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Indelible

Page 14

by Laurie Buchanan


  —JOHN SANDFORD

  Walking together part of the way to their cottages, Fran turns to Cynthia. “Wow, this evening was intense.”

  “Yes, it was.” Cynthia nods her head in agreement.

  “I’ve never known anyone who does what you do. I’m impressed that you use your intuitive gift to help families who’ve lost someone.”

  Eyes bright, lips trembling, Fran fears that at any moment she might weep. She looks at Cynthia through pain-filled eyes. “I want to thank you for what you said after reading my palm the other day. It’s made me realize that I’ve sacrificed my life on the altar of my inability to conceive.”

  With a keen sense for another’s wellbeing and the evening’s conversation fresh on her mind, Cynthia responds, “It’s left to the living to miss those who aren’t—including those who’ve never been born.”

  Fran reaches for Cynthia’s hand. “I’m beginning to understand that I’m enough just the way I am. Thank you.” She squeezes Cynthia’s hand in a parting gesture. “We’ve both had quite a day.” Stifling a yawn, she continues, “I’m heading to bed. I’ll see you at tai chi in the morning. Good night.” And with that, Fran turns onto the path that heads north to Dickens cottage.

  Cynthia is restless. She needs time alone, time to be quiet, and time to reevaluate. In the distance, the low rumble of the sea—like a siren’s song—beckons her. Instead of veering east to Brontë cottage, she heeds the enticing plea and the main house falls from sight as she winds her way through thick tree trunks with a ghostly sheen to their bark. Between the sound of the wind-whipped leaves and the surf, she is soothed. The gulls are down for the night, so there’s no screeching. And if there is the sound of boats rocking at their moorings, it’s muffled by the lashing wind.

  Tucked behind an unpruned hedgerow of photinia, a natural barrier Niall planted to ensure privacy, a line of perplexion creases Jason’s compact forehead. What the hell? Shifting slightly, he continues to watch Cynthia. He’d counted on her heading straight to her cottage.

  Treading over pine needles that have been years gathering, and gnarled tree roots that have been decades growing, Cynthia walks with unfailing certainty, guided by her inner compass. Her nostrils catch the scent of Douglas-fir, cedar, and the unmistakable rank scent—like rotten parsnips—of drying hemlock needles. Years ago, she’d learned from her mother that while hemlock and fir needles both have two white stripes, fir needles can be rolled between your fingers, but hemlock can’t because the needles are flat.

  Unbidden, thoughts of the past come flooding forward. Cynthia had been relieved when her father died, guiltily and honestly relieved. It was her mother’s death that had devastated her. She wished her mother was here now. This forest is muddy green, drab, in comparison to the vibrant, lush foliage of her youth. Life is so much shorter than we realize.

  The clouds are low and threatening. The air is drenched and salty. Thunder booms in the distance, but Cynthia continues, drawn to the sea.

  Jason follows Cynthia at a safe distance. A stealth and panther-like predator, he relies on quiet and strategy. His slit-like eyes, iced silver in the night, are coldly calculating, piercing, as he watches Cynthia turn, this time down a rutted dirt path.

  So intent on his quarry, Jason doesn’t see the exposed pine root and falls with bone-jarring intensity. With heart leaping in his throat, Goddamnit! rings through his head as he balls a fist to keep from releasing a sound, nails digging bloody crescents into the palm of his right hand. Bitterness curdles his thoughts, making him almost blind with rage. Resisting the urge to use his other hand to smash the bottle of wine he’s taken from the main house, he remains quiet.

  Cynthia steps out from the thick forest onto the bluff, a large clearing that borders the wind-whipped cliffs. Crossing the vast expanse, she notices the ground is barren except for intermittent chunks of fist and boulder-sized rocks. It looks as if the area has been bombarded by a meteor shower.

  Peering in tension-filled silence from the camouflaged space of shoulder-to-shoulder trees, Jason watches Cynthia as intermittent flashes of lightning illuminate the night. She seems to glide, not walk, over the uneven ground.

  He remembers Niall’s remark during dinner about their storms. “Lightning and thunder are rare in this part of the country.” Well then what the hell is going on?

