Kitabı oku: «The Accused», sayfa 2

The only clear memory she had was of that night—the night before they were sent away. And the sheer figure of her mother, dressed in a long white flowing gown and hovering over her bed.

She shook her head, trying to clear the image from her mind. It had been frozen there for so long, the lone thing she’d carried with her all these years. Logically, she knew that she’d been a scared little girl who’d just lost her mother, but emotionally, she still wondered if what she’d seen that night was real.

As she stepped back into the entry, she heard a noise overhead. Immediately she froze, trying to determine if she’d heard the normal sounds of an old house, or if something else, of the four-legged, undesirable variety, was inside with her. Her pulse quickened when she realized it was footsteps—the two-legged kind.

A single glance at the crack in the front door made her blood run cold. She was positive she’d closed and locked it behind her after carrying in the last of the supplies. But someone was inside with her.

She reached for her purse and pulled out the pistol she’d begun carrying after receiving her first official death threat on the job. Despite the heat and humidity, the metal was cold in her hand. She dug around in the side pocket for her car keys and mentally cursed when she remembered she’d set them on the kitchen counter.

She eased back down the hallway, praying she could get her keys and get out of the house. Surely someone with a legitimate reason to be inside would have knocked or called out upon entering. She could only assume that whoever had come in was up to no good. That was a problem for the sheriff, not an unemployed attorney who had no interest in playing the hero.

The footsteps faded away as she slipped down the hallway and into the kitchen to retrieve her car keys. She moved silently on the stone floor, giving mental thanks that she’d worn comfortable tennis shoes and jeans and not her usual casual wear of slacks, blouse and high-heeled sandals.

All she had to do was make it back down the hallway and out of the house. An athletic scholarship for sprinting had paid for most of her college. If she could get outside the house, she had no doubt she could beat the intruder to her SUV and get away. But as she hurried across the kitchen to the hallway, the pantry door flew open. Unable to stop, she collided with it and went sprawling to the ground, her pistol sliding across the stone floor.

She scrambled for the gun as a dark figure stepped out of the pantry. Panicked, she made a desperate reach for the pistol, which was still several inches away.

“I wouldn’t do that if I were you.” A deep voice sounded above her.

Chapter Three

One look at the man and she knew she didn’t stand a chance. He was easily six feet tall, with strong arms and chest. The butt of a pistol peeked out of the waistband of his jeans and she had no doubt he could fire before she could even latch on to her weapon.

This was it. Her life would come full circle in this swamp—birth to death.

“Alaina LeBeau?” he asked, staring down at her with a mixture of aggravation and resignation.

“Yes.” She pushed herself up to a sitting position.

He studied her face for a moment, then sighed and extended his hand to help her up from the floor. “I didn’t mean to scare you.”

“Then why were you sneaking around my house and hiding in the pantry?” The fear she’d felt only seconds ago was speeding away, only to be replaced by aggravation now that she no longer felt threatened.

His green eyes flashed with anger. “I don’t ‘sneak around’ private property, and that’s not a pantry—it’s a stairwell.”

She peered around him into the doorway and, sure enough, saw a narrow set of stairs leading up to the second floor. “Who are you and what are you doing here?”

“I’m Carter Trahan—Sheriff Carter Trahan—and I’m here to check off one day on my babysitting roster.”

Alaina clenched her jaw, forcing herself to pause before replying to his insulting statement. The last thing she needed was to alienate the man required to check up on her. “Mr. Duhon informed me that you’d be monitoring the residency terms of the will. I hardly need a babysitter.”

He merely raised one eyebrow and gave her an amused smile.

“Well, if you’re done slamming doors into visitors, Sheriff Trahan, I should get back to my unpacking. Next time you check on me, please knock.”

“I did knock … twice. Then I opened the door and called out from the entrance. I thought my voice would echo up to the second floor, but you kept on walking, so I went upstairs to catch you there.”

Alaina stared at him. “That’s impossible. I haven’t been upstairs yet.”

Carter frowned. “I saw someone enter the hallway upstairs that runs parallel to this one.”

