Fatal, But Festive, page 12
“I don’t know. I don’t know.” They emerged into the weed-filled old driveway. Chris looked toward the road. “We heard him drive off, so we have time.”
“I don’t think we’d better assume that we have any time at all,” Kiley said. “Johnny, stay outside with Jack, watch his back while he works on the van. The rest of us will pack up our gear. But call us the second it’s ready. We’ll take whatever we have and leave the rest. Okay?”
Jack looked at her for a second with some kind of distracted expression, but then he shook himself and said, “Yes. Okay. Go!”
“Looks like he yanked some spark plug wires,” Jack called. He straightened from under the hood and looked around. Johnny was already searching the weeds along one side of the van, so he began doing the same on the other. “He probably just whipped them. Doubt he took the time to hide ‘em or—”
He jumped at sudden motion, but it was only Kiley, sleeping bags bundled in her arms. “That would be easier if you rolled them.”
“We’ll roll them on the road.” She wrenched open the van’s rear doors and hurled the bags inside, then sprinted back toward the cabin as Chris and Maya emerged, each carrying a large cooler.
“Found ‘em!” Johnny came running with a handful of black wires and spark plug caps like a handful of snakes. Chris and Maya put the coolers into the back of the van and headed back into the cabin
“Great, great.” Jack took the plug wires and leaned in to re-attach them. “Johnny, try to start it up.”
Johnny got inside and turned the key, which was still in the switch from the night before. He tried, and the engine whirred and nothing much else.
“Hold up! I thought that might’ve been wrong.” Jack switched the wires around. “Try again.”
This time the van started. “Yes!” He slammed the hood down and turned to shout to the others, but they were already on their way, each bearing a backpack or gym bag. Johnny got out to take the oversize pack Maya was carrying. Jack got behind the wheel, and Kiley took the passenger seat. Once everyone had crowded in and slammed the doors, Jack drove forward, through the tall grass that had never been a driveway, because he couldn’t back up with Maya’s car under a tree behind him. He couldn’t see what the ground was like, and prayed he wouldn’t hit a hole or a ditch or a tree stump or…wait, there was the road, just ahead. He sent Kiley a relieved smile. “We’re gonna make it.”
Edward O’Reilly Cantrell stepped right out in front of them, not ten feet ahead, his white hair matted with red-black blood. He raised his shotgun up to his shoulder.
“Down!” Jack stomped the accelerator to the floor as flames flashed from both barrels. The windshield exploded.
They hit the road, Jack felt it, and turned left without being able to see. He popped up for a quick look and didn’t see any sign of the murderous asshole, so he kept the pedal down. “Is everyone okay?”
They all answered yes and started to straighten up, and then the back windows exploded, too.
Maya screamed and there was blood on her arm and Johnny started swearing, then said, “It’s the glass, not a bullet. You’re okay, you’re okay. She’s okay.”
One of the rear doors had flown open and was flapping in the wind as Jack drove.
He said, “Chris, can you get the door?”
Chris crawled to the back, and Jack wanted to slow down so he wouldn’t bounce the kid right out onto the pavement, but he saw headlights in his rearview mirror, closing fast. “Hurry up, Chris.”
Chris pulled the door closed, knotted it in place with his own belt, and scrambled closer to the front. “He’s coming.”
“I know.”
Johnny was tending Maya’s arm, cut from the exploding glass, and Kiley was refreshing her phone in hopes of getting a signal. The vehicle behind them, a pickup truck, was gaining on them. The van was not designed for speed.
“Got a bar!” Kiley yelled. “Pick up, pick up.”
“Nine-one-one, what’s your–”
“We are being chased and shot at by a man in a pickup truck. I’m sharing my GPS location with you now.” She paused and tapped something on her screen, then returned to the call. “We are in a white van.”
“We have someone in the area. Keep driving south, they will intercept you. And stay on the line be–”
Kiley frowned, looked at the phone, “What the–?”
Beep Beep Beep.
“Dropped the damn call.”
