Unholy Ground Read online

  “No.” A faint smile touched Jill’s nude-glossed lips. “It’s not like Susan is here to say you can’t.”

  “True.” Another brief hesitation, and he went on, “I know this seems like a lot to deal with. If I can find any information on next of kin, then I’ll pass it on to you. But if not….”

  “Then I have to figure out what to do with all of this,” Jill finished for him, looking dismayed by the prospect of having to dispose of Susan’s belongings.

  “There are charities that can help you if necessary,” Audrey said. “But let’s see what Michael and I can find first.”

  “Do I need to stay?”

  “No,” Michael replied at once. Audrey got the distinct impression that he would prefer to do this without an audience. “I can call you when we’re done. Do you live close by?”

  “In South Pasadena.”

  Only ten minutes or so away. That made things easier.

  “Then go on home,” Michael said. “I know this has been a shock.”

  Jill nodded, mouth tight. Then she asked, “How did it happen?”

  “An accident,” he said swiftly, before Audrey could reply. His eyes met hers, and she knew he was trying to press the point home once again, doing his best to remind her that she shouldn’t blame herself for Susan’s death. “We were shooting a cable TV show. Susan…took a very bad fall and didn’t survive.”

  For a moment, Jill Armentrout was silent. A small shake of her head, and she said, “That’s terrible.”

  “It was a shock for all of us. We’re still trying to come to terms with what happened. And this” — he looked back toward the bare little room with its horrible shrine — “this just makes it that much worse. But we’ll handle it, one way or another. For now, just let us work, and I’ll be in touch if I find something, or at least to let you know we’re done so you can come back and lock up.”

  “Thank you,” Jill said. “I do think I need to get out of here. I feel a headache coming on.”

  Audrey offered her a sympathetic glance, at the same time thinking she knew exactly how the other woman felt. Something about the little house oppressed her, although that could have just been her imagination working overtime. As far as she’d been able to tell, the duplex’s other unit seemed to be occupied, since she’d spotted some flowers in pots on the front porch. However, whoever lived there didn’t seem to be home at the moment. Had Susan’s activities in the spare bedroom affected them, or had she taken steps to ensure that there was no spillover from the dark magic being worked here?

  Impossible to say for sure, and since Jill had already left, they couldn’t ask her if there had been any complaints. Probably not, though; Susan sounded as though she’d been a model tenant.

  Now Audrey and Michael were alone in the duplex. They looked at each other, and he ran a hand through his hair, clearly just as flummoxed as she by this sudden turn of events.

  “Well,” he said at last, “I guess we’d better get to work.”

  Michael went into Susan’s bedroom, Audrey right behind him. At the moment, he didn’t know for sure what he was supposed to think. If it had just been the altar — which, in its kitschy ugliness, looked like something a rebellious teenager might put up in his room — then he might have been able to dismiss the whole thing and walk away. He might have been surprised that Susan, calm, kind, sensible Susan, would dabble in such things, although he knew better than most that people’s search for meaning in this insane world sometimes took them down some very strange paths.

  But those symbols and runes and sigils scratched with such painstaking care into the floor of the duplex’s second bedroom…only someone well versed in the dark language of summoning, of submission, would have been able to do something like that. Which meant Susan had given in to the dark path years and years ago, probably long before she ever came to live in Southern California. While he knew that the story about an abusive ex was definitely a lie, his instincts told him she was no native of the area, was as much a transplant as he.

  As Audrey watched, he went to the highboy and opened the top drawer. It was contained several carefully folded T-shirts and several scarves, and nothing else.

  “This feels wrong,” Audrey said, although she remained where she was by the doorway and didn’t make any attempt to come closer.

  “I know,” he replied. “But Jill gave us permission.” And it’s not as though Susan is around to stop us….

