Chapter Twenty-Five

Ang sat for a long time, just staring out the window. She had Richie’s words circling around in her head. She wanted to believe they’d find Kirstin. NEEDED to believe that. If she started to doubt, well there was just no telling what could happen. She longed for first light, when Marty had promised to return and help continue their search. She felt her eyelids growing heavy with waiting. When Ang slipped into slumber a little before dawn, Kirstin was waiting for her.

"Why won’t you let me help you help me?" Kirstin asked, reaching for Angel Rose.

Ang jerked away from her long, cold fingers. "I am trying to help you," she said. "Letting you in is not the way."

Kirstin’s voice was a low, seductive whisper. "But it will be so much easier if I can just show you WHERE I AM."

"So show me. Show us. We want to help you." Ang watched Kirstin deflate, folding in on herself. "We are open to you," Ang said. "Just not that open."

"You are strong," Kirstin said. "You could let me in long enough to find me, then you could let me go." Her tone was hopeful, and her face was as guileless as a three-year-old’s.

"I am sorry," Ang said. "I just can’t."

Kirstin sighed. "Then you must find me quickly," she said. "The pull to join you is strong." She touched the side of Ang’s head, and for a moment, Ang felt her resolve weaken. She wrenched away from her touch and felt warmth rush over her face. She awoke with a start, as the sunlight caressed her cheek.

Ang stood and shook her head, struggling to rid herself of the dream. She looked up, and saw Richie still asleep. "Wake up," she said loudly.

There were general grumbles as he slowly came to consciousness. "Angel Rose, darlin’, it’s just barely morning!" Richie said when he finally managed to get his eyes open.

"We have to figure out a different way to help her. Searching the acreage isn’t the way," Angel said. "We’ll never find her before she binds to me irrevocably. We have to find another way. There’s too much out there, and you’re right, Richie, things – the landscape – will surely have changed by now."

"What else can we do?" Richie asked.

"I don’t know!" Ang said, exasperated. "Maybe there’s something of hers we can use. Maybe there’s something that will give us, me, a deeper connection to her without letting her into my head. I know she can show us the way if only the channels were clearer."

"Like those psychics you see on the police shows on TV?" Richie was incredulous.

"Do you have a better idea?" Ang asked, whirling on him. "If you do, I’d LOVE to hear it."

Someone knocked at the door. Richie shook his head and crossed the great room to answer it while he looked at his meager possessions scattered throughout the space. "Darlin’, I toured this place before I bought it. There was nothing in it. Nothing in the attics or the cellars, or in any of the rooms. Well except for the study."

"Mornin’," Marty said with fake cheer in his voice. He held up three cups. "I brought coffee." He looked Richie over and smirked. "Looks like someone could use a cup."

"Marty, you are a lifesaver," Richie said, taking a steaming cup of brew from the older man. "We were just trying to decide the best course of action for continuing the search."

"I think we need to find something of Kirstin’s," Ang said, refusing to give up on that idea.

"Is there any chance," Richie said, "that anything was left behind?"

"From that long ago?" Marty asked, shaking his head. "I doubt it. The place was thoroughly cleaned before it listed – at least this last time. I assume it was cleaned before prior listings as well. Unless the cleaning crews kept whatever they found, which is very unlikely, the place was completely empty."

"But what about in Kirstin’s room?" she asked. "If Richie couldn’t get in there, maybe the cleaning crews couldn’t either."

"For all this time?" Marty countered.

"Will it hurt to look?" Ang asked, getting testy.


And that’s how Ang, Richie, and Marty found themselves upstairs in Kirstin’s study, sifting through the rubble. They were looking for something – anything – that would act as a sort of divining rod to Kirstin. They’d been searching for half an hour, but found nothing but papers and splinters. Even the key, the key that Kirstin had slid under the door to Richie was gone.

"This is hopeless," Marty said, kicking at a pile of papers. "This house hasn’t been completely vacant since Geoffrey packed up the children and left. There were others here. Anything of value found in this house, sentimental or otherwise, is long gone." He wanted to know the outcome of Kirstin’s tale as much as Richie and Ang did. He had to know which of his ancestors had killed the poor woman. The lack of progress was making him antsy and angry.

"Hey!" Angel said, pushing a sweaty hank of hair from her forehead. "There HAS to be something here I can use to get closer to Kirstin. The alternative is far too scary."

Richie had to agree. The alterative was for Ang to let Kirstin deeper into her head, into her mind, and hope to hell Ang kept the strength to push the spirit out after the fact. He supposed he could dig up the entire estate looking for Kirstin’s grave. Given the choice of alternatives, he didn’t want Ang to go through with the former. Richie was seriously considering the latter.

"I just don’t want you getting your hopes up, Missy," Marty answered. "If there’s nothing here, you’re going to need a ‘Plan B’."

Richie spoke up. "Look, Marty, let’s just keep searching. Kirstin chose to stay in this room for a reason, right? It stands to reason that –"

"Reason?" Marty asked, incredulous. He stood up, looking down at a crouching Richie like the younger man was insane. "REASON? You think there’s reason behind this? Or that what, now you’re an expert? You don’t know anything!" he shouted. "This is a colossal waste of time."

Richie stood too, towering over the other man. "I heard you," he practically shouted. "I said we can’t call it a waste until we finish."

