A Very Gothic Christmas Read online

  A chill went down Jessica’s spine. Her eyes strained in the darkness to see Brenda’s face, to read her expression.

  “I’m not crazy, Jessie. I feel her at times.” Brenda pressed a trembling hand to her mouth. “I think the kids or Dillon or maybe me, are in danger and she’s trying to warn us. Vivian wasn’t a bad person, and she believed in spirits. If she could come back to help set things right, she would. I’ve been afraid something was wrong for a while and the minute I came to the island, I was certain of it.”

  “You think Vivian is opening windows and drawing magic circles on the floor? Why, why would she do that, knowing how Dillon feels?” Jessica kept her voice very even. She didn’t know if Brenda was attempting to frighten her, or if she really believed what she was saying.

  “To protect you. To protect me. Dillon, the children. All of us. It was the only religion she knew.” Brenda leaned closer to her, pleading with her. “Do you feel it, too? Tell me I haven’t completely lost my mind. I don’t want to end up like Viv.”

  Jessica carefully leaned the guitar against the wall. She didn’t know if Vivian’s presence was in the house helping her or if the next flash of lightning merely illuminated her brain. Like the notes blending into harmony, the pieces clicked into place.

  “Since we came here, the accidents have all been random. I was trying to mold them, fit them into my idea that someone wanted to harm Trevor and Tara. But all the accidents could have hurt any of us. Anyone in the house. Do you see it, Brenda, the pattern?”

  Brenda shook her head. “No, but you’re chilling me to the bone.”

  “And the cape. The hooded figure. The dog didn’t bark.”

  “You’ve lost me. Bark when?”

  “When Trevor was buried under the landslide, Tara saw a hooded figure, but the dog didn’t bark. So it wasn’t a stranger hiding on the island, it was someone the dog knew.” Jessica knew she was on the verge of discovery. It was all there for her to see. The pattern in the discordant notes. “Why were only the three of us sick? Why Tara and Trevor and me? None of you were sick.” She pressed a hand to her mouth, her eyes wide. “It’s the chocolate. My God, he poisoned the chocolate. He did everything. He shot Vivian, he must have, and he covered his tracks with the fire.”

  “What do you mean, he poisoned the chocolate? Dillon? You think Dillon tried to poison the twins?” Brenda sounded shocked.

  “Not Dillon. Of course not Dillon. You can’t believe he shot Vivian! It was never Dillon,” Jessica was impatient. “You’ll have to call the helicopter, have them pick up the kids and take them to the hospital and tell them to bring the police.” She had to get to the twins, hold them in her arms, make certain they were alive and well.

  The next flash of lightning revealed the dark, hooded figure standing so silently in the corner. Jessica saw him clearly, saw the ugly little gun in his hand. The light faded away, but she knew he was there. Real. Solid. A sinister demented being bent on murder. Brenda gave a frightened cry and Jessica thrust the woman behind her. She felt her way along the instrument panel for the switch to turn on the recorder.

  There was a moment of silence while the rain came down and the wind howled and tugged at the house. While the gargoyles watched silently from the eaves.

  Jessica forced a small smile, forced a calmness she didn’t feel. “I knew it was you. It’s going to break his heart all over again.” There was deep regret in her voice. The knowledge of such a betrayal would hurt Dillon immensely. Some part of Jessica had known all along, but she hadn’t wanted to see it. For Dillon’s sake.

  “You didn’t know,” Paul denied, his face so deep inside the hood they couldn’t see him. He presented a frightening image, the grim reaper. All he needed was a longhandled scythe to complete the persona of death.

  “Of course it had to be you. No one but you would know that someone was trying to blackmail Dillon.”

  “Your mother,” he spat, “was so greedy. The money he gave her to care for the children wasn’t enough. I wrote the checks out to her—she had enough.”

  “Not my mother,” Jessica snarled back. “Don was blackmailing Dillon. She came here at Dillon’s request to discuss it with him.”

  “I don’t understand,” Brenda said. “Paul, what are you doing? Why are you standing in that stupid cape with a gun pointed at us? And you’d better not be naked under that thing! Everyone’s being so melodramatic! What are you talking about? Why would anyone want to blackmail Dillon?”

