The Sinner (19 page)

“Come take a look at this one.”

I walked over to the door, bending to get a better look but taking care not to brush up against him.

He adjusted the light for me. “Does anything about that lock seem strange to you?”

“Strange in what way? It looks like a normal padlock to me.”

“Keep looking.”

I leaned in closer, searching for aberrations in the steel or in the design. Then the importance of the engraved emblem struck me and I glanced up at Kendrick in surprise. “It's an owl's head. The same symbol that was on the mortsafe padlock. I heard Martin Stark talking about it when he came to the clearing that day.” I took another look. “This can't be a coincidence, can it?”

“Depends on the popularity of the lock and local availability. I'm not about to jump to any conclusions, but I'll admit it's piqued my curiosity. I'd be interested in finding out when this lock was purchased and by whom.”

“Maybe you should talk to Stark about that,” I said, remembering my own enlightening conversation with the locksmith. “You said the emblem has piqued your curiosity, but I think it's done more than that. It confirms something you already suspected, doesn't it? You always try to downplay or even deny it, but there's a connection between what happened twenty years ago and what's happening now. No matter what you say, I still think that's why you felt compelled to warn me about the Willoughby house.”

His gaze deepened. “I told you about the house because I thought you had a right to know.”

“Why? The Willoughbys died a long time ago. Why was it necessary for me to know their history if it has nothing to do with the present-day murder?”

“You know why.”

“I have no idea.”

We were still standing close, a mere breath apart. The light was angled at the lock, but the way it bounced off the building cast shadows across Kendrick's face, making my pulse race.

He lifted a hand as if to touch my hair, then seemed to think better of it. But his gaze was still on me, peering into my eyes and whispering over my lips until my knees grew weak.

“I understand your reluctance.” His voice was low and unbearably intimate in the dark. “The world is full of disbelievers, but I'm not one of them. You don't have to hide from me.”

“I don't...” Whatever I'd meant to say vanished as I became mesmerized by his golden stare. His eyes were at once dark and softly glowing and I felt inexorably drawn to him in a way I never would have thought possible after Devlin.

The scruff on his lower face was more pronounced in the reflected light and I had the strongest urge to run the back of my hand along the prickly texture, to trace a finger down that mysterious raised scar tissue at the back of his neck. My heart beat very hard against my chest and I felt breathless and anxious because I knew something was about to happen. A step was about to be taken that could change everything or perhaps nothing at all.

I didn't see Kendrick move toward me, but suddenly I felt a hand on my arm, warm and slightly roughened from calluses. It was a light touch, neither threatening nor seductive. The gesture was meant to reassure, but the contact made me tremble just the same.

His expression flickered, and for a moment, his guard dropped and an air of loneliness descended. I saw pain and longing in his eyes and the shadow of an old fear that made me want to offer him comfort. I thought again about that moment in the cemetery when a look had passed between us, a fleeting solidarity that had forged a bond whether I wanted to acknowledge it or not.

Without warning, my mind cleared and I found myself drifting into his past, settling into one of his memories. Before me was a young Lucien Kendrick with unkempt hair and an already jaded demeanor. He stoodstanding outside an old train station in Paris, a duffel bag in one hand and a backpack thrown over his shoulder. I recognized the writing on the building from my short stay in the city of lights.
Gare de l'Est.

It was just getting on dusk and he was dressed for the cold. His frosted breath floated out among the ghosts that hovered in the recessed doorways and alleys.

“Ils sont déjà là. Partout.”
A woman stood just beyond the fringes of the streetlamp. She wore a heavy wool coat and a silk headscarf that covered her hair and part of her face, but I somehow knew she was Kendrick's grandmother.

“Do you see them?” she asked in English as she pulled her coat tightly about her frail body.

“Only glimpses,” he said. “But even in this weather, I can feel their cold.”

She stepped out of the shadows and put a hand to his cheek. “You understand why they are drawn to us? What we must do because of our gift?”

“Oui.”

“Ours is a noble calling. Remember that in the dark times,
mon petit prince
. Remember me.”

“Always,
Mamiluce
.”

