The Ambrose Beacon Read online

  Chapter 1

  Several Years Later

  Thursday Evening, January 6th

  Jeremiah Ambrose stared at the computer screen, his eyes unfocused as his mind tried to follow a thought to its conclusion. The thought was one that had been in the back of his mind for the better part of a week. It was one that he couldn’t finish and at the same time one that he couldn’t let go of. He knew that this thought was the key to the investigation that had occupied most of his time for the past month. It was the key to solving the case.

  But something about it kept eluding him and no matter how hard he tried to concentrate, that last piece, the piece that would make everything else fall into place, continued to flit away from his mental grasp. He sighed loudly, sitting back in his chair and rubbing his eyes.

  “Maybe you should put your head down and take a nap.”

  Jeremiah looked up at his partner, Lorenzo Bianchini and knew by the slight tilt at the corners of his mouth that he was up to something.

  “A nap?” he asked, not sure if he had heard him correctly.

  “Sure, Sid. People your age always take naps,” he said as he looked down and smiled condescendingly.

  Jerry snorted and looked back at the screen. “You’re two years younger than me, Larry.” Sid, he thought. He hated that nickname, even after all these years. Larry thought Jerry looked like Sidney Poitier and, much to Jerry’s annoyance had started calling him Sid shortly after they had met. The name stuck and Jerry didn’t have the heart to tell Larry to stop using it. They had been in the same year at the FBI academy and had become best friends, requesting that all of their transfers since then be to the same city. Their ability as partners to solve nearly every case assigned to them in record time hadn’t been missed by the decision-makers and their requests had been granted. Their last transfer had been to the Denver office ten years before.

  Larry looked down at Jerry with pity and placed his hand on Jerry’s shoulder. “Physically, I’m two years younger,” he said. “But mentally, you’re over the hill, buddy.”

  Jerry looked at his partner’s substantial gut and then back up at his face. “Don’t get me started on our physical differences,” he said, ignoring the look of mock indignation on Larry’s face. Jerry watched as Larry raised a large donut to his mouth. “Seriously, I thought you were going on a diet,” he said, thinking about how much weight Larry had gained in the past year.

  Larry had a slightly wounded expression on his face as he answered, “I am on a diet. I stopped eating dairy.”

  Jerry pointed at the donut and the cream filling that was seeping out the side. “Cream is dairy, Larry.”

  Larry looked at the cream in consideration for a moment before shrugging his shoulders. “Well, I stopped drinking milk!”

  Jerry shook his head and turned his attention back to the computer screen, though the display had already switched to an aquatic scene with virtual fish swimming lazily back and forth. A vibrating sensation buzzed through his hip and he reached for his cell phone with his right hand as he hit the space bar with his left, banishing the electronic fish and bringing back the set of pictures he had been staring at. He looked at the number on the cell phone’s display and saw that it was his house. He made a mental note to call home when he had a free moment and placed the phone next to his computer keyboard. His kids liked to call him occasionally at work, which he was normally okay with. But he didn’t want the distraction of such a conversation to further derail his train of thought.

  Jerry stared at the computer screen as Larry stood in front of a large whiteboard, poring over the same photos, looking for the same elusive clue as Jerry. The photos were of a number of banks that had been robbed throughout a three-state area, including Colorado in the past six months. The FBI had been called in for assistance because of the similarities in the crimes, which suggested that they had been committed by the same person or people. Jerry agreed with this assumption and was analyzing the photos to see if he had missed something, some crucial clue that would put them on the trail to finding the criminals. But these criminals were good, covering their every track, ensuring that every trail that should have led to them pointed to a dead-end, instead.

  A sudden, loud vibrating noise made him jump slightly in his seat, his right hand reflexively reaching for his pistol in its shoulder holster. Larry chuckled at Jerry’s reaction as Jerry reached for the phone and looked at its display. It was his home number again. Jerry pressed the button on the side of the phone to stop the vibration and placed it back on the desk. He was starting to get annoyed. His children knew that he was working on a tough case and he had asked them not to bother him at work this week. He would have to remind them when he got home.

  Jerry sighed loudly and looked back at the screen, still sure that he was missing something that should have been obvious in one of the pictures displayed there. His eyes scanned the pictures one at a time, searching for that one elusive clue that would lead his mind in the right direction.

  The phone vibrated again, though this time it didn’t scare him. He had expected it to ring again and had prepared in his head the scolding that he would give whichever of his five children was the culprit.

  He pressed the green send button and then held the phone to his ear. “Hello?” he said with the irritation obvious in his voice.

  “Dad, it’s Cole,” the whispering voice on the other end of the line answered. Cole was his oldest child, sixteen years old and a junior in high school. Jerry relied on Cole to help his brother-in-law, Harper with the other Ambrose children, since his wife Arianna had died four years earlier. Cole was mature for his age, responsible, an excellent student and the one child of Jerry’s who always did as he was told. Jerry had expected it to be one of his other, less obedient children.

  “Cole? Why are you whispering?” Jerry asked, his curiosity at Cole’s behavior piqued further by this oddity.

  “Dad, something weird’s going on,” Cole whispered back.

  Jerry could hear the tension in Cole’s voice in spite of the whisper and he sat forward in his chair, his senses instantly on full alert. “What do you mean? Where are you and where are your brothers and sisters?”

  Cole hesitated for a moment on the other line, as if he had been listening to something. When he answered, his whisper was even softer than before. “We’re all down in the basement. The electricity went off and Uncle Harper freaked out and told us to get down in the basement. He told me to lock the door and wait for him to come back.” Cole paused again and Jerry knew that he was trying to keep his cool in spite of the fact that he was obviously frightened. “That was half an hour ago and I’m starting to worry.”

