Читать книгу Whispers in the Night - Diane Pershing - Страница 8

Kayla remembered the first time she’d seen the Old Stone Church; it had been nearly four years before, when Walter had brought her here on their honeymoon. As he’d shown her around his family’s mountain retreat and related stories of his childhood, there had been rueful pride and unabashed sentimentality in his voice. At the moment, she couldn’t help comparing that time with this one.

Somewhat guiltily, she contrasted her late husband with Fitzgerald. Walter had been under six feet, reedy rather than muscular. And, of course, a young-thinking but still aging man of seventy. Fitzgerald was so much taller and broader, so much more muscular…and so much younger. Always a fast walker, Kayla had had to slow her pace to match Walter’s stride. Today, she had to hurry to keep up.

They paused at the front of the building, which was relatively modest as churches went, one story made to look a lot taller by its sharply pitched roofline and a high, broad steeple. The bell tower still had its original nine-hundred-pound bell, one that was rung on special occasions.

Fitzgerald ran one huge hand over several of the dark gray and dusty brown stones that made up the entire facade. “Solid workmanship,” he said, and she detected a flicker of admiration—an actual emotion?—on his face as he did. “Do you know anything about it?”

“Just what’s in the brochure. It’s native fieldstone and was carved by Italian masons,” Kayla explained, “brought to America in the mid 1890s for that express purpose. A wealthy widow, Honoria Desbaugh, built it to honor her husband. For years, it was run by some monks, an offshoot of a sect called the Brothers of the Sacred Nazarene. Our cabin was their dormitory. One by one, the monks died out, and the place was pretty much abandoned till the 1920s, when Walter’s family bought the entire property.”

“The church is a real tourist attraction in the summer,” Hank added. “Good for the town.” He pulled open the thick wooden front door, and they followed him in.

As it had before, the cool quiet of the church’s interior had the effect of a balm on Kayla’s nerves; even if she hadn’t been aware of being tense, the easing of the tightness in her shoulder muscles and abdomen was a dead giveaway. She stood in the nave and breathed deeply of the air—it had the slightly musty but clean smell of damp earth and old caves.

The calm lasted seconds only, because Paul Fitzgerald came up to stand beside her, his hands in his back pockets as he peered upward, his gaze taking in the high ceiling and its heavy beams. She couldn’t help noting his strong neck and prominent Adam’s apple. The filtered sunlight streaming through the stained-glass windows cast shadows on the sharply defined planes of his face.

Good Lord, she thought, he was like some kind of stone monument himself.

“This has been kept up,” he said.

Hank, still standing near the door, said, “Mr. Thorne paid for the restoration years ago,” to which Kayla added, “Walter set up a fund to keep it up in perpetuity.”

“Religious, huh?”

“Not particularly,” she said. “He intended the church to be nondenominational, sort of a general, all-purpose place to worship whatever god you believe in.”

He angled his head to gaze down at her. His pale eyes were grim and joyless, and spoke of bone-deep bitterness. “What if you don’t believe in any kind of god?”

“Doesn’t everyone need to believe in something?” she asked him softly.

His gaze remained on her face for another moment or two, revealing nothing of whatever was going on inside him. She felt, again, her blood running cold, signaling her dread of violence. The bleakness in Fitzgerald’s eyes did that to her.

Then he shrugged and looked away. “If you say so.”

He walked over to one of the walls, and as he had outside, rubbed his hand over the stone. His attention caught by something near his feet, he bent over and scraped a nail against a floorboard. “This must be it, Hank. The leak’s under this area of rotting wood.”

“Okay.” Hank headed for a small side door near the altar. “I’ll just check in the basement, see where that water’s coming from. You two look around, I’ll be back in five minutes or so.”

Kayla watched as Fitzgerald ambled past the pews and to the altar. On the rear wall were five wooden statues of saints, each about four feet high. He studied them silently for a moment. What was he thinking? she wondered. Had he ever had any beliefs?

Why couldn’t she shake this need to understand this emotionally cutoff man? He was none of her business, especially as she would be sending him on his way as soon as they got back to the house.

