Love Me to Death

by Maggie Shayne

  True love can transcend time and death, but can it survive revenge? Don’t miss this fan-favorite novella from New York Times bestselling author Maggie Shayne, available as a standalone ebook for the first time!

  Five years ago, a burning house forever changed the lives of five teens… and ended a sixth. Years later, summoned to a gravely injured friend’s bedside, David Nichols must face the town he fled. Tormented by dreams of the dead girl he’d once loved, he’s become a firefighter in a futile attempt to save enough lives to balance out the one he took. Until he sees a woman who should’ve been dead… and his friends start collapsing, one by one.

  Sara Jensen’s life flips upside down when she’s suddenly plagued by fire-ravaged nightmares and a dream man who seems to touch her very soul. When a friend recalls a local tragedy from her childhood, Sara visits the town to make sense of the mysterious events. But her arrival sets off an eerie chain of events she must solve, especially if she wants to save the flesh-and-blood version of the man she thought only existed in her dreams…

  First published in 2010

  LOVE ME TO DEATH

  MAGGIE SHAYNE

  CONTENTS

  PROLOGUE

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  EPILOGUE

  PROLOGUE

  Valentine’s Day, Twenty-two Years Ago

  Port Lucinda, Maine

  DAVID TOOK A LONG PULL from the bottle. It was only wine, and it was cheap wine lifted from the back of Brad’s older brother’s Jeep before he left on his road trip. He wouldn’t even notice it was missing until he got to Miami. It tasted like hell, but beggars (or thieves, in this case) couldn’t be choosers, and none of the five boys currently sucking down the wine were old enough to have bought it legally. So they’d take what they could get.

  They deserved a good drunk after what they’d been through. It was David’s first one ever, though he wouldn’t admit that to the other guys if his life depended on it.

  And then Brad said, “Damn, I’m dizzy. And I think my lips are going numb. Is this normal?”

  “What?” Kevin asked. “You never been drunk before?”

  “Hell no.”

  Kevin grinned crookedly and said, “Me neither,” and then they all started laughing as if it was the funniest thing they’d ever heard in their lives.

  They were standing in a small circle outside the old Muller place, passing the fourth and final wine bottle around. David didn’t know why it was called the old Muller place. He’d never known any Mullers to live in Port Lucinda—never known anyone to live in that old house, period.

  He looked at the place now, its weathered gray boards and broken windows and sagging roof. Some of the shutters were missing, while others hung from one hinge, ready to fall off.

  “I can’t believe she did this to me,” Mark moaned, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand as he passed the bottle to the right. “I mean, right before Valentine’s Day.”

  “I know, man.” David slapped his friend’s shoulder. “It must have sucked walking in on her making out with that jock.”

  “Big time.”

  “At least Sally had the courtesy to dump me to my face,” Brad said. “Not that it sucks any less. Dumped is dumped.”

  Kevin nodded. “I guess I’m the lucky one. Mine’s only out of town for two months.”

  David looked at Randy, who was silent, and drinking more deeply than any of them. His girlfriend’s family had moved to Hong Kong when her father’s company offered him a huge promotion if he would transfer there. Hong Kong. It might as well be the moon.

  “Still no word from Sierra?” Mark asked him.

  David blinked and felt his throat go tight at the mention of her name. Unlike the other guys, he hadn’t been dumped or left behind or betrayed. He’d spent his entire sophomore year trying to work up the nerve to ask Sierra to go out with him. Last week he’d finally been ready to do it. He’d made his plan, figured out what to say, how to do it and when. And that day, she hadn’t shown up for school.

  No one had seen or heard from Sierra Terrence since. And no one knew where she was. The cops had been in and out of school all week, questioning students and teachers and staff. But no one knew shit.

  “Dave?” Mark nudged him with an elbow, handed him the bottle.

  “No, nothing. I mean, there are all kinds of rumors, but no one knows a damn thing.”

  “Yeah,” Kevin said. “I heard her dad was abusing her and she ran away, but hell, if the cops thought that, her old man would be in jail by now.”

  “I heard she ran off with an older guy—a college guy,” Brad said, and when Randy elbowed him hard, he rushed on. “Not that I believe it. No way.”

  “What do you think happened to her, Dave?” Mark asked.

  “I don’t know. I don’t want to talk about it.” He took a big pull from the bottle, draining it, and then tossed it onto the old house’s lawn and took a few unsteady steps forward, eyeing the thing. “This place is a freakin’ eyesore.” Only it sounded like “eyeshore.”

  “Sure as hell not worth the whole town fighting over, is it?” Mark asked. “Historical Society—led by Davey’s mom—trying to save it. Like it’s worth saving? I mean, look at it.”

  “It’s gonna fall down on its own pretty soon,” Kevin said. “Then the town council won’t have to keep fighting to have it condemned so they can do the honors.”

  “It’s all my mom ever talks about,” David said. “I’m sick as hell of hearing about it.”

  “We all are.” Brad marched a few steps nearer. Then he picked up the empty wine bottle and turned it in his hand. “I think we should do something about it.”

  David frowned. “Like what?”

