psychic crystal 03 - killer cruise (9 page)

Chapter Twelve

Juliette and Will dined at the outdoor café on the pool deck. From their vantage point, they observed the medevac helicopter from Barcelona hovering over the deck. The ship’s physician and the captain and a small contingent of the crew had fastened the body, wrapped like a mummy in a white sheet, to the waiting winch while it was raised into the medevac. The wind whipped up furiously around the copter, twisting the cargo. Juliette wrapped a shawl around her shoulders to ward off the chill, both physical and cosmic.

“I thought bodies aboard ship were supposed to be buried at sea,” said Juliette.

“Normally, yes, since we’re so far out in the ocean. But in this case, since the man was murdered, the captain is sending the body back to the mainland for further investigation. We’re too far out to sea to turn around.”

The helicopter circled back, and Juliette watched it until it was nothing more than a black speck in the sky.

“The crew is growing restless,” Will said, finishing his sandwich. “They’re spooked about the death threat to the European Union banking conference, and then the murder, although we’ve tried to keep it a secret. But the crew knows, and now anyone out on deck can see it. The news will spread like wildfire. And a murderer is loose on the ship. All bad signs. The crew is convinced this cruise is jinxed, cursed. Isn’t there something you can do? Some kind of spell you can weave, or a ritual you can perform?”

“Will, I’m not a magician or a witch. The truth is, this cruise
is
cursed. The crow we saw earlier was on the railing when I woke up this morning.”

“Crowzilla was back?” Will piped up.

“Yes, and with his two brothers,” Juliette added. “There were three of them, all in a row. It’s a classic sign. I did do a protective spell, but I’m not sure it will cover us out at sea.”

“Is that why you lit all those candles in the cabin?”

“Yes.”

“I thought maybe you were trying to send me a message by setting a romantic mood, but then you acted like you didn’t want to be around me, as usual.”

“This has nothing to do with you, Will Bradley. The world doesn’t revolve around you.”

“I’ve been on my best behavior, in case you haven’t noticed.”

“I’ve noticed.” Juliette’s mouth curved, and she barely hid a smile. “You’re becoming more… tolerable.”

“You’re a tough woman. I’ve never had so much trouble getting a woman to warm to me. I thought maybe I’d have to handcuff you to the bed with these.” Will brought out a pair of silver handcuffs from his back pocket and jangled them in front of her.

“Don’t be a cretin.” Juliette started to push them away and then she pulled them back and examined them more closely. “Are these real silver? They’re really beautiful and shiny.”

Will straightened and took them out of Juliette’s hands. “Yes. My deputies gave them to me on my fifteen-year anniversary with the force. They’re not regulation, but they work. They must have set the guys back a pretty penny. I always carry them with me. They’re my good-luck charm.”

“Well, your charm doesn’t work with me, Will Bradley.”

“Not even a little?” Will smiled and flashed his dimples.

Juliette shook her head. “We have more important things to worry about than your sex appeal or lack of appeal to women.”

“You think I’m sexy?” Will coaxed.

“I know you’re as conceited as a peacock.”

Will held up the handcuffs. “We can always take these babies out for a test drive, whenever you’re ready.”

“I’m not into hanky panky, Will Bradley.”

“You’re no fun.” Will laughed good-naturedly and placed the cuffs in his back pants pocket.

Juliette took out a velvet pouch and emptied some smooth stones onto the table.

“What are those? Magic rocks?”

“In a way. They’re healing stones. They have healing properties,” Juliette said, as she lifted each one in turn. “This amethyst releases tension and stress. The carnelian stimulates vitality and metabolic energy. The rose quartz strengthens the heart and lungs. And the sodalite blocks radiation and negative energies. Each of them have other properties, as well, for specific physical conditions.”

Juliette pulled out another pouch.

“What’s in there?”

“These are pure energy rock quartz crystals used to amplify energy. Rock quartz absorbs, stores, and regulates energy. It’s a master healer for any condition. The crystals work on a number of levels, and I can tune them to help attract what I desire in life.”

“And what is that? I know it’s not me.”

“Well, I can tune them to the specific quality I want to attract in life, whether it be love, prosperity, inner peace, health, travel, creativity, or body image.”

