Graveyard Games (19 page)

A small sob escaped her
throat and she turned her face into her pillow.
Oh Nick, Nick…
God, she missed him!
Sorry, sorry…oh, who cared? It was all too late. Sorry didn’t make
anything better. Sorry didn’t bring any justice or sense of order.
Nothing did. Nothing would.

Except, maybe, for her plan.

Could she accept Shane’s apology? What would
that mean? Hating him was the fuel for her fire. How could she let
that go?

So…maybe she would let him
think she’d accepted it, but she couldn’t let herself believe it.
She had to hate him—
she had to.

"Nothing's changed," she whispered into her
pillow.

It was good, better, to hear it aloud.
Nothing had changed, she insisted, nothing at all. Sorry,
apologies, it was all too late. Nick was dead, Tommy was dead…but
nothing changed the way she felt. Nothing.

Chapter Nine

"Luh-Lee said yuh-you can guh-go on yuh-your
break." Sam handed the tray of beer over the counter to her. Dusty
smiled, waving at Lee.

"Thanks," she mouthed, and he nodded, taking
an order.

"You've moved up in the world," she remarked
to Sam with a smile.

Sam shrugged, looking away. "Juh-just part
tuh-tuh-time."

"You'll be taking Lee's place soon, if you
keep it up." Dusty winked at him and Sam looked back at her shyly,
but still beamed under her compliment as Dusty threaded her way
through the crowd towards the pool tables. It was packed, even for
a Saturday. Everyone had found a reason to celebrate—mostly because
the hunt was going to be called off soon.

"Hey, it's the lady with the beers!" Billy
called to her. "Gimme one!"

"Need your money first, pal." She held her
tray just out of his reach.

"Don't I get a discount? I'm a buddy of your
boyfriend over there." He jerked his thumb towards Shane, sitting
astride one of the chairs. Anger flashed through Dusty, white-hot,
but she covered it.

"He doesn't even get discount rates," she
told him. "You had the Miller, right?"

Billy gave up and started to dig through the
pockets of his tattered jeans. "Here." He tossed the money on her
tray and took the bottle. "Hope you're happy."

"Only if you left a big tip," she said,
smiling. She made her rounds with the rest of the beer—she knew by
memory now what they all ordered—and then went to sit by Shane.

"Hey." He slipped his arm around her
shoulders and she watched as their pool game resumed. It was
amazing how easily she’d been accepted.

"They caught it." She leaned over so he
could hear her over the dull roar.

"I heard," Shane replied, not looking at
her. He didn’t say anything else and she tried to read his eyes,
but they strayed away.

"They're going to have the head mounted and
put up in the Sheriff's office," said Jake, who was standing near
them.

"They aren't really?" Dusty asked,
incredulous.

Jake grinned and blew a stray piece of his
long, dark hair out of his face. It settled back over his left eye.
"If they aren't, they should."

"What’s so interesting over here?" Evan
wandered over from the pool table. Chris was deciding on a shot,
and it took him forever in his meticulous, deliberate way.

"The infamous Clinton Grove kitty-cat,"
Dusty told him. "What do you think? Should they hang its head in
Thompson's office or not?"

"I think—" Evan started.

"Drop it," Shane said in a low voice. He
didn’t even look at them, but the two words were enough. The
subject was dropped and the game resumed. Jake went back to being a
spectator.

"Shane?" Dusty put her hand on his arm. He
jumped, looking at her. As always, the jolt was almost electric
when she touched him, and she hated herself for it. "You okay?" She
was calculating, keeping her voice at just the right, concerned
tone.

He hesitated, opening his mouth. Then he
just shook his head. "I'm okay," he replied, but his face told her
something else. Things were not okay at all. "Hey, can you come out
to the path with me this Friday? "

Dusty looked toward the bar. Lee was in
conversation with Will Cougar, who had stopped by for a few after
work. Sam's eyes were on her, as always, his gaze uncomfortably
steady. Dusty raised a hand to him and smiled.

"I can't," she told him, standing up. "I
promised Sam I'd have dinner with him."

"You serious?" Shane raised his eyebrows.
Dusty nodded. She had agreed to Sam’s invitation under the
stipulation that they were "just friends," and would stay that way.
She felt sorry for Sam, but she’d grown to like him a lot, too.

