Linda Welch - A conspiracy of Demons (15 page)

“Her
?”

“The girlfriend.”

I crossed my arms and tried to rub warmth into them. “She got life, but you k
now how that goes. She’ll be up
for parole
next year
.”

“I wonder how long I have.” She watch
ed
Toby disappear behind us. “Alfonso must still be alive, or I wouldn’t be here, would I.
Not that I dwell on it, but when I remember him and that my time is limited, that’s w
hen I get the urge to travel
while I can.
”

“You’d be in your mid-sixties were you still alive and Alfonso’s half your age. If he lasts into old age, you’ve got years yet to worry about the afterlife.” Alfonso was, briefly, Carrie’s mad fling. She died when he dropped a faulty electric hairdryer in the puddle in which she stood. I thought he killed her for her money; Carrie
declared it
an accident.

Carrie sounded subdued, her voice a low whisper. “What happens when we pass over?”

“
Beats me
.” I had
seen a few shade
s go on their way, but th
at didn’t tell me how it worked
.

“Is there really a tunnel with a bright light at the end?”

My voice rose
a tad
. “
I don’t know! You can ask Jack and Mel.”

“
Them
?”

“They chose to stay here when the time came.” I
rested
my
skull
on the h
eadrest and
closed my eyes.

Carrie leaned in again. “What do you mean?” then flopped back. “The people who killed them are dead, aren’t they? How could they decide to stay here?
You mean to say we get an option?
”

“Ask them,” I reiterated. With so much else on my mind, I’d had enough of Carrie’s questions.

Royal watched the road, but I knew that expression. Calm on the outside, intense concentr
ation, seething inside.

“What now?” I asked, and when he didn’t reply, “Royal?”

“You’re talking to me
?” he said in clipped tones.

“Yes, I’m talking to you.” Then I bit my tongue before I snapped his head off.

“I
will go to the High House and
ask if they have heard anything, although I doubt they have.”

“Guess it’s worth a try.”

“Will you come with me?”

I thought of
the High House
and
as always
of
the man who called me niece.
The two w
ere indelibly linked in my mind
, along with Dark Cousins and
whether
they would ever intrude in my life again.

When I think of my uncle, I see a man-shaped tower of writhing white flame. I see black-clad figures slaughtering innocent villagers, and the lost heir in a small, dank,
drafty
cell. I see a beautiful demon
with silvery-gray hair
dangling in chains from the ceiling in a cell crusted with old blood. I see my uncle Cicero, aka Orcus, the Burning Man, lying at my feet, clutching his knee where my bullet shattered it.

A pathetic excuse for a man, Cicero fooled an entire race into believing he was all-powerful, omniscient, as his predecessors did for generations. I can’t blame a nation mired in tradition for not seeing through him.

“No. Not t
h
is time.”

He nodded abruptly. “I wi
ll drop you off and go there directly. I do no
t know how long I will
be away
.”

My thoughts drifted to people in my world, in the fields of politics and re
ligion, who
’d
fooled millions
since medieval times
.

Sun bounced off cars to sporadically dazzle
me. I looked at the mountains and the new color on them. It had been a long, hot, dry summer, and I enjoyed the cooler temperatures of
October
, but they were warmer than normal. A drought would be declared unless we had a good winter.

We were in Clarion before I knew it
.

Carrie and
I walked in the kitchen to the usual refrain. “What happened?”

“Gee, sure would be
pleasant
if the greeting varied a little. Like, how you doing today, Tiff?”

“How are you, Tif
f? What
happened
?” Mel asked in a
voice tinged with sarcasm.

I headed for the table, but changed my mind halfway there. “
W
hy don’t you ask Carrie? She has the inside scoop.”

“I was there, I saw and heard it all,” Carrie preened.

And just like that they were
with
her. Carrie took her time seat
ing herself
at the table. Jack and Mel were either side of her
as I went back to the hall
.

“And you can tell me about these
wotsits. Gelphas? S
ince madam over there won’t,” Carrie said.

At least I escaped that recitation, although God only knew what Mel and Jack would tell her.

I went upstairs. Mac
stayed
at the bottom. “No!” I told him. “You can wait till supper.”

Sat at my desk, I read Lynn’s notes again. I already spoke to Polly and Terry, what about the third member of the love triangle, if it could be called that
?
Terry’s wife, Olivia. Did Lynn speak to her?

