Ghost Key

by Trish J. MacGregor

“Then answer your damn phone.”

  “It’s dead. I forgot to charge it last night. So let me get this straight. We’re going to anchor off Sea Horse, then you’re going to work?”

  “Yes.”

  “And I’m supposed to stay out there on Sea Horse all by myself? How does that keep me safe?”

  Good point. She obviously hadn’t thought this out well enough. “You go to Amy’s while I’m at work. We both go in on the skiff. But she has to pick you up and drop you off at the café.”

  “She will.” He paused. “She thinks you’re paranoid, Mom.”

  “I don’t give a shit what she or anyone else thinks.”

  As they neared the marina, Kate saw a crowd gathered on the public beach, tourists and locals shouting and pointing at something in the distance. People snapped photos, took videos, but from the road she couldn’t see what was going on. She turned into the marina, stopped in front of the houseboat. She and Rocky ran out onto the dock, where tethered pontoon boats bobbed in the water and throngs of gawkers watched a spectacle unfold about a hundred feet offshore.

  A pair of dolphins carried a woman between them. She appeared to be gripping one dolphin’s dorsal fin, while the other dolphin kept her feet elevated, so that it looked as if she skimmed the surface of the water. Kate couldn’t see the woman’s face, but even from here she could make out her curly copper hair trailing down her back, burning against her alabaster skin. Maddie. She looked like a mermaid, mythic, Neptunian, as if she had risen from ocean depths beyond human comprehension. Someone in a boat pursued her and the dolphins. Kate suddenly had an awful feeling about this.

  “What happened?” she asked one of the old-timers standing next to her.

  “That young woman supposedly leaped off the pier like she was hell-bent on killing herself. Way I heard it, she was with Mayor Stanton, and when he didn’t see her come up for air, he and some others went out in kayaks looking for her. They were sure she’d drowned. But the dolphins saved her. Pretty amazing.”

  Mayor Pete Stanton. Zee had told her he’d been taken early on and Kate had no reason to believe otherwise. Had Maddie tried to force the evil out of herself by jumping into the gulf? But why would that work? Kate realized she just didn’t have enough information to understand the nature of this evil, and until she did, she didn’t want to be anywhere around here. She tapped Rocky’s shoulder with the back of her hand. “Let’s get outta here.”

  He emitted a shrill whistle, calling Liberty, and the hawk appeared just ahead.

  When they reached the parking lot, Kate spotted Rich and Bean getting out of a cart, headed toward her. She pretended she hadn’t seen them, and she and Rocky veered off toward the houseboat. Anxiety chewed through her. It horrified her that she was afraid of Bean, a man she’d known for thirty years, and of Rich, whom she had known since she was in kindergarten and who, for the last fourteen months, had shared her bed and her life in a way that no man had since she and Rocky’s father had split. The faster she fled this island, the safer she and Rocky would be.

  “Hey, Katie-bird, hold on.” Rich’s fingers closed around her arm. “You moved without saying squat to me.”

  Kate jerked her arm free and addressed her son before she even looked at Rich. “I’ll be along in a few minutes, Rocky. Go ahead and get started.”

  He eyed Rich warily. “You sure, Mom?”

  “Positive.”

  Rocky hesitated, then hastened on to the houseboat. Only then did Kate meet Rich’s gaze. “Let me know how much I owe you for utilities and water. I can pay you next week.”

  He looked stunned. “That’s it?”

  The incredulity in his voice defied explanation. It was as if he had forgotten what had happened last night, what he’d said to her: Don’t make waves. It reminded her of how Bean had acted that February night after his fuck fest in the bar. Selective amnesia. “Yes, that’s it.”

  “But—”

  Kate leaned toward him, sinking her finger into his muscular chest, and whispered, “I know what you are, Richie-bird.”

  She whipped around and ran toward the houseboat, ran through the crowd still fixated on the dolphin spectacle, ran even though she hadn’t moved the cart to some location where she and Rocky could get to it. Rocky had started the engine and she jumped on board. She glanced back once, but Rich had vanished into the crowd.

  The houseboat turned into the open water, headed into the dying sun.