Her breath caught in her throat. “It wasn’t me,” she managed, “and I came here alone. Perhaps the caretaker …”

He shook his head. “Amos is eighty-six years old and walks with a limp. Whoever this was walked quickly enough to disappear before I got upstairs. When I got to the bedroom over the kitchen, I could hear noise downstairs. The door to the servant’s stairwell was partially open, so I assumed you’d gone down that way.”

He pushed shut the door to the stairwell and had to give it an extra nudge when it jammed in the doorframe. “The door had no lock, but it stuck when I tried to open it. I hit it with my shoulder, which is why it flew open and struck you. But if anyone had used it right before me, you would have heard and seen them.”

“I heard you walking upstairs. That’s why I was hurrying to get out of the house, but I didn’t hear anyone before.”

Alaina crossed her arms in front of her chest, a slight chill running over her. “You’re sure you saw someone? Maybe it was a trick of shadows and light. Between the storm brewing and that glass ceiling, maybe it just looked like someone was upstairs.”

“Maybe,” he said, but he didn’t look as though he believed it for a minute.

He spun around and strode down the hallway to the entry. Ignoring his abrupt departure, Alaina hurried behind him as he knelt in front of the circular stairs.

“Only one set of prints, and they’re mine,” he said, pointing to the prints that led up the dusty staircase.

“Maybe it was a ghost,” Alaina joked.

Carter rose and narrowed his eyes at her. “What ghost?”

She shrugged. “None in particular. I just figured old, spooky house equaled a ghost story of some sort, especially in a small community.”

“The locals have their share of beliefs about this house and your stepfather, but I prefer to deal with what I can prove. Given your profession, I assume you appreciate that.”

“Of course. I was just joking.” But she knew she was lying, before the words left her mouth. The memory of her mother’s ghost was something she couldn’t deny and had never been able to forget.

“Because I don’t believe in ghosts,” he said, “I’m going to take a look around.”

“Of course … Thank you.”

He nodded. “Do you know how to use that pistol?”

“Yes. I practice at the range at least once a week.”

“Keep it on you. I’ll make sure I announce myself before accosting you again.”

He pulled his pistol from his waistband and strode up the stairs. She watched him for a couple of seconds, then ran back to the kitchen to scoop her pistol up from the floor. Her apprehension when she’d first arrived had turned into full-fledged worry.

Something didn’t feel right.

The last time she’d felt that way, a child had died.

CARTER PEERED INTO each bedroom off the main hallway over the kitchen, but none of them showed any signs of human passage. Tiny tracks of four-legged critters appeared periodically, but he easily identified and dismissed them. Four-legged creatures may not be desirable inside a home, but there were worse things.

The more space he covered with no indication of the intruder, the more frustrated he became with the entire situation. When William had described Alaina as a successful Baton Rouge attorney, Carter had immediately formed a mental picture of a masculine-looking female. The tall, fit woman with hazel eyes and miles of wavy brown hair didn’t fit into his image at all.

He’d expected to be annoyed and he was, but he hadn’t expected to find her attractive, and that annoyed him even more.

Peering into the last bedroom along the hallway, he blew out a breath. There was no indication that anyone had traveled down this hall besides him, but he knew he’d seen something. Or maybe Alaina was right and the weather and glass ceiling had conspired to create a shadow he had taken for a person.

He started around the balcony that circled the entry, checking the rooms that shot off in every direction. None of them appeared disturbed until he reached the last. Trenton Purcell’s office, he thought as he stepped inside. A huge ornate desk stood in the center of the room. Bookcases, stuffed with leather-bound texts, formed every square inch of the walls, even framing the doorway.

The layer of dust here wasn’t as thick as it was in the rest of the rooms, which made sense assuming Purcell had spent a lot of time in here. He took a step toward the desk and realized that a narrow doorway sat in the back corner of the room, barely visible because it was stained the same color as the bookcases.

He pushed the door open to find a bedroom with another entry off the balcony. The bed was still covered with navy sheets and spread, and several bottles of medicine stood on the nightstand. He picked one up and checked to make sure it belonged to Purcell, then placed it back on the table.

