Free Cemetery Lake by Paul Cleave Page B

authority here.’ He composes himself immediately, as if the laugh was as fake as the concern he’s displayed over the years filling in and digging out holes. ‘They never found him, did they?’
    ‘What?’
    “You know what I’m talking about.’
    I slip my business card back into my pocket. I’m glad he didn’t take it. I don’t want this guy touching my card; I don’t like the idea that my name could be in print anywhere inside this house of the damned — worse, I don’t like the idea of his fingers brushing against mine.
    “I’ll find your son,’ I promise.
    ‘Ya think so?’
    “I know so.’
    He shrugs, as if it doesn’t bother him either way. Maybe it
    doesn’t. Maybe he really doesn’t care, and that’s always been the problem for his son. Already I can see Bruce Alderman being
    found not guilty on a plea of insanity. With this man as his father, there isn’t a jury in the world who would be unsympathetic.
    It’s been a pleasure,’ I say, and I back away from the door,
    keeping my eyes on him. He stares at me as if he is trying to unlock some great mystery. The only mystery here is how somebody so
    antisocial can have worked these grounds for so many years. He Closes the door.
    “I’m ashamed at myself, angry with him. I came here to
    intterview the bastard yet the only thing I achieved was to let him crawl under my skin. And I can’t take it out on either of us.
    I reach the footpath, unlock the car and swing the door open.
     
    And that’s when it happens. I sense it immediately. It’s a sprinkling of goose bumps that covers my arms and the back of my neck, and at first I think it’s just a residual feeling that anybody leaving that house would get; but then something touches my back. I know
    it’s a gun even though I’ve never felt one pushed there before.
    ‘S-s-slowly,’ he says, ‘just move s-sl-low-ly’
    ‘Where?’
    ‘Driver’s s-seat. Climb in.’
    I do as Bruce Alderman says, trying to stay as calm as possible as he climbs into the seat behind me.

chapter eleven
    Too much training and not enough experience. That’s my
    problem. Plus the training never detailed anything like this. It was more a general thing, like a commonsense warning. If a gun is pointed at you in close proximity, stay calm. Try to talk your way out of it. It’s advice I would’ve figured out even if I’d never learned it.
    ‘D-d-don’t try anything,’ Bruce says, so I don’t. I don’t fight for the gun. I don’t open the door and try to run. Don’t do any of this because it’d be pointless, unless the point was to get shot.
    Instead I slowly adjust my body so I can turn my head and
    face him. The gun looks huge, but only because of the viewing
    angle and I’m not the one holding it. There are two hands on
    the handle. Both are shaking. A finger is wrapped around the
    trigger.
    It strains my eyes to keep the barrel in focus, but I keep them strained. If Bruce Alderman wanted me dead, he’d have done it
    already, but I feel as though if I take my eyes off the barrel I’m going to die.
    ‘What do you want?’
    “I d-d-don’t know,’ he says, and his answer is a problem. If he doesn’t know, that means he has no plan, and that makes him far more dangerous, and it means maybe he is planning on shooting
    me. Maybe that’s where his plan is taking him.
    His hands keep shaking, the gun rising and falling with minute motions.
    ‘You must want me for something,’ I say. ‘Probably to tell me
    something. Right? To tell me you had nothing to do with the
    dead girl we found?’
    ‘Why were you t-talking to my f-f-father?’
    ‘I was looking for you.’
    ‘You s-started this,’ Bruce says. ‘If it hadn’t been for you,
    everything w-w-would be okay. It would be okay’
    No, it wouldn’t be okay. Hasn’t been okay for Rachel Tyler for some time now.
    ‘Why is that?’ I ask.
    ‘What did my father say?’
    ‘You’re dad’s a real affable guy. He had plenty to say’
    He pushes