Grave Echoes: A Kate Waters Mystery (28 page)

“Do you work here on weekend nights?”

“Yes.” The furrow between his brows deepened.

If anyone had seen anything or anyone the night Jev was here, it would be Adam. He was the groundskeeper.

“Have there been any problems with vandalism? My sister wrote some bin numbers down in a book, and I think they were tampered with.”

Adam shook his head slowly. “Nothing’s been reported.” He looked around, rubbing his hands together. “I think we should go inside, where it’s warm.”

Kate’s body did ache and a warm chair sounded good. “All right, but I’d like to find David first. He can help me explain it all.”

“He’ll find us,” Adam said, wrapping his arm around her shoulder.

“I think he’s just down the hall,” Kate said, turning toward the other end of the hallway where she last saw David in row B.

“Stop, Kate.” Adam seized her arm. “I didn’t want to have to do this.”

His grip constricted around her arm. She gave a small tug back, but he tightened his hands. Kate understood then that her snooping led him to suspect that she was the one vandalizing. “Adam, this isn’t what it looks like,” she said.

“Actually Kate, it is.”

In the silent halls of the mausoleum, the splatter of water from a nearby drainpipe resounded with Kate’s pulse, the lingering beats heightening her confusion. After discovering that the bin numbers Jev had scribbled in the book belonged to the ghosts in the house, she now had to explain it to Adam. But he seemed to think she was the one tampering with the grave bins.

“I can’t let you go,” Adam said, gripping her arm tighter.

“Please, Adam, I think you misunderstood me.” Kate tugged her arm away from him.

His eyes narrowed, and a subtle grin bent at the corners of his mouth. “I don’t think so.”

“Adam, my sister and I had nothing to do with the vandal…,” she started to say, until a horrid thought hit her—maybe Adam had something to do with the vandalism?

“What was that, Kate? I didn’t quite hear you.”

A bad feeling crept over her, like big, brown spiders, falling all around her.

“Graves at the cemetery are being vandalized?” His syllables rose and fell unusually.

The feeling of spiders crawled over Kate. Was she having another hallucination? The moment didn’t seem real, like it was just a bad dream. One she wanted to wake from.

A smile crested in Adam’s eyes, and with the sarcastic tone in his voice, she knew—Adam was the one who had vandalized the grave bins..., which meant, he was Jev’s killer.

“David!” Kate called out. She made a bolt for the entrance of the mausoleum, failing to get even two feet when a swift kick of Adam’s foot smashed into her shin. She stumbled flat on her hips and belly, chin smacking the pavement, the mashing of bone and flesh ruptured blood through split tissue. A jolt of pain fired through Kate’s skull. She drew her hand to her mouth where blood spilled in warm, bright red rivulets. The taste in her mouth was thick and peppery.

“David is busy,” Adam replied, his voice dry and sharp. He strolled in front of her, playing up his power over her.

Kate coughed, wheezing in a burning breath. Her hipbone felt chipped from the fall, and a hot, stinging pain throbbed from her knee. She scooted backwards against the cold marble of the mausoleum wall. Adam’s ominous appearance engulfed her with fierce trepidation. His eyes seethed with hate. In the crevice of his jacket, a burnished object caught her eye, a necklace of braided silver. Thea’s dream…Adam was him.

Kate’s knees weakened. Her body trembled, despite her efforts to stop it. “It’s you,” she cried. “You’re the one who killed my sister.”

“No, Kate,” Adam said, stepping toward her, confident and challenging like a bear. “She killed herself. She ran her car into the tree. Remember? She meddled with someone else’s life and so she paid the ultimate price.”

His words stuck her like a dagger, twisting madness into her reason. It was only days ago that she’d shared intimate thoughts with him, never suspecting he was responsible for her sister’s accident. He’d lied, without a hint of remorse, or a slip of guilt. He was death himself.

Adam stepped closer to her. She could smell mildew and dirt wafting from him, like the pungent decay of earth.

“There are others who know I am here,” she said. “They are on their way. You’ll never get away with it.”

“I’ve gotten away with much more than your sister’s death. And I will get away with yours too.”

***

Wells had been sitting in front of the Portland Police Department License Registry database since Ted’s visit to warn him about following protocol. But, after learning the black Ford pickup he saw leaving Walter Biddy’s belonged to an Adam Thatcher, who worked at the cemetery just down the road from Jevanna Waters’ fatal accident, he eagerly waited for the forensic results.

