Death's Excellent Vacation

Safe and Sound JEFF ABBOTT

Jeff Abbott was once involved in a taxicab race with Charlaine Harris in North Carolina (he did not win). He is the internationally bestselling author of twelve suspense novels, including Trust Me, Panic, Fear, and Collision. He is published in more than twenty languages. He is a three-time Edgar® Award nominee, a two-time Anthony Award nominee, a Thriller Award and Barry Award nominee, and a past winner of the Agatha and Macavity awards. He lives in Austin with his family. You can read more about Jeff and his work at www.jeffabbott.com.

IF Jason Kirk was still alive on the tiny island of Sint Pieter, that happy news would boost Nora Dare’s ratings to a level that made media presidents tremble, rewrote the rules of news coverage, and produced new business case studies at journalism school.

Nora Dare sat at her Constant News Channel (CNC) desk, lacquered talons skimming the notes on the most recent police report. Her camera-men readied themselves in the gleaming studio, the sound checks ringing in her ears. She put her carefully mascaraed gaze on the computer screen buried in her desk, scanning for any breaking updates. The interview had to be played carefully—to make the story last longer, without seeming exploitative of a missing young man’s tragedy. But, Nora knew, no one walked that line better than she did.

Of course during those treasured moments when she interviewed Jason’s family—which was roughly every other night on her cable-news show, Dare to Fight Back—she pleaded for Jason’s safe return, and she meant every word. Because if the young man turned up safe and sound, well, then, that was ratings gold. Not gold: better, platinum. Maybe even uranium. For three months, college student Jason Kirk’s disappearance while on vacation with his family had made for a deliciously high market share.

Stories as long-legged as Jason Kirk’s did not happen every day. It had all the elements Nora considered key to a ratings grabber: a highly attractive, sympathetic victim with an easy-to-remember name; a photogenic mourning family stunned by tragedy’s random sideswipe; an exotic locale; incompetent local police; a mysterious, exotic woman who had last been seen with the missing young man.

The theories had come up, and Nora had dissected them with the care of a coroner. Jason had been kidnapped (an early favorite and still the feeling of the Kirk family); Jason had been sold into slavery (popular for two weeks); Jason had been murdered by the mysterious woman, robbed, his body dumped into the ocean (more likely); Jason had drowned, drunk, in a swim off a Sint Pieter beach and the woman had simply fled the scene (the preferred theory of the local police); or Jason had committed suicide (Nora quickly slaughtered that theory; it would savage her ratings).

But now, everything had changed, and the story had fresh life. A witness from a small town on the far north tip of the island claimed that a young man fitting Jason’s description had been spotted near her house. The eyewitness was a young woman who could have been a little more photogenic (didn’t they, Nora wondered, have dentists in Sint Pieter?) but was earnest and heartfelt in her sureness that she’d seen Jason.

The makeup director tended to Nora’s eyebrows with the gentlest of touches while Nora’s director, Molly, slipped an update onto Nora’s interview pages.

“Um, Nora, I’m not really comfortable with your headline theme tonight.”

“ ‘Hope or Hoax’ is perfectly accurate.” Nora didn’t flinch as a stray hair was plucked away from her near-immaculate brow. It was a point of honor for Nora that she never flinched. She made other people flinch. It had been a rocky road on the climb to ratings glory and the multimilliondollar book deals. There’d been that suspect in one case who’d killed himself after Nora grilled him (could his guilt then be clearer? Nora had saved the taxpayers the cost of a trial, in her mind), and the other one where the man she’d proclaimed guilty for five months for killing his wife had, well, been found innocent via DNA evidence. Nora still had her doubts, as did any right-minded viewer. “ ‘Hope or Hoax’ is what tonight is about,” she said with an air of irritation.

Molly raised an eyebrow. “I see your point, but I think it’s a bit cruel to the Kirks to call this hope.”

“If it’s hope,” Nora explained with a smile of infinite patience, “then the viewers have a reason to tune in tomorrow. If it’s hoax, then they get to see me rip this little lying bitch to shreds.”

“It just seems a bit . . .”

“What?”

Nora thought for a minute Molly’s mouth was forming the fatal word tasteless, but Molly crossed her arms. “Opportunistic. We’re walking a very fine line here, Nora.”

“The only opportunistic person here might be this witness, this”—she glanced at her notes—“hotel worker, Annie Van Dorn. She could just be an attention seeker, a publicity hound. You know how I despise those loathsome people.”

“I know, feeding on tragedy. The vultures.”

Nora thought she detected sarcasm lurking in the vicinity of Molly’s tone but decided Molly wasn’t that stupid. “The intro stands.”

“All right, Nora.” Molly turned and walked back to the director’s seat in the control room.

Nora watched her go. She’d have to keep an eye on Molly. That girl was an unappealing mix of judgmental and ambitious. Most unbecoming. Opportunistic? No one was a greater friend or advocate to the Kirk family than Nora was. And poor lost Jason. She was truly his only friend, the person doing the most to keep his face in front of millions each day. She waved away the makeup artist.

They went live thirty minutes later, and Nora, after her standard setup on the missing Jason’s history, cut straight to the satellite interview with the young woman who’d supposedly (Nora wove this knotty word into every sentence; it was her second favorite, after allegedly) seen Jason on the far side of the island.

Annie Van Dorn’s skin was a caramel color; her voice lightly accented, her English excellent. Slightly crooked teeth, but otherwise a nice face. She’d put on what Nora surmised was her Sunday best for the interview: a neat white blouse, three years out of fashion. Annie stood in front of a gnarled, wind-bent divi-divi tree in her yard that, to Nora, evoked an air of mystery and danger and Caribbean intrigue. The tree looked like a hand, reaching to clutch the young woman.

