The Witch’s Grave (3 page)

I tossed around in bed trying to find a comfortable place.

Was Tink right? Was Abby right?

I glanced at the clock. Eleven.

Did Stephen survive his surgery? If I called the hospital would they tell me?

Probably not—I wasn’t a relative, and I doubted the nurses would release information to a stranger. I’d have to wait until morning to learn of Stephen’s condition.

Suddenly hot, I kicked off the covers and jumped out of bed. Queenie, routed from her cozy position, rose, stretched, and with an indignant look at me, jumped off the bed and sauntered out of the room. Crossing to the window, I pulled back the curtain and stared out into the backyard of my little Victorian cottage. A full moon lit the night. Long shadows cast by the trees ringing my property dappled the ground, and a hazy mist floated just above my freshly mowed grass. The scene was peaceful, yet eerie.

The air in my bedroom felt stifling, and I took a deep breath as if I couldn’t get enough oxygen into my lungs. All of a sudden I felt caged—the room seemed to grow smaller and smaller. Shoving my feet into a pair of clogs, I fled.

Quietly, I moved swiftly down the hall to the stairs.
I didn’t want to rouse Tink or Abby. I needed to think before we had any more discussions about the shooting. Creeping down the stairs, I heard Abby’s voice coming from the main floor guest room. The way her voice carried, it seemed she was still on the phone with Arthur, who often took out his hearing aids at night. Good, she’d be concentrating on making herself heard, and not paying attention. The irony hit me. This was just like high school, trying to sneak out from under the watchful eye of my mother.

As I rounded the corner at the bottom of the stairs, from over my shoulder I spied my dog, Lady, curled up in the living room by the fireplace. She lifted her head and one blue eye, one brown eye, watched me in speculation while her tail thumped the floor.

Turning, I placed a finger on my lips. “Shh,” I whispered, and patted my leg softly. “You want to go outside?”

She scrambled to her feet, and together we slipped out the back door onto the patio. I chose the chaise lounge, while Lady ran toward the trees, her nose close to the ground, sniffing for the trail of some elusive squirrel. Leaning my head back, I took another deep breath and let the night calm me.

The sounds of crickets chirping, and Lady rustling through the underbrush as she searched for her squirrel, filled the night. The air, though heavy with humidity, felt good against my bare arms. Stars, scattered across the sky above me, winked and sparkled like glitter.

In my mind, I returned to my original question: Were Tink and Abby right? Was I supposed to be there? Did the Universe have some task for me?

Yes.
And it scared the crap out of me. It had only been a couple of months since Tink’s kidnapping, one of the worst experiences in my life. We’d all struggled so hard to find her. It had been a battle of a lifetime, and I didn’t know if I was up to facing another ordeal so soon. What if my psychic gift
had been depleted? What if my “batteries” needed to be re-charged? It might account for why I hadn’t sensed the danger before it struck Stephen down.

Abby always said to trust myself, to have faith.
Right.
At times, that’s easier said than done. Facing challenge after challenge can beat you down until all you want is a little peace in your life. Some respite.

A long sigh escaped while I stared at the night sky. One thing I’d learned over the past couple of years—it didn’t make a difference if I was ready or not. Another fight was on the horizon, and I’d better be prepared.

Reclining on the chaise, tiredness slithered up my body and my limbs felt too heavy to lift.
Damn Abby’s potions—how long were they going to linger in my system?

A comet shot across the heavens above as sleep once again claimed me.

I walked through fields of wildflowers as before, only this time the world wasn’t sunny and bright. Storm clouds roiled across the sky and, from miles away, the low sound of thunder rumbled. Wind whipped the tall grass, bending it low to the ground. Each step was a struggle against the force of the wind.

Stephen stood on the crest of a hill, as he had in the other dreams, but he faced away from me. I shouted his name, but the shrieking wind blew the words back in my face. Yelling his name again, I lowered my head and fought to move forward. I had to reach him—somehow I knew my life, his life, depended on it. I lifted one foot, but it felt as if it were encased in mud. Struggling, I tried to hurry through the weeds, but the more I tried, the heavier my steps became. Vines wrapped around my ankles and I fell facedown. Thistles scratched my face. Arms trembling with exertion, I pushed myself to my knees.

Lifting my head, I called out, “Stephen, help me!”