The clock ticked, its long black hands, aligned beneath the twelve when the fax machine beeped next to him. He rolled his chair over and grabbed the first page. The cover sheet read Portland Crime Scene and Forensic Investigation. The next page came out so slow, he swore he could have typed it faster himself. In the bottom corner, Larry had scribbled, Don’t need to be a scientist to figure this one out. Three columns compared DNA plotters from those on the beer bottle and cigarette filters from the restaurant to the fingerprints on the girl’s neck—the blue dots lined up on every row.

“Bingo,” he said, grabbing his things and rushing for the door.

***

Kate shrank in the hallway of the mausoleum, her hands, chin, and neck smeared with blood seeping from her lip. Adam towered over her, intimidating her with his wrath—he’d killed her sister, had tried to kill Donna, and maybe even David, too. Now, he was going to kill her.

“You can’t kill everyone,” Kate said. “Donna lived…she’ll identify you.”

Adam’s smile lengthened. “By the time the police bag you and your lover boy, I’ll already be in the thick of Mexico. It won’t matter.” He stopped his advance on her. “And it certainly won’t matter to you, for you’ll be with your sister, united once again.”

He turned away from her, as if daring her to try to run, certain that he would catch her. And Kate knew she wouldn’t be able to outrun him with her wounded knee. Her hip ached with a biting throb, but it wouldn’t impede her mobility.

“You see,” Adam continued. “I’ve been planning this moment for a while now.”

As he spoke, Kate moved along the wall, toward the front of the mausoleum, hoping he wouldn’t notice the growing distance between them even though her hands left a crooked line of blood along the marble. She glanced at the intersection. Adam still had his back turned to her. She thought if she could get enough of a head start, she could escape into the shadows of the cemetery—get help.

“Nothing is going to interfere with my plans this time,” Adam said, spinning to face her. She stopped, but he’d already eyed the lengthened space between them. “Nothing will—no friends, no boyfriend, no detective. I could have broken into your home countless nights when David left you alone.” He clicked his tongue like one scolding a child, “Tsk, tsk, tsk. It must be lonely…all by yourself…in that big house at night.”

Kate felt like a mouse cornered by the hooked claws of a hungry cat, an unfortunate victim of his drawn-out, sick amusement.

“If I were David, I’d at least have left you something to remember me by,” he teased, letting his eyes cascade down the length of her.

Kate’s heart skipped a beat, as Adam introduced to her a world of other horrors.

“Curves like yours shouldn’t be left alone.”

She tried to block the images surfacing in her mind. The taste of blood in her mouth nauseated her. She needed more time to get to the end of the hallway and thought distraction might be her only chance. “All of this for a key,” she said, beginning to move back down the wall again, slow enough that he might not notice.

Adam’s bantering gaze hardened at the mention of his key.

“What does it unlock, Adam?”

He straightened, burying his playful tone with anger. “Possessions I’ve gone to great lengths to collect, which I’m not going to give up to just anyone.” He reached into his pocket and pulled out a large, black gun—an instrument of death. “Give me the key,” he said, aiming it at her.

Kate froze, gaping into the ominous barrel where a bullet would fire, tearing into her flesh, severing arteries, and imploding vital organs. The brutal reality of the situation sank into her like a bag of rocks. Within seconds, her life was going to be over.

Adam shook the gun at her. “C’mon Kate. I know you have it.”

She wanted to cry, scream, or run, but found herself reaching into the neckline of her shirt instead. Her hands trembled as she pulled the chain over her neck. The key felt warm from her heat, heat that would soon be cooling.

Adam lowered his aim, positioning the barrel at her stomach. “I can make this quick or painful. Your cooperation would be a wise decision.”

It suddenly struck Kate that they were in the middle of a city. If Adam really planned to shoot her, wouldn’t the gunfire be heard? Someone would call the police. Maybe he was just using the gun to threaten and coerce her. After all, what he said about Jev was right. He hadn’t really killed her—he’d forced her off the road. He hadn’t physically taken her life or Donna’s, and he couldn’t have shot David either, because she would have heard the gunfire. Hope brightened in Kate’s mind, despite her predicament, and she readied herself for the run of her life.