Annoyed with herself, she followed his progress as he strode over to the east wall and, one by one, perused the stained-glass windows. Several were dedicated to people who’d passed away, dating from the early 1900s to the 1970s. Desbaughs had given way to Montgomerys, who’d given way to Thornes. She joined him at her favorite, an exquisite rose window, its colors pale pink to deep red and all hues between. Along the bottom of the window ran a green-leafed vine, above it the words “Entwined forever.”

“Isn’t it beautiful?” she said as they both gazed at the fine craftsmanship combined with a delicate sensibility.

He didn’t reply for a moment, then he nodded. “Yeah.”

“I’m having a window made in honor of Walter.”

Again, he made no reply at first. Then he said, “Good for you.”

Was he being sarcastic? She had no way of knowing.

They were near the rear of the church now and he pushed open the back entrance door. Sunlight poured in, obliterating the shadows and sense of mystery in the old building.

Fitzgerald pointed ahead. “What’s that?” he asked, but didn’t wait for her answer, striding out the door toward what she knew was the memorial arch.

By the time she’d caught up with him, he’d already covered the cracked paving stones that led to the monument, a tall, narrow archway made up of small, ivy-covered stones. He stood beneath it and gazed out. Her instinct was to join him beneath the high curving shrine, appreciate the view, tell him a story or two about the arch’s history.

But the thought of standing under it, next to Paul Fitzgerald, made her distinctly uneasy. She remained several feet behind and to the side of it.

A sudden wind came up, the way it did here in the mountains, and she had to raise her voice to answer his previous question. “It’s called the Memorial Arch,” she told him, “in honor of the Native Americans who used to roam these mountains. Mrs. Desbaugh had some Mohawk blood in her, and asked that it be part of the original construction.”

He looked back at her, a slight frown forming between his thick brows. “Am I breaking some kind of law by standing here?”

“Not at all.” The wind whipped her ponytail around to smack her in the face, and she pushed it away.

“But you’d rather I didn’t.”

He was reading her unease. “No, no, it’s not you. I’m just being…superstitious.”

“There a curse or something?” he asked sardonically, and she knew he was scoffing at the possibility. “Something bad happens if you stand under this thing?”

“Not at all. People stand under the arch all the time. Sight-seers, couples getting married. It’s fine.”

She was being silly. But, in truth, she was actually afraid to stand under the arch with him. At the same time, she was experiencing this unexpectedly strong pull toward the ancient monument, a sense that she needed to be under there, next to Fitzgerald.

What was that about? And why the fear? Nothing popped into her head. She sighed, shook her head. The only way she’d get the answer was to—as she’d learned—go toward it and find out. Sometimes she yearned to return to the days of being the little girl who hid from life, but her path had gone in a different direction. For better or for worse, she was a woman who faced and fought her fears.

Shoulders squared with determination, Kayla took the few steps that had her standing side by side with Paul Fitzgerald, under the arch. The minute she got there, the wind died down, leaving her with that same vague sense of unease.

Also a nearly palpable awareness of—darn it!—that connection again to the man by her side, the way she’d felt earlier, back in the kitchen. Only it was stronger now, as if there was some invisible wire strung between them, with a jolt of electricity passing through it.

She knew that she and Paul Fitzgerald made an all-too-intimate picture: a man and a woman, surrounded by history and tradition, enveloped by a monolith that marked sacred ground, one used in ancient ceremonies of all sorts…including weddings.

Her heart stuttered. Oh, God, was she doing a you-are-my-destiny head trip? Because if she was, then fate had a major sense of humor, pairing a grieving widow with an embittered ex-con who looked like he ate small children for breakfast.

Turning her head, she studied his profile. The slight hook to his strong nose brought back her initial impression of him. “Do you have any Indian blood?” she found herself asking.

He turned to look at her, his features carefully neutral. “Cherokee. My grandmother.”

“I thought so.” A grandmother he’d loved, she just knew it.

Kayla was always interested in family stories; ordinarily she would ask him to tell her about his grandmother, but there was that don’t-go-there quality to Fitzgerald that discouraged questions. As though to prove her point, he turned away from her and stared out at the view again, which, from this angle, offered mostly treetops, and beyond, Shawangunk Ridge, with its single soaring pine tree reaching high into seemingly endless clear, blue skies.

The only expression on his face was a slight downturn of his mouth. “Nice,” he said.