Stephen’s body slowly rotated until he faced me.

Bleak blue eyes stared at me from across the meadow, and I stretched a hand toward him.

“Stephen…” I ripped away the vines and shoved myself to my feet. If I could only reach him, everything would be okay.

With my eyes focused on him, I watched him raise his hands in a helpless gesture as a small circle of bright red appeared in the center of his white shirt. The dot grew bigger and bigger, spreading beyond Stephen to color the meadow in a crimson haze.

Wind roared in my ears, and I shut my eyes to block the sound and the sight of the once beautiful field now stained scarlet. Dizziness swept over me. Shaking my head, I fought against it.

The world suddenly righted, and the wind stopped. A shove in the middle of my back had my eyes flying open.

“Hurry.”

Racks and racks of clothing surrounded me, and the small room seemed clogged with people. Tall, rangy women stood in a line and were being poked and prodded by a small man with a thin mustache. A tape measure dangling from around his neck swayed as he flitted down the line from woman to woman. Each one stood patiently while he yanked at their clothes and fluffed their hair. Then with a push, he sent them out between curtains hung across the doorway. Each time the curtains parted, the cloying smell of perfume wafted through the room.

What was he doing?

“Madeleine, get in line. You’re next.”

As I looked around to spot Madeleine, a rotund woman grabbed my arm and began to pull me toward the little man.

Me? I’m Madeleine?
I tried to take a step, but something was wrapped around my knees. I stumbled.

“What is wrong with you today?” she asked with a yank, righting me.

This is so weird.
I minced along beside the woman until I was in front of the little man.

“Tsk tsk,” he hissed while pinching at my waist. “No more croissants for you. You’re lucky this still fits.”

Wait a second, this might be a dream, but I didn’t need some strange little man telling me what I could or couldn’t eat. I tried to take a deep breath in order to deliver a scathing reply, but the bodice was so tight, my ribs barely moved. My eyes traveled down.

No jeans, no long flowing dress—instead I wore a tight-fitting jacket that flared over my hips. It had shoulder pads that made my silhouette look like a linebacker’s. Its material was black with tiny white polka dots. A body-hugging skirt of the same material completed the ensemble and seemed to swaddle my legs to mid-calf. No wonder I couldn’t walk.

“Look at me,” the man commanded. He lifted my chin and turned my head from side to side. “More powder,” he said with a snap of his fingers.

A woman in a white smock scurried over and dusted my nose and cheeks with a soft puff full of fine, light powder.

I sneezed.

“Zzt, none of that,” he scolded. “Do you want them to think you’re sick?” Reaching up, he drew a net veil down over my face.

It felt scratchy on my nose, and I lifted a hand to brush it away, but the man stopped me.

“Leave it alone. I know you don’t like hats, but the customers do.”

With a shove, he sent me out through the curtains.

My startled eyes flew around the room.

The entire room was decorated in white and gold. The walls were white satin and the floor was covered with gold carpet. Large vases of creamy white lilies on gold pedestals littered the room. Elegantly dressed women, with hair so blond it was almost white, stood in clusters, sipping pale liquid from fluted, crystal glasses. The tall women I’d seen in
the little room strolled from group to group, pausing in front of each and doing a little pirouette. The blond women studied them with arctic blue eyes, and a couple of the blondes lifted thin, penciled eyebrows as they sized up the clothes the tall women wore.

I’m at some kind of a fashion show and I’m one of the models.

The thought ricocheted through my brain and I stifled a laugh.

Me? Ophelia Jensen? The fashion challenged Ophelia Jensen? A model?

It was ridiculous even for a dream. Had to be the stuff Abby put in the tea to make me dream something as crazy as this.

I took one halting step forward then stopped when I noticed the blondes’ companions—a group of men in the corner sitting rigidly on white chairs trimmed in gold. They were dressed in gray uniforms, with epaulets on the shoulders and collars trimmed in silver braid. Their posture was stiff and they all looked bored. One man, with close-cropped hair, drummed his fingers impatiently on his thigh as he spun a peaked hat with a visor in his other hand. He stopped and shifted uncomfortably in his chair. As he did, the gold medal on his jacket pocket caught the light. An iron cross with some kind of insignia stamped in its center.

The veil covering my face made it difficult to see, and I squinted for a better look.

My god—a swastika.

