Love Lies Bleeding (2 page)

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Within the sanctuary, dreary daylight filtered in slits through stained-glass windows. A large gold cross dominated the otherwise tasteful decor. A portrait of an army medical officer sat on a table. This was Grady, as he looked in uniform; an immaculate version of himself. Grady embodied everything a doctor or soldier should be — clean-cut, straight back, strong jaw, with honest, crystal-clear eyes. Handsome, but not intimidatingly so. This was not actually as everyone would remember him, but it was his perfected public image. Not that it remotely mattered anymore, but Grady, Pamela’s beloved, was a Capricorn.

A large flower arrangement filled with love lies bleeding occupied the other half of the photo table. The red flowers hung over the frame as if weeping for, or perhaps just trying to kiss, the photo of Grady.

The pews were filled with a multitude of mourners, all of who were dressed in dark, somber clothing.

Valerie, trying to contain tears, hurried up the aisle to sit at the front with an older couple who were obviously her parents.

Karli followed closely behind Valerie, and, midway down the aisle, locked eyes with a clean-cut man in a suit who sat next to a slightly dumpy man. This was Erwin and Phil. For Karli, their presence at the church was obviously disconcerting and unwanted. Suddenly terribly grim, she shook her head and frowned in their direction. Erwin dropped eye contact, choosing instead to peruse his hymnbook. Karli, her back stiff and her gait now stilted, continued a few pews farther and slid into a middle seat.

“Who is that?” Phil’s whisper was in no way subtle.

“Someone we’re not supposed to know. Just keep focused on what you’re here to do.” Erwin caution came with a bit of an edge, like he was already tired of directing his companion.

“I’m getting everyone as they come in.” Phil, with a pleased grin completely at odds with his surroundings, indicated a University of Victoria Alma Mater pin on his lapel. “Have you seen this new —”

“Some stealth would be nice,” Erwin hissed through clenched teeth.

“You bet! And the resolution is fantastic,” Phil continued, completely undaunted.

Karli twisted in her pew to glare and shake her head at Erwin again. Erwin simply shrugged his shoulders in response, and avoided further eye contact.

This caught the attention of Karli’s companion, a dark-haired, sour-looking man. Dwayne slumped farther into his seat with a mumbled, “I still don’t get why I have to be here.”

“What are you, teething?” Karli snapped back.

“You know I hate these things.”

“Until everything is resolved, you’ll continue to put out with a smile.”

Dwayne offered up a grimace of a smile. Karli was unimpressed.

A batty-looking organist hammered her fingers on the church organ, startling the congregation. But then she began to expertly tease a dirge out of the instrument.

An emergency-only side door that led to the church parking lot, opened. A brutal-looking man, Shep, stepped through. He scanned the space, then nodded to an elegant older man, Mr. Doyle, over his shoulder. Mr. Doyle entered the church, and Shep courteously shut the door behind him.

“I cannot decide whether it is highly appropriate that this was to be their wedding day, or not,” Mr. Doyle said. He took a moment to survey the sanctuary and remove his leather gloves.

“Sick,” Shep agreed.

“Granted. Though not the class of perversity you prefer.”

Shep grinned, rather like a rabid hyena, in response. Mr. Doyle tapped his enforcer’s shoulder with the gloves and indicated an empty back pew. They skirted the last of the stragglers and took their seats.

The main doors opened, and Pamela, still in her wedding gown, stepped through.

Everyone swiveled in their seats, but no one stood as she traversed the aisle wedding march-style toward Grady’s photo.

“So this is her?” Dwayne asked Karli. “Hot. A little damp around the edges, but —”

Karli stamped her rather pointy heel into his foot and ground down. Dwayne whitened, looking faint with the pain, but made no further noise.

After a moment of staring down at Grady’s photo, Pamela placed her bouquet by the picture. The Minister, who’d been hovering nervously off to one side, approached his podium. He then fussed with his Bible and notes, while he continued to wait on Pamela.

Pamela took a deep, solidifying breath and turned towards the front pew. Valerie, tears freed, held her hands out to her daughter, and after stepping to take them, Pamela sat beside her mother.

Through all this, everyone kept their eyes averted from Pamela. They allowed for her grief even as they obviously questioned her choice of mourning gown.

