Black-Eyed Moon (A Guinan Jones Paranormal Mystery #1) (16 page)

"He couldn't wake his father," Rory said. "That's what set the wheels in motion."

I'd given him a
statement from my hospital bed, reciting events as if they'd happened to someone else. My initial shock was receding, but for Rory and everyone else, it was fresh. Every now and then, he widened his eyes and shook his head. Now he answered my questions about Zeke.

"He said at first he thought Tim had passed out from drinking. Then he saw his mother's sleeping pill bottle on the nightstand. She usually kept
it in the medicine cabinet and out of reach. He said his father hated taking meds and doubted he did."

I
nodded absently. I was on some kind of meds, too. The doctor called it remarkable that my injuries from the fall and the bat weren't more serious. Whatever was in the IV drip, I was grateful. It dulled my thoughts to the point I couldn't coherently contemplate that Tessa tried to kill me.

Rory exhaled loudly and scratched the top of his head. "That kid somehow put it together. He listened to your message on his cell, called the police, and headed straight to Jepson's."

A half-formed question swam around the edge of my mind. "Rory," I said. I squeezed my eyes shut, then opened them, trying to focus. "Why was Zeke conscious? Didn't Tessa try to...to..."

"Drug him?" Rory said. "Get this. He loves his mother's homemade
lemonade. She keeps a pitcher of it just for him. But when he got home from practice, he drank water, instead."

Granddad paced near the door. "I'm ninety-percent certain the lab will find something in the sample they took."

My father was on a plane headed to Ridge Grove, and my mother stood by the window grim-faced and watching Granddad pace.

"The day after the murder, Tim h
ad complained of feeling groggy," he said. "Like he'd been drugged. We laughed about it at the time."

His face seemed to have sprouted more lines than the day before.
He avoided looking into my eyes. Every time he glanced at my swollen head, he closed his eyes.

I reminded him
and my mother that it was my own fault.

"I'm the adult. I'm the cop. I should have—"

"Dad, Reggie's right. You can't watch her every minute of the day. Guinan has to take some responsibility for this. She's not a child anymore."

We both looked at my mother. She shrugged and rubbed her chin. She'd arrived at Jepson's Point just as I was being loaded into the ambulance. I'd heard she'd lunged at Tessa, and the police had to hold her back.
They found the shotgun in her car. I was so glad she decided against using it. She would have gone to prison along with Tessa. That is, if Tessa had survived the gun shot.

I lay stiff on the bed and felt tears rolling down the side of my
head. Motherless. Zeke and the twins were motherless. There was nothing I could do about it. As long as I slept, I didn't have to think about it.

The morning I was released, I heard on the news that Tessa had been arreste
d on suspicion of murder and attempted murder. I hadn't seen or spoken to Zeke since that night. I didn't contact him, and he didn't contact me.

"Your friend Tamzen came clean," Granddad said
to me over breakfast. I sat across from him at the kitchen table picking at my eggs.

"She said she lied about
not spending the night with Eric because she was embarrassed," he said, furrowing his brow. "Can you believe it? Someone's freedom was at stake, for crying out loud. I'm considering charging her for giving a false statement to the police."

I hadn't wanted to see her or Dean.
My parents instructed the hospital to allow only family to visit. Dean came to the house once, but my mother turned him away. He'd left several voice and text messages. Tamzen left messages, too. I felt ashamed, like it was partly my fault that Zeke's mother tried to kill me. I knew it was irrational.

Soon I'd make my
escape. But Tim, Zeke, Jacob, and Jude had none. Even if they left Ridge Grove, they'd always have a murderer for a wife and mother.

My fork hit the plate with a clank.

My grandfather jumped. "What's wrong?"

I
slid my plate away. "I'm going to ask you to do something, and I don't want you get upset."

He looked at the ceiling. My parents were upstairs.

"It's nothing dangerous," I said, offering him a weak smile. "Besides, the killer is locked up now." I swallowed a lump.

He agreed to
do what I asked only if I told my parents where we were going and why. They didn't protest.