  In the eeriness of the night, Jason doesn’t doubt for a moment that Cynthia’s a witch. I bet she brought the storm with her.

  Cynthia is a sight of understated elegance in the now-soaked caftan hugging the shape of her body. She stops next to a boulder at the cliff’s edge, tips her head back, raises her arms skyward, and sways from sole to sole. A mixed feeling of exhilaration and dread fill her heart.

  A blast of wind roars in from the west, only to discover it has no place to go. The area, much like a fortress, is surrounded by mountains. Turning back on itself, the wind rages, the ground rumbles, the cliffs brood, and the indigo skirt of the sea billows, shamelessly displaying white foam petticoats as wave after wave crash against the sand.

  Like a tick in dog flesh, Jason burrows into a mossy nook of exposed tree roots. His back is pressed into the rough texture of bark. Other than absently turning the bottle of wine in his hands—his thumbnail periodically scrapes the label’s edge—he sits statue-like amid the smell of rich earth and watches Cynthia. Is she performing some type of sorcery? All she needs is a hooded cloak, a dagger, and an animal sacrifice.

  Just then, a billowy whiteness wafts into his line of sight. It gives off an agitated feeling.

  Skin tingling, Jason watches, mesmerized, as the shimmering form goes slightly out of focus, like an old-time photograph. Moving closer, it congeals into a form—a woman with brilliant white eyes, silver skin, and the smile of a predator.

  Heart crashing against his ribcage, he wonders if this is his mother, or one of the ghosts they’d talked about in the van on the way from the airport. Hearing the nursery rhyme his mother use to sing-song to him and his twin, he freezes. The ending always scared them witless. “Here comes a candle to light you to bed. And here comes a chopper to chop off your head! Chip chop, chip chop, the last man is dead.”

  Jason raises a hand to ward off its approach.

  It stops and smiles. “Have you come to play?” it asks. The smile becomes a snarl, baring teeth like a wolf. As it drifts closer, Jason bolts into the clearing toward Cynthia.

  Thunder booms and lightning jags through the midnight sky. Looking over his shoulder, the apparition is gone. If he didn’t know better, he’d think that Cynthia is the one who arranged that ghoulish display and who is orchestrating the storm.

  Like a ripe melon, heaven’s canopy splits open, and rain falls in sheets. Perfect! he thinks, kicking into action.

  The air cringes. Cynthia feels a hot clench in the muscles of her throat as she senses, rather than hears, soft footfalls behind her. With a calm she doesn’t feel, she lowers her arms, turns around slowly, and says, “Hello, Jason, I’ve been expecting you.”

  Jason’s uneasy that Cynthia sensed his presence before he’d made a sound. He produces a rare smile, though disingenuous. “I’ve been watching you,” he grunts. “You look like a sorceress or Druid casting a spell.”

  “Maybe I am,” she says, smiling. “Why did you follow me?”

  “Because you know about me, don’t you?”

  “I don’t know anything about you. You never let me look at your hand.”

  In the next flash of lightning, Cynthia sees a movement in the far distance, behind Jason’s head. “What is it you think I know about you?” she asks, drawing him out.

  “You’re the psychic,” he sneers. “You tell me.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “Don’t toy with me.” Turning, he raises his right arm high, then slashes it down with fierce intensity, smashing the wine bottle against the boulder next to her.

  The fractured sound of shattering glass mesmerizes Cynthia. She star
es at the shards glittering like teardrops on the ground and wonders if her blood will soon mingle with the wine and the rain in the mud.

  She sees the movement behind Jason drawing closer. To hold his attention, Cynthia looks directly into his eyes.

  Hemingway is the epitome of power and swiftness as he charges across the vast space. His stride is long and smooth with great reach and a strong, powerful drive that eats up the ground.

  “And so close to the edge here,” Jason continues, waving the bottle’s jagged glass at Cynthia. Jutting his chin toward the cliff’s edge, he sneers, “Anything, a gust of wind, could cause you to keel over the edge and plunge to your death.”

  Speaking with an even voice, Cynthia asks, “Why do you want to hurt me?”

