The Departed

by Shiloh Walker

  Fortunately, he had the willpower to keep from blurting that much out. However…he could do something for her. “I’ll see what I can do about getting you a place to stay. Since you’ve signed the contract, we will pick it up.”

  Finding a place wouldn’t be an issue. His family had had its hands in everything—including real estate. He didn’t give a damn what happened to the money, but he did pay attention, simply because it was his responsibility. One of the rental houses had gone vacant a few weeks earlier—he’d gotten the e-mail from the lawyer who handled everything. As far as he knew, it was still sitting empty. She could stay there, once he’d made sure it was in decent shape.

  It was better than a hotel, at least.

  But in the meantime, they needed to find a place where she could give her statement. Shit.

  “Stop glaring at me,” Dez muttered.

  “I’m not glaring at you.” Shit. He probably was. Then he sighed and looked away. “How did you end up out here, Dez?” Here—now. Why the hell here and why the hell now?

  “You’ve already figured out the answer to that. Why do you need me to spell it out?”

  “Maybe because it’s not adding up.” He looked back at her and lifted a brow. “And maybe because you’re not telling me everything.”

  She wrinkled her nose at him. Then she jammed her hands in her pockets and started to walk, ignoring the restaurant and walking down the sidewalk like she didn’t have a destination or a goal in mind. He fell in step beside her. “Aren’t you hungry?”

  “After your little display back there? Hell, no. I may not eat for a week.” She hunched her shoulders up and shuddered. “His name was Tristan. A nice kid. Strong. You know that saying, ‘Only the good die young’? I swear, it could have been written with him in mind. This kid…Taylor, he was good. I’m talking solid-gold good. He stayed for one reason: that girl. He needed to save her and he wasn’t going anywhere until he did it. He couldn’t move on.”

  “So he knew about her. All along.”

  “Yeah.” She lifted her head, staring off into the distance. “If you go back through the obits, or talk to people around here, they’ll tell you he killed himself. They’ll tell you, ‘What a shame, we don’t get it. He was such a bright, nice young man.’ And he was—he was a nice kid, would have been one hell of a man. And they are right…they don’t get it. They are clueless. That boy didn’t kill himself. They killed him. Those boys who put that girl in there. They killed him because he didn’t want to go along with their little prank…and he wasn’t going to allow it. They killed him to shut him up.”

  “Fuck.” He closed his eyes as he realized what she was saying. He’d already assumed one kid had been involved, but as a prank? A fucking prank? And they’d killed another to silence him. Taylor closed his eyes. “You’re certain.”

  “Yeah. Pretty damn certain.” She licked her lips and shot him a narrow glance. “There was a boy yesterday, when I was getting ready to go up in that fort thing—he had on some sort of security uniform, and his name tag read Danvers. That ring any bells?”

  “There is a Mark Danvers on staff. He’s eighteen, works in the security department at the hotel.” Taylor frowned absently, going through his mental files, ticking off the faces until he came to the right one. “Skinny kid. Dark hair, cut short.”

  “That sounds right. He saw me. Could have called for the rest of security, done something to stop me from climbing out there…slowed me down a lot. But he didn’t.” She stopped now and turned to him. A cold wind kicked up, blowing through her short, dark hair. “He knew. He’s involved somehow and he was scared to death, but he knew. And when he figured out what I was up to, he was relieved. Somebody needs to talk to that boy, and they need to do it without his buddies around. Soon, too, because if the others would kill to go through with their plan…what are they willing to do to protect their secrets?”

  Taylor didn’t even want to think about that.

  * * *

  MARK waited thirty minutes before he slipped out of the house. He took his bike. He didn’t ride much anymore. Not since he’d started hanging with Brendan and Beau—the Mustang was so much cooler than a fucking bike—but as he pulled on the cold-weather gear he used to use back when he biked all over these roads, he felt some of the stress easing away.

  He never should have started hanging out with them.

