Whispers (6 page)

The sight of him slammed into her already overloaded emotions. He was like the song that would forever remind you of a tragedy. Where were you when the earth stopped turning? Standing face-to-face with Reilly Alexander, she thought.

If it wasn’t for her concern about Analise, the news of her grandmother’s death, and the unfolding drama of this never-ending night, she couldn’t have looked him in the eye. But it seemed that tonight she was insulated by shock and grief. Nothing could surprise her. At least that’s what she thought until the spry old woman opened her mouth.

“
The sheriff is right, Gracie Beck. We are here for Nathan,” she said. “He’s looking for a story.”

“
A story?” Gracie repeated, not following the mysterious woman’s meaning. Frowning, she turned to Reilly, who looked like a bad boy caught peeking up the teacher’s dress.

“
I—” he began, but the woman cut him off.

“
You see, your grandmother had a very strong spirit. She called to me. I, in turn, called to Nathan.”

To the best of Gracie’s recollection, Reilly hadn’t been called Nathan by anyone but his mother. Ever. So who was this woman? And what was her connection to him?

“
I’m sorry. How rude of me not to tell you,” she said, answering the question that Gracie had yet to voice. “My name is Chloe LaMonte. And these are my disciples.”

“
I am not a disciple,” the priest said. “I am clairvoyant, but not a follower of spiritual sacrilege.”

Chloe ignored him and went on. Her voice was clear and strong, tinged with a compassion that seemed misplaced, considering her motives. “We have been studying Diablo Springs for some time now. There is a psychic phenomenon here that is beyond anything I’ve ever experienced. It’s incredible, really. Like a vibration. I’m surprised even you can’t feel it.”

The “even you” comment irritated Gracie, but she was too tired to react. Too tired to even feign politeness. She turned abruptly away from Chloe and asked, “What about Grandma Beck, Eddie?”

Eddie glanced over her head at the group of people. “Maybe you folks could find your rooms?”

“
Rooms? They’re staying here?”

Chloe answered, “We have reservations.”

“
Gracie,” Reilly said. “I’m sorry about this. I didn’t know you’d be here. I didn’t know about your grandma.”

“
How could you? It only happened tonight.”

“
She knew,” the good-looking young man said, pointing at Chloe.

Reilly touched Gracie’s arm and nodded toward the closed kitchen door. “Why don’t we go in the kitchen? I’ll try to explain”—he looked at the group in the living room—“this.”

Gracie gave a curt nod and motioned for Eddie to follow. Stepping onto the porch, she untied the dogs, who dutifully trailed her to the kitchen. The small group in the front room parted for them to go by. Knowing how sweet the Great Dane and Labrador-mix dogs were, Gracie sometimes forgot just how intimidating and
big
the animals were. The expressions on the nervous visitors’ faces as they passed made a quick reminder.

Before they took their seats, she addressed Tinkerbelle and Juliet.

“
Friend,” she said.

The dogs scanned back and forth between Reilly, Eddie, and Gracie, their expressions seeming to say, “We don’t think so.”

“
Friend,” she repeated, then gave Reilly a brief hug, feeling unbelievably self-conscious as she came into contact with the warmth of him. The hug she gave Eddie was more heartfelt. He patted her on the back and pressed a kiss to her hair, murmuring how good it was to see her, under any circumstances. Satisfied, the dogs relaxed beneath the table, but Reilly didn’t look anywhere near at ease with their watchful eyes following him.

Gracie sat down next to him and Romeo hopped in her lap.

“
Why are you and those people here?” she said.

Reilly exhaled heavily and shook his head. Then, with obvious reluctance, he told them about his signing and Chloe’s approach.

“
I couldn’t believe she’d know your grandmother. Chloe’s ... out there. And Carolina was as down to earth as they come.”

“
So you just jumped in your car and followed that woman here?” Gracie said.

Reilly nodded his head, but she sensed he wasn’t telling her the truth. Not all of it anyway. No surprise there.

“
You drove all that way for a story?”

“
Well—”

Furious, Gracie stood. “
Well
, I hope my grief makes good copy.” He opened his mouth to say more but Gracie held up a hand. “I’m going to see if I can find my grandmother’s reservation book. If I can’t, I don’t care if it’s the storm of the century out there. All of you are gone.”

She stomped out of the kitchen. As if attracted by the radiation of her anger, the lunatics in the front room turned and watched her pass. On the table in the entry was the leather-bound book Grandma Beck had always used to record the comings and goings of the Diablo’s temporary residents. Gracie opened it and fanned the pages until she came to the last with writing on it.

There, under a page with today’s date, was Grandma Beck’s scrawl.
Bill Barnes, all rooms.
Then after that,
Sold Out!
Underscored twice. And then in small penciled-in letters, as if it were a secret mission, she’d written,
Paid in advance. Check with bank. Wire transfer??? Full price.

Damn it. Worse than reservations, they’d already paid. And they’d filled every room, which meant Gracie and Analise, when she finally got there, would be sharing quarters in Grandma Beck’s room.

Reluctantly, she faced the group watching her. “Who is Bill Barnes?”

Dracula stepped forward. Surely not?

“
She didn’t take credit cards, so I had Bill wire the payment to her bank account,” Chloe said. “She was very suspicious about it.”

“
Why didn’t you just pay her when you got here?”

“
Because I knew you’d throw us out.”

Chloe’s dark voice and unsettling declaration sent a deep unease through Gracie. She didn’t like Chloe LaMonte. Not at all.

“
I still might.”

“
No, you won’t. Not in good conscience and you are a person guided by your conscience.”

Gracie wanted to spite this woman and damn the consequences, but Chloe cut her off before she could form thought into action. “She called to us,” Chloe said softly. Again Gracie heard that ring of compassion. “All the way across the desert, we heard her. All of us.”

