Snake and Hollywood followed Jimmy back through the canopied entranceway and back out onto the stone platform in front of the house. He pointed upward, directing their attention to a window on an upper floor, right above the canopy’s top.
“I have a feeling I can get up to that window. Once I get through the window, I’ll find my way down and open the front door. That room has to be closest to this entranceway.”
“Dude, there are sixty-six rooms in this place,” Snake said. “What if you get lost?”
“Not to mention, how are you going to get up there, Einstein?”
Jimmy answered their questions in order.
“We all have our cell phones; we’ll just go from there if that happens,” he said. He turned to Hollywood. “And, I didn’t mention it, but I did something earlier tonight. Wait right here.”
They were dumbfounded as Jimmy disappeared around to the side of Cedar Manor. Looks of regret and failed interest passed between them. It was almost a minute before Jimmy returned from the side of the house with a metal ladder.
“I brought it up here, earlier, before I met you both. I hid it behind the bushes. Something told me we were going to need it.”
“So, you remembered a ladder, but forgot your gloves?” Snake said.
Jimmy shrugged.
“I don’t know,” Hollywood said, moaning. “This may not even be worth it. It’s getting cold out here.”
The temperature had started to drop, as twilight’s hours grew deeper. Jimmy spread the ladder out alongside the canopied entrance; it was almost a foot short of the top of the structure. The three looked heedlessly at the futile prospect in front of them.
“I can do it,” Jimmy said. “I know I can.”
“Man, you’re cracked!” Hollywood’s voice was beyond skepticism.
“I’m serious, guys. I know I can make it. All I have to do is get up there. Then once I’m up, I can easily make it to the window.”
“And then what?” Snake asked.
Jimmy shrugged again.
“Then, I’ll just break the window. I’ll climb in and find my way down. I do have the flashlight.”
He flashed the light one more time in their faces before stuffing it back in the duffel bag.
“I don’t know about this,” Hollywood sighed.
“I’ll be fine, trust me,” he said. “I’ll climb what the ladder doesn’t reach. I just need you two to watch the ladder, and then when I’m in, wait for me. Make sure your cell phone is on, Snake.”
Without another word, Jimmy began to climb the ladder, his knees bending one at a time on the way up and the duffel bag slung around his right shoulder. Hollywood chewed her fingernails watching him ascend, while Snake’s eyes searched around in case they were noticed. Jimmy reached the top of the ladder with less than a foot of space to go between it and the top of the archway. It made no difference to him as he tossed the duffel bag upward, allowing it to land on top of the arched entrance.
He rubbed his hands together for warmth and blew his heated breath between them. He looked down at the two nervous faces that looked up at him. They’d come this far; to back out now would make asses of all three of them. He looked back up at the top, a cinch for a young man with such great athletic prowess, as he possessed.
“Well, here I go,” he called down to Snake and Hollywood, who positioned themselves closer toward the ladder. With both hands he clasped the top of the canopied archway, then let go of the ladder with his feet. As he swung his right leg upward to reach the top, his foot accidently kicked the ladder away to the ground, distracting him. His leg didn’t make it over, and he swung from his fingertips, clutching the edge of the archway’s roof.
The ladder fell to the ground before Snake or Hollywood could stop it, spouting a flurry of snow upward in a whirlwind as it landed.
“Jimmy!” Hollywood screamed.
At the top, Jimmy’s breath rushed out in harsh, heavy puffs that struggled for dear life. His legs kicked frantically and uselessly beneath him, swaying to find some hold that would propel him over the top. The scrapes of his shoes against the brick could be heard from below.
“Hang on, man!” Snake called up, as he Hollywood ran for the ladder. “We’re getting the ladder. Try to reach it with your foot as best you can!”
They’d managed to pull the ladder up, and as they looked upward once more, they stopped, stunned where they stood.
