Night of the Raven (2 page)

Maybe if he did that, the nightmare would stay where it belonged. Buried deep in the past of the person he feared he’d once been.

Chapter Two

New Orleans, Louisiana
Present Day

“Make no mistake about it...”

Moments after the sentence had been passed, the raspy-voiced man with the stooped shoulders and the tic in his left eye had looked straight at Amara Bellam and whispered just loud enough for her and the two men beside her to hear.

“Those who brought about my imprisonment will pay. My family will see to it.”

Although her eyewitness testimony had played a large part in his conviction, at the time Jimmy Sparks had uttered his threat, Amara had thought his reaction was nothing more than knee-jerk. After all, life in prison for someone of his dubious health surely meant he wouldn’t see the free light of day ever again.

But the word
family
crept into her head more and more often as the weeks following his incarceration crept by. It took root when Lieutenant Michaels of the New Orleans Police Department contacted her with the news that one of her two fellow witnesses, Harry Benedict, was dead.

“Now, don’t panic.” Michaels patted the air in front of her. “Remember, Harry had close to two decades on Jimmy.”

“Lieutenant, Jimmy Sparks is the two-pack-a-day head of a large criminal family. He has a dozen relatives to do his legwork. Harry was a hale and hearty seventy-nine-year-old athlete who hiked across Maryland just last year.”

“Which is very likely why he died of a massive coronary just last night.” The detective made another useless patting motion. “Really, you don’t need to panic over this.”

“I’m not panicking.”

“No, you’re not.” His hand dropped. “Well, that makes one of you. Chad, our overstressed third witness, knocked back two glasses of bourbon while I was explaining the situation.”

“Chad dived off the temperance wagon right after Jimmy Sparks whispered his threat to us.” She rubbed her arms. “Are you sure Harry died of natural causes?”

“The path lab said it was heart failure, pure and simple. The man had a history, Amara. Two significant attacks in the past five years.”

Hale and hearty, though, she recalled after Michaels left.

For the next few weeks she fought her jitters with an overload of work. Even so, fear continued to curl in Amara’s stomach. She had thought she might be starting to get past it when the harried lieutenant appeared on her doorstep once again.

“Chad’s dead.” She saw it in his dog-tired expression. “Damn.”

The lieutenant spread his fingers. “I’m sorry, Amara. And before you ask, the official cause, as determined by the coroner’s office, is accidental suicide.”

“This is not happening.” A shiver of pure terror snaked through her system. When the detective spoke her name, she raised both hands. “Please don’t try to convince me that suicides can’t be arranged.”

“Of course they can, but Chad Weaver was surrounded by eleven friends when he collapsed—in his home, at a party arranged by him and to which he invited every person in attendance. No one crashed the event, and the drugs and alcohol he ingested were his own.”

She swung around to stare. “Chad took drugs?”

“Like the booze, he got into them after Jimmy Sparks’s trial. As witnesses, you all had—er, have—impeccable credentials.”

“Right. Credentials.” Feeling her world had tilted radically, Amara headed for her Garden District balcony and some much needed night air. “Mind’s really spinning here, Lieutenant. What kinds of drugs did Chad take?”

The cop rubbed his brow. “Ecstasy, mostly. A little coke. Might’ve smoked some weed earlier in the day.”

She made a negating motion. “No chance that any of those substances could’ve been tampered with prepurchase, huh?”

“Amara...”

Her sarcastic tone didn’t quite mask the anger beginning to churn inside her. “It’s a fair question, Lieutenant. We’re talking about street dealers, people who aren’t exactly pillars of the community. Are you saying that, given the right inducement, not one of them could or would have slipped a little extra something into the goody bags Chad bought?”

“The coroner is convinced it was—”

“Yes, I heard that part. Accidental death.”

“Suicide.”

It cost her a great deal to work up a smile. “I guess we’ll find out, won’t we?” She struggled to maintain her composure. “I can read your face, Michaels. You’re going to tell me there’s nothing you can do in terms of police protection. I mean, on the off chance the coroner is mistaken.”

