When Devils Sing(95)

On the third try, Isaiah was logged in.

For an hour, Isaiah combed through Leblanc’s computer, until he landed on a folder labeled Disney World Vacation 2018. He’d gone through nearly every innocuous file, finally ending up here. Except it wasn’t vacation memories within the content’s folder, but dozens of large files labeled with various dates. The thumbnail of each one showed a hazy, night-vision image that looked a lot like the back of Leblanc’s cabin cruiser.

“Whoa,” Reid breathed beside him. “Do you see June twenty-third?”

“Yeah, it’s here,” Isaiah said, suddenly feeling shaken. He couldn’t bring himself to open the video file. In all his fervor to reach this moment, he hadn’t prepared himself for what he might find in the footage.

Isaiah mentally counted down from ten, then pressed play.

An ERROR message flashed across the screen.

Isaiah cursed beneath his breath. He clicked the video file several times, but the error message continued to pop up.

“Try the others,” Reid said.

And so, Isaiah did. He opened the file of every date from the past month. They all worked except for the day of Dawson’s disappearance.

“They deleted it on purpose.” Isaiah cursed again, low and deliberate. He buried his face in his hands, massaging his temples, struggling to think of their next move.

Reid’s breath caught. “There’s more. Isaiah, it’s new.”

Isaiah glanced at the desktop screen. Reid pulled up a video from that day—that afternoon. The time stamp read two hours ago. There wasn’t anything for several minutes until there was. This new footage was rain-spattered, but Isaiah could make out enough. Leblanc and Wiley Calhoun were carrying a woman’s unmoving body onto the boat.

“Is that…?” A chill crawled down his spine. “I know her. Oh God. That’s Neera’s mom.”

“What the fuck,” Reid breathed. “Wait, there’s another. Look.”

As the pair had been watching the footage of Kiran, another one popped up. The time stamp was a few minutes ago. This one was similarly rain-spattered, nearly impossible to discern if they didn’t already know what to look for. Another body, this one with red hair.

“Sam,” they both said. But they were then interrupted by a car door slamming outside, followed by a silhouette passing the windows of Leblanc’s office.

“Hide,” Isaiah whispered.

In a chaotic blur, Reid moved to the office closet while Isaiah dug his USB drive from his pocket and attached it to Leblanc’s computer. He copied the newest videos to the flash drive, watching anxiously as the file transferred with tortoiselike speed.

The front door of the firm opened and shut as Isaiah ejected the USB, then made quick work logging out of Leblanc’s computer. He scrambled into the hallway just as a familiar face in a gray suit rounded the corner.

“Dad?”

Isaiah’s father greeted him with a portfolio in his hand. “I’m dropping this off for Leblanc.” His father’s dark eyes studied him carefully. “When you said you couldn’t attend dinner earlier, you didn’t mention you’d be here.”

Isaiah did his best to look composed, despite the weight of the USB in the pocket of his slacks. “I had some work I wanted to get ahead of for this week.” He quickly added, “You know, before the Fourth.”

“Of course,” his father said with a slight nod. “This will be a momentous Fourth of July.” Yet his father’s gaze was scrutinizing. He stepped forward, meeting Isaiah halfway down the hall. “What’s on your mind, son? Talk to me.”

“What? I—” Isaiah blinked, struggling to find the right amount of truth to share. His nerves were fraying at the seams. This wasn’t the right time to face his father—to appear controlled and composed when he was the furthest from it. He settled for a half-truth. “I feel like everything’s changing so quickly and I can’t find my footing.”

“I see.” His father braced his hands on Isaiah’s shoulders. “Are you nervous about Harvard? Isaiah, look at me, you were made for that school. You have nothing to worry—”

“It’s not that,” Isaiah interrupted, shaking his head. “It’s everything, Dad. It’s you and Mom separating. You buying a house on Lake Clearwater. You spending more time here than with your own family.” It’s me not recognizing the man you’ve become.

His father’s eyebrows furrowed. “What’re you so afraid of?”

Isaiah swallowed hard. He did well to tamp down his fears, but his grasp on the world grew increasingly fragile the more he discovered about Lake Clearwater. “I don’t want to lose you,” he confessed. I don’t want to lose you to this place.

“You will never lose me, son.” His father sighed, holding Isaiah’s gaze. “Every choice I make is for the betterment of you and this family,” he said. “Nothing, and I mean nothing, will ever change that.”

He pulled Isaiah into a tight hug, and Isaiah hugged him right back. His father may not have known the real meaning behind Isaiah’s words, but his embrace meant something all the same. For a breath, he allowed himself to relax into his father’s arms. Isaiah wished he could be a kid again, when his father had been his hero and everything felt right, and he didn’t have to worry whether his own father was involved in something terrible.