Fifth Grave Past the Light (15 page)

I started for the hospital again. Left with no other choice, I would just have to talk to her, to figure out if perhaps she had some kind of supernatural condition.

I got another text from Cookie as I pulled into the hospital parking lot.

Well, she seemed certain.

She was fine. Or she would be. And thankfully, so was everyone around her. Dodged a bullet there. Literally.

She was really into the fiber thing. Maybe she had a bran muffin on the way to class.

Nicolette was just getting off work. I spotted her coming my direction as I headed to the elevator. She pulled on her jacket and took off her lanyard, growling when it got caught up in her hair.

“Nicolette, right?”

She stopped and gave me a once-over. “Oh, right, from yesterday afternoon.” She finally pulled her hair free and checked her phone, looking exhausted.

“I was wondering if we could get a cup of coffee or something.”

“Now?” She looked devastated that I would even ask. “I just pulled a double shift. Can we set something up for tomorrow?”

“I’d rather not. It’s just – You came to me yesterday morning. You said you were dead.”

Surprise rushed through. She hesitated before her curiosity got the better of her. “There’s a coffee shop about two blocks down. I was planning on getting breakfast there anyway, if you want to tag along.”

“I’m all for tagging. Can I drive you?”

Her expression screamed possible abduction.

“Or we could just meet there.”

I followed Nicolette’s red Volvo to the Frontier, which was only a couple of blocks from my apartment building.

We ordered, then sat at a table in the back.

“So, you said I came to you? How?”

“Well, first let me say that I can see things others can’t.”

She shifted in her seat. “Okay.”

“And you showed up at my apartment yesterday morning and told me that you were dead. That your body was under a bridge out in the middle of nowhere.”

“That’s strange.” She ducked her head as though hiding something.

“Nicolette, you can tell me anything. I’ll believe you, I promise.”

She shrugged a shoulder. “No, it’s just, that’s strange. I have these dreams, but I don’t tell people about them, so I don’t know how you could possibly know that.”

“Because you showed up in my apartment and told me you were dead. That’s how.”

“That’s impossible,” she said, biting her lower lip.

“I don’t think you believe that any more than I do. Can you tell me what happened?”

“Happens. What happens.”

“This has happened before?”

She finally straightened and took a deep breath. “I have these seizure kind of things. It’s weird. And when I come out of them, I remember incidents about other people. I remember how they died. Only I was that person. I was the one who died.”

“So, you are actually seeing someone else’s death through their eyes?” That was new.

“No, you don’t understand. The deaths have never actually occurred. I used to check the papers the next day, but there wouldn’t be anything about a death in the way that I saw it. I’ve never found a true connection between what I see and what really happens.”

“You’re certain?”

“One hundred percent. I used to check. I used to scour the Internet, do all kinds of searches, check all the news programs and papers. Nothing.”

This was seriously odd.

“That’s our number.”

“I’ll get it.” I jumped up and grabbed our order, then went back to our table with my mouth watering at the scent of Nicolette’s breakfast burrito. I knew I should have ordered one. I handed it over reluctantly. “How about you describe a few of these events,” I said, pouring two pink packages and some creamer into my coffee. “Give me a couple of examples.”

“Okay.” She spooned salsa onto her burrito. “Well, a couple of weeks ago, I was an elderly man in a hospital and everyone thought I died of natural causes, but my grandson actually killed me. Right there in my hospital bed. He couldn’t wait for his inheritance. Even though I didn’t have that much longer to live, he couldn’t wait.”

I tore my eyes off her burrito and took out my memo pad and pen. “Do you get names when this happens?”

She took a bite and shook her head. “Only sometimes. Wait, that time I did get one. Something like Richard or Richardson. But I don’t know if it was the name of the man or the grandson, first name or last. It could have been the name of his nurse, for all I know.”

“No, that’s great. I can work with that.” I could check this out with Uncle Bob or have Cookie work her magic. If what she described had really happened, I’d find out. “Okay, give me one more.”

