Astounded.
Bereft.
“Where are you going? You can’t leave me now…not like this…”
“I gotta I gotta…,” he stammered desperately. “I promised Mom I’d be home for supper. She thinks I’m out collecting wood for tomorrow…I gotta go…I just gotta…”
He looked around wildly.
Torn. Willing himself to be somewhere else.
Night shadows had gathered. She couldn’t make out his features.
Couldn’t see if he was disappointed.
What had gone wrong?
Had she been too forward?
Whatever. Looks like she’d frightened him off…
And now he was leaving her.
But he couldn’t.
Not when we’ve had it so good together.
Nothing, no one, is gonna keep us apart!
She sprang up and grabbed him; he wrenched away from her urgent, shaking hands grasping his shirt, holding on to him.
“Mom’ll be looking for me. She’s expecting me…”
They fell to the floor, struggling, fighting. He rolled away from her.
Pushed himself up.
Unable to believe what was happening, she reached out to hold him.
He fell back, away from her, shoving an elbow hard on the floorboards. With a rending, splitting sound the rotten floor gave under his weight.
He plummeted to the ground below.
She stared at the black space where the floor, where Charlie, had been.
Hearing his low, hurt grunt as he hit rock bottom.
The dull crack that was a thud and a splish! all at the same time.
Like a ripe melon bursting open.
Terrified, Leigh scrambled to her feet.
“Charlie oh my God Charlie Charlie! Wait, I’m coming I’m coming.”
Naked, she bounded across the landing and took the stairs, two, three at a time.
Ouch.
Shit!
She caught her toe in a broken stair and stumbled.
Flinging out her arms, she clawed at the balustrade, almost falling headlong.
No need to search for Charlie.
His legs sprawled at weird angles in the room facing her.
“Charlie. I’m here. Don’t move…”
Then her heart stood still.
She was terribly afraid.
More afraid than she’d ever been in all of her eighteen years.
Her stomach turned to ice.
But she went forward, through the doorway.
To get to Charlie.
Lying there.
So still.
She was in an old-fashioned kitchen. Dark with shadows. Shuttered windows. Narrow rays of the setting sun carving through dust motes rising from where he’d fallen, in an awkward nest of wood and flaking bits of plaster.
She stared at Charlie.
“Oh, God. NO! NO NO NO-OOO!!!”
Forced herself to look at what had been his head.
Clumps of brown hair clinging to slivers of scalp, scattered in a mess of brain and shattered skull.
Slimed with matter, the base of the stove poked through the red mush of Charlie’s face. An eye, a bloodshot globe attached to bloody strings, escaped from its socket.
Leigh stared. The eye slipped a little.
Showing the brown iris.
It knows I’m watching it. It’s smiling Charlie’s smile at me…
Leigh heaved, swayed, doubled over, and slid to her knees on the dusty clay floor.
Breath burst from her lungs in great, ragged gasps.
Hot, chunky vomit rose in her throat.
This, this…wasn’t…couldn’t be Charlie.
Charlie’s beautiful, strong—and he loves me. I know that. He loves me…
Taking one last look at Charlie, flaked with dust and plaster like a discarded tailor’s dummy, she fled down the passageway, out onto the stoop, and stumbled down the steps.
Whimpering.
Fighting back vomit.
Sobbing, muttering, as she ran.
Straight into the small, rigid figure of a woman.
Charlie’s mother.
Thin, birdlike.
Openmouthed.
Shocked. Staring at Leigh’s naked body with horrified, accusing eyes, bright as polished stones in the fading light.
The woman skimmed past her. Into the house. Leigh hurried on, toward the canoe, her feet cut and bleeding as she fled over stones and fallen branches.
The scream coming from the house pierced the evening quiet, renting the air like a knife through silk.
Pure. Vibrant. Agonized.
An animal caught in a trap. Then…
“Whore; Lilith; poisonous bitch; filthy murderess!”
Under glowering skies, Leigh pushed her canoe into the lake and climbed in. Grasping the paddle, she worked it hard, bending forward and back; dipping, skimming through the dark water. As she traveled, crisp, white wavelets lifted around the bow, telling her the wind had changed direction.
