The Sinner (13 page)

He searched my face, something tugging at the corners of his mouth. A smile? A grimace? I really couldn't say. “I don't think you're
just
anything,” he said. “There's a lot going on inside your head. You see things, don't you? You know how to probe into the deepest shadows. You know how to read between the lines. You may not be a detective, but my guess is, there's not a lot that gets by you. And to certain people, that makes you a very dangerous woman.”

Eighteen

A
fter Kendrick left the house that evening, I remained on the porch for the longest time, trying to sort through my feelings and make sense of my reaction to him. No matter how many times I resolved to keep my distance, no matter how strongly my internal alarms sounded, I couldn't subdue a growing fascination.

The way he'd looked at me in the fading light...that dangerous edge in his voice.
“You may not be a detective, but my guess is, there's not a lot that gets by you. And to certain people, that makes you a very dangerous woman.”

To him? I wondered.

Dancing so close to a flame could be thrilling, I had to admit, but I could easily get burned if I wasn't careful. Maybe I was wrong and Kendrick really was nothing more than a small-town police detective, but I couldn't bring myself to buy that. I couldn't help wondering if he'd come to Ascension for the same purpose as the woman in the caged grave. Maybe he, too, was
Congé
. That would explain his return to the Lowcountry after years of being away. It might even explain the undeniable pull I felt for him.

But there was something else that worried me, a burrowing suspicion that kept me awake long after I'd turned in that night. How could I be certain that any of my experiences in Ascension were real? If the smoke had been conjured by Darius Goodwine and if the dead woman lumbering through the cemetery had been nothing more than one of his tricks, then how could I know if my attraction to Kendrick was anything more than a malicious manipulation?

Despite my instincts and the heightened senses that came with my gift, I could still be fooled by the likes of Darius Goodwine or a resurrected Atticus Pope or even by Lucien Kendrick himself. I felt certain none of these men had my best interest at heart and all of them had their own secret agenda.

As I lay there in the sweltering darkness with the covers pulled to my chin and Essie's charm tucked underneath my pillow, I had never felt more confused or more alone. And Devlin had never seemed farther away.

* * *

Days went by and I saw Detective Kendrick only in passing. No one from the Ascension Police Department came to follow up on my complaint, nor did I call into the station. If there had been news or another sighting of the man in the mask, someone would have surely notified me.

Occasionally, I would see Kendrick's vehicle parked at the edge of the road near the cemetery, along with James Rushing's, but neither man approached me and I kept my distance from the circle. I spent my time cleaning headstones and cutting away brush and vines until my arms and shoulders ached and perspiration soaked through my clothing.

The heat remained relentless. Every afternoon, dark clouds gathered in the distance, and sometimes at night I could see flickers of dry lightning on the horizon, but the rain never came. The air grew heavy with waiting. I began to wish fervently for a thunderstorm to break the tension, but I knew the weather was the least of my worries. I was on pins and needles because of everything that had happened and for what I feared was still to come.

At night I would lie in bed listening for furtive footsteps or strange sounds coming from the front bedroom. By day, I searched the shadows at the edge of the woods for the watcher, but if he still lurked in the trees, I never sensed him. The days and nights passed uneventfully and this, too, made me nervous. Beneath the tranquility, I sensed the restless stir of something evil.

Every morning before I left the house, I scoured the online edition of the local paper for any mention of the murder investigation or the remains that had been found in the center circle, but little was to be gleaned from the articles. Evidently, Detective Kendrick had clamped down on the flow of information, so much so that I didn't even know if the victim had been identified.

I thought about her a lot, that nameless woman from the caged grave. It seemed wrong that no one had come forward to claim her. Surely, she'd had a family, friends, someone who missed her. But if she were
Congé
as Essie had said, then maybe she'd been working undercover. Maybe no one knew of her whereabouts.

I still had a hard time accepting that such a group existed—a stealth faction with a mission to stamp out the unnatural in whatever form it assumed.
“Someone with your gift and abilities would do well to steer clear,”
Darius had warned me. It seemed impossible to fathom that I should find myself in the crosshairs of two old and opposing alliances when all I wanted was to restore Seven Gates Cemetery in peace. When all I'd ever wanted was to live a quiet and normal life.

