“I don’t think that would be wise,” she said. “The medication doesn’t seem to be working against the seizures. Until things are calmer, I’m better off alone. I hope you understand.”
Uncertainty softened his expression. “Yes. I wish things were different, though.”
“So do I.”
“Lock your door,” he said.
Sharon went in. Only after the lock clicked did she hear his footsteps moving off.
With a sense of utter weariness, she dragged herself to the bathroom, grateful that Greg was downstairs at Jody’s place. Too much had happened tonight. She couldn’t begin to sort it out.
This wasn’t what she’d bargained for when she left Buffalo, Sharon reflected as she undressed for bed. She had hoped to settle into her job and establish a home where she and Greg would feel comfortable. She hadn’t asked for a passionate romance or a great adventure. Certainly not for an angry spirit ordering her to get out.
Nothing had gone right since Jim died. Sinking into the well of sleep, Sharon wondered when things would get back to normal.
She awoke in raw darkness. The stinging in her eyes told her she’d slept an hour or two at most.
Then she realized what had awakened her—the scrape of a key turning in the lock.
In the deep silence, she heard the hinges whispering open. Someone was in her apartment.
Chapter Sixteen
Sharon’s first thought was that Ian must be coming to check on her. She almost called out, but some instinct halted her. As her mind cleared, she acknowledged there was no way he would have gone downstairs for the key and sneaked into her apartment.
Dispelling the sense of disbelief was hard. She felt almost paralyzed, as she did sometimes right before falling asleep. But she had to get up. Had to force her muscles to work.
Making as little noise as possible, she slid out of bed. Over the painful thrum of her heartbeat, she could hear something breathing shallowly and rapidly in the living room.
Maybe if she closed her eyes and reopened them, she would discover that this was a dream. But she knew it wasn’t.
Could the intruder be Greg? Her son sometimes got up to use the bathroom and, half-asleep, got lost on his way back to bed. Possibly, he’d climbed the stairs from Jody’s apartment—but unlikely he could have located the spare key without coming fully awake.
Sharon edged toward the living room, hoping to catch a glimpse of the intruder. She’d left the door ajar, an old habit in case her son called out in the night. Unfortunately, at this angle the panel blocked her view.
She scanned the room for a weapon. From the bathroom, the faint glow of the nightlight fell across the objects on her bureau. The hairbrush was too lightweight. The hand mirror, although not very lethal, at least might be swung as a club. Seizing it, Sharon flattened herself against the wall out of the intruder’s line of sight.
With a faint creak, her door eased back. She could see the figure now, about her own height but heavier, with unruly hair tangling around the neck. Back toward her, the intruder surveyed the bed.
With a jolt, she recognized the shape as Bella. Her hand gripped the sturdy cook’s knife that Sharon had used to slice pepperoni for tortilla pizzas.
The woman had gone over the edge. After tonight’s violent session, she’d taken it on herself to get rid of Sharon.
I have one chance before she turns on me.
Grasping the mirror in her right hand, Sharon raised her arm and smashed it onto Bella’s face with her full strength. The mirror went flying, hitting the wall with a thud. The woman uttered a high-pitched, unearthly scream, staggered, braced herself against the bed and twisted around.
Despite what appeared to be a line of blood on Bella’s forehead, the blow had barely stunned her. The knife flashed.
Unable to retreat, Sharon lunged forward and grabbed Bella’s wrist to stay the blow. With her free hand, she yanked the older woman’s hair, trying to pull her off-balance. At the same time, she tried to scream, but what emerged was little more than a rasp.
They seesawed across the room, slammed against the bed and crashed into to the bureau. The knife pressed relentlessly forward, forcing Sharon’s arm back. The more she fought, the more violently the woman threw her strength into the attack.
Suddenly her own wrist gave out and the knife plunged down. Sharon writhed away, and felt a puff of air as the weapon passed within inches of her. She collided with the wall. There was nowhere to retreat.