“Something of an understatement,” she countered wryly.

“There you are,” Hank said from behind them.

She nearly jumped with surprise as he came up to them, wiping his hands on a large white handkerchief. “I can fix that leak in the basement. No problem.”

Kayla stepped out from under the archway and faced the older man. “I’m sorry, Hank,” she said. “Really I am. I already told you on the phone that Walter was adamant when it came to the church. Any repairs, anything that needs to be done, is to be performed by a restoration expert. I’ve called the man Walter used, and he’ll be up in a couple of days to look it over and give me an estimate. I just wanted to see if there is something I should do until then.”

Stubbornly, Hank shook his head. “Those people cost a lot of money. Hell, me and Paul and a couple of my guys could do it just as well, cost you a third of what them fancy experts charge.”

She could see that she was dealing with a bruised ego, and she felt badly. Hank had always been kind to her and helpful to Walter. “If it were up to me…” she said, then shrugged with an apologetic smile. “It’s out of my hands. It’s actually in the will.”

Again, he shook his head. “Damn foolishness,” he muttered. Then, resigned, he stuffed the soiled handkerchief into his back pocket. “Guess I can’t fight a will, now, can I?”

“How about we go back to the house and take a look at your list?” This abrupt change of subject came from Fitzgerald, who didn’t wait for a reply before taking off, around the church rather than through it.

As Kayla and Hank followed, she was thinking, once again, that it was time to dismiss him. Just because he’d admired the church didn’t make him someone she wanted around her all day. Besides, she reminded herself, she had way too strong a reaction to him, equal parts attraction and repulsion, neither of which she needed in her life at the moment. It was most likely the nurse in her that was stirred up by the pain she sensed beneath the man’s steel surface. He might need healing, but he wasn’t about to get it from her.

“Um, Mr. Fitzgerald?” she began as the three of them strode up the driveway to the house.

“Call him Paul,” Hank said genially.

Before she could go on to tell him that she wouldn’t be needing his new recruit, Fitzgerald had taken the list of chores from Hank, glanced at it and headed for the drainpipe that ran down the side of the house near the kitchen door. He knocked on the metal, then said, “I think it would be better to replace this instead of repairing it. I’ll clean out the rain gutters first and make sure there are no rats making nests. Or snakes.”

If he could have invented a better conversation-stopper, Kayla had no idea what that would be. “Snakes?” she squeaked.

Hank shrugged. “We got ’em up here, sure.”

Her hand flew to her throat. “I hate snakes.”

He shook his head sadly. “They’re part of the habitat, Miz Thorne.”

But Fitzgerald had already headed for the rear of the house and Kayla and Hank followed. He leaped up onto the porch, forgoing the three steep steps, and kicked some of the floor slats with his foot, then rapped his knuckles on several pieces of wood siding.

“Yeah, it’s old,” he said with a nod, “but it’s good solid wood. Oak. They don’t make them this way anymore. I’ll have to find some older house undergoing demolition, cut and shape some of the slats. I can do that in Hank’s shop, bring them up here, install them. No problem for me there, I’ve done it before.”

Paul was aware he was doing a blatant selling job, being chatty as a woman over the back fence. But he’d seen the look in Kayla Thorne’s eyes, the one that said she’d made up her mind and was about to give him the heave-ho.

He couldn’t allow that. He needed access to her. If his first stab at finding out about her family had gotten no response, if his little attempt to introduce the topic of her brother had taken him nowhere, there were still several more ways to bring up the subject.

But only if he had the time and opportunity to do so, and to have that, he needed to remain here, on the premises.

“Let’s look at the rest of the list, okay?” he said, trying for upbeat but doubting it came out that way. He no longer knew how to be or sound cheerful. Tension and anger had filled every day of the past four years and he wondered if it would ever go away completely.

Instead of waiting to hear her answer, he slid open the sliding glass doors off the porch, entered the living room and took the stairs, two at a time, to the upper floor. When he heard her footsteps behind him, a small part of his tension eased. At least she was letting him get this far without canning him.

For the next half hour, he toured the house with her, not giving her much of a chance to say anything. There was no problem he couldn’t handle and he let her know it. More squeaking floorboards, several window trims needing to be recaulked. A little electrical work, a jammed closet door. Stair treads needed to be replaced, a banister reinforced. A couple of bathroom fixtures leaked and the water pressure wasn’t strong enough.

