NIGHTMARE-BY-THE-SEA

  by

  J.R. RAIN

  Jim Knighthorse Series #6

  Acclaim for the novels of J.R. Rain:

  “Be prepared to lose sleep!”

  —James Rollins, international bestselling author of The Doomsday Key

  “I love this!”

  —Piers Anthony, bestselling author of Xanth

  “Dark Horse is the best book I’ve read in a long time!”

  —Gemma Halliday, bestselling author of Spying in High Heels

  “Moon Dance is absolutely brilliant!”

  —Lisa Tenzin-Dolma, author of Understanding the Planetary Myths

  “Powerful stuff!”

  —Aiden James, bestselling author of Plague of Coins

  “Moon Dance is a must read. If you like Janet Evanovich’s Stephanie Plum, bounty hunter, be prepared to love J.R. Rain’s Samantha Moon, vampire private investigator.”

  —Eve Paludan, author of Letters from David

  “Impossible to put down. J.R. Rain’s Moon Dance is a fabulous urban fantasy replete with multifarious and unusual characters, a perfectly synchronized plot, vibrant dialogue and sterling witticism all wrapped in a voice that is as beautiful as it is rich and vividly intense as it is relaxed.”

  —April Vine, author of The Midnight Rose

  Other Books by J.R. Rain

  JIM KNIGHTHORSE SERIES

  Dark Horse

  The Mummy Case

  Hail Mary

  Clean Slate

  Night Run

  Nightmare-by-the-Sea

  Easy Rider (short story)

  STANDALONE NOVELS

  Winter Wind

  The Body Departed

  The Pale Cold Light

  Silent Echo

  Elvis Has Not Left the Building

  All the Way Back Home

  Killer Whale

  The Grail Quest

  The Lost Ark

  Nightmare-by-the-Sea

  Published by J.R. Rain

  Copyright © 2025 by J.R. Rain

  All rights reserved.

  Ebook Edition, License Notes

  This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

  TABLE OF CONTENTS

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-one

  Chapter Twenty-two

  Chapter Twenty-three

  Chapter Twenty-four

  Chapter Twenty-five

  Chapter Twenty-six

  Chapter Twenty-seven

  Chapter Twenty-eight

  Chapter Twenty-nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-one

  Chapter Thirty-two

  Chapter Thirty-three

  Reading Sample

  About the Author

  Nightmare-by-the-Sea

  Chapter One

  The drive up the Pacific Coast Highway was long and tiring.

  Somewhere along the way, we spotted a massive bird riding the thermals. Cindy swore it was a rare California condor. Endangered, majestic, blah blah blah. I told her condors were mythical creatures, right up there with Bigfoot, Thunderbirds, and pterodactyls.

  “Pterodactyls were real, Jim,” she says, already sounding tired of me.

  “Yeah, in Jurassic Park.”

  “Jurassic Park was about dinosaurs.”

  “No, it was about dragons.”

  She groans. “You can’t be serious.”

  “You call them dinosaurs. I call them dragons. We can agree to disagree.”

  She moans and slumps back against the seat. Yeah, we’ve been on the road for hours, and the fog hasn’t lifted once. The highway winds like a drunk snake, guardrails flirting with thousand-foot drops. My eyes are tired, my shoulders ache, and Cindy’s about one bad pun away from strangling me.

  The thing about coastal fog is that it doesn’t quit. It follows you everywhere, crawls inside the car with you, settles in your bones.

  Yeah, I might be in a bad mood, too. Not seeing the road ahead (or behind) for dozens of miles will do that to a fella.

  Soon, we crunch into the gravel lot of the Gull’s Nest Inn, a two-story place perched above the crashing surf like a drowsy pelican. Or maybe more like a seagull in a food coma after stealing a hot dog and churro from a toddler. The sign out front sways in the breeze, its hand-painted letters faded by salt and time. A wooden cutout of a seagull with a french fry clenched in its beak is nailed to the post.

