Beacon's Spark (Potomac Shadows Book 1)

by Jim Johnson

  I opened the screen door and walked out onto the porch. I gave her a weak smile as an answer before heading down her path and then toward home. I didn’t know what to say and was starting to feel the weight of the information bearing down.

  I was grateful I had a good long walk ahead of me. I’d need it to get my thoughts together before catching up with Abbie.

  Chapter 17

  I GOT HOME AFTER PENNY AND Cooper and Abbie had eaten dinner. Abbie was finishing up the dishes when I walked into the kitchen. She glanced at me as I walked in.

  I pecked her on the cheek. “You’re disappointed, aren’t you?”

  She picked up a plate and started drying it with a hand towel. The dishwasher that conveyed with the house worked most of the time, but there were days when it was just easier to wash things by hand.

  “Disappointed? No, not really. I got home just before Penny served dinner. I had meant to text you but my cell phone was dead.” She shrugged. “I thought you’d be home, but that’s all right. We still have tonight.”

  The wistfulness in her voice made my heart ache. I pulled another hand towel off the rack in front of the sink and picked up one of the wet pots and started to dry it. “I’m sorry. I got caught up talking.”

  “To Bonita?” She swapped the dry plate for another wet one.

  I shook my head as I dried the pot. “No, Miss Chin.” Abbie gave me an uncertain look. “She’s a friend of Bonita’s. She has a collection of crystals and sometimes brings some to Bonita’s shop to sell on consignment.”

  Abbie nodded. “Gotcha.” She stopped me from grabbing another wet item. “Did you eat? You should eat some of the leftovers.”

  I nodded and then traded my dish towel for a clean plate and fork and scrounged around in the fridge for some leftover kielbasa and homemade sauerkraut. As I waited for the microwave to finish heating up my dinner, I said, “Bonita’s is where I got my new little pendant from.” I gestured to my neck, where my crystal hung from its chain.

  She glanced at it. “Don’t think I’ve seen that one yet. When did you get it?”

  “Last night when I was at work.”

  She smirked. “Is that the one that talked to you?”

  I met her eyes and smiled tentatively. “Yeah.”

  She finished drying the last of the dishes while I wolfed down dinner. I cleaned my plate and fork and then helped Abbie put them and the other plates and utensils into their proper places. We headed up to our bedroom after tossing casual ‘good nights’ to Penny and Vinya, who were chatting in the living room, each armed with a glass of red wine.

  I glanced at Abbie as we got to our room and started changing into our sloppy bed wear and doing our usual night-time routine. “Did Penny and Vinya seem vaguely aloof tonight?”

  Abbie shrugged as she donned a pair of ratty sweat pants and an over-long pink t-shirt. “I hadn’t noticed. Dinner conversation was light, as usual. Mostly about respective jobs and what our plans were for the weekend. You know, polite stuff.”

  I sighed and grabbed a dog-eared copy of McCaffrey’s Harper Hall trilogy off my little bookshelf and climbed into bed. “Gotcha.”

  Abbie got her latest trashy romance and settled into the bed with me. She glanced at me as we both settled in. “Speaking of jobs, did you get a chance to make up a resume? I’d be happy to look it over for you.”

  I frowned, realizing I’d have to fib again. “Ah, no. I got caught up talking to Miss Chin after I got back to Del Ray following lunch with you and Robert. I just now got home.”

  She tried to cover the look, but I could tell she was disappointed. “Ah, okay. I thought you’d have come home.”

  I frowned and focused on her. “Is that a problem?”

  She glanced at me. “No, not really. I just…thought that you were going to use the computer to work on your resume. It’s fine.”

  I sighed. I could hear from the underlying tone of her voice that it wasn’t fine at all. Do I say something or do I let it go? I ran the debate in my head for a few minutes while we turned pages in silence.

  Finally, I said, “I’ll work on it tomorrow. I just…I needed to talk to Miss Chin. About, you know. Talking crystals.” I had decided, for better or worse, that the less Abbie knew, the better. For now.

  Not sure better for who, but it seemed to be the right choice to make.

