Forbidden Ground (Cold Creek)

by Karen Harper

  “All Gabe told me so far is I need a passport and clothes for some possibly cool weather.”

  “Ah,” Char said with a little laugh as she raised her wineglass. “Antarctica, here we come.” Kate clinked glasses with each of her sisters.

  “Oh, by the way,” Tess, the master of shifting topics, said, “Grant said his brother, Brad, is back in town for a while, so I said he should invite him to the wedding. He’s down on his luck lately. Some business deal fell through. What’s one more person on top of half the town at the ceremony and reception?”

  “Half of old town, you mean,” Kate said. “I can see that great social divide you mentioned. It’s always been the haves and have-nots. We’re theorizing now that the lower-class Adenas were cremated and only the upper or shaman class were interred in their elaborate burials—along with a few sacrificed slaves to serve them in the afterlife, much like the Egyptians.”

  “Kate!” Char threw a wadded-up paper napkin at her. “No talk about funerals past or present right now. Okay?”

  “Sorry,” Kate said. “I heard you talking about live Navajos, but I only have dead Adenas.”

  They jolted at a knock on the back door.

  “Maybe Gabe,” Tess said and bounced up to look out through the screen door. “It’s Gracie,” she whispered, then called out to the new arrivals. “Great to see you. Oh, and Bright Star. Is Lee here, too?”

  “He had a task and couldn’t come,” Kate heard Grace say.

  Kate and Char got up and went to the door, too. They hadn’t seen their cousin Lee’s wife in a long time. “Grace, hi!” Kate said. “Can’t you come in? And your friend is welcome, too.” When Grace just shook her head about coming in, Tess stepped outside, so Kate and Char did, too.

  Kate was surprised to see the man Grace was with. She’d heard about the strange Hear Ye religious sect and its leader, but to see him in the flesh... She barely remembered Brice Monson, who now went by the name Bright Star. She tried not to stare at the man. She didn’t think he was a bit charismatic as Gabe had said. Dressed in white clothes, pale and white-haired, he looked like she imagined a wraith or ghost. Tess had carried on about how he held scores of people, including their cousin Lee, his wife, Grace, and their two children, in thrall.

  “I’ll just make this quick, but I insisted on telling you in person,” Grace said. Kate’s first instinct was to hug Grace, but she hung back as if there were an invisible barrier between them now, maybe emanating from this man. Kate tried not to stare at Grace with her braid down her back, her long skirt and Little House on the Prairie look.

  Tess shot a sharp look at the Reverend Monson, or whatever he called himself, before looking back at Grace. “Did you get permission for Kelsey and Ethan to be flower girl and ring bearer?” Tess asked. “It’s not too late to change your mind.”

  “Oh, no, and I hear you have Sandy Kenton doing that. I’m glad you are so close to her.”

  “But she’ll never replace my own family,” Tess told her.

  The Kenton girl, Kate knew, was a child Tess had helped to counsel after her terrible ordeal. Tess was tight with the girl’s mother, Lindell, too, who would be in charge of the guest book at the reception and was going to work at the day-care center when it opened.

  “It’s just that...that,” Grace stammered and blushed.

  “Let me explain,” Bright Star said. “Much of the traditional American wedding ceremony, even if held in a church—or outside in nature as yours will be—is based on primitive rituals that our beliefs cannot condone or support. We at Hear Ye have our own ceremony, based on our own tradition and—”

  “Gracie,” Tess interrupted, her hands shooting to her hips. “You mean you can’t even come to our service out by the waterfall at Falls Park or to the reception, either, because you believe something pagan or forbidden is going on?”

  “I’m sorry,” Grace said, hanging her head like a scolded child. “That’s what I came to say. That’s what I think is right.”

