Contents
Title Page
Free Book
Quote
Prologue
CHAPTER 1
CHAPTER 2
CHAPTER 3
CHAPTER 4
CHAPTER 5
CHAPTER 6
CHAPTER 7
CHAPTER 8
CHAPTER 9
CHAPTER 10
CHAPTER 11
CHAPTER 12
CHAPTER 13
CHAPTER 14
CHAPTER 15
CHAPTER 16
CHAPTER 17
CHAPTER 18
CHAPTER 19
CHAPTER 20
CHAPTER 21
CHAPTER 22
CHAPTER 23
CHAPTER 24
CHAPTER 25
CHAPTER 26
CHAPTER 27
CHAPTER 28
CHAPTER 29
CHAPTER 30
CHAPTER 31
CHAPTER 32
CHAPTER 33
CHAPTER 34
CHAPTER 35
CHAPTER 36
CHAPTER 37
CHAPTER 38
CHAPTER 39
CHAPTER 40
CHAPTER 41
CHAPTER 42
CHAPTER 43
CHAPTER 44
CHAPTER 45
CHAPTER 46
CHAPTER 47
CHAPTER 48
CHAPTER 49
CHAPTER 50
CHAPTER 51
CHAPTER 52
CHAPTER 53
CHAPTER 54
CHAPTER 55
CHAPTER 56
CHAPTER 57
CHAPTER 58
CHAPTER 59
CHAPTER 60
CHAPTER 61
CHAPTER 62
CHAPTER 63
CHAPTER 64
CHAPTER 65
CHAPTER 66
CHAPTER 67
CHAPTER 68
CHAPTER 69
CHAPTER 70
CHAPTER 71
CHAPTER 72
CHAPTER 73
CHAPTER 74
CHAPTER 75
CHAPTER 76
CHAPTER 77
CHAPTER 78
CHAPTER 79
CHAPTER 80
CHAPTER 81
CHAPTER 82
CHAPTER 83
CHAPTER 84
CHAPTER 85
CHAPTER 86
CHAPTER 87
CHAPTER 88
CHAPTER 89
CHAPTER 90
CHAPTER 91
CHAPTER 92
CHAPTER 93
CHAPTER 94
CHAPTER 95
CHAPTER 96
CHAPTER 97
CHAPTER 98
CHAPTER 99
CHAPTER 100
CHAPTER 101
CHAPTER 102
Thanks for reading
Review Request
Acknowledgments
Author Notes
Next Book
About the Author
Copyright
NOCTURNE IN ASHES
A Riley Forte Suspense Thriller
Book One
____________
JOSLYN CHASE
________________
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“A voice was heard upon the high places,
weeping and supplications of the children of Israel:
for they have perverted their way,
and they have forgotten the LORD their God.”
Jeremiah 3:21
King James Version
THE SUMMER HE TURNED THIRTEEN, he took his first life. His first human life.
He’d killed scores of animals. His mother had taught him that.
“We’re living off the fat of the land and sometimes that calls for killing,” He watched her work over their latest kill, her long hair tangled and dangling, her arms bloodied to the elbow in the belly of the deer.
He’d learned to heed that call.
He gathered what he needed, sharpened the blade, laid everything ready to hand, the small pile of sticks and stones, the strip of cotton fabric. A three-quarter moon peered down through the trees, smoothing a layer of silver over the crisped and browning leaves and waving grasses, gilding the rippled lake. The last of the summer warmth came now in brief snatches, like the kiss of a capricious child. Autumn approached, and with it the familiar melancholy, the stirring ache of loss, after so many years, still sharp.
He felt the mantle heavy upon him, mourned the lonely course he was compelled to follow. So few understood his work. No one alive could appreciate his sacrifice. Was it necessary, what he did? Must he continue?
As he had that first time, in his thirteenth year, he asked the questions. As every time since, he has asked the questions. So many times. And every time, she whispers yes.
And so he plods on. He has seen the fruit of his works, his gift to the world. And yet the hunger, the need grows stronger. Always, more is required.
The killer let his gaze and his thoughts wander to the clump of bushes to his right. No sound or movement drew his attention, but he strained his eyes through the blackness and wondered if the slight shape he discerned was real or a product of his hyped-up imagination. He remained still, regulating his breathing and the beat of his heart.
The scrape of metal against metal reached his ears, raising him from his seat against the smooth bark of an aspen. He watched through the low branches, his eyes focusing across the small clearing. The sound was repeated, made by the door of an RV scraping across the ill-fitting steps which extended from it. A figure emerged and lurched down the steps, weaving and muttering as he staggered between the tall birch and pines. Into the silence of the night came the splash of an over-burdened bladder being released, and it was under cover of this noise that the killer moved.