“Annie, tell our viewers about yourself,” Nora said. Her voice was bright, open, and friendly.

“I work at a hotel on Sint Pieter, in housekeeping.” Annie had a quiet, mild voice. A servant’s voice, Nora thought.

“But not the hotel from which Jason vanished?”

“No, ma’am, another one.” Annie wisely did not try to work the hotel’s name into her answer. Nora frowned on free advertising.

“And what exactly do you claim you saw last night?”

“Well.” Annie swallowed. “It was close to midnight, and I was at home in Marysville, on the other side of the island from where young Mr. Kirk vanished. I was getting ready for bed—and I thought I heard a noise in the yard. I live with my sister, but she was asleep already. I went to the window, and I saw, in the moonlight, a young man standing in the yard. Close to this tree.”

“Describe him to me.” And at these words, a picture of Jason appeared on the split screen: blondish, handsome enough to be a model, six three, with a wide grin and broad shoulders, dressed in a T-shirt and baggy shorts. Smiling the smile of a man who has his entire and likely quite-happy life before him, and is savoring a particular moment of fun.

“I couldn’t see him well in the shadows. I thought maybe it was an old boyfriend of mine, at first. He was sticking close to the trees, not drawing closer, not really stepping out into the moonlight.” The camera panned across Annie’s yard: The viewers could see a dense growth of the divi-divi trees, dark and close; a neighbor’s fenced yard; a clothesline with athletic jerseys, jeans, and a checkered tablecloth snapping in the twilight air. Rustic, Nora thought, yet ever so mildly forbidding.

“Do your old boyfriends often stop by late at night?”

“Only one. Who might need money now and then and doesn’t understand I won’t loan him any,” Annie said with a little more spine in her tone, and Nora nodded. Her viewers would like Annie for her moral stance.

Annie continued: “So I went outside and called out ‘Who’s there?’ then the moonlight broke from the clouds, and I saw it wasn’t my old boyfriend. This man was tall, he was white, with blond hair, wearing a dark shirt, baseball cap, and muddy jeans. I thought he was a prowler then, and I stepped back toward my house.”

“Were you afraid?” Nora pounced.

“Not exactly. When I could see him, I just felt this . . . sadness. I can’t describe it; it was strange. He looked lost, like he needed help. Like he was confused. I wanted to comfort him. It’s like I could sense his need—like when you see a lost child.”

Nora’s voice sharpened into a needle. “And then what happened?”

“Well, my neighbor’s dog got roused; it started barking really loud, and the neighbor’s porch lights switched on, and the man just sort of vanished into the divi-divi trees.”

“He ran off?”

“I guess. I didn’t hear him. He stepped back into the shadows and then he was gone. I ran to where he had stood and there was no sign of him.” Annie swallowed.

“And you’re sure this was Jason Kirk?”

“At first, ma’am, I wasn’t. Then when I saw his face in the moonlight, clear as day—I knew it was him. He’s been all over the TV here, and the newspapers. I am sure it was him.”

Nora took a moment to let that grab her viewers by the collective throat. “And how did he—this man you thought was Jason—look to you?” Nora said, leaning forward.

“Heartbroken. Pale, like he was ill. Lost, I thought. Strange that he seemed lost when a whole island is looking for him.”

“Did you see anyone else with him?”

“No, ma’am, but it was very dark, cloudy; the moonlight kept coming and going.”

Nora let the words sink in. “Annie”—and here she knew it was important at this single moment to be kind and understanding—“are you sure about what you saw? Because you can understand”—dramatic pause, Nora gave her most sympathetic head tilt (patent pending)—“how very cruel it would be to give Jason’s family false hope.”

“Yes, ma’am, I do understand. It was him. I’m as sure of it as I can be.”

“Have you talked to any tabloids or other papers about what you saw?”

“No. I wouldn’t. I’m not selling a story, Ms. Dare. I only wanted to help . . .” Annie bit her lip. “I called the police, and I called your people, because you’ve been the one talking about him every night on the TV.”

Nora allowed herself a satisfied smile. Her efforts, as always, were for the public good. “But you see how hard it is to believe that if Jason was in trouble, and you were willing to help, that he ran away simply because the neighbor’s dog started barking.”

“I can’t explain it.”

“And how did the Sint Pieter police respond?”

“They did come out to the house. But I don’t think they believed me, at least not at first.”

“Thank you, Annie.” Nora switched to act two now: Inspector Abraham Peert. He was the third head of the Kirk investigation in three months; Nora’s reports had made it clear that his predecessors either were incompetent or actively wished the Kirk family—and by implication all tourists—ill. Peert had a lean, angular face that looked like he was always biting hard into a lemon. This would be only his second appearance on the show. He’d been her guest right after his assignment to the case but had refused Nora’s demands (requests was entirely too soft a word) for further interviews.

Nora gave Peert a quick introduction and said, “Is it possible that this young woman’s story is true?”

“I suppose that it is, but we can find no supporting evidence.” He kept his tone carefully neutral.

Oh, Nora thought, I shall enjoy this. He’s done nothing to follow this lead. Get me my cross and nails, boys, it’s hammering time.

“Is it possible that Jason Kirk is alive? Perhaps ill, perhaps wandering in the wilderness on the north side of Sint Pieter?” Nora said.

“Again, we can only postulate,” Inspector Peert said. “Ill and wandering freely for three months seems most unlikely. Surely there would have been other reports of him; our search crews would have found him if he were rambling insensate. If he is alive and roaming the hills, then that suggests that he does not want to be found.”