Where the hell was I?

A cold, wet nose nudging my arm had my eyes flying open while my heart still raced. I shot straight up in the chair and took a long, deep breath of the moist night air. With a groan, Lady nuzzled her head in my lap as if trying to comfort me. The pounding of my heart slowed, and I reached down to scratch her ears.

“It’s okay, girl,” I said softly.

She cocked her head to the side, and I could see the doubt in her eyes.

Stroking her ears, I forced a smile in the darkness. “No, really, I’m okay, but that was one heck of a dream. Remind me not to drink any more of Abby’s tea.”

Was it the tea? It had to be. All my life I’ve had dreams, but never one that strange. Never had I dreamt of events that had happened long ago. Chewing my lip, I tried to recall the images. It didn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out the men in my dream were Nazis. The swastika on the medal was a big clue.

Okay, the dream was taking place during World War II, or there about. I’ve never been a fan of military history, so why would I dream of that time period? I searched my memory for anything that might have triggered the dream. Had I read any articles about the war? Had we received any
books on the subject in the recent past? Nope—not that I could recall.

And what about the model thing? What possibly could’ve caused me to imagine that? As Darci frequently pointed out, I had no sense of fashion, and she’d made it a life mission to clear out all of the polyester in my closet. I wore linen in the fall and tweed in the spring—according to Darci—a big “no-no.” She’d even made me throw away my favorite hair accessory—scrunchies. Had Darci’s constant efforts to give me some style filtered into my subconscious, causing me to dream of being a model?

I snickered at the thought.

With a sigh, I tried to put the images out of my mind. I had enough to think about in this time period, instead of worrying about a silly dream of a time long dead. As the pictures in my head faded, I felt a band of anxiety squeeze my chest, and with it came the same feeling that I’d described to Darci earlier. The sense that there was something I needed to do, but couldn’t remember what it was.

Could the runes Abby had given me help? The glyphs acted as my guideposts and brought clarity to my thoughts, giving me some sense of what my visions might mean. But the dream hadn’t been a vision, and my mind was too jumbled to attempt using the runes tonight. Shaking my head in frustration, I thrust the dream away. I needed to focus on reality. To think about that day and the events leading up to the shooting.

Bill had asked me if anything in Stephen’s demeanor seemed odd. No. We’d walked down the lane talking. The conversation was normal for two people meeting for the first time. We stopped, then Stephen kissed me. I was facing away from the woods, so I couldn’t see if there’d been any movement in the trees. Stephen stepped around me when we heard the crows.

My face twisted at my next memory—the crack of gun
fire and the smell of sulfur, the expression on Stephen’s face, how he had staggered and fallen, his last words.

I slapped my forehead and sprang to my feet startling Lady.
Jensen, you’re an idiot
.
The book.

I rushed to the back door, opened it softly and crept into my now dark and quiet house. Not wanting to alert Abby, I snuck upstairs and into the bathroom with Lady at my heels. Seeing the dress lying on top of the trash, I reached down and with two fingers lifted it out of the trash. Dark streaks, almost black, where I’d swiped my bloody hands, marred the navy material. My stomach clenched at the sight.

At my side, Lady sniffed the air, took two steps back and gave a low whimper.

“I know…you don’t like the dress either,” I whispered.

At the sound of my voice, she plunked down on the floor and stared up at me.

With hesitation, I stuck my hand in the deep pocket and rummaged around until my fingers found the smooth leather cover. Grasping the book, I pulled it out. Bloody fingerprints etched the cover.

Dropping the dress back into the trash, I stared at the book in my hand. My common sense told me that I should turn it over to Bill, but a little voice inside my head asked a question.

What’s in this book?

I forced myself to open it.

It was a date book with appointments scrawled in large, loopy letters.

I flipped through the pages and saw the phone numbers and addresses of his agent, editor, and Karen Burns, his assistant. Examining the dates, I noticed Stephen had been on a book tour for the last few weeks. He’d had signings at Cornerstone Books in Salem, Massachusetts; Mystery Lovers Bookshop in Oakmont, Pennsylvania, last month; Booked for Murder in Madison, Wisconsin, and Once Upon a Crime
in Minneapolis, last week; and The Bookworm in Bellevue, Iowa, just prior to coming to Summerset.