"I've got to get back to work." She leaned
over and kissed his cheek. "I'll make it up to you, I promise."

He smiled, shaking his head. "I can't figure
you out."

She shrugged, tossing her
hair over her shoulder.
Thank god you
can't
, she thought, looking back at him
for a moment.
If you could, you'd probably
kill me.

* * * *

Aside from the Starlite, Larkspur at night
was like a ghost town. Most of the place was asleep by nine
o'clock. The curfew had some effect on the late night partiers, but
not much. Most were already in by eight or nine, unless they were
out at the path. Driving on Cass, on her way to Sam's, the traffic
light went red, then green, then yellow, and no one else was there
to stop for it. The neon lights of the Starlite flashed in the
distance, but everything else was closed for the night.

Dusty's was the lone car on the road, and it
felt eerie. The only light came from the Jeep's own headlights. She
began looking for Wanda road as she neared the cemetery. She knew
it was near Clinton Grove, separated from the cemetery by a stretch
of woodland.

Behind her, red and blue lights flashed and
she glimpsed them in her rearview mirror. Puzzled, she steered the
Jeep to the side of the road and rolled down the window in the cold
night air. Deputy Walker approached her wearing a heavy coat over
his uniform.

"Hi, Dusty," he said, leaning down. She was
shivering. "Where are you headed?"

"Sam's," she said. "Sam Lewis. I'm eating
dinner over there." Dusty pulled her coat around her.

"I didn't recognize the car," he apologized.
"We're supposed to check out anything suspicious and I couldn't
read your plates. The bulbs around them are burnt out."

"Oh. Sorry,” Dusty apologized, looking at
him in the light from the flashers. “I thought it was all
over?"

"Better safe than sorry, that's what the
Sheriff says,” Matt told her. “We caught a pretty big bobcat, and
we're pretty sure that's what's been causing the trouble. Sorry
about stopping you like this."

"It's okay, Matt," she said. "I know you're
just doing your job. Can I go now, or are you going to give me a
ticket for the burnt out bulbs?"

"No, just get them fixed, okay?" He took a
step back. "It's all just precautionary, anyway. We ought to be
clearing out of here within a week."

"That soon?" Dusty asked, shivering.

"Yup. Maybe we can get back to normal, then,
huh?" She looked at him, and it seemed his expression was almost
pleading with her, or maybe even with himself, to believe what he
was saying. She shrugged.

"I hope so, Matt."

He tipped her a wave. She waited until he’d
turned off his flashers and pulled away. He made a u-turn and
headed back toward town.

"I hope so." But she didn’t believe it any
more than he did.

* * * *

"C-c-come on uh-in." Sam opened the front
door. She’d found it—the only house on Wanda, a dead-end road and
difficult to find with no street lights. The house was huge and in
serious disrepair. There were sections where the windows were
completely boarded up.

"It's getting cold out there." Dusty
unzipped her coat as he closed the door behind her. "I think
winter's finally here."

"Truh-try riding a b-bike in this." Sam made
a face as he took her coat. He opened the closet and hung it on the
handle of a vacuum cleaner and shut the door. Dusty smiled to
herself when she saw the mess—sneakers, boots, coats.

"Smells good." Dusty looked around the
foyer. The ceiling was high above them. She glimpsed a curving
staircase as she looked through the archway. A chandelier that
hadn’t been dusted in twenty years hung from the ceiling. The house
had a musty undersmell.

"It's spuh-spuh-spaghuh-hetti. It's the only
thing uh-I know huh-how to c-c-cook that isn't uh-out of a
c-c-can," he said with a little laugh.

"You live in this big house all by
yourself?" Dusty asked, looking around. "How do you keep it
clean?"

"I duh-don't," he said with a shrug. "C-come
on. I'll shuh-show you where I luh-live."

Dusty followed him past the archway. It must
have belonged to someone rich once, she thought, looking around. It
was dingy now, in need of a serious cleaning, but a taste of what
it had once been remained. Dusty looked up the staircase and there
on the wall hung a huge portrait.

"Who is that?" Dusty asked, tugging at his
sleeve. Sam followed the direction of her gaze.

"Muh-my fuh-father."

Dusty looked at it a minute longer, taking
in the fierceness of the old man. It must have been taken later in
life, because his hair was completely white and hung to his
shoulders. He had blue eyes, like Sam’s.