  Jerry frowned in confusion. Why would the electricity have gone out? And why would Harper send the children to the basement? His brother-in-law, who lived with them and with whom Jerry had a strained relationship, was odd in many ways, but took excellent care of the children. “Why did he send you down to the basement?” Jerry asked. He noticed movement out of the corner of his eye and looked up to see Larry standing next to him, a questioning look on his face.

  “I don’t know,” Cole answered. “He just freaked out and…”

  Cole’s voice disappeared and Jerry heard the two-tone signal that his phone made when a call had ended. He lowered the phone and brought up the list of recent calls, hitting the button to redial his home number.

  “What’s going on, Sid?” Larry asked with concern.

  Jerry shook his head as he waited for the call to connect. “I don’t know. Something’s going on at the house and Harper made the kids go down to the basement.”

  “The basement?” Larry asked. “Were they acting up or something?”

  Jerry shook his head again as the repeating tone of a busy signal rang in his ear. He hung up and redialed the number, but the resulting tone was the same. Now he was starting to worry. As he pressed the button to redial again, he looke
d up at Larry. “Call the phone company and have them run a status check on my home phone.”

  Larry nodded and hurried to his desk, picking up the phone and dialing a number from memory. Jerry heard the busy signal again and swore softly as he ended the call. Larry’s voice drifted over to him from the other desk, but Jerry didn’t hear the words as his mind ran over the list of possible reasons for Harper to do something so odd. Maybe he had been punishing the children, but that was unlike him. Harper almost never had to discipline the children. They always did as he asked them and all five of them had a close and easy relationship with him.

  Larry hung up the phone and stood up, grabbing his jacket. “They said the line’s dead and that it looks like the problem’s coming from the house itself.” He held out Jerry’s jacket to him and said, “Let’s go.”

  Jerry led the way out the door to their office and downstairs to the parking garage. Larry always drove, but he didn’t say a word as Jerry climbed behind the wheel and started the car. Instead, he climbed into the passenger seat and the car was moving before he had even closed his door.

  The drive from the FBI office near downtown Denver to Evergreen, where the Ambrose family lived, typically took up to forty-five minutes. But Jerry’s concern for his children made him ignore the posted speed limits, pushing the car up to nearly ninety miles an hour; a dangerous speed during winter conditions on I-70. The possibility that he could cause an accident and injure himself, Larry or some innocent driver crossed his mind more than once, but he kept pushing the thought to the back of his mind. The safety of his children was more important than that. Jerry looked over at Larry’s seat and saw his hand braced on the dashboard. His body was rigid with tension and Jerry knew that Larry must have the same concern about an accident, but Jerry was grateful that he didn’t say a word. He took the exit to Evergreen and started up the winding mountain road that led to the few properties bordering the national forest, the banked curves barely keeping the unmarked sedan on its course.

  Jerry made the turn onto his property and looked down at the clock in the dashboard. They had made the trip in twenty-five minutes. The car skidded briefly in the snow, but quickly regained traction as the all-wheel-drive kicked in. The moon was bright overhead, casting a pale glow over the snow that blanketed the treeless expanse fronting the Ambrose house for nearly a hundred yards. Something instinctive told Jerry to turn the headlights off and slow the car down as he approached. The crunching noise of the tires in the snow softened slightly, though the noise seemed thunderous to Jerry in the still winter air. The house was completely dark, as were the lights along the driveway, confirming what Cole had said about the electricity being out.

  The house was large, even by Evergreen standards. Just ten minutes from the interstate and nestled in the foothills of the Rocky Mountains, Evergreen was a quiet town with a small town center. Many of its affluent residents lived in large, sprawling homes on even bigger properties. The Ambrose house was on the very fringe of the town, and their nearest neighbor was nearly a mile away. Jerry still wasn’t used to living in such solitude. He had grown up in New Orleans, where you could hear your neighbors using the bathroom.

  He brought the car to a complete stop and shifted it into park. The sight of his own house shouldn’t have given him such feelings of anxiety, but all of his senses were on high alert. He looked over at Larry and the steel in his gaze as he looked at the house told him that he wasn’t the only one feeling it.

  Jerry opened the door and slowly got out of the car, pulling his pistol from its holster under his left armpit as he scanned the front perimeter of the house, looking for signs of a break-in. He heard Larry exit the car and looked over to see him holding his own pistol, the barrel pointing forward.

  Jerry took a few deep breaths to relieve the tension and the cold air that burned his lungs also cleared his head. He felt a chilling numbness start to creep into his hands and he put his gun down for a moment as he pulled on the pair of gloves that he kept in his jacket pocket. He looked over at Larry to whisper for him to do the same, but saw that he was already wearing his own gloves. Jerry should have known better. Larry seemed lazy and even sloppy most times, but he was always ready when it mattered.

  Larry looked back at him and nodded, signaling that he was ready. Jerry moved forward, his eyes sweeping the house as Larry moved to his right, slightly ahead of him. Jerry felt the hair stand up on the back of his neck as he thought of the tree lines to his left and right and what could be hiding there, quietly stalking them from behind. But there was nothing they could do about it and he knew his focus had to stay on the house.

  Most of the curtains on the windows were closed, but Jerry could see a few feet into Cole’s room as they neared it, the pearlescent glow of the moonlight casting its light across the outline of Cole’s computer and desk. But beyond that, the house was completely dark. Larry signaled to his left and Jerry nodded. They would circle around to the back of the house first and check the door that led outside to the back deck.

  Jerry’s heart pounded in his ears and his breath sent clouds of steam from his nose as he and Larry moved around the house, his eyes constantly scanning the windows for signs of movement. Phantom shapes seemed to drift back and forth behind each of the glass panes, but his training and experience taught him to ignore them. Years of conducting surveillance and raids at night had taught him to trust that his eyes would focus on any true movement, even in virtual darkness.

