The Traveler: Book 5, The Eddie McCloskey Paranormal Mystery Series (The Unearthed) (26 page)

“Maybe Max Engel did it.”

Christie looked out the window. “We can beat ourselves up later. For now let’s keep going.”

“I get why we missed it,” Eddie said. “In all the other places, the ghost had been a traveler. We assumed the same thing happened at the condo. We didn’t even consider it as a possibility.”

Christie put the car in DRIVE and they headed up the road. They didn’t have far to go and arrived at Kinz’s house a few minutes later. He was an older detective and looked to be in his late fifties. He had put on a pair of sweats and wore a night robe and let them in.

“Tiffany Engel.” Kinz smiled. He had grey hair that had just started to turn white. “I remember that one well, because it was so different from all the other investigations. Around here, we’re usually looking at petty larceny, burglary, or assault, and every once in a great while, murder. It was one of my few forays into fraud and I enjoyed it because it was different.”

Christie had the relationship with Kinz, but Eddie was more familiar with the investigation having just read the file.

Eddie said, “Your witness—Diane Chong—changed her tune.”

Kinz nodded. “It happens. I thought there was something there, but she was the foundation to the whole case. Everything else I had was wishy-washy. Once her story changed, I had nothing.”

“She said she was suffering from headaches,” Eddie said.

“There were two reasons I moved on from the case. First, Tiffany Engel pulled a Houdini. And second, Ms. Chong came off a bit loony and I knew without even asking the DA she wouldn’t make a great witness.”

Eddie shot Christie a look. “What do you mean?”

Kinz held up a hand. “This didn’t go in the file. I liked Ms. Chong and wanted to leave an opening in case she changed her story again, or in case more evidence came in.”

Christie sat forward. “You don’t have to worry about Eddie.”

Kinz appraised Eddie and seemed to accept what Christie had said. “She was having these nightmares, only, they weren’t happening just at night. All these horrible ideas just kept getting into her head. Poor lady had to quit her job with the home health agency.”

Christie said, “And, like you said, Tiffany Engel disappeared.”

“Right. About a week after I started talking to the staff and Ms. Chong, Tiffany Engel split. The Engels were estranged and Tiffany ran the shop for the year or so leading up to her disappearance. During that time, Tiffany revamped the business and he knew next-to-nothing about it. He hadn’t met half the nurses that were on staff. He looked clean, and without Chong I had nothing.”

Christie quickly brought Kinz up to speed on their investigation. “Did Stahl, Myrna Fellov, or Dr. O’Donnell ever come up in your investigation?”

Kinz shook his head. “I know O’Donnell. He was the guy that got hit with that lawsuit awhile back.”

“Stahl was a medical coder, but he never worked for Engel’s agency,” Eddie said. “But he worked for O’Donnell before he ended up at the hospital.”

Kinz thought about it. “One of the nurses I talked to, can’t remember her name, she said Tiffany Engel was considering bringing in a third party to check their billing. She likely would have asked a good coder to do that.”

“So maybe Stahl.”

Kinz nodded.

“What about Fellov?” Eddie asked.

Kinz shook his head no. “Was she a patient there?”

“We don’t know.”

Christie said, “Does a home health agency have a medical director on staff?”

“No. The law prohibits them from keeping a doc around, actually.”

Eddie jumped in. “That means they needed somebody to write referrals.”

Kinz nodded. “Exactly. They would have needed a doctor to write a script for home health care.”

The picture was starting to come together. O’Donnell might have referred patients to Engel’s home health agency for care. Maybe they were kicking money back to him for writing the scripts. Once they had the patients, they upcoded their medical claims to maximize revenue, perhaps fraudulently.

“Thanks, Kinz,” Christie said. “This helps a lot.”

“Is it really a ghost doing all this?” He was looking at Eddie, but he was really asking Christie.

“We don’t know for sure yet.”

***

“I still have questions,” Christie said.

“Right. We have weak links for Stahl and O’Donnell to Engel, but it still leaves us with the problem of connecting everybody else.”

Eddie called Stan to check in.