Three doors occupied the far wall of the bedroom, one standing open, exposing the master bath. He opened the second door and found a musty walk-in closet, still full of tattered suits. He expected the third door was more storage but found another servant’s staircase instead.

It made sense, he supposed, that the servants would have a private entry into the master bedroom. That way, they couldn’t be seen going about their work by any household guests. At least, it made sense as much as having people living in your home and waiting on you did to Carter. He wasn’t convinced the convenience was worth the loss of privacy.

He followed the staircase down and pushed open the door at the bottom. It opened easily and without a sound and he stepped out into a laundry room at the back of the house. A door leading into the backyard was positioned at the rear of the room. A quick check showed it to be locked, but he pulled it open and studied the ground outside, trying to make out footprints. Unfortunately, ground cover of cracked stones, dirt and vines wasn’t the kind of material that was easily imprinted.

He stepped back inside and closed and locked the door. There was absolutely no indication that anyone had been in the house except him and Alaina. The fact that he’d found nothing to suggest the presence of an intruder should make him happy, but he couldn’t work himself up to that point.

The reality was, for the first time in his life, Carter knew exactly what his mother meant when she said she “felt” something was wrong but couldn’t put her finger on it. Something was very wrong in this house.

Whatever it was, he didn’t think it would remain hidden for long.

Chapter Four

Alaina felt as though she’d waited forever, but finally Carter emerged from one of the back hallways and into the massive entry room. She let out a breath she hadn’t realized she was holding and felt the tightness in her chest release. Then she realized that he’d just entered the room from the first floor but hadn’t used either of the stairwells to get down from the second floor.

“How did you get downstairs?” she asked as he approached.

He frowned. “A servant’s stairwell in the master bedroom. It led to the laundry room off the back of the house.”

“How many hidden passages are in this house?”

“More than I’ve found so far, I’d guess.” He didn’t look happy about it.

“Did you see anyone …? I mean, I guess you didn’t, but did you see any sign that someone had been up there?”

“No.”

“But?”

He sighed. “But I don’t believe in fanciful things like ghosts and I have perfect vision. I saw something on that landing.”

“An animal maybe?”

“It was too large to be any animal that would be in the house and I couldn’t find tracks on the landing.”

She swallowed. “Then maybe it was a shadow. With that enormous glass ceiling and the storm brewing, couldn’t it have created a moving shadow that looked like a person?”

“I suppose,” he said, but didn’t seem convinced. “Look, maybe you shouldn’t stay here just yet.”

His suggestion was tempting, especially given that she was completely creeped out, but it wasn’t conducive to the reason she was there.

“Is there a hotel in town?” she asked, wondering if spending the night in a hotel and milling among the locals the rest of the day would give whoever was lurking in the house the notice to clear out—assuming it was a human in the first place. Rats, raccoons and storm clouds probably wouldn’t care about the local gossip.

“No hotel. No rental property either. Calais is a small spot on the map and a dead end at that. People don’t come here unless they intend to, so there’s not much call for hotels and such. New Orleans is only a little over an hour’s drive, though.” He looked hopeful as he delivered that last statement.

She could do it—probably should do it—but the thought of packing everything back in her SUV and spending another hour plus on the road didn’t sound even remotely appealing. If she thought it would change something, she might consider it, but staying in New Orleans wouldn’t create any local gossip at all. It would only be delaying the inevitable.

She sighed. “I appreciate your concern, but if you saw something tangible, my staying in New Orleans for a night isn’t going to make it clear out. And it’s just one more day I’ll have to make up staying here.”

“It would give me a chance to poke around some more.”

“You’re welcome to do that while I’m here. In fact, as I’ll be the one living here for two weeks, I’d prefer it if I did it with you.”

She could tell by the way his jaw flexed that he didn’t like it. The attorney had already warned her that the sheriff who’d agreed to the terms of the will had long since passed. While the new sheriff had agreed to meet the terms of the will, he was neither under any legal obligation to do so, nor was he being paid for his time.

