Blood And Bone (2 page)

“Apologize for the inconvenience?” Shayne muttered. She was supposed to arrive in Dark Water tomorrow. God help her if she had to spend one more day living in her parents’ basement, she’d be the one behind bars for murder.

She scrolled through the Missed Calls log until she came to Carla’s number and hit Talk. A busy signal hummed in her ear.

She grabbed her battered planner from the glove compartment and rifled through the loose scraps of paper stuffed into the book. On her third time through, she found a yellow Post-it with a phone number scribbled across it. She hadn’t included anything besides the number, but the area code looked right. She dialed and hoped for the best.

“The Pinecone Lodge.” Shayne recognized Carla’s nasal voice.

“This is Shayne Reynolds. I received a call that my reservation has been canceled.”

“That’s correct, Ms. Reynolds. I’m sorry for any trouble this has caused.”

“Do you have
anything
available?” Even a broom closet would work.

“I’m sorry, no. We’re booked solid for the festival.”

Fabulous.
“Could you give me the number for another hotel?”

“We’re the only hotel in Dark Water.”

Of course you are.
“Is there anything available in town for a short-term rental?”

“I wouldn’t know.” Carla’s voice turned huffy. “You would need to contact the realty office.”

“Do you have the number?”

The clerk sighed. “Just a moment.”

After a few seconds, she read off a phone number .

“Thank you for your—” a click then a dial tone hummed in her ear, “—help.”

So much for small-town warmth.

Shaking her head, she dialed the number Carla had given her. A perky receptionist answered. “Grey Family Realty, how can I help you?”

Grey family? Any connection to Gwendolyn Grey? Had to be a coincidence. She wasn’t that lucky. “Yes, I’m looking for a place to rent or lease for a short-term period.”

“One moment while I transfer you.”

A strangely disturbing Muzak version of “Yellow Submarine”
filled her ear then cut off abruptly.

“Yeah.” The impatient male voice caught her off guard.

“Um, hello, I’m looking for a rental property. Something short-term. I was hoping you could help me.”

“Can you hold on a sec?” he asked, sounding distracted.

“Sure.” She rolled her eyes.

The receiver clunked as he set it down. Instead of more “Yellow Submarine”, the faint sounds of his cursing followed by loud, hollow banging drifted from the phone.

“Hi,” he said, “sorry about that. You’re looking for a rental? Anything specific?”

“Cheap,” Shayne told him, her dwindling bank account a constant presence in her mind. “And furnished. And available tomorrow.”

“Huh. How long were you looking to stay?”

“Two weeks.” It shouldn’t take her longer than that to get what she needed for her book. And by then, she should have the money from the condo and could pay off her legal bills and look at starting over. “A month,” she amended, buying herself more time.

He grunted and she heard the rhythmless clacks of typing.

“Maybe two.” That way she could write the book there—no distractions, no “I told you so’s” from her father and no pitying stares from her mother. And when she was done, she could find a place to live.

“As long as you’re sure.”

“Sorry.” She rubbed her forehead. “I hadn’t considered this. I was supposed to be staying at the Pinecone, but they overbooked.”

“Overbooked?” A combination of disbelief and amusement filled his voice.

“Because of the festival.”

“If you say so. I have something for you. It’s a little rustic, but I think it might work.”

“As long as there’s running water and electricity, I think I’ll be okay.”

He chuckled softly. “Great. You’re arriving tomorrow? What time?”

“Early, between eight and nine.”

“God, it’s Saturday,” he groaned, like a kid who’d been told to do his homework. “Fine, I’ll meet you at the office, nine o’clock. Do you know where it is?”

He gave some quick directions that she scratched out on one of the scraps of paper in her Day-Timer.

“What’s your name?” she asked, realizing she wouldn’t know who to ask for when she got there.

“Des Anderson.”

Des? As in Desmond? Maybe she
was
that lucky, after all.

“Thanks for your help, Mr. Anderson.” Hopefully, she didn’t sound as shell-shocked as she felt.

“My pleasure, Ms.—”

“Reynolds,” she supplied, and waited to be hung up on again. Silence stretched between them and she was certain he had. “Hello?”

