Pecan Pies and Homicides (22 page)

The moment the flower was hidden, the dome vanished and the humming in the water became a shrill, high-pitched keening. It was a frightening noise that set Ella Mae's teeth on edge. She tensed for attack.

The guardian's been summoned,
she thought, a wave of terror rushing through her.

Gripping the electric prod, she began the most challenging part of her quest. Keeping one eye on the water surrounding her and the other on her dive computer, she slowly ascended ten feet. Then fifteen. Then twenty. Physically, she felt surprisingly normal. Her faculties were sharp and she experienced no discomfort. Jenny's gift was working to its full effect, but Ella Mae knew that she needed to take her first decompression stop.

She followed protocol and treaded water while casting about for signs of the guardian. Continuing her ascent, she paused for her second stop. It was then that she could feel a shift in the water temperature. A wave of ice passed right through her, and the throbbing that had surrounded the magic dome abruptly ceased.

It's coming! The guardian's coming!

Ella Mae expected the beast to attack from below, but it came straight at her. A black shadow longer than the dingy appeared just out of range of her headlight beam. It was moving fast, circling her. Assessing her. Ella Mae raised the prod, her heart hammering in her chest. She knew she'd have only one shot. One chance to save herself and her mother. She must stay calm. If she didn't, if she somehow managed to miss, all would be lost.

Suddenly, the monster veered to the left just beyond Ella Mae's halo of light.

God help me,
Ella Mae prayed as she took in the rows of enormous jagged teeth crowded into its impossibly long snout. The beast was watching her through an icy blue eye. The black pupil narrowed into a malicious slit, and the look it gave her was oddly familiar, almost human in its contempt.

My heart is pure enough to take the Flower of Life, but I still have to face this monster! Magic can be so cruel.
The absurd thought passed through Ella Mae's mind while she slowly swiveled, her eyes tracking the creature as it swam into the gloom.

She wasn't foolish enough to believe it was gone for good, but she had to take advantage of its disappearance, so she began to swim to her next decompression stop. As she rose, she searched for the creature in front of her, then down, and then she turned to glance behind her. Because she never lifted her gaze, she failed to see the dark shadow looming overhead. Without a sound, the monster's powerful tail shot through the water, seared the light cast by her prod, and swatted the weapon right out of her hand.

The force of the blow sent a wave of pain up Ella Mae's arm. She watched in horror as the prod sank. Within seconds, it was out of reach and Ella Mae knew she had no chance of catching it.

Heaven help me,
she repeated, drawing out a small knife with her left hand. She kicked her legs, instinctively seeking escape now that she'd lost her weapon.

As she arrived at her last decompression stop, the beast swam in a wide, lazy circle around her. For half a heartbeat, Ella Mae considered skipping the stop and swimming desperately for the surface, but there was a chance she'd pass out. She still had her knife, and though she doubted she could use it to inflict any real damage, she didn't plan on surrendering without a fight.

As if reading her mind, the creature pivoted its head to stare at her once more. Again, Ella Mae got the sense that it was judging her—that it found her contemptible—and once again, its calculating gaze seemed inexplicably familiar.

Another icy current of water swept over Ella Mae. The monster opened its great and terrifying mouth and swung around, swimming directly for her. It was moving fast. So fast that its tails and flippers became a blur.

Ignoring the pain in her right arm, Ella Mae took the knife in both hands and held it out in front of her. Just as the beast moved to strike, she jerked to the side and plunged the knife down through the scaly hide of its shoulder.

It jerked away, blood billowing in its wake, and Ella Mae knew that she'd given it only a flesh wound.

There was only one thing left to do now. She had to swim. Faster than she ever had before. She had to swim for her life.

She lifted her arms into a V and pumped her feet hard, trying to guess where the next attack would come from. If possible, she'd shove her gas tank into the monster's maw and hope it would get lodged there, giving her enough time to reach the surface and the safety of the boat.

I dare you to follow me all the way up,
she thought wildly.
Reba will riddle you with bullet holes and then turn you into a pair of boots.

Ella Mae's mind was a tangle of images. Hugh, as she'd left him sleeping on the sofa with Chewy; Suzy, Jenny, Aiden, and her aunts standing in Partridge Hill's kitchen; Reba, sitting in the boat, a pair of guns on her lap; the rose petals that had fallen the last time Ella Mae had leaned against the ash tree that was her mother. It wasn't Ella Mae's life flashing before her eyes but a catalogue of those she loved. Thoughts of them gave her courage and strength, pulling her up and up out of the water. Away from danger.

