Authors: Heather Graham
“See!” Kendall said triumphantly. “Vinnie was telling the truth. He’s as innocent as a snow-white lamb.”
Aidan glanced her way. “‘Innocent as a snow-white lamb’ and ‘Vinnie’ don’t really sound like they go together to me, but yeah, he’s probably telling the truth.”
“Probably?”
He grimaced. “How do we know Vinnie wasn’t the genius who was going to let her in on a great discovery?”
“‘Genius’ and ‘Vinnie’ don’t exactly go together, either.”
“Come on, you’ve got to admit he’s a genius with a guitar.”
She was quiet for a minute. “Aidan, even if Jenny Trent was in my shop and at the bar, it doesn’t mean that she didn’t meet someone during the day, somewhere else, and make arrangements to meet him late that night.”
“You’re right.”
He was staring straight ahead.
“Where do you go from here?” she asked. “It sounds as if you’re at a dead end.”
“When you hit a dead end, you just go back out to the street and find a new route,” he told her, flashing a smile. “Thanks to your friend Rebecca, I’ll go back and start over with Jonas, get him to put in a Federal request to have the bones and the blood and the dress analyzed, and get them up to either Quantico or D.C. I’ll call on some old friends up there for help.”
“But you still won’t know what happened once Jenny left the B and B.”
“I know.”
“So?”
“We’ll start researching the other victims.”
“Other victims?”
He glanced her way. “There have been at least ten disappearances just like Jenny’s over the past decade, most of them in the last few years. We’ll look into them all, one by one. I’m convinced that most of them, at least, are connected, so eventually we’ll catch her killer.”
“You act as if you know for certain that she’s dead.”
He didn’t answer, but then, she thought, he didn’t have to. She felt as if she knew Jenny was dead, too.
They stopped at a restaurant for dinner on the way out to the plantation, and to Kendall’s surprise, Aidan seemed ready—even eager—to talk about other things. Music, books, even the weather. After they left the restaurant, Aidan pulled into a gas station.
A small, skinny man came out to serve them.
“Hey, Jimmy,” Flynn said.
“Mr. Flynn, miss,” the man returned, tapping his baseball cap.
“Jimmy has been staying out back at the plantation,” Aidan explained pleasantly.
“Oh,” Kendall said, for lack of another response.
“Don’t worry, I won’t be bothering you none,” Jimmy said hurriedly. “I can leave if you need me to.”
“You can stay out there, Jimmy. I talked to my brothers, and they don’t mind.”
The man frowned uncertainly. “You’re not…you’re not pulling my leg or nothing, are you, Mr. Flynn?”
“No. Maybe we can work out some kind of a deal. We’ll get you set up back there a little better, and you can keep an eye on the place if we’re not around.”
The man’s hands were shaking, and he looked too overcome to speak, so he only nodded.
Jimmy filled up the tank, which hadn’t been anywhere near empty, Kendall noticed. Then Aidan paid him, and they drove off.
“Very generous,” Kendall said.
“No. Selfish,” he told her.
“How?”
“I like him being out there.”
“Why? He’ll never see anything going on. You said he just closes the door and hides in there all night. Frankly, it’s a little creepy to know he was out there all that time, scaring Amelia with his light.”
“He has to come and go, doesn’t he?” Aidan said.
“So you think he’s the one creating all the mystery at night?” Kendall said.
“He didn’t plant the voodoo dolls,” Aidan told her.
“Honestly, Aidan, I know this is what you do for a living, but don’t you think people who do things like that—try that kind of scare tactic—are usually kind of frightened themselves? That they do things like that because they’re too scared to face the person they’re attacking.”
“Usually,” he agreed, his eyes on the road.
Usually
.
She read the unspoken corollary. Usually—but not this time
She had been feeling more relaxed than she had all day; dinner had been easy, pleasant, natural.
But his comment had spooked her, and then, as they crested a slight rise, she saw the plantation.
It rose high and white in the moonlight, and there were lights on inside, so many that it should have looked warm and welcoming. But somehow, tonight, the place she had once loved looked like a cruel jack-o’-lantern.
Aidan parked in the drive, looking up. “I can’t believe what they’ve accomplished since this morning,” he said as he got out and reached into the back to take Kendall’s bag, then started up the steps. She quickly followed him, unwilling to be alone outside.
