“Wide open. I guess the kids never locked it. The parents were in Brazil, so it was one big open house as far as those kids were concerned.”
With the gate unlocked, anyone could have come in, Luke thought.
“What about the front door?” he asked.
“Open, too, I’m afraid. Along with the back door.”
Once upon a time the place had been beautiful. Distinctive architectural elements abounded, like the carved double doors, the use of tile and marble and the giant Chinese lions that apparently hadn’t done much good guarding the place.
Luke stepped in. For a moment the house seemed to be bathed in blood, and then he realized it was just the sunset.
He turned on his flash light and his eyes went immediately to the west wall.
People might have cleaned the house. They might have scrubbed the wall. But he was startled to see that the bloodstains had never been fully erased. The remnants were faint, but the words were still legible.
Death to defilers!
And then an image that vaguely resembled a hand.
He closed his eyes. He could almost see the words as they had once been.
Red.
Bloodred.
FIVE
Monday seemed awfully long.
Chloe was accustomed to changing gears, as Victoria called it. She loved it when she was brought in to sketch for witnesses to or victims of a crime, because as much as it hurt to see someone in pain because of what they’d been through, she got a real sense of satisfaction from helping to see justice done. Art had been her first love, especially drawing. Finding the character in a face, the emotion in a captured movement. Stuckey had brought her in to help the police on a case she had no connection to about a year after the massacre. A witness had seen a suspect running down the street after a stabbing over a purse in downtown Miami. Listening to a description, closing her eyes, trying to make the face real in her mind, had been fascinating. She’d been called in several times after that when the police needed extra help, and she’d done such a good job that she’d even been asked to join the force. But she’d still been in college then, and in college, perhaps because of what had happened to her, she had fallen in love with psychology. Art therapy as an actual vocation had seemed the perfect fit, so she’d turned down the offer.
But today had been long, filled with patients whose troubles really got to her. Mindy Sutton was trying to maintain a normal life with a decent husband and a darling two-year-old, but she had been abused by her stepfather from the age of six until she was sixteen. He had gone to jail, but her mother had never forgiven her, convinced that she had made it all up or, worse, seduced her stepfather. After Mindy, she had worked with her youngest patient of the day, fifteen-year-old Isabel Jacobi, who had been stabbed by a fellow student in the restroom at school. Farley Astin was a gentle thirty-year-old who had been freed a year ago after serving seven years in prison for a rape he hadn’t committed.
The day had gone on in that vein, draining her.
She left for home late, thanking Jim Evans, her assistant-slash-secretary-slash-sometimes-very-best-friend, for all he did to keep her patients happy and her schedule in such good shape, and wasn’t surprised to see that her uncle had beaten her home.
She was just about to open the door to the carriage house when Leo stepped through the French doors from the main house to the pool area. “Chloe,” he called, and his tone was serious.
She groaned inwardly. “Hey, Uncle Leo.”
“I hear you’ve been doing some prowling around,” he said. “Want to join me for a minute?”
“Of course,” she said, forcing herself to sound cheerful, then walked across the pool area and gave him a hug.
“That’s not going to cut it,” he told her gruffly.
She rolled her eyes. “Stuckey has been talking to you, I take it?”
“He has.”
“Leo,” she said firmly, following him into the family room at the rear of the house, “I don’t know what he’s worried about. I’m telling you the truth. The agency is legitimate, and I haven’t seen or heard anything to imply that someone working there is a maniac. And you did tell me to keep my eyes and ears open because of Colleen. So what’s the big deal now?”
“I was a fool to suggest that you try to listen for information. I should have known that you’d go a step further and get involved yourself. I know you. And I should have realized you would run into danger if you thought it would help someone, because I remember how you looked that day when you saw Colleen Rodriguez’s parents at the courthouse,” he said.
“That’s neither here nor there. Look, I was already planning on doing that shoot—if they asked me. Leo, I’m a lucky woman.”
“None of you girls are lucky—not if you run up against whatever happened to Colleen Rodriguez.”
Chloe sighed. These days the parental figure-slash-child conversations between them tended to seem a bit ludicrous. Her uncle was an impressive man. He was apolitical and had no interest in ever running for office, but he loved the law and he loved a courtroom battle—and won most of the time. He was passionate about his cases. Leo was dark where she was light, but he had the same green eyes, fringed by thick dark lashes, a lean, wiry physique and sculpted features. At fifty-five he was a handsome man and still single, though he’d had relationships over the years. He seemed to run on a five-year cycle. She had liked most of his girlfriends and been sorry to see them leave, and she frequently wished he’d married. She felt sometimes that she really needed to have a good therapy session with him.
She had never known anyone more honest and aboveboard. Nor could she imagine anyone who could have tried harder to give a normal life to an orphaned niece. She listened to him now because she respected and loved him so much, even though she had no intention of changing her plans.
“I really don’t think you should do that shoot,” he said flatly.
