“Ice cream. We need ice cream. Meet me in the freezer section.” Her cart thumped along, squeak, bump, squeak, bump, as she fanned her heated face. She yanked out a carton of Caramel Delight, and a reflection appeared in the glass, right there beside the Chunky Monkey. Her heart froze. Russell! She whirled, searching the aisle for his dark blond head. It couldn’t be Russell. He was in Florida.

“Hello, Bree.”

She yelped and spun again, and the carton of ice cream shot out of her arms like a torpedo. “Peter!” Peter Rourke was a homicide detective. One of her grandmother’s dearest friends.

Peter chuckled, retrieved the ice cream from the floor, and placed it in her cart. “I swear, you remind me of Emily. Haven’t seen much of you since the funeral. You doing okay?”

“Good as can be expected.” Bree glanced toward the aisle where she’d left Faelan and saw him park the cart near the restrooms. “I still miss her. I think I always will.”

“Me too.” He sighed. “I’m glad I ran into you. I stopped by…”

She tuned him out, her thoughts racing. She had to get rid of Peter before Faelan got back. She took a couple of steps backward so she could see Faelan coming before Peter spotted him. Thank God they’d put the tote bag with his old clothes and boots in the car. How would she explain that? How would she explain Faelan? She wasn’t even sure who he was, what he was.

“…strangers in the area.”

“What did you say? Strangers?”

“You sure you’re okay?”

She nodded. “What about strangers?”

“A couple of campers saw something suspicious near your place.”

“Suspicious?” Breathe in, breathe out. Had someone seen her dragging Faelan out of the crypt? If the world found out about him, she’d lose him. Someone else would solve her mystery.

“This morning, before sunrise. They were pretty shaken, rambling a bunch of nonsense about… well, it won’t do any good to go into that. Must have been watching too many scary movies, but we had to check it out.” He paused and leaned closer. “We found a body in the woods behind your house.” His voice dropped to a whisper. “It was bad, Bree. I’ve never seen anything like it.”

Bree’s legs felt like a paper doll’s. A dead body? In her woods? Was that the scream they’d heard? “Who was it?”

“Don’t know yet. We’re talking to the campers. The man was… torn up,” Peter said. “Or else an animal got him. He’d been dragged through the woods.”

She remembered the shadow outside the bathroom window. Had she seen the killer?

“Whatever or whoever did it was big. And strong.”

Strong. Like Faelan, who’d looked ferocious enough to uproot a tree with his bare hands when she’d followed him? And she was almost certain he’d tried to hide a bloody footprint. But he was with her when they heard the scream, and he hadn’t been out of her sight long enough to kill someone and drag him through the woods. “I haven’t seen anything.”

Maybe he had. That might explain his desire to leave.

“Call me if you do. Better yet, why don’t you stay with me for a few days? I’d feel more comfortable if you were away from there.”

“Thanks, but I’m expecting some books I have to sign for. I’ll be careful.”

“Just like Emily,” he said with a wistful smile. “You could fill a room with all those books. Well, promise me you’ll be careful. We’re trying to keep this quiet, but your grandmother would come back and haunt me if I didn’t warn you. Maybe get that young man of yours, the archeologist, to stay for a few days. We’re patrolling the area, but it wouldn’t hurt to have a strong man around.”

She had a strong man around, but was he the one they were looking for?

“Did you know they have toilets on the wall—” Faelan stopped short when he saw Bree wasn’t alone. His gaze darted between Peter and Bree. He was still several feet away, but it was too late to pretend she didn’t know him.

“And this is?” Peter asked quietly, his shrewd cop eyes assessing Faelan and the loaded shopping cart.

“Faelan. He’s here for a visit.”

“Unusual name. Been here long?”

“Since last ni… last night.” Drat.

“I hope you didn’t pick him up somewhere.”

Did a graveyard count? “No, I’ve known him… seems like forever.”

“Is he staying at the house?”

“Yes. No. I mean, he’s leaving.”

“Does Jared know he’s here?”

“Not exactly. Do you think you could not mention him to Jared… or anyone?”

One eyebrow lifted. “One horse at a time, girl,” he whispered as Faelan approached.

Bree introduced the two men and maneuvered a hurried conversation in which Peter briefly explained the incident again, scrutinizing Faelan as he spoke. “I’ve got to get back to the office. Just stopped to get coffee. Call if you need me, Bree. Faelan, nice meeting you.”

