Deadly Harvest

by Heather Graham

  The trail kept leading them back.

  Back to the edge of the last cornfield.

  The door to the library opened. Rowenna looked up, expecting Daniel.

  She was stunned to see Adam standing there.

  “Adam!” she said, surprise quickly succeeded by alarm. “Is something wrong? Is Eve all right?”

  For a moment he didn’t speak or move. He just stared at the table, at the books, his eyes empty, as if he had blacked out while standing.

  “Adam?”

  She felt her skin crawling, because there was something so odd about his eyes—and the situation didn’t help. She was alone with him in the back of a museum, with a wax murderers’ row just beyond the door.

  And Adam—her friend whom she had once thought she knew so well—was reading books on Satanism and spells to let the Devil into his own flesh, so he could become immortal through the blood sacrifice of women.

  Atmosphere and Adam were kicking in. Goose bumps began to form on her flesh.

  She longed to jump up and run, but he was blocking the door.

  “Adam?” she said quietly, reassuringly. “Let’s go outside. I’ve been in here too long—I need a break.”

  Should she scream? Maybe someone would hear and come help her. Was there anything here she could use as a weapon?

  Books. All she had were books. She almost laughed as she supposed she could do her best to beat him over the head with a priceless volume on Satanic ritual. At least there would be a certain poetic justice in that, she thought.

  He seemed to snap back to the present. His eyes cleared and focused on her. “I came for you,” he said.

  “What?” she breathed.

  He shook his head. “I mean I came to see you. I…I haven’t been completely honest with you.”

  “You don’t always have to be completely honest with people,” she said uneasily.

  He didn’t seem to hear her. “I told you I love Eve, and I do. But something’s wrong, really wrong. She’s afraid of me.” He moved farther into the room. She shrank back, and he paused, frowning. “You’re afraid of me, too,” he said bitterly, then pulled out a chair opposite her at the table and sank into it, looking worn and dejected.

  He wasn’t going to hurt her, Rowenna realized.

  Not there and not now, anyway.

  “Adam, go on. Talk to me,” she said.

  “Blackouts.”

  “What?”

  He shook his head, then looked at her, his eyes bleak. “Rowenna, I’m having blackouts. I’ll find myself standing somewhere, and I won’t have any idea how I got there. And then Eve gets mad at me for taking off. Ro, I’m afraid.”

  You’re afraid? she thought.

  Could a man kidnap, rape, torture and then murder a woman in the midst of a blackout? Or was this just a clever act?

  “Adam, if you’re having blackouts, you need to see a doctor,” she said.

  He looked at her and shuddered. “I don’t like doctors,” he told her.

  “Adam, no one likes going to the doctor, but if you’re sick, you don’t have a choice.”

  “What if…what if I’ve done something horrible in the middle of a blackout?” he asked, his eyes and voice filled with torment. He reached into his jacket pocket for gum, started to open the pack, then looked at it in confusion, as if he’d completely forgotten what he was doing.

  “Let’s just deal with the blackouts,” Rowenna said. “You have to get help. I think you should go to an emergency room right away, before you get hurt or…or something.” She just couldn’t bring herself to upset him any more than he already was by saying or hurt anyone else. She looked at him with more confidence than she felt and said, “Come on. We’ll go tell Eve together.”

  Adam was still for a minute. “She’ll leave me,” he whispered. “If something is really wrong, she’ll leave me.”

  “She loves you, Adam. She always has, since we were kids. She won’t leave you.” Unless you’re a killer, a little voice inside her brain pointed out.

  He was very still for a long moment, his expression thoughtful, and then he rose slowly.

  “I’m going to tell her myself. I need to tell her myself. Now. I’ll put the Closed sign on the door and tell her. And we’ll make arrangements. Then we’ll call you,” he said gravely.

  “It will be okay,” Rowenna said, mentally crossing her fingers in the hope that she was right.

  He breathed a thank-you and left.

