As he’d known he would, Rogan dreamed about Jasmine. He made love to her while ravens watched and feathers fell, and a young woman shouted in the background.
“She has nothing to do with us, Rogan.” He felt Jasmine’s hands on his face, saw her eyes in his head. “You need to let her go.”
She was right. He knew that, too, but the table was always there, on the edge of his mind. As the ravens came closer, the table rolled in, and the shouts turned to tears.
“It was my fault,” he told her. “I should have done something. I should have done more.”
“You can’t always stop death.” Jasmine’s tone and her touch were gentle, but he felt her fading away. He couldn’t hold on to her, couldn’t stop her from leaving. Even love couldn’t keep her there.
Fog slithered in and out. Three feathers appeared on a dusty floor. They led him to the table. Fists pounded his back, but when his eyes finally adjusted, he no longer felt them.
He knew now where Jasmine had gone. Where he’d somehow sent her.
He stood and stared at her lifeless body on the no-longer-empty table, while a solitary raven circled in silence and shed its long black feathers over him.
* * *
JASMINE WATCHED ROGAN SLEEP. She understood that nothing about it was restful, but short of waking him every hour to drag him out of whatever nightmares seemed determined to suck him in, all she could do was let them play out and trust his mind to get him through the worst parts.
By the time he woke up, it was after 8:00 p.m. and dark again. The wind outside Blume House was a swirling horror, a precursor, apparently, to the autumn storm that was thrashing its way northward from the Carolinas.
Although he hadn’t said anything, Jasmine knew it was Rogan who’d made it possible for her ex to avoid a ride in the sheriff’s car. She also suspected he’d thwarted Boxman’s repeated attempts to question Daniel on his own.
“You want the truth, Rogan, you badger and hound.” Boxman gave the top of Wesley’s counter a frustrated whack. “Corey was on the premises in the company of a corpse. You ask him a few questions, then get a woman and a dog to babysit the guy while we give this place far more time and attention—your fault, Costello—than it requires. I want a shot at him.”
“Chewing up and spitting out pieces of puppy wasn’t in any academy manual I ever read. Not—” Rogan’s eyes slid to Jasmine “—that I wasn’t tempted.”
She slid the look right back before bouncing a finger between the two men. “This is why Rogan’s a lieutenant and you’re not, Sergeant. It’s all about control.”
“That’s naïveté talking, angel face. It’s really about the cool factor, lucky breaks and getting someone like Gus Ballard to bump your ass up the promotion ladder.”
She smiled. “You’re as transparent as glass, Boxman. Daniel doesn’t interest you. What you really want to do is take Cyrus apart again.”
He tightened his headband with a snap. “Bowcott’s a killer, I can feel it. Where is he anyway, since nobody in this damn town is currently under arrest for anything? Costello at least should be watching him.”
“Heard that, Sergeant.” Costello’s gray head popped up from behind the kitchen counter. “It may be a self-imposed task, but as I’m up to my elbows in filth and gunk, I’d welcome guard duty at this point.”
While Boxman went over to snipe at him, Rogan rubbed tension knots from the back of his neck.
“If you’re worried Daniel might sneak off and cause trouble, you can relax.” Jasmine knuckled his stomach. “Between Boris and Riese, he won’t be leaving Blume House.”
“Daniel’s not involved.”
She stopped knuckling to stare. “If you believe him so completely, what was all that stuff last night?”
“I thought we agreed it was me being an ass.”
When he pulled out and checked his iPhone, she grinned. “Come on, Rogan, you know that a watched cell never rings. It’s a Murphy’s Law thing.”
“Like it always rains after you wash your vehicle?”
“You wash your vehicle?”
“You don’t?”
“I thought that’s why God created car washes.”
“And neighbors named Gunther?”
A series of wind gusts battered the small house, sending a chill over Jasmine’s skin. She walked to the front window. “I have a love-hate relationship with storms, or I’d be all over you about Gunther.”
He came up behind her. “Does the hate stem from the fact that Wainwright’s men attacked the safe house during a storm?”
