No Rest For The Wicked

by James, Harper

  The SUV righted itself and they continued down the tree-lined drive, the snow still falling, but more gently now.

  ‘It’s so beautiful. I can’t believe this is real.’

  A couple of months earlier—although it felt like a lifetime ago now—they’d had dinner at a steakhouse near Louisville, down in Kentucky, while he was on a case. He’d never forget it—she’d never let him for starters—but it was the night before Gina was abducted and ended up getting shot in the leg while he overslept in her bed. He hadn’t known that at the time, of course, and on the way out he’d dropped his business card into a jar and forgotten all about it.

  Then, a month later, he took a call telling him he’d won a weekend for two at a newly-renovated hotel buried deep in the mountains of upstate New York. He’d thought long and hard about asking Kate Guillory if she wanted to go. Guillory was a detective with the local police department. Their relationship started out confrontational when she had to restrain him to stop him attacking her partner, and then turned into a purely professional working arrangement. Now things were blurring at the edges. In the end he decided against it. They’d only been to dinner a couple times, after all. And he wasn’t sure if he was ready for the relationship to develop with everything else that was going on in his life.

  So, he called Gina up and invited her and she jumped at the opportunity. She probably deserved a break more than Guillory anyway. It could hardly turn out as badly as last time, after all. Stuck out here in the middle of nowhere, even he couldn’t get in any trouble. There’d been a catch—the hotel wasn’t officially open yet after the renovation. Along with two other lucky couples, they were assuming the roles of luxury guinea pigs.

  Evan pulled up in front of the main building and parked next to the only other car, an expensive Mercedes SUV. They sat with the engine running admiring the beautiful old building and enjoying the sense of peace and solitude when a news item on the radio caught their attention.

  Using CCTV footage, police have identified one of the three armed robbers who held up the Liquor Warehouse near Warrensburg earlier tonight as Sonny Day. During the course of the robbery, Day shot and killed the store’s manager and the gang took a female clerk hostage with them as they made their getaway in a white Toyota Corolla driven by the fourth member of the gang. Police have warned that the men are armed and extremely dangerous and should not be approached under any circumstances.

  Evan reached over and switched it off.

  ‘That poor girl,’ Gina said.

  ‘Yeah. You, more than anyone, can sympathize with how she must be feeling.’

  They were both quiet a few moments as thoughts of Gina’s ordeal filled their minds. So far, they’d managed to keep away from the subject but he could feel it hovering just out of sight—and there was still a lot of weekend ahead of them.

  He gave her leg a squeeze.

  ‘Let’s hope it turns out as well for her as it did for you.’

  She pulled her head back to look at him better, her eyes narrowing.

  ‘What? You mean it’s worth being abducted by maniacs and getting shot for a chance at a weekend away with you?’

  He gave a gentle shrug, kept his face deadpan.

  ‘A lot of women would say so. It was only your leg after all.’

  She didn’t rise to the bait. She was learning.

  ‘You’re right. It couldn’t possibly turn out that well.’

  He grinned at her and she felt a little worm of excitement start up in her stomach. It soon passed as she thought again about the poor girl’s plight.

  ‘I’m afraid I don’t think it’ll end in a good way at all,’ she said. ‘Not where people like that are concerned.’

  He shook his head.

  ‘We passed through Warrensburg.’

  ‘Did we?’

  ‘You were dozing at the time.’

  ‘I was not!’

  ‘Snoring too.’

  ‘Now I know you’re lying.’

  ‘I remember seeing that liquor store and thinking maybe we should get a bottle of champagne there instead of paying for it here.’

  She slapped him on the arm but she was smiling.

  ‘You cheap—’

  ‘It must have been just before it happened. The timing’s about right.’

  She covered her mouth with her hand, didn’t want to think about what might have happened.

  ‘Thank God you decided not to be so tight. You might have been in there when it happened. It could have been you who got shot, playing the hero.’

  ‘That doesn’t sound like me.’

