Moonstone Shadows

by Patricia Rice

  The bubbling fountain had been knocked over, soaking the zebra-skinned rug Wan Hai had set in front of the door. The prisms in the window still sparkled a rainbow over the soggy mess.

  He knew a ghost hadn’t tossed his shop. He’d found the back door jimmied. Someone was trying to make him back off—someone who didn’t know him very well.

  Wan Hai began to wail at the destruction of all her hard work. Thank all that was holy, Hannah took the feng shui expert outside, into the waiting arms of Pasquale, the Italian grocer, who led her away, weeping.

  Aaron kept his eyes on the more dangerous women circling the room. Tullah and Amber had arrived first, since their stores were closest. The thrift store owner frowned and muttered voodoo chants under her breath. Gentle Amber shook her head and patted his arm comfortingly.

  Hannah stood back, observing, like the studious librarian she was. Aaron wanted to tell her to go back to Scotland, except he wanted to join her, and he couldn’t leave Hillvale unprotected. He was a selfish bastard, but he needed her here, helping him dig out answers—

  And waiting for her to convulse on the floor from the knot in her head. Evidently, he had one in his too, letting himself in for that level of pain again. Maybe, if he found the damned stone, she’d go away.

  Fee popped in, holding her little dog, which yapped frantically and tried to scramble from her arms. The cook sniffed, muttered mildew, and trotted back to her café.

  Even Dinah came in from the restaurant. Dinah seldom left her kitchen. She wasn’t a Lucy, but the gruff, transgender cook was the heartbeat of the town. Looking appalled, she began reverently picking up old books, until Tullah stopped her.

  “We need a circle, girl. We need to find who did this. You go back and cook us some gumbo because we’re gonna need it.” Tullah seldom descended to dialect. When she did, it was serious.

  “There’s nothing you can do with a circle,” Aaron protested. “This isn’t a ghost. This is someone trying to distract me from asking questions. I need Keegan or Harvey to test those stones. Otherwise, I just need to start putting things back in place.”

  “It ain’t just about you, boy,” Tullah retorted. “The spirits will tell us who was here.”

  Teddy arrived. Her jewelry store was on the far end of town and often busy. But he should have known she’d receive word the same way the others did—osmosis, he was convinced.

  She held her walking stick over the pile of rocks, shook her head, and crouched down. “I’m receiving few emanations from these. Aaron, have you tested them?”

  Hannah stepped in front of him. “Don’t. Not yet. Let me experiment with Teddy first. You don’t want to touch those rocks if they’re loaded with anything bad.”

  There was an entertaining spin—she was protecting him.

  “There’s no malum on them,” he told her. But he could see she was eager to test her new-found ability to enhance gifts. He almost felt jealous when she held out her hand to Teddy.

  As Teddy picked up one of the rocks, Sam and Mariah arrived from the furthest end of town. It was a damned Lucy parade. Aaron just wanted to toss furniture back in place, but instinct stopped him. He had to remind himself that these people were his friends. They wanted to help. He hadn’t had much of that in his life, which meant he didn’t know how to handle it now.

  “Not evil,” Teddy repeated, rolling the rock in her palm. “Not really crystal. I’m no expert. You’ll need to call Keegan for that. But I think this one is just granite with minute crystals embedded. The emanations feel spiteful, but that’s not my bailiwick.”

  Hannah wrapped her hand around Teddy’s. Both women stood still, then shook their heads. Hannah quietly stepped back to stand beside him. “Nothing,” she murmured in disappointment.

  Teddy tossed the rock back to the stack. “We need a circle. Sam, will Cass be coming?”

  “No, I don’t think so. Tullah, what do you think? Anything we can do?” Sam, the environmental scientist, had an unnatural talent for growing things but no ability to summon spirits.

  Aaron hadn’t realized he was growling under his breath until Hannah squeezed his hand. “Do you want to test anything before they get started?” she asked.

  “Yes.” While the women discussed their hoodoo, he stalked past them to the rocks. He ran his staff over them, looking for any unusual energy. Finding none, he picked up a handful of the smaller rocks. He found only faint impressions.

