Кэти Дэйли - The Curse Of Hollister House

As the morning waned and afternoon appeared, I could feel the breeze begin to pick up. Dark clouds gathered above the summit, and the temperature seemed to drop with each passing minute. Storms that crawl into our valley, leaving a layer of snow this early in the season, tended to blow out just as quickly. Gracie was right to cover her garden, but the reality was that once the storm blew through, the snow would melt and the warmer days of Indian summer would set in for a few weeks before winter arrived for real.

“I think we’ve done what we can for now,” Gracie said, pulling off her gloves.

“Hopefully, if it does snow, it won’t be a heavy snow,” Tom added, looking toward the approaching storm. “Early snow almost always brings broken branches.”

I remembered from my days at the lake that a heavy snow before the last of the leaves fell for the year was likely to bring its share of destruction. “Maybe it will just rain.” I leaned on the rake I was still holding. “The temperature has dropped, but I doubt it is anywhere near freezing.”

“Let’s hope so,” Gracie said. “I guess all we can do is wait.” She glanced at Tom. “Would you like to come in for some coffee?”

“I’d like that.”

Gracie looked at me. “Would you care to join us?”

“I have some emails to return, and then I need to hop in the shower to get ready for my dinner with Cass. I enjoyed helping you today. I haven’t worked a garden since I left for the city. It felt good to get my hands dirty.”

“You seemed to do okay today.” Gracie glanced at my left hand.

“I have enough feeling and movement that I am fine doing tasks such as raking. It is my fine motor skills that may never recover. Still, I guess time will tell, and I do feel like my range of motion has improved quite a bit even in the past couple of weeks.”

Gracie squeezed my arm in support and then headed toward the shed with her gardening tools. I gathered up the tools closest to where I stood and followed behind her. The wind had picked up to create a steady force that caused the aspens to quake. I paused and listened to the haunting sound made by nature’s symphony. I hadn’t realized how much I’d missed the anticipation of an approaching storm. Sure, it rained and even snowed in New York, but when I’d lived there, I’d spent most of my time indoors, so watching the clouds roll in and the trees begin to sway really hadn’t been a factor in my life.

Once we’d all made it indoors, Tom and Gracie settled around the kitchen table, and I headed upstairs. I didn’t really have emails to return. Telling Gracie that was just my way of offering an excuse to give the friends some privacy. I knew Gracie was happy to have me home, but I was equally certain that my abrupt arrival had most likely put a crimp in her normal routine.

Deciding to log on to my computer anyway, I went ahead and checked my email account to find it filled with spam. I logged off there and logged on to Google. When Stella died, I’d been just twelve. I realized something horrible had happened, but I don’t remember getting caught up in the details, although I could remember the fear that had settled onto the entire community, as it seemed to have now. I remembered the loss of freedom as parents began picking their kids up from school rather than letting them walk home, and late-night games of hide-and-seek had been replaced with early curfews and nights spent in front of the television rather than out with friends.

But I also remembered that after a while, the terror of Stella’s death had receded into the background and life returned to normal. After a time, doors and windows were once again left open, groups of friends played outdoors well into the evening, and children began to walk in groups to and from school. The light returned to our town, and the darkness became nothing more than a distant memory to most.

When I left Foxtail Lake, I rarely thought about my friend or the terrible circumstances surrounding her death. But now… now the fear I’d suppressed for years seemed to be finding its way back into my consciousness, and I was being pulled into the death of Tracy Porter to a degree I couldn’t really explain. I’d never met the girl or her family, but I supposed that the emptiness that permeated my life since the accident had left me with a lack of purpose. If I looked at my situation objectively, it was possible that obsessing about the details surrounding the death of this young girl gave me something concrete on which to focus my attention.

Realizing that I needed to jump into the shower if I was going to be ready for our dinner date when Cass arrived, I logged off and set the notes I’d made aside. Stella had been gone a long time. The odds of her and Tracy’s killer being one and the same were unlikely, yet my gut told me the deaths were connected, and it was in that connection that the answer to who’d killed both girls would be found.

Chapter 5

The steak house Cass took me to was a rustic log building settled on the beach on the eastern shore of the lake. The music was soft, the lighting dim, and the tables covered with white cloths. The restaurant was both elegant and woodsy, which I loved, but somehow the romantic setting made our dinner out feel a lot more datelike than I’d anticipated or was comfortable with.

“This is really lovely,” I said as Cass pulled out my chair.

“It’s one of my favorite places to eat. Their filets are the best quality I’ve ever had, and their pasta dishes are even better than Antonia’s,” Cass said, mentioning a local favorite. “I can assure you that anything you order will be delicious, but my favorite is the Seafood Oscar.”

“Sounds good.”

“The scampi and the stuffed salmon are wonderful as well. Like I said,” Cass laid his napkin on his lap, “you really can’t go wrong.”

Cass waved the waiter over and ordered a bottle of wine. I clutched the menu, hiding behind it as I tried to get my emotions under control. I seriously needed to get a grip. Cass was a friend. Just a friend. We’d been friends for years and had shared hundreds of meals. There really was no explanation for my jitters.

“Remember that time we camped out on the beach just south of here and that family of raccoons took the bathing suits we’d left on the line to dry and carried them up the tree?”

I lowered my menu and looked over the top of it at Cass for the first time since we’d sat down. I smiled. Leave it to Cass to find a way to break the ice and put me at ease with a silly memory the two of us shared. “That was pretty aggravating at the time, but looking back, it was hilarious. We had to swim in our underwear for the rest of the trip. And let’s not forget about that one superfat raccoon we named Chucky. No matter how hard we tried to keep him out of the food, he found a way in.”

Cass chuckled. “I have metal containers for my food when I backpack now, but back then we’d just raid the cupboard at your aunt’s place or my parents’ and take off at only a moment’s notice.”

I couldn’t remember the last time I’d done anything at a moment’s notice. My life as a concert pianist had been structured and disciplined. The spontaneous teen I’d once been had been shoved down into the deepest corner of my soul once the responsibilities of adulthood had set in. “Whatever happened to Toby Wallis?” I’d brought up a friend of Cass’s who’d come along on many of our expeditions and adventures.

“Toby is a ranger for the National Park System. He is currently in Glacier National Park, but he recently did a stint in Yellowstone. He married Natalie Green, who, interestingly, went on to become a wildlife veterinarian.”

“Really? That’s awesome.” I remembered Natalie as a shy but serious student who was smarter than Cass and me put together.