But suddenly, the monster was back. It raced at her like a missile and her heart stopped beating. Despite being numb with terror, she yanked off her tank. Still swimming, she held it against her chest like a mother embracing a child. She knew she'd reached the moment of truth. She would die now or buy herself a few more precious seconds.

Screaming in fear and rage, Ella Mae thrust the tank forward and the creature butted it aside with its sharp nose. Clinging to the tank, Ella Mae raised her legs to kick at the monster's hostile eye, at the rows of serrated teeth.

And then in an instant, the beast was abruptly sucked backward and entrapped inside a giant bubble made of pale light. It thrashed frantically, biting at the bubble walls, striking them again and again with its powerful tail, but failed to escape.

Ella Mae didn't wait around to see what would happen next. Letting go of the tank, she started to swim. She kicked once before she was enclosed within her own bubble of light.

There was no water inside the bubble. It was filled with pure oxygen. After drawing in a deep breath, Ella Mae glanced behind her in search of the bubble's source.

What she saw made her gasp.

Suspended in the water, his arms held out to the side and a grim look on his beautiful face, was Hugh.

Ella Mae blinked behind her scuba mask. Once. Twice. But it was Hugh, his eyes glowing a bright and angry blue. Ella Mae had never seen such fierceness in his eyes before. His naked skin also had a bluish cast, but the shade was cold, reminiscent of deep ocean trenches and subterranean caves. His hair floated in loose, lazy waves and a school of tiny silver fish darted through the strands.

Hugh didn't move. He simply floated, staring at her.

Ella Mae pulled off her mask and reached out to touch the bubble wall. Before she had the chance, Hugh lifted his hand, palm facing skyward, and Ella Mae's bubble began to rise. She looked back and saw that the bubble cage containing her attacker was descending.

“Thank you,” she mouthed to Hugh, though she knew that he was not the Hugh she knew. Not at this moment. He was something else entirely. Something magnificent and frightening. Beautiful and unpredictable. A water elemental.

Ella Mae had nearly reached the surface. She could make out the outline of the boat above her head. Hugh had risen with her, those electric eyes never blinking, his body relaxed as the water did his silent bidding. His lips were stretched into a thin, tight line of disapproval.

The bubble halted several feet below the surface and Hugh raised an arm.

He pointed at her pocket, the one holding the Flower of Life. His eyes bored into her and he made a “give me” gesture with his hand.

“No.” Ella Mae covered her pocket with her palm. “I have to save my mother.”

Hugh didn't react. He simply repeated the gesture.

“No,” she said again, louder this time.

A shadow rippled across Hugh's face and the silver fish scattered in alarm. Seeing them dart away, Ella Mae knew she should be frightened. This version of Hugh did not seem to recognize her. He simply wanted the flower and she would not give it to him.

She pushed at the bubble, but it wasn't like the viscous dome that had covered the flower. This film didn't give. It was solid as steel. She pounded on it while Hugh studied her with a displeased expression.

I can't have come this far only to fail now,
she thought, wishing Reba could see what was happening. But they were directly under the boat and its hull blocked the bubble from view.

I need to signal her
.
But how?
And then it came to her. Her mother's advice. The last words her mother had spoken, the ones that had sounded like lunacy at the time, lit up in Ella Mae's brain like a neon sign. Her mother had told her to call the butterflies. In the dead of winter, she'd told her to call the symbols of summer. The custodians of flowers.

Ella Mae opened her pocket and withdrew the Flower of Life. It shone like a star in her gloved hands. On the other side of the bubble wall, Hugh nodded in satisfaction. He thought she planned to do as he'd commanded. Ignoring him, Ella Mae stared at the flower petals and imagined orange monarchs, purple swallowtails, red lacewings, blue morphos, painted ladies—a rainbow of butterflies.

Wake up!
Ella Mae shouted in her mind.
I summon you! Wake and come to me!

The flower's radiance intensified. Rays of white light shot outward, tearing holes in the bubble wall. Water began to stream in through the openings, but Ella Mae didn't move. She kept her eyes locked on the petals and repeated her command.

Within seconds, the water reached her waist and was so cold that she felt as if her blood was freezing in her veins. The bubble was turning into ice. Ella Mae looked away from the flower and saw that Hugh was glaring at her, his fingers curling inward as he used his powers to make the water colder. He would trap her in ice to get the flower from her. He was willing to kill her for it.