  “I already like this place.”

  “I think the seagull is your spirit animal,” Cindy says.

  I kill the engine and lean back in the seat, stretching my arms behind my head. “Because it’s bold, majestic, and not afraid to fight for what’s his?”

  She looks at me sideways. “Because it squawks constantly and eats garbage.”

  Touché.

  We’ve been overdue for a vacation. Scratch that: we’ve been overdue for a normal vacation. No corpses, no upset clients, no chasing perps through backyards and up into tree houses. No sprinklers going off and dogs trying to attack my ankles. Just me, Cindy, a queen-sized bed with fluffy pillows, and some suspicious seafood.

  Unfortunately, the weather forecast here is going to be rough this week: wind and fog, lots and lots of fog.

  Great.

  The Gull’s Nest sits just south of Carmel-by-the-Sea, which means it’s technically not in Carmel and thus about $200 cheaper per night. I get our bags from the trunk while Cindy checks us in. The lobby is small, cozy, and overloaded with nautical décor: wooden helms, model ships, and a fishnet ceiling full of plastic crabs.

  The innkeeper, a man who looks like Santa Claus if he retired and opened a B&B, beams at us like we’re his long-lost family. His name is Harold, and he watches me a little too closely.

  Hmm, not sure what I did to offend him.

  “Welcome to the Nest!” he says, powering through whatever momentary glitch had seized his mind. “You must be Mr. and Mrs. Knighthorse!”

  Cindy corrects him, smiling. “We’re not married... just forever dating.”

  Yeah, that’s a dig on me for not popping the question after all this time. Cindy’s full name is Cindy Jeanie Darwin, and just so happens to be related to that Darwin from the history books. It’s why she got into anthropology in the first place.

  “Room Nine’s all ready for you two. Upstairs, ocean view, fireplace, and the best water pressure this side of Monterey.”

  I smile, appreciating his energy and the water pressure.

  Cindy takes the old fashioned key from his hand while I lug the bags upstairs. With my gimp leg no longer so gimp, I can lug with the best them. Room Nine is exactly what I was hoping for: charming, cozy, big bed, a balcony with a view. The sound of waves crashing is just soft enough to make me believe I’m in a Starbucks commercial. Oh, and there’s even a small welcome basket on the dresser with local jams and, weirdly, two sand dollars tied together with a ribbon. Sand dollars... those pale, palm-sized discs that look like fossilized cookies. I toss them to Cindy.

  “For your China hutch,” I say.

  “I don’t have a China hutch.”

  “Then for your sock drawer.”

  “Wonderful.”

  We unpack slowly, savoring the lull, while I mull over just how to build Cindy a China hutch. First, I would need a crap-ton of tools. Oh, and a working knowledge of how to use said tools. I bashed heads in high school and college and, later, in life. I’d never had to use my hands to build anything, but I wasn’t against the notion. As I ruminate aloud, Cindy suggests we could always just buy one at an estate sale.

  Once we’ve unpacked and have officially ditched the China hutch idea altogether, Cindy curls up on her side of the bed with a supernatural mystery novel about her favorite vampire mama, a gal I’m pretty sure I’d met in real life, but, obviously, that’s impossible.

  Then again, I did meet God at a McDonald’s, so anything is possible.

  As she reads, I do what men have done since time immemorial. I test the bed’s bounce factor with a flying atomic elbow drop. This earns me a stern glare from Cindy and a reminder that I’m not ten.

  In response, I promptly roll her into a figure-four leg lock. She squeals in laughter and bucks, but there’s no escaping a figure four. Just ask Hulk Hogan.

  “Tap out,” I say.

  “I’m a proper cultural anthropology professor at UCI,” she grunts. “I don’t tap out.”

  “Tap out, woman!”

  “I tap, I tap.”

  “You have to actually do it,” I grunt, applying pressure. “You don’t say it. Duh.”