  Larry peeked around the corner leading to the back of the house before nodding quickly. He crept forward slowly, while Jerry followed behind a few steps, cringing inwardly at every crunch of their feet in the snow. If someone lay in waiting on the other side of the back door, they would hear them coming. Larry stepped up onto the back deck and Jerry could see his eyes darting from the ground to the back door, constantly checking his path for obstacles. He was familiar with the clutter that Jerry’s children left everywhere in and outside of the house. Tripping over a discarded toy or piece of sporting equipment would have caused such a clamor that any element of surprise still left to them would have been erased.

  Jerry looked back to the house, his eyes focusing on the space beyond the glass door just as sudden movement burst into view. He felt his finger clench on the trigger in response for a split-second before the moving shape resolved itself into the recognizable shape of Cole, waving frantically at them. Jerry hadn’t realized that he was holding his breath until he released it with relief. His eyes refocused on the gun in his hands that was pointed at his son. He tried to command his heart to stop hammering as he lowered the weapon to point to the ground in front of him. A heavy sigh next to him told him that Larry had probably come just as close to shooting Cole as he had.

  “Jesus, that scared the crap out of me,” Larry said with a wry chuckle. Jerry looked over at him and grinned as he reached for the handle to the French door. Larry’s look in return was completely mirthless. “Seriously, I think I need to change my shorts.”

  Jerry cringed slightly and shook his head as he opened the door. “Nice image, Larry. Thanks.”

  Cole stood just inside the door as the two men entered. Jerry pulled his son aside and away from the door as Larry closed the curtains, leaving only a few inches open, enough for him to see outside. His eyes continued to scan the moonlit vista outside as Jerry quickly scanned his son for any sign of injury.

  “Are you okay?” he asked. Cole nodded in response, his dark eyes looking huge against his skin that was several shades lighter than Jerry’s. “Is someone in the house?” Jerry asked, knowing that Cole would understand that he meant an intruder. Cole shook his head and Jerry relaxed a little, though the tension remained as he asked his next question. “Where are your brothers and sisters?”

  Cole sighed with relief as his father’s comforting presence finally hit him. “They’re in the basement,” he said, nodding his head at the closed door behind him. “U
ncle Harper still hasn’t come back yet and I wanted to see if I could see him from the back door.”

  “What happened?” Jerry asked, knowing that Harper would never have left the children unless he had a good reason. “Did he say anything before he left?”

  Cole shook his head. “No, he just told us to get downstairs and lock the door.” A look of fear crossed his face, creasing his brow. “Dad, I’ve never seen him look like that before. He looked scared!”

  Jerry looked over at Larry, who looked back at him with a blank expression. But his eyes told Jerry that he was thinking the same thing. Nothing spooked Harper. The guy was completely unflappable and always in control. He was the only other person besides Larry with which he would trust his children’s lives. Cole put his hand on his father’s shoulder and Jerry looked into his eyes. “I’m worried about him, Dad.”

  Jerry nodded in what he hoped was a reassuring way. “Don’t worry, son. We’ll find him. Let’s check on the kids, first.”

  Cole nodded as his handsome features hardened slightly with determination. Jerry was so proud of his son at that moment, the maturity he was showing only a glimpse of the man that he was becoming. Cole walked over to the basement door as Jerry followed behind. Curiously, he knocked instead of opening it. “Dinah, it’s me,” he said with his mouth near the door. He looked back at Jerry and smiled sheepishly. “I told her to lock the door behind me and not to open it for anyone but you, me, Uncle Harper or Larry.”

  Jerry smiled and nodded. He thought of something suddenly that was probably irrelevant, but made him curious enough to ask. “Why didn’t you wait until we got here to come out of the basement?”

  Cole looked down in shame for a second before meeting his father’s eyes. “We heard loud noises coming from the back deck. It sounded like a bunch of animals fighting or something. And I swear I heard Uncle Harper shouting something, but I couldn’t hear what he said.” Cole looked away again before adding, “It sounded like he needed help.”

  “I’m sure he’s fine, son. Your Uncle Harper’s a lot tougher than he looks,” Jerry said. And he meant it. He had seen feats of strength and endurance from Harper that had amazed him and that belied his somewhat delicate appearance.

  “Cole, is that you?” asked a whispering voice from the other side of the door. Jerry recognized the voice of Dinah, his oldest daughter.

  “Yeah, it’s me. I’m with Dad and Larry,” Cole answered.

  The clicking of the lock being undone sounded a moment before the door creaked open. Jerry made a mental note to have Cole oil the hinges and almost laughed at such an incongruous thought. Dinah looked up at her father and brother, her face unreadable, as usual. Dinah’s personality was the most like her Uncle Harper’s, in that very little, if anything could bother her. “Where’s Uncle Harper?” she asked, looking at each of them in turn. Cole shook his head and was about to answer when an eerie howl split the silence instead.

  Jerry’s eyes shot toward the back door and met Larry’s gaze. Larry looked perplexed as he said, “If I didn’t know any better, I’d say that sounded like a wolf!” Jerry nodded as he rushed over to the door, pulled back the curtain and looked outside. A layer of clouds had covered the moon since they’d been inside, but there was still enough light to see the fifty or so yards to the tree line. Nothing moved outside. “Have you heard anything like that before?” Larry asked, his brow still furrowed with confusion.

  Jerry shook his head as he tried to pierce the curtain of darkness that started just past the first row of tree trunks. His view blurred as his breath fogged the glass and he moved his head to the side, thinking for a second that he had seen movement next to one of the trees.

