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Ghost Moon
Heather Graham


Reclusive collector Cutter Merlin is seldom seen in Key West—lately, not at all.Officer Liam Beckett visits Merlin's curious house and discovers the gentleman in his study. In his death grip: a volume of occult lore and a reliquary. His eyes are wide with fright, his mouth a horrified rictus where spiders now dwell.Kelsey Donovan returns to the old house to catalog her estranged grandfather's collection of artifacts and antiquities, vowing to see his treasures divested properly. But she cannot ignore the sense that she's being watched, the reports of malevolent black figures, the pervasive smell of death. Is the Merlin house haunted, even cursed?Liam knows well that some ghost stories are true and he swears to protect Kelsey. But there are forces at work for whom one more life is a pittance to pay for their deepest desire. . . .









Praise for the novels of Heather Graham


“An incredible storyteller.”

—Los Angeles Daily News

“Graham wields a deftly sexy and convincing pen.”

—Publishers Weekly

“If you like mixing a bit of the creepy with a dash of sinister and spine-chilling reading with your romance, be sure to read Heather Graham’s latest…Graham does a great job of blending just a bit of paranormal with real, human evil.”

—Miami Herald on Unhallowed Ground

“Eerie and atmospheric, this is not late-night reading for the squeamish or sensitive.”

—RT Book Reviews on Unhallowed Ground

“The paranormal elements are integral to the unrelentingly suspenseful plot, the characters are likable, the romance convincing, and, in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, Graham’s atmospheric depiction of a lost city is especially poignant.”

—Booklist on Ghost Walk

“Graham’s rich, balanced thriller sizzles with equal parts suspense, romance and the paranormal—all of it nail-biting.”

—Publishers Weekly on The Vision

“Heather Graham will keep you in suspense until the very end.”

—Literary Times

“Mystery, sex, paranormal events. What’s not to love?”

—Kirkus Reviews on The Death Dealer




Ghost Moon

Heather Graham











www.mirabooks.co.uk (http://www.mirabooks.co.uk)




Also by HEATHER GRAHAM


THE KILLING EDGE

NIGHT OF THE WOLVES

HOME IN TIME FOR CHRISTMAS

UNHALLOWED GROUND

DUST TO DUST

NIGHTWALKER

DEADLY GIFT

DEADLY HARVEST

DEADLY NIGHT

THE DEATH DEALER

THE LAST NOEL

THE SÉANCE

BLOOD RED

THE DEAD ROOM

KISS OF DARKNESS

THE VISION

THE ISLAND

GHOST WALK

KILLING KELLY

THE PRESENCE

DEAD ON THE DANCE FLOOR

PICTURE ME DEAD

HAUNTED

HURRICANE BAY

A SEASON OF MIRACLES

NIGHT OF THE BLACKBIRD

NEVER SLEEP WITH STRANGERS

EYES OF FIRE

SLOW BURN

NIGHT HEAT



The Bone Island Trilogy

GHOST SHADOW

GHOST NIGHT

GHOST MOON


For Sprout and Scout

and the Peace River Ghost Trackers

and a great time at the Spanish Military Hospital

in St. Augustine,

and Daena Smoller and Dr. Larry Montz

with the ISPR, New Orleans, Louisiana,

and the several great groups

who do ghost tours in Key West, Florida.




Key West History Timeline


1513—Ponce de Leon is thought to be the first European to discover Florida, which he claimed for Spain. His sailors, watching as they pass the southern islands (the Keys), decide that the mangrove roots look like tortured souls and call them Los Martires, or “the Martyrs.”



Circa 1600—Key West begins to appear on European maps and charts. The first explorers came upon the bones of deceased native tribes, and thus the island was called “the Island of Bones,” or Cayo Hueso.



The Golden Age of Piracy begins as New World ships carry vast treasures through dangerous waters.



1763—The Treaty of Paris gives Florida and Key West to the British and Cuba to the Spanish. The Spanish and Native Americans are forced to leave the Keys and move to Havana. The Spanish, however, claim that the Keys are not part of mainland Florida and were really North Havana. The English say no, the Keys are a part of Florida. In reality, this dispute is merely a war of words. Hardy souls of many nationalities fish, cut timber, hunt turtles—and avoid pirates—with little restraint from any government.



1783—The Treaty of Paris ends the American Revolution and returns Florida to Spain.



1815–Spain deeds the island of Key West to a loyal Spaniard, Juan Pablo Salas of St. Augustine, Florida.



1819–1822—Florida is ceded to the United States. Salas sells the island to John Simonton for $2,000. Simonton divides the island into four parts, three going to businessmen John Whitehead, John Fleming and Pardon Greene. Cayo Hueso becomes more generally known as Key West.



1822—Simonton convinces the U.S. Navy to come to Key West—the deep-water harbor, which had kept pirates, wreckers and others busy while the land was scarcely developed, would be an incredible asset to the U.S. Lieutenant Matthew C. Perry arrives to assess the situation. Perry reports favorably on the strategic military importance but warns the government that the area is filled with unsavory characters—such as pirates.



1823—Captain David Porter is appointed commodore of the West Indies Anti-Pirate Squadron, known as the “Mosquito Fleet.” He takes over ruthlessly, basically putting Key West under martial law. People do not like him. However, starting in 1823, he does begin to put a halt to piracy in the area.



The United States of America is in full control of Key West, which is part of the U.S. territory of Florida, and colonizing begins in earnest by Americans, though, as always, those Americans come from many places.



Circa 1828—Wrecking becomes a big business in Key West, and much of the island becomes involved in the activity. It’s such big business that over the next twenty years, the island becomes one of the richest areas per capita in the United States. In the minds of some, a new kind of piracy has replaced the old. Although wrecking and salvage were licensed and legal, many a ship was lured to its doom by less than scrupulous businessmen.



1845—Florida becomes a state. Construction begins on a fort to protect Key West.



1846—Construction of Fort Jefferson is begun in the Dry Tortugas.



1850—The fort on the island of Key West is named after President Zachary Taylor.



New lighthouses bring about the end of the Golden Age of Wrecking.



1861—Florida secedes from the Union on January 10. Fort Zachary Taylor is staunchly held in Union hands and helps defeat the Confederate Navy and control the movement of blockade runners during the war. Key West remains a divided city throughout the great conflict. Construction is begun on the East and West Martello towers, which will serve as supply depots. The salt ponds of Key West supply both sides.



1865—The War of Northern Aggression comes to an end with the surrender of Lee at Appomattox Courthouse. Salvage of blockade runners comes to an end.



Dr. Samuel Mudd, deemed guilty of conspiracy after setting John Wilkes Booth’s broken leg after Lincoln’s assassination, is incarcerated at Fort Jefferson, the Dry Tortugas.



As salt and salvage industries come to an end, cigar making becomes a major business. The Keys are filled with Cuban cigar makers following Cuba’s war of independence, but the cigar makers eventually move to Ybor City. Sponging is also big business for a period, but the sponge divers head for waters near Tampa as disease riddles Key West’s beds and the remote location makes industry difficult.



1890—The building that will become known as “the little White House” is built for use as an officer’s quarters at the naval station. President Truman will spend at least 175 days here, and it will be visited by Eisenhower, Kennedy and many other dignitaries.



1898—The USS Maine explodes in Havana Harbor, pre-cipitating the Spanish-American War. Her loss is heavily felt in Key West, as she had been sent from Key West to Havana.

Circa 1900—Robert Eugene Otto is born. At the age of four, he receives the doll he will call “Robert,” and a legend is born as well.



1912—Henry Flagler brings the Overseas Railroad to Key West, connecting the islands to the mainland for the first time.



1917—On April 6, the United States enters World War I. Key West maintains a military presence.



1919—Treaty of Versailles ends World War I.



1920s—Prohibition gives Key West a new industry—bootlegging.



1927—Pan American World Airways is founded in Key West to fly visitors back and forth to Havana.



Carl Tanzler, “Count von Cosel,” arrives in Key West and takes a job at the U.S. Marine Hospital as a radiologist.



1928—Ernest Hemingway comes to Key West. It’s rumored that while waiting for a roadster from the factory he writes A Farewell to Arms.

1931—Hemingway and his wife, Pauline, are gifted with the house on Whitehead Street. Polydactyl cats descend from his pet, Snowball.



Death of Maria Elena Milagro de Hoyos.



1933—Count von Cosel removes Elena’s body from the cemetery.



1935—The Labor Day Hurricane wipes out the Overseas Railroad and kills hundreds of people. The railroad will not be rebuilt. The Great Depression comes to Key West, as well, and the island, once the richest in the country, struggles with severe unemployment.



1938—An overseas highway is completed, U.S. 1, connecting Key West and the Keys to the mainland.



1940—Hemingway and Pauline divorce; Key West loses its great writer, except as a visitor.



Tanzler is found living with Elena’s corpse. Her second viewing at the Dean-Lopez Funeral Home draws thousands of visitors.



1941—December 7, “a date that will live in infamy,” occurs, and the U.S. enters World War II.



Tennessee Williams first comes to Key West.



1945—World War II ends with the armistice of August 14 (Europe) and the surrender of Japan, September 2. Key West struggles to regain a livable economy.



1947—It is believed that Tennessee Williams wrote his first draft of A Streetcar Named Desire while staying at La Concha Hotel on Duval Street.

1962—The Cuban Missile Crisis occurs. President John F. Kennedy warns the United States that Cuba is only ninety miles away.



1979—The first Fantasy Fest is celebrated.



1980—The Mariel boatlift brings tens of thousands of Cuban refugees to Key West.



1982—The Conch Republic is born. In an effort to control illegal immigration and drugs, the U.S. sets up a blockade in Florida City, at the northern end of U.S. 1. Traffic is at a stop for seventeen miles, and the mayor of Key West retaliates on April 23, seceding from the U.S. Key West Mayor Dennis Wardlow declares war, surrenders and demands foreign aid. As the U.S. has never responded, under International law, the Conch Republic still exists. Its foreign policy is stated as, “The Mitigation of World Tension through the Exercise of Humor.” Even though the U.S. never officially recognizes the action, it has the desired effect: the paralyzing blockade is lifted.



1985—Jimmy Buffet opens his first Margaritaville restaurant in Key West.



Fort Zachary Taylor becomes a Florida State Park (and a wonderful place for reenactments, picnics and beach bumming).



Treasure hunter Mel Fisher at long last finds the Atocha.

1999—First Pirates in Paradise is celebrated.



2000–Present—Key West remains a unique paradise, garish, loud, charming, filled with history, water sports, family activities, and down and dirty bars. “The Gibraltar of the East,” she offers diving, shipwrecks and the spirit of adventure that makes her a fabulous destination, for a day, or forever.




Prologue


The sun was setting, casting a bloodred hue upon the land and the Merlin house.

The house was quite odd, sitting on a spit of peninsula that stretched in a small curlicue from the Old Town mainland of Key West. One of a kind, it was Victorian and elegant—and in a state of neglect and decay that made it appear as if it were haunted, almost a living, breathing entity. Shadowed windows might have been eyes, watching all activity that surrounded the place. The fading gray paint created a trick of light in the coming darkness, making it seem as if there was a pulse in the façade of the place. It sat, quiet, dormant, and yet alive…waiting.

Liam Beckett parked his car in the overgrown gravel drive of the old house, dreading what he would find within, and thinking back many years.

This had been Kelsey’s home for so long. Until her mother had died, and her father had taken her away. Cutter Merlin had stayed behind, either mourning his only daughter or left behind by his son-in-law. Liam didn’t know. He remembered Kelsey, though. She’d been his enemy—the little girl who tortured him with spitballs while he’d slipped behind her to tie knots in her hair—and then, somewhere along the way, they’d become friends. And then she had become the first real crush of his life, a dark-haired tomboy who had become a lithe and elegant young woman. He hadn’t been able to say goodbye.

And now…

He walked to the front door and knocked. The house was nearly seven thousand square feet, and Cutter lived in it alone, so—with or without his sense of dread—there was no reason to fear because his initial knock wasn’t answered. He pressed the buzzer for the doorbell, but he was certain that it hadn’t worked in years.

He heard nothing within the house.

He banged on the door again, but there was still no response.

He stepped back on the porch. As Jason Fried had reported, the mail was piling up.

Maybe Cutter Merlin had gone somewhere. Out to see his granddaughter in California, perhaps.

But that wasn’t the case, and Liam knew it.

Cutter Merlin hadn’t left the island in a decade.

