Echoes Through the Mist: A Paranormal Mystery (The Echoes Quartet Book 1)

by K. Francis Ryan

  Without looking at her, Julian transmitted his thoughts. “I do not know another way. Feel the words I don’t trust myself to say.”

  Ailís’ eyes went large and fear paralyzed her. His lips did not move, but she heard the words all the same.

  “Do you understand?”

  The doctor nodded her head slowly once and stared at him, her breathing short and sharp.

  He continued, “You said before, ‘for the sake of any feelings I may have once had for you.’ Just now you said that I loved you once. I never stopped loving you, Ailís. Never. I can’t ever stop. Don’t you understand that? Can’t you see it?”

  Ailís stood up next to Julian. She took his face gently in her hands, looked into his tortured gray eyes and asked, “Julian, will you help me build a future? Can you do that for me?”

  Julian looked at the stack of papers on the floor. There sat the letter he had carried with him and inside of him for so long. He recalled what Bridget had said early on – ‘You have a letter. Destroy it now for your own good and that of others. It is poisonous and it will keep you from what you want most.’

  He understood, he knew, he felt it – all of his decisions had led him inexorably to what he wanted most. He leaned down, wadded up the letter and tossed it into the fire.

  The words that entered Ailís’s mind were clear and calm and tender. They carried with them a quiet strength and absolute assurance. “No, my love, but I can do it with you and for us.”

  Her knees buckled and she fell heavily against him. He guided her gently until she straddled the bench in front of him. Together they sat looking into the fireplace. They sat in silence and watched the paper burn, curl to gray-black ash and disappear.

  Chapter Twenty-nine

  Ailís let her shoulders drop and she leaned into him so that her back rested against his chest. She needed to be near him. She needed to feel he was close behind her with his strength and his vast capacity for tenderness.

  She pushed back again and reached for his hand. She looked at the badly bruised knuckles and the healing skin.

  She whispered, “I am sorry. It is very little, I know. I was frightened and took the coward’s way out. I said no to your love when all I wanted to say,” she lifted his hand to her cheek and then to her lips, “was to say yes.”

  His arms encircled her, wrapping her in a blanket of gentle warmth. Ailís groaned softly and said again the only word Julian wanted to hear, “Yes.”

  Her head rolled back and rested against his shoulder. How long they sat staring into the depth of the fire, neither knew. Her breath caught as she felt his lips close to her ear.

  He said gently, “Ailís?”

  “Yes?”

  “I don’t know if it’s a good time, but as for you being my doctor, you’re fired.”

  “Good,” she smiled. “That saves me the trouble of firing you as my patient.”

  “Ailís,” he whispered after a moment’s pause. “I have a confession.” This, she felt was an odd time for confessions.

  “Do you remember the first time I ever saw you? Do you remember that day when you were so angry? It was right here in this room.”

  She smiled and nodded. “Well,” he went on, “the first time I set eyes on you I…”

  Her breathing had picked up. “You? You what?”

  “Well, I looked at you and had – impure thoughts.” She could hear the smile in his voice and she knew lines of mischievousness would be gathering around the corners of his eyes. “The nuns told me that kind of thing would happen, but I didn’t believe them.”

  Her smile turned to a chuckle, then to a laugh. It was such a release that she sagged back further against his bare chest and laughed until tears ran down her cheeks. His arms closed more tightly around her making it difficult for her to breathe. With all of her strength carried off, all she wanted at that moment was to be held in this man’s arms.

  At last, when she could speak again she said, “Yes, I know. You had, what should I call it, an impressive display of sinfulness. I didn’t want to of course, but I noticed and had immodest thoughts of my own. Just think what Father Fahey would say and Sister Eugenia would be scandalized!”

  With his lips touching her left ear, Julian whispered, “Ailís?”

  There was something slow and seductive in his voice that caused her breathing to quicken again.

  “Yes?” was her tight reply.