  Brad met his eyes and smiled. “All we need is this bottle, a rag and some kerosene.”

  “And a lighter,” Mark said, his face splitting in a broad smile.

  “There’s kerosene at my house,” Randy put in. It was one of the few times he’d spoken all night. “It’s only around the corner. I can go get it and be back in five minutes.”

  “Yeah. Yeah, let’s do this. Let’s torch this freaking old hulk and get it over with,” Mark said, grinning from ear to ear. “Go, Randy.”

  Randy took off at an unsteady trot, but after a few steps, it slowed to a walk. An uneven, swaying walk. David bit his lower lip. “I don’t know about this, guys.”

  “What? Where’s the harm?” Mark looked to the left and right of the old house. “There’s not another house close enough to catch a spark or anything, right? There’s no one around. Shit, David, I’d think you would want to do this more than anyone. It would at least stop your mother from running around town like some kind of televangelist, trying to convert everybody to her way of thinking.”

  “That really must be embarrassing.” Kevin looked at Dave as if he felt sorry for him. “Shit, just last week she was standing in front of the town courthouse with a bullhorn. A bullhorn, for crying out loud.”

  David cringed inwardly. It was embarrassing. His mom and a handful of local housewives had latched on to this cause as if it were a shot at world peace or something. And she was so involved with it, she didn’t even care that his heart was broken, or that the girl he’d let himself fall for was missing.

  She didn’t have time to care.

  He sat down in the grass. The others joined him there, one by one. They all sat in a row, in the dead of night, staring at the crooked, falling down nightmare of a house.

  “Little kids are scared to walk
by this place,” Brad said. “We’d be doing this whole town a favor.”

  David sighed, and they sat there a while longer, all of them adding their arguments as to why this would be a good idea, when the truth was that it would just be a good way to vent their frustration. And fun, to boot.

  Randy came staggering back with a small kerosene can, and without waiting for anyone to say anything, he filled the empty wine bottle. Then he took a red bandanna from his back pocket, twisted it up and stuffed it into the bottle.

  He held it up, and the others all rose from the ground, one by one.

  “Who’s got a lighter?” he asked.

  “Here.” Mark dug in his jeans pocket and pulled out a little green disposable job. He handed it to Randy.

  Randy shook his head. “No way, I’m not throwing it. I got the kero. One of you guys has to toss this baby in.”

  “Which one?”

  Brad said, “Let’s draw for it.” He reached for the backpack he’d used to carry the stolen wine. David had assumed it was empty, but Brad pulled a deck of playing cards from a zipped pocket.

  “Jeez, you got a kitchen sink in there, too?” David asked. He was feeling nervous as hell and he didn’t know why.

  Brad shrugged. “I snagged the backpack from my brother’s Jeep, wine and all. He must’ve stuck the cards in there. Anyway, who cares?” He took the cards from their box, shuffled them a few times. As he did, one fell from the deck and landed, face up, on the sidewalk.

  Ace of spades.

  David felt a chill go up his spine.

  “Low card throws the bottle,” Brad said. “Draw.” He fanned the cards, facedown, and held them out.

  Each of the others drew a card, including Brad himself, though David wondered if he’d cheated. He was too drunk to notice if he had.

  Anyway, it didn’t matter. He’d drawn a two. And it didn’t get any lower than that.

  As each boy flipped his card to reveal it, he hoped for a tie, but it wasn’t to be. A king, a seven, a nine and a jack surrounded him.

  Randy flicked the lighter, lit the rag and handed him the bottle. “Throw it.”

  David closed his hand around the cool bottle, smelled the kerosene, thought about everyone having a blast tonight at the Valentine’s Day Ball, where he’d expected to be. He and his four friends, as well. Tonight was supposed to be a big deal. They were not supposed to be standing outside in the freezing cold of a Maine February night, shivering and drinking sour, cheap wine while their hearts bled out.

  It wasn’t fair.

  A sudden rush of anger surged up, and he let it move him. He drew back, took aim and hurled the bottle with all his might.

  It sailed right through an already broken window and landed inside. And almost as one, the five boys ran away from the house—but only a few steps away. They stopped and turned, looking back, waiting, but seeing no results.

  Five full minutes they waited there, staring at that dark window. But nothing. “Damn,” Randy said. “It must have gone out.”

  “No, wait!” Mark pointed. “Look!”

  There was light, dancing and flickering light. It grew bigger fast, though, and soon flames were shooting up. The old place was like tinder, dry and dead inside, and the fire quickly raged, showing its face in every window they could see.

  “How the hell did it spread so fast?” David muttered.

  “Come on. Someone’s gonna see it and call it in any second now, if they haven’t already. We’ve gotta get out of here,” Mark said, tugging on his arm.

  But David couldn’t take his eyes from the flames.

  Kevin punched him in the shoulder, hard. “Come on, David.”

  “Yeah,” David said. “All right.” And turning, he joined the others as they ran. And ran. And within a few yards, he felt as if he were being pursued, and he ran even faster as panic nipped an icy path up his spine.

  They didn’t stop until they were outside Randy’s house again, the only house where no parents were at home that night, and they crowded inside, closed the door and stood there, looking at each other.