Nora had to decide whether to play that comment as a hurtful blow to the Kirk family or as an exciting, intriguing new twist in the story’s worn fabric. She tilted her head again—she was known for the beauty and forcefulness of the head tilt—and decided the audience was hungry for a bit of the inspector’s flesh. “Why would Jason Kirk be in hiding? Nothing in this boy’s past suggests a desire to be away from his family. They are an absolutely wonderful, upstanding family, Inspector.” She said this with a convincing thunder, as if Peert held the opposite view.

“No one knows what goes on in the human heart,” Peert said quietly. “But I will say that I believe Annie Van Dorn believes she is telling the truth. We administered a lie detector test; she passed it.”

That was a news bomb. Nora was speechless for a minute; Molly should have known that tidbit and warned her about it.

Peert pressed on: “If she saw him, then Jason Kirk is not in trouble; he is hiding from us.”

It was not fair. It was not what Nora was expecting. It was not a dodge. And if Jason Kirk was simply hiding out on the island—well, then, he was simply a spoiled brat who’d driven his parents nearly mad with grief. And made Nora look like a fool in front of millions.

This could not be. All of this emotional calculus played out in Nora’s mind in less than five seconds. “If he is hiding, then why?”

“I do not know. We cannot know his reasons. If he has been kidnapped, there is no reason for his abductors to wait three months and not ask for a ransom.”

Nora went back on the attack. “How soon will you expand the search in that area?”

Now she heard the steel in Peert’s voice—even through the distance of the satellite hookup—and it infuriated her. “What choice do we have? You have turned American opinion against our entire nation. We have searched for this young man as if he were one of our own. We have followed every slim lead, and we have allowed your federal agents to comb our sovereign territory. We have endured your abuse and your innuendo as to our competence”—here Nora tightened her lips and straightened her papers, which was Nora’s signal to Molly to cut to commercial now—“and in short, we have done everything possible. You cannot hurt us more, Ms. Dare, but if we do not pursue a lead, we will have to live with ourselves. So every lead will be pursued.”

“I would hope so, and I think it’s a shame that you have not already expanded the search.”

Peert made his tone as sharp as hers. “We did search the area around Miss Van Dorn’s house; there was no sign of an intruder. None. No footprints, no broken grass, nothing.” Now his voice was rising. “So. She believes what she saw, but we can find no evidence.”

Nora thought Peert didn’t know his place; he was ruining the story’s next phase of life. “Or you simply can’t find what might be right in front of your eyes. What police academy did you attend again, sir?” One useful weapon in her arsenal was to make people justify themselves. It never failed.

“What journalism school did you attend, madame?”

Nora blinked, and for a moment the head tilt wavered. She’d never experienced anyone successfully biting back. Her lips narrowed into a slash. “I attended law school, which makes me uniquely qualified to report on cases regarding justice.” The cameras were still live; that idiot Molly hadn’t cut off Peert. “I will hold you to that promise to expand the search, Inspector. Let’s go to Jason’s parents . . .”

In her earpiece she heard Molly hiss: “They backed out. They’re too upset. They want you to quit hammering Peert.”

“I’m told we’ve got satellite difficulties in Los Angeles, where the Kirks live, so we’ll wrap it up for this evening.” And then she ended the Jason Kirk segments as she always did: “Jason, I will never stop searching for the truth, and I hope we can bring you home, safe and sound.” And she held her noble, dignified stance—she was justice without the blindfold—letting the viewers drink her in as they cut to her theme song and logo.

THE post-broadcast tantrum was a thing of beauty: Nora raged at the ingratitude of the Kirks, at the unwelcome (and unprofessional) steeliness of Peert, at the stupid hotel maid who probably hadn’t seen anything at all and now had thrown Nora’s show into a tailspin, at the fates. When she was done, Molly got her a glass of water and a sedative. Nora gulped both.

“Peert wasn’t supposed to be all uppity,” Nora said.

“He got tired of being your whipping boy,” Molly crossed her arms. “Did you think he’d dance to your tune forever? He’s fighting back. He’s tired of the abuse.”

“Abuse? I think you meant to say my investigation.”

“Nora, maybe it’s time to find a new case for you to . . . investigate. Maybe Jason didn’t vanish on vacation.” That phrase had been Nora’s lead for the first two months of Jason’s disappearance. “He could be in hiding. He could be shacked up with a woman. He could have been smoking weed in the mountains of Sint Pieter for the past three months, watching his face on the news. This one is getting ugly.”

“No. This one is getting good. Maybe this is all, like, you know, The Bourne Identity,” Nora said.

“What?” Molly said.

“Maybe he got hurt and he doesn’t know who he is,” Nora said. She sounded like a woman awakening from a dream. “Oh, yes. Wouldn’t that be great? That would be a story. Then I could bring him home. Get me a doctor who knows a lot about amnesia.”

“Amnesia. Please be kidding.”

“I don’t kid. Humor and justice are not friends, Molly.” She crossed her arms. She was going to get control of this story back; November sweeps were imminent. “We’re going to Sint Pieter. Make the arrangements.”

“Sint Pieter?” Molly stared at her.

Honestly, Nora thought, she did see two ears on the sides of Molly’s head. If only a brain nestled between them. “Yes, hon. Peert’s dragging his feet; we have a legitimate witness, it seems. And the day after tomorrow is the three-month anniversary of the night Jason vanished. I feel the story demands my presence. Go get the travel booked. Me, the film crew, makeup, and”—feeling magnanimous, and realizing someone would have to deal with the front desk and the security escorts and the autograph seekers—“you for director.”

“Should we let Jason’s family know you’re doing this broadcast?”

