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  LINDA LADD’S

  Claire Morgan Homicide Thrillers

  Head to Head

  Dark Places

  Die Smiling

  Enter Evil

  Remember Murder

  Mostly Murder

  Bad Bones

  Devil Dead

  LINDA LADD

  KENSINGTON PUBLISHING CORP.

  www.kensingtonbooks.com

  All copyrighted material within is Attributor Protected.

  Table of Contents

  Also by

  Title Page

  Prologue - Witch Way

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Epilogue

  Teaser chapter

  Copyright Page

  Prologue

  Witch Way

  Something really scary woke the little girl. At first, she wasn’t sure what it was. Frightened, and still pretty groggy, she shivered all over and tugged up her bedcovers. She hid her face in the soft, well-worn patchwork quilt that her Gram had made before the angels came and flew away with her soul. After a little while and with her heart still thumping hard, she peeked out and saw all the deep shadows crouching around in her bedroom. The darkness looked like big black bears or evil goblins poised to jump on her bed and attack her with their claws. Maybe monsters were hiding in the dark corners and making all those growling and scratching noises.

  There were so many shadows everywhere, and lots of them were thrown up on her walls by a great big full moon that had risen up high in the sky. Now it was glowing real bright and hanging just over the cypress trees across the bayou from her house. The tree branches were shivering and shaking in the wind and causing dark figures to creep up around her bed. They looked like big hairy spiders with long, skinny legs scurrying up and down her walls, just like the ones she’d seen out in the swamp in their giant silken webs. Her muscles tensed up tight as she watched them, fear overtaking her again, and she stayed very still, barely even breathing. The little Mickey Mouse night-light beside her bed didn’t throw off enough light to see what was hiding in the dark, and she was afraid that something scary and horrible was going to get her.

  Then she heard the sound of claws clicking across the wood floor. She sat up straight, feeling better now. It was her dog, and he was inside the room, too. Thank goodness for that. Her big German shepherd’s name was Spirit, and he was making all those creepy sounds. Now he was snarling, too, and growling some and scratching on her door. He never did that, so she knew something was wrong. She loved Spirit so much. He was big and strong and took good care of her. He was mostly black, but also had some brown and gray fur on him, too, especially on his head. He always slept on a little navy rag rug right beside her bed, all night long, every single night, and without making any noise. But tonight he was so restless, and he sure did want something.

  Mommy always told her that Spirit was her True Protector, blessed at birth by the Moon Goddess and Horned God. She said the little girl didn’t have to be afraid because he would frighten away the monsters and evil ones that roamed around outside in the dark swamp behind their house. Her mommy never, ever told lies, so she knew that was true. Right that minute, though, all Spirit wanted was to get outside. She wondered why he wanted out so badly and why he was whining around so much. Maybe he had something wrong with him, like the time that Mommy took him to the lady down the bayou who knew how to fix up sick dogs. But it didn’t matter, anyways, ’cause she was just glad he wasn’t some evil monster out to snatch her up and eat her, like Mommy said some of the scary swamp monsters did.

  “Ssh, now, Spirit, you best be quiet, you bad, bad dog. Mommy’s gonna hear you and then you’ll get in big trouble, you hear me, Spirit? She’ll make you stay outside in the yard, and then I’ll have to stay in here all by myself!”

  Spirit turned his big head toward her, all alert and stiff, his shoulders bunched hard and his ears perked up. She could see his fur standing straight up in a ridge down his back. The dog growled again, a long and scary sound, and then he padded back to the bed. He laid his long black snout on the covers beside her pillow, and she put her hand on top of his head where his fur was so soft and scratched him above his eyes.

  “What’sa matter, Spirit? What’d you want me to do? We’re supposed to be sleepin’, and you know it. Mommy’s gonna be mad at you for wakin’ me up.”

  Spirit listened, big dark eyes on her face, but then he ran back to the door and stood there, whining and pawing at the bottom. Maybe he had to go potty. Maybe that was what was wrong. Tossing back the white sheet and pink-and-blue quilt, she swung her legs out from under the covers, slid her feet into her fuzzy house slippers that looked just like two little white lambs. Then she tiptoed to the door. She couldn’t let Mommy hear them moving around. Mommy was grouchy when they woke her up before lunchtime. That’s when she usually got up, especially on mornings after the moon was full like tonight. Poor Mommy never got much sleep. Sometimes she just stayed up all night and then lay in bed all the next day. That’s when Spirit had to be the little girl’s nanny and watch over her and bark at anybody who came up on the back porch or knocked on the front door. That’s when the little girl was supposed to run and hide in her closet, because she was never, ever, ever supposed to open the door to strangers.

  Not sure what she should do, she leaned over and whispered softly in the big dog’s ear. “Okay, I’m gonna open the door up, you hear me, Spirit? But you gotta keep quiet, okay? You gotta keep real quiet, or else we’re both gonna get in big trouble with Mommy.”

