Slow Burn (Rabun County Book 1) Read online

  SLOW BURN

  Book One in the Rabun County Series

  A Novel by Lisa Clark O’Neill

  With special thanks to Brian Koch for his incredible graphic design work and for being the person who pushed me to take this journey; to Sandra Clark for her eagle eye and too many other things to enumerate; to my Pigeons for the laughs and support which help keep me sane; to Kristina Costello and Catherine Hudson for their very helpful feedback; and to Doctor Colin Walters for not blinking when I ask him things like “Where’s the best place to stab someone if you want to make sure they die.”

  I’d also like to express my gratitude to readers Dawn Kuntze, Judi Rae Kesner, Leslie Holcomb, Susan Dolan and Tracy Foley for their assistance in choosing character names. Thank you, ladies!

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, places and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any mistakes are my own.

  Other Novels by Lisa Clark O’Neill

  The Sweetwater Series:

  Mr. Write

  Admit One

  Circumstantial Evidence

  The Swamp Witch

  Undertow

  The Southern Comfort Series:

  Serendipity

  Forbidden

  Deception

  Nemesis

  Obsession

  The Southern Comfort Prequel Trilogy:

  Malice

  Avarice

  Justice

  The Dahlonega Trilogy

  Shattered

  Shadows

  Shiver

  CHAPTER ONE

  THE abandoned house sat back from the road, beneath the partially denuded branches of a towering oak. At least, she thought it was an oak. Having grown up on the Gulf Coast of Florida, Adeline Walker wasn’t overly familiar with all the different varieties of deciduous trees. And God knew there were a lot of them. All decked out in shades of red and orange and yellow, they formed an undulating wave of autumnal color that made her feel like she’d left one type of sea for another.

  Fog swirled over the rocky ground – a fog so thick that she’d almost driven past the place without seeing it. But the sun had chosen that moment to make an appearance, and the watery light was enough to illuminate a hint of a red brick chimney and deteriorating white clapboard siding. An old tire swing hung from the oak tree, motionless in the still morning air. It looked like something out of an apocalyptic movie set.

  Making a spur-of-the-moment decision, Adeline pulled to the side of the road, holding her breath as her right-side tires left the pavement. The crunch of gravel was the only sound aside from the hum of the SUV’s engine. Her nerves were almost certainly unwarranted, but she was having a difficult time getting used to the way the ground here tended to simply… drop off, sometimes precipitously, mere feet from the road. She’d never considered herself to be afraid of heights, but when you’d lived your whole life in a state where the highest elevation was less than four hundred feet above sea level, navigating winding, mountainous roads felt a bit like riding a roller coaster without the benefit of a safety bar.

  Releasing that breath when the car didn’t plummet down the hillside, Adeline studied the space between the pavement and the house, looking for any indication of a driveway. If there was one, it was either obscured by fog or had been overtaken by vegetation.

  Frowning, she drummed her fingers on the steering wheel, debating with herself about whether or not to get out of the car. This area was unfamiliar, and while she didn’t see any obvious No Trespassing signs, that didn’t mean there wasn’t a property owner or nosy neighbor in the vicinity who wouldn’t think twice about coming after her with a shotgun. Everything she’d read suggested that Rabun County had a considerably lower violent crime rate than most of the places she’d lived, which theoretically should make her feel safer. But this was also the North Georgia mountains, and she’d seen her share of horror flicks. It was impossible not to imagine that old houses around these parts harbored psychopaths who made prize-winning chili from their victims.

  “You’re being ridiculous,” she muttered to herself.

  About the chili, most assuredly. That had happened in Texas, after all. And it was statistically unlikely that every ramshackle mountain homestead in the area contained a house of horrors. However, she was also practical enough to understand that her hobby came with a certain amount of risk. Abandoned properties were often a magnet for critters of various types, including the human variety.

  But that was why she carried pepper spray, wasn’t it? And she was wearing her tall leather boots, which offered protection from snakes and other small, ground-dwelling critters with a tendency to bite.

  Of course, there were large critters to consider as well, including – or so she’d heard – black bears. And despite being the beginning of November, the temperature wasn’t quite cold enough to provide assurance of hibernation.

  “Snakes and psychos and bears, oh my.”

  Realizing that she was finding more reasons to talk herself out of exiting the car than reasons to talk herself into it, Adeline figured it was best to move on for now. She hadn’t intended to go looking for abandoned houses this morning anyway, and hadn’t even brought her good camera. It made more sense to come back another time, when she was better prepared, and the conditions were more favorable. The fog added another layer of danger, both in walking around an unfamiliar property in an unfamiliar state, and in leaving the car parked alongside the road. Granted, she could turn on the flashers, but that amounted to a beacon drawing attention to the fact that she was trespassing. There were plenty of better ways to start the day than getting shot at or arrested.

  Just as she placed her hand on the gear shift, the sun, previously weak, broke through the fog. Climbing high enough in the sky so that the gossamer light turned molten, it illuminated the abandoned farmhouse in a way that made Adeline catch her breath.

  The golden hour.

