Homecoming, Hangars, and Headaches

The rain followed them for miles.

It began as a steady drizzle outside the gas station, whispering across the windshield and turning the highway silver beneath the headlights.

Ten miles outside Twin River, the storm found its teeth.

The sky cracked open.

Water slammed against the white Ford Taurus in heavy sheets. The wipers thrashed back and forth, fighting a battle they were losing.

Courtney leaned over the steering wheel and squinted through the blur of headlights and black pavement.

“Tell me this road actually goes somewhere.”

“It does,” Tomas said.

Red sat upright in the back seat, secured by the middle seat belt.

Technically.

The tires slid through another stretch of standing water. Mud swallowed the shoulders where the pavement had begun dissolving into the surrounding fields.

Courtney tightened her grip on the wheel.

“You’re sure this is the right road?”

“Pretty sure.”

He means no.

A gust struck the car hard enough to shove it toward the ditch. Courtney corrected, muttering something Tomas couldn’t hear over the rain.

The road climbed a shallow hill.

For several seconds, the headlights found nothing but water.

Then weak yellow lights flickered in the distance.

Tomas leaned forward.

“There.”

Courtney glanced toward him. “What is it?”

“Twin River Municipal Airport.”

“Twin River has an airport?”

“Not anymore.”

Calling it an airport was generous.

The county had closed it years ago rather than pay for repairs. Grass grew through the cracked runway. One end of the terminal had collapsed during a winter storm, and no one had bothered clearing the rubble.

The hangars still stood.

One of them glowed like a lantern in the rain.

The Taurus rolled through a rusted chain-link gate hanging crooked from one hinge. A strip of broken runway stretched into the darkness beyond it. Water covered most of the concrete, reflecting the hangar lights in shattered yellow pieces.

Vehicles emerged through the downpour.

Pickup trucks.

Lots of them.

Tomas counted automatically.

Three.

Five.

Seven.

Courtney slowed the car. “Looks like someone’s home.”

“At one time, this place might as well have been called Kay Calder Aviation Park.”

“What did she use it for?”

“You really have to ask?”

“No. I suppose I don’t.”

The generator inside the hangar rattled loudly enough to be heard through the storm. Light spilled between the half-open doors and stretched across the flooded tarmac.

Tomas felt a sudden pulse behind his eyes.

Sharp.

Deep.

He winced.

Red went completely still in the back seat.

You felt that.

Tomas pressed two fingers against his temple. “Yeah.”

Courtney glanced at him. “What?”

The pain disappeared as quickly as it had come.

Red’s zipper opened a fraction.

He’s close.

Tomas looked toward the hangar.

“The Collector?”

Yes.

The word settled heavily inside the car.

Courtney parked beside the row of trucks and shut off the engine. Rain roared against the roof.

For a moment, none of them moved.

Somewhere inside that hangar was Tomas’s mother.

He had spent days believing the safest thing he could do was run from her.

Now he understood that running had only carried him toward different kinds of danger.

Courtney looked at him.

“You ready?”

Tomas stared at the light spilling through the hangar doors.

“No.”

Red released himself from the seat belt and climbed onto Courtney’s shoulder.

Good. Only morons are ready for things like this.

Tomas opened his door.

Rain swallowed him.

Cold water soaked through his clothes before he could close the door. Wind swept across the runway, carrying the smell of wet asphalt, fuel, and engine oil.

Courtney pulled her jacket closed and followed him.

“Why do criminals always choose terrible places to hide?”

“Cheap rent.”

They hurried through the rain.

Mud grabbed Tomas’s shoe on his second step. He lurched forward, and Courtney caught his arm.

“Graceful.”

“I was hit in the head yesterday.”

“So was I.”

“When?”

“Long story.”

They crossed what had become a shallow lake in front of the hangar. Water rippled beneath the lights like broken glass.

The sliding doors had been pulled apart far enough for a truck to pass through. Rust streaked the metal walls.

Voices drifted through the opening.

Laughter.

Real laughter.

Tomas stopped.

For a moment, he stood in the rain and listened.

Courtney nudged him. “Are we going inside?”

“Yeah.”

He stepped through the doors.

Warm air struck him immediately.

Portable heaters surrounded a collection of folding tables in the center of the hangar. Work lights hung from beams overhead, throwing long shadows across crates, toolboxes, fuel drums, and machinery.

The place looked less like a hideout than a temporary home built inside a shipping yard.

Then Tomas smelled the food.

His stomach growled.

Courtney smiled. “Oh my.”

“Berezina’s cooking.”

Folding tables had been pushed together beneath the lights. People crowded around them with paper plates and mismatched cups. Others leaned against tool chests or sat on overturned crates.

