Gone and Done It (15 page)

The connection ended. My hands shook so much that I pulled over and dug out the amethyst crystal. I ran my fingers over the smooth stone until a sense of calm returned. Buster Glassman was not a nice man. He’d threatened me all right. He’d threatened to ruin my business and suggested that a traffic accident was in my future.

Was it possible that Buster, a man from one of the “better” families, had strayed across the line between right and wrong? I believed it. But how far into the garden of good and evil had he strayed?

Had I just conversed with a killer?

He couldn’t threaten me and get away with it. I changed my destination from the morgue to the jail. Leaving my gun in the truck, I blustered my way past Tamika back into Sheriff Wayne Thompson’s lair.

He hung up the phone as I entered. Tamika must have warned him I was here. A thick stack of folders occupied the center of his desk. He yanked off his reading glasses and rose. Tension radiated from his athletic body. His eyes narrowed in speculation.

I sailed on in as if I had an engraved invitation. “I thought you should know Buster Glassman just threatened me.”

Wayne gestured to the empty chair. He continued to regard me with his cop eyes. “Sit.” We sat.

“He said he would ruin me,” I stated.

“You want to file an incident report?”

“Nope. I’m here to tell you this man is a worm.”

“Already knew that.”

“An evil worm. He hinted that Larissa and I would get into a nasty traffic accident.”

“We should write up a report.”

“I don’t want a report. I want him to behave.”

He leaned forward with a boyish grin. “You want me to rough him up for ya?”

A squeak came out of my throat. “I want to go about my business without having to worry about Buster Glassman breathing down my neck.”

“What does he want?”

“He thinks I can help him. You know, use my psychic powers and make him rich.”

“Can you do that?”

I shot him a look of exasperation. “If I could do that, would I be worrying so much about my unpaid bills?”

Wayne shrugged. “I can’t arrest him for being a jerk or he’d’a been rotting in jail for years. He’s got a mean streak when it comes to women.”

Buster had a mean streak, and we had a dead woman. That information ping-ponged through my head. “He does?”

“Roughed up a couple of escort women a few years back.”

“Escorts? He can’t get a date?” I blinked. “We have escorts in Sinclair County?”

“Nah. He got tangled up with a pair of Savannah women four years ago. Their pimp beat the crap out of him. Knocked out both his front teeth. That perfect smile? Fake, just like him.”

“Is he a suspect in the Mallow woman’s murder?”

“Absolutely.”

“Am I still a suspect?”

“Absolutely. I am not close to solving that case. Can’t ID the chick.”

“I have a favor to ask.” I swallowed around a lump in my throat. “I want to see the woman. The dead woman. I want to see if there’s anything I can learn from her.”

“You’re not working the case. You’re a suspect.”

“I understand, but if I learned anything that leads you to hard evidence, that would help us both. Win-win.” I echoed Buster’s words to me.

“I don’t know. It sounds irregular.”

“Of course it’s irregular. But since when have you played one-hundred percent by the rules? You could have a deputy there to make sure I didn’t destroy evidence.”

“The autopsy is complete. There is no evidence to destroy. All we have is a woman who was shot.”

Shot. I had suspected that but hadn’t known that for sure until now. Hmm. Maybe I wouldn’t suck at investigation. “What else do you know?”

He waved dismissively. “It’s all in Gail’s autopsy report. A young female of mixed race. Mid-twenties. Physically fit and pretty.” He paused as if remembering her features. “She had a nice rack, all natural. I verified them myself.”

I rolled my eyes. “Nobody reported this woman missing?”

“She doesn’t match any missing person report in the state.”

“May I see her?”

He studied me. Was he weighing the pros and cons?

I amped up my campaign. “I have seen a dead body before, and I didn’t pass out. Plus, I helped you flesh out Buster Glass-man as a murder suspect. He had opportunity with his easy access to the property. Now we know he had the means as well. All you need is a motive, and you’ve got your man.”

“Or woman,” he added sternly.

“I want to clear my name. I need this job consulting for the sheriff’s department. Please let me try with the dead woman. It won’t cost you anything.”

“I know that. I’m hesitating for your sake. Right now you’re a civilian. If you clear your name and consult for us, you will be forever stuck with images of dead people in your head. Is that what you really want?”