Nora’s eyes glittered. “I want them there. Get them in the same room they stayed in when Jason vanished. And me the penthouse.”

“Um, I know the Kirks are having money problems. They’ve been away from work, you know, spending so much time in Sint Pieter looking for their son . . . I don’t know if they can afford another trip back.”

“They told you this?” It had not occurred to Nora that anyone on her staff might have developed a friendship with the Kirks. Nora thought Molly simply told them when and where to be for their satellite interviews with Nora.

“Yes.”

“Hmmm. All right. Given that it’s the anniversary, we can pay for them to go. Book coach for all but you and me. We’ll have work to do on the way down. I want every bit of dirt we can find on the good Inspector Peert and on this Annie Van Dorn.”

“All right, Nora. But if you can spare me during the flight, I think I’ll sit in coach with the Kirks.”

“No. It’s not appropriate for you to get too close, too emotionally involved with the story.”

Molly stared at her. “I just feel so sorry for them.”

“And I don’t?”

Molly’s face paled. “Of course not. I never meant to suggest . . .”

Nora’s voice was a drip of acid. “On second thought, put the Kirks in first class with me. We can talk. You can ride in coach with the film crew.” Nora waved fingers at Molly. “Go. Book tickets; find an amnesia expert who wants a little attention. Maybe one with a book to promote?”

SINT Pieter was, to Nora’s mind, a strip of lousy dirt that South America had hawked up from its throat and spat out its mouth. A hundred miles off the continent’s northeast coast, Sint Pieter was narrow and twenty miles long. It had achieved independence from the Netherlands in 1970 and, in Nora’s view, had done little since then except misplace Jason Kirk. It was warm and wooded with stubby trees and studded with stunted little towns. The main town, called Willemstadt, boasted a half dozen luxury hotels, sparkling beaches, and fine restaurants. Tourism had made Sint Pieter rich until it lost Jason Kirk. Now that the island had been branded by Nora as dangerous, business was down fifty percent.

They were staying at the same Willemstadt hotel that Jason and his parents had been staying in when he vanished. Molly had pulled strings to get the Kirks the same room they’d had before, and they’d reluctantly agreed.

“Welcome, Ms. Dare,” the Hotel Sint Pieter’s manager said through a tight smile.

“Thank you. I sincerely hope you have beefed up your security since Jason Kirk vanished,” she said. The first two weeks of the disappearance she’d regularly suggested the hotel had inadequate security, before it became a boring drumbeat and she could blame the Sint Pieter police.

“We have,” the manager said. “We certainly want to keep you safe.”

“Naturally,” Nora said. She grew conscious of the simmering stares from the staff. The nerve of these people, she thought. She begrudgingly waited for Molly to finish the check-in and then bolted halfway across the lobby, heading for the elevators. Molly followed, rushing, tossing multicolored Sint Pieter currency at the bellhop.

“I have a real vision for tonight’s show, Molly,” Nora said. “We start with the family in the suite where they stayed . . . Are they here yet?” The Kirks had decided not to fly with Nora and the news crew, much to Nora’s annoyance.

“Yes. They arrived yesterday. They went and scoured the countryside near Annie Van Dorn’s house,” Molly said quietly.

“Hmmmm,” Nora said. “Without me? How odd. Did they find anything?”

“No.”

“I wish you’d sent a local camera crew with them.”

“Nora, they want their privacy sometimes.”

“Privacy doesn’t find the missing.” Honestly, she thought, she was doing everything to find Jason; couldn’t his parents just cooperate? “Okay, for tonight’s show, we retrace the steps Jason made on that fateful night.”

“I would suggest you not call it by that term in front of his parents.”

“Someone went shopping at the unsolicited opinion store.”

“I’ve expressed only one opinion,” Molly said mildly. “I guess my second one is that you seem on edge.”

“Do I? What an odd thing to say. I’m not nervous. I’m motivated.”

“Nora,” Molly said. “It will be fine. Do the story, remember this boy. But I think it would be best if we moved on to a new case for you to focus on. I think you’ve done all the good you can do for Jason Kirk.”

“If I’d found him, I would have done all the good. I need to find him, Molly.” Nora’s voice went low, and Molly looked surprised at the grit in her boss’s voice. “That girl who vanished hiking in Vancouver, well, we never found her. That couple from Illinois who went missing in Hungary. Never found them. This is a small island; I should be able to find out what happened to Jason Kirk.”

Molly opened her mouth to point out that the small island was surrounded by a vast ocean, and that the police were actually in charge of searches, not Nora Dare, but instead she simply closed her mouth and nodded.

THE suite. Then the nightclub where the mysterious and beautiful woman no one on Sint Pieter seemed to know had spirited Jason away, and then the beach where his torn shirt, the buttons ripped free as though in a fit of passion, had been found in the sand. The shirt was the only physical evidence of his disappearance.

Gary and Hope Kirk—Nora loved the appropriateness of the mother’s name—sat in the suite where they had been staying when their only child vanished. Nora’s eyebrow arched when the Kirks gave Molly a hug. She didn’t believe in getting close to the subjects. Both were pale and wan, as though grief were a disease slowly claiming them. They did not spend much time looking at each other.

But when the cameras started, Mr. and Mrs. Kirk joined hands, presenting their united face to the world.

“So let’s recall the night that Jason vanished. You’d spent a wonderful family day on the beach, yes?” Nora said.

It was the prologue to tragedy, and the Kirks did not disappoint. “Yes,” Hope Kirk said. “I didn’t feel well—I’d gotten sunburned and we decided to take it easy. We ate here at the hotel and then came back up to the room.”

“But Jason got restless, as young men will,” Nora prodded.

