South of Hell (Louis Kincaid Mysteries)

by P J Parrish

  “But we’ve also got the fact that Amy was living there, and that makes her a legal resident. She can give us permission.”

  They all looked at Amy. She was listening intently.

  “Amy’s consent might hold up to cover the day we found her there,” Joe said. “She was the only occupant at the time, and we had no reason to believe Brandt was even in the state. But now that he threw us off the property, her consent for a new search means nothing.”

  “Brandt’s the one who said it’s her home, too, Joe,” Louis said.

  “Even if they had been living there together for the last ten years, she’s a minor,” Joe said. “She can’t give consent over the adult owner’s objection.”

  “Yeah, but all that would be fought out months from now by the lawyers,” Shockey said. “Right now, Brandt wouldn’t know what his rights were or what the abandonment laws say.”

  “Do they have pizza here?” Amy asked.

  “No,” Joe said. “Here, look at the menu. Pick something else.”

  Amy took the oversized laminated menu and stared at it. Louis watched her. He knew she could read, and there were plenty of pictures, but still she seemed upset.

  “So,” Joe said, “you’re going to lie to Brandt and do an illegal search and hope his lawyer isn’t smart enough to figure it out six months down the road?”

  “The place won’t even belong to him six months down the road,” Shockey said.

  “Then why not wait until it goes up for auction and then ask the new owners for permission to search it?” Joe asked.

  “And what if Brandt somehow pays the taxes?” Shockey asked. “And even if he doesn’t, what happens to Amy? If we don’t find something to put Brandt back in jail, he’ll get custody of her.”

  “Miss Joe…” Amy said.

  “No judge is going to give this girl back to an abusive ex-con who can’t even support her,” Joe said.

  “Don’t be so sure,” Louis said.

  “Miss Joe…” Amy said.

  “Besides,” Joe said to Shockey, “what makes you think she’s even strong enough to take you back out there and show you where she thinks…” Joe glanced at Amy and lowered her voice. “Do you have any idea what that could do to her?”

  “She doesn’t actually have to go with us,” Shockey said. “She can tell us where to look.”

  “She’ll have to go through another session with Dr. Sher for that,” Joe said. “That’s not easy for her, and she might never remember any more than she already has. Then what are you going to do? Dig up the whole barn floor?”

  “Yeah, maybe we will.”

  “You’re forgetting one thing,” Joe said. “You and Judge Fells just appointed me Amy’s guardian for ten days. Whether she is allowed to undergo more hypnosis or visit that farm is totally up to me. And I won’t give my permission.”

  Louis and Shockey stared at Joe.

  “Miss Joe…”

  Joe finally heard Amy and looked to her. “What is it, Amy?”

  “I don’t see any of the things on my list on here,” she said.

  “This is a new list,” she said. “The whole menu is a list. Okay?”

  “Okay.”

  Joe sat back and crossed her arms. She was staring at something across the street. Amy lowered her menu. The soft brown eyes moved from Joe to Louis to Shockey and back to Joe. Louis watched her. Like all kids, she didn’t need to understand the argument to feel the tension.

  And he knew Joe was right. At this moment, Amy was a happy young girl, nothing like she had appeared in the cupboard at the farm. He couldn’t ask her to go back there, not in person and not in her dreams.

  Amy caught his eye. “I know you’re fighting over my mother,” she said. “You think she’s dead, and you think that’s what my dream was about.”

  “Amy, we’re sorry—” Joe started.

  “Don’t be sorry,” Amy said. “I know in my heart my mother’s dead, or she would have come back for me. But I’m not afraid to go look for her.”

  “Amy, remembering what happened could be very painful for you,” Joe said.

  “But it’s more painful for her,” Amy said. “I think she’s been waiting a long time for me to come.”

  Amy looked to Shockey. “And for you, too.”

  Shockey blinked rapidly. His ruddy face had gone gray. He held Amy’s eyes for a moment longer, then rose quickly and disappeared into the restaurant.

  Amy watched him, then looked down at her menu. “Tell him I’m sorry,” she said. “I do that sometimes.”

  “Do what?” Joe asked.

  “Get inside other people’s heads,” she said. “I shouldn’t do that. It’s not polite.”