“I know that, but please, hear me out. First off, I never have to be alone. I’ll be extremely careful, but I can—just by sitting around a table and having a cocktail—gather more information on this case than any cop could because I’m an accepted part of the group. Second, it’s still possible that nothing happened at all. Maybe Colleen Rodriguez is hoping for major news coverage when she surfaces in Australia or somewhere, looking for sympathy because she cracked under the strain of trying to become a super model.”
“What a liar you are. You don’t believe that in the least,” Leo said.
“Okay, I admit I think something happened to her. But that doesn’t mean it’s going to happen to anyone else, and it doesn’t mean that anyone concerned with the agency had anything to do with it. The island is minutes away from a dozen places in the Keys. There’s a gazillion boats in the area all the time.”
“And endless miles of sea—where someone could easily dispose of a body.”
“I know that. I’m just saying that there’s no reason to worry about me. Brad and Jared will be there, too. You don’t need to be afraid for me. You’re the one who taught me to get over the past and not to go through life being paranoid.”
“I didn’t suggest that you stop being smart.”
He had walked over to the wet bar and was surveying the bottles, trying to decide what he wanted. She was making him nervous, she thought.
She walked over and gave him a hug, then kissed his cheek. “Uncle Leo, I’m smart, I promise. I spend my days with people who’ve faced far worse things than I ever did—abuse victims who were tortured for years. I’ll be fine. You don’t need to start drinking.”
He laughed. “Actually, I was already planning to fix a drink and catch up on the news. So, what are your plans for tonight?”
“I’m going over to the mansion with…with a friend of Tony Stuckey’s.”
“Luke Cane?”
She stepped away, staring at him. “Don’t tell me you know the man, too?”
“Of course. He’s been around in the background for a long time,?
?? he said.
She stared at him, shaking her head. “Great. Everyone’s been in on some kind of secret but me.”
“There’s no big secret about him. He just doesn’t go looking for attention.”
“Oh? Want to fill me in? You can save me going online to find out about him.”
“You won’t find much. He stays under the radar. He does what he does quietly.”
“What exactly does he do?” Chloe asked.
“I don’t know—exactly. And I don’t want to,” Leo said. He had found a bottle of brandy that seemed to appeal to him. He poured an inch into a snifter and studied the color.
Chloe decided on whiskey, neat. He eyed her as she measured two fingers into a glass, then turned to stare back at him. “This is making less and less sense. He’s legitimate, he has a license. But he’s under the radar, and you know what he does, but not exactly.”
“All right. Do you remember the Holtzman-Avery case? About three years ago?”
She nodded. “Danny Holtzman was kid napped, and his body was discovered later in a suitcase in the Everglades. Then one of his friends, Dale Avery, disappeared, too. They suspected the same killer, and it was, except that Dale was found alive in a ware house out in the Redlands.”
“Luke Cane found the boy.”
“He did? I never saw his name in the papers.”
“That’s right. He did whatever he did to hunt down the perp—a psychotic pedophile named Elia Friar, a Little League coach, the whole bit—and get him to tell him where the boy was. I don’t know how he did it, and I don’t want to know.”
Chloe frowned. “You mean—he…beat the information out of him or something?”
“I didn’t say that.”
“Then…?”
“He saved a child’s life. He didn’t kill Elia Friar, he brought him in. Friar didn’t go to trial, though. He confessed so he wouldn’t have to face the death penalty. He never said a word about Luke Cane.”
Chloe hesitated. “And how do you feel about that?”
“I’m an officer of the court. I believe in the law.”
“Right. But we’re not in court. It’s me, your niece. So how do you feel about it?”
“I feel that the law can be slow, and it makes me crazy when a pervert gets off on some technicality. So do I envy guys like Luke Cane? Yes. Could I be him? No. I have my place in the system, and I work within it and fight against it all at the same time.”
“What makes him tick?” Chloe mused aloud.
“Why don’t you ask him?”
“What?”
Leo indicated a window that gave a view out to the street. She looked and saw that Luke Cane had driven up just beyond the gate. She swore softly, then turned to her uncle and said, “Sorry—but I lost track of time. Since you know Cane, would you entertain him for a few minutes while I get ready?”
The minute he agreed, she tore out the back door and ran for the carriage house. She had to take a shower. Had to. It was only April, but it was hot, and she felt sticky from working all day. And she was going to the mansion, so she had to look as if she belonged there.
She shed her clothing in the bathroom and jumped into the shower, scrubbing and rinsing quickly, then stepped out and wrapped herself in a towel.
Steam from the shower filled the bathroom, so she opened the door to let it out…and froze.
It was the steam, she told herself. It had to be the steam. Except that she was undeniably looking at a figure, a woman, standing right where she had stood before, but this time Chloe could see her clearly enough to recognize her.
Colleen Rodriguez.
She was wearing a flowing white gown, but both her hair and the gown were wet, clinging to her.
Fear shot through Chloe like a bolt of lightning.
A ghost. There was a ghost in her house.
And then she could have sworn she heard the ghost speak, except the words weren’t actually spoken aloud. They were somehow just there, in her head.
Help me. I know that you can help me.