  She wasn’t sure she’d ever seen it illustrated quite so literally.

  Knowing that she didn’t have much time, Adeline engaged her hazard lights after all. Killing the ignition, she double-checked the road for any oncoming cars before opening her door. Grabbing her phone from the console, she reminded herself to use caution as she navigated the hillside and crossed the drainage ditch. The last thing she needed was a twisted ankle out here in the middle of nowhere, where the cell service was sketchy at best.

  Prickly vines caught at her jeans, but most of the ground cover consisted of rotting tree limbs and multi-colored fallen leaves. The latter caused her to slide a little – her boots had been designed more for fashion than for hiking – and Adeline yelped as she fought for balance.

  But then she was safely on more level ground, and her artist’s eye took over.

  The single-story house wasn’t large, the frame construction simple. A wide porch wrapped around the front and one side, its only real architectural adornment. But the visual appeal wasn’t in the structure itself. Rather, it was the mood created by the decay, the nostalgia tinged with melancholy – and in this case, a hint of eeriness as well.

  She could easily see this transformed into the cover of a novel.

  Framing a shot of the mist winding around the base of the oak, climbing the crumbling foundation like some sort of ephemeral vine, Adeline’s blood pulsed with creative energy. It seemed like ages since she’d last felt truly inspired, or even semi-motivated to do what had previously brought her such joy.

  But then, she hadn’t felt much of anything lately.

  Yearning poked through that deadened emotional wall, and when she turned, managed to capture the very moment the sun speared through a broken window,
spilling liquid gold onto the worn floorboards of the porch.

  Startled into lowering the phone, Adeline could only stare. Talk about a personal metaphor.

  But then she had to shake her head. What was it called when people believed that nature somehow reflected their emotions? The something fallacy?

  Pathetic, she recalled. Probably because people were pathetic to believe the universe revolved around them.

  We’re all just dust.

  Heck, look at this place as an example. People had existed here once, carved out lives of hope and meaning, and now it was crumbling into nothing, returning to the earth. Was that nihilistic? Maybe. But it was also true. And it was that fine line, the balance between hope and meaning and the certainty that it would all end anyway that kept humanity moving forward. Or at least, it kept her moving forward. Artistically speaking, anyway.

  Realizing that she was wasting precious minutes caught up in her own head, Adeline returned her attention to what she’d come here to do. Take pictures.

  Of course, it wasn’t only the pictures that drove her. It was the back story, too.

  What must life have been like in this place? Was it simple and happy? Stressful and hard?

  She’d spotted a barn to the rear, in even worse condition than the house, as well as a small stone structure that she assumed was a well. Living as they had in what was a pretty remote area, she imagined they kept animals, maybe grew and hunted their own food – as so many people used to. That sort of self-sufficiency was almost incomprehensible to what she thought of as the on-demand generation.

  She wanted to peek through the windows, but the porch floor had completely rotted away in several places. It wouldn’t be quite as edifying or interesting, but it was certainly safer to explore the rest of the house from ground level.

  Not that the ground was exactly level. In fact, it sloped downward to such a degree on the left side that Adeline picked up a sturdy stick to help keep her balance. From somewhere nearby came the quiet babbling of a creek, the sound somehow amplified by the density of the misty air. Adeline imagined sitting in a rocking chair on that porch, listening to the sound of water rushing over stone, idling away the evening. She could all but taste the glass of ice-cold sweet tea, feel the hint of a breeze that eased the heat of a muggy Georgia summer.

  Drifting along, attempting to capture the ghosts of this place’s past, Adeline felt like a spirit herself. The fog created a sort of cocoon that gradually fell away as the sun gathered strength, spreading twin wings of warmth and light. Turning her face up to it, she felt a brief pang of homesickness, but the moment didn’t last. Maybe because the only home she’d ever known was no longer hers, sold so that some other family could fill it. With her dad gone, her stepmom hadn’t wanted to try to maintain it herself, and Adeline couldn’t blame her. But she also couldn’t help feeling like a boat cut adrift from its moorings.

  Walking around to the rear of the house, Adeline avoided a decaying, uprooted tree and the hole in the ground that it had left behind, but when she looked up, almost stepped backwards into it anyway.

  There was someone standing in the window.

  Scream frozen in her throat, she braced herself to run before realizing that it wasn’t a person. Rather, it appeared to be a dress, or maybe an old-fashioned housecoat. Upon closer inspection, she could see that it was indeed the latter, hanging from a peg on the back of an open interior door.

  Blowing out a breath, Adeline waited for her heart to settle back into its normal rhythm. With a half laugh for her own paranoia, she went to check out the new discovery.

  The window was part of a small addition, and the fact that neither it nor the siding matched the rest of the house suggested that it had been constructed later. Perhaps as the family grew, or when finances allowed. A mudroom or laundry, she guessed, given the vent cover on the outside wall. So, likely a necessity brought on by advances in technology. Adeline imagined the joy and quiet relief that must have come along with knowing a machine, rather than your own two hands, would now be responsible for the labor of washing.