  With trembling fingers, she reached for her cell phone. She had to call Jeremy. Or maybe she should call Joe; he was the real cop. No, she would call Jeremy, and have him call Joe, assuming there was a need to call Joe at all. Because if there really was something wrong with Adam, that could explain everything that was worrying Eve and prove that he wasn’t a killer after all.

  She snapped her phone closed when the door opened. This time, it was Daniel. Luckily, he didn’t notice her panic, because he was staring back over his shoulder as he came in. “That was nice. I haven’t seen Adam in here in, well, forever.”

  She stood. “That’s great, but listen, I’ve got to run…. I’ll be back later. See you.”

  She fled past him, anxious to get Jeremy on the phone and tell him everything that was going on.

  Alone.

  “Oh, God,” Brad breathed, then buckled over, shaking.

  The remains were just inside the first ragged row of corn, the one so far to the rear that the farmer would be unlikely to inspect it often. It was almost like a buffer row, the one in which he would expect some loss. It was also clearly a row the searchers hadn’t yet reached.

  There was very little left of the body. The elements, rodents and crows had seen to that.

  It had been there some time. At least a month, maybe two, Jeremy thought. He wasn’t an M.E., but he’d seen enough bodies. This much decomposition didn’t happen in a matter of weeks. The face was mostly gone, the white of the skull gleaming in the sun. The flesh of the body had been so consumed that the clothing was only a dirty, matted tangle, and the bones of the arms and legs lay at strange angles, disarticulated by the attentions of the carrion eaters.

  Brad was on his knees by then, sobbing.

  Jeremy set a hand on his shoulder. “It’s not Mary, Brad. It’s not Mary,” he repeated.

  Reason would take over, Jeremy knew. Brad had seen the ravages of time and the elements on the human body at least as often as he had. As soon as he got over the shock of their discovery, he would realize that these sad remnants couldn’t be his wife.

  Brad gasped, drawing a long, cleansing breath, then stared at Jeremy.

  “But she’s gone. Mary is gone. And now we’ve found two…”

  “We don’t know that Mary was taken by this man,” Jeremy said, but even as he spoke, he knew the words were patronizing. Brad wasn’t stupid. The truth was becoming more and more obvious. “Mary is strong, and smart. If he has her, she’s found a way to stay alive,” he said.

  “But for how much longer?” Brad whispered. “This woman, oh, God, this poor woman! Someone thought she was just missing. They’ve been hoping all this time. And here she is.”

  “Maybe he made mistakes this time, Brad. Maybe the crime-scene unit can find something. And now that it’s a serial case, the FBI will come in on it. We’re going to find Mary, Brad. Let’s back up and not contaminate the scene any more than we already have.”

  He took Brad by the arm and dragged him away. He didn’t think they could contaminate the scene much more than nature had already managed to do, but he wanted to get Brad away from there, and any excuse would do.

  He called Joe Brentwood and tensely informed him of what he had found. Joe told him to stay put, he would get cars out there immediately. Then he said something else, but Jeremy didn’t hear it, because his phone went suddenly dead.

  “What the hell?” Jeremy muttered.

  He looked at his phone. Searching for Service was streaking across the screen. He swore.

  “Wh
at?” Brad said.

  Jeremy showed him. “At least I got through first,” he said.

  Brad pulled out his phone, but it was showing the same message.

  “What’ll we do while we wait?” he asked.

  “Keep looking,” Jeremy said.

  “For what?”

  “I’m not even sure.”

  “Well,” Brad pointed out, “we already know that Ginny was right. There were lights out here. Someone was dumping a body,” he added bitterly.

  “Yeah, but there’s more,” Jeremy said.

  “More what?”

  “I don’t know, but it’s nagging at my mind, and we have to figure it out. Let’s keep searching.”

  Brad nodded, his constant struggle evident in his face. He was trying to be strong, but it was impossible for him not to be afraid that they would find Mary’s body out there in the corn.

  The sun was slipping farther down in the sky, the air shifting from warmth to the chill of late afternoon. Jeremy raised the collar of his jacket and, hands in his pockets, walked along the rows, his eyes searching the ground.

