The Hunting of Malin Read online

  “Big time,” he agreed, squinting against the sunlight. “So, where to now?”

  Slipping her shades on, she drummed her fingers against the hot roof of the car, inconspicuously watching Roscoe for a nervous tic to confirm her sneaking suspicions. The police didn’t know the whole story but she did. This was beyond them and Malin knew it was time to take things to another level, one she feared stepping foot inside ever again. “You know where.”

  Chapter13

  The black door opened and Luna’s face brightened at the sight of Malin and Roscoe gracing her doorstep. Reaching out, she pulled Roscoe into a warm embrace while Malin kept a close eye on her mother’s reaction to the contact. Waiting for the slightest sign that something was off. The same way Luna knew something was amiss with Malin at last night’s dinner. If Roscoe was the killer, Luna would sense it. Of that much Malin was certain.

  “Roscoe, my dear boy! I haven’t seen you in ages,” she breathed into his neck, hugging him like the son she never had.

  “Good to see you again, Luna. It’s been way too long.”

  Drawing apart, she held him out by the shoulders and the smile melted down her face. Malin’s heart did a small flip in her chest and landed in the pit of her stomach because this was it. Luna could smell it on him, and not just the sweat clinging to his clothing. But the evil hiding within.

  “You smell like the outdoors.” Luna traded a nonplussed look with her daughter. “Did you two just go for a walk or something?”

  Malin’s shoulders slumped with a deflated breath rushing from her lungs.

  False alarm.

  “We went on a hike out at the lake,” Roscoe answered, flashing a tightlipped smile. “Before it got too hot.”

  “Well come in, come in.” Shutting the door behind them, Luna planted her hands on her hips, spreading her long black dress out like sinister wings. “And to what do I owe this wonderful surprise?”

  Roscoe and Malin looked at each other, the cold air-conditioning caressing their sticky skin.

  “There’s something we have to tell you, Mom.”

  Crossing the room, Roscoe held his hand out. “We need your…help with something.”

  Luna’s gaze fell to the bloody locket coiled in his palm like a tiny metal snake. Staggering backwards as if something unseen just slapped her across the face, her wiry hand instinctively went to the evil eye dangling from her neck.

  Malin stepped forward and took her arm. “Mom?”

  “Where’d you get that?” Luna whispered gravely, struggling for breath.

  Malin’s mouth was too dry to swallow and she couldn’t tell if Luna was reacting to the necklace or Roscoe but something was clearly scaring the living daylights out of her. “It’s a long story,” she told her, unable to shake the feeling that spiders were crawling in her hair. “Why don’t you sit down.”

  Luna looked up from the bloodstained necklace, frowning as if she’d forgotten Malin was even there. “Yes, I believe I should.” Crossing the room, her long dress dusted the floor, making it look like she was floating without moving a muscle. She dropped onto some floor pillows with an exhausted sigh while Malin sat next to her and Roscoe took a green armchair across the way. “There’s tea in the refrigerator.” Luna’s voice was frail and distant. Roscoe set the locket on the coffee table between them and she recoiled into the pillows. Malin watched her stare at it like she was seeing the same callous vision Malin witnessed earlier this morning.

  Bravely filling her lungs, Luna set them free. “Tell me everything,” she said, massaging the necklace resting against her chest. “And you mustn’t leave anything out.” She seized Malin’s wrist, digging skeletal fingers into her daughter’s flesh. “Anything!”

  By the time they finished their sordid tale, the entire house smelled of sandalwood incense and was damp from the saltwater Luna sprayed over every square inch like Febreze. Energetic hygiene she called it. Malin just called it weird. Her mother set the mister next to a lit candle on the coffee table and sat Indian style on the floor pillows, studying Roscoe in the jittery light before speaking in a soft voice. “You have brought darkness into my home.” Her icy eyes fell to the dead girl’s necklace and Malin was still uncertain of which she was referring to as the darkness. “I’m afraid you must leave at once,” she said, rubbing her hands together as if they were cold.

  “Leave?” Roscoe tossed Malin a sidelong look. “Well, what should we do?”