He hadn’t said anything about a book tour. He said he was conducting research for the next Stephen Larsen book and that his next stop was Texas.

I read his entries for the month of September. He had signings listed for I Love a Mystery in Mission, Kansas; Main Street Books in St. Charles, Missouri; Big Sleep Books in St. Louis, and Mysterious Galaxy in San Diego, California. I flipped forward to October, but only found an entry for an appearance at The Women’s Expo in Kingsport, Tennessee. Nothing about a stop in Texas. Turning back, I looked at the date listing The Bookworm. Next to it was a phone number with a 515 area code. I knew that was for central not eastern Iowa, where The Bookworm was located.

Turning the page, I noticed that last Friday, just two days ago, Stephen had written
Vargas
and a phone number next to the date. He’d circled it twice.

Vargas? Vargas? We had a Vargas family living in Summerset, and the phone number was a local one. A coincidence? No, it had to be the same family. I’d seen Mr. Vargas on the street with his wife and daughter, and knew that he worked at the winery, along with many other Latinos in the area. Stephen said he’d heard there was someone at the fund-raiser whom he wanted to meet. His entry indicated that the meeting must have been with Vargas.

It didn’t make sense. Stephen had been in eastern Iowa. How would he have known of the Vargas family? And why did he want to talk with them? As far as I knew, they were a quiet family, staying mostly to themselves. I knew their little girl, Evita. She came to the library a couple of days a week, after school, but the only time I ever ran into her mother, Deloris, was when she picked up Evita.

A smile played at the corner of my mouth. Evita was a real sweetheart. About ten years old, with black ringlets floating around her shoulders, she was bright, inquisitive,
an avid reader, and for some reason, attached herself to me whenever she came to the library. The reason could’ve been the candy jar we kept at the counter to encourage children to return books. Every time they returned their books, they received a piece. But Evita? I always slipped her two pieces. For whatever reason, her brown eyes sparkled as she followed me around, asking questions and munching her candy. Already she was reading way above her age level.

Her mother didn’t share Evita’s friendliness. She seemed very shy and never engaged in conversation when she picked up Evita. She did adore her daughter, though. Her face lit up at the sight of her bopping around the library. The greeting was always the same. Evita would fly into her mother’s arms, rattling off words in rapid Spanish, Deloris would laugh and enfold her in a big hug, and then with a nod and a small smile at me, the two would leave the library hand in hand.

They appeared to be a happy family, and I couldn’t imagine why Stephen would be interested in them.

I glanced at Lady still lying on the floor watching me. “Well, girl. One way to find out—I’ll call Mrs. Vargas, then Karen Burns. Maybe she knows why Stephen wanted to talk with the Vargases. Never hurts to ask questions, right?”

“What are you doing?”

I jumped at the sound of Abby’s voice coming from the door way of my home office. With a hand to my chest, I glanced over my shoulder. “Jeez, Abby, you shouldn’t sneak up on people like that.”

“That doesn’t answer my question,” she replied, crossing to where I sat at my desk.

I tugged my linen jacket on with one hand fiddling with the clip holding back my hair with the other hand. “I thought I’d catch up on a few things before work,” I said, my eyes darting to the scanner holding Stephen’s date book. I knew I had to turn the book over to Bill, but it didn’t mean I couldn’t copy it first.

Abby leaned against the corner of the desk, crossed her arms and cocked an eyebrow. “Do you think going to the library is wise?”

“Yes,” I answered, trying to sound confident. “Work is the best thing for me now. I don’t need to be there until noon, so I’m going to the hospital first.”

Her expression softened as she placed a hand on my shoulder. “Of course you want to see him.” She lifted her hand and smoothed my hair. “I’m worried about you—yesterday was a shock.”

“Yeah, but I’m not the one who was shot. Stephen is the one hurt.”

Abby released a long sigh. “I’m concerned about him, too, but you’re my granddaughter—you’re my primary concern. You might’ve been hurt.”

Standing, I gave her a quick squeeze. “But I wasn’t, and now I need to know why him.”

A look of surprise flickered on Abby’s face. “This isn’t like you. I’ve never seen you willing to get involved in a situation like this.”

A wry smile played at my lips as I thought of my words to Darci. “Maybe I’m trying to change.”

Returning my smile, Abby patted the side of my face. “Not too much, I hope,” she said. “I rather like you just the way you are.”