Grave Danger (24 page)

Corrigan threw his napkin down on the table. “You
didn’t know because your husband didn’t want you to know, ever.
Cyrus couldn’t have come into our house unless he was invited. And
from what I could see, he knew his way around the house like he’s
been here many times before.” Corrigan’s contempt of his brother
was etched into every syllable of his words.

Ambrose shook off his wife’s hand. Leaning forward
in his chair, he studied his youngest brother. Under normal
circumstances Corrigan would never have questioned his authority
over the family. He accepted Ambrose’s rules of conduct in the city
better than any of his other siblings or his wife. But now he felt
that his baby brother was turning against him. Corrigan may not
always be an open book with his family, but he never shut himself
completely off from them.

“
Yes,” Ambrose began, “I did not think it
necessary to explain to the rest of you that the lead councilman
had been here in our home. It was for their safety as well as our
own. The ghosts are cleverer than you realize and I know the
temperaments of my own family.” He looked to Xavier who shrugged
his shoulders innocently. “If he had pushed your buttons one too
many times and you attacked him, he would find no recourse but to
end our treaty then and there. Perhaps that was what he wanted all
along, an excuse to push us out again.”

Ambrose turned then to his wife, his features
softening as he gazed upon his other half, his reason for living at
all. “I would not give them an excuse to paint us any blacker than
they already have.”

“
I resent that statement,” Chas remarked,
interrupting Ambrose. “Explain to me why metaphorically black is
bad and white is good. Those pasty faced people across the bridge
are about as corrupt as they come.” Chas waved his fork in the air
as he spoke.

“
Put down your fork, sweetheart, before you
stab somebody in the eye with it.” Helen took her husband’s arm,
pulling it back down to the table.

“
I know exactly whose eyes I’d like to stab
out of their sockets.” He turned to look down at his youngest
brother. “That little ghost girl from the other night. If anyone
deserves to have her eyes removed permanently, it’s her. She had
that look in her eyes, something not right, when she attacked me.”
Trueman laughed at hearing his brother attached by a girl. Chas
glared at him as Trueman tried to cover the laugh with a not so
subtle cough and the unbelievable excuse that a piece of his
lasagna had gone down the wrong way. Chas continued.

“
I swear it was like looking into the eyes of
death. She was like some super ghoul, not that I couldn’t have
taken her if I wanted to, but I know the rules.” That wasn’t quite
true, but Corrigan didn’t contradict him. If Ambrose knew that Chas
had been close to exterminating the ghost, he wouldn’t be allowed
out in the city for quite some time. As it was, Ambrose was keeping
them all on a short leash because of the murders.

Ambrose looked between Chas and Corrigan. “What is
this about? You two interacted with a phantasm from the mainland? I
specifically told you both to leave the dead people alone.” He
found himself enraged that his brothers would put themselves into
such danger. A ghost girl could go to her people with all sorts of
embellished stories and that would surely end this alliance.
Ambrose was tired of moving around. This city had been his home
first and no one was going to find reason to kick him out of it
again.

“
What happened?” Ambrose asked quietly, his
anger simmering under the surface.

Chas took the initiative to answer for both himself
and Corrigan. Helen interrupted a few times to include her own part
in the story. Though there was part of the story omitted or
abridged; Corrigan’s personal encounter with Clarissa. Once
Corrigan had left Clarissa behind, he had found his brother and
sister by the great lion statues on the bridge. He didn’t tell them
much, only that Clarissa was a foolish ghost who believed that he
and his family were responsible for the murders of their living
employees. Both of them had reacted as he had, denying any
involvement and dismissing the whole thing.

“
What are we going to do?” Margaret Ann spoke
up. “If they think we are responsible for these deaths, then we
can’t stay here. Before long they’ll find a way to get rid of us
permanently.”

“
I’d like to see those bastards try to kick us
out.” Xavier pulled out his short sword he always kept strapped to
his side. Standing up quickly from his chair, he swung his sword in
an arch across the table. Chas swore as he backed up out of range
of the steel weapon.

