RAVEN'S HOLLOW

by Jenna Ryan

  “Lovely,” she said, but took a bolstering breath, shoved up her sleeves and explored the ground with him.

  “I should have grabbed an arrow,” she muttered. “Except they’re made of metal, not wood, aren’t they? Taking us right back to Cal.”

  “He’s reclimbing the list.”

  “Wouldn’t he also be signing his name?”

  “Some criminals think the most likely suspect becomes the least likely suspect in the eyes of the police,” Eli said.

  “Why?”

  “No idea. Most likely’s most likely. Investigators don’t play games.”

  “Good to know. But staying in the criminal mind-set, who’s the least likely suspect? Other than Rooney, who doesn’t count because—well, duh.”

  “I thought you’d figure Ty for least likely.”

  “And I figured Ty was a given from your perspective.... Oh, wait. I found something.”

  She handed him a two-foot-long twig. “Six of one,” she murmured. “Either we stumble along in the dark and risk breaking a leg, or we risk having whoever’s after us see the flame.”

  Thankfully, no arrows flew out of the dark, and Sadie prayed all the crunching footsteps she heard belonged to them. Then she turned a corner, walked into a spiderweb and spent the next minute trying to keep the scream that leaped into her throat from escaping.

  It frustrated her that she also had to battle a strong urge to grab Eli’s gun and start firing into the shadows behind them.

  “Don’t think so hard, Sadie,” Eli advised. “You’ll only mess up your mind more than it already is. You need to focus on putting one foot in front of the other until we’re out of here.”

  She trudged another fifty yards up the sloping ground before deciding to hell with it and declaring over her shoulder, “I want to have sex with you, Eli.”

  Snagging the belt of her trench coat, he drew her to a halt and lowered his mouth to her ear. “Say that again, sweetheart, this time without the underlying threat of you turning me into a lizard if my answer isn’t to your liking.”

  Pushing the burning twig he held to one side, she turned to face his glittering eyes. “I want to have sex with you, Eli, when we’re out of this cave, out of the hollow and somewhere, anywhere, warm and safe and dry.” Even knowing her timing was way off, she pressed her hips to the front of his jeans. “I don’t want to die, but even more than that, I don’t want to die and never know what it would have been like to make love with you.”

  She saw the glitter deepen. “I’d want to make love to you even with the threat of life as a lizard hanging over my head.” His gaze dropped to her mouth, then rose. “No matter what my form, though, Sadie, I won’t let anyone hurt you.” Capturing her chin, he grazed her lips with his and added a soft “Especially not me.”

  * * *

  “KISSING ME, THEN GOING all enigmatic cop isn’t going to get you out of explaining what you meant.” Sadie ducked under a rough protrusion and immediately had her face slapped by an embedded weed. “You’ll also never convince me that you’re a threat to my life, so—oh, good, there’s the opening—if you’re not into sex, just say so and we’ll leave it at that.”

  “Find a foothold” was all he said, and gave her a boost from behind. “When you reach the exit, move aside and let me go first.”

  He had the gun, he was the cop—it made sense. But Sadie was irked enough to say nothing while he pushed through the underbrush and took a long look around.

  “We’re about a mile south of the bog,” he revealed when he returned. “Maybe a hundred yards from the road.”

  Using an elastic band from the pocket of her trench, she secured her hair. “That would put us midway between the Cove and the Hollow. Do we flip a coin?”

  “Anyone we want to talk to should be down at Two Toes Joe’s Bar.”

  “The Cove it is. Eli.” She caught his arm. “Once we’re on the road, we’re exposed. The wind blew most of the clouds away, and the fog’s not thick enough to obscure the moon.”

  “Which is why you’ll be carrying my backup and trying to reach Ty on your cell phone.”

  She took the gun and pulled her iPhone from her pocket. A rueful smile appeared when the screen lit up. “Second duh of the night. We could have used this as a light source in the cave.”

  “Fire worked well enough. If we’d killed your battery, there’d have been no way for us to call for help later.”

  “You didn’t think of it, either, huh?”