But that was not to be and I had every right to be on edge. By all indications, I'd been dragged into something larger and darker, something far more sinister than anything I'd yet encountered. Forces were gathering and I didn't feel at all prepared for what would be expected of me. For what I might have to do in order to survive.

As the week progressed, however, things gradually returned to normal and my worries abated, as they tended to do during the quiet times. I was able to enjoy my days in the cemetery without glancing over my shoulder every few minutes or tensing at the slightest sound. I even managed to get a good night's sleep now and then.

But I wasn't so lulled by the calm as to remain unfazed by the sight of Darius Goodwine lurking near the church ruins one afternoon. I put up a hand to shade my eyes as the blood in my veins turned to ice. Even as I braced myself against his magnetism and trickery, I found myself rising and abandoning my work to move across the cemetery toward him.

It was late in the day and I could hear voices drifting up from the clearing as Kendrick and Rushing continued their exploration of the circle. Angus hunkered in the shade of the cottonwoods watching a squirrel. His presence should have been reassuring, but I felt the tug of an ominous premonition as I wove my way through the headstones. Why had Darius come back? And what would he require of me this time?

He stood silhouetted in one of the openings—waiting for me, I assumed. But as I neared the structure, he disappeared inside. I glanced over my shoulder. Angus hadn't moved from his spot in the shade. He was so focused on the scurry of feet across the tree branches that he didn't seem to notice me at all.

I turned back to the ruins. Very little remained of the church beyond the brick facade. The roof had long since collapsed and the back walls had crumbled almost to the ground. Through the arches, I could see the woods beyond the fence and the spangle of sunlight down through the branches.

I told myself there was nothing to be afraid of inside those ruins, and yet as I followed Darius through the arch, the premonition deepened and a smothering claustrophobia threatened to bring me to my knees. I stood just inside the doorway for several long minutes, breathing deeply as I tried to fight off a panicky tightness in my throat and chest.

Despite the open roof, much of the interior lay in deep shade. Vines from the forest crept over the walls and snaked across the stone floor. Weeds grew in profusion. The air smelled dank and fishy, not unlike the bait shop I'd gone to as a child with Papa. I hadn't much cared for that place. The buckets of earthworms and night crawlers in damp earth had turned my stomach. A strange reaction, perhaps, since I found the smell of a cemetery soothing.

I searched the tenebrous recesses for Darius Goodwine. “Where are you?” I called softly.

“Here,” he said from the shadows. “Can't you see me?” His voice was low and resonant. Otherworldly.

Wrapping my arms around my middle, I took another few steps inside. I spotted him then, or thought I did. Maybe my eyes were still dazzled from the sunlight, but like the man in the mask, his form seemed to waver in and out of reality. I had no doubt that he was there, though. In one form or another.

A breeze rippled his loose clothing, and when he moved, a trail of blue sparks followed him. I could smell the ozone of his presence, could hear a faint tinkle from the metal charms he wore around his neck and wrist. I wondered how I could take in all these details if he only existed in my head.

“Are you real?” I murmured.

His white teeth flashed in the gloom. “I'm as real as you need or want me to be.”

“I don't need or want you at all,” I said. “You're the one who keeps seeking me out.”

“But there was a time when you came to me and now we have unfinished business. A score to settle, as it were.”

I sighed. I had always known it would eventually come back to the debt that I owed him for bringing Devlin back from the other side. “What is it you want from me this time?”

“Our bargain remains the same. Expose the killer and I'll help you find your great-grandmother's key.”

“You make it sound so easy.”

“Not easy, but necessary. I told you before, he'll kill again if you don't stop him.”

“Atticus Pope, you mean.” The very mention of the witch doctor's name seemed to have a chilling effect on both of us. My heart started to hammer in trepidation and I couldn't help glancing over my shoulder. No one was about. The cemetery remained sun-drenched and empty, yet I felt we were being watched.