The man in the trees zipped up and dug into the pocket of his grungy, low-slung jeans. He came up with a twist of paper, lighting it, puffing on it while he gazed up at the distant moon. Spread over his bare chest and biceps, a parade of inked figures swayed slightly with the gentle movements of hand to mouth. Cricket song resumed. The night’s gentle pulse beat out.
The killer waited, letting the man finish his smoke. He listened as the man sang and repeated an unfamiliar phrase. He sang, revi
sed, and tried again. The man was a songwriter, a guitarist and talented musician. Two nights before, the killer sat in the twentieth row, enjoying the man and his band in concert. A Tuesday night, in a half-filled auditorium. Rolling Stone featured an interview with the man in one of last year’s issues, but the great band’s comeback tour was falling short of expectation.
The man flicked the butt onto the urine-dampened earth and blew one last lungful into the velvet air. The killer nodded, gripping the knife, and stepped forward.
The man stopped singing.
CHAPTER 1
RILEY STOOD NAKED ON THE dressing room floor. She fingered the smooth black silkiness of the gown she would wear to cover herself on stage, knowing the very essence of herself would remain exposed, uncoverable by any length of silk. It was what she always felt before a performance and the knowledge exhilarated and terrified her.
She slipped a robe over lace-trimmed undergarments, knotting the cord at her waist, and walked to the battered upright, sitting down on the bench, touching naked fingers to naked keys. In Beethoven, there was no room to hide. Perhaps with Rachmaninoff and Debussy there can be some small degree of dissembling, but the spare lines of the Classical masters demanded the utmost precision and she had always been known for accuracy. Execution, interpretation, emotion—all are exposed under the stage gels at the piano.
For twenty-three months she had rehearsed and prepared, pouring herself into the work. She was ready. Certainly she was ready.
There was a knock at the door and Helen entered, a sheaf of printed programs in one hand and a spray of roses in the other.
“They’re lovely, aren’t they?” she said.
“Which? The flowers or the programs?” Riley asked, inspecting the thick, ivory-colored cards that spelled out the evening’s fare. This concrete evidence that she was about to go under the spotlight kicked off a rush of epinephrine, bringing the heady mixture of anticipation and dread. Why do I put myself through this? flashed through her mind, followed by the thought, what else is there? Her very soul was made of music. Sharing it was all she knew.
Helen placed the flowers on a corner table, pushing and pulling at the blooms, arranging them to her satisfaction. She was a tiny woman, plump in a way that rounded her features and made her look like a wise, old child. She came to Riley at the piano, dropping beside her on the bench, and squeezed an arm around her.
“You’re gonna do great, kid. Jim would be so proud.”
Riley nodded. No doubts on that score.
Helen patted her leg and switched to business. “Miller Cantwell is in the crowd tonight and I think a rep from Universal. Also Frank Coston and Gabrielle Wilson, so keep your smile pasted on whatever you do. Now get dressed and warm up your fingers. It’s time to knock ‘em dead.”
She waved and left the room, and in that interval before the door shut behind her, Riley heard the bustle of backstage, the faint chatter of the hall filling with people. Her hands were like ice against her skin as she pulled the silk gown over her hips and drew up the zipper on the low-cut back. She took the pins from her long, auburn hair and let it fall loose, filling in the space left bare by the fabric. Running scales at the piano, she numbed out, shook herself, and numbed out again. She tried to remember the initial notes of Chopin’s Fantasie Impromptu which opened the program, but came up blank. A jolt of panic speared through her chest and she felt the urge to pull out the sheet music, study, cram, but she knew from experience that the notations would only turn to blurred Chinese characters before her face. Heaven help me, what have I done?
She closed her eyes, exhaling into her hands to warm them, and brought her breathing into a slow, steady rhythm. Her grandfather, Zach Riley, for whom she was named, had been a jazz pianist doing USO shows during WWII. She fastened her thoughts on him playing doggedly through raids and bombings. She thought of the orchestra members on The Titanic who went down with the ship as they played through, lending courage to others. This was the heritage she claimed. She could do this.
She had to do this.
Applause flooded over her as she stood center stage and bowed her acknowledgment to a houseful of half-seen faces. Turning toward the piano, she took the first steps on what was always the longest walk, the distance stretching out and holding all the possibilities of triumph and disaster.
Her back was straight, chin lifted, as she seated herself, arranged her skirts, flexed her fingers, and began.
She struck the first chord, letting it resonate, floating up, drawing the expectant audience, and then the Chopin flowed out, her hands agile and dancing on the keyboard. Her heart pounded, pumping out adrenalin, speeding the tempo, and she pulled back just slightly, a gentle tap on the brake as her fingers raced. The music enveloped her like a flurry of golden butterflies, filling her with a rush of pure excitement. She executed a perfect, rippling chromatic scale, spanning the keyboard and building to a series of crashing chords.