  Hannah’s hand covered his as if it belonged there. The meanness in them exploded.

  “Just ugliness,” she whispered. “Is ugliness an emotion?”

  “Yeah, in this case, it’s vicious malice, like Teddy said.” He flung the stone back. “I think whoever did this enjoys destruction and was paid to do this.”

  She nodded. “That matches what I was feeling. I just couldn’t translate it. Nothing real but an ugly joy in being destructive, like a vandal who knifes art or tags walls.”

  Who knew he’d been asking about rocks? Lance, Cass, and Xavier. Lance had had time to tell half the town. Cass wouldn’t say a word. And this had been done while they were with Xavier. Anyone else? Or did this go back to his searching Francois’s room? Was the killer getting nervous?

  Looking as if he’d been dragged from bed, which he probably had, Harvey arrived. Aaron watched as the musician regarded the chaos, picked up the stones, studied them, and widened his eyes. “If they’re trying to make us believe these came from around here, they don’t know rocks or they think we’re idiots. See if Keegan recognizes them.”

  “He’s back in his cave. It will take a while for him to drive back,” Mariah said. “I had to leave Daphne with a neighbor. So let’s get this circle done with, and he can tell you more when he comes in.”

  Aaron signaled Harvey to follow him as he backed out to the boardwalk, leaving behind Hannah, who was fascinated by the Lucy’s spirit circle.

  “How do you know they’re not from here?” he demanded the instant Harvey shut the door.

  “I’m no geologist,” Harvey warned. “I don’t know proper names for anything. But granite is composed of several basic materials. That one's mostly gray, with very little crystal or pink. The granite up the mountain is heavy with quartz and what Keegan says is feldspar. He can tell you more. It has to do with volcanic action and former ocean currents and whatnot.”

  “So somebody just unloaded a bunch of stray rock in my store to mess with my mind—or because I’ve been asking about rocks.” Aaron glared down the sunlit street to where tourists roamed the walks, unaware of dangerous shadows lurking. Several glanced at his shop, saw the gathering inside, and hesitated. “Damnatus. I need curtains on that window.” Inspiration struck. “Do you know anything about a grotto?”

  Harvey looked suspicious. “On Kennedy land. My grandfather claims they stole his water to make it.”

  “Wonderful. More treachery to feed the malum.“ Aaron jammed his hands in his pockets and studied his shop window, looking for Hannah. Then he realized what he was doing and mentally slapped himself.

  Let the women do their thing. No spirit would explain this level of stupidity. And the spirits clinging to some of that furniture ought to drive them out soon enough. He had more people to interview while they played.

  He’d worked without Hannah all his life. He didn’t need her now.

  He just wanted her, which was a dangerous concept best buried and forgotten.

  “Want to talk to Kennedys about grottos and rocks?” He started across the street to City Hall.

  “I doubt they’ll know anything, but it’s a start.” Harvey crossed the street with him.

  Balance of power, Aaron mused, recalling Hannah’s comment: evil versus innocence, spirit energy versus money. Was it even possible to balance those?

  Hannah had attended séances before, perhaps none as eccentric or realistic as this one.

  Mariah failed to channel Daisy, as she claimed to have done before. Tullah complained that she needed Val, the Death Goddess, who had
mysteriously disappeared. The thrift store owner did contact a spirit who apparently lingered in one of Aaron’s chairs and who laughed at their puny efforts.

  “We just need to know who vandalized the shop.” Speaking to the dismissive spirit, Amber used a hypnotic tone that Hannah hadn’t heard before.

  “Big burly man,” Tullah answered in a husky, dismissive voice not her own. “Wouldn’t mind trying him on for size. Mean bugger though. Probably beats women.”

  Spirits were about as useless as neighborhood gossips, Hannah concluded.

  “Is there anyone else here who would like to speak?” Amber asked.

  “Honor the dead,” Teddy unexpectedly said. “Do not disturb the stones.”

  Hannah could feel shock vibrating through the hands clasping hers. As far as she knew, Teddy didn’t normally channel spirits. But the jeweler had helped Hannah dig up a stone guardian. Was she reaching the natives who had created it?

