by Liliana Hart
“I’ll admit, it’s a coincidence. But it still doesn’t make sense. Max died seventeen years ago. The lights have returned several times since then. Why didn’t Max come back on one of those other earlier visits? Why didn’t he come back in three years instead of seventeen, or ten years, or last year? Why now?”
Doug’s shoulders lifted in a fatalistic shrug. “You’re trying to attach logic to something that’s beyond our understanding. For all we know the woods, and whatever inhabits them, operates under different laws of nature, or physics. We have as much hope of understanding what’s happening in that forest—with those things—as a Neanderthal would have understanding a satellite orbiting earth.”
Kaylea digested that. “You really think it’s Max, don’t you?”
“Yeah, I do,” he said without hesitation. “You do too. You just need to let go of that rational brain of yours and accept it with your heart.”
She snorted, smiling slightly. “That’s rather ironic, don’t you think, considering you use logic and reason on a daily basis to solve your cases?”
Which reminded her that he was a cop.
Kaylea’s smile slowly died.
Doug wasn’t like other cops, though. He hadn’t put on the uniform to badger and bully, or to prove his superiority over others. He’d joined the force to get answers, to have access to her mother’s case file, to be in position to provide red-herrings, if it ever came to that.
It had become obvious, once she’d reached adulthood and put the pieces together, that Doug and her mom had been more than neighbors. Regardless of the fifteen year age gap between them, they’d been close. Too close. Lovers close, not neighbors close.
It had been Doug who’d gotten the county sheriff to take an interest in her mother’s disappearance. She suspected it had been Doug who’d tracked down the dirty details on her father and fed the information to the deputies.
He’d been the first person Lina had called that awful night, even before aunt Jessa. He’d been the one to dig the graves, one of them much deeper in the forest than she and Lina could have done on their own. He’d been the one to come up with a plausible scenario and drilled it into their traumatized heads. For seventeen years he hadn’t said a word. Not to anyone.
None of them had.
But that didn’t stop them from thinking about that night. Kaylea could see the memory like an ugly stain stamped across his face, a greasy slick in his eyes.
And she knew he was wondering the same thing she was.
“What if he comes back, too?” Kaylea finally asked, her voice thready, voicing the question on both their minds.
Chapter Four
By seven pm Beson was on his way to his daughter’s party and Logan was out on patrol. But before hitting the streets, he’d signed in and hit the dead room, the locker where all the cold case files were stored—or at least the capital ones.
Every department had one, but Jamesville had one of the smallest he’d seen. The chain link cage at the back of the precinct was the size of a walk in closet. It consisted of galvanized shelves against the right and left sides and three four-tier file cabinets against the back. All told, there were barely a dozen boxes of evidence on those shelves. Apparently Jamesville’s crime rate was one of the lowest in the country.
Which made it suspicious, very suspicious, that Joseph Armund’s case file was missing.
Logan checked the shelves twice looking for a white evidence box that bore the man’s name.
Nothing.
He opened all of the boxes that shared space on the shelves. Maybe the evidence had been misfiled, the box mis-marked. Mistakes happened all the time. But there was no clerical mishandling in this case. The evidence and case file were simply missing.
He did find the missing person’s report on Francisca Armund, but even that was shamefully slight. It read like a token report—one that had been taken and filed without any serious attention to detail or action being taken. Which fit Meechum’s retelling of events.
But the Joseph Armund file, yeah—yeah that should have still been sitting on the shelf, patiently waiting for new evidence to be added, or someone to take a renewed interest in the case.
The box’s absence itched unmercifully at Logan’s instincts. The man had been an officer of Jamesville’s police department. Had one of his fellow officers in a mistaken display of blue loyalty tossed the case file?
Logan mulled that over as he cruised the streets. He might have better luck at the Sheriff’s department. Since they’d launched an investigation into the man’s activities, they probably still had a file on hand—although seventeen years was a hell of a long time.
He glanced at the sky as he reached the outskirts of town and made a quick U-turn, heading back toward the city limits. Every night dusk fell a little earlier. He’d barely been out an hour and darkness already veiled the landscape, cocooning him in lonely silence. He hit the button next to his right elbow, and the driver’s window rolled down, allowing the soothing scent of imminent rain laced with pine to stream into the cab.
From the smell and clouds that had gathered overhead, it looked like another thunderstorm was brewing—an almost nightly occurrence since he’d moved to town. Jamesville had proven to be consistent in its bad weather. Of the dozens of places he’d lived during his seven year stint with the bureau, the storms here took the cake, worse than all the other places combined, and that included Atlanta.
Although perhaps living wasn’t an accurate description of his previous life. More like not-even-unpacking before the next case pulled him away. He’d spent more time in hotels or motels than in his own apartment.
The forest, the one the locals called Spirit Woods, rolled past him in a blur of tall, twisted shadows as he cruised from street to street. Jamesville was surrounded on three sides by the rambling forest. Thick with trees and dense underbrush, the entire stretch of land was a fire trap. One good hit with a lightning bolt and the forest would turn into a living, breathing flame and take the entire town down.
