Hex on the Beach by Kelley Armstrong
Chapter Three
Everyone gets more food and drinks, and Jonathan stokes the fire. Then Kennedy begins.
“Memorial Day weekend. 1969. The summer of love.”
Jonathan clears his throat. “The summer of love was sixty-seven. Also, Memorial Day didn’t become an official holiday until seventy-one.”
She glares at him. “Artistic license. Everyone knows what I mean. It was a late May weekend way back when.”
“Ancient history,” I murmur.
“Exactly. It was the sixties, when the summer of love came every year, and this one was no different. Unstable was having a massive celebration that brought people from across New England. Every campground and motel for fifty miles was booked. They say Old Man Cooper made more that summer letting out his fields for parking than he ever did planting crops. Bishop Street was so packed the fire marshal got involved and had to put up roadblocks, letting people in only as others came out.”
“It was busy,” Hope says. “Got it.”
“I’m setting the scene.”
Aiden nods. “Because the fact it was so busy allowed this girl to disappear unnoticed.”
“No,” she says. “The fact it was so busy makes it even stranger that she could disappear unnoticed. It suggests . . .” She waggles her brows. “Paranormal forces at work.”
Ani groans. Kennedy cheerfully flips her the finger and continues.
“Seventeen-year-old Lisa Lake came to Unstable with her parents and younger sister. There was some trouble the night they arrived, which is why people here remembered them after the incident. It seems the Lakes were strict church-goers. Plenty of those around Unstable, where no one sees anything wrong with being spiritual and believing in spirits. The Lakes were different. It seemed Mrs. Lake had seen a flyer for the festivities that mentioned spiritualism, and she thought that meant it was a festival for God-fearing folks. One that wouldn’t expose their girls to that free-love hippie nonsense. Imagine her horror when she discovered it exposed them to something far worse—the dealings of the devil.”
“Dum-dum-dum,” Hope intones ominously.
“Indeed,” Kennedy says. “Now, Mrs. Lake, being very organized—if not good with a dictionary—had booked a bed-and-breakfast right in town. Prime pickings. When she complained to the owner, they quite happily offered to cancel the reservation. Not as if they couldn’t fill it within the hour, probably at double the rate. But no, the Lakes had planned to spend the weekend in Unstable, and they were going to spend it there, whatever the cost to their eternal souls. That did not, however, mean they were going to do so quietly. Both Mr. and Mrs. Lake complained to every person they could. How could such a town exist in the modern, enlightened world?”
“Uh, because it is modern and enlightened?” Hope says. “Because it’s not 1692 Salem?”
“People tried to tell them that. You know Unstable. Live and let live. Consideration and co-existence. Etcetera, etcetera. We might not have been flying the hippie flag, but only because those ideals weren’t anything new here. So when the Lakes complained to locals, the locals calmly explained the roots of spiritualism and how it related to Christianity. They also assured the Lakes that they didn’t need to believe in any of it to enjoy their weekend. It didn’t help.”
“Never does,” Hope muttered. “Closed minds are closed.”
“Closed minds, and open mouths. Afterward, despite how busy the town was, people remembered them. The very angry couple and their very embarrassed teenage daughters.”
“Poor kids,” Marius says. “Are we sure Lisa didn’t disappear by sheer willpower? Praying the sidewalk would open and swallow her whole?”
“Oh, that’s been a theory. It didn’t happen on the sidewalk, though.”
“Tell us, Kennedy, how did it happen?” Jonathan says.
She grins at him. “So glad you asked. Well, it was Saturday night, and the Lakes were enjoying a history tour. Although one might say ‘enjoying’ was an exaggeration. You see, while it was billed as a history tour, this is Unstable. Every tour includes ghosts, because that’s what people want. This one started off very historical. When the first ghost appeared—figuratively—Mr. Lake complained, but his younger daughter begged to stay, which made others join in on the girl’s side. Harmless fun, and all that. Just a ghost or two with their history lesson. Nothing wrong with that. Mr. Lake relented and on went the tour. Soon it reached the old theater.”
Kennedy turns to Aiden, Marius and me. “You haven’t seen it. We’ll pop by tomorrow.”
“Or maybe we could take that tour,” I say. “The one for the anniversary.”
“Ooh, yes. That’d be cool. I’d love to figure out what happened.”
I try not to smile smugly at Marius.