Stan said, “Still have some things to check out. I’m going to crash here for the night.”

“Good idea.” Eddie looked out the window. “Stan, we still don’t know how we stop the ghost.”

“I’m working on it. The usual practices won’t work here.”

“Right. Because they all take time. Weeks usually, days at best. We only get one shot at Tiffany, though.”

“Where are you crashing?” Stan asked.

Eddie looked over at Christie as she started her car. “I’m working on that.”

Stan laughed. “I can tell.”

“That obvious, huh?” Eddie asked.

Christie looked over at him, like she knew what he was talking about.

Stan said, “Yes. I’m pretty sure she reciprocates.”

Eddie wasn’t so sure. For once. He could usually tell when women were interested.

He said, “Alright, brother. Stay alive.”

“You too.”

Christie turned out of Kinz’s driveway and got back on the road. She took her phone out and called in. She told the guys watching Engel’s house to set up shop at the condominium and confirm his presence, then hung up.

The more time he spent with her, the more Eddie fantasized about her. She had ended up here because of her ex-husband and had fought her way up through a police bureaucracy to become the youngest female detective in this town. And the chief had trusted her with this important case.

She was sharp. Always thinking. Always considering the next move. He’d done his best to keep up with her and when he’d pushed, she’d pushed back. She wasn’t afraid to spar, and he loved that.

He also loved her eyes. The word bewitching came to mind. He laughed to himself. Had he ever used that word before? Probably not. But it was the perfect adjective.

She worked hard and having spent some time around her, he got the sense the job was her life. But he was okay with that. He was the same way. There was no punching in and out of life. He went where the action was and never shrank from a challenge.

There was no way Christie ever had either. He could tell she got along well with her colleagues and knew how to play nice in the sandbox, but at the end of the day nobody was going to push her around.

Her mind excited him, just as much as her body.

She wasn’t exactly his type. Actually, wasn’t his type at all. He’d been with a lot of women, all kinds really, but over the years he had gravitated to the tall and busty ones. Christie was five-three on a good day and even with a push-up bra, nobody would ever call her voluptuous. She probably weighed ninety-five pounds when she was carrying her purse and police-issued .45.

But she fired him up. He’d watched her move. Watched her working on her laptop, catching her during her rare, unguarded moments.

“What is it?” she said.

What the hell. “Just admiring the view.”

She smiled. “Are you really flirting with me right now?”

“No time like the present.”

Her smile disappeared. “You remind me of my ex.”

“Wow.”

“What?”

“Seriously? I’m assuming that’s a bad thing.”

She didn’t respond right away. “He was obsessed with his job too. Great at it, but completely obsessed.”

“Pot, meet kettle.”

She laughed. “You have to be obsessed with police work to be a good detective.”

“I’ve been thinking,” he said.

“Uh-oh.”

He smiled. Might as well go all in. He’d come this far. “I can’t go back to my hotel.”

She pulled the car over onto the shoulder. It was late and they were far removed from the center of town, so they didn’t have to worry about any other traffic. The roads were deserted.

“Are you asking to come back to my place?”

Eddie winked. “It makes sense.”

“You’re serious? Do you really think I could do that right now?”

He leaned in and kissed her.

Her lips were soft and yielding at first, but then they grew firm. The passion in her built and she responded to him.

She grabbed his hair and kissed him back, and he fell into her. The burden of the last few days melted away. They stayed in that awkward position in the front seat till Eddie got a crazy idea.

He pulled away.

“What the hell are you doing?” she asked, breathlessly.

Finally, he’d gotten a rise out of her. Score one for Eddie.

“I’m showing you I don’t have to be in control,” he said.

She took his hand and he lifted her and she straddled his lap. She weighed nothing but was strong. Emotionally and physically. He wrapped his arms around her back and stared into her bewitching eyes and he knew he was falling. Maybe had fallen.

He smiled at her. “You’re in charge.”

She pulled him close and kissed him. Her fingers dug into his scalp. He moved away from her lips and nibbled her ear and his lips teased her neck. She gasped and ground her body against him, feeling him grow.