She took a sip of orange juice. “All right, well, a few months ago I had a really bad incident with a woman. It was so weird. I was trying to get out of my apartment, and yet I kept reminding myself to leave the stew I was making boiling on the stove. That was really important. Then I forgot something. I’d left a blanket at the apartment, so I went back after it. And when I tried to leave, my husband came home and caught me.” Her voice softened and a quake of sadness reverberated out of her. “He beat me to death.”

Cold chills washed over me as I sat there and listened to that story, recognizing every minute of it. Every second. I wasn’t sure what to tell her. How she would take it. Finally, I decided she needed to know. And I needed to know how this was happening.

“Her name was Rosie,” I said, and watched as Nicolette cast a suspicious gaze at me. “And she was one of my clients. I was trying to help her get out of an abusive relationship and I failed.”

Worried I was somehow trying to scam her, she hardened. Shrank away from me. “I don’t think I believe you.”

“The blanket was blue. She was going to have a son, but her husband had beat her and she lost it.”

Her eyes watered with emotion, but she didn’t want to believe me. “Anyone could have guessed that.”

“She had dark curly hair and —”

“I don’t see their faces. I
am
these people. I see everything else.”

“Okay, her husband was tall, heavyset with wide shoulders and light hair. He had a birthmark on his jaw and still wore his class ring. It was huge with a ruby in the center.”

Recognition dawned on her face.

“When did you have that vision?”

It took her a moment to shake out of her thoughts. When she did, she took out her phone. “I used to keep a journal on here. I stopped when I realized nothing was coming of them even though they’d always seemed so real.” She thumbed through a couple of pages. “Okay, that was on October fifteenth.”

I thought back. “You had that vision about four days before it actually happened.”

“This is not what I want to hear,” she said, shaking her head. “These aren’t real. They’re not real people I’m seeing.”

I put a hand over hers to calm her. “When did these visions start?”

“I was nine. I’d drowned in my neighbor’s pool and the paramedics resuscitated me. I started having the seizures soon after.”

“That seems to be a common catalyst for extrasensory perception of any kind.” I thought about my friend Pari, who began seeing the departed after her near death experience when she was twelve.

“Is that what happened to you?” Nicolette asked me.

“No.” I took another sip, then said, “I’m something else.”

Thankfully, she didn’t seem interested in knowing what that something else was. “It’s so weird,” she said, “because with every death, I get almost the exact same feeling. It’s not what you think.”

“What feeling do you get?”

“Relief.” She leaned forward as though telling me a guarded secret. “A release of all burden. With Rosie, her last thought was freedom at last.”

That realization caused a schism to tear through me. I felt like a piece of paper that someone had ripped down the center, turned over, and ripped again. I’d failed her, and yet she was still free. I didn’t know how to feel about that.

I cleared my throat and fought for control over my emotions. “Can you tell me about this latest vision?”

She thought back. “I just remember that bridge. It had metal bracings like an old railroad bridge. I think I could see the metal beams as I died. And I remember blond hair and the number eight. Like a tattoo or a mark of some kind. And I could smell an oil of some kind. Or a gas.”

My Spidey sense tingled. Maybe the cases were connected. All the women in my apartment had blond hair. It was thin, but I’d done more with less. “Did you get a name?”

“No. Sorry. I’m channeling these people. How often do you think to yourself, ‘My name is Charley Davidson’?”

“Well, I do that a lot, but don’t use me as a measuring stick.”

Nicolette Lemay could see into the future. I’d never met anyone who could do that, though I did meet a guy once who said he could see in the dark because he had secret wolf eyes. I bought it at the time. I was four.

Cookie called as I headed back to the office.

“Are you skipping class?” I asked. “You can’t let one humiliating incident —”

“I’m not skipping. We get breaks.”

“Oh. Sorry,” I said, snacking on some Twizzlers I’d found in my backseat. They were a little brittle, but I had strong teeth. “Just so you know, I think I’m in love with the person who decided to sell Twizzlers in a two-pound bag. What mad genius came up with that idea?”