  “Jesus!” Larry said loudly, as Jerry felt him jump. Jerry’s reflexes took over as he turned and dropped to one knee, raising his gun to point in the direction that Larry had been looking. A silver-gray shape materialized out of the darkness of the nearby living room. Jerry shook his head and sighed as the shape resolved itself into that of the family’s dog, Cody. The dog walked over to Cole, who absently stroked behind its ears as he whispered something to Dinah.

  Jerry looked up at Larry before standing. “A little jumpy, aren’t you?” he teased, though for a moment he had wondered if the sound they had heard just a moment before had come to life in his home. Cody was a male dog that was large enough for his shoulders to reach the waist of Cole’s six-foot frame and his resemblance to a wolf was more than passing. Harper had inexplicably brought him home less than six months ago, telling Jerry that all children needed a dog. The animal had bonded instantly with all of the Ambrose children, but Cole in particular. He very rarely left Cole’s side.

  As if echoing his thoughts, Larry muttered, “I swear he can hear what that dog is thinking.” Jerry nodded absently as he watched Cole kneel down and look into Cody’s eyes, still scratching behind his ears. Cole looked up at both of them and smiled awkwardly, likely hearing Larry’s comment. Jerry did think that the bond between them was a little strange, but he kept his thoughts to himself. Cole didn’t have any true friends at school, preferring to keep to himself, so Jerry liked the thought of him having any companionship, no matter how strange he thought it was.

  Jerry looked over at Larry. “Keep an eye out up here, okay? I’m gonna check on the rest of the kids,” he said to his partner, who nodded in response. “Cole, you stay up here near the door and shout down if Larry sees anything,” he said quietly to his son as he passed by. He headed down the stairs behind Dinah, who held a flashlight in front of her, its light creating a small pool ahead of her feet in the otherwise pitch-black stairway. She looked back briefly and some of the light spilled back against Dinah’s face. Her skin was as dark as Jerry’s, providing almost no contrast between it and her dark, tightly curled hair, which was pulled back into a ponytail. Though she couldn’t see it in herself, she was beautiful, with strong features and an athletic body that still managed to look feminine. They came to the bottom of the stairs and she turned right, toward the only bathroom in the basement.

  Dinah knocked three times in quick succession and held her mouth to the door. “Open up, Vaughan. It’s me and Dad.”

  The door opened and the light from Dinah’s flashlight illuminated the face of Jerry’s middle child looking back at him. For a split second and probably due to a play of the light, Jerry thought it was Arianna staring back at him. Vaughan’s face was nearly an exact duplicate of his late wife’s. The only differences were the color of his skin and eyes. Where Arianna’s skin had been an alabaster white and her eyes the blue of a summer sky, Vaughan’s skin was the color of caramel and his eyes a brown so light that it was closer to amber. Those eyes wouldn’t meet his for more than a second, but he smiled shyly as he opened the door. Jerry felt a moment of frustration at his son’s behavior. There had been some unknown – at least to Jerry – strife between the two of them lately and Vaughan rarely spoke to his father anymore.

  As he pulled the door completely open, two childlike voices screamed in unison, “Daddy!” Jerry was nearly knocked over by the two diminutive forms that flew into him, locking their arms around his waist. He looked down to see his youngest son, Louis smiling back at him through the gap where his front teeth used to be. His skin was nearly as light as Vaughan’s, but he had the dark eyes and hair of his father. Next to him was a face as alike to his own as Vaughan’s was to Arianna’s, with one notable exception: the bright blue eyes of his wife. Those were the eyes of his youngest child, his daughter Billie.

  “We were so scared, Dad. We didn’t know what was going on!” Louis said, looking up at him. Louis was short for his eight years and barely reached his father’s waist. Jerry hoped that he would hit a growth spurt soon.

  Billie was the only one of his children who looked like she had been crying. “Daddy, where’s Uncle Harper?” she asked, with fresh tears welling in her eyes.

  Jerry kneeled d
own and lightly caressed her cheek as he said, “We’ll find him, honey. Don’t worry.” He picked Billie up and walked out of the laundry room before heading up the stairs. The rest of his children followed quietly behind him.

  When he reached the top of the stairs, he wordlessly handed Billie to Dinah and walked over to stand next to Larry, who was still staring outside. Dinah took the other children into the kitchen, with only Cole staying in the dining room. “Still nothing,” Larry said without looking at Jerry.

  Jerry felt something nudge his knee and he looked down in curiosity to see Cody’s nose pressed up against the glass. He was making a sniffing sound and Jerry wondered if he could smell something through the glass. Another mournful-sounding howl broke the silence and it was quickly joined by a chorus of other throats, each one rising a split-second after the one before it. Jerry thought he counted seven in all, though he couldn’t be sure that he hadn’t missed one or two. He looked over at Larry, his brows furrowed with his unspoken question.

  Larry shook his head. “I’ve never heard of them this far south, at least not recently. You think that’s what Harper went after? A bunch of wolves?” The tone in Larry’s voice suggested that he didn’t think it was likely and Jerry agreed. Harper would never have abandoned the children for simple curiosity and no matter how unusual their presence would be; even a full-fledged pack of wolves was no danger to the family as long as they stayed in the house. And Harper would have known this as well as anyone.

  Jerry shook his head as the howling continued. He looked down at Cody, whose body was rigid as his gaze stayed focused on the trees outside. His weight shifted suddenly in the doggish gesture of impatience and Jerry looked up to see something straight out of a nature film.