  Julian could feel the heat generated by her body penetrate her silk blouse and warm his chest. He touched his fingertips gently to her shoulders and moved slowly down her arms. His fingers traced the outline of her muscles under the sleeves of her blouse. Past her wrists to the backs of her hands, he moved with agonizing slowness and began to trace over her delicate web of bones and muscles and tendons. His fingers moved easily between hers.

  “What do you think we should do to counteract our earlier sinfulness?” She could feel his tongue touch her earlobe.

  “Well,” she said in a high strained voice, “I suppose I could pray.”

  Julian removed his intertwined fingers from hers and his hands moved to the outside of her thighs. Her entire body became rigid when his fingers moved slowly over her thighs to her hips and then to her waist. Ailís exhaled a ragged breath slowly and completely.

  Julian felt the deep rumble that escaped her lips. It communicated her feeling of stark anticipation and matched his intense need for her. “Oh, Jaysus,” came her answer through clenched teeth as she lowered her left shoulder and tilted her head to the right giving him full access to her slender neck.

  Julian began kissing her shoulder and trailed kisses back to her ear where he whispered, “Are you sure I’m not distracting you from your prayers?”

  “Well, yes but it is helping me to come up with some new prayers so don’t stop now.”

  His arms tightened around her again. He leaned down and gently kissed the side of her neck. She murmured again the brief prayer lovers always murmur, “Oh God, yes.”

  For Ailís, for Julian, the past faded into the mist and their future became linked in that moment. Both understood that their past was a memory to be learned from and that the future might never come. Each understood the priceless quality of the one perfect moment in which they both existed. Each kiss, each movement, each unique moment they shared was imbued with a sacred quality and a crystal clarity neither of the lovers had experienced before.

  Ailís disentangled herself from Julian and stood silhouetted by the fire. He rose with her, took her face in his hands and looked deeply into her eyes.

  Julian smiled and said, “You understand the world will never be the same for us.”

  “I understand now that the world changed for both of us the moment I left Dublin, the moment you left New York and along the way at a thousand different points in time.” She placed her hands behind his neck, drew him down to her and slowly, gently and without trepidation, without hesitation, without reservation, she kissed him.

  ***

  Sister Eugenia sat in her office and waited with Sister Gertrude sitting in a side chair acting as witness. The older nun prayed to be given the strength to suppress her anger. She had put off this interview with Bobby McMaster and his father because she felt her rage would boil over onto the pair and scald them to death.

  She looked up as she heard the approach of heavy work boots coming down the hall. A light knock and the smiling face of Liam McMaster came around the door.

  Sister Eugenia was dumbfounded. “What can this man find to be grinning at?” she thought. The nun did not speak, but simply pointed to the chairs that faced her desk. McMaster entered and sat down and still the smile did not leave his face.

  “Where is your son, Mr. McMaster?” Sister Eugenia asked.

  “Well, Sister, it sits like this. After the beatin’ Oi gave the boy he was in no real condition to be out visiting. He’ll be missing more then a few days of his schooling and that’s a fact. Took me belt to him Oi did and make no mistake,” McMaster
replied with equanimity. “The boy did a wicked thing and he needed to be punished.”

  Sister Eugenia looked at her hands and found they were shaking with rage. She folded them on her desk, looked at a bewildered Sister Gertrude and looked back at McMaster.

  “Is it that you do not appreciate the gravity of the situation because you are ill informed or are you as monumentally stupid as you seem?” she said in tones so quiet McMaster had to strain to hear.

  “Do you realize what your son has done? Do you realize why? Have you any idea what his actions say about him – and you? You do know he is not coming back to school here not now, not ever.”

  “Ach, but Sister, the boy was having a bit of fun and it went too far is all. Oi’ve talked to him about it and, as Oi’ve said, Oi already beat some sense into him. You’ll not have any trouble with him again. In fact, when we’re done with our business, Oi’m going to see Sean Maher, if he’s sober,” McMaster winked. “I’ll give him a bit of money to go buy that boy of his – the simple one – a new little doggie.”

  Sister Eugenia rocketed out of her chair causing McMaster to sit back so fast he nearly overbalanced and fell to the floor. “Listen to me you disgusting creature. You are under the impression this is a small matter. It is not. Your son has an illness.