“Bella, stop!” she cried. “What’s wrong with you?”
The only answer was a feral growl as the heavier woman shifted her grip on the haft. From somewhere came thumps and a door banged open, but all she could see was the madness distorting Bella’s face.
Light flooded the room. Blinded, she heard someone grapple with her opponent. Squinting painfully, Sharon saw Ian wrest the knife from Bella’s hand and loop his arm around her throat, tightening his grip until she sagged onto the desk chair.
Into the room lumbered Pete Gaskell, fastening his bathrobe around his tubby midsection. “I heard someone scream.” He halted. “Bella? My God! What happened?”
“She tried to stab Sharon.” Ian looked around. “I don’t suppose you’ve got any cord, have you?”
“I can hold her,” Pete said.
“I’d better do it.” Although Bella had gone limp, Ian kept a tight grip on her.” Sharon, are you all right? Did she hurt you?”
“I… no,” she managed to say. Her knees had turned to pudding. She didn’t even try to get up. “She had a key.”
“It’s in the door,” Pete said. “Do we have to report this? I’ll take her away somewhere.”
Ian’s tone was hard. “She tried to kill Sharon. This is way beyond anything you can keep under wraps, Pete.”
“I’ll call the police.” Sharon found her cell phone on the desk. Her voice shook as she explained to the 911 operator what had happened, and finally she had to stop and collect herself.
Whatever fury had animated Bella seemed to have left her. Her face took on a waxy pallor and her eyes stared at nothing. Releasing her cautiously onto the bed, Ian took the phone and spoke to the dispatcher.
When he hung up, he said, “They’re sending a patrol car and paramedics. Bella needs to be treated for shock and you should be examined too, Sharon. Sometimes people don’t even realize they’re injured.” He reached down and took her pulse. “Steady.”
“I’m sorry,” Pete said. “Her father had mental problems when she was a child and he never recovered. She’s become more eccentric recently but she’s never lost touch with reality before.”
That depended on how you defined reality, Sharon thought, remembering the séance.
“Let’s take her downstairs,” Ian said. “We don’t want to contaminate the crime scene any more than necessary.” On the way out the door, he took the spare key and dropped it in his pocket.
The police arrived without sirens, honoring Ian’s request to handle the matter discreetly. Jody came out of her apartment to learn what was going on, informed the police distractedly that she hadn’t heard anything except their own thundering feet in her hallway, and went back to bed. Greg didn’t awaken, thank goodness.
One of the policemen, who introduced himself as Officer Romero, took a report while the other checked out the apartment. Sharon declined treatment for her minor bruises. Bella remained stunned and speechless, although she appeared to have sustained no serious injuries either.
“We can book her for assault,” Romero said while his partner was upstairs. “Or we could commit her to a locked mental facility for seventy-two hours for observation.”
“I just want her away from here.” Sharon hated to think of Bella in jail, disheveled and confused. Mental illness was a disease, not a crime.
“She’s never done anything like this before,” Pete put in.
“No criminal history? Good,” the policeman said. “We do have a certain amount of discretion in these cases. How
would you like us to proceed, Mrs. Mahoney?”
Pete gazed pleadingly at Sharon. “I’ll be forever grateful if you let her get the treatment she needs.”
Something else concerned Sharon even more. If she pressed charges, there might be publicity. Learning the ugly details of the incident would terrify Greg. He might never feel safe again.
“Just take her away,” she said. “She won’t automatically be released in seventy-two hours if she’s dangerous, will she?”
“No,” the officer said. “And you could press charges later. I’ve taken a report, so everything’s here in black and white.”
Sharon nodded. “All right.”
Pete touched her hand. “Thank you. I promise I won’t let her back in this house, ever.” He followed Romero to the front porch.
Outside, blue lights flashed in the darkness. The paramedics had already left, and only the police car remained.
