Darkest Journey (Krewe of Hunters #20)(31)

She laughed. “Not movies.” Then she sobered. “The FBI, being an agent, it’s more than a living for you, Ethan. And that’s great. Listen, I won’t be a sniveling coward forever. I won’t take up all your time, or you’ll never be able to do what you came here for.”

“I’m not worried. I know you don’t plan to monopolize my time, and anyway, I actually know how to manage my own time. I’ve cleared the decks, so I can spend the day on set. So...” He paused as he went to wash out his cup. “Whenever you’re ready, Ms. Moreau,” he said, setting the cup in the dish drainer.

“I’ll just grab my things.”

As they headed out, he turned and looked back at the house. “You should get an alarm,” he said.

“We’ve never needed an alarm. We’ve had the same neighbors for ages.”

“You need one now.”

She fell silent as he opened the door to his SUV for her, and she stayed silent as he got behind the wheel and started to drive.

She couldn’t help thinking about the way she’d felt the night before—afraid. Certain someone was outside.

Someone who was watching her.

And just might want to get in.

“Kind of ridiculous of me,” she said aloud as they stopped at a light. “Two men were killed. Not women. And men in uniform, too. I’ve done my dad’s reenactments, but I’ve never played a soldier. Some women did disguise themselves as men and join the army, and some of my friends have played those women, but I’ve always been a nurse, except once when I was a general’s wife. So it really was kind of silly of me to get so spooked last night.”

He glanced her way. “Nothing is silly when people have been killed,” he said.

“Well, I don’t usually... I don’t know why I was so frightened last night. If someone was hanging around outside, it was probably just some homeless guy feeling desperate and just looking for a place to sleep out of the elements. Anyway, I’m sorry, and thank you.”

“Like I said before, not a problem.”

When they reached the filming location, Charlie was surprised to see how pleased everyone seemed to be that she had brought Ethan. They were all staring at him like some kind of savior.

“Did you see the way they were all looking at you?” she whispered to him when they were finally alone before he headed out to the makeshift dressing rooms.

He laughed. “There’s at least one forensics show on cable almost every hour of every day. People think every case can be solved in an hour. Too bad it’s not true.”

“Is there such a thing as a perfect murder? Do people get away with it?”

“In my opinion, no, there’s no such thing as a perfect murder. But do people get away with killing? Yeah, sadly. Sometimes. But not this time, Charlie. We’re not going to let it happen this time.”

He gave her an enigmatic look and moved on.

Charlie headed to a bigger tent where she would have her hair and makeup done, as well as get into costume. They put her in spike heels and a pencil-skirted business suit, miserable clothes for running around in a field. She was playing an executive assistant who had just discovered fraud and shady dealing at the highest level in the film’s fictional oil company.

Her scene took place just prior to the one they had been filming the day she’d stumbled upon the dead man.

She tried not to think about that.

To distract herself, she ran over the backstory for her character, Dakota Ryan, in her head. Dakota had been concerned for a while about things going on at the company. Now, having driven out to the bluff to deliver an important message to one of her bosses, she was about to come upon him in a clandestine meeting with a state senator. The senator planned to rig things so that the oil company could drill and lay pipe in an environmentally sensitive area, where it would damage the riverfront, but the increase in production would provide a huge profit to the stockholders. Once they discovered her presence, the two men took off after her, clearly intent on murder.

She went over her lines in her head as she changed.

When she stepped out, she froze for a minute.

The Confederate cavalry officer from that long-ago night was standing right there.

No, she realized, he was there in the flesh.

This wasn’t a ghost, it was Ethan Delaney.

He was wearing a Confederate cavalry officer’s uniform, complete with gloves and rakish plumed hat, not to mention a blond wig. She couldn’t help being taken aback by his startling resemblance to a dead man.

A ghost...

A ghost who had come to her aid.

“A wig?” she asked him.

He grimaced. “Yeah. Jennie thought it would be perfect.”

“It is, but you do know...”

“I do know what?”

“You look like him.”

“Him?”

“You mean you don’t know? You look like Anson McKee—Captain Anson McKee. You know who I mean. You must know.”

“Are you talking about the ghost who brought me to you?” He shook his head. “I didn’t realize. It must be the wig. The uniform’s pretty typical for Confederate cavalry captains of the day.”

“Maybe,” she murmured. “You seriously look like you could be his great—well, I don’t know how many greats, but his many-greats-grandchild.”