by J. R. Rain
I counted seventeen people in all. Thirteen adults and four kids. The kids ranged from tweens to toddlers. Tara sat on the other side of me. I recognized the man at the head of the table: George Thurman Junior. Or, as he preferred, Junior, according to Tara who’d gotten Allison and I caught up, just before dinner. Patricia Thurman, Junior’s beautiful wife—too beautiful and too perfect, if you asked me—sat to his right and didn’t stop looking at me.
There was an older couple sitting together across from me. They both smiled warmly at me. There was a devilishly handsome young man who hadn’t stopped staring at Allison. To her credit, remarkably, she’d ignored him completely. I knew she was still grieving for her one-time boyfriend, the boxer, Caesar Marquez, and wasn’t in the market for men. There were two men sitting together, rather closely. I caught them smiling warmly at each other. Next to Tara was a young man who looked oddly familiar. No, not familiar. I mean, yes, I’d seen his picture before, but there was something about him...
Then I figured it out. His smile. It was the same kind of big, expressive smile that I had seen on Tara, my client. Lips curled up. Almost clown-like.
His name was Edwin Thurman, and he was Junior’s only son, the black sheep of the family with a history of drugs, public arrests and jail time.
I scanned the entire lot. Yes, a psychic scan of sorts. I couldn’t read everyone’s mind, thank God. Yes, it turned out that I could actually influence thoughts. But I could also get impressions from people. I noted, in particular, that my inner alarm was ringing mildly. There was a potential threat here, somewhere at the table.
I hated when that happened.
Dinner was served. There was no wait staff, which I found slightly curious. A big house like this with no staff? Who cleaned and cooked and manicured the lawns?
So, we served ourselves, like commoners. Of course, I just picked at my salad and scattered it around and pretended to eat, all while I spat it back in my napkin. I drank the wine, which at least gave me some semblance of humanity.
The dinner was mostly subdued. No one asked any questions of Allison or me. No one really looked our way. No one, except for Junior’s beautiful wife. The kids talked quietly among themselves, often laughing.
The many couples talked quietly, too. I scattered the salad sufficiently and Allison, bless her heart, reached over and picked at my salad as well. The end result was that I appeared to have eaten my light dinner, or at least some of it. I appeared, for all intents and purposes, to be one of the living.
As I pushed my salad away, feigning fullness, the young man sitting next to Allison looked at it, then at my nearly finished goblet of wine.
And smiled at me.
Knowingly.
Chapter Fifteen
We retired to the great room.
Yes, retired. That’s how Junior Thurman phrased it. I’m fairly certain I’d never retired to any room, let alone a great room. But, if sitting in comfy chairs and holding my wine and trying to pretend to be normal was retiring, then there was a first for everything.
As we sat, I sent a thought over to Allison for her to shield her own thoughts. She asked why and I told her to just do it, that I would explain later. She shrugged, and I sensed her mind closing to me, exactly the way I had taught her to do it.
Good girl, I thought, although she wouldn’t be able to hear me.
The great room was, well, great. It had a soaring ceiling crisscrossed with thick beams. It had arches and a brick fireplace and oversized furniture. The room was something to behold. And, apparently, to retire in.
Outside, through the stacked windows framed with heavy curtains, the tall evergreens were now swaying violently, although I doubted the others could see them in the darkness. A storm was moving in. A big one, too.
“It’s getting blustery out there,” said Edwin, the young man who might have been handsome if not for the perpetual smile on his face. He could see the trees as well?
“Blustery?” said Allison next to me. She’d had two glasses of wine. She was also smaller than me and hadn’t eaten much at dinner. I suspected the wine had gone straight to her head.
Junior Thurman, who’d been texting on his too-big cell phone, set it aside and looked up at her. He was holding a glass of sherry. I was fairly certain I’d never before seen anyone drink a glass of sherry in my life.
Another first, I thought.
“It’s a word we like to use up here,” he said jovially enough. He had a strong, resonant voice that seemed to fill the great room. His wife nodded. She had quit looking at me. Now she was staring down into her own glass of wine, legs tucked under her.
Junior went on: “Blustery is just our way saying that we’re getting some nasty weather out there, nasty even for the Northwest.”
“We just call it a shit-storm where I’m from,” said Allison, and immediately looked like she regretted it.
The kids who’d been playing cards nearby looked up. Junior frowned a little. Edwin, I saw, grinned even bigger.
“And where are you from, Allison?” Junior asked pleasantly.
“Texas.”
“Ah,” said Junior without elaborating, as if that answered everything. He turned his attention back to me. “Samantha, from where do you know my dear niece?”
“I’ve known Tari since we were in college,” I said, reciting the script. Tara was “Tari” to friends and family.
Junior nodded. He held the glass of sherry loosely in his hands. The rich vermillion color caught some of the ambient light. From here, the liquid looked like blood. My stomach growled. My sick, ghoulish stomach.
He said, “Did you two have many classes together?”
“One or two,” I said, “until I dropped out.”
“And why would you do a thing like that?” asked Patricia, Junior’s wife.
“I got pregnant,” I lied.
“Twins,” said Allison, jumping in.