Out of the thin, cold air the figure appeared, solid, black, and shapeless. It hovered atop the structure, just in front of Jimmy’s struggling body hanging less than half a foot from the top. It didn’t look like anyone or anything. It was a black, opaque mass, darker than the night and taking no recognizable form as the moonlight illuminated its undeniable presence.
The spiraling snow showered and blew around the figure, as though it dared not touch it. Jimmy continued to struggle, not noticing the ominous presence that awaited him at the top.
“Oh my God,” Hollywood cried out, clasping the cross that hung around her neck. Snake only stared up in disbelief, his jaw agape, yet the sound of Hollywood’s voice prompted Jimmy to glance upward.
He saw the figure before him, looming, and drawing closer to the edge. His breath became faster, and terror filled his voice once he found it and was able to speak.
“What the hell is that thing?”
“Jimmy, hang on!” Snake shouted up to him, his fear echoing out through the night. “We’re positioning the ladder, man, hold on!”
The desperate heaves of the dangling young man turned to quickened sobs of desperation. His fingers began to tire, yet he held on even as the pain ripped through his hands and wrists. His frantic cries grew louder as the figure moved closer.
Suddenly, the blackness moved over his fingers, pressing enormous weight down upon them, as though they were being stepped on. Now, his cries became screams as the weight became crushing. Snake and Hollywood moved the ladder into position.
“Come on, Jimmy. Catch it with your foot, come on!”
Jimmy felt his fingers slipping, first the pinky, then the ring finger, until finally the index finger. His feet swayed wildly, trying to catch the ladder in one last attempt to live. His scream seemed never-ending as he dropped into a face-first free-fall, and there were no bushes below to land in.
Snake and Hollywood watched their friend plummet through the air some twenty feet. Although there was nothing they could do to stop it, they moved to try to catch him. It all happened so fast. Jimmy Nort landed on the stone platform below the structure, his head smacking the surface with a loud crack. There was blood everywhere—blood in the snow.
They stared in silent shock, and then looked up at the blackened figure above. It watched them; they could hear a harsh, labored breath emanating from it. Then as quickly as it had shown itself, the figure disappeared. And where the figure had stood, the snow began to fall normally again, uninterrupted. Snake and Hollywood took one last look at Jimmy and screamed out into the night, hoping now that someone would notice.
* * * *
Leah fitfully awoke from the clutches of a new dream and found herself in the armchair by her bedroom window. She could see this dream just as clearly, though this one was a fast-moving pictorial, prompting her to understand just as quickly as it moved. In the soft nightly glow of her bedroom, she recalled the dream: Cedar Manor, the falling snow, two young men and a young woman, laughter, a falling ladder, a black figure, blood in the snow...
Something’s happened there.
She looked at the alarm clock-radio; it was now 2:50. She’d snoozed in the armchair for thirty-five minutes. She bolted from the chair and grabbed her cell phone from the top of her dresser. She had to call Susan—immediately. Even if it was nearly three in the morning, this was one of those times.
* * * *
Susan Logan sat up in bed, nestled snugly amid the quiet of her bedroom where the soft crackling of the fireplace contributed to the cozy twilight ritual she adhered to faithfully. It
seemed the perfect night for curling up and reading a book by one of her favorites, Agatha Christie. She’d read Destination Unknown before, but it was a classic that was definitely to be reread if she ever had the chance, and now she had.
But tonight, a forgotten line in the book caught her by surprise. It referred to so many steps...so many steps to death. Suddenly, her attention was diverted as thoughts of the recent past made her realize just how true that line was. She marked her place for a moment and let the book’s cover close.
She thought about Tracy Kimball and how she’d paid with her life over the steps she’d taken, all because she chose to face her grief alone, lost and trapped within the haze of alcoholism. Then there was Mark, her beloved Mark. The man she almost married and thought dead for many years turned out to be the mysterious Roman Hadley, a man whose identity had been changed and whose life had been stolen away by a cult of psychic spies and blackmailers.