“Yeah, sorry. I’ll see you tomorrow, Ms. Reynolds.”

“See you then.”

She blew out a slow breath and hit End. Apparently, he hadn’t realized the woman he’d rented a house to was the same woman he’d threatened to sue if she tried to contact him one more time. At last, her luck seemed to be changing.

The electronic pulse of her cell phone dragged Shayne up through layers of sleep. Blinking in the darkness, her eyes focused on the glowing green numbers of the alarm clock next to her bed. Three forty-five. Who in the hell?

She rolled off the sofa bed and shuffled toward the sound, stumbling over the coffee table. With a muttered curse and an aching toe, she snatched up her cell phone from the top of an ancient television set.

“Hello.” Sleep made her voice gravelly.

“Forget Gwendolyn Grey,” a man whispered.

“What? Who is this?” Her sleep-muddled brain tried to make sense of the call.

“Give up that book before I make you give it up.”

Oh please, was that the best he could do? A threatening call in the middle of the night? Not terribly original. “Get bent.”

She started to pull the phone from her ear, but the harsh voice stopped her. “If you want to stay alive, keep yourself in suburbia. You come to Dark Water, you won’t leave.”

The line clicked and a dial tone filled her ear, but she barely heard it over the pounding of her heart. A chill settled over her as she scrolled the menu for the number. Blocked.
Figures
.

How had he known she lived in the suburbs?

He didn’t, it was a lucky guess. Why not, “Stay in the city”? Or, “Stay away”? No, mentioning the suburbs was specific. Had someone followed her? Were they watching her now?

Don’t be paranoid.
She’d had whack jobs call her before. Vaguely threatening letters sent to her via her publisher, but none had ever hinted at knowing where she lived.

She snapped on the lamp next to the sofa. Soft light filled the room but did little to chase away the unease coiling around her like an icy fist. Shayne glanced around the small space she’d called home since she and Travis had separated almost a year ago. Orange, gold and chocolate brown with chunky wood furniture—her parents’ rec room was like going back in time to 1975.

Her parents were asleep upstairs. If something happened to them, because of her… For crying out loud, the jerk said the suburbs. He hadn’t rattled off her address. She was overreacting. At least she hoped so.

Chapter Two

“Statistics show that while a large number of men who kill their biological children take their own lives, men who murder their stepchildren rarely commit suicide.”

—excerpt from
Blood and Bone
by Shayne Reynolds

Shayne squinted in an effort to make out her barely legible handwriting on the crinkled sheet of paper. Her gaze bounced from the directions pinned between her thumb and steering wheel to the road. The turn to Dark Water should be coming up.

She might have been able to read the instructions easier—be better organized overall—if she’d stopped using her car as an office. These days, however, she didn’t seem to have much choice. Her parents’ dingy basement wasn’t exactly conducive for work, and her mother snooped.

Her parents meant well, and they’d helped her out by letting her stay with them while she and Travis fought it out in the courts. But since her divorce had become final, her father, always critical, had become far more provoking. Her mother insisted it was because he worried about Shayne now that she didn’t have a man to take care of her. The fact that she didn’t need a man to take care of her eluded him.

Whatever
rustic
dwelling Anderson had found for her, having her own space again would be a huge relief. Almost worth every penny this trip to Dark Water was costing her.

If you come to Dark Water, you won’t leave.

A chill danced along her spine.

She was making something out of nothing. More than likely, the creep on the other end of the phone was some pissed-off relative of Gwendolyn’s trying to scare her. Nothing to get bent out of shape about. Still, she couldn’t shake the unease knotting her insides.

Following Anderson’s directions, she steered on to Main Street. The early morning sun cast a soft, orange glow on the red
brick storefronts. Pretty baskets of purple and pink petunias hung from old-fashioned lampposts lining the street. The sidewalks were empty, except for an old man peering into store windows with a mangy, black poodle at his feet.

A sign with the words “Grey Family Realty, since 1952” in burgundy script caught her eye. She pulled up to the curb in front of an old house converted into a business, parking behind a rusted-out station wagon that might have been brown at one time.

