In the Arms of Stone Angels (19 page)

“You're down there, somewhere. Aren't you?” I whispered, hoping White Bird would hear me and would know I was coming.

Like Joe had told me, I followed my heart and headed down toward the water. And with every step, I thought about what he'd said about my journey, that it wasn't only about finding White Bird. I had to remember every encounter, every incredible sight, every sound and every creature from hell. Joe had said everything would be important to remember and I trusted him.

As I made a mental list of what I'd seen—picturing me doodling in an imaginary notebook so I wouldn't forget things—I hiked down to the water's edge. I trekked the rocky bank and peered into the depths of the gem-colored water. On the pond's calm surface, I saw the reflection of the brewing storm. The dark clouds rolling in were a striking contrast to the cool serene water.

Something on the glistening water brought images of White Bird to my mind. Glimpses of our past bubbled to the surface as I gazed into the shimmering pond. I should have felt at peace here, walking beside the still water, but I didn't. Nothing was normal in this place and a bad feeling gripped me hard. I picked up my pace and my search grew more frantic. Something lurked beneath the water and when I peered into the depths, I wasn't sure what I was looking for.

Until I found it.

“No! Oh, God. Please.” I gasped and collapsed to my knees. When I stared into the murky bottom of the pond, I was shocked at what I saw.

White Bird's body floated just beneath the surface of a deep underwater chasm.

He wore only jeans and his dark hair was long, as I'd always remembered it. Tiny bubbles dotted his eyelashes and clung to his lips. His handsome face looked pale, blanched by the water. Suspended beneath the surface, he lay perfectly still.

He looked more dead than alive.

“Oh, no. Please…no.”

The blow of seeing him like this took my breath away and my eyes brimmed with tears. I don't know how long I cried, but I was still sobbing when I finally waded into the water. Nearing the edge of the chasm, I wasn't sure the underwater rock ledge would hold me, but I didn't care. I had to see him. And if I could reach him, I wanted to hold him in my arms. He looked at peace in his watery grave like someone lying in a coffin. A rush of grief and shock welled inside me and I couldn't believe it was over.

“Why did you do this?
Why?
” I screamed. And the echo of my voice carried across the mountainous crater….

I slipped my hand into the water to touch him. Rings of shimmer lit his face before my outstretched fingers cast him in shadow. And I swear to God, I saw something move. I yanked my hand back and gasped.

White Bird's eyes had opened wide.

I'd scared the shit out of him—and he'd returned the favor.

“Oh, my God. It's really you.” My voice cracked. “And…you're alive.”

When I held out my hand to him, I expected White Bird to swim toward me and grab it, but he just stared at me with a pained expression. Only his eyes moved. His arms and legs floated limp beneath the surface of the water. He showed no relief that I had found him, and looked more worried for me than about what was happening to him. That made no sense.

“Can you move?” I yelled. “Blink once for yes, twice for no.”

With a strained look on his face, he slowly blinked twice.

He was beyond my reach. And after I looked around, I didn't see a lifeline that could help me haul him in. I thought about doing the whole lifeguard thing. I could pull him to shore, but maybe I'd get stuck alongside him. There were no guarantees of normal in bizarro world.

“We don't have a lot of options.” I chewed the inside corner of my lip and considered my next move. And when I stared down at him, he looked even more worried.

“Are you tied down? Once yes, twice no,” I asked, but none of my game of twenty questions was getting us anywhere.

There was a very good reason I hated charades—because I was friggin' bad at it. Besides, my thinking was wrong. The guy was submerged and still alive. The water where I'd waded into was cold, but not unbearable. But the deep chasm where White Bird floated, that was as frigid as glacier water. And in this strange place, he didn't have to be anchored to anything. Nothing in this damned nightmare was like anything I'd ever seen. I had to think out of the box. And whatever I decided to do, I'd have to do it really fast.

What the hell!
I sucked in a deep breath and jumped in.

Shawano Sheriff's Office

Will Tate took an early shift break and spent it at his desk, checking the messages dispatch had told him about. He'd gotten a return phone call from the customer service department at TimeOnMyHands.com, an online seller of watches. A guy by the name of Jon Fischer had left his direct dial number.

“Hot damn.” He grinned.

Will had the urge to rush to his desk and play his end of phone tag, but it might be helpful to have the watch with him when he called the retailer back. Even at this hour, these East Coast businesses had twenty-four-hour customer service departments. Maybe Jon Fischer was a night shift guy like he was. Will headed to the evidence locker to retrieve the watch he'd found near the crime scene.

After placing a few earlier calls to Bulova, the manufacturer of the watch, he'd lucked out in learning that the timepiece was pricey enough to be unique. Its striking blue face was distinctive and it had a stainless steel band with a clasp, but
the real identifier was etched inside. The watchmaker had told him how to retrieve a number etched on the back, inside the mechanism. That number could ID the specific watch and by backtracking transactions, they could isolate the retail seller. With any luck, eventually he'd find out who had bought it and where it had been shipped.