The whole time, Bella hadn’t said a word. The fight had gone out of her, along with her usual air of self-importance. It was as if she herself had departed, leaving an empty shell.
When the police took her away, Pete promised to follow in his car. “She’s been obsessed with this whole business, but I never imagined she’d try to harm anyone,” he told Sharon. “I’ll stay at a motel tonight, once Bella’s settled. Do you mind if I drop in to collect our things tomorrow?”
“Doesn’t matter. I’ll be leaving in the morning,” she said wearily. “Greg and I will find somewhere to go.” She’d had enough of tempting fate.
“No.” The word burst from Ian. “I don’t want them to drive you out. Besides, Bella’s gone.”
“But whatever wants me to leave here isn’t,” Sharon said.
“You’re actually starting to believe in ghosts?” Ian pressed. “I thought you were the original skeptic.”
“I don’t know what’s going on,” Sharon admitted. The mantel clock showed four a.m. No wonder she couldn’t get her brain to function rationally. “I just don’t think I could sleep here another night.”
“I want you to know that we’re going to move out permanently,” Pete said. “Bella should never live in this place again.”
“Do what you like.” Sharon couldn’t spare any sympathy, although she knew the man was sincere in his regrets.
After the Pete departed, Ian repeated his invitation to stay in his studio. Sharon was considering accepting when Jody came out.
“I couldn’t get back to sleep, what with all the commotion,” she grumbled. “You might as well stay on my couch. I should have known those idiot Gaskells would be trouble. Please let me help.”
“Thank you.” Sharon would be glad to stay in the same apartment as Greg.
“Good night, then,” Ian said. “Thanks, Jody.”
“It’s the least I can do.” His great-aunt gave him a hug.
Inside the flat, Sharon curled up on the couch, wrapped in a comforter. She lay there for a long time, trying to tell herself that the worst was over, then fell asleep and dreamed that she was still awake.
Ian heard people stirring downstairs shortly after nine a.m. Edgy until the adrenaline drained from his system, he had spent the last few hours jotting down his impressions of the past week, trying to make sense of them.
One thing he knew. Despite the dramatic events of last night, Bella Gaskell hadn’t been the instigator nor was she the source of the problems. He only wished he knew how she fitted in and what had tipped her over the edge.
He began with Sharon’s arrival and worked his way through the past week, trying to find a pattern. They were all involved—him, the Gaskells, Sharon, possibly even Jody in a way he didn’t understand. If he searched hard enough, maybe he could find a solution that would enable Sharon to stay.
By nine-thirty, he had to quit. Blearily, he splashed his face with cold water, took his medication for whatever slight value it might retain and descended to the kitchen.
His great-aunt shot him a warning glance as she removed mini-waffles from the toaster and doused them in syrup for Greg. Clearly she didn’t want last night’s activities mentioned in front of the boy, which was fine with Ian.
He wished he had Jody’s degree of self-possession. She didn’t seem troubled by emotional ups and downs and was rarely flustered. A good thing she hadn’t inherited the family tendency toward moodiness or she’d never have survived all she’d been through.
“Sharon went upstairs to shower and change,” Jody said. “What’ll you have?”
What Ian wanted was coffee, and then, he discovered, some waffles, and then more. Between him and Greg, they finished two packages.
“You eat even more than me,” the boy observed with admiration. “When I grow up, I’m going to eat as much as you do.”
Ian laughed. He’d never thought about growing up in terms of trying to achieve maximum food consumption. “That’s quite an ambition.”
“And I’m going to paint like you.” Greg paused before adding, “I mean, if you can paint with a computer. Can you?”
“In a way,” Ian said. “Computer Assisted Design is a popular field.” He’d enjoyed a couple of classes he’d taken in the subject but found it no substitute for working on canvas.
“That’s what I’m going to do, then,” Greg said.
Jody refilled Ian’s cup. “Remember that new computer program I bought the other day?” she asked the boy. “You can design your own greeting cards.”