***

Wells slammed the door to his undercover patrol car and sped from the lot. The streets were empty, giving him plenty of space to hustle. He’d called Kate’s house and cell phone to warn her about his suspicions, that Adam Thatcher was her sister’s murderer, but there was no answer on either line. Even her boyfriend David was unreachable. Switching on his siren, he raced towards Kate’s house, hoping she was asleep, or better yet, staying with someone else as he suggested to her earlier.

He spun the case around in his mind like a water wheel, each turn upwards taking another pool of facts that spilled into the basin of Jevanna Waters’ mystery. The road she’d wrecked her car on, Capitol Highway, was just a few miles from Tryon Creek Cemetery where Adam Thatcher worked. Police had found a bucket of dirt in her car, along with a bag of witchcraft paraphernalia, which now made sense to him. He hypothesized her trip to the cemetery to cast a spell had ended with the discovery of something Adam Thatcher didn’t want anyone to know about.

Pulling off the freeway, Wells steered through the rural streets to Kate’s home. He slowed down, searching the road for suspicious cars or pedestrians, but it was mostly farmland out here, nurseries, and cabbage fields. Up ahead, the road brightened from the porch lights of a few clustered homes. Kate Waters’ was one of them.

He rolled the car up to a dark house on the block, not wanting to announce his arrival in case something had happened. He exited his vehicle and checked the weapon at his side. When no shadows moved, he crossed the road.

There were no cars parked in the driveway, but the front door was propped wide open. Wells paused to assimilate the scene, his Glock poised and ready to fire. It had been awhile since he used it on duty, but practice once a week built his confidence in hitting his expected target.

Jogging up to the side of Kate and David’s house, he waited, scanning the grounds for potential threats. When he didn’t see or hear anything, he made his way to the front door. There didn’t seem to be anyone home.

“Kate Waters? David Bradshaw? This is Detective Orwin Wells.”

There was no answer. He stepped inside the doorway until he could see into the living room.

Moving with agile instincts, Wells advanced through the house, wondering to himself whether it was good or bad that no one was home. Adrenaline pounded in his chest as he searched through the rooms, cautious of the slightest movement or the faintest breath. He came back into the living room again and found a bouquet of white flowers strewn across the hardwoods. He picked one up. It smelled fresh, but had a hint of astringent to it, a smell that reminded him of the doctor’s office.

Wells went into the kitchen. There was no sign of David or Kate, except for her purse. He looked through the folds for a note, a business card, anything that might clue him into her whereabouts. Her wallet was there, but her phone was missing.

An odd feeling circled around him, that feeling of invisible pressure from someone watching him and he glanced up, making sure he was still alone. The house hummed with silence. There was something alive about it, as if shadows moved behind him, and then stilled whenever his eyes shifted. Wells glanced into the living room, where the flowers had been tossed about. Now, they laid neatly on top of the coffee table. He knew they weren’t like that before. He raised his gun again and walked back into the living room. He looked down at the floor—there wasn’t one petal on the ground. Something brushed against his arm, and he flinched, spinning around with his gun aimed. There was nobody there.

Wells went back into the kitchen, wondering why Kate would have left without her purse. He never claimed to know women very well, but he was sure about one thing—they never left the house without their purse…unless someone forced them to.

***

Kate stood a few feet from the intersection in the mausoleum. A sideways glance at the corner of the intersection told her she was still in row G. If she could make it around this corner, back into the main hallway, she could slip down one of the other corridors, making her way out the back entrance. But would she be fast enough? Even with a head start?

“The key,” Adam said, his gun seeming to stretch farther in her direction.

Kate paused, knowing it would all be over when she gave him what he wanted.

“You can’t escape, Kate,” Adam said, as if hearing her thoughts.

She held the key out to him. “Here.”

“Set it down on the ground,” he ordered.

Kate stalled.

“Now!”

His anger was building, and she questioned if it might work in her favor? Anger made people sloppy, but it could also incite cruelty. Kate sensed there was a fine line in the middle that somehow, she needed to keep him in—she needed to surprise him. What wouldn’t he expect her to do with it, and how could she remove herself from being the target of his gun.

Slowly crouching down, as if she were setting the key on the ground, Kate swung back and chucked the chain, directly at Adam. He flinched as he tried to catch it, his gun drew up toward the ceiling just as she had hoped would happen, giving her that split second to bolt around the corner.