by Joanna Wayne
She rounded the back corner, then froze. Selma was there singing, and making a pattern in the grass with twigs and rocks.
Carrie leaned against the house for support. “What are you doing, Selma?”
“I’m making a Thanksgiving altar.” She barely looked at Carrie. She just kept laying her pattern of twigs and singing her song.
She barely resembled the Selma of a few days ago. Her eyes glowed and her mouth was curved into a satisfied smile. And even though it was near freezing, she wasn’t wearing a coat. All she had on was a thin skirt and a light blue sweater.
“Where’s Owen?”
“He’s not here.”
“Where is he?”
“Where he always goes, I guess. He’ll be back.”
“Did he take the dogs?”
“They jumped in the back of his truck. He let them stay.” Selma placed another twig in the squiggly line, then twirled as if she were dancing.
“You seem happy today,” Carrie said.
“Yes, very happy.” She walked over to Carrie. “Would you like to know a secret?”
“Sure.”
Selma rubbed her hands across her flat stomach. “I’m pregnant.”
A new chill climbed Carrie’s spine. She didn’t even want to imagine how the symbol fit in with this news. “Does Owen know you’re pregnant?”
“I told him. He’s angry but he’ll get over it. He always does.”
“Doesn’t he want a baby?”
“Not anymore. Not since…” She lowered her eyes. “You know.”
“No. I don’t know.”
Selma started singing and went back to her Thanksgiving altar. Carrie walked over and took her hand. “Since what, Selma. What happened to change Owen’s mind about having a baby?”
“Since I was with that man in the mountains.”
Carrie’s breath caught in her throat. “Was this someone you knew?”
“No. He just stepped out of the mist. I started to run, but he called my name and I stayed. He was beautiful and kind. When he touched me, it was like riding on a magic carpet with the whole world at your feet.”
“Did you tell Owen about him?”
“Not at first, but then he saw the bruises.”
“The man from the mist bruised you?”
“Yes, on my stomach, but it didn’t hurt. Nothing he did hurt. The bruises are still here.” She lifted her skirt and pulled down her panties. And there were the bruises—so pale Carrie could barely see them in the twilight, but still the pattern was clear. The intersection of the undead and the living.
“When did this happen, Selma? When did you first show the bruises to Owen?”
“A little over a month ago.”
A month ago. Just before Elora was murdered. “Where’s Owen?”
“He’s not here.” She picked up another twig from the stack she’d gathered.
Carrie yanked it away from her. “Listen to me, Selma. I have to find Owen. Where would you look if you needed him?”
“I don’t know. He’ll come back. He always comes back.”
“That’s not good enough. I need to find Owen now!”
“Then turn around, Deputy Fransen. I’m right behind you.”
She turned and stared down the long barrel of a shotgun.
THE WEST WING at Fernhaven was officially opening for business the next day. Fine with Bart. Fancy re sorts weren’t his bag anyway. He gave his old room no more than a parting glance as he stepped into the hall.
He’d done what he’d set out to do. He’d stood by his partner. He’d gotten no credit for taking the knife from Harlan and killing him with it, but that didn’t matter. Sometimes it was best that way. Now it was time to move on, to start a new life and leave the old one behind.
A month ago the thought of that would have been more than he could bear. A lot had changed since then. He’d changed. Part of the difference could be attributed to his taking the bullet. Most of it was due to Katrina.
He didn’t understand her but who ever understood women? Her talk of death was disturbing, but when they made love, heaven and earth seemed to merge, so it didn’t matter a whole lot to him which one she thought they were in. Besides, he’d get her help. What love couldn’t accomplish, counseling and time surely could. All he knew for certain was that he loved her more than he’d dreamed possible, and he wasn’t going to lose her.
“Well done.”
He spun around. It was the old woman. It creeped him out the way she seemed to appear out of nowhere. “What was well done?”
“Your task.”
“What task?”
“You saved Carrie.”
