Page 61 of The Session

“That’s where your father lives,” Tru told him. She pointed toward a peninsula off to the right. “They found Kevin out there, tipped over in his kayak.”

Mark walked to the window and glanced out at the outcropping of tiny scrub-colored islands. For all its beauty, it looked like the loneliest place in the world.

“Mark, I don’t want to be weird, but would you hug me?”

Mark reached out and pulled her into his embrace. She buried her head against his shoulder.

“I know you’re not him, but you remind me of him,” she said.

“Were you guys . . .” Mark’s voice trailed off.

“When we were younger, we explored that a little bit, but realized we were better off as family,” she said, pulling away.

They sat on the couch that faced the ocean. Tru tucked her feet under herself and leaned on the armrest, her gaze fixed on the distance.

“I want to tell you something I haven’t told anybody else. Please, please keep it to yourself. Don’t tell Switchboard. Don’t tell anybody. Don’t tell Max. Promise?” she pleaded.

“Of course,” Mark said.

“I’m sure it’s just denial and I don’t have any evidence, but I do wonder if somebody killed him. Am I crazy?” Tru asked.

“You’re definitely not crazy. But how would I know? Y’all are still new to me, but from what I’ve seen? I guess anything’s possible. What did the police say?”

“That’s the problem. They said what we wanted them to—that it was a drowning, which it was—but it was also drug related.” She threw her hands up in frustration. “How can I believe anything when I know I’m in a world of liars?”

“Who would have wanted Kevin killed?” Mark asked.

“That’s the thing. He wasn’t a threat to anybody. He wasn’t a major part of the organization. He’d tuned out years before. He wasn’t in anybody’s way. I just can’t see what somebody would stand to gain by that.” Tru went silent for a moment, thinking. “One thing I thought about is that if he’d gotten back into drugs and was dealing with people outside the organization, maybe he got himself into some kind of trouble and didn’t want to come to us. But that doesn’t make much sense either,” she admitted.

“Would somebody who had a grudge against Summit go after Kevin?” Mark asked.

“I thought about that too, and it’s a real possibility. God knows we’re up to so many stupid things around the world—who knows? It could be almost anyone, given how convoluted some of our business affairs are. Maybe somebody wanted to send a message, but nobody told me about it.”

“Do you really think somebody would do that?” Mark asked.

“We have secrets, Mark. Things people would kill to make sure were never known. You’ve probably heard a bunch of different one-word descriptions of what we do. Well, I’ll tell you the real one: secrets, Mark—that’s what we do. Secrets.” She let out a harsh laugh. “The biggest secret of all is where we keep them all.”

“And where is that?”

“Fuck it. When you go to the main island—the one where Max lives, where we have the campus—there’s a building they call the Archive, where they keep all of his writings and papers and my dad’s work. And there are rumors about multiple levels and basements below the basement. But that’s not it. It’s actually at a place called the Vault at Black Seal Rock,” she confided.

“Where’s that?” Mark asked.

“It’s kind of brilliant,” Tru explained. “There’s an island up near Maine on the Canadian side of the border, but it’s owned by the First Nations, who lease it to a Summit-owned company in Estonia that, in turn, leases it to us as a wildlife conservation outfit. During World War II, the navy built an underground fuel depot there. Jurisdictionally, it’s a headache—not to mention that, logistically, you have to get there either by boat or airplane.”

“That is some James Bond–villain level of effort,” Mark said.

“There are no nukes there, Mark. Just people’s secrets. And those’re actually more dangerous.”

“I’d take the secrets over the nukes, but I get your point.”

“I’ve wondered if maybe somebody wanted something from there and we weren’t going to give it to them, and Kevin paid a price for that,” Tru said.

“Given what I’ve learned so far, I’m surprised they wouldn’t just sell it to them,” Mark replied. “Of course I’m still not sure who ‘they’ are.”

“Max, Morris, Marnie, my father sometimes, and some other people in the company who have a lot more power than maybe even they realize,” Tru told him.

“Why haven’t you told anyone your concern?” Mark asked.