She arrived at the dome that housed the rain forest and stepped quickly inside. If she hesitated, she would give herself a chance to rethink her decision, and that would do no one any good. She took only five steps inside before she realized that something was different.
She stopped, listening. She could hear the call of birds and reptiles. The air was warm and humid, as in an actual rain forest, and she had the immediate urge to shrug out of her coat.
She took a few more steps and nothing happened. The darkness she had felt before was gone. She was both relieved and angry with herself for her earlier cowardice. Someone or something had been here, and she should have confronted whatever it was.
Even if it had meant having to leave San Francisco and go somewhere else to hide her identity.
I am not a witch, she reminded herself again as she stared around.
But a witch was here, and I let him or her get away.
Slowly she began walking the circular path, looking for anything out of the ordinary. There were a few dim lights on in the structure, just enough to see the path. She was crazy. It was too dark to find any clues. She would need to come back when it was daylight.
You could reach out, see what you can feel.
She rejected the voice that whispered inside her head.
No more magic. She stopped, ready to exit the exhibit and rejoin her partner.
Suddenly a whiff of something came to her. She turned her head slightly, closed her eyes, and inhaled deeply. There was definitely something in the air. Sandalwood, maybe? She walked a couple more steps into the rain forest and her foot came down on a leaf in the path.
She froze as her senses were suddenly bombarded, assaulting her, undeniable. The presence of magic was so strong, it nearly overwhelmed her.
She stepped back. There was something on the path. There had to be lights that could be turned on in the ecodome. She would just have to go get someone to help her find it. She took a step backward. That’s what she’d do. She’d turn on the lights.
And suddenly she felt energy rippling through her body and then arcing out of her and into the structure.
“No!” she shouted.
Hissing and popping sounds surrounded her, and suddenly the lights nearby turned on.
“No,” she whispered. “That’s not what I wanted to do.”
She’d wanted to find the light switch. Instead she had used magic to send currents flowing to the lights. And she was still connected to them. They would remain on only as long as she was sending out the energy.
Tears of frustration stung her eyes.
She dashed them quickly away, though, and turned to look at what was on the ground.
Leaves from the nearby trees had been ripped free and formed into words on the path.
The last grave.
She blinked. What could that possibly mean?
And then, as suddenly as she had turned the lights on, they winked off. She sagged, feeling the drain of the energy. It took a moment for her eyes to adjust again to the darkness. She bent down toward the leaves, thinking to scatter them before somebody else read the message.
Stop! What are you doing, Samantha?
She blinked as if coming out from under a trance.
Had she really been just about to destroy crime scene evidence?
She sucked in her breath as she straightened. Even if the killer was a witch, she shouldn’t be destroying evidence, especially when she didn’t know what it meant and it wouldn’t require her to explain the realities of that world to her new partner.
“Idiot,” she said to herself. “Just treat this like every other case. If you don’t, you’ll expose yourself and lose any chance to bring Winona’s killer to justice.”
A bird screeched by, and she couldn’t tell whether the creature was agreeing with her or contradicting her. Either way, she knew it was time to leave the exhibit.
She hurried out and made her way back to the Swamp. Half a dozen more police personnel were there now. Lance appeared to have finished questioning the museum administrator and was crouched down by the body, talking to the coroner.
She moved to join them.
“Evening, Detective,” Jada King said, looking up at her. The coroner’s long black hair was perfect, as always. Her dark skin looked flawless, and there was even a dusting of eye shadow on her lids. Her fingernails were freshly manicured with French tips.
“How is it you look good even in the middle of the night?” Samantha asked.
“In case you haven’t realized it yet, appearances mean everything in this big, bad world,” Jada said, casting a disparaging glance at Samantha’s attire.
Samantha flushed, realizing she’d walked into that one. She had learned that Jada wasn’t trying to be catty with comments like that. She just really believed in always being at her best. Which was ironic, since she saw people only at their worst.
“Anyway, I was just telling Detective Garris that I’ve never seen anything like this.”
“So, any idea what could cause it?” Lance asked.
“No. This is a new one. I’m going to have to do some research, ask around, and find out if anyone has ever seen this.”
Samantha was willing to bet the answer was going to be no. She had been raised a witch and she certainly couldn’t remember seeing anything like this before. Of course, that didn’t mean she hadn’t. The holes in her memories of that life were still staggeringly large, the gaps in her knowledge numerous.
“Well, let us know when you have something,” Lance said.
“Really? Because I was planning on keeping that information to myself.”
“If we’re done here, I found something else,” Samantha said.
Lance nodded and stood up. “Lead the way.”
Not sure where the museum employee had gone, Samantha borrowed a flashlight from Zack. She led both of them into the rain forest and then shone the light on the message.
“‘The last grave’? What is that supposed to mean?” Lance asked after a second.
“It’s probably a prank—kids, a disgruntled janitor,” Zack chimed in.