You can't have it,
Ella Mae thought and smiled triumphantly. She could feel the butterflies approaching. In her mind's eye, she could see them swooping low over the lake, aiming for the small boat off the southern shore of the island.

Ella Mae channeled every ounce of will she could muster into the flower, bidding it to shatter the bubble of ice. Suddenly, Ella Mae heard a muted tinkling, as if someone had dropped a crystal glass on a hard floor a million miles away, and saw that she was free. Holding the flower overhead, she swam to the side of the boat and surfaced.

The second her hand burst from the water, the butterflies swarmed. They grabbed hold of her shining burden and lifted it high into the air.

Ella Mae gasped for breath, feeling dizzy, sick, and numbingly cold.

Take it to the grove,
she whispered and could feel Reba's fingers close around the material of her dry suit. She heard Reba's voice, hoarse with urgency, and tried to make out the words. And then she was lying down inside the boat and a blanket of butterflies had settled over her. Their touch felt like June sunshine. Her muscles drank in their heat and she felt herself drifting, surrendering to a magic as old as time, a magic that whispered to her, painting pictures of ancient forests with colossal trees, snow-covered mountains tall enough to pierce the sky, and verdant grasslands stretching as wide as a sea. And then she heard a woman singing. The language was unfamiliar, but the melody was so lovely that Ella Mae ached to hear it for the rest of her days.

And then another woman, Reba perhaps, was pleading to her. Telling her to stay. Begging her to come home.

Home. The word exploded in Ella Mae's heart like a fireworks display. Then, a string of names danced into her mind, followed by a collage of beloved faces. The faces burned in her heart like a hearth fire.

She wanted to be with them. She wanted to go home.

And so she opened her eyes.

Ella Mae's body felt like rubber. She was no longer cold or wet, but she was almost too exhausted to speak.

“Drink this,” Reba said, holding a cup to her lips.

“I can hold it,” Ella Mae protested. She tried to lift her arm, but it felt like a boulder was weighing it down.

Reba clicked her tongue. “Come on now. One sip.”

Ella Mae took a swallow of hot tea spiked with whiskey and then let her head fall back against the sofa cushion again. Verena tucked a wool blanket around her feet while Sissy plumped the pillows. Dee stood quietly in front of the fireplace, her hands stuffed into the pockets of her overalls.

“You gave us quite a scare,” she said and gestured at the fire. “Are you warm enough?”

Sissy started pacing behind the sofa. “Is there anything we can get you?”

Reba shushed both sisters. “Let me get this down her throat first.” She held up the cup of tea again.

This time, Ella Mae was able to hold the ceramic mug herself, though it felt anvil heavy. She drank the tea quickly, feeling its heat in her throat and belly, and said, “No time for questions. I need to get to the grove. The butterflies are waiting for me.”

Verena shook her head. “You're in no condition to—”

“I have to go. Right now.” Ella Mae turned to Aiden, who was standing at a discreet distance in between Suzy and Jenny. “I know you've done so much for me already. But can I beg another favor?”

Suzy understood immediately. She put a hand on Aiden's arm. “You need to carry her up the path. She's too weak to walk.”

Aiden dipped his chin. “I'd be honored.”

“I must get the flower in the ground,” Ella Mae said. “I don't know how long it'll last, and the butterflies are agitated. I can feel them calling to me.”

Verena rose to her feet. “Then we'll all go. We know you had to retrieve the flower by yourself, but you'll finish this thing with an entourage!”

Ella Mae touched Reba's sleeve. “Bring your Taser. Someone might try to stop us on our way to the grove.”

Reba grew tense. “Forget the Taser. I'll pump them so full of bullets that they'll set off the metal detectors in the Atlanta airport.”

“No,” Ella Mae said, her voice leaden with sorrow and weariness. “That someone is Hugh. He's . . .” She paused and Reba squeezed her hand gently. “He's an elemental.” She glanced at the concerned faces surrounding her. “He was down there, under the water with me, and he was really angry that I took the flower. You should have seen him. The way he looked at me.” A tear slipped down her cheek. “He didn't know me. Nor I, him.”

Sissy ceased pacing and gaped at Ella Mae. “Oh, my dear.”

“Maybe he was compelled to protect the flower,” Dee whispered. “I know it's not much comfort right now, but I don't think he would have threatened you without a reason.”

Jenny raised her fists and boxed the air. “If he tries to hurt you, I will demonstrate all of my mixed martial arts skills on him.”

