by L. L. Muir
From the bench on the wall behind her, she heard Lance shift in his seat. He was reminding her she wasn’t alone. Since she’d lived in Utah at the time she was attacked, Lance had never seen LaMont before, but he was aware of the details. When she’d gone off the grid to go live with Uncle Dewey, the sheriff’s office had been brought into the loop, and since day one, Lance had been preparing for the day he could face her abuser.
A little rattle of his chair was an impressive show of self-control on his part.
LaMont noticed him, then looked quickly back to her.
“I wanted to come talk to you,” she began.
He winced, like he was expecting a tirade.
“I wanted you to know…that I forgive you.”
He frowned, confused. But then his whole face lightened. His brows puckered together and she could see the shimmer of moisture gathering in his eyes.
She had to clear her throat again since she shared his reaction. “And I want you to forgive me. For shooting you.”
He shook his head vehemently, like he was trying to say she had nothing to apologize for, not that he was denying her request.
“I’m sorry,” he said, finally. “I went looking for you, to apologize, to explain. But crossing the state line landed me back in here.”
She tried to suppress the shudder caused by the grating of his voice. She remembered it clearly, would always remember it. But she also remembered the delicate state she was in back then, when Lance had come to tell her that LaMont had been released. If he’d shown up on her doorstep, even to apologize, she’d have ended up in a psych ward for good.
As it was, she realized that a prolonged conversation was a bad idea. No sense touching a hot stove just because you understand exactly how it would feel, and that one day her hand would heal.
“I have to go.”
He put one cuffed hand against the glass. “Wait.” The guard stepped closer and LaMont immediately pulled his hands back to his lap. “I’m sorry. I wanted to tell you. Those books were my life. I had no life. I just wanted to be part of something. I needed you to be part of me…” He shook his head fast. “But not anymore. I promise. I won’t…” His chin quivered for a second. “I won’t be bothering you anymore.”
Lance’s reflection appeared in the window as he came to stand beside her. LaMont looked at him and nodded, like he understood that someone would be watching over her no matter what he promised.
“On your feet,” the guard barked.
LaMont quickly hung up the phone and obeyed. And though Ash couldn’t hear him anymore, she read his lips when he said goodbye.
“Goodbye.”
~ ~ ~
They drove up the Interstate in silence. Ashlynn cried a little, but not for long. And when she was done, she was done.
“You know, I believe him, when he said he won’t be bothering me anymore.”
Lance snorted.
“Of course, I’ll probably always carry that heavy Taser in my purse, just in case.
“Good girl.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
All Ashlynn’s rituals changed, over time. She acquired a preference for nightgowns and for writing in the evening instead of the middle of the night. She still didn’t care for mornings. They smelled funny.
Through everything, Wolfgang never changed. He never treated her as anything other than his personal slave and the human that stood between him and a happy life with affectionate little boys. And she pretended to be grateful that at least something in her life remained steady.
After three and a half years of writing cozy mysteries, she decided she was ready to move on to a new genre. Though Angela had tried to get a commitment out of her, Ashlynn really didn’t know what she wanted to write next, but eventually, she had to force herself to put her butt in the chair and open a blank document.
It had been a long time since she’d started something new and she was excited to experiment. If she went a little crazy, she could always rein it back or delete any false starts.
With all her rituals seen to, she put her fingers on the keyboard and began…
The scene that poured from her fingers and played out on the page began in the woods. A sporadic, cold breeze harassed the dried leaves until they fell from the trees, discarded. Crusts of rust and red danced from one pile to the next before flying into the air again, to be born away into the darkening forest.
She sensed some menacing entity waiting, watching, but her character had not yet been detected. There was nothing she could do but press on.
The air was snatched from her lungs, then thrown back in her face as the wind grew more violent. It fought her every step.
“Go back,” it hissed. “Leave now.”
But she couldn’t go back. There was no going back. Whatever waited was her destiny. She would face it, no matter the cost.
Recognizing futility, the wind left her alone and settled for the distraction of the leaves once again. The piles scattered as Ash’s mysterious character strode deeper into the shadows. Minutes passed slowly. A mist rose from the wet earth, but the scenery never changed. She noticed a tree with a crooked trunk she’d seen before.
She’d been walking in circles.
Turning sharply to the left, she struck out in a straight line, determined to find…something. Soon, a large structure rose up on her right. A house? A business?
She stepped into a clearing—flat ground, covered in a thick solid blanket of leaves from seasons past. A pole separated itself from the mist in front of her. A broken lamp hung sideways. A hard blast of wind would send it crashing to the ground.
An oil lamp. An oil lamp!
She held her breath and turned. The pointed roof of the galloper was still intact, though the edges of the tin surface had been ravaged by Time. The breeze cleared the mist away like a nun shooing a crowd of troublesome children from a holy place.
It was a holy place, exactly as she remembered it, except for the fading colors of paint. The horses were no longer all white. Parts of their bodies had returned to the natural wood from which they’d been carved. But the blues, reds, and golds faded only slightly.
