Chapter 30 - The Shadow from the Old Woods
The storm came down from the Gulf of Alaska in the final week of October, howling through the coastal gaps with a ferocity that shook the old timbers of the Holloway Victorian.
It was nearly midnight. Cassidy sat before the roaring stone fireplace in the great room, a drafting table covered with next season’s replanting maps pulled up to her armchair. Outside, the rain drove against the tall bay windows like handfuls of river gravel, the wind groaning in the crowns of the two-hundred-year-old Douglas firs surrounding the estate.
The telephone on the mahogany credenza rang.
Cassidy paused, her pencil hovering over the map. Calls at this hour were rare; the estate lines were private, routed through the security gatehouse at the bottom of the mountain road.
She stood up, walked to the credenza, and lifted the heavy receiver. "Yes?"
"Cassidy?" It was the voice of Deputy Miller, crackling through the static of the storm-battered line. "Sorry to call so late, but we have a situation at the South Gate."
Cassidy tightened her grip on the receiver. "What kind of situation?"
"The state hospital in Eugene reported an unauthorized departure early this morning," Miller said, his tone grim and laced with professional anxiety. "Eleanor Vance signed Arthur out on a temporary medical transport pass for an eye clinic visit at nine AM. They never arrived at the clinic. Two hours ago, a vehicle matching Eleanor's station wagon was spotted at a gas station five miles outside the county line."
Cassidy felt a cold draft slide across the floorboards, though all the windows were latched. "Arthur can't walk, Miller. He’s paralyzed on his left side."
"He might not be walking, Cassidy, but someone is driving him," Miller replied. "And that's not the only thing. The station wagon didn't come alone. The attendant at the pump said there was a second vehicle following them—a black commercial utility truck with out-of-state government plates."
"Government plates?" Cassidy frowned. "What kind of government?"
"The attendant didn't catch the agency, but the driver was asking questions about the old boundary survey from 1984," Miller warned. "The private access road behind Section Twelve. Cassidy, I have two units heading up your way right now, but with the downed trees on the lower pass, it's going to take us forty minutes to reach the main house. Lock your doors and keep your security wardens inside."
The line went dead with a sharp, static pop as the wind rattled the outside power transformers.
The lights in the Victorian flickered twice, then extinguished completely, plunging the vast house into darkness broken only by the orange, leaping glow of the dying hearth.
From the upstairs landing, Wren appeared, wrapped in a heavy robe, holding a flashlight. "Cassidy? Was that the storm?"
"Stay upstairs, Wren," Cassidy commanded, her voice dropping into the familiar, battle-ready calm she had forged over a lifetime of Vance family ambushes.
She walked to the hall closet, retrieved a heavy brass rechargeable lantern, and switched it on. The beam sliced through the shadowy expanse of the stone hallway.
Suddenly, from the gravel drive outside the front veranda, came the heavy, grinding crunch of oversized tires rolling over wet stone.
No siren. No flashing blue lights.
Cassidy stepped to the bay window, easing the thick velvet curtain aside by an inch.
Idling in the driving rain, their high-beam halogen headlights cutting blinding cones through the mist, were two vehicles. The first was Eleanor’s battered station wagon, its rear end sagging heavily under the weight of luggage.
The second vehicle was a massive, unmarked black four-wheel-drive suburban, its engine rumbling with a low, predatory vibration that reverberated through the stone foundation of the house.
The driver’s door of the black truck opened.
A man stepped out into the pouring rain. He did not look like Donald, nor did he move with Arthur’s frail, broken stumble. He was tall, broad-shouldered, dressed in a tailored charcoal storm coat, carrying an aluminum field case. He walked around to the passenger side of the station wagon, pulled the door open, and effortlessly lifted the frail, twisted frame of Arthur Vance into a heavy-duty all-terrain wheelchair.
Eleanor stepped out behind them, shielding Arthur with a large golf umbrella, her face pale, determined, and lit by a terrifying, desperate fanaticism.
The man in the charcoal coat turned toward the house. Even through the sheets of rain, Cassidy could see his face clearly under the porch lights.
He had Cassidy’s high cheekbones. He had Cassidy’s dark, almond-shaped eyes.
The stranger walked up the stone steps of the veranda, pushing Arthur’s chair through the torrential downpour. He did not knock. Instead, he produced a heavy brass key—identical to the antique master key Aunt Clara had left in the trust vault—and slid it into the heavy oak front door.
The brass lock clicked.
The door swung slowly inward, letting the freezing gale and the roar of the Pacific storm pour into the darkened foyer.
The stranger stood in the entryway, water streaming from the brim of his hat, his dark eyes fixing directly upon Cassidy with an expression that held no malice, but an unfathomable, terrifying weight of history.
Behind him in the wheelchair, Arthur Vance’s twisted mouth worked silently, his one good eye gleaming with a vindictive, dying fury as his paralyzed hand pointed a trembling finger at Cassidy’s chest.
May you like
The stranger reached into his coat, pulled out a thick document stamped with the raised red seal of the Oregon Supreme Court and a military probate docket from 1991, and laid it flat upon the entry table.
"Good evening, Cassidy," the man said, his voice deep, resonant, and carrying an accent from a life lived far beyond these mountains. "My name is Julian Vance Junior. And you are living in my father’s house."
