The Ghosts of Cragera Bay

by Dawn Brown

  Miller sat up straight and frowned. The mention of Andy taking her car was the only thing to swipe away the man’s aggravating smile. “If he were angry or upset, he may not have been thinking straight. Or perhaps he took your car intentionally to force you to come after him. If he felt slighted, usurped.” His gaze flicked to Declan in case she missed the less-than-subtle innuendo. “Did you want to report your car stolen?”

  She was half-tempted to say yes so that at least the police would be out there looking for Andy, but if they found him she didn’t want him charged with a crime. She sighed. “No.”

  Miller stood, closing his notebook. “I understand your worry, but just give it a couple of days to let Mr. Quinn cool down. I’m sure you’ll hear from him then. If not, we’ll review the details and go from there.”

  The detective edged toward the door, apparently finished with them. A lump thickened in Carly’s throat, a knotted tangle of guilt and frustration. She’d dragged Andy into this and now he was missing and the police weren’t lifting a damn finger to do anything about it.

  “If you hear anything,” Declan said.

  “I’ll contact you straight away.”

  Once the detective had gone, Carly stood and crossed to the window. Fat raindrops pelted the glass and rolled down like jagged bolts of lightning. It could only be two or three in the afternoon at the latest, but the dark, low-hanging clouds made it look so much later. Cold dread settled over her like a heavy, wet blanket. Andy was out there somewhere and no one was looking for him.

  Unless he was already dead.

  Her throat caught and her eyes stung. She squeezed them closed and leaned forward, resting her forehead against the cold glass, while she struggled to regain control. She had to do something to find Andy, but after contacting the police she had no idea what.

  Large, warm hands closed around her shoulders. Declan’s chest pressed to her back. He brushed a soft kiss to her temple. Warmth welled inside her and she nearly gave in to the urge to sink into the comfort he offered. Only sheer determination held her rigid.

  “We’ll find him,” Declan said.

  She wanted to believe him, she really did, but she honestly couldn’t imagine how. Not that she didn’t appreciate all Declan had already done for her, was still doing. Since she’d initially called him, he’d been at her side, while they’d searched the village, investigated different routes to Stonecliff and The Devil’s Eye. When their search had proved fruitless, he’d contacted the police and stood at her side during that farce of an interview.

  She rubbed her eyes with her fingertips, wiping away any trace of hot moisture, before she opened them and met Declan’s gaze in the reflection.

  “I don’t know what to do next,” she admitted, her voice barely a whisper.

  “I’ll help you.” He shot her a faint smile. “Finding people who don’t want to be found is kind of what I do. But in the meantime, let’s get your things and bring them back to Stonecliff. I don’t want you staying here by yourself.”

  Despite the comfort his words inspired, she couldn’t stop the fresh wave of guilt from crashing over her. “This is my fault. I dragged Andy into this. You’re never going to sell Stonecliff once word gets around that another man is missing. I’m so sorry for everything.”

  “None of what’s happened here is your fault.” Dark eyes fixed on her and she could have melted into their depths. “If Andy disappearing has anything to do with those other men, we’ve got a much bigger problem than me selling that mausoleum. What do you know about the other murders?”

  “Not a lot,” she told him. “I’d done some preliminary research, but I was focused on the haunt activity. Come upstairs, and I’ll show you what I have.”

  “Okay, and you can pack your things.”

  “What if Andy comes back and I’m not here?”

  “You can leave word with Mrs. Leonard, but I don’t think he’ll be back on his own..” The certainty in Declan’s tone left her cold. He gripped her hand and tugged her toward the stairs. “Come on, let’s get your things.”

  * * *

  Declan followed Carly up the stairs and into her room at the end of the hall, a strange mix of apprehension and relief swirling inside him. He hated to think what could be happening to Andy, or that the man might already be dead, but he couldn’t stop thinking, thank God it wasn’t Carly who’d been taken.