  A sigh, and then Audrey gave a reluctant nod. “I know. It’s just….” She let the words trail off as she looked around the bedroom. Like the living space at the front of the duplex, it was strangely devoid of any personal items, anything that might make it feel like a room in someone’s house rather than a display at Ikea. Everything coordinated well, was simple and stylish and functional at the same time, but there was no soul to any of it. Even the drawer full of T-shirts he’d just rummaged through — there had been two white shirts, a gray one, a black one. The scarves were plain, in solid colors of brown and green and blue. Nothing with any personality, nothing to show that Susan had chosen any of these things because she liked them or thought they were attractive. They were useful, nothing more. He recalled that Susan had been dressed plainly every time he saw her, but he hadn’t really thought much about it. Her job was one which called for simple, comfortable clothes, and so the lack of individuality in her wardrobe had never been anything that would raise a red flag.

  Because Audrey didn’t seem inclined to offer any further protest — probably because she was feeling the same weirdness about this situation as he was — Michael continued with his search. The rest of the highboy was filled with similar items — jeans, yoga pants, plain underwear and bras. He might have been embarrassed to be rifling through these things, except again, none of them felt at all connected to the woman who had once worn them.

  “Nothing here,” he said as he closed the bottom drawer.

  Audrey had moved closer to him, although she still stood a few feet away. Her brow puckered slightly as she regarded him. “What exactly are you looking for?”

  “Something — anything — that might give us a hint as to what she was up to, might tell us something about her past.”

  From the way Audrey’s eyebrows lifted and she cocked her head to one side, Michael could tell she didn’t think he was going to have much success in that endeavor. Maybe she was right; if Susan had been hiding so much about herself, would she even have kept anything that might be incriminating here in her duplex?

  Unfortunately, he had no idea where else to look. Besides, he’d just gotten started.

  “Could you check the closet?” he said, and although Audrey appeared reluctant, she went ahead and opened both folding doors. They squeaked, and he could see her wince a bit.

  “There’s not much to see,” she told him, stepping aside so the closet’s contents were visible.

  She was correct in that assessment. Only half the space was even being used, a marked contrast to Audrey’s master bedroom closet. It might have been attacked by demons, its contents mangled beyond any possible use, and yet he’d still been able to tell that she’d once had a decent-sized wardrobe. Here, though, were only two or three button-up shirts, a blazer, a raincoat, two skirts. The shelf above the rack held exactly one brown purse, while the floor of the closet displayed one pair of athletic shoes, one pair of flats, one pair of low-heeled, sensible-looking pumps. Enough to get her past most social situations that didn’t involve a cocktail party, but all in all, it was a very meager assortment.

  So? he asked himself. Not all women hoard shoes like Imelda Marcos. This isn’t exactly damning evidence.

  Maybe not…but the runes and sigils scratched into the floor of the room next door definitely were.

  There was nothing else in the closet. No boxes of papers, no hanging files of old tax returns. Nothing, not even a small jewelry box.

  Michael turned back toward Audrey, who was still waiting patiently near the foot of the bed. “Let�
�s go look in the closet of the altar room.”

  Her shoulders hunched, as though she’d just experienced a sudden chill. “Do we have to?”

  While he understood her reluctance, he knew they didn’t have much of a choice. But he figured he’d better ask first. “Did you feel anything in there?”

  “No,” she said at once. “If I had, I would have said something, even though Jill was standing right there. Or at least….” Again, Audrey let her words trail off, and she looked at the wall this room shared with the next. “I can feel something here, but it’s not really like the Whitcomb mansion. Something heavy, oppressive.”

  “Like a thunderstorm coming in,” he suggested, and her shoulders lifted.

  “We don’t get too many thunderstorms in this part of the world,” she said. “But maybe. A shift in barometric pressure…I don’t know.”

  “Through the whole house?” Michael asked. He might have been doing the whole paranormal thing much longer than she had, but he’d already come to trust Audrey’s instincts. Now that she’d allowed that part of herself to blossom and grow, she’d proved to be far more psychic than he was.

  Her reply was immediate. “It was worse in the altar room.”