  “But I don’t know how to tap out!”

  “Like this,” I say and show her.

  “There, I tapped. Satisfied?”

  I release her. “I accept it.”

/>
  “I see your leg is feeling a lot better.”

  “Better than ever.”

  “Maybe you should try mixed martial arts, then,” she says. “Might burn off some of that pent-up energy.”

  I wag my eyebrows. “I can think of another way to burn off my pent-up energy.”

  “Leg locks don’t lead to sex, mister. When will you ever learn?”

  “Love hurts.”

  “Not my knees!”

  With that excitement behind us, we shower, change, and head down for dinner. From what I can tell, the inn is basically an oversized bed-and-breakfast, which just so happens to be two of my favorite pastimes.

  Dinner’s served in the inn’s small dining room at seven sharp. Communal table, cloth napkins, and a chalkboard menu listing “rosemary halibut” and “foraged mushroom risotto.” Pretty fancy for a guy who downed nearly three dozen chicken nuggets less than four hours ago.

  The other guests trickle in, each one straight out of a murder mystery playbill: there’s a young couple who barely speak to each other, a retired actress with teased hair, giant costume jewelry, and a commanding voice. Then there’s a middle-aged guy with a British accent and overly white sneakers. And finally, a lone woman who sits stiffly, arms crossed like she’s shielding herself from the entire world.

  She sits farthest from the table, doesn’t introduce herself, and leaves half her risotto untouched.

  Cindy nudges me.

  “What?” I whisper.

  “You’re already doing it.”

  “Doing what?”

  “That thing you do,” she murmurs in my ear. “That Sherlock thing.”

  I toss my well-used cloth napkin onto my plate. “I beg your pardon, madam!”

  “I’m willing to bet you’ve already stripped everyone in here down to their bare bones.”

  With my outburst going mostly unnoticed, I lean back in my chair and sip the wine they brought out. Local vineyard. Fancy label. Tastes like pine cones.

  “Well, if you want to get specific,” I say, “I’m betting the guy in the sneakers teaches yoga but somehow ended up with a stress fracture in his left foot. He’s been wincing and favoring it all dinner. There’s also a tan line on his ring finger from a band he doesn’t wear anymore.”

  “Where do you get yoga instructor from?”

  “He looks like a douchebag.”

  “I can see that. And he probably just took the ring off.”

  I shrug. “Vacation.”

  “Thus… douchebag.”

  Fran tops off our glasses with more of the weird pine-flavored wine. But when she reaches the severe-looking woman at the head of the table, she switches to a different bottle, one I haven’t seen on the table all night, and pours that instead.

  The woman takes a sip, then makes a face.

  “Bad wine,” Cindy muses. I can only agree. To the lady’s credit, she drains the entire glass; must have been thirsty. My own glass of the piney stuff goes untouched the rest of the night. Same with Cindy. We know good wine when we see it.

  Dinner wraps with some sort of citrus tart and weak coffee, which at least washes the taste away. Still, I can’t help noticing Fran carried that special bottle back to the kitchen like it was something worth guarding.

  Meanwhile, Cindy drags me out for a short moonlit walk along the bluff, and I try not to ruin the moment by pointing out how perfect this spot would be for disposing a body.

  Back in the room, we read for a bit, listen to the waves, and fall asleep with the windows cracked open. The air is damp and full of salt and brine, and maybe a hint of seagull feces.

  Around three in the morning, I wake to the sound of wood creaking in the old structure. Maybe someone walking the hallway just outside our door. Maybe even someone trying not to be heard, but the creaking gives them away.

  I sit up and listen. The sound stops. I lie back down.

  Light footsteps, I think. A woman, likely.

  The ocean keeps crashing. Beyond the windows, the fog rolls in even thicker.

  Tomorrow, someone will be dead. For now, it’s just night one of what could still be a relaxing vacation.

  Emphasis on could.

