Chapter 13 - What Luke Remembered
At first, Daniel believed Luke was confused.
Stress could mix dreams, memories and things a child had been told. Detective Cole warned him not to question Luke too aggressively.
So Daniel waited.
They returned home two days later.
Luke slept in Daniel’s room with the hallway light on. Rex rested beside his pillow, the tracker clipped beneath its tail again.
During the day, Luke played quietly and avoided closed doors.
Daniel removed every lock from the bedrooms.
He also installed a new red landline in the kitchen.
On the third morning, Luke asked for pancakes shaped like dinosaurs.
While Daniel cooked, Luke drew pictures at the table.
One showed the chapel.
Another showed the tunnel.
The final picture showed a woman in a blue coat kneeling beside Rex.
“Who is she?” Daniel asked gently.
“The blue lady.”
“Did she tell you her name?”
Luke shook his head.
“Where did you see her?”
“When Grandma first took me underground.”
Daniel sat beside him.
“What did the lady do?”
“She told Grandma to leave me alone.”
“Did Grandma listen?”
“No. They yelled.”
“What happened to the lady?”
“The tall man took her through the little door.”
“Amos?”
“The one with the scar.”
Daniel kept his voice calm even as his heart pounded.
“Did the blue lady speak to you?”
“She said I have your eyes.”
Rebecca had always said Luke inherited Daniel’s gray eyes, though in certain light they appeared blue.
“What else did she say?”
“She asked if you still keep the broken clock.”
Daniel looked toward the living room.
A wooden clock stood on the mantel. It had stopped working the week Rebecca disappeared. Daniel had refused to repair it because its hands were frozen at 7:10, the last moment she had been home.
No one outside the family knew what the clock meant.
“What did you tell her?”
“I said yes.”
Luke reached into his pocket and placed a tiny folded square of fabric on the table.
It was blue.
The same fabric as Rebecca’s coat.
“She put this inside Rex.”
Daniel had repaired the toy but had not searched beneath all the stuffing.
He opened the seam again.
Inside, behind the soft filling, his fingers touched a hard object.
A small metal cylinder had been hidden near the dinosaur’s heart.
Cole arrived twenty minutes later.
The cylinder contained a miniature roll of film.
A forensic technician developed the images.
They showed children, adults and buildings Daniel did not recognize. One photograph captured a sign beside a mountain road.
SAINT ORISON FAMILY RETREAT.
Another showed an underground platform with narrow tracks.
The final image showed Rebecca reflected in a window as she took the photograph.
Older.
Thinner.
Alive.
A date in the corner proved it had been taken six weeks earlier.
Daniel pressed his fingers against the image.
“She was at Black Pine.”
Cole studied Luke’s drawing.
“And someone moved her before we entered the lower rooms.”
“Vale?”
“He was surprised by the bracelet recording. I don’t think he controlled everything happening in the camp.”
“Then who did?”
Cole placed one of the copied ledgers on the table.
“Black Pine sent payments to an organization called Orison Family Services. We assumed it was a false company used by Vale.”
“It isn’t?”
“It owns property in six states.”
Daniel looked at the mountain retreat photograph.
“Then Black Pine was only one location.”
Cole nodded.
“Rebecca called it the first camp.”
Luke pulled Rex against his chest.
“The blue lady said not to go there.”
Daniel turned toward him.
“Why?”
May you like
Luke’s eyes filled with the restrained fear Daniel had seen through the chapel window.
“She said the people there know you’re my dad.”
