Ashley Ridge (Haunted Hearts Series Book 3)

by Denise Moncrief

  He held out his hand to Gray and his old friend shook it.

  “Don’t say it, Josh. I know I look like crap.”

  Josh grinned. “Like a whale swallowed you whole and decided he didn’t like the way you tasted, so he threw you back up onto the beach.”

  Tori placed a hand on Gray’s upper arm. “Really, Josh? I think he looks a little digested.” Her comeback was tinged with nervous tension.

  Gray rolled his eyes, an action that seemed a bit more like the Gray he’d known when they were much younger and much less damaged from the consequences of their bad choices.

  “You don’t look any better than I feel.” Gray pointed toward the door. “So are they in the house?”

  “I haven’t seen them yet.” Gray rolled his shoulders. “Let’s go in and get this over with.”

  Josh followed Gray up the porch steps and stood beside him when he knocked on the front door. Tori stayed behind at the bottom of the steps. When Josh glanced at her, she was trembling. “You okay, Tori?”

  Gray went back and grabbed her hand. “If you don’t want to go inside, it’s okay. You can stay in the car. None of this is your problem, you know.”

  Truthfully, it wasn’t Gray’s either.

  Tori pushed her long auburn hair back over her shoulder and straightened her spine. “No. Shaw said he might need me.”

  Josh lifted his eyebrows. So Shaw had been up front with her about her abilities and how he might use them. “I’m surprised the two of you agreed to this so soon after...”

  Chase Peterson opened the door, cutting off whatever reply Tori or Gray might have made. He nodded in greeting. “Grayson. McCord. You must be Tori Downing?”

  “I am.”

  “Come in. Shaw and Laurel are in the kitchen. Whatever it is we’re doing here, we’re gonna need to stay awake. Laurel made some strong coffee.”

  Chase backed up a step and gave them room to enter. “Grayson, I’m sorry to hear about your ex-wife.”

  After all the months and years they had not been friends, Josh could still read Gray’s body language. Gray pressed his lips together and turned his head away. Tori wrapped her hand around his upper arm and squeezed. His old friend was hurting.

  Gray rubbed his free hand on the back of his head, a sure sign he was disturbed. “Sure, let’s have a cup of coffee. I want to talk to Laurel a minute before we do this.”

  Josh suppressed a sigh. Gray wasn’t ready to talk about what happened to Caroline yet, and Josh suddenly realized how desperately he needed to talk to someone about what Lucy had done to him, and the two things would be forever linked together. Would Gray blame him for Caroline’s death?

  Once the coffee was brewed and they were all seated around the kitchen table, Josh lifted his cup to his mouth, took a gulp, and then winced when the brew was still too hot to drink. Gray leaned his elbows on the table, his hands tented over his mug. The steam from the coffee wafted across his face and made his features appear wobbly and even grayer and more haggard than they already were. Kind of ghostly.

  Gray blinked a couple of times before he started talking. “I know I agreed to this, but I’m not feeling so good about it. Before we do anything, Laurel, I want to make sure you can handle it.”

  Laurel had remained quiet until that moment, leaning against the kitchen counter, the only one of them that had declined to take a seat.

  “You know better than anyone what a tangled mess my family tree is. It’s not the potential of something supernatural happening that makes me nervous. It’s learning what’s in Celeste’s diary. What it says about me. About my family. About who I am. No, I’m not going to be able to handle it very well.”

  Her whispered admission tugged on Josh’s sympathy. No, more like empathy. Josh knew what it was like to have a torn and tattered family history.

  Chase rose from his chair and slipped an arm around Laurel’s shoulders. “You don’t have to do this if you don’t want to.”

  Wasn’t that what Gray had just told Tori on the front porch steps? Josh suddenly had tremendous respect for the two women. It took a lot of courage to face one’s fears.

  Laurel shook her head. “No matter how painful it is I need to know the truth. If I don’t find out, I’ll always be making stuff up in my head about why she sent me away.”