“I want to keep a roof over my head. I want to pay my bills in full. I want a chance to make it on my own. If my best shot at self-sufficiency is through helping you, so be it. I’ve got dead people in my past and in my future. Daddy handed off his dreamwalker job to me, though that isn’t a paying job either.”

Wayne tapped his fingers together, his expression thoughtful. “What the hell. Let’s give it a shot.”

The morgue occupied the back of the Marion Funeral Home. We didn’t have a hospital in the county. Marion Funeral Home was the only game in town for dead people.

Billy Ray Jordan, funeral director, greeted us in the spacious but rundown foyer, once the parlor of the former home. Billy Ray could have given Dr. Sugar lessons in being a walking cadaver. His threadbare suit hung on his narrow frame, but his dark brown eyes glinted with intelligence.

“Got a new lead on the victim’s ID,” Wayne said. “We need to take another look at the body.”

Billy Ray’s eyes rounded. “You talk to Dr. Bergeron about that?”

“Dr. Bergeron isn’t running the murder investigation. She’s the acting coroner right now. That’s the extent of her authority.” Wayne pointed to the shiny gold badge on his waist. “This says I’m in charge. You got a problem with me looking at my murder victim?”

Billy Ray’s hands shot up in defeat. “No problem, sir. Right this way.”

We walked down a narrow hallway, dimly lit by an overhead globe. Billy Ray opened the door at the end of the hall and traces of the former residence vanished. This room was all stainless steel, chilled air, and a wall of people-sized vaults.

My nerves flared up, past the cautionary range of yellow alert, all the way to orange, one step away from a full-fledged panic attack at red alert. I reached for my moldavite pendant. I needed the momentary calm before I plunged into the abyss.

“Change your mind?” Wayne asked.

In that moment I knew he’d expected me to fail, knew he thought I was too much of a wimp to do this. My competitive instinct rose to the challenge. “Yeah, I’m ready.”

Wayne glanced toward the door Billy Ray had just exited through. “Get going. We’ve probably got five, maybe ten minutes before Gail gets here.”

I listened to the sounds of the house, extending my senses through the walls. Sure enough, I heard the funeral director talking on the phone. I nodded. “He’s calling her right now.”

“Figured as much.” He slid out a metal shelf complete with a body bag. “Her face is messed up from the bullet. You can do the woo-woo thing with her shoulder or arm or something, right?”

My gaze fixed on the zippered bag as he opened the black bag, sliding the zipper past the bandaged head, exposing a pale shoulder and an arm. The chill of the room infiltrated my defenses. I caught the rancid odor of meat gone bad, and my gut clenched. I gripped the edge of the metal table for support.

“Baxley?” Concern etched the grim brackets around Wayne’s mouth.

“I’m okay.” I removed my pendant and handed it to him. Icy cold air socked me hard, the antiseptic scent of the room no match for the decay processes in this woman’s body.

I zoomed past red alert as my head filled with whispers of those who’d passed through this room. I swallowed hard. I could do this. I would not go insane. I wouldn’t become a whack job like my Uncle Emerald.

With iron resolve, I touched her pale shoulder. Her flesh was cold to my touch, cold and hard. Time stretched and folded and spun. I tumbled through the vortex of time and space, anchored to the dead woman. Snatches of conversations blasted past at alarming speeds. My head whipped this way and that, until I remembered my early training.

“Don’t fight it,” my father had said all those years ago. “Think of it as a roller-coaster ride through a fun house. You’ll be where you’re going in a heartbeat. All the rest is blurred scenery along the route.”

I visualized sitting in a small, open car with the woman, and the whirling tumbling freefall lessened. We coasted to a stop in a wooded area. I stepped from the car into the moonlight.

A hooded figure waited alone. Another person approached wearing a fedora, the wide brimmed hat shading the person’s facial features. Both people in the dreamscape were of average height and weight; both radiated high levels of tension.

“Hello?” the hooded figure asked. “Who’s there?”

It was a woman’s voice, thin and trembling with emotion.

“He isn’t coming, you fool. Did you think I wouldn’t find out,
Lisa
? Did you think I didn’t know about your weekends at Warm Springs? You will never see him again.”

Hat person’s voice was low and dangerous, a barely controlled rage. I couldn’t tell if it was a man or a woman. I shuddered in dread at what was to come.

“I don’t understand,” Lisa continued. Fear tinged her voice. She edged back toward the ring of trees.