“Bon voyage.”
She hugged him fiercely, kissing both of his cheeks before fading back into the shadows of his memory.

He stepped into the glow of the streetlamp, his gaze meeting mine across the wet street, across the long years and through the misty twilight, before a wall finally came up. That was all he would allow me to see, but it was enough.

He wasn't
Congé
. He was a ghost-seer. He had walked my dark path. He had known my fears and loneliness. And now he was offering me, what? Solace? Understanding?

And what would he expect in return? I wondered with a shiver.

Twenty-Five

F
ar more important questions needed to be asked. How had Kendrick known about me in the first place? What had I done to give myself away to him?

From the moment we met, I'd sensed that he knew things about me. I had assumed that he'd researched me on his way to the caged graves that first day, but now I was forced to consider the possibility that his interest went beyond my role as a material witness in a murder investigation. Perhaps even beyond the ghosts. Could he have been the watcher in the woods? Was he the one who had summoned me to that airless circle?

His eyes shimmered in that strange, yellow light. I didn't trust myself to speak, but so many more questions bubbled inside me. Had he always been aware of the ghosts or, like me, had he acquired the sensitivity in early childhood? Had he been sent to live with his grandmother because she shared his sight? Did he know about hallowed ground? Had he been given rules to follow?

And what had his grandmother meant by the nobleness of their calling?

“Do you understand now why I felt compelled to warn you?” He slid his hand up my arm, a feathery touch that made my breath catch. “I was afraid of what you might find in that house. Of what might find you.”

I still couldn't bring myself to open up about my gift. So much was at stake and secrecy had been too deeply ingrained. “I don't understand anything. This house, this town...you.”

He trailed both hands over my shoulders, cupping my neck as he gently caressed my jawline with his thumbs. His touch mesmerized me and yet I felt anything but languid.

“I don't know if we should,” I said, my voice raw with nerves.

“Is there someone else?”

My hesitation was slight. “Not anymore.”

“But there was. Someone important.”

I nodded.

He stared into my eyes, searching for a way in. I tried to glance away, but he wouldn't let me. His fingers slid into my tangled hair as he lowered his lips to mine. But he didn't kiss me. He remained so close and my chest was suddenly so tight that I wondered if he'd stolen my breath.

I kept my hands at my sides, but they itched to touch him. I wanted more than anything to thread my fingers through his hair and tug him to me until that minuscule distance between our lips had closed. I wanted to run my hands over his biceps and shoulders and press myself against him as my tongue tasted his skin. I pictured myself opening his shirt and unfastening his belt as I sank slowly to the ground.

In that moment, I craved him as surely as a ghost hungers for life and that desperate longing should have worried me. I was a careful person. I'd paid dearly for throwing caution to the wind and now I knew better. Lowering my guard was never a wise option, especially when I couldn't be certain that my feelings were even real.

Tread carefully
, a voice whispered through the haze.
And trust no one.

Kendrick's head came up. “What was that?”

I was still so lost in my fantasy that his question barely registered. “What?”

“You didn't hear that noise?”

“No... I...”

“Shush. There it is again.” He cocked his head toward the door, his expression grim as his hands fell away from me. “You were right. Something is locked inside the shed.”

That jarred me back to earth. “Oh, my God.”

“It's not a person,” he quickly assured me. “I think it's a cat. A stray, most likely. Sounds like it may be wounded.”

“Wounded?” I shook off the last of that betraying fog as I pressed my ear to the door. I heard it then, a soft, faraway mewling that tugged at my heart. “Oh, it's a kitten! We can't just leave it in there. We have to help it.”

“If we're not too late.”

His words conjured distressing images and I said urgently, “We still have to try.”

He nodded. “I'll see if I can get one of the windows open.” He moved away from the door, brushing my shoulder and making me all too aware of my momentary lapse and my still-thudding heart. I felt dismayed and not a little embarrassed as I followed him around to the side of the building.

“Can you see anything?” I asked anxiously as he shined the flashlight beam into the window.