Junior nodded, as if that made perfect sense. I nearly frowned at Allison. We hadn’t discussed me having twins. She’d drunkenly embellished the story. Tara was looking concerned, too.
“Twins,” said Mrs. Thurman. “How delightful. What are their names?”
“Tammy and Anthony.”
“They’re not, you know, identical,” said Allison, slurring her words slightly.
Mrs. Thurman regarded Allison curiously. “I gathered that.” She turned back to me. “And you’ve kept in touch with our Tari all this time?”
“On and off,” I said, lying easily. It was, after all, what investigators did. We often lied to get our information.
“We reconnected through Facebook,” blurted Allison.
“Oh, so you’re friends on Facebook?” asked Edwin. He continued smiling. He seemed to be getting a kick out of all of this.
I saw where this was going, and saw where Allison had screwed up. I said, “I don’t think so, not yet. We just emailed.”
Edwin leaned forward and rested his elbows on his knees and looked directly at me. His face was angular, his cheekbones high. His lips were a little too full, even for me. He said, “Maybe we can be friends on Facebook.”
“Maybe,” I said. “Depends how friendly you are.”
He laughed and sat back.
“I just love Facebook,” said Allison. “Just last week a friend of mine sent me this cat video...I swear to God that little booger was clapping. Clapping! A kitten! Can you believe it?”
Apparently, no one could. Or they were too dumbfounded to speak. Junior shifted his considerable gaze from me to her. The president of Thurman Hotels was also, apparently, the leader of the family, too. “And how do you know our Tari?”
“Oh, I’m just here for the ride,” said Allison, sitting back and kicking her Uggs comfortably. She snapped her gum. “I’m with Sammie here. Where she goes, I go.”
“Cute,” said Patricia.
Time to change the subject. “This is a beautiful home,” I said.
The older couple sitting near the roaring firepl
ace sat forward. Elaine Thurman, sister of the deceased. She smiled brightly. Her aura, I saw, was bluish and yellow, which told me she was a woman very much at peace with herself. Her aura also had a black thread woven through it. Grieving, obviously. This was, after all, the one-year anniversary of her brother’s drowning. She said, “The home has been in my family for generations. We’ve all been coming out to Skull Island for over seventy-five years.”
“Why is it called Skull Island?” asked Allison.
Edwin leaned forward again. “There’s a Native American burial ground on the other side of the island. It’s supposedly cursed.”
“Skull Island and curses,” said Allison, elbowing him. “Where’s Scooby-Doo and Shaggy, too?”
Which had been, of course, my exact thought.
“Well, the curses are just legends,” said Calvin Thurman, or Cal, one of the uncles. He was, I suspected, dying of a cancer. I knew this because of the dark spot of his kidney, a dark spot that was, literally, like a black hole, sucking in the color of his surrounding aura. Indeed, he leaned away from it, taking pressure off it.
He doesn’t even know, I thought.
He held my gaze closely, and something seemed to pass between us. His eyes, I was certain, were trying to communicate something to me. He said, “Although there have been a few cases of unfortunate deaths.”
“We don’t talk about those,” snapped Junior. “Not to strangers.”
“Nonsense,” said Cal, apparently not intimidated at all by his wife’s nephew, president of the company or not. He looked again at me. “It’s in all the papers. Anyone can find that.”
He continued looking at me. I looked at him. His eyes, I was certain, were pleading with me.
“Tell me about the deaths,” I said uncomfortably. I had, of course, come across three such deaths in my own research of Skull Island. Were there some that I had missed?
But Junior’s glowering stare finally cowered old Cal. He sighed deeply and winked at me. “Catch me later after I’ve had a few of these”—and he held up his Scotch—“and I’ll tell you all.”
He laughed. I laughed. No one else laughed.
Instead, Junior Thurman announced that tomorrow we would hold a memorial for his late father, George Thurman, whose death I had, unknown to the family, been hired to investigate. Junior went on: His late father had passed at this time last year, and he wanted to have a ceremony at the chapel located in the mausoleum.
Next, the conversation quickly turned to business. Tara turned and talked to me about my kids. All the while, I was aware of glances from various family members. Of course, some weren’t glancing. Some were openly staring. Like Edwin Thurman. Edwin with his perpetual grin. Patricia, not so much.
Outside, the trees continued to sway and bend and appeared ready to snap, all while a sheet of rain swept over the grounds.
Welcome to Skull Island.
Chapter Sixteen
We were back at the bungalow.
Just two college chums and their annoying new friend, all supposedly catching up—and most definitely not talking about murder.
Supposedly.
“You think they bought it?” asked Allison.
“Hard to say,” said Tara. She’d brought a bottle of wine with her, of which we were all partaking. Some of us more vigorously than others.
“I think they bought it,” said Allison, pouring herself yet another glass of wine.
“Tell me more about Edwin,” I said to Tara.
“He’s Junior’s only son.”
“Your cousin,” I said.
“Right.” Outside, rain slapped against the bungalow’s windows. Tree branches groaned overhead, as the bungalows were closer to the surrounding forest. “He was never much interested in the family’s business.”
