Chapter 37
Heidi

Emma’s cries jolted Heidi into a full-on charge through the Crawford kitchen. She left her phone on the table, ignoring the fact she’d just texted Rhett to see if he’d go with her to Brad and Vicki’s when he got off work. It was time to meet with her sister face-to-face. But now Emma’s wailing distracted her from waiting for his reply.

The family room TV had been muted. Murphy was kneeling on the floor in front of Emma, who sat on the couch rocking back and forth. Tears stained her face. Ducie had sidled up to his mistress, his broad nose resting on her knee. Connie rocked with her, holding her tight, whispering consoling words.

Connie glanced up in dismay as Heidi entered the room and skidded to a halt. The concern on Heidi’s face must have been enough to garner an answer.

“She lost her Ducie scarf.” Connie’s explanation meant nothing to Heidi, yet she was aware how losing a precious item would affect Emma.

Emma released another sob. Her lack of words sent an empathetic ache through Heidi. She eased carefully onto the floor by Murphy, hoping Emma hadn’t taken on her own anxiety after they left Kramer Logging. She’d tried to remain calm, to hold in her mounting hurt and betrayal. Emma had seemed fine. But—a scarf? There was still one around her neck.

“Where did you last see it?” Connie asked gently of her daughter.

Emma blinked and swiped at her eyes. Her rocking increased, and Connie adjusted her hold on her daughter, applying comforting pressure to help ease the anxiety.

“I saw it around my neck.” Emma’s chin quivered.

“Okay. That’s good, Emma.” Connie nodded. “When did you see it there?”

Emma sucked in a watery gulp. “When we went to the asylum.”

Heidi wished she could forget that day when she’d upset Emma by taking her out of her routine. When she’d incensed Rhett.

“I’ll go look there,” Heidi stated.

Connie gave her a quick glance. “It’s almost seven.”

“It’s okay.” Heidi stood. “I can get there and back before dark.”

The recollection that Emma claimed to have seen the woman who’d pulled Heidi from the fire came to mind. She quelled the unease at the idea. Emma needed her. She needed her Ducie scarf.

Connie nodded. “The scarf is patterned with dogs. She doesn’t wear it all the time, but when she wants it, it is always hanging on the pink hanger in her closet. Emma went to get it tonight, and the scarf was missing. There’s no coming back from a missing favorite item.”

Heidi gave Emma an empathetic smile. “It’ll be all right.” She hurried back through the kitchen, snatching up her car keys and phone from the table.

Far be it for the ghost of Misty Wayfair to keep Emma’s dog-patterned scarf from the woman. Heidi owed Emma one. She owed the Crawfords too. She owed them everything.

Heidi’s car slowed to a stop in front of the asylum ruins. Dusk was fast approaching, and for any other reason, there was nothing that would’ve inspired Heidi to come here alone. She glanced up at the line of windows on the remains of the second floor. Emma had seen the woman in one of those windows. The dead Mary Coyle? The ghost of Misty Wayfair? Or someone who needed more explanation, specifically from Vicki?

She wanted to interrogate her sister. That would come in time. Rhett had texted Heidi that they’d talk when he stopped by his parents’ place. Before she’d lost a signal, Heidi had sent back a quick OK. Rhett would know what was going on soon enough.

Heidi got out of her car, phone clutched in her hand. Lot of good it would do if she needed it, but the flashlight app was helpful at least. Heidi flicked it on and held up the phone. Though there was still plenty of light, the woods didn’t help any with their ever-deepening shadows. Heck, she had to be honest with herself. The flashlight just made her feel better.

Heidi revisited the events of the afternoon she’d visited here with Emma. Neither she nor Emma had gone inside the asylum. In fact, Heidi had returned later with Rhett. She would have thought, if the scarf had been dropped at the asylum, it would be lying on the old cobblestone walk. Why had Emma removed the scarf to begin with? A pointless question now. Maybe Heidi would return to the Crawfords’ empty-handed, and the scarf would show up elsewhere. But Heidi had to do something.