How in the devil could she know that? “Who are you?”
“The taskmaster.”
More like resident fruit cake. But she’d gotten his attention. “What does a taskmaster do?”
“I’m here to make certain all the spirits trapped in this dimension understand their tasks and their limitations.”
“And do these spirits always do as you tell them?”
“No. Some are as irresponsible in death as they were in life. Others simply don’t understand. And a few are stopped by factors beyond their or my control.”
The talk made him uneasy, and he wondered if she was the one who had Katrina confused. If so, he’d find a way to keep the two of them apart. “Have you seen Katrina?”
“Sit down, Bart. We need to talk.”
“About Katrina?”
“Yes, and about you.”
“I don’t have time. I’m looking for Katrina.”
“That can wait. This can’t.”
CARRIE FELT every bump and swerve as they rattled along the curving mountain road. Her feet and ankles were bound and a red mechanic’s rag had been shoved to the back of her throat, making it painful to swallow and impossible to talk. She was on the floor, stuffed behind the seat in the cab of Owen’s truck like a piece of excess luggage or a pair of old boots. She could see the gun rack above her and the back of Owen’s head.
She couldn’t see Selma’s head at all, but she could hear her from time to time, singing the same haunting tune she’d been singing when Carrie had found her building the pattern of twigs. It was about life and death and making love.
Owen was mumbling the way he’d been doing ever since Selma had helped him tie the ropes around Carrie’s hands and feet. Carrie couldn’t understand half of what he said, but what she understood was enough to turn her inside out.
“Violated. Deconsecrated. Tainted by the devil. Did you know that, Deputy?”
He was rattling on, knowing Carrie couldn’t answer with the rag stuffed in her mouth.
“Damaged goods. Damaged. Damaged. Filth growing inside her.”
Selma kept singing, as oblivious to his remarks as she’d been back at the house when she’d obeyed his every command. They were both stark-raving mad. There would be no reasoning with either of them.
For a few minutes back there, Carrie had thought she might be going mad as well. But the pieces were falling into place now. Owen had probably gone to the bar in the hotel to drink away his anger and hurt over his wife’s infidelity.
Elora and her husband must have argued while he was there. Already going out of his mind, he’d followed her from the bar, then accosted her before she reached her room.
He must have dragged her through the woods and tried to cross the road so that they were farther away from the cabins. But then he’d run into Bart and doubled back to the ravine not all that far from cabin twelve.
“Impregnated by the devil.”
Owen was angry, revolted by what his wife had done. He might have forgiven the indiscretion over time, but he would never get over the pregnancy.
He didn’t have any intention of letting Selma have this baby. That’s why he’d brought her along. He planned to kill both of them which meant that Carrie had more than herself to save.
But two against one was way better odds than one against two. All she had to do
was make Selma see that Owen was going to kill her, if they didn’t stop him first.
But Selma was still singing, lost in a world whose axis revolved around an intersection between the living and the dead.
RICH TRIED his cell phone. No signal. Par for the course for this part of the county. About once a day, he managed to get coverage from the hotel, and then it was usually so weak he got little more than static. He gave up and headed for the phone booths in the corridor just off the main lobby. They’d be clearer then his squawk box in the car.
The meeting with the hotel’s investors had officially come to a close, but Powell was still in there talking the ears off of a couple of the guys who’d started out by thinking they could give him orders.
Money and position might talk in the circles they usually ran in, but the sheriff was half-deaf all the time and totally deaf to anything that hinted of intimidation.
There were four phones, only one of which wasn’t in use. He took it and called Carrie’s cell phone number. It rang until the voice mail message came on. He hung up without leaving one, but he got that annoying little acid drip in the pit of his stomach.
She should be home by now, but she wouldn’t have turned her cell phone off. It was the only phone she owned. But she might have fallen asleep. There was nothing to worry about. The perp was dead.
