“If he hurt you…”
Renee pushed up to a sitting position and looked over at Jeremy. She took a big breath and let it out slowly. “It wasn’t Jeremy. I could tell that the second he touched me.”
She nodded. “Oh yeah, damn straight it wasn’t him.” She helped Renee to her feet and wrapped her arms around her. For just a second, she held her. Even soaking wet and cold, feeling the beat of her heart against her chest was glorious.
“I’m okay,” Renee said into her ear before giving her a gentle kiss. “I promise.”
“You better be,” she said and didn’t even bother to try to hide the emotion in her voice. Too damn close. It had been too damn close.
As fast as she could, Lorna hustled Renee back inside and next to the fire. She wrapped a blanket around her shivering body, put a pillow at her back, and turned to race into the kitchen. Hot tea was definitely in order. The fact that she was soaked to the skin didn’t even occur to her.
Before she could move more than a couple feet, Jeremy came in. Like her, he was drenched, his shaggy hair plastered to his head, one hand rubbing the back of his head where the shovel had connected. His eyes were wide and scared. She didn’t see her brother frightened often, and it pulled at her heart. “What was that?”
Renee surprised her with her simple statement. “It was the truth.”
His words trembled as he looked at Renee, and uncharacteristic tears glittered in his eyes. “I was going to kill you and bury you right there.”
Lorna nodded and tears welled in her eyes too. “It wasn’t you, Jeremy. You weren’t going to hurt Renee. He was.”
“Everything’s a great big blur. All I really remember is how angry I felt and how I wanted to choke the life out of Renee. I’ve never felt that pissed off before. Never want to again either.”
“It wasn’t Renee he wanted to kill. It was Catherine.” She went back to the sofa and sat beside Renee, taking her hand.
His eyes cleared suddenly as if a heavy curtain had been lifted. “Yes, it wasn’t Renee at all. In my head, it was another woman.”
She nodded again, putting her arms around Renee. She’d finally stopped shaking. The tea could probably wait. This was more important. “Tiana showed me and now I understand it all. Go back to bed, Jeremy.”
“But—”
“I’ll explain it all in the morning. There’s really nothing more we can do tonight.”
He still didn’t move. “What if he comes back?” The fear in his voice made her want to hug him.
“He won’t. I can promise you that.”
“How can you be so sure?”
“I just am. He lost this time and he knows it. It’s almost over. By tomorrow, it will be. Trust me.”
Chapter Twenty-three
The first thing Renee noticed when she woke up was that the power had come back on. The alarm clock on the nightstand was flashing, and the bedside lamp was on.
The second thing she noticed was that she was alone. When she’d finally made it to bed last night, Lorna had been right beside her, and Clancy, ever vigilant, curled up at the foot of the bed. After everything that had happened, he was making darned sure he had eyes on Renee. He was such a good boy.
Now, though, she was alone in the big comfy bed. No Lorna. No Clancy. It felt empty and cold without them. Slowly, she pushed up and touched the tender skin on her neck. She flinched and pulled her hand away. For a few minutes last night, she thought it was all over. Judging by how tender the skin was, it had been a little too close for comfort.
Not that she blamed Jeremy. She’d known the second he touched her it wasn’t him. The man who tried to force life from her body was an angry and bitter tyrant. John McCafferty might not have been there in body, but his spirit had been crushing the life out of both Jeremy and her. His anger survived the decades until it could no longer be contained. It was like a campfire that burst into a massive conflagration. Nearly all the color in Jeremy’s aura had been obliterated by black. It was then she realized it was McCafftery’s spirit that wrapped around Jeremy. Once it was over, Jeremy’s own aura returned bright and full of the colors of his beautiful soul. Not even a shred of blackness remained.
McCafferty did not prevail, and that was all that mattered. Today was a new day, and she had the feeling it was going to be a good one. She got up, took a shower, and by the time she was dressed, she felt like a new woman, bruises and all. Sure, her throat was bound to be sore for a few days, but she could live with that. Live being the operative word.
After checking on Mom, she went in search of her woman and her dog. She found both out where she’d nearly lost her life last night. Lorna was dirty and sweaty, digging as if her life depended upon it. An odd time to be landscaping.
She tilted her head as she watched Lorna shoveling away. Like her brother, the aura around Lorna was now clear of any dark shadows. That alone made her spirit lighter although she was really curious about the task Lorna was so intent on. “What exactly are you doing?”
Lorna looked up from the hole she was standing in. It was probably five feet long and an easy three feet deep. She pointed down the deep dark earth as she leaned on the shovel. “Solving the mystery of course. You didn’t think everything was solved last night, did you? I still have some work to do.”
“Of course you do.” Renee peered into the hole, and suddenly her breath caught in her throat as the full import hit her. “Is that…?”
“Oh yeah, it sure is. I think it’s time we put in a call to Alden Swan and the Makah elders.”
What she saw in the disturbed soil made her heart sad. At the same time it filled her with a sense of peace. Last night had been bizarre, unreal, and frightening. It had also been worth every second of the chaos.
She left Lorna working and went inside to call Alden. She suspected he’d been waiting for this call for a very long time. Six hours later, the police were gone, the medical examiner was gone, and they once more decided a bottle of wine was in order. Was it just her, or were they becoming very attached to the fabulous wine cellar Aunt Bea had left Lorna?
An hour later, Alden Swan pulled up in the driveway. Lorna took him out back first and then they came into the house. In the living room, Merry and Jeremy sat together on the sofa. Renee joined Lorna on the loveseat while Alden took one of the chairs. Her mother, feeling the need for company, joined them as well. Renee kept a close eye on her, still concerned by the pale cast to her skin and the constant fatigue. All things considered, though, she looked pretty good for all that had happened to her.