  “Holy shit!” Brad called.

  Jeremy swore and turned, then raced back toward Brad.

  Brad had gone a fair distance from the first corpse. He had moved to an area that was bordered by a thicket of trees, an area where the neat rows were out of kilter. The corn there had grown from seeds that had fallen off the back of a seeder, and it was tangled in with brush and trees.

  Brad was staring between two trees at a tall stake standing with a straw hat caught on it.

  The body it had once held was so badly decomposed that it had fallen from the wood, the bleached bones lying below it on the earth.

  This time Brad knew that the bones couldn’t be Mary’s without Jeremy telling him.

  But there was horror in his eyes nonetheless.

  “We’ve hit the jackpot,” he said bleakly. He was trembling.

  Jeremy suspected Brad was as afraid as he was to keep searching. They had found two bodies now.

  How the hell many more could there be?

  Rowenna couldn’t reach Jeremy. He must be on the phone or out of range, she thought, because her call went straight to voice mail, which made her decision easy. She had to call Joe. But he didn’t answer his cell phone, and when she reached the station, she was told that he had gone out on an emergency call. She hesitated, but she didn’t know that Adam was a killer, so she could hardly say so in a message. She asked the officer to please let Joe know that she had called as soon as possible.

  At a loss, she wandered around the corner, wondering how Eve and Adam would react if they caught her peeking through the door at them. She certainly didn’t want to make the situation any worse.

  If Adam was a killer who had blackouts, should he be alone with his wife?

  She walked to the shop, but the Closed sign was nowhere in evidence, so she took a deep breath, opened the door and walked in.

  Eve was behind the counter, straightening out a jewelry display. She looked up when Rowenna came in. “Hey,” she said, then hesitated, studying Rowenna. “You look as if someone stole your Thanksgiving turkey.”

  “Where’s Adam?” Rowenna asked.

  “He ran out about fifteen minutes ago. Said he had an errand to run. He should be right back. Why?” Her tone rose at the end; Rowenna could tell that she was worried.

  “Oh, I saw him, that’s all. I thought he’d be back here by now.”

  “Rowenna, what’s going on?”

  “He’s…he wanted to talk to you himself.”

  Eve frowned, looking angry. “Wait a minute, there’s something going on and my husband told you first?”

  “He’s afraid. And he loves you.”

  “He’s afraid of what? And love is just a word,” Eve said, growing visibly tense. “Rowenna, what the hell is going on?”

  Rowenna looked outside. There was still no sign of Adam. “He came and told me that he’s been having blackouts. He’s afraid there’s something seriously wrong with him, but he’s scared to go to a doctor and scared to tell you. He’s afraid he’ll lose you.”

  “Blackouts?” Eve said, her tone skeptical. “He isn’t having a ‘blackout’ when he flirts,” she said, sounding hurt.

  Rowenna felt uncomfortable. She wished she hadn’t come, hadn’t spoken.

  She wished to hell that Adam had done what he’d said he would do and told Eve himself right away.

  “I’m going to go look for him. And once I find him you two need to talk. Not argue—talk,” Rowenna said.

  She hurried out before Eve could say anything else. Suppose Adam was having neural issues? The pressure of coming to her might have brought on…something. Or maybe he had chickened out and gone to get a drink to shore up his courage before talking to Eve.

  She hesitated when she got to the cross street that led to the cemetery. She felt as if she was being drawn there, but she told herself that the feeling was absolutely ridiculous.

  Then she thought that maybe Adam had wandered that way.

  She turned the corner, and as she did, she had the acute feeling of being watched. She stopped and turned around. A couple of schoolkids, out for the afternoon, were dancing around outside the joke shop behind her, laughing. The elderly wiccan who owned Lamp, Bell and Candle walked by in a long black cape and smiled at Rowenna. “Blessed be, Ro.”

  “Blessed be,” Rowenna echoed, forcing a return smile.

  There were people out now. The streets were not inconveniently empty. But she still had the sensation of being watched.