“Yes,” Hope said. “He wanted to go out to a bar and have a beer. I mean, you understand, he was on vacation with his parents. How rare is that? A college kid, and he was happy to be with us. We’d had a great time. We enjoyed each other’s company. He invited my husband to go with him . . . but Gary said no.”

Four little words, each an explosion of accusation. Gary glanced at his wife, and even though they were holding hands, Nora sensed a foggy coldness rising between them. An unmet blame, Nora thought, liking the phrase, wondering how she could work it into a question or her summary at the end of the show. “I wanted to stay here and take care of you,” Gary said.

“A sunburn’s not fatal,” Hope said. “I would have been fine.”

Gary stopped looking at Hope. “So. I didn’t want to cramp Jason’s style. Maybe he wanted to meet a girl. He can’t do that with his old man in tow.”

And Hope opened her mouth, as if to say, And he can’t vanish with his old man in tow. Instead she just said: “So Jason kissed me on the forehead and told me to feel better, and he left. Gary and I stayed in and watched movies.”

“And . . .” Nora began, but Hope wasn’t done.

“So, while our son vanished off the face of the earth, Nora, we watched movies. A movie we’d seen in the theater and parts of on cable. I mean, when he needed us, we were watching this stupid, stupid movie.” Her voice cracked like glass. “He was being kidnapped, or killed, or drugged, and we were sitting in this room, watching a movie.” Her voice, usually calm, rose toward a scream.

“I think . . . I think being back in the suite is a bad idea, Nora,” Gary said. “This isn’t helping anyone . . .”

Hope pulled her hand free of his and pounded her chest with the flat of her hand. “He comes to me in my dreams. He says, ‘Mom, I’m trapped. I can’t get where I’m supposed to be. I’m trapped here and no one can help me.’ He begs me to help him escape.”

This was new, Nora thought. Interesting. Because if Hope was cracking up, it was a whole new twist and angle to the story.

“Cut,” Molly said to the cameraman.

“Don’t you dare,” Nora hissed.

“I can’t help him, I don’t know how.” Hope Kirk’s words broke into a howl, face in hands, ruined in grief.

THREE bars stood down the street from the Hotel Sint Pieter, and Jason Kirk had visited them all. Nora and a quiet Molly and an utterly silent cameraman had followed his tracks.

The bartender at the Beer Pig crossed his thick arms. “Well, I only remember him because of the woman. Gorgeous she was, like a Halle Berry type. Very elegant, well dressed, sexy. I was surprised she was talking to an American college boy.”

“Did you see them meet?” Nora asked.

The bartender squirmed slightly under the hard, bright lights set up by the crew. “Well, yes. I saw her come in. She came to the bar, ordered a glass of pinot noir. Every guy in the room noticed her. Two other guys tried to buy her a drink. She said no, she was waiting for someone.”

“Waiting for someone,” Nora said, with portent.

“Yes, ma’am, waiting for someone. I heard her clearly, and I thought, well, who’s the lucky guy. But so this blond American kid comes in, and he comes to the bar, and the hottie, she locks her gaze on him. She wasn’t much older than he was, but she had a maturity. A woman of the world, but I mean in a classy way. But . . . he came over to her. He bought her another glass of wine. He must have felt confident in himself.”

Nora tilted her head. “And they talked.”

The bartender nodded. “Yes . . . but for her to have said she was waiting on someone, it implies she knew him. I don’t think she knew that boy before he arrived.”

Nora said, “So maybe she was waiting on a type of someone.”

The bartender shrugged. “I guess. She was ravishing. You couldn’t take your eyes off her.”

“You never heard him call her by her name?”

“No, ma’am.”

They moved on to the Glass House Pub. The waitress said, “Jason Kirk and this very pretty woman shared a bottle of pinot noir. She paid with cash and she tipped very well. I thought they were on a date. I’d never seen her in here before, and I would have remembered her, I think. He was drunk. Not obnoxious, but not in full control of himself.”

“Maybe she drugged him?”

“I think the bottle of wine drugged him. I mean, I never saw her slip anything into his wine.” The waitress shrugged at Nora. “She steadied him as they walked out, her hand on his back as they walked out. I see it all the time. He looked besotted by her. Any man would have been.”

“Have you seen this woman before or since?”

“No.” And that had been the answer of all Sint Pieter: No one knew this remarkably lovely woman.

The bouncer at Jake’s Tallboy, who wore a suit for the occasion of his interview, said, “I might not have let the kid in; he’d been drinking a bit too much, not loud but walking unsteadily. But no way I could keep her out. The boss would kill me. It’s a bar for people on vacation; we’re supposed to accommodate beautiful women. She thanked me for letting him in.”

“You heard her speak?”

“Yes. Slight accent, a Caribbean/British mix. Elegant. But . . .”

The pause was an opening. “Yes.”

“She gave me a cold chill. Listen, I could see she was a stunning beauty, but I’m gay. I wasn’t seduced by her charms, you understand? I looked in her eyes and there was no there there, if you know what I mean.”

“No,” Nora said, “tell us.”

“The old saying is the eyes are windows to the soul. That soul was blank. I don’t know how to say it. Blank. But not like drunk blank. Just unsettling. Empty wrapped up in pretty, you see?” The bouncer cleared his throat.

“Fascinating,” Nora said.

“I would say she gave me a chill, the kind you get from having to deal with an extremely unkind person. I remembered her immediately after the story about this boy broke. She gave me the creeps, and I’m sticking by my story.”

“You saw them leave.”

“Yes. He staggered a bit; she held him. I asked if they needed a cab, and she shot me a rather nasty glare. She said she was fine. She. Not they. A bit cold toward the boy, I thought.”