“
Put that damn thing away you crazy
conquistador.” Chas barked as Xavier made another pass across the
table, taking the lives of several candle sticks from the
centerpiece in the process.

Xavier muttered something about Chas in Spanish
before he re-sheathed his sword and resumed his seat at the
table.

Maude tapped the table lightly with her finger tips
getting everyone’s attention with the subtle gesture. “This is our
one night to have a normal family gathering. Let’s not spoil it by
talking about the others. Tomorrow will be soon enough. Please,”
she pleaded, looking to each of them. “Just for now, pretend that
they don’t exist. Now eat the lasagna before it gets cold.”

With only a few short grumbles they all resumed
eating, except Corrigan. He couldn’t simply dismiss all this. The
others did exist and all too soon they would find a reason to
condemn them for some trumped up crime. Margaret Ann’s fears were
grounded and true, before long they would have a means to
exterminate them. Like the others of their kind before them, they
would be taken down permanently. He had to stop that somehow, but
the only way to do that would be to rid them of the soul who could
destroy them all, Clarissa.

“
I’m going out.” Corrigan stood up from his
place at the far end of the table. Ambrose stood as well, a
questioning look over his young face. Corrigan looked more like
Ambrose’s older brother even though Corrigan was several hundred
years younger than him. Xavier and Trueman were a few years older
than Corrigan, but even still there was something about Corrigan
that made him appear much older than them all; not in his face or
body, but in his eyes. It was a sadness that only decades of harsh
living could bring upon a person.

“
Where are you going?” Ambrose asked, a frown
pulling his mouth down.

Corrigan stepped away from the table, turning away
from them all. “Out,” he responded. With that said, he was gone.
His family was left sitting in the family dining room, confusion
and worry on their faces. Corrigan would never have behaved like he
had tonight. Something was truly troubling him, but none of them
could guess what.

Maude looked down to the full plate of food that had
yet to be touched. She shook her head as she turned to see her
husband also looking at Corrigan’s untouched plate of food. She
took his hand again. This time he squeezed it tight, not letting
go. Maude felt his concern for their youngest brother. But he was a
grown man and whatever Corrigan needed to resolve with his past or
his present, he had to do it on his own. All they could do was wait
and be ready for him when he was finally ready to open up to
them.

The LeMoynes sat at the dining room table in silence
with only the soft music from the stereo speakers intruding. No one
felt like having light conversation anymore. And despite Maude’s
request that they forget about the others on the mainland, none of
them could. The others were always a constant reminder of what they
were not and no matter how normal they tried to make themselves,
they all knew that their lifestyle was not seen as natural by the
others. The LeMoynes were freaks of nature; abnormal creatures who
many believed shouldn’t exist in this world. It didn’t matter that
they had loved ones, a home to call their own, or even a profitable
business selling commercial real-estate. It all boiled down to what
they chose to eat; as if that was all they were.

Chapter 13-

“
What do you want me to do, Clarissa?” Leah
walked beside Clarissa as they made their way down the quiet
streets of St. Augustine.

They had waited until Madeline had gone to sleep
before venturing out into the night. Maddy had been given the
thinly veiled lie that Leah had gone home hours before. And neither
woman could be sure that the intuitive older lady bought any of
their lie. Either way, she went to her bedroom on the second floor
across from Clarissa’s room and several minutes later Clarissa
could hear her sleeping soundly in her bed.

What they were doing was dangerous. Not only was
Clarissa putting her soul in jeopardy, she was also putting another
living life in parole. Leah was a delicious morsel for one of their
kind. But Leah would not be denied her chance to retaliate against
the things that took her friends life.