  She looked up the block toward the cemetery.

  She could have sworn she saw a large shadow rising at the back, but the people walking through didn’t seem to notice anything strange.

  At least, most of them didn’t seem to notice.

  Rowenna saw an attractive young blond woman somberly studying the grave markers where several children of the same family, who had all died very young, had been buried. Then the woman looked up suddenly, as if disturbed.

  The shadow seemed to be lumbering toward her.

  Rowenna could have sworn that she heard the old children’s song in her head.

  Don’t fear the Reaper,

  Fear the Harvest Man…

  She hurried into the cemetery and up to the woman. “Hello,” she said.

  The woman didn’t seem to hear her, even though she was standing right in front of her.

  “Excuse me,” Rowenna said, trying again. She reached for her arm and touched her gently. “Miss?”

  Startled, the blonde turned and stared at Rowenna. “Oh, I’m sorry. Were you speaking to me? How odd…. I just had…Oh, never mind. What can I do for you?”

  “This may sound silly, but it’s getting close to dusk and—” She broke off. A lie would have to do. She couldn’t very well tell the woman that a shadow was after her.

  “I saw a man in a dark cape and hat watching you, and it just made me uneasy. If you’re alone, I think you might want to go somewhere with lots of people, or…even go back to your hotel for the night.”

  The woman smiled. “Don’t worry. I’m with my husband. He just went to buy a new camera battery before I meet him for dinner.”

  Rowenna’s heart sank. She was certain that the woman had been about to be a victim.

  Of what? A shadow? In broad daylight, with people all around?

  But the woman had clearly been under a spell of some sort, which she had only shaken off when Rowenna forcefully caught her attention. She wondered what the woman had been seeing.

  A vision of a hill and cornfields?

  Rowenna was sure the blonde was going to politely tell her goodbye, but she didn’t.

  “I’m supposed to meet him at the Clam Shack at the waterfront. Can you tell me the best way to get there?”

  “I’ll walk you over,” Rowenna told her.

  “Thank you. I appreciate it. I’m not real sure of the streets here.”

  “It’s easy. I
’ll show you.”

  “I hate for you to go out of your way.”

  “Not a problem,” Rowenna assured her.

  On the way, they introduced themselves and Rowenna discovered that Sue was from New York. When they reached the restaurant, Sue’s husband was outside, enjoying the view of the docks. They asked Rowenna to join them, but she demurred, waved goodbye and hurried back. Adam should have shown up by now. And if he hadn’t, Eve was going to be having a fit.

  She hurried back to Eve’s, avoiding the cemetery, but that uneasy sensation of being watched returned. And she knew that those unseen eyes were definitely hostile. She kept moving quickly, and she made sure to keep where there were crowds.

  At the shop, she pushed the door open. “Adam? Eve?” Nobody answered. She kept calling their names as she peered into their little reading rooms behind the drapes, and then back in the storeroom. Neither of them was anywhere to be seen.

  They never left without locking the door. Never.

  A wave of unease swept through her. She was alone in the store. And she was certain someone out there had been watching her.

  Following her.

  She started for the door, planning to go straight to the police station, and on the way, she was going to get back on the phone and get hold of Joe—no matter what.

  But as she neared the front of the shop, a shadow loomed outside and the door began to open.

  Police were called in from all the surrounding cities. Joe was furious; warnings and instructions had been sent out to all the farmers, and in his opinion, the bodies should have been discovered already. Precious time was elapsing, precious time for Mary Johnstone—if she weren’t among the dead already.

  As Jeremy had expected, the crime-scene crew weren’t hopeful of finding much, but they were grateful that he and Brad hadn’t trampled the scene once they’d found it.

  Harold came out. There were so many mitigating circumstances that he was reluctant even to hazard a guess at either woman’s date of death, but when pressed, he estimated that the first woman had probably been dead six to eight weeks, and the other one, possibly three months.

  A cry went up while Joe and Jeremy were talking with Harold.

  A third set of bones had been found.