He walked around back. The house itself sat on a solid coral-and-limestone shelf that gave way to sand, sea grapes and mangroves. Bony pines and low scruff foliage surrounded the house, most of it appearing to be dead and unkempt, adding to the barren, forgotten and forlorn appearance of the property. Liam knew how to break in: when Kelsey had forgotten her keys, they had crept through the brush—once tended—to the rear of the house and the laundry room. There was a loose screen over the washer and dryer, and it was a piece of cake to move it.

Liam did so.

He slipped the screen out and crawled in, then leapt down from the dryer to the floor.

The odor assailed him immediately, and he knew.

He just had to find the body.

He flicked the switch, but the lights in the laundry room were out. He doubted it had been used in a long time. The connecting door between the kitchen and the laundry room was unlocked, though, giving to his touch. In the kitchen, he flicked another light switch.

A dim bulb came to life.

Cutter Merlin had been fixing himself something to eat. Flies buzzed around a bowl of tomato soup and the sandwich on the plate beside it. Liam touched the bread; it was hard as a rock. An odor different from the intense smell of death but nearly as bad rose from the sandwich.

He walked through to the massive dining room. A bay window seat to the north usually gave a beautiful view of the Gulf, a magnificent site to watch the sunset. But he couldn’t see the dying sun except for a sliver of light; the drapes had been drawn.

There was a patina of dust over the house. Cobwebs covered the chandelier over the dining table.

“Cutter?” Liam called the man’s name, and then felt like an ass, talking to himself. He knew that Cutter was dead. No living man could have remained in that house with the odor, a miasma that was palpable.

One tile step led to the grand living room. The light from the kitchen wasn’t enough to filter in, but, trying another switch, Liam discovered that it, too, was dead.

The room was cast in the eerie bloodred that was darkened by the shadows of the coming night.

It had once been beautiful, with Italian marble floors, elegant throw rugs and crimson Duncan Fife furnishings. Over the years, it had become cluttered, and not with the usual accumulation of silly souvenirs, magazines or papers. There were boxes everywhere. A suit of armor—real—stood in a corner, near a Victorian coffin with a window at the head and a painting beneath the window to display how the dead might have been shown. A mummy case lay to one side of the fireplace, and an authentic voodoo altar lay to the right. A glass dome covered a shrunken head he knew to be from New Guinea, and a stuffed raven took precedence on the mantel. Everywhere you looked, there was an artifact from somewhere, some in pristine condition, others worn and falling apart. Animal heads adorned the walls along with African masks and feathered spears.

There was so much in the room to attract the eye in the strange mixture of shadow and light that Liam didn’t even see the dead man at first.

And then he did.

Like one of his relics, Cutter Merlin was covered in a thin patina of dust. A spider had spun her web from the edge of Cutter’s reading glasses to the armrest of the rocking chair on which he sat.

Liam felt his heart sink. He’d known, of course. He found himself suddenly wishing that he—or someone—had kept up with the old recluse. Cutter Merlin had always been kind to children. He’d been filled with wonderful tales about distant lands: Asia, Far East, Middle East, the jungles of South America and the sands of the Sahara desert. But his daughter had died, his son-in-law and granddaughter had moved away and he had closed himself in with his treasures. Then there had been the strange rumors about the old hermit and his collections. He practiced black magic. He made deals with the devil.

He sat now, just sat, a book in his hands, dust motes dancing in the crimson air around him. Old and frail, his hair long and white, his cheeks covered in a stubble of white beard, he looked as if he might speak. But, of course, he would never speak again.

“Ah, Mr. Merlin!” Liam said softly, walking toward the old man. He noted then that the corpse’s mouth was slightly open, while its eyes were wide-open as well behind steel-framed reading glasses. It was as if Cutter Merlin had died staring toward the foyer and the grand front entry, terrified of whatever he saw there. The expression on his face was so filled with horror that Liam found himself turning to look.

But there was nothing there. He turned and came down on one knee by the corpse. He realized that he would be saturated with the smell of death when he left, but it didn’t matter; he had known the man. He was a sad old fellow who had given a great deal, and he had died alone, in fear.

He sighed softly, shaking his head sadly. He took out his cell and called in the death; the medical examiner would arrive soon.

There wasn’t a terrible rush; Cutter Merlin was dead. The spider that had spun the web about him emerged from the old man’s mouth, causing Liam to start and shudder—and be glad that no one had been there to see his horrified reaction.

Liam frowned, noting the book on the old man’s lap. It was large, with gold trim on the pages, and Liam judged it to be a hundred or more years old. He carefully lifted the cover, but the bloodred twilight was turning to darker and darker shadow, so he took his flashlight from his pocket, carefully lifting the book with the tip of the light.

In Defense from Dark Magick.

There was something in the old man’s hand, as well. Liam knew not to touch him until the M.E. came, but he was curious, and it hardly appeared that this could be a case of murder. An old man had scared himself, and died from a heart attack.

His gloves were in the car, so he used the tip of the small laser light to shift the hand and see what was clutched in the fingers. The old man had long since gone in and out of rigor, so he wasn’t stiff, and Liam was easily able to see what he clutched.

It was a casket, a little gold casket, like a jewelry box with its lid open for a special piece. Liam hadn’t been an altar boy, but he had been brought to church every Sunday when he’d been growing up. It seemed to him that the box was some kind of reliquary. It appeared to contain a small gold ball, filigreed, with the ball designed to fit into the casket, and the casket designed just to fit the ball.

Beneath the book on his lap, Cutter held an old sawed-off shotgun.

“What were you doing, old man?” Liam asked softly aloud. He shook his head and stood, looking around the room again. Boxes and crates and pieces—some priceless, some surely pure junk—seemed piled en masse. Now, the shadows stretched out like bone-fingered tentacles. Liam walked across the room to the main entrance, and, once again with his flashlight, studied the door. Odd. Cutter Merlin had prepared his dinner, simple soup and a sandwich. But he had never eaten it. He had taken a book and an old relic and gone to sit in his rocking chair by the fire, staring at the front door.

Staring as if he were waiting for someone, but with a book and gold casket as his weapons, along with a sawed-off shotgun. He hadn’t pulled out the shotgun to aim at anyone; it remained on his lap, beneath the book.

Cutter Merlin had been called eccentric as long as Liam could remember.

In the last years, he had been referred to as a crazy hermit. To keep their children from playing near the shoreline where the boats came and the water could suddenly become deep, local parents had warned that the man was loony, that he might have been the devil.

The front door was locked. In fact, there were three bolts on the door now, and they were all secured.

It was as if Cutter Merlin had become quite frightened of some visitor in his dotage. Who?

He’d probably begun to suffer dementia. Alzheimer’s. And none of them had really known. Or cared. Liam felt horrible again; how had they all forgotten this man?

He walked back to the corpse. Cutter still stared at the door in fear—and determination. He had been clutching the little casket as if his life had depended upon it.

“Poor old fellow,” Liam said. “You were always good to me. I’m sorry that I forgot you.”

Hearing the approach of the M.E.’s car, he returned to the door. He was about to unlatch the locks when he decided that he just might want to investigate the death further. He headed into the kitchen for a towel and covered his fingers to unlatch the bolts.

The M.E. was Franklin Valaski, a veteran of many a death, natural and unnatural. He was nearly Cutter Merlin’s own age, or at least he looked nearly as old. Maybe his years observing death had made him old early and given him that look of an old bulldog. He was short, stout, wrinkled and excellent at his job. He was followed by an assistant, one of the dieners at the morgue, who bore a stretcher.

“So, old Merlin finally bit the dust, eh?” Valaski said, shaking his head. “Tell you the truth, I had all but forgotten the old bastard was out here.”

“Sad, huh?” Liam murmured. “Looks like a heart attack.”

“Lead the way,” Valaski said.

Liam pointed to the rocking chair, and Valaski went on over to the corpse. The young diener nodded an appropriately grim greeting to Liam, which Liam returned, and then stared around the house.

The diener was gaping at what he saw.

You didn’t know Merlin! Liam thought.

Then, naturally, he found himself thinking about Kelsey. Her mother had died here. He didn’t know much about it—he had been fifteen at the time. It had been a tragic accident, he knew, and Kelsey’s father hadn’t wanted to do anything except escape Key West—and the place where his beloved wife had perished.

He had been brokenhearted to see Kelsey go. But then, half his class had been in love with or in awe of Kelsey—all of them budding into adolescence, a bit slowly, being boys. She had been a whirlwind of smiles and energy. In grade school, she had been a freckled little thing with thick pigtails. But in middle school she had shot up, and she had acquired an amazing shape. Unruly dark hair had become a beautiful and sleek deep brown, so shiny it seemed black, like a raven’s wing. Her freckles had faded, and her eyes had become the deepest shade of blue that he had ever seen. She had been friendly to everyone, kind to the kids other kids picked on, and she had eschewed as sophomoric the idea of being a cheerleader or belonging to any club.

Sometimes, when people had teased her about her grandfather, she had let her eyes grow big and assured them that he was the devil. Then she’d laughed and told them that he was an adventurer, and, until he had turned sixty, he had traveled the globe, battling primitive tribes on the islands of the Pacific and riding camels in the Sahara. She had defended him as the most magnificent explorer in the world. He’d even been to the North Pole!

Liam realized he hadn’t thought about Kelsey in years, either. He’d heard about her father’s death; he had succumbed to a virulent flu a few years ago.

He’d sent her an e-mail knowing that he had learned about it long after the funeral. No flowers to send—even if he had known where to send them.

Now, of course, he’d have to find Kelsey, wherever she was. Probably still in California—she had become a cartoonist, he’d heard. Naturally—she’d always been a good artist. He’d find a phone number; it was one thing to send sympathy in a note after the fact; it was quite a different matter to tell her about a death that way. He didn’t know what she would feel; Liam was pretty sure that she hadn’t seen Cutter Merlin since she’d left Key West.

“Odd,” Valaski announced.

“What’s odd?” Liam asked, walking toward the M.E.

“Looks like a coronary, but…”

“Yeah?”

“It looks as if he were…scared to death,” Valaski said.

“He was an old man, and he probably wasn’t under any medical care,” Liam said. “He might have been suffering from delusions.”

“Hmm,” Valaski said, agreeing. “Odd, though—a man who lived with a mummy, shrunken skulls, coffins and voodoo offerings. Stuffed animals. Bones. Petrified flesh. You wouldn’t think he’d scare easy.”

“He was old,” Liam said softly. Old and forgotten.

“Yes, of course. But what’s really odd…”

His voice trailed off, as if he were deep in thought. Or memory.

“Valaski?” Liam prompted.

Valaski looked up at him. He seemed to give himself a shake, physically and mentally.

“Nothing. Nothing, really. It’s just that…Well, he seems to be wearing the same expression I saw on his daughter’s face. You remember her. Chelsea Merlin Donovan. I’ll never forget. She was such a beautiful woman. She fell down the stairs—down that beautiful curving stairway right there. She died of a broken neck, and yet…Well, she had this exact same expression on her face. I remember it as if it were yesterday. Her husband was holding her, tears streaming down his face. She had fallen…and yet her eyes were open, her lips just ajar…and she seemed to be staring at the most terrifying thing in the universe. Just like Cutter here. Good God, I wonder what it was that they saw?”




Chapter One


Kelsey Donovan was at home, working beneath the bright light above her drafting desk, when her phone rang. She answered it distractedly.

“Yes?”

“Kelsey? Is this Kelsey Donovan?”

It was odd, Kelsey thought later, that she didn’t recognize Liam Beckett’s voice the minute he called, but, then again, it had been a long, long time since she had heard it, and they’d both been basically children at the time.

His voice was low, deep, confident and well-cultured, with the tiniest hint of the South. Naturally—they were from the southernmost city in the United States, even if that city had never been completely typically Southern or typically anything at all. Key West was an olio of countries, times, and people, and accents came from across the globe.

And still…

“It’s Liam.”

“Liam Beckett?”

“Yes, Kelsey. Hello. I’m sorry to be calling you. Well, I’m not sorry to be calling you, I’m just sorry because of…the news I have to give you.”

Her heart seemed to sink several inches down into her stomach.

“It’s Cutter, isn’t it?” she asked.

“I’m afraid so, Kelsey.” He was quiet a minute. “I’m afraid he died a couple of days ago. We just found him.”

A heart couldn’t sink lower than into the stomach, could it? It seemed that the depths of her body burned with sorrow and regret. It was human, she tried to tell herself, to put off until tomorrow what should have been done today. She hadn’t gone back.