  Jessica ignored her. She didn’t dare take her eyes off of Paul. He was unstable and she had no idea what could set him off. But she knew he was perfectly capable of killing. He had done so numerous times. “You were the only one it could be, Paul. You had access to all the rooms through the passageways. You’re the only one who has been here on a regular basis. Once I realized the accidents were random, directed toward everyone here, I knew they were designed to send everyone away. The landslide, the Christmas tree, the oil on the stairs. Even the chocolate. You thought if enough things happened, we’d all go away. That’s what you wanted, wasn’t it? You just wanted everyone to stay away from here.” Her voice was soothing, the voice she had used for years on the children, a blend of sweetness and understanding.

  “But you wouldn’t go away,” he said. “You brought them back here. Her children. Vivian was evil, an evil disgusting seductress who wouldn’t leave us all alone.”

  Jessica’s heart thudded. She heard it in his voice, the guilt, the seething hatred. It always came back to Vivian. She knew then. Her heart bled for Dillon. So much treachery, how did one survive it? She wanted to weep for them all. There wasn’t going to be any miracle for the twins or Dillon this Christmas, only more heartache, more tragedy.

  “You loved her.” She said it simply, starkly, saying the words in the dark to the man who had calmly walked up the stairs, shot Vivian and her lover in cold blood and locked the other occupants in the room after ensuring the fire was raging.

  “I hated her! I despised her!” Paul hissed the words. “She seduced me. I begged her to leave me alone, but she would crawl into my bed and I could never stop myself. She laughed at me, and she threatened to tell Dillon. He was the only friend, the only family I ever had. I wasn’t going to let her destroy me. Or him. Phillip deserved to die, he used her to get at Dillon. He thought Dillon would pay him to leave Vivian alone.”

  “Where would he get an idea like that?” Brenda was far too quiet and that worried Jessica. She glanced at the other woman but couldn’t see her clearly in the dark.

  “What does it matter? None of it matters. He chose you. When I knocked you off the bluff and slipped myself, he saved you, not me. I couldn’t believe it. He was never worth it. All these wasted years. His genius. I served his greatness, cared for him, protected him, killed for him, and he fell for another harlot.” Paul shook his head so that the hooded cloak moved as if alive. “I gave him everything, and he chose you.” He snarled the last words at her, like a rabid dog wanting to strike out.

  Jessica forced a derisive laugh. She was inching her fingers along the wall seeking the guitar, her only weapon. “Is that how you lie to yourself at night in order to sleep, Paul? You betrayed him by sleeping with his wife. You probably brought Phillip Trent into Vivian’s life. You let Dillon go through a trial, knew everyone believed he committed murder and yet you could have stopped it by telling the truth. You were responsible for the fire that burned him. You murdered my mother thinking she was blackmailing him. You left him open to blackmail and you arranged accidents that could have killed his children just to frighten them away from him. How in the world is that giving him everything? You made him a prisoner in this house and when it looked as if he might break free you started all over again to try to isolate him from the rest of the world.”

  “Shut up!” Pure venom dripped from Paul’s voice. “Just shut up!”

  “The biggest mistake you made was going after the children. Your plan backfired. You must have intercepted my lett
er telling him the children should be with him. You didn’t want them here, did you? They were a threat to you. You wanted me to think Dillon was trying to hurt them, didn’t you?” She looked at him steadily. “But, you see, I know Dillon. I knew he would never have killed Vivian or my mother or done harm to his children. So I brought the children here, knowing he would try to protect them.”

  “And delivered them right to me,” Paul snarled.

  “Put the gun down, Paul.” Dillon’s voice was weary and sad, a melody of smoke and blues. “It’s over. We have to figure out how best to handle this.” Dillon moved through the doorway.

  While Dillon was so calm, Jessica wanted to scream. Were the children writhing in agony upstairs, while they talked to a madman with a gun? Her fingers found the neck of the guitar, circled, and gripped hard.