While the bouncer spoke, the police sketch of the mysterious woman came up, with the caption Last seen with Jason Kirk.

“And the security tape, did it show her?” Nora asked. She already knew the answer.

“Um, we didn’t put cameras in until after all the attention you gave us from Mr. Kirk disappearing.” A bit of anger colored the bouncer’s tone. “There was no tape. But when they were leaving, I heard him say he was at the Hotel Sint Pieter but in a room adjoining his folks’, and I laughed a bit, because I thought, Dude, you will have to find another bed for you and that lady.”

Nora thanked him, turned back to the camera, and said, “Next, the final stop on Jason Kirk’s tragic night.”

THE bar at the hotel where Jason Kirk stayed was called the Eclipse, for no good reason. But Nora, touring it with the camera following, pointed out that eclipses had once been seen as portents of doom and approaching evil. The bar was not busy, and people cleared out when the cameras started rolling. As if the tragedy might be contagious.

The hotel manager stiffly told Nora that several people saw the couple having a quiet drink in the corner, locked in conversation, heads close together. Jason charged a bottle of pinot noir to his parents’ room account. They drank half the bottle, then headed out the rear of the hotel toward the private beach.

“And no one has seen him since?”

“No, ma’am.”

“And the hotel security cameras at the entrance and exits?” Again she knew the answer, but the facts bore repeating.

“The tape malfunctioned . . . It showed mostly white static.”

“Bizarre timing,” Nora said, and while they spoke, the hotel’s mangled footage of Jason Kirk and the woman, flooded with digital snow, played on the screen. “You can make out Jason, and the outline of the tall woman, Jason leaning close to her as they stumbled out the back door.”

“Yes. Then the static clears up a few minutes later. We can’t explain it.”

Nora thanked him and turned to her final guest, who had joined them at the last stop. “The recent alleged sighting of Jason Kirk near Marysville, on the northern tip of the island, has suggested one theory: that Jason is hurt, suffering from amnesia. I’m here with Dr. Kevin Bayless, an expert on amnesia and author of Still Here But Not Sure, an exposé on amnesia that argues memory loss is actually quite common.” The camera panned to a tall, thin man in a suit with a blood-red tie. “Doctor, from what you’ve heard, is it possible that Jason Kirk could have suffered an injury that blocked his memory?”

“It certainly can’t be discounted as a possibility. If he was intoxicated and suffered a blow to the head, he might not know at all where he was, who he was.” Bayless had a breathy voice that reminded Nora of the soft hiss a radio made, not quite tuned to a station.

“How long could the amnesia last?”

“Anywhere from minutes to hours to weeks,” Dr. Bayless said, as though giving Nora a gift.

“We know his torn shirt was found on the beach. He might have been attacked. Describe to me and our viewers what kind of injury could induce amnesia.”

“Well, there are several, and as I point out in my book, just out last week, amnesia is far more common or likely than we know . . .”

Nora saw Molly waving frantically at her, the cut sign. Molly had never gestured so wildly during a broadcast.

“We have a breaking situation, ladies and gentlemen, we’ll be right back.”

“Um, will I get to mention my book again?” Dr. Bayless asked.

Molly ignored him and looked stricken. “Annie Van Dorn is on the line. She said Jason Kirk is standing in her backyard again.”

THEY rushed to the cars, drove the fifteen minutes to Annie’s side of the island, Nora swearing at Molly: “Don’t call the police, let us handle this, don’t call. No one gets there before we do. If it’s him, we have to get him on tape.”

“I’m not calling, I’m staying on the line with Annie, but the Kirks will call Peert . . .”

Nora cursed. She’d forgotten about the Kirks. Oh well, but the police might well bundle up Jason and haul him off to the hospital. Surely not before the happy reunion. A strange flood of emotion coursed through Nora: anticipation of the greatest story in her career, and a sincere relief that he was okay. That a story of hers could have a happy ending. It was so rare.

“Uh-huh, Annie, yes, I’m here,” Molly said. The cameraman drove like a maniac, blasting through a red light at the edge of town, barreling the car into the blackness. No streetlights out beyond the tourist zones; Sint Pieter suddenly felt to Nora like a much more ancient, lost world, a back corner of reality. The only light was the wash of the headlights of the Kirks’ car behind them.

“Is he still there?” Nora screeched.

“Yes, well . . .” Molly started, and Nora seized the phone.

“Annie? This is Nora Dare.”

“Yes.” Annie sounded frightened. Eight minutes had passed since her phone call.

“Is Jason still in your yard?”

“Yes. Standing by the trees. I’m not sure he knows I saw him. My outside light’s off. But I saw him, in the moonlight, I can tell it’s him again. What should I do?”

“Leave the lights off; I don’t want the neighbor’s dog to frighten him off again. He may not be well. He might be confused. Don’t approach him.”

“I’m afraid,” Annie said. Her voice—calm and sturdy in the first interview—seemed to fold and crumple. “My sister’s not here. I’m alone.”

“We’ll be there in just a few minutes.”

“I’m going to hang up and call the police,” Annie said.

“No, sweetheart, stay on the phone with me,” Nora said. A dread touched her heart. “We’re handling calling the police, okay? We’ll be there in just a few minutes.” Then she added: “You don’t happen to have a camera, do you? I suppose the flash might send him running if he’s panicked . . .”

Annie gave off a choked sob. “I’m afraid of him.”

“We’ll cut off our lights before we get there so he doesn’t run,” Nora said.

Annie made a soft little whispery mewl. “He is walking toward the house. Slowly.” Annie’s voice cracked with anxiety. “Oh my God, he’s coming here.”

“Annie. Don’t scare him.”

