Buried

by Linda Joy Singleton

  “That’s a good reason.”

  “So you’ll go back to the show?”

  He gives a sad shake of his head and reaches for my hand. My fingers curl around his as if drawn to a magnet. An electric surge shivers through me and strange images whirl through my head: an image of us together, in a semi-dark room with striped red curtains and a fake-fur bear rug on the floor. We’re not alone … there’s a sense of others in the room. And danger. The images flicker and fade away. But fear lingers, and so does a map in my head that’s eerily similar to the map of where I found the grave.

  Jay has been talking and I missed part of it. “ … Get something back, and this will be my only chance. I’m leaving now.” He reaches up to pull his mask back on, and all I can see are those deep dark eyes. “Please don’t follow me.”

  “I don’t need to follow because I know where you’re going.”

  “I seriously doubt that.”

  A puzzle piece clicks in my mind. “To 358 Red Hawk Drive.”

  His jaw drops open. “How do you know?”

  “I’m psychic,” I say as if joking. “And I predict you’ll take me with you.”

  My prediction is one hundred percent right.

  Since there’s no talking Jay out of his stubborn revenge, I go along to make sure that whatever he has planned doesn’t hurt Amerie. The drive is familiar, through dusky hills and shadowy trees and buildings. When I shiver, Jay turns up the car heater and offers me a spare jacket. I slip it around my shoulders, inhaling leather and Jay. I find myself looking at him in a new way. His full lips are pressed tight with determination as he stares out the windshield, gripping the steering wheel like it’s an adversary.

  When we reach the bend in the road where one direction goes up the canyon toward where I found the grave and the other winds into the half-finished housing development, I tense. Our headlights reveal a street sign for Red Hawk Drive, which winds through the skeletal houses and up the hill into the older area of homes. Some houses here have lights on. There are rock-and-cactus-decorated yards and parked cars.

  A light green sedan is parked at number 358. Jay cuts his lights and rolls silently to the curb a few houses down.

  “You stay here,” he tells me.

  “Like hell I will.”

  He shrugs and doesn’t argue when I open my door. Moving stealthily close to the large decorative rocks, he creeps up to a window. Staying low, he peeks inside.

  “What do you see?” I whisper.

  He shifts to another window. “A light in the living room, but no one’s there. The house looks deserted.”

  “What about the car?” I gesture behind me to the driveway.

  “Must be an extra for when the family stays here. But Philippe and his crew have been staying in the bus and a hotel. No one lives here anymore.”

  “Philippe grew up here with his stepdad until he got a record deal and moved to L.A.”

  “Don’t tell me you’re a Philippe groupie?” he mocks.

  I smack his shoulder. “Shut up. I heard it from Amerie.”

  “Damn. You got a powerful arm.” Jay rubs his shoulder. “I’d ask you to wait while I go in, but I’d probably be wasting my breath.”

  “Totally. A big waste. I’m coming with you.”

  He nods, and I follow him as he winds around the backyard and goes up to a sliding glass door covered in dark beige drapes. He pulls tiny silver tools from his pocket, jiggles the lock, and silently slides the door open. We go inside.

  It’s not a large house—a modest living room opens into a small kitchen, and a narrow hallway leads to three doors. Jay pulls out a small flashlight and starts down the hall. He opens the first door: a closet-sized bathroom. He moves to the next door, shining the light into a very feminine room with a pale white carpet, a flowered comforter on the bed, a bright red suitcase propped open against the wall, and shelves overhead filled with hundreds of decorative porcelain plates.

  “His mother’s room,” Jay murmurs.

  “Before he moved her to LaLa Land,” I add.

  “One door left,” he says.

  We pause outside the final door and as my fingers brush the handle, I get a mental image of Philippe looking more like he appeared in the school yearbook; tough, with scars from fights and a mean scowl. Negative energy shivers through me.

