The Sullivan Gray Series Box Set #5 - 7

by H. P. Bayne

  From the back of the house.

  The way Sully had come.

  Knowing now he’d have to scale the fence along the front of the house, Sully found the stairs as he shoved his phone safely into the depths of his jeans pocket.

  The front door was directly across from him once he reached the base of the stairs. He ensured his hood concealed his face as he approached it, keenly aware of the possibility of security cameras guarding the entrance. A quick glance through the window to the side of the door revealed nothing but a wide expanse of lawn and driveway. Plenty of room to be an easily visible target.

  In the house, though, he was a sitting duck.

  With no option, he unlocked and opened the door. Then he was out, racing across the lawn, running in a zigzag pattern to try to lessen the chances of being hit by a bullet.

  Another crack sounded, this one louder than the first two, no walls or windows to buffer the noise. He poured on some extra speed, the fence now within reach. It was high, but he had his own height and adrenaline in his favour as he sprang at it, catching the top in one leap. A boot against the wall helped propel him up and over, and then he was free of the yard.

  Sirens sounded in the distance, growing closer as he ran. There was a park nearby, one he’d not so long ago taken shelter within as he’d waited for Forbes to come and get him. That time, Sully had fled Montague’s under a similar hail of gunfire.

  But this time, he couldn’t call Forbes, no way the Major Crimes investigator would be able to keep Sully’s presence to himself. The last time, Sully had been there with Forbes’s knowledge, and he’d been the sole victim. This time, he was fleeing the scene of a murder. He knew how investigations worked. Until they had a chance to check him out and clear him of wrongdoing, he’d be a suspect too.

  He couldn’t afford to be either a witness or a suspect. Not now. Not when the stakes had grown so high.

  Police would scour the neighbourhood, would be on the lookout for a gunman. So Sully did the only thing he could.

  He ran.

  29

  Making it back to Emily’s car wasn’t easy.

  The area was crawling with cops by the time he reached the vehicle, and he was now grateful to a neighbourhood that had made parking closer an impossibility.

  His hood would now be a hindrance rather than a blessing, making him a figure of suspicion to investigators on the lookout for a murderer. He’d already taken his gore-spattered outer coat off and turned it inside out, and tucked his gloves inside its pockets. He wouldn’t discard it here. He knew where he had to go, and no one would come looking for evidence there.

  His hoodie still appeared clean, so that stayed on. He pulled the hood out of the way and tied his hair back as neatly as possible. Emily’s car was another story. There was nothing he could do to help it fit in all that well in this neighbourhood, so all he could do was hope for the best.

  He made it back without incident to the Riverview area, making one last stop at the apartment building. He’d have to drop off Emily’s keys and get Pax, but he needed to do something else first.

  Dez had left his laptop behind, and Sully logged into it to upload his audio file. He reviewed it quickly within the corresponding laptop app, allowing himself a relieved sigh as he discovered the audio was not only there, it was of good quality. He made a quick edit, removing the initial portion in which he’d threatened the disgraced judge. No need to compound his existing problems. Then he downloaded the edited version onto his phone and logged out of Dez’s computer.

  He’d start a fake email account, send Forbes the file that way. Sure, there was probably a way to trace it, but it would slow the police down long enough for him to get out of Dodge. Where he was going, no one would follow.

  Leaving his phone to charge, he grabbed a quick shower, ridding himself of Montague’s gore. His outer jacket, he’d discovered upon removing it, was similarly splattered, and he thanked himself for having picked up a new coat at the goodwill store a couple of weeks ago. Freshly showered, he placed his bloody clothes into a plastic bag and stuffed those, the few clothes he owned and what was left of Pax’s dog food into his duffel bag.

  He took another minute to pick up the pieces of the broken coffee table, leaning the splintered surface and two snapped-off legs against the wall. He wanted to leave a note for Dez but, hand poised over a notepad on the kitchen counter, he couldn’t think of anything better to write than, “I’m sorry.”