  She glanced at me. “All right. Sounds good. I’m happy to look at it once you’ve got it together.”

  I smiled at her and then shifted back to my book and returned to Menolly’s world. Unfortunately, she and her many fire lizards weren’t enough to distract me tonight. Even with a good book in hand and my lover warm by my side, I found that I was replaying the conversation with Miss Chin over and over, picking apart the pieces, analyzing them, thinking of things I’d have to run an internet search on when I had the chance.

  I was so lost in thought about ghosts and blue energy and Valkyries that I missed Abbie’s question. She nudged me to get my attention.

  I glanced at her. “I’m sorry, what?”

  She chuckled and nodded toward my book. “I guess Pern’s got you good tonight. Did you hear anything I said?”

  I flushed and had to admit I hadn’t. She sighed softly and then leaned over and kissed my shoulder. “Never mind, then. I’m gonna get some sleep.” She dropped her book on her side of the bed and then scrunched down into the covers.

  I sighed as well, though more in frustration. “I’m sorry, Abbie. I got lost in my book and I guess I was also thinking about jobs, and money, and everything else.”

  She reached over and patted my thigh. “It’s okay, love. It really wasn’t important. I’m just amused you got so lost in your book that you didn’t hear me.”

  I put my book on my bedside table and hit the lights, then turned to snuggle up with her. “Anything I can do to make it up to you?”

  She wiggled her butt to push in against my legs. “Nah, not tonight. Just curl up with me?”

  I settled in behind her and played the big spoon, wrapping one arm around her and tucking the other under my pillow. We stayed like that for a while, quietly breathing together. She gradually dozed off.

  I leaned over and kissed her back, and then rested my head on my pillow, staring into the darkness, my brain blazing away at a hundred miles an hour on what I had learned from Miss Chin and excited about what I might possibly still have to learn.

  Chapter 18

  RIGHT AFTER ABBIE LEFT FOR WORK the next morning, I was up and out of the house in twenty minutes, not my record by any means but pretty good, all things considered. I wanted to stop by Branchwood to check on my grandpa and to meet up with Malcolm, and then I was determined to see Bonita and see if she could help me parse through what Miss Chin had told me yesterday.

  I rushed to the bus stop and actually managed to get there a few minutes before the next bus. Even found a seat, which for the late morning I’d call a success. The late morning commuters tended to fill the busses to standing-room-only.

  The bus dropped me off and I took an extra two block detour to the closest Starbucks for an iced chai for me and a lemon cookie for Grandpa. He’d told me on more than one occasion that the sweets Branchwood’s caterer provided were less than adequate for a man of his ‘years and stature’. His words. He makes me laugh.

  I’d guzzled down the chai and crunched all the ice in the time it took me to walk from the Starbucks to Branchwood, so I dropped the empty cup in the recycling bin just inside the entrance and signed into the guest register at the main desk.

  With the usual guest badge fixed to the front of my hoodie, I headed down the hall to my grandpa’s room and knocked on the door, glancing down the hallway toward that distant doorway where Malcolm and I had seen that woman’s ghostly face.

  Housekeeping seemed to be going on farther down the hall. A cart like the ones housekeepers in hotels use was parked in the center of the gray-painted hall and a pair of young Hispanic women were rummaging in the cart for toile
t paper and towels.

  I knocked again and heard my grandpa’s voice. “Come on in. It’s open.”

  I worked the handle and pushed open the wide door. Grandpa was sitting on an old wicker chair near the floor-length window on the opposite side of the room from his bed, a spread of solitaire on the table in front of him and a half-full glass of iced tea near his elbow.

  He glanced up from his game and smiled when he registered that I’d come in. “Well, well. Better check my pulse. Two visits in the same week from my grand-daughter.” He peered at me from under his bushy eyebrows. “Do you and your brother know something I don’t? Are the doctors keeping secrets from me again?”

  I smiled and closed the door behind me. The freshly-made bed and the fully stocked linen shelf suggested that my grandpa’s room had already been serviced.

  I walked over to him and leaned down and kissed his forehead. “Nothing like that, Grandpa. Just here to say hello.”