  He came over to her, gave her hand a reassuring squeeze. “Then we’ll check in there last. Let’s take a look at the kitchen.”

  The glance she gave him was so relieved, he knew he’d made the right call. They left the bedroom — after he took a quick peek under the bed, just to reassure himself that it was just as devoid of anything useful as the other places he’d checked — and went back to the kitchen. Everything was spotless; a wooden dish drainer sat next to the sink, because the kitchen wasn’t big enough to house a dishwasher, but the drainer and the two dishes that sat in it were the only things out of place.

  Looking at those plain white dishes, Michael felt a wave of sadness pass over him. When Susan had put those dishes there before she left for Santa Barbara, she could have had no idea she would never return. Possibly it was foolish to grieve for her, because it was now clear she’d been hiding some terrible secrets, and yet the Susan in his mind was still the woman he’d worked with, had thought he’d trusted. It would take some time to reconcile that Susan with the person who’d carefully destroyed the floor of her spare bedroom with all those unholy runes and symbols.

  For now, though, he had to do what he could to unravel the mystery that had suddenly confronted him and Audrey. And at some point, he’d probably have to say something to Colin, too, but he could put that off for now. Colin had bigger things to worry about.

  The cupboards were filled with more of the plain white dishes. Plain glasses — drinking tumblers only, no wine glasses. Well, maybe Susan had preferred to have only a mixed drink every once in a while. He couldn’t really hold a dislike of wine against her.

  The drawers contained only the most basic complement of cutlery and cooking utensils, not the usual jumble found in most kitchens. Two dark blue pot holders, two blue and white striped kitchen towels. A couple of mixing bowls, but no serving pieces to match the white dishes. Obviously, Susan had never entertained.

  As he closed the last drawer, Audrey spoke.

  “It’s strange,” she said. “It’s almost like…almost like she got one or two of each of the things she thought she was supposed to have, but nothing more. Or like she bought a prefab ‘complete kitchen’ set from a catalog and just stuck it in here.”

  Yes, that was exactly what all this looked like. He gave Audrey an abstracted nod. “I know. There’s no ‘here,’ here, for lack of a better word. Nothing to tell us about Susan as a person.”

  “It is very strange,” Audrey agreed. She pushed a strand of long brown hair back over one shoulder, dark eyes meeting his. “And it doesn’t feel like her. That is, I didn’t know her well, but she seemed warm and friendly enough. I would never have imagined her house being like this.” With one hand, she waved toward the carefully precise living room, the tiny dinette set of plain pine. “Maybe this tidy, but I would have expected fun pieces of pottery, or maybe a lot of plants, or….” She stopped herself there, a rueful smile touching her lips. “That sounds kind of silly when I say it out loud.”

  “Not really,” Michael told her. “I understand what you’re saying. I would have thought the same thing.” It was true — while private, Susan had been warm and friendly and helpful. He would have expected her to surround herself with things she loved, rather than living in a house that was so soulless, the whole thing looked as though it had been ordered straight out of a catalog.

  Nothing they’d found offered any answers, had instead raised more questions.

  “Let’s look in the bathroom,” he went on. “But after that, we’ll have to go into the altar room.”

  “I know,” Audrey replied, looking resigned.

  They left the kitchen and went down the short hall and into the bathroom. Or rather, he hung back in the hallway while Audrey entered the bathroom, since there really wasn’t enough room for the two of them in there. She crouched down — not without some difficulty, thanks to the high heels she was wearing — and opened the cupboards in the vanity, then started rummaging through the items there. Not that there seemed to be much; he’d spied a pack of toilet paper and what appeared to be a couple of spare boxes of Kleenex and not much else.

  Because there was so little to find, the search didn’t take very long. She opened each of the vanity’s four drawers, then closed it again once she was done looking at the contents. Finally, she straightened up before turning back toward Michael.

  “Nothing here, either — just the usual bathroom stuff. One tube of mascara and one of tinted lip balm was all she had for makeup. There is one weird thing, though.”

