Body Temperature and Rising - Book One of the Lakeland Heatwave Trilogy (8 page)

‘I know what you saw. I saw it too,’ Tim interrupted, running a heavy hand through his hair. ‘Jesus, I’ve seen it every night in my dreams since it happened, but don’t you see? It’s what she wants us to see.’ He gave a vicious nod to Tara. ‘What she wants us to believe.’

‘That’s ridiculous. You’re totally mad, why would she do that?’

‘I don’t know, to control them, to control us? I don’t know. But it’s true, ask her. Just ask her.’

Anderson grabbed for Tim, but he shrugged free and pulled Marie forcefully up off the sofa again with her fighting and clawing and kicking, as the room erupted in chaos. Her foot landed hard on the inside of Tim’s calf just as Anderson wrestled Tim away from Marie, but not before getting an elbow in the stomach. The two men were like wild animals in a cage, knocking over a chair and smashing two cups onto the Turkish carpet. Sky and Fiori were both shouting at once, Sky grabbing for Anderson and Fiori for Tim. And all the while Marie’s stomach burned like fire.

‘Stop it! Stop it now!’ Tara’s voice rose above the din. ‘I’ll have no more of this violence in my home. Enough.’ A deafening silence fell over the room, one that Marie wasn’t entirely sure might not have been magically enforced. Everyone froze, no one breathed. Even the ghosts held their breath. Tara still sat unmoving in her chair as though none of this had anything to do with her. 

Then Marie shoved her way out from between Anderson and Tim and moved to stand in front of Tara. ‘Is it true? Is what Tim says true?’

‘You don’t understand. You don’t understand how it happened, what it was like,’ Fiori began, but Tara silenced her with a glance that could have almost been a caress. The redhead leaned forward in her chair and her eyes welled with tears. ‘But they need to know. They need to understand.’ Sky reached out to her and took her hand. 

Then Tara turned her attention back to Marie. For a long time she said nothing. Anderson said something under his breath in what Marie thought might have been Italian. The knot of fire in her stomach suddenly felt more like ice. ‘Is it true?’ she asked again. She made no attempt to hide the tremor in her voice. Even with her skills at the negotiating table, she couldn’t have if she’d wanted to.

‘It’s true,’ Tara’s voice was soft, barely more than a whisper. ‘It’s true I killed Fiori. Tim is right.’

Both Fiori and Anderson started to speak. She silenced them with a glance, and Marie stumbled backwards, steadied herself on the edge of the upturned chair, and gave Tim a hard shove when he reached for her. 

There was chaos again, arguing and shouting, but she was outside of it all, moving in a different dimension, watching it all from a cold grey place. She watched herself run out of Elemental Cottage. She heard Tara tell Anderson to let her go. She watched Tim come after her, yelling something about her safety something about her not being alone right now. She watched herself get into her car and drive away, screeching her tyres on the driveway. She watched herself turn away from the road that led to Lacewing Farm and keep driving. 

She didn’t know how long she had driven aimlessly. When she came back to herself, it felt like she had been somewhere else for ages, maybe even for years. It took her a little while to realise she was driving over the Kirkstone Pass in the greying dawn. With a start, she recalled that she might not be alone, but there was no burning sensation between her hip bones, and when she called out Anderson’s name, there was no response. As for the possibility that she might with equal ease conjure up Deacon, well she didn’t even want to think about that. 

As she descended from the pass and drove along the shore of Ullswater, she thought she might just drive forever. Something about driving gave her a sense of security, albeit a false one. She was certain of that, as the memories of the past 48 hours lapped at her in waves not unlike those on the windy shore of the lake. In the end, she circled back on to the A66 as the sun turned the saddle of Blencathera pink. There was no place else to go but Lacewing Farm. It was now the only home she had, and there was no going back to Portland. She had burned her bridges even if she did want to return, and she didn’t. Like it or not she would have to face Tim. She would need him. They would need each other. This was not the time to be without allies. 

