Stop it!
She turned and hurried up the next block and a half to Cheryl’s studio. Though she still felt as if hidden eyes were watching her, following her every move, she ignored the warning prickle at the top of her scalp and just walked a little faster, past a parked car and a dripping wall of arborvitae before crossing a final street.
Three cats scattered as she reached the entrance to Cheryl’s basement and tapped on the door. Rain was pouring from the sky now, the day nearly dark as night, her sweater coat failing her completely, dampness seeping into her shoulders.
Cheryl, dressed in another tie-dyed caftan, opened the door and shepherded her through the bevy of rooms. “You’re going to be soaked to the skin,” she said as Ava slid onto the recliner.
“Is that a prediction?”
“I don’t predict. Just open doors to the mind.” But she chuckled as she lit a candle. The room began filling with the scents of lavender and thyme, and soft, soothing music could be heard over the drip of rain gurgling down a downspout mounted outside near the single window in the room. “So let’s get to it, shall we?” She unfolded a blanket and spread it over Ava’s legs before taking her own chair and starting the session.
Within seconds, Ava was relaxed, the edges of this dark basement room fading away, and she was with her son again in summer, when sunlight danced upon the water and Noah ran and giggled near the shore.
Happily he played in the sand, a small plastic boat in his hands . . . a boat that was the perfect replica of the Bloody Mary. “Where did you get that?” she asked him, and he looked up at her, his smile wide enough to show off his perfect little baby teeth. “Uncle Kelvin,” he said clearly. “He gaved it to me.”
But that was impossible. Kelvin died before Noah was born. Her son never had the chance to meet him. “It was Uncle Kelvin’s boat?” she said, clarifying. Maybe someone else had given the toy to her son.
But Noah was shaking his head, his blond curls catching in the sunlight. “He gaved it to me.” He looked up then, his eyes much wiser than his age. “Why don’t you believe me, Mama?”
“But I do—”
He frowned suddenly. “You don’t believe anyone.”
“Noah, that’s not true. Why would you say such a thing?”
He looked up at her innocently and said, “Daddy told me.”
“Daddy?” she whispered as the sun seemed to go down and her son faded from her sight. “Noah?” she called as darkness descended, and she found herself on the deck of the Bloody Mary, the storm raging. Sails whipped wildly and the wind screamed. Rain lashed the deck as the boat pitched and rolled. Jewel-Anne screamed as if in horrid pain. . . .
And then she was with Noah again, her perfect little son, a child she never thought she’d have after her series of miscarriages. So precious. A miracle. Born right after the storm. She hardly remembered much of the pregnancy, had thought she’d had the flu in the early months.
“Three, you’re coming around . . . Two, you’re surfacing, coming closer . . . One . . . And you’re back,” she heard, awakening to find herself in Cheryl’s studio. She looked down at her arms, empty. No baby to hold.
“You were in the boat again,” Cheryl said softly. “You were screaming.”
“I know.” Ava felt weighted down and weak. There was so much she couldn’t remember about that night, so much grief and sadness. She’d tried through her sessions with Cheryl to learn more about the tragedy of Kelvin’s death as well as her son’s disappearance, hoping the hypnotist would unlock some memory her brain refused to recall. Now, though, she wondered if it was maybe best that she couldn’t recall all the details of that horrifying night.
Both Khloe and Jewel-Anne seemed to have trouble forgiving her for suggesting the boat ride that day. God knew she’d mentally beaten herself up about it, even though she knew it wasn’t her fault. But sometimes it felt like there was something else. Something just out of reach, if she could just remember.
“You okay?” Cheryl asked, concerned.
“There’s that question again.”
Cheryl smiled, but it didn’t quite touch her eyes.
“What?” Ava demanded.
“Nothing.”
“Yes . . . something.”
Cheryl glanced away for just a moment, then said soberly, “It’s just that I think you should be careful.”
“Okay . . . scary. Why?”
“Things aren’t always as they seem or what we want them to be. There’s a lot of bad blood out on the island. You know it. I know it. And sometimes I can’t help myself. I worry about you.”