  * * *

  Sanchez’s motel stood at the end of First Street, an old rundown place that looked like it had been built in the fifties and hadn’t been renovated in all the decades since. Business wasn’t exactly booming—he and one other man were the only guests. But the motel allowed dogs and Jessie was sprawled comfortably on one of the beds. Sanchez stood in front of the wall map of Cedar Key, studying it.

  The main island consisted of a grid of eight east/west streets, and seven streets, A through G, that ran north/south. From Fourth Street north, the Back Bayou cut into streets A through D. No matter where you were on the island, water was everywhere. He had no idea where he should begin looking for Maddie, and decided to walk around downtown first and see what, if anything, he picked up. Then he would head over to Annie’s Café, where the hungry ghosts supposedly congregated every evening on the right side of the dining room.

  Sanchez scooped up his room key and promised Jessie he would be back in a jiffy. She didn’t even raise her head.

  The moment he stepped outside, Maddie’s silent scream for help tore through him, hammered against his temples. Sanchez spun around, trying to determine the direction. It seemed to be coming from the east. He raced up the street, past another rundown motel, past the entrance to Dock Street, into the marina parking lot. A large crowd had gathered near the water and even more people had spilled onto the beach, all of them watching something. In his head, he could still hear Maddie screaming, and was certain it came from out on the water, that she was what everyone watched.

  He couldn’t push his way through the crowd, so he ran along the outside of it, up a grassy slope to a condo complex and then down to a narrow, rocky spit of beach along the marsh. Even here, a dozen people stood around, gawking, pointing, shouting, taking photos and videos as though it were all part of a reality show.

  Then he saw them, a pair of dolphins cutting in close to the marsh, with a woman clinging to the lead dolphin. Red. When the dolphins dived, she disappeared and he heard her silent scream again.

  He snatched a paddle out of the sand and quickly pushed a yellow kayak out into the marsh. A thin black dog appeared out of nowhere and shot past him, splashed into the marsh, and started swimming. By the time Sanchez was calf deep in the water, the dog had disappeared into the tall reeds.

  Sanchez climbed into the kayak and paddled furiously. The dolphins surfaced again and he caught sight of Maddie struggling to hold on, to breathe, her head whipping from one side to the other as though she were trying to determine where she was.

  “Let go,” he shouted. “It’s shallow enough to let go!”

  The dolphins made an abrupt turn and Red either couldn’t hold on any longer or simply let go. She fell into the water. The dolphins swam off, arching in the dying light, diving, arching again, the whooshing noise from their blowholes echoing in the air, rhythmic, strange, mixing with a high, keening sound they made. Red didn’t come up.

  Frantic, Sanchez paddled the final twenty yards to where he’d last seen her. The kayak hit something—sand, a submerged island, rocks, a mound of shells, he couldn’t tell what the hell it was. But it beached the kayak.

  He scrambled out into water barely ankle deep and stood for a moment in the burning light of the setting sun, birds careening overhead, singing, cawing, crying out, squawking. He turned rapidly in place, eyes searching the water, the reeds, his head spinning, his senses out of whack.

  He suddenly saw a dark-haired man splashing wildly through the shallows. Where had he come from? Sanchez then saw what the man appar
ently saw: Maddie floating facedown in the weeds, arms out on either side of her. She wasn’t moving. Sanchez, closer to her than the man was, reached her first. He dropped to his knees in the shallow water, turned her over, lifted her head out of the water. Mesmerized by her beauty, by the dusting of ginger-colored freckles on her pale cheeks, by the perfect curve of her jaw, the seductiveness of her mouth, and all that luscious copper hair, seconds passed before he realized she wasn’t breathing.

  With her head and back resting against his knees, he pumped several times on her chest. “Breathe, Red, breathe.” He opened her mouth, pressed his own against it and breathed into her, then pushed down on her chest. Breathe, press, breathe, press. Again. She finally bolted forward, coughing violently, her parrot-green eyes bulging in their sockets. She retched seawater, coughed some more, sucked air in through her mouth. Sanchez helped her rock back on her heels, water lapped over her thighs.

  “Red,” he whispered.

  “Sanchez?” She raised her bloodshot eyes to his.