“While it is a grave and unfortunate event that gathers us here today, we must remember to celebrate Grady’s life and cherish his memory,” the Minister’s voice rang out as he referenced his notes. “He was a brave and loyal man, loving and devoted to his fiancée Pamela, and dedicated to making this world a better place one patient at a time. To know him was to love him.”

A sigh floated through the mourners. An acknowledgement of the beginning of the ritual of saying goodbye. A slump of acceptance.
 

Except from Pamela, who continued to sit ramrod straight and barely heard a word of what the Minister preached.
 

CHAPTER THREE

Capilano View Cemetery, West Vancouver

Two gravediggers put the final touches on a fresh site at the Capilano View Cemetery in West Vancouver. The cemetery spread its inset headstones and meandering property along the base of the mountains, which were still snowcapped enough to entice local skiers. Southward, the city of Vancouver spread out beyond the inlet. It was a beautiful and — at least externally — restful place for the dead. A pricey but quiet plot.

One of the gravediggers, the one whose muscle was a little obscured by a layer of fat, stepped off to the side of the freshly covered grave for a swig of water. He then contemplated the view. His coworker had taken to calling him Chubs, and he didn’t have the balls to stop him. He tried to find humor in the nickname and failed. He never had been very self-deprecating.

“To what base uses we may return,” he sighed, as if the weight of the world rested willingly on his shoulders.
 

“What?”

“Nothing.”

“Fuck, you weren’t quoting again were you?” The second gravedigger would have looked more at home with a cigarette hanging out of the side of his mouth, but he’d recently quit. He was making a real attempt to make it more than thirty days this time. Gum would have been a relief, but aspartame gave him migraines. People called him Dick, even though his given name was Earl, not Richard.

“Can’t a man relish a little education?” Chubs continued to reflect on the view, aware that tilting his head slightly to the right made him look thoughtful. Even insightful.

“For whatever good it does you,” Dick sneered. He knew bullshit when he saw it.

“Bettering oneself is a noble pursuit.”

“Is that another quote?”

“Could be. I don’t know. Sounds like one.”

“This job shows us day in and out —”

“I know. Nothing lasts beyond the grave.”

“You could let me finish,” Dick growled, but Chubs didn’t seem to hear the underlying warning.

Chubs, unwilling to pick up his shovel just yet, offered another opinion. “Some think death is just another step in evolution. Soon, we’ll cast off our bodies and live purely in the mind.”

“What good would that be? To never feel that first gulp of cold beer or taste a hot slice of pepperoni pizza?” Dick sneered again. His face was almost permanently crooked with it.

“Ah, I knew you were a closet romantic.”

Dick leaped across the freshly mounded dirt to grab Chubs by the shirt. “Take that back, you fucking fag.”

“Hey, hey. I didn’t mean it that way.”

“The shit that comes out of your mouth,” Dick spat, but he released Chubs. Then, leaning heavily on his shovel, he thought. It was a rather difficult process for him. He often chose to go many days without actually thinking about anything for too long or in too much detail. It was easier to just listen to his wants and needs, rather than weigh the merits and discuss things he had no real control over. Chubs watched him patiently, almost excited, as if a treat was coming his way.
 

Dick indicated the grave at their feet. “Take this guy. You think he’s happier to have ‘transcended’ beyond a good meal, a good shit, and a good fuck?”

“I’m talking way in the future.”

“And don’t you think if he was there in spirit when they packed his body in that box, he wouldn’t be thinking about the last time his lady wrapped her sweet lips around his dick?”

“I think …” But Chubs trailed off, as if suddenly aware that they were no longer alone.
 

They both turned to see Pamela, who was still wearing her full wedding outfit though she was now holding a pink flower umbrella. And, yes, the cherry blossom theme continued in the rain gear.

Pamela had stood very patiently, almost serenely, as she listened to their conversation. It wasn’t respectful to interrupt.

“Oh, shit fuck,” Dick blurted.

“I … I …” All of Chubs’ lauded higher education deserted him.

“We … we … sorry,” Dick rather lamely offered with slumped shoulders and downcast eyes.

“That’s all right. He, Grady, always liked a good blow,” Pamela answered, offering the gravediggers an easy out of the uncomfortable situation. She always erred on the side of exceedingly polite.

“Men do,” Dick agreed.