  Tess had teared up, and Char was sputtering with surprise, so Kate spoke. “You know, Mr. Monson, I’ve studied groups with strange beliefs, but this one—to borrow an allusion to a pagan wedding symbol begun by the Romans—takes the cake. Grace, is this man your Caesar, your Napoleon or Hitler, to order you around? You will not be corrupted by coming with your husband and children to your friend and cousin-by-marriage Tess’s wedding. Or is it that she’s marrying the sheriff?”

  “It’s obvious,” Bright Star said, his voice very quiet compared to Kate’s, “that you don’t understand our ways, our chosen path. I believe you are the Lockwood sister who studies the pagan beliefs, so I will forgive your outburst and—”

  “At this point, I’d rather trust those long-dead pagan ways compared to how you must browbeat and control your people,” Kate insisted. “Grace, you and Lee are always welcome to return to your roots, your family.”

  Grace lifted her teary blue eyes to meet Kate’s steady stare. “The Hear Ye people are my family now, Kate. Please try to understand. And, Tess, blessings on your day and your life with Gabriel.”

  The three Lockwood sisters just stared as Grace followed the man down the driveway and into a black car that was waiting for them.

  “That vehicle’s a hearse,” Char hissed, putting her arm around Tess to draw her back toward the house. “He’s not even a charlatan shaman. More like a witch doctor!”

  “Like the Beastmaster,” Kate muttered. She hurried inside before anyone could ask her what she meant.

  3

  Friday, the day before the wedding, loomed long for Kate. Though she was dying to see Mason Mound, she dared not trespass on Grant’s land, not if she wanted to get closer to him and be permitted at least exterior access to the mound—hopefully, more. Instead, she took her rental car and drove out to the site of two other, long-ago excavated Adena sites.

  She was walking around the slant of a mound she’d noted on an old archived map, this one called the Falls Mound. It was not far from the park boundaries where Tess and Gabe would take their vows tomorrow beside the waterfall. That was the spot where, Tess had told her, they had first kissed. Both the rehearsal dinner and the reception would be at the rustic lodge near the falls. When Kate’s cell phone rang, she glanced down at it to see Carson Cantrell, her friend and mentor, was calling and it seemed so appropriate to talk to him here.

  “Carson, guess where I am?”

  “Kate, darling, guess where I am?”

  “The Smithsonian? Practicing your talk before some of their indigenous-people tableaus?” she kidded him.

  “Sitting out in front of the National Museum of the American Indian, but it mostly features historic tribes. And—let me guess. You’re at an Adena mound, hopefully the Mason one you thought had been untouched by excavation.”

  “I’m at a mound but one that had some grave goods taken out years ago, according to my research. Some are in the Ohio Historical Museum. Some were stolen and sold on the black market and never recovered. Skeletal remains were too far gone to reveal much.”

  “How about your smashed-skull theory concerning those sacrificed in the mounds to serve the royals or shamans?”

  “No finds like that in the records for this mound. Once again, I think the early pioneer trespassers probably broke things up. As a result, skeletons were useless for examination. I read the pioneers left graffiti on the interior walls, though.”

  They chatted about his upcoming talk, and she assured him again that nothing but the wedding would have kept her away, not even a Celtic dig in England she was participating in. She did not mention that her father was flying in with his new family today and that his plane had been delayed and he’d barely make the rehearsal dinner this evening. Carson had advice for anything and everything, so she surprised herself in not wanting to share all that. But she was even more surprised by h
is question. “So what do you think of Grant Mason, the current owner of the Mason Mound property? You think he’ll go along with a dig? I looked at his house on Google Maps, but there are so many trees out back, I can’t pick out the mound itself from the satellite shot. Even zooming in, all I get is the roof and his curved driveway.”

  “He seems protective of the mound. His grandfather and father had the theory to let the dead stay dead.”

  “Which may mean his family knows there’s a burial there. But he sounds like a real small-town rube.”

  “No, he is not! Really,” she said, toning down her outburst. “He’s a college graduate, business major. Tess says he has ties to the Ohio legislature and even in Washington on environmental issues related to his lumber-cutting and mill projects.”