The detective regarded the toes of his scuffed shoes. “Massive coronary for Harry. Private party for Chad. No one except the three of you and me heard Jimmy’s threat. The media would love to jump all over this, but they won’t, because the powers that be are well aware of Jimmy Sparks’s many and varied connections. Sure, the odd question is bound to surface, but they’ll die as quickly as they’re born. After all, there’s no evidence of wrongdoing in either case.”

“I suppose not. Well, then.” Amara took a deep breath. “At the risk of sounding paranoid, do you have any suggestions as to how I can avoid a date with the forensic team?”

When he raised his head, the steely look in his eyes said it all. “You need to disappear,” he told her. “Get out of the city and go someplace safe.”

“Safe. Great.” She pressed firm fingers into her temples. “Where?”

Tossing a worried look onto the street below, Michaels pulled her away from the wrought iron railing. “Your parents are in South America, aren’t they?”

“Central America. They’re doing medical relief work, have been for the past two years. Mostly with children, Lieutenant. I’m not taking this nightmare to them.”

“You have relatives in Maine, don’t you?”

“What? Yes—no.”

“We’ll go with the first answer.” When the lights bobbed, he closed the French doors and pulled the curtains. “Let’s do it this way. You pack, make whatever calls you need to, and I’ll drive you to the airport.” He managed a feeble grin. “If there’s one thing I’m good at, it’s shaking criminal tails.”

Amara’s mind swam. “Surely Jimmy Sparks’s family will have the airport covered.”

“Not in Jackson, Mississippi. I know this guy, Amara. It won’t be a group hunt so much as a single-person stalk.”

“As in one person sent to make sure I choke to death on a bite of crawfish or drop dead on the sidewalk from a nonexistent blood clot that’ll dissolve before... God, what am I saying? No, wait, what am I doing?” She turned to face him. “I can’t endanger the lives of my family members. You know I can’t.”

“You can, and you should. Most of those family members live in a spooky little town in a remote and densely wooded section of coastal Maine. Raven’s Cove is your best and safest option right now.”

She stared at him for five long seconds before countering with a flat “It’s Raven’s Hollow, and I will call my grandmother. I’ll explain the situation. But if she’s the least bit hesitant, I’m choosing another destination.”

“Deal.” He ran his gaze over the ceiling when the lights bobbed again. “Pack only what you need.”

What she needed, Amara reflected, was a time machine. Unfortunately all she had was her iPhone, her grandmother’s number and a waning glimmer of hope that she’d ever see anyone in or out of Raven’s Hollow, Maine, again.

Chapter Three

“I’ve already broken up two bar fights tonight, Chief, and the crowd here’s spoiling for more.” Jake Blume’s tone, surly at the best of times, soured. “It’s gonna be a free-for-all by the time this two-town party—which ain’t no kind of party, in my opinion—plays out. Still three days to go and the hooligans on both sides are making their feelings known with their fists.” His voice dropped to a growl. “What do you want me to do about tonight’s ruckus?”

McVey heard about half of what his griping deputy related. More important to him than a minor barroom scuffle was the TV across the room where the Chicago Cubs were cheerfully mopping up Wrigley Field with his beloved Dodgers.

“Run,” he told the slow-motion hitter who’d just slugged the ball to the fence.

“From a bar fight?” Jake gave a contemptuous snort. “This town ain’t turned me into a girl yet, McVey.”

“Talking to the television, Deputy.” Disgusted by yet another out, McVey took a long drink of beer and muted the sound. “Okay, which bar and what kind of damage are we talking about?”

“It’s the Red Eye in the Hollow—a town I’m still trying to understand why we’re working our butts off to cover so its police chief can sun his sorry ass in Florida for the next couple weeks.”

“Man’s on his honeymoon, Jake.” Amusement glimmered. “The novelty’ll wear off soon enough.”

His deputy gave another snort. “Said one confirmed bachelor to another.”

“I was never confirmed—and that was a ball,” he told the onscreen umpire.

“Look, if I’m interrupting...”

“You’re not.” McVey dangled the beer bottle between his knees and rubbed a tired eye. “I assume the damage at the Red Eye is minimal.”

“As bar fights go in these parts.”

“Then give whoever threw the first punch a warning, make the participants pay up and remind everyone involved that it’s you who’s on duty tonight, not me.”