  Joe looked at Louis. He wasn’t sure what to say or if he even wanted to acknowledge what he knew Joe was thinking.

  “So, if Dr. Sher says it’s okay,” Amy asked, “can we go back to the farm and see if I can remember more?”

  Joe closed her eyes.

  “I can do this, Miss Joe.”

  Joe blew out a slow breath, opened her eyes, and gave Amy a nod. “I’ll ask Dr. Sher. If she says it’s okay, we’ll go back.”

  Chapter Eighteen

  The ride from Ann Arbor to the farm took place in near silence. Louis was driving, with Shockey in the passenger seat. Joe and Dr. Sher were sitting in the back with Amy between them. In deference to Amy, they had all agreed beforehand not to discuss the case.

  Joe had been concerned about Amy ever since the day before in the café. Although Amy had insisted she wanted to go back to the farm, she had turned quiet afterward, her somber mood lasting well into the evening. Joe had sat at her bedside until two, waiting for the return of nightmares. But Amy had fallen into an immediate and deep sleep.

  “I haven’t been out this way in years,” Dr. Sher said quietly. “I can’t get over how much things have changed.”

  Joe glanced at the doctor, who was looking out over the empty fields.

  “So many big trucks on this road now. And there used to be more farmhouses,” Dr. Sher said. “Where have they gone?”

  “The farms have been bought out by corporations,” Joe said.

  “How sad,” Dr. Sher whispered.

  Neither Shockey nor Louis seemed to hear. They were both off in their own worlds. Joe knew Louis was thinking about Lily. But Shockey? He had left the café with the barest grunt of a goodbye and had been oddly withdrawn today.

  Joe felt the press of Amy’s leg. “How are you doing?” Joe asked.

  “I’m fine,” Amy said. She, like the doctor, had been watching the fields stream by.

  “You know you don’t have to do this,” Joe said. She caught Louis looking at her in the rearview mirror.

  “I know,” Amy said.

  Amy took Joe’s hand and held it the rest of the way.

  A hard rain during the night had left the gravel road leading up to the Brandt farm a rutted mess. The house itself looked even more forlorn than Joe remembered. She watched Amy carefully as they pulled up to the gate. Amy had scooted forward and was staring at the house through the windshield.

  The slam of the Bronco’s doors as they got out split the quiet. Owen Brandt had left the gate unlocked. At least that made one part of this thing easy, Joe thought.

  Dr. Sher was the last one to get out of the Bronco. “Oh, my,” she whispered as she got her first good look at the house. Her eyes went to Amy, who had moved ahead to stand next to Shockey at the gate. Amy turned to look back at Joe, as if asking what she should do.

  Shockey took the lead. “Remember, this is technically not a search.”

  Joe was tempted to ask him what the hell it was, then. But she kept her mouth shut. Now was not the time or place. At least there was no sign of Owen Brandt. The Gremlin wasn’t here, and it didn’t look as if he had been around. Except for one thing: the padlock was gone from the front door of the house. If they could get this over with and get out of here, maybe they could slide this whole thing by a judge—if they
even found anything worth taking to court.

  “Are we ready?” Shockey asked.

  As if she knew she had to be the one to make this whole thing right, Amy stepped through the gate and started across the weeds toward the barn.

  Joe and Dr. Sher fell into step behind her. As they neared the big double wooden doors of the barn, Louis came up behind Joe.

  “The lock’s gone,” he said. “There was one on the doors the first time I was here.”

  “Then how’d you get in?” Joe asked. Then she quickly added, “Never mind.”

  Everyone waited while Shockey used both hands to slide the door open. The giant door moved with a screech. The odor of damp hay and manure floated out to them. Joe had the fleeting thought that it wasn’t an altogether bad smell. Still, her stomach was in a knot.

  What were they all expecting?

  Shockey was staring hard at Amy, hoping that something here would trigger a memory that he could use to avenge the death of a woman he had once loved.

  Louis’s eyes were on Amy, too. But Joe had the feeling that he was seeing that picture of Lily instead.

  Dr. Sher watched Amy with gentleness, but there was also a spark of intense and almost distant curiosity, like she was watching a grand experiment unfold.