  He sent her a distant grin. “Other things on my mind, sweetheart.”

  It felt as if the night wanted to close in around them. Sadie slammed a firm lid on the more insidious aspects of her dream. No point making everything worse. If anything could be worse.

  “Tell me what you’re thinking,” she said as they approached the narrow strip of road. “I can hear your mind clicking, but I can’t read it.”

  “Oh, I imagine you could if you tried.”

  “You kissed me to shut me up.”

  “Skip ahead, Sadie.”

  “Any of those dozen or so arrows we avoided in the bog could have hit you as easily as me. More easily, in fact, because you were shielding me.”

  “Which I’ll do every time, so lose the accusing tone and stay on track.”

  She tapped the phone screen with her thumb, glanced behind them. “Obsessed person transforms into monster. Monster’s pissed at me for—what? Not understanding his message?”

  “Go with that.”

  “He’s also pissed at you for coming to the Hollow and getting in his way. So he’s decided to eliminate both of us for his—host?”

  “Good a description as any.”

  “Once we’re gone, the monster retreats, the host mourns and soon enough, life resumes its normal rhythm.” She ran the idea a few times. “Going back to Laura, and assuming Cal’s not the killer, that could explain why he’s not dead. He and Laura broke up. He ceased to be a problem. The monster set his sights on Laura alone. Am I babbling?”

  “A little. It’s better than freaking.”

  Following his lead, she glanced into the darkness behind them. “Why do we keep looking over our shoulders?”

  “Someone’s back there.”

  Her fingers tightened on her phone. “I was really hoping that was my imagination.”

  “Keep calling, Sadie.”

  “I can walk, talk and check an i-screen at the same time. It’s a dead zone until we begin the descent into the—whoa—Cove!” With no forewarning, she found herself airborne as Eli tackled her into a ditch. “What now?” she demanded, climbing off him.

  “Gleam of metal. Keep quiet.”

  She obliged and listened. And, dammit, heard footsteps. Stealthy footsteps, squishing on the shoulder.

  “How far back does this ditch run?” Eli asked.

  “Maybe fifty yards. Wait.” She gripped his wrist. “He’s stopped.”

  “Noticed.” Pivoting, he took hold of her arms. “I need you to stay right here.”

  “While you walk into an arrow? Because you know that’s what he wants....” She trailed off, raised her head. “I hear a car. No, a truck. It’s coming from the Cove.”

  To her relief—and, she suspected, Eli’s annoyance—the engine grew louder. When the fog lamps came into view, he hoisted himself from the ditch and flagged the driver down with his badge.

  The man who stopped was a farmer named Ray. Their weapons didn’t faze him, but one look at her, covered in mud and sludge, with leaves and bark clinging to her hair, had his thick eyebrows winging up and laughter gurgling in his throat. Until she gave him the short version of their story. Then he reached behind him for a rifle.

  “You and me could take a walk,” he said around her to Eli.

  “Do you have a night-vision
scope?”

  “Three of ’em.” He scratched his throat. “Sorry to say, they’re at home.”

  “Would it matter if they weren’t?” Sadie turned to Eli. “The guy was behind us. He’ll know we got a ride. He also knows the area, because I didn’t hear him behind us in the cave. Every witchy sense I possess tells me that he and his crossbow have vanished into the night. We can drive slowly, keep an eye open for anything suspicious, but you know it’s done for now. We’re safe, and he’s gone. We should be grateful for small—well, okay, big—favors.”

  Eli scanned the road. “Big and small are relative terms, Sadie. Small picture, we’re safe for the moment. Big one, the killer’s still out there. And we have no idea who he is or where he’ll surface again. The only thing we can be sure of is that his homicidal alter ego won’t stop until it does what it came out of hibernation to do.”

  * * *

  HE WOKE UP facedown on the bathroom floor, with the shower running and the spray gone icy. Every part of his body ached, but his head most of all. Crawling to the tub, he prayed the cold water would shock some clarity into his brain.