  His smile widened, though he did lean back and touch his index finger to his nose. “Sure, sure you did. Did your brother have anything to do with it?”

  I moved over to the low desk and grabbed the wheeled stool, and rolled it over to his table and sat down.

  “Nah, Robert and I aren’t talking right now.” I took a deep breath to keep the anger out of my voice, and think I mostly succeeded. “But I heard that there had been another death here at Branchwood. I thought I’d come check on you and see if you needed anything.”

  Grandpa nodded sagely, and picked up the deck of cards in front of him and peeled off the top three, checked the results, and made some adjustments to the pattern in front of him.

  “Oh!” I said, remembering the cookie. “I brought you this.” I fished the cookie out of my hoodie pocket. I had double-wrapped it in napkins to try and keep it from crumbling.

  He glanced at me and then the gift, inhaled sharply, and a fresh smile broadened his expression. “Thank you, Rachel. It was thoughtful of you to make the side trip for me.”

  I waved off the gratitude. “Hardly an effort.” I pointed toward the game. “Are you winning?”

  He glanced at the spread and sighed. “If you count the cards I teased out from the bottom of the deck, yes.” He snorted. “Eighty-six years old and I’m still cheating at solitaire.”

  I smiled. “Whatever it takes to win, right?”

  He raised an eyebrow and shot a glance at me. “Now, that doesn’t sound like the Farran education at work. Where did you pick that up?”

  I shrugged. “School of hard knocks, I guess.”

  He snorted. “Hah. Well. You may be right, at any rate.” He flipped three more cards over, studied the results, and then gave one more resigned sigh and tossed his handful of cards on top of the spread. He glanced at me. “Care for some low stakes poker?”

  I shook my head, covering a small smile. “All the money in my pocket is on loan from you. You’re welcome to win it back but I bet it’d be a pretty hollow victory.”

  He watched my face as I talked, and then nodded once I’d finished. “I’m not worried, Rachel. You’ll find your footing soon enough. I can feel it.”

  I met his eyes, but couldn’t keep the connection. I was the first to look away. I stared out his plate-glass window, which overlooked a tiny walking garden outside his wing of the nursing home. An old white woman, with short gray hair and holding a cane, sat with a much younger woman dressed in a tasteful business suit. I guessed she was the older woman’s daughter. They were sitting on a wide wrought iron bench talking to a tall, bald black man in a navy blue suit that looked to be ridiculously well-tailored.

  That man made my neck itch.

  I nodded toward the window. “Who’s that?”

  Grandpa picked up his cookie and glanced out the window. “That? Oh, that’s Michelle Bowler and her daughter.” He focused back on me as he licked some of the powdered sugar off the top of the cookie. “She was...close to the recently deceased, another resident. Larry something-or-another. I don’t remember his last name and he couldn’t either.”

  He made a little cackle and then licked off some more of the powdered sugar. “They were a thing for a while and then she sorta moved on.”

  I frowned. “Moved on?”

  He smiled and leaned in close. “Michelle’s a...what do you say these days? A free spirit.”

  I stared out the window at the old woman, who had a smile on her face, chatting amiably with the black man who was giving me the heebies just by standing out there. I couldn’t pin down what it was about him that had me feeling anxious. I guess he just had some sort of presence that served to wig me out.

  I tried to focus anew on Michelle. “She doesn’t look like a player.”

  To my surprise, grandpa blushed, a pinking of his skin from neck to bald head. “Trust me, she gets around, and she knows just what buttons to push.”

  My eyes widened and I raised a hand as if to fend off the thoughts threatening to push into my brain. “You didn’t...”

  Grandpa grinned and opened his mouth to reply, but I raised my hand and firmly placed it between us. “No. I don’t want to know.”

  I shook my head to clear the thoughts sneaking in about Grandpa and Michelle hooking up and quickly stood. “I think, on that note, I’m gonna go walk around a bit.”

  He nibbled a bit of the cookie. “Want me to come with you?”

  “Nah. Hang out here and enjoy your cookie and your leering.” He glanced out the window and then back at me, and flushed slightly. My guess had been on target.