  Now Spirit was panting hard and drooling on the floor, his long pink tongue lolling out and dripping all over the place. She decided that he must be real thirsty. All he needed was a big bowl of water. So she turned the knob and eased the door open just a tiny baby little crack. Outside, the upstairs hallway was dark and silent, so she stepped out and looked down at her mommy’s bedroom. The door was shut. No light showing at the bottom. So it was okay.

  Then, before she could grab Spirit’s black leather collar with the little spikes on it, the German shepherd squeezed past her and ran down the hall. He bounded down the back stairs as fast as he could, so he had to be really, really thirsty. He headed straight to the kitchen where Mommy kept his water bowl in the pantry. She followed him, tiptoeing, always scared when the house was so dark and creaky, even if she was almost nine years old. The moon was still flooding all that smoky, spooky light through the undraped windowpanes, making those skinny spiders dance around on the old planked floor.

  She could hear Spirit slurping and lapping and splashing water out of his bowl. Glancing up the dark steps, she saw that nobody was coming. Everything was very quiet, except for branches scraping the windows. Then, somewhere off in the distance, she heard a different kind of sound, moaning, sort of like Spirit did when he got scared. But it didn’t sound like a dog; it sounded like a person. She tiptoed to the back door. Uh-oh—Mommy forgot to lock it. Outside, the moaning got louder. It was coming from her mommy’s own secret place far out in the swamp behind their barn. The little girl had never been there. Mommy said it was her own private place, her Sanctuary, where she prayed to her gods and goddesses and the spirits of woods and bayous. Mommy said only grown-ups could go into the Sanctuary.

 
The little girl just stood there for a moment. What was going on out there so late? It sounded like Mommy’s voice, droning out real low-pitched and eerie-like. What was her mommy doing? Or was somebody else out there making those weird sounds?

  Still too scared to go out into the dark night, she listened for a time, until the cool night air made her shiver in her pink Cinderella nightgown. The buzz and croak of crickets and cicadas sounded like the static that Mommy’s old radio made on stormy nights. Tree frogs shrieked loudly every once in a while. They all hid in the thick stand of bushes and undergrowth all around the yard and hopped about where she couldn’t see them. Mommy said the animals hid out there and spied on little children. It sure wasn’t safe to go outside at night, especially for little girls.

  She had always remembered that and stayed inside, because she really was a good little girl and always did everything she was supposed to. Sometimes she didn’t understand stuff. It was hard for her to think about things very long at a time or to remember things that she was supposed to remember. Especially if it had big words in it and took a long time to say. Mommy said that was because she was simple minded, and she couldn’t help it but it made her a real special kind of kid, and stuff like that.

  Spirit pushed past her legs before she could stop him. He dashed across the back porch and pushed open the screen door with his nose, and then he leaped down the steps and took off toward the Sanctuary. He probably knew Mommy was out there. He just loved Mommy so much because she had raised him from a little puppy. She hesitated some more, holding the back door open, not sure what she should do. She was awfully scared.

  Finally, she moved down the back steps and made her way out across the yard and around to the back of their big barn to the little gravel path that Mommy always walked down when she prayed to the gods. The ground felt rough under her slippers and was full of clumps of crabgrass and lots of old vines and rocks and such, and she could smell the usual fishy stink of stagnant water rising from the swamp. Still, the moon was bright enough to see, and she knew the way to the Sanctuary very well, even if she had never been inside.

  Mommy’s Sanctuary was pretty far out in the woods, about halfway to their neighbor lady’s property line, but it was built inside a whole bunch of tall live oaks and willow trees. The drooping willow fronds and draping gray moss on the oak branches almost hid it from sight. It was a pretty long walk, and when she got there, Spirit dashed ahead and stood just outside its door. It wasn’t as big as their barn, but it was almost that big. It didn’t have windows, though, not even one, just a small front door and another back door, and both had big silver padlocks and chains on the handles. But now the padlock was pulled apart and hanging by its chain. Spirit was whining and trying to nose the door open.

  The creepy moans were very loud now. It was her mommy’s voice, for sure. She was saying the same thing, over and over, a word the little girl didn’t understand, something like ummmmmm, ummmmmm, ummmmmm. She knelt and held Spirit’s collar. Mommy sounded kind of sick. What if Mommy was hurt? What if she cut herself with the knives she used to skin animals with or with that engraved silver knife she kept in a red-velvet box on the top shelf of her closet? Maybe that was why Spirit was so upset and all nervous-like. He got that way the time the little girl fell down and skinned her knee and made it bleed, didn’t he? So she lifted the handle and pushed the door ajar, but just a little bit.

  Eyes wide with astonishment and awe, she let out a little gasp. Never had she seen anything so beautiful. Tall candles sat around everywhere, white ones and black ones and red ones and purple ones, and every other color, too. They glowed brightly in big glass Mason jars filled up with sand. They were sitting on the dirt floor, and on the ladder rungs that went up to a loft kind of place, and then up higher along the edge of that loft thing. All were flickering and burning, more than she had ever seen in her life. The flames stood straight up and tall, until the breeze from the open door made them waver and wink, as if they were all dancing together.