“Help’s on the way, though,” Jack said. “You guys, pile all the equipment up against the back and stay low and way up as near the front as you can, in case he starts shooting again.”
“Right!” Chris started moving stuff immediately. “More for the bullet to pass through before it gets to us.”
“Go, help him,” Maya told Johnny. “I’m fine, it’s fine.”
He’d wrapped her arm in gauze and still had his hand around it. She pressed her hand over his and nodded at him to go, so he did. And sure enough, another shotgun blast ripped their way, but it missed the van entirely, that time.
Finally, like a blessing from above, Jack heard a siren in the distance.
Edward must’ve heard it too, because he hit the brakes, skidded the pickup around sideways, and then took off again in the opposite direction.
“Yes! He’s gone!” Chris said.
The police car sped past them, the fellow in the passenger side giving them a thumbs up on the way by. Everyone in the van let out a whoop or cheer.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
It wasn’t until nightfall, that they finally pulled into Kiley’s driveway in the van. It wasn’t made to seat five, but it had worked out fine. Maya had been given a CT scan, two stitches, and a clean bill of health. They’d all given statements to the police, who had accompanied them back to the site and Gabriel York’s remains. There had been no sign of Edward O’Reilly Cantrell.
It was kind of automatic, all of them coming back there, to Kiley’s big old spooky house. Kiley didn’t mind the whole gang there, for a change. She didn’t even like thinking about them all going home. Not just then.
They all went inside. They were dirty and exhausted.
The scent of pine greeted Kiley when she opened the front door. The tree lights were aglow, and there was a fire snapping happily in the fireplace. She turned around, frowning at everyone. “Who kept the fire going?”
“Who turned on the tree lights?” Jack asked. “We turned them off when we left.”
She looked around the place, rolled her eyes. “Ghosts again?”
“At least they’re warm, Christmas-loving ghosts.” Maya had a thick bandage on her arm, and another on the back of her head, where they’d shaved a bit off her white-blond hair to stitch up the crack the tree had made. She sank onto the sofa.
“Still,” Kiley said, “maybe we’d better—”
“Search the house,” Jack filled in. “I’m on it.”
“I’ll go with.” Chris clapped Jack’s shoulder and the two of them went deeper into the house.
“You guys want something to drink or eat or—”
“Girl, sit down before you fall down.” Maya spoke without raising her head from the back of the sofa.
“You know what? You’re right.” Kiley dropped into the big chair she loved best. “We have to talk to the twins, though. The cops will tell them—”
“The cops don’t even know what to tell them,” Johnny said. “They’ll say that their dead grandfather killed their father and buried him in the woods, then faked his own death. It’s entirely the wrong information.”
“All the more reason we should prepare them with the right information,” Maya said.
“Yeah, that’ll be a conversation, won’t it?” Kiley asked. “Your dead grandfather is alive, and he’s actually your dad. He killed the guy you thought was your dad to keep him quiet about the fact that he’d raped and impregnated his own daughter, your mom.”
“We can’t really prove that part of it, though,” Maya said softly.
“DNA could.” Johnny sighed, lowering himself onto the sofa beside Maya, but not too close. “But that will be up to the twins to decide, I guess. They might not want to know.”
“I might not blame them,” Maya said.
Kiley pulled her phone from her jacket pocket, only then realizing she was still wearing a jacket. And it was warm, thanks to the ghost fire. She shrugged it off while tapping her phone, then let herself sink deeper into the soft chair and curled into a comfortable little ball.
Jack and Chris came downstairs and passed through the room to continue their search. Chris went straight through to the dining room. Jack paused and glanced at her, then took the plush throw from the back of the sofa, brought it to her, and laid it over her where she was curled in the chair.
She met his eyes and thanked him there. He acknowledged it. No words were needed. Then he continued on his way to the basement, where only a short time ago, they’d discovered horrors that still haunted her dreams, if not her house.
Her thumb lingered over the contact for Sara Cantrell on her phone.
And then it rang, and Sara’s name lit the screen.
