The Girl and the Black Christmas (Emma Griffin FBI Mystery Book 11) Read online

  “What is the right path, Dean? Is it the one that brings you most easily through the maze? The way that is expected of you? Or is it the one you follow because it’s the only one your feet can follow with righteousness?” Xavier asks.

  “It’s a Thanksgiving-themed corn maze at a carnival,” Sam points out, his voice softer and higher with uncertainty. “They hand out candy corn at the end.”

  “You lay the bricks of your own path at your feet,” Xavier says. “You carry them with you and choose with every step. Do you lay them down where it’s easy, simply because it’s easy? Because the ground is smooth, and your way will be made clear for you? Or do you carry them on your back as long as you need to, creating your path even where it is hard? Where you’ll be challenged and torn apart, but where you know is the right place? Because knowing you are doing what’s right buoys your heart and makes your burden lighter?”

  For an instant, my breath stays locked in my lungs, and I can’t figure out which way to send it. Dean, Sam, and I stare at Xavier. I look at each of them, then at the two diverging paths in front of me.

  “Shit.”

  Tossing another handful of chickpeas in my mouth and washing them down with water, I head down the path marked “False”.

  Chapter Two

  “I’m pretty sure about this one. I know you have a filing cabinet of randomness in your head, but I’m going to go ahead and say you’re wrong on this one,” Dean says.

  Sam jogs up to me from the bathroom he made a beeline to as soon as we finally emerged from the maze a couple of minutes ago.

  “What are they talking about?” he asks.

  “The buckles on Pilgrim hats,” I say, letting the words out with a long breath.

  “They weren’t the fashion of the time, and they would have been far too expensive and showy for the Puritans. That would be like you going undercover in a diamond tiara,” Xavier says.

  “I think I could pull that off,” Dean protests.

  “They didn’t wear black all the time, either,” Xavier says. “That was their nicest clothes. Which is why they wore it for their portraits. They wanted to look their best. Which in my opinion is why individual portraiture is inherently problematic to anthropology and the tradition of commemorating generations for the future understanding of humanity.”

  “Why?” Dean asks.

  “It creates a false narrative. Are fossils posed so they look their best embedded in stone? Do beetles polish themselves up before crawling into sap and being encapsulated in amber? Pictures shouldn’t be a construct. They shouldn’t tell a story. They should be a candid slice of time. A moment laid to glass. As if you could breathe on it and it would come back to life for just that second,” Xavier says.

  “So, no wedding pictures?” Sam asks, wrapping his arm around my waist and patting my hip.

  “Those are fine,” Xavier says.

  “Why?” Dean asks.

  “Contextual meaning.”

  “How about Christmas cards?” I ask.

  “Social norm. But even those make me feel off. Fake scene, fake clothes. Pretending to celebrate. Are you wishing the people who get them a merry fake celebration? If you have to have a picture, it shouldn’t be of celebrating Christmas. That picture implies you are showing your celebration of the holiday for which you are currently sending greetings. Considering most people receive their cards well in advance of the holiday, you are implying you are sending a picture from the future, which is disorienting, or sending greetings from the year prior, which is certainly stretching the bounds of etiquette windows.”

  “What would you wear on a Christmas card?” Dean asks him.

  “A bathrobe.”

  My cousin looks at the little cellophane baggie of candy corn each of us was presented at the end of our trek through the maze. The supervisor slipped me a couple of extra since we were in there for more than four hours.

  “Alright, we’ve covered the Virginia-Massachusetts controversy. And the buckle inaccuracy. How about candy corn?” Sam asks.

  “Didn’t exist,” Xavier answers.

  “I mean the great mystery of the universe. Why are pieces of candy corn three different colors if it’s all the same flavor?”

  “To look like kernels of corn right off a cob,” Xavier says without a pause.

  Sam looks around on the ground and bends down to scoop up one of the discarded ears of corn that made its way out of the maze. He tilts it so he can look at one of the kernels still clinging to the cob.

  “Son of a bitch.”

  I laugh and wrap my arms around him, kissing him on the cheek.

  “One less mystery in the universe,” I say.

  In one fast motion he scoops me up and tosses me over his shoulder. I let out a squeal as he starts jogging across the carnival grounds toward the parking lot. We’re still laughing when he sets me down on my feet beside the car. It’s one of the very few still scattered across the swatch of gravel-covered ground. I’m pretty sure most of the others belong to people working at the carnival.

  The humor fades as we get in the car. We didn’t get into it this morning with any intention of stopping at a corn maze. Now we’re only a short drive from our intended destination and the heaviness of it is setting in.

  “We can go home, you know,” Sam says. “We can call this a success and just go home.”

  “I know,” I say. “It’s gonna be okay.”

  Sam smiles and kisses me as the others pile in the back seat. “It’s gonna be okay.”

  “Get a room, you two,” gripes Dean. Sam responds by dramatically wrapping both hands around my cheeks and making exaggerated smooching noises, which draws an uncontrollable giggle from me.

  “Okay, okay!” I breathe. “We’ve gotta go.”

