Chapter Four
Four
“What just happened?” Sophy said, trying to make the question sound logical. Detached. Just a matter of scientific curiosity. Or something.
“Isn’t it obvious?” Luke said. “Your aura is back to normal and I survived the process. Yay, me.”
He appeared almost as unfazed as Bruce. The hellhound was stretched out on the sofa, having seized the opportunity for a nap.
Sophy studied Luke.
“You’re not taking this seriously, are you?” she said.
“That’s where you’re wrong,” Luke said. He began to prowl the room. “I am taking it seriously. But we don’t have time for a discussion of bio-metaphysics. We’ve got a few loose ends to clean up here and then I need to do some thinking.”
“What loose ends? I fulfilled my part of the deal.”
“Not completely,” Luke said. “Ah, here we go.” He took a small plastic baggie out of his pocket and crouched near the window.
“What did you find?” she asked.
“A couple of cigarette butts.” He bagged his find, straightened, and went to the sofa. “You said it looked like Deke left something here.”
She was so rattled by what had just happened that she had forgotten about the sofa. That was not good. She had to stay focused.
Luke evicted Bruce from the sofa and then he raised each cushion in turn. He retrieved an unmarked envelope from underneath the third one. Sophy watched him tear it open. He considered the contents and took out a business card. He glanced at the front and then turned it over.
“Well, shit,” he said very quietly.
Curiosity overcame her disgruntled mood. She moved closer to see what he had found.
“That’s one of my aunt’s business cards,” she said. “I don’t understand.”
Without a word, Luke flipped the card so that she could read the one word scrawled on the back.
“Kaleidoscope.” Sophy looked up. “Your grandmother was right. This does involve the pact.”
“Looks like it.” Luke took two printouts from the envelope. “It explains why you saw your aunt and my uncle together in the cabin after you read the murder scene. They’re both involved in this thing.”
She groaned. “You knew I saw Aunt Bea?”
“Lucky guess.”
“You aren’t the type to take wild guesses.”
“No,” he admitted. “I just connect dots. When you suddenly went quiet and popped out of the trance I knew you had seen something that you thought you needed to keep secret.”
“Forget it.” She frowned at the printouts he was holding. “What are those?”
“Two passes to the Fool’s Gold Canyon Art Colony.”
“Fool’s Gold Canyon? I’ve never heard of it.”
“The fine print says the art colony is located at a little-known vortex site in Arizona.”
“So it’s one of those places that attracts the woo-woo crowd.”
“You and I could be classified as card-carrying members of the woo-woo crowd.”
She waved that aside. “Do you know anything about the art colony?”
“No.” He glanced at the printouts again. “I’m not into art.” He dropped the passes back into the envelope and removed a printout. “Looks like Mr. and Ms. Ainsley have a booking for room two-twenty at the Vortex Inn, which happens to be located on the grounds of the art colony.”
Sophy held out a hand. “Let me have one of those passes.”
“Why?”
“Isn’t it obvious? I’m going to check out that art colony.”
“Not a good plan.” Luke slipped the room reservation back into the envelope. “The passes and the hotel booking are the only leads I’ve got. Deke left them here for me to find. He knew that if he went off the grid I would be the one who looked for him.”
“Why you?”
“Because I’m pretty good at connecting dots and that’s how you conduct a search.”
“He left two passes because he and my aunt knew I would be here with you when you found that envelope. That means one of those passes is for me.”
“I’m not following your logic.”
She gave him another steely smile. “You don’t need to follow it. Just give me one of those passes.”
“We can talk about this in the morning.”
“We’re talking about it now. You may be good with dots but I’m the one with the talent for reading crime scenes. Face it, Wells, you’re going to need me to help you find your uncle and my aunt. Besides if you don’t hand over one of the passes, I’m going to head for Fool’s Gold Canyon anyway.”
He considered her for a long moment. “That sounds a lot like blackmail.”
“Don’t be ridiculous. It’s not blackmail, it’s a statement of fact.”
Without a word he handed one of the passes to her. She tucked it securely into a pocket and took a moment to survey the room.
“Aunt Bea, what on earth have you gotten yourself involved in?” she said quietly.
“The wind is picking up,” Luke said. “You need to get busy and clean up the scene so I can drive you back to the shop before the storm hits.”
She hesitated. “I’m not sure it’s a good idea to scrub the evidence. I know it’s only paranormal evidence, not the courtroom kind, but still, we’re talking about murder.”
“If you don’t clean the place there’s a very good chance that one of two scenarios will play out. The Foundation may get tipped off about what went down here and send out some crime scene readers of their own, in which case there’s a high probability they will conclude that your aunt was involved.”
She grimaced. He was right. The last thing she wanted to do was bring the heavy weight of the Foundation down on a Harper.
She took the chimes and mallet out of her pocket and prepared to neutralize the dark energy that seethed in the floorboards, walls, and ceiling. It was exhausting but it was much less stressful than reading the scene and there was virtually no psychic blowback—just a few bad dreams.
She paused before striking the note that would enable her to slip into a light trance. “You said there were two possible scenarios. What’s the second one?”
Luke smiled a very cold smile. “The second scenario is that the smoking ghost or someone else involved in this situation will come around looking to get rid of people who know too much.”
He was right, of course. If she had been thinking clearly she would have arrived at the same conclusions.
“Okay,” she said. “But for the record, I hate cleaning.”
She tapped the chimes with the mallet, found the right note, and went to work.