  He was trying to make light of it but she knew that’s exactly what would have happened if he’d been there. A shiver went through her.

  ‘Try to remember you’re on vacation, okay?’

  ‘You know what they say—no rest for the wicked.’

  She laughed, such honest pleasure in the sound, he had to smile.

  ‘If that was true, you could sell your bed, you’d never need it again. Come on, let’s go in. I don’t want to talk about it anymore.’

  They climbed out and he got their bags from the trunk, took them through into the lobby, a tasteful mix of old world charm and modern convenience. Off to the side a log fire crackled in a massive stone fireplace, comfortable chairs flanking it, a faded antique rug on the floor.

  ‘Mr. And Mrs. Guinea Pig checking in,’ Evan said to the clerk on reception.

  Gina kicked him. The clerk was polite and well-trained enough to pretend he hadn’t heard. He introduced himself as Luca Ebersold, he was Swiss, and he was actually the manager. They were operating on a skeleton staff on account of there being so few guests.

  ‘Who else is here?’ Gina asked.

  ‘Just one other couple. And their daughter.’

  Gina raised an eyebrow.

  ‘There were two other lucky couples,’ Luca explained, putting particular emphasis on the lucky, ‘but one of them cancelled.’

  ‘Really?’

  Luca shrugged like he couldn’t understand it either.

  ‘Then Mr. Harris called and asked if they could bring their daughter, Emily. She’s seven. I thought, why not? We’ve got more than enough space.’

  It sounded as if Luca wasn’t as thrilled as he tried to make out at having an excited seven-year-old running around his newly-renovated luxury hotel. Like he’d thought of a dozen good reasons why not, but he’d been overruled. He made the word seven sound like she’d contracted rabies. Gina glanced around and noticed a number of expensive looking antiques tastefully placed around the lobby.

  ‘She must absolutely love it here.’

  Luca smiled and Gina wondered how much training was needed before you could smile like that when a guest just said something that annoyed the hell out of you.

  ‘She does. And so will you.’

  He passed a key across.

  ‘I’ve put you in the Treetop Suite. Don’t worry, it’s not a tree house suite’—he gave a small, professional smile—‘but we call it that because it’s located on the top floor of the main lodge. It’s got stunning views of the forest, the lake and the mountains. The windows wrap around the entire suite.’

  ‘It sounds amazing.’

  She took the key, a proper old-fashioned thing you put in a lock, not a piece of plastic.

  ‘We might well spend the whole weekend in the room,’ she added for Evan’s benefit.

  ‘I think he put us up there because he’s worried you’ll make too much noise,’ Evan whispered as they started up the magnificent oak staircase. ‘Doesn’t want little Emily saying Mummy, why’s that lady screaming? Is somebody hurting her?’

  The room was everything Luca had said and then some.

  ‘Look at this.’

  Gina ran her hand over the massive antique four poster bed that seemed to grow out of the floor, the intricate carvings still well-defined.

  Evan gave it a shake.

  ‘Solid too. At least we won’t disturb little Emily.’r />
  He noticed some strange scarring on the wooden posts. Made him wonder what people had been getting up to.

  ‘Damn,’ he said, trying to keep his face deadpan.

  ‘What?’

  ‘I left the rope in the car.’

  His mouth froze, still half-open. He tried a stupid grin. Too late he realized his mistake. The last time she’d been tied to anything it was to a wooden chair in a deserted warehouse. There’d been a sexual undercurrent running through that experience as well, just not so wholesome or playful as what he had in mind.

  He needn’t have worried.

  Her forehead creased into a frown before she understood what he was saying. She rolled her eyes, shook her head—men!

  But she didn’t make the connection.

  Or, if she did, she didn’t let him know it.

  ‘There’s a fire too.’

  She walked over to the wood-burning stone fireplace and turned her back to it, warming herself.

  ‘By the time we finish in front of the fire here, all you’ll be good for in bed is sleeping.’

  ‘You reckon? I like a challenge.’

