Chapter 60
Kitty’s hire car, some road out of Los Angeles, California
We head east out of LA. I’m driving faster than I should be but I don’t care about being pulled over right now. All I can think about is that I hope we’re not too late.
As we drive, I notice the landscape changing. The built-up-ness of LA gives way to industrial estates, storage warehouses and sprawling residential developments. I see mountains appear on the horizon.
‘How far is it?’ I ask Lauren.
‘Not far,’ she says but I don’t really know what that means.
This is America after all and don’t they happily drive like two hundred miles for a burger?
I get stressed out if I have to go south of the Thames.
So I keep driving until the mountains are no longer on the horizon, instead they’re looming on either side.
There are no palm trees anymore, just low, prickly-looking shrubs and the occasional cactus. We’re in the desert now.
I hope we’re not lost.
‘Are you sure you know where you’re going?’ I ask Lauren.
‘I’m sure,’ she says. ‘Cort used to bring me out here when we first started dating. We used to come here to be alone.’ She presses her lips together like she’s trying to stop herself from crying.
‘Are you okay?’ I ask her.
‘I just feel so stupid,’ she says. ‘If you’re right and I’ve been dating a murderer. What does that say about me?’
‘Nothing!’ I say. ‘Lauren, if we’re right about Cort, it doesn’t say a single thing about you. It’s on him. He’s the one who chose to do these awful things. He fooled a lot of people. Everyone who listens to his podcasts and talks. All his social media followers. You’re far from stupid, Lauren.’
She keeps staring straight ahead. ‘But how could I not know? That’s what everyone will be saying, isn’t it? How could the girlfriend not know? Oh God, there will be Netflix shows about me!’ She turns to face me now, her eyes wide with panic. ‘And not in the good way.’
‘Lauren, please don’t think about that now. Please. We need to find Cort and hope he hasn’t hurt Antoinette yet.’ My mind flicks to the scrap of fabric, the smear of blood on it, and my stomach lurches. I open the window and take some deep breaths of sticky, warm desert air.
‘Are you okay?’ Lauren asks me. ‘You look like you’re going to barf or something.’
‘I’m fine,’ I say. ‘Just feeling a bit travel sick.’
‘Here, have some water.’ She pulls a bottle of mineral water out of her bag and takes the cap off for me. ‘Drink some of this.’
I take it from her gratefully and swallow down half the bottle.
‘Can you check my phone?’ I say. ‘Has Charlie called?’
‘Sure,’ Lauren replies and reaches for my phone in the centre console. Out of the corner of my eye, I can see her frowning at it.
‘What’s wrong?’
‘There’s no signal out here,’ she says, letting the phone slip back into place. ‘I forgot about that.’
My gut churns again and I realise how reckless I’ve been, coming all the way out here to confront a murderer without even a weapon.
And now a phone without any signal.
Lauren notices my distress and she puts a hand on my arm. ‘It’s going to be okay,’ she says.
I’d like to have her confidence.
I’ve spent so much of this trip rolling my eyes at Antoinette for not being careful. And here I am, doing exactly the sort of impulsive thing I’ve been warning her about.
I could kick myself.
‘Oh, take this exit,’ Lauren says. And then we’re on a long, desert highway that looks like something out of an old Western movie.
‘Where exactly are we going?’ I ask.
‘Wonder Valley.’
‘What’s Wonder Valley?’ It sounds like a theme park.
‘It’s just a remote bit of the Mojave out near Joshua Tree. Just derelict cabins, long roads and dust.’
A murder desert.
Cort’s taken my sister to a murder shed in a murder desert.
I put my foot down even harder on the accelerator.
We drive for about another hour, the road long and dusty. It feels ominous and I suddenly remember that Agnes and Charlie won’t know where we are. The last thing they need is to think that Lauren and I have vanished into thin air as well.
‘Can you text Agnes and let her know what we’re doing?’ I say. ‘Charlie will panic if they get back and find us gone.’
‘There’s no signal,’ Lauren reminds me.