She stood on the cobblestone walk, trying to ignore the asylum and the breeze that whistled through the crumbling roof. If, theoretically, the scarf had fallen on the walk, the breeze could have easily blown it somewhere. Heidi began searching the nearby undergrowth, the bushes, and along the fence line.

Some of the cast-iron fence still stood, leaning out from the asylum as if the years had made it tired. She weaved back and forth across the old hospital yard toward the side of the asylum and finally to the back. Heidi stopped. This was ridiculous. The scarf wasn’t here. She held the flashlight up and sent the beam toward the woods at the back of the asylum. There was no way the scarf would have blown back there. No way at . . .

A flutter in the far bushes caught Heidi’s eye. Her insides gave a jolt. Nervous energy and hope all wrapped into one. She glanced behind her to see if someone was following her. That prickly sensation she’d read about in books? Yeah. She was feeling it now.

Heidi hurried toward the flutter. “Ah ha!”

Weird. The scarf was looped around a fence post, like someone had picked it up and draped it there. She reached for it and paused. The remnants of a trail led beyond the fence. It was more than a deer trail, or any other trail made by animals. It had the appearance of once having been often traversed. Perhaps by patients or staff of the asylum.

She pushed through some shrubs, detaching a branch with thorns on it from her sleeve. Raising her flashlight, Heidi noted a small opening. Without giving it much thought, she shoved down the trail, maneuvering around branches and another thornbush.

“What the—” Her whisper drifting into the woods. Unanswered except by the chatter of a squirrel.

Heidi stared at the rows of gravestones. Mostly half buried by the earth now, but a taller pillar stood out in the far corner. She ran the toe of her Converse over one of the markers. The name was all but lost now, with weather and time having eaten away at the carvings that must not have been deep to begin with.

An asylum graveyard.

Heidi shivered and tiptoed around the stones toward the taller one in the back. One peek and then she was getting out of here. The unsettling feeling had become thicker now, especially since dusk seemed to be waving its farewell far too quickly for Heidi’s taste. Rhett would have a fit if he knew she’d come here alone.

She ran her hand over the face of the gravestone. A name of a man she’d never heard of. The next side.

Penelope Alice Reed Wayfair

Wayfair. Alice? Was this Simeon Coyle’s Alice?

The next side was guarded by an evergreen that had grown up against it, its branches scraping the side of the stone. Heidi shouldered her way in and lifted her phone. The shaft of light touched the first name, and Heidi sucked in a breath.

Misty Wayfair

Nope. She was not doing this in the near-dark, outside of the asylum ruins. Time to grab the scarf and get the heck outta Dodge.

Heidi spun toward the asylum, hurrying her way as speedily as she could along the abandoned path. She focused on the dim outline of the fence. The post with the scarf.

The scarf.

Heidi stopped. She lifted the light.

Where was the scarf?

It had been there just minutes before. There was no doubt.

She searched the darkness frantically, but her phone’s flashlight was only so bright and didn’t cast a beam very far.

“C’mon!” Heidi hissed in creeped-out exasperation. She needed to get out of here. Away from this place. But she couldn’t leave without Emma’s scarf.

Or maybe she should.

A heavy sense of danger settled over her. The kind that warned her no scarf was worth this. Emma would have to work through her anxiety. At this point—Heidi passed the fence and darted a look toward the far corner of the yard—at this point she needed to leave.

She took another step, and without warning the scarf settled around her neck, yanking her back. Heidi choked out a scream, and her phone dropped to the ground, the light aiming away from her. Her hands flew up to grab at the scarf that dug against her windpipe.

The body Heidi stumbled backward against was no ghost.

It was very real. It was a woman. She could tell by the strands of long hair that wafted over Heidi’s face as she fought against the cold hands that clutched the scarf.

“Don’t fight,” the woman’s voice crooned. It shook a bit. As if she were unsure of her own actions.

Heidi tried to spin, but as she did, the scarf twisted and tightened around her throat. She tripped and fell, gagging as the Ducie scarf cut into her neck.