  The wind rattled what sounded like a galvanized steel tub on the back porch and made them all jump. Gray glanced toward the partially open curtain over the kitchen window. “Storm’s coming. We need to get this done. I don’t think any of us want to be stuck out here tonight.”

  No one replied to his suggestion to proceed. No one moved. The faucet needed a new washer. The constant drip drip echoed throughout the eerily quiet kitchen. Outside the wind picked up and howled. Inside, the atmosphere was as still as death.

  Surely, there was a ghostly presence hovering around them already. Josh rubbed his hands up and down his arms in anticipation of a sudden drop in temperature. Shaw rose to his feet in one jerky movement. The table legs screeched across the floor as he bumped against it. Tori emitted a squeaky little gasp. Laurel flinched and snuggled in closer to Chase.

  Chase lowered his arm and held Laurel’s hand. “Okay, then.”

  Gray and Tori stood almost in unison, like two dancers in complete synchronization. Gray grabbed Tori’s hand, pulling her a bit closer to him.

  Josh happened to catch Shaw’s gaze.

  The man put his hands up. “Don’t look at me. I’m not holding your hand.”

  Everyone laughed, an uneasy burst of mirth that trembled out of each of them in waves.

  “I don’t think we should all go up there.” Josh directed his comment at Gray.

  Too many people in the room at once might keep anything from happening. Or too much might happen. Too much confusion. Too many voices. Josh couldn’t handle a repeat of his recent experience at Victoria House. But then, Lucy Kimbrough wouldn’t be there to add her psychosis to an already intense situation.

  Gray nodded. “He’s right. We shouldn’t have too many people in the room at the same time.”

  Laurel slipped her hand from Chase’s and held her hand out to Josh. “Me and you and Grayson. Okay?”

  Josh glanced at Chase, but the man didn’t seem to have any objections.

  He gulped down a wad of emotion, indefinable because there was such a mix of strong feelings swirling around inside of him. It had been a long time since someone had put this much trust in him. “Okay, then. Let’s get this party started.”

  Josh’s heart ached as he struggled with why he felt the way he did. Trust was a powerful thing, and once it was lost, it was hard to regain. He wished Ashley were with them. She belonged there. The situation seemed just as out of whack as when Gray and Josh had investigated the garage out back without her. Maybe Gray sensed their out-of-balance state as well.

  More than ever…if Josh survived the night…he needed to fix things with her. No matter how difficult. No matter how painful. No matter how long it took to win her trust again. Ashley’s love and respect were worth fighting for. Why hadn’t he seen the truth before tonight? The only reason she had been able to push him away was because he let her do it.

  Chapter Eleven

  Ashley drove past Terrance’s cabin and parked her car at a bend in the road about a quarter of a mile up the mountain. She grabbed a flashlight and a crowbar from where she’d placed them on the passenger seat, shoved the door open, and stepped out into a bed of spongy vegetation. There might have been a snake or two in the thick brush alongside the road, but she didn’t have time to think about that.

  She left her vehicle unlocked just in case she had to make a quick escape. Besides, no on was likely to steal her car from off the mountain. She’d driven the only road to the top and would surely hear if someone approached from below.

  Terrance had gone to Little Rock with Cissy for the evening. If Ashley was ever going to do any snooping, this might be her only opportunity. She pressed her hand over her pounding
heart and waited a moment until the first wave of fear eased.

  Large drops of rain filtered through the thick canopy of tree branches overhead and tapped on her head and shoulders. The rain hadn’t soaked her clothing yet, but her fear and the stifling humidity had produced quite a bit of perspiration. She plucked her sweaty t-shirt away from her stomach and began her trek down the road toward the cabin.

  A flash of lightning followed closely by a boom of thunder startled her and motivated her to pick up her pace. She switched on the flashlight and kept its steady beam focused straight ahead, never allowing the light to stray into the forest surrounding her. If there were critters in the woods, she didn’t want to know. The dirt road was becoming slick with rainwater. Her shoes slid in the sludge and several times she had to spread her arms for balance to keep from falling face first in the mud.