  He wrapped his arms around her, holding her close, tightly, aware of her breasts pressed against his chest, of the shape of her ribs, of the heat of her breath against the side of his neck, of her wet hair, strands of it curling against his arm. The dark-haired man reached them, flung his arms around them, and whispered urgently, “They’re everywhere, amigo. Get out of here fast, run, run. I’ll protect Maddie.”

  She clutched the sides of Sanchez’s face, her eyes bored into his. “It’s okay. Wayra’s a friend. She … Dominica … leaped out of me. The real terrorists sit on the right side of Annie’s Café. Remember that. Be there. Please,” she whispered in a choked voice.

  “I’ll find you,” he said hoarsely, and brought his mouth to hers, kissing her tenderly, swiftly.

  The dark-haired man pushed him forward. “Go.”

  Sanchez shoved the kayak off the sand, back into the water, leaped inside and paddled fast toward the closest stretch of shore. He stumbled up a boat ramp, glanced back once, but couldn’t see Red or the man. He fell to his knees in a patch of grass, hands clutching his thighs, his wet clothes like excessive gravity that pinned him to the ground. They’re everywhere. The ghosts? Was that what the man had been referring to?

  He ripped off his shoes and wet socks and weaved his way up the street, anxious to get back to his motel room, where he could text Delaney. And say what, Sanchez? You gave her mouth-to-mouth? You kissed her when the ghost named Dominica wasn’t inside of her? Even with what Delaney knew about what was happening here, that kind of information would land Sanchez in a padded room for sure.

  His BlackBerry belted John Lennon’s “Imagine,” the tune he’d assigned to Nicole. He couldn’t bring himself to talk to her, not yet, not this instant, and turned off his BlackBerry.

  * * *

  They surrounded him and Maddie, small, glowing orbs that dived at them like wasps. The orbs didn’t touch them, but they probed, and Wayra kept moving back, back, his arms encircling Maddie, holding her tightly as he tried to get her out of the shallows, to shore, where they could run. The orbs sensed he was different, perhaps they even sensed, for the first time, that Maddie was different, that she was not just some random host their leader had seized.

  “You don’t want to be a part of this story.” Wayra spoke quietly, his voice sharp. “It’s far more ancient and powerful than you are. Dominica uses you by telling you exactly what you want to hear.”

  “No good, Wayra,” Maddie whispered, tightening her arms around his waist. “The bitch is here. To your right.”

  Wayra saw her, a fat plume of discolored smoke zooming in on his right, just as Maddie had said. Before he could react, Dominica dived through Maddie’s skull. He felt it the moment it happened, the instant Dominica seized control of her, and his arms dropped to his sides. He stepped back.

  Dominica spoke with Maddie’s mouth and vocal cords and used Maddie’s hands, lifting them theatrically into the air. “Really, Wayra. I was, like, well, totally embarrassed you thought you could protect her just because your arms are around her. Since when was that one of our rules?”

  “Our rules?” He laughed. “How you twist your memories, Nica. You and I never established any mutual rules or playing field. I don’t collude with evil. What other lies have you told yourself about us? About you and me? How else have you edited your personal history?”

  She winced; he knew his words struck her to the core. “We brujos can seize you here. You don’t have any immunity on Cedar Key.”

  “Your tribe is new. They sense I’m totally alien to their experience. If they try to seize me, I’ll show them just how alien I am and I don’t think you want that, Nica. It would require you to explain too much. And I’m sure you still remember what it was like when I took your essence into myself in that greenhouse in Punta.”

  “You … you intended to obliterate me,” she spat. “To crush me out of existence. You were so hateful.”

  “You’re a plague.”

  “A plague,” she repeated, and shook her head. “I’m a survivor. So what can you offer in return for Maddie, Wayra? What are you and your chaser buddies willing to trade?”

  “You take the island, you give us Maddie in return.”

  She laughed hysterically, the last of the light setting Maddie’s hair on fire. “Cedar Key isn’t yours to give. It’s already mine.”

  “Then do what you must, as will I.” In a flash, he shifted and raced toward land.

