In the Dark of the Night (6 page)

T
HE KITCHEN WAS
bright and roomy, if a little dated, but surprisingly well stocked with better cookware than she had at home, and by the time Merrill had put all the groceries away, she was starting to feel better about the place. Except that the big kitchen and formal dining room seemed to demand something a lot more elaborate for dinner than the hot dogs and potato salad she had planned.

“I’m going to start the barbecue,” Dan said as he came out of the pantry, heading toward the dining room and the terrace beyond. But the expression in his wife’s eyes stopped him. “Are you okay?”

Merrill did her best to hide her misgivings, though she knew her whole family—and especially her husband—could read her like a book. “Oh, it’s nothing, really,” she sighed. “Just another of my stupid thoughts.”

“Which one this time?” Dan asked, coming over and slipping his arms around her.

Merrill sighed ruefully. “A really stupid one. Namely, should we be eating hot dogs and potato salad in that gorgeous dining room?”

Dan laughed out loud. “Absolutely not. So we won’t—we’ll eat our hot dogs and potato salad out on the terrace like the civilized people we are. And we’ll save the dining room for formal occasions.”

“I don’t intend to have any formal occasions,” Merrill protested.

“Then we’ll ignore the dining room,” Dan told her. “That’s the nice thing about renting—since we don’t own the house, we don’t have to use any of the rooms we don’t like. It’s not like we bought the place and have to get our money’s worth. So figure out which rooms you like, and ignore the rest.”

He continued out of the kitchen, and Merrill took the hot dogs from the refrigerator and cut the package open. If only it were that simple, she thought. Then she decided to put her worries aside. He’s right, she told herself. All I have to do is ignore the rooms I don’t like. It’s only for the summer. It’s not forever.

M
ARCI STOOD AT
the window with Moxie in her arms and watched Eric enter the boathouse, then turned around to eye her room suspiciously.

She didn’t want to open the closet.

She didn’t want to open the dresser drawers.

She didn’t want to unpack.

And she didn’t want to be a baby, either. But her room at home had all her stuffed animals, and her books, and her pictures and all the rest of her stuff. She liked her bed, which wasn’t nearly as big as the one in this room, but was just the right size for her. And she liked her bedspread, and her heart-shaped pillow, and the bird feeder that hung in the oak tree outside her bedroom window. Her room at home was
hers,
and this wasn’t. This was someone else’s room. Someone old.

And she hated it.

She knew she’d never get used to it.

Setting Moxie on the floor, she started casting around in her mind for some way not to have to sleep there.

Maybe she could sleep with her mom when her dad went back to Evanston for the week.

And maybe she could go back home with him and just come up on weekends, too.

Or maybe—

A movement in the reflected image of the lake in the mirror over the dresser against the far wall caught her eye, and Marci turned back to the window itself. Something
was
moving out there, barely visible through the tops of the trees, almost out of sight.

She shifted her gaze to the boathouse, but Eric was still inside.

Then she saw an old rowboat creep slowly into view, with something standing straight upright at its front end. As she watched, the boat slowly turned until it was pointing straight at the house, and now Marci could see that the thing in front was a big cross, like the one on top of the steeple of the Methodist church where she went to Sunday school. And sitting behind the cross, holding the oars, was an old man with a long beard.

And he was staring right at her.

Marci held still for a second or two as the man’s eyes seemed to bore right inside her, then she wheeled around and ran toward the stairs, already yelling. “Mom! Mom!”

Merrill met her at the bottom of the stairs, and as Marci flew into her mother’s arms, the tears that had been building up since she first saw this horrible house finally spilled over.

“There’s a man outside in a boat. A boat with a big cross in it! And he was staring at me.”

Merrill hugged her daughter and smoothed her hair. “A boat with a cross?” she asked, then turned and looked through the living room and its picture window, down the front lawn to the water.

She could see nothing but a ski boat speeding across the far side of the lake. “Honey, what are you talking about?”

“I hate it here!” Marci wailed. “I want to go home!”