  Never should have gotten so caught up in the idea of that shit. He knew it now, wished he’d seen then. Out in the garage, it was chilly, but he ignored it. He lived five miles outside of town. It wouldn’t take him long on the bike, but man, he was going to freeze his ass off. He grabbed an extra fleece from the wall and tugged it on as he laid out the plan.

  He’d look for her, first. Look for the woman, and then if he didn’t find her…shit. He didn’t know. Maybe the guy he’d seen hanging around. The blond guy. He wasn’t from town, but there’d been something about him. Or maybe Luther. Luther would know what to do. Luther always had the answers. Shit. He’d figure it out on the ride. Riding always cleared his head.

  The air laid into him with a cold bite, one that he welcomed. For the first half of the ride, he didn’t make himself think, not at all. He just rode and let his mind drift.

  But as he got closer to town, he made himself start thinking, made himself start trying to plan. If he couldn’t find the woman, and if he couldn’t figure out who the guy was, the next person was…who? Half the police department had their lips firmly plastered to the ass of Brendan’s father. He didn’t know who there he could trust. Luther seemed to be the right call, but Luther wasn’t a cop anymore. Still, he would know who to trust, Mark thought.

  So caught up in his thoughts, he was only dimly aware of the engine. He heard it, but he wasn’t paying attention the way he should. And it didn’t dawn on him until it was almost too late…it was coming way too fucking fast.

  At almost the last second, he jerked his head—saw the vehicle, that sunlight glinting off the Mustang’s gleaming windshield. Swearing, he jerked the handlebars. The wheel hit something and he went flying.

  * * *

  BEAU swiped a hand over the back of his mouth and told himself he hadn’t just done that. What the hell had he been thinking?

  He’d just seen Mark and lost it—the fucking pussy had said something. He knew it. They all knew it. All of them. Shit, shit, shit. Mark was the weak one; he was the one who’d talked. They needed to just stop pussyfooting around and deal with it before he fucked them all.

  He saw Mark lying crumpled on the ground and he gripped the gearshift—his hand sweating, his heart racing. He could do it now. Take care of it. It wasn’t like he didn’t have the vehicle for it.

  Up ahead, he saw something, though. Through the trees—sunlight glinting off paint.

  Shit. Heart racing, he pressed on the gas. Easy-like. Couldn’t let anybody see him peeling out of there, right?

  Shit. What the fuck did he do now? Wasn’t like he’d hit Mark or anything, right? He’d go talk to Brendan. Brendan would know what to do.

  CHAPTER TEN

  S O close to time.

  I wanted a more peaceful day for us, my pretty angel. My only.

  But it was tomorrow, and it would seem there was no peace coming anytime soon. It was a concern, because unrest made people jumpy, made them look.

  Not that there was much to see, after all. But still, it was a concern. But no one that would stop this special day. It only came once a year, after all.

  * * *

  YOU stupid motherfucker. Brendan stared at Beau, resisting the urge to get up and wrap his hands around the idiot’s neck and just squeeze. “What in the hell were you thinking?”

  “We know it’s him,” Beau said simply, staring at Brendan with a blank look. Like he wanted some sort of pat on the head.

  “And your point is…?”

  “What are we supposed to do? Just be quiet and not say anything?” Beau shook his head. “We
got to do something before he runs his mouth.”

  Across the room, Kyle laughed. “Shit, you’ve taken one hit too many in football, Beau. Anything happens now, it automatically looks worse for us, and since we’re all friends, it looks worse on all of us. Can you at least tell us he hit his head hard enough that he won’t remember what happened?”

  Beau reached up and scratched at his scalp, looking confused.

  “Guess we can take that as a no,” Kyle muttered.

  Brendan sighed. Kyle swore and then looked at Brendan. “What the fuck do we do now?”

  Brendan shook his head and stared at Beau for a long minute. He had ideas. But he didn’t want to do anything until he knew what was going on with Mark first. Shit. How in the world had everything gotten so screwed up?