  “Have others desecrated the burial ground?” Hannah asked.

  “Only Mother Earth. The evil haunts her still. Return the stones so they may rest.” Teddy’s hand fell limp in Hannah’s.

  The circle broke up after that. The Lucys chattered excitedly. Uneasy, Hannah began returning Aaron’s books to the shelves. “Does anyone know where there might be an old grotto?” she finally asked, because that had been on her mind when Teddy’s spirit had spoken.

  “I know where one used to be,” Mariah said, helping Tullah right the furniture. “Follow the cottonwoods. There’s a valley below the lodge, filled with trees. I was told the Kennedys once attempted to create a pool there.”

  “And I heard the artists gathered crystals there,” Hannah said. “Anyone up for an expedition?”

  “I thought their crystals came from Keegan’s cave.” Mariah sounded puzzled.

  “That may be where Daisy found hers, but Lance says some were found in a grotto. He has a painting of it in the gallery.” Hannah waited expectantly.

  By the time the Lucys sorted their schedules, Sam was the only one free to explore. Just as they debated postponing until another date, Keegan arrived. He glanced at the destruction, checked worriedly on his wife—who was still righting furniture—then turned to the pile of rocks.

  “You’ve started raising rocks instead of spirits?” he asked, crouching to wave his hand over them.

  “Straight from hell,” Mariah agreed cheerfully. “Harvey and Aaron think they’re harmless. What say you, Oh Great One?”

  He shrugged. “Granite, not local. Driveway material at best. Someone just making a statement?”

  “That rocks are rocks?” Teddy swept them onto a shovel. “Only a Null would do that.”

  “You didn’t really think a Lucy did this, do you?” Keegan stood. “Where’s Aaron?”

  “With Harvey. Tell him he’s talking to the wrong people if he wants to find the grotto.” With satisfaction, Hannah helped Mariah stack the coffee tables.

  Only when they were almost done did she remember the Eversham painting.

  Aaron had stored it in back, hadn’t he? She was hunting through the storage area when Aaron returned. Understanding what she sought, he wordlessly reached to the top of the old secretary.

  His hand came back empty.

  Twenty

  The missing painting was like a missing tooth. Aaron felt the gap and kept coming back to it, toying with it, irritating already inflamed tissue.

  “How did anyone know it even existed?” He paced his carefully curated living room—because Hannah had insisted he was in no shape to re-open the shop. She was damned right. He wanted to commit murder.

  “I knew because of the journals,” Hannah offered. “The Lucys know because we showed photos to Mariah and Keegan. If someone had you investigated. . .”

  Reading old newspapers would tell them he’d once had a valuable Eversham in his possession—but how would they know which one? His shop was full of valuable antiques. Why steal the hidden painting unless it was the painting in particular they were after?

  He didn’t know why he’d let Hannah follow him home. But she made an excellent sounding board and kept him from swinging from the rafters in frustration. “They might be curious about the painting I purportedly stole, but they wouldn’t know where I hid it!”

  “That part is troublesome, yes. Even I didn’t know where you’d put it, besides in the back somewhere. And the place is packed to the rafters with junk.”

  Hannah sipped the margarita he’d fixed, tasting it as if it were new to her, which it might be. She’d probably been under twenty-one when she’d left the States. He didn’t think margaritas were routinely served in Scotland. An innocent, a total innocent. He ought to have his mind washed out with soap for even looking at her.

  “Which makes me think either I have spyware in my shop or a Lucy took it. You’re the only Lucy I know who could sense it.” He watched her reaction mostly because he liked looking at her, not because he believed she’d stolen the painting.

  She took another sip of the drink and grimaced. “I only knew where to find it because it glowed. I don’t know if others noticed. The Lucys have seen the photos we took of the painting. No one seemed very interested.”

  He pointed at her as he paced. “But once we showed that photo, word of the painting would have got around. A Lucy mentions it to her Null spouse, who mentions it to someone else. . . Probably didn’t take a day for news to spread. Okay, that part makes sense now.” He returned to pacing rather than watch her with the drink. He liked his salty. She might have preferred more sweet.