Merrill knelt down and put her arms around the sobbing child. “It’s just going to take some getting used to,” she said. “We’re going to have a wonderful summer, you’ll see.” Sitting on the stairs, she pulled Marci close. “We’re going to have a barbecue tonight, then Daddy will build a campfire and we’ll toast marshmallows and make s’mores. That’ll be fun, won’t it?” Marci sniffled, then nodded, her face still buried in her mother’s shoulder. “And tomorrow we’ll go to town and do something even more fun. Girl stuff.”

Marci’s sobs slowed and turned to hiccups.

“Okay?”

Marci nodded.

“You want to help me set the table?”

Marci nodded again.

The crisis over, Merrill kissed her daughter on the forehead and dried the tears from her cheeks, and a moment later Moxie, who had followed Marci down the stairs, jumped up into Marci’s lap and licked her face.

“That’s my girl,” Merrill said, taking her hand and leading her toward the dining room and the kitchen beyond.

Just before she passed through the dining room door she glanced once more through the living room window, but everything seemed normal, just as before.

A boat with a cross? What on earth could Marci have been talking about? But whatever it was, it was gone now.

Or had never been there at all.

C
HERIE STEVENS RINSED
out the sticky bar towel after wiping down the tables in the ice cream shop for the last time and was about to hang it on the faucet to dry when she heard the ding of the door chime.

She’d forgotten to lock the door, and now another customer was coming in. But when she saw who it was, the frown she’d been preparing morphed into something that wasn’t quite a smile but wasn’t quite not one, either.

“Hey, Cherie,” Adam Mosler said as he swung onto a stool at the counter. “Can I get a root beer float?”

“We close at eight on Sundays,” Cherie said, tipping her head toward the clock on the wall that clearly read eight-seventeen, and wondering why she didn’t like Adam as much as he liked her. But she knew why, really. Though he was cute, he could also be a complete jerk. Tonight, though, he didn’t seem to be in one of his completely jerky moods. In fact, he seemed to be in a good mood.

“Okay,” he said. “So you’re off work?”

“Soon as I sweep up.” Cherie dried her hands, lifted one of the little wrought-iron chairs, and put it upside down on top of one of the round tables.

“I can do that,” Adam said, sliding off the stool and beginning to take care of the rest of the chairs while she started sweeping. “What are you doing after you’re done?”

Cherie shrugged. “I don’t know—going home, I guess.”

“I was going to take my dad’s boat over to the south shore.”

Cherie glanced at him, then shrugged again. “It’s kind of late.”

“Not too late,” Adam countered, putting the last chair on a table. “And it’s really nice out. Come with me.”

“What’s on the south shore?” Cherie asked, her mistrust of his motives clear in her voice.

Adam spread his hands dismissively. “Nothing. It’s just a ride.” Sensing her indecision, Adam put on his best smile—the one he’d practiced in the mirror to the point where it looked utterly uncalculated. “Come on. It’s really warm tonight.”

“Let me call my mom,” Cherie said, not quite agreeing, but handing him the broom as she went to the phone behind the counter.

Adam finished the sweeping while he listened to Cherie’s side of the conversation and heard her promising not to be home late.

“Good night, Mr. Evans,” Cherie called into the back room as she hung up the phone. “See you tomorrow.”

Adam opened the door and held it for her.

“You smell good,” he said as she passed.

Cherie rolled her eyes. “I stink like sour ice cream, and we both know it. Don’t push it, or I’ll walk home right now. In fact, maybe I’ll just do that anyway.”

“Come on!” Adam pleaded. “Jeez, can’t a guy say anything nice to you at all?”

Relenting, Cherie let him lead her down to the marina near the pavilion. Rows of boats floated quietly in the dusk. A few low-flying birds were still out scooping insects from the surface of the water, a few fish were still competing with the birds for the insects, and somewhere across the lake a loon was calling.

Everything else was quiet, their footfalls sounding unnaturally loud on the wooden planks of the dock. In a slip near the end, Adam’s father’s bass boat was gassed up in preparation for an early morning fishing expedition. Adam helped Cherie in, then cast off the lines, jumped into the driver’s seat, turned the key, and fired up the powerful outboard. Switching on the running lights, he backed the boat out of the slip. “Ready, babe?” he asked.