“Looks like a bunch of old furniture and equipment.” He placed the flashlight on the ledge and tried the window. Layers of paint and grime had sealed the frame tight, but after a few tries, he managed to get it open. Hitching himself over the sill, he reached for the flashlight, and then ran the beam over the walls and floors as he searched the interior.

“I smell decay,” he said. “Probably a dead rat.”

“What about the kitten?”

“No sign of life yet. Unless you count spiders.”

I braced myself against a twinge of arachnophobia. “Is there a light?”

He disappeared for a moment and then came back to the window. “No power.”

“That's too bad.”

He reached a hand down to me. “Are you coming in?”

“Yes,” I said without hesitation.

He clasped my wrists and easily lifted me off the ground. Once I had my upper body over the sill, I pulled myself through, and then glanced around as he passed the light over the piles of furniture. I caught a glimpse of his face in a mirror. The sight startled and intrigued me because somehow his reflection looked different. Or had my perception of him changed?

“All this stuff must be leftovers from the Willoughbys' antique business,” he said.

I turned in a slow circle, lifting my gaze to the roof. “The place is literally packed to the rafters.”

“Some of it may even be valuable. Strange that Annalee would leave it out here to mildew and rot.”

“Maybe she found the memories too painful to deal with it. Then again, she claims to have no recall of what happened in here.”

Kendrick turned. “Claims?”

“That's what you said, isn't it?” But Annalee did have memories. Perhaps buried so deeply that the images only surfaced during her blackouts, but they were there just the same. “Officer Malloy told me a story of when he and Annalee were children. She once lured him in here and locked him inside an old wardrobe. He wasn't found for hours.”

“Sounds like a typical kid prank.”

“I suppose so. But it's easy to imagine his terror, isn't it? To be trapped inside a confined space, not knowing whether you'll ever get out.”

We both fell silent, listening for the telltale cries. I sensed nothing unnatural in the building. No ghosts or the evil that had allegedly taken possession of Mary Willoughby's body, driving her husband to murder her while she slept. And yet there was something disquieting about that place, apart from the spiders and the smell.

Kendrick was still moving the light slowly over the stacks of furniture and up under some of the larger pieces.

“Do you see anything?” I asked.

“Not yet,” he muttered as he knelt to run the beam across the floorboards.

I watched him curiously. “Why do I get the feeling you're looking for something besides a wounded kitten?”

“Someone was in here earlier. We need to figure out what they were up to.”

“So you believe me now,” I said on a breath.

“I've seen no evidence, but I doubt it's wise to bet against your intuition and observations.”

I told myself now was the perfect time to open up a little about my gift, return the insight he had allowed me earlier. But our moment of bonding had passed and my self-preservation had returned. I needed to watch myself with Kendrick. Whether intentional or not, he'd shown me a memory that mirrored the loneliness of my childhood and I had to be careful that I didn't succumb to a false sense of kinship.

I watched him in silence as he moved about the crowded space, squeezing between heavy pieces of furniture to peer into web-draped corners.

“What about the other rooms?” I asked. “Can you go all the way to the back of the building?”

“Not easily. There's too much stuff in the way and it looks as if the doorway has been barricaded.”

“Maybe that explains the hammering.”

Stepping onto a box, Kendrick hoisted himself to the top of an old wardrobe—perhaps the very one that Malloy had been confined in—and then used the wooden beams to propel himself over the furniture.

He had only progressed a short distance when I heard the mewling. “There! Did you hear it? I think it's coming from beneath the floorboards.”

“Hold on.” He backtracked along the beams and swung down from a rafter to land at my feet. We both stood listening for a moment.

“I think you're right,” he said. “It's under the floor.”

“Should we go outside and look?”

“I don't think we can get to it from outside. If the animal is sick or wounded, its mother may have abandoned him. He probably crawled up under the floor as far as he could to hide from predators.”

I thought of the way Angus had looked, beaten and starved, when he crept out of the woods in Asher Falls. I hated to think what would have happened to him if he hadn't found me, just as I hated to think about a frightened and possibly wounded kitten cowering beneath our feet.