  He took one last look at the small apartment, then shut off the lights and left, closing and locking the door behind him. He paused a moment, looking down at the keys in his hand before crouching and sliding them under the door.

  Then he went to get Pax, hoping Emily hadn’t yet gone to bed. If she had, he’d have to wake her up. He couldn’t wait for morning.

  Relief flooded him when Emily answered the door almost immediately, the sound of the TV in the background.

  Her eyes grew large behind her glasses as she looked Sully up and down. “You aren’t leaving?”

  “I have to. I don’t know how long I’ll be gone, but I need to find somewhere to lie low for a while.”

  “Are you in trouble?”

  “I don’t know. I haven’t done anything wrong, but I’m in the middle of something big. I don’t want anyone caught in the crosshairs, and I can’t afford for anyone to find me until I figure out how to handle things.”

  “Why don’t you talk to me? Maybe I can help.”

  “You’ve already helped more than you know. Right now, I need to handle things alone.”

  “Maybe you don’t. That’s what friends and family are for.”

  “Friends and family have already been killed because of this. I won’t risk anyone else. I need to handle this myself, Emily.”

  “Where are you going?”

  “I can’t say. The fewer people who know, the better. It will be safer for everyone that way.”

  “You know you can trust me, don’t you?”

  “I know. It’s not about trust. It’s about me not being able to live with myself if anyone else gets hurt.” He paused, worked a smile onto his face, instilled in it as much warmth as he could muster. “I want to thank you for everything you—”

  “Don’t,” she said. “Don’t you say goodbye to me, Sullivan. You’ll be back. You can tell me then.”

  She closed the distance to him, drawing him into a hug. He embraced her, making an effort to commit the moment to memory. Where he was going, this might well be the last kind human contact he’d have for a while.

  “Take care of yourself,” Emily said. “Remember there are people here who care about you. We’re here to help you whenever you need it.”

  “I know,” he said. “That means everything to me.”

  He released her, looking down into her eyes, this tiny, warm, brave woman who’d saved him as a baby and had protected him ever since—even without his knowing it.

  Now it was his turn to protect her. Her and everyone else he loved.

  Pax waited patiently behind Emily, brown eyes solemn as if he sensed the gravity of his human’s mission. Sully patted his leg and Pax came toward him, pausing at the threshold to allow himself a final head rub from Emily.

  Then he followed Sully into the hall.

  Down the stairs.

  Out the door.

  Into the night.

  THE STORY CONTINUES IN SECOND SON. CLICK HERE TO PURCHASE OR READ FOR FREE IN KINDLE UNLIMITED.

  Second Son

  1

  Sully hadn’t counted on being back here.

  The manor stood before him, expansive, bleak and foreboding. The windows were like the eyes of a spider, many and watching. Behind them, he could sense the building’s inhabitants, former occupants who’d decided to stay after death and other spirits who had gravitated here. They were, almost to a one, bad-tempered and malicious, driving from these walls anyone whom they disliked. That meant most people.

  Sullivan “Sully” Gray wasn’t mo
st people.

  For some reason, they put up with him. Perhaps because of Pax. Sully wasn’t sure, but he believed the dog had belonged to the last owner, an old man who had been crotchety enough to fit in with his home’s miserable otherworldly inhabitants. He’d once heard Linton Blackmoor was the only buyer to live more than a year in the place. He’d lasted more than twenty.

  Then came the flood.

  Blackmoor refused to leave the house that had meant everything to him. Like most others who’d stayed behind, the decision became his last.

  Sully had never seen him; his ability to see ghosts was limited to those who had died by someone else’s hand. Blackmoor, like the rest of the ghosts of Ravenwood Hall, remained invisible to him.

  Of course, unseen didn’t mean unnoticeable. Ravenwood had its own poltergeist, a ghost Sully had nicknamed Noisy Ned. Naming the entity had seemed like a way to inject some humour, or at least some humanity, into a terrifying situation.

