The Skull Ring (27 page)

Master?

Dr. Forrest continued, in that soft, mesmerizing cadence. "We don't want you to fight it any longer, Julia.
He
doesn't want you to fight. He's been very patient with you because he cares for you so very much."

"
Who
cares?" Julia wasn't sure if she'd said the words aloud or not.

"Why does he bother, when he has so much power that he can take easily what is his?"

Julia sensed that Snead had moved from the window, but she couldn't force her eyes open to see. She tried to burrow into the chair to escape the horrors of the past, to keep from sliding into that black, yawning gulf.

Daddy can take what is his. He has always owned you, in life, death, or absence. Daddy can hurt you no matter where you try to hide.

"I'll tell you why, Julia," continued Dr. Forrest. "Because he
loves
you."

Love?

That was the first time Dr. Forrest had ever uttered that word. In all the months of treatment, in these accelerated sessions of the last week, the doctor had talked of sharing, healing, hope, and all the other abstract things that meant nothing. In the religion of the brain, even God was off limits. Now she had to bring out this last hollow word, the one that deserved a special place on the altar of useless words.

Snead's voice came to her as if he was on the foot of the stairs and she were hiding in the attic. "He owns you, Jooolia."

Her eyes snapped open, her abdomen clenched in a knot, her hands curled into fists as she sat forward. She blinked, her vision blurred. Snead still stood by the window.

Dr. Forrest wore her usual look of kind concern. "What's the matter, Julia?"

"What's he doing here?" Julia said, this time staring into Snead's small, dark eyes.

"You asked for him to be here, remember? When I talked to you on the phone last night."

Wait. Didn't Dr. Forrest just say I imagined the phone conversation?

Maybe she shouldn't have tried to resist Dr. Forrest. Because she was confused, her thoughts screwed up. How could she trust her memory when she had long ago lost the ability to tell what had been real? How could she even trust what she thought
now
, much less 23 years ago?

But since a policeman was here, she decided that there was one thing she hadn't imagined, a solid piece of evidence that might prove once and for all that The Creep had been in her house, and that Walter was innocent of breaking and entering. It was something she'd held in her own hands. Even though she didn't trust Snead, at least Dr. Forrest was present as a witness.

"There's something I found the other night," Julia blurted to Snead. "It was in my closet."

Snead's eyebrows arched, and that bug-eating smile slid across his face again. "What's that, Miss Stone?"

"The drawing."

"Drawing?"

She talked rapidly, glad to be relieved of at least one secret. "A picture of a pentagram. With 'Hello Julia' underneath, only 'Julia' was spelled 'Jooolia' with three
O
’s in the middle, just like Daddy used to spell it when he was teasing me."

"Where is this picture now?"

"I gave it to Dr. Forrest."

Dr. Forrest looked sadly at Julia, and then at Snead. The therapist shook her head.

"What?" Julia asked.

Dr. Forrest held her hands apart. "There's no picture, Julia."

She stood. "What do you mean, there's no picture? I gave it to you yesterday, right in this office."

"Please sit down," the therapist said.

"
What did you do with it?
"

"Sit down," the therapist commanded. Julia stared at her.

"She's worse off than I thought," Dr. Forrest said to Snead.

"It's not
me
that's crazy, it's all of
you
." Even as she said the words, she realized that was exactly the kind of thing a crazy person would say.

"Julia!" shouted Dr. Forrest. Snead moved after her, but she was already gone, through the office door and out of the building, into the reeling gray world outside, into her car and then forward into the mad, strange future.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

The climb up the winding road to her house was treacherous, the Subaru's tires squealing with each curve. The asphalt was covered with damp leaves, and a film of mist clung to the surface of the road and the windshield. Julia's panting fogged the window, so she wiped a clear circle with the bottom of her fist. She peered into the thickening gloom ahead, occasionally glancing into the rearview mirror, expecting Snead to come rocketing up behind her with bar lights flashing.

Why are you running? They know where you live. HE knows where you live.

She didn't have any kind of plan. All she wanted to do was get home, slam and lock the door, huddle in the house. But that wasn't an escape. Because, wherever she went, she was always inside her own head. She couldn't outrun the rising tide of shadows.

When Julia drove up, Mabel Covington was on the porch of her big house, leaning on her wooden walking stick, cats prancing around her ankles. The old woman waved frantically with a trembling hand. Julia slowed the car and pulled along the edge of the woman's yard. The apartments were quiet, their tenants off at school or work. Unless the Peeping Tom had his binoculars at the curtain's edge.

Julia rolled down the passenger window as Mrs. Covington hobbled over to the car.

"What is it?" Julia asked, looking down the drive to see if Snead was after her.

"He's here," Mrs. Covington said, her face nearly as white as her thin hair.

"Who's here?"

"He come back." The woman leaned against the door, wheezing as she put her head inside the car.

"The Peeping Tom?"

"Hartley. The one that used to live in your house."

The old woman had gone as mad as the rest of the world. "I'm sorry," Julia said. "I'm in a hurry."

"You don't understand. He was
here
. He was messing around your house. I called the cops, figuring he come back to get something he left."

"Why would he come back here?"

The woman's eyes narrowed, as cold and clouded as marbles. "Didn't nobody ever tell you, child?"

"Tell me what?"

"Oh, Lordy." The old woman backed a few steps away. "You don't know, do you?"