  “First, you must go back to the police station and give them this necklace. You should have never touched it. Secondly, do not hesitate to tell them everything you just told me.” Her eyes swung to Malin. “Especially the part about the man in your visions. It is imperative you hold nothing back.”

  A sardonic laugh popped from Malin, nothing she could do to stop it. “Are you insane? They’ll think I’m crazy!”

  Luna tipped her pointy chin down. “A lot of people thought I was crazy but that didn’t stop me from doing my civic duty, from using my gift.”

  Rolling her eyes, Malin shook her head and toyed with her rings.

  Luna set a hand on hers and tried to smile. “Maymoon, you cannot do this alone. Please do not try.”

  Roscoe cleared his throat. “Is there anything you can tell us to help the police catch this guy? Did you get a glimpse of him or his name from the necklace? Anything.”

  Taking her hand back, she pressed her lips into a thin, grim line. “I’m afraid not.”

  Malin’s subsequent gasp was part shock, part laugh. “Nothing? Really?”

  “What about a séance?” Roscoe asked, shooting Malin a warning glance. “Maybe you can speak with Amber, the girl who owned this necklace.”

  “No.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because that is risky business, Roscoe.” Her eyes flicked to Malin, sharpening to a razor’s edge. “Especially performing such a dangerous task with those who do not believe.”

  Exhaustion fanned Malin’s flames. “Mom…”

  “When you reach out to one of the dead, any of the dead can reach back! Privacy laws do not apply here.”

  Lips curling into a sneer, Malin tried controlling the rage in her voice. “I know all of this.”

  “Any negative energy,” Luna continued, holding her daughter’s seething gaze, “will open a doorway to the wrong spirit and I will not, under any circumstance, allow it into my home.”

  “Mom, please!”

  “Absolutely not, Malin! You know better than to even ask.”

  “Let me tell you something,” Malin said, shifting on the pillows, “you think I don’t believe after everything we just told you? After the visions I’ve had?” Her eyes welled with tears, reflecting her mother’s drawn face. “I just want it to stop. The murders, the visions, all of it!” A teardrop blinked out and raced down her cheek. “If you saw what I did, then you would help us any way you can.”

  Luna exhaled, sinking into the pillows with a defeated look settling in her eyes. “If you’re truly serious about a séance, we should wait for Autumn and Ester. The circle will be much stronger with them.”

  “Try telling that to the next girl who dies while we’re waiting for Aunt Autumn and Great Aunt Ester! There is no time, Mom. If you truly want to help stop this lunatic, then help us right now. Not later.” Pulling in a calming breath, Malin took Luna’s cold hand in her own and lowered her voice. “We will tell the police everything, I promise, but we have to give them something to go on. They need our help just as much as we need theirs.”

  Luna’s expression remained unchanged in the flickering light. The grandfather clock ticked off the seconds stretching between them. Pulling her hand away, she twisted her bony fingers so hard, popping noises dotted the silence sucking the air from the room. Then she forced a weak smile. “Okay,” she simply replied, rising from the pillows and gliding across the room. “Let’s move to the dining room table, shall we?”

  Chapter14

  Luna held a sage smudge stick over a candle and watch
ed it burn, wrenching Malin’s stomach. She hated this part. Smudging – a powerful cleansing technique from the Native American tradition – was the first step in purging the house of negative energies and smelled like shit. From grade school on up, the other kids would make fun of the way her clothing smelled and Malin never got used to it. Even now. Luna blew the flame out and waved the stick’s trailing smoke over the round dining room table, north to south and then east to west. Bringing the bundled herbs to her thin lips, she blew on it, killing the flame and making it glow. She set it in a black smudge pot with a pentagram etched into its side and looked up.

  “Let’s join hands,” she suggested in the same calm voice she always used at work, taking their hands and waiting for them to comply.