Considering the severity of the area’s thunderstorms, you’d think the fire hazard would be a major concern, yet nobody seemed to worry about it.
Granted, according to scuttlebutt, Spirit Woods had never caught on fire, which the locals took as some supernatural portent. Logan, on the other hand—well, he had a more logical theory; namely, that they’d been damn lucky so far. The whole area was ripe for disaster.
He glanced out the driver’s window as the eastern edge of the forest rolled past. Hell, the towering, twisted swath of trees did have a distinctly primeval feel. He could see why there were so many legends and myths surrounding the place. Still... He’d heard some pretty crazy shit since he’d arrived in town.
Rumor claimed the forest surrounding Jamesville was haunted. Locals cited strange whispery voices, chronic fog, rain from a clear blue sky, and frogs or lizards dropping from the tree tops. They also talked about animal mutilations, disappearances and resurrections. He frowned at that last bit, the golden retriever he’d dropped off at Kaylea’s clinic popping on his mind.
According to Meechum, Kaylea had owned a golden named Max back when she’d been a kid. He frowned, tapping his fingers on the steering wheel. He’d definitely picked up on some strong emotion in the clinic, too. Something she’d tried to hide—like shock, or grief.
Her reaction hadn’t been because of his sudden re-entry into her life, it had been because of the dog. He’d been certain of that. He shook his head slightly, his fingers tightening around the steering wheel. She couldn’t actually believe that the forest had resurrected her long dead family pet... could she?
While there was major speculation swirling around Spirit Woods’ supposedly supernatural abilities, when he’d asked for specific, substantiated cases to prove the claims, not one person had presented anything of substance. It was all “I heard” or “such and such said.”
Hearsay and gossip, that’s what Spirit Woods’ fearsome reputation was based on.
In all likelihood, the same explanation could be found here. The magnetic field was simply thinner above Jamesville, allowing some of the sun’s particles through, which resulted in Jamesville’s very own rendition of the Northern Lights.
There was nothing supernatural about it. Hell, nothing supernatural about any of it, from where he stood. From what he could tell, there was only one case on the books detailing someone who might have vanished in Spirit Woods—with might being the operative word.
The case involved a child, Jamie St. James, the seven year old heir to the multi-million dollar St. James estate. The money alone meant there were a couple million reasons for someone to take the kid. And while there had never been a ransom demand, nobody had actually seen him enter the forest either. The only evidence pointing to his being in the woods was his jacket at the base of a fresh landslide, which could have been planted to throw the investigation off track.
The child’s body had never been found, and there’d been no signs or sightings of him in the nine years he’d been missing, but there was as much evidence pointing to a maternal murder as there was pointing to a supernatural kidnapping. It was far more likely that Deborah St. James, the boy’s mother, had killed her son and disposed of his body, than that Spirit Woods had grabbed the kid and held him hostage.
Logan was in the final few seconds of the twisting, complicated route to the Alderberry Grove apartment complex before he finally admitted to himself that he was headed over to see Kaylea. He’d googled her before coming to town for that first interview not because of any deep seated, driving need to make contact with her, but to answer the simple question of whether or not she’d moved back to town after college. It was harder to explain the physical trip he’d made out to the apartment complex to locate her unit, so he hadn’t bothered trying. Instead, he’d chalked the drive-by up to idle speculation about a past lover.
While he hadn’t knocked on her door, he had located her unit. It was the bottom-right apartment in the first cluster of four, the one with all the dark windows. Apparently she hadn’t returned home yet. He cruised slowly past her apartment, studying the dark, sleek squares of glass. Maybe she hadn’t left her clinic yet.
Wheeling the cruiser around, he headed back to town. If she was still at the clinic, he’d stop for a quick visit, and get his questions answered. Like the dog… Did she really know who the animal belonged to, or had her assurances been lies to get him out of her clinic, so she could claim the animal for herself?
It took seven minutes, give or take, to reach the clinic. The windows in that brick building were glowing. A bright, cheerful yellow seeped out the edges of the closed blinds. She was definitely still in there.
He slowed his cruiser to a crawl and eyed the Ford Explorer in the clinic’s parking lot. She also had company.
He’d recognized the blue Explorer. There were only two blue cruisers with the Jamesville PD. The shiner one belonged to Nathan Stone, the new Police Chief. The older, less pretty one—the one currently sitting in Kaylea’s parking lot—belonged to Douglas Meechum.
Why the hell had Meechum decided to pay her a call?
Was it because of the dog?
He grimaced, his fingers tightening around the steering wheel. Great, he could just imagine how happy she’d been to get a visit from yet another cop. No doubt she blamed Logan for this new intrusion in her professional life, which wasn’t totally unfair. Meechum’s curiosity wouldn’t have been stirred if Logan had kept his mouth shut.