  He blew out a breath and shook his head. “Listen to me, damn it.” He pointed at Beau and bit off, “Listen good. You don’t do anything else. You got it? That was so fucking stupid.”

  “But…”

  “No.” Brendan shook his head. “Just shut up and listen. You could have fucked all of us. You don’t tell the others; you don’t mention this. It didn’t happen, you hear me?”

  “O-okay.” Beau nodded, licking his lips. “It didn’t happen.”

  Brendan turned away and shoved a hand through his hair, his mind racing furiously. “We need to just keep it cool, play it easy. We don’t have school tomorrow, so that’s good. And I heard my dad talking with somebody from the school board about either canceling school for Tuesday or setting up counseling and shit, because of what happened at the hotel and shit. They think we’re ‘traumatized.’ ”

  He’d drop a few comments, see if he couldn’t get his dad to throw his weight for an extra day off. They needed to make sure Beau wasn’t going to lose his mind again—Beau of all people. Shit.

  * * *

  THE day that Taylor Jones dreaded was almost here. Tomorrow. Fuck. It was tomorrow. The flowers were already ordered—he’d taken care of that earlier in the week, thank God. Daisies. Anna had always loved daisies.

  One more fucking day. Then it was behind him for another year. Another year for him to wonder and wait for there to be news. But there never was. Not that he hadn’t looked, quietly. But the trail had long since gone cold. He wouldn’t admit, though, not even to himself, that he’d never know what had happened to her.

  One more day…and already, he couldn’t think of anything but her, his sweet kid sister who made him laugh so easily. Part of him wished the damn phone would ring, that Dez would need him for something, just so he could escape these thoughts for a few hours longer. Until tomorrow, please God, just until tomorrow.

  But Anna deserved better than that.

  He’d been awake since before dawn and it had found him sitting in his bed, staring at nothing as he went back and thought of every last little detail about the girl.

  Her smile. The way she laughed. The times she’d gotten him in trouble for pranks she’d come up with. And how he hadn’t minded so much—because it had been Anna.

  And he remembered the horror as they all realized she was missing. All these years…never knowing. The bitch of his job was that he knew he’d probably never know. That her killer would likely go unpunished.

  “Anna…God, I’m sorry.” A tear slid free and rolled down his cheek. Taylor didn’t bother wiping it away.

  He missed his baby sister.

  * * *

  DEZ climbed out of the car, ignoring the dry, skittering whispers that danced along her flesh as she placed one booted foot on cemetery ground. People who thought ghosts were stronger at night were clueless. Ghosts didn’t care what time of day it was.

  Right now the sun was a thin, watery light high in the sky and although she couldn’t see a soul, Dez knew she wasn’t alone as she made her way through the graveyard.

  She didn’t know why she was here.

  Tristan was gone. She sighed and wondered if she could talk to his parents, if she should. She needed to find a way to give them the closure she’d promised their son, but right now, all she had was the knowledge that he hadn’t killed himself. It was empty knowledge without proof.

  But Tristan hadn’t called her here.

  Something…no, somebody else had.

  She couldn’t see the soul. Couldn’t even really feel whoever it was. The soul wasn’t strong enough. Either too long dead or just too weak in general. But somebody was tugging her.

  And there were others, too. Mostly echoes—not truly ghosts, just the remnants of their memories, the lingering of their emotions, echoes of their passings. She believed most of them had truly passed on to what waited beyond…this was just like…well, the afterdeath, perhaps.

  Only a few of the souls felt complete enough to truly be called ghosts and none of them were strong enough to manifest. The rest, they were just the lonely echoes of their mortal lives. She wondered if they’d ever find a way to let go, wondered what happened to their true souls if some remnant continued to cling. And those were only some of the questions she had.

  It was a terribly depressing thought, she decided.

  Those whispery echoes, so forlorn and sad. Dez lowered her shields as much as she could and reached out. “Hello?”

