Murder at Sunrise Lake

by Feehan, Christine

  She sat up slowly, a little surprised to find that her body didn’t want to cooperate. Her muscles felt heavy and battered. Bailey pressed close and she hugged the Airedale to her, grateful to the loyal animal. She could always count on the dog for companionship and protection. Bailey would have plunged into the icy lake after her had she stayed down too long. He’d done it before when she’d rolled her canoe. He hadn’t even hesitated.

  She dressed in fleece-lined leggings and a long sweater. Sam had left her fur-lined boots he’d found in her tent. She wore them at night to stay warm when she walked Bailey. Standing slowly, she was disconcerted to realize how unsteady she still was. Sam was sprawled in a camp chair by the fire, and the aroma of coffee hit her as she came up beside him and the warmth of the crackling flames.

  Stella reached for the coffeepot. Nothing smelled so good as coffee in the morning, especially now, when she was freezing and maybe a little scared. Well, a lot scared. Okay, terrified. Her cheekbone throbbed where the killer’s fist had connected with her face, and right under her breasts, where he’d kicked her, her abdomen ached. Her skin burned and her muscles hurt. Thawing out might not be all it was cracked up to be.

  Sam casually pulled the coffeepot out of her reach and indicated the camp chair he’d placed facing him. “Sit and tuck the blanket around you. You can have coffee when you’re settled.” He poured some of the ambrosia into a mug.

  She couldn’t take her eyes off the rich, dark liquid. In fact, she wanted it so much she didn’t even scowl at him for being so bossy. She just meekly dropped into the chair and pulled the blanket around her.

  Sam handed her the mug with a slight shake of his head. “You really are a terrible addict.”

  “I know. There’s no hope for me.” She wasn’t going to lie. She loved coffee. She was a coffee snob. In town, Shabina made the best coffee, but Stella was very, very good at making her own coffee. She’d learned out of necessity. “I don’t even care, and I hope I never recover.”

  Sam gave her a little half smile as he gestured toward the lake. “Someone just tried to kill me and you knew it was going to happen.” His voice was gentle. There was no accusation. No judgment. Just a statement of fact.

  That was so like Sam. Stella took a sip of coffee, blinking rapidly to clear her vision of the sudden blurring, and looked out over the lake. The capricious wind had died down and the surface looked like a deep sapphire gemstone blazing with beauty as the early morning sun shone down on it.

  “You’re going to have to trust someone, Stella. It may as well be me. I told you I would do certain things for you I would never do for anyone else, and I meant that, but you have to talk to me. I can’t help you if you don’t let me in.”

  “I don’t know how. I don’t know where to start.”

  “Look at me, Stella.”

  She’d almost gotten him killed. She’d been so selfish, wanting her night off, thinking she could set up her camping site and no one would go fishing. The killer wouldn’t have a target. Instead, she’d set up Sam to be the killer’s victim. She’d done that. Delivered him right into the murderer’s hands.

  “I could have lost you,” she whispered. Tears tracked down her face. She couldn’t stop crying when she normally never showed weakness to anyone anymore. She knew better. She’d learned that at an early age. “I almost got you killed.”

  “Look at me, Stella,” he repeated. There was no change in his voice. Not in the volume. If anything, the tone was softer, but there was a firmness to it, that absolute implacability that told her he wouldn’t stop until he had his way.

  She forced herself to lift her wet, spiky lashes. His features were hard, unreadable, all angles and planes, but his eyes held a gentleness at odds with the ruthless lines carved into his tough features. Her stomach did some serious somersaulting. Roller coasters had nothing on the performance going on. And her heart … serious melting.

  She didn’t trust. That was a given. She had reason not to. Real reasons. How had Sam, over the last two years, slipped under her guard? How had they gotten to this point?

  “I wasn’t knocked out. When I felt the tug on my line, I knew something was off. I saw you running toward the lake. It didn’t take a rocket scientist to put two and two together that you decided on this camping spot for a reason. You didn’t want anyone fishing here, did you?”

