AllFreeNovel
Share Us
34
They drove from the hospital back toward Gaffer’s Ridge through beautiful rural countryside, a single road cutting through flat green farmland, with copses of trees dividing the fields. The mountains were closer here, tree-covered with a soft and hazy fog lacing over them, impossibly magnificent. Griffin turned onto an unmarked single-lane road that immediately wound upward. Pines and oaks were summer full, their branches so thick over the road they nearly met to form a canopy. The temperature was cooling and Griffin cut the AC. Everyone opened windows and breathed in fresh, sweet-smelling air.
He said, “Last winter when I was driving across the country to Washington, I stopped in Gaffer’s Ridge. Jenny and Aimée Rose and I hiked for a week, didn’t matter when it snowed. I couldn’t get over how clean the air was, how the sun glistened off the snow. No cars, only the outdoors and the trees. It’s gorgeous country, endless mountains, make you feel like you’re standing on the earth’s backbone.”
Savich said, “Katie Kettering, the sheriff of Jessborough, Tennessee, says the same thing—the mountains are forever at your back, like a neighbor you can always count on.” He turned in his seat and said matter-of-factly to Carson, “Griffin told us about the gift you have. Did it surprise you?”
As if he were talking about the weather. Carson cleared her throat, saw Griffin nod at her, said to Savich, “I’ve been told it’s a gift—well, that’s what my mom calls it. Like I told Griffin, it’s always a shock, makes me crazy when it happens. Luckily, my mom didn’t haul me to a shrink when I told her. She believed me.”
Griffin asked, “What did your father say?”
“No way would I ever tell Dad. I can see his writer’s brain latching onto it, making me the subject of his next book, or maybe he’d try to fit me in with his current project—on Freud. No, thank you. But with you, Griffin, it was the first time I’ve actually communicated with someone. I guess it’s a gift, since if we hadn’t connected, I might be dead and buried with those poor girls.”
Griffin said to Savich, “Carson and I talked about this last evening. I told her it’s sometimes like that with you and me. Well, on occasion.”
They stopped talking to let Griffin navigate the sharp switchbacks up the narrow single-lane road. It sometimes passed a mere few feet from a sheer drop, and there was only the occasional turnout dug into the side of the mountain to allow an oncoming car to pass. But they saw no traffic, not a single car or truck. He said, “Jenny told me this is a private road, mostly a private mountain, really. She said she didn’t know of anyone who came here.
“She told me the Bodines are treated like royalty, well respected by the locals, but not exactly liked. She added no one ever crosses them, or appears to want to. Then she paused a second, and warned me to be careful.”
Sherlock said, “I’m wondering how Mrs. Bodine would fix us—what she actually does to ‘shine’ someone.”
Savich said, “That’s one of the reasons I want to meet her, to find out what this ‘shining’ means.” He remembered how Blessed and Grace Backman could control most anyone they wished to control—they had their own word for it, ‘stymie.’ He turned and smiled at Sherlock. She started, then looked wary. It went straight to his gut, but he said nothing.
Griffin pulled the Range Rover to a stop when the road simply ended. They saw a large sign on curved metal hanging on a freshly painted white gate, EAGLE’S NEST. There was a weathered dark wooden call box next to it.
Griffin said, “Why would someone want to name their property after a Nazi hangout in Bavaria?”
Carson said, “My dad told me Hitler disliked Eagle’s Nest because of his fear of heights, and who cares? Sorry.”
Griffin leaned out of the driver’s side window and pressed the call button. A woman’s deep voice answered. “What do you want, Agent Hammersmith?”
Griffin looked for a camera but didn’t see one. He raised an eyebrow at Savich as he said into the call box, “Since you know my name, ma’am, you probably also know why I’m here. Just to be sure, we’re FBI and we’d like to speak to you about your son, Rafer. You are Mrs. Cyndia Bodine?”
“Of course I am. Yes, I see you brought some reinforcements. Wise of you.” The gate buzzed open.
Wise of him? Griffin pulled through, looked back to see the gate close behind them. “I don’t see any cameras.”
“I don’t, either,” Carson said. “Guys, I really don’t want to be shined. Whatever that means can’t be good.”
Savich said, “We’ll see if she tries anything. Too bad for her son, Rafer, but it appears he can’t shine anyone or he surely would have tried it on you, Carson.”
The road didn’t widen when Griffin was through the gate. It narrowed a bit. At least the asphalt was new and the curves were less sharp, which was something. There was no railing on the cliff side, only stout-looking gnarly bushes planted every three or so feet. Carson said, “Those bushes are meant to keep your car from going over the edge? They look sturdy, but I doubt they’d stop a rabbit on a bicycle.”
Sherlock laughed, and was very glad Griffin hugged the mountain.
In five hundred feet they reached a flattened clearing near the top of the mountain, at least two hundred feet wide. In the back, on the very edge, stood an ultramodern structure of glass and painted black wood. Beside it was a huge garage. Across the way were what looked to be a guest house and storage sheds, and around all of it was a wide, perfectly landscaped yard, bordered by a thick forest.
