“I think it must have been a mask. I don’t know how else to explain what I saw. He looked...” I trailed away. “Animalistic.”
A brow lifted. “Can you be more specific?”
“Not really. He was some distance away and my eyes were still burning from the smoke.”
If my observation struck him as peculiar, he didn’t let on. “What about the rest of him? Was he tall, short, thin, heavyset?”
“He was thin. Not short, but not really tall, either. I would say less than six feet.” I paused, lifting my hand helplessly from my knee. “I’m sorry. I’m not being very helpful, but it was hard to tell about his height. He stood hunched over, gripping a machete.”
“A machete.” Kendrick’s gaze on me seemed to deepen. “You sometimes use a machete in the cemetery, don’t you?”
“Yes, why?”
“Is it accounted for?”
“It’s in the back of my vehicle with the rest of my tools.”
“Did you check to make sure it’s still there?”
“Yes, as soon as I got home. Do you want to see it?”
“That’s not necessary.”
He came up the steps then and sat down beside me on the porch. I scooted over to make room for him, but our arms brushed, making my pulse jump.
“You think I’m making this up, don’t you?”
“No, I’m sure you saw someone,” he said. “But you just admitted that you’re an unreliable witness. Even if you’d been close enough to get a good look at his face, your vision was blurred by smoke. And about that smoke...” He paused. “I didn’t smell any in the cemetery or even in the woods. Not a whiff.”
I glanced at him in alarm. “How far into the woods did you go?”
“All the way to the swamp. It’s possible the wind shifted by the time I got there so the scent was carried downstream. But if there’d been a recent fire in those woods, I would have found some evidence.”
“What about footprints?”
“I saw plenty of prints in the woods and along the side of the road, but that’s hardly surprising, considering the recent activity.” He hesitated again as if trying to calculate how best to proceed. “Let’s go back to the physical description. You say the person wore a hood and possibly a mask. Is it possible he was a she?”
“A woman?” An image of Annalee Nash hunkered at the edge of the orchard flashed in my head. “Why? Do you have someone in mind?”
“I’m just trying to get a clear picture of what you actually saw. What about the two boys you said were hanging around the gate earlier? Would either of them match the description?”
I gave him a long look. “I know where you’re going with this. Officer Malloy is convinced those boys pulled a prank on me. Sounds like you think so, too.”
“It’s not out of the realm of possibility with everything that’s happened lately. That’s probably why they were there in the first place. They heard about the body and were trying to find a way down to the clearing. That would also explain why you weren’t actually threatened, let alone attacked. You said you were blinded for a time by the smoke. Surely it’s occurred to you that if this person meant to harm you, he or she had ample opportunity to do so.”
It had also occurred to me that the smoke might have been another of Darius Goodwine’s tricks, but I couldn’t dispel that bestial facade so easily. Not after everything I’d learned about Atticus Pope.
“I wouldn’t be surprised if those boys had also heard about the recovery of the skeleton,” Kendrick said.
“How would they know about that? The information hasn’t been released to the public, has it?”
“We try to keep a close rein on the flow of information, but this is a small town and word gets out. And our activities in and around the cemetery haven’t exactly been discreet.”
I gave him another look. “I saw you and James Rushing out there again today. Has he already begun the excavations?”
“I’m not sure this is the best time to get into that.”
I felt a chill of excitement along my nerve endings. “You found something else, didn’t you?”
“I didn’t say that. Most of the afternoon was spent photographing the mortsafes. Rushing is bringing in a couple of his colleagues to help with the excavations so the actual work may not begin until the end of the week. But just so you won’t be alarmed if you see him coming and going, I’ve asked Martin Stark to begin removing the locks in a way that will cause the least amount of damage to the cages.”
“So you’re planning to exhume all the graves regardless of what you find in the first one?”
“Let’s just say, we plan to be prepared for any contingency.”
I took that as a yes. “Have you used Stark before on other cases?” I asked carefully.
Kendrick seemed surprised by the question. “Once or twice. Why?”
“I’m just a little curious about him.”
“Curious about a locksmith?”
“More specifically about his shop. I’ve been drawn to the key painted on the front window ever since I arrived in town. The work is beautifully detailed. Not the kind of artistry one normally sees on a commercial building.”
“I can see why that key would catch your attention.” Kendrick’s gaze dropped subtly to my throat. “It’s a lot like the one you wear around your neck.”
I resisted the urge to grasp Rose’s key in protection against his scrutiny and my reaction to it. “You’re very perceptive.”
“I wouldn’t be worth much as a detective if I didn’t notice things. You have a tendency to reach for that key when you’re nervous or preoccupied. It must mean a lot to you.”
“It belonged to my great-grandmother.”
“More of your roots?” His smile was cynical.
“Yes. Unlike you, however, I don’t consider having roots as a bad thing. But that’s neither here nor there. We were talking about Martin Stark.”
He looked amused. “Surely we’ve exhausted that topic.”
“Not quite. At the risk of sounding like a gossip, I’d like to ask you something. Do you know of any connection between Martin Stark and Annalee Nash?”
