Deadly Touch

by Heather Graham

  “Yes,” Raina said.

  “What are you seeing? Remember, you’re with us. You’re safe. But we need to know what you’re seeing. To try to help.”

  Raina nodded, again, doing so without her eyes changing. She stared straight ahead.

  She didn’t blink. “Right now...” She paused.

  “What?”

  “I see Jennifer. She’s happy, she’s excited, and she’s feeling daring. She’s trying on the dress for a special occasion. She likes it. She thinks she’ll buy it, but she’ll wait. She’ll check her finances. She’ll make sure that...”

  “That?” Kylie prompted softly.

  “That he’ll be there. She likes him. And she knows he likes her. She’s been hurt before. She means to be careful...”

  Her words broke off.

  “Raina?” Axel said softly.

  “It’s growing dark. It’s night. She was so happy. She saw him. She knew she’d see him again. And she’s hurrying and she’s careless and she doesn’t see...”

  “See what?” he asked her quietly.

  “What’s coming around from the side of her house. The person. So dark. Because there’s no face. It’s all dark and then...

  “Then the bag. The burlap bag over her head. And even while she’s terrified, she’s still thinking it has to be a joke. Her coworkers, trying to surprise her, trying to make her have fun. They don’t think she gets out enough. Still, she tries to scream. She can’t. She can barely breathe. Her scream is just a sound, so weak. And she isn’t strong enough to save herself from being dragged. Her hands are tied and she’s suddenly in the back of the car, and she wonders if it’s him...”

  “Him as in Jordan Rivera?” Axel asked.

  “Yes. Whoever it is, he’s tall. Tall and strong and...”

  “Jordan?” Axel said.

  Raina slowly shook her head. “No. She can’t see him, but she knows. It isn’t Jordan. It can’t be Jordan.”

  “How does she know?” Kylie asked.

  Again, Raina shook her head slowly. Her eyes remained staring straight ahead. Wide open.

  Still unblinking.

  “Because she knows how Jordan smells. No cologne or aftershave. Nothing bad. Just something unique that is Jordan. And this isn’t Jordan.”

  “Can she sense anything? See anything? Is it definitely a man?” Axel asked.

  “She’s trying to tell. The person who took her, she doesn’t know, but she does know someone else is driving. She tries to cry out, make someone in another car see her. No one does. No one stops them. She tries to tell herself it’s a prank, that it’s all going to be okay, and then...”

  Neither Kylie or Axel spoke.

  Titan whined softly.

  Raina’s hand moved automatically over his head.

  “She is terrified. She’s being dragged out of the car. She feels high, wet grass all around her ankles. She can smell the earth and its rich aroma and the ground is soft, muddy or mucky. And in a flash, she feels something, something move across her throat. It doesn’t even hurt at first. She just becomes aware of the warmth. Sticky warmth sliding down her throat and through her blouse and down her shirt. She can smell something awful and she starts to feel the pain and the smell at the same time, the pain at her throat, the smell of her own blood.”

  Raina’s eyes closed at last.

  Axel was about to rise when they opened again.

  Titan whined softly again.

  He turned.

  The barn was in shadow. No lights turned on, just a bit of the sun filtering in through the wooden structure and the open doorway to the stables.

  In those shadows, something appeared, slowly taking form.

  It was Jennifer.

  She was not ripped or torn or covered in the thick grasses or dense mud of the Everglades, of the embankment where she had been found.

  She was in a flowered blouse and jeans, the outfit she had been wearing that day, fresh as it had been before she had been killed. Her eyes were wide and full of gratitude. There was a pained smile on her lips.

  She reached out to Raina.

  And, in turn, Raina reached out to her.

  Then, just as it had appeared, the ghost of Jennifer Lowry disappeared, and as it did, Raina blinked and stood and stared and then sighed softly.

  Axel stood, as well, and waited, ready to steady Raina, to speak, to hold her, to try to make better what had to have been hard and painful.

