“I think it did, too,” Bran said quietly.
In that moment Zach would have given anything to have come back to Clear Creek before Dad died. To have been able to say, I missed you. And I love you, Dad.
But he also knew he’d never be satisfied until he had his answers. Monsters were good at hiding in plain sight. Families were the last to guess.
When neither brother said anything, Jack nodded, turned and shambled away. Bran and Zach watched him get into that old pickup, start it and drive away without ever once looking back.
“Shit,” Bran said under his breath. He bent his head and pinched his nose so hard between his thumb and forefinger, Zach would have sworn he heard cartilage creak.
Zach couldn’t think of a single thing to say.
He met the tow truck driver’s stare and waited until the guy’s face reddened and he went back to work. Then Zach laid a hand on his brother’s shoulder.
“Come on into the house. At least have a cup of coffee. Or, hell, a beer.”
“Yeah.” Bran let out a long breath. “Damn. I lost it there. I never do that.”
Zach shook his head even though Bran’s outburst had jarred him in a way he didn’t recognize. “You’re entitled once in a while. Anyway, he’s the one who took a swing, not you.”
Bran only grunted, but he did walk with Zach to the house. As Zach shut the front door, he heard the clank of chains, a mechanical groan and, a minute later, the sound of the tow truck moving slowly down his driveway and into the street.
No reason he should feel as if he’d been turned upside down and shaken.
* * *
LATE TUESDAY AFTERNOON, Zach strolled into Fabulous Interiors, once again wearing his uniform. Only Tess was behind the counter, Greg having left to take his seven-year-old daughter to spring soccer practice while his wife chauffeured their son to some other activity. As slow as business had been, Tess had shooed him on his way.
Predictably, Zach frowned after taking a look around. “Are you here alone?”
“For the moment.”
“I guess you can’t help it,” he conceded, not sounding happy.
She smiled at his tone. “No, I can’t. Anyway, there are businesses on each side. We share a hall and a restroom with the coffee shop. People walk past the front windows often enough, I don’t feel all that alone.”
He nodded. “I installed the cameras today, but they feed to a receiver I need to put inside your house.”
When she asked, he explained that he’d gone with three cameras, one looking at the back of the house and one on each side. All had motion detectors and quality night vision. If something happened, they could watch what the camera had recorded.
“Okay. Um, do you want to follow me home?”
“I’d rather nobody sees me arrive. I’ll come over after dark. Don’t turn your front porch light on. I won’t use the doorbell, I’ll knock.”
“Three times?”
He cocked an eyebrow, not amused.
No surprise, he waited until she had closed the shop. The last thing she did was let him out the front.
His knock didn’t come until almost nine. Days were stretching now, in early May, with sunset at eight-thirty or later already. A box under his arm, he slipped inside the moment she opened the door. He’d changed to all black—chinos and a long-sleeved T-shirt with boots.
Didn’t it figure? Black suited him, enhancing his air of danger. He could have been a burglar...no... Tess thought, her grandmother had had a more romantic term. Second-story man.
“Where do you want the receiver set up?” Zach asked.
“That depends. Does it just record, or if I hear something outside, can I watch?”
Zach’s smile was wolfish. “You can watch.”
“My bedroom, then.”
He followed her without comment. By his very presence, he shrank the room and made her acutely conscious of the bed. Thank goodness she’d made it that morning. It looked less suggestive than it would have if disheveled.
Zach set up what looked sort of like a notebook computer. He showed her how to switch from one camera to another.
“I’ll go out in back and trigger this one. Stay here so you can tell me if it works.”
Barely a minute after he disappeared, the screen brightened to a sort of greenish hue and there he was, walking into the middle of the yard, looking directly into the camera then returning to the back door. The camera hadn’t yet lapsed into stand-by mode when he reappeared.