Marty’s face darkened. "Do not raise your voice to me, young man," he said, poking a finger into Richie’s chest.

"Keep your hands off me," Richie retorted, slapping Marty’s hand away.

"HEY!" Ang shouted, stepping up between the two men. She put a restraining hand on Richie’s chest and pointed at Marty. "That’s enough. Marty, if you don’t want to be here, you know where the door is." She stood there between them waiting for them to calm down,

Marty sighed. "Sorry," he said. "I guess this feels like whole lot of ‘doing nothing’."

"We’re doing the best we can," Ang said softly.

Marty circled the room, ranting like a petulant child. "But we’ve been up here for over an hour." He kicked another stack of papers, sending them flying. "We haven’t found anything useful at all! We should go back out to the thicket; keep working on the path." He kicked at a large chunk of wood, sending it sailing across the room.

The broken piece of chair hit the wall, making a solid, slightly metallic thud. The three of them stood slack-jawed, staring at the mark the wood made on the wall. Finally, Ang broke the silence. "What the heck was that?" she asked. "That was not the sound of something hitting a lathe-and-plaster wall." She crossed the room, and started knocking all around the area where the chair had hit. Sure enough there were different sounds around the area of wall. There was obviously something behind it. Ang looked at Richie, an unspoken question in her eyes.

Richie looked around at the wreck of the room. "Go ahead, Angel Rose," he said. "Whatever you want to do, it can’t make this room too much more of a disaster area than it already is."

Ang pressed a quick kiss to Richie’s lips. "Thank you," she said, and ran from the room. Marty and Richie stood there in silence until they heard her footsteps come pounding back down the hall. Ang skidded to a halt just inside the door holding a fireplace poker. She held it in both hands, angled across her torso like a spear.

Richie smiled. "You look like you’re ready to go off to war," he said.

Ang smiled back. "I feel like I’m getting ready to fight a war," she answered. "Whatever happens next with Kirstin, it won’t be easy."

Richie took the poker from her hands. "Whatever happens, I’ll be there right beside you," he said, hefting the iron bar and tapping its end against his open palm. "Now, let’s break something."

He strode to the wall where Ang had heard the strange sounds. After making sure that an outlet hadn’t been added to the wall, he plunged the point of the poker through the wall. He pulled, tearing off a fair chunk of wall. "Sheetrock," he said. "Looks like this wall has been replaced once already."

Marty stepped forward. "Whatever is in this hole may be something from a more modern time than the Maddoxes." At Ang’s angry look he hastened to add "I’m just saying."

"And maybe it isn’t," Ang answered. "Just be quiet."

Richie continued to pull pieces of the wall away until he had a hole large enough to stick his arm into. He didn’t want to risk damaging whatever may be back there by just poking holes in the wall, so he reached in and felt around with his fingertips. They brushed against something that was definitely not wood. "Holy shit, there’s something in here," he said.

"Pull it out!" Ang shouted.

Richie started to methodically pull away parts of the wall until he could better reach the item. The original lathe-and-plaster wall came down with the Sheetrock. "Looks like they just put this wall up over the existing one," Richie muttered to himself.

"Oh, please hurry!" Ang pleaded.

Richie reached his arm into the hole again and wrapped a hand around a small handle. He lifted the object, and pulled it toward the hole. As he drew his arm back, the object came with it – a metal lunchbox. "Ang honey, I’m sorry." The metal container was still relatively clean and definitely not that old. "This isn’t Kirstin’s." He flipped the latch and lifted the lid. "There’s nothing in here except some costume jewelry," he said.

Ang was so upset she nearly cried. "Damn it!" she swore. "Damn, damn, DAMN!" She tore the box from Richie’s hands and upended it in the center of the floor. Dropping beside the meager pile of beads and paste, she pawed through it quickly looking for something, anything that would be helpful. "NOTHING!" She scattered the small pile, sending the pieces skittering around the room. One piece stopped it’s skid in a beam of sunlight. The light reflected off the faux-diamond pendant hanging from a silver-plated chain.

The glints of light hit Ang squarely in the eyes. "Damn, that necklace is blinding – OH!"

Richie looked at her, his pity turned to curiosity. "What?"

"The necklace!"

Richie scooped it up and examined it. "Honey, this isn’t that old."

"Not that necklace, you big goof; THE necklace!"

"What the Sam Hill are you talking about, Angel Rose?" Marty asked. "What necklace?"

Ang was already running out into the hall. "Come ON!" Ang called frantically over her shoulder. The two men shrugged and hustled after her. By the time they got downstairs, Ang had flung the front door open and was racing toward the truck.

"Ang, darlin’," Richie said, "where are we going?"

"To the Historical Society building," she called. "Hurry!" She looked inside the truck to see her purse on the floor and hoped her keys were inside. She repeatedly pulled on the handle of the truck’s door, and growled when she found it was locked. "You’re out here in the middle of nowhere and lock your freaking door?"

Richie chuckled. "I am not from here, darlin’. People steal things in LA." He fumbled the keys from his pocket and hit the button on the fob to unlock the doors. Ang jumped in, grabbed her purse, and dug through it, muttering under her breath until she found the key ring she was looking for. She jiggled it in her hand, the four metal keys clanging together as they lit out for town.