  But Raina was fine. Steadfast. Straight as a ruler, dignified and in complete control.

  “She so desperately wants to help us. Everything was stolen from her—life, a promise of happiness. She was excited about Jordan. She liked him—really liked him. I mean, we saw the picture Jordan had snapped of the two of them on his computer. He liked her, too. It was the first time in a long time she’d dared to think someone might really care for her. But she’s given us what she can. She just doesn’t know anymore.”

  Axel nodded. “She’ll grow stronger. We’ll see her again. And there may be something she’ll recall later—just like a living witness. Raina, thank you,” he said softly.

  Titan let out a woof. He had either sensed or seen the ghost. Dogs tended to be far more perceptive than people.

  Raina looked at Kylie.

  “Thank you so much!”

  “I didn’t do anything,” Kylie told her. “You really came to it all on your own. And it gets better, honestly.”

  “You’ve regressed again?” Axel asked Kylie.

  She shook her head. “No, but I’m getting to be more like Raina. And I don’t think I’d be afraid to try much of anything—if Jon was there, of course, or perhaps other Krewe members.”

  “I’m not sure we’ve learned much,” Raina said. “I mean, we knew she cared about Jordan. We know Jordan cared about her. He didn’t kill her. And now, he’s in a coma, and he can’t talk.”

  “But we now know there was one kidnapper—and one driver,” Axel said. “That’s more to go on than before. Now we have to find out just how Jordan is related to those he might have suspected. He didn’t know Jennifer had been killed—and he was angry, incredibly angry. He knew the method and he evidently knew how to escape once they were in the Everglades.” He smiled at Raina. “We have the connection. Now, we’re going to find out where it leads.”

  * * *

  “Money,” Nigel said, looking up.

  It had been quiet awhile. They were all—Axel, Nigel, Jon, Andrew, Kylie and Raina—going through files.

  Every file they had on the murder victims.

  On those around them.

  “Motives for murder. Revenge, hatred, jealousy—money,” Axel said suddenly. He leaned forward. “Jennifer Lowry died just before she might be one of a number of people receiving a large inheritance. We need to be looking for a similar motive with the other victims.”

  “But didn’t you all look into Peter Scarborough’s estranged wife? He had no money—he left no money,” Raina said.

  “I’m looking at her finances, and I don’t see anything. Then again, he was cremated, and his ashes were finally picked up by a coworker. His stepchildren didn’t come. What the hell?” Nigel said.

  Axel gritted his teeth and looked at his file. Nigel touched his arm. “Hey, this has been going on for years. We’re not going to get an easy answer.”

  He nodded and stood. “There’s money somewhere. A money trail we can’t find. Raina, want to go riding?”

  “Sure.”

  “Good idea. Get out and clear your head,” Jon said quietly.

  “You’re starting to drive us all stark raving nuts,” Andrew told him.

  “What the hell? I’m not doing anything,” Axel protested.

  “Breathing,” Nigel said.

  “Gritting your teeth,” Andrew told him.

  �
��There’s an annoying sigh now and then,” Jon said.

  Raina smiled. “I’m happy to go for a ride.”

  They headed out to the stables again. The blue dress was still there, thrown on a shelf in the tack room.

  Raina ignored it.

  “Saddles or bareback?” she asked Axel.

  “Bareback. I need to do something!” he said.

  They headed out, following the trail they had followed before.

  The crew from the forensics team were gone, but some of their tape remained, trampled to the ground.

  “I guess they found all they could of Fran Castle?” Raina asked Axel.

  He nodded. “Some bones. Not a complete set. At least we know where she wound up and her family has something to bury. Closed coffin,” he added dryly.

  Raina nodded. “I wonder if...”

  “What?”

  “It’s really horrible.”

  “What is it?”

  “Well, I didn’t try to get anything off what we found.” She hesitated. “What I thought was some kind of leftover steak in the yard. The poisoned...meat.”

  Axel was quiet. “Raina...”