“Partly. But you showed up during a storm, too.” She wanted him to touch her; however, she wasn’t sure enough of his mood to initiate the contact. Instead, she drew a picture of a raven on the dusty pane. “What is it you’re not telling me? And I’m not talking about the case.”
Turning her from the glass, he studied her face. “Did I say something in my sleep last night?”
She stared for half a moment, then breathed out. “You said it was your fault.”
“That’s it? That’s all?”
“No, but it’s the only thing that made sense. I heard the words table and raven and the name Diana. Then later, a lot later, something about pearls.”
The clouds in his dark eyes cleared with the last thing. “Pearl,” he corrected. “Cyrus’s grandmother. I’ve been trying to reach her.”
“And Diana?”
“Someone I knew once. She’s dead.” And he’d tightened right up, she realized. He squeezed her arms briefly, released her and stepped back. “It was a long time ago.”
Not long enough, apparently. But she nodded and didn’t press. If he wanted her to know, he’d tell her. Simple as that.
The wind howled through the rafters. The lamps and overheads flickered.
“Gonna need battery lamps,” Costello predicted.
“What we need,” Boxman said, “is our heads examined. We went through this garbage all last night and half of today. There’s nothing here. Badgering and hounding’s the way to go. Before one or both of our star suspects skip town. We all know my money’s on Bowcott, but I’m not dismissing Corey or Wainwright.”
“Or Dukes,” Costello said from behind the counter.
“You told him?” Jasmine asked Rogan in surprise.
“A theory’s a theory, love. Doesn’t matter whose it is. And the ‘dead’ aspect of the calls you’ve gotten fits.”
The lights fluttered uncertainly.
Boxman waded through the clutter. “I’ll get us some battery backup. No need to trouble yourself, Lieutenant.” He yanked the door open, almost got blown off his feet, closed it again and slapped at one of the wall switches. “Someone’s out there. Costello, kill the kitchen light. Rogan?”
“Got him. He’s in the trees behind the shed.”
“He’s also nothing if not persistent,” Jasmine muttered.
“In the house, doors and windows locked, with Costello, no matter what you see or hear.”
It was the safe house all over again. On a smaller scale, but still a potential night attack. Only this time, instead of Dukes and two other officers going out, it was Rogan and Boxman.
Rogan caught her chin. “Promise me you won’t leave.”
“I won’t leave.” She accepted the gun he handed her and the kiss he pressed to her lips.
He was gone with the next powerful blast of wind.
Costello set a hand on her arm. “We need to lower the blinds. Long as there’s power, I want light in here.”
It amazed and unsettled her how a situation could go from relatively normal to completely surreal in under half a minute. But it had, and she was going to cope with whatever happened.
Just not with Rogan’s death.
Costello’s penlight guided them from window to window. Once all the blinds were lowered, he switched on a small desk lamp and motioned her to the rear of the house.
Although her teeth wanted to chatter, Jasmine forced herself to follow his instruction
s and tried not to visualize any mutant combinations of Malcolm Wainwright, Donald Dukes and ravens with death on their minds.
She paced because moving helped, and left Costello to inspect the door bolts.
The wind began to swoop as well as gust. Tree limbs hit the roof. She heard the first drops of rain start to fall. So far, the predicted thunder and lightning hadn’t materialized, but they would come, eventually, and turn a volatile situation into an explosive one.
“Can you tell me anything the killer said that I might not know?” Costello asked.
She wrested her eyes from the window. “He said I’d see him, but it wouldn’t really be him because he hides himself away. He insisted he wasn’t going to die again, and that when I was gone, he wouldn’t have to worry anymore.”
“Riddles.” Costello flexed his arthritic left wrist. “They’ve never been my strong suit. Probably part of the reason I never made captain. Murder can be a riddle or a jigsaw puzzle, both or neither. Motives vary from payback to gain to personal gratification.”
“And none of us knows which one applies here.” Her gaze went to Wesley’s raven-shaped wall clock. She couldn’t make out the position of the hands by the desk lamp alone. “How long have they been gone?”