And Will had been able to speed up the process by telling the Bulova customer service guy that the watch would have been purchased longer than two years ago. Because his inquiry was part of a murder investigation, the manufacturer had fully cooperated and expedited their response. It hadn't taken long to isolate the online seller as TimeOnMyHands.com.

Will was getting closer to finding out who owned the property that was now evidence in a murder investigation.

“Hey, Walter. How's it going?” Will smiled at the evidence clerk as he signed the log to retrieve the watch. “I need the Madsen box.”

“Comin' up.” The clerk flipped the sign-in sheet around and glanced at what Will had written. The guy was a stickler for rules. And that was a good thing.

After Walter pulled the box and shoved it over the counter, Will opened the lid and reached inside the case file. The watch would have been on top, where he'd left it. But it was missing.

“Did anyone check this box out today?” Will looked more carefully. Maybe the timepiece had slipped deeper into the box.

“Don't know. I'm night shift, but I'll have a look.” Walter read through the log and shook his head. “No. You're the last signature I have for that case. You missing somethin', Will?”

“Yeah. Most likely, my mind.” He narrowed his eyes and
backtracked over what he'd done with the evidence, but came up with the same answer.

The watch was missing. And no one had signed out for it.
What the hell was going on?

“You want me to leave a note for the morning crew?” the clerk asked.

“No. I'll come in early tomorrow and look into it. No problem.”

Will had taken photos of the watch, but without the real deal those digitals might not hold up in court and be difficult to place in the context of the investigation or the crime scene. Will grabbed one of the photos and headed back to his desk. When he called Fischer, he got good news and bad news. The good news was that the guy worked night shift, but the bad news was that he was taking a dinner break. And he hadn't left word on the watch with anyone else. Will had to leave a message.

Although he was disappointed that he'd have to wait, Will had hopes that he was onto something. Soon he'd know the name of the person who'd purchased the watch and where it had been shipped.

With any luck, he'd still hit pay dirt—with or without the damned watch.

 

The water was friggin' cold.
Freezing!

When I hit a wall of ice, I almost lost consciousness. And I sank like a rock. The extreme cold made me gasp and the air in my lungs erupted in a burst of bubbles. I watched the last of my air race to the surface. Gulps of air lost. My muscles had instantly constricted and I got hit with uncontrollable shivers.

My body felt sluggish and too heavy to move. I floundered
in the deep water, flailing my arms and legs in a desperate attempt to pull White Bird to the surface. My lungs felt like they were about to burst. The more I struggled, the worse I hurt. He was too heavy or I wasn't strong enough. It didn't matter which. My body was working against me and my brain was shutting down. In minutes it would be too late to save either of us.

I don't know exactly when it was that I gave up, but when I did, I turned my head to look for him.

White Bird's body had rolled under mine. When I reached for him, I held on and we sank into the depths. I felt everything in me shut down and I was numb from the cold. To survive, my body had shifted any heat I had left to my chest. And when my thinking became muddled, I knew it was only a matter of time before my brain would stop, too. And being in a no-win struggle to live, thrashing around in sheer panic wasn't the way I wanted to spend my last minutes.

My mother's voice filled my head and I saw Grams smiling at me. It was my way of saying goodbye.

And with the last bit of awareness I had, I held on to White Bird as we spiraled into the deep. When I looked into his eyes one last time, he had never looked more beautiful than at that moment. He had a peaceful look on his sweet face and his long dark hair drifted in the current. I felt my heart slow to a crawl as we drifted down. Both of us were swallowed in billows of cobalt blue, as the shimmering light from the surface grew dim.

I kissed him for the last time. And when his arms wrapped around me, I felt whatever heat remained in my body slowly leave me. I closed my eyes and fell asleep in his arms. I didn't want to die, but I wasn't afraid.

Everything went dark and as my body went limp, White
Bird and I drifted apart. In the quiet of the deep, I heard my mother's voice again.

“Stay with me, Brenna. Honey?”

She sounded so real, I wanted to tell her how much I loved her, but my mouth wouldn't open.

“Brenna, can you hear me?” This time she yelled. And she shook my face.

When I opened my eyes, the stark white was back. And a bright light spun over my head in circles until it stopped. It took me a while to recognize that I was staring into a light fixture and I was lying on a floor, shivering. In the water, my body had been numb, but now I ached all over. And when a sudden rush of noise hit my ears, it scared me. I reached out my hands and someone grabbed hold.

It was Mom.

“Honey, are you all right?” She had tears in her eyes and she kissed my forehead, like a million-gazillion times. “Oh, my God. She's awake. She's gonna be okay, isn't she?”