  Even with the haze dispersing, he couldn’t remember the night. He knew he’d opened a can of beans for dinner, thought he’d eaten most of them, plus coffee and a few stale cookies. But that’s where it ended. His mind went blank after the first bite of gingersnap.

  Okay, back up. He’d been tired. He’d drifted off. Then what? What grim horror had unfolded while he slept?

  His palms felt damp. The skin on his neck prickled. It wasn’t morning yet, not quite. First light was coming, but slowly, like the panic that was starting to pitch and roll inside him.

  “What did I do?” he whispered to the walls. “What did we do?”

  The bathroom held no answers, so he shut off the water and grabbed a towel when he left.

  There was no sign of blood. Maybe it wasn’t too terrible. Swallowing the grit in his throat, he moistened his lips. He should contact Sadie. Yes, he needed to stay calm and ascertain her status.

  Ascertain her status? Whose thought was that? And why couldn’t he remember?

  Feeling like a man after a weekend drunk, he walked with his face buried in the towel. When he walked into a table, he lowered his hands and forced his bleary eyes to travel from point to point in the room. Chair to window. Window to floor. Floor to door.

  When they stopped, so did his heart, for several long seconds. Then it started to gallop.

  He stared, sweat dribbling, at the entryway, at the shoes he wore for special occasions. And the layers of green-brown mud that coated them.

  Chapter Fourteen

  “Word has it the fights at Joe’s bar got out of hand last night.” Molly picked up and shook the bottle of Tylenol on Sadie’s kitchen counter. “When all was said and done—long after midnight, I’m told—Rooney called Ty, who never showed, and reamed him out. Ty called Brady, also a no-show, and on down a twisty, turny path, until sometime around 2:00 a.m., our great-grandfather called me from the north woods. Among other things, he wants you to listen to your landline and cell phone messages more often. Same memo to Eli.... Er, where was I?”

  “You lost me after ‘the fights at Joe’s bar got out of hand.’” At the table, Sadie raised her forehead from her arms. Molly had invaded her kitchen at 6:00 a.m., on her one and only day off after a night of pure hell that had not resulted in her and Eli having hot sex or even a reasonable facsimile thereof. “Why are you telling me this?”

  “Because Rooney’s upset that you weren’t there wearing your journalist’s hat. Your only saving grace is that he’s miffed at several of us for doing other life things when he believes we should have been drinking Joe’s gross beer and throwing up in the bathroom between bouts. Do you want coffee?’

  Sadie propped her chin in her palms. “Do ravens have feathers? My guess is Joe’s was packed to the rafters, and everyone in attendance snapped a dozen or more photos with his or her phone. My assistant—” she emphasized the word “—will have plenty to choose from when she opens her morning emails.”

  “I noticed you didn’t get home until close to midnight.” Molly measured out the ground beans. “Would that be Eli’s doing?”

  How much should she reveal? Sadie wondered. “Eli and I had an incident on the Hollow Road. By the time we got to the Cove, we were wet and muddy and not very happy. We spent close to an hour trying to locate Ty, only to be told he was still in Raven’s Hollow. So, back we went. At a snail’s pace, though, because Eli wanted to see if he could locate his truck.”

  Molly stopped her measuring spoon halfway to the machine. “Eli lost his truck?”

  “Long story. Short answer? Yes. With it went my camera bag and all the pictures I’d taken of Ben Leamer’s corn maze—which I flatly refuse to walk through again after discovering a wolf spider the size of Solomon on my coat sleeve yesterday afternoon.”

  “I have shots of the maze,” Molly told her. “Lots of them. In a way, you could say I helped design it.”

  Sadie slid her eyes sideways and up. “Say what?”

  “More accurately, I helped Brady, who helped Ben design it.” She returned to her task. “Think, Sadie. Brady’s a vet. He takes care of Ben Leamer’s livestock and pets. He spends a lot of time at the farm. Ben asked for help, Brady made suggestions and when we—Brady and I—drove into Bangor together for medical supplies, I did a little tweaking for him.” Her mouth tipped up into a rare smile. “I remember Orley smoldering over that trip, because it left her alone at the clinic. According to her, hell broke loose that afternoon, and being a complete putz at channeling her emotions, she blamed me for taking Brady away. Put another X in the ‘I hate Molly’ column. Did Eli find his truck?”

