The Dark (A Detective Alice Madison Novel)(66)

“Just grab the kid,” Gilman said.

“What we’re going to do with him?” Ronald asked.

“He’s coming with us.”

“What are we going to do?”

“Shut up and start the van.”

“This is not—”

“Shut the fuck up, and start the van.”

Gilman went back to the little one. “You remember what we talked about?”

“How’s David? What happened?”

“You and your friend don’t say anything to anyone. Not to the cops, not to no one.”

“What did you do to David?”

“Not to the cops, not to no one.”

“What did you do to him?” The thin voice cracked.

“Maybe I should make sure you do remember.”

The last thing Ronald saw as he was climbing back into the van was the light catching Gilman’s blade.





Chapter 30





Madison walked out the glass doors of the hospital and let out a big breath. So far every conversation she’d ever had with Nathan Quinn had been less than straightforward, and today’s had been no different. Somehow, in their brief acquaintance, they had relentlessly managed to be both truthful and oblique, their words slanted by circumstance, respect, and slights given and borne with the same unease. And sheltering in those words was a burden of secrets; Madison had first glimpsed it as Quinn had given up his position as the Sinclairs’ “in-case-of-emergency” contact and/or executor to be Cameron’s attorney, his faith in his friend wrestling against evidence and common sense.

After the dry heat of the hospital, Madison shivered in the chill: Quinn had created another trail and trusted her to follow it to the end, wherever it might lead. Beyond the layers of cloud cover, the sun would soon set, and Vincent Foley—who would be watching and waiting—was, for all concerned, the end of the trail.


“We need to protect him,” Madison said into her cell phone to Lieutenant Fynn. Her engine was running, and the windows had already fogged up.

“I’ll take that into consideration,” he replied.

“Sir, how long do we have before someone puts two and two together and works out what cases we were working on when we went to the Walters Institute?”

“I’m not disagreeing with you. I’m saying we don’t have enough warm bodies to scatter around the grounds. You’ve seen the place. It’s massive.”

“I know.”

“What they already have is a half-decent security system, and hopefully that will be enough.”

“Sure. Then again, their main concern is to keep their patients in, not to keep professional killers out.”

“We’re going to have to take this one day at a time, Madison. Any news from Quinn?”

“Nothing concrete about Gilman. No surprise there.”

“Have you told the doc his Rain Man patient could be a murderer?”

“Not yet. And Foley is not autistic. He’s borderline low IQ with PTSD and God knows what else thrown in.”

“You’re going to talk to him? I mean, will you try to get something out of him, anyway?”

Madison rested her head back and closed her eyes. “I’ll try.”

A rustle of papers over the line. “Something else,” Fynn said. “Do you remember that Warren Lee had a sister?”

Madison dipped into her mental archive. “Tennessee. They haven’t spoken in years?”

“Right. Thirteen years to be precise. Spencer called her back, because, as luck would have it, they were still talking twenty-five years ago.”

“In 1985?”

“Exactly.”

Madison sat up. “What did she say?”

“As far as Spencer could tell, there was no love lost between them even then. She thought he was trouble and didn’t want him anywhere near her husband and kids. However, she remembers that Lee had a girlfriend in the 1980s. Spencer is tracking her down.”

“That’s good news.”

“I sure hope so.”


While Spencer and Dunne were left working on Lee’s and Gray’s work records to find points of contact, Madison scribbled the girlfriend’s current address and phone number in her notepad. Paula Wilson lived in Bellevue, across Lake Washington, and her social security number had told them that she was a nurse in a medical practice.

When Madison called, she didn’t sound particularly happy to dredge up the past, and yet she hadn’t been surprised by the call: she had seen the news, had recognized the murder victim’s name.

“My husband will be back from work soon. Can you try to make it here before he does?”

Madison didn’t question that; she drove fast on I-90 and took the north exit to Bellevue Way SE.