Scent of Roses & Season of Strangers

by Kat Martin

  “Sí, I think so, too. The doctor says she is going to be fine.”

  “And she will be.” Zach’s words held a note of warning. “As long as you keep her away from the house.”

  “She does not wish to stay there…not until after the baby comes.”

  Probably not even then, Zach figured, thinking of Carrie Ann and the murderers who had once lived in the house.

  Miguel returned to Maria’s room, and Zach saw Raul walking toward them down the hall, striding along beside Sam Marston, who waved a greeting.

  “Hey, Zach!”

  “Good to see you, Sam. You, too, Raul.” Raul shook his hand and so did Sam.

  The boy tipped his head respectfully. “Hello, Ms. Conners.” The earring was gone from his ear, though the tattoo below it remained, along with the one of a skull on the back of his hand.

  Elizabeth gave him a smile. “Hello, Raul.”

  “My sister…she is going to be okay. And she is moving out of the house.”

  “We know,” Zach said. “We’re damned glad to hear it.”

  Raul just nodded. “Thank you both for all you have done.”

  “This isn’t over yet, Raul. But we’re hoping it soon will be. In the meantime, you keep up the good work you’re doing at Teen Vision.”

  Sam slapped a hand on the strapping youth’s shoulder. “He’s doing great, just one more exam and he’ll have his GED. Passed the last four with flying colors.”

  “That’s terrific, Raul,” Liz said.

  He flushed a little at the praise, tilted his head toward the door to his sister’s room. “I better go in.”

  “You go ahead,” Sam said. “I’ll wait for you out here.”

  Raul disappeared into Maria’s room, and Zach turned to Sam. “I imagine you’ve heard about Maria’s ghost.”

  “Raul told me his sister says there’s one in her house. Says she’s seen it.”

  “I know it’s hard to believe,” Liz told him, “but I saw it, too, Sam.” She went on to tell him about the night she and Zach had spent in the house, then the night she had seen the ghostly apparition of the little girl in her party dress and the events that had wound up putting Maria Santiago in the hospital.

  Sam scratched his hairless head. “That’s a pretty incredible story.”

  “Totally unbelievable,” Zach agreed. “Which means there’s no way we can get a warrant to dig under the house.”

  “No kidding. You don’t think Carson will give you permission?”

  “Not likely.”

  Sam glanced both ways down the hall to be sure no one could hear. “Maybe you should just go under the house and start digging, see what turns up.”

  “So far that appears to be our only option,” Liz said.

  “I hate to do it,” Zach said. “I don’t like the idea of digging up a possible forensic site without someone in authority being present.”

  “So what will you do?”

  “I’m not sure. Carson has control of the farm, but technically the property belongs to my father. I could probably gain legal access through the courts, but after what happened to Maria, time is a major problem. We don’t want anything bad happening to her husband.”

  “You don’t actually think he might be in danger.”

  Elizabeth looked at Sam. “You weren’t there, Sam. Whatever is happening in that house, the forces unleashed are incredible. No one should have to stay in an evil place like that.”

  Sam ran a hand over his shiny dome. “This all sounds pretty far-fetched, you know.”

  “Never were truer words spoken,” Zach said.

  Sam flashed a grin. “Let me know if there’s anything I can do to help.”

  * * *

  It was dark by the time they drove out of the hospital parking lot. Both of them were tired from the exhausting weekend and fighting the Sunday night L.A. traffic all the way back to the San Joaquin Valley.

  “I’ve got to go into the office for a while in the morning,” Liz said. “I’ve got three appointments and a bunch of paperwork to do. I can probably take the afternoon off. Maybe we can figure out where to go from here.”

  Zach just nodded. Whatever they decided, two people telling the same insane story had to be better than one. He could just imagine the look on Sgt. Drury’s face if they told him they were after a warrant to search for the body of a ghost. Smiling at the thought, Zach turned the corner onto Cherry Avenue, then drove down the alley into one of the guest parking spaces behind Liz’s building.

