Chapter Five
Mac
The producer and I are standing outside my room talking about my plan for the next days when we both hear a scream and the door to one of the rooms flies open.
I’m about to go find out what is going on when a small body comes flying at me.
My arms come up to wrap around the very person I’ve not been able to get off my mind all damn day.
At first, she acts like she doesn’t even realize I have her in my arms, but then she turns big, scared brown eyes up at me. Her little body is shaking and it drives home exactly how tiny she is compared to me. It’s also driven home just how curvy and soft she is.
“What? What happened?”
More people come out of their rooms, and I see Roxie stick her head out of a room right beside the one Cori just ran from.
“What’s going on, guys?” Theo is asking the question everyone wants to know. What the fuck happened, and who do I have to kill?
She looks around at everyone and takes a step back away from me.
“I…I…saw a mouse?”
“A mouse?” She gives me a nod. “It’s not too late to go back. We could use the satellite phone to…”
“No.” She takes another step back from me, her brows furrowing. “I…I’m staying. I…Sorry everyone. Sorry, I bothered you all.”
She looks down at herself and must just realize what she’s wearing because she lets out a little gasp before taking off for her room and leaving all of us standing around trying to figure out what the hell just happened.
I doubt very seriously it was a god damned mouse causing all this.
It also leaves me trying to talk my body into cooperating after seeing her in the sweet little purple nightgown that barely came to her thighs and flowed around her curves like water.
“Well, there’s our weak link if she’s all messed up over a little mouse.” Ripley stands with her hands on her hips, and for some strange reason, I want to defend her even though I was the person asking her to let me call the ship back.
“Speak for yourself. I see a rat and I’m gonna be doing the same dance.” Roxie is the one speaking up. “And don’t even try to pretend you wouldn’t either, Ripley.”
The girl sticks her tongue out as she wraps herself around Drake.
“She’s probably just trying to get attention.”
I only offer up a frown as I head back into my room and shut the door.
I doubt very much she was trying to get attention if the look on her face when she realized everyone was looking at her was any indication.
If she wanted attention from me, why didn’t she ask to stay with me like Ripley did earlier this evening? And why would I have let her?
Speaking of Ripley, I have issues with her.
The same girl wrapping herself around Drake now was trying to get me to invite her into my room this afternoon, just as Cori had left hers, which did not make me happy.
The last thing I want people to think is that I fuck around or don’t follow my own damned rules.
It surprised Roxie and Theo that I didn’t make a big deal out of Drake taking the carriage house, but it shouldn't have.
I want to be with my people, not apart from them.
I want to experience what they are experiencing, not just listen to it second hand.
I want to create that bond with them so we can build trust and have a safer work environment.
I don’t go to bed until early in the morning, and when I do, I dream of Cori with her soft curves and her soulful eyes.
When I wake up, I’m short-tempered and don't have a lot of patience for bull shit.
So when I start into the kitchen and hear Roxie and Cori, the bane of my current existence, I can admit I might already be gunning for a confrontation. Then I hear Tray.
“What are you two doing?”
I step into the doorway, but both girls have their attention fully on Tray - and the camera in his hands.
“I don’t...,” Cori holds her hands out in front of her like she’s trying to block the camera.
Laughter greets her, “Please, the camera loves you. You two look amazing.”
That’s it!
“What’s going on here?” I step more fully into the room.
Tray doesn’t even pull the camera from his face; he just turns it my way.
“Oh, hey boss, I was just telling the girls how good they look on camera.”
“She’s not one of the investigators so…it doesn’t really matter how good she looks on camera, now does it?”
Cori’s smile melts off her face, and she goes back to typing. Could I have said it better? Probably. And Roxie lets me know about it.
“Wow, Mac, that was…a dick thing to say.”
I open my mouth to tell her she’s absolutely right, but I am too late.
“No, he’s right. I’m not really great with people looking at me. I much prefer to stay behind the scenes and just do my research and history.”
“It’s still dickish.” Roxie gives me a death stare before scooting closer to Cori and bumping knees. “What have you found out for us so far?”
“Oh, this place is magnificent…and terrifying.” She just lights up when she starts talking, and I can understand why the museum hated to see her go and why Tray would want to point his camera at her.
“The earliest known inhabitants of the island were the dead. The Native Americans used the island to bring their dead here for air burials. They left them on the beaches and in the trees, and the first white settlers were more than horrified about it; they thought the whole island was cursed from the very beginning. It was rumored to be a pirates’ refuge during the early days of the nation and has seen three shipwrecks just off its coast. There have been yellow fever epidemics and a slave uprising in the 1800s, too. ”
“Is any of this verifiable?”
“Well, I’m not there just yet. I’ve started with the most recent murders.
The 1998 murder/suicide was the most documented case.
It was in all the newspapers, on several news channels, and on a multitude of podcasts since then.
In the early 2000s, a hurricane came through and washed some remains up on the shore.
They couldn’t tell if they were recently dead or had been washed out of graves nearby because of the storm.
And going back to the 1950’s there was a serial killer who used this island as a body dump. ”
“Randell Simon Karlson. That should be easy to look for.”
I step up behind her chair and lean forward to see what she’s pulled up.
“It is. Apparently, he…got creative with his victims. Most of the bodies were found around the waterfall.”
Roxie makes a face, and I see a shiver work through her. “That place already freaks me out.”
Cori nods in agreement.
“The one I’m really trying to verify is this one. The 1930s cult that led to teenagers using the island in the late 70s as the site of some devil worship, but I can’t find anything about it.”
“What kind of cult was it?”
“The typical one where you had to sacrifice your wives and daughters to the leader,” I tell Roxie.
Cori picks up where I leave off. “They performed certain ‘rites’ centering around sex magic, but something pissed off the leader, Jebidiah Anders, and he ended up killing all his members one night. But I can’t find anything, and I know something is there just out of my reach.”