The Last Child

Joh

Joh

He was through the front door and about to lock it when the van turned into his driveway. Paint peeled from the hood in uneven patches; the right front fender was banged up and rusted. It slewed into the driveway with a shudder, and Joh

“Get in,” the man said.

Joh

“Uncle Steve.”

“You’re not my uncle.”

The door squealed open, and the man stepped out. He wore a blue jumpsuit with a gold patch on the right shoulder. The belt was heavy and black. “I’m your father’s first cousin, and that’s close enough. Besides, you’ve called me Uncle Steve since you were three.”

“Uncle means family, and that means we help each other. We haven’t seen you in six weeks, and it was a month before that. Where have you been?”

Steve hooked his thumbs in the belt, making the stiff vinyl creak. “Your mom is hanging with the rich folks now, Joh

“Getting in his way?” The disbelief came off Joh

“That’s not-”

“You’re scared of him,” Joh

“He signs my paycheck, me and about four hundred other guys. Now if he was hurting your mom, or something like that. That’d be one thing. But he’s helping her. Right? So why would I get in his way. Your dad would understand that.”

Joh

“Yes, I am. So get in.”

Joh

“Your mom called and asked if I could take you to school. She said you missed the bus.”

“I’m not going to school.”

“Yes, you are.”

“No, I’m not.”

“Jesus, Joh

“Why don’t you just tell her that you took me and leave it there?”

“I told her I’d take you, so I have to take you. I’m not going anywhere until you get in the van. I’ll make you if I have to.”

Joh

“Screw this,” Steve said. “Wait right there.” He pushed past Joh

“What are you doing?”

“Talking to your mother.”

“She’s asleep,” Joh

“I’ll wake her then. Don’t you go anywhere. I mean it.” Then he was through, into the small house that smelled of spilled booze and generic cleaner. Joh

It was quiet in the house, the light still dim. Joh

Uncle Steve twitched in guilt. His hands came up, fingers spread. “It’s not what you think.”

But Joh

Uncle Steve’s eyes showed rare desperation. “I just opened the door. I didn’t mean anything by it. Swear to God, Joh

A sheen of greasy sweat slicked Uncle Steve’s face. He was so scared, it was pitiful. Joh

“And you won’t say anything?”

“Not if you do what I tell you.”

“Swear?”

“Just go, Uncle Steve. Go to work.”

Uncle Steve slipped past, hands still up. “I didn’t mean nothing by it.”

But Joh

He picked a street at random.

CHAPTER THREE

Detective Hunt sat at the cluttered desk in his small office. Files spilled from cabinet tops and unused chairs. Dirty coffee cups, memos he’d never read. It was 9:45. The place was a mess, but he lacked the energy to deal with it. He scrubbed his hands across his face, ground at the sockets of his eyes until he saw white streaks and sparks. His face felt rough, unshaven, and he knew that he looked every bit of his forty-one years. He’d lost so much weight that his suits hung on his frame. He’d not been to the gym or the shooting range in six months. He rarely managed more than one meal a day, but none of that seemed to matter.

In front of him, he’d spread his office copy of the Alyssa Merrimon file. A well-thumbed duplicate was locked in a desk drawer at home. He flipped pages methodically, reading every word: reports, interviews, summaries. Alyssa’s face stared out at him from an enlarged copy of her school photograph. Black hair, like her brother’s. Same bone structure, same dark eyes. A secret kind of smile. A lightness, like her mother had, an ethereal quality that Hunt had tried and failed to identify. The way her eyes tilted, maybe? The swept-back ears and china skin? The i

And then there was her mother, her brother. They all had it, to one degree or another; but none of them like the girl.