It hadn’t been that long ago that she had slept here most nights. After Amelia had died, she had been determined to leave everything as nice as she could. She had stripped off the old bedding, washed it and given it to the Salvation Army. She had purchased new sheets and new drapes, and she had scrubbed the bathroom and kitchen herself. She had never really known why, except that she didn’t want anyone coming in and saying that the place smelled musty or like a nursing home—or like death.
Inside, the floors were covered with plaster dust and there were white handprints on the banister. She could see that one of the hallway walls was freshly plastered and painted, and she imagined that most of the plumbing pipes had gone in behind it.
“They
are
working hard,” she said, as she looked around.
“Yeah, they’re trying to finish and get out as soon as possible. My brother wants to do something here for Halloween. I can hardly believe it, but I think they’ll be done in less than a week. They’ve got people coming in tomorrow and Sunday.”
“Amazing. I love my landlords, but I can’t get a drain un-clogged for a week,” Kendall told him.
He started up the stairs. “I was actually surprised to find that the bedroom was in such great shape. It was Amelia’s room, right?” He stopped and looked back at her. “Your work, I take it?” he asked with a smile. “Why? Amelia had died.”
“I just didn’t want anyone coming in and thinking badly of her.”
“Well, thanks. I had a comfortable sleep last night.
While I slept.
”
“I’m kind of glad of it now myself,” she said lightly.
She followed him up, thinking that the house felt strangely chilly, as if it wasn’t happy to have them there. She told herself not to be ridiculous, that it was a house, nothing more, and didn’t have any feelings about anything. Once upon a time, she reminded herself, she had loved it—especially the attic, filled with all Amelia’s family treasures.
Flynn
family treasures, she corrected herself.
She wanted to ask him about the attic and whether they were tearing that apart, too. She felt indignant about the very possibility, then told herself again that it was no longer any business of hers and remained silent.
In the master bedroom, he set her bag down at the end of the bed. She saw that there were logs by the fire and more arranged on the hearth. She looked at him, and he shrugged a little sheepishly. “Zach has been spending most of the day out here, so when you agreed to come, I asked him to buy some logs and kindling.”
“Nice,” she said.
“There’s all kinds of stuff in the kitchen, too,” he said.
“Great.”
“And I have one of those little DVD players and some movies.”
“Do you really want to watch a movie?” she asked him softly.
He walked over to her, set his hands on her shoulders and met her eyes. “No.”
Suddenly the house didn’t feel menacing at all. She felt as if she were stronger than the entire world. And then even the world didn’t matter, once he kissed her.
His kiss was seductive, electric. Their mouths were locked as their clothing was shed and he backed her toward the massive sleigh bed. He fell onto the mattress, bringing her down with him. His laugh was husky, exciting. His body molded to hers, and still she couldn’t get enough of his mouth. She felt him moving, and every pulse and supple brush of his body seemed to fill her with a rising urgency. With some kind of shared inner instinct, they both knew that foreplay would have to wait for next time, and she clasped her thighs around his hips, spiraling into sensation as he thrust slowly into her, held for breathless seconds, then stroked in earnest. She clung to him, rising madly against him, aware that the mind was indeed a wicked tease, because on some level she’d done nothing all day but anticipate the sleek heat and energy of his body, done nothing else since the first time he’d touched her.
She was aware of the almost desperate sound of their breathing, the thunder of their hearts. She savored the damp, powerful feel of his body, the tautness of his abdomen and thighs, and the fact that he was in her, arousing parts of her she hadn’t known existed. She knew the frantic fever of wanting more and more, the honeyed feel of rising and needing, and then the sweet explosion of a violent climax that left her shuddering against him as they both trembled and surged again and again, until the tidal wave receded and his erection became an intimate and gentle warmth.
He moved to lie beside her then, stroking her hair, and she curled against him, happy, for the moment, just to
be
.
She was still drowsy when he rolled over, reached into the nightstand near the side of the bed and produced a gun, which he set on top of the stand.
She rose on an elbow, looking at him.
“We’re out in the middle of nowhere,” he reminded her.
She nodded, suddenly uneasy again.
But not nearly as uneasy as she would have been at home, she admitted. Or anywhere without him.
Would any broad-shouldered, powerful man have done? she asked herself mockingly.
But the answer was an honest
no.
“All you all right?” he asked her.
“Sometime,” she said, “you need to teach me how to shoot that thing.”
“It’s pretty easy. You aim, hold your arms steady and squeeze the trigger. But we can practice anytime you want.”
