House of Dreams (30 page)

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Authors: Brenda Joyce

BOOK: House of Dreams
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Antonio was standing. “You are misunderstanding me,” he said.
Cass couldn't face him. Aunt Catherine was dead—she and Antonio had practically desecrated her death. What was happening?
“Cassandra.” He turned her around to face him. “I don't regret this.”
She had no choice but to meet his eyes.
“I regret the timing. I am at a loss to explain … certain things. But I don't regret making love to you.”
Cass stared. “We weren't making love.” Love had not been on her mind when they had been in bed together. Sex had been on her mind. No, not sex. Fucking. Animal fucking.
Antonio actually flushed.
“Antonio, I am worried.”
“How so?”
Cass took a quick glance around the room; they were alone. “She was here while we were … doing it. I am certain.”
“Cassandra,” he protested slowly.
“She was watching us. I felt it. Didn't you?” Cass cried. “We weren't alone!”
“Cassandra.” His jaw flexed. “You are in the throes of shock and grief. I admit to also being out of sorts. But Isabel was not here just now, watching us.”
Cass folded her arms. “I would love to agree with you, but I can't. Didn't you smell her perfume? It's gone now—but a few minutes ago this room was reeking of violets.”
He hesitated. “No, I did not.” He was firm—and grim.
Cass faced him. “Maybe I am confused … I wish that were the case. Antonio, there's something I have to tell you.”
“What is that?”
“When Catherine had her seizure, or whatever it was, I could barely breathe, also. That damn scent was there—”
“What are you suggesting?” He was suddenly angry. “That Isabel is haunting us—
and
that she killed your aunt? That she has this poisonous scent?”
Cass paled. “I don't know what I'm suggesting!”
“I'm sorry.” He pulled her close. Cass stiffened in surprise, resisting him, but briefly, he embraced her before releasing her. “We are all overwrought.”
“Yes, we are,” Cass agreed unevenly. “But let's look at the facts. My aunt suffered some kind of attack within minutes of arriving here. My aunt, who was your father's lover—who was here thirty-four years ago when he died. Tragically. You didn't tell me your grandfather also died in his early forties—stabbed to death by his own wife.”
Antonio paled. “No. I did not.”
Cass found it hard to breathe. “How old are you, Antonio?” she asked unsteadily even though she knew.
His eyes widened. “Thirty-eight. What does that have to do—” He stopped.
Cass felt tears coming to her eyes. “I don't want anything to happen to you.”
His jaw flexed. “Nothing will happen to me.”
“But something is happening here. Your father, your grandfather, now my aunt. And what if Margarita is tied in to all of this?” He paled. Cass didn't regret her words. “I felt Isabel here, moments ago, I am certain—it was not my imagination—and I think she was very pleased, no, satisfied, with this—with us. Antonio. I'm not crazy. My aunt is right. There is a pattern here. We just don't know what it is, exactly.” She paused. “My aunt told me that Isabel wants revenge.”
He stared. She stared back. He finally said, “Isabel is dead. If ghosts exist, they do not have desires—or ambitions, Cassandra.”
Suddenly she was so angry. “So now you are an expert on ghosts?”
He flushed. “Hardly.”
“Well, what if they do have desires? Thoughts? Feelings? Motives?” When he remained stubbornly silent, she cried, “Did we really see Margarita last night? Maybe it was Tracey. Maybe it was Isabel herself.”
“At this moment, I do not know what we saw last night,” he said grimly.
“Maybe Aunt Catherine is wrong,” she cried. And then as she recalled that Catherine was dead, tears slipped and slid down her face. “But so far she has been right, hasn't she? She said tragedy strikes when our families are together. Your father is dead. My aunt is dead. And where is my sister? It's almost six o'lock. In a few more hours she will have been gone for twenty-four hours!” Suddenly, to Cass's horror, she began to cry. “I just lost my aunt, I can't lose Tracey, too.”
Antonio pulled her into the shelter of his arms. “Tracey will be fine. We will find her. There will be a simple explanation. As for the rest, it is coincidence.”
Cass wanted to believe him. But there was a tension in his tone and
she looked up, meeting his eyes. “You're saying the words,” she said, “but you don't believe in them, either, now do you?”
He did not answer her.
Cass trembled. “There's something you are hiding from me. What is it?”
He stared. “There is a photograph,” he finally said. “But I am sure there is a rational explanation.”
 