  Though, if Andy’s disappearance had anything to do with the men who had vanished before, Carly had never been in danger. For some reason it was only men who were targeted.

  Once inside Carly’s room, she closed the door behind them and flipped on a light. The soft glow helped alleviate some of the gloom caused by the bleak weather outside. The room itself was cluttered and fussy and left him feeling a little like he’d stepped back in time. Large, ornately carved wooden furniture dominated the space. Lace drapes covered the windows filtering what little daylight there was. A collection of doilies covered the dressers and night table to protect the wood from the collection of ceramic ornaments and vases stuffed with dried flowers.

  In complete contrast to the old-fashioned furniture and flowered bedspread, camera and computer bags had been pushed up against any bare wall Carly could find. She lifted a large file box from the floor next to a desk that made the writing table in his room at Stonecliff look perfectly functional.

  She set the box on the bed and lifted the lid. Inside, a stack of neatly labeled green file folders leaned against the cardboard walls.

  “Wow, you are organized,” he said, impressed.

  She snorted. “I’m kind of anal about my research.”

  She flipped through the files until she came to one marked, TDE MURDERS, in perfect square printing.

  “This is everything I have on the murders,” she told him, pulling the file from the box. She flipped it open and rifled through the pages inside. Most were handwritten notes along with photocopied newspaper articles.

  “Do you know the identity of the man who survived? The one Miller talked about?”

  She nodded. “I told you about him. Kyle Peirs. He lives with your sister, Eleri.”

  “Right, the reporter. Did he tell you about what happened to him at The Devil’s Eye?”

  She shrugged. “A little bit, but not very much about the people who attacked him. Most of my questions were about paranormal experiences in the house.”

  She sounded distracted and her brows had pulled together in a faint frown.

  “What is it?” he asked.

  “Two things, maybe.” She looked up and met his gaze with smoky eyes. “I think someone’s been through my research. These are witness statements.” She held out a collection of pages held together with a blue paper clip. “They shouldn’t be in this file.”

  “Could you have just slipped them into the wrong file?”

  She shot him a look that told him just how ridiculous she considered his question.

  “Is anything missing from the box?”

  “I don’t know,” she said, looking down at the stacked files. “I’d have to go through each one to tell.”

  She handed him the file in her hand, then began to do just that, flipping through one folder after another.

  “Could Andy have done it?”

  “Maybe.” She didn’t sound convinced, nor did she look up from the pages as she scanned them.

  “You said there were two things. What was the other?”

  “Oh.” She blinked as if his question had snapped her from a trance. She set down the folder in her hands and pointed to the open file in front of him. “Look, Detective Miller was one of the investigating detectives prior to the arrests last spring.”

  Declan supposed it would make sense for Miller to follow up on their complaint, then. “He wasn’t the lead investigator, though.”

  “No, that was Martin Harding, and I should expect the man was fired after working so hard to see Eleri arrested for murders she didn’t commit.”

  He’d heard more than a f
ew stories about Eleri. Some of them so farfetched they couldn’t possibly be true. At least he hadn’t thought so at the time, but if she’d been a serious suspect in the murders of fifteen men, maybe there’d been some truth to them after all. “What does she look like?”

  Carly lifted her gaze to him and tilted her head a little to one side. “Like you, actually.”

  “So she’s big?” he asked. She had to have been for the police to believe she’d overpowered these men.

  Carly snorted. “Not quite. Next to her I feel like a giant. I meant she’s dark haired like you, has the same angled features.”

  “So why did the police suspect her?”

  “Like I said, I’m not as well versed in the murders as I am about the paranormal activity on the property, but if memory serves she had a connection to some of the missing men. Then when the bodies turned up in The Devil’s Eye, everyone was certain she was responsible.”

  “That’s stupid. The estate’s huge. Anyone could have killed those men.”

  “As was proven.”

  There had to be more to the story than that. “Did you ever speak to Harding?”

  She shook her head. “My interest really wasn’t about the investigation.”