  She couldn’t look away from his gaze no matter how much she wanted to. She shook her head.

  “I felt someone grab my ankles and yank, so I let them take me under. The blow to my head stunned me, but didn’t knock me out. I had my knife, sweetheart. No one was going to kill me. I don’t die so easy.”

  She let her breath out. If she had just stayed out of it, Sam might have killed him, or at least subdued the potential murderer, and it would all be over. She’d rushed in to save him and now the killer was on the loose.

  “That just makes it worse. Now he’s out there and he’s going to kill someone else. He’ll keep killing. He isn’t going to be easy to stop. I’m sorry, Sam. I didn’t realize you’d come out here. I thought if we left the tents here, no one would come to this spot to fish. Both Denver and Bruce were drinking last night and they’re the only ones that I know of who really come to this spot to fish.”

  She rubbed her pounding temples. First her left one and then right. She took another sip of coffee. “I really am sorry.”

  “There’s no need, Stella. Just talk to me. Look at your lake. Drink your coffee and know that you can trust me. Talk to me.” He indicated the lake.

  Stella took a deep breath and inhaled the Sierras. The fresh morning mountain air. The campfire. Sam. Bailey. Even the smell of her friends’ tents. She looked around her at the sheer beauty of her chosen home. The magnificence of it. The trees and colors. Sunrise Lake.

  She moistened her lips. “I wish I would sound sane, but I’m not going to, so I haven’t decided how I can say this to you and make you believe me.” She was as truthful as she could be.

  Stella kept her gaze on the lake’s surface as the colors went from those beautiful shades of purple to various shades of red. She glanced up to the sky. Clouds had drifted, just little lacy formations, nothing threatening. White and gray, they took shapes in the sky. Little fingers of fog crept from the mountains, emerging from the trees, coming toward the lake in strange ghostly arrows of fine mist. Was that some sort of portent? Did she even believe in things like that?

  “Stella, you’re as sane at it gets. Talk to me.”

  She opened her mouth twice to tell him because she really needed to share. It wasn’t like Sam talked to anyone. She closed her mouth both times and shook her head. He didn’t say anything encouraging. He just waited in silence. A fish jumped and plopped back in the water close to the reeds jutting out of the water by the rocks where Sam had been pulled under. If Stella looked close enough, she’d swear she could see a smear of blood on one of the rocks. Her stomach rebelled. She put her coffee cup down and wrapped her arms around her middle.

  “I think there’s blood on that rock, Sam.” She whispered it.

  “Most likely, Stella. We’ll have to show the sheriff. We have to report this.”

  She closed her eyes. She knew he was right. This was going to be a storm she wouldn’t get out of. “I sometimes have nightmares.”

  That was such a great start. Nightmares. She had seen hell in Sam’s eyes on more than one occasion and she was fairly certain he knew what real nightmares were.

  “I’ve only ever had these kinds of nightmares a couple of other times in my life. I was four the first time. Four. Five. Six years old. The nightmares were in fragments at first, but then as I got older and the dreams were more frequent, they would be in more detail. By the time I was seven, I could see the details enough to draw them and write some of them down.”

  She frowned, trying to think of a way to explain. “I didn’t realize at first, because I was a child, but the dreams came in a five-day pattern. The first day I would see a small
glimpse of a scene as if a clip of a movie or video was playing. Each night the lens would open wider. I was actually seeing a serial killer murder a victim. I would never see the killer, only the setting and sometimes enough of the victim to identify him or her.”

  She buried one hand in Bailey’s fur, needing the comfort of the Airedale. Bailey responded by shoving his big head in her lap. She could feel Sam’s eyes on her, but she didn’t look at him. She had to find a way to tell him this in her own way.

  “Usually, two days after each nightmare, someone would be murdered in the way I would see it in my dream. I was a little girl and had no idea the nightmares were coming true. I told my mother, but she never told me they were coming true. Later, when I asked her why she didn’t go to the police, she told me no one would take the word of a child and she didn’t want to turn our lives upside down.”