“Tiana showed me,” Lorna was saying to them all. “It was as you predicted, Alden. She was reaching out to me. If I hadn’t been so reluctant to open up to the her, I’d have seen what she’d been trying to show me all along. I was too dense and stubborn to see it. I’m a pretty sucky psychic if I do so say.”
“Now you understand why she reached out to you?” Alden asked.
Lorna smiled though it was a sad smile. “Yes, I think we all do although it was my lovely lady, Renee, who figured out that piece of the puzzle. As it turns out, Jeremy and I are actually descendants of John McCafferty. After his wife died, he had another child with the woman who came in to help. She was our great-great-grandmother. That’s how Aunt Bea ultimately came to own this place.”
Despite understanding the blood connection Renee was still a little confused. “If you were all related to Tiana and John, why didn’t any of this craziness happen to anyone else in your family before you two showed up?”
Lorna put an arm around her. “You know I’ve been thinking about that ever since I figured out what Tiana was trying to tell me. The only answer I’ve come up with that makes sense to me is it’s because of you and me.”
For a second, she didn’t get it, and then it hit her. “Ohhhh, because we’re…”
Lorna smiled. “Yeah, because we are and so was she. Tiana was waiting for someone who could really understand her love for Catherine. Family, and I don’t mean the blood
kind, if you get my drift. Enter you and me. The only two who could understand because we’re living it, and the necklace?” She turned her gaze onto Alden. “I think it has to do with the Watcher you told us about. All along I’ve had a feeling someone or something else was out there. I think he’s the one who put the necklace where I could find it so I could connect at an even deeper level with Tiana. Like I said, I’m kinda dense and it took the equivalent of a sledgehammer to get my attention.”
“And me?” Jeremy asked. “What did I do to deserve the asshole? You get a gracious, caring young woman and some kind of dark angel to help you along, and I get a control-freak with violent tendencies. That’s messed up.”
“My uneducated guess: luck of the draw. I think he’s always been here making sure no one tarnished his perfect castle. When Renee and I—well, you know—shook up the status quo, his spirit grabbed what he could to put a stop to it. Who better than a male descendant? Blood is thicker than water and all that. Long story short, in your case, wrong place, wrong time, bro. You agree, Alden?”
Alden nodded. “I do.”
That explanation actually made a lot of sense to Renee, and at the same time sent shivers up her spine. It all fit together in a very bizarre puzzle. Except for one final piece. “How did you know where to find her?”
Lorna smiled. “Two things. John dragged you to the same spot where he’d buried her body after he choked the life out of her. At first, I thought he was going to dump you off the cliff except that he didn’t seem to want to get very far from that patch of grass. That was clue number one. Tiana helped again too. The sorrow that filled me when I stepped on that spot last night was so all-consuming it was impossible to ignore. Only one thing could bring that depth of emotion, and I just knew. That was clue number two.”
Renee thought of the pale skull that had been in the dirt at Lorna’s feet. The sight had filled her with such a deep sadness. For a hundred years, Catherine Swan lay beneath the lush green grass of an estate honored for its natural beauty. There, in anonymity, she was for over a century denied the love of her life and the respect of a decent burial.
Until now. Lorna had found her, and now Catherine Swan’s family would take her home at last. Somehow, it all seemed right.
*
Darkness fell swiftly, obscuring the land where only hours before the grass was green and undisturbed. As dawn had broken, the sins of the father came into the light of day. The murder by John McCafferty was no longer a secret. His hold on the two beautiful souls denied their destiny was shattered. Never again would he hurt another.
Catherine Swan was on her way home, and his promise had at long last been fulfilled. His prayers had been answered. She had come, and she had made right what had been wrong for so many long years.
The house was silent now, the whispers of the past laid to rest. He was gone, and no more would he taint a love born of truth. They had been denied in life and in death. No more. She had made things right, as the universe had decreed.
The moon rose as he stood in the shadow of the trees. The golden light this hour free from the storm clouds that had passed away shone down in bright shafts across the lawn. As he watched, two women walked together hand-in-hand toward the bluff. One woman was tall and fair, the other one shorter with dark hair that fell down her back to below her waist. They were a striking couple not simply because they were both beautiful, but also because of the depth of the love they shared was so clearly evident.
At the edge of the bluff, they turned as one and looked in his direction. Tiana McCafferty was radiant in the moonlight, her joy undeniable. Beside her, Catherine Swan smiled, her quiet beauty unmarred by the years of sorrow and separation. Tiana’s head tilted ever so slightly, and across the distance, he could read the movement of her lips. “Thank you.”
The Watcher reached out his hand as if he could touch them. How he longed to go with the two as they began their journey, but as he watched them fade from this place, he understood his work in this world was far from complete.
For so long, he’d believed that to bring Tiana and Catherine together once more, his path to heaven would open. Now he knew it was not so but simply one more step on a path long and twisted.
His redemption lay not in just this one night, but in the woman he could see inside the house as she stood at the window gazing out. It was not Tiana he was brought here to save, but Lorna. For if he could save her, he would save himself.
About the Author
Sheri Lewis Wohl grew up in northeast Washington State and though she always thought she’d move away, never has. Despite traveling throughout the United States, Sheri always finds her way back home. And so she lives, plays, and writes amidst mountains, evergreens, and abundant wildlife. When not working the day job in federal finance, she writes stories that typically include a bit of the strange and unusual and always a touch of romance. She works to carve out time to run, swim, and bike so she can participate in local triathlons, her latest addiction.
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