“Dang, I wonder if this psychic shit is contagious,” she said, and tapped the answer button.
Before she could say “hello” Sara’s voice stabbed her ear drum. “Did something happen? What the hell happened?”
Jerking the phone away from her ear, Kiley hit the speaker button, and cranked the volume.
“What’s going on, Sara?”
“Mom’s going crazy! Things are flying around the room. By themselves. Jesiz, help!” Kiley could hear the noise in the background, a hoarse wailing, a series of crashes.
“We’re on our way. Try not to let her hurt herself.”
Maya groaned and got upright.
Jack held up a hand. “I think Kiley and I can handle this one. You’ve been through hell. You, too, Johnny.”
Johnny nodded, not even arguing. “I’ll call a Lyft.”
“Hey, um…why don’t you guys stay here?” Kiley asked. She was grabbing her jacket off the floor, pushing her tired arms into its sleeves with no small measure of regret. “There are guest rooms to the moon and back. They’re all made up because I’m a little bit OCD. Pick one.” Everybody looked at her, and she said, “Or two. Or, three, because, you too, Chris.”
Jack frowned at her. “You sure?”
“Jeeze, it’s three thirty in the morning. What’s the point of them going home now? Besides, this way they’ll all be here if we need them over at the Cantrell place.” She looked at her guests and said, “I’ll make Jack cook his french toast for breakfast. It’s to die for.”
Maya groaned at the bad pun.
“Sold,” Johnny said, and he sat back down.
Chris held up his phone. “If you need us, call. Otherwise, Imma pick the best room, get a shower and some sleep.”
Jack was confused by Kiley’s invitation to the gang. He’d been hoping she would want him to stay the night, but he’d kind of envisioned them alone together. Not that he had the energy to make the most of things, but after a few hours of rest, who knew?
Kiley got behind the wheel of her old car, and he was grateful. He’d driven all the way back from that hunting cabin, after a full day with the cops. He was bleary-eyed.
She seemed wide awake.
He glanced sideways at her, noting her white knuckled grip on the steering wheel and the way she leaned slightly forward, not back against the seat. Like doing so would make the car move faster. She was doing nine miles over the limit, and he could tell she wanted to do more. They had about five minutes at the speed she was going, unless she killed them first. Maybe enough time to ask.
“So…you wanted the gang to sleep over, huh?”
She gave him a quick sideways look that felt a little sharp. “It’s practically morning.”
“Yeah. But none of them live far.”
“Maya’s injured. She shouldn’t be alone overnight.”
“I got the feeling she wasn’t going to be,” he said.
She lifted her eyebrows. “You got that, too?”
“Hoh, yeah. I just don’t know if Johnny’s aware the attraction runs both ways.”
“He’s oblivious,” Kiley said. “Probably thinks she’s out of his reach, with the age thing and…hey, wait a minute. Maybe that’s why.”
“Maybe what’s why what?”
“Why Gabe identified with Johnny. They’re both in love with women they can’t reach, can’t touch, can’t have in some way.”
Jack nodded slowly. “That’s a really good theory.”
She smiled, a little of the tension easing from her face. “They kind of work, don’t they?”
“Not as well as we do,” Jack said.
“Nobody works as well as we do,” she shot back. Then the grin faded and her eyes looked like they were asking, who said that?
Too late, though. She’d said it.
“Here we are.” She turned into the driveway just as an upstairs window exploded, raining glass down on the car. Kiley swore a blue streak, wrenching her door open at the same time. She held her arms over her head and dashed toward the front door. Jack dove out and ran behind her. The door was unlocked, so they ducked inside.
Brushing her hands through her hair in case of glass, Kiley looked around. There were crashes and loud voices coming from upstairs. She met Jack’s eyes.
“We’ve got this,” he said. “We’ve come this far.”
They hurried upstairs, straight into the bedroom where Rosalie was sitting up in the bed, swinging her arms, kicking her legs. She latched onto an IV pole and hurled it at them, maybe because it was the only thing left to hurl. She’d cleared the nightstand. Broken glass littered the floor, a clock with its insides spilling out lay near the wall, and God only knew what she’d thrown through the window.