Ava thought about Tanya’s comments but said, “Don’t,” to Cheryl, touching her surprisingly cold hands. “I am careful, in my way.”
“Good,” Cheryl said fervently.
“Maybe we could get together, next week?”
“Yes . . .” But Cheryl’s thoughts were clearly elsewhere, and Ava left feeling more unsettled than when she’d arrived.
Cheryl closed the door of her basement and leaned against it, waiting for Ava to head down the street. Her expression was sober. Dealing with Ava Garrison was always difficult, and sometimes Cheryl didn’t know if she helped or hurt her.
“Help her . . . you always help,” she reminded herself as she walked back to the room where they’d just ended their last session. A few of her cats swarmed around her feet and she smiled, then reached down to pet each head. Merlin, her long-haired stray, slipped into the next room, his gray tail twitching a bit. Cheshire, her overweight tabby, and Olive, the skittish tuxedo cat with white toes, white chest, and white whiskers splashed upon her black coat, trailed after her.
“Watch out,” Cheryl scolded as she entered the room, closed the door, and went about straightening up. She folded the blanket that had been tossed over Ava’s legs and put her notebook into a desk drawer. She blew out the candle, then snapped out the light at the doorway. The studio was instantly dark, not so much as a frail beam of light falling through the window.
Hisssss!
The sibilant sound whispered through the warren of rooms in the basement. One of her cats . . . in the hallway, from the sounds of it. Probably scared himself. “Merlin?” she called, walking to the open door where the hallway, too, was dark.
Odd.
She didn’t remember turning out the light.
“Here, kitty, kitty.” She slapped at the light switch, but nothing happened. The hairs on the back of her scalp lifted, but she told herself it was merely a burned-out bulb. “Damn.” Where were the extra bulbs? Down here and around a corner, in the utility room.
Feeling along the edge of the wall, she heard Merlin again and this time he growled, low and throaty.
Cheryl’s heart began to thud. Her nerves tightened and she told herself not to let her imagination run wild. The cat’s skittish. Always jumping at his own shadow. Remember that. Nothing to worry about. Just get the bulb for the hall fixture and grab a flashlight so that you can replace it. There’s one in the utility room over the sink—
Another growl and a hiss, then a deep yowl and the quick, soft footsteps of the cat running off. Cheryl waited, ears straining. She didn’t hear anything over the rapid-fire beating of her heart, so she ran her fingers along the wall, guiding herself, mentally walking these halls as she always did.
One foot in front of the other, her breathing a little faster than normal, she rounded a final corner to the utility room, stepped inside, and threw the switch.
Nothing.
The room, without a window, remained black.
The circuit breaker again.
This wasn’t the first time, but the damned breaker hadn’t flipped since last winter and she’d told herself she didn’t need the expense of fixing it. Now that she knew what it was, she realized the fan on the furnace wasn’t blowing any air; the basement was nearly silent.
Breathing a little easier, she rummaged in the drawer near the utility sink as the acrid smell of feline urine swept up her nose. Definite
ly time to change the litter box again. Fumbling, she found the flashlight, her fingers first encountering pencils, stain sticks, and a box cutter on which she nicked herself before grabbing the heavy cylinder. With her thumb, she pushed the switch and the flashlight’s weak beam appeared, giving only feeble light.
It would have to do.
A few more steps with the uncertain beam directed at the wall and she found the breaker box screwed into the wall opposite the dryer. This junction box had been dedicated for her set of rooms, which included her apartment on the first floor and this lower level. As she pried open the box, her bloody finger left a smudge on the metal door.
Sure enough, the main switch had blown.
Never before had this occurred. Yeah, one or two breakers had switched off, but not the main switch. What the hell? She reached up to hit the button when she felt a drop in the temperature in the room.
Just a few degrees.
And she heard some street noise, the sound of a car driving past. As if a window in the basement had been left open.
