Heather Graham Krewe of Hunters Series, Volume 4

by Heather Graham

  “They got into a car here,” Mo said. “Rollo can’t take us much farther unless we have a place to begin.”

  “A tomb or a vault,” Aidan said. “A cemetery.”

  Mo looked at him, her eyes wide.

  “Which one?” he asked her. “I’d thought the killer would stick to one area, but we found his first lair—and we found the second.”

  “They must’ve been taken by surprise,” Van Camp said. “Jimmy’s a good cop. He loves kids, too. He’d have died for that boy in a heartbeat.”

  “Unless...” Aidan said.

  “What?” Van Camp demanded.

  “Unless Jimmy is in on it somehow.”

  “No. No way,” Van Camp said firmly. “You don’t know Jimmy.”

  “And,” Logan pointed out, “Jimmy was here—at the hotel—when Sondra was killed last night. Debbie, too.”

  Aidan hesitated uncomfortably. “Granted, it’s not likely but it could be one of them,” he said. “We haven’t really considered Debbie, but we know that two people were involved. At least two people.”

  “That makes it even more imperative to find them. One thing for damned sure—J.J. isn’t in on it. He could easily be a victim.”

  Mo had been waiting for them to finish before she spoke. “Someone could go back out to the cemetery where we found Richard and Wendy. And someone else should head back to the Haunted Mausoleum. Cover both old haunts.”

  Van Camp nodded. “All right, I’ll take officers out to the mausoleum. I have a pretty firm grasp of the place now. And we already have an all-points bulletin out on a dark SUV with Horsepower tires. Oh, and by the way, Jimmy doesn’t own an SUV. He drives a Chevy.”

  “Good.” Aidan nodded, feeling a sense of relief. “We’ll take the old cemetery that borders Sleepy Hollow Cemetery,” Aidan said. He glanced at Mo as they began walking toward his car. “I just have a feeling....”

  “What?”

  “It all goes back to Lizzie grave.”

  They reached his car and got in, Rollo clambering into the backseat. Logan was preparing to follow them. “Can you have Jane trace Sondra Burke’s lineage?” Mo asked.

  “Sondra was from here?”

  “Her family goes back a long way, but...I’m thinking she might have been related to the Highsmith family. Which would have meant—”

  “That she went back to Lizzie—Major Andre’s daughter—as well.”

  Mo nodded. “Lizzie grave, Highsmith, Continental currency. Do you think—”

  “That the Continental currency could be in Lizzie’s grave?” Aidan finished. He pulled out his phone and asked Jane to get on it immediately.

  “Aidan, what if it has something to do with the grave itself?” Mo asked. “Wouldn’t the killers have gotten to it by now?”

  “They might have been missing the last piece of the puzzle. Or...it could’ve been too much of a risk. But maybe they were getting rid of any and all Highsmith descendants,” he said.

  “J.J.!” she whispered.

  He turned to her, a concerned expression on his face. “Well, we’re headed there now,” he said. He called Logan and conveyed their thoughts. Logan was calling Adam Harrison; he’d get the proper clearance to tear the old graveyard apart and exhume a few bodies.

  Aidan glanced at Mo again.

  He was definitely falling in love. She was beautiful, engaging, honest.

  And they could be together and even work together. True, he worked in the city. She’d left the city for a little peace.

  But this life was what she’d found. Maybe she needed to realize she’d come here trying to ease her turmoil. She’d tried to escape a particular place. Whereas he’d tried to run away from the strange talent that could allow him to be the most helpful—and even save lives.

  Maybe he could make her see that they’d both been running.

  And perhaps they could both stop running. Together.

  She looked at him. “What?” she asked.

  He shook his head. “I’m just thinking.”

  “About the graveyard?”

  “About you—but I am going to think about the graveyard and the mausoleums now.”

  He drove down the side street.

  “There’s no SUV,” Mo noted.

