Wolf River, page 6
Fear knifed through Devon as Mick towered over her. He seemed to fill the tiny run-down cabin the same way her father had filled the grand mansion that had once been her home.
But no place she’d ever been had felt like home. Nowhere had ever felt safe. Except maybe, at first, the shelter, after she met Hank.
“She won’t be back, Mick,” she repeated desperately as fresh tears spilled from her eyes. “Forget about her.”
He glared at her, his eyes so black and soulless that the tears only fell faster.
“You forget about her too,” he snarled. “Don’t talk to her. Don’t tell her a damned thing about you, Hank, me, Wells, this place. Nothin’, you got that?”
“Yeah, I g-got it. I wouldn’t…I’m not ever talking to her again. Don’t worry.”
Mick grabbed her hair and yanked her head back, just to make sure. He ignored her gasp of pain. “You’re the one who should be worried. Don’t forget that.”
He let go of her hair with a grunt and watched with satisfaction as she again covered her face with her hands and fell back against the sofa, crying.
Didn’t take much to keep this brat in line. Especially since she knew he meant every word he said.
Chapter Five
Her bones were like icicles, her skin slick and clammy. The tunnel was darker and narrower than ever before as she hurtled through it, barreling so fast her breath was trapped in her throat.
Then she glimpsed something ahead, and she clamped her lips tight to keep from screaming. A figure, slight and huddled, lay prone in a small space…a space enclosed on either side, on top and bottom…a coffin?
Erinn could see right through it.
The figure’s hands were bound. She knew that without seeing them. White mist like cobwebs obscured the face and the body.
Hurry, Erinn told herself, hurry. She willed herself forward, closer, desperate now to see more. To lift that swirling curtain of mist and glimpse the face in the coffin.
Who is it? Let me see. Please—let me see…
Instead, she heard something. A cry. Low and keening and full of despair, it wailed from its confining box. Man or woman or child, she couldn’t tell. It was an unearthly cry, one of hopelessness tinged with…death.
Death hovered there in that cramped misty space…waiting, watching, ready to sponge the life from that slight, unmoving figure…
Erinn’s senses whirled. She tried to stay, to see more, know more, but blinding pain pierced her skull as she was hurtled back up the tunnel at a speed so swift it churned nausea in her stomach.
Her hands lost their grip on the Jeep. She slid to the ground, falling hard, falling fast…
He caught her just before her head struck the pavement. His arms clasped around her as her body slumped like a sack of sugar.
Then her eyes flew open and she stared at him, not seeing him, still seeing that prone helpless figure in the darkness.
“Is it happening now?” she whispered in a voice raw with fear. “I have to stop it.”
“Oh, my God, Jase, what’s wrong?” Lily reached him first but Colton drew up right behind her. Before Jase could reply, his father stalked up, took one look at the slim woman lying in his eldest son’s arms, and spoke in clipped tones that brooked no argument.
“Bring her inside. Lily, get some water. Colton, you call Doc Stevens.”
Jase lifted her with ease and carried her into the house. She was still staring straight ahead, those gorgeous dusky green eyes unfocused. But a haunted expression of fear lingered on her face and he could feel her shivering in his arms as he carried her through the hallway, shivering as if it was February and not June.
He took her to the small sitting room near the back of the house, the one that had been lovingly furnished by his mother, and that now had become Lily’s favorite place to curl up with a book. Carefully he set her down across the overstuffed floral chintz sofa, frowning as her eyes closed again.
An instant later, they opened, and this time, she gazed straight at him with perfect clarity and recognition. Bright color stung her cheeks.
“I’m all right. I’m f-fine.”
Her voice shook a little as she swung her legs to the floor and sat up. Jase didn’t budge. He stood over her, his brows knit.
“Easy. I wouldn’t jump up if I were you—not until the doctor checks you out. He’s on his way—”
“There’s no need for a doctor.” In alarm, Erinn pushed herself to her feet, just as Lily rushed in with a glass of iced tea.
“Oh, good. You look much better.” The girl expelled her breath in relief. “Please, sit down and drink this. Give yourself a minute or two,” she urged.
Not altogether a bad idea, Erinn admitted to herself. The visions always drained her, more so each time. The image of the figure in the coffin still filled her mind, and the coldness in her bones hadn’t yet eased. She sank down on the sofa and accepted the glass Lily pressed into her hands.
“Thanks. I’m all right now.” She took a sip of the sweetened tea, trying to think of how she could possibly explain what had just happened.
“I didn’t eat much today, what with traveling…and everything. I guess it made me a bit light-headed.”
Light-headed? It sure looked like more than that, Jase thought, but he kept silent as Lily murmured something sympathetic and the woman with the unforgettable green eyes kept her gaze lowered as she sipped the iced tea.
He noticed her fingers, long, slim, and graceful—like the rest of her. Her nails were delicately oval, painted the shell pink of a Western sunrise. And ever since she’d come to, her cheeks had been flushed the same color.
Is it happening now…I have to stop it, she’d said. What the hell did that mean?
“I don’t think I caught your name.” His voice sounded rougher than he’d intended and Lily glanced at him sharply.