  “Are you spending the night?” Liz asked, her pretty blue eyes on his face.

  His gaze moved over the fullness of her breasts and a shot of lust slid into his groin. He couldn’t remember wanting a woman the way he did Liz. “You all right with that?”

  She gave him a tentative smile. “I must be. I’m already starting to miss you and you haven’t even left.”

  He returned the smile, knowing exactly what she meant. When he was without her, he felt as if something were missing. It was a feeling he had never known before. He hadn’t forgotten the comment he had made when they were in bed. He was in love with her. He knew that for certain.

  He just wasn’t sure what to do about it. And he wasn’t sure the feeling was returned.

  Parking the Jeep in one of the empty spaces in the near-empty lot behind her apartment, he helped Liz out of the car then went to the back, lifted the rear door, and grabbed their bags. As he closed the door, he noticed the big overhead light that usually lit the parking spaces had burned out. He would have ignored it, except for the faint tickle of awareness raising the hair on the nape of his neck.

  “Let’s go,” he said and started walking, crossing the empty parking lot in as little time as possible, herding Liz ahead of him. The sixth sense he had developed as a punk who ran in bad company was kicking in big time, and he had learned way back then to trust it.

  They had almost made it past the tenants’ parking garage when the shadowy figure of a man stepped out in front of them. He was dressed in jeans and a black T-shirt, dark-skinned, average height, a woman’s nylon stocking pulled over his head. Liz gave a startled gasp as a second man, his appearance much the same, fell in behind them, and another appeared from out of nowhere to join the other two.

  Everything happened at once. The first man swung a punch. Zach ducked, then swung a blow that connected with his assailant’s jaw, knocking him backward, at the same time kicking out at the second man, slamming his foot hard into the man’s left knee. The man went down, sprawling onto the walkway.

  “Run!” Zach shouted to Liz, then turned to see her swinging her white leather bag like a shotput at the third man’s head. The blow smashed into his temple, careening him backward several paces.

  “Bitch!” the man roared in a heavy Spanish accent, rushing toward her. Zach drove forward to intervene, but the first man hit him a crushing blow to the jaw that knocked him sideways. From the corner of his eye, he saw Liz’s attacker grab the front of her blouse and jerk her toward him, saw him slap her roughly across the face.

  Fury engulfed him. With a guttural growl, he charged his opponent, driving him backward into the side of the tenants’ garage so hard his head snapped back, crashing into the wall and knocking him unconscious. Turning to fight the tallest of the three, he threw a hard punch to the man’s face, and a shower of blood erupted from his nose. Zach kicked him in the stomach, doubling him over, then whirled toward the man attacking Liz.

  He never saw the length of pipe swinging toward the back of his head, never heard Elizabeth’s scream. Instead, a wall of pain hit him, driving him to his knees, and darkness whirled at the edge of his vision. He saw Liz struggling, heard her shout his name and tried to reach her. Instead, a deep black pit opened up and swallowed him, and the world around him disappeared.

&n
bsp; * * *

  Night sounds roused him: the distant whine of a car, the breeze rattling the leaves on the trees next to the building. He stirred and groaned as his memory returned and he saw that Elizabeth leaned over him. Her blouse was ripped open, her slacks streaked with dirt, and there was blood on her face.

  “Zach! Zach! Are you all right?”

  He groaned again and sat up on the cement walkway holding the side of his head against the pounding in his temple. “I’m all right.” He looked up at her, reached out and touched her face, came away with a smear of blood on his fingers.

  “What about you?” He rolled to his feet and a wave of dizziness hit him. Fighting to steady himself, he reached a shaky hand into his pants pocket to pull out his cell phone. “You’re bleeding. I’m calling an ambulance.”

  “I—I’m all right, just…just shaken up a little. Oh, Zach. Those three men—I think your brother must have sent them.”