Cherie decided to ignore the patronizing endearment rather than just shove Adam overboard, and pulled her long hair up into a ponytail, fastening it with a rubber band as Adam idled out of the marina. When they were past the buoy holding the
NO WAKE
sign, he pushed up on the throttle. The bow rose in the water as the stern dropped, and a moment later they had leveled on the plane and were flying across the glassy surface of the lake.

I called her “babe” and she didn’t even tell me to shut up! Adam thought. This was going to be the summer he nailed Cherie Stevens.

C
HERIE LEANED BACK
in the seat and concentrated on the feel of the evening air on her face as they ran across the lake. The town was behind them now, and the first of the summer houses were coming into view, spread along the south shore of the lake like jewels on a necklace. Lights were on in some of the houses already, and if Adam were just idling along instead of racing like a nutcase, she knew she’d be able to hear people laughing on patios and around the small fires burning in the outdoor hearths.

Someday she wanted to live in one of these big lakefront houses; the only question was which one, since every one of them always looked even more beautiful to her than the last.

Adam took a sweeping turn along the shore, then abruptly decelerated the engine. The boat instantly dropped back, its own wake quickly overtaking it and threatening to swamp it.

“Adam!” Cherie cried as the wake splashed on her back. “What are you doing?” He turned off the running lights. Cherie braced herself, ready to push his hand away the moment he tried to touch her. A boat ride was one thing, but if he thought she was going to—

“Look!” Adam whispered, his voice breaking her thought as he pointed toward the shore.

“At what?” Cherie asked, her voice dropping to match his.

“Pinecrest,” Adam whispered. “Look. Someone’s living there.”

Sure enough, lights were on all over the big house, which had been dark for so many years Cherie could barely remember when it was anything but a dark silhouette against the night sky. Tonight, though, it glowed beautifully in the twilight.

As Adam idled the boat up to the Pinecrest dock, Cherie reached out and grabbed one of the cleats. Adam turned off the motor. “I heard that someone rented it for the summer,” she whispered. “But I didn’t know they were already here.”

“Want to go see if we can look in the windows?”

Cherie glared at him in the fast-fading light. “You mean like be a Peeping Tom? You’re weird, Adam!”

Ignoring her words, he stood up on the seat of the boat and peered up the front lawn toward the big house, and suddenly Cherie understood. “Is that why we came out here? So you could spy on these people?”

“You don’t have to spy,” said a voice from the shadows by the boathouse. “Just come to the door and knock.”

Nearly losing his balance at the unexpected sound, Adam sat heavily back down, rocking the boat violently.

“Hi,” Cherie said. “We didn’t mean anything.” She glanced at Adam. “At least
I
didn’t.”

A boy about her own age emerged from the shadows and walked down the dock, a spark plug in one hand, a greasy rag in the other.

“I’m Eric Brewster,” the boy said.

“Hi. I’m Cherie Stevens. This is Adam Mosler.”

“I already know him,” Adam said. “His dog shits all over town.”

Cherie turned and stared at Adam. “Excuse me?”

“It was only once,” Eric explained. “And I picked it up. With my handkerchief. Your friend didn’t think I’d come back if I went for one of those plastic bags.”

Cherie gasped. “So you used your
handkerchief
?”

Eric shrugged, doing his best to act if it had been no big deal. “Well, it was either that or have your friend and his buddies take a swing at me. And handkerchiefs don’t cost much.”

Abruptly, Adam twisted the key in the ignition, and the outboard roared back to life.

“Hey,” Cherie said, raising her voice over the rumble of the engine. “Doesn’t Kent Newell stay out here somewhere?”

“Yeah,” Eric said. “Next door.”

“Fuckin’ coneheads,” Adam muttered.

“Coneheads?” Eric repeated, finally shifting his gaze from Cherie to Adam.

“It’s stupid,” Cherie said. “Because you’re in The Pines, you know? Pinecones? Coneheads? And it’s from some old movie they did a hundred years ago.” She turned her head to stare directly at Adam. “It’s stupid.”

Adam, his jaw tightening, said nothing. He put the motor in gear, but Cherie tightened her grip on the cleat that was bolted to the dock. “Do you know about the dances at the pavilion on Friday nights?” she asked.