  He heard Larry’s sharp intake of breath and knew from the sudden pressure in his chest that he had done the same thing. From the tree line to the north emerged the unmistakable canine shapes that Jerry knew were the source of the chorus of howls. They ghosted across the snow, moving across the open space and toward the fence on the southern side of the property which marked the entrance to the forest reserve beyond. They loped along with an easy grace, their quick steps barely sinking in the snow, though one of the animals moved with a slight limp. Jerry couldn’t be sure if their thick coats were different shades of gray or if the light cast by the shrouded moon made it appear that way. Cody’s gaze never left the animals, though he gave no other visible reaction to them, which Jerry thought odd. He would have expected Cody to become agitated at the sight of such a potential threat. But he just watched them.

  Just before the wolves reached the fence, the large animal in the lead paused and swung its head toward the house. It was the largest of the group and clearly the leader, as all of the others stopped to look in the direction in which it stared. He couldn’t be sure at such a distance, but he guessed that the animal was nearly as big as Cody. He felt a chill along his spine as he realized that the animal was looking directly at them. Confusing Jerry even further, Cody shifted his weight and sat down, though he continued to stare at the animals staring back at him. The silent exchange continued for a few seconds before the animals turned as one, as if at some unspoken command and ducked under the fence, one at a time. Crossing the barrier last was the large leader, who turned its head one last time and looked directly at them for a moment before turning and moving past the fence.

  Larry exhaled loudly, dispelling the tension that had formed in the room at the unusual sight. “Man, that was something,” he said, shaking his head.

  Sudden movement just outside and to his left and Larry’s flinching reaction made Jerry jump and reach for his gun, which he hadn’t remembered holstering. In a split second, it was pointed at the glass and the shape that had appeared suddenly on the other side. The barrel of Larry’s gun was next to it almost immediately after, pointing in the same direction. Larry swore loudly as they both realized what had appeared before them. It was Harper.

  He stood on the other side of the glass, no more than five feet away, though Jerry hadn’t seen anything near that spot just a moment before. He chalked his lapse in observation to the unreliability of peripheral vision and the gray darkness around him. Harper held his hands up and in front of him, showing that he could see the weapons pointed at him. But Jerry could see the mocking half-smile on his face that made it clear that he didn’t consider himself to be in danger. It always amazed him that Harper could manage to infuriate him so quickly and with almost no effort.

  If Vaughan resembled Arianna strongly, Harper could have been her twin. He had the same angular, but well-proportioned features, the same pale skin and the same bright, blue eyes. Even his build was slight, as his sister’s had been. And like his sister, he was rather tall, a few inches over six feet. It was freezing outside, but he only wore jeans and a t-shirt and didn’t appear cold at all.

  Larry opened the door and moved out of the way as Harper stepped in. He cuffed Harper lightly on the shoulder as he passed and shook his head, chuckling. “Crazy bastard! I could’ve blown you away, jumping out at us like that.”

  Harper smiled wryly as he moved to one of the dining room chairs and sat down. “Lucky for me that your aim’s as bad as your breath.”

  Larry chuckled louder as he nodded. “Heh, good one, Harper!” He closed the door and locked it, though he continued to stare outside.

  Larry and Harper had one of the strangest relationships Jerry had ever seen, one in which they constantly traded barbs that would have made just about any person cry. In spite of this, Jerry sensed that Harper had a sort of grudging respect for Larry. And inexplicably, Larry seemed to genuinely like Harper.

  As Harper shifted slightly, the moonlight illuminated the side of his torso. Jerry noticed the tear in Harper’s shirt for the first time. Underneath it, he saw what he suspected to be a long gash running down the side of Harper’s pale skin. The shirt was dark, but Jerry could just barely make out several dark stains near the edges of the tear, stains he knew must be blood.

  Jerry turned to Cole and said, “Go and grab some towels and some peroxide from the hall bathroom.” Harper opened his mouth as if to protest, but closed it wordlessly a moment later. “Let me take a look at that,” Jerry said to Harper as he kneeled beside him.

  “It’s just a scratch,” Harper said. “A tree branch caught me on the side as I ran by.” He didn’t flinch as Jerry’s fingers lightly brushed the shallow wound.

  Jerry frowned in confusion as he looked at the perfectly straight line of the cut. “A tree branch, huh? This looks like it was done by a knife, or a scalpel.” Jerry’s nose wrinkled as a faint odor similar to rotten eggs hit his nose. “And what’s that smell?”

  “Maybe you should ask Larry that question,” Harper said as he nodded his head toward Larry.

  Larry held his empty hand up, though he continued to stare out the door. “It wasn’t me. I would claim it if it was.”

  Harper smiled and shook his head as he looked down at Jerry, who looked back at him, expecting some kind of explanation from his enigmatic brother-in-law. But Harper just shook his head. “I don’t know, maybe it’s the new detergent I’m using or something. Really, it’s just a scratch. I’m fine.”

  Jerry’s response was stifled as the children came rushing from the kitchen, swarming over Harper, kissing and hugging him. Harper’s smile was wide and genuine as he listened to them individually voice their concerns for him and their relief at seeing that he was okay. Seeing him like that reminded Jerry of just how much his wife’s brother loved his children. Those were the images that Jerry would store in his mind, bringing them out again whenever he felt like his patience with Harper was at an end.

  Cole walked into the dining room as Jerry stood back. He held one of the towels he had brought with him over the top of the open bottle of peroxide, upending it before gently cleaning the gash on Harper’s side. Harper didn’t flinch as the towel
rubbed along his side. Jerry looked more closely at the wound, blinking to be sure that he wasn’t seeing things. He thought that it must have been a trick of the light, but the wound that was bleeding lightly just a moment before looked like it had closed completely. He opened his mouth to ask Harper again what had happened, but Harper spoke first.