  Nine

  Dominica watched the black Lab race through the marsh, a fleeting shadow in the starlight. A rushing tsunami of memories nearly crippled her. For a hundred and thirty-seven years, she and Wayra had loved each other, traveled together; they could have ruled an empire. How had it come to this, a standoff in a salt marsh?

  “You fool,” she shouted.

  Her words drifted out over the marsh, filling the emptiness between them. Disgusted, Dominica forced Maddie’s body to move forward. She slogged through the water, struggling not to think about the last time she had seen Wayra, outside a church in Punta, Ecuador, more than a year ago. He had tried to obliterate her by taking her essence into himself and shifting. She had saved herself by hurling out her most intimate memories of their centuries together and it was enough for him to hesitate.

  In that instant of hesitation, she had fled. But she doubted if even her most intimate memories would prompt him to hesitate next time. After he had assaulted her in Punta, she had exacted her revenge by seizing Sara Wells, the woman he had loved then, and had killed her. He would never forgive her for that.

  Her fear of the shifter remained, but as long as she occupied Maddie’s body, he wouldn’t dare attempt to annihilate her. He knew all too well how quickly and effortlessly she could bleed Maddie out. But Maddie’s stunt deserved punishment. She had humiliated Dominica, who only last night had decreed that any brujo who couldn’t control his host didn’t deserve a host. She somehow had to turn this incident to her advantage.

  She reached the rocky beach in front of the Old Fennimore Mill condos, grateful that the darkness hid her from the spectators on the balcony and along the beach who had witnessed Maddie’s antics. I should just bleed you out and be done with you, Maddie.

  Maddie didn’t reply. Dominica sensed she was curled up in her virtual room, sobbing. Save your tears. You’ll have plenty to cry about when we get back to the house.

  Pain and more pain. Bring it on, bitch.

  Such rage, Maddie. Here I thought you were weeping.

  I wouldn’t give you the satisfaction.

  Dominica laughed, anticipating how she would make Maddie suffer, how she would break her. Yes, it might come to that. Breaking her spirit so completely that she would be the most compliant host Dominica had ever had.

  Who was the handsome young man who gave you mouth-to-mouth, Maddie?

  Silence.

  Well, it doesn’t matter. And I wouldn’t get your hopes up about Wayra. Even the shifter can’t fight a thousand br
ujos by himself.

  Maddie had nothing to say about that. Just as well. Dominica didn’t feel like talking to her, anyway. She climbed a shallow, grassy slope, hurried into the driveway in front of the house where she and Maddie had been living since their second week in town, and bounded up the creaky steps. She tore off her wet clothes and left them where they fell. She rushed into the bedroom for her spare cell phone and immediately called Whit.

  “Nica?” He sounded anxious.

  “I have her again, Whit.”

  “Password?”

  “Pensacola.”

  She felt his relief.

  “Excellent. The net is humming like crazy, though. Since you were unable to control your own host, many in the tribe are asking if last night’s decree still stands.”

  She had expected this, but nonetheless felt angry and irritable that she now had to create some colorful fiction to explain what had happened. You’ll pay for this, Maddie.

  “What happened to me is precisely why it’s vital that hosts are tightly controlled. I used myself as an example to illustrate the point. I allowed her to escape. There was never any doubt she would be seized again. The decree still stands. But additional training will be available for anyone who wants it.” As soon as she spoke, the brujo net hummed and buzzed with the tribe’s reaction.

  You’re such a goddamn liar, Dominica. You lost control of me because you weren’t paying attention. And regardless of what you do to me, this body is still mine. If you do something that I find personally abhorrent, you won’t be able to control me. Pervert asshole Whit copping a feel isn’t going to happen again.

  Dominica ignored her. “Whit, meet me at the house.”

  “Be there in a few minutes.”

  Dominica disconnected and stood there for a moment, staring out through the floor-to-ceiling windows that overlooked the gulf. The house sat on pilings fifteen feet above the water, and although it was small—just eight hundred square feet, most of it in one room—the view compensated for the lack of space. Stars popped out against the black skin of the sky, lights from downtown danced against the water, a slice of moon moved upward against the sky. It all looked lovely and oddly peaceful, but didn’t lighten her mood.