Band of Demons (The Sanheim Chronicles, Book Two) (9 page)

In his place stood the ancient Hessian soldier, his tattered uniform black from dirt and rot. His cloak rustled with the wind, revealing the scabbard and sword at his side.

The woman—a ghost herself—gasped and took a step back.

“He has no head,” she said.

But Kate could not keep her eyes off the sight in front of her. She should be repulsed or afraid. Yet she felt nothing but awe. This Headless Horseman wasn’t here to kill her. This one was… hers.

As if confirming it, the Horseman knelt on the ground in front of her. Even though he had no head, she had the sense he was looking at her.

He couldn’t see, couldn’t hear, and yet he sensed… he sensed everything.

What is your wish, my love?
he asked in her mind.

Escort the woman to her grave
, Kate replied.
Keep her safe.
I’ll come soon.

As you wish
, the Horseman replied.

He rose, moved to his horse and mounted it. Although he was usually an apparition of terror, he moved forward almost gently toward the woman in black. Leaning down, he extended his hand to her.

Tell her I mean her no harm
, the Horseman told Kate.

“You’ll be safe with him,” she said out loud.

The woman took his hand and he helped lift her on to the back of the horse. She cradled the black bag in her hands. For just a moment, Kate was jealous. She wanted to be on the horse. It was where she wanted to be.

Soon,
the Horseman said.

She saw him kick his feet and the horse shot forward. She watched them ride until they disappeared into the woods.

Kate barely could comprehend what had happened. She could feel Quinn’s transformation. He was the Horseman, the Horseman was him.

But who was she?

She still didn’t have the entire answer, but she had a part of it.

“I know where I belong now,” she said to the empty cemetery. “I belong with the dead.”

Chapter 8

“As paranormal investigators, it behooves us to look past the official explanations of events. We must be careful not to overlook genuine phenomena disguised as tragedy. Take the story of Crail, Scotland, for example. If we are to believe the history books, the entire town was burnt to the ground because of a freak lightning storm. But a number of us suspect the full truth is very different. There were no storms, or unusual weather, recorded that night. And the sheer number of paranormal stories before and after the conflagration suggest something unique occurred.”

—Terry Jacobsen, “The Truth About Ghosts”

September 13, 2007

Sam Robertson’s hands were shaking. He hadn’t noticed until he waved goodbye to the bank manager, who was now making his way out the door. He quickly put his hand down and stared at it.

This is no good
, he thought.
They’ll see. They’ll know
.

But there was no one left to observe him. It was nine o’clock, far past his usual closing time, and late enough that Gladys had already called him twice. He had told her the same tale that he had related to Phil. The examiners had merely wanted to double-check some figures that weren’t adding up. There was no problem. It was just a misunderstanding that would soon be cleared up.

But of course it was nothing of the sort. Sam stood in his empty bank, feeling lost and alone. How could he have let things get so out of hand? Surely people would understand. He hadn’t meant to let the situation get out of control. They were investments—solid and dependable. The bank would get its money back. There was nothing to lose.

But the full force of how wrong that was had only just hit him this morning. His anxiety had been acute ever since the examiners had shown up unannounced, which was highly unusual. They had laid it out plainly enough. An anonymous tip had come in telling them some of the assets were missing. That he, Samuel Robertson, chief executive officer of Leesburg National Bank, had been secretly loaning himself money.

The surprise wasn’t that they knew, it was how. Robertson had been careful—he hadn’t told a soul. Phil didn’t know, so who did? Someone working at the bank? Someone else? Who? The thoughts rang around his head, echoing and unanswered. He had always expected to be caught, but had assumed it would be because of a slip-up. He must have made one somewhere, but he had no clue when.

He felt time was running out. If word of this hit the street, he would face an old-fashioned bank run—he imagined the scene from
It’s A Wonderful Life
, complete with lines of anxious depositors. It wouldn’t matter that customers’ money was protected by the government. It certainly wouldn’t matter that he, Samuel Robertson, would get the bank’s money back eventually. Panic was contagious and it wouldn’t take much to catch the fever.