His babysitting comment earlier had left her no doubt as to how he felt about his assignment. She sympathized with his position, but ultimately it wasn’t her problem. If he didn’t want to deal with it any longer, Alaina was certain Mr. Duhon would find someone else.

Finally, he blew out a breath. “Okay, then the first thing we should do is locate a bedroom for you that is easily secured. No servants’ passages and a good, sturdy lock.”

“One with a connecting bath would be best.”

“I agree. The master bedroom has a connecting bath but also several ways in and out.”

She crossed her arms over her chest, as if to ward off the unease she felt at the thought of sleeping in the same bed that her dead stepfather had slept in. “I wouldn’t want to sleep in there anyway.”

“I don’t blame you. Let’s check downstairs first.”

Alaina nodded and walked to the left side of the entry as Carter took the right. A careful inspection of the downstairs rooms did not reveal any equipped as a bedroom.

“We could move some bedroom furniture downstairs,” Carter suggested as they met at the back of the entry.

She shook her head. “There’s no connecting bath for any of the rooms. There’s a half bath off the kitchen, but that’s the only one I’ve seen downstairs so far.”

“There’s another off the laundry room.”

She blew out a breath. “Both of those are hallways away from these rooms, and I can hardly put a bed in the middle of the kitchen or the laundry room, or shower in the sink.”

“No. Neither of those rooms is secure anyway. They both have wide entries with no doors.”

“Probably to make carrying laundry and food easier.”

“Which doesn’t help us at all.”

“Then I guess I’ll have to stay upstairs.”

He motioned toward the spiral stairwell. “After you.”

As she walked up the stairs, she looked out the glass ceiling. The clouds overhead swirled, creating constantly shifting patterns of light and shadows.

“That storm looks like it’s going to be bad,” she said as they stepped onto the landing.

“It doesn’t look like a mild one,” he agreed. “I can’t believe that glass ceiling is still intact. We had a horrible storm last week—lots of lightning and hail even.”

“It’s got a panel that covers it. I accidentally opened it thinking it was a switch for the lights. It didn’t sound like it had been used in some time.”

Carter looked up and frowned. “Your stepfather was a recluse. Maybe he didn’t like the light either.”

Preferring to lurk in the shadow like most monsters.

She shook her head. Now was not the time for fanciful thoughts, especially those that might scare her once she was alone in this house in the dark. She had no concrete memory of her stepfather, but she knew she’d feared him. That was all she wanted to know.

“I just hope it closes,” she said.

“Let’s not borrow trouble,” he said and pointed to a hallway on the left side of the landing. “I saw several bedrooms that direction when I was up here earlier. Let’s see if one works.”

By unspoken agreement, they each took a side of the hall and began inspecting the bedrooms. Alaina made it to the door centered at the end of the hall before Carter. She stepped inside and sucked in a breath.

This was it. The bedroom she’d shared with her sisters.

It was situated directly over the kitchen area and just as large. Her memories were fuzzy, but she could remember the single beds and crib, all decked out in pink and white. White dressers stood against the wall across from the beds. The beds and dressers were long gone, but against the far wall stood two wooden school desks.

She crossed the room and ran her fingers over the dusty desktop. A chill coursed through her when she felt the indentations in the corner. It had been restained and lacquered when she was a child—her punishment had been scrubbing the marble floors downstairs for a week by hand—but even the new stain and lacquer hadn’t erased the single word she’d carved in the corner with her scissors.

Help.

“Is everything okay?” Carter’s voice sounded behind her, causing her to spin around.

“Sorry,” he said. “I didn’t mean to startle you.” He studied her for a couple of seconds. “Is something wrong?”

“No,” she said, straining to keep herself from sounding as anxious as she felt. “Just coming face-to-face with old ghosts.”

She forced a small smile. “I suppose I should get used to it, right?”

He looked around the room and she had no doubt he noticed the desks and other remnants that marked the room as occupied by children. “I guess it’s strange coming back here after so long. You must have a lot of memories of this place.”

“Not really. To be honest, I barely remember anything about my childhood. I should because I was old enough to, but it’s as if it’s been erased.”

