Читать книгу The Sinner - Amanda Stevens - Страница 11

Six

Kendrick’s words faded away, leaving a sinister silence. I thought instantly of that shadow moving through the trees, quick and furtive. Then I thought of the inked skull on Kendrick’s hand. The triskele that Darius had drawn in the dirt. The curlicue of a tattoo on the inside of the dead woman’s wrist.

A pattern was starting to form. I felt the tiniest prick of a dark premonition.

“It’s not haunted,” I said, and then realizing he might find my definitive tone curious, I hurriedly added, “At least, I haven’t seen or heard anything out of the ordinary in the nearly three months I’ve been living there. My stay has been quite peaceful, in fact.”

“Maybe that has more to do with you than the house,” Kendrick suggested.

“So what happened there?”

He seemed to measure his response before answering. “I’ll tell you what I’ve heard on one condition. If you’re still curious once we’re done, you’ll limit your research to the internet.”

“Why?”

“It’s not a good idea to go around talking about that house. People here don’t particularly like it when strangers start asking questions and they get more than a little defensive about the town’s past.”

“I’ll be discreet. You have my word. But now you have to tell me.”

He turned back to the woods. For the first time since I’d met him, he seemed ill at ease. He twisted a silver ring on his finger, his eyes crinkling at the corners as he scanned the trees. I followed his gaze, peering intently into the deepest part of the shadows, but nothing glided among the tree trunks. Nothing floated up into the branches. Whatever I’d glimpsed earlier had fled with Darius Goodwine’s disappearance. Or perhaps Detective Kendrick had once again chased away the watcher.

I glanced up at him, my gaze settling unexpectedly on his mouth, which was not as aesthetically pleasing as Devlin’s. But the bloom of his bottom lip cast an intriguing shadow in the hollow of his chin and softened the harsher line of his upper lip and jaw. It was a purposeful mouth and there was sensuality in the resoluteness of its lines.

I tore my gaze away with a shiver. Where on earth had that come from? I didn’t like having such thoughts about Lucien Kendrick. They were foreign to me and I didn’t trust they were my own rather than another of Darius Goodwine’s manipulations. Why he would want to foster an attraction between Detective Kendrick and me, I couldn’t imagine, but I put nothing past him. Maybe he wanted to prove how easily he could control me, or more likely, he wanted to drive a deeper wedge between Devlin and me so that I would be more receptive to him. I could be reaching, but it was the only way I knew to explain my feelings.

Unless the manipulation came from Kendrick himself. For all I knew, he was as masterful at head games as Darius. He was certainly no ordinary cop. My instincts had warned me from the start to keep a safe distance, and now that I knew he had a connection or at least an acquaintance with Darius Goodwine, I would be even more careful.

Darius’s negative reaction to Kendrick’s name should have fostered a kinship with the detective if for no other reason than the old adage the enemy of my enemy is my friend. But Kendrick was just a little too slippery, a little too mysterious, and I couldn’t shake the notion that he had already known about those cages before he arrived on the scene.

His stillness now was so absolute, his silence so intense, that I couldn’t help wondering if he was trying to slip past my defenses. Was he inside my head even now?

It seemed as though the quiet had stretched on forever, but only a few seconds had passed before Kendrick turned back to me. “A couple by the name of George and Mary Willoughby once lived in that house, along with their young daughter, Annie. By all accounts, they were a close family. God-fearing, church-going, salt-of-the-earth types. Then seemingly overnight, George became delusional. He told his neighbors that his wife was not who she seemed to be. She’d gotten involved with some very bad people. Satan-worshippers, he said, but there was never any evidence of the practice in this area. He insisted he’d caught them conducting the devil’s business right in his own home.”

“What did he mean by the devil’s business?”

“Séances. Rituals.” Kendrick’s gaze darkened. “Who knows what else? He claimed they were trying to raise the dead.”

Raise the dead.