“Right? So, what did you find out about Zombie Chick?”

“She’s totally not dead. I’ll explain later. It’s a little bizarre.”

“This coming from the grim reaper. I just wanted to let you know that Noni told us a construction crew found what is looking like a mass grave on a ranch in southern New Mexico. They’ve found the remains of three bodies that he knows of. All female. And, Charley, they’re all three blond.”

I sat back, feeling like the wind had just been knocked out of me. “That would explain a lot. I’m not sure why the discovery of the grave would have them all running to me, but it had to be the catalyst somehow. Maybe they didn’t like others on their turf. Do you think ghosts have turf wars?”

“I think ghosts have all kinds of pent-up angst. So, is Noni married?”

“Cookie!” I said, pretending to be appalled. “Focus on your instructor’s words, not his ass.”

“Have you seen his ass?”

I groaned inwardly and made a mental note to get Cookie laid. “Get back to class, and thanks for this. I’ll call Ubie and ask him what he knows.”

“No problem. But, really, is he?”

“Do you still hate me with every fiber of your being?”

She hesitated, then conceded. “No, I guess not.”

“Yes, he’s married, and his wife is a champion markswoman.”

“Damn. Another one slips through my fingers.”

“I am not touching that.” I hung up with a chuckle and called Ubie.

“Hey, pumpkin,” he said.

“You didn’t think to mention the mass grave?”

“What mass grave? How did you know about that? They just found it late Friday afternoon. It was being kept quiet for the time being.”

“You didn’t happen to tell Noni Bachicha, did you?”

“Son of a – I may have. I had a few beers at his house last night.”

“He grilled you for info and you caved like an unstable salt mine.”

“Thanks for the visual.”

“You’re welcome. Mass grave?”

“I’m at the bar about to head out there, not that we have jurisdiction or anything, but we’ve joined forces with the state ME, the FBI, and local law enforcement to get this under control. I volunteered to assign a task force from APD to assist with the efforts.”

“That explains your working on a Sunday.”

“Yeah.”

“With a hangover.”

“How do you always know?”

“Because you always sound like you have a cold.”

“It’s about a three-hour drive, if you’re interested.”

“I’m interested,” I said, trying not to sound desperate.

“Why don’t you meet me here?”

I drove to Calamity’s and parked in my usual spot. The spot where I’d put up a sign saying
no parking: violators will suffer from several exotic std’s for which there is no cure.
It seemed to do the trick. My landlord didn’t especially like my tactics, but everyone was a lot happier when I had a parking space. I walked over to the bar and ducked in the back door.

The place was packed. On a Sunday. At lunch. On a Sunday. And once again, women seemed to be the main enthusiasts.

“What’ll you have?” Ubie asked when I walked to the table he’d snagged. I couldn’t believe it. Jessica was there again. What the freaking hell? Had she moved in?

Emaciated from watching Nicolette eat her breakfast burrito, I said, “I’ll have my usual breakfast fare.”

“You got it, pumpkin.” He waved over our server. She was new, so I didn’t know her name. Because of this, I was forced to call her Sylvia. “She’ll have huevos rancheros with scrambled eggs, and I’ll have a
carne adovada
burrito smothered in red.”

“So, we’re going to the actual site, yes?” I asked him as Sylvia wrote down our order.

“Yes, and I know how you are with dead bodies.”

Sylvia paused then restarted, pretending not to hear us.

“How am I with dead bodies?” I asked.

“Squeamish.”

“Oh, right.” Dead people I could handle. Dead bodies not so much.

“It amazes me that you deal with dead people all day every day, but toss a dead body at you, and you turn into a girl.”

“I am a girl,” I said, utterly offended. “And I happen to know plenty of men who would rather eat fried worms than come face-to-face with a dead body.”

“Okay, sorry. That was sexist.”

He best be sorry. “So what’s up with this new cook, Sylvia?”

“Um, it’s Clair.”