  “Oh, but you’re mistaken. I don’t want to hurt you. I’m going to kill you. But it’s got to look like an accident.” His cruel wink looks like a grimace in the flash of lightning.

  A deep-throated growl that vies with the storm’s grumbling causes Jason to look over his shoulder. His emotions shift as panic rises.

  There stands Hemingway, feet planted in a fighting stance, one hundred and fifty pounds of menace, a terrorizing sight of strength and savagery. No longer the friendly mascot of Pines & Quill, his ears are tucked to the sides of his head, hackles raised, and lips pulled back revealing teeth that can tear the flesh of formidable prey.

  Grasping at mental straws to buy time, Cynthia lets out a cackle-like laugh and says, “And here you thought I was a sorceress or Druid. I’m neither.” Pulling herself up to her full height she continues in what she hopes is a foreboding voice. “I’m a witch. And this,” she says, pointing a long, slender finger at Hemingway, “is my familiar.”

  Jason looks at her blankly, without comprehension. She smiles indulgently as if he were a child, and says, “You should have done your homework. Let me enlighten you. Familiars are animals that work with a witch during spell casting, rituals, and for psychic guidance. Any animal a witch feels a spiritual connection with can be a familiar.”

  Eyes narrowed against the rain, Jason looks at Cynthia and Hemingway with wariness.

  Playing on his fears, she continues. “Jason, you saw me, arms raised, orchestrate this storm didn’t you? And then Hemingway appears. You said yourself that I know who you are and what you’ve done. I drew you out here intentionally and you followed. Can you explain that?”

  As the sinister implication dawns on him, Jason reacts, wide-eyed. He swings the bottle, its jagged edges hissing through the air in an arc, catching Cynthia’s thigh. Slicing through the rain-soaked material, it lacerates the tender flesh beneath.

  Cynthia sucks in air as burning pain sears her leg. Falling against the boulder, she presses the wet fabric of her dress against the wound to stop the bleeding.

  Wheeling around, Jason squats with both arms out. “Come on you son of a bitch, try this on for size.” He taunts Hemingway, thrusting the broken bottle at the imposing dog.

  Hemingway, with well-muscled dexterity, side-steps the weapon, all the while maintaining eye contact as he circles his prey.

  Jason springs toward Hemingway’s withers. The serrated glass meets shoulder bone with a resounding shudder as it penetrates hair and skin.

  Cynthia falls to a sitting position on the ground where her hands search desperately for a rock. Finding one she can palm, she eases herself back to a weak-kneed, standing position. In her entire life, she’s never seen anything like this. She wishes it was a nightmare but it’s grimly real. She doesn’t know if her uncontrolled shaking is from fear or the frigid cold wafting off her rain-soaked clothing.

  What she does know—this is a fight to the death.

  Jason reaches a hand up to wipe pouring rain from his eyes. In one swift, powerful lunge, Hemingway’s head catches him in the solar plexus, knocking him off balance. Pinning his opponent to the ground, he fastens his teeth—designed to tear, shred, and grind—on Jason’s right forearm.

  “Release the bottle,” Cynthia commands.

  Jason’s gray eyes ice over. “Not on your life,” he spits through gritted teeth.

  Cynthia looks at Hemingway and nods.

  Clenching his powerful jaws, he pierces Jason’s flesh with unrelenting strength until Jason lets go of the broken bottle.

  Laying on his back, Hemingway still over him, Jason tries to gain purchase with the soles of his shoes on the rain-soaked, slippery bluff.

  Darting a glance at Cynthia, Jason lifts his head while continuing to deliver heavy blows to Hemingway’s neck, chest, and belly—anything in reach. “You’ll pay for this,” he growls at her through anger and excruciating pain.

  It’s then he realizes with horror that his head, no longer supported by the ground, is entirely over the precipice. With his good arm, Jason gouges at Hemingway’s eyes. Redoubling his efforts, Jason tries to sit up, succeeding only in sliding yet further past the muddy edge.

  Hemingway’s long muscular legs step away from Jason and toward Cynthia. With a hard, wiry outer coat he seems impervious to the downpour. Standing guard in front of her, his broad chest thrust forward, he’s the epitome of courage and protection.

