The Everdon Series- the Complete Set

by L C Kincaide

  “I will end this for us all.”

  As much as she wanted to go to Mason, there was something she needed to take care of first.

  Following Brad, Jen trudged through the brambles along the western edge, but it looked the same as what she had already seen — more neglect in the form of tall grass and weeds, cracks in the mortar, and peeling window frames. What a pity to let such an imposing and once beautiful building fall to ruin. Ivy would have loved it. It was exactly the dream house she had envisioned for herself, had circumstances been different. She picked her way through the unruly vegetation and rounded the corner. Up ahead, she noticed him standing still and staring, and with her heart in her throat, she hurried toward him, afraid of what she’d find once she got there.

  “Oh my God!” She gasped.

  The second and third floors of the northwest wing were nothing more than a scorched skeleton of crumbling stones and blackened shapes jutting out of the debris, the charred remnants of wooden beams. Gone was the roof and broken shards of slate tiles lay among piles of loose stones and chimney bricks. The gaping holes that were once windows stared into eternity with blind eyes.

  “We should keep going, it’s nearly dark.” Brad suggested, grim-faced. Wordlessly, she followed as they turned the corner past the ruins. The central section between the two north-facing wings remarkably escaped the ravages of the fire, but was by no means spared the ravages of time. Like all the others, the windows here too were shuttered against the world. Undeterred, Jen pushed through the weeds and searched until she found a gap between some broken slats on the French doors and peered through the crack.

  It appeared to be an enormous room, perhaps one that would have been used for parties to entertain large groups of people. Shrouded in darkness with only slivers of light to illuminate patches, the interior was in shambles. The furniture was pushed aside and the remnants of a massive chandelier lay among the debris in the center of the devastation. Jen stepped away, anxiety gnawing at her ever more. This can’t be the place, her mind argued.

  They hurried along past the northeast wing and around the corner to a pea gravel path. Beyond a stand of bare-limbed maples, she noticed the ruins of an old hothouse, its once ornate roof caved in, the ridge cresting rusting in the dirt and tangles of dead weeds, most of its ironwork curlicues snapped off, and shattered glass panels. She didn’t want to stop anymore nor see anything else. Ivy couldn’t have been here. It wasn’t possible. By the look of things, nobody had been here in years, never mind earlier today, and somehow, that brought her a small measure of comfort. The notion that Ivy had been on the other side of these walls at any point was a terrifying prospect. There were no signs of life here.

  She caught Brad’s eye; he appeared to be thinking the same thing.

  “I don’t know.” He shrugged, shaking his head. He too was at a loss.

  “Sometimes the GPS gives only a general location. She could be in the village. It’s really not that far.” Jen suggested trying to come up with a rational explanation. “Maybe we should ask if anyone has seen her. For all we know, she could be there waiting.” Her voice reflected a strained confidence. It was a long shot, but she needed a thread of hope to cling on to.

  “Good thinking.” He agreed with guarded optimism, and they turned the corner.

  “Do you want me to drive?”

  Jen nodded, weak, shaken, and terrified for her friend. “Maybe you should.”

  Resigned, yet still holding on to hope, they progressed along the front of the building toward the car. Jen opened her mouth to speak when her foot kicked into something lying in the gravel at the edge where the grass encroached onto the drive. Frowning, she bent to see what it was. With a trembling hand she picked up a cracked cell phone with a lace patterned cover.

  “Oh, God!” She clutched the broken device, shaking uncontrollably. “NO!” She screamed and found that she couldn’t stop.

  Squaring her shoulders, Ivy took to the stairs, each one bringing her closer to her wretched foe. Gone was any semblance of fear and intimidation she had experienced earlier. There was a time she had been naïve, had refused to see what was so plain before her, so was she enraptured, and in her ignorance, she had lost it all and caused suffering to more innocents. But no longer! She paused at the entrance to the connecting corridor. The silhouette, back-lit from the gaslights in the portrait gallery, waited.

  “Come out, Victoria!” She commanded. “Come out, or I will drag you out!”

  Victoria gradually emerged from hiding, and even in her moment of culpability, she stood straight, her expression smug and defiant. She opened her mouth to speak, but only a startled yelp escaped her lips when Amelia grabbed her by the wrist and pulled her the rest of the way and out into the open. She led her toward the stairs in full view of those watching below. When she resisted, Amelia yanked again, harder this time. Victoria stumbled behind her to the bottom of the staircase, not slowing until they came to a stop beneath the skylight.

  Family and friends spanning several generations watched to see what would happen next as she considered her words. Her grasp on her foe’s wrist didn’t weaken. Finally, the moment of judgement had arrived, and she would not risk the chance of her getting away.

  For now, Victoria had ceased her protests and glanced around nervously. Though still defiant, there was an unmistakable glint of fear in the violet eyes.

  “Tell them! Tell everyone present how you used Margaret, how you, yourself set fire to the house, how you pushed her into me the night of the party and left her to take the blame for it!”

