The Unseen

Page 30

Kelsey decided not to tell him she’d seen the woman he’d loved, seen her murdered—over and over again, in her dreams and visions.
Logan didn’t say anything; he waited for her to speak.
Kelsey took a deep breath. “I believe she had it, Zachary, because people have searched for it for years and years—to no avail. Of course, time passes, seas and sand change, hurricanes almost wiped out Galveston, and still…I think she had it. I suspect she was waiting for her own courage not to fail her, and then she would have ridden away with you.”
Zachary smiled and looked at her. “Do you really think so?” he asked.
“I do.”
“If I could only reach her…touch her,” he said, his ghostly voice wistful. Then he seemed to give himself a shake. “But…even if Rose had the diamond, what does that have to do with someone kidnapping women from the Alamo?”
“We haven’t figured that out yet,” Logan said.
“Are you sure? Are you sure it’s the same man, and that it could be connected to Rose and the diamond?”
“No, we’re not, but we need someplace to start.” Logan got to his feet. The darkness was descending upon them. “Thank you, Zachary,” he said. “Kelsey?”
She rose, too, and so did Zachary. He began to walk by, then quickly turned.
“Thank you,” he told Kelsey. “I will do my best not to disappoint you.”
She watched as he moved toward the chapel and disappeared into the dusk and shadows of nightfall.
“He may be in love again,” Logan said dryly.
“Jealous?” she teased.
“I’m pretty sure I’m a bit ahead of the poor guy, being flesh and blood,” Logan said. He added briskly, “It’s time to get to the station. I’m tired—and hungry.”
“Yes, we really should remember that thing called lunch,” Kelsey said.
They retrieved Logan’s car and drove to the station. When they entered their office, Jane and Kat were already there, leafing through a sketch pad with Jackson. “May we?” Logan asked Jane, and the other three were quiet as Logan and Kelsey looked through the pages together.
“These are just sketches,” Jane said. “I have computer renditions that may be better. I don’t know yet. I’ll compare the women and the sketches, and you decide which you want to go with. The sketches give an opaque quality to the faces—it makes them a little dreamier. The computer images are sharper.”
“The sketches…have so much life,” Kelsey said. Jane was a talented artist. The faces on the page seemed to have an individuality. Each woman was drawn with medium-length hair, and yet the personalities all seemed different.
“We can put them out tomorrow,” Jane said. “Copies are already at the paper. They just need an approval.”
Kelsey realized that the others, including Jackson, were looking at Logan. He met Jane’s eyes. “Have them printed, please.”
She nodded and just then, the door burst open. Sean entered, pulling a computer from his shoulder bag even as he shoved his way in.
“You have to see this,” he said urgently.
“What? Did you come up with something in a grid?” Logan asked.
Sean was shaking his head. “No, no. I hear you and Kelsey were there for this! I thought Chasson had fiddled with the image somehow. I thought…I don’t know what I thought. But I haven’t given it back to anyone yet. I haven’t shown it to anyone. I just called Earl Candy and asked him if they’d been playing around with Halloween props or anything of the sort, and he swore they hadn’t. All he’d seen through his lens was Sandy and Jeff.”
“What’s in the film?” Logan demanded.
Chapter Eleven
Logan glanced covertly at Sean, curious about his excitement regarding the film.
There was nothing unusual in it. At first.
He saw what he’d seen earlier that day, in a smaller version on the computer.
Jeff Chasson stood by the window, posing for the camera. He spoke with a husky tremor in his rich voice. “We’ve come to Room 207. When some guests phone to book it, they call it the murder room. It was where Rose Langley entertained men from the Alamo, and where she met her death. And where, nearly two centuries later, another young woman encountered a terrible fate, although the truth of that fate is still not known.”
Logan thought Earl Candy was a damned good cameraman. He’d caught the room at just the right angle, getting in the period dressing table and drapes; he’d used a lens that created a mysterious, ethereal quality.
Chasson spoke again, gesturing Sandy toward him. “With me is Sandy Holly, current owner of the Longhorn Saloon and Inn. Sandy, can you tell us more of the story?”
And then Sandy stood next to him, looking sweetly innocent as she faced the camera, Chasson’s arm around her shoulders. “Ms. Holly, you bought the Longhorn right after the incident with Sierra Monte, didn’t you?”