  Smoke rose to the ceiling in ashen streams. The air conditioner kicked off and Malin could hear her pulse banging in her throat. Tightening her ponytail, she took Roscoe’s hand and completed the circle. For a moment, they exchanged unreadable glances over the three candles dancing in the middle of the table. Sandalwood incense mixed with the sage rising from the smudge pot in wispy trails, stinging Malin’s eyes. She stared at the water glass centered on a strip of red velvet stretching across the table, heart hammering so hard in her chest she feared it would taint the procedure. She felt dizzy. Roscoe’s palm was sweaty in hers, Luna’s eyes tight and shifty.

  Now,” Luna said in a near whisper, “we shall begin with a quick protection prayer. You may close your eyes or keep them open, whichever makes you comfortable.” Shutting her eyes, she inhaled a deep breath of the sage and held it for a moment before speaking in that soft, professional tone. “Saint Michael the Archangel, please defend us in battle,” she said, smoke seeping from her lips in ghostly tendrils. “Be our protection against the wickedness and snares of the devil. May God rebuke him, we humbly pray, and cast into hell, Satan and all the evil spirits who roam the world seeking the ruin of souls.” She paused to give their hands an encouraging pump. “Amen.” Luna opened her eyes and they were different now, oily against the yellow flames throbbing inside.

  Malin’s chest tightened along with Roscoe’s grip. An itch on the tip of her nose begged her to break the circle.

  Luna focused on the bloody necklace laid out next to the glass of water, her face changing in the nervous light, aging her twenty years before ebbing back to normal again. “Today we seek Amber Rowe, who left this world all too early through the injustice of another.”

  Malin watched the water glass. Unlike her, it was half full and calm. She held her breath, the smoke in the room going straight to her head.

  “Come Amber Rowe and communicate with us.”

  The water remained as clear and smooth as the glass itself. Malin looked up, impatience flaring in her eyes. Something needed to happen and she felt guilty for wanting to ease her own pain more than saving the next victim but this madness had to stop. Her old life called to her, her old job, old routine. But that life was gone and there was no way to start a new one without ridding herself of this cumbersome burden. How was she supposed to handle a job interview with visions of dead girls dancing in her head?

  Luna lifted her shoulders and tried again, this time in a stronger voice. “Amber, please feel welcome in our circle and join us when you are ready.”

  The water barely rippled, jumpstarting Malin’s pulse. At first, she thought it might be her imagination but the looks on Luna’s and Roscoe’s faces told her otherwise.

  Luna stared at the glass. “Are you here, Amber?”

  The water rippled again and Malin – thinking Roscoe bumped a table leg with his knee – looked suspiciously to him. He barely shook his head with a it wasn’t me look swimming in his saucer-sized eyes.

  “Is this your necklace on the table before us?”

  Luna’s bedroom door slammed shut down the hall and Malin screamed. Despite all of the windows being closed, the three candles shivered with a breeze running over the table.

  “Jesus Christ,” Malin breathed, searching the hallway for a sign of something.

  Luna tightened her grip on their hands, pulling their attention back to the table. “Did you get a good look at the man who killed you, Amber?”

  Boom.

  The water vibrated, as if rattled by a distant footstep.

  Swallowing hard, her sunken eyes rose to Roscoe. “Is he here in this room with us?”

  A frown inched down his face and the water settled, dragging a relieved breath from his lips.

  Luna raised her voice. “Will he kill again?”

  Water splashed onto the red velvet and Roscoe jumped, nearly tipping over backwards in the chair. Luna held fast and yanked him back to the table.

  “You must not break the circle,” she hissed.

  Barely nodding, his chest heaved beneath his shirt, sweat stains blooming in the armpits.

  It got quiet again and Malin wiped a mysterious teardrop from her cheek. Her emotions were all over the place and she didn’t know why. Her skin crawled, stomach churned, nose itched. She wanted to laugh and cry and it made her shift uneasily in the dining room chair. Noticing her mother watching out the corner of an eye, she tried to focus. That was important if this was to work and she damn well knew it.

  Without moving her head, Luna’s gaze slid back to the water glass. “Can we stop him from killing again?”

  The water calmed to a flat surface and everything got unnervingly quiet. Roscoe’s jeans squeaked against the chair. The grandfather clock ticked. Malin’s blood crashed through her ears in thunderous waves.

