Chapter 79
quinn
Their vehicle slews to a stop in the middle of Stowebury Main Street, just inches away from the pedestrian whose sighting caused Quinn to scream at Phil to slam on the brakes.
Horns blare as other drivers are forced to swerve around them, and Phil pulls off the road into the parking lot of the Stowebury Inn, which is conveniently where they happen to be.
Mac must see their roadway antics in his rear-view mirror; he comes to a sudden halt and reverses along the road and into the parking lot just as Quinn and Phil get out of their car.
‘What the hell?’ Mac demands, as he leaps out.
The pedestrian who caused all the commotion is standing, dazed, dangerously close to the road. Quinn gently guides him to the safety of the parking lot.
‘Who is this man?’ Mac says.
Quinn doesn’t blame Mac for being confused.
This is one hell of a mind fuck, even for her.
‘His name’s Luke Connelly,’ she says.
‘Luke Connelly?’ Mac exclaims. ‘The guy who went missing last summer? I thought he was dead.’
‘We all did,’ Quinn says.
Phil has his camera out, already recording.
The man looks like a castaway, with crazy, matted hair down to his shoulders, and a thick, greying beard.
He’s emaciated to the point of near-starvation and his weathered, leathery skin hangs from his bony frame.
His lips are chapped and blistered, his face seamed with grime.
The left side of his mouth droops oddly, and he has a peculiar, listing gait when he walks, like a sailor newly returned to dry land.
He looks at least twenty years older than the thirty-five Quinn knows him to be.
‘I did a bad thing,’ Luke says suddenly.
‘What do you mean?’ Quinn asks.
The man shakes his head and mumbles into his beard.
‘What’s wrong with him?’ Mac says, his voice low.
‘I’m not sure,’ Quinn says. ‘It looks like he might have had a stroke. It might explain why he didn’t come home.’
‘More likely someone gave him a hard fucking whack on the head,’ Phil says, looking up from his viewfinder.
‘Where’s he been all this time?’ Mac says.
‘Hiding in the mountains,’ Quinn says. ‘I think Phil’s right. I think someone attacked him and left him for dead, and he’s been too scared to come forward in case they tried again.’
Phil lowers his camera. ‘Poor bastard.’
‘Luke,’ Quinn says, as the man turns in tight circles. ‘Can you tell us what happened?’
‘Bad thing,’ Luke says, shaking his head vigorously. ‘Bad thing.’
‘This isn’t getting us anywhere,’ Mac says. He puts his hand on Luke’s shoulder, calming the man as you would a restive horse. ‘D’you think maybe you could show us, Luke? Where did the bad thing happen?’
Luke hesitates, and then nods.
‘Can we walk there, or d’you want a ride in my truck?’ Mac asks gently.
Luke points towards the truck. Mac opens his passenger door for him, and Luke settles gingerly into the front seat as if he’s never been in a car before.
‘What about Nicky and Rose?’ Phil asks Quinn as they get back into their shitty rental vehicle. ‘I thought you wanted to find them ASAP?’
‘It’s all connected,’ Quinn says.
‘Spidey hunch, huh?’
‘More like there’s a limit to the level of random fucked-upness one town can have,’ Quinn says.
Phil follows Mac’s truck as he pulls back out onto the main road and heads out of town.
It’s getting dark, and it’s hard to keep up with Mac, who knows every bend of the road like the back of his hand.
Phil has to brake sharply when Mac takes a sudden tight right turn, heading down towards the lake.
‘Fuck,’ Quinn says, smacking her palm on the dashboard. ‘The marina. Jesus Christ! I should’ve fucking guessed.’
Mac stops in front of the gates and gets out to open them. As they drive into the parking lot, their headlights pick out Iris’s Audi, tucked away behind the deserted office cabin. Clearly this is where the tracking app led her all along.
Luke is already out of the truck and loping through the maze of trailers and rotting boat hulls towards the far side of the marina. It must be hard for him to see where he’s going in the dark, but he seems to be on familiar ground, moving with surprising speed.
‘Mind your step,’ Mac says, as they start to follow. ‘There’s a lot of ropes and iron rebar around. You don’t want to trip.’
Luke stops beside a concrete pit with a large, rusting boat davit swinging unevenly above it, which Quinn guesses was once used for boat repairs.
In the fifteen months since the marina closed, it’s become a dumping ground for everything from fibreglass insulation to old fridges, most of which have been lobbed over the chain-link fence, landing here, near the repair pit.
Mac peers down into the darkness, using his phone as a flashlight, and then suddenly turns away, covering his mouth with his hand.
‘Camera,’ Quinn tells Phil quietly.
Luke is shifting agitatedly from one foot to the other, banging the right side of his head with his knuckles. ‘Bad thing, bad thing.’
Quinn glances into the concrete pit, already knowing what she’ll see at the bottom.
She can’t tell who it is.
There’s too much blood.
‘Oh, Luke,’ she says softly. ‘What did you do?’
As if in answer, Luke produces a creased photograph from his pocket and hands it to Mac.
‘Where’d you get this?’ Mac says.
Luke bangs the side of his head again, clearly terrified.
‘Where did this come from?’ Mac demands. ‘Luke! Where did you get this?’
‘Back off. You’re frightening him,’ Quinn says. ‘It’s OK, Luke. You’re not in trouble.’
Mac hands Quinn the photograph. In it, Nicky is holding aloft a cross-country medal, with Amy and Mac proudly standing on either side of him. It looks like it was taken maybe a year or two before the accident.
Luke suddenly snatches the photograph back from her. He rubs his grimy forefinger back and forth over Amy’s face, whimpering to himself.
‘Did you see this lady?’ Quinn exclaims. ‘The lady in this photograph? Luke, did you see her? Can you tell us where she is now?’
Luke wraps his arms around himself, rocking back and forth, his eyes squeezed shut. It’s clear they’re not going to get anything more out of him.
‘Jesus Christ,’ Mac says. He glances down into the pit, and swiftly averts his eyes again. ‘Is that – oh, God, did he —’
‘It’s a man,’ Phil says, lowering his camera. ‘Look at the size of the boots. I don’t know who it is, but it’s definitely not a woman. I don’t think they’ve been there long.’
He and Quinn exchange a glance. They both know what death smells like after a day or two.
‘Then where the fuck are Amy and Iris?’ Quinn says.
‘Jesse’s Chris-Craft is missing,’ Mac says suddenly.
He’s right: the boat is no longer in its cradle. Quinn remembers seeing it when she met Rose at the marina. The two WaveRunners nearby are gone, too, their protective tarps yanked onto the ground. Marks in the mud nearby suggest both were dragged down to the water, and recently.
‘You need to call the cops out to that body,’ Mac says. ‘Get emergency rescue here, too. Someone needs to keep an eye on Luke. Don’t let him disappear. We still don’t know what he’s got to do with all of this.’
‘Where are you going?’
‘Caleb Yearick has a Boston Whaler,’ Mac says. ‘His place is five minutes down the shore. He always leaves the keys on the boat. Everybody round here does.’
He runs down the beach, and is swiftly swallowed up by the darkness.
Phil joins Quinn by the edge of the water.
‘If Luke Connelly is alive,’ he says, ‘who the fuck did they find up in the mountains?’