The Girl and the Cursed Lake (Emma Griffin FBI Mystery Book 12)

by A J Rivers

  "Where is Elsie?" he asks carefully. "I'd like to tell her how excited I am."

  Laura shakes her head. "No, no. Now, you know you can't see the bride before the ceremony. It's bad luck."

  "Okay," he says, taking a few steps into the water and holding both his hands out toward her. "Then just come up here with me."

  My hand goes to my gun as she lets him take her hands. The two of them start slowly walking out of the lake. I take a step back and get my walkie out to call Sam.

  "You're going to need to call for backup," I say calmly and quietly.

  "Everything okay?"

  Before I can answer, a high-pitched sound slices through the air and Dean throws his back into a dramatic arch. The sight of the arrow sticking out of Dean's back is so surreal I almost can't process it. He tips forward and Laura screams as he collapses into her arms. She stumbles under the weight of his body, struggling to stay on her feet.

  Her frantic eyes lift to mine and search my face as if she's desperately asking for help but can't form the words. The walkie talkie drops from my hand, and I run forward as Laura's knees start to buckle, and she drops toward the water.

  I grab onto him and try to hold him up. His head drops back, his eyes rolling as he fights to stay conscious. Blood pours from the wound through the back of his shoulder, soaking into his shirt.

  "Dean!" I shout into his face.

  Laura stumbles, continuing to sink down into the water as she tries to hold him. She looks up and gasps, her expression filled with fear.

  "No," she cries out, grabbing the front of Dean's shirt to try to pull him closer as she tumbles down into the dark water.

  My hand reaching for my gun, I spin around. Pain explodes in the side of my head, and the next thing I'm aware of is cold water and the taste of blood in my mouth.

  The taste is still there when consciousness creeps its way back in. I groan as I open my eyes and try to figure out where I am. My head throbs, and there’s a dank smell around me that hits the back of my throat as I drag in a breath.

  Everything around me is dark. My backpack is gone, but I can feel the small flashlight shoved in my pocket. Hoping it still works, I fish it out and press the button. A beam of light hits a damp stone wall in front of me, and I shine it around to try to get an idea of where I am.

  What I find are piles of bones. Piles and piles. Sagging against the wall in front of me is a ripped, dirt-caked sleeping bag. Bones of a hand spill from the open mouth. Beside it, a skeleton curled in the fetal position still wears a blue and white sundress and a single shoe.

  As I get to my feet, I hear a shuddering breath a few feet away. Turning my flashlight beam, I catch a bloodied face in the light.

  “Oh my God, Elsie,” I say.

  Dropping down beside her, I put my flashlight in my mouth to hold it in place as I take her face in my hands.

  “Elsie,” I say. “Open your eyes. Look at me.”

  My voice is muffled, but I hope she can understand the words.

  She makes a groaning sound, trying to say something, but not having the energy to get it out.

  “Open your eyes,” I tell her. “I'm right here. My name is Emma, I’m with the FBI. You're going to be okay.”

  I take the flashlight out of my mouth and run the light over her to try to find the injury that's causing the blood to streak across her skin. It looks as though she struggled with whoever dragged her from the beach and has been fighting to stay alive since the moment they tossed her here. She also looks as if she’s close to losing the fight.

  Her hands and wrists are tied, and I quickly release them. I wasn't tied when I woke up. Either whoever brought me here didn't have the time to tie me, or didn't think I would survive long enough to need the precaution. I'll take that arrogance.

  “I'm going to get you out of here,” I say. “I'm going to send help.”

  She has just enough in her to nod.

  Careful not to step on any of the bones on the ground, I shine my light around, trying to figure out where I am. It looks like a collapsed shaft of some sort. An old well or a mine shaft. The pain in my head is making my stomach turn and makes me unstable on my feet, but I can't stop. Dean is still out there. If he's alive, he's not in a good way. That arrow ripped right through him and he was losing blood quickly. I need to find him.

  And I know exactly where to look.

  I just have to get out first.