Why in hell had she never gone back? She had meant to, she had promised Cutter Merlin, her only living relative, that she would do so. And yet…

Even after her father had passed away, there had been that dark, empty place that had made her afraid to do so.

“Kelsey? Are you there?”

“Yes, I’m here. I’m…Thank you. Thank you for calling me.”

“Of course.” He was silent, and then he cleared his throat awkwardly. “Well, there are matters, of course, that must be dealt with. The property is yours—and the decision on the final arrangements for his interment are yours as well, of course.”

“Um…” She couldn’t think. She didn’t want to think. She didn’t want to sit here and think of herself as being such a low and callous human being for not having gone back. Whatever had happened when she had been a teenager, she didn’t think that it had been her grandfather’s fault, no matter what her father had believed. And her father hadn’t actually called Cutter evil, he had told her he was a good man. He hadn’t even said that the house was evil. But there had been something. She had known that her father believed that her mother’s death hadn’t been an accident, and that he had taken Kelsey away from the house because he had wanted her away from Cutter Merlin.

But the man had been her grandfather, her flesh and blood! She had spoken with him on the phone after her father’s death, and she had said that she would come out. But there had been the awful grief of losing her father, and then the flurry of work to learn to live with the fact that he was gone. And then…and then…

She had meant to go down to see him. She hadn’t. And that’s the way it was, and now he was gone, too, and she was a horrible human being. Liam had said that they had just found him, but…

He had been dead some time. He had died alone, and his body had just sat there alone in death, because he had been so alone in life.

“Kelsey?”

“I’m here.”

“His attorney was Joe Richter. I’ll text you the phone number and address. I suppose you can come here yourself, or make whatever arrangements you’d like with Joe.”

“Sure. Thank you.” She still felt numb—and filled with regret. She didn’t like herself very much at the moment. She roused herself, though, curious as to why it was Liam who had called her.

“Um—how is it that you’re calling?” she asked.

“I’m a cop these days,” he told her. “And we’ve had a few shake-ups in the department lately, so…Anyway, old times, I suppose. When his mail carrier reported that he wasn’t collecting his mail, I went to the house. I found him.”

A cop. Of course, Liam was a cop. He’d wanted to solve every riddle, put together the pieces of any puzzle. Once, when a school lab rat had disappeared, he had discovered that Sam Henley had stolen the creature to take home; he’d pretended to find Sam’s fingerprint on the rat cage, and Sam had quickly squealed—like a rat.

She closed her eyes. She was thinking about Liam. And Cutter was dead.

“Was it a heart attack?” she asked.

There seemed to be a little beat in time before he answered.

“Apparently. But his body is still with the M.E. Just procedure,” he said.

But there had been something odd in his voice!

“Please go ahead and call Joe, Kelsey. Let him know what you’d like. Are you still drawing?”

The new question took a moment to comprehend. She was surprised that he remembered how she had loved drawing.

“I’m a cartoonist. I have a column, and we do a little animated thing on the web,” she said. “I have an animator partner, and we’re doing fairly well. Thanks for asking.”

“That sounds great. Well…”

His voice trailed off. He was a cop. He was busy.

“Thank you again, Liam. I’m glad the news came from you.”

“I’m sorry, Kelsey. Though I guess it’s been a while since you’d seen Cutter.”

“We had talked,” she told him. Ah, yes, there were defensive tones to her words!

“Take care,” he told her.

“Of course, thank you—you, too.”

The phone went dead in her hands. She still didn’t move for several minutes.

The room darkened around her. Only the bright light above her drafting table gave illumination to her apartment.

She liked where she lived. People often thought of the L.A. area as rather a hellhole of plastic people and traffic.

But Hollywood had neighborhoods. She didn’t have to travel most of the time; she worked from home. She had great theater around her, and wonderful music venues. A decent, busy life in a place where there were actually local bars and coffee shops, where she knew the owners of the small restaurants near her and where, day by day, things were pleasant, good.

She didn’t need to go back. She could call Joe Richter, and he could make any arrangements that might be necessary.

No, she couldn’t. She owed Cutter the decency of arranging a funeral herself.

A beep notified her that Liam Beckett had sent her the text with Joe’s information.

She would call him in the morning. She swiveled in her chair from the drafting board to her computer. And she keyed up the airlines, and made a reservation to reach Key West.

She was going home.

Once the reservation was made, she found herself thinking about her father. He’d been a good man. He’d loved her mother so much, and her, too. And he’d even loved Cutter Merlin, she thought. But when they had moved away, she had asked him why, and he had told her, “Because it isn’t safe, kitten. Because it just isn’t safe to be around Cutter, or that house, or…all that he has done. That man will never be safe, in life…or in death.”



The call came when Liam was off duty, when he was down at O’Hara’s having dinner—the special for the night, fish and chips.

His cousin David was frequently there, since David was about to marry Katie, Jamie O’Hara’s niece, and the karaoke hostess at her uncle’s bar. They’d all grown up together. Liam had stayed, while David had gone, until he’d returned recently. Sean, Katie’s brother, had also spent many of his adult years working around the world. Like David, he’d gone into photography and then film.

There were others, friends of various ages, sexes, colors, shapes and sizes, who were local, and the locals came to O’Hara’s with a standard frequency, though the place also catered to tourists—in Key West, tourism was just about the only industry.

The fish was fresh—caught that afternoon—and delicious, but he’d barely begun his meal, sympathizing with David about the problems inherent in planning a wedding when Jack Nissan called him from the station.

“I just got a call—something is going on over at the Merlin house. I know you cared about the old fellow and contacted his granddaughter. I thought that maybe you wanted to be the one to check it out,” Jack told him. “If not, I’m sorry to have called.”

“Who called, and what is the something going on?” Liam asked.

“Mrs. Shriver. She could see the place across the water from the wharf area. She said she saw lights, and knew that we’d found the old fellow dead. Should I just send someone on patrol to check it out?”

“No, Jack, thanks. I’ll go on over,” Liam told him.

“What is it?” David asked.

“A report of lights over at the Merlin house,” Liam said.

“Want me to come with you?” David asked.

“No, it’s all right. I’ll be back. I’ll see you later.”

When he headed out to his car, Liam knew that he was being followed. He paused, turning around.

Bartholomew.

Not everyone saw Bartholomew, and frankly, he’d been among the last in their group to really see the pirate.

Bartholomew had died in the eighteen hundreds. First, Bartholomew had attached himself to Katie O’Hara. Then, somehow, he had become Sean O’Hara’s ghost, and now, with the world quiet—and, Liam assumed, because the others were all living basically normal lives and were romantically involved—Bartholomew had decided to haunt him.

It was quite sad, really. He’d listened to his cousin and the others talk about Bartholomew, but he might have actually believed that it was all part of a strange mass hallucination because of the danger they had been in.

But then, Bartholomew had decided that he needed to attach himself to Liam. It had been after the affair out on Haunt Island, when, his cousin David had assured him, the ghost had been instrumental in saving a number of lives.

At first, seeing a ghost was definitely disturbing. And as far as that went, he’d assumed you’d see some wisp of mist in the air—hear the rattle of chains—or the like. But seeing Bartholomew was like seeing any would-be contemporary costumed pirate in Key West.

The pirate—or privateer—had been a good man. He could be a fine conversationalist, and had certainly helped them all in times of great distress.

It was still unnerving to be followed about by a ghost few others could see, a man in an elegant brocade frock coat, ruffled shirt and waistcoat, and tricornered hat. Since it was Key West, with Fantasy Fest and Pirates in Paradise—not to mention Hemingway Days—it shouldn’t have felt that odd to be followed about by anyone in any attire—or lack thereof. Though it was illegal to travel the streets nude, there were those who did try it during Fantasy Fest, when body paint was the rage.

Katie O’Hara, was the one who had been born with the sixth sense, gift, curse or whatever one wanted to call it that allowed people to see what others did not. Liam didn’t think that the rest of them had anything that remotely resembled Katie’s gifts. But they had all survived events in which what wasn’t at all ordinary had played a major part.

And they all knew there were forces in the world that weren’t visible to the naked eye.

And he should have been accustomed to Bartholomew by now.

In life, Bartholomew had surely been a dashing and charming individual. Even in death, he was quite a character: intelligent and with a keen sense of justice.

“What?” Liam said, spinning around.

Bartholomew stopped short. “What do you mean, what? Cutter Merlin was found dead in a most unusual way, and, God knows, the place had its reputation. You just may need me.”

“It’s going to turn out to be kids, I’m willing to bet,” Liam said. “Teenagers who know the man died and want to break into a haunted house.”

Bartholomew shrugged. “I’m just along for the ride,” he said. “I haven’t seen it yet. The place sounds extremely unusual, and I’m fascinated.”

Liam groaned. “All right, let’s go.”

Liam supposed it was natural that people—young and old—would find the Merlin house fascinating, and that it did make a great haunted house. Once, of course, it had been a beautiful grand dame, but time had done its work, and with Cutter Merlin being old and alone, it had taken on that aura of decay long before the gentleman had passed. Then, of course, there was the truth—he had been a collector of oddities, including human remains such as mummies and shrunken heads.

It was a little more than a mile down Duval and around Front Street and then down around the little peninsula to reach the Merlin house. Liam parked in the overgrown yard. He exited the car and stared at the place, but not even the porch light he had left on after Merlin’s body had been removed was still shining. A burned-out bulb? Or was a prankster inside?

“That’s one eerie residence,” Bartholomew commented.

Liam shrugged and walked up the path to the porch. He tried the front door and found it unlocked. He knew that it had been locked and they had sealed up the entrance over the washer and dryer. Merlin’s attorney, Joe Richter, had the only other set of keys.

He stepped in. Somehow, the house still seemed to have an aura of death about it.

He tried the light switch by the front door, but nothing happened. He turned on his flashlight, and the parlor was illuminated.

An odd whisper emanated through the house. In his mind’s eye, Liam thought about the layout of the house. The front door faced south and Old Town, Key West. Cutter’s library or office was to the left, and behind it was a workroom. The living room stretched the rest of the way in the front, with a doorway leading into the dining room. The kitchen stretched across the back of the house and could be entered through the dining room or the living room. In the center of the living room there was a grand stairway.

The staircase where Kelsey’s mother had died.

He hadn’t been there when it had happened; he had seen Kelsey after, at the funeral. Throughout the service, attended by most of the city, Kelsey had stood, pale and stoic, trying to be a rock for her father, and for Cutter.

Later, when the formal services had ended, they had come here.

Friends and neighbors had helped; food had been set on the buffets, and on the dining-room table, and people had talked. And one by one, their other friends had gone, and finally he had been alone with Kelsey, and they hadn’t said much; he had just held her while she sobbed, until she was so tired that she needed to be brought up to bed.

He had carried her. With her father’s permission. Cutter had suggested that they just wake her; he had been loath to do so. “She’s not heavy, sir,” he had assured Cutter. But when he had brought her up the stairs and laid her down, she had clung to him, and he had stayed beside her in the darkness and the shadows until the exhaustion of her grief had brought sleep mercifully to her once again, and only then had he tiptoed away.

It had been the last time he had seen her.

He couldn’t think about Kelsey or the past now. He wasn’t the same; he was sure Kelsey wasn’t the same. And the house certainly wasn’t the same. It seemed like a shell, the bones of a family and happiness that had once existed.

He owed it to Kelsey, though, to keep the miscreants and thieves away until she decided what she wanted.

Two archways sat on either side of the stairway, one leading to the dining room, the other leading to an area that was a family room—in Victorian days, the family had seldom used the proper living room or parlor. The fireplace was dual; a mantel sat on the other side in Cutter’s office. Though it was seldom that the temperature went below forty even in the dead of winter, it could be cold in the dampness of the semitropics. He had found Cutter in the rocker by the fireplace.

He cast the light over the parlor. It sat in still and brooding silence, boxes everywhere, the heads of long-dead animals staring down at him, spiderwebs reigning supreme along with the dust.

“Oh, God! Oh, God!”

The sound was coming from the kitchen. Frowning, Liam walked through the parlor and quietly continued, skirting boxes and crates and statues, until he reached the kitchen.

He cast the flare of his flashlight toward the far wall even as a bloodcurdling scream ripped through the air.

It startled and unnerved him; even Bartholomew gasped.

“What the hell…?”

“Oh, my God! You’re alive, you’re real!”

The light illuminated three people—three young people.

Teenagers, as he had suspected.

They looked like little Key deer caught in the head-lights, staring back at him with white faces and terrified stares.