The steps that he’d taken all of those years to protect his family, as well as her, had ended up costing him his life anyway. He’d died in her arms. So many steps to death, she thought.
Then, there was Agent Wiley. She thought it unwise to continue seeing him. She liked him well enough, but he was a constant reminder of that Halloween night: the discovery that Mark was the infamous Roman Hadley and a kidnapper on the verge of insanity, the realization that much of her life had been stolen away from her, how she watched Mark die, and the explosion that almost claimed the lives of both her and Wiley.
It was a night she was determined to put behind her forever. As the new head of the university’s Paranormal Investigative and Research Society, she would have to. There was much to be done, and one young woman needed her expertise now more than ever—Leah Leeds.
Just as she thought of her, the phone rang.
Susan had merely said ‘Hello,’ when Leah’s frantic voice burst through her cell phone.
“Susan, something’s happened, I know it! I’ve been dreaming of that place all night, and I know something’s happened there. I can’t take much more of this. It’s time to go in there, and it’s my decision!”
“Leah, what happened?”
“I’ve been dreaming that same dream over and over, as usual. Then tonight, I thought about calling you and fell asleep in the chair for half an hour or so. I had another dream in that short time. Something has happened there...I saw it!”
Susan set the book aside, sat straight up in bed, and removed her reading glasses.
“Leah, stay calm,” she said. “Take a deep breath, and tell me what you saw in the dream.”
The frantic tone of Leah’s voice was subdued by the suggested inhalation and a slight pause. Slowly, she told her what she’d seen in the dream: three adolescent faces, a trio strolling through the snowfall, the house, this time from the outside, a metal ladder that fell, spraying the powdery snow up in a whirlwind when it hit the ground. Then, she saw a dark figure hovering atop the canopied entrance.
“Then, there was blood,” she said. “I saw blood splattered through the snow.”
Susan paused for a moment, ingesting what Leah had just told her and breathing a sigh through the phone.
“Well, Leah, let’s not jump to conclusions just yet,” she said. “After all, the dream could have been just that—a dream.”
“I don’t think so, Susan. Something’s happened there; I know it.”
“Yes, but couldn’t what you saw in the dream be the future? It could be something about to happen, couldn’t it?”
“It’s possible,” Leah said. “But, I don’t think so.” The tone in the young seer’s voice became a grave finality.
Leah Leeds was not what was known in the world of paranormal investigations as a ‘dreamer.’ Dreamers were people proven to see the near future in their dreams. Leah was accurately classified as a ‘seer,’ one with a very powerful third eye that had recently erupted with visions and peaked in its active sight. Susan was convinced it was that third eye that was fueling these dreams, foretelling some catastrophic event about to occur.
Leah had seen the spirit of Ryan Quinn’s father; he’d guided her third eye toward finding his son. Then shortly after, Leah had seen the explosion that almost killed Susan and Agent Wiley only moments before it happened. Still, it was impossible to discern just how Leah’s third eye was functioning.
“Well, there’s not much we can do, now, at three in the morning. If we go there, or call the police, we may rouse unwanted interest for nothing. Have you slept at all tonight?”
“Sporadically,” she said. “I’ve slept for quick moments here and there. The dreams have taken over my sleep.”
“And that isn’t good, either, Leah. I know we agreed that we were going to explore these dreams, discover just what they meant, but you also have to sleep. Your body will shut down if you don’t.”
Susan spoke now as the psychiatrist, prescribing stringent doctor’s orders. After the brief pause that elicited no argument, she continued.
“Leah, I want you to take one of those sleeping aids I prescribed for you. You need to rest without the interruption of the dreams. Tomorrow morning, we’ll get to the bottom of this, you, me, and the rest of the team. And if the dream is prophetic, we’ll remain watchful and aware. But tonight, you need to sleep.”
Leah reluctantly agreed, though she’d voiced an earlier opinion against the use of sleeping aids. She would do so tonight and tonight only, and then Susan continued.