I was fully prepared to rip up the floorboards with my bare hands if need be, but Kendrick reasonably suggested we try and pinpoint the cries first. He cleared some of the lighter pieces of furniture out of the way and then knelt to glance under an old library table. From what I could see in the dim light, the piece looked massive. We were both strong, but I doubted our ability to move the heavy table without help.

“Can you still hear it?” I asked worriedly.

“You're the one with the superhuman hearing,” he said. “You tell me.”

I crouched beside him, listening so intently that I fancied I could hear the scurry of spider legs up the walls. But the mewling had stopped and I wondered if we'd scared the poor creature back into a hidey-hole. I remained frozen, my senses attuned to the darkness. After a moment, a plaintive cry rose up through the floorboards.

“There,” I whispered, pointing to the spot where the sound had apparently emanated.

Kendrick maneuvered under the table and flattened himself on the floor as he ran his hands over the planks.

“I feel a slight draft coming up through the cracks,” he said, sweeping aside cobwebs that hung from beneath the table. “Which is odd because the shed sits on a concrete foundation. This place is solidly built. You can tell by walking across the floor. Not much give and take or even creaking for an old building.”

“Then how did the kitten get up under the floor?”

“Who knows? Right now I'm trying to figure out where that draft is coming from. Roll the light to me, please.”

I upended the flashlight and gave it a shove. The arcing beam cast leaping shadows on the walls, making the place seem truly haunted. I had no trouble imagining a distraught George Willoughby closed up in that desolate room, brooding about what he had done to his wife as he worked up the courage to take his own life. The images were so vivid that I wondered if I had somehow slipped into his memory. But George Willoughby had been dead for a long time and so far I'd yet to encounter even his ghost.

Kendrick rapped on one of the planks and then moved his hand over a few inches. “Do you hear the difference?” He repeated the knocking.

“Sounds hollow,” I said.

“There's a hole beneath the floor. I don't know how an animal managed to get inside, but I think that's where we'll find our stray.” He glanced back at me. “I saw some tools on a table near the window. See if you can find a crowbar or hammer, anything we can use to pry up these boards.”

I collected the tools and then hurried back over to shimmy up under the table.

“The draft is coming from this spot,” Kendrick said. “Can you feel it?”

“Yes, but...” I stopped to listen.

“What's the matter?”

“The cries are getting weaker.”

“He's probably just frightened by all the noise. But we should hurry before he decides to crawl off somewhere out of reach. Move back a little so I don't hit you with my elbow.”

I pushed away, holding the light steady for him. He fitted the claw of the hammer beneath a nail, taking care not to splinter the wood as he prized it loose. Within a matter of moments, he'd removed several boards, revealing the source of the draft.

A circle had been cut in the concrete subfloor and fitted with a metal grate that was roughly the size of a manhole cover.

“What is that?” I asked as I moved back up beside him.

“Could be an old well or cistern.” He shined the light down through the grate. “The cover was probably put in place before the shed was built to keep someone from falling in.”

“I wonder why they didn't fill it with concrete when they poured the foundation.”

“Too costly, maybe. It looks pretty deep.”

A terrible dread came over me. There was something strange about that hole. Something sinister. I felt a powerful urge to look over my shoulder as I remembered Dr. Shaw's warnings about sacrifices and torture and young girls being held against their will.

From the bottom of the pit came a piercing yowl. If the kitten had been frightened into silence before, now he seemed determined to alert us of his whereabouts.

I moved in closer, trying to get a glimpse through the grate as Kendrick aimed the flashlight straight down through the layers of cobwebs and shadows.

“Can you see the bottom?” I asked.

“No. It's pretty murky down there. Too many spiderwebs.”

I could feel those tiny feet crawling all over me now, but I ignored the sensation as I focused on helping Kendrick remove the metal grid. The hinges had rusted in place and we couldn't get leverage in such cramped quarters.

After a few minutes of pulling and tugging, I pushed back in frustration. “The thing won't budge. We'll never get it off without moving the table and I don't think we can do that by ourselves.” I hated to think of the hours that would be eaten away if we had to wait for help. Who knew how badly the kitten was injured or how long it had been constrained in that terrible place. If we didn't get it out of there now, we might be too late.