“Yes, I’m alive,” Liam said irritably. “Who are you, and what are you doing here? You’re trespassing.”

There were two boys and one girl. It was the girl who worked her jaw and gasped out, “There are things in here! Things! Horrible things, shadow ghosts, they touch you…they try to kill you!”

She had been hunched in terror against the wall. She had a frying pan clutched in her hands. She was dressed in capri pants and a tank top that left her stomach, and her cute little belly-button ring, visible. She was as skinny as a twig, maybe fourteen.

The boys seemed to gain courage from her. They both stood as well, and were each about an inch shorter than she was. One of them held a copper dough roller. The other was clutching a deep dish pan. Strange weapons—gained from the racks that stretched out over the brick island in the center of the room. Liam was surprised that none of them had grabbed the fire poker.

“Sir! There’s something awful in here!” one of the boys said.

“Awful!” the other repeated.

“How did you get in here?” Liam asked.

“The door was open,” the girl said. She was shaking. “Please…please get us out of here. We’ll never come back, never!”

“You can take us to jail—it will be okay!” the boy with the roller clutched in his hands told him, his eyes still huge and panicked.

“Look, just stay here, and I’ll check out the place and—”

“No!” The wail came out of the three of them in a chorus.

Liam sighed. “Look, if the door was open, someone was in here ahead of you. I’ve got to find whoever it is and—”

“No, oh, God, oh, no! You can’t leave us here! Please?” the girl begged.

Liam pulled out his phone and called the station. Jack, on the desk, answered the phone.

“Get a car out to the Merlin place for me, will you, Jack? I’ve got some teenagers.”

“Sure. Are you arresting them?” Jack asked.

“No, I just want them taken home. But I think there’s still someone in the house. The lights are down. I need some backup.”

The three teens were still huddled in front of him. He hung up and asked their names. The girl was Jane Tracy, the boy with the roller was Hank Carlin and the last was Joshua Bell. They had just come in as a prank.

“You know, it’s like…it’s like a haunted house. Like at Disney World,” Hank said. “We just wanted to have some fun. We weren’t going to steal anything. Please, can we get out? It can kill you, too, Officer, you don’t know…it’s terrible!”

“The Addams family…the Munsters…,” Jane said. “We just wanted to see. They said he had all kinds of treasures…Can we just get out?” she begged again.

He didn’t blame them. There was something creepy about the house. The hanging utensils cast strange shadows in the glare of his flashlight, while a rocker by the fire seemed to move. Dust motes seemed like misted forms in the artificial light, as well.

“All right, come on.”

He turned, and the three came running up behind him like metal drawn to a magnet; he thought he’d trip, they were so tight against him.

Scared. They had scared themselves in the place. They’d wanted a spooky challenge; they had found one in the Merlin house.

They went out to the porch. Liam hoped the patrol car would hurry. If the door had been unlocked, someone else had gotten in. That someone might have provided the shadows and touches that had scared them so badly.

He wanted to find the trespasser before it was too late.

The three remained stuck to him like glue while they stood on the porch. “Hey!” he said. “You’ll be home in a few minutes. Look, there’s someone still in there. That person was trying to scare you out. But it’s a good lesson. No trespassing. It can be dangerous.”

“They weren’t just trying to scare us, and it wasn’t any person,” Jane said. “They wanted to kill us—they would have killed us. They were ghosts, evil spirits!”

“Jane, it’s just a house,” Liam said.

“Then the house wanted to kill us.”

“What makes you say that?” he asked.

“Because we heard it!” she whispered. “We all heard it! It was horrible, a horrible whisper in the darkness saying, ‘You’re going to die. I’m going to kill you.’”

“And he was there,” Joshua said gravely. “I saw him. I saw old man Merlin. His eyes were burning in the darkness. I felt him, felt him put his hands around my throat.”

“He shoved me,” Jane said.

Just then the patrol car arrived and Art Saunders and Ricky Long emerged. “Art, get these three home,” Liam instructed. “Ricky, come with me. Lights are out, and I want to search the place.”

“Yessir,” Art called. “You three, get your little juvenile-delinquent butts into the car,” he said to the kids.

Ricky Long had been with the department about three years. He was a good cop. He’d seen some bad things in his brief stint.

He looked sick as he walked toward the house.

“You want me to search it with you, sir?” he asked.

“Ricky, it’s a house. If there’s something in it, it’s flesh and blood. Yes, we’re supposed to guard lives and personal property. I’ll take the upstairs, you take the downstairs.”

Ricky nodded slowly.

Liam left him to search through the ground floor. Upstairs, he went methodically from room to room, aware that Bartholomew was at his back.

“I don’t like this place,” Bartholomew whispered.

Liam stopped. “Bartholomew, you are a ghost.”

“I still don’t like this place. There is something here. Remnants of evil and pain. Maybe it’s in all this creepy stuff. Mummies, coffins, shrunken skulls. Evil spirits, the memories of pain and sacrifice and human suffering. Miasma on the air. Let’s get this done and get out.”

“Bartholomew, someone human was in here. Doors don’t unlock themselves.”

“What if evil spirits unlock them to lure in the innocent?” Bartholomew asked. “I may be a ghost, but we both know that evil isn’t something that dies easily.”

Liam wondered if Kelsey Donovan was going to have Joe Richter sell the place for her, or if she’d come to Key West herself. He’d have to ask Richter. If Kelsey was going to come down and move back into the house, he had to stop whatever the hell was going on.

“Cutter Merlin wasn’t an evil man,” he said.

Bartholomew sniffed, sidestepping a huge stone gargoyle probably procured from a medieval church somewhere in Europe.

The gargoyle’s huge shoulders hunched and the eyes seemed to stare at them with malice.

“They say he practiced black magic!” Bartholomew told him.

“People make up whatever they wish regarding an old hermit,” Liam said sadly.

“He was some kind of a wizard. Or a witch, maybe. Men can be witches, right? Yeah, that’s right. They hanged men as witches in Salem, Massachusetts. And in Europe, too,” Bartholomew said.

“They hanged a bunch of innocent people caught up in hysteria or a land grab,” Liam said firmly.

As he did so, he heard a scream again. Male this time, hoarse and curt…and somehow just as bloodcurdling as the first he had heard that evening.

The sound came again, a scream of abject terror.

Then, it was broken off. Midstream, as if the screamer had…

As if the screamer’s throat had been slit.

Ricky. Ricky Long, screaming from the ground floor…

And then—not.

Liam forgot Bartholomew and the idiotic imaginations of the masses and went tearing down the stairs.




Chapter Two


Liam’s call had opened the door to the past.

Odd—that was actually what she had done in her mind, she realized. Closed a door. And as if that door had been real and tangible, she had set her hand on the knob and turned it.

Cutter Merlin, her mother’s father, had been so many things. He had doctorates in history and archaeology, and he had been the best storyteller she had ever known. His beautiful old house in Key West had been like a treasure trove, filled with things, and each thing had offered a story. She had loved growing up with the exotic. While her friends could be easily scared, she loved the idea that she lived with a real Egyptian mummy. At campfires she had told great tales herself, describing how she had awakened once to find the mummy standing over her…reaching out for her.

It had been great. The others had squealed with fear and delight.

Except for Liam, of course. She could remember the way he would scoff at her stories. He was two years older than she was, but in their small community they often wound up at the same extracurricular events, and even when they were in grade school, they had battled.

“Yeah, sure!” Liam said, mocking her story. “Like the mummy really got up. The mummy is old and dead and rotten, and if you let me in the house, I’ll prove it!” he would say.

“Ask my grandfather!” she’d dared him.

“I’ll be happy to,” he’d assured her. But he never did. He didn’t want to prove his words, because her stories made her popular.

And they were good stories, of course.

He’d been so elusive; that little bit older, somehow, even for a boy, more mature.

And sometimes, when they were grouped together out on the beach at Fort Zachary Taylor, she told stories that were true about the aboriginal tribes her grandfather had known, getting a little bit dramatic by adding the fact that Cutter had barely escaped with his life—and his own head.

Liam listened, rolling his eyes at her embellishments.

She had been tall, since girls did tend to grow faster than boys. But Liam had grown quickly, too, and by the time they had reached their early teens, he had stood at least an inch over her, and when she would talk, he would lean against a doorframe, arms crossed over his chest, that amused and disbelieving look on his face.

But when her mother had died, he had been like the Rock of Gibraltar, telling her to go ahead and break down when she had tried so hard not to cry in public, and he had held her while she had sobbed for an hour. He had been her strength that night, smoothing her hair back, just being there, never saying that it was all right that her mother was dead, just saying that it was all right to cry.

And then…

Then she hadn’t seen him again. Her father took her away from Key West, hurriedly, one night. She had left most of her belongings, taking only one suitcase, because her father had been in such a rush.

She’d told no one goodbye.

And no matter how real her life in Key West had been, everything about it had faded away. She had enrolled in a California school. She had acquired new friends. She had played volleyball in the sand, and she had finally learned to surf in cold water. Everything in their apartment was brand-new, and her father never even watched old movies.

There had only been one time when she had asked him about Cutter. She had never called him grandfather, grandpa, or even gramps—he had always been Cutter to everyone. And so she had asked her father, “Do you hate Cutter, Dad? Do you think that he hurt Mom somehow?”

He had hesitated, but then shook his head strenuously. “No, no. Cutter is a good man. Don’t let anyone tell you anything different, ever.”

“Then why did we run away from him?” she’d asked.

“Because bad things can follow a good man, and that’s that, and please, I don’t want to talk about it anymore.”

And that had been it.

Key West had faded away, like a scene out of a movie, one she had seen long ago. Until her father was dying, and he had talked about Cutter again.

Cutter wasn’t safe.

She’d loved him. She thought about it now, and she knew that she had really loved him. He’d had such a wonderful sense of adventure. His eyes had been brilliant while he’d described the pyramids in Egypt and the temples in ancient Greece. He talked about places like the Vatican, St. Paul’s Cathedral, Westminster Abbey and Notre Dame with great awe. He’d talked about the catacombs in Paris, and about marvelous, creepy grottos in Sicily.

His talent as a storyteller had been amazing. And, of course, he’d turned her into one, she thought. No one had ever really known when Cutter was telling the truth—and when he was spinning a very tall tale.

She called Joe Richter, the attorney, to let him know that she would come in person, and then she called Avery Slater, her creative partner, to let him know that she was leaving and why. And naturally, Avery appeared at her door within twenty minutes.

He was seriously one of the most beautiful people she had ever seen, and she used his image for one of her characters, Talon, an angel who had come to live among men. Avery was tall, and he spent his free time at the gym, so he was lean and muscled, as well. He had luxurious, thick, almost black hair, his eyes were chestnut and his features might have adorned a Greek statue. He was a skilled animator, her partner and one of her best friends. She knew that people often thought they were a romantic pair, but Avery was gay, not in the closet in the least, but someone who was very private as well, unless he was among close friends.

He burst into her home with the ease of a best friend, heading straight into the kitchen, opening the refrigerator and finding the chardonnay. He poured himself a glass, didn’t offer her one and swallowed it down as if it were water, staring at her all the while.

“You can’t just up and go to Key West,” he told her, setting his glass down firmly on the counter.

“I’m not moving to Key West, I’m just going down for a few weeks. My grandfather died,” she said.

“Yes, yes, you told me that. But you weren’t close—you hadn’t seen him in years,” Avery reminded her.

“I owe him a decent burial,” she said.

“Send money,” he said. He frowned. “Oh, wait—will you inherit money? A lot of it?”

She laughed. “I don’t know. Maybe. He had a number of artifacts, but I knew, even as a kid, that he’d willed a lot of his things to various museums.”

Thoughtfully, Avery nodded. “Yes, yes, a will. Of course. There you go. There’s no need for you to go to Key West.”

“Yes, there is.”

“An attorney can arrange for a funeral.”

“Avery, he was my grandfather.”

“But we have work to do!” he said.

“Avery, I will bring my computer. And my scanner. And I will send you the strips, and you will set them up for animation. It will all be fine. Seriously. We’re ahead.”

“You can never be ahead in this business. We have to keep the Web stuff going daily—that’s the only way to really acquire an audience. The bigger we get on the Web, the more the advertisers will pay,” he reminded her.

“I have to go.”

He frowned. “I don’t think you should go.”

“Why?”

“I’m seeing a guy who reads tarot cards,” he told her.

“Okay…?”

“He warned me that a friend would want to go on a dangerous journey,” Avery said, his expression somber and grave. “It’s dangerous.”

