Deadly Night (25 page)

It was Aidan’s voice.

Jeremy unlocked the door and let his brother in.

“Everything all right?” Aidan asked.

“Fine,” Jeremy told him. “Now that you’re here, I’m going to get going. I’ll stay out at the plantation tonight, just to keep an eye on things.”

“Thanks, Jeremy,” Aidan said.

Kendall gave Jeremy a quick hug. “Yes, thanks. I’m sorry you got stuck babysitting me. I’m not usually such a weenie.”

“Hey, strange times call for…careful action,” Jeremy said a little lamely. “Talk to you tomorrow,” he told his brother.

The minute Jeremy was gone, Kendall found herself shivering suddenly.

“What is it?” Aidan asked, locking the door.

“Paranoia setting in,” she said. There had been someone in Sheila’s house. That was a fact, and she’d been right to be afraid. There was
not
someone in her courtyard, trying to spy on her through the drapes. Being afraid now was paranoia.

“Come here,” he said gently, folding her into his arms.

“Is it wrong of me to be glad you carry a gun?” she told him.

“Of course not.” He lifted her chin. “Are you all right?”

“She’s dead, Aidan. I know it.”

He didn’t try to contradict her; he just held her.

She let herself cry for her friend. Other people might say she was being ridiculous, giving up hope so quickly. But she knew Sheila was dead, and now all she could do was make sure Sheila’s killer was caught.

God help her, she wasn’t going to be afraid to face the unknown. She was going to accept all the help she could get from the living or the dead to bring the killer to justice.

For Kendall, the next day seemed to last forever. Mason was as upset as she was. All morning, he kept suggesting that Sheila must have gotten tired of the academic life, that she had decided to go wild and crazy, and have fun. She had met some people and gone with them for a frolic in the islands.

“The police are investigating,” she assured him.

Vinnie was depressed, too. “It’s hard to think about having a party,” he told her.

The one bright spot in the day was Jean’s article on the plantation. Not only did she set the record straight about the cousins, she implied that the local historical society was likely to look into Victor Grebbe’s life and he might at least be condemned by history, since it was far too late to see that he paid appropriately for his crimes during his lifetime. The article ended on a whimsical note, saying that the cousins’ ghosts, now exonerated of any malicious intent, should be resting far more peacefully.

Ady came in just after lunch. Kendall was afraid to read for her, but she had promised herself that she was going to try to read every sign. But Miss Ady shook her head when Kendall led her into the back room and asked what kind of tea she wanted for her reading. “I’m just here to say thank-you. The doctor called me about the scan. He says they’re going to give me a little shot of radiation, and some chemo. He says we caught the cancer before it could spread.”

“I’m so thankful, Miss Ady,” Kendall said, taking the older woman’s hand.

“I heard about all the commotion last night,” MissAdy said.

Her old eyes were kind and filled with empathy. “That pretty little friend of yours, that girl Sheila. They say she’s missing now. And that someone might have been in that house when you were there. Oh, Kendall, I told you to be careful.”

“Miss Ady, I was careful,” she assured the older woman. “How did you know Sheila’s missing? There wasn’t anything in the paper.”

Miss Ady sniffed. “Rebecca heard about it at work, and she told me. The cops asked them to be on the lookout for a Jane Doe that might be your friend.”

Cold chills ran through Kendall’s veins, but she already knew the truth. Whether they found her or not, Sheila was dead.

She knew because she had been walking in her friend’s footsteps in a dream.

“Amelia came to me again, last night,” Miss Ady said gravely.

“Oh?”

“She said she’s very worried about you.”

“Please, if you’re ever able to answer her, tell her that I’m fine.”

“Pull out a card,” Miss Ady said, indicating the tarot deck on the table.

“What?” Kendall asked her.

“Shuffle your cards. Pull one out.”

“Oh, Miss Ady, that’s just silly.”

“Please. Humor an old lady.”

Kendall sighed. She didn’t want to do it, but she didn’t see any way out of it. She shuffled the cards, then shuffled them again. And then again. Finally she knew she couldn’t procrastinate anymore and she pulled out a card.

Death. But at least it wasn’t laughing. It was just there.