Sandy nodded. She was a natural, speaking to Jeff, but cheating toward the camera. “I was in the process of buying the saloon, yes, and it was so tragic! We don’t know what happened, other than that a tremendous amount of blood was found in the room. But after the police were finished, a cleanup biohazard crew came in and, as you can see, the room is beautiful now.”
Logan cleared his throat. “Sean, I’m not sure what we’re supposed to be seeing.”
“Wait,” Sean said.
“But, Sandy, twice in the same room… Do you think the spirits of Rose Langley and Sierra Monte are still here?” Jeff Chasson asked.
“No. I think that if there are spirits, they’re the souls of those who have gone on, and both women know I revere the history in this place, and that they’re as welcome as any other guest of the Longhorn Saloon,” Sandy said, passion in her voice.
And then Logan saw it, but he had to blink to be certain. A shadow seemed to step out of the wall. A shadow in the shape of a woman. As the computer continued to play the scene, they heard something that sounded like a sob.
As Jeff Chasson wrapped up, then stood there, giving the camera his final half smile, the sob turned to a wail, and then it, and the shadow, disappeared.
There was silence as they all stared at the blank computer screen.
“Play it again,” Logan said.
Sean did.
And it came back, exactly the same.
“No one’s had the opportunity to alter this film?” Jackson asked.
“I don’t see how they could have,” Sean said. “I got a call from Bernie, and he seemed really annoyed with Jeff, except that he thought they’d gotten some good stuff. He wanted to see it, and he wanted me to play with shadow and light, to make the room look spooky and haunted. But this is what I saw before I did a thing.” He shook his head. “I don’t think there was time for anyone to look at it, much less alter it in any way.”
Kelsey turned to her cousin. “You did say you haven’t given them this footage, didn’t you?” she asked.
Sean stared at her, exasperated. “Of course not! I kept this and copied it, and cleaned up the sound, then exaggerated the shadow so they’d assume I put it in. I brought the original here.” He glanced from Logan to Jackson, and then at Logan again. “I knew you wouldn’t want any of them seeing this, especially knowing Chasson as I do. He would’ve turned this into a media circus. I figured we didn’t want them following anything related to our dead women right now.”
“Kelsey, that’s the room you sleep in?” Jane asked.
Kelsey nodded. Logan felt as if his stomach twisted and every muscle in his body tensed.
“I don’t think you can go back there,” he told her softly.
But she looked at him with bright eyes. “Logan, everything I’ve seen so far has been like a repetition. It’s just a residual haunting. Now I know there’s someone in the room who can be reached. What I couldn’t tell from the image was whether the woman was Rose Langley or Sierra Monte.”
“You shouldn’t be in there alone,” Sean said, sounding like a big brother. He was her cousin, Logan reminded himself. But at the moment, that didn’t matter.
“She won’t be there alone. I’m going to stay with her,” Logan said firmly.
“That’s kind of cute—they’re fighting over you,” Kat said, trying to be light.
“I don’t think Sean’s fighting to be with me,” Kelsey retorted.
Logan ignored them both. “Kat, anything else from your end?”
“More of the same. I was able to get more test results from Tara Grissom. And we’re looking at the same mix in her system. She was definitely drugged when she was taken—the same as Vanessa Johnston,” Kat said.
“How’s he getting to them? Wouldn’t you find needle marks?” Kelsey asked.
“Well, I’m not sure yet, but… I probably mentioned that when it’s used medicinally, the drug is often delivered through a patch. The killer might be using the same method, with his own little drug cocktail. That would explain why we can’t find any pinpricks, and it would explain how they became so docile. I’m still looking, but soft tissue decomposes quickly,” Kat said. “You should also know that you didn’t fail anyone,” she added, looking around at the team. “There’s a high probability that Vanessa Johnston was killed the night she disappeared. She was covered by plywood, dirt and other grime, but…well, the development of larvae and flies can help a lot in determining time of death.”
Logan watched Kat, glad she was on the team. Or with the unit. Yes, they were going to be a unit. She was a tiny blue-eyed blonde with more energy than a hummingbird; she was thorough and open-minded, never dismissing the suggestions of law enforcement officers, and always going the extra mile.
Logan turned to Sean Cameron. “Have you done a grid on the bodies that can help us any?”
“Yes.” Sean gestured to the desk where Jake Mallory had set up his computer and the connections to the large screen. “I need about two minutes,” he said. “May I?”