Kennedy continues, “The theater is at the other end of Bishop Street. It’s the oldest building in Unstable. Or the bones of it are, at least. It was one of the first houses here, and the owners sold it to the town shortly after Unstable became Unstable. It started life as the town hall, with the stables and the barn being renovated into a museum and a small theater. When Unstable established itself as spiritualism-friendly, the need for performance space grew. The town hall was relocated, along with the museum. Today it’s a full-blown performing arts center. There’s a restaurant and patio and gift shop in the house, a large theater in the former barn and a smaller one in the former stables. Tours usually end in the house.”
“The ride exits at the gift shop,” Hope says.
“The gift shop and the charming patio where you can enjoy a hot spiked coffee and a delicious slice of homemade pie. The town staggers tours so they don’t all hit the theater at once. This particular tour reached it at about nine-thirty, just as dusk fell, when the real ghost tours are just starting up. They proceed around the house—after chatting up the charms of the patio—and into the smaller theater. At this point, the younger daughter complains of cramps. Her mortified mother shushed her, but the poor kid meant stomach cramps. She’d eaten a candy apple at the carnival and it didn’t agree with her. Yet even when she clarified, her mother still shut her down.”
“Nice,” Hope says.
“Yep, parents of the year, they were not. But this is significant for what happens next. The tour proceeds to the lounge of the larger theater. All of a sudden, the younger sister can’t take it anymore. She needs a bathroom right away. She races off. There’s a bit of a commotion over that, and the parents stay behind, arguing over whether to go after her or continue with the tour. Lisa stays with the tour. It moves from the backstage to the auditorium. They’re up at the front as the guide tells the story of a fair young milkmaid, Dolly, who walked into that very barn one day and never came out. Disappeared. And then, suddenly—”
“The lights go out,” Hope says. “Plunging the theater into total darkness.”
Kennedy turns to her. “Really? Really?”
“Did they?” Aiden asks.
Kennedy glares at her sister. “Yes, Hope stole the moment, but that is exactly what happened. It’s part of the performance. Just enough time to give people a scare, but not enough for them to freak out. The lights go out, and milk cans clink, and the image of a girl with milking cans flits across the stage curtains. No one pretended it was an actual ghost. It was just atmosphere. Theatrics.”
“But this time,” Jonathan intones, “it was different.”
“You, too?” Kennedy says.
“Adding my own theatrics.”
She rolls her eyes at him. “Fine. Yes. This time it was different. The lights came on as the shadow play rolled. People gasp and cry out, and then realize it’s a projection. Lots of laughs and elbowed ribs and ‘you thought it was a ghost, didn’t you.’ Just like normal. But then the younger sister comes in and says ‘Where’s Lisa?’ And Lisa is gone.”
“All right,” Aiden says slowly. “Not to state the obvious, but she must have snuck out the back exit when the lights turned off.”
“The back exits were locked from the outside. Yes, total fire-code violation, but this was the sixties, and with the overcrowded long weekend, they’d caught people trying to overnight in the theater. So they chained them up.”
“Out the main door?” Marius says.
“Closed. They would have noticed the lobby lights if it opened. They did notice when the younger sister came back inside that way.”
“Backstage doors?”
“Her parents were in there, still arguing over whether to go after the younger sister. Also, to get backstage, she’d have needed to climb onto the stage itself, which is five feet off the ground, and she wouldn’t have had time before the lights came on. She’d have been on the stage as the shadow played right over her. They’d have noticed.”
“All exits were accounted for,” Jonathan says.
Kennedy continues, “Lisa was standing right in the middle of the group. When the lights went out, she was there. Someone even heard her gasp. Lights come on, and she’s gone. It took a moment to realize it, because her family wasn’t there to notice, but there is no way she bolted out a door in those few seconds.”
“Could she have been hiding in the auditorium?” Aiden says. “Ducked into the seating and waited for her chance to escape?”
“Nope. After sending his assistant for the police, the tour guide—fearing Lisa had been abducted—asked two people to guard the only unlocked entrance while several guests searched the building. When the police came, they kept everyone there while the building was again searched. Every inch was scoured. There are no windows—it’s a former barn. No old tunnels. No basement. A small loft for storage, but that’s behind a locked door and they still checked.”
“You’re forgetting the—” Hope begins before Kennedy’s glare cuts her short.
“May I finish?” Kennedy says.
“It’s taking a while.”
Kennedy ignores her and turns back to us. “As Hope says, there is one more thing. Something that was discovered immediately. The younger sister ran in and asked where Lisa was, and everyone who’d been near her turned. Someone looked down. And that’s when the younger sister started to scream. Where Lisa had been standing . . . there was now a small pile of ash.”