  “I know it’s a strange idea, but anything that would help. I mean, horrible, yes, but I’m more than willing. Though I foresee a problem—trying to tell a medical examiner or someone else you want to hold someone’s sliced-off flesh...”

  He looked at her. “It can be arranged,” he assured her.

  For a moment, he remained reined in on the trail where the leftover crime tape littered the scene, where the bones of Fran Castle had finally been found.

  “Anything here?” he asked her.

  Raina closed her eyes. She heard birds, something sliding in the mud, the chirp of some kind of insect.

  A mosquito landed on her arm, giving her a good bite.

  She slapped at it and looked at Axel. “I’m sorry,” she told him.

  As she spoke, someone stepped around one of the trees. Peg-legged Pete with another of the ghostly pirates.

  “Axel, Miss Hamish!” Peg-legged Pete said, sweeping off his feathered pirate’s hat and bowing low before her.

  “Hi, Pete!” Raina said.

  “What a sweet lass, and a beauty,” Pete told Axel.

  Axel grinned. “I do agree,” he said. “Joshua!” he added, addressing the other pirate. “Has Joshua met Raina yet?”

  “Miss,” the other pirate said, stepping forward. He was wearing a knit cap, blousy shirt, vest, breeches and high boots. Puffs of long sandy hair escaped in long tendrils from his knit cap. He was very thin, and as he greeted her, he swept off his cap, bowing low.

  “I was hoping to see you...thought I’d take a walk on to Andrew’s place, but you never know who might be there, and you know me, I don’t like to be causing trouble,” Pete said.

  “You have something for us?” Axel asked.

  “Joshua, tell them,” Pete said.

  Joshua, his cap between his hands, nodded anxiously. “Strange, it were, in my estimation, that be. People out here. Several of them. They came in an automobile, parked on the trail where it ends to our west there. They were shouting, angry. Someone was saying the situation had to be stopped. I couldn’t see anyone clear, but I’d say there were three of them at least, running around. And the dress...so strange. Looked like they were in trousers and handsome coats of some kind...not what you often see out here. But I could see no faces. I hid, and then, sometime later, I saw people, lots of people, crawling around. Not here, deeper in. Then I heard a man screaming and then airboats, and then, well, you were there, and you know the rest.”

  “Wait—men in suits were out here right before we arrived in the airboat?”

  “No, they were gone. Only one remained.”

  “Was he tied up, then? Did you see him running?” Raina asked anxiously.

  Joshua shook his head sadly. “I don’t know. I just heard when he started screaming. When the snake took him.”

  “Thank you,” Axel said.

  “It’s not much,” Joshua told him.

  “Well, I’m truly grateful,” Axel said.

  Raina echoed her thanks. Peg-legged Pete and Joshua nodded grimly and Pete told Axel, “We’re headed deeper in. Watching the airboats. Lots of them moving around. The usual tourist trade, and it seems like more. Python hunters.”

  “That’s a great idea,” Axel said. “You have been incredibly helpful, Pete. Joshua.”

  The pirates looked pleased. They started off, moving like fog through the foliage.

  Pete stopped and turned back. He lifted his hand in the air and gave them a hearty “Arrrr!” which seemed to provide Joshua with a great deal of amusement.

  “They were really brutal once upon a time?” Raina asked when they were gone.

  “Some men find a time when they regret the evil they’ve done,” he said quietly. “I wasn’t there, of course, but I know the legends. I know the dead. How deeply they were involved in cold-blooded murder, I don’t know. But—” he grimaced, looking at her “—being passive when evil is happening is just as bad sometimes. Maybe the pirates I know are the ones getting a second chance.”

  His phone rang and he answered it.

  “We should head back,” he said to Raina. “Vinnie Magruder made it to Andrew’s. God knows what he might remember, if anything.”

  “Everything is something,” Raina said, lifting Wild Thing’s reins.

  Everything, indeed, could be something. She was learning.