I felt the dart of cold apprehension in my veins. I wanted to take all this in calmly, but it was hard to keep a neutral expression in light of my conversation with Darius Goodwine.

“Raise the dead...how?”

“There were ceremonies. Certain spells and incantations. The leader of the group was a root worker named Atticus Pope, who claimed to have descended from a powerful witch doctor. Willoughby swore he saw Pope change forms right before his eyes. From man to beast and back. Like the loup-garous my grandmother used to tell me about when I was a boy.”

“Loup-garous? As in werewolves? Shape-shifters? You don’t believe that, surely.”

“People see what they want to see,” Kendrick said.

Or were persuaded to see by the likes of Darius Goodwine. I thought about how easily and subtly he had planted the notion of corpse beetles in my subconscious so that I’d manifested one on my arm and another on my neck. If the root doctor named Atticus Pope had been half as cunning and powerful as Darius Goodwine, he could have made poor George Willoughby see almost anything.

“I assume there’s more to the story,” I said as I turned my attention back to Kendrick.

“Willoughby chased away the group with a shotgun, but things were never right with his wife after that. He was convinced something evil had taken over her body.”

“He thought she was possessed?”

“Apparently.”

According to Darius’s simplistic and disturbing explanation, possession was like a hostile takeover, but transference was a peaceful merger between the living and the dead. Had Mary been willing?

“What happened to her?”

“Her husband murdered her in her sleep and buried the body in an unknown location. Or so the story goes. But that’s mostly an assumption because all that was ever found of the woman, apart from the blood-soaked bedclothing, was a hank of her hair clutched in George’s hand. The police discovered him in the shed behind the orchard where he’d gone after he disposed of her body. He’d put the barrel of the shotgun in his mouth and used his toe to pull the trigger.”

“That’s quite a gruesome tale,” I said with a shiver.

“How much of it’s true is anyone’s guess. We’ll probably never know what really happened.” A shadow flickered in Kendrick’s eyes. “You said you haven’t seen or heard anything out of the ordinary in the house, but I would think that if any place is haunted, it would be that shed.”

“Do you really believe a place can be haunted?” I tried to keep any telltale inflection or inference from my voice, but it wasn’t easy. “Do you believe in ghosts?”

He didn’t scoff at the question as I’d come to expect, but instead he took a long moment to consider his answer. “I’ve seen a lot of things in my lifetime. Unexplainable things. I learned a long time ago that it’s best to keep an open mind.”

How different he was from Devlin, who seemed to have an almost pathological need to disavow the supernatural.

“What about you?” he asked.

“Me?” I smiled. “Like you, I try to keep an open mind.”

Our gazes held for a moment, and I had the strangest notion that if I told Kendrick about my gift, he wouldn’t bat an eye.

The prospect was at once exhilarating and terrifying, and I reminded myself that I knew nothing about him. He was a perfect stranger. For all I knew, a man as dangerously sly and powerful as Darius Goodwine.

“I’ve often wondered about that old shed,” Kendrick said. “And whether or not there’s anything still to be found there. Especially when I drive by the Willoughby place at dawn and see patches of the roof peeking through the treetops.”

“You’ve never stopped to explore?” I asked.

“That would be trespassing.”

“Just as well. There’s a padlock on the door and you can’t see much through the windows.”

“You’ve tried, I take it.”

“Once or twice. You mentioned a daughter.” Very deliberately, I steered the conversation back to the story. “Where was she when all this happened?”

“The police found her huddled on the porch. They figured she must have heard the shotgun blast, got up from bed and went out to the shed to investigate. She may even have tried to resuscitate her father because the police said she was covered in blood. So much so that she looked as if she’d been rolling around in a puddle of gore.”

“That poor child. How old was she when it happened?”

“Around ten, I think. As I said, a lot of this is assumption and guesswork. The girl was the only witness and she’d fallen into some sort of catatonic trance or fugue state. She couldn’t tell the authorities her name let alone what had transpired between her parents.”

“What became of her?”