  “So you like him. Just remember, I think we’re ready to take the two of us to another level. As for Grant Mason, I’d like to visit Cold Creek, meet him, see the mound. Next week I hope, as soon as I get back to Columbus. Stick around there awhile if you can, try to get closer to him—in a highly controlled way. Since he’s a business major, keep it all business, okay?”

  “Right,” she told him. But with her instant attraction to Grant, it seemed somehow wrong.

  * * *

  Kate hated to admit it, but Jack Lockwood, at age fifty-two, looked as handsome as she remembered from her memories as a ten-year-old girl and dreams of “Daddy.” As he entered the room reserved at the Falls Lodge for the rehearsal dinner, he let go of his youngest boy’s hand and ruffled his older boy’s hair. His wife, Gwen, was a pretty blonde, probably fifteen years younger than he was. She looked as nervous as Kate felt, but her father strode across the room toward his three daughters.

  Tess met him partway and threw herself into his arms. Char grabbed his shoulder until she, too, was pulled into his embrace. But he looked over both their heads directly at Kate.

  “Katie,” he said.

  She blinked back tears and extended her hand when he stepped free from the group hug. Gabe hovered nearby; she could see Grant watching from the doorway where he was talking to the two young Lockwood boys—her half brothers. She felt frozen in place.

  “Welcome back,” she managed to say, not stepping closer.

  “I know how hard you worked to keep things together, Katie,” her father said, lowering his voice. “You and your mother did a great job with everything.”

  Her brain told her to say thank-you, but the words wouldn’t come out. She tried to move away, but he raised her hand and kissed the back of it. The years, the fears, came screaming back as he released her. He had a determined way about him, and maybe she owed her own pluck to that.

  Suddenly, everything turned chaotic, meeting his wife, stooping to look into the darling faces of his sons, chatting with them. Dad remembered Vic Reingold, who had helped the sheriff when Tess was abducted, so they shook hands. And then they all held their breath as he came to Gabe’s mother, with whom he’d had an affair that helped to end his marriage—though only those closest to him had known.

  “Sarah, you’re looking great,” he said, shaking her hand. “My condolences on the loss of your husband and congratulations that Tess and Gabe have put all the pieces together like I couldn’t.”

  “Yes,” she said. “The second generation atones for the mistakes of the former sometimes. That’s a blessing.”

  “It sure is.”

  Finally, everyone’s attention turned back to Tess and Gabe. They all trooped out to the grassy spot where the wedding ceremony would be held. The backdrop was a sky-blue lake with a waterfall crashing into it from granite cliffs. When the wind blew just right—or wrong—mist floated in the air, like nature’s attempt at a cleansing, Kate thought, a sort of new-family baptism. If only she could hug her father, forgive him and be glad that he was here, but she just couldn’t.

  In the wedding rehearsal, Kate walked down the grassy aisle just ahead of Tess’s entrance. Gabe and Grant stood waiting next to Pastor Snell and the portable altar. For one fleeting moment, with the whirring rush of the falls in the background, she imagined she was walking down the aisle to Grant.

  After Pastor Snell talked them through the ceremony, she walked up the aisle and back to the lodge on Grant’s arm. It seemed so natural, actually exciting, to be with him, paired with him, even for someone else’s wedding. Strange how her feelings for Carson were so different—admiration, an intellectual bond—while she felt Grant’s mere presence in her very bones. He radiated intensity, which shot little shards of heat through her. They sat together at the rehearsal dinner, sometimes talking with others but often only with each other. She wanted to fall into the deep pools of his eyes.

  She clung to a bit of rationality, though, telling herself she had just accepted going uptown with him to the English pub for many reasons other than just to be with him. It was still light outside. If only she could talk him into at least showing her Mason Mound before he got busy with his life again—before Carson roared in here next week.

  * * *

  In Grant’s car, Kate was excited as they drove out of the park, when he said, “I know that reunion with your dad was hard for you. But maybe you can forgive if not forget. I know I’d give about anything to have my father back again, and he was no angel.”