  I shine my light directly above me and see what looks like a rope ladder a dozen feet up. A small, cracked bit in the wall could be an opening, but how the hell can I get up there? I reach up to grab at the slick, moss-covered wall, and pain shoots through my arm.

  I must have been dropped in here from above. Not brought in and set down. Dropped. I wonder how many of the other bodies in here were also dropped from ten feet up. If Elsie was one of them.

  Turning around, I sweep over more of the cave and see something in the distance. I walk over to it and notice it’s a wall of loose rock. I pull at it and it begins to crumble, but there is more solid rock behind it. Damp, cold airstreams in through a tiny prick in the wall of hardened rock, and I recoil. But there is another scent there with it. The smell of water. Of hot, muggy summer air.

  Looking around me, I search for something blunt. All I have is my flashlight, and if I break it, I’ll be in the dark. It’s tough, though, not the cheap plastic or rugged rubber ones like survivalists have, but heavy and metal like cops carry. I bought it on a whim at a cop supply shop, just because I liked the heft. In case I needed to throw it at something.

  Or smash something with it.

  I take a deep breath and swing hard. The sound of collapsing rock rumbles down beyond where I hit, but I can’t stop. I swing again, smashing the bottom of my hand when I hit it. It vibrates my arm, and I have a sudden flash of hitting a baseball with a metal bat and feeling the jolt for hours. It’s like that, only worse. Panic is rising in my throat.

  I hit the button to turn on the light. It flickers but comes on. Pointing at the weak spot in the wall, I see the hole is open, maybe six inches. I have to keep going. I have to see if there is a way out.

  I swing again and again, sounds of effort filling the cave. I glance behind me once to see Elsie, curled up against the wall, her eyes almost empty as she watches me.

  Suddenly, I hear something collapsing behind the wall. I shine the light toward it and watch as the hole opens by about two feet. Just enough to squeeze through.

  I jump into it, wiggling until I make it inside.

  This isn’t a cave. It’s a mine shaft. A collapsed one.

  And ahead of me, deep in the distance, I see a pinprick of light. I run toward it, tripping over abandoned equipment, shining my light ahead of me to find my way along a track. It ends where the light was streaming in just a few feet above. Boards block a hole, but they are old and brittle. Soaked by rain and snow and aged by the summer sun for many years.

  My shoulder howls in pain from where I was dropped, but the boards splinter and fall apart as I smash into them. I collapse on wet moss, at the mouth of the abandoned mine overlooking the campgrounds. I don’t know exactly where I am, but I think I can figure it out.

  I click my flashlight. The light flickers again but stays on.

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  The park feels impossibly massive as I make my way to the dark trees. I have no idea where I am or how I'm supposed to get back to the campground. But I can't stop. I can't pause and think about it. I have to just put one foot in front of the other and keep going.

  An idea flashes through my mind. It's unlikely, but it's all I have. Taking my phone out of the bra pocket where I've learned to keep it, I open it and check the bars. There's just enough, and I send up a quick thank you. I may not believe in the supernatural, but I’ll take all the help from the universe or spirits or ghosts or whatever I can get at this point.

  “Please,” I murmur. “Please work.”

  I click through a series of commands and
a map appears on my screen. I nearly cry in relief.

  “Thank you, Xavier. Thank you for all of your disturbing people tracking ways.”

  I don't know how long the signal is going to last, so I move as quickly as I can, simultaneously following the map and trying to memorize directions. I'm not too far from the campground, but it's going to be a hike. Praying I can push myself through it, I follow the tracker connected to Dean's phone.

  He told Xavier to stop tracking him, but I'm thankful Xavier tends to take instructions as being temporary. Of course, considering why we came out here, Dean might have given him permission to reinstate the tracking. I don't care. I don't care why he did it or why it's working. All that matters is for this moment, I have a path in front of me to follow, and I hope with everything in me, he's at the end of it. That I still have a chance.