Eric nodded. “Kent and Tad told me.”

“They start next week,” she said. “Maybe I’ll see you there.”

Adam pushed harder on the throttle, and Cherie was finally forced to let go of the cleat. She waved back at Eric, who stood silently on the dock, watching them go.

“You were pretty rude,” she said to Adam when they were far enough from the dock so Eric wouldn’t hear her.

“Why did you tell him about the dances?” Adam shot back, ignoring her question.

“Why shouldn’t I?” Cherie countered. “They’re for everybody, aren’t they? And besides, he already knew. So what’s the big deal?”

“They’re summer people,” Adam said, his voice taking on a hard edge. “They’re coneheads. I hate them.”

“Well, I think you’re an idiot,” Cherie said, sitting up straight in the stern and crossing her arms over her chest. “And I thought he was cute.”

Adam threw the throttle forward so quickly that the boat’s surge almost tossed Cherie into the lake. When they got back to the dock, she ignored his hand, easily stepping out of the boat unassisted.

“And I think I can walk myself home, too,” she said, turning and marching up the dock before Adam had even the first of the boat’s four lines secured to the dock.

Furious, he watched her go. This wasn’t how the evening was supposed to end, and he knew whose fault it was.

Eric Brewster’s.

And if he had anything to do with it, Eric Brewster would get exactly what was coming to him.

That, and maybe a whole lot more.

T
HE OLD DOG
moved restlessly in the bottom of the boat, and the even older man put a quieting hand on his flank. “Shhh,” he said gently to the animal, who settled down with a tired sigh.

Logan parted the branches of the overhanging willow he had slipped into when the loud fishing boat came charging around the point from town. It was a good thing, too. Yes, it was a good thing, because a boy had been in the boathouse, and he hadn’t known that.

Hadn’t known that at all.

But now, peering between the willow branches, he could see the faint light of the bare bulb in the boathouse, and as he watched, it went out. A moment later the boy closed the boathouse door behind him and walked up the lawn toward the house.

Logan waited a few more minutes, then quietly rowed around the overhanging tree just far enough so he could see up the lawn to the house.

The old mansion was ablaze with light; a warm, yellow light.

The house looked happy.

And if the house was happy, then the evil was angry.

“Mercy,” Logan breathed softly, his eyes shifting from the house in the distance to the cross he’d mounted in the bow of his boat. “May the Lord have mercy on us all.”

He bowed his head and prayed silently for a moment, then looked up again. But what was he supposed to do now?

Keep watching—that was it! Keep watching, and see what happens!

Then maybe he’d know what to do—maybe the answer would come into his head like answers sometimes did.

But the answer, when it came, would be bad.

He was pretty sure of that.

In fact, he knew it.

Sighing almost as tiredly as the dog had a moment ago, Logan quietly dipped the oars into the water and brought the boat right up to the shore at the edge of the property. He secured the bow line to a branch and touched the dog on the head to reassure him, then stepped out into the shallow water and moved slowly up the bank.

He edged up the property, staying out of the light, keeping to the shadows of the trees.

Making sure he was invisible.

Soon he was close enough to the house to see people inside, and the sight of them drew him on.

His heart began to pound, and his head throbbed. He tried to turn back, tried to go no closer than he already was, but he couldn’t help himself. He wanted—he
had
—to see what they were doing inside.

And who they were.

There was a boy inside, he knew that.

But who else?

As he edged yet closer to the house, he glanced over toward the carriage house that seemed almost like it was trying to hide behind the larger building. But it looked all right—dark and safe, although even from here he could feel the pull.

But it was all right.

He could resist, at least for now.

For now, he was safe.

But he couldn’t resist the family inside the big house.

He crossed the lawn to the steps, slipped silently up onto the terrace, and peered in through the big living room windows.

A fire burned in the fireplace.

He remembered another fire burning in that fireplace.

There was a woman reading in Dr. Darby’s leather chair in front of that fireplace.

He remembered Dr. Darby reading in that chair.

As Logan watched, a little girl appeared, carrying a bowl of popcorn.

No! No little girls! No boys, no little girls!

Danger…so much danger.

It was happening again. It was all going to start again! Soon!