“The danger is in getting a serious sunburn,” she said. “Avery, I lived there, remember?”

“And your mother died there, remember?”

She felt a chill, and it was almost as if she knew the words would haunt her later.

“You can take me to the airport, if you want,” she told him.

He sighed deeply. “You’re going to go no matter what I say, aren’t you?”

“Yes.”

He came over to her and drew her into his arms, hugging her tightly. She was touched by the gesture; she had thought that he didn’t want her going because he was so ambitious, and he liked to work together, with her at his beck and call whenever he had an idea.

But he seemed genuinely concerned.

She drew away from him. He was so gorgeous.

“It’s okay. I’ll see to the house and his things. I owe Cutter that much. And I want to have a funeral for him. Then I’ll be back. It will all be fine. Really,” she assured him.

“No. That’s not what will happen. You’ll go home, you’ll see old friends. You won’t want to come back here.”

“I left as a teenager. My life is here,” she said. “I’ll be back.”

He wagged a finger at her. “If you’re not back immediately, I’ll be down there to get you. I’ll take care of you. And if there’s anything bad, well…I’m psychic, you know.”

She laughed. “No, I didn’t know. But by all means. Key West is beautiful. Come on down.”

He sniffed.

At last he left, still offering dire warnings to her.

She needed to pack, but she wandered out to the porch and gazed at the pool she shared with the others who lived in the group of old bungalows. She stared at the water.

Cold water. Even heated, it was still cold, in her mind.

Key West had warm water. Beautiful, warm water.

A sudden scream startled her and brought her back inside. She had a habit of keeping the television on for company. One of the movie channels was running an all-day marathon of classic horror movies.

Someone was running from a werewolf.

She smiled and sat, and then stretched out on her sofa, watching the television. As she did so, her eyes grew heavy. A nap would be great; she had tossed and turned through the night.

As she felt herself nodding off, she thought about fighting sleep.

She knew that she would dream.

It seemed that a scene from a movie was unfolding. The house was distant at first, sitting on its little spit of land. The water around it was aqua and beautiful, as it could only be around Florida and the Caribbean.

But then dark clouds covered the soft blue of the sky, and the ocean became black, as if it were a vast pit of tar.

The camera lens within her dreaming eye came closer and closer, and the old Victorian with its gingerbread façade came clearer to her view. She heard a creaking sound and saw the door was open, that the wind was playing havoc with the hinges.

She was in the house again, and she heard the screams and the wailing, and she saw her father, as she had seen him that day, holding her mother, the sound of his grief terrible. She ran toward him, screaming herself, calling for her mother.

Then Cutter himself came running down the stairs, crying out in horror. He sank down and she felt herself freeze, just standing there as she had on that day.

Then her mother and father and Cutter all faded to mist, and she stood in the empty house, alone. There were boxes and objects, spiderwebs and dust, and there was something else in the house as well, something that seemed like a small black shadow, and then seemed to grow…dark, stygian, filling the house with some kind of evil.

The mummy rose from its sarcophagus and stared at her with rotted and empty eyes. It pointed at the black shadow, and its voice was as dry and brittle as death as it warned, “The house must have you. It’s up to you. Now you—you must come, and you must stop it from growing, from escaping. It’s loose, you see, the evil is on the loose, and it’s growing.”

The mummy wasn’t real. The mummy was dead. Liam had said so.

Terror filled her. She heard her name called. She turned. Liam was there, a tall, lanky teenager, reaching out to her. “Come here, come to me, it isn’t real, the mummy is dead, it’s in your imagination, in all the stories. Don’t believe in it, Kelsey—take my hand.”

There seemed to be a terrible roar. She turned, and the mummy was a swirling pile of darkness, a shadow, and the darkness was threatening to consume her.

Kelsey awoke with a start. She was in her charming living room, in her charming bungalow apartment, and she had fallen asleep with the television on.

And the movie channel she watched was showing Boris Karloff in The Mummy.

She laughed aloud at herself, turned off the TV, and decided that she was going to get things done, batten down the house, pack so she could leave in the morning, and then get a good night’s sleep. She wasn’t a coward; she had spent her childhood with Cutter, and really, she had to have some kind of sense of adventure.

I owe you, Cutter! I’m so sorry. I should havecome to see you. I never should have let you die alone like that.

Please forgive me.

She wasn’t afraid.

The house was just a house.

And Cutter’s mummy was just preserved flesh that could now find a good home in a museum. Everything in perspective.

Cutter himself needed to rest at last, in peace.

She would see to it.



Liam shouted the officer’s name. “Ricky!”

There was no answer. As he reached the bottom of the stairs, however, he saw him on the floor, caught in the glow of light from his own fallen flashlight.

“Ricky!”

He rushed over to the man. Hunching down, he called for backup and an ambulance. He instantly checked for Ricky’s pulse, and was relieved to find that it was beating steadily.

Ricky groaned, and moved.

“Lie still. Where are you hurt? What happened?”

There was no sign of blood anywhere near Ricky.

As Liam spoke, Ricky opened his eyes, staring at Liam for a moment and then jerking around in panic. He stared across the room in the darkness. Liam aimed his flashlight beam in the area that seemed to be causing Ricky so much fear.

His light fell upon a suit of armor.

Ricky let out a scream, trying to choke it back.

“Ricky,” Liam said evenly, “it’s a suit of armor. Probably real, historic and worth a mint.”

“It moved!” Ricky declared.

Liam walked toward the armor. It was just that. Metal. It was buckled together by leather straps that had been made to replace the originals. They were probably period, but not historic.

The metal display stand was not on rollers. It hadn’t moved.

Liam turned to look at Ricky. He was rubbing the back of his head. It appeared that the man had seen the armor and backed himself into the edge of one of the display cases on the other side of the room.

“I swear to you, it moved!” Ricky told him.

He’d called for an ambulance. Even as Ricky stood, rubbing his head, and Liam checked all around the suit of armor, they heard the sound of a siren. Help was on its way.

Ricky winced, looking sheepish. “It moved. I’m telling you, it moved.”

“It’s dark down here, and you’ve heard all kinds of rumors about this place,” Liam said. He sighed, shaking his head. “Or maybe it did move, Ricky. Maybe a trespasser was in here, hiding behind the suit of armor, and when you knocked yourself out, he got away.”

Ricky’s mouth fell open. He was young, twenty-five years old. He was a good officer. Strong, usually sane and courteous. He could break up a barroom brawl like no other.

He protested weakly. “No…no, I would have seen a person.” He cleared his throat. “Oh, Lord, Lieutenant Beckett, please…maybe we could not mention this?” he asked hopefully.

Liam was irritated; he might have just lost his chance of finding whoever had broken in. But he said, “I’m not going to say anything—hell, I don’t want half the idiots in this city starting all kinds of rumors about haunted houses and animated suits of armor. Let the paramedics check you out. Just say you crashed into the display shelf, and that’s what I’ll say, too. It’s the truth.”

He walked out. The paramedics were exiting their ambulance with their cases in their hands.

“It’s a knock on the head, self-inflicted,” Liam said. “I think he’s fine, but check him out, please.”

The paramedics nodded and headed for the house. A patrol car came sliding up to park beside the rescue vehicle. He sent the two officers inside, telling them to secure the residence before they left.

He stepped down to the lawn and looked back at the house. He felt the presence behind him and didn’t turn.

“Did you see anything?” he asked softly.

“No, I was with you,” Bartholomew said.

“Well, what do you think?”

“I don’t like the place, if that’s what you mean.”

“Is there anything in it? Anyone?”

“I sense—something,” Bartholomew said.

“I’m telling you, this has to do with something human,” Liam said flatly.

“Maybe. I’m human,” Bartholomew protested.

“You’re a ghost.”

“But I was human. Evil isn’t…it isn’t necessarily human.”

Liam groaned softly. “We both know that human beings are the ones who carry out physical cruelty and injury to one another.”

“Well, we don’t actually know everything,” Bartholomew said.

“If I were going to be hounded by a ghost,” Liam said, “you’d think it would be one who knew a little more about eternity.”

“There’s no one in the house now,” Bartholomew told him indignantly. “No one who isn’t supposed to be there. No one human.”

“Someone else was in that house tonight,” Liam said with certainty.

“I think so, too,” Bartholomew said.

“And now?”

“Whatever is in there isn’t human,” Bartholomew said quietly. “So, what now?”

There was nothing else to be done for the night.

“Now? Hell, I’m heading back for a new batch of fish and chips,” Liam said. But as he walked toward his car, he hesitated. It was dark now on the little peninsula. But there were three acres surrounding the house. There was a strip of beach on the property, and near that there were mangrove swamps and bits of pine and brush on higher ground. The house itself was built up on a large slab of coral and limestone, but surrounding it were dozens of places where someone could conceivably hide, or places where one might stash a small vessel like a canoe, or…

Hell. A decent swimmer could make it across to the mainland easily.

In the darkness, someone could hide with little chance of actually being discovered. He would need a helicopter and megalights to find someone in the night.

He made a mental note to get an electrician out there in the morning.

When he reached O’Hara’s, he found Katie, David and Jamie at a table, all dining on fish and chips themselves.

“Well?” David asked curiously.

“Teenagers,” he said.

“They mess anything up?” David asked.

“They were huddled together in the kitchen, terrified,” Liam said. “They thought the shadows were coming after them.”

Katie laughed. “I can well imagine that place at night. They must have been scared out of their wits.”

“Hey, that place is frightening to an adult,” Jamie O’Hara said.

Liam was surprised that Jamie might have ever found anything frightening. He was a solid man with gray hair, bright eyes, and the calm confidence that made him a good man in any situation and—in Key West—a good barkeep. He could stare down any man about to get in a brawl, and if a punch was thrown, he had the brawn to walk an unruly guest right out to the street.

He’d been both a friend—and something of a parental figure to all of them.

“Cutter Merlin was born and bred right here, and he was popular with folks when he was a young man. He was our version of Indiana Jones, I suppose,” Jamie said. “When he got older, that’s when folks started talking about him. They said that he got himself into too many places that maybe he shouldn’t have gone. It wasn’t until his daughter died, though, that folks started saying that he might have been a Satanist, or a witch. Trying to explain that wiccans, or witches, practiced an ancient form of religion that had to do with nature and that Satanism meant worship of the Devil didn’t seem to go over. After his daughter died, people said everything in the world about him. He’d signed the Devil’s book. He held Black Masses. You name it, people said it.”

“He was a nice old man, and a great storyteller,” Katie said. “I was out there a few times. Kelsey is a few years older than me, but we were in a sailing class together, and we all went to her place for a picnic after the final day. Cutter was great. He dressed up in a suit of armor, then showed us how heavy it was and why a knight needed a squire. He was wonderful.”

Jamie shrugged. “Well, you know how people gossip, and you know how rumors start. People said that his daughter died because he’d signed a pact with the Devil—and that was why Kelsey’s father got her the hell out the minute he could after his wife passed away.”

“I wonder if it occurred to people that he might have been in tremendous pain—and that he wanted to raise his daughter without her having to remember how her mother had died on the stairs. A tragic accident,” David said.

Liam hesitated, thinking about the things the M.E., Franklin Valaski, had said the day before when he had studied Cutter Merlin’s mortal remains and mentioned the man’s dying expression, comparing it to that of his daughter.

She had fallen, but her eyes were open, her lips ajar…

And Cutter had been found with a relic in his hands and the book in his lap.

In Defense from Dark Magick.

Just what the hell had the old bastard been up to?

“I wonder if Kelsey will come back?” Katie mused. “Actually, I wonder what she’s like now. Do you think she became a Valley girl?”

“I don’t know,” Liam said. He was curious. He wanted to see her. It had been a long time. Other women had come into his life, and other women had gone. She was the only one who had ever teased his memory in absence. “I don’t know,” he repeated with a shrug.

And he suddenly prayed that she had become a Valley girl, that she would stay away and that whatever cursed the Merlin house, human or other, would never touch Kelsey.

The next night, it was a dinner of shepherd’s pie that he had to leave. It had just arrived, and the call came from the station.

It was Jack again.

“Lieutenant, I know you found kids last night, and I can’t believe they’re back, but we’ve just gotten another call. This time it was from a tourist who is staying at a bed-and-breakfast across the way. He saw lights on at the Merlin house, and he’s certain he heard a scream.”

Liam set his fork down. “There are lights on because I had an electrician out. The lightbulbs are all new. I left a light on inside the living room, and one on the front porch.”