  “What’s that?” he asked, hoping against hope that Audrey had found their smoking gun.

  “No feminine products,” she replied, a slight flush touching her cheeks.

  Funny how even an adult professional woman could find the topic embarrassing. They hadn’t really discussed the subject, although he’d seen the box of tampons Audrey had stowed in the cupboard of the second bathroom upstairs and realized her period would probably be along fairly soon now, since they’d spent nearly three weeks together so far. He figured she’d let him know when the time came, and thought it was probably safer to leave it at that.

  “Nothing?” he asked, and Audrey shook her head.

  “No. No tampons, no pads, no nothing. I suppose it’s possible that she’d just run out, but it doesn’t seem very likely. Or she’d already gone through early menopause or had a hysterectomy for some kind of medical condition, although that’s sort of unusual for someone her age.” She glanced back at the vanity, then shrugged. “I don’t know. It just seems…odd.”

  He had to agree, although, as Audrey had said, there could have been a perfectly logical explanation for that particular omission. Still, it didn’t seem very likely.

  “I guess we’ll have to file that detail away for future reference,” he said. “But let’s check the altar room now.”

  She didn’t protest, although he could tell by the way she stayed behind him that she definitely was not eager to reenter the room. Michael wasn’t exactly what he could call enthusiastic, either, but it had to be done. Best-case scenario, he’d find something of interest early on and they could get the hell out of here, or if something did start to go wrong, Audrey’s spider sense would pick up on it before things got ugly.

  They went across the hall into the spare bedroom. As much as he would have liked to inspect the glyphs on the floor more closely, he knew doing even that much could be dangerous, as would be taking any photos with his phone. With Audrey at his side, he paused just inside the doorway and let his gaze scan the room, looking for anything that seemed out of place. A difficult task, since there really wasn’t much here to see.

  But then he saw a thin line tracing around the altar about an inch of so in from the edge. Frowning, he moved closer, while Audrey s
tayed about a foot behind him.

  “Do you see something?” she asked.

  “I’m not sure,” he replied. He went to the altar and lifted the heavy, ugly stone statue from where it sat, then put it down on the floor. Now he could see a pair of very fine hinges at the rear of the altar/table, hinges that had been obscured by the statue. With one hand, he gestured for Audrey to approach, which she did…reluctantly. “Do you see that?”

  She nodded, a small frown of her own pulling at her brows. “The top opens?”

  “It sure looks that way.” He eased his fingertips into the narrow groove, basically using his nails as levers to get under the thin piece of wood. It was difficult, but he was able to get just enough purchase on the thing to raise it a fraction of an inch. That was enough, though; now he could slide his fingers underneath and lift the table lid all the way.

  Inside the small space that was revealed rested a single manila envelope. Michael passed a hand over it, trying to see if he could sense something off about the envelope — or possibly its contents — but he didn’t feel anything.

  “What is it?” Audrey asked as she peered over his shoulder.

  “I’m not sure yet.” His fingers felt cold as he opened the envelope, although he didn’t know precisely why.

  Inside the folder was a single black and white photograph, yellowed with age. It was creased and smudged, as if it had been handled many times over the years. He stared down at the photo, trying to understand why Susan would have kept it in such a hidden spot.

  The black and white image was of a young, fair-haired woman in a dressy-looking satin gown, an orchid corsage pinned to the right side of her chest. Her hair was pulled back from her face in the type of rolled hairstyle he thought had been popular in the 1940s, and her mouth was carefully traced with lipstick that he guessed had probably been dark red in real life. Next to her stood a man in a U.S. Army uniform, his hat at a jaunty angle.

  They were both smiling at each other as if they didn’t have a care in the world, although Michael guessed the photo must have been taken sometime during World War II. In fact, because of their smiles and their clothes, and the unfamiliar hairstyle and makeup on the woman, it took him a minute to realize who it actually was in the picture.