Wicked Times (An Ivy Morgan Mystery Book 3)

by Lily Harper Hart

  Ivy returned to the living room, studying the floor with a mixture of dread and curiosity. “Maybe I should call my dad,” she said, glancing around. She’d left her cell phone to charge on the table behind the couch. It was still there. “He was working over at the nursery. He might’ve come over here if he was hungry or wanted to check on me.”

  “Something bad happened here,” Laura said. “I think it was Marcus.”

  “I’m betting money it was Marcus,” Ivy said, touching her phone screen and sighing when she saw three missed calls. All of them were from Jack. “God, I hope Marcus doesn’t have my dad.” Ivy was worried for an entirely different reason this time. She punched up her voicemail button and pressed the phone to her ear. “I’ll bet Jack panicked when he couldn’t get me on the phone and sent my dad over here to check on me. Oh, God!”

  Ivy listened to Jack’s increasingly frantic voicemails back-to-back-to-back and then dialed her father’s number. He picked up on the second ring.

  “What do you want, car thief?”

  “Thank God,” Ivy cried out, relief washing over her. “I thought something happened to you.”

  “Why would you think that?” Michael asked.

  “I just got back from my fairy ring and the front door was open,” Ivy explained. “The vase I had by the door is smashed on the floor and I’m sure there’s blood on it. I thought maybe Nicodemus was hurt at first, but I found him and he’s fine. My next thought was of you.”

  “Ivy, have you tried calling Jack?”

  “No. I had three voicemails from him, though. I left the phone in the house to charge while I was at my fairy ring. Why? Is he mad?”

  “They found Laura Simmons’ hotel room,” Michael said. “Jack called me about … I don’t know … forty-five minutes ago. She’s been stalking you. She had hundreds of photos of you and Jack.

  “Jack thinks she’s coming for you right now,” Michael continued. “He was on his way to your house.”

  Ivy’s heart rolled. “No … .”

  “Is his truck there?”

  Ivy glanced out at the driveway. She would’ve noticed Jack’s truck on approach. It wasn’t there. “No. He’s not here.”

  “That doesn’t mean he wasn’t there,” Michael said. “You hang up and lock the door. Call Brian and tell him what’s going on. I’ll be there in two minutes. Don’t open that door for anyone but me. Do you understand?”

  Ivy nodded, tears filling her eyes. “Dad … .”

  “We’ll find Jack,” Michael said. “We’ll find him.”

  JACK woke in a dark room, his head throbbing. He tried to focus, but the edges of his eyesight were blurry. He probably had a concussion. He tried to remember the last thing that happened, and that’s when Laura’s smiling face swam into view.

  He moved quickly, trying to push himself up from the chair he sat in, only to find himself tied in place, his hands secured behind him. He swore, tilting his head to the side and listening. There it was. Someone was in the room with him. He could hear breathing.

  “Laura?”

  A light snapped on, causing Jack to close his eyes to ward off the glare. When he risked opening them again, it took a moment for his eyes to adjust. He was in a basement, the only light coming from a naked bulb with a chain overhead.

  Laura stood beneath the light. She was dressed in jeans and a T-shirt, her hair pulled back in a ponytail and her face bare of makeup. She looked like a different person.

  “Where are we?” Jack asked.

  “In a safe place,” Laura replied. “I’ve been scouting locations for a week. This house is empty because the owners moved to Bay City. I set up a showing with a local realtor and got the combination for the lockbox on the door. It was pretty easy to gain access. The place is ours … and there are no neighbors within screaming distance.”

  Laura looked pleased with herself.

  “Where is Ivy?”

  “Oh, little Miss Ivy evaded me,” Laura said, rolling her eyes. “I was trying to get her, but she disappeared into the woods. I was following her, but I somehow lost her. I gave up and went back to her cottage to wait for her to return – I was going to kill her there and leave you to find her dead in her bed with a bunch of roses spread around her – but you showed up instead.

  “I had to make a choice,” she continued. “I knew I was running out of time after seeing you at the hotel. As much as I want Ivy, I want you more. I had to settle for you. I guess Ivy gets a pass … for now.”