  “I am sure there are lower forms of life on this earth, but right now I can not think of a single one lower than you. But it is lucky for you that I am a nun for if I were not I would never warn you about going to see Sean Maher. If your paths crossed just now, you would not be getting up. I tell you this not to save your skin, but to keep Sean out of the dock charged with capital murder.

  “Now get out of my sight. I have people to contact. People in the Government who are charged with providing the type of help your son will be receiving. Are you somewhat hard of hearing, McMaster? Get out now!”

  “Sister,” Sister Gertrude said looking frightened and coming toward Sister Eugenia.

  “Sit,” Sister Eugenia said with a voice that brooked no further discussion.

  “Look now, you’ve no right to be talking to me all bold like you have!” McMaster shouted.

  “Don’t tempt me,” Sister Eugenia growled. “Get out and do it now without another word.”

  The farmer rose saying, “If you wasn’t a nun Oi’d…”

  “You would do what, you worm!” the nun exploded. “Take your belt to me too? Well, I would be imploring you to do just that and be quick about it because it is the last thing you will ever attempt to do. You little gobshite, you had better pray God gets to you first. If He does not, trust I will sort you out myself and there is not a bit of it you will like.

  “I need not worry though. A time is coming for you, boyo. You are known, you quisling, and you can believe scores will be settled and soon.”

  Liam McMaster was shaken not so much by the nun’s words as by her venom. After weighing the risks and the absence of any possible rewards to be found in striking her, he opted for a hasty departure.

  As the door to her office slammed shut, Sister Eugenia sat down heavily in her chair. Sister Gertrude came and stood beside the older nun and put a hand on her mentor’s shoulder.

  Sister Eugenia reached up and touched the hand of the younger woman. Straightening herself and exhaling deeply Sister Eugenia said, “Well now, that did not go nearly as badly as it could have.

  “I’m sorry I barked at you, Gertrude. I hope you will forgive me – and pray for me for I will not be doing any praying for that animal. There is only one thing for which I am truly sorry. I am sorry God didn’t strike Liam McMaster stone cold dead. I would have in His place.”

  ***

  A thin, pale man with cold dead eyes sat in a lifeless house and dreamed of a future in which he could buy the life he wanted, the life he deserved. He didn’t know exactly what that life would be, but he knew it wouldn’t be anything like the life he had endured to date. The Pale Man looked up before the knock on his study door.

  “Farmer McMaster to see you, Sor,” the butler announced from the doorway. The Pale Man pulled a face, rolled his eyes and opened his desk’s bottom drawer.

  “Tell him to come in.”

  A red-faced McMaster entered and approached. “They’re on to me!” he said.

  “Stay right were you are,” the Pale Man said. “I like you better at a distance. So, whoever they are, are on to you. And that would be any of my concern because…?”

  “Yor honor’s business will be in jeopardy,” McMaster said flatly.

  The Pale Man smiled his cold smile as he watched the farmer cry out as he collapsed to the carpet clutching his legs. They had gone numb from the knees down and he could feel the paralysis moving inexorably higher. “Yor honor! Please!” McMaster begged.

  The Pale Man’s face was a malicious mask. He said, “I’ve told you before you don’t know my business, so how could anything you do or say put me or my plans at risk? It simply isn’t possible. Surely, you see that. In the grand scheme of things, you, McMaster, are exactly no one.

  “You are an insignificant creature who would inform on his mates for two pence apiece. I do believe you would sell your mother to the highest bidder – that is assuming you knew who she was or was it your father whom you didn’t know. Refresh my memory,” the Pale Man goaded and continued.

  “You’ve lost all feeling below your waist by now and it’s climbing higher. Soon your lungs will stop working and I’ll be able to watch you suffocate. Remember Donny Pearce, the one who shot his mouth off in the pub? I rather liked popping his head like a balloon. You were there, do you remember the look on his face? A priceless memory, don’t you think? Your death promises to be far more entertaining, well, for me anyway,” the Pale Man said.