“Meaning?”

“You’ve got a shorter fuse, zero tolerance and, between the towns, six empty jail cells just begging to be filled.”

“Good point.” Jake cheered up instantly. “Can I threaten to cuff ’em?”

“Your discretion, Deputy. After you’re done, head back to the Cove. I’ll be in at first light to relieve you.”

When he glanced over and saw his team had eked out two hits, McVey gave his head a long, slow roll and sat back to think.

In the fourteen months since he’d arrived in Raven’s Cove, he’d only had the dream five times, which was a hell and gone better average than he’d had during his six years with the Chicago Police Department or the nearly eight he’d put in in New York. At least once a month in both places, he’d found himself up in a smoke-filled attic while a woman he still couldn’t place told him she was going to screw up his memories. Not that he’d given up city life over anything as nebulous as a dream. His reasons had run a whole lot deeper.... And was that a floorboard he’d just heard creak upstairs?

With the bottle poised halfway to his mouth, he listened, heard nothing and, taking another long swallow, switched his attention back to the TV.

A third run by the Dodgers gave him hope. A screech of hinges from an interior door had him raising his eyes to the ceiling yet again.

Okay, so not alone. And wasn’t that a timely thing, considering he’d received two emails lately warning him that a man with secrets should watch the shadows around him very, very closely?

Standing, he shoved his gun into the waistband of his jeans, killed the light and started up the rear stairs.

The wind that had been blowing at near-gale force all day howled around the single-paned windows. Even so, he caught a second creak. He decided his intruder could use a little stealth training. Then he stepped on a sagging tread, heard the loud protest and swore.

The intruder must have heard it, too. The upstairs door that had been squeaking open immediately stopped moving.

Drawing his weapon, McVey gave his eyes another moment to adjust and finished the climb. He placed the intruder in the kitchen. Meaning the guy had the option of slinking out the way he’d entered—through the back door—or holding position to see what developed. Whatever the case, McVey had the advantage in that he’d been living in the house for more than two weeks and had committed the odd layout to memory.

Another door gave a short creak and he pictured the intruder circling.

The anticipation that kindled felt good. Sleepy coastal towns worked for him on several levels these days. Unfortunately, as action went, they tended to be...well, frankly, dead. Unless you counted the increasing number of bar fights and the sniping of two local factions, each of which had its own legend, and neither of which was willing to admit that both legends had probably been created by an ancient—and presumably bored—Edgar Allan Poe wannabe.

Another blast of wind rattled the panes and sent a damp breeze over McVey’s face. It surprised him to see a light burning in the mudroom. Apparently his intruder was extremely stupid, poorly equipped or unaware that he’d broken into the police chief’s current residence. The last idea appealed most, but as it also seemed the least likely, McVey continued to ease through the house.

He spotted the shadow just as the wind—he assumed wind—slammed the kitchen door shut. The bang echoed beneath a wicked gust that buffeted the east wall and caused the rafters to moan.

Shoving the gun into his jeans, he went for a low tackle. If the person hadn’t swung around and allowed a weak beam of light to trickle through from the mudroom, he would have taken them both hard to the floor. But his brain clicked in just fast enough that he was able to alter his trajectory, snag the intruder by the waist and twist them both around so only he landed on the pine planking.

His head struck the table, his shoulder the edge of a very solid chair. To make matters worse, his trapped quarry rammed an elbow into his ribs, wriggled around and clawed his left cheek.

He caught the raised hand before it could do any serious damage and, using his body weight, reversed their positions. “Knock it—” was all he got out before his instincts kicked in and he blocked the knee that was heading for his groin.

Jesus, enough!

Teeth gnashed and with pain shooting through his skull, he brought his eyes into focus on the stunning and furious face of the woman from his nightmare.

* * *

F
EAR STREAKED THROUGH
Amara’s mind, not for her own safety, but for that of her grandmother who’d lived in this house for close to seventy years.

Although she was currently pinned to the floor with her hands over her head and her wrists tightly cuffed, she attempted to knee him again. When that failed, she bucked her hips up into his. If she could loosen his iron grip, she might be able to sink her teeth into his forearm.