  Stella rubbed her hands on her legs. She braced herself to look at Sam. To see the condemnation there. The killings had spanned four years. There had been a lot of murders in that time. She should have known Sam would never have judged that little girl. His features showed no emotion. He was all planes and angles, that dark masculinity that whispered he had his own stories to hide.

  “My mother wasn’t telling the truth. I would tell her”—she lowered her voice even more—“Mommy, Daddy’s doing the bad thing again. She would get so angry with me. She didn’t want me to say that. Or tell anyone. We were very well off and she had so many friends, luncheons to attend, tennis games to play. She couldn’t be bothered with nightmares that couldn’t be real, even if she knew they were. She fired my nanny so I wouldn’t talk to anyone about Daddy doing the bad thing again.”

  Stella looked down at her hands. “All those lives that maybe could have been saved over those years. The cops most likely wouldn’t have listened to a little kid, but maybe one of them might have. My mother started drinking. I was seven when one of my tutors listened to me and took me to the police department. Eventually, my father was caught. My mother drank herself to death. By that I mean she committed suicide. After the media circus died down and there was no one willing to come forward to take the daughter of a serial killer, I was put into foster care.”

  Sam didn’t offer sympathy and she was grateful. She buried her fingers deep into Bailey’s fur and kept her gaze on the mist. With the sun in the sky, the wisps of fog had turned from the gorgeous lavender to slashes of crimson, so it looked as if blood spilled in rake marks across the surface of the lake. What should have been beautiful made her shiver. Those arrows of mist looked as if they’d been dipped in blood.

  She wasn’t going to share that with him. She ran a multimillion-dollar resort because she was level-headed and detail oriented, not fantasy driven. The nightmares were screwing with her head.

  “Things were okay for a few years, but then when I was sixteen, I started having nightmares again. They started the same way. Mommy, Daddy’s doing the bad thing again. I would always hear myself say that very distinctly and then I’d see a part of the murder. Each night a little more would come to me. The fifth night I’d see the murder and then I wouldn’t dream. A couple of nights later, I’d hear of a murder committed that exact way. I’d read about it or see it on the news.”

  She pressed her fingers to her mouth. Her hand was shaking. She was suddenly the scared teenager, knowing if she went to the police the circus would start all over again. If she didn’t go, she might be responsible for others losing their lives. She didn’t want the notoriety. She detested the spotlight.

  Stella forced air through her lungs, remembering how difficult it had been to make that decision. “I didn’t want to tell anyone, but I felt guilty that people were dying, and maybe by revealing the dreams, I might save lives, so I went to the police. They laughed at me. I was actually happy that they did, but the murders kept happening. My nightmares kept happening. My foster mother was very compassionate and she put me in counseling. I wanted to believe everyone, that the murders were triggering the nightmares because of my father, but I knew better. I was seeing murders before they actually happened.”

  Stella sighed and picked up her coffee, took a few sips, grateful for her favorite outdoor to-go mug that kept coffee hot forever. “Eventually, the FBI came to me and asked me all sorts of questions. My foster mother and my counselor both were with me and they insisted the FBI promise to keep me out of it. The agents had me draw details of each of my dreams. They told me when I had a new one to contact them and start detailing everything I could remember. The serial killer was caught and the FBI did try to keep me out of it, as they promised. Unfortunately, my identity was leaked and it was too good a story to pass up for the media. My name was everywhere.”

  She stole a quick look at him. Sam was looking out over the lake, and the air she’d been holding in her lungs left in a rush. He could be counted on, just like the Sierras. Her place of peace. Her rock. The world might be crashing down around her, but he was steady. Quiet. Confident. The same.

  “Eventually, I inherited a large trust fund. There was enough money for me to live however I wanted. I legally changed my name. I got my degree and eventually ended up here. I loved this resort, hired on as manager and turned it around with a lot of hard work. The owner was older and wanted to sell. I made him an offer and bought four years ago, although we didn’t tell anyone at the time. I don’t like anyone knowing my business.”

