by Kay Hooper
“No. Not a hint.”
“That was what we thought. Noah was suspicious, but . . . When that vortex was closed, the dark energy was trapped again, rendered more or less harmless.”
“More or less?” DeMarco asked wryly.
“You both know energy can’t be destroyed. It can be transformed, it can be channeled—and it can be trapped. But it can’t be destroyed.”
“Well, that’s comforting,” Hollis said with a sigh. “And what’s going on there? The fourth pair of girls, have they been found yet?”
“No. But there’s an army searching these mountains, on foot, on horseback, by ATV, and by chopper. He hasn’t tried to hide any of the other girls. We believe if the last two are dead, they’ll be found like the others.”
“If?”
Miranda hesitated, then said, “It’s at least possible that Samuel—whoever or whatever he is now—does have a disciple, an apprentice. The former is probably more likely; being worshipped was part of what made him powerful. At any rate, if that is the situation, then once Samuel fixed his attention on Sociable—for whatever reasons—he could have left his disciple here to continue this part of his plan. Gathering more dark energy.”
It was DeMarco who said, “But that would only work if he and his disciple were connected in some way, probably psychically.”
“Yes.”
“Then it’s a woman,” he said definitely. “That’s the way his connections worked, the way he drew power.”
“It’s something we’ve considered. And it’s entirely possible that if Samuel is at the heart of this, he does have a woman here in the mountains doing his bidding.” Her voice changed, became more brisk. “But that’s our worry, at least for now. You two have the greater worry.”
“Understatement,” Hollis muttered.
“Hollis, the two of you are there because you’re the best team for the situation.”
“Why?” Hollis demanded baldly.
“Because he’s about energy, about power. He thinks of it as a weapon, so he hoards it, builds on it, covets it.”
“Uses it,” DeMarco reminded.
“Yes, he uses it. Or at least he did. We aren’t at all sure he can do anything now the same way he could before.”
“But if he can?” Hollis held her voice steady. “I felt the force of his energy, Miranda, and it nearly killed me. Would have killed me, if I hadn’t been able to heal myself.”
“You’re stronger now,” Miranda said.
“Am I strong enough?”
“I don’t know. And neither do you. Until you find him. Until you face him.”
“And then? Am I supposed to throw rocks? I have a feeling bullets won’t even slow him down.”
“Hollis. He’s about energy.”
She opened her mouth and then closed it, thoughtful.
“I don’t like this,” DeMarco announced.
“No,” Miranda murmured. “I didn’t expect you would. But you’re there, too, Reese. Even if she doesn’t like to admit it, Hollis knows as well as you do that the two of you forged a very unusual connection when she was channeling all that energy—and you were her lifeline.”
“Dammit,” Hollis said.
“Connections are also a tool we can use, Hollis. Believe me, I know,” Miranda said.
Hollis avoided any glance at her partner. “I get that. It’s just . . . I feel a connection to Samuel I don’t like at all. It’s as if he’s gotten inside my head somehow.”
DeMarco said, “You haven’t mentioned that.”
She still refused to look at him. “The headache. The nosebleed. What I felt up there at the church and the parsonage. The . . . unnatural way it all felt. It was him. I wasn’t sure what it was at the time. But I’m sure now.”
“He thinks he knows you,” Miranda said. “But you’ve grown incredibly since you faced him in North Carolina. Among so many other things, he’s an utter narcissist, Hollis. He doesn’t really think about anyone but himself. And I’m betting—we’re betting—that you’re going to surprise the hell out of him.”
—
MELANIE RUBBED HER forehead between her brows and said, “Well, that was weird. Still weird.”
“You still have the headache?” Annabel asked.
“No, the pain’s gone. But I feel kind of lightheaded.”
“Toby?”
“Yeah, me, too.”
Practically, Annabel said, “None of us ate much for lunch. Melanie, you said you didn’t have any more appointments today, and most everybody is getting ready for the storm. Why don’t we go get something to eat and—and then decide where we want to ride out the storm.”
Melanie eyed her. “Is this you not wanting to be alone, Annabel? Because if that’s what it is—”
“No, this is me thinking we all belong to The Group, and it wouldn’t be a bad idea for us to stick together until Trinity and your brother and the other agents figure out who the killer is.”
Toby said, “I agree. Look, why don’t we take that other two-bedroom suite at the hotel? I know the agents have one of them, but the other’s empty, and Bill would probably cut the price in half just to have somebody there this time of year.”
Bill Moss was the hotel owner and manager.
“Toby—”
“It’s right in the center of town, above a good restaurant, and it almost never loses power during storms. Melanie, I don’t think even you want to go home alone. Not now, with all this happening. Why don’t we go together, and each pack a bag at home, leave a couple of lights on, and come back down here to stay at the hotel.”
Melanie studied her for a long moment. “You know, you kept it pretty calm, and you haven’t mentioned it since, but you did say you believed one of the agents would be destroyed.”
“Do we have to talk about that now?”
“Well, why not?”