Tomas recognized almost every face.

José saw him first.

“Tomas!”

The shout echoed through the hangar.

Chairs scraped against concrete.

José crossed the distance in three strides and wrapped Tomas in a hug that nearly undid Red’s healing.

“Madre de Dios. You’re alive.”

“I was the last time I checked.”

José held him at arm’s length and looked him over.

“You got taller.”

“Funny what a couple of days can do.”

Marleen shoved José aside and grabbed Tomas next. She smelled like cigarettes and motor oil.

“You look like hell.”

“Everyone keeps saying that.”

Eljen appeared behind her, grinning wide enough to show every crooked tooth in his head.

“Look what the storm dragged home.”

Berezina hurried over, wiping her hands on a kitchen towel. She cupped Tomas’s face between her palms.

“You look thin.”

“I ate today.”

“That was not food.”

“You don’t even know what I ate.”

“It was not my food. Therefore, it was not food.”

The ranch hands crowded around him, talking over one another until another voice cut through the noise.

“Well.”

Everything inside Tomas stopped.

Kay stood at the far end of the tables.

One hand rested on the back of a folding chair. The other held a steaming mug.

Her dark hair was pulled into a loose knot. Her clothes were wrinkled, and exhaustion had carved shadows beneath her eyes.

For a moment, neither of them moved.

Then Kay set down the mug.

She crossed the hangar in five quick steps and pulled Tomas into her arms.

“You idiot,” she whispered.

Tomas hugged her back.

“Missed you too, Mom.”

She tightened her grip, holding him as though she intended to prevent him from ever leaving again.

Then she pushed him back and caught his chin. She turned his head from side to side, inspecting every bruise.

“You’re soaked.”

“It’s raining.”

“I can see that.”

Her fingers found the swelling at the back of his head.

“What happened?”

“I’ll tell you later.”

“You’ll tell me now.”

Kay’s attention shifted past him.

Courtney stood several feet away with Red resting on her shoulder.

The relief vanished from Kay’s face.

“You.”

Courtney stepped forward. “Courtney.”

“I remember.”

Red shifted slightly.

Kay’s gaze dropped to the bookbag.

Her expression hardened.

Tomas moved between them.

“She brought me back.”

Courtney held Kay’s stare. “I didn’t kill your horses, and I don’t work for Kincaid.”

“Convenient.”

“It’s also true.”

“She helped me,” Tomas said. “Both of them did.”

Kay looked at Red.

“That thing stays away from me.”

I feel very welcome.

Kay’s eyes narrowed slightly.

Whether she heard the words or merely saw the bag’s zipper move, Tomas couldn’t tell. It didn’t matter. Whatever she noticed, her mind pushed it aside.

Tomas remained between them.

“Red stays.”

For a moment, Kay looked ready to argue.

Then she studied Tomas again.

Something in her expression changed.

Not surrender.

Recognition.

“Fine,” she said. “But if that bag starts talking—”

Rude.

“—it goes back outside.”

Courtney bit the inside of her cheek to keep from smiling.

Eljen slapped the table.

“Enough standing around. Berezina didn’t cook all this for us to stare at it.”

José dragged out a chair. “Sit, Tomas.”

Berezina was already filling a plate.

Kay kept one hand on Tomas’s shoulder as they walked toward the tables, as though she still wasn’t convinced he was real.

Tomas looked around the hangar.

The lights.

The food.

The people who had helped raise him.

For the first time in days, he felt like he was home.

Deep inside Red, something tightened.

The Collector is still close.

Tomas glanced at the storm battering the hangar.

For the moment, he didn’t care.

The table filled quickly.

Someone found two more folding chairs for Courtney and Tomas. José kicked a toolbox aside to make room. Berezina moved between the portable burners, returning with a different steaming pan every time.

Taquitos.

Rice.

Beans.

Something red and spicy that smelled strong enough to make Tomas’s eyes water.

Courtney placed Red upright beside her chair.

If anyone asks, I’m decorative.

Tomas snorted.

Kay looked at him. “What?”

“Nothing.”

José shoved a plate into Tomas’s hands. “Eat before Berezina decides you’re starving and feeds you until sunrise.”

“Too late,” Berezina called. “He is starving.”

Tomas loaded his plate.

For several minutes, the table quieted. The only sounds were silverware scraping paper plates, the generator rattling, and rain hammering the metal roof.

Eljen leaned back and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand.

“Now that we know the boy isn’t dead, someone needs to tell a story.”

José pointed his fork at Tomas. “He disappears for two days and comes home during the end of the world. That sounds like a story.”