She shivered, feeling its chill on her tear-streaked face, on her cold, trembling body.
Paddling hard, her uneven breaths coming in raw, hurting gasps, she left Goon Lake behind.
The screams of Edith Payne followed her like arrows from hell.
EIGHTEEN
“Hey. Earthling. Anybody home?”
Jenny eyed Leigh over the breakfast table. She didn’t like what she saw. Yesterday Leigh had been bright and breezy. Today, it looked like her personal piece of sky had just caved in.
“Sorry, Jenny. I…I didn’t sleep too well last night.”
“Didn’t hear you come in.” A pause. “We waited to eat supper, just in case. Then, when you didn’t show, we ate your share and decided to turn in.” She paused, not wanting to appear heavy—after all, Leigh was on vacation. She decided on the concerned-aunt routine, hoping it wouldn’t come over too strong.
“Didn’t you know that Mike and I would worry if you stayed out late? ’Specially nights…What happened, Leigh—or is it a state secret?” Beneath her determined smile, Jenny was worried.
If this is what life with a teen is all about, Mike and I sure missed out on all the excitement.
They’d regretted not having kids, and visiting Jack and Helen on the West Coast once in a while made up for it to some degree. That, and teaching kids at high school, helped them both understand what went on in those young minds.
Leigh hung her head. Put her fork down and pushed away her untouched eggs. Her lip trembled. She scraped back her chair and rushed from the table.
Jenny followed her to the guest bedroom. She spotted Mike coming out of the bathroom and put a discreet finger to her lips. With raised brows, he carried on rubbing his damp hair and went on his way.
Kids, eh?
Jenny sat on the bed and drew the sobbing girl to her. “Come on, now, tell Aunt Jenny,” she said gently, cradling Leigh’s head against her shoulder.
Leigh let everything go, crying as if her heart would break. Eventually, the great, gulping sobs trailed off and she recovered sufficiently to wonder where to begin her story and what, if necessary, should be left out. The plain, unadulterated truth was just too awful to say out loud.
“It’s bad, Jenny. It’s real bad…” Leigh broke down again, heaving and sobbing into her aunt’s soft, accommodating bosom. A cold shiver touched Jenny’s spine. This was bad. She knew she wasn’t going to like what Leigh was about to tell her.
Had the girl been raped? Oh my God! What do we tell Jack and Helen?
“Take your time and tell me all about it, baby,” she said in a soothing voice. “Tell your auntie Jenny.”
Leigh’s parents listened in horror to Mike’s story over the phone. “Not that we wouldn’t like her to stay with us a while longer,” he’d explained in a calm but concerned voice. “It’s just that I—we think Leigh needs her parents at a time like this…And, of course, there is the matter of her being questioned…”
Mike met
Jack and Helen at General Mitchell International. They’d brought a change of clothes in their carryons, expecting only to stay overnight before taking Leigh home.
The journey to Wahconda was not a good one. Along the way, there was a wearing mix of tearful accusations from Helen, interposed by irate remonstrations from Jack—punctuated by Mike’s patient explanations. Fielding their rhetoric wasn’t easy, and Mike wished like hell Jenny had come along as referee.
He sighed. He’d expected the drive to be a nightmare. It was—and more besides.
They arrived at Wahconda in the early hours, fatigued and more than ready for the fragrant coffee, but, for the aggrieved parents, not the cheese sandwiches and apple pie Jenny put before them. Preparing the snack beforehand, she hadn’t reckoned on them doing much eating.
She was right.
Jack and Helen demanded to see their daughter, who’d taken sedatives prescribed by Doc Barton and was lying, pale and barely breathing, when her parents arrived.
“Not a good time to wake her, Helen. The poor dear has been through a lot these last twenty-four hours. Best let her rest while she can.” Jenny looked anxiously at her sister-in-law. The last thing they all needed was one of Helen’s tantrums.