He decided to run downstairs for drinks; Kendall opted to take a shower. While she was drying off, she heard noises below and ventured out in her towel to the top of the stairway. She listened, and realized that he was checking the locks on the windows and doors.
A few minutes later he was back, bearing a thermos of cocoa, cups and a bottle of brandy. She laughed, and applauded his arrangements.
They poured themselves hot chocolate with brandy, lay in bed and talked about the things they could do for the Halloween party. Then they made love again, indulging in long, slow kisses that tasted like chocolate. And they were kisses that traveled. Her shoulders, his ribs. She was fascinated with every inch of him, and she noticed details. Like the three scars on his back, the swirl of hair just below his beltline, the fact that his second toe was longer than his first. Then she concentrated on the area most crucial for lovemaking, covering his body with the length of hers. Later, when she could have sworn he was dozing, she felt a quickening along her skin as his lips teased along her spine, and fingers ran over her hip and down the length of her thigh. They made love again, and again; it was demanding and passionate, the climax rich with energy and wonder. At last they fell asleep in one another’s arms, her last thought that she was so happily sated and exhausted that she would certainly sleep like the dead.
And she
was
sleeping deeply when she was startled awake, by…what? A whisper? A voice? A touch? She didn’t know.
But she was wide awake. And Aidan wasn’t with her.
H
e was walking through a deep fog, as gray and opaque as a shroud.
He could hear a distant and mournful tolling, like a call for the dead.
And then they came.
An army of them. They walked past him, their skin as gray as the mist. Their eyes were black, hollow and deeply shadowed. They marched in rows, as if they had been summoned to some great meeting, and at first he thought that they didn’t see him as they passed.
And then he realized that, from the dark pits of their eye sockets, they were watching him.
Then he saw her.
She was still distant, but a light radiated from her. She was clad in a flowing white gown, and alone among the hordes of the dead, she was beautiful.
She was trying to speak to him, and he tried to hear.
He was no longer just standing there, letting the dead march by. He was walking, trying to make his way to her. She needed to tell him something, and he needed to hear it.
But the fog was like soup; walking through it was like wading through a swamp. He strained…and then he stopped.
The dead were no longer walking past him, with him.
They were strewn in front of him, like dolls. Dolls torn apart by a maniacal child, a head tossed one way, an arm, another. But the detached heads had eyes, and the eyes were looking up at him, beseeching him.
Their lips were moving in silent prayer.
He had to pass them to get to the woman in white, but he knew that he couldn’t, and that she couldn’t reach him, because those hands would reach for him, clutch at him, trip him….
Go to her. Help her.
He heard the words as clear as day. Though he couldn’t see her, he could feel the old woman behind him, trying to push him through the fog and past those poor dismembered dead.
She is the one with the strength,
the old woman said, panting as she pushed him.
He turned to look at her.
“Amelia?” he asked, somehow knowing it was true.
The rest is legend, this is real,
Amelia said.
You’re a Flynn. Can’t you feel it? I felt it, when it changed. He came back evil, as evil as the one before him. And of everything that is bad, he is the worst.
“Aidan!”
He heard his name, felt someone shaking him.
He woke up—and found himself standing, stark naked, on the stairway landing. Kendall, her face lined with concern, was holding his arm, shaking him awake.
What the hell?
“Aidan, thank God! You were sleepwalking, and I couldn’t wake you,” Kendall said.
“I don’t sleepwalk,” he told her.
She stepped back, looking at him with a grin that indicated where he was standing and how he was dressed—or rather,
un
dressed. She had thrown on his shirt, and he wasn’t at all sure why, given that he was a confident man, but he felt vulnerable and embarrassed.
“Wow. I guess I
was
sleepwalking,” he said, and offered her an awkward grin. “Thank heaven we don’t have kids, or that we weren’t spending the night with the relatives, huh?”
She nodded. She looked almost scared. Oh, God, a perfect night, and now this.
He took her by the shoulders. “Kendall, I’m so sorry I scared you. I swear, I’ve never done this before.”
She flushed slightly. “I’m not frightened. I was worried when I couldn’t waken you, but I’m not scared.” She was silent for a moment. “You were dreaming, I think,” she told him.
“Oh?” He gave her a half smile. “Tell me about it. But let’s go back upstairs first.”
When they reached the upstairs bedroom, Aidan realized the first pale streaks of dawn were just beginning to break in the east. He kept trying to shake the feeling of vulnerability; it was a new sensation, and one he didn’t like. And he didn’t want to talk about his dream yet, he realized; he wasn’t ready.