“Because . . . it’s all shifted. Storms always change things. Energy shifts and things change. Trinity and the agents have to get ready for the storm just like we do; we’ll all be stuck inside. At least they’ll have files and things to go over, and I wouldn’t put it past Trinity to ask at least a couple of the guys she may be suspicious of to come to the station to answer some questions. Good time, with everybody preoccupied by the storm.”
Melanie shook her head. “You’re avoiding, Toby. What do you mean, it’s all shifted?”
Toby frowned. “I don’t know. It’s . . . fuzzy.”
“You don’t still believe one of the agents will be destroyed?”
“I think . . . I feel . . . that somebody is going to suffer. Be in a lot of pain.”
“There’s this killer,” Melanie reminded her, not as dryly as she had intended.
“Not that kind of pain. Not physical injury. Not torture, the way Barry was . . . Something else. Something deeper, in a dark place. From a dark place. An old agony exploding.” Toby shook her head. “Look, I know that sounds like the worst kind of carnival bullshit, but I can’t explain it any better.”
“And in the meantime, you believe we should stay together.”
“Yes. I do.”
“So do I,” Annabel said. “Because I didn’t imagine that voice last night, Melanie. I hadn’t had too much wine. And because we both know Toby saw Scott, just like she said she did.”
“Annabel—”
“We need to stay together, Melanie. It’s important.”
Melanie could have thought of several reasons to disagree, but none of them convinced even herself. The truth was that two of her friends had been horribly murdered in the last week, that their killer remained unidentified but was being pursued by another of her friends and her brother, that a storm of unknown severity and duration was approaching—and she didn’t want to spend any more time alone than she had to.
And because Toby wasn’t the only one who had seen the spirit of a murdered ex-lover trying desperately to tell her something.
—
“HOLLIS?”
She was alo
ne in the closed conference room, since DeMarco had gone to get coffee, and Hollis hadn’t heard the door opening. She wasn’t surprised she hadn’t.
She was surprised at the stab of relief she felt when she pushed back her sleeve to watch gooseflesh rise on her arm, when she felt the odd chill, the change in the very air around her.
When she looked up slowly and saw a grave girl of about twelve standing at the end of the conference table.
Hollis could, just barely, see the closed door behind the girl. Through her. Because she had died violently at the hands of Samuel many months before.
“Brooke,” she said.
The spirit of a little girl who was lifetimes older than she appeared smiled at Hollis. “We thought we’d give you a break,” she said.
Hollis blinked. “What? You mean it wasn’t my fault all these months that I couldn’t see spirits?”
“You needed to rest,” Brooke said seriously. “Clear your head, so to speak. You’ve been through a lot.”
“I thought I was broken,” Hollis told her indignantly.
“You’ve never been broken, Hollis. Even when you thought you were.”
That silenced Hollis, but only for a moment. “You’ve appeared to me even though you’re one of Diana’s guides. But the stakes were high then. Are they now? Is Samuel here?”
“He wanted to live. He found a way. But . . .”
“But?” Hollis was so accustomed to uninformative spirit “guides” that she was honestly surprised when Brooke answered.
“Reese was right. Samuel had spent a lifetime learning how to collect and contain energies. How to use them. How to keep them from destroying him. Even though he was weak when he crossed back over, he still had the ability to collect energy. The dark energy he wanted and needed. What he hadn’t counted on was that his new vessel lacked all those years of building control.”
“So he’s burning out his vessel?” Hollis asked directly, digging for information while she could get it.
“He will, if he expends too much energy. But that isn’t his main problem.”
“What is?”
“His vessel still has . . . the original personality.”
“What? I thought he’d probably choose someone who was brain-dead, no personality of their own left. That must have been an easier thing to do.”
“He thought he had done just that. As it turned out, the doctors and machines didn’t know everything. And Samuel wasn’t strong enough to totally overwhelm the personality he found there.”
Hollis frowned at her. “You’re being awfully forthcoming. Why?”
“I can’t be helpful?”
“Is that sarcasm? You’re actually being sarcastic with me?”
Brooke smiled, but then sobered and said, “I wanted to warn you. There’s still some of the original person left, and he can . . . surface now and then. He’s confused. Sometimes he’s weak. Sometimes he thinks he’s in the middle of a very vivid nightmare where people who wronged him, often only in his own mind, are punished. Other times . . . he knows what’s happening.”
Sober herself, Hollis said, “Oh, man, that’s gotta be hell.”
Brooke nodded. “Poor man. You have to understand . . . his only release is death.”
“Shit. I knew you were going to say that.”
“I just didn’t want you to feel guilty. He wouldn’t have survived physically if Samuel hadn’t taken him. And he won’t survive much longer no matter what you do or don’t do.”
“What about Samuel? We can’t seem to kill the bastard.”
Brooke seemed to hesitate, as though listening to a voice only she could hear, and then she said, “He knows the weakness of his vessel, and he’s beginning to get desperate. He’s tried more than once to invades someone else’s mind.”
“My headache? The nosebleed?”
“You have a kind of shield he didn’t expect.”
“I don’t have a shield at all.”
Brooke smiled faintly, but said only, “He’s tried others. He’ll go on trying. Sooner or later, he’ll find a vessel he can possess that’s strong enough to hold him indefinitely. Or else you’ll destroy him. There is no in-between.”