  He stiffened, swayed at a fresh round of dizziness. “What are you talking about?”

  “One of them said…” She swallowed. “He said this was only a warning. He said we had better stay out of other people’s business. If we didn’t…this was only a sample of what would…what would happen to us.”

  Then she passed out cold, and Zach caught her up in his arms.

  * * *

  Zach drove to the hospital like a madman, squealing the tires around corners, roaring through intersections, ignoring stop signs, picking up a police car in the process, which turned on its siren, commanding him to stop.

  He didn’t, of course. For the second time in the past few days, he felt frantic, desperate in a way he hadn’t been in years.

  First Maria, now Liz.

  He tilted the mirror to look at the woman lying unconscious in the backseat of his car. Outlined in the moonlight, her face looked deathly pale, and his heart squeezed hard. He pressed down on the accelerator and the Jeep squealed around a corner. If Carson was responsible…

  He clamped down on the thought. From what Liz said, it couldn’t be anyone else. The three men were all Hispanic. Migratory workers, no doubt, men Carson could pay and send on their way and no one would ever miss them. He wondered at his brother’s motive. Surely the lawsuit he had begun wasn’t enough to warrant this kind of response.

  Behind him, the police siren roared. Zach spotted the two-story brick building up ahead, San Pico Community Hospital, and his heartbeat quickened. He had used his cell to phone ahead, told them what had happened, and that he was bringing in an unconscious woman. Two men in white coats were waiting as he drove up in front of the emergency entrance, jammed on his brakes, shoved the car into Park and threw open the door.

  One of the attendants was already opening the back door on the opposite side.

  “We’ll take it from here,” he said, eyeing the blood on Zach’s clothes and the corner of his mouth. “What’s her name?”

  “Elizabeth Conners.” He looked down at her pale, still form. “I call her Liz.”

  “Listen, Liz is going to be okay. We’ll take care of her. They’re going to need you to fill out some paperwork inside. In the meantime, the best thing you can do for her is just keep out of our way.”

  He nodded, stepped back as someone wheeled up a gurney and they began to lift her out of the car. From the corner of his eye, he saw the police car pull over and park, but the cop seemed to be waiting for the attendants to finish their work before he approached. As the two men settled Elizabeth on the gurney, her face emerged from the shadows and he saw her swollen bottom lip, the purple bruise beside her eye, and rage filled him. If Carson was responsible, the son of a bitch was going to pay.

  Zach watched as the attendants wheeled her away, her thick dark hair curling wildly around her shoulders. She looked even paler than she had before and it occurred to him that she might be hurt really badly, that she might actually die.

  His stomach clenched and the bile rose in his throat. For the first time he realized what losing her would mean. What if she died? He thought of her beautiful smile and lovely blue eyes, her long legs and the sexy way she moved. He thought of her intelligence and determination. He thought of her loyalty and how much she cared about others, and the knot in his stomach went tighter.

  All his life, he had taught himself never to allow his emotions to rule him, never to let himself love anyone too much. It was simply too painful to lose them.

  But Zach had broken his lifelong rule. He had fallen in love with Liz.

  And now he might lose her.

  Zach watched the white-coated attendants wheel her through the emergency room doors, watched her disappear inside, and knew a desolation worse even than the day his mother had given him away.

  Zach turned as a wave of nausea hit him and threw up in the bushes outside the hospital door.

  * * *

  Zach wiped his mouth with his handkerchief and shoved the square of white cotton into the back pocket of his navy blue slacks. He turned and saw that the officer had stepped out of the car and was approaching him.

  “All right, buddy. Put your hands behind your back.There are speed limits, my friend, and you broke just about every one of them.”

  “Look, officer, I had to get to the emergency room. I didn’t have time to stop and explain.” He thought of Elizabeth lying pale and unconscious in a cubicle alone, hurt, maybe even dying, and started walking toward the door.