Marleen nodded. “Start talking.”

“It’s not that interesting.”

“That means it’s interesting,” Eljen said.

Courtney hid a smile behind her cup.

Tomas looked along the table.

Everyone was watching him.

Merrill stood near a stack of crates rather than joining them. He was one of the cousins Kay had summoned from Florida, a huge man with thick arms and a beard that reached the top of his chest.

He wasn’t glaring at anyone.

He wasn’t smiling either.

He was simply watching.

Red tipped slightly toward Courtney.

Does that one ever sit down?

Tomas ignored him.

“I went to the beach.”

Eljen blinked. “You went to the beach?”

“Yeah.”

José laughed. “Everything falls apart, so you take a vacation?”

“Pretty much.”

“Kids today,” Marleen muttered.

Kay hadn’t touched her food. She sat at the head of the table, watching Tomas over the rim of her mug.

“Which beach?”

“Pelican Point.”

Her eyes sharpened.

“That’s a long drive for sand.”

“I needed some space.”

Courtney kicked him beneath the table.

Tomas looked at her.

She raised her eyebrows.

“What?” he asked.

“Nothing.”

José lifted his cup. “I’m glad you made it back before the world ended.”

The table laughed.

Sagen laughed with them.

Merrill didn’t.

The hangar door slammed open.

The noise cracked through the room like a gunshot.

Everyone turned.

One of Kay’s Florida cousins stood in the doorway, soaked to the bone. Rain blew around him in wild sheets.

“Kay!”

She was on her feet before he reached the table.

“What?”

“The two pilots from Kincaid’s transport—the ones we locked in the maintenance office—they’re gone.”

Silence fell.

Kay set down her mug.

“Gone how?”

“I checked the room. Door was open. Ropes were on the floor.”

Eljen pushed away from the table. “They walked into that storm?”

“They aren’t in the building.”

Kay’s expression changed. The mother disappeared, and the woman whose name people whispered throughout Twin River took her place.

“Eljen, José, take the runway. Marleen, check the terminal ruins and fuel sheds. Berezina, get everyone inside and lock down the main hangar.”

They moved immediately.

“Call the others back,” Kay continued. “No one leaves alone.”

Courtney stood.

“I’ll help.”

Kay glanced at her. “You don’t know the airport.”

“I know how to find people.”

“You stay where I can see you.”

Red shifted on the floor.

She likes us.

Courtney lifted him onto her shoulder.

“I’ll go with José.”

Kay hesitated.

Then she nodded. “Stay with him.”

Sagen rose slowly from his chair.

“What do you want from us?”

“Check the equipment rooms,” Kay said. “Then secure the north side.”

Sagen nodded.

“Merrill.”

The big man pushed away from the crates.

Within seconds, the hangar emptied.

José, Courtney, and Red disappeared through one door. Eljen and Marleen took another. Sagen and Merrill moved toward the equipment corridor.

The main doors slammed shut behind the last search group.

The hangar suddenly felt enormous.

Kay returned to her chair.

She didn’t sit.

Her eyes fixed on Tomas.

“So,” she said. “Where were you really?”

The warmth disappeared.

Tomas wiped his hands on a paper napkin.

“I told you. Pelican Point.”

“You didn’t drive all that way to look at the ocean.”

“No.”

“Try again.”

The rain beat steadily against the roof.

Tomas looked toward the equipment corridor. Sagen and Merrill were gone.

He turned back to Kay.

“I met two people.”

“Who?”

“Bentley and Corvetta.”

Kay stopped breathing.

Tomas saw recognition immediately.

“Mercedes’s children,” she said.

“They’re Soren’s children.”

Kay’s face lost color.

“And mine,” Tomas continued.

Her eyes snapped to his.

“They’re my brother and sister.”

“Tomas—”

“I stayed at Soren’s house.”

Kay’s chair struck the floor behind her as she shot upright.

“You what?”

“I didn’t know who he was when I got there.”

“I told you never to go near that man.”

“You never told me who he was.”

“I told you enough.”

“No. You told me not to ask.”

Her palms struck the table.

“How many times did I tell you to stay away from him?”

“A lot.”

“And you decided that meant nothing?”

“I didn’t remember him.”

The anger in her face flickered.

Tomas continued before he lost the nerve.

“He told me he was my father.”

Kay’s mouth opened, but nothing came out.

“Bentley confirmed it,” Tomas said. “Soren is their father too.”

She grabbed the edge of the table.

“You shouldn’t have gone there.”

“I know.”

“No, you don’t.”

“I remember some of it.”

Kay froze.

“Some of what?”

Tomas saw the memory again.