  “Larry, you can put your gun away. It was nothing, just some wolves running along the back of the property.” He smiled down at Cole and nodded. Cole stopped his ministrations and took the soiled towels and peroxide from the table before leaving the room. Harper looked back up at Jerry before turning and speaking to Larry’s back. “They must have come across a deer carcass or something, but I think I scared them off. There was nothing in the woods besides them and me.” Larry looked at Harper for a moment, as if weighing what he had said. He exhaled and nodded before placing his gun back in its shoulder holster.

  A growing light came from the other room a moment before Cole came into the dining room, holding an illuminated, battery-powered lantern in each hand. He placed them on the table as Jerry sat down. “What happened to the electricity and phone lines?” he asked, looking directly at Harper.

  Harper shrugged his shoulders. “Who knows? It’s probably a downed utility pole out on the road. It’s one of the many hazards of living in the middle of nowhere and it being the dead of winter, and all.”

  His tone was even, but Jerry could hear the barb in Harper’s words. He had tried on several occasions to convince Jerry to move the family closer to Denver, but Jerry loved their house. The success of his wife’s jewelry designs had allowed them to live in relative luxury and the royalties from those designs still brought in enough money to make all of their lives comfortable. But it wasn’t just the size and beauty of the home that made him reluctant to sell it. Every room in the house had memories of the times his family had shared in them. Looking at Harper, he could imagine Ariana’s laughing face as she sat in the very same chair, gently rocking Billie in her lap as one of the other children said something funny. He knew that he would never sell their house for all the money in the world.

  Jerry sighed as he stood and looked to Larry. “You wanna spend the night? It’s a long drive back to the city.”

  Larry shook his head. “No, I’m fine. Thanks, though.” He unlocked the sliding glass door and turned to wave good-bye to the kids and Harper before stepping outside.

  Jerry looked at Harper. “I’m going to walk Larry out to his car. I’ll be right back.” Harper nodded in response before turning his attention back to the children, who were continuing to replay the excitement of the night, as if Harper hadn’t been a part of it himself. Harper just continued to nod patiently as Jerry followed Larry outside.

  As Larry walked down the steps of the deck, Jerry could see his eyes scanning the ground to either side of his steps. He paced slowly along the path that had been tamped down in the snow and as Jerry followed him, he did the same. It was mostly by force of habit, but Harper’s half-hearted explanation of his disappearance hadn’t fooled Jerry one bit. Something suspicious had happened that night at the Ambrose house and Jerry was willing to bet that Harper knew more than he was pretending. And he was also willing to bet that there had been something dangerous out there in the woods, something far more dangerous than a pack of wolves that had wandered too far south. It was the only explanation for Harper sending the children down to what he knew to be the most secure room in the house and for his leaving them alone while he investigated.

  “Sid, check this out,” Larry said as he hunched down to look at something in the snow.

  Jerry looked where Larry’s finger pointed and at first, all he could see were two pairs of overlapping shoeprints that he knew had been made when he and Larry had first arrived. But when he looked more closely, he could clearly see the prints of some kind of animal pressed lightly into the snow. “These must be from one of those wolves,” Larry said, rubbing his chin as he looked at the different prints. Jerry thought they looked no different than the prints he had seen Cody make in the snow and wondered if Larry was mistaken.

  Larry pointed to a pair of side-by-side paw prints that were much larger than the rest. “Look at these, Sid,” he said softly. “They’re twice as big.” He was right, though they were closer to three times as big as the smaller prints and pressed several inches deep into the snow. Larry looked up at Jerry, a thoughtful expression on his face. “What the hell do you think could have caused these? Even that big one leading them couldn’t have left these.” Larry looked back at the ground, his eyes scanning the snow around them for other clues to their origin.

  Jerry searched the snow around them in a wider arc, thinking that they could cover twice as much ground together. His investigative instincts were taking over, pushing his mind to analyze everything around him and pushing most other thoughts, including the biting cold in the air around him aside. But one thought refused to be banished. The image of the huge prints in the snow so near to his house and his family made him tense with concern.

  His eyes fell on a patch of snow that was darker than the rest. At first, he thought it was just a shadow. But as he moved closer and crouched down, he could see that something had stained the snow in two distinct colors. The first was a dark, greasy black substance. A faint smell hit his nostrils, one that smelled similar to what he had smelled earlier in the house. It was the smell of sulfur. But something familiar tinged the sulfuric odor, something metallic and unmistakable. And as the other color in the snow resolved itself in his vision, he recognized that smell. It was blood.

  “You find something?” Larry asked, crouching down beside him. “Hey, that looks like blood.”

  Jerry nodded, murmuring his assent. He looked around him, searching for more of the strangely mixed liquids, which had begun to turn to slush in the cold of the snow. He could just make out a faint line of alternating colors, red then black, which ran across the path to the back door and toward the tree line to the side of the house. But the darkness of the trees, no more than a hundred feet away, was impenetrable beyond a few feet past the first line of branches. He looked back at the stains near him as Larry leaned in and sniffed the air.

  Larry looked up at Jerry, a slight frown creasing his forehead. “It smells like that stuff that Harper had on him in the house…that black stuff.” He reached out with his finger pointed, but Jerry impulsively grabbed his hand, holding it back from the oily mess.

  “Don’t touch it, Larry,” Jerry said. Larry looked at him in confusion and Jerry explained his impulse. “I’ve got a funny feeling about that black stuff.”

  Larry looked at him for a moment, his expression unreadable before nodding. “Okay, whatever you say, Sid. But I want to get a sample of this stuff and take it back to the lab. It kind of looks like dirty motor oil, but the smell is all wrong.” He stood up and headed for the car as Jerry continued to scan the ground around him. “I want a sample of that blood, too,” Larry called over his shoulder as he opened the trunk of the car. Jerry couldn’t see him, but could hear him fishing around for a moment before pulling the trunk closed and walking back with two flat, plastic containers in his hands.