 
The search for Tracey began.
They searched every room, every closet, every bathroom, even the dark, cavernous dungeons below. And then they left the children with Alfonso while Cass, Gregory, and Antonio split up to cover the ground around the house.
Cass was trying not to give in to hysteria and panic. But it was past seven o'clock. In two hours it would be dark.
She headed past the garage and cottage, while Gregory took the opposite side of the house, Antonio the Jeep, the better to cover more territory. As she walked farther and farther away from the house, stumbling on the uneven, rocky ground, the sun still high but not quite as bright, she desperately tried to hold back the waves of undulating fear, while her mind wanted to spin and race, conceiving every possible explanation.
This made no sense. Tracey could not have simply disappeared.
And now she was finally beginning to understand what Antonio had gone through eight years ago. Margarita's disappearance had made no sense then, either. How did one live with that kind of unresolved loss? Never knowing what had really happened, not knowing if the one you loved was alive or dead?
Cass resolved not to let her thoughts go there. It was too soon. And Tracey wasn't Margarita. She was a loose cannon. She had been rejected by Antonio. What if she had simply decided to leave?
But Cass could not imagine her sister walking down the road until a passing vehicle came by to give her a ride to civilization.
And tragedy had already struck twice—three times if you included Margarita in the equation. Cass could not shove aside the gnawing fear. Tracey's disappearance was not a coincidence.
Cass realized the house was no longer in sight. She paused, standing on a slight knoll, squinting, the sun behind her, realizing she had been
walking for a good hour. Her body was tired, her feet hurt. But then, her body was sore for a very good reason. No—she must not remember what had happened earlier that afternoon. She could still barely believe it.
Had Isabel been watching them? Cass shivered.
She looked around again, afraid that she might be lost. Her heart lurched unpleasantly—she could not deal with being lost tonight, not after all that had happened. And what if she couldn't make it back to the house before dark? She should have turned around earlier, she thought, with a sinking heart. The idea of wandering around in the dark, lost and alone, was distinctly unappealing.
Isabel's taunting image filled her mind.
Cass felt raw fear. “Go away,” she muttered nervously. But what if she was right and Antonio was wrong? What if Isabel was a very active presence amongst them? Cass had seen that damning photograph. Antonio and Gregory kept insisting that it was not a photograph of a ghost, that the image was hardly clear. Cass disagreed. The image was clear enough for her.
Just what was Isabel capable of? Could she feel, think, plan?
Trembling, Cass turned to gaze in the other direction from her vantage point. She hadn't found her sister and she was going to have to go back. Just ahead was the ruins of the castle. Huge shadows spilled forth from the crumbled walls and the two towers.
Cass was about to turn around when something caught her eye, and she faced the ruins again, holding up a hand to shield her eyes from the setting sun. Light flashed below the castle walls, a reflection of some sort.
What if it was Tracey? What if it was Isabel?
Cass started to run toward the ruins, which were farther than she had thought. She did not let up her pace, praying the reflection she had glimpsed had been caused by her sister, refusing to think it might be someone—or something—else. In fact, Tracey never went anywhere without her gold Cartier lighter. That could certainly cause a reflection of the light.
She hit the road, running harder now, as the sun continued to sink lower, as the shadows surrounding the ruins lengthened, as the sky blushed pink, mauve. It was quickly turning into twilight, making it impossible to see clearly.
She would have to follow the road back to the house in darkness,
she realized, very unhappy with the thought. She had forgotten how quickly the sun set. But at least she could not get lost on the road, even if it meant traveling a longer distance.
Isabel's image flashed through her mind, her eyes piercing and intense.
“Do not think of her now,” Cass told herself, speaking aloud. She hated the sound of her own voice. In the desolation of the night, it sounded jarring.
Suddenly she came up short. The electrician's truck was ahead. Maybe it had caused the reflection of light she had seen. For one moment, as Cass stared at the older vehicle, she thought it was parked, and at an odd angle—and then she realized its front end was smashed into the castle wall.
There had been an accident.
Cass broke into a run, and a moment later she was beside the front door. She cried out. The electrician was collapsed on top of the steering column, and the entire windshield was broken. The front of the truck was crushed into itself like an accordion.
“Oh, God.” Cass knew he was dead, but she opened the door and touched his neck, looking for a pulse while careful not to move him.
She jumped away from him, having never touched a dead person before, suddenly, violently, wanting to throw up. Cass turned and heaved.
And when the heaves had passed, she sat there on her knees, shadows falling over her, trying to understand how the electrician had gone off the road at such a high speed. She finally got up, thinking that maybe his brakes had failed, or the steering, or maybe he'd simply had a heart attack. And as she stood there debating the possibilities, suddenly the car's radio came on.
Cass jumped in shock and fear as the radio blared, some Spanish disc jockey speaking rapidly, unintelligibly. And as suddenly, the radio went dead.
Cass backed away.
A short, she finally told herself, a short caused by the crash.
The dead man suddenly fell over, to one side. Cass screamed.
She had left the door open, and his head lolled out. Cass met a pair of wide-open, astonished eyes.
And she saw the knife protruding from his chest.
 
 
Cass couldn't breathe as she ran down the road, stumbling on rocks and ruts. The night had abruptly turned black. She was immersed in what was almost total darkness. She was trying not to think the worst, trying not to think about ghosts and murderers, trying desperately not to become overwhelmed by panic and fear. Of course she was out there by the ruins alone. But nothing in the world could have stopped her from glancing repeatedly over her shoulder—she was terrified.
The electrician was dead.
Stabbed to death.
Her aunt was dead.
Casa de Suenos was already a terrible place of tragedy. But was it also a place of death?
Suddenly the night seemed to sigh.
Cass ran harder, gasping for air, her legs beginning to fail her, until she realized it was only a breeze, sighing through the trees. Wasn't it? And her thighs were screaming now in pain, her calf muscles knotting, cramping; she did not know how much longer she could keep up the pace, but she refused to slow down. She did not dare.
Cass fought to run harder, unable not to think. Ghosts did not stab people. People stabbed people. What if the electrician hadn't fallen out of his vehicle, what if he had been pushed out? What if whoever was responsible for his murder was still lurking about? Finally terror overcame her.
Which was why when headlights suddenly fell over her, her first instinct was to leap off of the road and hide.
But not before she froze, briefly. Trapped in the car's headlights.
Cass dove off of the road. She landed on her hands and knees, sank onto her belly, rocks stabbing her cheek and chin, dirt in her mouth, shaking like a leaf.

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