He’d been with his share of women, not so much recently but definitely during his twenties. With all that experience he’d learned a few things and prided himself on always being in control, knowing exactly when to slow down and when to speed up. The last time he had crossed the finish line before a woman, he’d been a teenager.

But Christie was in charge. He wanted her to be. He wanted her to decide how this would go. Because this wasn’t some one-night stand. He wanted it to be more than that. He hoped she felt the same way.

She was in charge. She didn’t let him throttle it back. His urgency grew and he realized with not a little fear that he was
actually close.
Just like he was back in high school again, the last time dry-humping had been exciting enough to get him off.

Suddenly she pulled away. He was agonizingly close and she had known that. But she had been right there with him.

Her eyes were wide, her mouth half-open, and her breath came in shuddering gasps.

He was at a complete loss for words. His need grew. She touched his face. Her fingertips were like electricity running across his skin.

She rolled off him and got behind the wheel. “We’re going back to my place.”

“You promise?”

“Oh yes.”

Eddie smiled. He didn’t want to wait. He wanted to jump into the backseat with her. But he also knew the waiting would make it better.

“Hurry.”

She looked over at him. “I’m about to hit the lights and siren, Eddie.”

***

They agreed to go slow, to savor each other. They didn’t last a minute the first time. But that was okay.

They had the night.

After their first time, they shared a warm shower and explored each other in that agonizingly pleasing way. They made love twice more and each time was different. They took turns guiding one another, learning everything they could. Around four-thirty, they dozed off in her bed, tangled up in each other.

Eddie woke suddenly. His heart was racing. He’d been dreaming again, but already couldn’t remember what it had been about. Clutching his chest, Eddie took deep breaths and tried stepping outside of himself. He pictured himself on the bed, with each breath getting calmer. The dull ache in his chest went away.

Better
.

He hoped that Stan had found something to help them combat psychic attacks. Last night he’d successfully warded the ghost off. But he didn’t like his chances if they went another round.

Sumiko slept peacefully beside him, her face half-buried in the pillow. Somewhere between their foreplay in her cruiser and the in-between shower, she had stopped being Christie and started being Sumiko to him.

She had burst into laughter at his poor attempt to pronounce her name in between kisses. He had joined in the laughter and she had taught him the correct pronunciation. Throughout the night he’d had many opportunities to practice her name…now it rolled off the tongue.

Drifting off to sleep, he’d asked her what it meant.
Beautiful child.

And she must have been.

Eddie got out of bed and stretched. It was still early. He guessed about six-thirty.

Eddie crossed the room and sat in a reading chair where he could watch Sumiko sleep. Her tiny body gently moved with each breath. He focused on her rhythm and felt himself relaxing. He could have sat there and watched her all morning. It eased his mind. But she woke up about twenty minutes later.

“...time is it?” she said.

“Time to get in the shower,” he said.

She picked her head up off the pillow and squinted at him. “How did I know you were going to suggest that?”

“We’ll save water if we take one together.”

“Somehow I think we won’t.” She rolled to her side and pulled the sheet up to her shoulder. “Figure out the case yet?”

“Maybe.”

“Really?”

He nodded. In those tranquil moments, just watching her breathe, a few ideas had come to him. Sumiko smiled and pulled the sheet all the way up to her chin.

“Why so bashful?” he asked.

“Cold, not bashful.”

“Prove it.”

She pulled the sheet down.

He laughed. “You are cold.”

She smiled and pulled the sheet back up. “So tell me. What did you figure out?”

He went to the bed and slipped under the covers. She wrapped a leg around him and put her head on his chest. Instantly, he was ready to go.

“How am I supposed to explain this case to you while you’re doing that?”

She laughed. “Try hard.”

He let that one go. “We think Max Engel is helping her, right?”

She thought about it. “At the very least, he knows what she’s up to.”

“Fair enough. Which means we can’t believe anything he tells us.”

“Thank you, Captain Obvious.”

He pinched her side and she squealed.

Eddie said, “Think about everything he’s told us and just assume he’s lying.”

“Okay.”

“And then ask yourself why he would lie.”

Christie rolled onto her back and looked at the ceiling. Then it came to her.