  Larry crouched down and carefully used the lids of the containers to scoop two small sections of the discolored snow into the containers; one of them holding the bloodied snow and the other filled with the mysterious black stuff. Jerry watched him fill the containers, inwardly wanting to warn Larry again not to touch it, but keeping his mouth closed. Larry knew what he was doing.

  Jerry suddenly felt a chill run down his spine, causing the muscles in his back to flex involuntarily. He spun around and tried to pierce the inky blackness between the trees with his eyes, searching for the source of the unmistakable feeling that someone or something was watching him. His peripheral vision registered Larry rising and moving to stand next to him.

  “Yeah, I feel it too,” he said.

 
Jerry looked over at him and saw that he was watching the trees, too. He looked down and saw that Larry was holding his gun in his hand and when his mind registered a foreign weight in his own hand, he realized that he had pulled his own pistol from its holster. “Maybe it’s another one of those wolves we saw earlier,” Larry said, though there was a complete lack of conviction in his voice.

  “Maybe,” Jerry murmured as he stared into the trees, wishing he had a spotlight to illuminate the woods. He turned to look at Larry, trying to brush away the feeling and trying to write it off as nothing more than anxiety over the safety of his family. “And maybe we’re both just a little jumpy.”

  Larry looked at him and raised an eyebrow. “Yeah, because we’re both the jumpy type, right?” He holstered his pistol, but continued to stare at the trees. “Maybe I should spend the night,” he said.

  Jerry’s first instinct was to agree, but he was trying desperately not to give into his fears that his family was in danger. The logical side of him said that there was no evidence so far that this was the case, other than Harper’s bizarre reaction to what amounted to little more than an unusual wildlife sighting. But Harper was strange to begin with and had always been so. Jerry sighed and shook his head.

  “Nah, we’ll be okay,” he said to his partner. He walked Larry over to the car and waited for him to get in, start the engine and buckle his seat belt. He leaned in and looked his partner in the eye. “Do me a favor,” he said as a fresh wave of anxiety hit him. “Give me a call when you get home, alright?”

  Larry grinned back at him. “Yes, mother.” His grin faded when Jerry didn’t grin back. “Hey, no problem,” he said, trying to reassure his partner and friend. He opened his mouth to say something, but seemed to decide against it. “You sure you don’t want me to stay? Or call someone over to watch the house?” he finally asked.

  Jerry smiled as he responded, “No, we’re fine. Besides, I’ve got Harper here to back me up.” He said the last ruefully, knowing that Larry would appreciate the jab at Harper.

  Larry snorted as he shook his head. “I don’t know, Sid. I think your brother-in-law’s a lot tougher than he looks. All I know is I don’t think I’d want to meet him alone in a dark alley. I wouldn’t be too worried to have him looking after the kids.”

  Jerry nodded as he thought the same thing. There was something about Harper that made you look at him twice, something other than his good looks. The quiet confidence he possessed and the way that all of his movements seemed so controlled, yet so fluid at the same time had made Jerry wonder on several occasions if there was something about Harper’s past that he didn’t know. He smiled at Larry as the car was shifted into reverse. “Yeah, I’m sure you’re right,” he said as he looked briefly at the house. He reached in and patted his partner on the shoulder. “Get home safe,” he said.

  Larry nodded and backed up before turning the car around and slowly heading down the driveway. Jerry watched the car pull away until it made the turn onto the main road. He turned around and looked back at his house, the windows still completely dark. He walked toward the garage, where their emergency generator was kept. He didn’t know how long the power was going to be out and it was a cold night. They could go without lights for one night, but going without heat was out of the question. He made a mental note to call the power and phone companies to report the outage from his cell as he walked to the side door of the garage.

  As he turned the corner of the house, a twinkle of light in the distance drew his eyes. Nearly a mile in the distance, where the land sloped into a valley between the hills surrounding his home, he could see the lights of his neighbor’s house shining brightly. The home belonged to James McCallister, one of Vaughan’s teachers at the local middle school. Jerry respected him and hoped that his stern, yet fair personality would have a good effect on Vaughan, who Jerry thought was just a little too soft for his own good. He worried that he was being picked on at school, but didn’t know what he could do about it. He thought of his middle son for a moment, feeling a sense of helplessness at how far their relationship had deteriorated and not knowing how to repair it. His moment of self-pity was broken as he looked at the lights and realized why the sight was so strange. All of the homes in their area of Evergreen were on the same power grid. If the electricity was out at the Ambrose house, it should have been out at his neighbor’s, too. Jerry walked over to where the utility box was mounted to the side of the house. The lines running to the Ambrose house were mounted on telephone poles, as were all of the lines in the neighborhood. But his wife had insisted that the lines running from the street be buried when their home was being built.

  Jerry traced the lines running up from the ground to the point near the box where they had been severed. At first, he thought that something must have hit the wires but there were no signs of damage around the box. He leaned in and grabbed the wire near the box, careful not to touch the line leading from the ground, suspecting that it was probably still live. As he turned the wire away from the box and into the moonlight bathing the area around him, he saw the clean cut across it. It looked like it had been a deliberate cut with a very sharp knife. There was also a line of what appeared to be soot where the lines had been, and the paint there blistered as if it had been burnt. He looked around him, looking for any signs of intruders near the house, though the feeling that he was being watched had long since disappeared. He thought briefly about calling Larry and asking him to come back to spend the night, but decided that he was being a little paranoid. It was dark and he couldn’t see clearly. Something could have severed the lines in some kind of freak accident, he told himself, though that didn’t explain the blistered paint. He released the wires and opened the door to the garage, bypassing the electric opener. After starting the generator and checking to be sure there was enough gas to run through the night, he took a roll of electrical tape and walked back outside, where he taped off the ends of the severed wires. The lights in the house were now shining brightly, but there were no outdoor lights that shone on this side of the house, so he couldn’t get a good look at the wires. He would get a closer look in the morning. He walked back into the house through the garage, locking all of the doors behind him as he went and as he entered the kitchen, he set the alarm, which was unusual. They always locked the doors at night, but never set the alarm unless no one was going to be home. Jerry thought that he was still being a little paranoid, but the thought that the alarm was set made him feel a little better.