  “There is only one way to handle it, Dillon,” Paul said just as calmly. “I’m not about to be locked up for the rest of my life. I couldn’t stand being interviewed behind bars while the band makes it to the top again.”

  Jessica knew. She always knew before things happened, even though she had doubted herself. There in the darkness with the rain coming down, she knew the precise moment Paul shifted the gun. She knew he was finished talking and that his finger was squeezing the trigger. Without hesitation, Jessica stepped solidly in front of Dillon and swung the guitar toward Paul with every ounce of strength she possessed.

  She heard the bark of the gun, the simultaneous crack of the guitar as she hit Paul hard, and Dillon’s husky cry of denial even as something knocked her legs out from under her. Jessica hit her head hard on the floor. She lay still, staring up at the figure in the hooded cloak. He was bent over, twisted. She blinked to clear her vision. Everything seemed hazy, a weird phosphorescent light was seeping into the room, a mist of colors and cold. The draft was icy, so that she could see the air as a foggy vapor. It seemed to slide between Paul and the other occupants of the room.

  Paul screamed, a hoarse dark cry of rage and fear. For one moment the colors shifted and moved, formed the shimmering, translucent image of a woman in a flowing gown reaching out a long thin arm beckoning toward Paul. Dillon moved then, covering Jessica’s body with his own, blocking her view of the strange apparition, so that she only heard the gun as it went off a second time.

  “Vivian, don’t leave me again!” Brenda’s cry was anguished and she stumbled forward, her arms outstretched. Dillon caught her, dragging her down to the safety of the floor.

  Jessica heard the body fall with a soft thud to the floor, and she found herself staring into Paul’s wide-open eyes. She knew he was dead, with the life already drained from his body before he hit the floor. In the end, he had been determined to take Dillon with him, and she had been just as determined he would not.

  Brenda’s weeping was soft and brokenhearted. “Did you see her, Jessica? I told you I wasn’t crazy. Did you see her?”

  Dillon kicked the gun away from Paul’s hand. “Call the doctor, Brenda, right now!” His voice was pure authority, snapping Brenda out of her sorrow. “Check on Tara and Trevor—make certain they’re all right. And then call the police.” His hands were running over Jessica’s legs, searching for a wound, searching for the bullet hole that had knocked her to the floor.

  There was no blood, no gaping wound, only a huge dark bruise already forming on her left thigh. The area was tender, painful, but neither Dillon nor Jessica knew who had struck her hard enough to knock her legs out from under her. Brenda had stood frozen, unable to move. They both stared at the strange mark, two circles, one inside the other, the center circle much darker. A circle of protection.

  “I have to see to Paul,” he said and she heard the heartbreak in his voice.

  “He’s beyond help, Dillon. Don’t touch anything,” Jessica cautioned gendy. Now that it was over she began to shake almost uncontrollably. Her need to get to the children was paramount. Her need to comfort Dillon was just as great. More than anything else she was afraid for him. This time the truth had to be plain. “Wait for the police.”

  chapter

  14

  THE WHITE BIRD WINGED its way across the wet sky. Far below, waves crashed against rock, foamed and sprayed, reaching toward the heavens, toward the small white dove as it flew with a glittering object in its beak.

  “Jessie, get out of bed,” Tara insisted, jarring Jessica right out of her happy dream. “It’s Christmas Eve, you can’t just stay in bed!”

  Jessica turned over with a small groan and pulled the blanket firmly over her head. “Go away, I’m never getting up again.”

  She wasn’t going to face Christmas Eve. She didn’t want to see the disappointment on the faces of the twins. She didn’t want to face Dillon. She had seen him when the police took Paul’s body away, when he told the truth about what had happened. Dillon looked like a man lost, with his heart and soul torn out. Reporters had been brutal, swarming to the hospital, nearly rioting at the police station. So many pictures, so many microphones thrust at him. It had to have been a nightmare for him. It had been for her. The police had the recording Jessica had made as well as Brenda’s and Jessica’s statements to back up Dillon’s. The crime scene people had come and gone. Paul was dead by his own hand. They all said so. By mutual consent, they kept their knowledge of the apparition to themselves. There was no need to complicate the story to the police or the newspapers. And who would ever believe them?