  I want to try to call Sam, but I'm afraid to take my eyes away from the map. I got in touch with him over the walkie-talkie. He knows I need him. I can only hope backup is headed to the campground or is already there. I don’t know how long I’ve been gone.

  All too soon, the reception disappears and I'm on my own. I have to try to remember what I saw, remember how to get through the inky black trees and potential dangers at every turn. Finally, I find myself on a path. I shine my flashlight down it and choose my direction with the shreds of confidence I'm dragging up and forcing into every step.

  Deep in my heart, I keep calling out to Dean. I gather every bit of positivity, every bit of good energy I possibly can, and force it through to him. I don't know what it means. But I know he's out there. I know we're connected, and maybe he'll somehow feel it.

  The path doesn't lead me directly to the campground, but around to the back to the other side of the lake and the cabins decaying there. A light glows in a boarded-up window of one of them. It's the cabin Laura pointed out, the one she stayed in every time she came to the park. Cabin 2.

  I glance down at my phone, but there's no more signal. Stuffing it back in place, I make my way to the cabin. There's only one door, and I step in front of it. Usually, I would take the time to try to look in the windows or find a subtle way to get inside.

  Not this time. I don't know what's on the other side of the door, but it doesn't matter. It's a risk I’m going to have to take. Grabbing onto the support beams on either side of the porch, I brace myself and kick the door, just under the doorknob, as hard as I can. It splinters and I rush inside.

  The first thing I see is Laura sitting on the floor in the middle of the living room, cradling an unconscious Dean in her arms. She rocks him back and forth like a baby, looking down into his face and stroking her fingers down his cheek. Tears stream from her eyes as she sings to him.

  I recognize it as the same tune she was singing on Elsie's footage, and when she was standing in the lake. I can only imagine the nights when she held Aaron in her arms and sang the same song to him.

  “Laura,” I say.

  She looks up at me and shakes her head.

  “You can't be here,” she says. “You can't be here. You have to go.”

  “I came for Dean,” I say. “You need to let him go now.”

  “My son,” she whispers. “My baby. He just came home.”

  “Laura, that isn't your son,” I say.

  I can't play along anymore. Dean isn't moving. He isn't responding to anything around him, and I don't know how much time he has. I have to get him out of here.

  "You need to go," she repeats in a desperate whisper. "Go."

  "I'm not leaving without Dean."

  "You have to go. Don't let him find you here."

  "Who?" I ask.

  “Rodney.”

  A door at the back of the cabin crashes, and I turn toward it. My hand instinctively goes to my hip, but my gun is gone. The man coming into the room has fire in his eyes, and they burn into me. I square off in front of him. I didn't see his face, but I know this is the man who hit me and the one who shot Dean.

  The edges of his face are different, but I can still see the boy in the pictures. This is Laura's older son. Aaron's brother.

  "Don't hurt her," Laura says. "She'll leave. Just let her go."

  "No, she won't. She's not just going to walk away from here and leave him," he says. "She's a cop."

  “There's one thing you're right about. I'm not just going to walk away from here and leave him. But I'm not a cop. I'm FBI,” I say.

  “Just go,” Laura asks desperately. “Just go.”

  “I'm not going anywhere. Laura, I need you to listen to me. That is not your son.”

  “Yes, it is,” she practically wails. “Stop it.”

  “It's not,” I say curtly.

  “Stop saying these things,” she begs.

  “His name is Dean Steele. He is my cousin. Aaron is dead. He died when he was a little boy.”

  “Stop it,” Laura says. “Don't say that. He's right here. My Aaron is right here.”

  "No," I say, shaking my head. "Laura, I need you to listen to me. You didn't do anything wrong. You didn't cause Aaron's death. It was an accident. It was horrible, and I know you miss him. But you didn't do it. It wasn't your fault. And you couldn't save him. But you can save Dean. He's alive right now. But I don't know how much longer that's going to last. He needs a doctor. He needs help. Let me take him to help.”

  “He's fine,” Laura sobs.

  “Then why are you crying?” I ask.

  “I'm happy he's home.”

  “He's not home,” I say. “Listen to me, Laura. This is not your son.”

