“It’s bad, Julian.”
He didn't like the sound of that. “Bad like Tori finding a dead guy or…”
Christina took over for her fiancé, “When we searched his room, we found the things that you would normally expect from a couple on vacation. Then, we found the unexpected.”
“What?” Tori asked.
Kane picked up the story, “Stephen Snyder had a Glock in his suitcase. It was tucked into his socks.”
Neither Littlemoon moved at that little piece of news. If the man was carrying a gun that meant the stakes were higher now. They didn't only have to worry about being shoved off balconies, or bookcases crushing them, but now a bullet to the brain was a very big concern.
Tori was confused. “His wife told me today that they were from Georgia. There’s no way that they could get that gun on a plane. The TSA’s would have found it, even in checked luggage.”
Julian agreed.
“That’s odd, because I also found a rental receipt for their car. It has their home address, and it’s located not far from here. I thought it was odd to use a rental car if you lived locally, but we assumed that maybe they needed it to replace their personal one.”
“Or, they’re not who they say they are,” Tori added. “We’re all renting luxury vehicles to fit in. Look at our personal rides. We have standard vehicles. Christina and I have SUVs, Kane has a truck, and Julian a sedan. We’re pretending to be wealthy and a car is the sure fire way to pull that off, without waving around a bogus bank statement. We’re trying to fit in here at the Hesser House, and they may be doing the same thing too.”
“If they lived around here,” Julian began, “that would explain how they managed to conceal a weapon. They never got on a plane. Were there travel tags on the bag? You know, the ones the airport puts on before you board?”
Kane shook his head because he didn't recall seeing any.
“This is all getting weirder and weirder,” Tori said. “We have a man who was crushed to death after meeting with us, and now one couple is lying about their background and carrying a gun.”
“Did you find any weapons elsewhere in the room?”
Again, Kane indicated that he didn't. “I did have one other problem that you should be aware of,” he stated.
“Oh no, what?” Julian asked warily.
“It seems that the couple was expecting to have their room tossed. On the one corner of their suitcase, they had placed tape to ensure that it wasn’t opened or moved.”
“Well, shit.”
“I caught it and put it back the way it was left, but that’s not something a normal, unsuspecting person does on a daily basis.”
Christina spoke up, “Maybe they’re just paranoid.”
Tori disagreed. “Julian is the king of paranoia, and he didn't booby trap our room like that.”
Julian hated to burst her bubble. “Uh, I don’t use tape. That’s for amateurs. I use hair, and for the record, I did do that to our room. Hair is far less noticeable, and that’s why you probably didn't pick up on it.”
Well, so much for that theory. Long live the king.
“What about the man you found dead. What happened?” Christina asked.
Tori had an idea. “I took pictures, since we’ll never see the crime scene ones. Do you think that you can get anything from them, just by looking?”
She didn't turn around, even when she heard the rustling behind her. As the phone was slipped through the bramble and dropped beside her hip, Christina picked it up.
“Ignore the naked ones of Julian,” she teased.
“TORI!” he admonished, only making her laugh harder. With his wife, half the time he wasn’t quite sure if she was teasing or dead serious.
Julian looked horrified.
Christina snickered as she flipped through the photos. “They’re not bad shots, and I can see that he has a head wound to the side of his skull, but that’s about it. I don’t think anyone can tell if the bookcase did it, just by looking at it. The ME would have to check and measure the wound to see if it was a corner or an object that caused it.”
“Yeah, well, we’re out of luck here. I heard the ME telling the sheriff that ‘Poor William should have cleaned his place up more often, and he wouldn’t have been killed by his books’,” stated Julian.
“So, basically our killer is getting away with murder,” Tori stated disgustedly. The part of her that always wanted to balance the scales of justice was really pissed off over that.
“Pretty much.”
“Damn it!” Tori said, sighing. “This is a lot more than we assumed it was ever going to be. I didn't think we were going to be having run-ins with killers and ghosts. This was supposed to be a simple case of ‘find the book’.”
Julian was well aware. “The worst part is that we don’t know if William told anyone who we were, so we all need to watch our backs. Someone tried to hurt Christina already. I hate to be a pessimist, but that doesn’t bode well for what’s coming,” Julian stated.
“I don’t like this,” Kane said. Once more, he wanted to have Christina as far away from this as possible. The other side of the country was looking damn fine right about now.
“We’ll all be okay,” Tori reassured. “First, we need to figure out who killed William Macavoy. We can’t let his life end like this, and for nothing. Then, we need to figure out what the ghost and our client need from us.”
“Did you really hear the ghost?” Christina asked.
“Yeah, unfortunately.”
Julian glanced over at her and knew that he needed to warn his team. He mouthed ‘I’m sorry’, before telling them. “I’m afraid it’s worse than just hearing her.” He told them about Tori blacking out and the overly enthusiastic sex. He could only pray his wife would forgive him for sharing something so personal.
If their roles were reversed, he wasn’t sure that he would be so magnanimous.