  Seventeen

  “You know,” Vinnie said. “That poor girl, Fran Castle, disappeared over thirteen years ago. Now, I know you’re coming up with more corpses, and that anthropologist medical examiner person is certain she found a slash on the hyoid bone, but that was over thirteen years ago.” He shook his head. “A shame, a crying shame, what’s going on.”

  Vinnie Magruder had the look of a grizzled old Floridian, skin bronzed and wrinkled by endless years in the sun, gray hair worn a little long now and matching a gray beard and sideburns. He wore old jeans, battered by the years, and an open cotton shirt over a T-shirt. He was a big man, tall and broad in the shoulders, polite, but skeptical about himself, and seemingly about the ability of anyone else to do anything to stop the killings in the Everglades.

  “You came out here when one of the school camps was going on,” Axel said, studying him intently. “What I need to know is if you remember timing. It was night when you arrived. You found the car at about 2:00 p.m. I know about the events registered in the records, but that doesn’t mean something wasn’t going on before.”

  Vinnie sighed and looked at Raina. Titan was sitting next to her, and Vinnie smiled. He’d heard Axel perfectly clearly and he would answer, Raina thought, in his own time.

  “Great dog,” he told her.

  “Thank you,” she said.

  “He’s always with you?” Vinnie asked.

  “As much as possible,” she assured him.

  He nodded. “Good. A dog is better than many a man. Or woman.” He looked at Axel again. “She’s special, huh?”

  Raina smiled; she knew he was referring to her.

  Axel nodded gravely. “Very.”

  “Another of you spooky types, huh? And your friends?” He looked down the table where Jon and Kylie were sitting.

  “My spooky friends?” Axel asked.

  Vinnie waved a hand in the air. “Oh, in the best way!” he said. He glanced at Nigel Ferrer and said, “You know these guys and their ghost stories about the Everglades. Oh, wait! I think I’ve heard you tell a few, too!”

  “There are some good stories about the area, Vinnie, you know that. And we all enjoy the ones from way back, right?” Nigel said easily.

  Vinnie shrugged and nodded at the same time. “Ghost ships, ghost planes...the land can claim a lot. Anyway, these
murders. I came out here back then to get search parties started up because the girl was missing and her car was parked where it shouldn’t have been. And when I found the registration and called it in to headquarters, they already had her name. Well, her friend, it seems, started with the casino security at about noon and then demanded that the police be notified. Now, you know, that’s not a great deal of time for an adult to be considered missing at all—but I found the car, and the cops had already heard the young woman’s name.”

  “Noon?” Axel said. “You’re saying the friend reported her missing at noon. Do you know how long before that she had last been with the friend?”

  “We have surveillance video of her at the entrance around ten thirty. They’d met out there early. Seems they had a theory that if you hit the machines early after the night before, they paid out better.”

  “But you found her car abandoned about 2:00 p.m.,” Nigel noted, frowning. “People are on the Trail during the day. A two-lane highway. And nothing weird was reported.”

  “Right. People all in a hurry. If anyone saw anything, they didn’t call it in. And yeah, 2:00 p.m. is when I saw the car and checked on it. The car was open and no one was around. But it was where it shouldn’t have been—that must be in the report. Anyway, I called in about the car after I checked it out, a little after 2:00 p.m., so that would be correct. Again, Fran Castle had been at the casino with a friend. When the friend couldn’t find her...they hadn’t come together, you see. But they’d planned to spend the day together. Play some machines, have something to eat and then maybe head back in or play bingo or I don’t know. They were supposed to spend the whole day together. The woman who reported her missing—Terry Highsmith—said they’d gotten into a little tiff over some kind of animated machine.”

  “This Terry Highsmith was checked out, right?” Nigel asked.

  “Thoroughly. She never left the casino. Cameras everywhere, you know.”

  “What about Fran Castle?” Andrew asked.

  “She got a phone call and then left the casino. That was at 10:30 a.m. Then there were no more cameras. After Fran went missing, Terry waited there all morning, growing more and more anxious.”