“Leah, we’re about to investigate that house, and its history, and what role it’s played in your life. I think you need to consider alerting your father to what’s going on. He may be able to help you, to shed some light—”
“Absolutely not...” Leah’s protest was quick, determined.
“But Leah, he remembers so much more about that house than you do. He’s the one person who can fill in the missing pieces. The team and I will be there with you, of course, but you and your father have experienced this house together, and he should be there with you when you go back in. Leah, if Paul discovers that you’re going back into that house, it’s going to be impossible to keep him away.”
“Then he won’t find out, will he? That house killed my mother and almost killed him. I won’t let that happen again.”
“Either way, we can worry about that later. Tonight, you need to get some rest. The sleeping aid will cause you to sleep uninterrupted, and tomorrow you’ll feel completely rested. We’ll all meet in the morning at the university. I’ll describe to the team what’s been happening, not that they haven’t figured it out, and we’ll discuss our next assignment. For now, take the sleeping aid and get some sleep. Call me as soon as you wake.”
As Leah agreed, Susan placed her cell phone back on the nightstand. She knew this moment would happen, the moment when the memories of Cedar Manor would climax and provoke Leah into facing her past in a direct confrontation. Susan had known better than to think that it would all work itself out somehow through the dreams, that inexorably, some conclusion would be found as all of the memories subconsciously unraveled. She should’ve known not to hope for such luck. It was finally, and unfortunately, inevitable; Leah Leeds would return to Cedar Manor and face her haunted past, once and for all.
Susan decided to tackle Agatha Christie’s Destination Unknown another time. She walked over to the small bookcase that stood against the wall of her bedroom, and retrieved the one book she’d placed haphazardly on the shelf. It was time to start reading that which she’d put off for some time now. She’d been waiting for the right moment, never dreaming that Leah’s past would simmer to a boiling point so quickly.
But now she had to read fast, hoping that the book would set a backdrop for what she’d already known through Paul Leeds, and what Leah had already mentioned in the sessions. She stared at the title...
Cedar Manor
The Leah Leeds Memoir
She began reading...
Chapter Two
Cedar Manor
The Leah Leeds Memoir
(Excerpt)
There is a memory from the earliest stage of my life that recurs every so often throughout my adult existence. It flashes through my mind, and I can see it clearly in its chronological sequence, but not enough to fully comprehend its precise significance. It comes to me sporadically throughout my life, as though somewhere inside me a switch is being turned on and off. I’ve arrived at the conclusion that this memory represents my initial diagnosis as a seer, and the first time I had ever heard the phrase ‘third eye.’
It concerns a trip to Arizona that my parents had taken me on when I was five. We’d gone there to visit my grandparents (my mother’s parents), and one day my father, Paul, took me with him to the desert while my mother stayed behind. I can still clearly see the blazing, blinding sun and feel its burning heat on my tired little face as he carried me, and still hear the short, tiny puffs of breath that blew the blonde bangs from my small heated forehead. The upright cacti and swerving dunes of sand still set the scene to perfection in the memory’s replay.
He carried me a short, but grueling distance to a large dwelling tent much like the kind you’d see at revivals. My father stopped a short way from the entrance, and almost on cue, a man of Native-American descent with the kindest smile I’d ever seen, emerged from it. He was over six feet tall with long, black hair that was subtly streaked with gray and pulled back into a ponytail. His features were soft, yet what I would later describe as stoic, wise. He nodded to my father and then smiled at me.
“Greetings,” he said to my father, and Dad replied in kind. My father put me down on the ground next to him, and from the corner of my eye, I saw his open hand motion toward me.
Then, the wise man walked over to me. I felt an overwhelming goodness about him, a lack of fear the closer he came to me. He loomed over me with wide smiling eyes and then squatted in a kneeling position in front of me.
“Your little one,” he said to Dad, not asking but asserting.
The Third Eye of Leah Leeds Page 2
