“I hope this alarm is bitchin’ loud,” she whispered.
Getting into place, they waited for their cue. Julian sent the text and aimed the flashlight beam at their target.
“Yeah, so do I.”
Kane and Christina had to wait. Bruce the butler was in the foyer, sorting mail that he had just brought in from the mailbox. His presence was a huge problem.
They needed to get rid of him.
When he still gave no indication of moving, Christina took things into her own hands. “You hide, and then hit the alarm. I’ll keep the butler busy.”
Heading over, she placed her hand on her stomach. “Bruce?” she called, trying to sound as sick as possible.
When he turned, he immediately looked worried. “Ma’am, what’s wrong? You don’t look well.”
Christina acted her heart out. “I’m really sick. This pregnancy is killing me. Do you think that you can help me to the kitchen? I feel a little woozy.”
He took her arm, doing just that. “We’ll have the chef make you some ginger tea.”
“Oh, Bruce, you are a godsend. My husband ran out to get me more lemon candy and should be back shortly.”
The man walked her carefully to the kitchen.
From the shadows of the corner, Kane smiled wickedly. He loved his woman.
Christina was damn good at her job.
When the coast was clear, he made his move. It was going to be now or never. He couldn’t risk someone else wandering in at that moment.
Heading to the door, he reached over and hit the button, and then ran for it.
As the alarm screamed, step one of the mission was accomplished.
Now, it was all up to the bosses to get it done.
* * *
Julian heard it, and even though it wasn’t super loud, he knew it would do the job.
Immediately, they began kicking.
The well placed shots did the job. The wood began cracking and splintering beneath their boots. They each managed to get in a good five or six shots before the alarm suddenly came to a stop.
“We’re through,” she whispered, as the dust began to settle. Tori had her shirt up over her mouth and nose, not wanting to breathe in any of the ancient dust, spores, or God only knew what. If she was having their child, that had to be her priority.
Julian tried not to inhale any of the floating debris as he watched the hole becoming clearer.
“We can fit through there,” he said, grateful that he wasn’t as big as Kane. It would be painful, trying to get the man squeezed through there. “Be careful of the splinters and rusty nails,” Julian warned, as he moved through the hole first.
Tori wasn’t far behind.
The dust was thick and there were enough cobwebs to hide a horde of spiders. Tori was accustomed to bugs and nasty things, but even this room gave her the willies. She hoped that some didn't take a ride back out in her hair.
“No one’s been here for a while,” she said, glancing around as Julian moved the flashlight beam.
The room was oddly empty with the exemption of one long crate.
“I don’t think the family knows this passageway exists,” she said.
Julian found the mechanism and touched it. It was rusted shut. “No one’s oiled this one either.” When he found the slide to open the peephole, he moved it and he couldn’t see anything.
“There’s something over it,” he added.
“Yeah, this is the space that time forgot.”
Julian pointed at the one thing there. “Except that box.”
Suddenly, the room got incredibly chilly and Tori shivered. “Do you feel that?” she whispered.
Julian did, but he wasn’t exactly happy about it.
Without warning, Tori went still. The music began playing, and she could hear it as clear as day.
“Jules, she’s here,” Tori whispered.
Yeah, he didn't like that at all.
“Bethany, I can’t help you if you get in my way,” she whispered. “Let me do my job.”
Julian watched his wife as she talked to the invisible spirit. The cold remained and that alarmed him. If Tori blacked out, they would have a problem.
Without warning, Tori jumped.
“What?”
The heat shot back through her body as she swore there was a hand on her belly. “I got it! You don’t have to remind me,” she hissed in irritation.
“What?” he asked again.
“She just touched my stomach. I think she’s trying to remind me that I owe her.”
“I hate pushy ghosts,” he said, trying to add some levity. His heart was pounding, and he didn't like that his wife was getting pawed at from the great beyond.
“I think she wants us to open that,” Tori said, motioning toward the crate.
“Yeah, so that makes me think one thing.”
He didn't have to say it, she already knew. “It’s not going to be empty.”
“Nope.”
Handing his wife the flashlight, he dropped to his knees to check out the situation. There were some small nails in the crate, but nothing they couldn’t handle.
But they needed to be quiet.
“Can I have your keys?” he asked, holding out his hand.
When Tori pulled them out, Julian got to work. Using the biggest key, he slowly worked the corners until he could slide his fingers into the gap.
Next, it was time to pull.
“On three,” he whispered, praying it would be empty.
When he counted down, Tori readied the beam. As Julian yanked it open, she stared into the crate. Yeah, it was pretty much what they expected.
There were bones.
“Well, I think we can knock one more thing off our mystery to-do list,” he stated.
“Yeah, I think we just found Bethany Duvaul’s final resting place.”
Chapter Twenty Six
Tori was amazed at the size of the woman in the box. It was hard to believe that at one point, she had been pregnant with a child. As she stared down into the makeshift coffin, sadness overwhelmed her.
This was just a child.