The figures were clumsy and rude compared to the swan sculpture at the Sawtooth Bar. But even in their sad, dilapidated state, they were the most beautiful things on earth.
As she moved closer to the carousel, her gaze was drawn to the woods into which she’d disappeared that night, so long ago. And she wondered if the sense of menace she’d felt came from there.
Did those trees hide a family graveyard? If she dared look, would she find a headstone that would break her heart?
Alexander. Alexander. I never meant to leave you!
She lifted the ruffled hem of her white nightgown and raised a foot over the edge of the platform, then paused and stepped back. She wasn’t worried about the wood falling apart, she just didn’t want to change anything. The coach and four horses were exactly where they’d been the last time she’d looked back, as if the place had never been touched since that night.
Had Braun never been asked to do his magic again?
She stared at the spot where Alexander had been standing when she warned him not to move. His hand had rested on the red mane of the front horse. A strange white spot, exactly where his hand had been, made her wonder if he’d left her a message. And in a heartbeat, she was on the stage to take a closer look.
It was a message alright, but not a written one.
The red paint had been worn away in the very distinct shape of a man’s fingers—created by what had to have been hundreds and hundreds of touches by the same hand.
She had barely any air left in her lungs, but she managed to whisper his name as she walked around to stand where he’d stood, to touch the place he’d touched, to know that he’d been real.
Through a thick curtain of tears, she glanced at the woods and thought again of what might lay beyond it. Then she shook her head.
“I don’t want to know.”
Her
tears were flavored with a light salt of relief. Deep down, she’d worried that she and LaMont had too much in common, that they’d both obsessed over characters they wanted desperately to have in their lives and were willing to do just about anything to make that happen. But the difference was there, under her fingers—the proof that her obsession hadn’t been one-sided.
Alexander had waited. And waited. And had wanted her back just as badly as she’d wanted him.
What had she done differently? Why had it worked this time, when she hadn’t been trying?
She went over the steps she’d taken all day, the routine, the lack of routine. Then she remembered thinking, very clearly, that it was okay to go a little crazy, since she was starting something new. She’d given herself permission to go nuts—like she always did when starting something new. There was no doubt in her mind that she’d done the same the first time she’d found herself standing on that balcony!
And all the times she’d tried to return—she’d been trying to prove she wasn’t crazy, doing exactly the opposite of what was required.
“Mystery solved,” as one of her sleuth witches would say. Too bad she hadn’t figured it out a long time ago.
~ ~ ~
Ashlynn didn’t need to look around to commit the place to her memory. It was already embedded. And she’d remember it the way it had been before, with a new roof and bright new paint—except for the worn mark on one red mane…
She would never regret what had brought her there the first time, or the second—whether it was the power of her mind, or the power of her heart. For all she knew, she might find herself there again. But without an Alexander in the scene, she was content to leave it behind.
Just as she was about to step off the stage, she heard a sharp noise and wondered if Wolfgang was trying to bring her back to Ketchum and his reality. She heard it again, but still couldn’t say what it was, only that it had come from the direction of the house.
She squinted to see between the trees of the overgrown orchard, hoping for a glimpse of the grand manor that should have held up even better than the galloper. She was thrilled to find so much of the white building was visible, but she was curious about the gardens.
It wouldn’t hurt to walk through that maze again. Would it be ten feet tall? Would it be a solid, massive hedge? Or would it have died and crumbled?
Since there was no rush to go back, she jumped down and picked her way through the gnarled branches of the fruit trees. When she reached the edge, she paused to gage the distance.
The house was there. The house was fine. The length of two football fields lay between her and the white balustrade where she and Alexander first met. The hedges of the maze were only waist high, though not so neat anymore.
All of that she absorbed in an instant, just before her heart exploded. Because there, down the center of the garden, with his white shirt billowing and his black boots running at full speed…
Came Alexander.
EPILOGUE
Sheriff Lance King got on the radio and ordered two deputies to meet him over at Dewey’s place. That Wolfgang was outside in the middle of the night worried him. The fact that he was barking like a rabid dog made his blood run cold.
He redialed Ashlynn’s cell phone for the third time since her neighbors had called dispatch. Still no answer.
“Please be asleep.”
He got in his truck and took off. His phone rang. It was the boys in Utah calling him back.
“Whatchagot?” There was no time for beating around the bush.
“LaMont’s accounted for. Checked in with his parole officer seven hours ago, in Tempe.”
“Relieved to hear it. Thank you.”
One of the deputies, Rawlins, was already on scene, parked at the neighbor’s. He got out when Lance rolled up behind him. “Lights on in back. No movement. As you can tell, dog’s still going nuts. You think it’s LaMont?”
“LaMont’s in Arizona.”
He sent Rawlins around back, then moved to the far side of the house so he could see into the backyard, where Wolfgang still barked. Before he even reached the fence, the dog quieted and hurried over to sniff through the fence at him.
“I’m here, Wolfgang. It’s all right.”
The dog whined, then ran back to the side door and started barking again. Though Lance was relieved the dog didn’t need to be put down, it meant something was wrong inside the house. So he moved back to the front door.