  “Still, McMaster, killing like this, although entertaining, well, it isn’t very satisfying. I would like to perform an experiment.” The paralysis stopped at mid chest and feeling started to return to the farmer’s body.

  “You see, although you knew you were dying, you still had the insane hope you wouldn’t. I would like to remove that hope.” The Pale Man reached into his bottom drawer and came out from behind his desk. A short-barreled side-by-side shotgun hung easily from his hand.

  McMaster fear turned to abject horror. He tried to crawl away, but was rooted to the spot. The Pale Man crouched in front of his victim. The farmer reached out, pleading, appealing for compassion where none existed. He begged for a reprieve.

  “People are strange creatures, don’t you think?” the Pale Man said. “I possess an unfathomable ability. I need only think it and you will die in hideous agony. That, you sorry shit, is real power. Still, for all my mastery, I must demonstrate what this inanimate object can accomplish with its simple presence. Don’t you find that odd?” The Pale Man handled the shotgun casually, the twin barrels never straying far from McMaster’s face.

  “I can see it, feel it. Hope is dying inside of you. Let’s extinguish all doubt and all hope right now, shall we?”

  The Pale Man’s lips never moved. The words that followed were thoughts unspoken, whispers in the dark and they ratcheted up McMaster’s terror. “Prepare to find out if there is a God, McMaster,” the Pale Man thought as he enjoyed the death of all his victim’s hopes.

  He brought the shotgun to bear on the farmer’s face. One of the weapon’s hammers fell forward; the exposed firing pin striking with a sharp, sickening snick that McMaster felt rather than heard. He urinated on himself, at the moment the hammer fell, but there was no bone shattering, tissue tearing, all encompassing, unique moment when life winked out.

  The Pale Man stepped back laughing. “Good thing I remembered which barrel was empty, eh? There would have been even more of a mess if I’d got that the wrong way around.

  “Don’t worry, I won’t make you clean up after yourself. You just run along now. Keep your mouth shut and think about what it’s like to die. Remember, you fool, there is always the other barrel waiting for you,” the Pale Man said aloud.
/>
  The farmer tried to stand, staggered, fell and tried again. He waited a moment and tried again and this time succeeded. The urine that stained his crotch and ran down his pant leg had started to cool and shame burned the soul of Liam McMaster. After fumbling with the doorknob, he managed to get it to turn. He lurched out of the study and with a stumbling run made it out the front door, down the steps of the manor house and into his work truck.

  The Pale Man followed McMaster to the front door and waved as the farmer’s truck passed down the gravel drive. The pale man, with cold, dead eyes, smiled his thin mirthless smile and squeezed the second trigger. The hammer fell. There was no explosion. There was no shell in that chamber either. “I think I’ll kill him next time,” the Pale Man said and laughed.

  Chapter Thirty

  Later that afternoon, Ailís Dwyer woke in a state of drowsy contentment sheltered under Julian’s arm. She could feel his heart beat. All of her senses were dreamily alive.

  Her thoughts drifted to the tenderness he had shown and his maddening control. She smiled as she thought of the slowness he employed to undress her. She recalled the near insanity she experienced at being the focus of his endless succession of building then slowing down to let her senses settle only to stoke the fire again.

  She smiled as she thought of how each agonizing cycle made her more aware than before, more alive. She remembered the events as a montage of pleading and bargaining. When she could take not another instant of it, he had fanned the fire until the world inside her exploded.

  She floated on waves of that pure emotion until she felt the touch of his lips and he would begin again. “It was just as I wanted it. Like he could read my mind,” she said to herself and her eyes narrowed slightly. The thought passed quickly when she felt him draw a deep breathe.

  She whispered to herself, “I felt his need. I saw that hunger so clearly. He wanted me, but until he felt sure I was content, he wouldn’t let himself go. But when he did, Jesus, I thought I would burn up with the pleasure of it.” Her mouth had gone dry. She shivered with the memory and pulled herself closer to him, draping her leg over his, feeling his warmth.