Witching Moon (7 page)

A scream from Barbara had him leaping back, rocking the boat dangerously.

Both passengers gripped the sides of the craft, and he found himself sitting back down heavily.

When the rocking had stopped, he turned toward Barbara, struggling to keep his expression bland. Really, he wanted to chew her out for startling him, but he knew it was prudent to resist the impulse.

“What's wrong?” he asked.

“Over there. A snake.”

He followed her outstretched hand, but if the creature had been real, it had already slithered away.

“Thanks,” he said, then took his time inspecting the area before climbing onto the slippery surface of the tree root and finding a handhold on the rough bark. Carefully, he worked his way toward the object.

When he was close enough, he hauled out the penknife he always carried and cut the piece of rough cord that held the bag to the tree.

Moments later, he was back on the aluminum bench, where he stowed the thing at his feet.

John reached for it. Adam kicked it under his seat. “Leave it,” he growled.

The other man must have heard the wolf tone in his voice, because he reared back.

“The tour's over,” Adam said. “Sorry we have to return early, but I'll refund your money when we get back to the dock.”

FALCON LEANED BACK
in his chair, stretching out his long legs under the table, and crossed his scuffed boots at the ankle as he sipped his Bud Lite. His head had been a little muzzy, but he'd put in most of a day's work.

He was still feeling a nice warm glow from the up close and personal contact with the clan last night.

Of course, he had to steer his mind away from the ending of the night's revelries. But that wasn't difficult. He was the kind of guy who could ignore inconvenient details when he wanted to.

He'd packed up his tools, and now he was relaxing at his favorite little café on Main Street.

Some part of him would have liked to see the core of Wayland shrivel and die like so many of the little southern towns with their boarded-up storefronts, trash blowing down the main drag, and all the action, such as it was, out on the highway in the Wal-Mart parking lot.

But there were some advantages to what the chamber of commerce liked to call Historic Wayland.

The town's core had survived the new development that had come to the cheap land on the outskirts of town. The old business district had transformed itself into a kind of yuppy tourist haven, with a few bright spots for the locals to enjoy.

Like the Good Times Café, with its down-home southern cooking at reasonable prices.

He saw the waitress step out of the kitchen. Her name was Betty Sue, and she was about his age, mid-twenties. She'd lived here all her life. Not like him. His family had left town, suddenly, in the middle of the night. They'd run for their lives and found a place to rent in Jacksonville, where his dad had gotten a job driving a delivery truck.

Daddy had scraped along. It had been better than getting burned up or ripped apart by the nice Christian folks of Wayland.

That had been twenty-five years ago. And now the son was back. And as far as he knew, the good people of the town didn't know who he was. But they were going to find out, and they were going to be sorry for what they had done.

Betty Sue came swishing over to the table and delivered his food. A hamburger and fries, nestled in a napkin-lined plastic basket to save on dishes.

She and the rest of Wayland were in for a surprise when the clan had consolidated their power. Just a few more weeks, and they would be ready to get even for the sins of the past.

He picked up the catsup bottle and shook it over the thick home-cut fries, being careful not to get the napkin soggy.

“Can I get you anything else?” Betty Sue asked.

He considered a suggestive answer, then thought better of it and shook his head as he bit into a fry.

Um, um good.

He had taken a seat by the window, and as he ate his fries and burger, he watched the car and pedestrian traffic. There were a lot of tourists. Which was good for business. But there were a fair number of townspeople out as well.

He watched a woman pushing a baby carriage. A family of four, the parents and kids all licking ice cream cones. An old guy leaning on a cane. An old lady with an ugly dalmatian on a leash.

Wayland looked like such a peaceful little town. Yet the things that had happened here would curl your hair.

Regular witch-hunts. Like in the middle ages. Only now the witches were getting ready to turn the tables.

