27. Wolf
Chapter 27
Wolf
T he diner was dark in spite of the early hour, two windows at the front facing away from the morning sun and letting in so little light it could have been late afternoon. It was barely big enough for four tables and the counter, the waitress turning sideways to carry multiple plates to a couple at the back of the place.
It sounded like an out-of-tune guitar.
“Where the fuck are we?” I asked.
“Greenvale,” Jace said. “It’s halfway between Carlton and Phoenicia.”
“Literally never heard of it,” I said. It wasn’t the first time I’d stumbled on a tiny two-block village off all the main roads but it was still surprising when it happened.
“That’s the idea,” Jace said.
He waved to the waitress and she nodded at the two empty tables. Jace chose one away from the windows, which made sense. We’d gone to a lot of trouble to stay out of view. It would be dumb to do something careless now.
“I’m fucking hungry,” Otis said. “These early gym mornings are killing me.”
We’d gotten up early to take Daisy to the gym against her protests — I was starting to worry she’d been telling the truth when she’d said she hated us — and had ordered coffee but not food while we waited.
“I’ll take over if she’ll let me,” Jace said, sliding into one of the chairs.
“Fat chance,” I said.
“Yeah.” He sounded dejected, and I didn’t blame him.
We’d all known there would be fallout from Jace’s fake death, had known Daisy would be pissed and hurt that we’d kept the truth from her, but none of us had had the time to think it through when Jace came up with the plan. At that point, the fire at the compound had been raging all around us, the whole building about to cave in. We’d had less than two minutes to discuss the idea.
And yeah, I’d second-guessed the decision on a daily basis, especially when Daisy was in the worst of her depression, but by then it had been too late.
“Think we made a mistake?” I asked.
“Who knows?” Otis said, opening the menu. “Can’t do anything about it now.”
The dark-haired waitress came to take our order, poured us all coffee, and retreated to her other tables.
I took a drink of the coffee and took the place in: the 1970s paneling and chipped Formica tables, the vinyl chairs and smell of stale coffee. I could only hope Jace was right about the food.
“Did you come here a lot?” I asked Jace. “While you were gone?”
“Now and then,” he said. “When I got cabin fever. No pun intended.”
We knew now that Jace had been living in one of the abandoned hunting cabins in the woods, getting by with the cash and supplies Otis and I had left at our drop point. It sounded rough, and that wasn’t even counting how hard it must have been to stay away from Daisy.
“So what are we going to do?” Otis asked.
I turned my silverware over in my hand. “About the missing girls or Jace’s fake death?”
“Both,” Otis said.
“It’s not a crime to fake your death,” Jace said.
I knew it was true because I’d looked it up after the dust had settled from the fire. Someone could be convicted of crimes associated with faking their death — cheating the IRS, claiming life insurance, dodging debt — but just faking your own death wasn’t a criminal act.
“Still a problem,” I said.
We couldn’t just trot Jace out around town and not expect the Blades to be shocked and pissed, let alone everyone else in town who’d thought he was dead.
“I say we carry on and let everybody talk,” Otis said. “Fuck ’em.”
“Except that’s going to create a lot of noise and we’re still trying to figure out who’s taking the girls,” I said. “Going to be hard to keep digging with all those eyes back on us.”
“Maybe I should have stayed gone,” Jace said.
The waitress returned with an armful of plates and set them down on the table, then returned a minute later to refill our coffee cups. “Can I get you anything else?”
“No,” Otis said.
It was blunt enough that she retreated without a beat.
“Don’t be a dick,” I said.
“I’m not,” he said. “She asked. I answered.”
I sighed and looked at Jace, staring at his pancakes like they held the answers to the all our questions. “The longer you stayed away, the worse it would have been for Daisy. You did the right thing by coming back when you did.”
I didn’t say the other thing: that Jace had probably needed to come back.
Not for us, but for himself.
Because finding out his dad wasn’t really dead, that he just hadn’t wanted to be a dad to Jace anymore, was all kinds of fucked up. I knew a little bit about that (my dad had split when I was a kid too) but it was worse for Jace. The story he’d been told his whole life — and the one he’d been telling himself too — was a lie.
He scratched his cheek and picked up his fork. “Maybe.”
I dug into my omelette while Otis doused his French toast with enough syrup to send a healthy man into diabetic shock and for a few minutes we ate in silence. It felt good to have Jace back, to be together again, even if everything was fucked.
“I think I’ll stay under the radar awhile longer,” Jace finally said. “Stick to the house and places where we don’t know anyone.”
“You sure?” I asked. It must have sucked to be in the shadows for the past three months, to be outside the rest of his world while it kept on spinning without him.
“It’s the thing that makes the most sense,” he said. “I’ll stick around the house, try and lay low.”
“We’re prepared to take the heat whenever you’re ready,” I said.
He nodded.
“I’ve been thinking about your dad,” Otis said. It sounded out of left field, but Otis was like that sometimes, thinking about things no one else was thinking about and then making it sound like it had been part of the conversation all along.
“What about him?” Jace asked.
“How much do you know about him?” Otis asked. “Like from when he was a kid and shit?”
Jace shoveled another bite of pancakes into his mouth and washed it down with coffee before answering. “The basics. Grew up in foster care in Blackwell Falls. Went to Blackwell High with Mac. Foster mom died after he graduated. Founded the Blades. Met my mom. Had me. Disappeared, apparently. Why?”
“I’ve been wondering if we should dig into him a little more,” Otis said. “See if there’s something we’ve been missing.”
“Like what?” Jace asked.
“I don’t know,” Otis said. “Something.”
I stared at him. “What are you thinking?”
He sat back in the booth. “I don’t know yet. But we have all these pieces. If we can’t make them connect, we should at least make sure they don’t.”
“Sounds like it could be a wild goose chase,” Jace said.
“You got a better idea?” Otis asked. “Either of you?”
“I’ve got nothing,” I said. “Unless Daisy finds something on Blake’s phone or gets into his email, I think we’re at a standstill.”
Jace seemed to consider the idea. “What do you suggest?”
Otis played with his butter knife, threading it between his fingers like a magician with a coin. “Know anybody who can get us into the high school?”