The Lost: Book Two, The Eddie McCloskey Series (The Unearthed 2) (21 page)

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second story was just as impossibly massive as the first. Kindler showed them down the main corridor to what he called the study. Eddie was expecting anything but a library but was surprised to find a room of shelves filled with dusty volumes.

“There are cameras everywhere else in the house.” Eddie followed Kindler and Ana out of the study. “So how about up here?”

“Yes. All areas except the master bedroom will show up on the monitors downstairs. I’ll show you which screen corresponds to which cam.”

They went back down the hall. Kindler opened each door they came to, showing off one bedroom after another. The fifth door opened to reveal a weight room with a Smith machine, two ellipticals, a treadmill, and gym quality free weights.

“Ms. Anders does her Pilates in here,” Kindler said.

They came to a double-door that Kindler did not open.

“Master bedroom?”

“Yes. And I’ll only let one of you in here.”

Eddie looked at Ana. “I’ve got to see the set-up and check the equipment. I’ll be out in a few.”

She nodded, looked down the dark hallway tentatively. “Be quick, alright?”

He gave her a smile.

Kindler pushed open one of the doors to reveal a dark room. Eddie stepped inside and Kindler shut the door behind them. Kindler flipped a switch, and soft light bathed the room.

They stood in a sitting area with two couches and some nice furniture. Women’s clothes were piled and spilled everywhere, and Eddie saw two walk-in closets on opposite sides of the sitting room. Beyond, the sitting room opened to a high-ceilinged bedroom with an oversized bed.

Eddie looked back at the door they’d used to access the master bedroom and saw long indents on both sides of the doorway in the walls. He knew what they were immediately.

“Where are the monitors?” Eddie asked.

Kindler turned into one of the walk-in closets and Eddie followed. Kindler turned on a light in the closet, and Eddie saw another console, identical to the one downstairs.

“I’m big on security,” Kindler said. “You never know. There are a lot of nuts out there.”

And a lot of nuts in here too. “You can’t tamper with the cameras up here?”

“It’s just a feed.”

“Come on, Kindler. I can tell this is a panic room. You’ve got reinforced steel doors in the walls outside. If you’ve got intruders and you’re trapped in here, you’d want to be able to control the cameras.”

“Yeah, okay, it’s a panic room.” Kindler shook his head. “But that’s top-secret, need-to-know, confidential, you got it?”

“I won’t tell a soul. Now answer the question.”

“Look, all I can do is zoom and pan.”

“Where’s the footage saved?”

“On DVDs. They’re recycled every two weeks. Anything of interest that I want to keep long-term is transferred to a hard drive.”

Eddie gave Kindler a skeptical look. “I want this console turned off while I’m downstairs.”

“Not a chance,” Kindler said. “With Colin dead and Bernard missing. I’m not turning this off.”

Eddie stretched the silence a moment. “I know a guy. He can spot a fake a mile away. He’s going to review the footage for me.”

“That’s fine, but I want this wrapped in a few days. And I want your preliminary findings to be made available tomorrow night at the lake.”

“Yeah, yeah. I’m going to watch the footage myself tomorrow. If I see anything funny, I’m calling bullshit.”

“Eddie, Eddie …” Kindler shook his head. “Why would I go to such desperate lengths?”

“I’m going back downstairs now. We have an understanding.”

Kindler put his hand over his heart like he was standing up for the national anthem. “I find your lack of faith disturbing.”

They went back downstairs.

Kindler asked them to sit down at the bank of monitors. Eddie felt like a mall security guard.

“Stay here. I’ll be right back.” Kindler disappeared again.

Ana turned in her chair to look at him. “Well?”

Eddie shook his head. “There’s another set of monitors up there. He claims he can’t tamper with the footage in real-time.”

“What are we going to do?”

“I threatened him with my special effects expert. He didn’t balk. He’s not scared of having someone technical look at the footage.”

“Who’s your expert?”             

“Stan is the closest thing. But really I just wanted to see how he reacted.”

“If he’s not afraid of someone looking at the footage …”

“Don’t get ahead of yourself.”

Kindler came back in. “And now for a demonstration. Please keep your eyes on the screens.”

“What am I looking for?” Eddie asked.

“There. In the foyer.”

Ms. Anders appeared in the bottom left monitor and waved at the camera. She was still in her undersized bikini.

Ms. Anders crossed the room and disappeared.

Kindler pointed. “Watch this screen.”

Ms. Anders appeared in the next screen a few seconds later.

Kindler said, “Ms. Anders is going to walk through the house and you’ll see what all the cameras are looking at. Now she’s in the main hallway.”

“Why do you call her Miss Anders?” Ana asked.

“Because that’s her name, silly rabbit.” Kindler pointed at the next screen. “Drawing room.”

“No, I meant …”

Kindler gave her a puzzled look, and Ana didn’t finish her question.

“Parlor room.”

They repeated the process until Ms. Anders had traversed the entire mansion. It gave Eddie a better sense of the layout. Kindler even let him use a Sharpie on the monitors for some of the rooms.