She said, “Tiffany is dead.”

Eddie nodded. “Right. She didn’t disappear. She was killed. Now ask yourself why.”

***

Chief Knotts was waiting for Christie and Eddie. Harney came in a minute later and shot Eddie a look. He got the weird vibe that Harney somehow knew about him and Christie. But he shook it off.

Knotts opened his meeting like he always did. “Well?”

Christie explained their current theory of the case. Knotts didn’t interrupt. Harney made all kinds of incredulous grunts and interjected every chance he got. But his objections didn’t hold up. Eddie behaved himself and deferred to Christie. It was her case and she was holding court.

When she was done, Knotts looked at Eddie. “You were attacked. Are you certain it was psychic in nature?”

“Psychic attack to the T. And I saw the ghost.”

“Then who was it?” Harney asked.

Eddie shrugged. “I didn’t get a good look at her. I was on death’s doorstep.”

“
Riiiight
.”

Eddie didn’t engage the man. He’d learned by watching Christie that was the best way to deal with Harney, especially in front of the chief.

The chief studied Eddie for a moment, then nodded. “We don’t have enough to bring Engel in.”

Christie looked down.

The chief said, “And just as importantly, how do we stop the ghost once we have Engel in custody?”

It was the million dollar question, and one Eddie still didn’t have an answer to.

Christie said, “We’re still working on that.”

“That’s good,” Harney said. “Assuming all this bullshit is actually true, the minute you arrest Engel is the minute his dead wife no longer has anything to lose. She’ll kill anybody to get Max out of jail.”

The chief swiveled in his chair and stared at Harney. “Detective, don’t you have a lead to chase down?”

Harney’s face turned fire engine red. His eyes darted from the chief, to Christie, to Eddie, and just about everywhere else in the room.

“Chief, I’m out there doing real police—”

Knotts held out a palm. “Harney, you’re a good cop. I’ve seen you do quality work and close cases as good as anybody and better than most. Now you were wrong on this one. And that’s okay. I was wrong on plenty myself. The most important thing you can do right now is accept it and move on. Don’t say or do something stupid that’s going to make things difficult for everyone here.”

Harney looked ready to burst.

The chief stared him down. “I’d hate to lose you, Harney.”

Harney held that ready-to-explode pose for another moment, then the fight went out of him. His shoulders sagged.

“How can I help?” he said.

The chief looked to Christie.

She said, “Harney, we don’t even know how we’re going to approach the second problem yet. But once we do, I’d be grateful for your help.”

Harney nodded once then left.

Eddie couldn’t help it. He shot Christie a quick smile before the chief caught him. True to form, she kept her professional composure. But he knew deep down she was doing somersaults.

The chief said, “Did we pick Engel up yet?”

Christie nodded. “He’s at the condo.”

“He never called you back?”

“No.”

“You sure he’s still alive?”

“We put eyes on his condo last night.”

***

The man couldn’t take much more of this.

“It’s time to talk about our escape plan,” he said.

The ghost hissed. It sounded like she was agreeing.

“If they pick me up, I need to take them to where you are.”

The ghost just watched him.

“You’re more powerful there,” the man said. “That way I can escape and you can catch up with me later.”

The ghost hovered, watching him intently.

***

They found Stan hunched over his laptop in the conference room.

“How’d you sleep?” Stan asked.

So Stan knew they’d shared an intimate evening. Was it that obvious?

Stan grinned like an idiot. Eddie wanted to throw something at him.

“Good,” he and Christie said at the same time.

Stan nodded innocently and stood. “I’ve spent the entire night reading up on psychic attacks and it boils down to this: if you’re not afraid, you’re okay. The experts say the same thing, just in a million different ways. Many of them refer to it as detachment. Sticks and stones may break my bones but psychic attacks will never hurt me.”

“Great,” Eddie said.

Christie started pacing. “I can’t put this guy in prison and find out six months from now his ex-wife killed a bunch of guards.”