As for Darius, he'd moved back so deeply into the shadows that I thought for a moment he'd disappeared altogether. Even the scent of ozone had faded.

I took a few more steps inside the ruins. I was well away from the arches now. Too far to make a dash back into the sunlight if I felt threatened. “If you know Atticus Pope is responsible for that woman's death, then why not tell the police? You could do it anonymously if you don't want to get involved.”

“And tell them what? That a man who died twenty years ago now hides in the body of another? What do you think their response would be?”

He was right, of course. Even if Kendrick remained open-minded, that would be a hard pill to swallow. “Do you know who Pope is now?”

“Only you can unmask him.”

“Then how can you be sure it's him? How do you know he's come back?”

“The signs are all there,” Darius said. “You just have to know where to look.”

He pointed to a place on the wall between two of the arches and I turned to follow his direction. The vines and foliage had been recently chopped away to reveal a large triskele that had been etched into the surface of the brick.

I glanced at Darius. “I don't understand. What does that prove?”

“This was his place. He's come back to claim it.”

I scoured the ruins anxiously. “I never noticed before how unsettling it is to be inside here.”

“You're only now opening yourself up to the vibrations,” Darius said. “To the dark emotions that reside here. During all the months that you've worked near these ruins, the key you wear around your neck has protected you. It allowed you to deny your true nature by blocking their screams, but you can't keep them silenced forever. Just like the ghosts of Kroll Cemetery, they demand to be heard.”

“How do you know about the ghosts of Kroll Cemetery?” I asked with a frown.

“I know everything about you. Your whole life is right there in your head, right there in your dreams. Buried deep, some of it, but not too difficult to find if one knows where to look.”

The notion of him having access to my private dreams and buried memories terrified me, but I didn't bother trying to shut him out because I was no match for his cunning. Not yet, anyway. “Is that why you brought me here? To show me that symbol?”

He put a finger to his lips to silence me as he lifted his head, listening. I did the same, but I heard nothing beyond the sawing of the breeze through the trees.

“What is it?” I asked, but I wasn't sure I wanted to know. I wished fervently to go back to the peace and quiet of early summer before I'd stumbled upon those mortsafes. I wanted to end my day with the lull of a sea breeze and the sway of the hammock and the satisfying exhaustion of hard work. I wanted to hide behind the protection of Rose's key until everything went back to the way it had been before Darius Goodwine's arrival, but I knew in my heart there was no turning back. I'd passed the point of no return the moment I followed him into the ruins. I had no choice but to do his bidding because he wouldn't leave me alone now that my defenses had tumbled.

“Listen,” he said. “Just listen to them.”

I had the urge to press my hands to my ears and block out whatever had endured inside that abandoned place, but instead I forced my gaze to move slowly over the symbol. The linking spirals were oddly hypnotic. I felt myself weave as a cold sweat broke out on my forehead.

“Don't fight it,” Darius said, his lyrical cadence deceptively mesmeric. “Let them in.”

My hands clenched into fists at my sides as if I could somehow defy his witchery. But I felt an all too familiar tightness in my chest as my stomach began to churn. “I'm not well,” I said. “I need some air.”

“Let them in.”

My ears began to roar. The day was still and silent and yet suddenly I felt as if I'd been caught in a powerful vortex, one that might sweep me off my feet and carry me into the next world if I let it. I tried to move back toward the arches, but a terrible vertigo seized me. I fell to the floor on hands and knees as the world tilted and the arches, the cemetery and all the trees in the forest began to spin around me.

Over the howl of that rushing wind, I heard their screams. I could even catch a glimpse of their wavering forms in a twilight corner of the ruins. Two young girls chained and terrified, their agonized wails echoing for eternity inside those fragmented walls.

I dropped all the way to the floor, curling myself in a ball as I reached for Rose's key, clutching it tightly until the dizziness began to pass. I heard Angus whimper as if from a great distance, but he didn't come into the ruins and I didn't call to him. I lay there until my world finally settled and then I sat up, hugging my knees to my chest as I sought Darius Goodwine in the half-light.