That was disappointing. Now I knew her name, but she’d always be Sylvia to me. “That’s too bad. And the new guy?”

She grinned and ducked her head shyly. If I didn’t know better, I’d say Sylvia had a little crush on him. Or her. Either way. “He’s a really good cook.”

He
it was. And she had a point. “Okay, well, thanks.” That was about as useful as a chocolate teapot.

She headed for the order station when a large man in dire need of anger control therapy stormed into the place with fire in his eyes. He took hold of her shirt collar, and she was too startled to do much about it. Poor thing.

“Doesn’t anyone know this is a freaking cop hangout?” I asked aloud. “Why do they do these things?” I jumped up, hurried over, and flashed my PI license. “APD,” I said, illegally impersonating an officer in a room full of off-duty officers, but no one else was jumping to Sylvia’s rescue. I looked over at Uncle Bob. He crossed his arms over his chest and leaned back to watch the show.

“What seems to be the problem?” I continued.

“This man is the problem. Look at this.” He jabbed a phone in my face with a picture. Then he scrolled for me.

It took a moment for me to focus, but it took only a microsecond for me to recognize the man in the images. Reyes. Shot after shot, photos of Reyes scrolled past me. What the fuck?

“This is my wife’s phone,” he said, his voice screeching until the entire room quieted and a familiar heat rose around me.

Uh-oh.

“I want to talk to this asshole immediately.”

I looked over as Reyes walked up beside us wearing Sammy’s apron and wiping his hands on a towel.

“What are you doing here?” But he didn’t have to answer. Suddenly it all made sense. The women. The heat. The food. “You’re the new cook?” I asked him, stunned.

“You,” the man with questionable intelligence said. “My wife comes in here every day to eat because of you. And she takes pictures!” He shoved the phone toward Reyes, but Reyes had no intention of entertaining the guy’s accusations. He kept a deadpan expression on him, refusing to look at the phone, until I thought the man would explode.

I decided to intervene. “Oh, my god!” I said to Reyes, my eyes radiating accusations at him. “She took your picture? Just what kind of game are you playing? You’re under arrest, mister.”

His mouth tilted and a dimple emerged on one cheek as I took his wrist and threw him against a wall. Or, well, urged him toward it. I held him against the cool wood with one hand and frisked him with the other. Slowly. Deliberately caressing parts of him I had no right to caress in public. I ran my hand over his buttocks, caressed first one pocket, then the other. Then I slid my hand under the apron and did the same to his front pockets. He tensed when my fingers brushed across his crotch. Feeling the heat surrounding him magnify, I ran my palms down his thighs, front and back, then up over his stomach and ribs. I had no idea frisking could be so fun. Thankfully, we were partially hidden by a rubber tree plant.

Though I wasn’t doing it to make anyone jealous, the lethal glares coming from half the women in the place told me they were not as amused as I was. Or Reyes. At least he got my sense of humor. And he didn’t mind my groping him in public. Welcomed it, if the sultry look in his eyes was any indication.

The man stood back, not sure what to think. That was my secret weapon. Confuse ’em and keep ’em guessing long enough to run away.

I brought out the most powerful tool I had in my arsenal. “If you resist,” I said into Reyes’s ear, “I’ll be forced to Taser you.”

He looked at what I had in my hand. “That’s a phone.”

“I have an app. You’ll probably experience nerve damage. Slight memory loss.”

His grin widened. He reached back, took hold of a belt loop, and pulled my hips into his.

Finally deciding to join in, Uncle Bob walked over, his gait unhurried, his expression bored. “What’s the problem?”

I held up a hand. “I have this, Detective.”

Just then I got another text from Cookie.

Oh, my god. I was busy groping my man. I texted her back.

I looked back at Reyes. “Have you learned your lesson, sir?”

I could feel a wave of jealousy swirl around me like a hot wind. After all, he was the reason the place was drowning in women. If looks could kill, I would have been writhing in agony, well on my way to the afterlife, clutching my throat and fighting for air with one eye slightly larger than the other.