"Tell me what happened," Julia said, suddenly remembering the murder of the little girl that Rick had mentioned. That name, Hartley, struck a dismal note of recognition.

"You must have found out something. I was hoping and praying they'd leave you alone."

"Maybe we'd better go inside."

The old woman shook her head, the weathered flesh of her neck quivering under her chin. "They told me to stay out of it. I done said too much."

Mrs. Covington turned and struggled across the yard and levered her way onto her porch, planting the walking stick before her with each step. The wooden knocking was swallowed by the silence of the shrouded forest. Then the woman disappeared into her house. Julia rolled up the window and parked in front of her own house.

Hartley was here. What did that mean? Was he really the one that had killed that girl two years before? A crime like that must have sent seismic shock waves through this little community, and Rick O’Dell probably would have woven it into his pet conspiracy theory. Why hadn't Walter told her about it? Walter, the man she thought she could trust?

Julia tiptoed around the side of the house, wishing she had the Louisville Slugger with her. One hand was tucked in her purse, ready to draw the mace, but the spray would have little effect if someone really intended to harm her.

No one was behind the house. She thought of checking around her bedroom window for footprints, to confirm that someone had actually stood there last night and called to her. But more leaves had fallen, covering the ground in a damp carpet of dying color.

The trees somehow seem closer today, surrounding the house.

She almost laughed at the absurdity of the thought. But she was afraid that if she started laughing, she might never stop.

Nothing stirred in the woods, and through the thick autumn mist came the soft gurgling of the creek. She glanced toward the shrouded hill beyond. For a moment, Julia pictured a child sprawled in a clearing, people in hoods gathering around. Then she blinked away the image and hurried to the front of the house.

No Snead yet. He must have decided not to pursue her, for whatever reason. Even the Chief of Police needed some kind of justification to come after her. Maybe Julia
was
a threat, both to herself and others, and should be locked away for her own good.

Maybe she had imagined the pentagram drawing, the man at her window, the message on her computer at work. But she hadn't imagined the skull ring. The skull ring was real, solid, a link between the past and present. As she searched for her house keys, she dug into the bottom of her purse to reassure herself with the substance of the engraved box.

A weird fetish object to make yourself feel better with—

The box was gone.

She held the purse close and raked through the contents. Wallet, keys, mace, tampons, hair brush, note papers. No ring.

But the purse hadn't been out of her sight.

Julia checked again, but the box and the ring inside it were gone. She unlocked the door, her hand trembling so much that she could barely fit the key in the lock. Despite the muted daylight, the house was dark and forbidding.

Once the door was locked safely behind her, she put her purse on the couch and went to get the Louisville Slugger. She was bending down to reach under the bed when he grabbed her from behind, one hand clamped over her mouth to keep her from screaming. She struggled and kicked, nightmare visions of Mitchell's assault forcing their way to the surface. But Mitchell was in Memphis.

And this Creep was stronger than Mitchell. She tried to drive an elbow against his ribs, but he pulled her back into the dark open closet.

"Shh," he hissed, his voice like the moist flickering of a snake's tongue near her ear.

She bit his hand, and he grunted in pain. "Damn it, Julia."

Walter!

So he was a Creep after all.

He had her in the closet now, and clothes fell from their hangers as they struggled. Walter pulled his hand away from her mouth and whispered, "Hush, they're probably listening."

Listening?

Julia pushed herself from his grasp, falling against a thick row of coats and sweaters. "What in the hell do you think you're doing?"

Walter put his index finger to his lips. A purple half-moon marked the flesh where she had bit him. He looked as scared as she felt, his eyes showing white all around the irises.

"Shut up for a second," he said. "I'm not trying to hurt you."

She almost believed him. But in this new world of secrets and lies, no one deserved her trust. If she was going to go crazy, she was determined to do it the old-fashioned way, without any help from anyone. She was going to walk straight up the stairs, stand in the middle of that dark attic of her mind, and scream at the warped walls until they collapsed in upon her.

She didn't need a nudge from Walter. She didn't need a carpenter to fix her house. All she wanted was strong locks and tightly nailed shutters, all light barred from her rooms. All she wanted was to disappear, into the shadowed corners of her attic or the musty depths of her cellar. Alone in the ruins.

Walter pressed against her in the cramped closet. He shook her and whispered, more urgently this time. "Listen to me. Don't break down right now. I need you."

Need? He needed
her
? Again she almost laughed, but even that took too much effort. As always, surrendering was the most painless option.

"They're outside," he continued. "Deke Hartley, Snead, and the others."

"Snead?" She wondered how the cop could have gotten to the house so fast. And how had Walter gotten inside? Was he the one with the key, the one who had left the pentagram drawing, who stole the skull ring, who tricked her with the digital clock?

That made sense. Foolish Julia, she had asked him to check the clock. She had turned to him for comfort, had made the insane mistake of putting faith in this man who now seemed the most desperate of Creeps. This stranger hovering over her, sweat on his pale face, eyes flicking, lips pressed white.

You don't have to let the Creep into your house. HE'S ALWAYS INSIDE.

Before she could scream, Walter crouched in the corner of the closet. He pulled at a plywood panel set in the wall. The wood came loose, revealing water pipes and insulation. Walter ripped the insulation away in clumps.

The musty smell of the crawl space rose up and filled the closet. The gap between the shower stall and the wall was about two feet wide, with the subfloor cut out. "What are you doing?" Julia asked.