Crushed flowers.

Kay sitting at a kitchen table with her head down.

A bruised cheek.

Blood on her mouth.

“Enough,” he said.

Kay stared at him.

He didn’t need to describe it. She saw the answer in his face.

Her shoulders folded.

She lowered herself into the metal chair and covered her mouth with one hand.

“I’m sorry.”

Tomas moved toward her.

Kay shook her head, but once he knelt beside her, everything she had been holding back broke loose.

“I’m so sorry,” she choked.

Tomas wrapped his arms around her.

She resisted for half a second.

Then she clung to him.

Kay Calder—the woman who had walked armed men into the sheriff’s station and made Sheriff Rook forget how to breathe—cried against her son’s shoulder.

“I should’ve told you.”

“It’s okay.”

“No, it isn’t.”

“You got me away from him.”

“I should’ve taken us farther.”

“You got me away.”

Her hands closed around the back of his wet shirt.

“I was young. I was so damn stupid.”

“You were eighteen.”

“I thought I knew what I was doing.”

“No one does at eighteen.”

“You’re fifteen. What do you know about eighteen?”

“More than I did last week.”

A broken laugh escaped her.

She pulled back and held his face between her hands.

“I need you to know something.”

“I know.”

“No. Listen to me.”

Tears ran down her cheeks.

“I have always loved you. Whatever he told you, whatever you remember, you were never a mistake.” Her voice broke. “The best thing Soren ever gave me was you.”

Tomas’s eyes burned.

“I love you too, Mom.”

She pulled him against her again.

They held on to each other as rain hammered the roof.

For a few seconds, Tomas was little again. Kay’s arms were the safest place in the world, and nothing could reach him there.

Then she released him.

“What did he do to you?”

Tomas looked away.

“Tomas.”

“He forced Bentley, Vette, and me to do something.”

“What?”

“I’d rather not tell you yet.”

Her expression tightened.

“Are they safe?”

“I don’t know. They took off.”

“From Soren?”

“With something he wanted.”

Despite everything, the corner of Kay’s mouth moved.

“Good for them.”

“He’ll come after them.”

“He has to find them first.”

“That’s what Bentley said.”

Kay wiped her face with the heel of her hand.

“Oh, kiddo. What are we going to do?”

Tomas drew a breath.

“Mom, I have a plan.”

She stared at him.

“You have a what?”

“A plan.”

The softness drained from her expression.

Suspicion took its place.

“You disappear for two days. You stay with Soren. Then you come home in the middle of this storm with a plan.”

“It isn’t Soren’s.”

“Did he tell you that?”

“No.”

“Did he make you think it was your idea?”

“It has nothing to do with him.”

Kay stood.

Tomas rose with her.

“The storm isn’t normal,” he said. “There’s something inside it. Something that came here for Red.”

Kay’s gaze moved toward the door through which Courtney had disappeared.

“And she told you that.”

“I know it.”

“How?”

Tomas hesitated.

He could explain the stones.

The Keeper.

The Collector.

The connection that allowed Red to heal him.

Even if he found the right words, Kay wouldn’t believe them. She would hear Soren’s manipulation in every sentence and Courtney’s influence behind every impossible claim.

That hesitation was all she needed.

Kay laughed once.

It wasn’t a happy sound.

“He got into your head.”

“No.”

“I was eighteen when Soren found me. He knew exactly what to say. He made me feel smarter than everyone else. Stronger than everyone else.”

“This isn’t the same.”

“You don’t know that.”

“I know what happened to me.”

“You are fifteen years old.”

“That doesn’t mean I’m stupid.”

“No. It means you are a fifteen-year-old boy who got hit in the head, disappeared for days, and came home talking about an evil storm with a girl I don’t trust and a bookbag you think is your friend.”

The words struck harder than Tomas expected.

“Red is my friend.”

Kay stepped closer.

“Listen to yourself.”

“I saved someone today.”

“And who saved you yesterday?”

Tomas went still.

Kay saw the wound open.

Fear told her to stop.

Fear also told her that if she hurt him badly enough, he might stay out of what was coming.

She chose the second.

“I’m the one who has kept you alive,” she said. “I put food on the table. I put clothes on your back. I built the name that keeps people from coming through our front door.”

“I know.”

“No, you don’t.”

She pointed toward the storm outside.

“I’m the one Kincaid is afraid to confront himself. I’m the one Sheriff Rook won’t look in the eye. My name is the one people whisper in this town.”

Her gaze moved over the fading bruises on Tomas’s face.

“I’m not the one who comes home with black eyes because he can’t stand up for himself.”

Tomas felt the words land.

“That’s not me anymore.”