Chapter 8

Tim was in the stable with the mare when she arrived. She could see his broad back through the open door. A sudden eruption of butterflies in her stomach made her skittish like the mare had been, was it only yesterday morning? It made her not want to face him, not just yet. As she watched him moving about the stable, heard him talking softly to the horse, the ache she felt was a very human one, one that sprang from being alive and not wanting to be alone and all the other things that living entailed. It was not the fiery burn that accompanied the presence of spirits. It felt cleaner somehow, more sane. But on some deeper level, it felt at least as frightening, so she swallowed hard and turned quietly toward her cottage.

She was half way up the porch steps when she changed her mind, squared her shoulders and headed for the stables. 

When he saw her, he surprised her by scooping her into his arms, holding her tight, so tight she could barely catch her breath. A sense of relief rushed over her, a feeling that she wasn’t in this alone, and she held him tight right back. 

‘I was so scared,’ he spoke against her ear, his voice thick with emotions. ‘I didn’t know what they’d do to you, if they’d follow you, and I didn’t know where you’d gone or where to look for you. I couldn’t bear the thought of it happening to you. What happened to Fiori.’

She said nothing; she wasn’t sure she could speak without blubbering.

‘I’m sorry,’ he whispered against her hair. ‘This is not how I wanted it to be. This is not what I wanted you to know about me.’

‘What?’ She pulled away enough to look up into his eyes, ‘Tim I don’t blame you for any of this. I still don’t know what to think about it all. I don’t know …’ Her voice drifted off. ‘Do you think we should go to the police?’

‘And tell them what?’ he said stepping back. ‘We’re the only ones who know. We’re the only ones who can tell they’re dead. To anyone else Fiori and Sky look as real and alive as you and I do, as real as that Anderson bloke you let plough you. He must have been impressed, the way he fought me.’

This time the clench in her stomach was anger. ‘You son of a bitch!’ She shoved him with the flat of her hand and he yielded, perhaps too shocked to do anything else. She shoved him again. ‘What the hell business is it of yours who I let plough me anyway, and for your information, yeah, he liked it just fine. Like you care.’ She shoved him again, and the mare looked up from munching her breakfast. ‘Lest we forget that you ploughed Fiori. Oh that’s right, I forgot that was different. She wasn’t dead when you fucked her, so that makes it all right.’

She saw his face darken, and in her own mind’s eye, she saw the woman’s tragic death, and for a split second she wished she hadn’t said anything, but damn it, he was such a bastard. ‘First you treat me like I don’t exist, then you go all big brother on me like I’m too delicate and soft-brained to take care of myself. Well I have news for you, Tim Meriwether, I was taking care of myself for a long time before you decided I needed looking after.’ She shoved again, and this time he grabbed her with such force that she felt the bones in her neck pop. 

With her forward momentum, he stumbled over an uneven paving stone, lost his footing and went over backward into a manger full of fresh hay, pulling her on top of him. 

Before she could shove and claw her way to her feet, He grabbed her around the waist and rolled, pinning her beneath the weight of his body. He gave her no time to think about it, but pulled her into a bruising kiss, forcing her lips apart, probing her hard pallet with his dexterous tongue, biting her lower lip before he came up fighting for the breath to speak. ‘I think about you a lot, Marie,’ His chest rose and fell in hungry gasps. ‘But I promise you, none of those thoughts were even remotely brotherly.’

She bucked underneath him and clawed at his shirt. ‘Then do something about it, damn it, and stop toying with me.’ Several buttons popped and flew across the stable floor. He forced her legs apart with his knee, moving it up to rub against the crotch of her jeans. She shoved his shirt open and arched up to him as he pushed her T-shirt up and manoeuvred and tugged, forcing her breasts free from her bra into his splayed hands and hungry lips. 

She fumbled with the fly of his jeans, sliding an anxious hand into his boxers. He huffed a breathless grunt, and the muscles low in his stomach tensed as she closed her fingers around his engorged penis and began to stroke.

He had just began the anxious efforts with her own fly when suddenly the stable door slammed shut, and the light bulb overhead exploded in a shower of fine glass plunging the two into total darkness. 