“But I bet he’s interested in the family money,” said Allison, laughing. “Oops, sorry. Was that inappropriate?”
“No,” said Tara. “Of course not. You guys are here to find answers to my grandfather’s death. I’m not sure, at this point, if anything could be inappropriate, or if I would even care. And to answer your question...I’m not so sure about his desire for money.”
“What do you mean?” I asked.
“He lives fairly simply. In fact, he often lives here.”
“Living here isn’t living simply,” said Allison.
“True, but even while he’s here, he lives simply. In fact, he prefers sleeping in the basement. On a cot, of all things.”
“He’s here a lot?” I asked.
“Often. In fact, he’s rarely not here.”
“What does he do here?”
“Nothing, as far as anyone knows.”
“How did he take your grandfather’s death?” I asked.
“That’s the strange part,” said Tara, looking up from her glass. “He didn’t seem to take it hard at all.”
“What do you mean?” I asked.
“I mean just that. He didn’t appear overly distraught.”
“No tears?” asked Allison, piping in.
“None that I saw.”
“Is there a room in the basement?” I asked.
“Of course, but it’s so cold down there. Drafty. Miserable.”
“Well, maybe he just wants to stay out of the way,” said Allison. “You know, since he’s here all the time.”
“Maybe,” said Tara.
Or maybe the cold doesn’t bother him, I thought, sending it over to Allison.
A vampire? she thought back.
Yes. I thought. I think. I can see his aura, so that’s a problem.
Problem, why?
I can’t see vampires’ auras.
Gotcha. So, is that why you had me shield my thoughts back at dinner?
I nodded and turned my attention back to Tara. “Were you here on the night of your grandfather’s death?”
“Yes,” she said. “We all were.”
Tara next asked Allison for some more wine, who was only too willing to comply, and shortly, my friend and witness were both gone for the night.
I sighed, and made notes in my case file, all while the girls giggled and talked and got drunker and drunker. I made a mental note to fire Allison.
Rhetorically, of course.
Chapter Seventeen
It was late.
Both Allison and Tara had drunk themselves into oblivion. Me, not so much. Other than a mild upset stomach, my two glasses of wine had had no effect.
I wasn’t hungry yet, either. Two nights ago, I had drunk deeply from Allison’s punctured wrist, as she’d looked away, winced, shuddered and broken out into a sweat. The wound had healed instantly, and by the time I had finished, she was no longer sweating. She had been grinning ghoulishly to herself. The act of me drinking from her gave her some sort of high.
Two sick puppies, I thought, as I pulled on a light jacket and flipped up the hood. My tennis shoes were already on, along with my jeans. I stood at the open door. The rain and wind had let up a little.
It also gave her more than a high, I knew. It sharpened her psychic abilities, of which she was already quite proficient. The act of me drinking from her had now made her into a sort of super psychic.
It was in much the same way that my own daughter’s telepathic powers had increased due to her connection and proximity to me. And, for that matter, perhaps anyone connected to me.
I exited the bungalow, and hung a left toward the big house. It was 3:00 a.m., and I was alone in the night.
I couldn’t have been happier.
Today had been a bit overwhelming to me. Too many people, too many introductions, too many handshakes, too many times I had apologized for my cold hands, too many times I had pretended to be normal.
I continued along the stone path, through the manicured gardens, past the epic barbeque and headed toward the pool. I paused at the surrounding gate and took in the scene around me. Trees lined the far edge of the massive estate. The bungalows dotted the perimeter of the grass, near the trees. T
he massive edifice of the Thurman home rose high into the night sky, like something medieval and ominous. The pool fence itself was only about six feet high. Tall enough to keep the kids out. I unlatched the gate.
The pool itself wasn’t overtly big, perhaps slightly bigger than the standard pools. In the winter, I suspected the pool was covered. It wasn’t winter. It was the beginning of summer, so all the pool toys were near: floating inner tubes, floating killer whales, floating rubber deck chair. The water rippled with the light rain and wind.
How could a grown man drown in his own pool?
I studied the area, noting the layout. There was a balcony directly above the pool. A part of me had suspected that George Thurman might have accidentally fallen into the pool—or been pushed. The balcony suggested that the possibility was still there.
The autopsy had been thorough. No drugs or alcohol, no blunt force. Skin clear, no lesions or scrapes or bruises. Blood tests came back negative, too. No poisoning. No sign of foul play.
Just a dead man in the water.
As I slowly circled the oval-shaped pool, my inner alarm began ringing a little louder. The sound was followed by footsteps, and then the appearance of a man.
A smiling man.
Chapter Eighteen
It was Edwin, of course.
“Good evening, Samantha,” he said.
He came closer and I saw that his hands were covered in dirt. Dirt was also under his fingernails. And it wasn’t just dirt, but something else. Clay?
“Pardon my appearance. I was on an emergency dig.”
“Digging what?” I asked, and was all too aware that my inner alarm was ringing even louder.
He came closer, grinning macabrely. He looked, quite frankly, insane. “Tell you what, Samantha. I will show you someday. How does that sound?”
“Weird as hell,” I said.
He laughed. “Yes, I suppose it does sound sort of odd.”