“You’re right, of course,” Jack said, placing an arm around Helen and steering her into the hallway. “Come along, dear. Let’s get us some rest. Plenty to discuss tomorrow.”
“You’re not kidding,” retorted Helen, glaring at him through red-rimmed eyes. “Leigh had better have a real good reason for going off on her lonesome like that.” She darted an accusing glance at Jenny. Clearly, right now, she was blaming her in-laws for the mess they were in.
Daylight found them drinking coffee around the kitchen table again. Still tired, but determined to see this thing through like sensible people.
“At least,” Dad said, “Leigh’s alive. That’s a blessing in itself.”
Leigh, pale and dazed from her drugged sleep, joined them in the kitchen. Smiling wanly at Mom and Dad, she avoided their questioning looks and gratefully hugged the mug of steaming coffee Jenny placed before her.
“Good morning, young lady,” Dad began.
Leigh groaned inwardly.
This I can do without.
After…Charlie…
Tears welled and fell down her face. Mom rose and took her daughter in her arms. They both had a darn good cry. Then Mom told her: “We love you so much, sweetie. How could this awful thing be happening to us…?”
“Now, Helen,” Dad put in. “All we can do is get our little girl through this unfortunate incident. We have to be strong, for her sake.”
“Agreed,” Mike murmured. “At this stage, recriminations are redundant. Leigh needs all the help we can give her.” Jenny nodded, smiling bravely. “That’s right,” she said. “We must pull together, whatever happens.”
“Now, perhaps you’ll be kind enough to tell us in your own words what happened back there, day before yesterday.” Dad caught Mike’s raised brows, realizing that maybe a confrontational attitude wasn’t going to work with his little girl. Not this time.
“It’s okay, Dad. I’ll tell you as best I can…I appreciate you need to know the facts before the cops get here.”
Mom and Dad exchanged glances. This was their errant offspring. Chastened and acting grown up for a change.
They listened in stunned silence to Leigh’s halting account of her brief affair with Charlie. Afterward, Mom stifled back tears, her cheeks getting redder all the time. She fiddled nervously with the gold cross hanging on a chain around her neck. Dad looked shocked and embarrassed by turns. For the first time in living memory, he had nothing to say to his daughter.
Leigh sank into a bewildered daze, reliving the nightmare of Charlie’s death—the way he’d looked—over and over again. It was the most horrendous thing she’d ever experienced; something she’d never, ever, forget even if she lived to be a hundred years old. Tears streamed down her face, and she just couldn’t face her parents’ wounded expressions.
Just as if it had happened to them.
But they had every right to be horrified.
And so, she told herself, had Charlie’s mom—she had more right to hate her than anyone.
Losing her son that way.
Mom got upset and Mike called the doc, who said it was okay if Mom used a couple of Leigh’s sedatives. No problem. They were just your average sleeping pill, he told them. Nothing too strong. But take them only till the intial shock passes over, you understand.
Dad was grimly stoical. Patient. At least there were no more black looks. Leigh couldn’t bear it when he looked at her as if she were some kind of stranger and called her “young lady” instead of Leigh. Meanwhile, he spoke urgently with Mike in low tones, while Jenny went around making more coffee, filling in the awkward gaps, and trying to keep tension at bay.
By the time Officers Fallon and Henty dropped by to get the story, Leigh had taken to her bed again.
Apologizing for the trouble, they waited for Leigh to emerge. Meanwhile, Fallon confided that Edith Payne had made wild accusations against the young lady who was, ahem…with…her son at the time of his death.
“Not that we’re paying any attention to all that.” He didn’t think now was a good time to quote the words Charlie’s mom had really screamed at them. Like: “Find the whore who murdered my son. Or I will.”
No-sirree. Instead, he gave Mom a reassuring smile, telling her that he himself had an eighteen-year-old daughter and so was no stranger to the workings of a young girl’s mind—
Mom stopped him short with a sour look.
The officers questioned Leigh for half an hour or so and, at the end of it all, went so far as to say that what they had here was a case of Accidental Death. Not, in their opinion, Murder One.