“This is Erinn Winters—she’s a famous author of children’s books, Jase. She won the Newbery Award. She—”
“I asked her, not you.”
Colton poked his head into the room.
“Doc Stevens is on his way. Pop said she’s to stay put until he checks her out—”
“No—I don’t need a doctor.” Erinn stood up again, handing the glass to Lily with a quick, firm smile. “I’m sorry to have caused so much trouble, but honestly, Lily, I’m fine. I need to get back to the Watering Hole—and I’ve disturbed your family enough for one day. Please call me there tomorrow and let me know when to stop by the day-care center.”
Jase watched curiously as she brushed past him, quick as a shadow passing in the night. Lily bit her lip and Colton stepped aside as Erinn hurried past him into the hall.
She ran lightly to the front of the house, relieved that there was no sign of the elder Mr. Fortune. She was dimly aware of the sound of her sandals clicking on the polished hardwood floor, of the scent of lemon wax and oranges, of the bleeding sun partially obscured by cotton-puff clouds as she hurried outside and toward the Jeep.
All around her was a peaceful silence, except for the whinny of a horse from the corral, but inside her head a chaotic tension thrummed. Then she heard running footsteps and turned to see Lily racing toward her.
“I almost forgot—directions. Go straight to Cedar Road and then turn left,” the girl said breathlessly. “That will take you to Weeping Rock Road. Follow that to the second fork—you’ll go to the right and keep on until you see the sign for the Watering Hole. It’s just before the highway.”
“Got it. Thanks.”
She accelerated down the long drive, trying not to floor the Jeep. She couldn’t get away from Fortune’s Way fast enough. As if the unpleasant vibes she’d gotten from Lily’s father weren’t bad enough, she’d actually had a vision right there in front of all the Fortunes. In the daytime.
Her cheeks burned. The visions were her secret. They were private. They almost always came to her when she was alone. Usually in the deepest hours of night.
Trying to concentrate on the road, she couldn’t block out the image of that bound figure still imprinted in her mind. Cold sweat moistened her palms as she clutched the steering wheel. She knew the headache that always followed the visions would come on any moment.
Damn it, wouldn’t she ever get accustomed to them? They’d been part of her life for a long time now, but it had been two years since the last one. In that case, she’d seen a boy locked in a basement. His terror had been palpable.
Erinn had awakened in her bed when the vision was over without a clue where that basement was. She hadn’t known if what she’d seen was happening right at that moment or if it had taken place a long time ago. Even more chilling, she didn’t know if it was something about to happen, something she could prevent if only she could see more.
Of course, as always, she’d gone to the police. Detective McKindrick of the NYPD had thought she was crazy the first time she’d gone to him eight years ago, haltingly telling him about the tunnel and what she’d seen in her mind. But then he’d found the body she described, dragged out of the Hudson River. And after checking her out, he’d started asking questions—and writing down her answers.
Unfortunately, Erinn’s visions weren’t filled with detail and she never seemed to see the victims’ faces clearly. But she’d known it was a middle-aged man who’d been killed and dumped in the river, and after the body had been found, McKindrick had asked her to accompany him to the morgue. It was the very last thing she’d wanted to do—but she had.
And though she’d only glanced at the dead man for an instant before turning away and pressing the palms of her hands to her eyes, two words had burst into her brain and out of her mouth.
Ivan Berberro.
McKindrick had stared at her as if she’d just dropped from the moon. Then he’d made several phone calls.
It turned out that the man dragged from the river had been a police informant who’d recently leaked incriminating information about a drug lord named Ivan Berberro. Because the body was found quickly, the police were able to identify the informant and trace the events of the previous forty-eight hours, finding evidence that linked Berberro’s organization to the murder.
McKendrick had become a wary believer.
And through the years, he and Erinn had developed an alliance of sorts. Two years ago, after her visions of the young African-American boy tied up in a basement, McKendrick had linked her vision to an Amber alert that had gone out hours before in Detroit.
Erinn had been flown in by the police, and driven to the small well-kept house on the city’s east side—the house from where eleven-year-old Damone Knox had vanished while his mother was at the grocery store.
At first nothing had happened. But after she walked through the house, with Damone’s parents looking on with desperate hope, she’d stepped outside and circled through the grass of the postage-stamp-size yard.
Still nothing.
But when she returned to the cement steps of the front porch, the vision had swooped in and grabbed hold of her, sucking her down the tunnel, flooding her with terror. When she’d awakened, stretched out on the stoop, with three Detroit police officers crouched over her, she’d pushed herself up to a sitting position and riveted her gaze on a house across the street, four buildings down.
“There.” She’d pointed at the house with the crumbling roof and dirty windows. “He’s in there.”
And he had been. He was alive.
All the while a nationwide alert was going out for information on Damone Knox’s whereabouts, a twenty-two-year-old registered sex offender had been holding him captive in a locked basement no more than thirty yards from his own home.
Not all of her cases had turned out so well. Sometimes her visions were too late. Sometimes the police couldn’t link them to a crime.
But one thing was certain. They weren’t going away. They were, however, becoming less and less frequent. Steadily so.
Until now.