  A collective gasp broke the deep silence. Amelia avoided meeting her husband’s gaze, for she knew a storm brewed in his eyes. Like her, he had not been witness to Victoria’s role that night.

  Victoria glared back and only raised her chin in response.

  “You killed me and our child.” Amelia continued. “You took me away from my husband and everyone I love. You destroyed everything that was precious to me — to us!”

  “And I would do it again!” Victoria spat. “You were never good enough for him!”

  The words did not come to her as a surprise. It was an old story, one that began even before the two women had met. But it had become tiresome.

  “It ends now.” Amelia replied evenly. “I bear responsibility for what I have done, and finally, you shall too.” She twisted Victoria around, released her and stepped back.

  “Get out of my house, Victoria Ruskin Seabrooke! Be gone and never return!”

  A low rumbling sounded overhead and was followed by a violent slash of lightning that tore through the skylight. It didn’t shatter the glass, rather, passed through it easily as if through a thin membrane, trailing a slim column of fog. It descended toward the figure of what was once Victoria Ruskin Seabrooke.

  Victoria’s gaze swept the room. Amelia’s opinion held no more importance to her than it ever had. She regretted nothing; not her actions nor her words. She had meant everything she said now and before. Her one regret was never finding a way to persuade Mason, and she feared time had run out for them. But the grotesque coil descending on her frightened her even more.

  Reaching the floor, it found her ankles and coiled itself around her legs. To her horror, it slithered up her writhing body, and when she opened her mouth to scream, a tendril of the milky vapor detached and muffled her screams. Within seconds, it had wrapped itself around her head, and her struggling form was enveloped in the twisting coil. In a burst of iridescence, the enwrapped figure of Victoria Seabrooke dispersed into the air.

  The fog that hung in a thick and heavy sheet above the skylight broke apart and gathered into clumps and allowed a full moon sailing in the waning twilight to peek through. Moments later, the fleecy clouds themselves dissipated, and a brilliant beam of light flooded the central hall.

  The veil lifted and joy and deli
ght replaced the melancholy that had clouded their reality. Shimmering tendrils sought them out, one at a time and drew them into its brilliance. The former captives of Everdon Manor stepped forward free, no longer doomed to remain trapped in the dreary existence they had endured for so long.

  Still dressed in their finest evening attire, Lucy and George led the pairs to the ballroom that awaited them in its original splendor. The chandelier once again gleaming in the center of the high ceiling, the party they were promised was beginning and already cheerful banter emanated from beyond the open double doors. Only the two of them remained in the central hall.

  The woman who embodied Amelia and Ivy turned to Mason, no longer confused by the revelations, nor burdened by the anguish of the past. Her longings for a bygone era and all she had experienced in her life had brought her to this moment. She too was free, and everything that mattered was within her reach. She was finally home.

  Mason took her hands in his, raised them to his lips and gently brushed the tops of her fingers as he had done a thousand times before. “I always knew you’d come back to me.” His eyes smiled into hers. “We’ll have our chance yet.”

  ~*~

  THE END

  Return to Everdon Manor

  Book 2

  ~*~

  Believing themselves safe, they couldn’t be more wrong...

  At the party year ago, Ivy Wylmot vanished without a trace, and since her disappearance, Emma still has no peace.

  While everyone else moves on with their lives, Emma suffers from a recurring nightmare of Ivy calling for help to free her from her entrapment in the old manor.

  For months, she tries to push the nightmares aside until those who were present during the party start to fall victim to bizarre and unexplained accidents.

  Compelled to take action, Emma realizes that she can no longer ignore the call. She must find a way to help the desperate and angry spirit of her friend to save those she loves from more harm, even if it means returning to Everdon Manor on her own.

  But is the tortured spirit really that of her friend, or is it something devious from a darker past that wants to lure the last Everdon back for its own purpose?

  ~*~

  AFTERMATH

  MONDAY

  TUESDAY

  WEDNESDAY

  THURSDAY

  FRIDAY

  SATURDAY

  SUNDAY

  AFTER THE WEEKEND

  AFTERMATH

  ~*~

  “What was he doing here again?” Emma asked suspiciously as soon as she set foot into Elinor’s living room.

  She had spotted the stoop-shouldered, sharp-featured detective as she was parking her car and waited for him to drive away before getting out. He had no doubt come on yet another mission to ferret out whatever he was hoping to find, and having already endured a session under his hawkish scrutiny, she was loath to repeat it. She would, in all likelihood, become his prime suspect given her guilty conscience.

  Elinor Everdon-Stuart reclined in one of her comfortable armchairs and gazed at a pleasing view of the sun-dappled harbor.

  “It’s that Jen person. She simply won’t let up. First, she files a Missing Persons Report, and as if that weren’t enough, she now insists they take a detection dog to the manor.” At least the odious detective had manners to not refer to the animal as a cadaver dog!

  “What? Out there? Seriously?”