  “Someone could have gotten them here, knocked out with chloroform and then moved the vehicle.”

  “Do you really think he always kills them when he first takes them?” Mo asked quietly. “That would mean—Well, maybe no hope. You told me last night that you were certain Sondra was killed before she was taken to the tomb and...beheaded.”

  Aidan inhaled. “Yes, I said that. But I don’t know for sure when they were killed—how long after they were kidnapped. I’m not certain even the M.E. would be able to determine the timing exactly.”

  Logan parked his car behind them, and as he got out, he handed Aidan two extralarge flashlights, one for him and one for Mo. “It’s a big place. I’ll go left. If I hear Rollo, I’ll know you’re on to something.”

  “We’ll take the wall of vaults over here,” Aidan said.

  Aidan and Mo walked along the vaults together, casting light in all directions. Rollo sniffed and sniffed as Aidan ripped away vines.

  “The whole situation doesn’t make sense,” he mused. “The crew around Richard was definitely in the hotel. We know there are two people, so that means nothing. But since all five were in the hotel at the time, how the hell did one person sneak up on two adults and a child and knock them out?”

  “You think Detective Van Camp is wrong—and that Jimmy is involved?” Mo asked, sounding a little shocked.

  “I’m not sure what I think.” His phone rang and he answered it quickly.

  “Bingo,” Jane said. “Going back to the Civil War. Sondra Burke’s great-great-grandfather, Albert Highsmith, was a Union colonel. He left behind a son, Richard Highsmith’s however-many-greats grandfather, and two daughters. One didn’t marry. The other married Augustus T. Burke. I’ve got a search going for other descendants, but it seems that the line died out. Other than Richard Highsmith—and Sondra Burke.”

  “Thanks, Jane,” he told her. “I’m not sure how it’s going to help tonight—but I suspect it means something. I think it confirms that Andre’s descendants are being targeted. Keep checking. See if you can find any connection with anyone else.”

  “How about Debbie Howell?” she asked.

  “Maybe. Can’t hurt to look,” Aidan said. “But tonight...I’m afraid the killer was after J.J.”

  “How’s it going there?”

  “Nothing yet.”

  “I’ll keep in touch,” she said, and the ended the call.

  “Rollo isn’t interested in these vaults,” Mo told him. “Should we go up?”

  “There’s a manageable slope we can get up right there,” Aidan said.

  They trudged up the hill. Even with his flashlight and the golden cast of the moon, it was dark. Trees surrounded them. And, as if on cue, as if they were in some bizarre B-grade horror movie, a ground fog was rising, swirling around graves and headstones, cherubs and angels.

  “There are more vaults in that area, against the next hill,” Aidan said. “Let’s walk Rollo around there.”

  “The Bakker mausoleum is here,” Mo said. “Where Lizzie’s buried.”

  He nodded. But he doubted Voorhaven and Debbie had been brought here; that would’ve been too obvious. It was also too easily accessible.

  “We’re going to have Lizzie exhumed?” Mo asked.

  “Yes. I think we have to,” he said.

  “You don’t suppose it was just a place Wendy wanted to bring Richard? Where, perhaps, she meant to give him the gift of his past?”

  “I had thought that, but...it’s too much of a coincidence tha
t both Richard and Sondra are descendants of the same man—through an illegitimate birth. The child Lizzie had by Andre. And what scares me the most is that J. J. Appleby is now the last of the descendants.”

  “But someone would have to know that. And how would they know—unless Richard or Wendy told them?”

  “That’s why it had to be someone close,” he said.

  His phone rang again and he paused to answer it. As he did, he called to Mo, asking her to wait; she and Rollo had walked on to a little hill farther into the graveyard. He watched her for a moment. She seemed to be a beautiful vision in the moonlight, her hair flowing behind her, whirling in the slight breeze that stirred the fog. Graves were all around her, and she stood by a large angel with folded wings that looked down at the earth and wept.

