If She Should Die (2 page)

At the time, Dara was stunned that her father couldn’t take a joke like her mother. Later Dara thought he’d been unnerved by the discovery of the skeletons and frustrated that he couldn’t keep her away from the place that secretly frightened him. But even now nothing frightened Dara except the thought of getting old and losing her looks, and that was not an immediate concern. She was only nineteen. Middle age seemed a century away.

The song “Rhiannon” ended and on her way back to the CD player to replay it, Dara heard a noise. She stiffened. Several times Jeremy had followed her out here at night. She never spoke sharply to him. She hated to admit it, but one look at his defenseless face and adoring eyes and she couldn’t force herself to be mean. She had told him of snakes and witches and other horrors she’d hoped would scare him off, though. They hadn’t. He always wanted her to show him where the ancient Indians had lived. He was almost as fascinated by the place as she. Worst of all, she couldn’t complain about him trailing along without giving away her own trips to the creek after she’d convinced her father she’d abandoned them. Miraculously, Jeremy had kept the secret about her continued visits.

She looked up at Rhiannon. The cat’s golden eyes moved toward the creek and Dara heard another sound. Water splashed as a small animal—a muskrat or a mink—jumped into the water. She was disturbing the woodland life, she thought. Didn’t the creatures realize she was one of them—wild, native, full of animal energy trapped in human form? She smiled. She was getting downright poetic like her “almost” sister, Christine. But Christine was not moved by this place. She didn’t like it. Christine was an outsider who didn’t belong here like
she
did.

Except for tonight. Dara knew she’d only heard an animal. Still, she felt uneasy. Her breath quickened. Every sense seemed to snap to life, quivering with primal instincts of danger and the need for preservation. She shut off the CD player and moved away from the bridge, heading for the tree where Rhiannon sat tensed on a branch.

Dara stooped and from a flat, dry rock picked up a heavy glass sphere tucked in a burgundy velvet bag. It had belonged to her mother, Eve, when she’d dabbled in witchcraft “just for fun,” she’d told Dara. When she
was young, Dara had been half-afraid of the witchcraft, but when her mother died, she’d insisted on having the sphere, an actual crystal ball the size of a small cantaloupe. Dara loved to hold it up to the sun and the moon to see watercolor-tinted light flash through the facets. Sometimes Dara kept the sphere near just for luck, or to remind her of her mother. Right now, though, she was thinking of it more as a weapon than an object of divination. But there was nothing to fear. Or was there?

Apprehension cold as a dead finger touched Dara’s neck. She’d felt so anxious lately. An intense fear had overtaken her, a fear she’d never felt in her life. And she’d brought it on herself, she thought. She’d been playing a risky game, a game that had gotten dangerously out of hand. She’d pushed things too far. She deeply regretted it, but she didn’t know how to fix her situation.

Unless she left this town, she thought. After all, since last week nothing held her to the place anymore except her father, whom she’d never forgiven for remarrying a much younger woman so soon after his first wife’s death. Or for taking in Christine and Jeremy. But strong as Dara’s attachment to him was, she couldn’t turn to him now. He would be infuriated. He would be disappointed in her. Humiliated. He would never understand.

He would probably hate her, and that she couldn’t bear.

Yes, she should leave, she told herself firmly. She’d made tentative plans the last few days, thinking of where she might go, withdrawing $10,000 from her bank account full of money she’d accumulated from generous lifelong Christmas and birthday gifts. Still, she’d hesitated. Leaving the place she’d always known was a big step. Considering the bad vibes she’d been getting lately, though, she felt like leaving tonight. She felt like she
needed
to leave tonight.

But she was frightened. Frightened to stay, frightened
to leave. God, what a quandary. She sat down on the flat rock and let hot pent-up tears slide down her cheeks.

The breeze picked up, heavy with rain. Late March always brought rain. Every few years so much rain came that Crescent Creek flooded and rushed, as if exultant with its temporary strength, into the swollen Ohio River. This felt like one of those years. A flood would bring excitement to this calm West Virginia town, Dara thought, but the last thing she craved was more excitement.

From her perch on the tree branch, Rhiannon growled low in her throat. Dara looked up in surprise. Rhiannon was an amazingly quiet feline, meowing softly only two or three times a week, seldom purring, even more rarely growling or hissing.