  It hadn’t worked.

  Ned still threw things at odd hours of the night, startling Sully awake and putting him on high alert for intruders. Here in The Forks these days, intruders carried far more danger than violent ghosts.

  Thankfully, the house’s reputation preceded it. Few dared to visit. Those who did regretted it quickly.

  It made Ravenwood Hall the safest place for Sully to be.

  Given the situation in which he’d landed, The Forks was the safest place for him in all of Kimotan Rapids.

  And the loneliest.

  But, right now, his being alone was the safest thing for everyone else.

  In a weird way, it might also be a relief. The house came with its own ghosts, and it didn’t like outside spirits any more than living intruders. Sully had first noticed Prescott Montague’s ghost shortly after leaving Emily’s apartment, and the spirit had trailed him here, a constant angry presence at his shoulder. The possibility of being somewhere he couldn’t easily follow was a welcome one.

  As Sully approached the manor’s threshold, he avoided seeking out the image of Montague. Instead, his gaze drifted to the happy sight of the dog next to him.

  “You and me, Pax.” He stretched out a hand and rubbed his dog’s head. Pax turned brown eyes up to meet Sully, his tongue lolling out the side of his mouth as he regarded his human. Whether the dog made the expression on purpose or not didn’t matter. Sully laughed anyway.

  He needed it. He hadn’t found much to laugh at in the past couple of days.

  Giving Pax one more pat, he returned his attention to the house.

  Then he led the way inside.

  2

  Dez hadn’t counted on being back here.

  Not permanently, anyway.

  It felt like forever since Eva had kicked him out, told him his drinking and foul moods were hurting their daughter. He’d gone, not entirely willingly, but with the acceptance that what Eva had said was true. He’d been a screwup, caught in a depression he couldn’t pull himself out of. But even then, the last thing he wanted was to drag anyone down with him.

  Especially his little girl.

  He’d left, found himself a dumpy apartment in the Riverview area. He’d stayed there until a couple of days ago, when his brother had revealed to him the details of a secret so dark, it risked throwing Dez right back into the pit he’d clawed his way out of.

  He’d hoped being back here, back at his own home with Eva and their little girl Kayleigh, would be enough.

  It wasn’t.

  “Dez, you need to deal with this.”

  He looked up at Eva from the downstairs sofa, redirecting his gaze from the TV show he hadn’t really been watching. He hadn’t even heard her approach.

  “I’m trying.”

  “No. You’re not. You’re doing what you did before, what you always do when things are bad, and you feel like everything’s out of your control. You’re brooding. And you won’t talk to me about it.”

  “I don’t need to drag anyone else down.”

  Eva closed the remaining distance between them and settled onto the couch next to him. “Newsflash, Snowman. I’m already down there with you. So talk to me.”

  “I told you everything.”

  “About Lowell and about the fight you had with Sully. What you haven’t told me is what’s going on in your head because of it. That’s a lot for anyone to deal with, and you aren’t dealing. So talk.”

  Dez sighed, met her eye. “What do you want me to say? That I’ve never wanted to kill anyone so bad in all my life as my own uncle? That my regret alternates between punching Sully and not punching him again? I’m pissed off, Eva. Like, beyond pissed. It’s taking everything I have not to get up and leave and find Lowell, to beat a damn confession out of him. Hell, even coming here instead of going to look for him took every bit of self-control I had.”

  “I know. And I’m sorry this is happening. But we need to get this sorted out, you and me, before it destroys you. I don’t want to see you go down the same road you did after you lost your dad and Sully. Especially now, when we’re just getting us back.”

  “I don’t want to see that either.”

  “So let’s talk about what we can do.”

  Dez raised his hands, palms up, a demonstration of helplessness. “Do? There’s nothing I can do. The only person alive with any information isn’t supposed to be alive. I can’t just drag my brother into a police station and get him to sit down with an investigator, can I?”