He was debating whether to pull into the parking lot or wait until Meechum left when the clinic door opened and the detective stepped outside. Kaylea stopped long enough to block the golden retriever, which had attempted to follow them outside. She leaned over to say something to the animal and then closed the door, following her visitor outside.
They stopped in a halo of light spilling down from the parking lamp above Meechum’s SUV. It had barely registered that the pair were standing pretty close together, closer than strangers would find comfortable, when Kaylea lifted her arms and hugged him.
Fucking hugged him.
A cop.
Logan stiffened, his foot hitting the accelerator. As his car surged forward, tires squealing, the couple broke apart, heads turning toward the street. There was little doubt they saw him, but they’d been so intent on each other and that fucking hug, they wouldn’t know how much he’d seen—or how long he’d been watching.
For all they’d know, he’d just turned onto the street.
Not that it was any of his business who they fucking hugged, or where they did the fucking hugging.
Scowling, he kept going when he reached the end of the street.
Not your business. Not your business. Not your goddamn fucking business.
On the spur of the moment, he headed for the edge of town and the quiet, lonely solitude of the open road.
Obviously the woman didn’t have a problem with all cops. Some cops she got downright friendly with. Some cops she got all touchy-feely with. Apparently, when it came to cops, if you were old enough to be her daddy—okay, that wasn’t quite fair—Meechum was in his late thirties, which only made him ten years her senior, not old enough to be her father—but still...
He wallowed in the ugly mood that had descended on him for the next few hours, all the while managing to avoid answering the big question—which was why the sight of Kaylea hugging another man had shoved a red-hot poker up his ass.
Normally, he didn’t mind a quiet, uneventful shift. But the silence and calm wore on him with each passing mile. By mid-shift he was itchy and irritable, just spoiling for a good fight. Which Jamesville refused to provide. Hell, the radio was absurdly quiet all night, so silent he tested it repeatedly to make sure the damn thing was working.
Right around midnight the radio finally came to life with a sputter and crackle, he reached for the mic in relief. Finally, something to take his mind off things that weren’t any of his business.
Except... He frowned, pulled the cruiser to the side of the road, and leaned closer to the dashboard. Another burst of static lit the car. No voices. Just harsh white noise. Adjusting the channel in case the dial had slipped, he picked up the hand piece and keyed the mic.
“Dispatch, I didn’t copy that.”
“Nothing to copy,” Rutley’s high pitched voice immediately answered.
“Ten-four.” With a grimace, Logan secured the hand piece back to the metal bar anchoring the radio in its housing.
Apparently he wouldn’t be getting his distraction after all.
Damn it.
“You hear something?” Rutley asked over the wire, his voice climbing eagerly.
Rutley ran the house during the midnight shift, manning both the dispatch desk and keeping an eye on the holding tank. No doubt he was even more bored than Logan was.
Logan leaned forward and activated the mic. “Negative. Looks like it was just static.”
“You out by Spirit Woods?” The high voice thinned, vibrated with anticipation.
Logan glanced toward the shadowy march of trees along the left side of the road. The night was particularly dark with the moon obscured by the thunder clouds boiling overhead, so the trees themselves were only visible as blue-black towering spheres.
He hesitated, then picked up the handset and keyed the mic. “Why?”
“Because the Spirit Lights have been linked with radio and cell phone interference.”
The Spirit Lights? Seriously? What a fucktard.
Logan shook his head in disbelief. No wonder Stone had relegated the man to the midnight shift. Talk about gullible idiots.
“I’m talking to you,” he pointed out dryly. “No radio interference.”
“Well, keep your eyes peeled.”
Yeah, like that hadn’t already been on the agenda. Logan snorted and tossed the mic on top of the radio, then leaned down to turn on the truck’s radio. Maybe some music would speed his shift along. He dialed the knob to a station offering light rock and turned the volume down so it wouldn’t interfere with dispatch.
Keeping your eyes open was all part of good police work, but he sure as hell wasn’t going to obsess about the Lights of Spirit Woods.
As it turned out, he didn’t need to obsess about them. Hell, he wasn’t even thinking about them when the radio suddenly flew into a temper tantrum unlike anything he’d ever heard. With a horrific squawk of static, it jumped from station to station. Two to three second beats of everything from classical music to the news, to preaching, to Korean and then Japanese voices yammering.
What the hell?
Logan instinctively reached out to turn the radio off.
And then a burst of colors lit the woods in front, maybe a mile or two down the road. At first it looked almost like fireworks, an explosion of sapphire and emerald, with smaller, more subtle detonations of purple and ruby mixed in... Except... the colors were all clumped together, dense rather than dispersed. And they didn’t fade after a few seconds, not like fireworks did.
He pulled the cruiser over to the side of the road, wincing as the radio static reached a screeching crescendo even though he’d turned the damn thing off. Without taking his eyes off the colors churning across the top of the trees, he reached for radio dial again. The damn thing was definitely off—only the sound didn’t die, just continued to surf from channel to channel, from music to music, from language to language.
But Logan was too busy staring to worry about his possessed radio.