to talk to you, bro.”

Eddie forced his eyes open. It was like trying to bench press four hundred pounds. “It’s good to see you. Now what the hell do you want?”

Tim smiled. That was the Eddie he knew. “You can’t quit. You’ve got unfinished business.”

It took Eddie a moment to process what his dead brother was telling him. Then it hit him.

“I know.”

One state away, the nineteen-year-old boy responsible for Tim’s death sat in a psychiatric facility. Eamon Moriarty. There would be a reckoning. Somehow, someway.

Some day.

But not today.

Tim smiled like he could read Eddie’s mind. “Where are you going now?”

“Away. Then back to school.”

Tim shook his head. “Don’t go to college.”

“Now I know I’m dreaming. You saying that.”

“Don’t go.”

“What do you want me to do? Write the great American novel?”

“What you’re good at.”

“Stocking shelves at Vic’s store? Humping a register?”

Tim shook his head.

Eddie turned his head away. “No.”

“It’s your best shot.”

“My best shot at what?”

“You know I’m right.”

Eddie looked back at his brother. “I hate this work.”

“You don’t.”

“I do.”

“You feel like you shouldn’t after what happened to me. You feel you owe it to me not to.”

Eddie said nothing because Tim was right.

Tim said, “When are you going to stop punishing yourself?”

“When I can stop.”

“Until that day then,” Tim said.

“Until that day,” Eddie said.

Then he opened his eyes and found himself in what looked suspiciously like a hospital room.