Ella Mae gave her a weak smile. “I'd rather you helped me into my coat.”

Later, a pair of cars drove through a dark and deserted downtown, heading north for the parkland. Ella Mae was nestled between Dee and Sissy in the back seat of Reba's Buick, and all three of them were being pitched about like buoys in a stormy ocean as Reba drove even more erratically than usual.

“Are you trying to kill us before we get there?” Verena demanded from the front seat. “You're going twenty miles over the speed limit!”

“Verena's right,” Sissy said, gripping the door handle for dear life. “How can you even
see
where you're going? The roads aren't lit and they're as curvy as a snake's back.”

Dee reached over Ella Mae to pat her sister's hand. “Reba has the night vision of an owl. We'll be fine.”

They pulled into the parking lot and Reba helped Ella Mae out of the car. Ella Mae tried to walk to the trail's entrance on her own, but stumbled after only a few steps. She only had to look at Aiden and he was at her side. Without a word, he picked her up and started to climb the narrow trail.

Reba took the lead, flashlight in one hand, Taser in the other, while Jenny covered the rear. She had a rifle slung over her right shoulder and promised not to fire on Hugh unless absolutely necessary.

They walked without speaking, and in the silence, Ella Mae found herself thinking of Eira. She'd probably been carried just as Ella Mae was being carried. On another cold, moonless night, a man had held her close. A man had made his way along the trail until its end. There, at the foot of the boulder wall, the killer had set his burden down. And then he'd turned and disappeared into the darkness, leaving Eira to her lonely death.

I have not forgotten you,
Ella Mae promised, as if communing with the young woman's ghost. Her thoughts were a jumble. This close to the grove, she had trouble focusing on anything but the agitated buzz of the butterflies.

Finally, Aiden rounded the last bend. And when he did, he gasped.

Butterflies covered every inch of the boulder wall. A rainbow of fluttering wings formed a veil between this and the magical world, and Ella Mae knew that she'd be the only one permitted to pass through. Despite Verena's wish to be involved, this was still Ella Mae's quest and it wasn't over yet.

“Thank you, Aiden,” she said as he gently let her feet drop to the frozen ground.

Jenny's face was lit with wonder. “Where did they all come from?”

“And how can they survive in this cold?” Suzy asked.

“They live in the grove,” Ella Mae said. “They only came out because I needed them. They'll return with me and sleep until spring.”

Sissy leaned close to Verena and whispered, “Can this flower truly bring Adelaide back to us? Do I
dare
hope?”

Verena put an arm around her younger sister. “If our niece says it can, then I believe it with every fiber of my being.” She regarded Ella Mae with a new deference. “Go on, my girl! Take that flower and rescue my sister.”

Ella Mae cast a lingering glance at Reba and her aunts and then faced forward again. She raised her hands and the butterflies began to part. As she placed her palms on the wall she heard Jenny say, “Ella Mae told me how you sang to Eira—the day you found her. Would you sing it again while we wait?”

“Of course, dear,” Sissy said.

Ella Mae heard a few hauntingly beautiful notes of “In the Bleak Midwinter”
before stepping into another world.

The butterflies crossed to the other side with her. They set the Flower of Life on a soft patch of grass and hovered protectively above it. To Ella Mae's incredible relief, the flower looked just as radiant as it had on the bottom of the lake. It sat on the emerald grass, pulsing like a heart waiting to be transplanted. A heart filled with magic.

Silently thanking the butterflies, Ella Mae picked up the flower and held it gingerly in her cupped palm. She walked through the orchard, past the meadow and the rows of rosebushes to the clearing. Her eyes traveled up the shallow rise to the top, where the ash tree presided over the enchanted garden.

As Ella Mae drew alongside the tree, she realized that she didn't know where to plant the flower. With her free hand, she touched the ash tree's bark.

“You're the master gardener. Tell me what to do,” Ella Mae murmured to her mother. When there was no reply, she began to dig a hole at the base of the tree using the diving knife she'd slipped into her coat pocket. She scraped away the dirt for several minutes and then placed the flower in the hole. Pushing the soft soil over its roots, she gave the turned earth several firm pats and then sat back on her heels and held her breath.

Nothing happened.

Ella Mae watched and waited. The flower looked the same. So did the ash tree. Everything was the same.

She was doing something wrong.