When my mother spoke to someone else in the room, I gazed around to see the shadows of several others. Two faces emerged from the haze. Joe Sunne came into focus. He looked tired but damned good. Seeing him made me smile, I think. And Dr. Ridgeway had tubes in his ears and was checking my heart. I knew that I was back at the hospital, 'cause it smelled like one.

After I realized where I was, my heart lurched and I scrambled to sit up.

“White…Bird.” I choked on his name. “Where is…he?”

I looked to my right and saw Dr. Ridgeway hunched over his body. Instead of being dressed in jeans, like I'd last seen him in the vision, White Bird was again dressed in pajamas and a robe, with slippers on his feet.

“What happened?” I sat up and ran a hand through my hair. It was dry. And my mind grappled with what I remembered, but how much of it had been real? “Is he going to be okay?”

When no one answered, I yelled, “White Bird?” and struggled to stand, but Mom held me in her arms. Her warmth felt good.

“He's awake, honey,” she said as she grinned at me. And when she leaned closer, she whispered in my ear, “You did it. You brought him back. I don't know how, but you did.”

I heard my long-lost—
very lost
—friend cough. And when Dr. Ridgeway helped him into his wheelchair, White Bird saw me for the first time. He was so totally exhausted that he could barely keep his eyes open, but his blank stare turned into a warm smile that was contagious.

“What took you so long?” was all he said.

I grinned back. And for a change, I had nothing to say.

In that moment, I believed he had sensed me the first time I had touched him. And he'd sent up the equivalent of a mental flare for help that he knew I'd “feel” when he came to me in my dreams. I also knew the vision that we'd both shared had really happened, at least to us.

“We need to examine him, but that won't take long.” Dr. Ridgeway sucked all the joy from the room. “I'll come get you when we're done. And you'll have plenty of time to visit. How's that?”

The doc didn't wait for anyone to answer. He never did. He swept from the room, pushing White Bird on wheels. And I felt like someone had stolen my best friend.

No, wait, that's exactly what happened.

Mom helped me to my feet and pulled a chair under my butt so I could sit at the only table in the room. Behind me,
she straddled the chair and hugged my neck. But when Joe plopped down across from me, I knew he had something more on his mind than a pat on the back and giving me a big “Atta girl.” He had beads of sweat on his forehead and I swear to God, he looked older. Seriously older.

“Your job ain't over yet.” He winked and slid a small notebook and pen across the table, things he had stashed in his sport coat. He had come prepared. “Write down everything. In order, if you can. And don't leave anything out.”

My brain was fried, but thankfully I considered that fairly normal. I knew what Joe wanted. I still didn't know why making the list was such a big deal, but I got to work. Joe wasn't an easy guy to say no to.

And the sooner I got the list done, the sooner I'd see White Bird. I couldn't believe he was back from the virtually dead. And I didn't care how it happened. Soon we'd have real time together. And after the past two years of hell, that was as good as eating dessert first.

Red Cliffs Hospital—An Hour Later

This time it was me who paced the floor, wringing my hands, with Mom sitting patiently watching me. And Joe was looking over the notes I'd written. He'd promised to give me his insights and interpret whatever I saw. And since I hadn't held anything back, his job wouldn't be quick or easy.

I should have been more patient, especially after coming back from a virtual trip that seemed like it had lasted days, when it had only taken less time than Dr. Ridgeway was spending examining White Bird.

“What time is it, Mom?”

“Five minutes from the last time you asked.” Normally she would have sounded annoyed, but Mom had this goofy smirk
on her face. She looked really happy for a change, but I sure wasn't.

Ridgeway still had us waiting outside the locked door of the detention unit. After all that had happened, I felt like I was back at square one, wondering if any of what I remembered had actually taken place. Seeing White Bird awake and being able to talk to him would make things real for me.

“You think he's okay?” I didn't wait for anyone to answer. “What could be taking them so long?”

“Bren?”

When Mom called my name, I turned and she nudged her head behind me. Dr. Ridgeway had buzzed through the locked door, but he wasn't smiling.

“How is he, Doc? Can I see him?” I swallowed, hard.

“He's lucky. And it's a miracle how lucid he is.” The doctor shook his head. “I don't know what happened in there. And if you have time, I'd like to talk to you about…”

“Yeah, I'm sure. But I'm a little fuzzy, you know. Maybe it'll come to me.” I stepped closer and fixed my eyes on his. “You promised. Can I see him?”

“Yes, you can. Follow me.” He turned to escort me, but when he saw Joe and Mom stand, he said, “He's a little weak. It would be best if only Brenna came with me. I hope you understand.”

The doc sounded almost human. Almost.

Mom looked disappointed, but she shrugged and said, “Sure. We'll be here when you're done, honey.”

And Joe only nodded.

Walking from the waiting area to White Bird's hospital room was a total blur. Ridgeway said stuff, but I didn't listen. Nothing became real until the doctor opened the door and I saw him lying in a hospital bed.