“She was in a psychiatric hospital for a long time. Then one day she came out of her trance and decided to carry on with her life as though nothing had happened. She claimed to have no memory of that night.”

“I suppose that’s possible. Trauma-induced amnesia isn’t all that rare.”

“Anything’s possible,” he said in a strange tone. “She married and moved away when she was still very young, but after her husband died a few years ago, she came back here. As a matter of fact, you know her. Annalee Nash.”

I stared up at him in shock. “Annalee? But she seems so...”

“Normal?” he supplied with a sardonic lift of one brow. “That’s a relative term.”

Didn’t I know it?

“It’s just that, on the few occasions we’ve spoken, I would never have guessed she’d gone through something so harrowing,” I tried to explain.

“It’s been my experience that people only let you see what they want you to see.” He shot me another knowing look and I returned his shrewd appraisal.

“Yes, I’m sure that’s true,” I said slowly, meaningfully.

He glanced away. “It’s also been my experience that the people you would least expect of guile and subterfuge are the most adept at hiding their true nature—at least for a while. But it almost always surfaces sooner or later, sometimes violently.”

“I’ve never sensed anything remotely violent in Annalee Nash. She seems quite gentle.”

“I wasn’t talking about her specifically. We’re all capable of violence under the right circumstances.” Kendrick’s voice hardened ever so slightly. “Even you, I would imagine.”

“Perhaps so.” But I didn’t like to think about my capabilities in that regard. “They never found Mary’s body?”

“Not a trace.”

“Where was her husband buried?”

“Here in this cemetery. They put him over by the back gate, facing north.”

Kendrick’s specificity in the location seemed to suggest that he knew the significance of such an arrangement. Most bodies were laid to rest from east to west, facing sunrise and the Second Coming. But not those who were compromised.

“At least they allowed him to be buried in the churchyard. There was a time when suicides were treated as outcasts,” I told him.

“As you can see, the church has been in ruins for decades and the cemetery has been closed to the public for at least twenty years. So I guess, in a way, George Willoughby was cast out. People tend to hold a lot of superstitions when it comes to old graveyards, but you would know that better than me.”

He seemed to know plenty, and at that, he was only letting me see what he wanted me to see. “Thank you for telling me about the house,” I said. “It’s a fascinating if gruesome story.”

“You aren’t afraid to stay there now that you know?”

“No, why would I be?”

“Some people would turn tail and run after what I just told you.”

“If ghost stories frightened me, would I have chosen my current profession?”

“A good point,” he allowed.

“Besides, it all happened a long time ago and the house seems perfectly at peace.” Which made me wonder if the key I wore around my neck had chased away the spirits, evil and otherwise. It seemed strange that for all my supposed powers and heightened senses, I hadn’t picked up a single discordant vibe from that house. “Anyway, I appreciate your taking the time to tell me about it. But now,” I said briskly, eager to leave behind the disturbing plight of George and Mary Willoughby, “we should probably get back to the business at hand. Wasn’t there something you wanted to talk to me about?”

“A couple of things,” Kendrick said, seamlessly switching back to his detective persona as if he were as willing as I for a change of subject. “First, I thought you’d be interested to know that I was able to get in touch with your friend at the state archaeologist’s office. She’s agreed to come down and take a look at the graves. She seemed particularly interested in the cages.”

“I knew she would be. When is she coming?”

“Not until next week, unfortunately. In the meantime, I’ve called in a forensic anthropologist from Charleston that can help with the identification of any skeletal remains we uncover. And I’d like you to come into the morgue this afternoon and take a look at the victim. If you’ve no objection.”

“I’ve no objection. I’m more than willing to help in any way I can, but as I told you yesterday, I know very few people in the area. The odds that I’ll be able to make a positive identification are slim.”

“I understand that. But the victim was alive for a period of time after she was buried. Which means there’s a chance she got to that clearing under her own steam. Maybe she was coerced or lured there or maybe she came of her own free will. In any case, unless she was taken there by way of the swamp, she would have likely come through or at least near the cemetery, perhaps in the company of her killer.”