“It just means a new beginning, Miss Ady,” she said, though she wasn’t sure who she was really trying to reassure.

“And if we’re believers in a higher spirit, isn’t that what death is?” Ady asked her.

Kendall forced herself to smile. “Maybe it just means I’ve closed the door on being such a loner, and now I’m going to continue on a new path with Aidan Flynn. Maybe Amelia left me something far better than a plantation, maybe she knew somehow that Aidan and I would hit it off.”

She had expected Miss Ady to smile, but the older woman didn’t, only continued to study Kendall with grave eyes.

“Don’t you go anywhere alone, you hear me? And don’t you go off in the dark, neither. You make sure you stay around that Flynn boy of yours all the time, you understand?”

“Okay, Miss Ady, I will,” Kendall promised her.

Aidan’s first stop was the police department.

Hal was in and saw him right away.

“Did you ever get anything more on the break-in at the morgue?” Aidan asked.

“Yeah, we got a delivery man. He left a box of chemicals.”

“That’s it?”

“And we got a shadow. I can show it to you, if you like.”

“There’s a movie I’d love to see,” Aidan told him.

Hal made a call, and they walked down to the computer lab, where the tech played the security tape, which he’d refined as much as was technically possible. Just as Hal had said, they saw a delivery man at the back. He rang the bell, and then, when no one answered, looked around, set down the box, hunched his shoulders and hurried back to his vehicle.

The tech fast-forwarded through what seemed like hours of nothing. Then, as Hal had said, they saw a shadow walking up to the back door. It was human, but there was no way to tell if it was a man or a woman. The face was completely obscured, and the person seemed to be wearing a hooded black cloak.

“As you can see, it looks as if the grim reaper paid a visit to the morgue,” Hal said dryly.

Aidan thanked him for showing him the tape, then asked if there was anything new on Sheila Anderson.

“She never got on her plane,” he told Aidan. “We’re running a trace on her cards, but I’m not counting on anything to turn up. Meanwhile, we’ve got crews going over her car, her house, her yard. All we have so far is that the electric cable was cut by a sharp instrument. Oh, and Jonas was in here this morning. He delivered the girl’s wallet. Told me they’d been having an affair, and that she’d left it in his car.”

“And what’s your gut feeling about that?”

“My feeling? Well, you’re friends with the guy, so I’ll be polite. I think he’s a cocky SOB with a wife who’s sweet as molasses, and he’s been a real jackass, playing around on her. But do I think he’s a murderer? That he did the girl in? No.”

“Thanks,” Aidan told him. “If I hear anything, I’ll get with you. So you got nothing off the car?”

“Can’t say nothing. She was driving on some rough terrain, not her usual ride into work and back. But I can’t say exactly what it means. We’ve got gravel roads over half the state.”

“Thanks,” Aidan said again.

He knew one place where they had a gravel road. The driveway to his house.

After saying goodbye to Hal, Aidan planned to drive straight out to the plantation, but a call from Matty as he was walking out to his car detoured him.

He agreed to meet her at a café right across from the station, since they were both already in the area. When she saw him, she walked up to him and gave him a hug and a kiss on the cheek. There were tears in her eyes.

“Thank you, Aidan.”

Oh, God, had she taken his time just to say thanks? Not that he didn’t appreciate her feeling that she wanted to say something, but a few simple words on the phone would have done just as well. Still, what was she thanking him for? He’d proven that her husband was a cheat.

“Matty. You’re welcome. But…”

She sat. “Oh, I know he’s been a bastard. But, Aidan, last night, he asked me for help. He
cried,
Aidan. I’ve never seen him do that. He said he was sorry he’d gotten messed up with that girl, and that he knows he acts like a fool sometimes. But he said he was scared. Like the years were passing. And he hasn’t always gotten the promotions he wanted, and he just needed to know that someone else found him exciting. I guess that’s why most guys cheat, huh? I told him I wished he had just squandered our savings on a Porsche. But he’s scared now, really scared. He says that the girl he was seeing is missing, and that he had been out to her place. He swore to me that he’d never hurt anyone, and I believe him, Aidan. He may be in trouble, but he needs me now, and I’m going to stand by him.”