  Joe herself wasn’t sure what she expected—or hoped for—out of any of this. Maybe only that no one got hurt.

  Amy was standing nearest the open door, peering into the gloom. She swiveled her head to give them all one last look, then stepped inside.

  Joe followed.

  Up…

  She couldn’t help it. That’s where she looked first. Up, up, up…into the rafters and the slanting light of the barn. She had been in a barn once before, on a field trip to a pumpkin farm when she was in fourth grade. But never had she been in a place like this before.

  Space. Huge, soaring space. That was all she could think about. And that odd sweet-sour smell of old hay and what she could only think of as the ghosts of the animals that had once lived here.

  She shivered. The place was cold and swirling with the wind leaking through the old wood planks. She looked to Amy. She was just standing there, wrapped in her pale pink parka. She looked relaxed but alert, and Joe had the weird thought that she looked like her old dog Chips when he was listening to something no one else could hear.

  “Amy?”

  Joe turned at the sound of Dr. Sher’s voice. The doctor had moved closer to Amy. Louis and Shockey were still standing just inside the door, watching.

  Amy ignored Dr. Sher and moved deeper into the barn. She walked slowly, examining the stalls, the rusted skeletons of the old machines, the hay bales that had long ago shed their true shapes.

  They all waited.

  Suddenly, Amy stopped. “Horses,” she whispered. She closed her eyes and tilted her head up. “I hear the horses.”

  Joe exchanged a glance with Dr. Sher. The horses had been a benign memory Amy had retrieved under hypnosis.

  There was a long silence.

  “The horses are screaming,” Amy said. “They know something is wrong.”

  More silence. Amy still hadn’t opened her eyes.

  “They’re here,” Amy said.

  Joe moved closer. They? She felt Dr. Sher at her side.

  “Who is ‘they,’ Amy?” the doctor said.

  “The men. They’re here. And they want…” Amy’s breathing quickened. “I have to hide, I have to hide. They can’t find me, they can’t find me.”

  Joe started toward them, but Dr. Sher waved her to stand back a little. Dr. Sher took Amy’s hand.

  “Can you remember what happened here, Amy?” Dr. Sher asked.

  Amy nodded. Her breathing was becoming more labored.

  “Can you tell me?”

  A hesitation and a nod.

  “It’s all right, dear, I am here with you,” Dr. Sher said. “Tell me what you see.”

  “Corn,” Amy whispered. “I’m in the corn, and it’s so cold. I see clouds over the horses’ noses. The horses are scared, and the man in the carriage is whipping them. I see…they are looking for me. The men…looking for me.”

  Shockey had come up to Joe’s side. “Men? Did she say men?”

  Dr. Sher silenced him with her hand.

  “I can’t…” Amy’s face screwed up. Joe hoped it was from concentration, but it looked like pain.

  “Oh…”

  “Amy? What is it?”

  Joe watched as Amy clasped her hands together, holding them in front of her face. “No, don’t, don’t, don’t.”

  “Dr. Sher,” Joe whispered.

  “She’s all right,” Dr. Sher said. “What’s happening, Amy? Where are you now?”

  “Here,” she said. Her breathing had turned to short gasps. “It’s cold in here. I have no clothes. He took my clothes…”

  Joe shut her eyes. What the hell had Brandt done to this child?

  Suddenly, Amy began to groan. “Oh…hurt…hurt…hurt. So much hurt!” Her hands were still clasped in front of her face. She raised them higher now, as if warding off a blow.

  Her body jerked once, twice. Amy dropped to her knees, then to the dirt. She began to cough and gag.

  Joe jumped forward, looking up at Dr. Sher. “She’s having an asthma attack. Stop this now.”

  “Too late,” Amy whispered.

  She had suddenly gone very still. She lay there in the dirt, curled on her side.

  Joe knelt and gathered Amy into her arms. Amy’s eyes fluttered open. She looked first at Joe and then at Dr. Sher, who seemed frozen in place by what she had just seen. Finally, she knelt next to Joe.

  “How do you feel, Amy?” Dr. Sher asked.

  “Tired,” Amy said.

  “Do you remember what just happened to you?”

  Amy nodded.