They wound up again on the rear porch, where, this time, instead of kicking at loose slats, Paul got his first real look at the view.

It stopped him cold.

It was broader and more expansive than the one from the Memorial Arch, and it had it all: mountains, autumn-colored trees, the ribbon of a river cutting through a small valley. Houses nestled into the hillsides. Wisps of white clouds, a sun that was becoming stronger by the minute. And, to add to the perfection, a single eagle soared overhead, its wings stretched wide, riding the shifting wind currents as if it were the master of the skies.

His gaze shifted again from the eagle to the panorama before him, the whole thing hitting him like clean, fresh oxygen after being in smog all day. As he drew in a deep breath and exhaled it, something tight inside began to gradually loosen up, leaving room for a sensation that, at first, he had trouble identifying. But the sensation grew stronger and he let it take him over, until he could put a name to it.

Elation.

It was as though, while he stood there, his spirit was being cleansed. Garbage out, beauty in.

God! He was free!

He felt like shouting it out loud. After four long years behind bars, four years of a living hell, he was no longer a prisoner. Instead, he was way, way, way high up, above all the pain and violence, as unfettered as the eagle circling overhead.

Unexpected emotion flooded him. To his horror, out of nowhere he felt moisture forming behind his eyes.

No.

Gritting his teeth and expending every effort of will he could muster, Paul forced himself to cut off the feeling before it took him over.

No softness, he reminded himself. He would allow nothing to blunt the edge of his purpose. Nothing.

He took another moment to regain his composure, during which a disturbing thought struck him: Had Kayla Thorne noticed his reaction? Bad enough to feel weak inside, but to have a witness? Unacceptable. He slanted his gaze over to where she stood, half a yard to his right, also taking in the view. She seemed composed, but the edges of her mouth were turned down, and even in profile, he could tell she was concentrating on some thought.

“You can see a lot more from here than you can from the church,” he observed, his voice cracking slightly, hoping the words sounded as casual as he’d wanted them to come out.

Kayla, her mind a jumble of images and emotions, was waging an inner war with herself. She adored looking out over what she secretly thought of as her hills, but today there was an added dimension to her appreciation: it was as though she were seeing it through the eyes of the man by her side.

Good heavens, what this must mean to him! In jail, he couldn’t have had anything to stare at but walls and bars, other prisoners, guards. No colors, just grays and drabness. This had to be beyond precious to him.

Or was it? Was she, once again, letting her imagination run away with her, filling in, providing the missing pieces to a man who chose to remain inscrutable? Was he the kind of person who truly appreciated nature’s colors and the infinity of sky overhead? If he wasn’t, then why was she trying to make him into that man? After all, if she was hiring a handyman, all she needed to know about him was if he could do the work.

Which was when she realized she’d done an abrupt about-face. She’d changed her mind. Or he’d done it for her. It didn’t matter. After he answered a few questions, she was going to offer him the job.

So much for absolutely, positively making her mind up, she thought, disgusted with herself. She was a wuss.

Hank came around the side of the house and joined them on the porch, a small toolbox in his grip. “I got to take off, Miz Thorne. So, what do you think? Will my new man do?”

She told herself she was in charge, that no matter how tall or broad or menacing—or wounded—Paul Fitzgerald might be, he had no power over her. Turning her head and meeting his silver-gray gaze directly, Kayla said, “I need to ask you a few questions first.”

“Ask away.”

“Do you ever smile?”

As though she’d surprised him, there was the briefest suggestion of softening around his mouth, then the flinty look returned to his eyes. “When I have something to smile about.”

“Well, I don’t do jokes.”

He cocked an eyebrow. “That’s a shame. I could use a good laugh.”

Another man might have said those words with some irony, or even as an invitation. But there was not a hint of amusement in his words; his face remained expressionless.

“You sure could,” she agreed, thinking—like the utter fool she was—that she would make him smile if she died trying. Why it was important to her, she had no idea.

“And you have experience?” she asked. “I mean with old houses, not just new ones?”

“Yes. In my former life, on weekends, I was part of a crew that renovated historical homes.”