Eddie sat down and sipped his coffee. He remembered that today was Saturday and he hadn’t called his client to reschedule this weekend’s job. With Stan here, he had no one to cover. The only other person was Daria, but he wanted to keep her around in case this investigation went left on them. If the ghost wasn’t Tiffany Engel, then they would have to start over and go back to looking at the Schuberts, in which case he’d need every ghost hunter he could get his hands on.

Stan said, “Catch twenty-two here. We can’t pick him up until we know how to stop the ghost. But if we wait to pick him up, the ghost might kill someone else.”

“
Will
kill someone else,” Eddie said.

“How can you be sure?”

“Because Max Engel slept in his condo last night. He would have run by now if this was over.”

“Run away from millions of dollars that are waiting for him when he sells his business?” Stan said.

Eddie thought about it. “Good point.”

Stan said, “We also keep looking at this like the ghost is in charge. But maybe it’s Max running the show.”

“It’s her. It’s the ghost.”

“How do you know?”

“Because she tried to kill me last night.”

“Maybe on his orders.”

“Either way,” Christie said. “How do we stop the ghost?”

Eddie said, “Honestly?”

“Yes.”

“Max Engel dies.”

Christie’s eyes bugged. “Are you serious?”

Eddie started pacing. He felt like they were both close and a million miles away from a solution. “I’m not, but it’s the closest thing to a foolproof plan. Without her link to this world, Tiffany goes away. Permanently.”

“There’s another way,” Stan said.

Eddie stopped pacing and looked at his friend. “You found something?”

Stan nodded. “A few cases in the seventies and eighties, in Europe of course.”

Eddie didn’t quite groan. The paranormal data wasn’t very reliable anywhere, but the shit that came out of Europe was usually the worst.

Stan brought his laptop out of hibernation. “The conventional solutions won’t work.”

“What are the conventional solutions?” Christie said.

Eddie said, “First, you ask the ghost to leave.”

“
Ask
?” Christie was incredulous.

Eddie nodded. “If that doesn’t work you introduce more and more aggressive tactics. The problem is this approach takes time.”

“And we don’t have time,” Christie said. “She’ll kill anybody that gets close to her. So we have one shot at this.”

They both turned to Stan.

“Relink,” Stan said.

Eddie stopped pacing. He hadn’t thought of that as a possibility. Thank God Christie had urged him to call Stan. He was the best researcher that Eddie knew.

Christie said, “How do we do that?”

“First, we need something to relink her to.” Stan folded his arms. “Some place that holds meaning to her.”

Christie looked a little lost. Eddie explained. “We believe a ghost’s link to this world is based on thermodynamics. It has to do with energy. Very strong emotions create a lot of energy. Trauma does the job well. Which gives me an idea.”

“Before we get to the idea.” Christie put her hands on her hips. “How would it work?”

Eddie said, “We find a place that’s meaningful to her and we get her there.”

Stan said, “Assuming we can do both things—”

“We can,” Christie said.

Eddie smiled. She was thinking the same thing as him.

Christie said, “Max Engel will tell us.”

“How?” Stan said.

“I don’t know yet,” Christie said. “But part of him wants to tell us. We just need to lean on him. And he’ll know of one place in particular.”

“What place?” Stan asked.

“We’ll get to that, bro,” Eddie said. “But before we do, relinking doesn’t solve the whole problem.”

“It solves the big one that’s in front of us.” Stan smirked.

Eddie nodded. “Sure, but even then it’s still a temporary solution in search of a permanent fix.”

“Permanent?” Christie asked.

Stan explained. “By linking her to a new place, we don’t destroy her. She’ll just haunt that new location forever. Any poor son of a bitch who gets too close will be in danger. It’s like leaving a live mine out in a field.”

Christie nodded. “But it separates Engel from her and gets rid of her ability to roam. Right?”

“In theory,” Eddie said.

“If I had a nickel for every time you said that.”

Stan said, “Every big shot paranormal guru will line up to help make Tiffany dissipate permanently.”

“Right,” Eddie said. “The important thing is the town will be safer.”

Christie fell silent and thought about it. Eddie paced the room. He was all nerves, now that they were closing the net. The sooner they got to Engel, the better their chances of preventing another death.