“I’ll destroy him? Brooke—”
The spirit guide was fading.
“When the time comes,” she said in a voice already growing distant, “you’ll know what to do. Don’t be afraid to use your connection with Reese. He’s still your lifeline, Hollis. He always will be.”
Hollis opened her mouth to speak, but Brooke was gone. And before she could gather her thoughts together, a wave of intense dizziness swept over Hollis, she felt icy cold—and then everything went black.
—
HOLLIS WAS STANDING in front of the small graveyard between the church and the parsonage when DeMarco joined her.
“The negative energy has lessened, hasn’t it?”
“Reading me?”
“Your shoulders are more relaxed,” he said, maybe answering.
Or not.
Hollis glanced at him, then returned her gaze to the graveyard. “I thought maybe if I stood here long enough, I might sense a different kind of energy. But these are old graves. If anybody waited around long enough for me to get here, I guess they don’t have anything much to say.”
“And Barry Torrance? He died here.”
“Not a peep from him, either. Have to say, I’m relieved by that. I generally don’t see them with the injuries that killed them. Really hoping that holds true here. Assuming I see anything at all, of course. Or hear. Whatever. Right now I barely have five senses.”
DeMarco frowned. “Barely?”
“Yeah. My eyes are . . . acting up.”
“What do you mean?”
Hollis kept her gaze on the graveyard. “The church is white. The parsonage is white, too.”
“Yeah. So?”
“When I look at the church now, there’s a . . . there’s something almost like an aura around it. Red.”
He waited a moment, and then said, “And the parsonage?”
“It’s just . . . All red. The siding, the front door. Even the roof. Sort of white trim here and there, but there’s red dripping or smeared on that. Other places still white, like someone was in a hurry and missed spots, or were on a ladder that didn’t reach far enough. In some places things look . . . distorted, as if I’m seeing just those places through a magnifying glass held at the wrong angle or something. Everything I see is wrong. It’s a house of blood, Reese. So it has to be my eyes, right?”
“Hollis—”
“It has to be my eyes. Maybe the energy up here. Because I’ve never seen anything like this before. Or maybe, hopefully, just because I’m asleep and dreaming all this.”
“I’m in your dream?”
“Of course.” Her voice was abruptly calm and certain when she told him that. “You’ve always been able to hear the whispers of my dreams. The next step was always this one.”
“This one?”
“Walking with me in my dreams. Or in yours, I suppose. We’ll have to figure that out. If there’s time. Later.”
He tried again. “Hollis—”
“Is Braden still on the steps?”
DeMarco turned his head and saw that the black dog was at the steps leading to the front door of the parsonage. His front paws were up a step or two, and his head was turned, his gaze fixed on them.
“I’m not going back in there,” Hollis said.
“Is that what you believe he wants you to do?”
“Don’t you? I’m the only one here who’s supposed to be able to talk to the dead. And I’m pretty sure Braden knows there’s nothing alive in that parsonage.”
“But something you—we—need to know about?”
“I’m not sure. Maybe. Maybe he thinks so.”
DeMarco was as certain as he’d ever been that he knew exactly what Hollis was feeling, and despite the lessening of tension in her posture, what his certainty told him was that she was afraid.
He couldn’t remember Hollis ever being afraid.
Not like this.
He put his hands on her shoulders and turned her to face him. But she didn’t look up at him. She kept her eyes fixed on the center of his chest. And he could see for himself that her eyes were . . . different. The pupils were enormous. And around them was a thin rim of bright, bright blue.
“Hollis, what are you afraid of?”
An odd little smile made an attempt to shape her lips, but it was unsteady. “Ghosties and ghoulies and things that go bump in the night. We deal with those.”
“Yes. Is this something new? Something we haven’t dealt with before? Isn’t it Samuel?”
She gave a little nod. “It is . . . and it isn’t. Not the man you knew. Not even the madman we knew. I know . . . what’s been watching us. All this time, ever since we got here.”
“What? Not who?”
“It’s . . . a what. Maybe they all start out as whos, and then they get darker . . . and darker . . . and darker. From evil. From soaking it up. Until they’re black. Until there’s nothing left of them that’s human anymore.”
She raised her eyes to meet his at last. “The parsonage. Second-floor window on the left. It’s standing there. Watching us. Not a spirit. Not a shadow. Something . . . old. Something ancient. Something he thinks he created. Something that wants us to go away.”
DeMarco hesitated only an instant, then quickly turned his head and found the window.
And for a split second, he saw a shape in that window.
A featureless bit of utter darkness with the outline of a man.
For a split second.
And then it was gone.
Melanie made sure her apartment door was locked behind her, then made her way downstairs to the lobby where Toby and Annabel were waiting for her. Of their three homes, her apartment was the only one with a lobby, and the other two women had remained there to watch weather reports on the flat screen in a nice little seating area across from the security desk.
Annabel was sitting on the arm of a chair, and as soon as Melanie reached her, she said, “The weather people don’t seem to know what the storm’s going to do. Far as I can tell, on their maps we’re in the colored area that’s somewhere between a dusting of snow—and a blizzard.”