  “It’s Jane,” Jane told him unnecessarily, since he knew the sound of her voice and had recognized her caller ID.

  “I found something. Not sure if it means anything.”

  “What?”

  “Tommy Jensen—the owner of the Headless Horseman Hideaway Restaurant and Bar—has a black SUV. Will is on his way to Jensen’s residence now. He’ll check it out.”

  Tommy Jensen?

  Well, he’d lived in the area forever. And it would’ve been damned easy for him to get to the convention center, whisk away his victims and take them into a vault—a vault that was right across the street from his workplace.

  He heard Rollo let out a bark, and he looked up; Mo and the dog were still standing on the little hillock that led toward more graves and more cliffs and vaults.

  “Aidan, you there?”

  “Yes, yes, I’m here. Jane, I know it’s late, but find someone who works there, at Tommy Jensen’s restaurant. Find out if he was at work last night or if he was out for any appreciable length of time.”

  “I’m on it,” she said.

  He put his cell away. “Mo?”

  She wasn’t on the rise.

  Panic instantly clouded his mind and swept through him.

  “Mo!” he shouted. But she’d just been there. Seconds ago she’d been there!

  He ran up the hill. “Rollo, Rollo! Here, boy!” No response from the dog.

  He climbed to the top of the hill, certain that he’d see her there. Mo might’ve thought she’d discovered something. She might have walked a few steps ahead.

  But she wasn’t there.

  Fog puffed and twisted and turned at his feet.

  The winged angel monument seemed to weep real tears.

  And there was nothing else. No sight of Mo or the dog among the broken stones and crypts before him.

  “Mo!” he shouted, and he began to run.

  CHAPTER 16

  Mo opened her eyes. Her head hurt like hell.

  For a moment, she was completely disoriented. She was in the dark, pitch-black dark. It took her time to remember. She’d been in the graveyard with Aidan and Rollo. They were looking for J.J., Debbie and Jimmy. Mo was sure that she’d screamed. She must have screamed!

  Because one minute she’d been walking, following Rollo, and the next she was falling. It was as if the earth itself gave way beneath her feet.

  Maybe she didn’t actually scream. Maybe it was just a gasp as the air was sucked out of her lungs.

  She tried to move, hopeful that all the places that hurt didn’t mean she’d broken any bones. She was sore everywhere, but her limbs seemed to be working. There was dirt all over her. When she looked up, she could see nothing—no moonlight. It was as if she’d been part of a cave-in.

  Perhaps she had. A grave-in, she thought, and realized her mind was running toward the hysterical.

  Alarm seized her then. Rollo! If she’d fallen, he should have been barking, He should have been going crazy, leading Aidan to her. Unless he’d plunged down, too.

  Dread that she fought to dispel seized her.

  “Rollo, Rollo, where are you boy?” she called, creeping around in the dark pit. She stared up again—and still saw nothing except the merest glimmer of light from above, where she’d fallen through. But if Rollo was above her, he’d be barking! She eased to her knees.

  “Rollo!”

  She crawled through dirt and broken stones, pieces of wood—and what she feared was a pile of bones.

  But she kept going.

  And then she came upon the dog. He had fallen, too. “Rollo, Rollo!”

  He didn’t respond. She ran her fingers over him to see if he was alive. She found his neck and tried to ascertain any damage. He was still warm.

  He can’t be dead. He can’t be dead! He’s knocked out—like I was. He was too good, too loyal, too wonderful a companion to lose!

  She had to find out where she was and get help for both of them. She tried shouting. Nothing, not even an echo. She didn’t know where she’d fallen and whether she’d rolled when she hit the ground.

  She’d had a flashlight.

  “I’m here, Rollo, I’m here,” she whispered to the dog. “I will never leave you. Except to go for help so I can get you out of here.” There were tears forming in her eyes. She had no idea how badly the dog had been hurt. She couldn’t feel any blood or obvious broken bones but he wasn’t responding to her, either.