  Her sneaker snagged a rock embedded in the roadbed. Pain shot through the joint and her big toe started throbbing.

  “Great. Just great.”

  She studied the steep downhill grade and considered turning back. I must be out of my mind. I’m not going to find anything up here. I should turn around and leave before the road becomes too muddy to drive.

  She refused to listen to the little voice in her head that sounded so much like common sense. After a while, she trudged around a curve and got her first glimpse of Terrance’s evil little cabin. Unlike the previous time she’d driven up the mountain, there was no light in the window. The place appeared ominously dark, a heavy sort of darkness that made her shiver.

  Stop it, Ashley. You’re being ridiculous. Cabins aren’t evil.

  Looking downhill from the curve in the road, she could see the back of the cabin. Terrance’s car wasn’t parked in its usual spot, but she hadn’t really expected it to be there. She exhaled a quick sigh of relief, and then gulped in a deep breath of moisture-rich air.

  A few more yards and she came face-to-face with the front door. The place creeped her out. It wasn’t rustic or charming. A rather plain façade. Nothing decorative or ornamental. Flat except for the recesses for the door and two windows. Considering how wealthy Terrance was, it was furnished rather cheaply with vinyl upholstery on the living room furniture and a rickety dinette in the kitchen that looked like it might have been manufactured in the 1950s. Four rooms. Living room. Kitchen. Bedroom with attached bath. And a fifth room Terrance called his office, a room with a padlocked door. Ashley had watched enough horror movies to know the lock meant something. Padlocks secured secrets.

  She tucked the miniature flashlight into the back pocket of her jeans. The heavy denim fabric, now thoroughly soaked with rainwater, had slowed her movements coming down the mountain. The rough material rubbed against her inner thighs. She grimaced. The next morning she was sure to have some nasty blisters.

  Before she could talk herself out of what she was doing, she jammed the business end of the crowbar between the doorjamb and the lock and jerked. The tool slipped and clattered onto the stone slab right in front of the doorway. She picked up the crowbar and tried again. The wood splintered a bit. The more the lock resisted, the more determined she became to break and enter Terrance’s property.

  When the door finally busted open, she stumbled backward and dropped the tool, but managed to grab the doorframe before she tumbled into the grass in front of the house. A large cluster of yellow blooms on a tall goldenrod bumped against her thigh. An assortment of weeds stretched long tendrils up from the ground toward the windowsills. When her quest was over, she’d have to stop by the drug store for some antihistamine. Goldenrods were not her friends.

  Terrance didn’t do a very good job of maintaining the front access to the house, which wasn’t really a yard, just a few square feet of grass that hadn’t been mowed in awhile. There was no pride in ownership evident in the upkeep. So unusual for Terrance. He was obsessively picky about his possessions. Terrance had concrete ideas about appearances. Even his mistress had to act and look a certain way.

  Ashley peeked through the now open entry and scanned the small front room. The heavens finally burst and the rain poured down in sheets. She gathered her dropped tool and rushed into the cabin before pulling the wrecked door shut behind her. Reluctant to turn on the generator for electrical power, she swung her flashlight around the interior. A fresh boom of thunder rattled the windows. She jumped, and then closed her eyes and counted to ten.

  When she opened them, she took the time to adjust to the semi-dark. The place appeared just as she’d last seen it. The furnishings were still tacky.

  She began in the bedroom, not that she wanted to set foot in a place that made her feel violated and abused, but if Terrance had evidence of a secret hidden in the cabin, he’d want his hiding place close by while he was there. Once she had sucked up enough nerve to enter the room, it took her about two minutes to search the small space with its minimal furniture. She tapped her foot on the wood floorboards, hoping that one of them would wiggle loose and reveal a hidey-hole, and then pounded the walls, searching for a hollow place.

  She poked around in every conceivable hiding spot in the bathroom. Peered behind the toilet tank. Felt along the top edge of the shower stall. Proceeded to search the small kitchen. Pulled everything out of the kitchen cabinets. Checked the bottoms of all the drawers. Moved on to the living room. Squeezed the sofa cushions for hard objects stuffed in the middle of the fluff. Emptied the contents of every container in the place. Nothing seemed unusual or out of place. Nothing weird or creepy. Just plain and an everyday sort of mediocre.