Kane dropped his arm over Christina’s shoulders protectively. Now, he had one more thing to worry about. This husband and father thing just might be the death of him yet. It was bad enough before, but now he was in terror overdrive.
“Are you okay?” Christina asked, knowing that had to be terrifying for Tori.
“Yeah, I’m still a little freaked out. I think we both are,” she offered, hoping that she wasn’t alone in that boat. It would make her feel a little better if Julian was worried too.
When he took her hand reassuringly in his, she took a deep breath and relaxed.
“We have a shit mess going on here,” Julian said. “I don’t like coming into things that we’re not prepared for. I like to be ready for everything, and this pisses me off.”
“Man, we could use Vivian and a few of her dreams, right about now,” Kane stated.
“Yeah, tell me about it,” Julian replied.
Kane liked the reassurance of a plan. “What do we do next?”
“We watch our backs. Once we get that call from Elizabeth, we’ll know what we’re up against. Then, we can start eliminating people around us. The only thing that we know is Jamie Montgomery hired us, but she could have told someone on the staff, or they could have overheard us. We need to know what role Stephen and Katy Snyder are playing in all this. From day one, they’ve watched us like we’re prey, and I need to know why.”
Suddenly, Kane coughed into his hand, hiding his warning. Someone was definitely coming, and right at them.
Tori and Julian peered out of the bramble, knowing they couldn’t remain there. Up close, they’d be seen. “Work on those journals! We have one of our own to start to deconstruct. We’ll text you later,” he said.
Tori grabbed her phone, and Julian’s hand, as they slowly began moving away from the couple.
“Well, hello there!” said Lawson West, as he walked up with his wife, Candy. “How are you tonight?”
Kane tried to look as calm as possible, even though he was feeling none of it. In order to keep their cover, he needed to be as friendly as possibl
e. “We’re just enjoying the moonlight on the duck pond. It’s rather peaceful out here,” he said, protectively blocking Christina’s body, just in case.
“Congrats on your baby,” stated Candy. “Is it your first?”
She smiled genuinely at the couple. How could she not? Christina was over the moon about being a mommy-to-be. Then, add in that it was with the man of her dreams, life was perfect. “Yes, and I can’t wait,” she said, leaning into Kane.
Lawson West nodded. “It’s a terrible thing what happened in town today,” he started, trying to talk about the body.
Kane wasn’t having it. “I’m sorry, but the idea turns my wife’s stomach, and as you can imagine, we don’t want to make her morning sickness any worse. If you’ll excuse us,” he said, pulling Christina up to her feet. “Have a good night,” he added, before pulling her away.
They watched the couple walk away, mouths hanging open at how they’d been dismissed.
“I don’t think I’m coming here next year, Lawson. The guests here just aren’t friendly or our kind of people,” Candy said, when they were gone. “It’s a waste of our time.”
He had to agree with his wife on this one.
“Oh well, let’s continue our walk.”
* * *
Back in the room, Tori grabbed the bottle of wine that Bruce had left for them and headed into the bathroom. When Julian heard the shower running, he wanted to check on her. Opening the door a crack, he found Tori sitting on the floor, open wine beside her, and journal in her lap.
“Want company?” he asked, waiting to see what kind of mood she was in at that moment. All night, he could tell that she wasn’t feeling well. Her body language was all off, and once more there appeared to be a wall between them.
“Sure.”
Entering, he locked the door and sat beside her, his back resting against the tub. “Why are you in here?”
She took a sip of wine right from the bottle. It spoke volumes to her mood. Tori wasn’t one to ever drink copious amounts of liquor, and never like a wino on a bender. Booze made her feel out of control, and that was always a bad thing for her PTSD.
“Because this room is clean,” she stated. “I checked for passageways and since there’s no wallpaper, no one is watching us. This gives us the chance to look at the journal without being observed.”
He was impressed. “You’re pretty smart, Victoria.”
She shrugged, scanning the inside of the book.
Julian didn't know how to reach her. Already, he could feel another level of bricks going up between them. It reminded him of the first time she ran from him.
That memory scared him and made him want to weep.
He prayed that what they had formed, and lovingly built, would stand up under the pressure of what was happening around them.
“What’s in there?” he asked, taking a sip from the bottle. It was a little entertaining that they were drinking a very expensive vintage wine like that.
Yeah, the Littlemoons were classy as hell.
“It looks like the man’s personal diary. He has some of his thoughts in here. It wasn’t a daily journal. It spans a couple of years.”
“What’s the first entry?”
Tori flipped backwards in the book, until she found it.
September 1911
Today I married. I didn't really want to do it, but I was told it was family obligation. My father is dying, and I need to be the man of the household now. My mother picked a local girl. She’s pretty enough, but she’s bitter and cold. Whenever I try and kiss her, she pushes me away, like it’s some horrible sin. I can already tell that I’m going to regret this, but what choice do I have? Where I hoped to find love, I’ve only found ice. I want to laugh and cry at the same time, because we have more money than God, and the only thing that I want to spend it on is a wife, who I love, and I can’t.