  His cell phone sounded with the old John Denver tune “Country Roads.” He pulled over and stared at the phone.

  “A call from my home phone number,” he told her. “Probably my brother, Brad.”

  But when he answered it, Kate could hear it was a woman’s voice.

  “What?” he almost shouted. “Is Brad there?”

  “No,” she could hear the woman tell him. “Since you and Todd were at the wedding rehearsal, he went to the mill and hasn’t come back.”

  “Phone him, please. I’ll be right there. You’re right. I didn’t order that! Kate,” he said, turning to her, “I’ve got to get home fast. Can’t stop to drop you off.”

  “What is it?”

  “That was my cleaning woman at the house,” he said as he pulled out onto the main road. “She heard a chain saw out back, but couldn’t see anyone. She says the tree canopy has a lot more open sky out the back window. We’ve had a problem with tree thieves around here, but they surely wouldn’t come so close to a house—my house!”

  He dropped his phone in her lap. “Call 911 and tell the dispatcher to get Jace Miller. Gabe’s been trying to nail that gang, but today and tomorrow—I just can’t bother him. Have Deputy Miller meet me out behind the house. These bastards hit fast and disappear, and I’ve got heirloom, valuable trees back there.”

  She did as he said while he drove like a man possessed. Well, she thought, this was one way to get near Mason Mound, though her heart went out to him.

  * * *

  Grant could not believe the gall of whoever was tampering with his trees—in daylight, close to the house! He’d helped to spearhead the search for whoever could be sneaking in and stealing from woodlots in the area—valuable oak, maple, walnut and cherry, the very timber he paid big bucks for at the mill. They were robbing people, they were robbing him and desecrating—murdering—trees!

  The more desperate people got for money in these tough times, they pirated anything they could, stripping copper pipes from old houses, brass doors and urns off local cemetery crypts—and wood, none of which he’d seen come into his lumber yard. He’d dedicated himself to helping Gabe and Jace stop the crime. He’d put in days trying to convince legislators at both the state and national levels that they needed stricter timber-theft laws, because it wasn’t just a problem around here. People from California to Florida were fighting this.

  But now it was personal. Had someone known he’d be away most of the day? Were they daring enough to come right into his woodlot to defy him or prove he couldn’t stop them? And you might know Brad had left
the house, because he surely could have caught on to the fact a chain saw was too close. Mrs. McGirty, who had worked for his family for years, might have a hearing problem, but not Brad.

  He roared into his driveway and jerked the car to a stop. “Sorry to involve you in this, Kate. Make yourself at home. Thanks for the help,” he told her, as he grabbed his phone from her, got out and sprinted for his front door.

  * * *

  Kate saw an older lady with a dust rag open the door for Grant. He ran past her. Kate got out and hurried after him, nodding to the woman as she went inside.

  Kate could hear Grant run through the house and slam a back door. Thank heavens she was in flats today, since they were wearing them on the grass for the wedding. She went downstairs, saw where he’d gone out. She caught a glimpse of him as he ran across the back lawn and disappeared into the fringe of forest. His shouts floated to her. He sounded almost like an enraged or wounded animal. Or had he spotted someone still out there? Even she could see a huge, blank place in the foliage that had not been there before.

  She found a dirt path and followed it. The shape of the entire mound appeared the moment she started into the trees. Hoping Deputy Miller would be here soon in case Grant was confronting someone, she rushed on. She found him swearing and stamping through a tangle of limbs, smashed brush and sawdust that circled a massive tree stump. With nearby bushes crushed and saplings snapped off, she could instantly tell where the massive, missing tree trunk had been felled and dragged away. The trunk Grant kept circling was so close to the edge of the mound that it seemed to be guarding it. And around him lay broken pieces of something built of wood, a deck, a railing, even a broken roof.

  She gasped. “The tree with your tree house?”

  He stopped and looked up, as if surprised to see her. He only nodded and turned away, but not before she saw he was in tears.