“Hey, I’m just going to pop into the shower,” he told Kendall, who was still watching him with concern. “I’m sorry, I’m being rude. Do you mind if I go first?”
“You’re more than welcome to the first shower. I’ll run down and put some coffee on,” she said.
She seemed to understand that he needed to regroup, he thought, and found himself feeling closer to her than ever, even as he stepped away.
He turned the showerhead on full blast. He tried to shake the feeling that something about the dream had been real.
“Where the hell is Freud when you need him?” he asked himself aloud.
Kendall was perplexed. It wasn’t just that Aidan had been in the midst of a nightmare; everyone dreamed, and some dreams were bound to be bad.
But his eyes had been open. He had spoken Amelia’s name.
She’d been awakened by…something to discover that he’d gotten out of bed and was standing in the middle of the room. When she had touched his arm, he had shaken her off and started walking toward the door. She’d followed and seen him start down the stairs. She had called his name. She had touched him. Finally she had all but shouted in his ear, and had grabbed his arm and shaken it as hard as she could. Only then had he turned to her. Blinked. Awakened.
She measured coffee into the pot, knowing that Aidan’s dream wouldn’t have bothered her so much if Ady hadn’t come to her and warned her about her own dream. There was evil in this house. Ady had said so, had said that
Amelia
had said so, that the evil hadn’t always been there but now it was.
And that it was coming for her.
Rubbish. The house was just a house, and she and Aidan were the only ones there.
She still found herself thinking about Miss Ady’s words, though.
No one had died at the plantation in years. Amelia’s parents had both died in the hospital. No one had been buried here since then, until Amelia. So whose ghost was supposed to be the newly arrived evil entity? It just didn’t make sense.
She wished Sheila were home. Sheila knew all about the house, but she wasn’t due home until sometime this weekend. But maybe, with or without Sheila, she should head over to the historical society where her friend worked and see what she could discover on her own.
Was she actually admitting that there might be ghosts in the house? she asked herself.
The coffee was ready, so Kendall thoughtfully poured herself a cup and turned.
A man was standing there. Tall, lean, wearing a flannel shirt, breeches and suspenders, a worn straw hat on his head. His eyes were a sad and watery green, and his skin was the color of café au lait. And she was absolutely certain she had seen him before.
At the bar, though he dressed differently there.
But he was the same man.
He was staring at her, but she wasn’t afraid, because the sadness in his eyes took away any thought of fear.
She tried to speak, but before she could make a sound, she blinked—and he was gone.
Her hand was shaking so hard that she had to set her cup down. She looked all around the kitchen, then ran to the back door, which was still securely locked. She turned and rushed around the lower level of the house, checking every window. Then she hurried to the front door. As she neared it, she backed away in horror. The door was opening.
By the time he had finished with his shower, Aidan had reconciled everything in his mind. He knew from Kendall that Amelia had been a kind and caring woman. He knew what she looked like, because there was a picture of her in the family gallery in the formal dining room. So the dream made total sense. He was certain that Jenny Trent—and probably at least some of the others—had been murdered in this vicinity. And though all he’d found so far were the two thighbones from two different women, he was willing to bet that those bodies had been disposed of here at the plantation or nearby. And what he needed was to find the rest of her body. His dream had been a subconscious push to do just that.
He stepped out of the shower, vigorously towel-dried his hair, then got dressed. He planned to drive Kendall into town to open her shop for the day, then come back and explore the family plot more thoroughly. If he’d found one bone, the rest of the woman had to be somewhere. He made a mental checklist of the facts he considered certain: there was a killer on the loose, a clever killer who targeted women who were heading off on long trips. How did he do it? Most people were friendly, and those who frequented Bourbon Street tended to have a few too many drinks, which made them more talkative, helping the killer to figure out who fit his profile. It was likely, but not certain, that the killer haunted the Hideaway, the bar where Vinnie played, though it was possible he made the rounds of the Bourbon Street hangouts. Maybe the “evil” Amelia had been afraid of before she died had started with the killer disposing of his victims here, but did he lure them here first, then kill them, or kill them elsewhere and then bring the bodies here after?
He had just pulled on a clean pair of jeans when he heard his cell phone ringing from the pocket of the pair he had worn the day before. He extracted it and answered.
“Flynn.”
“Aidan?” a tentative female voice asked.
“Yes, sorry, Aidan Flynn. Who is this?”
