Forbidden Ground (20 page)

She clicked on her bedside light, got up and pulled the box with the mask out from under her bed. She lifted it onto the mattress, pulled off the lid. There was an envelope stuck along the inside of the box. As she reached for it, her fingernails snagged some of the mica chips on the side of the mask. She’d have to glue the chips she’d loosened.

She closed the box, shoved it back under the bed, wishing she had a better place to keep it. Sitting there, she knew she was putting off reading Carson’s article, and she wasn’t sure why. If there was something in it to take to heart or help with the mound here, she should study it now. Or was it just Carson she was trying to put off? She still wanted to get into Mason Mound and with him at her side.

She took out the article and opened it. She read Carson’s neat, tight script across the top.
Had we world enough and time, this coyness, lady, were no crime...

She recognized the quotation from a 17th-century poem called “To His Coy Mistress.”
And she got the hint. He was upset. He thought she was stalling, that her putting him and the mound off was a crime against knowledge, archaeology, mankind—and him.

She skimmed the article. It was about two-thousand-year-old Etruscan tombs in Italy being broken into and looted by thieves called
tombaroli.

A couple of blows from a pickax breaks the ceiling into the burial chamber, the roof caves in, and the tomb, crammed with antiquities and even bodies, is ransacked and the precious artifacts sold to illegal dealers and museum curators.

She’d heard of that, of course, but was Carson suggesting that someone—maybe someone who had marked several local mounds with metal stars—would break into them if they weren’t properly, quickly excavated first? The poem reference and this article implied she was running out of time.

She gasped as she read that the Italian police often looked the other way as did European and international law enforcement. Places with excellent reputations such as Sotheby’s auction house in London, the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York and the J. Paul Getty Museum in California had been accused of buying antiquities that were looted. And her eyes were drawn to the line with the word
mask.
A stolen 2,500-year-old theater mask had been found in an art dealer’s briefcase, one maybe close to the age of the Beastmaster cauldron and mask.

She put Carson’s article in the bedside-table drawer and turned out the light. She lay back down in bed, staring at the dark ceiling, agonizing about what to do, whether to beg Grant, buck Grant, sneak around him to check the entry, whether—

Something scraped or scratched against her bedroom window. A branch? It was almost like fingernails on a blackboard. Chills shot through her. Had the wind picked up? Squirrels sometimes got on the roof. That could be what she’d heard, but they usually stayed away after dark. The bushes outside were cut low, which pleased her, since it made it easier to see the mound.

The sound came again, more like a growl or snort this time—just like before in Tess’s garage. Her heart pounding, she got up, went to the window, parted the drapes a few inches and peered out.

Nothing. Nothing but the night, the lawn, the woodlot beyond and the mound, which always beckoned to her. Again she recalled the stag outside the garage window, the sounds it had made, but maybe she’d been half-asleep and had hallucinated this. There was absolutely nothing out there to make sounds on the window, no animal in the yard.

Yet the face of the Beastmaster mask under the bed flashed through her mind. Suddenly, she didn’t want it under her bed. Grant didn’t want it in the house, as if it were evil. She had to get it out of this room or she’d never sleep tonight.

She dragged the box out again, took it down the hall, into the kitchen and clicked on the basement light so she could take it downstairs. Hurrying now, feeling cold to the core, she put it on the Ping-Pong table and scurried back upstairs. In the morning she’d suggest to Grant that he get safety lights that clicked on where there was movement outside, like Mom had put in years ago at their old house after Tess had been taken.

Trembling, Kate got back into bed and pulled the covers up as if she were a kid afraid of the dark. She left her bedside light on, turned her back to the window and curled up in a fetal position. Yet, despite the fact the curtains were closed, she felt exposed as if the eyeless mask was outside, staring in at her, able to see right through walls, right through the centuries.

She got up, dragged her bedding to the floor and, with the bed as a buffer between her and the window, made a messy little nest on the carpet to comfort herself. As she lay down again, she pictured the darkness outside.

As she tried to doze, her thoughts flitted past like bats in the night, sharp ideas like deer antlers, faces wearing masks—Brad and Lacey, Kaitlyn, Carson. Could she really trust anyone?