Again, the feeling of something being not quite right crawled up her spine on whispery, cold legs. She reached for the circuit breaker switch and heard the scrape of leather against cement, a footstep behind her.
No!
She threw the breaker, but it was too late. The laundry room was suddenly awash in flickering fluorescent light, the tubes throwing off a weird bluish color just as strong hands slipped around Cheryl’s throat.
Someone was choking her!
Panic invaded her body.
She tried to scream, to kick, to fight, but the steely fingers tightened and suddenly she couldn’t breathe. Heart pounding painfully, her lungs on fire, she struggled like a wild thing, flinging her fists backward, throwing her head back, kicking and flailing, to no avail. Whatever maniac had her was strong.
Determined.
Deadly.
Please, God, no!
Her lungs felt as if they would burst, and she knew her eyes were bulging, sensed the tiny veins within popping. No, no, no! This couldn’t be happening . . . not to her . . . not . . . to . . .
Blackness swam before her eyes and she was suddenly released, allowed to drop onto the floor. She gasped for breath, but the sound was a rasp, broken and wheezing, as if her larynx had been crushed. For a second she thought she might live, and then in her weakened vision, she saw the blade.
Long and deadly, glinting with malevolent intent.
Fear congealed in her brain.
Who . . . ?
The blade came down and slipped across her exposed throat. All she felt was a slight burning sensation, but as she lay dying, she knew that her attacker had left, heard the sound of footsteps fading, and then one of her cats meowed softly . . . gold eyes glowing in front of her face.
Cheshire . . . oh, sweet kitty . . .
And then there was nothing.
CHAPTER 18
Dern kept his distance.
There were just too damned many people from the island in town today. He’d seen them. Ava’s husband, Wyatt, was in town, meeting with the psychiatrist. Odd, that.
And Ian had sailed into the marina a couple of hours earlier. Spent some time in the bait shop and coffeehouse, looking as if he were waiting for someone.
And then there was Mrs. Garrison.
He’d been careful with all of them. Didn’t want anyone to know he’d been in town. Didn’t need the wrong eyes catching a glimpse of him. If a witness noticed that he was keeping Ava Garrison in his sights, it could spell trouble. Big trouble. So he’d kept to the shadows, collar up, baseball cap low over his eyes as he’d viewed her leaving the police station. He’d hung back as she’d walked to the beauty salon, then nearly missed it when she and the hairdresser, Tanya Denton, had ducked out the back entrance and hurried along an alley to have lunch at that Italian place. Nearly two hours later, she’d left her friend back at Shear Madness while she’d trudged up the hill to the hypnotist’s quarters.
Yep. Mrs. Garrison had been busy today.
By the time he’d observed her leaving Cheryl Reynolds’s hillside home, it was dark. He managed to catch up with her a bit later at the marina, though he still kept to the shadows.
Even from a distance, he could tell that she was upset as she walked beneath the streetlights, sipping from a paper cup with an emblem of a local coffee shop, her mouth pulled into a tight line.
Eventually, nearly forty minutes after leaving the hypnotist, Ava was able to catch a ride to the island by good old Butch Johansen, sea captain of the Holy Terror.
So her little foray into town was over for the day.
He watched until Johansen’s boat disappeared into the fog, and then he walked to the far end of town and down through the trees to the edge of the bay where he’d docked his small boat.
Now that it was dark, if he worked things right and his luck held, no one would know that he’d ever left the island.
“Geez, Ava, I didn’t realize you’d be so bent!” Butch cast her a sidelong glance as he helmed the Holy Terror toward Church Island.
“I thought you hated Wyatt.”
Butch was squinting into the night as the boat chugged and bounced over the choppy waters of the bay. “I don’t like him, but I don’t discriminate. I give rides to anyone, including Wyatt.” He gave her a look. “At least I didn’t marry the guy.”
She was bundled up in one of his old waterproof jackets that smelled of cigarettes and the sea. “I just thought you would have said something to me.”
“And get you all riled up?” Scowling beneath his ever-scraggly beard, he added, “You were riled enough as it was.” Another glance sent in her direction.