He thought for a moment. “The only connection I’m aware of is a vague one. Stark sells old locks and keys in his shop and the Willoughbys were in the antique business. I’ve heard that the two families had a professional arrangement at one time, but anything beyond that...” He shrugged. “Why all the interest in Martin Stark?”
“It’s not just about Stark,” I evaded. “I saw him in town with Annalee and I can’t stop thinking about the story you told me. About what happened here.” I still wondered why he had decided it necessary to inform me of the house’s gruesome history, but there were a lot of things about Lucien Kendrick I had yet to figure out. I found the prospect of delving into his motives, let alone his psyche, more than a little daunting. “I followed your suggestion and searched the internet, but there’s not a lot of information available. I did find one interesting tidbit. Mary Willoughby wasn’t the only one who disappeared back then. Atticus Pope and twelve of his closest followers vanished at around the same time. But I’m sure you already knew that.” I eyed him closely.
He didn’t seem too impressed with my findings. “I’ve heard a lot of stories about Atticus Pope. I doubt very many of them are true.”
“Twelve missing disciples, twelve caged graves? You don’t find that at all suspicious?”
“Disciples?”
“That’s how they were referred to in the article. The skeletal remains recovered from the center grave may well be Pope’s.”
“And you came to all these conclusions after reading one article online?”
I frowned. “The conclusions are logical, aren’t they? At the very least, it’s a starting place once the gra
ves are exhumed. There must be dental and medical records still available. DNA if any relatives remain in the area.”
“Slow down,” he said with a flash of annoyance. “I’d rather not have that kind of talk getting out. We’ve got enough of a circus on our hands as it is. Even if we do find evidence that Pope and his followers are buried in those graves, my priority is still to the victim.”
“Of course. But don’t you think it could all be related? You said yourself that someone has been using that circle for years. Maybe the killer was close to Pope. Another of his followers.” Or the spirit of Pope operating inside another body. “Removing the skull from the grave may have been ceremonial or ritual, like the wrapping of the remains in linen before reburial. As Rushing said, the shroud indicates respect, if not reverence, for the deceased.”
Kendrick didn’t say anything for the longest moment. Then suddenly he leaned in and my heart lurched. He was so close I could see shadows in his eyes, could trace the sharp curve of his cheekbones. I could smell the mint on his breath and a dark, heady scent that seemed to emanate from his skin. It was dangerous, that scent. It lured me in when I knew that I should run away. It dared me to throw caution to the wind when I needed my defenses more than ever. I was wounded and human and Lucien Kendrick was right there.
He moved closer still and I thought for a moment he meant to kiss me. A fleeting and foolish notion because his eyes had gone very cold save for a spark of something that might have been suspicion. Whatever attraction I’d entertained a moment ago fled as my pulse pounded in agitation. I wanted to scramble away or at the very least put my hands up and shove him back to a safe distance. But I remained motionless, my gaze fixed on his pupils.
In that moment I knew that Lucien Kendrick wouldn’t be as forgettable as I’d wanted to believe. I had a feeling if I let him in, my life would never be the same.
His hands were at his sides and yet I felt as though he held me in a death lock. His expression never changed, but there was an underlying menace hanging between us.
“Why do I get the feeling you know a lot more about all this than you’re saying?” he asked softly.
I tried to glance away, but I felt myself sinking more deeply into his gaze. “I don’t know what you mean. I did some research as you suggested and I found a reference to what happened in this house. To Atticus Pope and his followers. I formed an opinion, which you seem to think is inconsequential to your current case. Fair enough. I’m not a detective, obviously. I’m just a cemetery restorer who happened to be at the wrong place at the wrong time.”
He searched my face, something tugging at the corners of his mouth. A smile? A grimace? I really couldn’t say. “I don’t think you’re just anything,” he said. “There’s a lot going on inside your head. You see things, don’t you? You know how to probe into the deepest shadows. You know how to read between the lines. You may not be a detective, but my guess is, there’s not a lot that gets by you. And to certain people, that makes you a very dangerous woman.”
Eighteen
After Kendrick left the house that evening, I remained on the porch for the longest time, trying to sort through my feelings and make sense of my reaction to him. No matter how many times I resolved to keep my distance, no matter how strongly my internal alarms sounded, I couldn’t subdue a growing fascination.
The way he’d looked at me in the fading light...that dangerous edge in his voice. “You may not be a detective, but my guess is, there’s not a lot that gets by you. And to certain people, that makes you a very dangerous woman.”
To him? I wondered.
Dancing so close to a flame could be thrilling, I had to admit, but I could easily get burned if I wasn’t careful. Maybe I was wrong and Kendrick really was nothing more than a small-town police detective, but I couldn’t bring myself to buy that. I couldn’t help wondering if he’d come to Ascension for the same purpose as the woman in the caged grave. Maybe he, too, was Congé. That would explain his return to the Lowcountry after years of being away. It might even explain the undeniable pull I felt for him.