There was just that one nagging question that hadn’t been answered and that he hadn’t wanted to mention to Carrie just yet. How was Harlan connected to the symbol that had been cut into Elora’s stomach?
Rich stepped back from the phone booth, reached into his shirt pocket and pulled out the list he’d started on the drive back from Tom’s last night.
Locals who know the hotel and who’ve reported dealings with the spirits.
There was only one name on the list so far. Owen Billings, and his dealings with spirits hadn’t come directly. They’d come through his wife, and Harlan hadn’t admitted that. But Selma had said something to Maizie or else Maizie had assumed that the mountains had sent Selma spiraling into depression a couple of months after she’d miscarried.
Rich tried Carrie’s number again. Still no answer. If this were a TV detective show, the car would have a GPS system, and he’d be able to track the location of the vehicle and make certain she was home. His car was lucky to have a radio.
While he was standing at the phone and waiting on the sheriff, he might as well call and check on Tom. Tom answered on the first ring.
“Where are you?” Tom asked. “I’ve been trying to call you for ten minutes.”
“The dead-cell zone. What’s up?”
“Maizie just made me take her over to the Billings’s to check on Selma. Nobody was there, but I would have sworn that was your old wreck parked in front of the house.”
“It could have been. Carrie was driving it home from the hotel. Are you sure no one was there?”
“Not a soul. We walked all around the house and even peeked in the windows. The house was dark.”
“Thanks for the info. I’ll check it out.”
“One more thing. There was this symbol in the backyard, laid out in twigs and rocks. It was…”
The acid drip turned into a raging river as Rich cut Tom off and ran to get the sheriff. No wonder Harlan hadn’t matched with the symbol. He wasn’t their man.
Somehow Carrie had figured that out and now she was out there facing the real madman all alone. And he could have taken her anywhere, anywhere at all.
TWILIGHT HAD deepened to a hoary gray when Owen’s pickup truck made a jerking stop. Owen killed the engine and opened his door.
No time for panic, Carrie reminded herself. It was crunch time, and she’d trained for this moment for years. And if there were supernatural powers to face, she’d find a way to do that, too.
“Get out of the car, Selma.”
“Stop it, Owen. You’re hurting me.”
“Then do what I say.”
Selma whimpered, but she must have complied. A second later the front passenger seat flew forward.
“Your turn, pretty deputy.” Owen took hold of her feet and pulled her close enough that he could reach in and grab her arm. He yanked her up, then dragged her out of the truck, leaning her against the front fender.
There wasn’t much she could do with her hands and feet tied except try to get a feel for where they were. Nothing looked familiar. Selma started singing again, this time it was a lullaby.
Owen grabbed Carrie and started dragging her into the woods. Her feet scraped and bumped along the ground as if she were a dead weight. She couldn’t see far in the growing darkness, but she could hear Selma following behind them.
“I want to go home,” Selma begged between songs.
But they kept walking until Selma quit singing and started to cry.
“Just a few more steps. We’re almost there, almost to the ravine,” Owen said.
Carrie looked around. She spotted the ravine and the downed tree in the twilight and knew they were at the same spot where they’d found Elora’s body.
“Okay, pretty deputy. This is the end of the road.” Owen stooped down and cut the rope from her feet, then yanked the rag from her mouth. Her hands were still tied in front of her and his grip on her arm was so firm, she couldn’t break away.
If he was going to kill her here, there was only one reason for him to have cut the rope on her ankles. Now he’d be able to separate her legs. Her stomach rolled sickeningly, but she forced herself to hold on to control.
“Scream all you want now, Deputy. No one will hear you, and if they do, they’ll just think you’re a screech owl out looking for dinner.” He pulled a hunting knife from his pocket.
Selma grabbed his arm. “What are you doing?”
“Nothing. Get back and shut up.” He shook his arm free, and Selma cowered next to him.
“He’s going to kill me, Selma. He’s going to rape me and slice my throat the same way he did Elora Nicholas. And when he’s through with me, he’s going to kill you.”