  Despite his predicament, Jack was secretly relieved. Ivy was safe. With his disappearance, Brian, Max, and Michael would rally around her. She wouldn’t be alone. If the unthinkable happened and Laura managed to kill him, at least he would pass with the knowledge that Ivy would live on. That was everything to him.

  “I don’t understand why you’re doing this, Laura,” Jack said, deciding to approach the woman from a place of friendship and shared mutual pain. “I know you loved your brother, but is this really what you want to do?”

  Laura contorted her face in dramatic fashion. “You still don’t get it, do you?”

  “Get what?”

  “I’m not Laura. I’m Marcus.”

  Jack bit the inside of his cheek, unsure. Was Laura so mentally unbalanced she thought she was Marcus? That was a problem he wasn’t expecting. “You’re not Marcus. You’re Laura Simmons. Marcus was your brother. Deep down inside, you have to know that.”

  “You’re such an ass,” Laura said. “I know who I am. I’m Marcus. Somehow I managed to jump out of my body right before I flew over that guardrail. I landed in Laura’s body. She was asleep, so it was pretty easy for me to push her out.”

  That was the most ludicrous thing Jack had ever heard. “Did you see that on a television show or something?”

  Laura frowned. “Do you really not believe me? Are you going to force me to prove myself to you?”

  Jack considered the question. Maybe there was hope for Laura if he proved that Marcus wasn’t inside of her. Maybe she would finally see the truth of what she’d done if he could somehow manage that. “Let’s do that,” he suggested. “Prove to me you’re Marcus.”

  “Okay.” Laura tapped her lip as she thought, eerily mimicking one of her brother’s mannerisms perfectly. Jack swallowed hard. She was really going all out. “Okay,” Laura said, taking a step forward. “Six months after we became partners we went out for our first beer together. It was a little Irish pub on the south side of the Cass Corridor.

  “I bet you that I could pick up a girl before you could,” Laura continued. “We made an agreement about overtime and I approached a brunette with huge boobs. You went after a mousy thing at the bar. She shot you down and I went home with the brunette.”

  Jack’s heart rate sped up. That was true. He remembered that night. Still … . “Marcus could’ve told you that story,” he said, choosing his words carefully. “He liked to boast about his sexual prowess. I’m not sure why he would do that with his sister, but I wouldn’t put it past him.”

  “Oh, good grief!” Laura kicked an empty bucket across the basement, the sound echoing throughout the space. “Fine. If you don’t believe me, ask me something that only Marcus would know. Make it as obscure as you want.”

  “Okay.” Jack licked his lips. “What happened to the gun Marcus used to shoot me with? How did you get it?”

  “That’s not the type of question I was talking about,” Laura snapped. “I’ll answer it for you because I know how you like answers, but then you’re going to ask me another question. After I shot you – and I was sure you were dead, so I have no idea how you managed to survive – I knew I had to get rid of the gun.

  “I drove to that old lot where we used to question narcs and dug a hole and buried it,” she continued. “I dug it up again about six weeks ago and used it on my mother because she would not shut her filthy hole. She figured out that I switched places with Laura and she was threatening to do an exorcism on me. The old bat always was a superstitious
moron.”

  Jack shook his head. “But … .”

  “No! Ask me something to prove that I’m Marcus,” Laura instructed. “This isn’t going to be any fun if you don’t believe.”

  “Fine,” Jack said, searching his memory. “Um … what did I tell you after the prostitute murder at the Renaissance Center? We were in the elevator on our way down, and I confided something in you. What was it?”

  Laura screwed up her face in concentration. Jack was convinced he’d won until her eyes brightened. “You told me that you didn’t understand how anyone could hire a professional because sex was so much better when emotions were involved,” she said, chortling. “You said you believed you would find love one day. I guess you did, huh?”

  Jack was dumbfounded. There was no way Laura could know anything about that conversation, and there was no reason for Marcus to ever confide anything of the sort in his sister. “Marcus?”

  “There it is,” Marcus said, gleefully bending over to stare Jack in the eye on an even level. “How’s it going, buddy?”