As she climbed from the car, she spotted a man in his mid to late twenties, wearing a god-awful Hawaiian shirt, slouched on a park bench. With his arms draped casually along the back, he turned his head to watch her. Dark sunglasses shaded his eyes, but Shayne was certain he was checking her out from behind the tinted lenses.

“Nice car,” he said.

“Thanks.” Shayne barely gave the sleek convertible a second glance, but as she dropped her keys into her purse, she hit the remote lock and automatically set the alarm.

At the high-pitched double beep, the man smirked.

Odds were her car wouldn’t be stolen in broad daylight in a town with a population of less than ten thousand, but why test fate? Especially with a seedy character loitering next to it.

She’d traded in the minivan Travis had insisted they buy for the Solara shortly before they’d split up. For her, the car represented her first acceptance she wouldn’t have children and she was okay with the realization. The car wasn’t super sporty, but it didn’t scream soccer mom either.

“Ms. Reynolds?”

Her name, spoken by the man on the bench, jerked her from her reverie. She stopped and faced him, frowning.

“I’m Des.” He stood, almost reluctantly, jammed his hands into his jeans pockets and sauntered toward her.

Oops. Okay, not loitering, and probably not interested in stealing her car. Crap. “Thanks for meeting me.”

“I’m thrilled, naturally.” He smirked and stared at her for a long moment. At least she thought he did. She wished he’d take off those glasses. “Did you want to follow me to the house?”

“Sure.” Actually, she wanted to ask him about a million questions, but had no idea how to get around to mentioning she was the person he’d threatened with legal action.

How could he not have made the connection?

Certainly he’d heard what was left of Anderson’s family, as well as some of his parents’ acquaintances had agreed to speak to her. Wouldn’t he suspect she and the writer attempting to contact him were one and the same?

He walked over to the ancient station wagon and tugged open the driver’s-side door. She half expected the handle to fall off in his hand. As Shayne slid behind the wheel of her car, the station wagon rumbled to life and pulled away from the curb.

She followed Des past century-old homes with meticulous green lawns and brilliant gardens, then past tiny wartime houses skirting the edge of town. The neighborhoods fell behind them and thick forest rose up on either side of the narrow road.

“Where are you taking me?” she muttered. A flutter of apprehension tickled her belly. Maybe he
did
know who she was after all. Could he be the creep who’d called last night? Perhaps he’d inherited a little of his father’s psychotic nature.

A twinge of guilt pulled at her conscience. Not fair. He’d probably spent most of his life facing down that particular legacy. Especially living in the town where it had happened. So why stay in Dark Water? She’d never lived in a small town, but while writing about them, she’d learned they had exceedingly long memories.

The road dipped slightly and, through the trees on her right, the dark, sluggish water of the river from which the town took its name caught her eye. But there were no houses to be seen. Where in the hell was she?

Stop the car, he’ll stop too and you can make him explain where he’s taking you.

Brake lights shone red beneath the dirt-encrusted plastic and his turn signal flashed. Yet where, exactly, in the wall of trees next to the road he could be turning escaped her.

She followed him anyway. Up two narrow, dirt ruts enclosed by tree branches, forming a sort of tree tunnel. The long grass growing between the ruts whispered against the underside of her low car.

“Oh, this
is
promising.” Maybe his reward for killing her and disposing of her body would be her car.

The stone cottage seemed to appear from nowhere, and she took back every mean thought she’d had about Des Anderson. The house was cute and private and perfect.

Des stopped the station wagon and slid out. She pulled up beside him and did likewise.

“This is great.”

“It’s a little small,” he told her, climbing the wood steps of a newly added deck, “but the price was right and it was available.”

He unlocked the door and she followed him into the dark cottage. The air smelled musty and stale. Des went to the window and pulled back the heavy gold drapes, allowing dappled sunshine to spill into the sitting room.

White sheets covered the furniture, protecting against dust. A short set of five steps led to a tiny galley kitchen overlooking the sitting room. Shayne climbed the stairs, opened the 1950s fridge and peered inside. It wasn’t running, but it was clean.