"C-c-coming?" Sam asked.

"Yeah." Dusty took her eyes off the picture
and followed him down the long hallway and past at least five
closed doors. The house was strangely built. At the very end of the
hall was a light-washed room.

"Muh-mine," Sam said proudly.

It was a small one-room apartment of sorts.
There was a bed, a table, a make-shift kitchen equipped with a
stove, sink, refrigerator, one counter and a few cupboards. A door
at the other end she assumed to be the bathroom. It was sad to see
this little place, so cramped and small, surrounded by a once-great
exterior.

"It's nice," she said, trying to sound
enthusiastic.

"Thuh-thanks.” He smiled. “Duh-do you want
something to druh-drink?”

“
Soda?” She looked at the
strange configuration of things hanging over his bed. As she drew
closer, she realized they were masks. He had ten of them, all
different, hanging over his bed.

“
They were muh-my
father’s.” Sam handed her a Coke. She took it, looking at each mask
in turn, wondering what they were made of. “Nuh-Native Uh-American
masks.”

“
Interesting,” Dusty
commented.

“
Suh-sit.” Sam offered her
a chair at the kitchen table. “It's ruh-ready."

Dusty sat down, looking around her. It was a
pretty big room, but there was no window. It seemed dreary—lonely.
She looked at Sam, busying himself with dinner and humming. He
seemed happy, content, but how could he be, living alone with no
family or friends?

"Have you always stayed in this room?" Dusty
asked as he set the food on the table. It smelled delicious.

"Yes." He served her spaghetti and then
served himself. "My fuh-father lived in the buh-basement, and this
was muh-my place. Better than duh-down thuh-there."

Dusty tried to imagine this scenario. "What
was your father like?"

Sam looked at his plate for a moment, using
his fork to wind strands of spaghetti around and around on his
plate. His hands shook because of his palsy, making it difficult to
keep on the fork.

"I nuh-never huh-had friends,” Sam started.
“Huh-he was my onluh-ly real friend. I tuh-take care of
huh-him."

"You must miss him," Dusty said, taking a
bite of a meatball. "I miss my brother, too."

Sam, his head down, eyes glued to his plate,
said softly, "Uh-I'm sorry."

"It's not your fault," Dusty told him, but
Sam just shook his head.

“
Uh-Are you still having
buh-bad druh-dreams?” Sam watched her as she took a drink of
Coke.

“
You know, that’s weird.”
Dusty reached into her blouse and pulled out the talisman. “Since
you give me this, I really haven’t! I’m wondering if it really is
magic.”

He smiled, chewing, his eyes following the
motion of her hand as she tucked the necklace back into her blouse.
“It is.”

She paused, her fork in mid-air.
“Magic?”

“
Yes.” He nodded,
swallowing and opening his can of Coke. “Don’t you buh-believe in
magic?”

Smiling, she shook her head. “The only magic
I’ve ever seen is on TV. You know, David Blaine and his deck of
cards, David Copperfield making the Statue of Liberty disappear.
That sort of thing.”

Sam laughed. “That’s not magic. Those are
truh-tricks.”

“
What’s the difference?”
Dusty noticed how his eyes followed her movements when she picked
up her napkin.

“
Magic is ruh-real,” Sam
insisted. “It’s about faith, a duh-deep belief in something outside
yourself. Yuh-you have it. I know, because the druh-dream-eater
works for you.”

Dusty smiled. “That could just be a
coincidence.”

Sam shook his head, his eyes on hers.
“Muh-my mother had it, too,” he told her. “Duh-deep faith in
magic.”

“
But I don’t,” she said,
taking a bite of spaghetti. “I don’t have any faith.”

He just smiled at her from behind his soda
can.

“
Do you have a picture of
your mother?” Dusty asked, glancing around the room.

Sam got up from his chair, moving in his
slow, jerky way. He opened his night table drawer and pulled out a
small book, coming back and setting it next to Dusty.

It had a black cover with the word “Mother”
in red on the front. She gave Sam a little smile when she picked it
up, beginning to flip through the pages. There was a woman smiling
at the camera, the beach at her back. There were pictures of her
dancing, cooking, laughing, kissing the cheek of an old,
gray-haired man.