  “But that doesn’t explain how they found it,” she argued. “And we don’t know for certain that it was stolen during the vandalism, unless you’re in the habit of checking on it nightly. I would have noticed if I’d seen it glowing if I came in after dark, I think, and I don’t remember seeing it since you moved it.”

  Aaron grabbed the phone and left a message with Walker asking that he check the storage area for spyware. “Unless that painting is giving off infra-red, I just don’t see how thieves could find it,” he said when he hung up.

  She screwed up her petite nose. “And I don’t want to think about people spying on us in your office. So let’s go see the grotto. I still think that’s central to our understanding of whatever is happening. If you need to punish your feet, it ought to be while doing something useful. Mariah said we need to follow the cottonwoods.”

  “Harvey would have done that already. He’s obsessed with finding water on the mountain.” His interview with the Kennedys had been a waste. They’d known nothing about the grotto—it had been before their time.

  Still, a fruitless search made more sense than wearing out a priceless carpet. Aaron set down his drink to dig in a closet for a backpack. He wasn’t the hiking sort, but he had equipment for everything.

  Hannah turned to his refrigerator. They’d grabbed lunches from Fee earlier, but sustenance was always good when on the trail. Aaron liked that Hannah was self-sufficient, not needing to be given instructions—a damned good thing because he wasn’t accustomed to communicating.

  “You restocked,” she said dryly, removing various ingredients.

  “I called Pasquale, and Harvey picked it up yesterday. I do eat,” he added, filling a water bottle.

  “Not a vampire, good to know.” She cut a crusty roll and began adding vegetables and cheese, avoiding the lunchmeat he preferred. “How many hours of daylight left?”

  “Out in the open, four or five. If we enter the more wooded areas, less. We have time for a quick reconnaissance.” He grabbed slabs of lunchmeat and slapped them on one of the rolls she prepared.

  He continued packing essentials while she finished wrapping sandwiches and choosing fruit. The quiet familiarity of the preparations reminded him that they shared a commonality in spending time in the sparseness of the Shetlands, where striking out across land meant no McDonalds, no gas stations or mini-marts. The routine soothed some of his restlessness.

  They s
et off in the heat of late afternoon, but there was enough of a breeze to prevent melting in puddles of sweat. Aaron felt better now that he was actually doing something, even if it was pointless.

  “I have no idea how this helps find Carmel’s killer,” Hannah said, reflecting his own thought. “I should think if they wanted her stones, they’d have done more to get them by now.”

  “By robbing the sheriff’s office? Or rummaging the suite after Carmel screamed the house down and brought everyone running? If the stones really are the object, he must be biding his time.” Which set off a whole new train of thought.

  She hopped on that train with him. “He thinks he can steal them from the Kennedys when the sheriff returns them? Unless you believe her sons killed her.” Hannah strode beside him, almost keeping up with his longer strides.

  “Her sons were in the bar when she started screaming, or they’d be under suspicion by now. Maybe they hired Francois to kill her, then killed him so they didn’t have to pay.” Knowing the honorable Kennedys, Aaron played this game with amusement.

  “Unless they had some pressing urgency to kill their mother now, they’d have done it long ago if they were murderously inclined.” Her voice was tinged with humor that showed she knew they’d reached the ridiculous. She cut away from the path to cross a field toward the largest clump of cottonwoods.

  “They were talking about having her committed, so I don’t think murder was their intent.” He studied the sparse line of trees. “There is a lot of dead wood. Any water in there probably dried up this summer.”

  “We probably ought to have Keegan with us. Or maybe Teddy. She’s sensitive to rock vibrations. Even Sam could probably tell us more about what to look for. I just hate sitting idle, waiting for a killer to strike again.” She swiped at a hank of sunny hair adorning her brow.

  She’d abandoned her wispy shirt for just the tank top and shorts. Her shoulders were turning pink from the constant exposure to sun since she’d arrived. Aaron tried not to look further down than her shoulders, but he should probably remind her to rub on more lotion. . .