  Joe looked at Dr. Sher. The woman didn’t seem to know what to ask Amy—or what to do next. Louis came forward, and Joe knew he had to ask the question that was on everyone’s mind. In her nightmare back at the hotel, Amy had seen someone hung from a hook in the barn—and someone digging a hole here.

  Joe’s eyes swept over the barn’s dirt floor and came back to Louis.

  “Amy,” he said gently, “where did he dig the hole?”

  Amy slowly broke away from Joe and rose. She walked five feet into the center of the barn and pointed.

  “There,” said softly.

  The scrape of shovels. The grunts of the men as they dug. The soft cooing of doves in the rafters overhead. It all came to Joe now in a blur of sound as she sat with Amy on a hay bale in a stall tucked in a far corner of the barn. Dr. Sher sat on a milking stool nearby, head down, lost in thought.

  Amy was sipping from a plastic cup. Dr. Sher had given her some tea from a thermos. They couldn’t see Louis and Shockey digging from where they were. Joe hadn’t wanted Amy to be in the barn if a body was unearthed and had tried to take her out to the Bronco to wait. But Amy had insisted on staying.

  The sound of the shovels stopped suddenly.

  Joe rose and went to the entrance of the stall.

  About twenty feet away, Louis and Shockey stood motionless. Their heads were turned toward the open barn door.

  Good God. It was Owen Brandt.

  Joe’s hand went instinctively to the .45 automatic clipped at her belt. She felt someone at her side and looked down to see Amy. She was staring at Brandt.

  “Dr. Sher,” Joe said. “Please keep Amy back here.”

  “What is it?”

  “Just keep her back here.”

  Brandt had come further into the barn, his eyes shifting between Louis and Shockey and settling finally on Joe as she approached.

  “What the fuck are you doing in my barn?” he said.

  A jangling sound drew Joe’s eyes to the door. A woman had come in, the blonde who was with Brandt the day they had taken Amy out of the farmhouse. Margi Ames. She was standing there, mouth agape, cradling a six-pack of beer to her leather jacket.

 
Brandt saw the hole. His eyes shot to the shovel in Shockey’s hand. “What the fuck is going on here?” he demanded.

  Shockey took a step toward Brandt, the shovel held like a weapon across his chest. He was breathing hard from the digging, his face red. His eyes were riveted on Brandt, and Joe realized this was the first time Shockey had seen the man since Jean disappeared.

  “I asked what you’re doing here!” Brandt repeated.

  “Looking for Jean,” Shockey said.

  Brandt stared at him for a second, then laughed. “The bitch ain’t here.”

  Joe was ready to jump in, but Louis was there, stepping in front of Shockey before he could move. Shockey’s eyes blazed as he stared down Brandt.

  But Brandt…he was looking somewhere else suddenly.

  Joe turned to see Amy standing behind her.

  “What’s she doing here?” Brandt said, pointing at Amy.

  “She’s no concern of yours,” Louis said.

  “She’s my daughter!” Brandt said. He started toward Amy, but before he could take two steps, Louis had his arm twisted behind him in a lock. Brandt squirmed and grunted.

  “You take one more step, and I’ll break your arm,” Louis hissed in Brandt’s ear.

  Joe could feel Amy retreating, but she didn’t want to take her eyes off Brandt. She sensed Dr. Sher move forward and pull Amy back into the shadows.

  “Let me go,” Brandt said to Louis. “I ain’t gonna hurt the girl.”

  Slowly, Louis loosened his grip. Brandt bucked loose and backpedaled, rubbing his arm. “You got no right to keep me away from her,” he said.

  Joe pulled the court papers out of her jacket and held them out. “I’m her temporary guardian,” she said.

  Brandt snatched it from her hand, scanned it quickly, and looked up at Joe. “This don’t mean shit. I’ll get a lawyer.”

  “You do that,” Joe said. Her eyes settled behind Brandt to the blond woman in the leather jacket. “You’re going to need one when we bust you for parole violation.”

  Brandt laughed. “For what?”

  Joe pointed to the beer the blond woman held. “That.”

  Brandt spun, saw the beer, and hesitated only a second. He reared back and smacked the woman in the right temple.