  I take a step towards them, and Rodney lunges at me. It forces me back and deeper into the dimly lit living room. He's positioned between me and the door to the cabin now. I can't get out. But from this vantage point, I notice my backpack on the side of the room. On the floor beside it is my gun. He must have tossed both of them aside without thinking.

  "Stop talking to her like that," Rodney says. "He's not going anywhere. Neither of you are. We're here now. We're a family again. You aren't going to ruin that."

  For the first time, I really look at his face, and I realize I've seen it more recently than in the pictures of when he was young.

  "You did the project with Adrian," I say. "You made sure those pictures were captioned as having Aaron in them."

  "He was," Rodney says.

  "No," I say, shaking my head. "You know he wasn't."

  Laura lets out a sob, and I look over at Dean. He's sweating heavily and his skin is pale. The blood isn't running as freely now, but the stain running down Laura's leg and the pool on the floor beneath him is too much.

  "Aaron," she whispers, looking down at him again. "My baby boy. We're going to be so happy."

  "Is he breathing?" I ask. She doesn't answer. I raise my voice louder. "Is he breathing?"

  "He's okay," she says. "He's going to be just fine. I just wish it didn't hurt. I don't want to see my baby in pain."

  "He's not okay," I say. I drop down into a crouch. Rodney steps toward me, and I send a glare up to him until he steps back. "Laura, look at me."

  She lifts sad, aching eyes to me.

  "Please." The word creaks out of her, barely getting past her raw lips.

  "You know, Laura. Look at him. You got friends for him. Toys. Everything he loves. Because you want your son to be happy. Look at Dean. Does he look happy?"

  "He will be," she whispers.

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  “I have spent my entire life in my brother’s shadow. My entire life doing my mother’s bidding and bringing him things. Bringing him people. Bringing him friends, just to keep her happy. So much blood. So much blood,” he says, his voice trailing a bit. His eyes search the wood floor of the cabin as if he is seeing the faces of those he killed.

  His mother puts her hand on his leg, and he flinches until she takes it away. My eyes keep darting down to the gun at his feet. I hope he is too distracted to notice I am doing it. Getting to the gun might be my only chance, and I need
to get him distracted enough that I can get to it. But he’s standing between me and it.

  “Rodney,” Laura starts, her voice returning to the elderly, sweet sound it had when I first met her. It seems like a year ago, and yet it was only a day.

  “Mama, stay out of this,” he warns her.

  “Rodney, you listen to Mama, now,” she says a little more sternly. “Let her go. She doesn’t need to be here. Let her go.”

  “No, Mama. I can’t let him get away again.” Rodney says. “This woman wants to take him away. She wants to take him away from you, Mama. She wants to hurt our family.”

  I keep my eyes on the gun. His feet shuffle as he paces the step or two between his mother and the gun. Dean is unconscious on the floor, blood still oozing from his wound. How much time does he have left?

  “Shh, baby. No one is taking you away again,” she says, her focus back to Dean. “You’re such a good boy.”

  “Rodney,” I say, my voice feeling like gravel in my throat. “Rodney, he is going to die. We need to put something on his wound at least, so he doesn’t bleed out.”

  “Shut up!” he explodes at me. “You aren’t going to ruin this for us. I’ve spent too long. Too long! I almost had him that summer when he was thirteen. I was so close, but he got away. He slipped through my fingers. Mama was so sad! Too many people were there to try again. Always too many people. But not now. He’s finally home and Mama is happy. That’s all that matters.”

  There is a sudden crackle of sound and everyone freezes. The sound is coming from my chest and I realize there is something on the inside pocket of my jacket. Something square and heavy. I slowly reach in, Rodney’s eyes watching my every move. I unzip the pocket and grab the metal case and pull it out.

  It is one of the ghost hunting devices Xavier had been working on. He must have stuffed it down in my pocket at some point. A spinner dial in the center keeps rolling through numbers. I recognize the pattern as radio stations. It is scanning radio stations.