  “What? No. It’s in the bog somewhere, though, has to be.”

  She glanced up to find Molly gaping at her. “Why is Eli’s truck in the bog?”

  “Have you ever heard of a spike strip?”

  “No.”

  “Picture spikes on a chain meeting tires on a road. Going back to Ben’s maze for a minute—who designed the layout of the paths?”

  “I imagine Ben did. Ty warned him to keep things on the low side of terrifying, but I think Ben added a few more figures after he—Ty—did his walk-through.”

  “Ty did a walk-through?”

  “You sound like a broken record, Sadie.”

  “I know. Why didn’t Ben tell me any of this?”

  Molly’s eyebrows came together. “Because it wasn’t important?”

  “Right.” Sadie regarded the hissing coffeemaker. “Right. It wasn’t—isn’t.” Was it? “I need to wake up more.” And sift and sort and process. She opted to change the subject. “Do you need help with the séance?”

  “Not on the inside. You know what they say about too many cooks. But you should probably know Ty will be there. Ty—Eli.” She made a spacing motion with her hands. “I’ll seat them far apart. I was going to invite Cal Kilgore, too, but I don’t know how to reach him, do you?”

  “Not without dodging bullets.” Sadie grinned. “Rooney might know.”

  “Why would Rooney know how to contact a metal maker from the north woods?”

  “Because being so tied up with his maze, one or two of Ben Leamer’s other ventures have been shunted to the back burner lately.”

  “Are you being cryptic on purpose?”

  “At six in the morning, absolutely not. Talk to Rooney.” Pushing away from the table, Sadie headed for the now-spitting machine. “Why do you want Cal at the séance, Molly?” It struck her as she reached for the pot. “Oh, damn. Tell me you’re not going to do what I suddenly have a horrible feeling you’re going to do.”

  Her cousin linked and twisted her fingers. “I have to do it, don’t I? I saw the writing on your entry wall. I also heard you and Eli ta
lking. I know what you’re thinking. What’s happening to you is a lot like what happened to Laura.” She worked up a smile. “Think of it this way. We’re making a phone call. A very long distance phone call.”

  * * *

  IT ONLY TOOK from predawn until noon to get his truck out of the hellhole that was Raven’s Bog. Cursing and snarling by turns, Eli inspected the scraped and dented body. But when he saw the shredded tires, it hit him what he could have lost if even one small part of last night’s horror show had gone down differently.

  “I have to say, this is much worse than the tree.” Brady circled while Eli crouched to inspect the rear axle. “Is Ty looking into what happened, or are you taking it on yourself?”

  “What, you think he’ll stay out of it if I ask nicely?”

  “I think I don’t want to wind up in the middle of things.”

  “In that case—” Ty slid down the gentlest portion of the embankment “—you should consider removing yourself right now. Arrows, Eli? Someone shot arrows at Sadie last night?”

  Eli regarded him from the ground. “That was act two, Ty. The first was even more fun.”

  “Right, the spike line.” He made a show of searching the ground. “Funny, I don’t see one lying around anywhere, but your tires are screwed, I’ll give you that.”

  Shaking his head in mild amusement, Brady leaned on the banged-up box. “Don’t mind me. I’ll just stand here and try to figure out what I’m going to tell Rooney when he blasts me again for not showing up at the fights last night.”

  In spite of everything, Eli could still chuckle. “Consider yourself lucky. I got my encore blast before I was fully awake.”

  Ty’s eyes shot hot spikes. “And just where were you, cousin, when this encore blasting occurred?”

  “Where you probably think,” Eli returned. “Or close to it.”

  “What the hell does that mean?”

  “Oh, come on, Ty,” Brady called out. “You’re not dense. He was at Bellam Manor, but not in Sadie’s bed. At least not when he talked to Rooney.”

  Eli wiped his hands on an old rag. “You’re enjoying this, aren’t you?”