“Good for you, Matty,” Aidan said, then couldn’t help himself and glanced at his watch.

“I know you’re busy, Aidan, you don’t have to stay. I just wanted to ask you a favor.”

“What?”

“I need you to be his friend, too, Aidan. He thinks the world of you, always has, you know. He looks up to you. You—you just quit the Bureau. You walked away and made a success of your life. You never cared what anyone thought of you, just went out and did what you felt like doing.”

“Matty, I lost my wife. I had to change my life.”

She waved a manicured hand in the air. “I understand. Still, it would mean a lot if…”

“I’ll be his friend, Matty,” Aidan promised.
As long as he doesn’t turn out to be a psychotic killer,
he added silently. After all, who made a better criminal than a cop, someone who knew how to avoid leaving evidence behind?

They said goodbye after that, and he drove out to the plantation. He could hear the workmen banging away, and he waved to the contractor when he saw the man standing on the porch, talking to a painter.

He didn’t stop, though, but headed straight out to the graveyard.

He sat on the grave of Henry LeBlanc and studied the whole place. He could still see the mounds where he had recovered the old graves.

A cemetery. Where better to hide a body?

Would his brothers think he was crazy if he wanted to dig up the entire graveyard?

The cost might be astronomical. Could he even do it without a court order?

And what if he found nothing?

A weeping cherub nearby gave him no answer.

He stood and walked over to the family vault, pushed open the iron door and went in.

The cross on the small altar at the far end was catching the sun’s falling rays and reflecting them into the vault like prisms of gentle pastel color. The place felt peaceful. He ran his hands over the two marble tombs in the center. They were completely sealed.

He checked the seals on the tombs that lined the walls.

Nothing appeared to be cracked or open in any way.

Once again feeling that he was missing something, he left the family mausoleum and headed back toward the house.

As he walked, he looked up, and there, on the balcony, was a woman. A woman in a white gown billowing in the breeze, the same breeze that played with her deep red hair. She was pointing, and she seemed to be weeping with infinite sadness, just like the marble cherub in the graveyard.

He turned in the direction she was pointing, back to the graveyard, yet nothing had changed.

He looked back toward the balcony, but the woman was gone.

“If a man is going to see ghosts,” he said aloud, “then hell, they at least ought to stick around.”

What the hell? He walked back to the cemetery and stopped at the tomb that bore the name Fiona MacFarlane.

He ran his hands over every possible crack in the tomb, but the only damage he could find had been done by time, not man.

Swearing again, he started back for the house. He pulled out his phone and was about to call Kendall when he heard footsteps coming up behind him and spun around.

Jimmy Wilson was walking toward him along the trail to the slave quarters. He saw Aidan and waved, a huge grin on his face.

“Mr. Flynn, thank you. The electricity works great. And those fellows, they fixed me up with running water, too. I swear, Mr. Flynn, I’ll get you paid back.”

“Don’t you worry about it, Jimmy. Hey, aren’t you supposed to be at work?”

Jimmy shook his head. “Night off,” he said. “I thought I’d stack some of them lumber scraps them fellows left lying around. Thought that would be helpful.”

“Thanks, Jimmy. Hey, listen for cars coming up the drive, will you?”

“Yes, sir, I sure will. And you need to think of more work for me to do, Mr. Flynn.”

“I will, Jimmy.”

“Your brother says I can help you fix her up for the party.”

“Sounds like a plan,” Aidan said, then waved and kept going toward the house. Just then his cell rang.

“Flynn,” he responded automatically.

“You know, you really have to start saying
which
Flynn,” Kendall teased.

“I’m on my way in to get you.”

“It’s all right. I packed up some things that will be great for the benefit and I’m bringing them out,” she told him. “And I thought we’d cook there, if that’s okay.”

She sounded good, he thought. Strong.

“Can’t wait,” he said. “See you soon.”

“You bet.”

A little while later, Aidan was inventorying the refrigerator when his cell rang again.

“Flynn.”

“Aidan?”

“Yes?”

“It’s Robert. Robert Birch. At Quantico.”

“Robert! Hey.”

“So things are wild down there, huh?”

“I don’t know about wild, but we do have a serial killer on our hands.” He filled Robert in on some of what had happened.