“Perhaps it was too painful to deal with, so you locked away those memories.”

A bit of relief washed over her. “Yes, I think you’re right. You’re very intuitive.”

“Not really,” he said, looking slightly uncomfortable. “It just seems logical given the circumstances back then.”

She studied him for a moment. It was the first time since she’d met him that she got the feeling he was lying to her. As an attorney, she had a highly honed ability to detect untruth.

“Looks like the dam is breaking. I guess that’s something else I’ll have to deal with,” she said, pushing all thought of Carter and his potential ulterior motives from her mind. Whatever Carter was hiding was none of her business. She barely knew the man and that was the way things were going to stay.

He nodded and scanned the room again. “It looks like this is the only one with serviceable furniture, but if you don’t feel comfortable staying in here …”

“No, this will be fine.”

“Are you sure?”

“It doesn’t require moving furniture and is as secure as any other option, right?”

“Assuming the locks work properly, yes.” He walked to the doorway and checked the lock, then crossed the room to open the French doors that led onto a balcony overlooking the backyard.

She stepped out to join him. The square lines of cypress trees were the only indicators of the lawn that used to exist. Now it was as if the entire area had been swallowed up by the swamp that surrounded it. Marsh grass and weeds grew as high as a person, and scraggly shrubs had spouted up in random patterns. Vines clung to everything capable of supporting their weight and when nothing was available, they ran across the ground, mixing in with the moss to make a mottled carpet of green.

“It’s not very inviting,” she said, trying to shake the uneasy feeling that the swamp gave her.

She’d expected Carter to provide another logical explanation—one that she could lock on to and carry over the next two weeks—but instead, he stared silently out across the tangle of undergrowth. Finally, he spoke. “The swamps of Mystere Parish aren’t like other places, not even like other swamps.”

“What do you mean?”

He shook his head. “Can’t say exactly. It’s just a feeling, really, that something isn’t right. Swamps in Mystere Parish are quieter than most and have more than their share of unexplained phenomena.”

“The legends and lore of Creoles?”

“I’m sure that’s some of it, but I’m not much for old wives’ tales or stories told to scare kids into minding their mothers. Still, I don’t much like spending time in the swamp.” He looked her straight in the eyes. “I’m not trying to tell you what to do, but you probably shouldn’t venture out there. Too many lethal things could be lurking just past your back door and not a single one of them the kind of thing legends are made from.”

Despite the heat of the evening, a slight chill ran over her and she crossed her arms. “You don’t have to worry about that for a second. You couldn’t pay me enough to go in there.”

He nodded. “Well, the locks on both doors are fine. I wish we could have found a room closer to the stairwell …”

His voice trailed off and Alaina realized he hadn’t wanted to alarm her by finishing his sentence, but she had little doubt what he was thinking.

“In case I need to get out in a hurry,” she finished for him.

He frowned. “I don’t want to scare you unnecessarily, but I’d be lying if I said I liked you staying out here alone.”

“I thought there was a caretaker.”

“Amos lives in his own cabin.” He pointed across what used to be the back lawn. “It’s somewhere in that mess. Even if he heard or saw anything from his cabin, age and physical conditioning are working against him. He wouldn’t be much help.”

She leaned over the balcony and was relieved to see a stone walkway below that led around to the front of the house. It was a bit overgrown with vines but still visible.

“No worries,” she said as she straightened back up. “If things get hairy, I’ll go right over the balcony and run for my SUV.”

Carter glanced over the balcony and raised his eyebrows. “You’re going to jump from the second floor then run?”

“I went to college on a track-and-field scholarship. Almost made the Olympic team. The drop from the railing is no worse than the high jump, and trust me, if it’s a footrace with anything on two legs, I can take them.”

His lips quivered for a moment, then broke into a slow smile. “That’s good to know, but if it’s all the same, I’m going to hope you don’t have to back up those words.”

She smiled. “Me, too, but if it’s all the same, I may sleep with tennis shoes on.”

