Once they were outside, Hunter asked, “So, maybe you trust me now?”

  “I wouldn’t go that far. But I have so many questions.”

  “I’ll tell you everything. I promise,” Hunter said.

  III

  “Did you love him?” Sam asked.

  They’d walked a long way south and were now at what the locals called the “gay beach” at Hollywood and Ardmore. The city called it Kathy Osterman beach, but no one ever referred to it as that.

  “Why don’t we sit? It looks like little Vito is getting pooped out,” Hunter said. In the past few minutes, the dog had slowed his pace and exhibited a lot less interest in sniffing bushes and things like fire hydrants.

  “Good idea.” Sam sat on a bench overlooking the beach. The waves rolled in, their white caps made silver by the moonlight. “So, did you? Love him?”

  “Is that important to you?” Hunter replied, watching as Vito curled at his feet. The dog continued to prove his trust in Hunter as they walked. Hunter had had the experience before; animals sensed he loved them and would never do them harm. “Is there a reason you want to know?”

  “I loved him,“ Sam told Hunter. “I think back to when we were kids, it was a kind of puppy love. But his disappearance solidified it. If he hadn’t been taken, it might have faded away. Who knows? I certainly can’t say that I even knew Jeb all that well. He was my first crush, my first fantasy lover, the kid I fooled around with a little bit before I even really understood what sex was. So yeah, I’m curious to know if you loved him. And did he love you?”

  Hunter stayed quiet for the longest time. The waves rolled in and the sound of them, rhythmic, almost soothing, usurped even the sound of traffic flowing by behind them, where Hollywood curved into Lake Shore Drive. The questions were loaded. They had so much back story behind them that they would be here until dawn’s grayish light filtered over the water. He’d still be talking as folks bicycled along the trail, on their way to downtown jobs. Hell, he might still be talking into the darkness of the next day. But for now, his best answer was, “Yes. I loved Jeb. Very much. He was a lifeline. I told you how I died inside when I was taken? When Jeb joined me on our nightmare adventure, I had what I thought was a friend. What was inside awakened a little bit. And because we were forced into what I can only describe as sexual slavery, we bonded very quickly, both as friends and, not long after, as lovers.”

  “How about Jeb? Did he fight to get away?“ Sam reached down to scratch Vito behind the ears. “I know you said you didn’t. But what I don’t get is that you two were with this Walker sicko for not weeks, not months, not even years, but decades. Why did you stay? Surely there must have been opportunities to leave.”

  There were, Hunter thought, there surely were. But there was the crux of the whole problem and he didn’t know how to explain it. He didn’t know if he wanted to clarify things for Sam because to do so would reveal something he hadn’t even yet hinted at—that Jeb Kleber was a monster.

  Hunter knew Sam clung to memory, to nostalgia, to things like crushes and boyhood dreams of forever love.

  To destroy that? Why? How? Could Hunter do it?

  He and Jeb had reacted differently to their trauma, although the source of that agony stemmed from the same horrible experience. While Hunter became a kind of shell-shocked victim, suffering from what would nowadays be referred to as Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, Jeb followed a different path.

  Hunter had been there to witness it.

  The fact was it hadn’t taken Jeb long at all to align with Walker. Jeb was just a kid, so it was difficult for Hunter to level blame at him, but the truth was, Jeb seemed to take to the life. He learned quickly to enjoy seeking out men. Hunter didn’t want to believe it, but he’d seen the transformation with his own eyes. And it happened over the course of weeks, not years. It was Jeb who even introduced blackmail into their games, and that particular crime helped the three to survive, helped fuel—literally—their travels across the country.

  In the end, Hunter decided he couldn’t speak his truth, not yet. He’d unloaded so much on poor Sam that he didn’t know what would happen if he told him Jeb had become, either through trauma or an inherent predisposition toward evil, a predator who was, in the end, no different from his captor.

  And Hunter had remained by both of their sides. Walker, because he was terrified of the man. And Jeb, because, even though he became something Hunter would never be able to understand, Hunter loved him.