The three of them laughed awkwardly. But when Pamela quickly fell silent, the two gravediggers picked up their shovels, and — in a hell of a hurry — took off.

•••••••••

Pamela didn’t even bother to watch the gravediggers retreat. She had eyes only for the final resting place of her beloved fiancée, Grady. Grady’s grave sliced through the almost unnaturally green grass like a nasty hemangioma.

Pamela crossed to the grave and knelt in the dirt. Her skirt spread rather prettily around her, as if she was sitting in a pile of meringue. She reached down, grabbed a fistful of earth, and held it in her hand. “Now we’ll never have Paris,” she whispered.

She set down the umbrella, which, once released, was buffeted slightly by the wind.

She peeled off a glove, and then the other.

“I won’t lose you, Grady.” Pamela’s voice was steady and grim.
She carefully removed her pearl necklace and placed it in her clutch purse. She touched the emerald-cut diamond engagement ring on her left hand — reverently — but didn’t take it off.

“Wherever you are, so am I.” It was a statement of fact rather than a declaration of love.

She pulled a straight razor out of her clutch, snapped the bag closed, and delicately laid it off to one side in the grass.

She drew a thin line of blood across one of her wrists with the razor. Then she moved the blade to the other wrist. The pain of the cut didn’t even remotely register within the pain of her ragged soul.

The wind caught the umbrella and flipped it tumbling past headstones and grave mounds. Pamela didn’t spare it a glance.

She stretched out on the grave, her cheek pressed to the dirt. Her slit wrists curled beside her face.

She watched as blood pooled by her wrists and was slowly absorbed into the ground.

Then she closed her eyes.

Still rolling away from her, the umbrella caught the full wind and was suddenly free. But then just as quickly, it tangled in the branches of a winter-bare tree.

THE INTERROGATION

CHAPTER FOUR

Capilano View Cemetery — The Next Morning

The sun actually rose the next morning, and even the cemetery was momentarily beautiful. The view helped, of course. Nothing was more gorgeous than Vancouver in the sun.

Birds bantered.
 

Voices murmured.

“Jesus.”

“You can say that again.”

“Jesus Christ.”

“Holy moley is right.”

Pamela, woken by the men’s voices, recoiled from the sunlight as she tried to open her eyes. Dirt coated her lashes.

“She’s breathing,” Erwin said. As he loomed over Pamela, his shadow shaded the sun off her face. It might have seemed as if he hadn’t changed his suit from the funeral, but in fact Erwin owned seven identical suits. Sometimes, he changed up the tie, but not today. Today, with his dark hair, dark glasses, and dark suit, he looked like a typical G-man. It was a look he cultivated. It made up for all his other inadequacies, not that he admitted to any. Denial was Erwin’s friend, and favorite vacation spot.

Pamela groaned and sat up, unsteady. She had one hell of a headache, and was rather disappointed that she seemed to be alive.

Erwin exchanged a look with Phil, not knowing how to proceed. Phil’s hair curled on his damp temples. His tie was crooked and his breath slightly short, as if he’d just climbed a steep hill. The grounds of the cemetery were perfectly flat.

Pamela inspected her wrists, which, clogged in dirt, had clotted.

“Ah, Miss … err … Ms …” Erwin stumbled over his address and then settled on a firm, “Pamela.”
 

“How many bad things do you think can happen in a single day?” Pamela whispered.

“Ah, well —”

“It’s morning now,” Phil helpfully pointed out. “Birds, sunshine —”

“Right, well …” Erwin attempted to interject.
 

“Maybe today will be better!” Phil ended his little pep talk with a blazing grin. He really did have lovely teeth.

“Let’s get started at it, then,” Erwin testily snapped.

“Of course,” Phil agreed. He held a hand out to Pamela, who hadn’t attempted to stand yet. “If you would be so kind —”

“You really are going to have to come with us,” Erwin menaced.

“I don’t think it’s necessary …” Phil started to admonish Erwin, who gave him a cut-it-out look. “Fine. Your way, then.”

“I am lead agent,” Erwin huffed.

“I defer,” Phil said, and dramatically took a step back from the gravesite.

Erwin turned back to address Pamela, but Phil, peering over his shoulder, interrupted. “You know best.” Erwin shot a glare at Phil, who raised his hands in mock surrender. “Done. I’m done.”