“Now if you’ll excuse me.” Kindler clapped his hands together. “Me and the girls have a special night planned, if you know what I mean, so I’d appreciate no disturbances.”

Kindler winked at Eddie like they were old friends. Then he said good night to Ana and disappeared.

“Gross,” Ana said. “Is that really every guy’s fantasy?”

“I’m pleading the Fifth on that one. Now let’s get to work.”

Tw
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sweeps of the downstairs later, they regrouped in the Control Room. Ana plopped down in front of the monitors, blew out a big breath.

Eddie said, “Okay, I’m going upstairs.”

“You can’t.”

“Relax. Kindler is otherwise occupied right now. He’s not watching the monitors.”

“How can you be sure?”

Eddie stretched out, rolled his head to loosen his neck. It was after midnight, but they had another couple of hours ahead of them.

He said, “I have to be sure they haven’t pulled a switch with the feeds or the footage. Keep your eyes peeled.”

Eddie didn’t give her a chance to object. He walked out of the control room and tiptoed upstairs.

It was dark and quiet. The double doors to the master bedroom were shut tight. No light came from inside the room. Eddie kept walking down the hallway, went into one of the guest bedrooms, then peeked into the exercise room. He went back downstairs.

“Well?”                                                      

“You were outside the master bedroom, the first spare bedroom, and then where Ms. Anders does her Pilates.” Ana batted her eyelashes at him.

“Okay, fine.”

“Does this mean that finally you’re okay using these cameras?”

“I’ll reserve judgment till I see the actual footage.”

She shook her head, but she was smiling. “Very thorough.”

“It’s one of the lessons I had to learn the hard way. Don’t be like me.”

Eddie sat next to Ana and put his feet on the desk and his eyes on the screens in front of him.

“Now we hurry up and wait.”

* * * *

Ana stood and paced the room.

They had been watching the screens for an hour. They didn’t pay security guards enough, whatever it was. This was boring.

“Wonder if it’s still snowing,” she said, more to make conversation than anything.

“Go check. Take a few minutes.”

She didn’t want to be alone, well-guarded as they supposedly were. It was a strange house, on a strange night. And her dead sister might have been roaming the halls.

But she couldn’t ask Eddie to go with her. She knew what he’d say: they needed someone manning the monitors.

Ana hovered by the door and looked down the hallway. She kept her eyes on the dark interior of the house. “What are the rules?”

“Rules?” he said.

“Let’s say Tessa is a ghost now. And let’s say she can interact with our reality. Can she hear me? If I talk to her, will she understand?”

“Nobody really knows.”

“I’m wondering if her spirit is just a monster …” Hot tears stung her eyes. “ … Or if she can be talked to. Maybe that’s all she wants. Someone to listen to her and talk to her.”

She turned to face him and leaned against the doorway. He’d repositioned his seat so she was in his periphery.

“Doesn’t hurt to try. Why don’t you talk to her?”

“I don’t know what to say.”

“She’s your sister.”

“I was eight when I last saw her.”

Eddie took his eyes off the screens for a moment to look at her. “Be polite. Courteous. Heartfelt. Don’t push. Don’t antagonize. Just imagine she is standing in front of you and you’ve got just one chance to communicate with her. Imagine this is it.”

Ana choked back her tears.

“Just start talking. You’ll forget I’m here.” Eddie swiveled in his seat and focused on the monitors again.

Ana took her glasses off and cleaned the lenses with her shirt.

“Hi, Tessa, it’s good to see you.”

Ana moved from the doorway into the middle of the room. She imagined Tessa standing in front of her. Tessa had long dirty blond hair and she rocked a pair of jeans and a retro t-shirt.

“I saw your dad last week at the mall. He was buying some flannel button-downs. He’s gotten old, but he looks pretty good. He saw me across the way, and we just kind of looked at each other. I wanted to go up and talk to him. I don’t know if he wanted to talk or not. Anyway, we just shared a look and then we waved and that was it. It was kind of sad.

“I haven’t heard from mom in a long time. I don’t know where she is or what she’s doing. Last I heard, she’d gotten married again to some thirty-year-old down in Florida who was fresh out of rehab or something. I don’t know. For awhile, I made an effort but as time passed it was too much.”

Ana smiled.

“I’m talking your ear off. I’m sorry.”

She chuckled as a tear raced down her face.

“Colin is dead. I don’t know how close you actually were in high school, or if you just ran with the same crowd. I … I don’t think … I don’t know what I think. And Bernard is missing now. I don’t know if you can do anything, but if you can, could you help either of them?”

She paused.

“Your dad once told me you planned on going to Drexel. It’s funny because that’s where I ended up, but only for one term. You might think I was trying to follow in your footsteps or something, but truth is, I didn’t know that about you until after I started. It makes me wonder how alike you and I would have been. I never thought we were.

“It sounds like you were really popular. I wasn’t. I had my friends, but I wasn’t breaking hearts left and right. What I don’t understand is, why did you date Mike Hollis? You could have had your pick, and you …”

She glanced at Eddie. His eyes were glued to the monitors.