  David heard sirens and swore under his breath. “That was the stupidest thing we’ve ever done.”

  “Only if we get caught,” Mark said. “Randy, we need to wash up, get the wine smell off our breath.”

  “They’re gonna know it was us,” David said. “Everyone else is at the damn dance. They’re gonna know.”

  Randy clasped his shoulder. “No one’s gonna know, because we’re not gonna tell them. We take an oath, right here, right now. None of us are ever going to say a word about what we did tonight. On our lives. Swear?” He thrust a fist out.

  One by one the other guys clapped their right hands over his fisted one. “Swear,” they each muttered.

  “Good. Bathroom’s through there. Let’s clean up.”

  And so they washed up, and they went home, and they acted as if nothing had happened and pretended it was all going to be just fine, even though David had a sick feeling in his gut that told him it wasn’t.

  When the cops showed up at school the next day, he knew it wasn’t. And when the principal called an emergency assembly in the gym, he was sure someone was going to point a finger right at his face and say, “He did it!”

  But that wasn’t what happened. What happened was that Principal O’Malley stood at a podium in the front of the gym and told them that Sierra Terrence had been found, and that she was dead. She’d run away, and apparently had been hiding out in the old Muller house. Last night that house had been gutted by fire. She’d been trapped inside, and had died of smoke inhalation. Arson was suspected and if anyone knew anything about any of this, they needed to come to him privately, and in complete confidence.

  David barely kept from throwing up right there. He managed to hold on until the assembly was dismissed, and then he ran straight to the boys’ room and vomited until he thought he’d puked out his insides.

  When he rinsed his mouth at the sink and lifted his head to look into the mirror through burning, wet eyes, there was a cop standing behind him.

  Raising his chin, David turned and met the officer’s steady gaze. He didn’t even wait for the man to ask him the question. He didn’t care that he was breaking the vow he’d made to his friends. And he didn’t intend to rat them out. He was the one, anyway. He was the one who’d thrown that molotov cocktail into the old Muller house.

  It was him.

  “It was me,” he said aloud. “I started the fire. I…I killed Sierra.”

  CHAPTER ONE

  Present Day

  Boston, Massachusetts

  DAVID NICHOLS LIFTED the visor of his helmet and stood gazing at the sodden, still smoldering pile of rubble that used to be a diner, wishing his crew had been able to do more. The business owner, a man who probably looked like a biker most of the time, stood silently, holding his wife as big fat tears rolled down his face. The wife’s grief wasn’t as silent. She was sobbing openly.

  His fellow firefighters were rolling up hoses, gathering equipment. He went to the couple, taking his helmet off as he did. “I’m so sorry. If we’d gotten here sooner—”

  “My fault,” the man said. “The alarm system went haywire last week. I should have had it fixed, but I put it off, and now—” He looked at the wreckage that had been his livelihood and shook his head.

  “You’re insured, right?” David said, relieved when the woman nodded. “I know it looks bad now, but you’ll be okay. You will. I’ve seen enough of this to know. And really, thank your lucky stars no one was inside. No one was hurt or killed. It could’ve been a lot worse.”

  “We know you did all you could,” the woman said.

  He nodded and moved aside as the couple were surrounded by friends or loved ones who’d rushed to the scene. They would be okay.

  As for him, hell, he never would. It wouldn’t have made a difference if he had saved the structure. He would still feel the black knot in his stomach that had never quite gone away. No matter how
many kids or pets he’d carried out of burning buildings, no matter how many lives he’d saved, he would never erase the stain from his soul.

  The two years he’d spent at juvenile detention hadn’t come close to being a fair price to pay for what he’d done as a kid. But Sierra had been poor, and of mixed blood—her mother was East Indian and had left Sierra and her white-trash father before Sierra’s death, to return to her family in Delhi—while he and the guys had all been upper-crust white boys on their way to college. So they’d been tried as minors, sent off to juvie until they turned eighteen, and then set free with their records wiped clean. A fresh start. A second chance.

  It was more than Sierra Terrence had been given.

  He walked back to the truck, shrugging out of his heavy yellow coat as he did. Climbing into the driver’s seat, he saw that his cell phone, lying on the dash, had Missed Call shining from its face.

  Frowning, he picked it up, recognized the number and hit the voicemail button.

  But it wasn’t his old friend Mark’s voice on the recording.

  “David, it’s Janet. Mark’s been in an accident. It’s…serious.” That word emerged as if it barely fit through her throat. And her voice was tighter, deeper after that. “He’s asking for you. All of you. Please come…soon.”

  That was it. There was nothing more. All of you, she’d said. All of you. And that could only mean his closest friends and himself. They’d bonded twenty-two years ago. Oh, they’d been friends, good friends, before the drunken debacle that had cost a young woman her life. But afterward, their friendship had taken on a depth David figured few men experienced in their lives. When he, David, had confessed, he hadn’t given up any of the others. But they had all come forward, one by one, to shoulder their share of the blame. And then in juvie, hours from Port Lucinda and surrounded by really messed up young men, they’d needed each other just to stay sane—and safe.