Deputy Barnes reached the steps at the same time with his flashlight ready. “You gonna knock?”
Lance shook his head. “She wouldn’t expect me to.”
He tried the handle. It was locked. He backed up and rammed it open with his shoulder. The old, hollow door splintered into pieces as it surrendered. He pulled his weapon and listened, but heard no movement.
“Ashlyyn! Ashlynn, it’s Lance, honey. Where are you?”
It was impossible to hear anything over the dog at that point, so they moved carefully through the house, securing each room, then moving to the next. When only the bedroom was left, he said a quick prayer, then turned the knob. It wasn’t locked.
The bed was in disarray, but there was no sign of a struggle. One pillow had spilled onto the floor, but that was it.
“Sheriff?” Barnes whispered and nodded toward the bathroom door, which stood slightly ajar. After Lance nodded, the deputy opened the door quickly, then braced himself. Lance didn’t relax until Barnes straightened and holstered his gun. “Nothing in here.” He stepped inside, looked over the edge of the tub, then shook his head. “Maybe she just hooked up with someone and left the dog outside overnight.”
Lance pointed to the familiar bag on the desk. “Without her purse?” He shook his head. “I’m going to let the dog in. I suggest you wait outside.”
He’d barely opened the kitchen door an inch before the beast nosed it open and charged into the house. In a frenzy, he searched every room, going back to the desk and the bed half a dozen times to search again.
“She ain’t here, boy.”
Wolfgang gave him an eyeroll, he was sure of it, then he went on searching. Eventually, he returned to the desk, nudged the rolling chair out of the way, then sat down in front of the monitor like he was going to search the internet or something.
Lance half expected to hear Ashlynn’s voice coming out of it, like in some horror movie. It gave him the creeps enough that he had to laugh it off.
“She ain’t in there, either.”
“Barf,” the dog said, which was the extent of his vocabulary.
Since the Jeep was still in the garage, they treated the house like a crime scene. He called his wife and she brought the boys over to calm Wolfgang down. The dog was thrilled to see them, and when the front door opened, Wolfgang ran out and climbed into his wife’s car. His boys couldn’t be happier. His wife…sighed a lot.
Twenty-four hours after they’d arrived at Dewey’s, Lance filled out the missing person report himself. They made fliers with a photo taken from the back of one of Ashlynn’s novels and sent them off in all directions with truckers. They took search dogs out in a new area every day for two weeks. The Sawtooth National Forest was just too big to search on foot, so they flew drones over the mountains for another two weeks.
They just had no leads to follow.
Except one…
~ ~ ~
William Bainbridge was waiting at the bottom steps of his large Boston home when Lance pulled up in a rental car. When he’d called the man, he never expected his cooperation, let alone an invitation to come to his home.
The house itself looked like it had been built long before the United States had become a country. The wide, three storied home had at least eight large pillars in front and elaborately carved pieces over each window and door.
“Welcome,” Bainbridge said, and offered a firm handshake. “I’ve been waiting for you.”
Lance was ushered into a large living room with red velvet chairs and carpet so deep
he worried he’d leave footprints everywhere he stepped. Two framed pictures sat on the mantle with white cloths covering them.
Bainbridge laughed. “Yes. Those are the paintings I told you about all those years ago. And I assume, if Ashlynn Garrity is missing, you didn’t give my secret away.”
“I didn’t tell her a thing. You sounded crazy. And the last thing she needed was another lunatic in her life.”
“Well, we’re all grateful. After all, if I’d messed things up—which I very well might have—my sister and I might not be here today.” He gestured around the room. “None of this would be here. For you see, my 17th great-grandfather gave his title and properties back to the crown soon after he married, then brought his bride here.”
Lance rotated his cowboy hat in his hands and shook his head. “I think you misunderstood if you think I believe that story you told me.”
Bainbridge just laughed. “I’m sure you will. Once you see these.” He made the long walk over to the mantle and whipped the cover off the first frame. “This is him. Alexander Bainbridge, once known as Lord Beaufort.
The frame held a painting of a handsome dark-headed man with a thick white cloth tied around his throat, a large knot in front of his Adam’s apple. He looked like he was trying not to smile. Even a hick like him knew the painting was very old, and probably worth a pretty penny.
Bainbridge reached for the other cover, then looked at Lance. “You may wish to sit down, sir.”
Lance shook his head and waved his fingers, to tell the guy to get on with it. When he’d arrested him, Bainbridge had told Lance, privately, that Ashlynn Garrity, a novelist from Ketchum, Idaho, was his 17th great-grandmother, and that he could prove it. That there was a painting of her that had been handed down through the family for ages.
Bainbridge grinned and pulled the cover away while keeping his eyes on Lance. And though, as a sheriff, he’d learned how to keep his reactions to himself, his pride took a beating when he wound up sitting on a carpet that might forever hold the imprint of his ass cheeks.
He’d been prepared to see a resemblance to his post high school sweetheart—he had never considered it might be an actual painting of her.