“You don’t need any help in that department.”

“It’s not
your
image of my body I’m concerned about. I’m making a broad appeal to the universe for the safe passage of this ship.”

“Well, I think it’s a little too late for that dead man in the helicopter.”

“I’m afraid so,” Juliette admitted. She held the crystals up to the sunlight.

“Sunlight restores their energy.”

Then she held them in her hand, rolling them quickly back and forth.

“This activates the crystals’ personal connection with me.”

“Maybe I need some of those crystals so I can improve our personal connection.”

“If you want to win a woman, you don’t do it by sorcery, although there are love spells.”

“Well, then, how do I get through to you?”

Juliette looked at Will and pursed her lips.

“By being genuine. Just be yourself, Will, if that’s even possible.”

Juliette gathered her stones and crystals and replaced them in her handbag. They got up from the table and strolled around the ship.

“Let’s sit here,” Juliette said. “The sun is so warm here. We can hear the music by the pool, and I want to get one of those fancy drinks with an umbrella.”

Will flagged down a woman with a notepad.

“Miss, we’ll take two of those piña coladas with the fancy umbrellas.” He gave her their cabin number, and she was on her way.

As they passed the cabana station, Will grabbed two thick cornflower blue towels engraved with
Sea Nymph
and the cruise line logo, and when they had decided on where to sit he spread them out on the wooden deck lounges.

Juliette settled in and sighed.

“This is absolute heaven,” she said.

“Jack and Kate will be down in a minute,” Will said.

Juliette closed her eyes, and Will adjusted the angle of his lounge and took Juliette’s hand.

“Just for show,” Will said.

Juliette relaxed her shoulder.

“What’s wrong?” Will demanded.

“Nothing,” Juliette said.

“I’m holding your hand.”

“So you are,” she responded.

“Why aren’t you snipping at me or pulling your hand away or casting a spell?”

“Because I am so happy right now. I feel like I’m floating, and nothing can change my mood, not even you.”

Will smiled and tightened his grip. No reaction.

“Juliette?” he whispered.

Juliette looked over at Will, eager to hear what he was about to say.

“Can you tell me about him, about the Reverend Carter Coulter?”

Juliette looked out at the ocean and sighed. Another voyeur interested in the prurient details of the murder. Would it ever end? Would she always be known as the girl who had an affair with the cult leader of Casa Spirito and later murdered him in cold blood in his bed and blew apart his secret society of psychics?

Will took her chin gently in his hands and twisted her face toward him until they were eye to eye. “Can you look at me when you tell it? You can trust me, Juliette.”

As she read his soul, she thought she could.

“I’m sure you’ve read all about it in the papers.”

“And I know you can’t believe everything you read in the papers. I would like to hear your side.”

“I can imagine what you think of me. How weak I must have been to stay with a man like that. A cult leader who preyed upon innocent young women, who got me pregnant and then stole my child. And still I stayed with him.”

“You must have had a reason.”

“I fancied myself in love with Carter Coulter, at first,” Juliette admitted. “To me, he was like a god. He was in total control of everything and everyone in Casa Spirito. He must have had us in a trance, because we would have followed him anywhere, done anything for him. I did everything for him.”

“You were only seventeen when you met, isn’t that right?”

“Yes, and he was the first man I’d ever been with. He took me in. He was kind to me. He set me up in my own shop, gave me an opportunity to make a living as a psychic and a spiritual healer and a medium. He said he loved me, that I was his soulmate, that we were destined to be together, and that he was ready to leave his wife. But of course, that was what he had told all the girls he seduced. So many innocent, wayward girls. We were all strays, sensitives he took in and kept under his spell. What I didn’t know was that while he was sleeping with me, he was also sleeping with all the other girls who came into town lost and looking for spiritual guidance. He used me, seduced me. He said I couldn’t survive without him. That he was the leader of the church and of the community, and that he was my master.”

Will grimaced but took Juliette’s hand, encouraging her to continue. “Go on.”