At Jepson's Point, Granddad
stuck close to me while I searched for the cluster of marigolds I'd seen while up in the oak tree. When I found it, he dug with the shovel I asked him to bring. I didn't know what I expected to find, but I had a feeling there was something to find. When the shovel met resistance, we both stared at the spot. I kneeled and brushed away dirt. It was a small metal box. I gave him a questioning look.

He nodded.
"Use the glove and peek under the lid. Don't pull it out. It might be evidence relevant to the case."

I nodded,
put on the latex glove, and carefully lifted the lid. "It looks like a piece of clothing. It's pink." A baby's gown? Why would Tessa bury it and commit murder here? What did this place mean to her?

Granddad leaned on the shovel.
"What made you think something was buried under the marigolds?"

I explained about
the ones that grew in Tessa's garden, the buried bat, and symbolic things. I told him that she'd confessed to being clairvoyant and that she shaved her widow's peak.

He raised his eyebrows. "So, all that brought the picture into focus, huh?
I figured she must have sixth sense, her mother being a boardwalk psychic and all. But I never suspected she was a psycho."

I thought about my own mother. "I wonder why
I inherited, but Mom didn't."

He shook his head, staring at the box.

I closed the lid and looked at the sky. "To tell the truth, it could have been Eric in that ski mask, and I wouldn't have been surprised. I thought it was dumb that he'd bury the blood-covered murder weapon, but people do dumb things all the time."

He put his hand on my shoulder. "Come on, get up. Be careful of your back."

I held on to him as I stood. "Zeke probably hates me."

"Why should he?"

"For one thing, every time he looks at me or thinks about me from now on, it'll remind him that his mother's a murderer."

He grunted. "That's not your fault, hon. What's say we get out of this heat?"

I looked at my grandfather. He cracked a smile.

"You'll get through this
," he said. "I know it doesn't seem like it now, but you will. I love you. I don't tell you that often enough."

"
I know you do," I said, my voice thick. "And I love you, too."

***

Chelsea International Airport – Exit 5 two miles

While my grandfather and father made polite conversation in the front seat of the truck, my mother and I sat silently in the back. My
throbbing ear was bright red, but I didn't want to take anymore pain pills. Most of my bruises were fading, and my head didn't look too swollen. I wore my hair loose to hide my ear.

Granddad pulled up to the airport curb. He'd wanted to park and walk us inside, but my parents insisted that he just drop us off. They knew I didn't want to say goodbye in front of a bunch of strangers.

The four of us stood at the curb surrounded by luggage. My lips trembled, but I was determined not to cry again.

"Guinan could've have been seriously hurt or dead," my mother said to my grandfather. She paused. "And so could you."

He raised his hands in mock surrender. "You're absolutely right. The whole thing was a real mess."

"I have a mind of my own, you know."

My mother put her arm around me. I gently pulled away and embraced my grandfather. The lump in my throat was so big I could barely breathe.

"No need for
goodbyes. Next time you see me, I'll be delivering your chariot at Thanksgiving."

His
face looked blurry through my tears. I hadn't given my car a fleeting thought in days. I gave him a quick nod and a tight smile.

Once we'd arrived at our gate, I watched people idling in the area, sipping coffee, tapping on laptops and tablets and tending to restless toddlers. I closed my eyes and pretended the sounds of tiny children were the Hicks twins. I was struck with a th
ought. Did my grandmother suspect Tessa had serious issues? So many questions. I was getting my hopes up about those journals. They certainly wouldn't contain all the answers I wanted. But within those pages, I'd learn more than I knew now.

My cell buzzed in my pocket, and I grinned through my tears. Granddad
must have forgotten to tell me something. I looked at the screen, and my hand shook.

My father noticed. "Who is it?"

I squinted at the phone to make sure I wasn't just seeing things.

Zeke's
image appeared on the screen.

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I'm a freelance writer who loves watching, reading, and writing murder mysteries. Book 2 in the Guinan Jones Paranormal Mystery series will be published in September 2013.

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