  It was a sick, twisted love with no logical basis.

  Hunter felt, suddenly, flooded with weariness. His eyes burned. His limbs felt like he’d run a marathon.

  He’d said too much.

  He hadn’t said enough.

  He dodged. “Can we talk more later? It must be well past midnight. You have work in the morning and I have, er, things.” Hunter desperately wanted to see Sam again and would do whatever it took to be near him once more.

  “But—“

  Hunter cut him off by holding up a hand, stop. “Soon. I’ll tell you everything. Okay? Because you do need to know, Sam. You really need to know. I don’t think you can ever understand, but at least you will have the whole story.” Hunter turned and began walking away from Sam and his dog, heading west, toward the L train that would take him back to the southside and what passed for home. “Your life may depend on it.”

  Chapter 14

  Now—Sam

  I

  I woke the next morning surprised that I’d so much as closed my eyes at all the night before. But I had. I had not only slept, but overslept. Brilliant sunlight flooded the bedroom, telling a tale of late morning as opposed to early. I rolled onto my side and plucked my phone off the nightstand. It was just after nine. Damn. I’m gonna be so late for work. Again.

  Even though I’d missed far too much work lately with all this unexpected and unwelcome trauma, I decided I needed to call in sick just one more time. I wasn’t certain I’d used up all the personal days I’d been allotted. I shrugged. The worst that would happen is I would lose my job or not be paid for the day. I’d survive.

  I simply couldn’t abide the thought of pretending—riding the train downtown, greeting coworkers and boss, going through the motions of a humdrum job that meant less and less as time and experience wore on. That world was for others, at least at the moment. Still, I hoped I wouldn’t lose my job over this, but the idea of trying to act normal for eight hours or more was more than I could bear. All the pretense had been drained out of me.

  I selected Becky Osbourne from among the contacts on my phone, pressed it, and waited to be connected. My prayer that I’d get voice mail was answered. I quickly explained that this time, it was not me but Vito who was ill. I said I’d managed to get an appointment for him at the vet’s in the early afternoon. “I’m sure I’ll be back tomorrow,” I said, even though I wasn’t sure at all.

  Just as I was about to put the phone back down so I could get dressed and take care of the feeding and walking of Vito, the phone rang.

  “Oh god no,” I whimpered, thinking Becky was calling back, suspicious. She would say something like how much she regretted doing it, but she’d have to write me up. One more time and I’d give her no choice but to dismiss me. Or maybe it was wishful thinking believing she’d give me one more chance.

  But it wasn’t Becky.

  My mother’s name and face had appeared on my screen. Odd. She never calls at this time of day on a weekday. I answered, “Mom?”

  “Sammy? Glad I caught you, hon. You’re not at work, are you?”

  “No. I called in sick today.”

  “I don’t blame you, sweetheart. You must be out of your mind.” She made a tsk sound. “So horrible.”

  I cocked my head. A chill coursed through me, making me shiver for a second. “Why?” I stood and slid in to pair of athletic shorts, a tank top, and flip-flops. Holding the phone away from my mouth, I patted my leg and whispered to Vito, “C’mon, boy.” The dog hopped down from the bed.

  “Oh, you haven’t heard the news?”

  “What news?” Dread arose, mainly in my gut. A wave of nausea weakened me. What now? Don’t I have enough to worry about?

  “Go check out the news. It’s on TV, in the papers, online—even back here.”

  “Mom, just tell me.” It seemed like my whole life had become a series of connections where I begged to be led out of the darkness.

  “Okay,” she said, voice strained and barely above a whisper. “I don’t know anything for sure and neither does anybody else apparently, but a man’s body was found in the wee hours of the morning at a place—let me look—in Chicago called Kathy Osterman Beach. Are you familiar with it? It looks like it’s not too far from you.”

  I plopped back down on the bed and closed my eyes to shut out the irrationally bright sunlight. For several seconds, I couldn’t speak. Words evaded me. The room swayed, making me wonder if an earthquake was happening.