He was startled by the phone call. No one should be calling the bank at this time of night. Gladys would have used his cell. Wondering if it was the examiners, Robertson picked up the phone.

“Hello?” he asked.

He heard nothing at the other end. No, that wasn’t quite right. He could just make out something… some kind of music? He pressed his ear to the receiver and thought he could make out the faint sound of a flute.

Robertson couldn’t say why, but the music was disturbing. It reminded him of something, but he couldn’t say what. He slammed the phone down, but jumped again a moment later when his cell phone rang. The display on his phone read, “Caller Unknown.”

Robertson didn’t answer it. Maybe he was cracking up or maybe the examiners had a bizarre sense of humor. It didn’t matter. He suddenly felt vulnerable here all by himself. He just wanted to go home. After all, he didn’t know how many nights he had left there. Soon—very soon—he could be spending his evenings in jail.

He moved quickly to arm the bank’s security system for the night, turn off the lights and lock the door. The phones in the bank started ringing once again, but Robertson ignored them. He was packing it in, literally and figuratively. He had made a decision. There was no way he could bluff his way out of this. Tomorrow, he would admit everything to the examiners. It was probably too late, but maybe he could get some clemency. At least they might help him stop the run on his bank.

He walked outside and locked the door behind him. Robertson had taken only a few steps to the car when he heard it—the sound of a horse running at full gallop. He didn’t wait to see what was coming. Already a jumble of nerves, Sam broke into a run to get to his car.

He never made it. A black horse with red eyes suddenly blocked his path, rearing back in front of him. Robertson fell back, dropping his keys on the ground. When he looked up, he screamed. The figure on the horse held a sword high above him.

Robertson didn’t waste time studying him. He scrambled up and began running back toward the bank. Only when he got to the door did he realize he no longer held the keys in his hand.

“You’ve been a very bad boy,” a voice said.

He turned around slowly to face the horse and its rider.

“Please,” Robertson said and his voice came out like a whimper.

The rider slid off the horse and began walking toward him.

“No mercy for the wicked,” the voice said.

Robertson watched in horror as the thing walked toward him, never wavering. With sword in hand, it cocked back its arm and then there was a motion so quick he could scarcely detect it.

It was the last thing Sam Robertson ever saw.

*****

Kate woke to a strange buzzing sound and momentarily wondered if some large, mutated insect was by her bed. It took a moment for her to realize it was her phone vibrating on the bedside table.

She looked at the clock, wondering how badly their exhaustion from the night before had made them oversleep. But it was only 6:30 a.m. She grabbed the phone and answered it.

“Kate Tassel,” she said.

“Kate, meet me at the office as soon as you can,” Tim said on the other end.

“Is there a problem?” she asked.

“More like an opportunity,” he said. “I’ve had a tip from a trusted source. The CEO of Leesburg National Bank has just been found murdered.”

 “Jesus,” she said.

“I’m pretty sure he wasn’t involved.”

Kate didn’t laugh.

“Tell Quinn to get to the bank as soon as possible,” Tim said. “I need you here for some research.”

“Do you have a sense of who might have done it?” Kate asked.

“Let’s just say I don’t think the CEO was on the up-and-up,” Tim replied.

“Understood,” she said and hung up.

She flopped back on the bed, wondering how she was going to make it through the day. They had less than two hours of sleep.

The last part of the night before was already a blur. She remembered driving to the Hillsboro cemetery, knowing exactly where it was because
he
was already there.

And then everything was fuzzy. She remembered him digging, knew that what had taken them hours in Leesburg took only minutes then.

Then the woman had gently laid the bag of bones to rest. She had smiled, thanked them with tears in her eyes, and disappeared. Kate didn’t know what the episode meant, couldn’t understand the full ramifications. But she knew something momentous had occurred.

She woke up Quinn, who stared at her when he saw the clock. He mumbled something very close to “No fucking way” and sank back into bed.

“It’s a homicide, Quinn,” she said. “You’re the crime reporter. Time to get to work.”

He rolled over.

“Please tell me last night was some weird drug-induced dream,” he said.