“What were you in jail for?” she continued. “Even though you were innocent,” she added quickly, still not sure if she totally trusted that assessment. If there was smoke, there was usually fire.

He didn’t respond for a moment; instead, his eyes grew hooded again and his nostrils flared, letting her know she’d hit a sensitive area.

Well, too bad.

“I mean, if you were accused of being a rapist or a murderer,” she added, her chin jutted out to let him know she wouldn’t be browbeaten, even if the old trembling inside had started up again, “you know, bodily harm kind of thing, well then, I think you can understand that I’m not too nuts about you working here. Even if you were innocent.”

It was a reasonable question, Paul knew it and acknowledged it, but still, he had to tamp down the fury roiling in his gut. He gave himself a moment before he spoke. “I was accused of taking payoffs.”

“Paul here used to be a cop,” Hank chimed in. “A good cop, Miz Thorne, decorated and all. Made detective. But there were some corrupt officers in that precinct. You know, taking bribes and selling dope they’d confiscated. Maybe you read about it, a few years back. It was in Albany, the precinct near the capitol buildings? The cops and the drug ring?”

“Oh, yes,” she said, nodding.

“See, Paul didn’t like what was going on, told them to cut it out or he’d turn them in. So they set him up.”

“And you know this, how?”

“Paul told me. And his lawyer. Also a couple of friends I have on the force. And I believe them. I got a sixth sense about cons, Miz Thorne. Like I said, Paul’s innocent.”

“You have quite a champion,” the woman said, her face reflecting her lingering doubt.

He didn’t blame her. The tangible proof of his innocence wasn’t available, and she wasn’t thrilled with another ex-con’s “sixth sense.”

All he could do was nod his gratitude to Hank and wait for the next question.

“And you were in jail how long?”

“Four years.”

Her eyes widened. “Oh, my. A policeman in jail for four years.” Her face reflected a mixture of sympathy and horror. “That must have been tough.”

He felt his jaw tense at the effort to keep his expression neutral. “I survived.”

Barely, he thought. Everything she was imagining, all that she’d read about cops in jail—gang rapes, brawls, weapons made out of kitchen utensils—he’d seen it all, and even taken part in some of it. Never being able to turn your back, making sure you were so strong they were scared of you. Yeah, he’d survived. By being terrified every day and night of those four years, and never, ever letting it show.

He watched her expression as she made up her mind about him. He wasn’t aware he’d been holding his breath until, still obviously doubtful, she said, “Well, if Hank trusts you, I guess that’s good enough for me.”

A small stab of disappointment hit him in the gut. He should have been glad, should have congratulated himself on getting the job, on taking the first step toward clearing his name. But all he felt was let down.

What had he expected? A ringing endorsement of his superior character? That Kayla Thorne would look at him and just know he could do the work? That he would be responsible, would put in long hours and not skip corners? Would be honest and reliable? The way he’d used to be, back before his life had changed one-hundred-eighty degrees from relative heaven to a hell blacker than a starless night? Maybe that was too much to expect of anybody.

“Good.” Hank slapped Paul on the back and handed over the toolbox he’d been carrying. “I’ll leave you to it, then. Get started, Paul, okay? Make a list of the supplies you’ll be needing and we’ll take care of it tomorrow.”

“You’re leaving?” she asked Hank, and Paul could tell she was not pleased.

“Got to get to the Gillespies’,” he told her, his gold teeth glinting as he smiled reassuringly. “I’m late as it is. I’ll swing by and pick you up about four,” he told Paul, then hurried off.

Kayla watched him leave, nearly called out that she’d changed her mind and to take this hulking, smileless man with him.

But she didn’t. She’d said he could work for her, and at the least, he deserved a chance. Had she expected an armed guard to come with the package?

“Well, if you’ll excuse me, you do what you need to do, and I’ll just…be around,” she finished lamely, and headed into the house.

Knowing she was being a coward, she kept out of his way all day, staying as busy as possible. She took down curtains to have them cleaned, did a couple of loads in the ancient washing machine, puttered in the garden for a while. Basically she managed not to be wherever Paul Fitzgerald was.