  Trudy cut in. “Look, Chicago’s a big town. Lots of crime. It probably isn’t Marc, but the description seemed to fit—the age, the general stats. I just thought you should know, so you could get in touch with the cops.” She breathed hard, almost gasping, then added, “You know, just so they can rule Marc out.”

  The saliva in my mouth dried up. I struggled to get words out. “He wrote to me a while back, Mom. He’s taking a break from us. It’s sad, but it is what it is. I’m sure it isn’t him.”

  “I know you’re right, hon. But just check, okay? And then let me know.”

  “Did they say how this man was killed?” Say he drowned, Mom. I can at least think it was an accident.

  “He was stabbed, left near the entrance to the men’s room.” Her voice broke a little, and I wondered why she was so certain this was Marc.

  “Why do you think it’s Marc?” I snapped. She was right about what she’d said about crime and the size of our metropolis. She paused and I used the time to put her on speaker and search for body found Kathy Osterman Beach. Two articles came up immediately from the Tribune and The Sun Times. Both described a body discovered by a runner near the beach in the early hours of the morning. The victim was a white male, approximately forty-five to fifty-five years old, five feet, ten inches tall and weighing one-hundred-and-eighty-five pounds.

  It all fit.

  I told myself that the description fit thousands of men, but my intuition begged to differ and caused the rat gnawing at my gut to bite harder.

  “Oh, you’ll think I’m crazy.” Mom brought me back to the present.

  “Mom, that ship has sailed.”

  She laughed, but it was uneasy, mirthless. “I had a dream last night. Woke up screaming.”

  I didn’t want to hear about the dream. I didn’t want to hear any more of this at all. I longed to start the day over, go to work as I was supposed to. Maybe that way, this phone call—and all it involved—wouldn’t happen, wouldn’t be true.

  She told me about the dream, anyway. “Honey, I dreamed Marc was dead. I didn’t see the killing in the dream, but he was lying on the grass, eyes wide open and not moving. It’s so weird. I was eating a red Popsicle as I stared at him.”

  A chill passed through me. Vito whined. “I got to go, Mom. I’ll look into this more and see if there’s anything we need to worry about.”

  I hung up. Vito pawed at my leg. I couldn’t keep him in misery any longer. I gathered up my phone, put his camo harness on, and leashed him. We headed out.

  Fall was coming. Although the day was sunny, there was an undercurrent of chill to it that made me shiver, thinking of what was around the corner. Would I be alone this winter? Could Marc have been the murdered man?

  Even though I could tell myself—and I did—that it was unlikely that he was a crime victim, another part of me, the part some people called the gut or heart, or even intuition, told me it was him. My mother’s dream was the truth. As we headed toward Clark Street, I remembered unwillingly the times Mom had had a glimpse into the future—when my fifth-grade teacher, Mrs. Mateer, was on maternity leave, Mom had dreamed her baby was stillborn. And it was. She’d also known our dog, Missy, would be hit by a car the day before it happened. Fortunately, Misty was with us a few more years, but with a limp and a terror of automobiles that never abated.

  Dreams weren’t reality, I told myself. Mom’s past dreams were coincidences and nothing more. Yes, she was right about an unidentified man being found in the grass near our gay beach, but that doesn’t mean it was Marc.

  Vito and I walked for a long while, my stomach churning with dread. Finally, we reached another beach, the one at the end of Touhy Avenue, and I sat on a bench. Vito curled up at my feet, head up, sniffing. Since it was a weekday and cool, the beach was mostly empty. There was a woman with long dark hair flying a red and white striped kite, running across the sand. She looked as though she didn’t have a care in the world.

  I longed to be that woman.

  I raised my phone and called the non-emergency number for the Chicago Police Department. I didn’t want to—I dreaded what might be conveyed. But I told myself that it was even more likely I’d get news that would allow me to exit this state of suspense that threatened my sanity.