“No!” The woman’s voice was urgent. Worried. Heidi felt the woman drop to her knees behind her. The scarf loosened, and the woman’s arms came around Heidi’s neck instead, dragging her back against her chest.

A hand came up and stroked the side of Heidi’s face, flattening her hair.

“Shhhhh,” the woman crooned. “It’s okay, baby. Momma’s here.”

Thea

She groaned, turning her head on the pillow, only to endure the throbbing pain that made the light from the windows feel like a thousand knives burrowing into her skull. A hand clamped over her forehead. It was cool and gentle. Thea heard the murmur of voices, first Rose’s, then Simeon’s. She opened her eyes in small slits, just enough to see Rose exit the bedroom and Simeon sitting vigil by her side.

“Thea.” Simeon edged closer when he saw she’d awakened. His familiar features were blurry. Thea tried to open her eyes wider, but it hurt too much. Her stomach still rolled with nauseating persistence.

“What happened?” Thea muttered.

“You fell down the stairs at the asylum. You’re at our house. Rose has been tending you through the night. Mrs. Amos insisted we take you there, but they have no spare room for you.”

Thea tried to journey through the fog of her mind. It was thick. But Effie’s face revived in her memory, and then her story. Thea struggled to sit, but she fell back against her pillow as Simeon’s hand pressed against her shoulder.

“Don’t try to move.” His fingers smoothed back her hair.

The weight of what she knew crashed in on her conscious mind.

“Edward Fortune!” Thea gasped.

“What?” Simeon leaned closer.

She felt as though she were speaking so loudly she was screaming, but perhaps she was only whispering. Thea couldn’t tell.

“He’s my grandfather.”

Simeon’s eyes widened. His mouth twitched.

Thea tried to push words past her dry mouth and thick tongue. “He fathered my mother with Misty Wayfair. He knew your grandmother Mathilda had killed Misty, and he—allowed it. Took the blame and put it on Fergus, so Edward would bear no shame.”

Simeon’s face darkened. Thea watched his shoulders stiffen as the truth barreled into him.

“The Fortunes took my mother in and raised her as a waif.” Thea’s words tumbled over each other, on a dash to escape before she forgot the details entirely. “She left them and must have birthed me. Before she returned to Pleasant Valley, she left me at the orphanage.”

Simeon’s gray eyes were turbulent, and again his hand brushed her forehead. “Shhh, Thea. You must rest.”

“No!” Thea blinked rapidly to avoid the feeling she might lose consciousness. “Mr. Fortune needs to answer for this. For my mother. She used to haunt your family, escaping the asylum at night to watch you. All of you.”

Simeon didn’t respond. The implications were there, and yet Thea thought she saw him calculating by the way his lips moved silently.

“She could not have been behind the deaths of my family,” he said, more to himself than to her. “At least not my mother or Mary. Penelope had already been dead herself. And, they died of melancholy.” Simeon dropped his gaze back to Thea. It was clear in his eyes that he no longer believed that. “Was it Effie?”

“No,” Thea whispered. “Not Effie. She hasn’t the mind or a reason to—to be a cause of your family’s deaths.”

“So, did . . . ?” The chair scraped on the floor as Simeon jolted to his feet, awareness flooding his features. “Edward Fortune. Did he kill my family? Did he allow the story of Misty Wayfair to propagate in order to drive away the Coyles from Pleasant Valley?”

Simeon stalked to the door, a purpose in his stride Thea had never seen before. As if Simeon had been awakened from a stupor of aimless wandering and hopeless resignation and now wished for closure. Once and for all.

“Simeon,” Thea begged. No. He didn’t understand. Mr. Fortune had no reason to make the Coyles his vendetta of death. He’d already had his purposes fulfilled. Mathilda Coyle had done so when she’d murdered Misty Wayfair in a misplaced jealous attack.

But Simeon didn’t seem to hear Thea. He looked over his shoulder at her, their eyes locking. Hers, attempting to plead for him to stay, and his, resolute that the truth of his family’s deaths might finally be uncovered.

“This will end. Today. The curse of Misty Wayfair will be over.”

The door closed firmly behind him.