  Sam was silent for so long she wasn’t certain he would say anything. He drank his coffee, looking out over the lake, processing what she’d told him. His gaze shifted to her face. “The nightmares started up again.”

  She nodded. “They did.”

  “That was why you weren’t getting any sleep and you snapped at Bernice.”

  “That still isn’t a good excuse, Sam. I did apologize to her.” If she hadn’t … She blinked back tears and sipped at her coffee. “I couldn’t believe a serial killer was here in our beautiful home. He’s going to make his kills look like accidents. The first is supposed to be a fisherman. I knew I had one or two days to find the kill spot so I drove around looking like mad. It was pure luck that I found this spot, since it’s secluded and no one really comes here that often.”

  “You had a nightmare that ugly five nights in a row, Stella, and you didn’t even mention it to Zahra?”

  She pressed her fingers to her mouth and shook her head, keeping her eyes on his chest. “If I told her, I’d have to tell her everything,” she whispered. “Sam, you wouldn’t have been here if it hadn’t been for me.”

  “That’s not the kind of thinking that’s going to do us any good, sweetheart. If we’re going to catch a serial killer, we’re going to have to get out in front of him. Worrying about whether or not you forced me to go fishing when no one has ever forced me to do anything is kind of ridiculous, don’t you think?”

  “I didn’t see any part of him,” Stella confessed. “Nothing that would help me identify him. I was so focused on getting to you that I didn’t think to even look at his equipment. The water was murky because the bottom had been stirred up and it was difficult to see. I was cold and terrified I wasn’t going to get to you in time. I didn’t even think to wear a knife.”

  “He knows about this fishing spot, but a lot of those who come here year after year know all the best fishing spots. When anyone goes to the bait shop and asks, Roy gives them a map of the various spots and even marks how to get to them,” Sam reminded.

  “That’s true,” Stella conceded. She hadn’t thought of that. “He was wearing a wet suit and swimming in the lake, which means he at least knows his way around it somewhat. If he’s local, what would trigger him to start killing?”

  “If you hung out with the FBI, you probably know more than I do. My guess would be serial killers kill for a variety of reasons. Anger. Thrills. Money. Even power. Sex. Sometimes it could be seeking attention. That to me all sounds logical enough, but then are serial killers logical? Who the hell knows?”

  Stella scow
led at the lake. Her beautiful lake. “Whoever thought up this murder went to a lot of trouble to make it appear an accident. We’re in a secluded spot. He donned scuba gear and swam under ice-cold water and carried out an elaborate scheme in order to fool the ME, the sheriff and everyone else.”

  “To be a serial killer, which he would have to be to trigger your nightmares, means he plans on carrying out more than one murder, right?” Sam mused.

  She nodded. “I don’t get nightmares every time someone is murdered. I have to be in very close proximity to a serial killer. This has only happened twice before this.”

  “If he wants the murders to look like accidents, we can rule out attention seeking and sex as motivators.”

  “Denver always fishes here with Bruce. It’s their favorite spot. He inherited a great deal of money. When I say a great deal, I mean millions. More than millions. Enough that someone may want to kill him for that money.”

  Again, Sam was quiet, turning that information over and over in his mind. “If Denver is the target, he would be a single target. Our murderer wouldn’t be a serial killer.”

  “Unless he wanted to cover his tracks by making it look as if Denver was one of many if the so-called accidents were discovered,” Stella pointed out. She felt that was a little too far in left field, but who knew what went on in the mind of a killer? “I’m just glad Denver and Bruce were both drinking last night.”

  She looked up at him and smiled, realizing she was warm again and had coffee. Her dog was right there and even the colors in the lake were once again beautiful and nonthreatening. She had Sam to talk things over with.

  Sam shook his head. “Woman.”

  “Man.” The smile faded from her face. “I don’t want to count on you, Sam, and then have you disappear. It would be better never to start anything and just let me figure it out on my own than to let me lean on you and you pull out when I think you’re going to be here.”