  Then, Ashley swiveled on her heel and turned her attention to the padlock. She’d saved whatever was behind the locked door for last. Before she drove up the mountain, she had been quite certain she would end up breaking into the room. She had imagined the door as a portal into another world. Terrance’s world. She hesitated, unsure if she really wanted a glimpse into his secret life. The thought of what might go on in his twisted mind petrified her, but she desperately wanted out of her own reality, so she was willing to venture into that dark world for a brief time.

  The wind had risen to a screeching crescendo outside the cabin. Ashley glanced over her shoulder at the partially open front door letting in sideways sheets of rain. She kicked it all the way shut, crossed the few steps to the locked door, jammed the crowbar into the hook of the padlock, and twisted until the resulting crack pierced the cacophony of the storm.

  The lock popped and she yanked the door open. She flashed a beam of light through the entrance and was surprised at what she found.

  ****

  Laurel hesitated in the doorway of her bedroom, breathing rapidly and twisting one hand over the other. Tori, Chase, and Shaw had remained in the kitchen just as Laurel had asked. Josh could only imagine the conversation that might be taking place between Shaw and Tori while Gray was out of the room. Definitely still a lot of tension between those two.

  Gray hung back in the hallway, but Josh peeked around the doorframe, wary of what might be lurking in the shadows of the room.

  After another few moments of intense silence, Gray cleared his throat. “So does it look any different than when you left it?”

  “No. Looks just the same.” Laurel shuddered once and took a step forward. “But it feels different.”

  “How?”

  The room appeared no different than when Josh had last seen it.

  “It feels kind of flat. I don’t know if that makes any sense.” Laurel wrapped her arms around her middle and stared at the closet.

  Gray reached over and placed a hand on her shoulder. “It’s okay, Laurel. Take your time.”

  “I’m all right.” She shrugged his hand off and took another couple of steps forward. Gray followed right behind her, never more than a pace away.

  “Did you take the door off its hinges?”

  Josh rubbed the back of his neck. “Shaw and I did that.”

  She turned bright eyes toward him. “Why?”

  Her gaze revealed curio
sity in her question more than anything else.

  “We didn’t know how big the closet was, and you remember what happened in the garage? I didn’t want to get trapped in there if the door got stuck.”

  She blinked, and then smiled. “That makes sense.”

  “You weren’t the one who got stuck,” Gray grumbled.

  He smirked at Gray’s back. “I can put it back before we leave.”

  Laurel’s lack of a response indicated that her mind had already moved on to something else.

  After another moment or two, she began speaking again. “This room has always had kind of a vibe to it. Like there’s an undercurrent of electricity or activity or something. Like the room is…alive.”

  Gray remained focused on her, as if he was waiting for her to do something out of the ordinary. “And now it feels…”

  “Dead. Like it has no life at all.” She faced Gray. “Maybe it’s just because I haven’t been here in a few days. You know, like that feeling you get when you’ve been on a long trip and you come back home and it doesn’t quite feel the same.”

  The storm outside was pounding the exterior of the house, but inside the air was calm. Laurel had described the feeling the room gave off just right. It felt flat. Stagnant.

  She pointed toward the center of the floor. “So that’s the book?”

  Josh laughed uneasily. “I kind of halfway expected it to be back in the closet.”

  Laurel turned wide eyes toward him, and he raised his hands in defense of his expectations.

  “Strange things happen in this house. That’s all I’m saying.”

  She smiled a knowing smile as if allowing him an opinion on something with which she was infinitely more knowledgeable. “Okay, I’m going to pick it up now.”

  She stated her intention with an unnaturally loud and extremely monotone voice, but made no move to follow through with her declaration.

  Josh pressed his hand to his mouth to suppress a chuckle. She was being a bit dramatic, in his humble opinion. What did she think she was doing? Challenging the ghost of Celeste Standridge to stop her?