Another woman said, “You can’t arrest Reyes because this bee-yoch is obsessed with him.” They knew his name even? I was always the last to know.

“Oh, right,” I said, letting him go. “She has a point.”

Reyes leaned into me. “No, she doesn’t.”

The man decided to take his life into his own hands and grab my arm. “Do you think this is funny?”

“Is that a trick question?”

But I realized Reyes had stilled. He stepped closer and pulled me out of the man’s grip. “You don’t want to do that.”

“Look, sir,” I said, now trying to appease two angry men, “this is clearly a conversation you need to be having with your wife. And just so you know, half the people in this place are cops.”

Surprised, he turned to scan the area.

But Reyes was still simmering. He stepped even closer to the man so only we could hear him. “I’m not a cop. And I just got out of prison for killing a man. If you want to go outside, I can explain exactly how I did it.”

The color drained from his face.

“Zimmerman,” Uncle Bob said, calling out to one of the uniformed officers, “why don’t you take this gentleman outside and convince him that what he just did was wrong.”

“But I’m eating,” Zimmerman said. When Ubie cast him one of his death stares, Zimmerman cursed. Now he was mad and he was going to take it out on the guy. I hoped he gave him a ticket. A bad one that required community service or anger management classes.

“Thanks, Uncle Bob.”

“I had to stop you. I think half the women in here were plotting your death.”

“You’re probably right.” I turned to Reyes and took his arm in mine to steer him back toward the kitchen. “Okay, I’m fine. No harm, no foul. And look at you. I can’t believe you’re filling in for Sammy.”

He shook out of his anger. “I was having lunch. Your dad needed a cook. I offered.”

“Wait, you didn’t… break Sammy’s leg?”

After rewarding me with a soft, deep laugh, he said, “No, I’m pretty sure Sammy broke Sammy’s leg.”

“You realize you have a fan club?” I indicated the room with a nod.

“Yeah, that tends to happen.”

“Must be a bitch,” I said, teasing him.

“You didn’t come over last night.”

“Right, um, I had to get some paperwork done.”

“You realize you can’t lie to me.”

“I know. I’m not lying so much as stretching the truth.” We were at his stop. I leaned against the bar.

Reyes looked past me. “Your uncle is watching us.”

“He does that. We’re grabbing lunch, then heading out to a crime scene down south.”

“Okay, if you have to go. I’m not sure what I’ll do with all these women around.”

Jealousy spiked in me so fast and so sharp, Reyes sucked in a breath, the air hissing through his teeth. He closed his eyes, leaned his head back, let my emotion roll over him.

I bit down, embarrassed. “Are you enjoying that?”

“No,” he said, panting. “A little. It’s like being hit with a hundred razor blades at once, each leaving a tiny cut as it passes.”

“Ouch. That sounds horridly unpleasant.”

He lowered his head, regarded me from underneath his lashes. “Someday you’ll figure out I’m not like other guys.”

“Actually, I figured that out a while back.”

“Nothing and no one interests me besides you. But what’s the deal with the redhead?”

My stomach clenched at the thought of him even noticing Jessica’s red hair. He sucked in another sharp breath.

“Sorry,” I said, trying to get a hold of my sudden streak of jealousy. “We were friends in high school. It did not end well.”

The recognition on his face surprised me. “That’s her?” he asked, his expression hardening.

“Her? You know about her?”

He looked down at me, regarded me as though wondering how much he should say. “I could feel your emotions even back then. I didn’t even know you were real, but I could feel everything you went through growing up. Your stepmother was a constant source of pain. I considered breaking her neck several times.”

Horrified, I said, “I’m glad you didn’t.”

“I’m not. But that one.” He looked over at Jessica again. “I’ve never felt such pain from you. Such absolute devastation.”

I crossed my arms over my chest. “Great. I would hate for you to be unaware of how gullible I am. How easily I can be duped.”

His features softened and he lifted my chin. “You trusted her. You believed you could tell her anything. That doesn’t make you gullible.”