“Can I go try it?” Greg asked. Receiving a nod and instructions on which icon to click for the program, he raced from the room.
Jody studied Ian across the table. “You might as well tell me what happened last night. I’d like to hear the details from you before I read them in the newspaper.”
“They won’t be in the newspaper,” he said. “At least not today, because the incident happened too late. I’m hoping we can avoid publicity altogether.”
Jody shrugged. “In any case, give me your version.”
He explained about the séance and the attack in Sharon’s apartment. “Even though the Gaskells are moving out, she’s determined to leave today.”
“I know. She told me,” Jody said. “I suppose she’ll go to her sister’s, although they’ll be cramped in a small apartment with a baby. Perhaps I could find them a place.”
“In the neighborhood?” Ian wondered if his great-aunt knew how much he wanted to keep Sharon nearby, and then realized that of course she did.
“A lady in the next block came to ask advice last year when she converted her house to apartments,” Jody said. “I’ve still got her card. I’ll see if there’s a vacancy.”
“I’d be grateful,” Ian said. “You don’t mind about her breaking the lease?”
She made a face. “I’ll be lucky if she doesn’t sue me. You know how people are these days.”
“Not Sharon.”
“I’m sure she won’t,” his great-aunt agreed.
They sipped their coffee peacefully for a while. “This place is only a block away?” Ian said. “That’s close enough so Greg could visit you after school.”
“Never crossed my mind,” his great-aunt said with an almost-straight face.
While getting dressed, Sharon basked in the sunshine flooding through the bathroom window. After the violent storm last Wednesday and the changeable skies ever since, the contrast soothed her. Maybe the worst really was over.
She dialed Karly’s phone number. Ordinarily, she didn’t like to call people on Saturday mornings, but parents of babies didn’t get the luxury of sleeping in.
The answering machine picked up. She left a message, hoping her sister would interrupt halfway through, and stayed on the line until the machine hung up. Maybe Karly and Frank had gone out for breakfast.
Sharon didn’t feel like herself this morning. A shaky awareness of how easily she could have been killed intruded on her thoughts as she showered and dressed. She’d never known this kind of fear before, an anxiety that refused to dispel even though Pet
e had called to say Bella, still in a daze, was confined to a locked ward.
Shadows moved in odd ways. The normal creaking sounds of the house rattled Sharon. She wondered if she would feel safe even at Karly’s place.
The one bright spot was the memory of Ian coming to her rescue. At the critical moment, he hadn’t suffered a seizure or acted bizarre. He’d been there when she needed him.
The worst thing about leaving here was putting distance between the two of them, Sharon thought. She wondered if their relationship, still so new, would survive the move.
But she had to consider Greg’s safety first, along with her own peace of mind. Staying was out of the question, especially with tomorrow being the anniversary of the tragedy.
Until last night, she had considered the date’s significance to lie in its power to stimulate Ian’s seizures and possibly to reawaken old fears and sorrows in others. Now she wasn’t so sure there might not be nastier surprises in store. She didn’t know the explanation for what had happened at the séance. She was no longer sure she wanted to know.
Half an hour later, Sharon called her sister again, in case Karly had been in the shower and hadn’t noticed there was a message. Again, she got the machine.
If she couldn’t reach her sister, they would have to go to a motel. That didn’t suit Sharon’s budget and wouldn’t please Greg, but she saw no alternative.
To her surprise, when she passed Jody’s apartment, she heard Greg’s and Ian’s voices overlapping. The two must be manipulating some kind of designs on a computer, because they were talking about clicking a picture into the upper right corner, and something else about fronts. Greg sounded excited, while Ian seemed amused.
Sharon didn’t think she could face anyone right now, not even her son. She continued on to the kitchen and sat down to read the newspaper.
While she was chuckling over a humor column, Jody appeared from the back yard. “I can never keep up with those weeds,” the landlady complained as she washed her hands. “After the rain, they’re easy to pull out, though.”
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