“I don’t think so. I thought I heard someone in here, but I couldn’t find anybody. It would have been a great place for the killer to hide out while we were all busy in the Swamp,” Samantha said.
“Okay. Zack, get the lights on in here. Grab a couple of guys and sweep this place. If there’s even a remote chance our killer’s still here, I want this place torn apart,” Lance said.
Zack nodded and dashed off. Still using the flashlight, they looked around the area some more. “So, this is where you disappeared to?” Lance asked.
“Yeah.”
“Mind telling me why?”
“I don’t know. Hunch, I guess,” Samantha said, striving to be vague.
Lance turned to look at her, and in the light from the flashlight he was holding, his face looked demonic. She forced herself to stand her ground, reminding herself it was only a trick of the light.
“What’s the matter, spooked?” Lance asked.
“Something like that,” she said.
The overhead lights flooded on, and she breathed a silent sigh of relief that it had nothing to do with her and that the darkness had been driven away. She helped Lance do a preliminary search of the area even though she knew they wouldn’t find anything else.
She traced the paths through the rain forest. Had it been a witch hiding in here when she was here earlier? She was sure it had to be. But why leave the bizarre message on the ground, especially since it was nowhere near the body? Janitorial staff could have easily mistaken it for a joke and cleaned it up without the police ever seeing it.
She walked for another fifteen minutes, peering into dense copses of trees, but seeing nothing. When she returned to the beginning of the trail, she still had no idea wh
y the message had been left with the leaves or what it meant. Some uniformed officers joined in the search, and a few minutes later she and Lance conferred.
“I think it’s time we head out,” Lance said.
“Agreed. I don’t think there’s anything else we can do here tonight. If the others find something, we can come back.”
“You need to get some sleep?”
She shook her head. “We need to tell Winona’s daughter what happened to her before she wakes up and realizes her mother isn’t there.”
“Worst part of the job.”
“Always is.”
They made it to Lance’s car, and as soon as they were inside, he turned on her. “What the hell happened back there?”
“I don’t know what you mean,” she said, forcing herself to meet his eyes.
“Don’t give me that. You froze up. You got a problem with Santa Cruz? Did the place personally offend you somehow? An ex live there? What?”
She took a deep breath. “A friend warned me that I wouldn’t like it there.”
“Because of all the hippies? They’re harmless. Obnoxious, but harmless.”
“No, I’ve just heard some unsavory things about other people . . . not hippies.”
“Look, we’re nowhere near Halloween, so there won’t be a bunch of stupid college kids trying to perform satanic rituals and torturing cats.”
“Are you kidding me?” she asked, revulsion flooding her.
“I wish. It’s one of the reasons a lot of the local animal shelters won’t adopt out black cats in the month of October. But like I said, none of that is going on for another nine months.”
Her stomach turned, and she began to move her hands, then stopped herself just in time before she had conjured Freaky.
“But the fact that kind of stuff happens at all is enough to keep me from wanting to go there. Because those people might only be doing that stuff a couple of times a year, but they live there all the time.”
“I know—it’s sick. Like I said, mostly college kids, not the regular granola-eating, tree-hugging residents.”
She didn’t respond, and he seemed willing to drop the topic, which relieved her to no end. She couldn’t help but wonder how many of those “college kids” were actually practicing real witchcraft and how many others were just jumping on the bandwagon. Some could even be the unwitting pawns of the real witches, who were using them and harnessing their energies.
Lance turned on the radio and classic rock filled the car. They left San Francisco and passed through neighboring towns and cities until they finally were in the mountains. The highway narrowed, and it seemed as if the trees were pressing in on either side. There were only a handful of other cars on the road and whole stretches where they saw no one.
“Where are we?” she asked at last.
“Santa Cruz Mountains. We’re in the Redwoods.”
A while farther on, they turned off the main road and climbed into the mountains. She caught glimpses of houses tucked away here and there.
“People here must love their privacy,” she commented.
“You could say that again.”
Finally, more than an hour after they’d left, they arrived at Winona Lightfoot’s house. It was a beautiful cabin constructed in the Arts and Crafts style. The porch light was on, but the rest of the house was dark. They pulled into the driveway, and Samantha reluctantly climbed out of the car. She hated doing this, shattering someone’s world. It was bad enough to lose a loved one to illness or accident, but to lose them to violence changed a person’s view of the world forever.
The gravel on the walk crunched underfoot as they made their way to the porch. Three steps up and they were standing on a well-worn welcome mat, facing a heavy wood door inset with beveled glass.
Lance rang the doorbell. They waited a minute and then rang it again. Lights came on inside, and she could hear steps pounding toward the door. She heard the lock turn and a moment later a girl came into view.
The girl stood, blinking at both of them in surprise. Samantha could only stare back at her. She was about fifteen, very young looking, with long dark hair and wide, hazel eyes. And there was the thrum of power coming off of her. Samantha reached out and grabbed the doorframe to steady herself.