Faelan muttered a reply, staring at the street outside, his eyes narrowed, body stilled. A tingle tiptoed across Bree’s arms. She followed his gaze, subconsciously looking for Russell’s dark-blond head.

“Let’s go home. We have enough food for now.” She took the ice cream from the second cart and hurried Faelan to the checkout. His jaw dropped as he watched the items being scanned. He asked the lusty-eyed cashier to charge him for the half a pound of grapes he’d eaten, and she simpered and sighed, paying more attention to him than the groceries sliding past. Bree was certain at least two items made it into the bag without being scanned. When the third item missed the scanner, she started to mention it, but alas, it was a box of extra large condoms.

***

The tall man reached inside the coffin and removed the metal object hidden under the corpse’s hand. He stared at it, stunned. God in heaven, it was true.

This was far beyond what he’d expected. He needed help.

***

“You did this?” Faelan asked, looking at the newly sanded floor in one of Bree’s second-floor bedrooms. Sweeping and scrubbing floors was a woman’s work. Refinishing them was not.

“I’m doing the smaller stuff myself. Grandma’s dream was to restore this house to its former glory. I’m going to finish it for her. And the chapel, too. There’s still a lot of work to be done. My sander broke. I’ll have to finish this room by hand, but it keeps me occupied until I go back to my job.”

“You work outside your home?” He’d assumed her grandmother had left her provided for, since she had no husband to take care of her.

“If I don’t have a job, I don’t eat. Come on, I’ll show you where you can sleep.”

It wasn’t enough that he’d brought hell to her door. He was a burden on her purse as well.

Bree led him to the room across from where he’d slept last night. “You can sleep here.” There was a dresser, one table, a chair, and a small bed frame without a mattress. He wasn’t sure if he’d fit on the bed, but was pleased to see a window facing the graveyard so he could keep an eye on the crypt. No point in sending the time vault back when he’d need it for Druan, but it wasn’t safe to leave unguarded. At least he’d hidden the key.

“We’ll have to get a mattress from the attic.”

“Are you sure you won’t—”

“I told you, I’m not going to stay with Biff. This is my house. I’m not leaving.”

If he could drive that confounded thing she called a car, he’d throw her over his shoulder and take off. If he had a horse, he’d do it anyway. “A man’s been killed not a mile from your back door. It would be prudent to leave.”

“Prudence has never been my forte. I’m sure it was a fight between two campers or a wild animal attack.”

It wasn’t an animal. He knew that scream. It meant one thing. They were here. But did they know he was?

“I don’t suppose the trip jogged your memory,” she said, stacking the rest of Faelan’s new clothes on the chair.

“No.” He knew she doubted his story, but he couldn’t tell her the truth, not until he knew for sure who she was. “Do your doors and windows lock?” he asked, resuming his inspection of the room.

“Yes.”

“Keep them locked. And stay away from the graveyard.”

“Why?”

Because something was out there. And it wasn’t human. Not fully. “You mentioned your great-great-grandfather was killed out there.”

“In the chapel, not the graveyard. A falling stone hit him. And I think I’m perfectly capable of deciding whether or not to visit my graveyard. Somebody has to pull the weeds. I’m going to start dinner.” She stalked out of the bedroom and left him staring after her.

He’d never seen anything like her. She was intelligent, beautiful, and he felt some kind of connection to her that scared the hell out of him, but he’d never met a woman who explored caves and searched graveyards for treasure, not to mention let him get away with things that would’ve had a woman of his time hysterical. He hoped she wasn’t touched in the head.

It could be she wasn’t scared because she was the one who’d brought them here. He looked around the room, relieved it was simple, with no newfangled devices. He’d seen enough modern inventions to make him wish he was still in the time vault. Automobiles and airplanes and buildings that reached the sky. He touched his pocket where he kept the phone she’d insisted he have, claiming someone could talk to him on it from the other side of the world. If anyone knew he was alive.

The quest for knowledge and convenience in this time was alarming. Nothing was left unexplored. There was some machine or apparatus to do anything a person might want. It seemed to him people had more need for things now, and less for each other. If this generation knew what evil walked among them, their technology wouldn’t be so prized. If he didn’t find Druan, all the knowledge and all the gadgets in the world wouldn’t save them.