  After going through multiple voice-mail-type prompts, being transferred twice, I finally got to talk to a live person.

  “This is Detective Andrea Cawood. I understand you might have some information for me?” Her voice was gravelly, reminding me of Kathleen Turner.

  “Uh, yes. I think so, but I’m not sure.” I sounded like an idiot. And in a way, I hoped that impression might continue because it would mean I was totally off the mark about this murdered man.

  “How about you give me your name before we go on?”

  “Is that necessary?”

  “Uh, not absolutely. Is there a reason you want to remain anonymous?” She paused and I could hear clicks as her fingers ran over a keyboard. “You do realize your number came up on Caller ID?”

  I sighed. “Samuel Blake.”

  “And you’re calling in reference to?”

  “Marc Cornish. He’s—”

  The detective cut me off. “Did you say Cornish?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Would this be the Marc Cornish whose last known address was on North Wolcott in Chicago?”

  I nodded and then hurried to add, “Yes.”

  There was a long pause. I heard a cough in the background, garbled broadcast voices, and then, “Mr. Blake, are you available right now?”

  I told her I’d be home in fifteen or twenty minutes.

  I was about to ask if she needed my address, but she didn’t need it because her next question—and it was no question, not really—was, “Could you come into the station on N. Clark, just north of Devon? Do you know where that is?”

  “I do. I’ll be there as soon as I can.”

  “Thanks. Just tell the officer at the front desk you’re here to see me. I’ll be expecting you within the half hour, okay?”

  “Sure, no problem.”

  “And if you’re not here within that time frame, I’ll come find you.”

  I was surprised she’d say this, yet I imagined her smiling as she did.

  II

  By the time I got to the precinct, I was sick to my stomach. The nausea was so bad, it reminded me of last winter, when I’d gotten a horrible flu that had Marc contemplating calling an ambulance. From the chill and my own slick bodily dampness, I knew I probably looked as ill as I felt—whitish skin, slick, hair plastered to my head.

  I also worried that all of this would make me look guilty.

  I couldn’t help it, though. I was now certain the murdered man was my husband. Despite the hurt I’d endured from his letter and his admission he no longer loved me, it didn’t change my feelings toward him. I loved him deeply and always would—no matter what. He was my family as much as Trudy was. I’d never been open to allowing many people into that exalted circle known as family, whether that be defined by choice or by blood.

  I expected to spend the rest of my life with him—sharing the good times and bad, growing old together. I thought of how we’d always planned to leave the cold and snow of Chicago winters behind when we retired. We’d move together to the sun and heat of the desert—Palm Springs.

  When informed that I was here to see Detective Cawood, the uniformed officer on the front desk, a young guy with a blond buzzcut and piercing brown eyes, looked me up and down. He lifted the phone, spoke into it too softly for me to hear, and hung up.

  He didn’t smile. “She’ll be right out. You can wait over there.” He gestured toward the plastic seating near the front doors.

  I barely had time to sit before Detective Andrea Cawood came through a pair of double doors behind the front desk. She was unusually tall, at least six feet, and her figure was one my mom once referred to as “womanly”. Her hair was a bleached-blond halo with dark roots, cut short and framing her face. She wore a pair of navy polyester slacks, blue button-down, and a sport coat with a subtle gray and blue pattern. When it opened as she moved, I spotted a gun in a holster at her side, which made me even more nervous.

  She isn’t going to shoot you.

  “Mr. Blake?” She called from across the room. I stood, feeling eyes on me, and followed her back. We went down a hallway and she led me to what she referred to as an interview room.

  Inside, the room was pretty much like the ones I’d seen on TV in countless crime dramas. Linoleum floor, pale gray walls, a chrome-edged, Formica-topped table and two black metal folding chairs. The big picture window/mirror upped my anxiety level. Was there someone behind the glass, watching?

  “I’m going to record this, okay?” She asked after we’d sat down. There was no fancy recorder, just her phone. I knew I wasn’t really being asked for permission, so I nodded.

  “Could you answer verbally, please?”