  The big dog pushed in behind her and walked straight over to where her mommy was sitting in a big white iron bathtub that had been placed on a raised platform near the loft. Her head lay against the back edge with her long, curling dark hair hanging out and almost touching the ground. She was still making those low, guttural sounds. The little girl was suddenly afraid. What if her mommy got mad and punished her for coming to the Sanctuary? Terrified at the thought, she knelt beside the door and kept quiet and watched and hoped her mommy wouldn’t see her and slap her in the face like she did sometimes when she got very angry. She wished now she had obeyed Mommy’s rules and not come out to the Sanctuary. If Mommy saw her, she was gonna get into big trouble.

  But most of all, she was afraid her mommy would go crazy again.

  Chapter One

  Canton County Homicide Detective Claire Morgan roused up from where she lay dozing in the shade of a palm-draped cabana, relaxed and at peace with the world. Out in front of her, she could hear the never-ending roar of the wild ocean surf. Stretching luxuriously, she opened sleepy eyes and gazed down the long planked pier that stretched far out beyond the breakers. The cerulean blue of the South Pacific Ocean spread out to the far horizon in a panorama of incredible tropical beauty.

  After a particularly traumatic homicide case in which she had been used as a punching bag by an insane serial killer, she had earned herself a lengthy and paid medical leave. Nicholas Black, who happened to be her honeybun and newly designated fiancé, had decided they were getting away for a while and then flown her off on his own private Learjet. About five thousand miles later, they ended up at Motu Teta, which had turned out to be the most glorious little private island in the Atoll of Rangiroa in Tahiti, which happened to be smack dab in the middle of the French Polynesian islands, which happened to be smack-dab in the middle of the aforementioned South Pacific Ocean. After which he declared they would never leave said paradise again.

  Truth be told, she didn’t put up much of a fight. Not yet, anyway. Tahiti had certainly lived up to its slice-of-heaven reputation, plus some. For almost two months now, they had slept with plantation shutters pushed aside and wide sliding doors left open to the warm tropical breezes, frolicked in the sunlit sea and made love in their own little palm-covered villa in their own little paradise on earth. Just the two of them, left alone to enjoy and explore the flora and fauna of the three-mile-long and very private island that Black had leased just for her so she could recuperate and forget some very bad things that had happened to her.

  Even better, their main house was lovely and spacious, a villa that went by the well-deserved name of Bungalow Royale. It even had a personal chef who came in by boat every evening and prepared them a gourmet meal and a picnic lunch for the next day, then cleaned up the kitchen, replenished all their supplies, and took off for places unknown. Talk about pampered and privileged and obscenely sublime. No people, no cars, no murders, no death, no bloody crime scenes, and last but not least, no getting beat up by anybody wielding hammers and/or baseball bats. What more could a gal ask for?

  Sighing, Claire felt so unbelievably loose and pliant that she could barely even move her muscles. Not that she wanted to. Missing her dear and ultra-generous one, Claire turned her head, shielded her eyes, and peered down the curved beach to the point, where waves pounded into the golden sands with immense power and ferocity. Black was still down there and having what looked like one helluva good time on his surfboard. At the moment, he was way, way out past the swells, sitting astride a big yellow and red surfboard, moving up and down with the waves, black hair wet and slicked back, muscles sun browned and more than impressive, waiting for the big one no doubt. He was as good at hanging ten as everything else he did, all masculine grace and balance and male confidence. Yep, he was quite a guy all right.

  During their lovely sojourn upon the island, he’d even talked her into learning how to surf, which involved actually pushing herself up to standing on her own matching yellow and red board a
nd riding it all the way in to the beach. That was a feat that she didn’t think possible, considering her fear and loathing of man-eating sharks. In fact, they were probably out there now, cruising under the water and waiting for a tasty lunch of one famous American psychiatrist by the name of Nicholas Black.

  Today, however, had been super fantastic, just like all their other Tahitian days. They’d both enjoyed sailing in the morning and scuba diving all afternoon long, at least until she’d thrown in the towel and retreated with her sunburn to the shady cabana in the calmer part of the lovely half-moon bay. No telling how long Black could keep it up. The man had stamina, to be sure, and he did love to surf. So, very comfortable and content, she closed her eyes again and slept some more, grateful for the peace and quiet and whispering trade winds and surging surf and warmer than warm day.

  Not sure how long she had slept, she came awake later to that same and now familiar crash of the ocean and lay there on the nice soft cushion, listening, loving it, loving Tahiti, loving Black, loving life. At the moment, yes, she was a happy camper. Black was happy, too, happy as a lark in fact. He loved these islands and would probably stay forever, as he had decreed, if their future abode was left up to him. Claire, on the other hand, was now ready to go home and get back to real life and all the perils it presented. She’d had plenty of time alone to think and consider and worry about what she wanted to do next and what Black wanted her to do next and what was the best future for both of them. She had made some very tough and serious decisions wiling away the pleasant days and weeks, and all she had to do now was tell him. That opportunity came along about twenty minutes later when he finally came striding down the dock, done battling the waves, and collapsed on the cushions beside her.