The House Next Door Read online

  Ellen’s eyes widen in disbelief. She feels a flurry of conflicting emotions. Shock. Confusion. Anticipation. Arousal.

  Flustered, Ellen hastily smooths the front of her blouse and runs some fingers through her hair, trying to make herself as presentable as possible while she waits for McGrath to knock.

  But he doesn’t.

  Instead, McGrath suddenly kicks the door open and bursts inside, his Glock 22 service weapon aimed and ready.

  “Andy!” Ellen exclaims with an almost giddy laugh. “My God, you scared me! What…what are you doing here?”

  McGrath is just as surprised to see her standing there. He lowers his gun but doesn’t yet put it away.

  “What are you doing, Ellen? What the hell is this place?”

  “An old hunting cabin. It’s been in my family for generations.”

  “Who owns it?” McGrath asks. “Your house is the only property listed under your or your husband’s name. We checked.”

  “Of course you did,” Ellen says with a rueful smile. “Legally it belonged to my grandfather. After he died, it just kind of sat here. Michael and I rediscovered it a few years ago. We started coming up here sometimes to get away. It’s peaceful. Quiet.”

  McGrath looks around at the cramped interior and floor-to-ceiling butterfly displays with apprehension. “Yeah,” he says, “feels real relaxing.”

  “How did you find me?” Ellen asks. “I could have sworn I wasn’t followed.”

  McGrath finally reholsters his sidearm and takes from his pocket a small electronic device about the size of a deck of playing cards.

  “Last week…before our night at the motel, but after your crazy 3:00 a.m. wrong-way drag race down the 101…I came by your place and stuck a GPS tracker under the rear bumper of your car. I knew I couldn’t risk losing you, Ellen.”

  Ellen absorbs that for a moment, trying to decide whether McGrath means it romantically as well as literally. He does.

  “You were able to get a warrant to monitor the comings and goings of a suspect’s spouse?”

  McGrath slips the tracking device back in his pocket—and dodges the question.

  “I don’t regret anything I’ve done on this case, Ellen. Especially anything I’ve done with you. You’re not like any woman I’ve ever met. If we’d crossed paths at a different time, different circumstances…maybe it would have been us spending weekends in this cabin.”

  Ellen nods, wistfully. It’s a sweet sentiment, but painful, too.

  “You’re welcome to spend the night,” Ellen offers. “On the couch, I mean. Unless—”

  “That’s all right,” McGrath says, waving her off. “I wanna start heading back down the hill. Lousy cell service up here. I’m gonna ask Forensics to take a fine-tooth comb to this place, inside and out, first thing in the morning.”

  “You really think Michael might have brought those girls…here?” Ellen asks with a shiver.

  “Honestly? Not a chance. He was smarter than that. But maybe we’ll find a print. A hair. A fiber. Anything we can use to find them. It’s worth a shot.”

  With a resigned shrug, McGrath starts heading for the door.

  Ellen, overwhelmed, takes a few steps backward toward her desk, bracing herself against it for support.

  “Good night, Ellen,” McGrath says. He holds up his cell phone. “Guess I’ll see you in a few hours. I’ve got some calls to make.”

  “Sorry, Andy…”

  McGrath has his hand on the doorknob when he hears the unmistakable click of a handgun’s safety catch being flipped off.

  He spins around.

  He can’t believe his eyes.

  Ellen is aiming a compact .38-caliber handgun right at him.

  “I can’t let you do that.”

  Chapter 35

  In all my years with the SLOPD, I’ve had a gun pointed at me only once before, by a desperate coke dealer during a drug bust gone awry.

  Tonight makes twice.

  And it’s by a woman I thought I loved.

  Suddenly it all makes sense! I knew it all along—but I just couldn’t see it.

  Ellen is a hell of a lot more than just the killer’s wife.

  But there’s no time for that now.

  My heart is thundering. Adrenaline is coursing through my veins.

  My life could be over in a few milliseconds—way too little time for me to draw my own gun, turn, and shoot first.