Juliette closed her eyes and remembered. “And then, I got pregnant. And I carried the baby to term. I wanted to keep the baby, but Carter had other ideas. He told me that if anyone found out the baby was his, he would lose everything. Broken trust, I think he called it. But he was more interested in maintaining control of the finances of the Casa Spirito church, money that he skimmed from church funds that only I knew about.

“I wanted to keep the baby. She was a girl. He tried to convince me to give her up. He told me we could go back to the way we were and no one would have to know. He threatened me, but once the baby was in my arms, I wouldn’t let her go. I couldn’t. I had already fallen in love with her.

“One night, while I was nursing the baby, he came in, had some of his disciples hold me down, and he stole her, right out of my arms. I screamed and I struggled. I screamed so loudly, but he slapped me across the face until I bled and said if I ever told anyone I would be sorry. He said if I didn’t cooperate, I’d never see my baby again. But if I was a good girl, he would eventually tell me where she was. Of course, he never did. Because he had sold her to a wealthy couple in Atlanta, and I never would have found her again if Kate and Jack hadn’t come looking for me.”

Will clasped Juliette’s hand tighter.

“Did you, were you—”

“You mean was I ever intimate again with him?”

Will nodded.

“I warmed his bed on occasion, over the years, pretended to have feelings for him, to see if I could get him to tell me where my daughter was, but once I realized he was never going to tell me, I wouldn’t let him touch me again. But he wanted to. He tried everything he could to coax me back into his bed over the years. But I refused to fall for his lies and false promises. And I stayed because I had nowhere else to go. Casa Spirito was my home. And because I hoped one day he’d tell me where to find my daughter. And because he continued to do the same thing to so many other girls, and I stayed to help them.”

A quiet stream of tears flowed from Juliette’s eyes.

Will wiped away the tears with his thumb.

“You were just a child. He was twice your age. He took advantage. He murdered Kate’s parents.”

“And when Kate told me who she was and what had happened to her parents, I knew Carter was serious when he said he would kill her if she exposed him. He trapped Kate and Jack in his house, drugged Kate, and had her in his bed, about to rape her. He called it trance sex. He used the same words and the same technique on me. ‘No inhibitions,’ he said. ‘Once I put you under, you will stop struggling, and I will take you to levels you’ve never dreamed of.’ Carter loved a good struggle. He told Kate he would be her spiritual guide and that theirs would be a perfect union. She, his own daughter, was created in his image, and his lifeblood flowed through her veins, and with her psychic ability and his superior talent, the children that would spring from their loins would be magnificent. His vision was to propagate his own stable of psychics, with Kate as his brood mare. He called it fulfilling their destiny. Carter would have killed Jack next. So I killed him first.”

“You were justified, Juliette. As the chief of police, I would have done the same thing. I only wish I had killed the bastard first.”

“You didn’t even know me then, Will.”

“But I do now. And I know you’re a good person. And you are a good mother to Kate. You can tell how much she loves you.”

Juliette licked some stray tears from her lips. “Thank you, Will. I was so ashamed.”

“You have no reason to be, not with me.” Will leaned in and hugged Juliette, who heaved a heavy sigh, leaned back on the lounge chair, and drifted off to sleep. Will placed Juliette’s wide-brimmed yellow straw hat loosely over her face. Then he took her hand and wouldn’t let go.

“Will, buddy, there you are.” Jack ambled over, pushed two lounge chairs together next to Juliette’s chair, and covered them with blue signature cruise ship towels.

“Mind if we join you?” Jack asked. He and Kate settled on their chairs, staring out at the ocean. “What’s wrong with Juliette?”

“Juliette?” Will whispered. “Juliette?”

“She’s asleep,” Kate observed. “She must be exhausted.”

Will dropped Juliette’s hand.

“I guess that’s why she didn’t get mad when I grabbed her hand. She was too tired to care.”

Kate stifled a giggle.

“Give her time, Will. You’re just getting to know each other. You never know what surprises are in store.”

Jack and Kate looked at each other and grinned.

“What’s with you two?”

“Nothing,” Jack said smiling.

“Nope,” Kate mimicked. “Not a thing.”

“I’ll be glad when we dock in Bermuda,” Will said. “I’m getting antsy on this ship.”