  He grinned at her, opening the French doors that led onto a private covered balcony. He stepped out and looked down, over the pristine snow-covered lawn to the boathouse and frozen lake beyond, and the mountains beyond that. He brushed an inch of snow off the wooden railing, drew the clean, crisp air deep into his lungs. It made him want to leap over the railing and slide down the roof, roll in the perfect snow. He ought to live somewhere like this, in the mountains, where a missing cow was front-page news and nothing bad ever happened.

  ‘Aren’t you going to shut that?’ she said, when he finally came back inside, leaving the door slightly open.

  ‘No. Fresh air’s good for you. And it helps the fire draw.’

  She pretended to shiver.

  ‘You better come over here and find some other way to keep us warm.’

  Chapter 3

  GINA WOKE LATE THE second time. The first time was when Evan got up and headed out into the woods some place to get in an hour or two of tai chi before breakfast.

  He’d asked if she wanted to tag along, and she’d replied she had things to do—like rolling over into the warm patch he’d just left and going back to sleep.

  Like all normal people would.

  She got out of bed, wrapped herself in the thick robe from the bathroom and stood at the French doors, staring out at the clear, pale blue sky. Below her, a line of footprints ran through the six-inch covering of snow on the lawn leading down to the lake and then off into the woods. Evan would have found somewhere peaceful without having to look too hard. He usually performed his tai chi set barefoot. She wondered whether he’d give himself a break today and keep his boots on. You probably got thrown out of the club for that sort of behavior. It made her shiver just thinking about it.

  They’d banked the fire the previous night and now she added some fresh logs and kindling. She prodded it with the poker and soon it was crackling away in the fireplace. What she needed now was coffee. Being such an up-market sort of place there wasn’t a coffee machine in the room, you were supposed to call for room service. She wondered just how skeletal the skeleton staff really was. Would Luca be covering that duty as well?

  She dialled the front desk anyway but there was no reply. She’d have to go down and find some herself. It would give the fire time to get the room nice and cozy for when Evan came back. The French doors were still slightly open, the cold air helping the fire get going as Evan had said. Smart ass knew everything.

  Earlier, he’d gone out onto the balcony to see if he could do his set there, but he’d pronounced it far too small. She smiled to herself. They both knew the real reason was because he didn’t like it when she giggled as he went through his moves. She couldn’t help it, he took it so seriously.

  She pulled on jeans and a sweater, slipping her feet into the heavy hiking boots he’d insisted she bring along. She automatically picked up her cell phone, then remembered there was no signal. The hotel had free Wi-Fi but it had gone down in the storm last night. She dropped the phone back down on the dresser next to Evan’s. He never kept his with him when he was doing his tai chi thing. He’d never allow modern day technology to interfere with his arcane, medieval Chinese activities.

  His precious Zippo lighter sat on the dresser next to his phone. That was strange, he never went anywhere without it—even though he wasn’t a smoker.

  She’d never asked him about it, got the impression he didn’t want to talk about it. It wasn’t a problem, it was just a lighter after all. It had most likely belonged to his father, as he wasn’t old enough to have fought in Vietnam himself. Whatever it was, it was important to him.

  She picked it up and read the verse engraved on the worn, pitted metal.

  We the unwilling

  Led by the unqualified

  To kill the unfortunate

  Die for the ungrateful

  She shivered as she read it and it wasn’t from the draft. That a man chose those words in the full knowledge he was likely to join those who died for the ungrateful made her swallow thickly. If those emotions had flowed down into Evan’s genes, she could understand why he was driven the way he was. And why he sometimes acted like it was him against the whole world.

  Trouble was, he was keeping it all bottled up inside. One day soon the lid was going to come off. She wasn’t sure she wanted to be there when it did. Last night, he’d been tossing and turning, crying out in his sleep. Names she didn’t recognize—Adamson, Crow—and one she pushed to the back of her mind.

  But it was the phrase he kept on repeating over and over that stuck in her mind.