  “I DON’T know what to do,” Ivy said, pacing her living room as Brian and Michael watched. “He’s out there somewhere. Marcus is going to torture him to death. We have to do something.”

  Brian rubbed the back of his neck, conflicted. He was convinced Ivy was losing her mind. “Sweetie, I think you’re in shock,” he said. “Marcus Simmons is dead. Laura is the one behind all of this.”

  Ivy rolled her eyes. “I can’t explain this to you right now,” she said. “I know that Laura Simmons’ body is doing all these things. Marcus is inside of her, though. We’re not going to find Jack by thinking like Laura would. We have to think like Marcus would.”

  Speaking of Laura, Ivy hadn’t heard a peep from the ghost since her father arrived. She wanted to talk to her. She wanted to ask a thousand different questions, and yet she knew if she started holding a conversation with thin air Brian and Michael would have her committed.

  “Honey, why do you think that?” Michael asked, his voice soft. “Did you hit your head?”

  Ivy slapped his hand away when he tried to rub it down the back of her head. “No!”

  “I can’t deal with this right now,” Brian said, exchanging a worried look with Michael. “Jack is out there. A crazy woman bent on revenge has him somewhere. We found Laura’s car abandoned on the side of the road about a mile down. That means she has Jack’s truck. That’s why Ivy didn’t see it when she returned to the house.”

  “How are you going to find Jack?” Michael asked.

  “The state police are sending everything they’ve got,” Brian answered. “Bellaire is, too. They want Laura badly because she took out one of their own. We’re setting up a search grid and going from there.” He darted a look in Ivy’s direction. “Ivy, you need to stay here with your father. I’ll call as soon as we know something.”

  Ivy made a face and turned away from Brian and her father. She knew they were trying to do the right thing by her, but she was frustrated. She couldn’t listen to them when she had to focus on Jack. He needed her. Somehow, deep inside, she knew she would have to be the one to save him.

  “I’m going to lay down,” Ivy announced, moving toward the hallway. “I feel sick to my stomach and my head is pounding. I … need to lay down.”

  “I think that’s a good idea,” Michael said, his heart breaking for his only daughter. If Jack died, he knew Ivy would never recover. He had no idea how to console her, though. “Do you want me to bring you anything?”

  “I just want to be alone,” Ivy said, fighting back tears. “Just … leave me alone.”

  She stalked into her bedroom and slammed the door shut with enough force to scare Nicodemus off the bed. He shot her a disdainful look before crawling under it. He was not having a good day.

  “Laura?” Ivy hissed, keeping her voice low. “Are you here?”

  “I’m here. I’m sorry I didn’t say anything. I didn’t want to risk them thinking you were crazy.”

  “They already think I’m crazy,” Ivy grumbled. “Where would Marcus take Jack?”

  “I can’t be sure, but he went and looked at an empty house about a week ago,” Laura said. “I’ve been racking my brain, and I think that’s where he took him. He would need privacy to do what he wants to do, and that’s the best place to get it. The house was in the middle of nowhere.”

  “Do you think you could find it again?”

  “Yes.”

  Ivy moved to her dresser and opened the top drawer, digging around in the dark until she found what she was looking for.

  “Are those keys?” Laura asked. “What are they for?”

  “My father’s car,” Ivy replied. “I forgot I even had them until he went off about me stealing his car this afternoon.”

  “What are you going to do with them?”

  “We’re going to wait for Brian to leave so he doesn’t catch us and then I’m going to climb out the window and go to the nursery and steal my father’s car again.”

  “What if he hears you?”

  “The car is across the way at the nursery. He ran here to get to me. He won’t hear it.” Ivy was grim. “Then you’re going to lead me to Jack. Once we’re sure he’s there, I’ll call Brian with the location.”

  “Are you sure you want to do this?”

  “I’m sure I can’t lose Jack,” Ivy replied. “I’d rather die with him than live without him.”

  Twenty-Four

  “I don’t understand,” Jack said, his mouth dry. “How is this possible?”