But there was something else that worried me, a burrowing suspicion that kept me awake long after I’d turned in that night. How could I be certain that any of my experiences in Ascension were real? If the smoke had been conjured by Darius Goodwine and if the dead woman lumbering through the cemetery had been nothing more than one of his tricks, then how could I know if my attraction to Kendrick was anything more than a malicious manipulation?
Despite my instincts and the heightened senses that came with my gift, I could still be fooled by the likes of Darius Goodwine or a resurrected Atticus Pope or even by Lucien Kendrick himself. I felt certain none of these men had my best interest at heart and all of them had their own secret agenda.
As I lay there in the sweltering darkness with the covers pulled to my chin and Essie’s charm tucked underneath my pillow, I had never felt more confused or more alone. And Devlin had never seemed farther away.
* * *
Days went by and I saw Detective Kendrick only in passing. No one from the Ascension Police Department came to follow up on my complaint, nor did I call into the station. If there had been news or another sighting of the man in the mask, someone would have surely notified me.
Occasionally, I would see Kendrick’s vehicle parked at the edge of the road near the cemetery, along with James Rushing’s, but neither man approached me and I kept my distance from the circle. I spent my time cleaning headstones and cutting away brush and vines until my arms and shoulders ached and perspiration soaked through my clothing.
The heat remained relentless. Every afternoon, dark clouds gathered in the distance, and sometimes at night I could see flickers of dry lightning on the horizon, but the rain never came. The air grew heavy with waiting. I began to wish fervently for a thunderstorm to break the tension, but I knew the weather was the least of my worries. I was on pins and needles because of everything that had happened and for what I feared was still to come.
At night I would lie in bed listening for furtive footsteps or strange sounds coming from the front bedroom. By day, I searched the shadows at the edge of the woods for the watcher, but if he still lurked in the trees, I never sensed him. The days and nights passed uneventfully and this, too, made me nervous. Beneath the tranquility, I sensed the restless stir of something evil.
Every morning before I left the house, I scoured the online edition of the local paper for any mention of the murder investigation or the remains that had been found in the center circle, but little was to be gleaned from the articles. Evidently, Detective Kendrick had clamped down on the flow of information, so much so that I didn’t even know if the victim had been identified.
I thought about her a lot, that nameless woman from the caged grave. It seemed wrong that no one had come forward to claim her. Surely, she’d had a family, friends, someone who missed her. But if she were Congé as Essie had said, then maybe she’d been working undercover. Maybe no one knew of her whereabouts.
I still had a hard time accepting that such a group existed—a stealth faction with a mission to stamp out the unnatural in whatever form it assumed. “Someone with your gift and abilities would do well to steer clear,” Darius had warned me. It seemed impossible to fathom that I should find myself in the crosshairs of two old and opposing alliances when all I wanted was to restore Seven Gates Cemetery in peace. When all I’d ever wanted was to live a quiet and normal life.
But that was not to be and I had every right to be on edge. By all indications, I’d been dragged into something larger and darker, something far more sinister than anything I’d yet encountered. Forces were gathering and I didn’t feel at all prepared for what would be expected of me. For what I might have to do in order to survive.
As the week progressed, however, things gradually returned to normal and my worries abated, as they tended to do dur
ing the quiet times. I was able to enjoy my days in the cemetery without glancing over my shoulder every few minutes or tensing at the slightest sound. I even managed to get a good night’s sleep now and then.
But I wasn’t so lulled by the calm as to remain unfazed by the sight of Darius Goodwine lurking near the church ruins one afternoon. I put up a hand to shade my eyes as the blood in my veins turned to ice. Even as I braced myself against his magnetism and trickery, I found myself rising and abandoning my work to move across the cemetery toward him.
It was late in the day and I could hear voices drifting up from the clearing as Kendrick and Rushing continued their exploration of the circle. Angus hunkered in the shade of the cottonwoods watching a squirrel. His presence should have been reassuring, but I felt the tug of an ominous premonition as I wove my way through the headstones. Why had Darius come back? And what would he require of me this time?
He stood silhouetted in one of the openings—waiting for me, I assumed. But as I neared the structure, he disappeared inside. I glanced over my shoulder. Angus hadn’t moved from his spot in the shade. He was so focused on the scurry of feet across the tree branches that he didn’t seem to notice me at all.
I turned back to the ruins. Very little remained of the church beyond the brick facade. The roof had long since collapsed and the back walls had crumbled almost to the ground. Through the arches, I could see the woods beyond the fence and the spangle of sunlight down through the branches.
I told myself there was nothing to be afraid of inside those ruins, and yet as I followed Darius through the arch, the premonition deepened and a smothering claustrophobia threatened to bring me to my knees. I stood just inside the doorway for several long minutes, breathing deeply as I tried to fight off a panicky tightness in my throat and chest.
Despite the open roof, much of the interior lay in deep shade. Vines from the forest crept over the walls and snaked across the stone floor. Weeds grew in profusion. The air smelled dank and fishy, not unlike the bait shop I’d gone to as a child with Papa. I hadn’t much cared for that place. The buckets of earthworms and night crawlers in damp earth had turned my stomach. A strange reaction, perhaps, since I found the smell of a cemetery soothing.
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