“Don’t scare him?” Annie said. “Why is he here?”

“Annie,” Nora said, and she said this with the firmness of tone that made her a star, “Don’t let him see you’re frightened. He has to be reassured so he doesn’t run again. You’re going to be a hero, Annie, to his family, to Sint Pieter.”

“He’s at the door,” Annie said, and she didn’t sound afraid anymore. More just surprised. “He’s just standing at the door.”

“Annie, you have to help that boy. You have to help him as much as I have,” Nora said. “He must need help.”

“Help him,” Annie said. Sounding a little sleepy. “He’s . . . he’s better looking than his picture.” Nora could hear the door swinging open. And Annie saying, “Hello.”

The phone clicked off.

THREE minutes later, they were at the small bungalow. The clouds had scudded to the south. Bright moonlight spilled across the eaves, the flat glass of the windows, the bent shadows made by the divi-divi trees. Nora was out of the car before it stopped, heading around to the backyard.

The car with the Kirks screeched to a stop, and she heard Hope screaming, “Jason! Jason!”

Nora ignored her and ran into the scrubby backyard. No lights on in the yard. A dim light burned in the kitchen. The back door—where Jason had come to—stood open.

“Annie?” Nora called. “Jason? Jason, it’s all right. I’ve brought you your parents, sweetheart. Just come on out.” She glanced behind her; the cameraman was struggling to get his gear squared on his shoulder.

She stepped inside. A small, modest back entry, then a kitchen. The tile was worn and peeling but the room was spotless. A dinner on the plate—noodles and salad and sliced tomato, a glass of soda next to it—lay half eaten. The window by the table fronted the backyard. She must have been eating a late meal, feet tired from cleaning hotel rooms all day, when she saw him.

Nora walked quickly through the house. No sign of Annie. No sign of anyone else. No sign of a struggle.

No Jason.

Gary and Hope Kirk tore through the house, and in the still distance Nora heard the rising cry of police sirens.

“He’s not here.”

“Was he ever?” Hope Kirk screamed at her. “My God. Is this a trick?”

“She said he was here.”

“Well, she’s not and he’s not. This is just a sick prank. I can’t—I cannot keep doing this, Gary. I can’t. I can’t. I can’t.” Hope fell to her knees on the wooden floor. Gary Kirk knelt by his wife, put his arm over her shaking shoulders.

“We are done with you,” he said to Nora. “I mean, what was this stunt? Invented drama for the ratings? An exclamation point on the whole awful evening of revisiting our loss? Did you put this young woman up to this? Did you just need some damn footage, Nora?” His voice rose into a roar.

“No, of course not . . .” Nora’s voice trailed off. “She said he was here. She said he was.” And now she saw in the doorway Inspector Peert, with his lemon-sucking scowl. She turned back to Gary Kirk.

“We counted on you. You wouldn’t let go. You said you wouldn’t forget him. But this . . . tricking us, this is too much,” Gary hissed.

“I had nothing to do with this,” Nora said.

“Yeah, this drama just happens the night you’re filming.”

“Blame Annie Van Dorn, not me.” Nora’s voice shook, and she glanced; the cameras were rolling. Oh, Molly, damn you, she thought. Molly stared at her. “Ask Molly, she took the call.”

Peert folded his arms. “Did you hear this woman say she saw Jason?”

“I heard her say she thought it was Jason. But then Nora took the phone . . .”

“Oh, this is too much. Too much!” Nora whirled on Gary Kirk. “You listen to me. I could have helped any missing person anywhere in the world, and I helped your son. I kept this entire island looking for him, and I kept the whole U.S. of A. thinking about him and praying for him to come home safe and sound. Without me, everyone would have forgotten him, just a kid who got drunk and probably drowned in the ocean.” She stopped, slammed a hand over her mouth.

“It was never about him, was it?” Hope Kirk said in a small voice. “It was about you. Always you.”

“Molly, tell them. Tell them what Annie said!”

“I didn’t hear, Nora, you did.” Molly turned to Peert. “Annie Van Dorn did call, did say that she thought Jason was standing in her backyard. We rushed over. I heard nothing else.”

“You’re fired, you backstabbing bitch,” Nora said.

“I work for the network, not you,” Molly said in her usual calm voice.

“Find Annie Van Dorn,” Nora said to Peert. “She saw Jason, identified him at her back door. I heard her say hello to him.”

“Then what?”

“Nothing. She hung up. But find her, she’ll confirm what I said.”

“I’ll confirm what?” Annie said. She stood in the open back door, a bit breathless. She blinked at the crowd.

Nora lurched toward her, clutched her arm. “You said . . . you said Jason was here.”

Annie blinked again. “Oh. Yes. I did. I went outside to see after I called you, but there was no one there. Someone was playing a trick on me.”

A long, low moan from Hope Kirk.

“You didn’t speak with Ms. Dare?” Peert said.

“Well, she kept insisting the man must be Jason Kirk, and I got tired of hearing her say that and I hung up.” Annie’s voice was dreamy-raw, as though she’d just woken from sleep.

“Oh my God, this is insane!” Nora said. “In-freaking-sane. I had an entire conversation with her. She said he came to the door, she was afraid of him, she could see him at the door, she said hello to him . . .”

Annie shook her head.

Nora grabbed her, shook her. Annie seemed limp, like a cast-aside rag doll. Peert pulled Nora’s hands from Annie’s throat.

FOUR in the morning. Nora lay dozing. The echoes of the past hours: the real fear in Annie’s voice, the blame in the Kirks’ accusations, the staring disbelief of that traitor Molly, the dazed surprise of Annie in real life. There were talks of charges to be brought, of a lawsuit by the Kirks. The network brass fumed; Nora knew, in her lawyer’s readiness, that she was going to be burned by this, very badly.