  Turning the key in the ignition, I pull out of the gravel parking lot and onto the narrow back road that brought us to the corn maze. I drive in silence up to the main road and pause. It forks left and right. The sign perched on the corner only has arrows and the names of towns.

  “No question on this one to help you decide,” Dean says.

  “Yes, there is,” Xavier says.

  I glance through the rearview mirror at him behind me. He’s staring out the window but turns to look at me. I pull up onto the road and turn.

  “You sure?” Sam asks.

  I nod and he reaches over to squeeze my thigh.

  By the time we leave the highway and get onto another set of serpentine back roads, the sun is setting, and night is filling the space among the trees to either side of us.

  “Is he meeting us there?” Sam asks when we get on a narrow dirt driveway.

  “No,” I tell him. “Clancy said he would leave the keys for us.”

  “Is that a good idea?” Dean asks.

  “There are cameras now,” I say. “They keep an eye on it. They are a lot more particular about who rents it now.”

  “They need to just bulldoze it,” Dean says.

  There’s tension and pain in his voice, but I shake my head. “No. It needs to stay here.”

  “Why?” he asks as I pull the car to a stop and turn off the engine.

  “As a reminder,” I say.

  We get out of the car and a shiver rolls along my spine. The first time I was here, it was so cold it chilled my bones, and I felt like I would never get warm again.

  And just like that, I’m back where all of this started. Cabin 13, in Feathered Nest.

  “How long ago was it?” Xavier asks.

  I pull my eyes away from the cabin to look at him, my arms sliding up to wrap around myself, then turn back to the porch.

  “Four years.” I glance at him again. “Feels like a lifetime. But also as if no time has passed. As if I’m still here.”

  “You are,” Xavier says. “You walked across this ground and left footprints, softened the earth so plants could grow. You breathed and the trees drew it in. Those breaths are a part of the leaves and the shade. Whatever you touched took on your ener
gy and holds you there. Close your eyes. You can feel everyone who has ever walked through these woods. You’re still here, Emma. You always will be.”

  I take in a shaking breath as I walk across the open area in front of the cabin and climb the steps onto the porch. Kneeling down, I touch my hand to the wood right in front of the door. It’s painted now, but I can still see what it looked like four years ago. I can still see the blood seeping into the wood and the gash where Elliot’s belt buckle cut into it when he fell.

  The paint can’t cover the dip still left in the board. I touch my fingertips to it.

  “Then he’s here, too.”

  Chapter Three

  “I didn’t think I would ever want to come back here,” I say, leaning back against the porch support.

  “Why did you?” Xavier asks.

  “I told you. For him,” I say. “It’s the anniversary of his death.”

  After his breakdown just before Halloween, I thought he would understand. But the way he’s looking at me feels as if he can’t get his mind in that space. The truth is, I never know with Xavier. I don’t know what he sees when he looks at me, or what he hears when I speak. But I’m learning. We all are.

  “You could have gone to his grave,” he says.

  “You didn’t go to Andrew’s,” I point out. “You went to an abandoned amusement park.”

  “Does this place bring you peace?” he asks.

  I shake my head. “No. But it keeps calling me back.”

  “How about him?”

  “Elliot was here for me,” I say. “He was protecting me.”

  “Now you’re protecting him,” he says.

  My heart aches, a sharp pain going through the center of my chest. I nod and look down at the porch. The sun has long since dropped down below the horizon. The hazy glow from the porch light creates a pool in the center of the wood. It rolls down the steps before fading into the edge of darkness coming up from the woods.

  It’s a brighter light than last time I was here. After Anson was able to get into the cabin while I was here, Clancy went to great lengths to make this place safer. In each of the corners over my head a tiny camera trained on the front door ensures every person who climbs the front steps is recorded. I can’t see them, but I’m sure there are others.

  “Let’s go inside,” Sam says. “Unless you don’t want to. I’m sure Myrna has vacancies. We can stay there.”

  I climb to my feet. Part of me feels as if I should be crying. Or at least feeling that sting in my eyes. Something more than the crushing pressure in the middle of my chest. But maybe there’s a limit on how many tears you can cry for any particular place, and I’ve just run out for the cabin in the woods of Feathered Nest.

  “No, I came here for this. I slept here the night he died, and I will be here tonight,” I say.

  Just as Clancy promised, the keys are waiting for me in the mailbox attached to the wall of the cabin beside the front door. I use them to unlock the door and we step inside. Every time I come in here, it’s like going back to that first night.

  It’s no different than it was when I first arrived in Feathered Nest on the undercover assignment I thought was going to revive my career and get me off desk duty, where I had landed myself. That night I drove a beat-up rental car left for me in an empty parking lot outside the train station and wound up here. At first, I thought it was a mistake, but Creagan assured me it was the right spot.

  The furniture is the same. The quilt draped across the back of the chair gives me a bit of a sick feeling but is also oddly comforting. I won’t touch it. That can just stay right there, and I’ll be happy to curl up with the blankets I brought from home.

  But something about its still being there makes me feel more grounded. It’s a reminder of the type of humanity people sometimes forget exists. That bit of good and tenderness that can exist in even what seems like the worst and darkest. Reminders like that help me to keep my head on straight. They stopped me from spiraling into misery and getting taken over by bitterness.