“Well, then, it looks like we have a plan.” He stepped back toward the door to the bedroom and motioned her inside. He stood just outside the doorway, waiting for her to pass. As she stepped past him, her arm brushed across his chest and she felt a tingle deep inside. Even though it had been a tiny bit of contact, it had left no doubt that underneath the worn T-shirt and jeans contained a ripped body built for action.

Maybe she needed to revise her earlier statement. She might not be able to take Carter in a footrace, but then, depending on the reason he was chasing her, she might not run.

She shook her head to clear it from thoughts that had no business being there. Had it really been that long since she’d enjoyed the company of a man that she was fantasizing about the first eligible one she ran across? She’d ended a three-year relationship eight months before and hadn’t been interested in pursuing another. Or maybe her last relationship had left her so jaded about men—particularly good-looking ones—that she had been intentionally avoiding them.

Funny how she’d managed to do just that in Baton Rouge, the capital of the state, but the second she set foot in a town with less population than her condominium complex, she came face-to-face with the only man who had piqued her interest since her ex.

Carter closed and locked the French doors behind them. “Let me help you get your things up here.”

“Oh, that’s okay. I brought only one suitcase of personal things. The rest goes to the kitchen. It will give me something to do.” She hoped he’d leave her to it. With her imagination in overdrive and her memory rapid-firing without warning and her obvious attraction to the sheriff, she felt too vulnerable. And she didn’t like that feeling.

Carter nodded and they made their way back downstairs. He stood in the entryway next to the front door and scanned the area one last time. She could tell he was still uncomfortable with her staying here alone—and that made two of them—but she wasn’t about to admit it. The sooner she got started, the sooner her fourteen-day stint would be over. Besides, she couldn’t put her career on hold forever. A delay meeting the terms of the will would delay anything else she decided, as well.

“Can I see your cell phone?” Carter asked.

“What? Oh, sure.” She dug the phone out of her purse and handed it to him.

He checked the display and frowned. “Only one bar. I figured as much. When the storm hits, you may lose service altogether.”

He pressed the phone’s screen for a minute, then handed it back to her. “I loaded my cell number in favorites along with the number for dispatch. As soon as you get a chance, you should head to the café—they have free Wi-Fi—and download that app that allows you to put a phone number on your screen for speed dial.”

She stared at him for a moment.

“I’m not trying to scare you,” he said. “It’s just that the house is old and poorly maintained and there are a lot of things that could become an emergency. William Duhon is a family friend, and I promised him I’d look after things. He has an office here in Calais, but also in New Orleans, so he’s not always readily available.

She nodded. “That’s a good idea. And thank you for being on call.”

He handed the phone back to her, but as she was about to pull her hand away, he gently clasped his hand around it. “If you see anything that doesn’t look right—hell, if you feel like something’s not right—call me.”

The heat from his hand coursed through her and she suddenly realized how close they were standing to each other. If she tilted her face upward and leaned in just a bit, it was all it would take to kiss him.

She pulled her hand away. “I can hardly bother you with every little noise. I’m sure there are plenty of things here that are going to try my nerves. This isn’t exactly the kind of living arrangement I’m used to.”

He shook his head. “Don’t give me that. If you were any good at being a lawyer, then you know how to read a situation better than most. I’m asking you not to second-guess yourself.”

A bit of annoyance started to creep in. Caution was one thing, but now she felt as if he was trying to scare her. And certainly, he had no right making assumptions about her professional abilities. “Look, I appreciate your concern, but other than ensuring I don’t leave town, I’m not really your responsibility.”

His expression didn’t change except for a tiny flex of his jaw. Her words had—what?—annoyed him? Frustrated him? She couldn’t tell exactly.

“As long as William Duhon is my mother’s best friend, then you’re my responsibility. You may as well get used to it.”

He opened the front door and left without so much as a backward glance. She watched as he pulled away in his truck and then she shut the door and locked it. Mr. Duhon hadn’t told her that a hulking male was part of the deal.

Unlocked memories, ghosts, storms and a creepy house being swallowed up by the swamp. She had to face all of them for thirteen more days.

At the moment, the hunky sheriff was the thing that scared her most of all.