And all she’d tried to do was to bring a boy home, safe and sound.

A breeze poured in from the open balcony window. She was on the top floor of the Hotel Sint Pieter, where she belonged, and having drunk half the minibar when she got back to her room, her body felt feverish from the alcohol. She got up; the cooling ocean breeze was a relief. She was groping toward the bathroom when Jason Kirk said, behind her, “You made it very hard for me.”

She froze. She shook her head, as if to settle her imagination back into its distant corner of her brain. Then he said the words again, and she spun in stark terror.

Jason Kirk stood on the balcony, kissed by moonlight. The wind ruffled his light hair slightly.

She tried to scream and she couldn’t. Oddest thing. She sank to her knees.

He said, in a voice barely louder than the ocean wind, “You keep telling people you will never forget, you will never stop looking. Safe and sound, right?” He shook his head. “I needed you to stop looking. Do you know how hard it’s been?”

Nora’s mouth worked. How had he gotten here? It wasn’t possible. Not possible.

He looked better than his photos and his videos. Handsome face, high cheekbones. Even in the broken moonlight he had dark eyes, pools of black that could let you fall into their depths.

“May we talk?”

Nora nodded, and he stepped into the room.

“You’re alive,” she said. “Oh my God. Jason, the story this will be.”

“There is no story. You would let it go on forever, or as long as you could use me. There is no story. I need for there to be no story.”

She hardly heard him, her mind spinning with possibilities and ramifications. “Listen, you have to come with me. Now. Let your parents see you . . .”

“You don’t see how cruel that would be? I have to be . . . dead to my mom and dad. I have to stay that way.”

“I don’t understand.” She groped for the lamp, clicked it on. “Were you at Annie’s house tonight?”

“The tasty little maid? Yes. She only remembers what I want her to. I won’t bother her again.” He took a step toward her. He wore old jeans, a worn soccer jersey, and a long low cap favored by Sint Pieter toughs. Like clothes she’d seen on the neighbor’s clothesline at Annie’s house. “She played her part.”

“I don’t understand . . .”

“I wanted to draw you here, bait you with what you couldn’t resist. Me, on the verge of safe and sound. To bring you to me. Because you put my face everywhere, I couldn’t come to you to stop you. I couldn’t get near a boat or a plane or anything else. I needed you to come to me so we could have our chat.” He crossed his arms. “I need you to shut up about me, Nora.”

“I can . . . now that you’re found.” She nearly felt giddy. That little bitch Molly would be gone. The Kirks would see that she’d only meant the best. And having broken this case open, having personally brought their son home, she would be the undisputed queen of cable news.

“I’m not found. It’s time for the world to forget about me. Move on to the next tragedy.”

“But I don’t understand.”

Jason smiled; there was something wrong with two of his teeth. Small, pointed, in the lush curve of his mouth.

Nora said, “Oh.”

“The woman who made me—she left me. She didn’t like the sudden attention. She came to Sint Pieter to feed. She liked me so she left me . . . like she is. Not just dead. But you put my picture everywhere, you talked about me nonstop, I had to hide in the hills, far away. Live on rats, stray cats, rabbits. It doesn’t quite do, Nora. I’ve nearly starved to death because of you. I want to go where there are beautiful young things pulsing with life. Las Vegas. London. New York. Which means you have to let me go.”

Nora’s mouth worked. This was an even better story. This would change human history. Agree to whatever he wanted but get a photo, get his voice on tape. Her own camera was on the desk. Her gaze flicked to it. “Sure. Okay. Whatever you want. I’ll stop. I’ll never talk about you again.”

Jason said, “Let’s have everyone talk about you for a change.”

“TONIGHT, on The Molly Belisle Show—the one-month anniversary of the death of Nora Dare.” Molly gave her best steely-gazed look to the camera. “Nora Dare plunged to her death from her hotel suite in Sint Pieter while pursuing answers in a missing-person case. Now she is the story. Was it suicide, driven by an insane need to keep covering a story? Was she murdered by an islander who blamed her for the drop in tourism? Where are the police in their investigation—and are they dragging their feet to find the killer of a brave journalist? Stay tuned!” The music boomed; the opening credits showed Molly standing before her logo with a confident head tilt.

In Las Vegas, the hunter that was once Jason Kirk clicked off the television with a smile and headed down to the casino. He’d managed to stow onto a boat from Willemstadt to Panama, drink a bit from the crew without drawing attention, and hunt his way quietly up to America. His picture wasn’t on the news anymore, and now he had dark hair. Life—or afterlife, to be exact—was good. People never looked at him too closely, unless he was looking hard at them, and then they forgot. Or they died.

In Marysville, Sint Pieter, Annie Van Dorn watched her television and fought a little shudder. That Dare woman had been crazy. She rubbed at the little raw patch on her throat that had taken forever to heal. She was tired but not as exhausted as she used to be, and she no longer saw beckoning backyard shadows that both frightened and thrilled her.

In Los Angeles, Hope Kirk got up from the couch and thumbed off the television. She opened a beer—Jason’s favorite brand—and went to his room, sat on his bed, drank half her beer. She stared at the frat party photos and the track awards and the science fair ribbons, the remnants of her lost boy’s life. She felt drained of tears. She finished the beer and went to her own bed. Gary was already asleep. She curled close to her husband and wondered if she would dream of Jason tonight. Her night-mares, where he pleaded for her help to escape a trap, had vanished the night Nora Dare died. Hope didn’t dream of Jason anymore, and she could not decide if that was comfort or curse.