Then a vision that shot her straight up, wide awake, in her ravaged covers. Could she trust Grant, smiling and seductive, staring at her from behind his mask?

20

A
s soon as daylight seeped into her room, Kate got off the floor, stretched her sore back and whipped open her curtains. The forest and mound were still in shadow, but looked so normal. Just another June day—Monday. Gabe and Tess would be home in five days. She pictured them sipping wine, sitting on the deck of the riverboat, gazing out at old châteaus and castles along the Loire...man and wife.

She yanked the curtains closed and hurried to take a shower and get dressed. The house was quiet, so she’d fix breakfast for Grant. And Brad, if he’d come in last night. Today she and Grant were going to Keith Simons’s house for lunch so she could talk to Lee. But before any of that, she was going outside.

She went out the kitchen door and checked outside her bedroom window where she thought—no, she was sure—she’d heard sounds, scratches, even snorts or grunts last night. Could Brad have come home drunk with Lacey and they were goofing around in the backyard? She doubted it, but that thought made more sense than what was really tormenting her, that the stag she’d seen outside Tess’s garage window had been here, too. Just a deer, she told herself, not someone in a Beastmaster mask—or worse. No, the only ghosts she believed in were ones from a person’s past, like her dad, not the dead-come-to-haunt-you kind.

Under her bedroom window, she was certain the hosta plants had been trampled like someone had stood close to the house and her window. There was definitely disturbed foliage, and, since it had rained yesterday, she wondered if she’d find footprints in the soil under the bent leaves.

She pushed the green-and-white-striped leaves of the plants to the side so she could see the ground. Damp soil, vague shapes, but nothing distinct, as if a person’s standing on the large leaves had blurred any prints. But something on the ground glittered. She saw small flakes that looked like pieces of the broken record her mother had kept because it was from Dad’s old Johnny Cash collection, and she was sorry she’d smashed it against the wall when he’d walked out.

Kate reached down for a handful of soil and looked closer. Mica chips! Thin mica chips just like the ones from the Beastmaster masks! She’d go around to her rental car and get some of her smallest handpick tools and a sieve.

“Kate!”

She gasped and jumped to her feet. “Oh, Grant. I just... I heard noises out here last night and wanted to look for prints. But look, look!” she cried as she showed him three small chips of the black mica on her dirty palm. “Proof someone was out here with a Beastmaster mask, since it has a mica covering! I heard scratching and snorting and—”

He held up his hands as if trying to stop traffic. “Kate, sweetheart, this whole area has mica chips in the soil, and there’s a vein of it a little ways back in the woods. Besides, they put mica in potting soil and a bunch of other things. A garden store from Chillicothe once asked if they could dig out the mica back there, and I said no.”

“Of course you said no digging,” she retorted, instantly angry with him again—and at herself for being so foolish.

He looked almost smug, but she’d fix that. Her old competitive drive took over. “Mica in this area and in the woodlot near the mound? That’s great! So the Adena in this area could easily have used that mica to adorn their clothing or masks. I can’t wait to see that vein, if you’ll show me. You might know about potting soil, but I’m telling you the ancient Egyptians, Greeks, Aztecs—and Adena—valued mica. So, you’ve given me another great piece of evidence that something important is in that mound. But can you explain how beat down these hosta plants are?”

He frowned at her, at the foliage. “Beat down by yesterday’s rain, maybe, or the guy who washed the outside windows a week or so ago. Kate, I know this sounds like the same old song, but wildlife, especially deer, eat a lot of the plants here. They could have stood there grazing.”

“Well, they haven’t eaten these recently. They looked stepped on not chewed up.”

“Look, I’ve got to get into work early since Brad’s going to start covering for Todd, and I need to explain that to the staff. I had coffee, so I’ll just grab toast and juice, but I’ll be back about eleven to pick you up to go to Keith’s so you can talk to Lee.”

Still clutching the mica chips in her hand, she tried to keep up with his long strides. “Grant, I’m sorry I seem so paranoid. And I appreciate your taking the time for this lunch when I know you’re extra busy at work. I’ll go in to help with breakfast. Does Brad need something, too?”