Kay’s expression hardened.

“Do you know what they call me in Twin River?”

He didn’t answer.

“Because it sure as hell isn’t Bookbag Boy.”

The nickname exploded between them.

For one terrible second, Kay looked like she wanted to pull the words back.

Then her fear hardened around them.

Tomas pushed his chair away. Its legs screamed across the concrete.

“Fine.”

“Tomas—”

“You’ve got everything handled.”

“That isn’t what I said.”

“It’s exactly what you said.”

He turned toward the doors.

Kay didn’t follow.

Neither of them trusted what might be said next.

Tomas walked into the storm.

Rain struck him hard enough to steal his breath. Within seconds, his clothes were soaked again.

He crossed between the parked trucks without knowing where he was going.

His mother had always known where to hurt him.

That was what made her different from Bryce.

Bryce guessed.

Kay knew.

Bookbag Boy.

Tomas stopped in the middle of the runway.

A pressure pulled behind his eyes.

Not pain.

Direction.

Red.

Tomas turned toward the far end of the airport.

Beyond the main hangar, another building sat half-hidden by rain. Weak light escaped through its partially opened doors.

A dark cargo plane crouched on the tarmac beyond it, barely visible through the downpour.

Tomas felt the pull again.

Sharper this time.

He started toward the second hangar.

Water splashed around his ankles. Wind shoved at his back.

The light inside the building flickered.

Something was wrong.

Tomas slowed as he reached the doors.

He saw the boots first.

Two pairs protruded from behind a stack of crates.

Tomas stepped inside.

The missing pilots lay twisted on the concrete. One had blood dried beneath his nose. The other stared blankly toward the ceiling.

Neither man was breathing.

Tomas’s stomach dropped.

“What the—”

“Well.”

Tomas turned.

Courtney was on her knees beside a military transport truck. Her hands had been pulled behind her back and secured with a plastic tie.

Red sat on the concrete beside her.

Merrill stood behind them.

Across the hangar, twelve girls huddled beside the lowered ramp of the truck.

Some wore borrowed sweatshirts and oversized jackets. A bowl of food lay overturned near their feet. Their faces were clean, but their hands had been rebound in front of them. A single chain ran through the ropes around their wrists, fastening them together.

Some were Tomas’s age.

Others were younger.

Different faces.

Different skin tones.

Fragments of different languages moved between them in frightened whispers.

Every one of them wore the same expression.

Fear.

Tomas understood.

The container.

This was what Kay had refused to deliver.

This was why Kincaid had killed the horses.

This was why his mother had abandoned everything she owned.

Sagen stood between Tomas and the girls. A pistol rested casually in his hand.

He sighed.

“Damn. I really wish you hadn’t seen this, kid.”

Tomas stared at him. “Kay freed them.”

“She made an emotional decision.”

“You tied them up again.”

“I put the merchandise back in condition for delivery.”

One of the girls began crying.

Tomas looked at the dead pilots.

“You killed them.”

“They worked for Kincaid,” Sagen said. “They would’ve told him Kay lost control of the shipment.”

“So you’re giving it back.”

“I’m correcting her mistake.”

“You think Kincaid is going to make you his new Kay?”

Sagen smiled faintly.

“I think Kincaid needs someone in Twin River who can finish a job.”

“And my mom?”

“She’s done.”

Merrill stepped closer to Courtney.

Sagen nodded toward him. “Merrill and I can run the crew. Most of them will come around once they understand Kay isn’t coming back.”

Tomas looked at Courtney.

Blood darkened one corner of her mouth.

“What happened?”

“I found the pilots,” she said. “Then I found Merrill.”

She found his fist shortly afterward, Red added.

Merrill kicked the bookbag onto his side.

Red’s zipper snapped.

I dislike him.

Sagen rubbed his forehead.

“Get Tomas.”

Merrill moved.

Tomas charged him.

It lasted less than two seconds.

Merrill caught Tomas by the front of his jacket, lifted him off the floor, and slammed him onto the concrete.

Air exploded from Tomas’s lungs.

He landed beside Courtney.

Red’s zipper opened slightly.

Bold strategy.

Tomas groaned.

Merrill seized his collar and hauled him upright.

Charging a man built like farm equipment.

A pause.

Two out of ten.

Thunder rolled across the runway.

The lights flickered.

The twelve girls drew closer together.

Far beyond the hangar walls, something moved through the storm.

It hadn’t created Sagen’s ambition.

It hadn’t made Merrill pull the trigger.

It hadn’t put the girls inside the container.

It had only followed the chaos.

Welcomed it.

Fed it.

And now the Collector was almost there.