  None so lost.

  The words sounded so forlorn. She lay there half-asleep, half-awake with the covers pulled up under her chin, the cold draft from the open French doors chilling her bones. Her pulse was racing, her mind more so, as she imagined faceless men with hands as cold as death climbing in from the balcony. She saw them standing at the foot of the bed, watching her, then carrying her off as Evan slumbered unawares.

  She eventually fell asleep to the sound of the mumbled words, meaning to ask him about it in the morning. But when morning came, she was scared to ask. In the cold light of day, the words were like a harbinger of heartache to come.

  Besides, she knew him well enough already to know he’d accuse her of dreaming it or make a joke about it, saying she’d drunk too much wine. You only got to find out something about him when he was ready for you to.

  It wouldn’t be an easy conversation if they ever had it. She wasn’t about to risk spoiling the weekend. She put the lighter back carefully, wishing she hadn’t picked it up in the first place, and headed off in search of coffee.

  The loud clumping of her boots on the stairs was the only sound as she made her way downstairs. The lobby was deserted, the roaring fire of the previous night dead. Not everyone was as good a Boy Scout as Evan. The room didn’t feel nearly so inviting without it. Luca was nowhere in sight. Maybe he was cooking breakfast. The rug that stretched from the front doors to the reception desk was sodden, water pooling on the wooden floor, as if somebody—a whole herd of people from the look of it—had tramped snow in from outside not caring how much mess they made.

  It hadn’t been like that last night—and they’d been the last to arrive. No more guests were expected.

  An uncomfortable burning sensation started building strength in her chest, a buzz of trepidation rippling through her stomach. Something wasn’t right. Where the hell was Luca? How could someone like him, who got bent out of shape about a seven-year-old child just staying in the place, put up with a mess like that. Times like this, she wished she didn’t watch so much TV. Scenes from the movie The Shining filled her mind, made her wish Evan would hurry up and get back. Trouble was, she knew once he got into his routine he could lose himself for hours.

  Wet footprints tracked across the polished wood floor from the rug to
behind the reception desk. She followed them, more convinced with every step that she was about to find out exactly where Luca was, find out why he didn’t give a damn about the mess in his lobby. She imagined him lying on his back behind the desk, mouth open, his neck bent at an impossible angle, a pool of blood congealing behind his head.

  He wasn’t there.

  She breathed again, felt her stomach drop back into place, saw something that surprised her. An empty bottle of Old Crow Bourbon. Surely the impeccable Luca wasn’t a secret drinker. Then something else caught her eye only because it was exactly what her over-active mind was expecting to see—a blood-soaked Kleenex dropped on the floor.

  She told herself he’d most likely had a nose bleed. It was the dry, cold air, everybody knew that. Apart from the little voice at the back of her mind, of course. Seemed it didn’t know shit.

  She told it to shut up, went and looked in the dining room. Empty. It hadn’t even been set for breakfast.

  The feeling in her stomach intensified, moving downwards into her legs. The scar from when she’d been shot throbbed insistently, as if it was anticipating some company.

  Damn it.

  She never used to be like this. But ever since the events of two month ago, the slightest thing turned her into a nervous wreck. She wished she’d never come down. But coffee was coffee after all.

  There was a murmur of voices coming from the far end of the dining room. She guessed that’s where the kitchen was. She immediately felt better. Felt stupid in fact for worrying over nothing. She clumped towards the kitchen doors in her heavy boots, the thick rug underfoot absorbing the sound of her footsteps.

  The voices in the kitchen were louder now—too loud, as if people were arguing.

  The feeling in her gut came back with a vengeance.

  She crept forward, suddenly aware of the sound of her heavy boots, despite the thick rug.

  There were double doors, each with a round, porthole window. She’d take a peek first, before going in. Maybe the argument was nothing, maybe Luca had burned the toast and the chef was chewing him out. She was being stupid, but better safe than sorry. She stepped up to the doors, keeping her head to the side of the windows.