A slight stumble as she crescendoed down the piano, one finger sliding off the slick surface of a polished key. None but the most distinguishing of ears would catch it, but it threw her concentration and she struggled to maintain the rhythm and balance of the piece as she transitioned into the central melody.
Drawing strength from the gentle, lyrical notes, Riley regained her equilibrium, preparing to face the second round of chromatics and thundering chords. She felt a blip of panic as she approached the section, fighting to control the impulse to flee that always hit her when she lost focus. She clenched her jaw, then released it, zeroing her attention on the keyboard choreography.
Her hands flowed up the keys like a wave on the beach and moved back down again, hitting the chords with determination. She navigated the passage without mishap, returning to the tranquility of the melodic line. As the last gentle notes faded, applause surrounded her, and she felt her face grow pink with pleasure and relief. A good opening.
She sat at the bench, breathing in, breathing out, nodding her thanks to the audience. Lifting her hands to the keyboard, ignoring their palsied tremble, she straightened her spine and began the Tchaikovsky Barcarolle. She watched her fingers, almost with wonder, as they produced the tones of heart-rending sadness, feeling the music pulse within her, building through the impassioned midsection before coming back to the opening theme.
The gondola rocked, moonlight rippled, the midway storm raged and she conquered it. Riley was inside the music, constructing the image, living it, swaying and bobbing on the Venetian waters of the picture she played. As the last melancholy notes drifted and diminished, applause burst over Riley and it felt like sunshine.
This was her first concert in over two years and she had designed a short program, without intermission. She floated through the Bach Prelude and Fugue, the Haydn Sonata, and the Scarlatti. Only the Gershwin Preludes now and then the Beethoven.
She tried to push the thought from her mind. It was always at this point, when it seemed she was home free with a near flawless performance, that she tensed up and mistakes loomed like rocks on the shoreline. She focused, instead, on Jim, as she always had. He was her fortress, her rock, her support. He was her family, the father of her child. He was her anchor.
He was gone.
Jim was dead and Tanner, their son, gone with him. But she had practiced through this, prepared for it, playing through the pieces while holding this thought, this harsh fact, in her head. She’d learned to draw strength from it, to make her work a sort of tribute, to hold them with her in the music. But tonight, it wasn’t working.
The fall was coming. She felt its approach as the tension in her neck and arms increased. Her mind fumbled, small tremors at first and then increasing in intensity like the buildup to an earthquake. The flight impulse threatened again, and she wrestled it, fighting to keep herself at the piano even while her mind was already fleeing out the door, down the staircase, into the night.
She was furious with herself, felt hot tears on her face and ignored them. She skittered along t
o the end of the last Gershwin piece, hardly hearing or acknowledging the applause as it rose and petered out.
It was time to finish the program.
Her stomach roiled and the silence stretched and grew, punctuated with short coughs and the rustling of paper. Riley took a deep breath and positioned her shaking hands for the opening chords. They hung there, frozen above the keys for an agonizing eternity.
The blood rushed in her ears and a moan tore from her throat as she jumped up, tipping the piano bench. The swirl of her skirt caught in the adjuster knob and she heard it tear as she ripped free and fled the burning spotlight. The bench fell with an echoing thud, punctuated by the staccato clattering of her heels as she ran from the stage, leaving the shreds of her comeback performance drifting like the tatters of her silk dress.
CHAPTER 2
“I’M NOT A GROUPIE, I’M his wife.”
Detective Nate Quentin eyed the woman who claimed she was married to Coby Waters, bygone rock star and notorious bachelor. He pressed his palm against the air as if activating a giant pause button.
“Phoebe?” He tossed his voice to the fingerprint tech but his gaze never left the witness. “What do you know, Feebs?”
“Married, huh?” The small black woman looked up from where she crouched, rolled her eyes, and considered. “No. I didn’t hear anything about a wedding.”
Nate folded his hands on the table in front of him, waiting for a response. The woman seated across the scarred board that doubled as eating surface and spare bed in the spacious RV sent a searing look in Phoebe’s direction. The bones in her shoulders rose like hackles under the spaghetti-string tank top and a flush spread from her breast up and over her cheekbones. She seemed to be gearing up for an explosion but then the huff went out of her. She shrugged.
“Three and a half weeks ago, in Vegas. We kept it quiet.” She paused, the pink-tinted cheeks turning sepia. “We didn’t even make it to one month.”
Nate leaned back against the bench seat, glancing at his partner, Rick Jimenez, who hovered over the kitchen sink with a notepad, taking down the details.
Nocturne In Ashes: A Riley Forte Suspense Thriller, Book One Page 1