“He never came home last night. I thought he’d be trying to toe the line since he’s going to manage the mill. I just—with two of my friends hurt—I just hope he’s all right. If he’s not stone-cold sober, I’ll put Keith in as foreman, despite what I promised Brad. And, Kate,” he said, turning back to her. “Please don’t go looking for the seam of mica yourself. It’s hidden by overgrowth. And don’t get too excited about the mica connection. You’re clutching at straws.”

“Sometimes, I think that’s all I have, and here this fantastic mound is, sitting within view...and reach.”

“I want to be out of here in ten minutes,” he said, opening the back door for her then following her in.

She muttered under her breath as she washed the mica chips and her hands, then got the juice out of the fridge. The mound might be in physical reach, but it seemed so far away—sometimes as far away as Grant.

* * *

On the way to Keith Simons’s house, Kate hit Grant with another surprise. “Oh, by the way,” she told him, “I put the box with my mask in the basement. It’s better down there than under my bed—humidity, dust and all.”

He turned to her as they drove up the road on Black Mountain. “Where in the basement?” he snapped much louder and harsher than he’d intended.

“Just on the Ping-Pong table. I can move it, if that’s a problem.”

You are a problem
was his first thought, but he managed to keep his mouth shut. She frustrated and infuriated him, even as he was trying to be her host and protector. She was a woman who could cause him all sorts of trouble—hurt Todd and Brad, too. Man, she ticked him off yet he was tempted to just grab her, kiss her, put his hands all over her and...

“No problem,” he muttered. “I was just surprised. I’m on edge after having to tell everyone about Todd and explain Brad taking over today....”

“So he did show up?”

He was grateful that she went for his change of subject. Again, he could picture those Beastmaster masks—her phony one and his authentic one—getting together down in the dark...breeding more masks, more trouble. Damn, he was getting as off base as she sounded sometimes with her fears about Adena demons peering in windows. But considering what had happened to Paul, when there were no prints to suggest a home invasion, and then Todd, of all people, falling from a tree...

“Was Brad sober?” Kate asked, yanking him back to reality.

“Ah—yeah. And ready to go, there before I was. It went unspoken that he’d obviously spent the night with Lacey somewhere, but he’s welcome to her. And he volunteered to stay at the mill during the lunch break, go around and talk to the guys, so that Keith and I could both be away. I explained to Brad why we’d set this up for you, so he didn’t think Keith and I were plotting something behind his back. I hope this new responsibility will settle Brad down, bond the two of us again.”

“Sometimes I wish something would make me feel that way about my father. I was awful to him when he was here, but I just couldn’t help it.” She sighed. “So Keith’s wife’s name is Velma. Do they have kids at home?”

“Two in high school, but they sent them to camp for the first time this year. Keith came into some money from an old Desert Storm buddy who died and didn’t have a family. It sounds like he and Velma have been spending money like it was water—a new truck, furniture, not sure what all. And, of course, having Lee, so Keith tells me, not repair but
replace
their fence.”

“Maybe Keith will try to help out his sister and brothers, though not much he can do for the one in prison. It’s a real blessing one of them seems on the right path, to stick with you, not blame you and Gabe for the troubles of the others.”

“Yeah, I never did understand that guilt-by-association stuff when Gabe’s the one who arrested Keith’s brother, not me. I need all the help I can get right now. And I appreciate your helping out Nadine financially and Amber with her kids. And reaching out to me,” he said, putting his hand on her knee.

As usual, merely touching her sent a jolt of energy through him. If he made love to her, possessed her body, would that stem the ache she’d created in his life?

* * *

Kate thought Keith and Velma Simons made a strange team. She was as short and wiry as he was tall and brawny. She had hair bleached so blond it looked almost white, while his was dark. She talked a lot; he was a man of few words. Velma was proud of their new things and showed them off, while Keith seemed a bit embarrassed by them.

“Your cousin just took a break and is eating his lunch over on the hillside,” Keith told Kate, pointing. “You can see the hill but not him from here.”

“I fed him up good yesterday,” Velma said. “Today I wanted to keep him off by hisself for you to talk to. So nice to meet someone’s been all over Europe, like you, Kate. I got Keith here to promise me we might go to Paris someday, so’s if you can fill me in on that, much obliged.”