I felt a chill go through me. I hadn’t considered that possibility.

“Even with so little traffic, it’s still possible you saw something and don’t remember it,” he said. “A face in a car window or someone in the woods. All I ask is that you view the remains with an open mind.”

I nodded. “When do you want me to come in?”

“Let’s say one o’clock. I’ll meet you there and walk you through it.”

“Thanks.”

“No need to thank me. I would never expect you to do this alone. Although...” His gaze swept over me, deep and fathomless. “You strike me as someone who is more than capable of taking care of herself.”

For some reason, I didn’t think he meant it as a compliment.

* * *

I left the cemetery in time to stop by the house for a quick shower and change of clothes before I drove into town. The silence of the place bothered me now that I knew the grisly history, but I didn’t allow myself to dwell on the story Kendrick had told me. There would be time enough later to explore the rooms with a new eye and perhaps even take a stroll through the orchard to the shed.

For now, I busied myself with the mundane tasks of drying my hair and refilling Angus’s water bowl on the back porch and then propping open the screen door so that he could come and go as he pleased. But I couldn’t resist glancing over my shoulder now and then. I couldn’t help thinking that the vibe of the house had been subtly altered by my newfound knowledge.

I chalked it all up to imagination as I drove into town and followed Kendrick’s directions to the hospital morgue. I didn’t relish the task that lay before me. The last time I’d been near a morgue, the voices of the dead had filled my head, making me aware of another terrifying aspect of my gift. I’d later come to believe that the recently deceased had somehow opened a door, allowing the trapped and restless souls of Kroll Cemetery to make contact with me. Once the ghosts had been released, the voices had faded, though I didn’t expect the silence to last for much longer. Not after my discovery of those mortsafes.

Kendrick waited for me at the front desk. After we signed in, an attendant showed us back to a room where the body had been placed on a stainless steel table, awaiting autopsy. He went around to the far side of the table and I stepped up to the near side. He gave a nod and the attendant peeled back the sheet that covered the body.

I braced myself for the possibility of seeing a familiar face staring up at me, but I didn’t recognize the dead woman and I was thankful for that.

The first thing that struck me was the condition of the body. She hadn’t been prepped for the postmortem, which surprised me. She was still fully dressed in jeans and a band T-shirt, her face and arms streaked with grave dirt and her long, dark hair matted with leaves and twigs. A silver cross glinted in the hollow of her throat and a series of ruby studs ran from her lobes all the way up into her cartilage. One of the studs was missing, I noted.

She looked to be my age, late twenties or perhaps a year or two younger. She was slim, almost petite, but even in death, she appeared strangely dauntless. She wouldn’t have gone down without a fight, I thought, though I saw no evidence of a struggle on her body.

“Do you recognize her?” Kendrick asked.

I could feel his gaze on me across the table. I shook my head as my hand crept to the key around my neck. “I’ve never seen her before.”

“You’re sure? Take a closer look.”

“I am looking. I don’t remember ever having seen her before.” But even as the words slipped out, something tugged at the corner of my memory. Had I seen her before?

And just like that, an image came back to me. The flash of those ruby earrings as a dark head tossed. The glimpse of a tattoo as a hand lifted to open a glass door.

Whether the memory was real or imagined, I had no idea. It was there one moment and gone the next.

“Can I see her left arm?” I asked.

Kendrick gave me a quizzical look, but he said nothing as he nodded to the attendant and she lowered the sheet.

“Can you turn it so that I can see her wrist?”

The woman complied and I leaned in to get a better look at the tattooed words on the pale flesh as I muttered the phrase aloud, “Memento mori.”

I jerked back in shock as the import of the message sank in.

“What is it?” Kendrick asked.

“Her tattoo...”

“It’s Latin, right? What does it mean?”

I lifted my gaze to his. “Remember to die.”