“Tessa, I hope you’re not scaring these people or … anything. I know how mad you must be about what happened, but nobody did this to you on purpose. Sometimes, bad things just happen and—”

Eddie sprang up in his seat and pointed at a monitor in the middle of the bank. “Look!”

Ana shot forward.

Footprints in the laundry room.

“What do we do?” she asked.

He was moving toward the hallway. “Keep your eyes on these screens. I’m taking your camera.”

“Eddie, I’m freaked. Don’t leave me alone.”

“It’s okay, Ana. If this is your sister, she doesn’t blame you for anything.”

He grabbed her video camera and hustled out of the room.

“What if it’s not my sister?”

Eddi
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raced down the hallway, past the man cave, past the pool, past the entertainment room, past the family room, past an office. The door to the laundry was open. He counted three footprints coming toward the doorway. The last one bisected the threshold. He knelt and double-checked the hallway to make sure he hadn’t missed more.

He hadn’t. The footprints just stopped right there.

He turned on the video camera and filmed, getting a wide angle on all three prints then zooming for individual shots.

When that was done, he held the camera with one hand and touched the footprints with his other hand. They were cold. 

“Eddie?”

Ana’s voice made him jump. He banged his head on the door to the laundry.

“Jesus! What’s up?”

She called out from a great distance, like she was still in the control room. “There are more. In the trophy room!”

More
? Eddie backtracked to the man cave. Immediately saw the prints leading to the trophy case. Then they just stopped.

Carefully straddling the prints, he filmed each one. Four, five, six steps. Then he pulled back for a wide shot again, trying to squeeze them all into the frame.

Then he touched each one. Wet.

He couldn’t believe it.

The final footprint reached the trophy case. If someone had been standing there, they would have been face-to-face with Kindler’s most prized trophy of all. Regional Champs, 1998.

He stood and did another sweep of the downstairs. Checked the front door. Still locked, and the security system was activated. Nobody had come in or out from what he could tell.

He went back into the Control Room.

Ana got out of her seat. “Well?”

“They’re wet.” Eddie sat down at the console. He’d check the footage later. For now, he wanted to keep a live feed in case more prints materialized. “What did you see?”

“Nothing. One second they weren’t there. Next, they were.”

“You saw the prints appear?”

“No, not exactly. Both cameras panned and the prints were there.”

Eddie said nothing.

Ana was bursting with nervous excitement. “Did you see any prints between the laundry and the sports room?”

He shook his head no.

“Wow, it’s gotta be her.”

Eddie leaned back. His mind raced with questions. The initial excitement was starting to give way to cold, analytical reason. “Two sets of prints, three people in the house other than you or me. Kindler could have had two people set up to create the prints. Maybe his two lovely ladies did it.”

“Now you’re just being stubborn.”

“I’m being thorough.”

“You’re telling me that not one, but two people avoided all the cameras in the house?”

“Or he doctored the footage.”

“But you independently verified the footprints yourself. They’re on film and you saw them with your own eyes.”

Eddie thought about that. “You saw me on the monitor, right?”

“Yes, in front of both sets. Don’t the prints just stop also? They walk to the trophy case but that’s it?”

Eddie could see her point. There were three—and only three—prints in the laundry room. How would a person make those prints and then not leave another trace as they continued down the hallway into the man cave, where they suddenly started making more prints again?

“But if it was two people making the prints?”

She shook her head no. “The prints in front of the trophy lead toward the case. There aren’t any coming back. I guess someone could have been in that room, hiding from you, and waiting for their chance to get back out.”

“Too difficult. They would have to know when the camera was off them, when you and I wouldn’t be able to spot them if we left the Control Room …”

Eddie looked away. The footprints, if verifiable, were a huge find. What would Tim do with evidence like this? He’d try to quantify it somehow.

“You want to see them?”

She nodded tentatively. “Not alone.”

“Bring your notebook.”

They left the monitors and walked to the man cave first. Eddie knelt next to the first print.

He was sailing through uncharted waters here, so he did the only thing he could think of. He measured.

He didn’t have a ruler so instead he opened Ana’s notebook to a clean page and laid it down next to the print. She handed him a pen and he marked the toe and the heel on the page.

He said, “What size shoe did your sister wear?”

“I have no idea.”

“Find out tomorrow.”

Eddie repeated the process with the next footprint and then with the third.

Ana said, “Can I touch them?”

“Go ahead.”

She knelt outside the doorway. Her tiny hand hovered over the nearest print.

“Go ahead. It’s okay.”

She gulped then slowly lowered her fingertips. “It’s wet.”

“Let’s look at the others.”

They went back the way they’d come to the man cave.

“Wow …” Ana strolled in step next to the footprints, as if she was walking beside her sister. “I can’t believe it.”

Eddie measured the first two footprints then gave up. They were all about the same size, so he saw little point in continuing.

“Go ahead and talk,” Eddie said.

Ana sat beside the final footprint, nearest the trophy case. She ran her forefinger along its perimeter. “Unbelievable.”

Eddie unzipped her backpack and found the recorder. He punched the RECORD button.

Ana smiled. “Hi, my name is Ana. Did you make these marks on the carpet?”

Silence.

“Can you do it again?”