“Nothing could have made me happier,” Mo murmured.
“What will happen to me, Debbie?” J.J. asked. “They won’t say it—but my mom is dead. Like my dad. What’ll happen to me? Debbie, my mom...she was the best mom.”
He cried again, this time clutching Debbie Howell like a koala. She reassured him. “I can’t be her. You’re right, she was the best mom ever. But you’ll have me, J.J. You’ll have me forever and ever, I promise. Your mom and I talked about this. She had a will and made it clear that you’d be with me.”
The nurse was back at the door. “He needs to get some rest,” she said sternly. “If the doctor comes by, you’ll be out in the hallway. She can stay—” the nurse pointed at Debbie “—but no more talking.”
Mo noted that J.J. hugged Debbie even more tightly.
“J.J., I need to leave,” Mo said. “I’ll see you later, okay?”
He pulled away from Debbie’s embrace for a minute. “Thank you,” he whispered. “And thank...Rollo. Rollo is a dog, right? I wish I could see him.”
“Actually, he’s a certified service dog so, legally, I can bring him in here. He’ll come to see you tomorrow, J.J. You can thank him yourself.”
She wasn’t sure if a dog coming in thrilled the nurse, but it seemed to brighten the world for J.J.
If she could do that at this moment, she just didn’t care what others thought.
Aidan, too, stepped around the bed to leave. “J.J., we’ll be back to see you when you’ve had some time to rest,” he told the boy.
When they left the room, Mo saw a police officer in the hallway.
She glanced at Aidan.
“They’ll keep an eye on him. We’ll let J.J. get some sleep, and then Voorhaven and Van Camp will talk with him. We’ll talk with him again, too.”
“It doesn’t seem like he can help much. He didn’t see anything,” Mo said.
“But he might have heard something. He told us he smelled something sweet—obviously the chloroform. There might be other memories he hasn’t brought forward yet.”
Aidan didn’t stop to talk to the officer on duty; they just nodded to each other.
Heading out to the parking lot, Mo saw that the sun was up, strong and bright on a beautiful fall morning.
It was a beautiful morning. They’d found J.J. alive.
Jane and Sloan were waiting in the parking lot with the dog. Rollo rushed to greet her—and Aidan.
Mo realized that Aidan’s coworkers were waiting for a report, but they didn’t ask questions. They knew he’d fill them in.
“We’re going back to the convention center,” Aidan said. “J.J. told us they’d arrived there, gotten out of the car and then they were taken. He didn’t see anything. Whoever grabbed them slipped something, probably a cloth saturated with chloroform, over their heads.”
“That would suggest two people. Even when it’s a woman and a child, how do you take them by surprise?” Jane said. It was a statement more than a question.
“What’s the story at the station?” Aidan asked.
“They’re going to arraign Jillian Durfey this morning. As for the others,” Sloan said, “we’ve got nothing else to hold them on. They’ve been released. But we’ll be watching them now. Logan Raintree is heading up here with one of our best men as far as video, film and what-have-you goes. Will Chan can set up cameras where you’d never suspect them. And Logan...Logan can track anything. Oh, yeah, we’ll keep our eyes on Taylor Branch and those three security guys.”
Mo was quiet. She looked at Aidan and noticed for the first time that they were both covered in soot, grime and grass stains. They were still bearing traces of spiderwebs, too.
She figured they were probably lucky the hospital had let them in at all.
“We should catch a few hours’ sleep,” Jane suggested.
“When Logan gets here with Will.”
“The cops are on this, too, Aidan,” Sloan reminded him.
“I know. I just don’t think I’ll sleep well until we’ve got some reinforcements. Mo, I’ll take you and Rollo home.”
She said good-night—or good morning—to Jane and Sloan, and took Rollo’s leash from Jane. He hopped into the backseat of Aidan’s car as if he belonged there. She slid into the passenger seat, and in a few minutes they were on their way to her place.
“You think you might have it solved?” she asked him. “So J.J.’s explanation helped you?”
“Yes,” he said. “Although someone went for the bizarre in displaying the bodies, I believe that it was someone close to Richard. He was taken from the convention center with the use of chloroform, and chloroform was found in Jillian Durfey’s room. She still claims it was planted. If it was, that definitely points to an inside job.”
“So you believe Highsmith was targeted,” Mo said. “Possibly by his own people.”
“Yeah. But what I can’t understand is this—why J.J.’s mother, Wendy Appleby? And she was killed, but the boy—thank God—was not.”
“What will happen to J.J. now? Debbie is a good person. Is she going to be allowed to adopt him? She says Wendy stipulated that in her will. ”
“It’s complicated. The state will have to make that decision. It depends, too, on the exact provisions in Wendy’s will. At any rate, he appears to care deeply for Debbie, and vice versa, so I hope it works out for them,” Aidan said.
“Poor kid. His dad dead and now his mother,” Mo said. “Thank God she left a will.”
Aidan nodded.
“You knew Debbie...before?”
“I met her at the club where she works, Mystic Magic. I was following a lead—the matchbook in Richard’s pocket. I still can’t help wondering what Lizzie grave meant.” He flashed her a quick smile. “Lizzie might have been Major Andre’s love, but even if she was, what did she have to do with Richard?”