  So I get a crazy idea.

  I slap the light switch near the front door, plunging the little cabin into darkness. Then I quickly drop to the ground and roll out of the way.

  Ellen yelps with shock and fires a shot—blam!—but it misses me by a mile.

  “Damnit, Andy!” she exclaims as I frantically scramble behind the couch for cover. “Where are you?”

  Ellen fires two more wild shots—blam! blam!—in my general direction. Again she misses me. But only by a hair.

  Now it sounds like she’s shuffling across the room toward the light switch herself. So I use those precious few seconds to quickly crawl around the couch and behind her. As soon as Ellen turns the lights back on…

  I leap up and pounce.

  I clasp my hands around the hot metal gun, squeezing Ellen’s fingers tightly so she can’t pull the trigger. Then we tumble to the floor together, our limbs intertwined.

  “No, no, no!” she screams, again and again, kicking and flailing wildly as I wrestle with her for control of the weapon. Damn, she sure is feisty—and strong!

  At last I manage to yank the pistol from Ellen’s grip. Then I smack the hard steel clean across the side of her head. Ellen grunts in pain and goes limp.

  I crab-walk backward a bit, then stand up, tucking her little pistol into my belt and drawing my own Glock.

  “Don’t move!” I shout. I keep my gun trained on Ellen as she groans and writhes. God only knows what this woman might do next, so I’m not taking any chances.

  “What the hell did you do to those girls?” I demand, practically foaming at the mouth with fury.

  Ellen doesn’t respond.

  Then she starts to laugh.

  Chapter 36

  “You damn fool, Andy,” she hisses, wiping a dollop of blood off her lip. “You know exactly what I did. What we did.”

  “You mean…?”

  “That’s right. Michael and I were partners. We picked those girls out together like we were ordering artwork from a catalog.”

  Ellen gestures to the hundreds of dead butterflies on the walls.

  “I guess you could say we both liked collecting all kinds of beautiful things. This cabin is exactly where we kept them. Claire, Samantha, Maria, Patty—we did what we wanted to them, we took a few pictures, then we buried them out back, in the woods.”

  I’m too stunned to speak. My hands begin to tremble so much that I can barely hold my gun steady.

  “Look at you,” Ellen says, laughing even harder now. “You had it all wrong from the start. You thought you’d get close to me, use me, extract evidence from me, then dump me by the curb, didn’t you?”

  I don’t answer…but what Ellen is saying, of course, is true. At least it was. Until I started getting to know her. Until I started falling for her.

  “But I was the one using you, Detective,” she snarls. “I loved my husband. We understood each other. That night he picked up Brittany, he knew you were following him. He let himself get caught to protect me.” Then she adds, “He was a good man, Andy. He was ten times the one you’ll ever be.”

  “He was a goddamn murderer!” I yell. “A monster. And a coward. And so are you!”

  I feel a swell of emotions deep in my gut so powerful, I can barely describe it. Horror, disbelief, humiliation, rage. That this bitch could have lied to me for so long…

  “I know you tried so hard, Andy,” Ellen says, almost tauntingly now. “And you came so close, too. Patty was still alive just a few weeks ago. After Michael was arrested, I had to take care of her myself.”

  My jaw
clenches like a vise. My eyes start stinging with tears. It can’t be…

  “Her body should still be pretty fresh. As for the other girls, they’ve probably all decomposed so much by now, not even their parents would be able to recog—”

  Blam!

  I’m almost as shocked by the gunshot as Ellen is.

  And I’m the one who fired it.

  The bullet strikes her in the throat. Her eyes bug out of her pretty head. She starts to gag and choke on her own oozing blood.

  But I just stand there, numb with shock at what I’ve done, watching as Ellen takes her last gasp of breath, then slumps backward against the wall.

  Holy shit. I’ve just committed second-degree murder.

  I’ve just killed the killer.

  And yet, I feel an instant sense of tranquility come over me like a warm blanket.