S
he had no reason to. Most of Lynn’s
cases were for private parties. If she
worked for
the police, it went only as far as to tell them what she learned from a shade. She didn’t follow up. She reported, and left it at that. She did exactly that with this case.

Curious
, I booted up Snoopy and found a few news stories.
Olivia
was
at the Republican Party’s
temporary base of operations
in Portland
on the day she killed Terry and Polly. In fact,
her coworkers
thought she was
hard at work
in the back room
when she slipped out of a side door, bicycled three blocks and shot her husband and his lov
er at the Economy Lodge. Her co
workers were shocked; they liked and admired her for her upbeat personality and dedication.

Lynn stayed on
in Portland
the day after she spoke to Terry and Polly
. Why?

I rotated my shoulders and rubbed the back of my neck.
RP
became a refrain running endlessly through my mind.
Odd, that
Lynn
didn’t put a
full name,
time
or location
in her appointment book
for this particular meeting
.

“So you didn’t see a white light, or a tunnel?” Carrie asked Jack as I reached the bottom of the stairs.

Jack twitched his shoulders. “Not a thing. Apart from finding
old Fred
Coleman d
ead on the floor, it was just another day.”

I entered the kitchen with Mac glued to my heels. “You didn’t feel anythin
g odd, something tugging at you?
” I asked, intrigued.

“No,” Mel answered.

“A v
oice calling, a weird sensation?
” Carrie added.

“Must I repeat myself?” Jack snapped.

My roommates’ words circled in my mind
.
I can’t spe
ak for what a shade feels, sees or hears
when they pass, but they realize
something
is happening. I pictured Brenda the bag-lady, how her once frozen face became mobile, and she wept. From her expression, she wept from joy.

Sylvia and Paul Norton. Peter Cooper.
Brenda Lithgow. The white glow which emanated from them. Their blissful expressions. The tears in their eyes.

Seeing shades was still a fairly new experience when I moved
to
my house and met Jack and Mel. I delve
d
into
the circumstances of their death, but most of what I knew came from them
. They told me how they died and I didn’t think to question it. They
said they decided to stay here.
I didn’t question that either.

Frederick Coleman waylaid
Jack
first
.
He threatened
him
with a gun while he
tied
Jack’s
hands,
gagged
him
with masking tape and co
vered his head
.
Coleman
pushed
him
in
a car and
bound his ankles
, and
t
hey drove
for a while
. Jack heard a garage door close. He
sat in the car
for hours, I think because it was still day and Coleman waited for darkness to take
Jack
in
the house. He died in the
basement
.
Jack
do
es
no
t remember a blow
, and
indeed,
his body as I see it
bears no evidence of
bruising, abrasions or
wounds. He
didn’t
lay eyes on
Coleman again
after their initial meeting, and
thinks
he was
awake only a few hours until
he
died.
Jack remembers
a st
ing in the area of his spine, which made me wond
er if Coleman killed him with a lethal
injection
.
He felt
no pain.
He
went to sleep again
and woke
in the basem
ent
looking at
his
dead body.

Coleman used a jackhammer to break up the concrete floor, then dug down into the dirt. I expect making that last resting place for Jack’s body took a good long time, then he had to refinish the basement floor.

In a near-identical abduction and murder, Coleman got Mel four years later.
Coleman dug up his basement again.

Unfortunately, the cau
se of death will never be known
unless I dig up their bodies and have them autopsied, which
would make life awkward for me to say the least
.

Did I . . . did all three of us make assumptions?
I told them they should have passed over when Coleman died and
assumed they had a choice
when they said they
’d
decided not to
.

“When Mel turned up, I felt . . . responsible to
show her the r
opes,
”
Jack was telling Carrie.

“You did?” Mel asked.

“And death wasn’t so boring,”
Jack continued. “When we found the old bastard
on the floor, well, we had a discussion. You remember, Mel
?
”

“Yeah. We wondered what would happen on the other side. If there’d be TV and stuff or if we’d sit
on clouds
wearing white dresses and playing harps all day.”

“
We didn’t want to take the chance, so we decided
not to
go.”

I didn’t thi
nk so. My heart did the little fluttery thing it does when something comes to me out of the blue.

The dead never f
orget the face of their killer -
if they see it. Someone killed Jack and Mel in my basement
, but that person
may
not have been Coleman
.
Did n
othing co
me for Jack a
nd Mel because their killer still lived
?