At seventeen, she had no business having a baby, and the way her life ended was a sad testament to the times.
The clothing that covered the skeletonized body hung sickly on the bones. Where it once fit Bethany, making her womanly, it now gave her a garish look.
The other thing that caught her off guard was the head. Her skull was misshaped on the one side. When she went to reach into the box, Julian grabbed her hand.
“No way! You’re not touching her,” he hissed. “The book is bad enough, but I’m not having her take permanent residence in my wife. Hands off!”
“I need to see her skull.”
“I’ll do it.” Reaching into the crate, he delicately moved her skull. It came away from the rest of her body easily. When he turned it over, the evidence of how she died was clear.
Someone had bashed her in the head with a very large object.
Now, it was coming together.
“The chef told us that the man who used to work in the kitchen would always see the puddle of blood. This kind of head trauma would leave a lot of blood,” Tori stated. “I bet she was killed there.”
“But by who?”
Suddenly, the breeze picked up and the cobwebs danced around them. Tori could once more hear the music and she knew what to do.
How it popped into her head, she didn't have a damn clue. It just did.
“Check her dress.”
Julian stared at her. “You want me to pat down a dead woman?” he asked, placing the skull back in the crate.
“If you don’t look, I’m going to have to do it. We don’t need me going into some hypnotic trance. Please, Julian,” she pleaded.
This was the last thing he thought he would be doing that day. Running his hands over the disintegrating dress, he found what his wife suspected was there. When Tori was right once more, by some ghostly intervention, it freaked him ou
t. There, tucked in a pocket of the skirt, was a note.
“Let me have it,” she whispered, as she passed off the flashlight.
Julian watched her carefully, making sure that she stayed in the here and now. When her face didn't change, he momentarily relaxed.
Tori pulled the embossed envelope open. In the front was a faded gold ‘H’. There was no doubt who it once belonged to. This girl arrived at this makeshift grave by one of the Hesser’s hands. Now, it was a matter of finding out which one.
‘Here lies Bethany Duvaul. She died because of me. I found her in the house and in a jealous rage, I struck her. I believed her to be having an affair with one of my staff, since we weren’t supposed to be meeting. In anger, I took my mistress’s life.
She died in my arms. I’m the one who murdered her. May God have mercy on my foul soul.’
Joseph Hesser
They didn't see that one coming.
“Wow, I would have bet on the wife being the one who offed her,” stated Julian. “I really believed that she had something to do with this.”
Tori had to agree. “Yeah, keep this in mind,” she warned, referring to the fact that if he ever picked up some side action, it would end pretty much the same.
Julian kissed her on the tip of the dusty nose. “That’s never going to happen. I don’t cheat, and I certainly don’t have affairs when my wife carries a gun most of the time.”
Tori wouldn’t argue with that.
“Well, we found her and the confession, now what?” Tori asked. “We can’t leave her back here.”
Julian thought about it. “We also can’t tell anyone. If we do, our cover is blown. How do we explain we were wandering around in the passageways?”
He had a point.
“Plus, the killer shoved your jeans under that boarded up crack. We don’t know if they were aware of what was here, or if it was just a fluke.”
Tori placed the note in her back pocket and pulled out her phone to snap some photographs just in case the bones went missing. Now that the passage was open, anyone could wander in here. “We’re not leaving you, Bethany. We have to figure out how to get you out of here. We’ll be back.”
Julian stared at her. “I want to go on record and say that’s creepy. It makes me want to wig out.”
She laughed. “You should feel what I’m experiencing then. She’s in my damn head.”
That didn't offer him much reassurance. “Okay, let’s text Kane and Christina and get back to our room. We need to work out a plan.”
“I think we need to call the sheriff. At least, then our asses are covered.”
That was probably a good idea. Then, they could at least say that they went to the cops. “Works for me,” Julian said, taking his wife’s hand in his as he led her out of there.
They further away they got, the happier he was going to be.
Good riddance to the dead.
* * *
Kane and Christina were waiting there for them when they came back. They sat anticipatorily on the bed, dying to hear all about it. They must have been a mess, because both of their team members stared at them.
“Did you roll in dust?” Kane asked, taking in their appearance.
“No, but we’re covered in cobwebs.”
When Tori pulled the note from her pocket, she let them read it. Nothing more was said until they both finished and stared up at her.
“So, you found her?”
They nodded.
“We’re awesome,” stated Christina. “We got the book, the ghost mystery is solved, and we can lay her to rest.”
“Yeah, and get home.” That was Kane’s favorite part.
“We need to get Beckett Rand here. He’s going to have to help us work through this,” Julian stated.
Kane thought about it. “Tell him to climb the tree. The women have to head down to get their hats soon, so we three can deal with the dead girl, and they can be our eyes and ears.”
That was a good idea.
Tori headed toward her suitcase. She couldn’t deal with it looking like this. For now, she would clean up and play debutant with the rest of the women. “Give me ten minutes.”