  I calmly reholster my handgun. I slowly push open the front door. I steadily walk back to my car. I carefully drive back down the dark, hilly road.

  When I reach the main town again, I check my cell phone. Seeing I have a few bars of service, I pull over and call my partner. She answers groggily after the fifth ring.

  “I solved the case, Gina,” I say evenly. “I just closed it, too.”

  “Andy? What are you talking about? What time is it? Where are you?”

  “Listen. Ellen’s side of the family used to own a hunting cabin outside Santa Margarita. Dig up the address in county records, then send Hyong and his techs there right away. It’s an unsecured murder scene.”

  “Hang on. It’s a what?”

  “The girls’ bodies are in the backyard. Ellen’s is inside, by the front door. I’ll be back at my place when you’re ready for me, after I pick up my parents and let them know I’ll be going away for a while.”

  “Andy, you—you’re not making any sense,” Gina stammers. “You found the girls? And…and Ellen’s been killed, too?”

  I don’t blame my partner for not understanding.

  Shit. I’m more confused than I’ve ever been in my life.

  “See ya, Gina,” I say.

  I hang up my phone and turn it off. Then I pull back onto the road and start to head home.

  As I do, I notice the sun is just starting to rise, painting the sky a vibrant orange and bloodred.

  I imagine I see a swarm of butterflies, fluttering in the air.

  We.

  Are.

  Not.

  Alone.

  James Patterson

  with Tim Arnold

  Prologue

  The commander sets her hard-shell polycarbonate suitcase down by the front door and musters up every ounce of courage she’s got. These good-byes are never easy.

  But this one, she fears, is going to sear a hole right through her heart.

  The commander is leaving home to lead what she believes will be her last mission.

  Her husband and two children are in the next room, waiting for the typical round of farewell hugs and kisses. They know their wife and mother is about to embark on yet another very important, highly classified, and quite possibly dangerous mission to outer space.

  What they don’t know is, they will probably never see her again.

  The commander steps into the living room. Her family is gathered on the sofa. They’ve said nearly a dozen good-byes like this over the years, but right away, her kids and husband seem to sense that something’s different. Their worry is palpable, written all over their faces, hanging in the air like it has all week.

  At first, the commander can’t look her loved ones in the eye. Her gaze falls instead on the aluminum-sheathed smart walls of their home. Then the silver, achromatic furniture. Then the concave digital holographic monitor projecting a montage of family photographs in 3-D. Like baby pictures of her two children. Snapshots from family vacations. Even wedding photos taken sixteen years ago under a spectacular celestial sky, glowing from the night’s depth and intensity as if to embrace the bride and groom below—her husband’s idea, a tribute to her passion for space and a symbol of their infinite love.

  All of which momentarily brings the commander up short: all these images from a rich, rewarding life, each of them touching her as especially poignant, smiling down on her husband and two children sitting there on the couch, waiting.

  Through the living room’s giant double-paned bay window, the commander notices something outside. A sleek, black government SUV pulling up to the curb. Her ride.

  The silence is deafening. She knows she doesn’t have much time.

  She pulls her son up off the couch and into her arms for an embrace that, for once, this teenager accepts fully, returning it in kind.

  He knows something, she’s thinking.

  “Listen—you are so special to me, this young man of mine, experiencing life. None of it’s easy, this growing up business. I understand. But stay with it. Live life! You must know how much I love you—you need to—and I always will. Promise me that you’ll keep on being yourself, no matter what else is out there.”

  “And remember what you promised, too, Mom. You’ll start teaching me how to drive as soon as you get back. Right?”

  His words catch the commander off guard. And sting her heart.

  Before she has to reply, her younger daughter leaps into her arms and squeezes her around the neck in an emphatic hug.

  A lump quickly forms in the commander’s throat. “Sweetie, I have to. But just look at you, my special little girl. Growing up into such a smart, strong, beautiful young woman. Never forget: anything you set your mind to, you can achieve. Okay?”

  Her daughter sniffles. And nods. “What I want to be is…an astronaut. Like you.”