  He walked through the garage and into the brightly-lit kitchen, but the children weren’t there. He moved into the adjoining dining room and saw Harper sitting alone in the darkness, staring out the sliding glass doors. “Did the kids go to bed?” Jerry asked, trying to decide whether to sit down or stand. Harper’s presence always made him feel slightly ill-at-ease.

  Harper nodded, though he didn’t look up at Jerry. He raised a mug to his mouth and Jerry could see the steam rising from within. Harper drank more coffee than anyone Jerry knew and he wondered how he could sleep after so much caffeine. Although Jerry had never actually seen Harper sleep, which was strange, his appearance suggested that what little sleep he did get was more than enough. Jerry thought for a moment of telling Harper of the severed power lines, but decided that it wasn’t worth worrying anyone else until he could be sure of what had happened. On an impulse he moved to the opposite end of the table from his brother-in-law and sat down.

  Harper had removed his shirt and Jerry could see the tight muscles of his upper torso clearly as his skin glowed faintly in the moonlight spilling through the glass of the doors. He had never seen Harper do any kind of regular exercise and yet he was in perfect physical condition. Jerry thought of his own softening middle that had once been firm and wondered at the fluke of genetics and how certain people could be so blessed while the rest of humanity had to actually work at being healthy. He suddenly realized the reason for Har
per removing his shirt and asked him, “How’s that cut healing?”

  Harper turned to look at him, his expression blank before answering, “It’s fine, thank you. It really was just a scratch.”

  Jerry stared back for a moment but finally had to avert his eyes, looking down at his hands, instead. He looked so much like Arianna that it was hard to look at him for very long. He thought again of Harper’s torn shirt and the oily black substance that had coated it, the same black substance that he and Larry had found in the snow. “You said your shirt tore because of a branch?” he asked, tensing in preparation for Harper to become defensive.

  Harper’s expression remained neutral as he stared at Jerry for a moment. “Yes,” he finally answered. “That’s what I said happened.” He was quiet for a moment before asking, “Is there something you’d like to ask me, Jeremiah?”

  Jerry clenched his hands at Harper’s use of his full name. In spite of him asking several times to be called Jerry, Harper refused to call him by any other name than his given one. He had said that Jeremiah was a name full of honor and should not be shortened to anything simpler. He had said it sincerely, but Jerry always thought that it was another one of Harper’s ways of trying to antagonize him.

  He wanted to tell Harper that there was something he wanted to ask him and that he suspected he wasn’t telling him the truth, but he was tired and didn’t want another fight with his wife’s brother. He shook his head. “No, Harper. I just wanted to be sure I understood. That’s all.”

  Harper continued to stare at Jerry for a moment before taking his hand from his coffee cup, standing up and walking toward the living room. Jerry watched him go, wondering as he always did what Harper was thinking. As he neared the threshold of the arch leading to the living room, he stopped. Jerry looked at his back, which rose slightly with each slow breath that he took. He turned his head slightly, though he didn’t look at Jerry. “You know that I would never do anything to place the children in danger, don’t you?” he asked, and the genuineness in his voice surprised Jerry.

  Jerry was so surprised by the question that he forgot to answer. “Of course,” he finally said. “I know you love my children, Harper. I know that you’d do anything for them.” Though he meant every word of what he said, he was glad that his sincerity had come through in his voice. He truly appreciated everything that Harper did for his children and didn’t want him to think that he took it for granted.

  Harper nodded his head and smiled slightly. “Good,” he said softly. He paused for a moment before adding, “Good night, brother.”

  “Good night, Harper,” Jerry responded, though he couldn’t believe what Harper had said. He had never acknowledged their familial bond before and Jerry had not doubted the sincerity in Harper’s voice when he said it. It had been a strange night all around.

  Jerry looked out the window, thinking of his relationship with each of the members of his family. He doubted that he and Harper would ever be more than cordial to each other, though he admitted that it had been a sort of breakthrough for Harper to call him brother. Vaughan’s reluctance to speak more than a few words to him was a source of constant worry and frustration, but he hoped that it was just the enigmatic troubles that seemed to plague many children his age. Cole had always been on the shy side, but Jerry doubted that he had anything to worry about with his oldest child, who was steady and constant. Dinah was a whirlwind of focused energy, but excelled in school and sports and never gave him problems. Louis, on the other hand constantly caused problems at school with his often wicked sense of humor and need to be the class clown. And then there was Billie. She really was her daddy’s little girl and even the thought of her made Jerry smile. The same bright blue eyes that had been the twin of his wife’s still looked at him as if he was the greatest person in the world. He knew that would change eventually, but until it did, she could do no wrong in his eyes. He knew that his problems were no greater than any other parent’s, but he wished again that he could share those problems, and the rewards that came from fixing them with his wife.

  He sighed as he stood up and checked to be sure the glass doors were locked. He went through the main living area of the house, checking doors and shutting lights before sitting down on the couch in the family room, which stood at the center of the sprawling structure. He pulled his pistol from its holster and held it in his hand, checking to be sure the safety was on before resting it on his knee. If anyone or anything entered the house while his family slept, they would have to get past him first. He sat there for less than an hour before his eyes grew too heavy and he fell asleep, his gun still held tightly in his hand.