Dara glanced around. Someone stood on the narrow, sloping path leading down to the bridge, someone whose stiff form was only nebulously limned by star- and moonlight.

“Jeremy?” Dara called shrilly, abruptly rigid with unreasoning panic. God, she was really spooked tonight, she thought, in spite of the usually calming vodka. But aside from Jeremy, her only visitor in this place was Streak Archer, an eccentric friend of her father who jogged at night and always called out to her before approaching.

“Streak?” she asked anyway. Streak did not answer.

“Christine?” Dara tried again, her voice cracking. Christine didn’t come here, but maybe Jeremy had told the secret and Christine was playing watchdog tonight because Dara’s father and stepmother were out for the evening. The figure was tall, and at five-ten, Christine seemed like an Amazon to petite Dara. Yes, it must be Christine, who’d tracked her down and come to drag her home.

The figure stood perfectly still, its face lost in shadows. Then a voice rang out: “Dara, I couldn’t see you hiding under that tree!”

Dara didn’t know whether to be frightened by the person’s presence or relieved by the congenial tone of voice. She decided to act nonchalant. “I wasn’t hiding. I was just sitting here enjoying the night. But a storm’s coming. Feel that wind!”

No answer. Dara’s eyes narrowed. The visitor’s body bore an odd tension. The voice wasn’t normal, either. Too cheery. Strained. Dara grew wary. Something was wrong. “It’s time for me to go home, though. I’ll walk back with you!” she called casually, her perspiring hands picking up the crystal sphere. Once more to Dara it had become not a memento but a weapon and somehow an object of spiritual protection because it had belonged to her mother. Dara stood and took a few steps forward, wind whipping her hair across her face, her fingers trembling, wondering if she was really in danger or just crazy from the influence of the second new moon of the month.

Rhiannon’s golden eyes remained fixed on the visitor. Slowly the cat stood up on the branch. Her eyes turned to slits, her back arched, her tail bushed, her ears flattened. She hissed again and again.

Twenty minutes later, just as raindrops were beginning to splash into the already swollen waters of Crescent Creek, Rhiannon daintily walked along the railing of the bridge. Her ears remained flattened. The shining black hair along her backbone stood up. And she left a path of bloody paw prints behind her as the boom box played loudly, sending the haunting sounds of “Rhiannon” into the empty darkness and up to the Black Moon.

Three Years Later

Christine Ireland struggled to clasp the silver-and-garnet line bracelet around the customer’s plump wrist extended to her. She was successful, and blood vessels in the woman’s hand immediately distended. “Wilma, this bracelet is lovely, but it’s only seven inches long. I believe you might need an eight.”

Wilma Archer burst into jolly laughter. “Oh, Christine, didn’t I say this is for my granddaughter’s high school graduation in two months? Good heavens, if I wore this for a day I’d be a candidate for amputation.”

Christine breathed easier and smiled. So many women who came into Prince Jewelry tried to force wrists and fingers into jewelry that was far too small for them, then became insulted when a clerk suggested a larger size. Christine had known Wilma Archer for years, though. The woman didn’t have a vain bone in her body.

“Are you sure you wouldn’t prefer the bracelet in gold?” Christine asked as she gently unfastened the tourniquetlike bracelet.

“Of course I’d like it in gold with a few diamonds for accent, but that would triple the cost and my granddaughter
will be keeping the bracelet in the dormitory. It could be lost or stolen.”

“She’s living in a dorm?” Christine asked as she placed the bracelet on cotton in a long navy blue box bearing a small gold crown logo. “Isn’t she going to college here in town?”

“She had aspirations for Princeton because Brooke Shields went there, but her grades kept her here at Winston University. Not that Winston isn’t a good school.”

“It’s my alma mater,” Christine said.

“And you graduated summa cum laude, which I’m sure my granddaughter won’t manage. You were also sensible enough to live at home.” Wilma scowled. “Her parents will be paying a fortune to let her stay on campus in some cramped little dorm room when her home is fifteen minutes away from the school.” Wilma sighed. “Oh well, I doubt she lasts more than a year, but if she miraculously graduates, I’ll buy her a bracelet, a ring, and earrings in gold, garnet,
and
diamonds!”

“That should be incentive enough for her to get a degree,” Christine laughed.