“I don’t know. We don’t know where her grave is, either,” Mo said. “What I do know is that I’m so tired I can hardly keep my eyes open.”
She hadn’t been aware that they’d driven the length of the road and reached her cottage until he stopped the car. Rollo barked from the backseat.
“Uh, would you like to come in? Would you like coffee or something?”
“You just told me how tired you are,” he said.
“Yes, but I have to shower, I’m hungry and I’ll still be up for a while.”
“All right,” he agreed. “I could use some coffee.”
Once inside, Mo started the coffee and dug through the refrigerator and cabinets. “Omelets, grilled cheese or peanut butter and jelly?” He was standing by the end of the counter, watching her, a smile on his face.
“What?”
“I feel like I’ve been invited to breakfast by the Spider Queen,” he said.
She flushed and then laughed. “I’m wearing a lot of webs, am I? You do realize you’re not much better? I’ll run and clean up before I contaminate our food. There’s another bathroom in the hall. Washcloths and towels and soap are in the little wicker cabinet.”
“Thank you. I suppose that was rude. As you pointed out, I probably don’t look any better than you.”
He turned to head for the downstairs bathroom and Mo went scampering up the stairs.
When she saw herself in the mirror, she shuddered at how ghoulish she looked. She took a three-minute shower and washed her hair. Within another three minutes she was dressed and hurrying downstairs.
He saw her shiny-clean wet hair and grimaced. “Cheater,” he said.
She smiled. “You look like you cleaned up okay.”
“Ah, but it’s not as good as clean clothes and clean hair.” He sighed. “The coffee’s ready. I poured you a cup. I would’ve whipped up the omelets, but it would have felt rude rifling through your kitchen.”
“A cook, too?” she asked.
“I live alone. And I don’t like processed, microwaved food. It’s all about necessity, not talent.” She took out the ingredients and cracked eggs into a bowl, then added milk. She stirred the mixture and tipped it into butter sizzling in the frying pan.
“What can I do?” he asked.
“Plates, I guess. They’re in the cabinets. And silverware—”
“In the silverware drawer.”
“Quick learner! No wonder you’re an investigator,” she said, shaking grated cheese onto the eggs.
It was nice, preparing breakfast with him moving around in her kitchen. Despite the deaths that had occurred, their last night had been a victory. They hadn’t had any sleep and surely needed some, but this felt like a strange and even light moment between them.
“Oh, and juice is—” she began.
“In the refrigerator. As you’ve already discovered, I’m not an investigator for nothing,” he finished.
A few minutes later, the table had been set and everything was on it—omelets, toast and fresh coffee.
“You must be really hungry,” he said. “I interrupted your late dinner.”
“How did you find me?” she asked.
“It wasn’t that hard. I knew they’d reopened the attractions. I assumed you’d be with Grace. I got the info on where Grace worked, checked that out and learned from one of her bosses that some of the crew hit the café at night.”
“Sounds like a lot of effort.”
“Took about five minutes.” He hesitated, his fork halfway to his mouth. “I also wanted to find you,” he told her.
She hesitated, too, staring down at her omelet.
“How do you do it?” he asked quietly. “How did you determine where the bodies were? Where J.J. was? Good as Rollo is, I know it’s not just him.”
“I explained my reasoning to you,” she said. “It’s unlikely that someone could hack up bodies like that in one place and then move them to another, a hotel room or public location.”
“There are warehouses around, other venues.”
“But the bodies were found at the cemetery, and that’s the other part of my rationale. We—most people—don’t disturb the dead.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means that unless someone’s just died and is being entombed, no one has any real reason to go into the old vaults.”
“That’s it?” he asked. “That’s all there is to it?”
“Logic,” she said with a shrug. “The likelihood of being found in a long-forgotten vault while cutting up bodies is pretty much nil.”
“So, you worked out that the actual murders—certainly the mutilations—took place in a vault, in a cemetery. Because that’s where the bodies were found.”
She frowned. “Whoever did this had to know the area well. I knew about the old vaults—and that some of them were long decayed and forgotten—but you have to be really familiar with this area to know that.”
“And this morning,” he asked. “How did you find J.J?”
“I...I didn’t. Rollo did.”
“Rollo was spectacular. But you found the vault.”
“I was in the right place at the right time.”
He stared at her for a moment, clearly skeptical. She leaned forward, irritated. “We found him alive. What else matters? And it had nothing to do with speaking to the dead.”
“So you do speak with the dead.”
“The only way people ever recognize that possibility is if they speak with the dead,” she said.
“Whatever I had,” he told her, “I don’t have now.”
“We were lucky, and timing is definitely part of it. We found J.J. alive.”
“And he might not have lasted much longer. You have something more than logic and a smart dog,” Aidan said. “Even more than good instincts or intuition or whatever you want to call it. You have more than I ever had.” She felt again as if he were observing the behavior of an exotic animal or studying a new species.
“I have excellent hearing,” she said.
“He was unconscious when we recovered him.”