  The beam of Jay’s flashlight lands on a wooden cabinet and he hurries into the room, which gives off a strong Philippe energy. Philippe’s old bedroom. My footsteps soften as I step on a fake-fur bear rug. Drawers creak open and shut as Jay searches. Then there’s a sharp intake of breath. I come up behind Jay as he shines his flashlight on stacks of vinyl records.

  “Yes!” he exclaims as he pulls out a record. “We can go now.”

  “You only wanted a record?” I ask with surprise.

  “It’s a really good record.”

  “Valuable?”

  “Not really—except to complete a vinyl collection.”

  “So why do you want it so badly?”

  “To return it to Wiley.”

  “This is all because Philippe has an old record of Wiley’s?”

  “Phil borrowed it when he and Wiley were in a band together. Then Philippe found fame and took off for L.A. The singer on this record is Wiley’s great-grandfather, and it’s autographed to his mother. Wiley sent texts, wrote letters, and left phone messages, but big-shot Philippe couldn’t be bothered to reply. So I left more direct letters and a DVD of Phil and Wiley jamming together. When they were in the band, Wiley helped Philippe write some of his songs, so I warned Philippe to return Wiley’s property or the DVD goes on YouTube—which means everyone would find out that Philippe didn’t write his bestselling song alone. Wiley doesn’t even care about getting credit; he just wants his great-grandfather’s record back. And now that I have it, Philippe can keep his secret.”

  “So let’s get out of here,” I say.

  “Sure, let’s—”

  “Stop!” interrupts a shrill voice. “Don’t move!”

  The overhead light flashes on. I blink in the blinding brightness.

  “I said don’t move!” the woman warns. “Slowly turn around, both of you.”

  Her voice is familiar, and when I turn to face her I see red: glamorous red dress, ruby high heels, and furious crimson lips pressed tight. Philippe’s manager, Collette, aims a gun at us.

  I remember Sabine’s warning about a gun. Uncanny Opal was right again. Now it dawns on me that the red suitcase in the feminine bedroom was open. Collette must be staying here instead of a hotel.

  “Put that down,” Jay tells her, in a relaxed and friendly tone. He lifts one arm as if in surrender, but holds tight to the record with his other hand. “We’re not thieves.”

  “Then why is your face covered? And what’s with the smiley face cap?”

  I move slightly in front of Jay. “I know this looks bad, but you have to believe us—we know Philippe, and we aren’t thieves.”

  Collette snorts. “Your masked friend has an album from Philippe’s vinyl collection. Breaking, entering, and stealing! Yeah, that really sounds like you’re friends.”

  “Philippe stole this record from Wiley Calderon,” Jay declares. “If you check the autograph, you’ll see it’s autographed to Wiley’s mother. Wiley’s been after Philippe for two years trying to get it back, but his calls and letters were never answered.”

  “My client is too busy to bother with trivial manners.” Collette waves her hand dismissively.

  “Are you saying he never got Wiley’s messages?” Jay demands.

  “I protect him from obsessive fans, opportunists, and thieves.” Collette barks out a sarcastic laugh. “I’ve already called the police.”

  “Good luck with that,” Jay says wryly. “We don’t have ‘p
olice’ like in a big city, just the sheriff. And I saw him at the contest.”

  “We’ll wait as long as it takes. You two aren’t getting away.”

  “I only came here for the record. Philippe knows Wiley—they were in a band together,” Jay says.

  “Philippe used to run around with unsavory characters, just like you.”

  “He’s telling the truth,” I add. “I know Philippe, too. He’s dating my friend.”

  Instead of supporting our case, this causes her face to darken. “If you mean that fairy freak Anne Marie—”

  “Amerie,” I correct, then match her glare. “And call me whatever you want, but do not ever insult Amerie.”

  “She’s just another groupie who doesn’t have a chance with Phil.” Collette raises the gun higher and aims it directly at Jay. “Put the record down.”

  “This doesn’t belong to him!” Jay repeats.

  She smiles smugly. “We’ll let the sheriff decide. Set the record on the dresser.”