Grabbing something more girly, she figured that she’d dress for the night. Since they had the BBQ to go to later, Tori might as well kill two birds with one stone. Heading into the shower, she closed the door.
Julian pulled out his phone to make the call. On the third ring, Beckett answered.
“It’s Julian. We have a BIG problem. We need you to come here and be sneaky.”
“What kind of problem?” he asked, closing the journal that he was flipping through. With his hand, he dismissed Deputy Tadd Marston, so he could take the call in private.
“We found something, and you need to see it.”
He didn't think that they would be wasting his time, so he figured he needed to get there. “I can head over there.”
“You need to sneak up to our room. Getting in the gate will be easy. You can say you’re there to interview. Outside our window is a giant tree. Climb it and head in through the balcony on the second floor.”
Beckett was both alarmed and curious. “Is this worth all the secrecy?”
Julian didn't hesitate when he answered. Generally, a body took priority over everything. “Oh, yeah.”
“I’ll be there in twenty minutes,” he answered, hanging up the phone.
“Now, we wait.”
* * *
When he arrived, he felt silly scaling a tree to get into their room. A part of him was hoping that this was some sort of joke, and not as ominous as he suspected.
As he swung his leg over the rail, he was met with the four people sitting inside the room.
“What happened?” he asked, looking from face to face.
Tori didn't speak, she simply walked toward him, handing the sheriff her cell phone.
When he scrolled through the pictures, he was shocked. “Holy shit! This is a full set of remains,” he whispered. “Where did you find it?”
They pointed at the wall.
Tori knew it was time for her and Christina to cut out. Returning to her husband’s side, she gave him a kiss. “Play nice with the sheriff and the dead woman,” she stated, leaving the room. Tori was very glad that she wasn’t going to have to head back down into that mess.
“Where are they going?”
“The women have to grab their derby hats,” Julian answered.
“What? You found a body, and now she’s off to play dress up?” That was astounding to him. Who did things like that?
“We have to keep our cover,” stated Julian. “That’s why we called you. We’re going to take you to the victim, but you can’t pull it out of here yet.”
“Why the hell not?”
Julian liked the man. He seemed genuinely good at his job. “Because you’ll blow our cover, and that can’t happen yet. We still need to figure out what happened to William Macavoy.”
That calmed Beckett down.
“When we roll out of here, you get to play hero and tell the world that you solved a hundred year old mystery.”
Taking the letter out of his pocket, he handed it to the sheriff. “Feel free to read the confession.”
Beckett carefully opened the letter and scanned the contents. When he finished, he looked up at the men and had to know. “Why are you handing me this present? You could take this to the media and be in the spotlight for years to come.”
Julian snorted. “Uh, we work undercover. The spotlight isn’t exactly our friend. In our jobs, we want to work without being noticed. You’ve played fair the entire time, so this one is all yours. Consider it a thank you gift from Littlemoon Investigations.”
He appreciated it. “Okay, take me to your dead victim.”
Julian sized him up. “I hope you don’t mind getting that white shirt dirty, Sheriff. The space is tight, and you and Kane are going to have to squeeze through.”
“I’m good with dirt.”
At the wall, Julian pulled out the knife. Popping the mechanism, it swung open and the sheriff’s mouth dropped open.
“Holy shit,” he muttered.
“Yep, this whole house is built on a maze of them,” Julian answered, leading the way. Kane was the last man in, closing the door behind him. “We have to whisper. We’re traveling alongside the hallways and people can hear us if we’re too loud.”
Beckett was too much in awe to say anything else. This was like an adventure. What he wouldn’t do to have a life where you walked through secret passages, found hundred year old victims, and solved the oldest mysteries.
“You have the best job in the world,” he finally said.
Neither man could disagree there.
“Again, my offer stands. We have job openings if you’re interested. Just track me down,” Julian stated once more.
Beckett buried that little offer in the back of his brain. He had always wanted to be a cop, but like many things in life, the fantasy lacked appeal after reality had set in. Police work, while very rewarding, was a lot of paperwork and very little excitement. This was something he needed to seriously mull it over.
As they headed through the corridors, there was a chill in the air. “It’s cold down here,” stated Beckett, as he moved closer to the room. The hair on the back of his neck stood up when they reached the newly opened passage.
“Are you kidding? It’s hot down here,” Kane muttered.
Julian glanced over his shoulder at the man positioned between Kane and himself. His eyes were glassy.
Uh oh! Julian saw trouble on the horizon. The signs were the same ones that he’d seen when looking at his wife. Beckett Rand was picking up the ghost vibes.
“Are you okay?” he whispered.
“Yeah, I’m good.” Beckett focused all his energy on the task at hand, trying to not think about the feelings he was getting.
Now wasn’t the time or place.
“It’s in here,” Julian said, squeezing through the opening. Once in, he began pulling some of the loose boards out of the way so Kane and Beckett could fit through.
Lost & Broken (LIttlemoon Investigations Book 2) Page 39