“I don’t know, Aidan. I thought I heard him. Rollo showed us the way. If I hadn’t come across the entry, someone else would have.”
She saw that he’d consumed all the food on his plate.
“Can I get you anything else?” she asked, taking the last few bites of her toast.
“No, thank you. That was excellent.” He lingered at the table, watching her.
“I’m good with dishes. Actually, I’m a better dishwasher than a cook.”
“I just rinse them and put them in the machine.”
“I’ll help.”
When they were done, he said, “Well, I guess I’ll get back. I should have a few more coworkers coming in. Once they’re here, I’ll sleep for a while. I promise I’ll keep you filled in on whatever’s going on. And if you need anything—” He paused, as if not sure what she might need from him. “Call me,” he finally said.
She nodded and walked him to the front door. Rollo trotted beside her, his toenails making the little tap-tap-tap sound that was so reassuring.
At the door he turned to her. “Thank you again. For your work—and for coffee and breakfast.”
“Finding J.J. is the kind of thing that...that makes everything worthwhile,” Mo told him. “As for breakfast, that was certainly easy enough.”
“I owe you a meal.”
“Hmm. A lovely lobster with an exceptional bottle of wine,” she teased.
But he didn’t laugh or demur.
“You choose the time and the place,” he said.
When he left, she closed and locked the door. As she turned, she would have collided with Candy had Candy been flesh and blood.
“I like him!” her resident ghost announced. “And you found a lost boy— Oh, that’s so wonderful! You and Rollo found the boy! I’m so proud of you, Mo. Now, I really do think you need to be friendly to this agent. He’s a delightful man. Reminds me of my dear colonel. Granted, he was a Confederate officer, and he fell in love with me! This man is like Daniel, yes. Ready to fight, longing for peace. A man of his time, yet so far ahead. And he likes you, Mo.”
“He looks at me like I’m alien spawn, Candy. He’s grateful to me, that’s it.”
“I personally think you’re showing a bit of cowardice there, my dear,” Candy chastised her.
“Candy—”
“You want him, but you’re afraid of rejection.”
“I can’t be afraid of rejection when I’ve already been rejected.”
Candy shook her head. “No, give him time. Oh, and lead him to the truth. Gently.”
“You heard him— Whatever he had he lost.”
Candy laughed. “What was lost can be found again. Oh, and speaking of which...”
She crooked her finger, leading Mo to the window again. “The curtains, please. It’s exhausting for me to move them.”
Intrigued, Mo pulled back the curtains.
He was there again.
The ghost of Richard Highsmith stood at the edge of the woods.
He moved toward the house. Suddenly he stopped.
He seemed to shimmer in the sunlight for a moment.
Then he was gone.
Mo started for the front door.
She felt the brush of Candy’s hand on her shoulder.
“No,” Candy said. “Don’t chase him. He’s gaining his strength. He will come to you.”
Mo nodded slowly. “I hope so,” she murmured.
“I’m glad you’re listening to me. What are you going to do now?”
“Sleep!” Mo told her. And smiling, she raced up the stairs, Rollo a
t her heels.
9
The sound of Aidan’s alarm was pitiless.
He’d actually fallen into a deep sleep for the few hours he’d allowed himself.
Logan Raintree, one of the unit heads, had shown up with Will Chan soon after he’d returned from Mo’s house. While Aidan was still new to this unit—and he’d feared that being part of it labeled him odd, to say the least—he liked the Krewe members and had an instinctive trust in the men and women who were now part of his team.
Before joining the FBI, Logan, like Sloan Trent, had worked in Texas; he’d been a Ranger, while Sloan was a Houston cop who went on to become an Arizona sheriff. Will Chan—a tall striking man with family roots in Trinidad—had actually come to the FBI via a different path. He was a self-termed “master of weird trades.” He’d been a professional magician among other things. But he was an expert with film and computers.
Once Will and Logan had arrived, they all met briefly in Aidan’s suite. Directly afterward, Will got to work, setting up cameras in the hallway and the elevators. Taylor Branch, Muscles, Mischief and Magic wouldn’t be going out or coming in without the Krewe’s knowing it.
Before Sloan, Jane and Aidan had dropped into bed for their few hours, they’d discussed the current situation. Jillian would probably be out on bail, despite the fact that the chloroform meant she’d be arraigned. Still, a good lawyer could point out plenty to suggest that there was reasonable doubt as to her guilt.
“Not to mention,” Jane observed, “that Jillian Durfey is a tiny little thing. Even with the assistance of chloroform, was she big enough to have done this? Or strong enough, I should say.”
“There had to be two people involved,” Aidan said. “According to J.J., he and his mother had parked and gotten out of the car—and they were both attacked from behind. Based on what he said, they were knocked out almost instantly and it sounded like some kind of bag or hood or even just a cloth was thrown over his head.”
“If that’s the case, you think it was one of the others?” Logan had asked Aidan.
“It’s certainly possible,” was Aidan’s reply. “They were all here—and they all alibi one another. By the way, there’s someone who should be interviewed again, although I know the police already questioned her, and that’s the woman who works for the convention center—Bari Macaby.