“Sir, the lights are coming from an upstairs bedroom. The lights didn’t bother Mr.—” Liam could hear papers rustling as Jack checked his notes “—Mr. Tom Lewis, from New York City. What bothered him is that he could swear he heard a scream.”

“All right. I’m going out,” he said.

He slid off his bar stool. He’d been alone thus far that night, though Katie was working her Katie-oke, and he knew that David would be in soon. Clarinda had taken his order and delivered his food. She came by as he stood. “I take it you’ll be wanting this reheated when you get back?”

He smiled at her. “Yep, thanks.”

“The Merlin house again?”

“Yep. What made you say that?”

She grinned at him. “You don’t usually leave your dinner for drunks on Front Street.”

He nodded, thanked her and assured her that he’d be back.

On the street, he looked for Bartholomew, but he didn’t see the ghost, who usually hovered near or around him. It disturbed him to realize that he wished that Bartholomew was around.

He wondered if he should call for backup, but decided that he would be able to see in the house that night, and he wanted to move in quietly himself.

So thinking, he parked out on the road and walked onto the property.

When he reached the house, he moved quietly up to the porch. When he touched the front doorknob, he carefully twisted it and once again found it open. He pressed it inward carefully, remaining as silent as he could.

To his surprise, he heard conversation coming from the kitchen. “Look, none of this stuff is worth stealing. I thought we could find some small thing that would bring in a few bucks, something that no one would notice, and maybe sleep a few nights in a place that wasn’t a hellhole,” someone said. “But there’s nothing. We’re going to take a shrunken skull? There aren’t even any amulets or anything on that ragtag excuse for a mummy. And guess what? I don’t like this place! It’s creepy and scary. That damned door opened as if the house was sucking us in!”

“Don’t be ridiculous. This is a house—that’s all there is to it. Things are things. The dead are dead, and I don’t know about you, but I’m certain there’s got to be something that doesn’t weigh a hundred pounds and can be sold easily,” said a second speaker. “He’s supposed to have all kinds of jewels, diamonds and so on.”

“You know what? You’re wrong. This is bad. I don’t feel good about taking anything out of this place. It may be cursed, you know?” said the first voice.

There seemed to be a slight hesitation between the two; Liam almost moved forward, but then the second speaker said, “All right, so the house is…weird. Creepy. We look fast, we get out—fast. Hey, I was always kind of close to old Merlin. Ran errands and stuff. He owes me, honestly. So, nothing creepy will happen if we’re just careful about taking what we need, and not robbing the place blind.”

It was enough. Aware of his gun in its holster beneath his light cotton jacket, Liam stepped forward, walking casually into the kitchen.

The first man, with scraggly blond hair and a scruffy face, let out a startled yelp.

The second one spun around as if he were ready to pounce on the threatened danger; he saw Liam and backed down.

Liam knew them both.

The scruffy blond was Gary White, a guitar player who wasn’t bad, with a voice that, likewise, wasn’t bad. He could get work. Thing was, while he wasn’t bad, he just wasn’t good. That meant he didn’t work all that often, but he was still convinced that he’d get rich one day, that he’d be discovered in Key West. His last name fit him—his hair was so bleached out by the sun, it was platinum, nearly white.

The second man was Chris Vargas. He was dark haired, about a decade older than Gary, an inch taller, and he couldn’t play guitar at all. He had a beat-up old rickshaw, and made money running tourists up and down Duval Street. He had a home in a tiny apartment above the garage of a house on the south side of Old Town.

“What the hell are you two doing?” Liam asked tiredly.

Gary looked at Chris in alarm. His mouth began to work. “Uh—uh.”

That was all that he could come up with.

Vargas said, “Oh, hey! We saw lights in here. We knew that old man Merlin just died. We thought we’d better check it out.”

“Vargas, you ass, I just heard you talking,” Liam said.

Chris Vargas reddened. He was a lean, lithe man in decent shape from running up and down all the time with a fair amount of weight behind him. He could probably be dangerous, under certain circumstances, Liam decided. His features were sharp, like a little rat’s. He’d been scraping for a living too long, drinking to drown his unhappiness a few too many nights.

“All right,” the man said softly. “We—we weren’t after much, Lieutenant Beckett. Honest to God. Just some little thing.”

“And you were in here last night, too, trying to scare those kids to death, huh?” Liam asked.

“No, we were not in here last night!” Gary White said, indignant. He stood straight, and seemed really hurt at the accusation.

Liam looked at Chris Vargas. Vargas stared back at him, shaking his head emphatically.

“Oh, God, we’re under arrest, right?” Gary asked miserably.

“How did you get in?” Liam asked.

Gary looked puzzled. He wasn’t the sharpest knife in the drawer. “Um—the door?”

“You walked in the front door. How? You picked the lock?” Liam asked.

“No, it wasn’t locked,” Gary assured him.

Liam believed him. Gary White was just a bit too dense to be a good liar.

“Look,” Vargas said, “we just walked in because—”

“You were robbing the estate,” Liam interrupted.

“Not really robbing,” White protested. “Just…Ah, come on, Lieutenant. If you heard us, you know that we’re just…All right, so we were going to take something really little. And, hell, we’re not bad. The kids in here the other night—those little bastards have broken into other places. They don’t steal, but they smoke pot, yeah, they smoke pot up in the rooms and play with all the stuff the snowbirds leave behind.”

“If you weren’t in here,” Liam asked wearily, “how do you know about the kids?”

“Because everybody knows about the kids,” Vargas said. “Ah, Lieutenant! You know this is a small town, really. Everybody knows everything. And it’s true. I heard they got the bejesus scared out of them here. I hope it’s true. It will keep the little rug rats from causing real trouble.”

“That’s right,” White agreed solemnly, nodding at Vargas as if the two of them were the most solid citizens in the world.

Gary White must have seen something in Liam’s face. He choked slightly, cleared his throat and asked, “Are you going to arrest us?”

This whole thing was beyond absurd. Two nights in a row. First, kids. Second? Two of the denizens of the place who weren’t known for violence, who just eked out a living. If he arrested them, an attorney would have them out on bail. And what would they get for trespassing? They hadn’t stolen anything; he had arrived too soon, and, from what he could tell, they couldn’t find anything they actually wanted to steal anyway.

He thought about the paperwork.

And, to his knowledge, Gary White had never done anything to break the law that was more serious than jaywalking.

“Get the hell out of here,” he said.

They both stared at him.

“Now,” he said.

They bolted like lightning. He turned and watched them from the kitchen doorway. They had trouble opening the front door, the one crashing into the other, crashing into the door, then each other again.

Finally, they made it out.

He walked to the door himself. There was nothing wrong with it that he could see. The lock hadn’t been picked.

Someone else out there had a key.

Tomorrow he’d have to have the lock changed.



Going from the West Coast of the States to the east coast made it difficult to arrive with much of anything left of daylight, especially once daylight savings time was gone. But Kelsey had found an early-morning flight that got her into Miami around three in the afternoon. She could have taken a puddle jumper down to Key West from Miami International Airport, but she wanted to drive. Baggage claim at MIA was insane, but eventually she was ready to head out for the rental-car agency, and by four-thirty she was driving south.

The turnpike took her to Florida City, and she headed down U.S. 1, past the gas stations, one real restaurant and fast-food eateries to the eighteen-mile stretch of nothingness that led to Key Largo and from there south and then west to Key West.

They’d improved the road, though she still saw signs and crosses where those in a hurry had tried to pass, only to pay the ultimate price. She managed to get behind a truck towing a huge boat trailer, but she didn’t mind waiting for the passing zone.

It had been a long time.

The day was beautiful. The turquoise water glistened, the waves were gentle and calm. In a few areas, construction workers were still claiming land to widen the road and the stench of stagnant water overpowered the view, but the sight of a cormorant soaring above the water seemed to lift the stench beyond her windows, and then she was past it.

A new overpass made getting into Key Largo a bit easier and faster, and it was still daylight when she arrived. Key Largo was built up. She assumed she’d see that all the way down the Keys.

By six-thirty she had lost the daylight, and she had come to the middle Keys where there were still vast tracts that didn’t seem to have been built up much. Marathon had acquired another shopping center, but the lower Keys were still tiny and starkly populated. She slowed at the signs warning that her speed needed to be minimal in honor of the little Key deer that roamed the area, and at last, in darkness, she reached Stock Island and then drove on to Key West. Following North Roosevelt Boulevard around, she sought out the shopping plaza on the newer part of the island where the attorney had assured her he would leave the key to the Merlin house in a lockbox—a brand-new key because the police lieutenant had suggested new locks. She found the shopping center easily enough, decided she’d just stop quickly for a sandwich at a small Cuban restaurant and went to procure the key. As she punched in the number Joe Richter had given her, the door to his office in the plaza opened.

“Kelsey. Kelsey Donovan! Young lady, you have grown up!”

Joe Richter was probably about fifty. She remembered him the minute she saw him because he hadn’t changed at all. His hair was snow-white, and he had a full head of it. He was lean, a gaunt man who managed to maintain a presence and a tremendous sense of dignity.

“Joe, I remember you, of course,” she said. When she had called about Cutter’s death, he hadn’t reminded her that she knew him. But she had been distracted when she called—still wallowing in guilt.

“I was just about to leave—you just caught me. I wanted to let you know we can do a formal reading of the will anytime you like. You’re the only heir, so…Then,” he added, clearing his throat, “we do need to make arrangements for Cutter’s burial. He’s still at the morgue, awaiting your plans.”

“Thank you, Joe, for handling everything so far,” Kelsey said.

“He was my client for years, though even I had barely seen him lately,” Joe said.

“When did you see him last?”

“About six months ago.”

“That long? Was there any special reason you saw him then?”

Joe shook his head. “No. His will has remained the same since your mother died. I happened to be shopping down on Front Street, so I took a ride out. I told him he needed a maid—he said that he’d tried hiring someone once, but she’d left in the middle of the job, screaming. I guess the house isn’t for everyone.”

“No,” Kelsey agreed, smiling.

“Well, young lady, I’m going to suggest you get some help to clean the place out. It’s going to need a lot of work.” He hesitated. “Can I do anything for you now? Would you rather stay somewhere else? I can get you a reservation…Of course, you could have gotten your own reservation, if you had wanted,” he added gently.

“No, I think I need to get out to the house. Everything is actually working, right? Electric, plumbing…that kind of thing?”

“Oh, yeah, the police saw to it. All I had to do was hire the locksmith—safety’s sake, you know?”

“Sure, thank you. I’ll talk to you tomorrow,” she told him.

He nodded and watched her head out to her car. She revved the engine and found herself looking around the plaza. She might have been almost anywhere in America, in this parking lot. This portion of the island was fairly new, created by dredging salt ponds, digging some places, dumping others. Once she headed down Roosevelt toward Old Town, things changed. Hospitals, restaurants, tourist shops and bars were interspersed among old Victorian buildings, and grand dames from the past sat side by side with neon lights. The Hard Rock Cafe was located in one of the old Curry mansions—in fact, it was “haunted,” of course. Robert Curry, unable to sustain the family fortune due to ill health and a lack of business smarts, had killed himself there. Also on Duval was St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, rebuilt and rebuilt again—and still the haunt of a sea captain and a group of children tragically killed in a fire. Key West jealously guarded her ghosts, just as she did her bizarre history and all her citizens who had come and gone.

Kelsey didn’t drive as far as Duval, though, turning to take Simonton down to the wharf and then turning onto the private road that led out to Cutter Merlin’s house.

Her house.

She hesitated a minute at the overgrown gravel drive that led out to the house. Funny—as a child, she had never thought of the house as remote.

That night, in the darkness, the road looked like something out of a slasher film, and the house seemed to sit in a lonely jungle far from the mainland.

It wasn’t far, she reminded herself. She and her friends had swum the distance from the house’s spit of land over to the mainland many a time. Of course, they were good swimmers. They knew the currents that could sweep by, but the eddy would keep them closer to the road, and they had learned as kids never to strike out alone. Her mother had been an amazing swimmer and diver, and she had taught Kelsey that the biggest mistake those who knew what they were doing made was that they didn’t take common-sense precautions.

Still, the house seemed so austere, so alone out here tonight.

All right. So much for the swimming. She had walked in and out of town as a kid. There was nothing far or remote about the place.

It was hers, and she had to take care of the place.

She could wait until morning.

That would be ridiculous. She didn’t need a hotel room. She owned a house. Even if she planned on selling it, she owned the house.