“Ten minutes.” Costello set his gun on the table. “There’s a lot of ‘there’ beyond these walls. Woods go on for miles.”
So did the treacherous coastline, she thought, tapping her elbows with her palms.
The rain fell harder, slanting against the walls at near gale force.
“This is exactly how it felt when Wainwright’s men rushed the safe house.”
“Yet despite the attack, here you are today. Rogan slipped you out from under enemy noses while Victor and I provided cover and Boxman and Prewitt held the front line. Funny the things that go through your head at a time like that, but all I kept wondering was—how did they find us? Someone must have informed.”
Jasmine glanced at the clock again. Still unable to see the hands, she used the switch by the front door to turn on the lamp beneath it.
A red siren light gave the room an eerie look of possession, which, while appropriate, provided little comfort.
Ten-ten. Rogan and Boxman had been outside for more than fifteen minutes.
And there it was, she thought a few seconds later. Thunder rumbling ominously in the distance.
The lights bobbled. As they did, she felt a click of memory in her head.
The wind gave a mighty roar. The lights snapped off and on.
Determined to eliminate everything except that one elusive thought, Jasmine pressed her fingers to her forehead and concentrated on the flash.
For an instant, half a heartbeat, the vision solidified. Hitching in a startled breath, she snatched her hands down and brought her head up. A second later, the lights sizzled and died.
The entire house trembled now, as if a giant were shaking it.
“Costello?”
“Over here.” He waved his penlight. “By the…”
The sudden blast launched Jasmine into the wall. Her head struck the table under the raven clock.
The memory, whole now, drifted through her mind like a wisp of fog. A man’s face, a crimson glow and a simple yet terrifying lie.
As the dust settled and the light and the face dissolved, Jasmine’s mind went dark.
* * *
ROGAN LOST BOXMAN DURING the first ten seconds of the chase. But the man ahead of him carried a light that rose and fell and followed a zigzag path toward the cliff.
That was good, Rogan reflected. Out of the woods, he’d be exposed. No place for him to hide.
The wind blew everything not rooted to the ground into his face. Broken branches got his shoulder twice. Twigs, stones and pinecones battered the rest of him. A dislodged bird’s nest narrowly missed smacking him in the face.
The rain slowed him down, but it seemed to impede the runner even more. Rogan knew he was closing on him and felt a fresh pump of adrenaline when the man stumbled.
Thunder rocked the ground. Lightning split a turbulent night sky. It also showed a large mass steaming toward him from the left. He tried to rear back, but couldn’t avoid the collision.
It was like plowing into a stone wall. Rogan wound up on his knees. So did the steam engine that broadsided him.
“How come we can always find each other, but never the person we’re chasing?” Boxman panted above the wind.
Ignoring the question, Rogan searched for the light.
Strong gusts of wind bowed the trees so he almost missed it, but when the runner jumped and the light made an arc, he had him.
“We can cut him off,” he shouted to Boxman. “At the edge of the woods.”
“Your wish, my command.” Doubled over, Boxman flapped a hand. “Go. Cut. I’ll be there.”
Rain blurred trees and undergrowth alike. The light bumped up and down over boulder and stone. Rogan saw Boxman charging in from the left. Tucking his gun away, he went for the tackle, used a rock for a ramp and laid the guy flat.
Thankfully, Boxman pulled up at the last second and landed in the mud rather than on Rogan’s back.
Out of patience, out of breath, and with his right shoulder throbbing, he grabbed the runner by his hair and gave it a yank.
It didn’t surprise him that he recognized the man’s face.
“Nice try, Lieutenant,” Cyrus bit out. “But you got the wrong guy again.”
Instead of releasing him, Rogan summoned a nasty smile. With his forearm pressed to Cyrus’s neck, he bent close. “Cliff’s right here, Bowcott, and I’m in a pisser of a mood. Either you talk, or you take a swim.”
“Don’t talk,” Boxman begged, swiping mud from his eyes. “Lieutenant, you’re ringing.”
Jasmine’s face leaped immediately to mind. Which was the only reason he shoved Cyrus’s head down and pulled out his cell.