“Rosalie!” Jack cried, and the emotion in his voice struck Kiley. He really cared about her. He went to the bedside and let her hands smack and claw at him. “We found Gabe. We know what happened to him. He’s going to be okay now.”
“Dead dead dead dead,” she cried.
“Yes, but not trapped anymore. He’s free now. He’s free, do you hear me? Gabe is free.”
“Free.” A whisper. Her eyes were closed. She stopped swinging her arms. Her legs went still. “Gabe?”
Sara came from the attached bathroom, wrapping gauze around her open hand. There was blood soaking through it, over her palm.
Kev remained where he was, in the corner furthest from the bed, wide-eyed.
“He’s coming for me,” Rosalie said matter of factly, as she lay back on the pillows. “It’s Christmas Eve and he’s coming. I should get ready.” Her face relaxed, and a long, relieved breath stuttered between her lips as she sank deeply into slumber or coma or whatever state she was in.
“What do you mean, Gabe is free?” Sara asked.
“Let’s talk … not in here,” Kiley said. “Let her rest.” And she walked out of the bedroom, leaving them to follow.
They did, the twins, at least. Jack didn’t and when she turned back to him, she saw him staring at a spot between himself and the bed.
“You need a minute?” she asked him.
He nodded, his gaze not moving.
“Okay, I got this.” She closed the door to give him space, pretty sure he wasn’t alone in there. Then she turned to the twins. “Okay, so…we went to a little cabin up north. It belonged to Gabe’s uncle, who left it to Gabe when he died. It was where he planned to take your mother, when he came for her that Christmas Eve.”
The twins looked at each other in stunned surprise.
Kiley took a breath and forced herself to speak the next sentence. “Gabe was buried up there in the woods. We found his body.”
“His…body? You found our father’s body?”
“We found Gabriel York’s body, yes.” She cleared her throat. “And then your grandfather showed up and tried to kill us.”
“That’s ludicrous,” Sara said. “Our grandfather is dead.”
“No, he’s not. Not dead and I’m really sorry to tell you this, but he’s not your grandfather, either.”
“I don’t—”
“There’s no easy way to say it. Edward O’Reilly Cantrell raped your mother, his own teenage daughter, and got her pregnant. He is your birth father. Your mom fell in love with Gabe and told him the truth. He wanted to marry her and take her away from here. And so your grandfather killed him.”
Kev wobbled, then pressed a hand to the nearest wall, maybe to stay upright.
“That’s sick,” Sarah said. “And a lie. A filthy lie. How could you possibly know any of that? What, the ghosts told you? Or was it my comatose mother?”
“Gabe told us,” Kiley said. “And your grandfather admitted it all. But you can prove it yourself with a DNA test. Your sperm donor murdered Gabe because Gabe knew the truth and was going to take his little girl and victim away from him. Your grandma Nisha found out what her husband had done when she read your mother’s diary. So when he followed Gabe to the cabin, she followed him. But she was too late. Gabe was already dead when she arrived.” She lowered her head. “Nisha told Edward to go away and never return. After he left, she wrapped Gabe’s body in her favorite coat and buried him in a shallow grave in the woods. And that’s where we found him. The police, who will be in touch before the night is out, if they haven’t already—”
“Phone’s been ringing off the hook,” Sara said.
Kev sat down, right there on the floor, looking shell shocked. “That’s why he never came for her that Christmas Eve? Because he was dead? And our grandfather—our father—is still alive?”
Kiley nodded. Gabe came out of the bedroom, pulling the door gently closed behind him. “She can’t see Gabe anymore. He’s there, though. He can’t leave her side.” He sighed, looking from one twin to the other, then at Kiley. “You told them.”
She nodded.
“She told us,” Sara said. “But what the hell we’re supposed to do with it, we still don’t know.” She stretched out a hand toward her brother. “C’mon, Kev, get up.”