“Fair enough.” She was tired of fighting, tired of second-guessing, and tired of being suspicious of everyone she knew. It was exhausting.
With the boat’s engine grinding loudly, he crossed the bay, slowing near the dock at Neptune’s Gate. The second and third stories of the old mansion were dark, though lights were visible from the first floor and even the small window of Jacob’s basement apartment.
“Just so you know,” Butch said, “I’m supposed to pick up Wyatt in about an hour and bring him back to the island.”
She glanced out to the cold, dark water. “I didn’t really know when he’d be back.”
As he lashed the boat to the dock and let the engine idle, she unzipped the oversized jacket and slung it over the back of one of the seats. “Thanks,” she said, paying for the ride.
“Any time, Little Sister,” he said with a quick smile.
She headed up the stone steps leading to the front door. As she pushed open the door, she caught the scent of roast pork wafting from the kitchen and saw the door to Wyatt’s den slightly ajar. Tossing her purse onto the table in the foyer, she straightened her still-damp sweater coat before walking to her husband’s office . . . to find Jewel-Anne behind his desk, sitting in the near-dark, only the computer screen giving off any light in the room where the shades were already drawn for the evening.
At the sound of footsteps, Jewel-Anne looked up sharply and tried to maneuver away from the desk toward the door, but it was too late. One wheel got caught against the leg of Wyatt’s desk chair, which had been pushed aside.
“Busted,” Ava said softly, leaning against the door frame and crossing her arms over her chest.
“I left something here and I just wanted to see if I could find it.”
“You left something on Wyatt’s desk? Maybe dropped it on the keyboard of his computer?”
Jewel-Anne was nodding; then as her gaze met Ava’s, she gave it up. “Okay, so you caught me. I was snooping.”
“Snooping.”
“Things are . . . weird around here.”
“Really.” This from Jewel-Anne?
“I overheard you and Wyatt fighting and”—she glanced at the doorway off the front hall and lowered her voice—“I thought you should know. I heard him, too.”
“Him?” Ava froze. ?
??Wyatt?” she asked, but she knew, even before Jewel-Anne whispered the words.
“Noah. I heard the baby crying. I heard him.”
Ava’s knees quivered. Was this some trick? She pressed one palm against the top of the desk for support. “You did not.”
“Yes, I did! I heard something and it sure sounded like a baby crying to me!”
Okay, for once take this at face value. “What are you looking for on the computer?”
She shook her head. “This room is where I thought the crying was coming from.”
“No.”
“Noah’s room is right above this one,” Jewel-Anne stated flatly.
“Yes, but . . .” As she began to argue, her gaze moved to the ceiling. She pictured her son’s room directly above.
“The heat ducts.” Jewel-Anne rolled over to the space under the ceiling duct, which connected to the duct that opened into the nursery. “I remember playing here when we were kids. We would talk through the vents and try to ‘spy’ on each other.”
Ava remembered all too well the games they’d played, all the cousins, how they’d run through this house, chasing each other, playing hide-and-seek or, yes, spying on each other.
“I always tried to hear what Jacob and Kelvin were doing,” Jewel-Anne admitted. “And this was a good spot to hear what was happening upstairs.”
From the corner of her eye, Ava noticed a shadow pass near the door, but Jewel-Anne, oblivious, was still babbling on. “. . . so I thought I might look here and see if there was anything . . .”
She let her voice drift away as Ava placed a finger to her lips, silently sending a message for Jewel-Anne to be quiet. Then, as her cousin watched, Ava crept to the doorway and peeked outside.
Of course there was no one loitering in the hall. Not a soul around. Graciela’s soft humming was drifting down from the upper floor, and the sound of pots and pans rattling in the kitchen could be heard, but nothing else.
“What?” Jewel-Anne whispered, her eyes huge behind her glasses.
“Nothing. I guess. But . . . you know what? I appreciate that you’re trying to help. I’m glad that someone can confirm that I actually heard a baby crying, but you probably shouldn’t be snooping in Wyatt’s office.”