  No, it wouldn’t have been. “We should find him and speak to him now. If Andy vanishing has anything to do with the murders, we need to know as much as we can about them. Harding will be our best bet.”

  * * *

  Martin Harding lived in a white stucco row house about twenty minutes south of Cragera Bay. Carly didn’t share Declan’s opinion that the man’s insight would help them find Andy, but at least they were doing something more than sitting around, waiting for Andy to call.

  She glanced at her mobile’s dark screen. No new calls. No new texts. She blew out a soft sigh, doing her best to ignore the disappointment weighing heavy on her shoulders. Andy’s call wasn’t the only one she was waiting on.

  While Declan had been trying to track down Martin Harding’s address, she’d rung Reece. She needed insight, a lead, some shred of hope that Andy was still alive, something that would lead them to him.

  Reece hadn’t answered, so she’d left a message.

  “Reece, please,” she’d said, her voice trembling. “I really need your help. The man who came to help with my investigation has vanished. The police aren’t taking us seriously and I’m afraid of what it could mean that he’s gone. Please call me back.”

  But he hadn’t so far.

  Declan steered into a narrow drive, pulling in behind an aging navy blue sedan. He nodded at the parked car. “Hopefully, it’s a sign he’s home.”

  Despite ringing the man several times, Harding hadn’t answered. Declan hadn’t bothered to leave a message. No doubt his calls wouldn’t be returned, either.

  They both got out of the car, and Carly followed Declan up a narrow concrete walkway. A rubbish bin, piled so high the plastic lid couldn’t close all the way, stood next to the door and filled the cool air with the fetid stink of rot.

  Carly wrinkled her nose. “God’s sake, when’s the last time that’s been emptied?”

  “Smells like months,” Declan muttered, and knocked hard on the door.

  There was no answer at first, so Declan tried again but harder. A moment later, the door swung inward and an older man in a tattered brown-striped bathrobe filled the opening. His steel-gray hair, unwashed and greasy, stood up from his head at awkward angles. White stubble covered his sagging jowls and chin. An invisible cloud of body odor, stale booze and old cigarettes rolled out with him, momentarily eclipsing the stink from the rubbish.

  Carly swallowed hard to keep from gagging and took a step back, while the man’s ice-blue gaze peered out from his bleary red eyes.

  “Whatever you want, I’m not interested. Now piss off!” the man snarled and started to pull the door closed again.

  Declan stepped forward and grabbed the edge of the door, forcing it open. “We just need a moment of your time.”

  Despite his bleary, disheveled appearance, something flashed in the man’s frigid eyes and he grinned, sharp and nasty. “Oh, now, lad, you don’t want to be playing games with the likes of me.”

  “Please, Detective,” Carly said, moving closer and gently nudging Declan back from the door. “We have some questions about the murders at The Devil’s Eye.”

  Redness heated the man’s face and his gaze narrowed. “I told you people before, I’ve nothing to say to any of you.”

  The door slammed shut with a solid whack before Declan could grab it. The windows rattled in their frames. Carly didn’t know who Harding though they were, but he obviously wasn’t going to give them a chance to explain.

  Still, Declan wasn’t ready to give up.

  “Detective Harding, my name is Declan Meyers. I own Stonecliff. I need to ask you some questions about The Devil’s Eye.” He waited for a response, but the house remained silent and still. He glanced back at Carly.

  She shrugged and called out, “Detective, another man has gone missing.”

  The door clicked and opened wide enough for Harding to poke his head out. “When?”

  “This morning. He’s a friend of ours. No one’s taking his disappearance seriously.”

  His eyes narrowed. “What makes you think I can help you?”

  “We’re not sure you can,” she admitted. “But we’d still like to ask you some questions.”

  “You better come in, then.” He opened the door wider so they could enter.

  The old cigarette smell intensified once inside, a blue-gray haze filled the foyer, and Carly’s stomach churned. Harding showed them into a small, dim lounge. Drapes pulled closed over the window, the television cast the only light—a flickering gray and white glow over piles of old clothes, take-away containers and empty whiskey bottles.