Marie yelped, and Tim cursed. As they fought their way to their feet, the mare screamed, and they could hear her struggling. 

Tim vaulted over the manger’s edge seconds before Marie, calling back to her. ‘Get the door. Get it open.’

Struggling to secure her jeans with one hand, Marie felt her way along the perimeter of the stable toward the door. The relief was short-lived when her fingers closed around the handle, and it wouldn’t budge.

‘It’s locked,’ she shouted above the desperate cries of the mare.

‘What do you mean, it’s locked,’ Tim shouted back. ‘It doesn’t have a lock. It can’t be locked.’

‘I’m telling you it won’t open,’ she yelled back, feeling an icy chill blasting her from behind. With one final tug, the door gave and she tumbled backward on her arse. The sharp knife-edge of light that shot through the darkness was blinding, like a flashbulb going off, leaving a deep bruised after image dancing in front of her face, an after image of Deacon.

She cried out and crab walked backwards, as he stepped toward her, unfurling his bullwhip, in what seemed like endless slow motion. 

Then from somewhere beyond the blinding light, Tim grabbed her beneath the arm pits and hauled her to her feet, pulling her protectively to him, manhandling her until his back took the brunt of the whip’s lash, as it cracked like thunder even above the horse’s terrified screams. 

Marie felt his body tense, jerk and go rigid, felt his heavy pull of oxygen. 

Then the air was suddenly warm again and filled with birdsong, and the mare was instantly calm. The light from the sun filtered through the open stable door sliding down the dust motes as though nothing had happened. With a sob of relief, Marie wriggled free of Tim’s arms and shoved at his shirt. ‘Get it off! Get it off. Let me see.’

‘I’m all right,’ Tim said.

‘Let me see!’ Marie shoved and tugged at his shirt, then turned him so his back was to her. 

‘I’m all right,’ he repeated. ‘Honest. It wasn’t real. It only seemed that way.’

And sure enough Tim’s broad muscular back was smooth and supple with no sign of the damage a whip would have made on tender flesh. 

‘But you felt it,’ she breathed incredulously. ‘I felt it. I felt the wind of it as it snapped by.’

‘Marie,’ he turned to face her and took her by the shoulders. ‘It wasn’t real.’

She felt the tension ease from the back of her neck. The mare munched her oats as though nothing had happened. The heat of the heavy morning once again settled around them like a thick blanket. Marie nodded up to the shattered light bulb. ‘Parts of it were pretty real, I’d say.’

‘So what are we going to do?’ Marie said, pacing the floor in front of the kitchen table ignoring the cup of tea she’d just poured for herself. ‘I don’t have any knowledge of magic and the paranormal, and we just found out the only person who might have been able to help us is a killer. Any suggestions?’

Tim sipped his tea and ran a hand through his hair. ‘They can’t be the only woo woo folks in Cumbria, Marie. There must be someone else who could help us out.’

‘Woo woo is one thing, Tim. I have no problem with people who want to dye their hair red and dance naked in the full moon, they’re harmless. They’re innocuous, but we’re not dealing with woo woo. We’re dealing with a poltergeist or a demon or something, and he’s real, and he wants to destroy us because of our association with Tara Stone.’

He raised an eyebrow. ‘Is that what she told you, that it was all because of her? Well what the hell did you expect her to tell you, Marie?’

She turned to face him, hands on her hips. ‘She hasn’t tried to hurt me, Tim, and she’s had plenty of opportunity. In fact, I don’t know what would have happened if Anderson hadn’t shown up when he did last night, or on the fells the day before for that matter.’

Tim cursed under his breath at the mention of Anderson’s name. ‘I don’t know why they do what they do, but I do know that Fiori is dead and she’s dead at Tara’s hand. Of that much I’m certain.’

She dropped into her chair and glared across the table at him. ‘How did you know that Tara killed Fiori?’ Even now, she found it hard to believe, even after Tara had admitted it, and something definitely didn’t add up when Fiori stood right by her and fought like a trooper. 