She pulled the rental car around the side of the house, where they had always parked the family car. There were no cars there; she wondered if Cutter had stopped driving as the years had gone by. There was a lot she had forgotten to ask Joe. But she had just arrived; she’d spend time with him learning about the entire situation tomorrow.

If Cutter had employed a maid who had run away, he had stopped hiring a gardener as well, that was certain.

She exited the car, and was startled to feel an uneasy sense of being watched the second she did so. She looked around. She could see the lights across the tiny inlet, and the lights in the house itself. A porch light was on, and light glowed from the living room.

Parlor, she corrected herself. Cutter had always called it the parlor. Now it would be called a living room.

Maybe she was having a ridiculous argument with herself about semantics because she just wasn’t sure she wanted to go in.

She had always loved the house. Her mother’s death had been an accident. She had tripped and fallen down the stairs. She might have just broken a leg, or an arm. She might have tumbled down and been fine, just bruised and shaken. But the way she had fallen…

She had broken her neck.

Kelsey dug in her over-the-shoulder bag for the new keys. On the porch, she discovered that there were two bolts, thus the chain of keys. She turned both, opened the door and walked on in.

She thought that memories would come flooding back, that she might feel weepy and nostalgic, but the house was actually different. Not the house per se but the appearance of the house. When she and her parents had lived here with her grandfather, the clutter had been at a minimum. There had still been strange objects everywhere: a hundred-year-old stuffed leopard on a dais, mounted heads on the wall—none of them killed by her family, and none less than a century old—native American art, dream catchers, Indian statues of Kali and other gods and goddesses, Roman busts, wiccan wands and so on. The items had been displayed on the wall, or in etageres, or freestanding on mounts. Now…items were everywhere, boxes were everywhere, and the objects on the walls were strewn with dust and spiderwebs. Cutter’s glass-encased six-foot bookstand—which had held priceless first editions of many works—was open, and it seemed that the spiders and other crawling creatures had done their damage in there, as well. Sawdust and packing material was strewn haphazardly here and there, almost as if Cutter—or someone else—had been feverishly looking for something special among the endless supply of things in the house.

Standing there, looking around, she felt a sinking sensation. The work this place was going to require would be enormous. And yet…they had been her grandfather’s treasures. Joe Richter had his will and his detailed papers on where things should go. Only Cutter would have known what had value, what belonged in a museum, and what had been sentimental to him.

A prickly sensation teased her spine, and she looked around quickly, having the eerie feeling once again of being watched. She didn’t know how that was possible, except that…

Well, actually, anyone could be hiding just about anywhere.

She walked forward and turned on more lights. She frowned as she surveyed all the boxes and crates. She had nearly reached the kitchen when she heard someone on the porch.

They would knock—if they were legitimate.

They didn’t knock. She heard a scratching sound, and something like metal against metal.

With her heart in her throat, she went flying across the room. She reached for the poker in the stand by the fireplace and grabbed the ash sweep instead. No matter; there was no time. She flew for the light switch, turned it off and dived behind one of the boxes.

A second later, she heard the knob twist; the door was unlocked.

Had she locked it again after she came in? She couldn’t remember.

The door creaked open. She heard footsteps, and then nothing. Whoever was there was just standing, listening.

Seconds ticked by with nothing, nothing except the pounding of her heart.

Then, as if the intruder could hear that pounding, he zoned in on her exact location. The footsteps came closer and closer…

And he was right in front of her. In a second, she would be pinned in place, trapped where she crouched in fear…

She shot up, swinging the metal ash sweep. She heard a hoarse cry as the rod connected with flesh, but then it was pulled out of her hand and a body tackled her length, sending her, and him, crashing down between the boxes.

“Bastard!” she raged, struggling desperately.

Her attacker went still.

“Kelsey?”

She knew the voice. Years dissipated. She knew the voice well.

The boy had changed. The long, lean, muscled body bearing down on hers had definitely changed.

“Liam?” she breathed.

“Good God, Kelsey!” he said.

For another split second, he was on top of her, vital, tense, a mass of flesh and sinew like a brick prison wall that lived and breathed…and then he was up, reaching for her hand, hauling her to her feet.

“Kelsey!” he said again, rubbing his arm, staring at her in the shadows.

“Liam,” she said.

Then he turned away from her and walked toward the light switch, and the eeriness of the night was filled with a glow of rationality once again.




Chapter Three


It was good—and strange—to see Kelsey after so many years. The promise of great beauty that she’d always shown had come to full fruition, and the awkward, embarrassed smile she was giving Liam was nothing short of pure charm.

Kelsey had grown up. She was in a pair of rolled-up capri jeans, a soft cotton V-necked T-shirt and sneakers—she seemed as elegant as a swan. A little tremor ripped through him. Time could wash away so easily. Once, she had been the love of his young life, the seductress of an adolescent’s libido and the object of many a dream.

And she was home.

“Liam!” she said again, and laughed. “Oh, Lord, I am so sorry.”

“Hey, it’s okay. I’m sorry—I tackled you,” he told her. “I heard you were coming. I just never expected you to arrive so quickly.”

“So, what were you doing here?” she asked him.

He shrugged. “Folks have been breaking in,” he said.

“Oh, yes, I heard—Joe Richter, told me. He said the police suggested that the locks be changed and—oh!” She stared at him, her brows arching. “Liam—okay, I guess that you are the police officer who told him to get the locks changed?”

He nodded. “Guilty as charged. I’m with the criminal investigation unit. Seems a lot of crime down here has to do with brawls on Duval and drugs but we’ve also had our share of serious crime lately.”

Kelsey nodded in agreement. “I read about your cousin being cleared in Tanya Barnard’s death and the awful things that happened.” She grimaced sheepishly. “I was happy—David is a great guy. Just because I haven’t been here doesn’t mean that I don’t read. And I read a really bizarre story about murders that took place near here—out on the islands. Sean O’Hara was involved, right?”

“Sean and David were filming a documentary. They meant to go through our history of oddities and wound up following the minds of the mad. But it’s over. They finished up the filming a few weeks ago and are thinking about their next project. David has moved back—he’s living at our grandfather’s place. He and Katie O’Hara are planning their wedding now.”

“Oh, that’s wonderful! Katie—so, what is Katie doing these days? Cutter told me that she went up north to college, but came home.”

“She’s home. She runs Katie-oke at O’Hara’s.”

“I can’t wait to see her,” Kelsey said. “Katie was younger, of course, but we took a sailing class together, and I knew Sean fairly well. She was such a cute little ragamuffin, running around with him all the time!”

“Actually,” Liam said, glancing at his watch, “you can see her right now, if you’d like. Have you eaten? I can take you to O’Hara’s for some dinner and old-home night.”

She hesitated. Liam wondered if her current life involved a boyfriend, a lover or even a husband. She wasn’t wearing a ring but still he wondered if there had been a husband who was gone now. Maybe he was pushing too far too fast. It just seemed so normal and right that she was here.

“Sorry, no pressure,” he told her.

She shook her head. “No, no…I was just looking around—before I panicked when I heard you at the door. This house is going to take…wow. A lot!”

“Were you really going to do much tonight?” he asked.

“Probably not. Um, why not? I had a sandwich, but I’d love to see O’Hara’s.” She smiled again. There were the dimples he remembered.

“Hey, by the way, how did you get here?” he asked her.

“I have a rental car. I drove down from Miami,” she said. “The car is around on the side—that’s where we always parked. I guess Cutter hasn’t had a car for a while?”

“Not in years. He never left the house.”

“How odd—he traveled the globe, and then he became a hermit,” she said.

“He was a fascinating old fellow,” Liam said. “Brilliant. A real-life Indiana Jones.”

“Hmm. I think most of my friends thought of him more as Uncle Fester, I’m afraid. Or Dr. Frankenstein, creating monsters out of his collections of strange things,” Kelsey said.

“Well, you have friends here who cared about him. Shall we go?”

She hesitated, frowning. “Liam—you said you were in the criminal investigation unit. Why was Cutter’s death investigated as a crime?”

“It wasn’t. I chose to come out—old times,” he said with a shrug.

“I see. Thanks.”

When they left the house, she turned one key in its lock. “I think you ought to be locking both locks,” he said. “In fact, I don’t think you should actually be staying here.”

She looked at him with amusement. “I grew up in the house. I’m not afraid of the mummy or the coffin—or even the shrunken head.”

“Kelsey, I came out here tonight because the house was broken into twice. The first time, a pack of kids came in. The second time, two local lowlifes were looking for something to steal. That’s why I told Joe Richter to get a locksmith out here and change the locks. The lowlifes said that the door was open when they got here, but I knew that it had been locked the night before. I’m not sure I feel good about this place,” Liam said carefully.

She offered him her dimpled smile once again. “Well, obviously, there had been a key out there somewhere. The locks are brand-new. Honestly, most thieves wouldn’t break into this place. It’s supposed to house evil spirits, or something of the like. There’s so much to be done here. It’s ridiculous to own a house and go rent a room. Trust me, I’ll be fine. The house likes me, honest!” she said teasingly. “Actually, though, it was a long trip. I’d love a good Guinness—and my dad always said that O’Hara’s kept the cleanest taps in the state.”

She was a grown woman, and maybe, Liam thought, his unease was unfounded. “Okay, then. Let’s go. I’ll drive.”

He saw that Bartholomew was standing at the edge of the porch and seemed thoughtful. He prayed the ghost wouldn’t start talking to him, distract him and make him appear crazy.

No such luck.

As he walked to his car, slightly behind Kelsey, Bartholomew fell into step beside him.

“I don’t like it,” he said.

You don’t like what?

The words were on the tip of Liam’s tongue. Somehow, he refrained from saying them aloud.

Bartholomew followed them to the car. He’d known the ghost for some time now; it still unnerved Liam when he simply misted through doors. The physiology was intriguing. Maybe it was the fact that he didn’t want to believe in ghosts. Bartholomew could sit on a chair, but he misted, blended, faded—whatever!—right through doors. He loved boats, hated the water. He’d been around nearly two hundred years, and he knew the answers to many questions, but he didn’t know a great deal that Liam felt a ghost should know. It was a different existence, Bartholomew believed. He didn’t know every ghost—just as Liam didn’t know every living, breathing human. Ghosts were still the essence of people. They were good, bad, clever, dedicated, lost…greedy, generous, loyal, traitorous. That’s the way it was. But most of the time, they stayed behind because of a passion or a need. A passion for revenge, or justice—to save the life of a loved one or to right a terrible wrong.

Liam liked Bartholomew. But he wasn’t sure he wanted him around right now.

As he pulled the car around the circular drive, he caught a glimpse of the ghost in the rearview mirror.

Bartholomew was staring solemnly at the house, his gaze intent. He was searching for something.

Liam paused and stared up at the house himself.

He thought of the other night. The house seemed to have a life of its own. Beneath the moonlight, constantly shadowed by clouds, it seemed to breathe, and to watch, and to wait.

“What is it?” Kelsey asked him.

“Nothing.” He paused, his foot on the brake. “You’re sure you want to come back here, stay here alone?” he asked.

“It’s my house now,” she said quietly, staring at it. “With all that it holds!” she added, and smiled.



O’Hara’s was charming, and it hadn’t changed a bit—at least, not in Kelsey’s memory.

They entered a large open area with high-top tables scattered toward the rear; the space allowed for dancing and was right in front of a stage area that could be set for karaoke or live music. Tonight, rock music was playing, but Kelsey saw a sign that advertised “Katie-oke” four nights a week. If “Katie-oke” was going on that night, it either hadn’t started or Katie was taking a break.

“There,” Liam said.

“I see.”

She had wondered if she would recognize anyone; in the time she had been gone, many people must have come through Key West—and possibly moved on. It could be a city that was warm, like a true neighborhood, yet it was also a city of transients. And most of her friends had been young when she had seen them last, and surely they had changed.

It was easy to see that David Beckett was there, seated at a far booth on the restaurant side, to the left of the dance area. He resembled Liam, or Liam resembled him. He was a tall man with a face made of rugged angles, striking eyes. Katie had grown up beautifully, her red hair having darkened to a gorgeous hue. Sean was easy to recognize, as well—he was a far more masculine version of Katie, and though Katie was definitely feminine, with fine features, they both resembled their uncle, Jamie O’Hara. Kelsey didn’t recognize the young woman with Sean, but they were obviously together. She thought she recognized the woman with a tray standing by the table, and even the others who were there: another young couple who looked like flower children. His hair was as curly and long as hers was, and they both wore wire-rimmed glasses.