  “Jessie, really, get up,” Tara dragged at the covers.

  “I’ll get her up,” Dillon told his daughter gently. “You go play hostess, Tara. Tell everyone your Christmas story. They all need a feel-good story tonight. And Brian’s made a special Christmas Eve feast. I believe he made pancakes.”

  Tara giggled as her father walked her to the door. “Not his famous pancakes! What a shocker.” She leaned over to kiss his forehead as she went out.

  Jessica heard the door close firmly and the lock turn. There was a mysterious rustle and then the room was flooded with music. Soft, beautiful strains of music. The swelling passion of the song she and Dillon had worked on so hard. She blinked back tears and sat up as he crossed the room to sit on the edge of her bed. The light was off and the room was dark, only the sliver of moon providing them with a streak of a silvery glow.

  Jessica drew up her knees, rested her chin on them. “So what now, Dillon?” She asked it quietly, facing the worst, prepared for his rejection. He hadn’t talked with her, hadn’t come near her in days. He’d spent most of the time on the mainland.

  Dillon reached out to her, his palm cupping her chin, skin to skin. She realized then, that he wasn’t wearing his gloves. “It’s Christmas Eve, we wait for our miracle,” he told her gently. “Don’t tell me after believing all this time, you’ve suddenly had a crisis of faith.” His thumb brushed along her chin, a slow sensual movement that made her shiver with awareness of him.

  Jessica swept a trembling hand through her hair as it tumbled around her face. “I don’t know what I think anymore, Dillon. I feel numb right now.” It wasn’t altogether true. When she looked at him, every part of her came alive. Heat coursed through her body, while her heart did a somersault and a multitude of butterfly wings brushed at the pit of her stomach. “I thought, with all that has happened, that . . .” she trailed off miserably. No matter what she said, it would be hurtful to him. How could she admit she thought he would retreat from her, from Trevor and Tara?

  Dillon’s smile was incredibly tender. “You didn’t really think I would be so incredibly stupid as to send you and the children away again, did you? I wouldn’t deserve you, Jess, if I’d been thinking of doing something that thick-skulled. I don’t know that I deserve you now, but you offered and I’m holding on tight with both hands.” He rubbed the bridge of his nose, suddenly looking vulnerable. “I thought about things, sitting up in my room, about treachery and betrayal and about letting life pass me by. I thought about courage and what it means. Courage was Don coming to me when he didn’t ha
ve to and telling me how idiotic he had been. Courage was him willing to be kicked out of the band or even prosecuted. Courage is Brenda and Robert learning how to be an aunt and uncle to two children they are secretly terrified of. Courage is Brian standing in that kitchen and telling me his beliefs.”

  His hands framed her face. “Courage is a woman stepping between a man and death. You fought for me, Jess, even when I wouldn’t do it myself. I’m not walking away from that. I’ll never play the guitar again like I did, but I still have my voice and I still can write and produce songs. I have two children you gave back to me and God willing, I hope we have more. Tell me I still have you.”

  She melted into him, a long slow kiss that stole her breath and took her heart, that told him everything he wanted to know.

  “Everyone’s waiting for you,” he whispered against her mouth.

  Jessica hugged him hard, leapt out of bed, rushed for the bathroom. “Ten minutes,” she called over her shoulder, “I have to shower.” She peeled off her pajama top and flung it toward a chair.

  Dillon’s breath hitched in his throat as he saw her drawstring pants slide over the tempting curve of her bottom just as she disappeared into the other room. He stood up, a slow smile softening the edge of his mouth as he tossed his own shirt aside. He padded on bare feet to the bathroom door to watch her as she stepped under the cascade of hot water. She turned her head toward him just as he slowly pushed his jeans away from his hardened body. At once her gaze was on his heavy erection. Knowing she was looking hardened him more so that the ache grew and his need was instant and urgent.

  “You missed me,” she greeted, her smile pure invitation. The moment he stepped into the large compartment, she wrapped her hand around his thickness, warm and tight. “I missed you.”