  We separate into our bedrooms, and I grab pajamas out of my suitcase to bring into the bathroom. I shower off the remnants of the corn maze and go into the living room to curl up on the couch. Xavier is sitting at the other end, reading.

  “Where’s Dean?” I ask.

  “Physically?” he asks without looking up.

  “Yes,” I say.

  “In his room. He’s unpacking and said he wants to take a shower.”

  “Well, Sam’s in there now, so unless he wants to get really cozy with him, he’s going to have to wait a bit,” I comment.

  Xavier shrugs. “It would be environmentally responsible.”

  I tuck that away as viable reasoning and stand back up. Wrapping my blanket around myself to ward off the chill, I walk over to the built-in bookshelves along the back wall and browse through the titles.

  “This is why I love books,” I say a couple minutes later when I’ve chosen an old favorite and I’m curled back up on the couch.

  “The cover art?” Xavier asks.

  I glance at it. “No. But that’s a nice detail, too. I like that I can depend on it. It’s the exact same every time. Can’t use up a book.”

  “Sure, you can,” he says. “Electronic copies of library books are used up.”

  “Okay, yes,” I say. “Once you’ve gotten through your borrowing time, they disappear. But they still exist. And you can borrow them again, and they’ll be the same thing.”

  “They won’t be the same,” Xavier says. “You can read a book over and over, and it’ll be different every time. It relies on the moment you read it. Just like every breath you take in is not the same. Every time you blink is not the same. Why do you kiss Sam?”

  “Because I love him,” I raise an eyebrow, attempting to follow the detour in the conversation.

  “Is every kiss the same?”

  “No.”

  “Right. Because every moment isn’t the same. You kiss because that moment needed a kiss. And the moment changes it. It could mean hello or goodbye. Good morning or good night. Thank you or you’re welcome. I’m sorry or I forgive you. It’s the moment that matters. The same as a book. When you read, your existence melds with the book. It becomes your reality as much as your reality becomes a part of the story.

  “The man who sat beside you in the bus becomes the voice of the neighbor. The little girl who disappears at the beginning of the book looks like your best friend’s grandchild. You visualize the towns you’ve visited and the restaurants you’ve eaten in. What you love becomes what you love in the book, and the fears of the characters become your own. It’s immersive, but also transient. It’s like when you watch a movie made from a book. It probably doesn’t look exactly like what you thought it would, because you’re seeing the experience another person had with that book.”

  “I’ve never thought of it that way,” I say.

  Xavier nods. “I’ve heard that before.”

  I laugh. “I’m sure you have.”

  We settle into silence as I turn to the book in my hands. It’s one I’ve read a dozen times before, but the first sentence feels different. I read it again, and rather than rushing on to the next, I let the words linger. They roll around in my mind, and I think about each one of them before they melt into my thoughts.

  “Why are we here, Emma?” Xavier asks.

  I look to the end of the couch. He’s still sitting just as he was, his eyes traveling across the words on the pages in front of him in a smooth, continuous sweep. It doesn’t even look as if he’s reading. The movement reminds me of old photocopier machines, where the bright green glow slides from one side to the other to scan what’s on the page. His eyes are just absorbing the words.

  It’s the same question he’s already asked, but there’s a shift in the meaning.

  “When we were in Harlan investigating Lakyn Monroe’s disappearance and murder, Dean asked me why I was staying in a hotel room, when I could have just rented a house for t
he time I was going to be there. You answered and said I couldn’t do that because I didn’t want to make Harlan my space. You said people become their surroundings,” I say.

  I can still hear his words. “Your surroundings become your identity. They are your reality. You can always hope for something different, or dream that you’re somewhere else. But you are where you are. There’s never a guarantee you’ll be anywhere else. This isn’t where she wants to tie her soul.”

  “That’s right,” Xavier says.

  “My soul was tied here a long time ago, before I even saw this cabin, and I feel as if I am still trying to figure out the person these surroundings want me to be,” I say.

  “So, tell me,” he says. He puts down his book and looks over at me. “Maybe I can find you.”

  Chapter Four

  Thirteen years ago …

  Julia ran up the brick steps of the impressive house, only stopping on the porch for a few seconds to smooth the hair away from her face and straighten her shirt. She didn’t want to look as if she’d run the entire way, even though she was late.

  These days, she always felt as if she was running late. No matter how hard she tried to balance everything, it was as if she was never able to stay caught up. There was always something she didn’t get to on time, or something she had to miss because there were a dozen other things she needed to finish.

  It hadn’t always been like this. There had been a time when she felt as if she had it all together, as if she had her life under control and could handle whatever was coming. She wished she could say she didn’t know what had happened to change it. At least then, there would be a chance things could turn around and she would be able to claw her way back.

  But that wasn’t the case. Julia knew exactly what had shifted. She saw a hill in front of her and climbed to the top. When she was there, she felt as if she could see everything. The world stretched out in front of her. The future she’d envisioned from the time she’d known what it was to see more than a few days ahead was there, in bright, vibrant color. With details so crisp she could have believed they were already real.