Chapter 18
The parking garage was located one floor down, and from what Tean could tell, it was the only part of the lodge that didn’t have windows.
Unlike the rest of the lodge, with its earth tones and stonework and touches of copper, the garage was exposed concrete, with a fire suppression system overhead and ventilation that rumbled at the edge of hearing.
It was cold but not as cold as it should have been, and wet tire tracks crisscrossed the pavement where vehicles had brought snow into the garage and it had subsequently melted.
Daylight-white LEDs should have lit up every corner of the garage, but only a handful were on—a result of the switch to backup power, most likely.
Jem stood by the door to the lodge, glancing up one ramp and then shuffling a few feet over to glance down the next one. After a moment, he nodded and motioned for Tean to follow, and he started down the ramp.
“Why—” Tean began.
Jem shook his head once, sharply. Then he whispered, “Quietly.”
“What are we doing?” Tean asked, dropping his volume.
“Getting a look at that woman.”
“Right, but, um…” For lack of anything better, Tean simply said, “Should we be doing that?”
“Yes. Because if I’m right, then she started following me back in the valley. And she followed us up here. And she broke into our room and attacked us.”
“Well, she threw a coat on you.”
Jem shot him a look that mingled hurt and disappointment. “Uh, yeah. And that coat had a zipper.”
“I know.”
“It hit me in the eye. I might have permanent damage.”
“Well, you don’t seem to have any damage.”
“It’s called Hoffsted Zipper-Eye syndrome, and they can’t fix it, not even with surgery.”
“You didn’t have any problem spotting that bacon.”
“Babe!”
“I thought we were whispering.”
“We are! But come on—there’s rude, and then there’s mean.”
“It’s just that there were a lot of greens, and you never get enough vegetables.”
Jem was making a whining noise in his throat that sometimes precipitated various medical emergencies, most of which could only be cured by leaving him alone for a while so he could take a nap with Scipio.
A change of subject seemed to be in order, so Tean asked, “What if she’s, you know, dangerous?”
Jem snorted. “I’m more dangerous than anybody we’re going to meet on this mountain.”
They passed three more stalls before Tean said, “Wait, didn’t you recover from a case of tail eye at one point?”
“No more talking.”
At the bottom of the ramp, Jem rounded the corner and continued down without slowing. It took Tean a moment to figure out why—then he noticed, farther below them, a few scattered LEDs popcorning on.
“Motion activated,” he whispered. “She’s right ahead of us.”
Jem grunted.
“You’re so smart.” Tean kissed his cheek.
Some of the grumpiness in Jem’s expression eased, but he only whispered, “Get ready.”
Now Tean caught the faint scuff of a sole on concrete.
It came from farther down in the garage—probably around the next turn, which was why he couldn’t see anything.
He did what he should have done when they’d first reached the garage and made a more thorough assessment of the space around them.
Almost every stall was occupied, most of them with luxury vehicles, and surprisingly few of the plates were from Utah.
The Florida ones were rentals, he decided. Or hoped.
More importantly, the abundance of cars meant a lot of places he and Jem might take cover if they needed to. Or where someone might hide. He started scanning left and right.
Jem must have noticed, because he took Tean’s hand and squeezed. He dropped it a moment later, though, as they reached the bottom of the ramp. “Here we go,” he said. And he started around the turn.
The woman Tean had seen watching him in the bar, and who had later been hiding in their closet, was staring at a green Chevy Tahoe.
She was huddled inside an overcoat of thin white wool—more fashionable than functional.
She still hadn’t noticed them, and it gave Tean a chance for his first sustained look at the woman.
She was White, probably not quite to middle age yet—late thirties, maybe, but wearing it well. She had a lob of blond hair with a neon pink streak, and where her arms protruded from the overcoat’s sleeves, her wrists were thin enough for Tean to make out the bones.
“Hey there,” Jem said. “Car trouble?”
The woman spun to face them, and one hand dipped into the overcoat.
She brought it out again, holding something tightly.
Not a gun. Pepper spray, maybe. Or one of those cat-shaped self-defense weapons.
Tean gauged the distance. Twenty feet. Maybe thirty.
Jem shifted one step to the right so that he was partially in front of Tean.
“You notice that she didn’t ask who we are?” Jem said to Tean.
Tean nodded slowly.
“You startled me,” the woman said. Her voice had that low, crackly quality that Tean had heard too many times from the shows Jem occasionally watched, the ones Tean mentally grouped together as rich White ladies having drama.
“Sorry about that.” With a vague motion at the Tahoe, she said, “I’m just grabbing something. ”
Jem shook his head. “It’s too late for that. I’m cold. I’m tired. I’ve got a raging case of Hoffman’s Zipper Eye syndrome.”
“Hoffsted,” Tean whispered.
The glower Jem shot over his shoulder suggested maybe this didn’t actually matter.
The woman considered them for a moment. Then she said, “Do you think this is funny?”
“Not so much,” Jem said. “Start with your name. It’s too late for the bullshit.”
She didn’t say anything.
“All right,” Jem said. “We can do this the hard way.”
“River,” she said. “River Jordan.”
“Sounds made up.”
“That’s my name.”
“What are you doing here, River Jordan?”
A flicker of emotion came and went. Tean thought he knew what it was: fear. In that dry, crackly voice, she said, “Something happened to my car.”
“Ha ha,” Jem said. “Why are you following us?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about—”
“We’re past that. You tried following me after work the other night. You were watching Tean at the bar. You broke into our room.”
She shrugged. “I’m a journalist.”
“Bullshit,” Jem said.
“Look me up.”
Jem glanced over his shoulder.
“No service,” Tean whispered.
“I’m telling you the truth,” River said.
“Who do you work for?” Tean asked. “A newspaper? A TV station?”
“I’m independent—a creator journalist. My content is on several platforms, but most of my long-form stuff ends up on my website.”
“Like a Czech cam boy,” Jem said.
River didn’t seem to know what to say to that.
To be fair, neither did Tean, so he asked, “Why are you following us?”
“I’m looking into a series of murders.” She paused. “Rydel Owens.”
Tean didn’t say anything. The past October, he and Jem had become involved in tracking down a serial killer named Rydel Owens.
They’d found him—and they’d rescued Daniel—but not before a pack of killers had tortured and murdered Rydel.
He hoped nothing showed on his face, nothing from that day: the clapboard rambler, the body in the bathtub, the words written in blood, the two state agents lured into a trap and attacked. And the men. The wolves.
“Jesus,” Jem said under his breath. “That’s why you were following—” The gap was only the faintest thing.
Barely there at all, the kind of micro-edit that Jeremiah Berger was unnervingly good at.
The one you wouldn’t notice if you hadn’t known him for a long time.
Hadn’t heard it before when he was telling you what he and Scipio had eaten for breakfast, and he was starting to say the number of hash browns he’d ordered.
And then Jem was past the gap, and he finished, “—us.”
“I’ve reached out by phone,” River said. “I’ve tried contacting you on social media.”
“Uh huh,” Jem said. “You’re a real trooper.
Sorry we made your job so hard. You still haven’t told us why you’re following us.
You’re working on a story about the murders?
Great. Knock yourself out. Go talk to the police, talk to the families of the victims, dig up old yearbook photos, and make everybody miserable all over again.
Why the fuck do you need to talk to us so badly that you followed us up to this lodge? ”
“Because—” River broke off, and she laughed strangely. Disbelief. But also, to Tean’s ear, a raw edge like the brink of tears. “Now someone is following me.”