  Coming around to the front of the addition, she saw that the door stood open, some sort of vine spilling through it like an especially forward guest. Adeline stood at the bottom of well-worn steps, her gaze fixed on the housecoat.

  The bold floral print appeared faded, whether from years of use or more recent exposure to the elements, it was difficult to say. Brownish stains – Adeline assumed that they must be oxidation from the wire hanger – marred the white trim around the neck.

  Something about those stains made her feel uneasy.

  It’s only rust. But still, the visual bothered her.

  Most of the places she photographed were almost entirely empty of stuff, the accoutrements of daily life and true indicators of human habitation. Sometimes a few items had been left behind, pieces that were too bulky or heavy to pack off, or simply no longer wanted. Old televisions that were out of date. Pianos that were out of tune. And while she’d gotten some incredible photos of those things, it was the personal items – the clothing, the broken toys – that truly spoke to her.

  Who were these people, who’d dwelled in this place?

  It was that question that initially pushed her into researching the structures she photographed, to talk to the neighbors. To track down remaining family members, if she could find them, and gather anecdotes and information. Short stories and tall tales. And eventually, she’d starting putting all of that information together, along with the photographs of the properties in question, into a blog.

  Somewhere along the line, she’d become a documentarian of the abandoned.

  It was a strange hobby, perhaps, for someone who’d never been a particularly great student of history – too many dates, and her brain didn’t do well with numbers. But these small slices of life were more of a microcosm of the past, and suited her not infrequent tendency toward melancholia.

  But now, staring at the housecoat, Adeline lowered her phone.

  On occasion, the urge to photograph and document was overridden by the sense that she should just let a particular thing be. Most places had been uninhabited for so long that the human energy had dissipated, but sometimes…

  Sometimes she could feel the remnants of emotion. Joy. Sorrow.

  And sometimes, a place simply felt wrong.

  She hadn’t gotten that impression when she’d first spotted the house, or even when she’d walked the rest of the property. Indeed, she’d been so blinded by the absolute perfection of the light, the setting, the mood, that she’d felt nothing but creative excitement.

  But now…. she couldn’t explain it. Then again, she rarely could. Bad vibes.

  Her logical mind wanted to reject the feeling as a product of emotion, or imagination. But having experienced such things for more than twenty years, she knew that no amount of logic could override it.

  The light no longer seemed warm, and indeed Adeline found herself shivering as she studied the open door. Glancing at her phone, she debated whether she should delete the photos she’d already taken. She wasn’t susceptible to superstition, like the idea that photographs somehow stole souls, but she’d gotten rid of images before. Images of places that, for whatever reason, caused a sense of soul-deep foreboding.

  Before she realized what she was doing, Adeline took a step back, and then another, putting distance between herself and the door.

  It was only when she found herself flat on her back that she recalled the hole she’d been avoiding.

  Staring at what had become a clear blue sky, Adeline was glad she’d pulled on her down jacket that morning. The overnight temperature may have hovered just below fifty degrees, but at least the almost absurdly puffy thing cushioned some of her fall.

  Taking a moment to do a systems’ check, Adeline determined that she was unharmed. Physically, anyway. Sitting up, she pushed her glasses back up her nose and reached for her phone, which she’d dropped as she was going down like… well, like the
tree which once occupied this hole. Seeing that no damage had been done, Adeline took a moment to appreciate the guy at the cell phone store who’d talked her into the screen protector.

  Her clothing hadn’t fared quite as well. Thankfully, the ground was dry, otherwise it would have been a lot worse than some streaks of dirt and bits of leaves. After brushing those off as best she could, Adeline patted her head. With a muttered curse, she pulled off her hat.

  Knit from bright yellow and orange yarn, complete with pompom, it had been a going-away gift from her stepmother. A bit of sunshine, Sally told Adeline, to remind her of home. It clashed horribly with her current hair color, which resembled an artificially flavored cherry soda, but the thought had been so well-intentioned that she didn’t even care.

  Several decaying twigs and pieces of bark were stuck to it, and Adeline removed them as carefully as she could. When one snagged, dragging a piece of yarn with it, Adeline found herself on the verge of tears.

  Not now. She wasn’t going to break down here. Not while sitting on her butt, after having fallen into a hole somewhere in the wilds of North Georgia.

  Granted, that was a pretty flimsy excuse for holding it together. But she’d been holding it together for the past six months, and she wasn’t about to give in now. Grief was a pernicious enemy, and if you didn’t remain ever vigilant, it could sneak past your defenses and destroy you.

  God knew it had nearly destroyed her before.

  Fighting to shove her emotions back into their box, and ignoring the mental image of her therapist’s disapproving expression while she did so, Adeline studied the doorway again, and the faded housecoat that hung there. A forlorn remnant of a life that was gone, but it no longer struck her as alarming. Maybe it was her own emotional state, the sorrow that kept trying to break through her defenses, that had colored her initial perception?

  Perhaps. But whatever the reason, the disquiet appeared to have vanished. The last of the fog had burned away, taking the preternatural magic with it, and it was just an old, falling-down house on a lonely southern mountainside.