  Tipping her head down, Luna dug in hard, face aging in the candlelight. “Can anyone stop him?”

  The water glass remained unchanged and a dark feeling seeped into Malin’s bones, corrupting her marrow. This wasn’t working because they could stop him. The spirit was wrong. She looked up to find Luna staring at her again. Then, ever so slightly, Luna’s eyes rose over her shoulder and widened, spiking Malin’s adrenaline. She couldn’t breathe, frozen by the haunted look gripping her mother’s pallid complexion. Hanging onto their hands for support, Malin began twisting around in the chair to see what had her so spooked but Luna pulled her back to the table.

  “What is it?” Malin whispered, unable to shake the feeling someone was standing right behind her.

  “Stay focused,” Luna whispered back, hitting her daughter with a petulant look that did the trick. Cautiously, she returned her attention to the glass. “Are you Amber Rowe?” The water rippled slightly and Luna stiffened. “Will you help us stop the killer?”

  The water calmed to a glassy surface and Malin needed to look behind her. Had to look behind her, even if her curiosity broke the damn circle. Something was there and it was driving her insane. The hairs stood up on the back of her neck, prickling her flesh like static electricity.

  “Do you want to stop the one responsible for your death?”

  A spare bedroom door slammed shut down the hall, vibrating the pictures on the walls.

  Luna lifted her voice. “Are you still afraid?”

  The glass tipped over and so did the candles. Water dripped into Malin’s lap and everything got quiet. Without the light, it was so dark she couldn’t see her mother or Roscoe but could feel their hands. She could also feel something breathing down the back of her neck. She stiffened as cold air rushed across her skin in rancid waves. The hair on her arms stood up as goose bumps dimpled her skin. “Mom?” she whispered through the darkness, afraid to breathe let alone move. “There’s something behind me.”

  Luna didn’t answer.

  Blood pumped thickly in Malin’s temples. “Mom?”

  Luna’s hand went limp in hers and so did Roscoe’s. Suddenly, they felt different. Cold. Thin. Dead. “Mom!” A hand landed on her shoulder and squeezed so hard Malin thought her bones would shatter like fine china. An earsplitting scream ripped from her mouth as fingernails dug into her flesh.

  “Break the circle!” Luna cried, jumping up and flipping on the dining room light.
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  Malin squinted against the harsh chandelier swinging over the table, the eyes staring back big and round.

  “What happened?” Roscoe took in the place, convinced they weren’t out of the spiritual woods just yet.

  “What do you mean, what happened?” Malin panted, finally looking behind her to see nothing there but an empty living room.

  “Put out the fire, Roscoe,” Luna calmly instructed, up righting the water glass and wiping blood from her nose with the back of a hand.

  “You just screamed at the top of your lungs!” he replied, gawking at Malin. “What happened?”

  “Roscoe!” Luna shouted, drawing his bewildered eyes. “Put out the fire.”

  Roscoe used his hand to pat out the small flames eating away at the red velvet while Luna hurriedly sprayed saltwater around the room.

  “Someone was in here!” Malin insisted, searching the house.

  Dropping back into the dining room chair, Luna set the spray bottle down and let out a tired sigh, blood trickling from her nose. “No one was in here, dear,” she calmly explained, rubbing the necklace. “You were in there.”

  Malin stared back aghast. “What!”

  “You stepped into the spirit world and I had to pull you back.” Luna brought the evil eye to her lips and whispered something against it.

  “That’s not possible. Someone was standing right behind me.”

  Glancing at Roscoe, she pulled a tissue from a hidden pocket in her dress and dabbed at her bloody nose. “Did our hands feel limp and cold?”

  Malin’s heart sank. “Yes, but…”

  “Did you detect the strong odor of decay?”

  She swallowed dryly, craving the water that spilt from the glass. “Yes.”

  Luna massaged the evil eye, sweat glistening along her brow. “Did someone touch you?”

  Following a moment of uncertainty, her voice came out as a pathetic whimper. “Yes.”

  “Where?”