  She began running her fingers over the ground, looking for the flashlight. She nearly shrieked as something crawled over her hand.

  Rat, she told herself.

  She’d fallen into a vault. She was surrounded by the dead. In the dark.

  She closed her eyes—although she could see nothing. She wasn’t afraid of the dead, she reminded herself.

  No, but you are terrified of this kind of darkness! a voice inside her mocked.

  “I could use the dead right now, Rollo. Someone I know—or don’t know!—who could help us get out of here.”

  She kept groping around for the flashlight. As she did, she paused. She heard a sound—like something being dragged along the ground.

  She almost cried out but stopped herself.

  Jimmy and Debbie and J. J. Appleby were missing.

  And the killer might have brought them here.

  She crept forward, still feeling for her flashlight—and then she found it. As she clutched it, she looked behind her, blinking. She could see a faint light in the distance.

  Coming from where she’d heard the dragging sound.

  Her fingers tightened around her own light. She didn’t turn it on. In the darkness she inched closer to the source of the light, which was somewhat downhill.

  She hit a crumbling wall of earth, but there was a fairly large ill-defined hole that let her look through.

  And when she did, she caught her breath. She could see by pale light into the vault just below her and to the right. There was no altar, but there was a low-lying tomb with a large stone slab.

  Beside it rested a hatchet and a knife.

  And slumped over by the altar was J. J. Appleby.

  They’d come to find J.J.

  And she had.

  * * *

  “She’s gone. Vanished. Disappeared!” Aidan said into the phone. “She was here—and now she’s not. I’m going over every inch and I can’t find her. It’s impossible! She and Rollo. Just gone, as if the earth swallowed them up. Which means the earth did swallow them up. I need a search party here, Logan. I need everyone. We have to find her!”

  “On the way,” Logan assured him. “I’ll get Van Camp and half the force up here, too.”

  “Get the whole force!” Aidan knew he had to get control of himself. If he didn’t, his lack of competence, of composure, could get her killed.

  He called Jane on a hunch.

  “I was about to phone you. I reached one of the cooks. Tommy Jensen was there last night to open, but then she didn�
�t see him again. He left the bar in Abby’s hands. She’s his main bartender.”

  “Yes, I know. Did Will and Sloan get him at his house?”

  “No. He wasn’t there, Aidan. They’re on their way to the cemetery now. Don’t worry, we’ll find Mo.”

  He wished he could believe her. As he slipped his phone back into his pocket, he noticed that he was standing on the highest point of the hill; he could see across to Tommy Jensen’s. There was a light on inside.

  He called Logan. “Get everyone looking over here—right by the giant weeping angel with the folded wings. I’m trying a different route.”

  “Aidan?”

  “I’ll just be a few minutes,” Aidan said.

  “What—”

  “Trust me. That’s what Krewe members do, right?”

  * * *

  Digging at the hole with her bare hands wasn’t easy but Mo was persistent. Of course, it would’ve been somewhat easier if she hadn’t been trying to avoid any noise. She knew that the crypt extended farther in a direction she couldn’t see from where she crouched. That was where the light came from—someone had left a lantern there. It illuminated the place where J.J. lay on the floor.

  She didn’t see Debbie Howell or Jimmy Voorhaven. And, she didn’t see blood on the axe or the knife or the tomb.

  She kept clawing away at the hole in the earth, making it larger and larger.

  There was movement below her. She could see that someone or something was creating shadows in the vault—a vault like any other. Shelves of coffins on both sides, old, decaying and chipped.

  She and Rollo had gone by every vault on the lower level! Rollo would have known J.J.’s scent; he would have barked furiously to tell them J.J. was there.

  And then she understood. The killer had come here after that. Maybe, since he’d been bold enough to walk through the Haunted Mausoleum with a body and a severed head, he’d been bold enough to come here when he knew they were searching the graveyard.

  She continued to claw at the earth. Eventually, she’d get through.