“Shut up, you bitch. I should have left the rag in your mouth.”
“He’s going to kill us both, Selma, unless you help me stop him. You’ll never get to have your baby.”
Owen slapped Carrie so hard across the face that her vision went blurry. When she could see again, she saw Selma. She’d pulled up her shirt and was staring at her stomach.
“You can’t hurt my baby,” she wailed. “I won’t let you do that, Owen.”
He glanced at her bared stomach and then it was as if something exploded inside him. He shoved Carrie to the ground and grabbed Selma.
Something hard dug into Carrie’s knee. She picked it up. It was some kind of necklace, bulky and covered in mud. But its sharp points were the closest thing she had to a weapon.
When she looked back, she knew it wouldn’t be enough. Owen had Selma on the ground, and he was holding the knife to her stomach.
Carried screamed at him to stop, but he plunged the knife into his wife’s stomach as if he were gutting a fish. There was no time to wait, no chance at reason. Carrie dived on Owen. She pulled him backward as best she could with her hands tied, but he was too strong. He rolled her over and pinned her to the ground.
Now the knife was at her neck.
She was going to die, but she’d die proud. She might have no roots, but she had herself. She was Deputy Carrie Fransen, and she’d die fighting to the end.
Bart would be proud of her.
So would Rich. He wasn’t half-bad as a partner. Now she wished she’d told him so.
Chapter Fourteen
Rich was running on an adrenaline rush and a prayer, following nothing more than raw gut instinct. If Owen had killed Elora, then he might return to the same place. It happened occasionally, especially when the killer wasn’t your normal criminal type.
It was nearly dark when Rich hit the woods, but still light enough that he didn’t have to turn on his flashlight to maneuver through the trees. That made it better than
Bart had had it the night he was shot.
Rich pushed the thought to the back of his mind. That night had ended in death. This one wouldn’t. Carrie was trained and smart. She’d know how to handle Owen.
Still dread pummeled inside him as he rushed toward the spot where Elora’s body had been dumped in the old ravine. If Owen hurt Carrie, he’d kill him with his bare hands.
A man’s voice carried on the night breeze. Rich was almost sure it was Owen’s. His chest tightened, but he kept a steady finger on the trigger of his weapon as he crept closer.
And then he saw them and his insides kicked so hard, Rich felt it clear to his heart. Owen was taunting Carrie, letting the blade of his knife slide over her flesh at the point of her jugular vein. A little more pressure on the knife, and…
No. He wasn’t going to let it happen. But even if Rich put a bullet though Owen’s head, the push from the guy’s reflexes alone might be enough to bury the blade in Carrie’s throat.
“I didn’t want to kill Elora,” Owen said, his voice easily carrying to where Rich was hidden in the trees. “I don’t want to kill you. It’s the mountains. They’re making me do it. The mountains and Selma.”
Owen’s voice was shaking, and so were his hands. He’d lost it and Rich damn sure couldn’t just wait around. He stepped from behind the trees. “You have until three to drop the knife, Owen. I’m starting counting with two.”
Owen turned, but only for an instant. That was all it took. Carrie swung her right hand into Owen’s face, striking his left eye with what looked like a piece of metal. He fell backward, yelping like an injured dog and clawing at his eye while blood poured down his face.
But the knife was still in his hand, and Carrie was still pinned beneath him with her hands bound at the wrists. Owen lifted his hand to strike, and Rich pulled the trigger. Owen went down. The knife missed Carrie by a fraction of an inch.
Rich rushed over and shoved Owen’s dead weight off of her. His chest was so tight, he had to fight for breath before he could speak. “Are you all right?”
“Yeah. About time you got here, partner. A deputy could die waiting on you to show up.”
He breathed a little easier as he helped her to her feet and cut the rope from her wrists. “It’s your own damn fault, Fransen. Didn’t anyone ever tell you to let your partner know what you’re up to?”