  Outwardly, the commander smiles. But inside, her heart is breaking.

  She had long suspected her daughter might share her love of the cosmos, especially once the girl began showing an aptitude in school for math and science. But this is the first time her daughter has voiced it herself, and the news is bittersweet. Will the girl’s interest in space grow, the commander wonders, if her mission is a “success” and she never comes back? Or will her dreams be dashed forever?

  Pushing those painful thoughts from her mind, the commander turns at last to her husband—her tall, handsome man with strong hands and soft eyes. Her rock for the better part of two decades.

  She hasn’t told him the truth about her mission, but she’s afraid he’s figured it out. He could always read her like a book, ever since they first met—a last-minute blind date she had almost skipped. After all, they seemed such an unlikely match. She was writing her dissertation in quantum engineering. He was a construction site foreman, who even showed up to the restaurant still sprinkled with cement dust. But he “got” her like no one else ever had. He could make her laugh, or cry, often at the same time.

  They fell for each other, fast and hard. Before long, they had created a beautiful family, a beautiful life.

  Her husband pulls the commander into an embrace. “Good-bye for now,” he says simply.

  Good-bye for now. That’s been their typical send-off, their little tradition, each time she’s left for a mission. At this point, it’s practically a superstition. The words and tone are intentionally light. Almost glib. Deliberately far too casual to be their final farewell.

  Until today.

  Startled to see tears welling in his eyes, the commander kisses her husband deeply, then explains, almost pleadingly, “This mission…it’s something I have to do. They picked me because they think I’m the very best one for the job. I’ve trained for it my whole life. I wish I could tell you more. But I can’t. What I can say is…I love you. All of you. No matter what happens, you three will be in my heart. Forever.”

  And with that, the commander heads to the front door. On her way, she slides a favorite family photo (a rare printed one, not a digital holograph) out of its frame and tucks it into her pocket: her two children, infants, sitting on her husband’s lap. Her daughter is hugging a favorite toy, a stuffed rock
et ship.

  The commander steps outside. She hands her suitcase to the uniformed driver standing next to the SUV. Then she looks up at the rich, crystal-clear night sky, flush with twinkling stars. Beautiful. Infinite. She still finds it breathtaking, every time.

  Less than an hour later, the commander arrives at the highly secure Cancri 55 Interplanetary Complex, suits up, and is ushered, helmet in hand, through a maze of underground passageways to her waiting shuttle. There she joins the rest of her crew, already inside the cockpit.

  Their spacecraft is moments away from departure.

  Chapter 1

  …feep…feep…feep…feep…feep…

  Am I…dreaming?

  …feep…feep…feep…feep…

  Or is that really…the sound…I’ve been waiting to hear my entire life?

  …feep…feep…feep…

  “Holy shit!” I scream, and bolt upright in my desk chair, knocking a pile of empty takeout containers and coffee cups to the floor. I’m instantly awake—and already hyperventilating. I rub the sleep from my eyes, in total disbelief of what’s in front of me.

  The bank of giant monitors on my desk have taken on a life of their own. They’re beeping wildly, flashing an endless stream of numbers and symbols.

  …feep…feep…feep…feep…

  “Holy shit!” I shout again, even louder.

  “Holy shit, holy shit,” squawks Alien, my twenty-two-year-old pet parrot, from his cage in the corner of the room.

  I’m blinking rapidly, my eyes glued to my screens.

  Could it really be?

  After so many years of thankless, hardheaded, pain-in-the-ass persistence—could all my hard work and determination be about to pay off?

  Am I really intercepting a transmission from deep space?

  Could this really be a message from another world?

  …feep…feep…feep…

  What a glorious sound—which I was beginning to worry I’d never hear!

  For years now, using my home-built supercomputer, I’ve been scanning the night skies. Tapping into satellite feeds. Listening to the farthest reaches of the most distant galaxies. Searching, hoping, praying that my long-held theory about the existence of extraterrestrial life might one day be proven true.