“How? How in God’s name can I possibly help you?”
You can. I know you can. You can see me, and there’s so much I need to tell you so you can help me…help…
Then the steam cleared and the vision was gone.
For a long moment Chloe just stood there in her towel, staring at the spot where the vision had been.
Tears burned her eyes, but she blinked them away.
“Steam. Steam and mist,” she said aloud. And then, “This is pathetic. I’m going to have to give myself therapy. Or else go back to the real shrink.”
She was unnerved, but she didn’t have time to think about it now. Luke was there, and she could just imagine telling Mr. Ruggedly Handsome that she had been delayed because she had seen a ghost.
She took a deep breath.
The vision was gone, and she was a psychologist, so she could figure this out. She was probably seeing things because of everything that was going on right now. She was sure that Colleen was dead and wanted to figure out what had happened to her, even though no one else seemed to want her on the case. If Colleen’s “ghost” asked her for help, then that gave her a good reason to pursue the truth—along side Luke Cane.
Ghosts were not real. End of story.
She dressed quickly, slipping into a sheath, grabbing a shawl and hopping on one foot and then the other while she slipped on T-strap sandals.
Then she paused for a moment, looking around her bedroom.
What if ghosts did exist? What if they did appear to people, seeking closure? What if…the woman in white really was a remnant of Colleen’s soul, and she was looking for help, for justice?
Chloe took several breaths. She believed in God, and if there was a greater power, and if people were essentially energy, and that energy was essentially a soul…
Not now, she warned herself.
She could try to understand what was going on later. This was definitely not something to share with others.
Straightening her shoulders, she made herself hurry, but she remembered to lock the carriage house before making her way through the French doors into the rear of the main house.
At which point she completely forgot the ghost.
Because of Luke.
She was surprised to find herself feeling like a teenager going out on a first date with the cutest boy in school, except that Luke Cane looked nothing at all like a teenage boy.
She reminded herself that this wasn’t a date. They were headed out to the mansion on business.
“Hey there—I thought you had forgotten,” Luke said.
“No, no, I told you I’d take you out there,” Chloe said.
Luke offered Leo a hand. The two men shook and said goodbye as Chloe headed toward the door.
“I should go out there with you one of these days,” Leo said to her.
“Right. No one will notice an A.D.A. on the premises,” Chloe said.
Leo shook his head. “Fine. Don’t be late. And, Luke? I’m not even going to ask what you’re doing out there, but don’t you dare let anything happen to her.”
“Count on it,” Luke promised.
“I’m not going to pay attention to either one of you,” Chloe said as she gave her uncle a kiss on the cheek. “Don’t wait up,” she teased, then wondered how that sounded and lowered her head quickly to hide a blush. She certainly didn’t want Luke Cane thinking that she was imagining a romantic end to the evening. She wondered if he had the slightest clue that she felt a wildfire rush through her whenever they accidentally touched, or that in a secret place in the back of her mind, a place she didn’t want to acknowledge, she was imagining him naked beside her, touching her.
She’d noticed things about him that were simply part of who he was. He stood when a woman entered the room; he opened every door. She didn’t actually think that much about such things generally. While it was nice to have a door opened for her, she was perfectly capable of opening a door herself and was
quick to do so when she saw a woman with a baby carriage or someone on crutches, for instance. But she liked his courtesy, and they did seem to be getting along now that they were partners in the search to find out what had happened to Colleen Rodriguez.
“So, how was your day?” he asked her once they were settled in his car.
“Brutal. How was yours?”
“Interesting.”
“Oh?”
He cast her a quick glance before concentrating on the road. “You might not like where I’ve been,” he told her.
“Really? Now I’m intrigued. Where have you been?”
“The Everglades.”
Chloe mulled that over for a moment. “I have nothing against the Everglades. People go there every day. Care to elaborate?”
“I went out to the site where they found the two men who tried to kill you and murdered your friends,” he said bluntly.
Chloe couldn’t have been more stunned. She was silent for several long moments, amazed at his interest in the so-called Teen Massacre.
Ten years was a long time, but in some ways, for her, it could have been yesterday. “Why?”
“I don’t know. The case just…I don’t know. There’s something about it that doesn’t sit right.”
“You’re looking at something that’s over ten years old, just because it doesn’t sit right?” she asked, shocked that this man had the same feeling about the case that she’d had ever since the police had officially closed it.
He shrugged but didn’t explain further.
Chloe felt at a disadvantage. She still knew almost nothing about him, and even though she agreed with him, she wasn’t pleased with this turn of events. She wanted to be wrong. She wanted to think that the men who had killed her friends were dead.
“Don’t worry—I don’t want to hypnotize you and look for repressed memories,” he said.
“Good. Because you’re supposed to be working on the Colleen Rodriguez case.”
“And you’re not supposed to be working on it. Not actively, anyway.”
Chloe exhaled. “Look—”
“Sorry. Truce.
“But, seriously, if the people who committed those murders are still walking around somewhere, wouldn’t you want them stopped?”