  “Not unless he’s willing.”

  “He won’t be. He’s got too much to lose, and he’s already been through the wringer because of this. Anyway, who’d believe him over Lowell?”

  “You never know. If he’s being honest, investigators will figure that out, especially once they start digging.”

  “Eva, my uncle is one of the richest men in town, maybe the richest. He’s charming, well-respected and popular. Sully is a scruffy, shy homeless guy who was once the suspect in a murder investigation, spent a couple of months as a patient at a mental hospital, and faked his own death. There won’t be any digging. No one will take him seriously enough to even go to the trouble of a sit-down interview. And I think that was Lowell’s plan all along. If killing him didn’t work, discrediting him was a solid second option.”

  “What about Forbes? He might listen.”

  Dez lowered his head into a hand and massaged his temples. “He’s not exactly the most competent detective on the force. And I’m not sure I’d trust him with this.”

  “So how about Lachlan? He loves a challenge. And he’s got some well-placed contacts.”

  “Lachlan would salivate over this.”

  “So tell him. See what he comes up with.”

  “I’ll think about it.”

  “Good. In the meantime, you need to go talk to your brother. You can’t leave things like this.”

  “Like what? I’ve got every right to be mad at him.”

  “I know. But you also need to remember where he’s coming from. Given what he went through, I can understand why he wouldn’t want to talk about it.”

  “But this is my family, Eva. He knew how badly I needed to know about Aiden, and he knew I’d want to know about Dad. Hell, about him too. And he shut me out. He lied to me.”

  “He thought it was for your own good. He wasn’t sure you could handle the truth.”

  “Please, don’t quote A Few Good Men.”

  Eva smiled. “Dez. I’m being serious here. The effect it’s having on you, the depression you’re slipping back into, the way you’re battling yourself not to confront Lowell, those are things he would have expected. He wouldn’t have wanted that for you.”

  “So, what? His plan was for us to go to our graves with me not knowing?”

  “I don’t know what his plan was. You should ask him. Talk to him, Dez. Half the reason you’re sitting here in the dark, stewing, is because of the fight you two had.”

  “I’m not in the dark.”

  Eva looked around the room as if
to make a liar out of him. Sure, he’d only turned on the pop lights above the couch, but still….

  “Honey, it’s dark,” Eva concluded. “And you’re in a bad place. Finding a way to deal with Lowell is a big challenge. I get it. But this thing with Sully—that, you can fix.”

  “I don’t know if I can.”

  “Why not?”

  He hadn’t told Eva this part, too ashamed of himself to say it out loud. Now, he had no option. “I said some things to him too…. One thing, really.”

  “What?”

  Dez took a breath, held it, let it go before answering. “I told him about Gerhardt being his father.”

  “Oh, Jesus, Dez, you didn’t. Not like that.”

  “I was angry. It just came out as I was leaving. It was that or beat the crap out of him, so I chose the non-violent method.”

  “I can’t believe you.”

  Dez’s temper rose at the criticism, but almost as quickly, he tamped it back down. She was right. Hell, at least part of his current anger was directed at himself for having thrown the comment out there, like it meant nothing. He couldn’t believe himself.

  “I know I was an ass. And I regret it, but it’s done.”

  “You need to make this right.”

  “I need to make this right? Look, I know blurting it out was low, but he held out on me too.”

  Eva’s glare suggested she wasn’t sold. “Look. You can sit here, arguing with me about who’s right, or you can make things right. Which one of you was more wrong doesn’t matter in the end. What matters is the two of you love each other, and if you don’t fix this, you might lose him. You can be angry, Dez. You have every right to be. But don’t let this cost you more than you can afford to pay. It’s not worth your relationship with your brother.”

  He knew she was right. There was no question, the stupidity of costing himself a still-living family member over two who were already gone.