I’m trapped and have no choice. My hell is about to begin.
JH
Julian was taken aback by the words. Where he was expecting arrogance and cockiness, he was shocked that the man had been so candid in his feelings.
“Wow! He just wanted love.”
Tori turned the page. “Yeah, I guess we know why he cheated on Cherie as much as he did. He was trying to find that one person who mattered to him in his life.”
It needed to be said. “What if Bethany was that woman?” he asked.
Tori wanted to be disgusted that a man in his thirties was having a dalliance with a seventeen year old girl, but then she thought about it. If Julian was seventy, she would still love him. Maybe love was blind to age. “It could be.”
“We have a lot to work on,” Julian stated.
Tori glanced up at him. She didn't think that he only meant the case. “Yeah, we do,” she answered, closing the book and placing it back in the plastic protection. “I’m tired, Julian. Let’s go to bed.”
He helped her up, and together they brushed their teeth. Julian still couldn’t shake the feeling of dread as he watched the only woman who he would ever cherish, push away from him.
He prayed that love would lead her back.
For both of their sake.
It occurred to him. Julian was a lot like Joseph Hesser. All he wanted was love, and now it seemed to be slipping away.
* * *
Nineteen Fourteen
There was no peace.
The music wouldn’t stop.
No matter what she did, or what room she went and hid in with her child, it never went away. There was singing and the haunting melody.
Cherie was all alone.
She couldn’t say anything to her husband anymore. He didn't want to hear it. Where she thought she was being tormented, something more sinister chased him. She could see it in his eyes.
There was no kindness left.
It was nothing but hollow emotions.
The medicine, which the doctor prescribed, made her groggy and discombobulated. In fact, the pills drugged their child as he breast fed.
So, like any good mother, she stopped them. When the maid would bring them, she’d place them beneath her tongue and pretend to swallow them. Once the woman was gone, she placed them down the drain.
Not that it mattered. While taking the pills, they didn't work. The singing continued.
The touching kept happening.
There was nothing that could save her, short of running away from the mouth of hell with her son.
Yet, she knew the truth. He wouldn’t let her take him. In a heartbeat, he would set her free, but the babe would have to remain.
It wasn’t happening.
Over her dead body.
As long as she couldn’t take her son, she had no other choice. She would stay and fight the unseen.
Needing a distraction, she wandered down to the lounge and the grand piano. It had been a present from her father on their wedding day.
Joseph hated it.
Whenever he would hear the soft music coming from it, he would be trapped in a rage. In fact, he had declared no one to ever touch it.
But, she couldn’t help it. It gave her peace. Maybe now if she played, it would drown out the sounds of the singing. Since he wasn’t home, it wouldn’t matter.
Sitting behind the keys, she slowly began playing a song. It was the first which came to mind.
It was the one song that meant something to her.
On their wedding day, it was the song that they danced to. Even then, she knew he wasn’t going to be the man for her, but what choice did she have? At that point, she resigned herself to accepting what was meant to be.
Besides, at least she was wealthy and could have anything she wanted.
Except love.
Oh, and her husband.
Since impregnating her, he hadn’t touched her again. That was okay, since she received the best gift ever.
Her child.
Playing more and more, the sounds suddenly stopped. All that remained was the piano music in her ears. For the f
irst time, there was peace.
Then, the air got cold.
A breeze touched the back of her neck, and she was scared. There was wave after wave of dizziness assaulting her, and she already knew why.
Breathing out, her breath formed a misty cloud as it floated from her lips.
Cherie wasn’t alone anymore.
If she opened her eyes, the dead woman would be haunting her once again. Not willing to run in her own home, she defiantly kept going.
At first, it was all normal.
Then…
There was more laughter.
More singing, and when she glanced down at her beloved piano, it had changed. Gone were the ivory keys, and in their place were jagged broken ones. Across the lovely white, was now a splattering of blood and red fingerprints.
The laughter continued.
Cherie couldn’t take any more. Staring down at her fingers, the blood began to cover them.
Once again, the dead woman had won.
Opening her mouth, the most horrible scream escaped her lips.
Then, the blackness came as she tumbled.
Cherie fell into the nothingness and finally, for that brief moment she had peace.
* * *
Early Thursday
As her body slid silkily across his, the panic and fear welled up inside him. It was like a repeat performance, and the terror was back that the woman touching him wasn’t the one who he loved with all his heart.
He was sure that two doors down, they could hear his heart pounding in his chest. It was like the staccato of angry drum beats, filling his ears.
Julian took the chance, knowing he needed to face his fears. Opening his eyes, he stared up at Tori, searching for any sign of reassurance.
If he could find it, maybe he could carry on.
When she woke, she knew that she needed to fix this. Normally, they would be cuddled together but that morning, Julian was across the bed with no contact.
Lost & Broken (LIttlemoon Investigations Book 2) Page 18