‘Please try,’ I say. ‘It might go through if we find a pocket somewhere.’
Lauren reaches into her pocket, takes out her phone and taps out a message. ‘All done,’ she says. ‘We’re almost there. It’s round here somewhere.’
I don’t even begin to understand how she can tell. All I can see is sand, skeletal shrubs and the odd abandoned building. The whole place is an absolute ghost town, like proper horror-movie vibes. A cold shiver runs down my spine, a ghostly finger tracing the bones.
‘Over there.’ Lauren points to one of the larger abandoned buildings. ‘That’s the one.’
I pull over at the place she’s indicated. It looks like it was once some sort of homestead, but now it’s little more than a ruin. Completely dilapidated. The windows are all smashed in but the glass isn’t jagged, it’s smooth, suggesting many years of being left to the elements.
‘This is lovely,’ I say as we get out of the car and make our way towards the building. ‘And he brought you here? Did you really not see any red flags there at all?’
Lauren gives a sort of half shrug. ‘I don’t know. No. It seemed kinda romantic out here.’ She looks around the barren landscape. ‘Don’t you think it’s like eerily beautiful?’
I do not think this at all.
I think it looks like something out of a low-budget slasher film.
I think it looks like the end of the world.
But I don’t say anything.
Lauren looks like she’s in some sort of trance as she makes her way to the front door, or what’s left of it.
‘There are hundreds of places like this all over the desert,’ she says as she pushes the door open and walks inside. ‘Cort was always fascinated by them.’
A murderer fascinated by murder sheds.
‘Why are they all abandoned?’ I ask her as I step over a rolled-up carpet and follow her inside. ‘Where did everyone go?’
‘Back to civilisation,’ Lauren says but doesn’t elaborate.
It’s dark in the cabin and I feel around on the wall for a light switch. My fingers make contact with something and I flick the switch but nothing happens.
‘There’s no electricity out here,’ Lauren says. ‘Hasn’t been for as long as we’ve been coming out here.’
‘Right,’ I say and reach into my pocket for my phone. But it’s not there. It’s still in the car.
‘Have you got your phone on you?’ I say to Lauren. ‘We can use the torch.’
‘Oh yes,’ she says. ‘Of course.’
She takes her phone out and turns the torch on.
Somehow this makes the whole place even creepier.
Now I can clearly see just how rundown it is.
There are cobwebs choking every surface, this mixture of sand and dust on the floorboards, a broken-down child’s cot shoved against the back wall.
It reminds me of a song my dad used to sing to me at bedtime when I was little.
All the crew has gone ashore,
But the ship sails on forevermore.
That icy finger trails down my back again.
‘Do you think he’s here?’ I whisper to Lauren.
‘I don’t know,’ she says. ‘Wait here. I’m going to look in the other rooms.’
‘Is that safe?’
‘Cort’s not going to do anything to me,’ she says. ‘But I can’t say the same if we both spring him and he feels cornered. Just stay here, okay? I won’t be long.’
She gives my arm a reassuring squeeze and heads to one of the darkened doorways guided by the light of her phone.
The only light in the room now is coming from the moon, which is streaming in through the empty window frames.
I look around again. Maybe there is something here I can use as a weapon if I need to.
There’s an area of the room that looks like it was a little kitchenette and I tiptoe over to it, flinching as the wooden floorboards creak beneath my feet.
There’s a rusty stove, some battered old pots spilling out of a cupboard and a half-open drawer.
I pull the draw out further, slowly, trying not to make any sudden noises.
I’m pleased to see a few pieces of cutlery but my heart drops when I realise it’s just spoons.
Alanis Morissette would have something to say about this.
I can’t believe I came all the way out here with nothing.
I’m about to have another look in the main body of the cabin but when I turn around, I have to clap my hands over my mouth to contain the scream that I almost scream.
Because a figure has appeared in one of the doorways.
The figure of a man.
A man I recognise.
Only it’s not Cort.
It’s Travis.
‘Kitty,’ he says.
But before I can ask him anything, there’s a blinding pain across the back of my head.
And then everything goes black.