He chomped off a bite of burger and bun, chewed, and swallowed, his thoughts turning back to the night before. To the smoke, the women, the feeling of strength that he knew came partly from the black waters of the swamp. And the unity of the group. It wasn't just having mind-blowing sex. It was the way they fed each other's power when they joined together. It had been his idea to gather up the descendants of the witches. He'd thought of it after he'd met Willow and found out her parents had run away from Wayland, just like his momma and daddy.

He and Willow had hit it off in bed real well. But he'd recognized the experience as something more profound—as a pooling of energy. And he'd wondered if he could multiply the effect. So he'd set about gathering the clan around himself.

Eyes closed, he relived the scene last night. Relived the orgiastic frenzy and the pleasure like a thousand suns bursting in his brain.

But this time he couldn't ignore the ending. The way everything had all come to a screeching halt in the moment when they sensed that guy watching.

After Ken White, Falcon had been sure nobody else was going to bother them. Then this guy had shown up.

Who the hell was he?

His hand clenched around the glass of beer, and he made a concerted effort to relax.

The guy had been naked. Ready for action.

Falcon gave a soft laugh. He'd also sensed the man's longing for a connection with them.

Maybe and maybe not. He'd decide, after they figured out who he was. Falcon already had a couple of candidates in mind. Actually, by chance, he'd gotten a look at one of them today. With his clothes on, he'd just looked like an ordinary guy.

Of course, Falcon knew that was true of himself, too. But he wasn't ordinary. He had power and the strength of his convictions. And he was going to make damn sure that nobody wrecked his plans. He and the members of the clan had waited too long to get revenge on this town that had killed their parents and their grandparents down through the generations. This time, the hunting and the terror were going the other way.

 

ADAM
was feeling more in control by the time he reached the boat dock. Probably he shouldn't have overreacted to the bag. Or to Sara earlier. But he'd been on edge since the moment he'd opened his eyes.

“Sorry for hurrying you back here,” he apologized when he'd tied up and helped the Carltons back onto the planking. “I want to find out what's in this thing.”

“No problem,” John answered.

It was obvious from the tone of the other man's voice that he'd also like to know what was in the yellow bag. Adam didn't offer to share the information. Really, he would have preferred to have been on his own when he'd found the damn thing. He counted himself lucky that he'd been the one and not someone else on the staff.

Would they have brought it to him? Would they have pitched it in the dark water? Or would they have known what the thing was and hidden it? Ordinarily he wouldn't make that assumption. But he was learning that the town kept the secrets of the swamp to itself.

“I can give you a refund,” he said. “Or if you're going to be in the area tomorrow, I can give you another trip into the swamp for free.”

The couple exchanged glances.

“A free trip,” Barbara said.

“Okay. Good.” Free trips weren't something he handed out on a regular basis, because he knew that Barnette could be tight with his money. He wanted an accounting of how much was being spent and how much was being taken in, although he didn't insist that the park make a profit. Sometimes receipts were ahead of expenses and sometimes they weren't. If the operation needed extra cash, the owner had reluctantly supplied it.

But Adam didn't plan to push his luck in that department. He led the way to the service counter, where Amy was staring at them.

Her gaze flicked to the bag, then quickly away.

“You seen anything like this?” he asked.

“No.”

He was almost positive she was lying, but he didn't press the point. Instead he asked her to write up a ticket for a courtesy trip for the Carltons. When that was taken care of, he headed back to his cabin. He didn't know exactly why he wanted to be alone when he opened the damn bag. It was just a feeling he had.

Probably it came from his wolf instincts. Subliminal awareness was always stronger when he was a gray shape running free in the darkness of the night.

But he wasn't a wolf at the moment. And he wasn't going to change now, not when someone could come marching up to his cabin and find a dangerous animal inside.

So he set the bag on the kitchen table, then started working at the knotted twine that held the top closed. Of course, he could have slit it with his penknife, but he wanted to keep as much of the artifact intact as possible. And besides, the knot told him something about whoever had left the bag.

It wasn't any kind of expert knot. It was a crude series of ties, probably done in haste.

As he worked, he became aware that the makeshift bag was giving off a pungent odor. Stopping, he took a cautious sniff. The last thing he wanted was to find himself overcome by more drugged fumes like last night.