In turn, the girl looked at her, eyes wide with bewilderment.
“Who are you?” she asked after a moment.
They showed her their badges.
“Robin Lightfoot?” Lance asked.
The girl nodded.
“I’m Detective Garris and this is Detective Ryan. May we come in?”
The girl moved back, her face already turning ashen. They stepped inside the house, which was just as beautifully crafted as the outside. Native American pieces accented the walls and floors. Robin closed the door and led them into the kitchen, where she turned around, leaning against the counter with her arms folded across her chest.
“What’s this about?” she asked, voice heavy with dread and suspicion.
Lance looked at Samantha, and she saw the pain on his face. She swallowed hard. He was a jerk a lot of the time, but no one wanted to break this kind of news to a kid.
Samantha looked Robin in the eye. “We are sorry, Robin, but something’s happened to your mom.”
“What?” Robin said, voice raising in a high squeak. “Is she . . . She’s not—”
“She’s dead, Robin,” Lance said, his voice quiet.
The girl crumpled to the floor. Samantha dropped to her knees and reached out, pulling the girl close. Robin leaned her head in to Samantha’s chest and began to sob and scream. And even though she was struggling to shut out her sensory input, trying desperately not to use her powers and praying that Robin wouldn’t inadvertently use hers, she could tell the girl was not surprised.
Usually there was that moment of shock, followed swiftly by denial, before a victim’s family truly processed what you were saying to them. Robin had understood immediately, and there had to be a reason it hadn’t come as a complete shock to her, even though the news was still devastating her.
“I can’t believe they killed her!” Robin shrieked after a minute.
“Who killed her?” Lance said, and Samantha realized he was on the floor next to them. His eyes were wide with sympathy but, ever the cop, he was quick to try to gather information.
“Those people, the ones who sent her the letters,” Robin wailed.
“Who sent her the letters?” Lance asked.
But Robin just started crying harder. She was clinging to Samantha so fiercely that the girl’s nails were digging into her. The grief she was radiating washed over Samantha, smothering her, until all she could feel was the grief, fresh and harsh as though it were her own.
Samantha twisted her head just enough to glimpse Lance’s face, and she could see the tears streaming down his cheeks. She would not have labeled him an empathic individual. Robin was radiating her grief, and it was so all-consuming and her powers were careening so wildly out of control that she was making them feel her emotions whether she intended to or not.
“You have to calm down,” Samantha said, dropping her voice into its lowest register and willing it to penetrate the haze surrounding Robin’s mind. It didn’t work. If anything, Robin’s grief was becoming wilder, more out of control. Next to her, Samantha heard Lance swear and slam his fist into a kitchen cabinet moments after Robin began pounding Samantha’s back with her fists. Samantha fought back her own urge to hit something.
The girl was caught in a feedback loop of her own emotions, and she had trapped them with her. Words weren’t breaking through to her no matter how much force and persuasion Samantha put behind them. Samantha took her left hand and focused her energies on it until she had built up an electrical charge. Then she put it on Robin’s back, giving the girl a mild electrical shock.
Ro
bin jerked and looked up at her, tears ceasing for the moment.
“You’re going to be okay,” Samantha said, seizing the opportunity to try to reach her. “Do you understand me?”
Robin nodded slowly. Samantha allowed energy to flow softly, subtly, from herself to the grieving girl. They couldn’t have her collapsing on them. Not yet, at any rate.
The girl sighed and her eyelids drooped slightly.
“Now, is there a relative, a neighbor, someone you can call to come over and be with you?”
“I don’t know,” Robin said. Panic began to creep back into her eyes, and Samantha increased the sensations of warmth and calm that she was pushing through her own hands into the girl’s arms.
“Where’s your father?” she asked.
She shook her head. “He was killed in a car crash when I was little.”
“Any aunts or uncles?” Samantha asked, keeping her voice level and steady.
“No. Mom was an only child. Dad too.” Her eyes teared up again. “There’s no one.”
Samantha nodded. “It’s okay. We’ll help you think of someone.”
Beside her, Lance was also reclaiming his senses. “Robin, who is it you think did this?” he asked, hastily rubbing his eyes on his sleeve.
“I don’t know who they are, but I know Mom got some threatening letters and they really upset her.”
“When was this?” Lance asked.
Robin shrugged. “I don’t know. It was like a week or two ago. She tried to make out like it was no big deal, but I could tell they really upset her. I . . . um . . . made . . . her talk to me about it.”
The girl flushed.
She used her powers to compel her mother to tell her, Samantha realized. And now she feels guilty.
That meant that Robin was aware of her abilities and could use them to a certain extent. The odds were good that her mother hadn’t shared them or she should have been able to defend herself.
“What was in the letters exactly?” Lance asked.
“She wouldn’t say. She just said she had made some people angry at her and they were threatening her with not nice things.”
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