Now she’d had two similar visions in the past two days. That hadn’t happened before, except in the rare instances when she was very close to the victim.
Like the little boy in the basement.
Why now? she wondered as she followed Lily’s directions back toward town. Why a second vision today?
Uneasiness prickled down her spine. And so did a quiver of frustration. There was nothing to go on. She’d caught no glimpse of a face. She didn’t even know if the person she’d seen was a man or a woman, or, God forbid, a child.
Only one thing was clear. Death was very near…
As Erinn parked in the lot behind the Watering Hole, her head began to throb. She called McKindrick the moment she reached her room.
He questioned her for a good fifteen minutes before ending the conversation with instructions to call him back if anything else came to her. He was a sergeant now in the 69th Precinct—grayer, heavier, and even more seasoned by the brutalities he encountered in his profession. But he’d become a believer.
And a friend of sorts.
One of the few friends Erinn had allowed herself to have.
She threw herself down across the faded bedspread and tried to still the frantic hum in her head. The vision, the tunnel, the sense of death. The sight of Devon in that cabin, shouting at her to leave. The tears shining in her sister’s eyes.
And the humiliation of succumbing to the vision outside the Fortune ranch house. With Jase Fortune staring down at her as she awakened, cold, scared, and at her most vulnerable.
He’d carried her inside with such ease. Such strength. Though still dazed from the vision, she’d been achingly aware of how effortlessly he’d lifted her and carried her through his house. Even now, warmth tingled through her as she recalled how firmly those powerful arms had cradled her.
A man like Jase Fortune wouldn’t understand what it felt like to be vulnerable, out of control. At the mercy of a supposed gift that always arrived unexpectedly and brought with it fear and violence and death.
But Erinn did.
Frustration made her turn restlessly to her side, sleep sliding impossibly further away. At the age of eighteen, she’d seized control of her life, but now she felt like she was losing that control again. She couldn’t control the visions, what they revealed to her, when they might come. And now one had come to her for no apparent reason—the second vision in two days.
This afternoon a man she barely knew had been there when the vision took hold. He’d seen her helplessness, her weakness. Her secret.
Unacceptable.
She came off the bed, rubbing her fingertips against her temples. She didn’t want to think about Jase Fortune. Those cobalt eyes of his seemed to burn right through her, and it wasn’t a comfortable feeling. The man was far too confident, too good-looking to be anything other than a player of the first order. He was probably used to women melting if he even glanced their way. As for his irritable father—well, she didn’t want to think about him either.
And she couldn’t bear to think about Devon.
Too much was clashing in her brain, all of it jarring.
She knew only one possible way to escape. Pulling her laptop from its case she propped it on the scarred desk that looked as if it had been dragged from a junkyard.
Peering desperately at the screen as the laptop powered up, she tried to concentrate on Devonshire. The poor mouse was still trapped in a spiderweb.
It was time to figure out how she escaped. Time to lose herself in the private world of a heroic mouse and a hapless squirrel and a cocky chipmunk…
For nearly an hour Erinn typed and then deleted one page, one scene after another. There was no escaping the truth.
Her imagination was in lockdown. And so was her brain.
At last she shut down the monstrous machine and pushed back her chair.
It’s eight o’clock, she realized dazedly, and I don’t have anything to show for it. Not a single new page.
Nor had she eaten a bite of food since she’d devoured Ginny Duncan’s chocolate-chip cookies.
Feed the stomach, feed the brain, she told herself wearily. Pausing only long enough to brush her teeth and tug a comb through her hair, she grabbed up her purse and fled the ill-lit confines of the Watering Hole motel, stepping out into the cool vast darkness of the Montana night.
Chapter Six
“Damn.”
Erinn gripped the steering wheel and stared in dismay at the shuttered blinds of the Saddleback Grill. The printed sign announced that the diner closed each night at eight and opened for business each morning at seven.
Now what? she wondered, her stomach growling with unladylike ferocity.
Ruefully, she scanned the empty street, wishing she hadn’t waited so long to think about eating.
The growling of her stomach was turning into a roar.
Streetlights shone amber beneath a wide inky sky, but the shops were all dark and First Street looked like a ghost town.
I guess a big breakfast tomorrow will have to make up for skipping dinner. She drove on past the Saddleback, trying to resign herself to the idea of waiting until morning for sustenance. It occurred to her that there might be a half-eaten Milky Way at the bottom of her purse, and reaching for her bag, she groped around inside it with one hand while steering with the other. Suddenly a burst of music blared through the car’s open window.
She followed the sound to the intersection. First and Main. And there, down the block, she saw a big frame building ablaze with light and noise.
A huge neon sign told her it was the Redrock Bar and Grill.
Salvation.
Erinn made a right and stepped on the accelerator, noticing that the bar was flanked by a small parking lot where nearly every space was full.
Which wasn’t surprising, considering that the din coming from the place suggested it was packed.
I hope that means the food’s good, she thought, sliding into a spot between a pickup and a motorcycle. She guessed the Redrock would be all about the beer—and that was all right too. A cold one would go down nicely right now. It might take the edge off the nerves still prickling like sparkplugs through her body.