  Chapter Two

  Mornings in Carmel don’t so much begin as nervously creep in.

  I awaken to a soft light bleeding in through the sheer curtains, the kind of light that promises absolutely nothing: no sunshine, no warmth, just chilly vibes. Cindy’s already up, standing barefoot at the window, mug in hand, hair a glorious mess that somehow still looks like she’s in a shampoo commercial.

  “How did you sleep?” she asks, smiling and turning. There’s a chance I might have whistled at her, and mentioned how her legs looked in those shorts of hers.

  “Just fine until the haunted floorboards started creaking,” I say, sitting up.

  She frowns. “Say again?”

  “Probably just the old house settling,” I say, sitting up and stretching. “Or someone trying to sneak a late-night snack.”

  “Did you investigate?”

  “No. That would’ve required pants, and there was nothing to investigate. Just some creaking. I didn’t hear a scream or a fight.” Though I might have heard a small gasp. Definitely heard a door click shut. That’s what happens when you stay at an inn with thin walls, but not enough to get worked up over, even if the creaks, the gasp, the click did trigger something within me.

  Yeah, I probably should have gotten up, with or without pants.

  Jeans on, we head down for breakfast, which is served in the same dining room as dinner. The long communal table is back in action, but the vibe is different this morning. Tense. Electric.

  A few of the guests are already seated. The British guy, Graham, gives us a nod, his grin carrying the overeager energy of someone desperate to look laid back. The young couple leans over a plate of melon slices, arguing in hushed tones that do nothing to hide the tension. And Marjorie, the retired actress in full aging-Hollywood glory, looks spent, her eyes half-lidded like she’s still under the spotlight.

  She stands at the window, tilts her head just so, and exhales through a menthol sigh. “Darlings, the coffee tastes like ashes, but I forgive it... because look at this horizon. It’s practically begging for a monologue.”

  Cindy and I move past her, grabbing warm plates and warmer coffee. We exchange polite nods with everyone.

  But something’s off.

  I do a quick headcount. One guest is missing, though it’s still early. Undoubtedly, one of us is still asleep. But, man, I can’t help but feel like something is wrong.

  The tense woman from last night, the one with crossed arms, a clipped voice, and the kind of attitude that comes from a steady diet of Dateline reruns, Reddit forums titled “Unsolved and Terrifying,” and way too many Gregg Olsen true crime books, isn’t here.

  “Someone’s missing,” I whisper to Cindy.

  “Who?”

  “The angry one.”

  She looks around, frowns. “She wasn’t angry... just, I dunno... on edge, maybe. And she’s probably just sleeping in.”

  I shrug. We’ll see.

  The innkeeper, Harold, lumbers in from the kitchen carrying a tray of cinnamon rolls and a smile that’s only slightly forced. He sets it down, claps his hands, and gives a chipper “Good morning, Nesters!”

  No one responds. His presence, even with the cinnamon rolls, doesn’t relieve the tension in the air.

  “Well, okay, then,” he mutters.

  He moves to pour himself a cup of coffee but pauses as he glances toward the lobby, frowns, and scratches his white beard. “Strange,” he says under his breath.

  “What’s strange?” I ask, not bothering to hide my curiosity. Or the fact that my superhero-level hearing picked up what he said.

  Harold blinks at me, perhaps surprised that he finds himself in the company of an Avenger. “Oh, nothing. Just... I haven’t seen Miss Holt this morning. She’s usually up early. Even said something about catching the sunrise from the bluff, too.”

  “She sat at the head of the table?” I ask.

  He nods. “Yes, that’s her. Claire Holt. Checked in three nights ago. Quiet sort. Early riser, though.”

  I place my hands on my narrow hips. “Want me to go check on her?”

  Harold hesitates, then shrugs. “If it’s not too much trouble, Mr. Knighthorse. She’s up on the second floor, Room Seven. Few doors down from you.”

  I’m already moving with Cindy at my heels...