‘I know.’ Tim was suddenly very interested in the spoon in the sugar bowl. 

She reached across the table and grabbed his hand. ‘Tim, I need to know how you know. Who told you? Was it the bum bashers?’ 

He shook his head, still avoiding her gaze.

‘Then who?’ 

A fine tinge of pink rose above his collar and onto his neck and cheeks, and with an icy knot of certainty she knew. ‘Jesus, Tim, Deacon told you, didn’t he? And you believed him?’

‘I didn’t have to believe him, did I? She confirmed it.’

‘But you believed him when you came in. You believed him enough to barge into a house that didn’t belong to you like a rampaging bull. I saw it in your eyes. How could you believe him? How could you possibly trust him at all?’

Tim pushed the chair back from the table with a loud screech. ‘I don’t trust him, and I don’t doubt for a minute that he would lie to me if it would get him what he wants. But this is a truth he likes. This is a truth he wants made known. It serves his purpose.’ Then he added quickly. ‘That doesn’t make Tara Stone any less of a killer, does it?’

‘So that brings us right back to where we started.’ She watched him pace. ‘What do we do? Especially if what they say is true about me.’

That got his attention, and he eased back into the chair. ‘What did they say?’

She told him about her ability to enflesh ghosts without the spell, without even realizing what she was doing. She told him that they all believed she was responsible for Deacon’s unbinding. All the while she spoke, the lines along Tim’s jaw got harder, straighter. Several times he cursed under his breath. By the time she had finished, he sat with his arms defiantly folded across his chest. ‘So you conjured this Anderson bloke, and Deacon? That’s what they’re telling you?’

She nodded.

‘And do you believe them?’

She released a slow breath, and squared her shoulders. ‘After what’s happened to me the past 48 hours, I don’t know what to believe. I can see how I could have conjured Anderson. I saw him with Tara. I had opportunity. As for Deacon, I can’t imagine how I could have conjured him. But I do know that knowledge is power, and without the Elementals, we had better be for finding another source of knowledge really quickly because I have a feeling we’re gonna need all the power we can get.’

He worried his lip with his bottom teeth, then nodded to her laptop where it sat on the end of the table in a pile of newspapers and unopened mail. ‘You any good at research on that thing?’

‘Not bad. You?’

He disappeared out the door and returned in a couple of minutes with a bright red netbook. ‘OK, let’s do this then. Let’s find us some knowledge.’

She grabbed the mocha maker from the cupboard. ‘We’re gonna need coffee.’ At least they were doing something, and she was amazed at how much consolation she took in such a small thing.

Serena Ravenmoor was startled out of her meditation by the ghost watching her at the water’s edge. She loved it when he watched her. She loved it that he found her so fascinating. A gifted witch, he had called her that first night before he made love to her, before he made her come like she’d never come before. Just thinking about it made her heart race. And thinking about him, like always, summoned him to her side. 

He helped her to her feet. ‘I hope I didn’t disturb you, my darling. But I just couldn’t stay away from you any longer.’ He raised a hand with a flourish in front of her chest and offered a wicked smile as her nipples hardened beneath her blouse without so much as a touch. She gave a little whimper of delight at what she felt far south of her nipples. He chuckled softly. ‘This place is much too public for me to pleasure you as I desire.’ He rubbed the thick pad of his thumb against his index finger and dropped his gaze to her crotch for the briefest of seconds. And her whimper became a little cry, which escaped before she could cover her mouth. 

A man sitting on a nearby park bench looked up from his newspaper. But he only saw what he might have thought was a silly woman probably yelping at the sight of a spider or some such. He had no idea that the orgasm she was in the midst of would have rendered it impossible for her to stand if not for the support of her ghost, her lovely, strong, virile ghost, which the man, like the rest of the people enjoying the sunshine around Derwent Water, couldn’t see. 

As her Deacon moved to support her, he guided her hand against the bulge threatening the crotch of his leather trousers. He spoke against her ear. ‘That was only just a foretaste of what I will do to you if you take me home.’