As they neared the table, unseen, Kelsey heard the last man at the table talking. He was very long and lean, but had a rich voice.

One that she thought she knew.

“They should really just bulldoze that house—let a major-league hotelier come in and put up one of the mega hotels—well, you know, a within-limits mega hotel,” he said, slipping an arm around the waitress who hovered by the table. “No more than two stories, of course—you can’t ruin the horizon.”

“Jonas,” Katie O’Hara argued, “don’t be silly. That’s an historic house. Why would anyone want to destroy it?”

“Well, please. Who would want to keep it?” Jonas asked.

Liam, his hand at the small of Kelsey’s back, cleared his throat.

“Actually, Kelsey hasn’t decided what she’s doing with it yet.”

It was almost funny, the way the eight people at or near the table swung around to stare at them.

It was Katie who gasped, then leaped off her bar stool with pleasure. “Kelsey! Oh, my God. You came home. How wonderful to see you!”

Her eyes were sparkling, and her words were sincere. She came forward, offering a hug, and Kelsey was glad to accept it. She drew away. “I’m Katie. I’m sorry—you might not have recognized me. Katie O’Hara.”

“Of course, Katie, I remember you well, and thank you for the greeting,” Kelsey said. By then, the men at the table were standing.

“Let’s see who you remember, and who you don’t,” Liam said. “My cousin, David. You can’t miss Sean O’Hara. And I don’t know if you ever met Vanessa, though she’s been down now and again over the years. And these are our friends Ted and Jaden. And Clarinda, and Jonas.”

David and Sean greeted her like a long-lost kid sister, Vanessa was charming but reserved, and Jaden and Ted were as loving as any good flower children might be. Clarinda welcomed her, and Jonas quickly apologized. “Wow, I’m sorry. I mean, it is my opinion, but—” He broke off and grimaced. “You remember me, don’t you? We had a house just across from you near the wharf. I still have it. It’s called the Salvage Inn now. I run it as a bed-and-breakfast.”

Kelsey grinned. “Yes, of course I remember you. You groaned anytime I was over at your house with either of my folks.”

“Okay, well, I’m afraid I have a few years on you. You were a pest back then.”

“Not that much of a pest,” David Beckett said, “I remember really liking you. I can’t believe that you’re an adult now.”

Kelsey seldom flushed, but she did so. David Beckett had an amazing sense of class and kindness.

Like Liam.

But her mother had always said that their grandfather, Craig Beckett, was one of the most honorable men she had ever known. He had taught his progeny well, she thought.

She needed to take a step back; this did feel like old-home week. And she wasn’t staying. She had started life over again, and she was comfortable where she was. She loved her work, her neighborhood, and she wasn’t sure why she had come, other than guilt and a sense of debt, and she was very afraid of falling back into…she didn’t know what. Maybe the oddity of belonging to the house and being Cutter Merlin’s granddaughter.

“Thank you, David. And Jonas, it’s really okay—I wasn’t so fond of you back then, either,” she said, and the group laughed.

“Have a seat—I’ll get you a Guinness,” Liam said.

“Oh, wait! I’m supposedly working,” Clarinda said.

“It’s all right—I know the owner,” Liam said laughing. He headed straight back behind the bar to pour the beer himself.

“We’re right across from you,” Clarinda told Kelsey. “I live with Jonas, and if you need anything at all, we’re really close.”

“Thank you.”

“Yes, honest. Now I’ll be glad if you stop by,” Jonas said. He made a face. “And I’ve got rooms if you want out of the old place.”

“Actually, I loved living there,” she said.

“Oh, I don’t know,” Katie put in. “Liam said it’s in pretty bad shape. Although I’ll be happy to come over and help you put things in order, if you like.”

“That would be great,” Kelsey said. Could she really ask someone else to sweep up spiderwebs and dust with her?

“I would absolutely adore getting into that house!” Jaden said. “That’s what Ted and I do. Well, not exactly. We own a place called Sunken Treasures. Most of what we do is restoration of things that divers bring up. Salvage restoration. But I worked at an auction house for a while before Ted and I opened our own place, so I’m pretty good at assessing the value of old treasures.”

“That’s great to know,” Kelsey said.

Liam returned with two pints of Guinness, setting one in front of her. She thanked him, and Ted said, “Well, you do have an army here for help, if you want it. I must admit, I’m fascinated by the prospect of getting into the house, too.”

“We could have a clean-the-house day,” Liam said.

“Do you all have a conception of just how bad the house is?” Kelsey asked.

“Oh, hey, well, it doesn’t take a lot of talent to get entangled in spiderwebs,” Katie told her.

“There’s still a barbecue out back, isn’t there?” Jonas asked.

“Oh, Lord, if there is, God knows what’s in it,” Kelsey told him.

“We have an old portable barbecue somewhere,” Sean said. “Why don’t we dig it out? I mean—if you want an army trampling over on Saturday. I’m thinking Saturday would be the best day?” He looked at Katie and the others. “Katie, you don’t start until nine or ten on Saturday night, Clarinda can come in late, and Ted and Jaden can close early. Liam, you take Saturday off, don’t you?”

“Unless someone calls in with a real problem,” Liam said.

The pretty blonde at Sean’s side—Vanessa—cleared her throat. “Excuse me—we’ve all just invited ourselves over, you realize.”

Kelsey laughed. “It sounds great. Sean, you can bring the barbecue, but I’ll supply the food. If you’re cleaning the house for me, the least I can do is supply the barbecue.”

“It’s not that bad. The weather should hold,” Liam said. “We can clean—then wash all the spiderwebs off by taking a dip. The water is a little cool right now, but not that bad.”

“Hey…I’ve got to get started,” Katie said. “We have a group of coeds looking at the suggestion books, and I’m not sure they’ll like the choices.”

Kelsey glanced over to the stage area. She smiled, as well—it looked as if the cast of a college comedy had just walked in. They were beautiful people; three girls who were blonde and slim and wearing tiny shorts and belly-baring ripped-up tees had come in with two young men who looked like linebackers—young ones. They still had baby faces.

Katie slid behind her computer, politely salvaging her songbooks and apparently telling the crew that she probably had what they wanted right on the computer; they just needed to name their songs. She made an announcement using the microphone.

“This is O’Hara’s, and it’s Katie-oke here, four nights a week. Sometimes, it’s actually Clarinda-oke, but it’s all the same fun. O’Hara’s offers twenty-five beers from the cleanest taps you’ll find from here to Canada, so enjoy—responsibly, please.” Katie said the last with a hopeful but ironic twist in her tone. Key West and responsible drinking weren’t really known for going hand in hand. Luckily, partygoers usually stayed within walking distance of the bars on Duval, while a lot of the major-chain hotels farther around the island sent shuttles to drop off and pick up their guests in the Old Town area.

Katie started the music. The college crew whooped and hollered and began dancing energetically to the music.

“It really wasn’t that long ago, but I don’t ever remember being quite so young,” Liam said, his grin wry as he seemed to echo her thoughts.

“It’s a good-looking group, and they seem friendly and ready to have fun,” Kelsey told him.

Liam nodded. “Cheerleaders,” he said solemnly. “You can tell.”

“A bit too happy for me,” Jaden said. She yawned. “Ted, feel like calling it a night?”

Ted nodded. “We’re still working on a lot of treasure recently brought up from that film shoot.” He shuddered. “Ugh. We’ll tell you all about it at the barbecue, Kelsey.” He stared at Vanessa. “It was bad. Very, very bad.”

“Hey!” she protested. “We did capture a pair of truly deranged murderers.”

“That’s true,” Jaden said happily.

“Oh! I did hear about that!” Kelsey said. She stared at Liam. She had been so caught up in her own situation, she had forgotten that she had seen their names online, and one night on the news. Sean O’Hara and the Becketts had gotten involved with a film crew, recreating the situation in which two people had been brutally murdered on an uninhabited island. A documentary would air sometime the following year.

“And it’s over,” Vanessa said with a shudder. “Next week, I’m filming dolphins for a public-service feature. I’m much happier!”

“That sounds great,” Kelsey said.

“Okay, we’re really out of here,” Jaden said. “It’s wonderful to meet you,” she told Kelsey. “And thanks for letting us get in the place on Saturday.”

“My pleasure. If anyone is allergic to dust, they’re in trouble,” Kelsey warned as Ted and Jaden left.

It was a warm group, and she was apparently accepted.

Sean and Vanessa decided to brave the bouncing coeds and dance; Liam looked at Kelsey. “Want to try it?”

Dance. He was asking her to dance. Just dance. And yet…

“Do you remember grade school? Mrs. Miller insisted we have something like a cotillion!” she said, grinning.

“We can probably still manage.”

Clarinda was busy taking drink orders at another table; Jonas and David were deep in conversation. She still hesitated.

It was a dance, just a dance. She wasn’t being sucked back into this actually being her home.

“Sure,” she said with a shrug.

By the time they reached the floor, however, Katie was singing at the request of the coeds—she was doing a Shakira number, and Liam told her, “Salsa!”

“Oh, Lord!” she said.

“You’ve been gone too long. We have a major-league Cuban influence down here—everybody salsas. You’ll be fine!”

Oddly enough, it all kicked in. Maybe it was like riding a bike.

Liam knew what he doing. She remembered in ballroom dance, her job was to follow. He led well. And it was fun, exhilarating. She didn’t remember the last time she had been out like this.

By the end of the number, they had the floor. The bouncing coeds came over and hugged them enthusiastically, then decided to drip their inebriated adoration on Katie.

It was too easy to have too much fun. To feel his hands on hers, and his arms around her, and feel as if time had evaporated. They’d never taken a step past friendship, but then, they’d still been so young…

“This has been wonderful,” she said. “I think, though, Liam, if you don’t mind, I should get back home.”

“Hey, I can take you,” Jonas said. “I’m a stone’s throw from you.”

“Clarinda is still working,” David pointed out.

“I’m fine taking Kelsey home,” Liam said. “I want to walk around the place a bit, too.”

“The new locks are on, right?” David asked.

“Yes. I just want to take a walk around the place,” Liam repeated.

“Sure, but, Kelsey, don’t forget—the Salvage Inn, right across from you. Clarinda and I are in room one—it’s the left half of the house. Our breakfast chef and server are in at five-thirty in the morning, and we have a bartender at the tiki bar until two a.m., so if you’re ever nervous at all, someone is there. And, of course, don’t hesitate to wake us up!” He rose.

“Thanks,” Kelsey said. “That’s really nice. Especially since I was such a pain in the ass as a kid!”

He laughed. “Hey, David, tell Clarinda I’ll be back. I’m just going to go home and check on the B and B for a few minutes. Make sure we don’t have any calamities going on.”

“Will do,” David said.

When they walked out to Liam’s car, the coeds decided that they were all best friends, too. Kelsey endured a round of hugs from the cheerful cheerleaders and their bruiser dates.

At the cars, they waved good-night to Jonas.

Liam turned down Simonton rather than Duval, knowing that Duval would be filled with jaywalkers. It was seldom an easy street to traverse—except maybe at five in the morning.

But the backstreets could be quiet and pretty. There were so many fine Victorian houses, since the great age for Key West—when the city had boasted one of the highest per-capita incomes in the country during the age of wreckers—had occurred when building had been seen as artistry. There were bungalows, shotgun houses and many a grand dame in Old Town.

“Have you missed the place?” Liam asked her. He had apparently been watching her as she surveyed their surroundings.

“Of course, I’ve missed it. I mean, I think—unless a place were absolutely terrible—you’d miss it if you’d basically grown up there,” Kelsey told him.

“But you like where you live now,” he said.

“Yes.”

“And you’re in Hollywood,” he said.

“Yes, but it’s not as…All right, well it can be plastic, but my neighborhood is great. My dad worked at UCLA, and so I went to UCLA, and they have a great school of art and animation.”

“I’ve seen your column. But you do gaming, too?”

“I don’t. My partner, Avery, does.”

“Ah.”

When they pulled in front of a house, he turned off the car’s engine and sat staring up at it for several moments.

“My grandfather was not some kind of evil wizard who cursed the house and set a dozen demons loose in it,” she said, surprised that she sounded so resentful.

He flashed her a smile. “I wasn’t afraid of demons. I’m afraid of real people breaking in to steal things and not caring much if they take a human life in order to do so.”

“Liam, honestly, if there was some kind of really terrible thief who knew about the strange treasures that might be found here, they could have easily broken in while my grandfather was alive. He was an old man living alone.”




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