At lunchtime, she asked him if he’d brought lunch, and when he told her not to worry about that, she made an extra ham and cheese sandwich and brought it, along with a bag of chips and an apple, out to the porch, setting them on the scarred round table positioned between two ancient Adirondack chairs.

“Your lunch is out on the porch,” she told him when she found him at the side of the house, working on a pipe.

“I told you not to bother,” he muttered.

“Well, I did, so be gracious and eat it.”

Without giving him time to reply, she herself headed into the kitchen and had her lunch there, even though she always took her meals on the back porch. She and Fitzgerald had been getting along just fine, she figured, by not being in the same room at one time. Avoidance? Worked for her. She could keep this up for the week or so it took him to finish his chores, and then she wouldn’t have to see him again.

If in the darker recesses of her brain she was aware she was expending entirely too much energy on keeping her distance from the new handyman, that awareness remained subliminal. She’d come up to the mountain to escape stress and to recoup her energies. To rest. But being in Paul Fitzgerald’s presence wasn’t restful in the least.

The early morning air was crisp and clean. A slight chill forecast the coming winter. The perfect beginning to the day, just the way Kayla liked it.

She sipped her coffee, then expelled a huge, grateful sigh. Would she ever stop being appreciative, she wondered, of her luck, of the chance to be away from the relentless noise and chaos of city life in Albany? Up here there was only quiet. Peace. Solitude.

She’d actually slept well the night before. If there was a bear around, she’d told herself before turning in, then it would just have to share the mountain with her. As for the mysterious chicken bones, someone—a hiker, some kids—must have thrown them in the compost heap because they were too lazy to find a trash bin. Whatever. Here she was, the start of a new day, and she was beginning to get a sense of who she was, a sense of…

“Beware the bones of the dead.”

Kayla literally jumped up off her chair, one hand to her thudding heart, the other making sure the coffee mug was firmly on the table.

At the far end of the porch stood an old, slightly bent woman with long, straggly white hair, a once-beautiful face, and a look of manic intensity in her eyes. Like something out of a fairy tale, Kayla thought wildly. Not Disney, but Grimm.

Bailey, who had been sleeping at Kayla’s feet, rose, took in the newcomer and began to bark.

“Bodies and bones. They will rise and destroy everything,” the woman said, her voice amazingly resonant, her dark eyes boring into Kayla’s with mad fervor.

Even as the words sent a chill down her spine, Kayla couldn’t help making an absurd association: Was the woman talking about the chicken bones? The ones from yesterday? Were chicken bones going to rise up and give birth to—what? Baby chicken bones?

She stifled a nervous giggle, then ordered her one-eyed Yorkie, “Bailey, be quiet.” As usual, he continued barking until she picked him up, at which time his barking became a combination growl and whine.

Swallowing her fear and trying to keep her tone conversational, Kayla took a few tentative steps toward her visitor. The way the old woman’s spine was curved, she suffered either from scoliosis or advanced arthritis. “You must be Melinda.”

The so-called “wicked witch of the mountaintop,” a local character who lived in a shack deep in the woods, half crazed, it was said, but harmless. Walter had told Kayla about her, but in the previous visits she’d made up here with him, she’d never met the woman. At the moment, the word harmless wouldn’t have been Kayla’s first choice.

At the mention of her name, Melinda ceased talking and just stared at her, that same wildness in her eyes not diminished by her silence. Then she shifted her gaze to the dog. “Hush, now,” she ordered, and like that, Bailey did, whimpering for a brief moment, then burying his nose in Kayla’s neck.

Maybe she really was a witch, Kayla thought, thoroughly spooked. Still, she took another hesitant step toward her visitor. “Um, may I offer you something to drink, Melinda? Some water?”

As Kayla moved closer, the old woman’s eyes widened and she backed up until she was at the edge of the long porch. There were three steep steps from there to the ground, and sensing her visitor’s panic, Kayla became concerned that she might fall.

“I won’t hurt you,” she assured her, reaching a hand toward Melinda but remaining where she was. “Tell me about the bones, Melinda. I’m interested.”

The old woman paused briefly. “The bones,” she muttered, almost to herself, a faraway look in her eyes. Then her gaze focused again, horribly fierce and quite crazed. She pointed a crooked finger at Kayla. “Bodies and bones. They will destroy you.”