  Grandpa put the cookie on the table and reached out for my hand and held it for a few heartbeats, then squeezed it gently and let it go.

  “I’m all right, Rachel. I didn’t know Larry all that well, and I knew he wasn’t well.” He gestured toward his head. “The man had advanced Alzheimer’s so he probably didn’t even know what was happening or who he was. Really sad, but....I’m all right.”

  He sighed, then added, “But I won’t lie. Three deaths in this place in the last few months, and two within the week. Kinda makes me wonder if we should look around for another home.”

  I leaned down and kissed him on the forehead. “Don’t worry, Grandpa. We won’t make you move without your approval. We know how much you hate to move, and you’ve been here barely a year.”

  He nodded. “All right. Sounds like we’re on the same page, then.”

  Darker thoughts started to crowd into my mind, but I did my best to shrug them off. “Enjoy your cards.” I rolled the stool back underneath the low desk and then held my hand on the door handle. “I love you, Grandpa.”

  He smiled at me from his seat. He had a little bit of powdered sugar on his nose. “Love you too, Rachel. See you in a couple days.”

  I left the room and pulled the door shut behind me. With my mind whirling with family matters, I wandered down the hallway, surprised I couldn’t shake the image of that tall black man out of my mind.

  Chapter 19

  I TRADED HELLOS WITH ONE OF the maids and then worked my way toward the doorway where Malcolm and I had seen the woman’s face. Today the lights were on, and there was no weird face floating in the air. I headed through the doorway and into the second hallway, noticing the closed door at the far end of the hall that I knew led to the stairwell.

  My steps slowed as I neared the stairwell door. I focused on the wall opposite the door. That was where Malcolm and I had gotten blown back, away from the strange glowing conduit.

  I got close to that spot and stopped in the center of the empty hallway, staring at the gray-painted wall.

  At first I didn’t see anything, but a closer look showed a few dark smudges where my sneakers and Malcolm’s boots had hit the wall. In fact...

  I leaned in closer. I raised an eyebrow. The force of the energy throwing us back had actually lifted us off our feet so that our heels had slapped into the wall with enough force to dent the drywall.

  I didn’t remember that. I glanced higher up on the wall, and sure
enough, there were a couple of slight impressions there too—no doubt from where our heads had met up with the wall.

  Probably explained why I didn’t remember hitting the wall from a couple feet up in the air. I moved over to the stairwell door and glanced through its small inset window. I saw the set of stairs leading down to the basement and the stairs up leading to the next wing of residences. At least one of the recent deaths had occurred up there.

  I reached down and tried the stairwell door handle. It wasn’t locked, and was cold to the touch, perhaps colder than I expected, though that might have been my imagination playing tricks on me.

  It opened easily under my hand. The stairwell was noticeably colder than the hallway, and while I’m no good judge of temperature, it had to be at least twenty degrees colder. I glanced around the steps leading up, approximately where I thought I remembered seeing the strange glowing curtain hanging in the air.

  I didn’t see anything at first, but then some impulse led me to check out the metal stair railings bolted into the cinder block walls. As I leaned down to look more closely at the metal, I heard a whispered “Yes.”

  I stood up straight and glanced behind me and then up the stairs. “Hello? Anyone there?”

  There was no answer. I glanced down at my hands. Somehow, instinctively, I had wrapped one hand around my crystal pendant and balled the other into a fist and had it held near my hip, ready to uppercut any fool who tried to jump me.

  I willed myself to relax and loosened my fist and the grip on the pendant. Voices, again. Surprisingly, the crystal felt warm in my hand, almost too warm. I glanced down at it and raised both eyebrows in surprise.

  Unless there was a trick of the fluorescent lights going on, the crystal seemed to be glowing on its own. A tiny little spark of silvery-blue light was shining merrily deep in its center, just barely reflecting off the interior facets.

  I lifted the pendant off my chest and held it out as far from my body as the length of chain would allow and stared into its glowing center. I didn’t hear any new voices and didn’t feel any significant warmth, but the light from it did lighten my mood and put me at ease.