“
I’d never have guessed, not in a million years,” Carrie said.

I
poured chunky bean and ham soup from the pan into a bowl
. “Kind of blows your mind.”

“I did wonder, because he looks different, all s
himmery metallic
, but you don’t. You’re quite normal.”

“Thanks, I guess.”

“For a giantess.”

Jack and Mel
had
told Carrie about me and Royal.
But Jack and Mel
didn’t know everything, only what I told them
, a
nd
Carrie
had
plagued me with questions - some of which I actually answered - since I came downstairs.

It was better done
without Royal
here.

I found
a soup spoon
and too
k
my bowl
to the table. Carrie seemed to have run out of steam, or
was gathering
her thoughts for another assault.

“
Tiff,
will you
need me again?
”
she
asked
.

I
slurped a mouthful of soup, chewed and
swallowed
.
“Need you how?”

“
Well
, listening in on the police
was exciting
, and I’ll do it again in a
jiffy
. But
will
you need me, because
I’ll be on my way
if you don’t. As much as I enjoyed seeing you again, it’s my holiday, I want to see more of America before I leave.”

I leaned back in the chair and regarded Carrie. Would I need her again? Maybe, maybe not.
An invisible spy
was a massive advantage, but asking her to stay
in cas
e?
And although she and my room
mates were getting along better
, I expected more flare-ups. Any little thing could set off Jack and Mel.

I smiled. “I don’t think so, Carrie. And I’m sorry I’m not much of a hostess.”

“Quiet all right, dear. I understand.” She
went
toward Jack and Mel, who occupied their favorite position in front of the television
,
looked over their shoulders at the screen,
then
returned
to me
. “There’ll be another time. You did say you’ll b
e back in England for the trial?
”

Patty Norton resided in Her Majesty’s care and prosecutors were pushing for a trial early next year. Royal and
I would be called as witnesses
.

“It should be early next year.”

“And you’ll come to Little Barrow?”

I thought about it. I’d promised Carri
e we would do some touring when
I
returned to
England, and I do
no
t break promises, but I didn’t want to
lodge in
Little Barrow and speak to Sally and Greg Short again. “I’ll be by to let you know we’re in England. We can work something out from there.”

“Lovely. Well, can you take me to the station
when you get a minute
?”

“Um, I guess so. You want to go now?”

“Might as well.”

Just like that? This felt strange. If she were a living visitor,
she’d
have
reserved
a flight and
be packing her bags. I would be watching the clock to make sure I got her to the airport
or station
in good time. I looked at m
y
soup
;
it was cold
. “Okay. Give me a minute to put these in the dishwasher.”

Carrie ambled over to Jack and Mel as I took my
bowl
to the trash can and
scraped it
, shadowed by an ever-hopeful Mac
.

“
I’m off then,” Carrie
said. “W
e’ve had our ups and downs,
heh,
but I
did enjoy
talking to other substantials
.”

Jack looked over his shoulder. “You’re leaving, for good?”

“It’s time.”

Mel wriggled uncomfortably. “Back home?”

“Not straight away. I’ll see a bit more of the United States.”

I
rinsed the
bowl
, spoon
and
pan
under hot running water and loaded them
in
the dishwasher.

Jack
gestured with his hand
. “Well, have a jolly good trip and all that.” His attempt at an English accent failed miserably.

“Yes, ta ta,” came from Mel.

Carrie leaned over them. “Remember what I told you.”

“We can’t,” Jack grumped.

Carrie straightened up. “Don’t know until you’ve tried.”

I wandered over there. “Tried what?”

“
Mind their Ps and Qs and act like grownups,
” Carrie
said quickly as she
twisted on her heels.

“Hey!”
Mel
protested
.

“Don’t bother,” Jack told her.

I squinted at them. Something here didn’t ring true.

“Are we ready then?” Carrie prompted.

“I guess so.” Still, I hesitated,
d
o you have everything?
on the tip of my tongue. I wanted to slap myself.

I didn’t accompany
Carrie inside
the station. I could see myself slipping up and speaking to her as people watched.

“Again, I’m sorry I blew you off so much.”

“Forget it, love,” she said from the passenger seat. “Bad timing, I suppose. But I’ll see you next year.”

I opened the door and got out. We stood on the sidewalk for a moment, then I nodded at the wide path where commuters headed for the ticket office and waiting room. “This is it then.”