  As Jay reluctantly reaches toward the four-drawer dresser, my gaze takes in several items scattered on top: a mirror, a brush, and some jewelry.

  I stare in complete and astonished disbelief at one of the pieces of jewelry.

  The golden locket.

  Twenty-Four

  Oh my God!” I pick up the locket and dangle it at Collette. “It was you! You lost the locket on the stage, then stole it back. You have the nerve to accuse us of crimes when you’re a thief and maybe even a murderer. You buried the baby.”

  All the color fades from Collette’s face.

  But she doesn’t lower the gun.

  “How do … do you know about … the baby?” she asks in a strained voice.

  “I found its grave.”

  “Her grave,” Collette corrects me, in a tone sad enough to break my heart—except that right now my heart is pounding like an army of drummers.

  “The baby was a girl?” I ask solemnly.

  Collette purses her lips, refusing to answer.

  “Why bother lying?” Jay asks in a casual tone, as if there’s friendship between them instead of a gun. “We’re the ones who broke into your client’s house and you can have us arrested if you want to. No one would believe us.”

  “Tell us what happened to the baby,” I add, sensing that she wants to talk.

  “It’s none of your business.”

  “When I found it—her—” I swallow hard. “That made it my business. I need to know who she was and how it all happened.”

  A shudder seems to go through Colette, but she keeps a firm grip on her gun. “Okay, why not? We have time to kill.”

  I grimace at her words and glance over her shoulder at the half-opened door to the hallway. If we made a run for it, one of us could get away. Of course, the other one could get shot. Not great odds. So I try to keep her talking.

  “Were you in love with Philippe?” I ask bluntly. “Was it his baby?”

  “Don’t be stupid,” she replies coolly. “Only silly girls fall for his charm.”

  “But you must have loved him, because you had his baby.”

  “Ridiculous!” The gun shifts to me. “It wasn’t me.”

  “Then who was it?” I ask.

  “A groupie he met in Ohio. She threw herself at Philippe, then flipped out when he moved on to another girl.”

  “Rebecca?” I remember Manny’s information about the broken-hearted girl.

  “How do you know her name?” Collette asks, startled.

  Jay chuckles. “Didn’t you know? Thorn’s psychic.”

  I cringe at his attempt at a joke but don’t say anything. I think hard, trying to understand the sequence of events. “Rebecca was pregnant? Not you?”

  “Of course! Philippe has no common sense when it comes to his groupies. I warned him he’d better not put himself in this position again or he could find a new manager. Who else would cover up his indiscretions so cleverly? Philippe was relieved when I offered to handle Rebecca’s accusations. He was going out with a famous model at the time and just wanted the rumors to go away. So I took care of Rebecca.”

  Collette grimaces as if remembering a deep pain. She’s so lost in her thoughts that she lowers the gun. This is our chance, I think. The door swings open a little further, as if urging us to make a break for it.

  But I hesitate, aching to know more. “What did you do to Rebecca and her baby?” I ask Collette.

  “She wouldn’t listen to reason, so I arranged for her to stay in this house with a midwife. We had an agreement that involved a substantial amount of money and an adoptive family.”

  “But something went wrong?” I prompt.

  “Rebecca argued with the midwife and the idiot woman quit right before Rebecca went into labor—early. The baby didn’t make it.” A pained look crosses her face and she exhales deeply. “It took hours before I could catch a plane here, and when I arrived, Rebecca fought me when I tried to take the baby from her arms. I finally calmed her down with a sedative—then I dealt with the problem.”

  At least no one intentionally killed the baby, I think with relief.

  “Why didn’t you take her to a hospital or call 911?” I ask.

  “And get hounded by paparazzi? Not an option. If we’d reported the death, the tabloids would have destroyed Philippe’s reputation.”

  “So you buried the baby,” I guess. “Then you threatened Rebecca or paid her off to keep quiet.”

  “I did what was necessary to protect my client.”

