Valenti cringed when he thought of his former house-guest. He had taken the seemingly helpless girl into his home and let her live with him and his son as a part of their family and all the while she was using one of their friends and ultimately wound up killing him. Valenti had always prided himself on his detective skills, and still had not managed to get over the fact that he had lived for weeks with a murderer under his own roof.
Pushing the useless regrets out of his head, Valenti took a moment to observe his slumbering son. When Kyle was a child, Valenti used to make a practice out of peering into the boy's room when he would come home late from work, to make sure his son was sleeping soundly. He especially made a habit of it after his wife, Michelle, had left them for parts unknown.
Sitting for a moment on the piano bench, he remembered
back to the time when music had filled the house. He and his former wife would take turns singing their son to sleep on the nights he had come home from work on time. He had forgotten how much he missed the music until recently. The memorial for Alex had been a powerful reminder.
Kyle was tossing on the unmade couch and mumbling slightly. Valenti worried that his son might be having a bad dream, because the way his face was scrunched as if in pain. He remembered back to a time when, as a child, Kyle always looked like a cherub lying under the covers-one of heaven's youngest angels. Valenti chuckled to himself as he thought, Kyle would love me to describe him that way in front of his friends. Ill have to remember to do that someday.
Still in silence, Valenti finished up his morning rituals planning for the long day ahead of him, in which he had much to do. Writing a note to his son, he tried to explain what he was up to, but decided on a simple, «Gone out. Be back later,' because the full explanation was more than one sheet of paper off the notepad could manage to fit. Valenti left the note on the coffee table, taking one last look at his sleeping son. Then he threw on a light jacket and made his way out the front door, humming as he carefully closed the door behind him.
The slight click of the lock was enough to rouse Kyle from his somewhat troubled sleep. Morning came for him much more slowly than it had in the past few days. Light was streaming through the window warming his face and brightening the darkness behind his eyes. The dreams had not gone away, but somehow they had seemed more manageable, more tolerable. For the first time in weeks, he felt somewhat rested.
Peering through the slits in his eyes, he turned his head to the clock on the wall and saw that he had actually gotten over five hours of uninterrupted sleep. It wasn't a full night, but it was far more than he had slept in a long time.
With a small sense of relief, Kyle fully opened his eyes.
Rolling off the couch and onto the floor, he did his usual quick set of push-ups to get the blood flowing and rouse the body and mind back into full consciousness. He hadn't done this morning ritual in several days, since he was usually too tired to get out of bed, much less attempt any exercising. Today, however, was different. True, he was still somewhat groggy, but at least he felt rested.
Reaching out to the coffee table, he picked up his father's short note and added yet another meaningless clue to the mystery of his dad's disappearing acts. Oh well, hell tell me when he's ready, Kyle thought.
Stretching, he stood and scratched his belly. Taking a deep breath, he felt more awake than he had in days, but still with some residual sleep filling his head. It was taking a while for him to clear his mind and become fully conscious, but at least he wasn't plagued with horrible images. He hoped that the feeling would last the rest of the day, or at least the morning.
Moving to the bathroom, he splashed some cold water on his face to shock himself into consciousness. It seemed to work as his brain slowly came around. He took a long look up at himself in the mirror and was surprised to see he looked happy and far more awake than he actually felt.
This is going to be a good day, he thought as he prepared to start it off-totally unaware of the fact that Isabel was still in his mind.
10
Lying in what must have been the most comfortable bed on this or any other planet, Max was reluctantly waking to the new day. He had heard a buzzing in his ears slowly breaking through his sleep enough for him to think an alarm clock was going off. Realizing that he had set no alarm, Max assumed there was a fly circling his head. He swatted away whatever it was that stole him from his peaceful dreams.
Unfortunately, once the buzzing stopped, he knew that he was too awake to recapture his lost sleep and would have to get out of bed soon. He took a few minutes for the rest of his body to catch up with his now partially aware mind, wondering what new challenges Jason would present today and how he would handle them. Liz had a great idea, he thought. Who could ask for better on-the-job training for fatherhood?
Just as he was finally ready to pull himself out of bed, Max heard someone knocking.
«Max, are you up?» Liz asked through the door of the
guest room in which Max had spent the night. They had agreed that it would be best if they were sleeping in different rooms in case Jason got up before them. Things were stressful enough already that they didn't need to add anything else into the mix. Not that they would have been doing anything other than sleeping in a shared room, but Jason's young mind probably wouldn't have assumed that their intentions were entirely pure. And the jury was still out on what Liz's young friend would be keeping secret when his parents returned-if anything at all.
«Come in,' he said, yawning.
Liz opened the door. «You're still in bed?»
«It is Saturday,' he reminded her, as if weekdays and weekends really mattered in the summertime. Pulling back the covers, he revealed he was dressed only in a T-shirt and boxers. «How long have you been awake?»
Liz politely turned so he could have some privacy as he slipped into a pair of pants. «Long enough to have eaten my breakfast and gotten a shower.»
Max immediately felt guilty for sleeping in. «You should have woken me up.»
«I just did,' she said with a sly smile. Turning, she went back into the hall. «Don't worry, you can have breakfast with Jason.»
«Thanks,' he called after her, dreading the idea of another meal spent in silence. Day two begins.
Walking only a few steps down the hall, Liz brought herself to Jason's door. Pausing to take a deep breath, she braced herself for whatever response she was about to receive. «Jason, time to get up,' she said, knocking. «Jason?»
Max joined her, brushing his hand through his hair to rid himself of bed head. «Let's not start this again,' he said under his breath. Turning the knob, he found that the door was unlocked. «Jason, we're coming in.»
And they did.
Jason, however, was not in the room.
Max thought the unmade bed looked out of place in the still spotless room. In fact, it was the only thing that indicated a twelve-year-old lived there.
«He must have gone downstairs already,' Liz said hopefully.
Max feared otherwise as he remembered the boy's miserable attitude from the night before, but he chose not to say anything for the moment. With a growing sense of dread, he started down the stairs behind Liz, silently willing her to move faster.
They didn't find Jason in the kitchen, either, and there was nothing around to indicate that he had made himself breakfast. The only dishes out were the ones that Liz had already cleaned and left in the drain board to dry. With growing concern, they searched the rest of the first floor from room to room and found nothing.
«Should we try back upstairs?» Liz was trying to remain calm.
«He's not there,' Max said, pulling on the shoes he had left in the foyer the night before. «He's not in the house.»
«It's a big ranch.» Liz grabbed her own shoes. «He's probably out somewhere on the grounds.»
«I hope,' Max added.
«We're probably just overreacting.» Liz tried to put reason behind her positive spin. «He's not a baby. He can get