The name on the screen wasn’t Jasmine’s, but it intrigued him all the same.
“Looks like you’ll have a chance to say goodbye to someone before you take that dive, Cyrus. It’s your grandmother returning my call.”
* * *
BY THE DIM FLASHLIGHT, Rogan saw the color drain from his prisoner’s face. More intriguing still. And possibly the break they needed. Extending his phone, he gave Cyrus the option.
“Three seconds,” he said.
Cyrus took all of them, but in the end his bravado deserted him. “Don’t involve her. She wears a pacemaker. She doesn’t need any more jolts.”
Rogan caught the call before it went to voice mail, spoke to the woman briefly, then climbed from Cyrus’s back and grinned at Boxman.
“You wanna bring him?”
“Do ravens have feathers?” The big man’s saber-sharp teeth appeared as he one-handed Cyrus to his feet. “Old stone lookout’s about fifty yards north, around that jut of trees.”
Rogan nodded and let Boxman lead the way while he called Jasmine’s cell.
No answer. Had she taken it inside? he wondered. Or left it in his truck?
He tried Costello and got a busy signal. And Wesley’s place didn’t have a landline.
“Lookout,” Boxman shouted back.
The narrow stone structure was pitch-black, and it smelled strongly of damp. Boxman shoved Cyrus through the remnants of a door and onto a rough bench.
“I figure my belt light’s got fifteen minutes left in it. Lieutenant?”
“Maybe ten. Means you want to talk fast, Cyrus.”
“Talk, not lie.” Boxman shrugged. “Though I’m good either way.”
Cyrus slumped in his seat. “Victor was right when he said I couldn’t deal with the blood and death anymore. It is one of the reasons I quit being a cop.”
“What was the other?” Rogan asked.
Cyrus let his head fall against the wall. “My older brother died when I was fourteen. That’s a matter of record. The circumstances surrounding his death aren’t.”
Rogan surveyed the man’s taut
facial muscles and his defensive posture. “What happened to him?”
“His name was Robbie. He was our mother’s favorite. No idea why. He was a bully and a jerk to Victor and me. One day while our parents were out, he got hold of a whiskey bottle. He dared us to match him drink for drink. Being fourteen and faced with an opportunity like that, we were happy to oblige.”
“Cut to the end,” Rogan suggested.
Cyrus’s eyes glittered. “Sure, no problem. Squish.”
With his patience exhausted and his temper beginning to strain, Rogan pulled his gun. “You’ve got a choice, Bowcott. You can give me something concise and coherent or choose which of us you want to deal with one-on-one. Either way, you won’t be feeling your best when you leave here tonight.”
Cyrus snorted. “You’re bluff—” Rogan raised his gun, cocked the hammer “—ing.” Fear strangled the final syllable. “Fine. We obliged him. We got drunk.” He tossed a glare skyward. “That was the point, wasn’t it, Robbie? To get us in trouble. But you didn’t like it when I stopped. You came at me with Mother’s boning knife.”
Boxman nudged Rogan’s ribs. “Is he faking us out?”
“Not sure.”
“You’d have stuck me without a second thought if Victor hadn’t wrestled you down. But you were bigger than him and stronger, and we were all trashed.”
Lowering his eyes, Cyrus spoke through his teeth. “I don’t know how it happened. We were all flailing around like wild animals. Robbie slashed my arm. I thought he was going to stick Victor. Pretty sure he would have if Victor hadn’t rolled away. That’s when Robbie lost his balance and fell.”
“Onto the knife,” Rogan assumed.
Cyrus made a slice-and-twist motion. “Right between his ribs. That’s how he died. Eventually.” His eyes met Rogan’s and slitted. “But sometimes the dead don’t stay dead, do they? Robbie was one of those. Our mother blamed us, and we knew, somehow we knew, that Robbie did, too. It took a while, but finally it happened. One horrible day, I realized he’d come back. Robbie really had returned from the dead.”
Boxman, who’d been staring in suspicion, kicked Rogan’s foot. “Maybe we should…”
Raven's Cove - Jenna Ryan Page 17