Relieved that this part was over, Leigh returned to her room.
“Thank ya kindly, ma’am,” Henty said, and smiled, nodding briefly at Jenny as she came around with yet more coffee. Fallon turned to Mom and Dad. “We’ve known for some time that old house out on Goon was a death trap,” he admitted. “But,” he went on, “the place is in probate and we can’t do a dern thing about it. However, in the light of…er…recent events, we’ll try for a court order to take the place down. Demolish it. Clear the site. Leave things as they are,” he added, “more kids could get hurt.”
“She’s asking about the funeral,” Mom said flatly.
“Funeral?” Glancing at his partner, Henty decided to lay it on the line.
He did. Confiding that this particular funeral wouldn’t be such a good thing for a young girl to experience.
“Not as if it’ll be your regular funeral,” he said, sending Dad a level look in a man-to-man sort of way. “We’re talking personal tragedy here. Big time. Lotta raw feelings on the loose, that kinda thing. Old Ma Payne’s a weird piece a’ work. No telling what might happen, under the circumstances.
“Yessir. Best take the young lady on home…”
“And so,” the preacher said, “as the coffin sinks slowly into the ground, we bid a fond farewell…”
Leigh’s heart lurched.
Coming here is not the smartest thing I’ve ever done, she told herself with a shudder.
Charlie’s mother approached. She walked around the end of the grave, slowly. Standing apart from the small group of mourners, Leigh held her breath, watching the small, upright figure dressed in black.
She’d known where to come.
She’d heard Mike tell Dad that Charlie’s funeral would be at the Seventh-Day Adventist Church.
Here, on Wahconda.
It services the lake people hereabouts, he’d said.
Keeping her eye on the mother, Leigh shivered some more. No sun reached this desolate plot hidden in the pines just north of Carson’s Camp, and she wished she’d worn something warmer.
I shouldn’t be here at all, she chastised herself. But God knows, I had to come. Needed to be at Charlie’s funeral. I o
we him that much. If I hadn’t gone with him to the old house, everything would’ve been okay…Charlie’s death was all my fault.
Stay back.
No, don’t point at me. Oh, my God!
Her heart raced. She took a step backward as the mother approached…
The following day, Leigh and her parents said their goodbyes to Mike and Jenny and flew back to the West Coast. In the days that followed, Leigh waited anxiously for her period.
It didn’t happen that month.
Nor the next.
Tests showed she was pregnant.
NINETEEN
“Mom.”
“Uh-huh?”
“Johnny Depp just called to ask me for a date. That okay with you?”
“Er…what was that?”
“Mom. You haven’t been listening to a word I’m saying. I could sprout wings and fly away, and you wouldn’t even notice. What’s up? Your man Mace playin’ on your mind?”
“Sorry, hon. Sure, I got things on my mind. What with this guy and his ‘unfinished business,’ and everything…”
“Okay. So this guy and his unfinished business. We keep on our guard ’n’ call Macie baby if we get spooked—what else can we do? Detective Harrison seems like a pretty smart cookie to me. He’ll catch that weirdo before we even know it.”
Deana put her arm around Leigh’s waist. Feels like I’m a regular grown-up, she thought. What goes around comes around, I guess. I’m glad Mom was there for me over what happened to Allan—now it’s me comforting Mom.
She liked the warm feeling this gave her. How it should be. Anyway, Mom knows what I’m going through. She’s been there. History repeating itself.
Except, I’m not pregnant.
I don’t think.
Nah.
Didn’t get the chance back there in the woods.
Thanks to that madman.
She caught Leigh’s sigh and frowned a little. “C’mon, Mom. Tell Deana. What gives?”
“What gives? Isn’t all this enough, young lady? Madman on the loose. Nelson sounding off back at the restaurant. Mace playing this whole thing down—but heaven knows, I can tell he’s worried. God, Deana. How can you be so blasé about it all?”
“Sorry, Mom. I really am. If Allan and I had gone to the movies like we said, all of this wouldn’t be happening.” Deana’s eyes filled, and Leigh softened.