  No answer.

  “If you want to talk, I’m here.”

  There was almost a shivering sigh on the air—almost the echo of a sound. So hesitant and faint.

  “I’ll hear you, you know. All you have to do is focus a little. Reach out to me and just think about making me hear you. And I will.” She skirted around the base of a large marble angel, absently stroking the petals of the flowers that had been placed there.

  The silence lingered.

  Sighs gathered and she felt the press of their presence, but nobody answered.

  Dez reached up, rubbing the back of her neck, frustration mounting hard. She wanted so desperately to be able to help, but she didn’t know how. She couldn’t reach out and focus until the soul actually reached for her first. And there was nothing. Simply nothing.

  The air was thick with sadness, heavy with it. It almost broke Dez’s heart. After another circle around the marble angel, she ambled back over to Tristan’s grave and crouched down, absently picking up a few dead leaves and tossing them aside.

  In the back of her mind, she heard more vague whispers. No words, nothing she could lock on. But there was somebody there…watching her. Somebody who needed her, or was at least aware of her.

  It seemed the only time the departed were really aware of her was when they wanted her help. But this one wasn’t reaching out. As the ghostly brushes against her subconscious grew stronger, colder, she shivered. Staring at Tristan’s marker, she murmured, “At least I was able to help you, right?”

  She jumped when there was a harsh, almost broken sound that echoed all around—it was so loud she felt it. It sounded like a sob. She could almost taste the tears.

  Swallowing, Dez rose and looked around.

  “Who are you?” she asked again.

  But once more, there was nothing but the sound of the wind, and those ghostly, lingering sighs.

  “I can’t help you until you talk to me,” Dez said quietly.

  There wouldn’t be a response, though. She could accept that. Okay. So she’d just come back. Give it time. Sooner or later, she’d get whatever connection she needed, because she couldn’t rush this.

  The ghost simply wasn’t ready to speak to her yet.

  Still, despite her unease, she was oddly hesitant to leave and she found herself doing another slow circuit around the cemetery. She might have done it endlessly.

  But her phone rang, the jingling tune sounding strident and harsh in that place of silence and unrest. Jolting, she reached into her pocket and pulled it out in a rush, silencing the sound before it could shatter the quiet any more than it already had. Her heart was racing before she even lifted it to her ear. It was Taylor.

 
“Yes?” she asked, her voice creaking.

  “I need you at the hospital. Immediately.”

  Swallowing, she closed her eyes. She didn’t want to ask. She didn’t want to—was it Ivy? What had happened to her? “Why?”

  “That boy. The one you saw. He’s been in an accident. Get here. Now.” In typical Taylor Jones fashion, he delivered those words in a short, concise fashion and before she could ask a single thing, he hung up.

  That boy. Mark. Shit.

  Dez lowered the phone and cast one final look around the cemetery. “Whoever you are, I’ve got to go. But if you want my help, sooner or later, you’ll have to speak to me.”

  The wind gusted through the cemetery as she headed back to the car, blowing the tail of her coat around her legs, sending leaves swirling around her in gusts.

  And although she knew she wouldn’t see anything, Dez knew she was being watched.

  * * *

  “I usually have to be in a town a few months before I have to visit the hospital twice,” she muttered as she joined him in the hallway on the way to Mark Danvers’s room.

  Taylor just frowned. “If you really think he knows something, then we need to know now so we can have somebody placed here to watch him. This town is too small to be able to spare it unless it’s absolutely necessary.”

  “Gee, I never would have thought of that,” she drawled, giving him a look of wide-eyed innocence as she fell into step next to him. “The two or three stop signs in lieu of stoplights never would have clued me in to that. I’m surprised you even get cell phone reception here.”

  “Smart-ass,” he whispered, nodding to the nurse as she came out of the room. He caught Dez’s arm and gestured to the doorway. “He’s in there. You’ll need to give the cops a minute to get the kid’s parents out.”