I silently urged her to run, but this dreamscape from the dead woman’s mind wouldn’t allow me to interfere. I could only watch events unfold like a movie reel, knowing that it would turn out bad.
Focus.
What can I take back to the real world to help us solve the case?

Both participants wore dark clothing, and I saw neither face. I didn’t need to see the dead woman’s face, but I keenly wanted to view her interrogator’s face. The shadows deepened.

“Your boyfriend missed your last little appointment, didn’t he? You sent him an email to his private account. It’s over, whore. You can’t have him.”

Ah, the aggressor felt betrayed. The pieces fell into place. Lisa was in a love triangle.

“We never meant to hurt you,” Lisa said.

“A little late for apologies, don’t you think? I could have forgiven him for another slight indiscretion, but you’ve been going at it like bunnies for three years. Three years.”

Lisa kept stepping backward. Her killer matched her step for step. Fear radiated from Lisa’s body. “Run,” I screamed. I ran to her side, shouted in her ear. “This person’s going to kill you.” My words fell on deaf ears. I was the ghost here. I couldn’t change the past. A sob ripped from my throat.

“He loves me,” Lisa insisted. “We are building a life together.”

The killer slowly pointed a gun at Lisa. “He will never leave me, you fool. The money is mine, and he is a slave to my fortune. You’re roadkill on the highway of his life.”

Lisa’s hands went up, shielding her face and torso. “No! I don’t believe you.”

The killer’s gun leveled out shoulder high. “Believe this.”

My gaze riveted on the pistol in the killer’s hand. It looked like Roland’s Glock, maybe smaller. The killer was right-handed. A filigreed silver ring glinted in the moonlight. The gun roared. Lisa fell backwards on the ground, her face imploding into an unrecognizable mass of flesh and bone.

I tumbled back through time and space, drawn to my earthly form by a sense of urgency. Nothingness ebbed. I gradually became aware of a woodsy fragrance. Of strong arms wrapped around me, of comforting warmth.

Wayne’s arms.

Wayne’s dark eyes drilled into mine. “Hey there.”

The room stopped spinning, but I still felt boneless. “What happened?”

“You started to fall. I caught you.” His gaze warmed.

Heat rose from my shirt collar. Starch returned to my spine. “Thanks. You can let me go now.”

His face loomed closer. “Not just yet. I’ve a mind to take some compensation. You’ve put me to a lot of trouble recently.”

Tucking my chin, I pushed against his very solid chest. His thickly muscled arms didn’t yield. “Don’t.”

The door opened. Gail Bergeron swept in, her short blond bob shimmering with outrage. “What kind of sick people are you? Good God Almighty, Sheriff. Can’t you conduct your tawdry affairs someplace other than the morgue? What the hell kind of town is this? Is every male jacked up on testosterone?”

Wayne pressed my necklace into my hand and stepped in front of me. Calm sped through me, easing the ragged transition from dream world to the present. I wasn’t ready to conduct brain surgery, but I didn’t have to. All I needed was to get Wayne away from Gail so that I could tell him what I’d learned about the victim. Then I’d be one step closer to being a psychic consultant for local law enforcement.

“Dr. Bergeron. What a surprise.” Sarcasm edged his voice.

Gail hustled over to the pull-out shelf. With brisk efficiency, she zipped up the body bag and stuffed Lisa back into the refrigeration unit. “What is the meaning of this? I’m in charge of this morgue.”

Wayne had her by at least six inches, maybe more, but the state archaeologist’s voice rang with authority, making her sound ten feet tall. Instinctively, I edged toward the door, hoping to avoid further confrontation.

“You may be in charge of the morgue, Doctor, but I’m running the murder investigation. We are investigating a lead.”

She arched a pale eyebrow. “Is that what they call it down here?”

Gail’s bulldog tenacity concerned me. If I left, she’d come after me, snapping and growling all the way. With Wayne’s pit bull mentality, this dogfight wouldn’t settle anytime soon, not without damage control.

With a sigh, I stepped around Wayne. “I can explain. The strong smell in here made me woozy. The sheriff caught me before I fell.”

“I’ll bet he did,” Gail said. “I won’t have it. I’m writing a report to my superiors about the irregular activity in Sinclair County. Bo Seavey won’t be the only one out of a job.”