Ella Mae wondered if the flower needed water but immediately dismissed the notion. It had grown over a hundred feet below the surface of a lake without receiving an ounce of fresh water or sunlight. It must have absorbed its nutrients from the maze of roots growing on the lake floor.

“You were tapped into a source of life,” she said, her gaze falling on the knife blade. “If I think of you as a beating heart ready to be transplanted, then you need a host. A new source of life.”

Suddenly, she knew what to do.

“Forgive me
,”
she said, hoping her mother heard her plea. She then pinched one of the ash tree's thin roots between her fingers. It curved above the ground like a tiny bridge and disappeared into the grass again directly below the trunk. Ella Mae hesitated. She looked at the veins on the back of her hand and thought about how they carried blood and oxygen to the rest of her body. The flower needed to be grafted to the tree's veins. After listening to her own heart for a moment, she sliced into the tree root with her knife.

A scream of pain bloomed inside her mind, but Ella Mae steeled herself against it and sawed deeper into the root. Another cry of agony echoed inside her head, shrill and terrible, and Ella Mae's mouth twisted in anguish.

“Hold on,” she whispered to her mother. Gently pulling the flower out of the dirt, she cut the tip of a root at an angle and pressed it into the wet cavity she'd created in the ash tree root.

The flower instantly fused with the tree. For a brief second, all was still. And then the entire grove starting shaking. Ella Mae reached out to grab hold of the tree trunk, but a violent tremor knocked her backward. She lay sprawled on the grass as the canopy of branches over her head twitched and trembled. Leaves rained down on her and a frenzied wind hurled twigs and petals and bits of bark into the air.

Ella Mae tried to keep her eyes on the flower, but they were watering against the sting of the wind. Squinting, she saw the flower's glow spread outward, like a star going supernova. Its pure white light was so blinding that Ella Mae had to hide her face in her hands.

“Mom!” she cried. Had she made a grievous error in grafting the flower to the tree? Had she destroyed everything?
“Mom!”

Abruptly, the wind stopped and the ground ceased roiling. Ella Mae's body trilled with energy. Every ounce of fatigue vanished from her cells. She felt powerful enough to lift the ash tree and balance it on her shoulders as if it were a broomstick. She felt like Atlas. Like she could carry the whole world on her back.

Rising to her feet, she opened her eyes and saw wavelets of silver sweeping across the meadow. Like ripples moving over a stagnant pond, the flower's magic was permeating every blade of grass, every plant stalk, every stone and tree. It flowed through Ella Mae's bloodstream and she felt light enough to fly.

The entire grove was quickly consumed by white starlight and glittering silver. And then, just as abruptly as it had flared, the light winked out. The moment it disappeared, the ash tree started to twist and buck. With an inhuman groan, a large rent appeared in its trunk and Adelaide LeFaye was ejected from within. She pitched forward, limp and lifeless, and fell into Ella Mae's open arms.

Her mother was coated with a sticky, saplike film from her crown to her feet. Her eyes were closed and she didn't seem to be breathing, but her flesh was warm to the touch.

Ella Mae wiped the sap away from her mother's mouth. “Breathe,” she whispered. “Come on, Mom. Breathe. You're not a tree anymore. You're Adelaide LeFaye. Adelaide LeFaye. Adelaide. You're my mom, and you need to breathe.”

Her mother's lips parted and she drew in a wet, ragged breath.

“Yes, yes! That's it. Keep going.” Ella Mae smoothed her mother's hair while tears blurred her vision.

Her mother blinked and breathed, blinked and breathed, as if waking from a very long slumber. Ella Mae sat cradling her mother's head and felt her heart swell in her chest. A lump formed in her throat and she started to cry. She let go of all the fear she'd held at bay since she'd put on the dry suit hours before. Hot tears streamed down her cheeks and dripped into her mother's silver hair.

Ella Mae sobbed in relief first. And then, after her mother whispered her name aloud, from joy. Her mother could speak again. In the days to come, the two of them could sit and talk as other mothers and daughters did. And Ella Mae had so much to tell her mother. So many questions to ask. And now there would time for that.

Ella Mae helped her mother sit up. They stared at each other, each of them drinking in the familiar contours of the other's face, cherishing each angle and plain, every line and freckle.

“You saved me,” her mother said, her voice as faint as a distant breeze. She held Ella Mae's cheek in her palm and smiled.

“I didn't want to be without you.” Ella Mae swiped away the tears pooling in her eyes and took her mother's hand. “No one will ever again have to make the sacrifice you made. That part of our history is over.”