“I’d be happy to,” Kate told her, looking out the window in the direction of the hillside. “My sister and Gabe will be back this weekend from France and—”

The moment that was out of her mouth, Kate realized these people wouldn’t want anything to do with Tess and Gabe, since it was their evidence that had sent Keith’s brother Jonas to prison for working with the meth gang. And Gabe had fired Keith’s sister, Ann, whom he used to date, though she’d pled to a lesser misdemeanor and was only on probation.

“But sure,” she said quickly. “Never mind them. Let’s talk about Paris at lunch.”

“Better go out to see to your cousin now,” Keith said. “You know, while he’s on break, not working. See—we understand how blood’s thicker’n water, if’n you get what I mean, that you’re worried about your kin.”

“And you’re worried about yours,” she said. “Of course, I understand that and thank both of you for helping Grant set this up for me. I do worry about Lee, Grace and their kids at that commune.”

“Oh, yeah,” Velma said, hands on her skinny hips. “For sure that squirrel—Bright Star—got more than one screw loose. We’ll hold lunch for you now.”

Kate was grateful they’d given her a pass on her misstep. One thing she recalled about this area fringing the Appalachians was that kin counted. Grudges and insults could go on for decades, kind of like the Hatfields and the McCoys. And here she was, sister-in-law to the sheriff. At least Keith didn’t hold it against Grant.

As she left the three of them talking, she saw Grant position himself so he could watch her out the window. Kate crossed the front porch with its new lawn furniture—Grant had said there used to be a beat-up, old couch there—and toward the hill. She could see the white picket fence Lee was erecting and painting. She supposed they got the wood from Mason Mill.

She passed Lee’s tools neatly laid out on the ground, his closed can of paint, the few slats and boards he had yet to assemble. A longing for her own excavation tools laid out on the ground near a dig swept through her. She spotted the top of Lee’s head first, then saw he was sitting down the hill and had finished his lunch. He was dressed in the muted, nondescript clothes the Hear Ye male converts tended to wear.

“Lee,” she called so she wouldn’t startle him by coming up behind him. “Grant Mason and I are having lunch here today, and they mentioned you were working on a fence out back. I thought I’d just take a minute and say hi.”

He sprang to his feet and turned to face her so fast that she thought he might tumble down the hill. He looked dismayed, as if she’d caught him at something.

“Kate. What a coincidence.”

“I guess so—a good one. After all, the last time we were together, Bright Star ran the show.”

“He always does—more than a show. Reality. Eternity.”

She wasn’t sure what he meant by that, but she didn’t want to get confrontational or stuck on some philosophical topic. “Well, it was good to see you and Grace anyway. How’s everyone doing lately? I will make an appointment to visit both of you and the kids. Tess will be back this weekend, so you’ll see her soon, too.”

So she didn’t seem to tower over him, she walked down the hill a ways. She was tempted to sit, but she didn’t want to invade his space. She was an outsider to him, maybe a dangerous one if Bright Star found out about this private chat. Would Lee have to confess it as if it were a sin?

“I thought Grace looked good,” she rushed on. “Maybe a little tired.”

“She works hard. The angels do.”

“The angels?”

“Like, ah—those who are specially chosen.”

“Leaders in some way?”

“For sure,” he said, but she couldn’t decide if he sounded proud or angry.

Kate had meant to question Lee about what the star Grace had drawn on her chest could mean, but suddenly, she hesitated. If Grace had been trying to give something away or even call for help, could she be punished by Lee or Bright Star? It had been obvious that she’d meant to show the sign only to Kate.

“So,” Lee said when she hesitated. “Are you going to be allowed to dig in the ancient mound? The Adena were infidels, you know, pagan people. Pieces of their past, things they left behind, should be buried for good, not brought into the light of day, where they would be studied, cherished and idolized.”

She wondered if those were Bright Star’s words, not Lee’s. And it annoyed her that he seemed to be on Grant’s side. “But we can learn from them,” she said. “What they did, what not to do, since they disappeared almost as quickly as they arrived in this area.”

“A warning then that modern men and women can disappear in death as quickly—or so Bright Star says.”

“What does he mean by that?”

“Just that life is short. Living people matter, not dead ones, not places.”