  Elinor nodded. “Oh, yes, he was quite adamant. I can’t imagine what he hopes to find. Does he suppose we have hidden the body inside?” She sniffed with disdain. “There is nothing there, nor is there any reason for him to look. But no one can tell him that!” She emphasized “him” in equally disdainful tones.

  That an investigation was taking place vexed her enormously, especially when she had been so meticulous in leaving no connection between the family and Ivy Wylmot. Her housekeeper, Esther had paid cash for the young woman’s train ticket, which left neither trail nor witnesses outside of the usual gathering to her. That ensured no evidence existed of her ever having been to the area. She had taken similar precautions with each guest preceding her.

  “Oh, my God!” Emma plopped down into the opposite chair. There was no end to this. Of course, the woman couldn’t accept her friend’s disappearance. She, herself being a witness was having a hard enough time.

  “Don’t worry. I’ll send Matthew to let them in. Once they see the look of things, they’ll realize they have embarked on nothing more than a wild goose chase.”

  “Are you sure?”

  Elinor turned to face her daughter. “Yes. I am sure.” She said decisively. “And God willing after that, they will leave us alone. It never occurred to me there would be so much bother afterwards.”

  Bother? “Did you think Ivy had no friends who would miss her?” Emma asked incredulous. Sometimes she wondered about her mother and if she had a heart at all, or even a conscience.

  “I was her friend, and I miss her!” She shot to her feet and crossed the room to the bar suddenly feeling in need of a drink.

  “It’s a bit early for that, don’t you think, dear?” The carefully pencilled eyebrows drew together.

  Ignoring the tone and the implied rebuke, Emma poured a glass of wine. Two weeks after the Weekend, and the days she was tipsy far outweighed the days she was not. The price of being an Everdon, she supposed, was living with guilt — hers and that of her predecessors. She would curse them all, but good ‘ole Mason Everdon beat her to it in 1903, and here they were. At least wine took the edge off.

  “I would rather not have you admitted to one of those rehabilitation institutions.”

  “It’s called, rehab, mum.” Emma rolled her eyes, her back turned. Why had she come?

  “Can I assume the inmates are alcoholics, or are they referred to by another name?”

  Several names came to mind, and she was about to remark on that, but Elinor, phone already in hand, was calling Matthew. Emma picked up her glass and headed to her old room instead. Maybe here she’d have a dreamless night. In her own bed, the nightmare replayed itself regularly. She would be alone in the portrait gallery standing before the painting of Amelia. Then Ivy’s voice would call to her first from one end of the hallway, then the other. Each time she followed the plaintive calls though Ivy was nowhere to be seen. Sometimes Ivy was crying, at other times she screamed her name in anger. Halfway down the hall, Emma reconsidered and returned for the bottle.

  ~*~

  “Why do you have to go? It’s a horrible, dangerous place. Promise me you won’t go in.” Rachel wrung her hands. For a few blissful days, she actually believed her husband was free of the annual ordeal of having to participate in the bizarre family tradition of the Weekend, as they referred to it. Everdon Manor was ominous at best. Terrible things lived there, apart from the rodents in the cellars.

  “Don’t worry, babe. Has anything ever happened to me?” He gave her his most reassuring smile, which she promptly dismissed.

  “This is different. A woman disappeared into thin air. I don’t want you to be next.”

  He circled his arms around her waist. “Nothing will happen to me.” He kissed her lightly on the forehead.

  He loved his wife, but she worried too much, especially after the night she held her séance in the manor. Dark-haired and dark-eyed, she was a gypsy in appearance, which is what drew him to her, but in reality, the event had left her terrified. She never went back, and he’d been on his own keeping his mother and sister company since.

  Her eyes darkened to nearly black. “Don’t be condescending, Matt!” She twisted away from him. “I’m not stupid. Something is in there and it’s not Casper, the friendly ghost!”

  He started to say some words of reassurance, but she took a step forward, silencing him. “I know
everyone had a good laugh the night I held the séance, but nobody’s laughing now, are they? Like I said, a woman is missing and unless she escaped and was eaten by wild animals, she is somewhere in that house, trapped, would be my guess. After everything that’s gone on, why do you think you are magically immune and nothing can happen to you? Maybe your mother is okay with all of it. She seems happy enough, and Emma? Has she had a sober day since?”

  Rachel trembled before him in either rage or fear; probably a toxic combination of both. While she had a point, the situation itself defied logic. Normal families didn’t live under a curse for generations and never had to contend with angry spirits making demands on pain of death. No one had forgotten about George Langstone and his fatal crash after defying the terms laid down by their ancestor.

  As if reading his mind, another spooky aspect of his wife, Rachel drove her point home.

  “And what about your cousin, George? He pissed off the resident spook and got himself killed!”

  Matthew’s shoulders slumped in defeat. It was no use. Once his wife started, there was no stopping her and to continue, risked his own life becoming a unique kind of misery without the help of Everdon spirits and curses. To make matters worse, her indignation spent, was hunched over and crying into her hands. Taking a chance on Rachel pushing him away, he embraced her again.