  “What about Philippe?” Jay interrupts, his black eyes narrow through his mask. “Didn’t he care about his own baby?”

  “He never cares about what he doesn’t know,” she snorts.

  “You’re wrong about that,” says a cold, angry voice.

  Philippe steps into the bedroom. Amerie trails behind him, her gauzy wings tilting as if broken. Her face is paper-white with shock, a sharp contrast to the mottled red fury of Philippe’s. His lips press furiously tight as he strides over to his manager. “Collette, is what you said true? How could you not tell me?”

  “Eavesdropping is beneath you, Philippe. Leave this minor problem to me.”

  “Just like I left Rebecca and her baby to you?”

  I turn to see Jay’s reaction—but he’s no longer here. I catch a glimpse of shadowy movement beyond the door.

  “You told me she was crazy and not really pregnant.” Philippe glares at Collette.

  “The result was the same,” his manager snaps.

  “No, it’s not! I almost had a daughter I didn’t even know about. If the baby had survived, would you have told me? I doubt it. You had no right to lie! And stop aiming that gun at Amerie’s friend. Have you lost your mind?” He offers me an apologetic look and snatches the gun from Collette’s hand, setting it aside. “I heard nothing about Rebecca for months, then I get a locket with a curl inside and a note from Rebecca that says, Your daughter’s hair. My daughter!”

  “The locket was yours?” I ask Philippe. “You lost it at school?”

  “Yeah, but Collette found it for me.”

  I touch my neck where I’d worn the locket, knowing how Collette “found” it.

  “I should have thrown the damned thing away when I had the chance.” Collette gestures to the locket, which I’m still holding. I see the longing way Philippe is staring at it, so I reach out and hand it to him.

  “Thanks,” he says.

  Beside him, Amerie whispers as if in shock.

  “Your … your daughter?”

  “I didn’t know what to think when Rebecca sent me the locket,” Philippe says. “I figured it had to be her own hair—Collette had told me Rebecca was crazy and making up stories to try to get money out of me. I was going to trash the locket, but I coul
dn’t … and now I know why. Rebecca was telling the truth. Collette was the liar.”

  “I protected you,” Collette says savagely. “When I told you I’d take care of your problem, you were happy to leave it to me. I always pick up after your mistakes. But I’m growing tired of your juvenile behavior. Don’t think I don’t know why you brought her to this house.” She gestures to Amerie. “What lies did you tell her? The same ones you told Rebecca and countless other girls? That being together is the only way to prove your love? That you’ll take her with you on tour? That you’ll marry her?”

  Amerie gives a sharp cry, as if she’s been stuck.

  I cross the room to stand protectively beside her. “Amerie, why did you come here with Philippe?” I ask gently.

  “I … uh … we … ” Amerie looks helplessly at Philippe. “When the contest ended, we left before he could be mobbed by fans. He said we could be alone … that he loved me … and I—I believed him.” She steps toward him desperately. “Philippe … is it true?”

  Philippe glances at Collette, then at the gold locket dangling from his fingers. Instead of putting his arm around Amerie, he moves away from her. “I’m sorry.”

  Amerie’s eyes widen with shock and hurt, then disbelief. I hold tight to her hand, letting her know she’s not alone.

  “I’ve been stupid about a lot of things,” Philippe tells his manager is an icy tone. “But it ends now.”

  “Are you firing me?” Collette asks with mocking amusement. “Because if you are, get used to handling your own problems.” A smug smile curves her full red lips. “Do you hear that siren? It’s the sheriff, finally showing up about a break-in. Would you like to explain what we’re all doing here, and how this locket holds DNA matching the remains of a buried baby?”

  Philippe’s mouth opens, then closes. He steps closer to his manager.

  “As I expected.” Collette pats his arm the way a mother might comfort her child. Philippe may resent her lies, but not as much as he needs her support. They understand each other, I realize.

  And finally Amerie understands, too.

  “Thorn, I want to go home.” She wipes away a tear. “Please.”