  Jason manages to get to his knees, then maneuvers to unsure feet just as a large gust of wind comes tearing from the north. He loses his footing on the slippery edge. Sheer terror consumes his face as he plunges over the cliff.

  Spoken only minutes before, Cynthia remembers Jason’s threatening words. “Anything, a gust of wind, could cause you to keel over the edge and plunge to your death.”

  CHAPTER 16

  “Always write as if you are talking to someone. It works. Don’t put on any fancy phrases or accents or things you wouldn’t say in real life.”

  —MAEVE BINCHY

  Cynthia crumples to her knees as a searing pain shoots through her thigh like a red-hot bolt. At Hemingway’s gentle nuzzle, she turns and wraps her arms around his neck, sobbing in relief.

  He answers with a soft whimper as her hands touch his injured shoulder and pummeled body.

  “Thank you for saving my life,” she whispers into his fur. As she pulls away with an iron-like taste on her lips, she realizes that his wiry coat is soaked with a mixture of rain and blood. “We’ve got to get you home.”

  Cynthia struggles to her feet. After grasping Hemingway’s collar—as much for support as guidance—they start to make their way across the rock-strewn bluff. With every footfall, a flash of white sparks burst into Cynthia’s vision, a familiar precursor to her recurring cluster headaches, but somehow this seems worse. Please God, not now, she thinks, as panic flirts at the edge of her mind.

  She remembers what her doctor said about the correlation between stress, dehydration, and these debilitating headaches. She tips her head back, opens her mouth, and lets the rain sluice over her face, willing the pain away. I’m in the middle of a rainstorm, yet I need to hydrate. Under different circumstances, she’d find it humorous.

  With her head tilted back, she drinks in the night sky. Like a vast black sea, its depth is unfathomable.

  Hemingway looks at Cynthia—a question in his eyes—when she stops walking. There’s nothing he can do as darkness pulls its velvet corners tightly around the edges of her consciousness and she collapses to the ground.

  With his long, wiry-haired muzzle, Hemingway nudges his fallen companion. Puzzled by the lack of movement, he paws the ground next to Cynthia, tips his head back, and lets out a long, doleful cry. A twin to the howling surf of the storm-savaged bay.

  Still no movement.

  Furrowing his brows, he licks her face, then sits quietly and watches for any sign of motion. Even in the raging wind, his nose catches the metallic scent of human blood. Moving closer he finds the open wound on her thigh.

  Infinitely devoted to the people he likes, Hemingway runs for help, blood oozing from the serrated gash in his shoulder, his broken ribs screaming in pain.

  As his left hand clings to a small horizontal sill, Jason knows he�
��s losing his grip on one of the slight projections on the side of the cliff. His right arm dangles at his side. He uses the next flash of lightning to get his bearings. As he looks down, he sees a shelf-like outcropping about six feet below. I hope it’ll hold my weight, he thinks, as his fingers lose their purchase and a forceful impact evicts the air from his lungs.

  The rock shelf he hits is like a coffin, just wide enough to hold his frame. Below, he hears the crash of waves smashing against the cliff. He turns with care to look over the edge. With minimal light, his guess is a hundred-foot drop to the storm-whipped water of the bay. Shit! Mind racing, he lays still and stares at the cauldron-black sky. If I can make it to the canyon, I can hide. I’m glad I stashed my backpack there yesterday when checking out the caves.

  He remembers the way Mick looks at Emma and knows his weakness. With that in mind, he’d set out to locate the perfect, yet private, place to hold Emma hostage while he drew Mick out. God damn that bitch Cynthia, and God damn that bastard dog!

  The rain continues to lash his face. The next bolt of light serves to unveil tiny lichen and moss clinging to the cliffside with tenacity, like barnacles on a ship’s hull. As the storm brews overhead, each flash of light reveals more of his surroundings. Depressions, humus-covered rock shelves jutting out in varying shapes and sizes, and cracks splayed every which way—like on his mother’s gray-veined porcelain. It’s too bad I had to remove her from the equation, but she just wouldn’t cooperate.

  In his mind’s eye, he rereads the headlines of The Plain Dealer, northeast Ohio’s largest newspaper.

 

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