“I hope so, but I’m not holding my breath.” Wilma glanced casually around the showroom. “My husband bought my engagement ring here when old Mr. Prince managed the store.” She raised her eyes to the ceiling. “Listen to me—
old
Mr. Prince. He was younger than I am now, but he seemed old as the hills to me back then. And very grave. He made every purchase seem as if it were the most important thing that had happened to him all week. You would have thought that ring with its little chip of a diamond was one of the crown jewels,” she said wistfully. “It’s such a shame Ames didn’t go into the business. I know Mr. Prince wanted the store to pass from generation to generation. But at least Ames didn’t sell the place.”

“His heart is in the law, Wilma, and he’s generated
quite a practice in a city of only thirty-five thousand,” Christine said. “He
must
be good.”

Wilma grinned. “Is he as good a guardian as he is an attorney?”

“You know he is, and I’m grateful to him every day for taking in Jeremy and me.”

Christine remembered being seventeen and feeling like she was plunging down into a dark, cold pit when a doctor entered the hospital waiting room where she and Jeremy had been sitting for five hours. With a grave face and gentle voice he’d told them both their parents were dead from the crash of her father’s small plane. Jeremy had begun to cry in a low, monotonous whine. Christine had pulled his head to her shoulder, her grief and horror mixed with the weight of knowing that above all she must take care of her mentally disabled brother and not let him be swept into a system that would let him wither for lack of attention and love.

“I don’t know what we would have done without Ames,” Christine told Wilma. “I hate to sound self-pitying, but the few elderly relatives we had didn’t want us.” The relatives didn’t want Jeremy, she meant, in spite of their sizable trust fund.

“Shameful!” Wilma burst out. “Family is the most important thing in life, I say.” She tapped her pudgy fingers on the glass showcase for emphasis. “The
most
important. I complain about mine sometimes, but I cherish them.”

“Even if they throw around their money?”

“In
spite
of all their flaws!” Wilma declared, grinning.

Christine giggled and Wilma said, “It’s so good to hear you laugh, honey. You don’t do it often enough, a beautiful young lady like you. Actually, you’re more like Ames Prince than his own daughter was. Responsible and sensible.”

Wonderful, Christine thought. Dara Prince was a laugh a minute. I’m responsible and sensible. Dara was a sexy red spike-heeled pump. I’m a sturdy brown oxford.

Wilma laughed good-naturedly and patted Christine’s hand. “Oh, sweetie, if you could see your face! You think I wish you were more like Dara, don’t you?”

Christine felt her cheeks warm. “I know how much fun she could be.”

“Sometimes Dara was fun. But there’s a time for levity and a time to be serious. . . .” Wilma trailed off as sadness flashed in her usually merry eyes. “If she’d been around longer, she would have learned that not all of life is fun and games.”

“It seems her mother’s death would have taught her that,” Christine said softly.

Wilma nodded. “I know. But Eve’s death had the opposite effect. Afterward, Dara seemed almost reckless. Maybe Ames indulged her too much.” Wilma shook her head as if clearing it. “Enough sad talk.”

“I agree. Do you want this bracelet gift-wrapped?”

“No, dear. I don’t like that garish wrapping paper Ames makes you use for all occasions. I don’t know why he insists on it.”

“Because Eve picked it as Prince Jewelry’s trademark paper. Frankly, I don’t like it, either. Over half the customers decline it, but I can’t budge Ames on the matter.”

“You are the manager of the store, for heaven’s sake!” Wilma huffed. “He should listen to you. But I know how stubborn he can be.
I’ll
speak to him about it. Sometimes I have great influence on him.”

“Most of the time, you mean.”

Wilma couldn’t hide a slightly self-satisfied smile. “Where’s young Jeremy?”

“In the back working on some pieces.”

“Who would have guessed that boy had such a talent for jewelry design?”

“Not me,” Christine said. “Artistic talent doesn’t run in the family.”

Both women looked up when the front door opened and a tall man strode in wearing a tan raincoat and carrying a black umbrella. Christine cringed as he shook the umbrella vigorously, dousing the pale gray carpet and a nearby chair covered in hyacinth blue silk. He had started to tramp across the showroom when Wilma Archer said commandingly, “Ames Prince, maybe you own this store, but you should treat its furnishings with a little respect. Wipe your shoes on the mat, put the umbrella in the stand, and hang up that dripping coat.”