“
You don’t need to do anything.” Clarissa was
on edge. It was much more difficult to have Leah with her. If she
was going to do this tonight then she really didn’t need to have
Leah’s safety keeping her mind from the task ahead. Leah was not
only bait for the flesh-eaters, she was a liability. If anything
happened to her living friend, Clarissa wasn’t sure if she could
ever forgive herself. Even if it was Leah’s choice to come out with
her tonight, ultimately it was Clarissa’s responsibility as a death
bokor to keep her from harm.

“
Can we stop and rest for a bit?” Leah was a
living, and had the misfortune of tiring out easily. Unlike
Clarissa, who could remain moving for hours without tiring or
needing to sit and rest, her body wasn’t as resilient to the forces
of nature.

“
Sure,” Clarissa conceded. She had noticed
that Leah had yawned several times in the past hour. Realizing it
was many hours past midnight, a time when most of the living were
in their beds dreaming. They had been wandering the streets of
downtown St. Augustine almost half the night. Leah had to open the
bookstore in the morning and she was going to be exhausted as it
was. Clarissa knew she needed to get her friend home before she
passed out.

Instead they found their way to one of the old
cemeteries across from the visitor’s information center. There were
no ghosts milling about inside, as most ghosts found cemeteries
unflattering reminders of their own deaths. Not to mention, what
was there to do in a cemetery? Many of the living believed that
they could visit the sites where their loved ones lay resting,
thinking that in some way they could speak to the person. They
couldn’t. What remained behind was not a person, but an illusion.
It couldn’t answer you back. All that was human and good went to
places beyond, back to the cosmos and the world above.

Leah sat on a steel bench, resting her head on the
back of it as she curled herself into a tight ball. She was tiny
enough she could manage it. “They’re not coming are they?” she
asked sleepily, covering her mouth as she yawned yet again. “Or
else we missed them.”

“
I don’t know,” Clarissa answered honestly.
She plopped down on the cement sidewalk, her legs and feet bent
over the curb of the street. From here she could see the
Ripley’s Believe it or Not Museum
,
not that anyone was inside, ghost or otherwise. “I should have been
able to sense them, unless they’re being more cautious because they
know I can listen in on them.”

“
Somehow I thought this would be more
exciting,” Leah grumbled as she closed her eyes. “Maybe they don’t
go out on Sundays because it’s a holy day.”

“
I highly doubt that flesh-eaters have
anything to do with the church. Their sins can’t be blessed away so
easy.”

Leah sighed. “I’m just going to close my eyes for a
minute.” She turned her body into the metal bench, turning herself
away from Clarissa. “Wake me if anything interesting happens.” Not
that she believed anything other than the occasional residual
haunting would walk the streets at night. And everyone left them
alone.

Clarissa sat quietly on the curb. She had brought a
back-pack from the house; an old one that Jackson had left behind
some months back. In it she stored a few items she thought might
come in handy.

In a room down the hall from her bedroom, Clarissa
had found a case of old tools and ancient artifacts. Lying on a bed
of soft black velvet, there had been a small dagger with a silver
handle adorned with raised vine details, the end carved into a
skull. Something unseen compelled Clarissa to take it along.
Finding a silk scarf from a drawer in the room, she wrapped up the
weapon, stuffing it into the bottom of the back-pack.

Setting the bag on the curb next to her, Clarissa
unzipped it and reached inside. She pulled out a thin plastic
object about the breadth of a large book. A gift from Henry, he had
explained that it was a device for reading and storing multiple
books and magazines. Clarissa had remembered hearing about the
machine. She thanked Henry profusely for the expensive gift, but he
reassured her that the purchase wouldn’t put a dent in his
savings.

Clarissa turned the device on as she plugged in the
tiny accessory reading light. Going through her most recent book
purchases, she found her place in a book where she had earlier left
off.

It did seem that Leah was correct. Either they had
missed them, which was unlikely or they had chosen not to come
across the bridge tonight. In a few hours their hunt for the
flesh-eaters would be over. Once the sun began to rise in the sky
the creatures would be forced back onto the island until the
curtain of darkness fell once again onto the old city.