“
All of you?” Eddie repeated, staring from one face to another.

“
She is angry.”

Gracie was angry too. How dare this woman come here with all this mumbo jumbo gibberish?

“
Listen, I don’t know who you are or what—”

“
I am Chloe LaMonte,” she said patiently. “A vessel of the spirits. I am here to help your grandmother find peace and move on.”

“
My grandmother is dead. She doesn’t need your help.” Gracie was shaking with anger.

Bill Barnes touched Chloe lightly on the arm and murmured something in her ear. Chloe nodded. “You’re right, Bill.” She looked at Gracie. “We think it’s best if we discuss this in the morning. Would you be so kind as to tell us what rooms we’re in?”

Gracie glared at her, wishing with all her might that she could tell them to take a hike, but the rain was hammering down now, coming in sluices that roared through the rain gutters on the roof. Thunder shook the house as the wind rattled the windows. And Chloe was right, she was a woman guided by her conscience, damn her. She’d have to be heartless to send them out in this when she knew there wasn’t another place to stay for at least fifty miles, and she was too exhausted to be heartless tonight. But that didn’t mean she’d be nice.

“
Up the stairs and to the right. To the left are family quarters. Stay out of those.”

With that she turned on Eddie who stood just outside the kitchen, Reilly at his side. The dogs remained where she’d left them, but they were on their feet and watching through the open door.

“
Eddie, it’s been more than a few minutes. Where is Analise?”

As if in answer, headlights shot through the windows and climbed the walls as a car approached. Gracie went to the porch and stared through the pouring rain as Dr. Graebel got out and ran around to the other side. Sheltering his passenger, he hurried them both up to where she waited. When he lowered the umbrella, Analise stepped forward into her mother’s waiting arms.

Chapter Six

May 1896

Somewhere in Colorado

THE first scream carried across the plains like the howl of an October wind. It brought my head up and around. I was on all fours, trying to pull some deadwood free from a tangle of roots. As the sound settled around me, I perched up on my knees like a prairie dog to see over the waving sea of grass, but that didn’t help much. All I saw was more of the same.

I figured it must have been a crow or buzzard I’d heard. There’d been plenty of each on the way, and I hated them both. In fact, today I hated just about everything and everyone.

I’d been mad for days, ever since my daddy came home and said we were pulling up roots and running away. He hadn’t said “running,” but that’s what it was all the same. I wasn’t old enough to argue, but I was old enough to be mad about it. I hadn’t even gotten to say good-bye to Charlotte or Willie Johnson, who’d been acting like he might want to be more than friendly with me. Seventeen was only old enough to do a woman’s share of chores, not speak my mind.

The fact that we were running like cowards bothered me as much as anything. I’d begged my daddy not to testify in court about the holdup, but of course he didn’t listen. Men. The bank sure didn’t deserve his loyalty, but he’d given it all the same. And look how it had paid him back. Momma had tried to sway him, too, but then he’d gone all Stonewall and decided that, as the man of the house, he’d say where and what and why things got done. Even at my age, I was woman enough to know life wasn’t fair.

We were five days from Alamosa now, and I was still madder than a hornet. I didn’t like walking day in and day out. My momma looked like she was carrying a litter of babies, though we both prayed just one would come out. Even though her ribs must have felt like they were ready to burst, Momma still took in the scenery like she’d been blessed to even step foot on God’s green earth. I couldn’t see it that way. Not when I was sleeping on the hard ground with bugs sure to be creeping and crawling over me all night and my bed at home as empty and neat as could be.

I picked up another stick, shifting the bundle in my arms and giving myself a splinter in the process. That only spurred my mad.

And then I heard the next scream.

This time, there wasn’t any doubt. That was no bird. I rocked back on my heels, looking over the swaying seed-pods toward our camp on the other side of the hill. The sun arced low in the sky, dragging shadows out with the wind. A gun fired, and an instant later a gray puff of smoke wafted upward.

I scrambled to my feet, dropping the wood I’d been gathering as I raced without thought toward the sound. More gunshots cracked the dusky blue day, followed by a triumphant whoop of glee that made my blood run cold. Indians? Was it Indians?

I dropped to my knees at the top of the hill and scooted up to look over. My skirts tangled about my legs and ripped when I didn’t heed them. Belly flat to the earth, I peered down at our camp. Five men on horseback rode circles around it, firing pistols into the air just for the fun of it, I guessed. Not Indians. These were white men, men who looked like they’d not seen a bath for many years. They seemed to be playing a game of some sort, turning and riding and darting around. I couldn’t see beyond the wagon, though, to what was at the center of their sport. I cupped my hands to my eyes to block the glare of the setting sun and searched for my momma and daddy, grandma and brother. Had they gone to gather wood or hunt? Were these bandits robbing us while they were gone? But even as I thought it, I recognized the flaw in my thinking. It was Momma I’d heard scream. I was sure of it.

The men down below laughed and shouted happily to one another as they raced around. I made my eyes squinty, trying to make out features through the dirt and dust that caked their faces. Who were they? Why were they here?

I scanned the far hillside, praying the rest of my family was there, on the other side, watching with the same horror I was. Over the fire, a pot of stew Momma had set to cook still hung and the fresh breeze brought the smell of it to me.

Momma, where are you?

Johnny’s toys lay atop the quilt Momma and I had sewn when he was born. Beyond that...

A wave of sickness hit me. Beyond Johnny’s blanket, Grandma’s wheelchair lay on its side, wheels peeking out from behind the crates we’d unloaded when we set camp. I stared, one part of my mind jamming like gears in a windmill as another part spun out of control. Why was Grandma’s wheelchair all tipped over? And where was Grandma?

A rider charged up the hill, and I ducked down.