“It’s a beautiful
building
.”

I’ve always admired the station
, a long, low place of pale brick and intricate stonework
. “Yeah. I like Art Deco. There’s quite a few like this in Clarion.
Where will you go
?”

She shrugged. “To the airport
and see where it takes me.”

“I’d drive you, but - ”

“You have
business
to deal with
,” she cut in. “Shall we go? We both hate good
-
byes.”

She walked with me, passing couples, families, single travelers. And she was gone
in a blink
, attached to two good-looking young men who wore suits and ties and carried brie
fcases. H
er short,
overly
curvaceous figure swayed
along.
She walked
backward
and waved before she went through the main entrance.

To hell with it.
I stuck
my hand
in the ai
r,
waved
and
yelled, “Bye Carrie. Take care.”

I parked at the cu
rb, went in the house and thanked
my lucky stars Royal had not returned and seen
that
not only did I
not
activate the alarm, I
forgot to lock the front door.

Racing
upstairs to my bedroom before Jack and Mel could waylay me and Mac give me meaningful looks,
I
shut the door and sat at my desk. Jack’s and Mel’s folders
were in the bottom drawer
.

Fifteen minutes later, I had
no
t deduced anything new from the information I
ha
d read a hundred times before.

Should I talk to them, suggest Coleman did not kill them? From what I
knew of them, they would get
in
a flap as they imagined
their killer dying at any given moment
, causing them to
blink
out of existence.
Maybe
I could dig out
something
new from them first.

Jack and Mel were
still
cross-legged on the floor
in front of the television.
They
watch
ed
me as I walked through the kitchen.

“Ahem,”
from Jack.

“Y
ou want the TV on. Give me a minute.”

“It’s not as if anything else is about to rivet our attention,” Mel said.

“Hey, Mel.” I opened the pantry door to get
a handful of chocolate chip cookies
. “
What you said
to Carrie made me think -
you didn’t feel anything when you died, like Jack did,
a kind o
f pinch, or prick, in your back?
”

They looked over their shoulders at me.
“More like the
back of my shoulder,
”
Jack said.

“Bu
t you didn’t feel anything, Mel?
”

“I ached something terrible from sitting there with my arms pulled behind my back. I think they were numb, along with my shoulder
s, and my back was shrieking
agony. Perhaps I didn’t feel it.”

“Hm.
And yo
u two didn’t know each other
, you never met?
”

“I saw her
on
campus
the year I graduated
,
but I don’t think we spoke, did we Mel?”

“Not that I recall.
We didn’t run in the same circles.
”

A whine from Mac told me he wanted out.
I
opened the backdoor and
he
shot outside.

Jack rattled his fingers on the floor. At least, they appeared to tap away, though I didn’t hear a thing. “Why is this more important than Masterpiece Theater?”

I
lifted one eyebrow
. “Is that what’s on?”

“Endeavour. I
nspector Morse before he
became
an inspector.”

“It’s good,” Mel added.

I walked over there and turned on the television, and used the remote to find the
station
. I’d
sooner
they beca
me immersed in television than start wondering at my renewed interest is their deaths.

Mac
barreled through the pet door.
I eyed his
stocky
body
. “
W
e’re going for a walkies, Mac.” We could use the exercise, and maybe a hike would clear my head.

Mac’s ears perked up like two small tents.
He
scuttle
d
toward the hall where his leash
dangled
.

“Okay, okay.” I grinned at the little monster. “Give me a minute to change.”

I went upstairs and changed into comfortable o
ld track pants, a long-sleeved T
-s
hirt and thicker socks. Sitting on the bed, I laced up brown hiking boots, then
went to the closet and
grabbed a down vest. Outside temperatures were still mild, but cooler where I planned to hike.

Downstairs, Mac looked anxious
until I grabbed his leash off the hook. I passed the martingale collar over his head and led him to the front door.

“See ya later, guys?”

“
Y
ou
’re
going
out
?” Mel called.

I looked around the kitchen door frame. “You didn’t hear me tell Mac we’re going for a walk?”

Neither roommate took their gaze from the television,
though
Mel shook her head.

“We won’t be long, maybe an hour and a half.”

That elicited no response at
all, so I opened the front door and ignited the stupid alarm. I called out, “Bye!”

“Later,” Mel said from behind me.
I twirled and found her so near
,
she was practically attached to my back.