  “She’s unconscious. I don’t know how badly she’s hurt. I had to get her here quickly. If it was your…friend, I think you’d do the same.” He’d started to say wife, just to be sure he could see her, then caught himself. It was time to face the truth. He couldn’t deal with the kind of emotional attachment he felt for Liz. He’d seen that clearly tonight. He had to detach himself, bring some control back into his life.

  As soon as all of this was over, he was leaving. And he wouldn’t be coming back to San Pico for Liz.

  “What happened?” the officer asked, falling in step beside him, apparently deciding to let the matter of the broken speed limits drop.

  “We were attacked by three men behind my friend’s apartment. One of them hit me over the head with a piece of pipe. One of the others hit my friend.”

  “You sure she isn’t more than just a friend? From the blood on your face, looks to me like maybe the two of you had a fight. Maybe you’re the one who hit her. Maybe you’re the guy who put her in the hospital.”

  “I didn’t touch her. I told you we were attacked by three men. The lady’s name is Elizabeth Conners. She’s a family counselor here in Sam Pico.” He started walking faster, anxious to find out what was happening, afraid to think how badly Liz might be hurt. Whatever happened between them, he still loved her. Nothing could change that.

  He didn’t think anything ever would.

  They shoved through the glass doors into the emergency room, which was overflowing with humanity, a large percentage of the group Hispanic.

  “Elizabeth Conners,” he said to a nurse who passed through the room. “Where is she?”

  “In cubicle B. You’ll need to fill out some paperwork.”

  “Is she…is she going to be all right?”

  “You’ll have to ask the doctor. She took a pretty bad blow to the side of the head. She must have landed hard, too. Dr. Lopez says she’s got a concussion.”

  A concussion. Damn. Couldn’t something like that be deadly? “Is she awake?”

  “I think so.” The nurse walked off and left him standing there. Zach tore after her, leaving the policeman behind. He poked his head through one of the curtains, saw a white-haired old woman lying on a gurney, searched behind another curtain and saw Liz lying in one of the narrow, sheet-draped beds. He stepped inside, letting the curtain fall behind him, fighting the fear and the lump that was building in his throat.

&nb
sp; For several seconds he just watched her, silently praying, as he hadn’t done in years. Then she opened her eyes and looked at him, and a wave of relief hit him so hard his knees nearly buckled beneath him.

  “Hi…”

  He sat down in the chair next to her bed, reached out and took hold of her hand. “God, I was so worried. Are you all right? How are you feeling?”

  It took an effort for her to swallow. “I’m a little…rocky. The doctor wants to run a couple of tests…but he thinks I’m going to be all right.”

  His hand shook as he reached up and touched her face. “I’ve never been so scared in my life.”

  “I was scared, too, Zach. When I saw that man coming at you with the pipe…I thought he was going to kill you.”

  He managed to muster a smile. He ought to be the one with the concussion, but apparently he got lucky. “I’m tougher than I look.”

  “There’s blood on your face. Are you…sure you’re okay?”

  “I’m fine.” His jaw went hard. “Tomorrow I’m going out to see Carson.”

  Her fingers tightened on his. “Maybe you shouldn’t. Maybe you should just…go to the police, tell them what happened.”

  “We don’t have any proof that my brother was involved. We have no idea who those men were and by now they’re probably long gone. Carson has an endless supply of people ready to do his dirty work if the price is right.”

  Liz closed her eyes. “This is all so mixed up. I can’t make sense of any of it.”

  “I know what you mean.” He bent and pressed a kiss on her forehead. “Get some rest. Maybe tomorrow things will look better.”

  Liz nodded, but neither of them believed it.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  Elizabeth slept lightly off and on. Dr. Lopez had ordered an overnight stay for observation and scheduled a CAT scan procedure in the morning to be sure there were no serious injuries. Sometime during the night, she’d been moved into a hospital room shared by an older woman asleep in the other bed. One of the nurses gave her some Tylenol for her seemingly endless headache and the general soreness she felt all over.