“It’s Matty, Aidan. Jonas’s wife.”
“Matty, hi. What can I do for you?”
“Aidan, would you consider meeting me for a quick lunch or even just a coffee today?” she asked. “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t be asking. I know you must be busy, and I’m going to see you at the charity party tonight anyway, it’s just that…No, never mind. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t be calling you.”
He winced, remembering that Jeremy had told him that Jonas had been flirting at the bar, unaware that his wife was in the room.
“It’s all right, Matty.” He hesitated and glanced at his watch. He could take Kendall to work and meet Matty for half an hour, and still get back here with plenty of time to look around before he had to shower and dress for tonight.
“Matty, can I meet you just after ten?” he asked.
“Yes. Aidan, you won’t tell Jonas, will you?” she asked anxiously.
“No, Matty, not if you don’t want me to.”
They made plans, then hung up. Jonas was an idiot, Aidan thought, wondering what the hell he was going to say to Matty.
As he slipped into his shirt, he found himself wondering if Jonas was something worse than just an idiot.
Much worse.
Kendall backed away from door, almost screaming, and then it registered in her mind that she had heard a key turning in the lock.
She stopped herself from running and stood dead still, her eyes wide.
Sunlight poured in, and for a moment, all she saw was a tall silhouette in the doorway.
“Hey there!”
It was Zachary Flynn, she realized, and he seemed as surprised to see her as she was to see him.
“Hey,” she returned. It was definitely an awkward moment, but she wasn’t as frazzled as she might have been even an hour ago. After all, he wasn’t a total stranger who appeared out of thin air and disappeared in the blink of an eye.
A stranger, who looked at her with such sad eyes, and who hung out at the Hideaway at night.
Zachary seemed to take her presence in stride. “So where’s Aidan?” he asked cheerfully.
“He’s upstairs,” she said.
He nodded. “Mmm. I smell coffee.”
“In the kitchen,” she said.
Aidan made his appearance just then; she heard his footsteps on the stairway and felt him come up behind her. “Hey, Zach.”
“I’ll just run up and shower and get ready. Saturday is one of our busy days,” she said. No point in pretending she’d just dropped by. Given her current apparel, it was more than obvious that she had slept here….
“Excuse me,” she mumbled, and fled.
When she came back down a little while later, she found the brothers in the kitchen, talking.
“It’s a ridiculous threat,” Aidan was saying.
“What’s a ridiculous threat?” she asked, going for a second cup of coffee.
“Jeremy got a caller last night who knew we were thinking of having another benefit out here, which is kind of strange because we haven’t really talked about it. Not that it was a secret. I mean, we’ve all mentioned it to someone. But the guy had a really creepy voice and said we were all going to die if we brought people out here for a party.”
“Maybe it was our guy with the voodoo-doll fetish,” Zach said.
“Maybe,” Aidan agreed.
“Wouldn’t that make him…kind of a nutcase?” Kendall asked.
“Oh, yeah,” Aidan agreed. “And it just means we’ll work all the harder to have this place ready for Halloween.”
“So you’re into the idea now, too?” Zach asked.
Aidan grinned. “Nothing like telling me I
can’t
do something to make me want to do it.” He took a long swallow and finished his coffee. “Listen, Zach. I’ll be back in a few hours. I just have to take Kendall in and meet someone for coffee. While I’m out, will you ask the contractor to talk to the electrician about getting some wiring into that far back shack?” He paused. “And if our tenant is still out there, would you let him know? I told him yesterday that he could stay, that we’d work something out.”
“I’ll take a walk back there, see if I find him,” Zach assured him.
“And if you have a chance, go through the rest of those files you pulled off the computer. See who you can call to get any information about the other women who’ve disappeared. See if they actually made it here to New Orleans.”
“Will do,” Zach said.
As they left, the drive was beginning to fill up with the various subcontractors’ vehicles.
Kendall looked back at the house as they drove away. It was gleaming white and beautiful in the sun. And it was just a house.
A house where she had seen a mysterious man in the kitchen.
“Are you all right?” Aidan asked, looking at her.
“Fine,” she told him quickly.
They were both silent for a moment.
“Are
you
all right?” she asked him then.
“Fine,” he said.
“You never told me about your nightmare.”
He shrugged. “I swear, I’ve never sleepwalked before. And the dream was…bizarre. I guess I’ve been getting obsessed with this case. I dreamed that Amelia was telling me that I had to help…someone.”