He knew it wasn’t. For one, his muscles ached, though he felt like he should have been in even more pain, given his exertions.

“No such luck,” she said.

She quickly brought him up to speed on what Tim had said. They showered—Quinn had gallantly offered to shower together, until Kate noted that the ensuing distraction would only delay them further—and got dressed within 20 minutes.

On the way to the
Chronicle
, Kate dropped off Quinn near the bank and headed to the paper.

Tim and Rebecca were both in the office when she arrived.

“What do we know?” Kate asked before she sat down.

“According to my source, the banker was under investigation by federal regulators,” Tim said. “They suspected he had been illegally funneling deposits to—get ready for this—riverboat casinos in Louisiana.”

“And here I thought bankers were dull people,” Kate replied.

“He was investing in them, apparently,” Tim said.

“You seem to know an awful lot,” she said.

“I have a good source,” he replied, and once again, Kate found herself wondering who his sources were. For a guy who had only been back in town a few months, he knew a considerable amount of private information.

“But you need me to confirm it,” she said.

“Exactly,” Tim replied. “That source doesn’t want to be traced.”

“So we have a murder and a salacious story,” Kate said. “We think someone killed the banker when they found out where their money was going?”

“Seems like a reasonable guess to me,” Tim said.

Kate sat down at her desk, scanned through her contacts and got to work.

*****

Quinn stood at his second murder scene in two days.

He had only been on the crime beat for less than a year, but Quinn had covered roughly a dozen deaths. Most of them had been accidental in nature. Only five had been ruled homicides.

It would be natural to assume that two murders within two days were connected. But did the bank CEO know Madame Zora? He also listened in as Tim told Kate what was going on. It might just be a coincidence. The banker and Zora probably had nothing to do with each other.

Police were practically swarming the area, but luckily it was too early to attract the attention of many onlookers. The body was gone, but Quinn could see where it had been. The blood stains were right in front of the door.

He was trying to get back inside
, Quinn knew.

If it was connected to his fraud at the bank, who had known about it?

The examiners certainly knew, but they didn’t have a motive to kill the guy. They must see bank fraud on a regular basis.

It could be someone inside the bank, someone who stood to lose money if the institution failed.

The only problem was the manner of murder. Quinn could believe someone would be angry enough to kill the banker, but according to the police report, he had been decapitated.

An angry employee or private investor might have confronted Robertson at his home or in the bank and shot him. But slice off his head? That was a particularly brutal and unusual way to kill someone. The only person who had done that lately was… Quinn himself.

Something isn’t right here.

A dark and disturbing idea occurred to Quinn. For such an old institution, the bank’s headquarters were relatively new. The branch in town, the sole other branch of Leesburg National Bank, was clustered among every other building along Route 7. But the headquarters, built in 2002, were a little outside of town, sitting on top of a small hill. The path that led to the parking lot was short, but went through a grassy stretch.

Quinn walked off the path and onto the lawn. It didn’t take long for him to find what he was looking for: hoof prints. Someone had been riding a horse nearby, likely the killer.

The police will see this too
, Quinn thought.
They’re going to think…

The conclusion would be unmistakable. Last year, the spot where Lord Halloween was murdered was littered with hoof prints in the dirt. The story written by Kate and Quinn earlier this year had even made mention of a mysterious horseman. The police were looking for a killer who rode a horse.

And thanks to Quinn and Kate, it wasn’t just the police. Their story had been a hit. It had worked to calm people down about the death of Lord Halloween, but—perhaps inevitably—it had generated its own wave of fevered speculation. All people knew about the Prince of Sanheim was that he rode through Loudoun County on a black horse, and had a penchant for decapitation.

This would be tagged on them. Never mind that in their sole letter, the Prince of Sanheim had…

Quinn stood frozen to the ground, still staring at the hoof prints. The letter had said the innocent had no need to fear. But the guilty?

It had made it pretty damn clear they were up for grabs. And what could be guiltier than a man who stole from his own people?

He had refused to admit the thought into his brain until now, but he could no longer see it any other way.

The killer, whoever he or she was, was pretending to be the Prince of Sanheim.