But this was a clean odor, not like the smoke of the night before. When he'd worked the knot loose, he carefully spread open the cloth. Inside was a collection of leaves and twigs and a few other things, like chicken feathers.

He lifted a sprig of something and sniffed. The unmistakable scent of feverfew filled his nostrils. It was hard to describe. Something like mothballs. But not as unpleasant as moth repellent. The sprig wasn't dried. It had been picked fresh and put into the bag, where it had wilted.

Its condition told him something about the length of time the bag had been there. Only a few days, because the herbs inside hadn't had time to go brittle.

Herbs. Yes. That was a good guess. In addition to the feverfew, he recognized the smell and the small leaves of a thyme sprig. There were others, too. But he wasn't an expert on the subject, so he couldn't be sure what they all were.

He looked at the chicken feathers mixed in with the greenery. They had some thick black stuff on the quill end, stuff he didn't want to examine too closely.

So what the hell was this collection of greenery and feathers and black gunk? A voodoo hex? An Indian medicine bag? A joke? A warning—left for whom and by whom?

That last question sent a shiver traveling over his skin. Not much scared him, but he didn't understand this stuff, and he didn't like it.

He had the feeling Sara Weston could tell him exactly what plants had been included. Maybe she even knew enough old-time lore to tell him what it meant.

Sara. His mind kept zinging back to her every chance it got. The two of them would make a great team, he thought. He loved the natural environment. So did she. She had all the qualifications to be a forest ranger's wife.

That thought stopped him cold. He'd met her exactly once. He didn't know how she'd like living in a cabin in the wilderness. And more to the point, he didn't want a wife. He had never wanted a wife. And the realization that the notion had popped into his head was startling. Even somewhat horrifying.

He fought a sudden impulse to get up and claw off his clothing so he could change into a wolf, leap through the cabin door, and run headlong into the swamp—in a futile effort to outrun his destiny.

Instead, he sat for several moments, dragging air into his lungs, getting a grip on his emotions.

Jesus, everything had been going along just fine. And now, suddenly, he felt like he was losing control of his life.

Too restless to sit, he pushed back his chair and stood, then had to reach for the chair back to keep it from tipping over.

He wasn't going to ask Sara anything. He was going to stay away from her.

He wasn't going to talk about this bag of herbs—to her or anybody else. Yet.

Maybe he'd show it to Delacorte later, if it turned out the lawman was playing straight with him. For all he knew, the sheriff was protecting the murderers cavorting in the swamp. An unsettling notion, but one Adam couldn't dismiss out of hand. For the moment, he was on his own. And his first step was to do some checking in town. Ask some questions and hopefully get some of the answers that he had been seeking since this morning.

But not now. Because he wasn't the kind of manager who just took off when the spirit moved him. So he stuffed the contents back into the bag and put the whole thing into a plastic grocery bag, then into the bottom right-hand drawer of his desk.

After that, he checked in at the office, then went on a small inspection tour of the park, asking staff members who had been on water tours if they'd seen anything unusual. Nobody had, which might simply mean that they didn't have his eye for detail. Or they were lying.

He ended up back at the park office and stayed around until closing time, taking care of the usual jobs, then trying to occupy his mind by going back through some park records.

His tour guide spiel on the boat trip into the swamp had gotten him thinking about the history of the park. One thing he hadn't known was exactly when Austen Barnette had acquired Nature's Refuge. Now he saw that the swampland had been purchased twenty-five years ago. So the park wasn't all that old.

Barnette had done pretty well by the natural environment, Adam mused. But opening the park to Granville Pharmaceuticals didn't quite fit the pattern. Why was he inviting big business into Nature's Refuge?

Pulling out the correspondence file, he found the letter Barnette had written him about Sara Weston. When he'd seen it the first time, he hadn't been paying much attention to the details. Now he read it with a lot more interest. She was here for six months. And she was staying right on the east edge of the park, in a cabin that Barnette was renting to the pharmaceutical company.