  “How did you manage to come to own Stonecliff?” Harding asked Declan, shoving bundles of old clothes off the settee onto the floor so they could sit.

  “I inherited it.” Declan sat on the freshly cleared cushion. Carly eased onto the edge of the seat next to him.

  “Why would Arthur James leave it to you? I figured it would have gone to his girls, or that butler of his.”

  “I’m his…I was his son.”

  “James had a son? Who’s your mother?”

  “Amy Meyers—it was Fields before she married him.”

  “Right, the first one. I’d almost forgotten about her. That was a marriage that didn’t last long.” Harding dropped onto the loveseat opposite them, not bothering to clear away the newspapers piled there before sitting down. The pages crinkled every time he moved. “I didn’t even know he’d had a child with her.”

  Declan stiffened, the conversation obviously making him uncomfortable. “She left him while she was pregnant.”

  “James never had much luck where wives were concerned.”

  “I can’t imagine why,” Declan muttered.

  “So this friend of yours who vanished.” Harding reached for his cigarettes, and Carly nearly whimpered. “It was her, wasn’t it?”

  Declan frowned. “Who?”

  He lit his cigarette with a match and leaned closer. “Eleri. She’s back in Cragera Bay, isn’t she? Did someone see her?”

  “No.” Carly shook her head. The man didn’t honestly still believe Eleri had killed those men. Not after three people had been arrested for the crimes. Not after Eleri had nearly been murdered herself. “Why would you think that?”

  “Your friend’s missing and you’re here. Why else would you come to me?”

  “We came to you because you were the lead detective on the case,” Carly explained. “Detective Miller isn’t taking his disappearance seriously.”

  Harding snorted two streams of smoke from his nostrils. “Well that little fucker wouldn’t, would he? Bastard sold me down the river. He pretends he didn’t, still tries to buddy up to me, but I’m no fool. I don’t know what he told the boss, but it must have been a hell of a good story
. Otherwise, how did I wind up sacked, and him promoted?”

  His continuing obsession with Eleri James might have played a big part of that, but Carly kept the thought to herself.

  “Why are you so certain Eleri was guilty, even now?” Declan asked.

  “If you’re going to sit there and whine about me railroading your sister, you best get out.” Harding jabbed his dwindling cigarette at him.

  Declan merely stared blandly at the man. “I’ve never met my sister. I have no opinion on whether you railroaded her or not. Right now, I want to know why you still suspect her.”

  Harding dragged hard on his cigarette, then said on the exhale, “There was something wrong with her, since she was a child. Just a weird, creepy kid. Her stepmother saw her kill a kitten behind the coach house. Said she bashed its head in with a brick. That’s not something a normal little girl does. Then she tried to drown her sister.”

  Declan glanced at Carly, and she sat straighter on the settee. “Brynn said it was her mother who tried to drown her. She remembered last spring when Ruth Bigsby pushed her into the bog.”

  “I know what that girl said, but I’ll tell you this.” He stubbed his cigarette hard into the overflowing ashtray. It tipped, spilling ash and cigarette butts onto the badly scuffed coffee table, but Harding barely noticed. “When Thomas Grady pulled that child out of the bog, it wasn’t Meris he saw hiding in the woods. It was Eleri.”

  Thomas Grady was the village drunk. Carly had met him and wouldn’t have given anything he said a second thought.

  Carly thought back to the petite woman she’d spoken to a little more than a month ago. Well spoken, bright, a little shy at first, but the longer they spoke, Carly caught glimpses of a wry sense of humor. When Eleri’s gaze had fallen on Kyle’s, and his eyes met hers, there was no doubt what they felt for each other. She’d almost been envious, or would have been if she believed in the whole “one person forever and ever” sort of deal.

  Carly didn’t believe for one moment that woman could have been involved in murdering all those men, in attempting to kill the man she clearly loved.