  “You’re asking the wrong person,” Marcus said. “I didn’t even believe in this stuff until it happened. The last thing I remember is wishing I could be in someone else’s body and then … poof … I was. I woke up on Laura’s couch and went into the bathroom, thinking I somehow must’ve passed out at her house or I was dreaming, and then I realized what happened.”

  “But … that’s insane.”

  “I’m right there with you, buddy,” Marcus said, laughing maniacally. “It took me a week to realize it was really happening. After that I started planning my revenge. Do you know how surreal it was to go to my own funeral in my sister’s body? Creepy.

  “I couldn’t take a shower for a week because the idea of seeing Laura’s naked body was so gross,” he continued. “I smelled so bad my mother finally insisted I reintroduce myself to soap. She assumed poor Laura was grieving.”

  “What happened to Laura?”

  “She hung around in my new brain with me for a little bit,” Marcus replied, his eyes flashing with annoyance. “She kept nattering on and on about me leaving because that was my only true escape. I kept telling her to shut up … and then she would go away for days sometimes and I thought I’d won … but every time she came back begging me to do the right thing. She always was a moron.”

  Jack couldn’t decide if he was lost in a nightmare or if this was really happening. If this was a nightmare, his only hope was Ivy finding him to drag him away. Maybe he was still unconscious. That was a more reasonable assumption than believing Marcus somehow managed to body jump.

  “Where is Laura now?”

  “She left,” Marcus replied. “She was there when I dug up the gun and she called me a bad man.” His tone was mocking. “She said that karma was going to get me no matter what. I knew that wasn’t true. If karma was going to get me I would’ve died on the expressway that night.”

  “You did die that night,” Jack said, his voice wavering.

  “Nope. Now I get to finish what I started. I’m going to kill you, Jack. I’m going to make it hurt, too. When I’m done, I’m going to find a way to get your precious Ivy. I’ll send her along to the other side soon after I’m done with you. Your biggest problem is that I want to take my time. You’re going to have to do some suffering before I let you die. I hope you’re ready for it.”

  Jack’s heart thudded at the thought of Marcus putting his hands on Ivy. “Leave Ivy alone.”

  “Is t
hat all you care about? What about you? Don’t you want to beg for your life?”

  “I’ll beg for Ivy’s life if it makes a difference,” Jack offered. “I won’t beg for myself.”

  “Have it your way,” Marcus said. “Ivy is dying, though. I’ll just bet they bury you guys next to each other. It will be sweet and romantic. I can’t wait to see how she screams.”

  “WELL?” Laura asked, her voice close to Ivy’s ear.

  “You were right,” Ivy whispered. She stepped away from the half-window of the old Winchester house and dug her phone out of her pocket. “Keep watching them. I have to make a call … and then we’re going in.”

  “What are you going to do when we get inside?”

  “Save Jack … and hopefully figure out a way for you to get your body back.” Ivy pressed the phone to her ear and waited for Brian to pick up. When he did, he sounded irritated. Ivy cut him off before he could get a full head of steam. “I know you think I’m crazy, and I don’t blame you. I’m not at my house, though.”

  “Where are you?”

  “I crawled out the window and stole my father’s car,” Ivy replied, her voice even. “He’s probably panicking right now, but I had to find Jack. He’s at the old Winchester house on Cedar Creek Road. Do you know where that is?”

  Brian was flabbergasted. “How did you find him?”

  “You won’t believe me if I tell you,” Ivy answered. “He’s in the basement and he’s tied to a chair. I’m going in after him.”

  “Don’t you even think about it!” Brian roared. “The one thing in this world Jack wants above everything else is for you to be safe. If you go into that house, you’ll both be in danger.”

  “If I don’t go into that house, Laura is going to torture Jack to death,” Ivy countered. “You’re on your way. I can distract her until you get here.”

  “No!”

  “I’m hanging up my phone now,” Ivy said, eerily calm. “I’m going into that basement. I’m going to save Jack. I’m going to need you to save me. I’m turning off my phone so it doesn’t give me away. I … if something happens, tell my father I’m sorry. I can’t leave Jack, though.”