Until I Die Again [On The Way To Heaven] (Soul Change Novel) (34 page)

Finally, he rolled over and hung his head off the bed, letting the blood rush to his brain to help him figure this out. Where else would she have gone? She was born in California, had never lived anywhere else but Caterina, had hardly been anywhere. She hadn’t charged the flight on her credit card.

A tearing noise drew his attention to the floor where Phoenix sat intently ripping a piece of paper to shreds. He gently smacked his nose, and the pup retreated, duly chastised. Jamie had lost more receipts and notes to the dog’s paper shredding habit. He picked up the soggy papers. Copies of two newspaper articles. When he idly unfolded them, the irrelevancy of the headline made him curious. He sat up and read the first one.

A woman named Chris Copestakes had been killed in a car accident in some place called Maven, Colorado. Some things were underlined, like the fact that her boyfriend Alan blamed her loss of control on her being upset. At the top the word “MURDER!” had been written in Hallie’s handwriting. It was dated about three months earlier, at the time when she was in the hospital. In fact, the day after her stroke.

Alan. The name she’d screamed out once.

He set that one aside and unfolded the next one. He pieced the photo back together and studied the picture of Chris and her family. Kinky hair, round face, and a sweet smile. He had no idea who she was, or why her obituary was in their house. She didn’t look the least bit familiar. Jamie read on:

“It’s not fair that I should have to say goodbye to my sister, Chris. She was my best friend, the godmother to my baby-to-be, and a wonderful person. She could make herself one with nature, spending hours in the woods with the wild creatures she treated like family. She was going to school to learn how to protect them, and she took with her to class dreams of making our world a better place. When Chris cared about someone or something, she worked tirelessly to win them over, love them or take their pain away. She was always there, willing to take your burdens from you, with room left on her shoulders for your tears.

“The thing I regret most about her unfair passing is that she never got to really fall in love, never got to have a family of her own to share all the love she carried inside. Somewhere, the man who was destined to marry her is out there feeling an emptiness he can’t explain, mourning a lost love he never found.

“Those of us who felt her love will carry it with us always in our hearts. Me, Mom and Dad, Bernice, Charlene, Tubby, Phoenix and Shelby will miss her more than life itself. She lives in us.

Paula Copestakes-Garth.”

He stared at the article, then read the words again. The first thing he realized was that it could have been written for Hallie, if she had died. Every word fit his wife perfectly, at least the post-stroke version of her. And the feeling of emptiness and mourning did fill him constantly. But Hallie had not died, had never been to Colorado, and did not have a sister.

Then there was the names of the dogs. Phoenix, the name she mumbled when she awoke from a nightmare and reached down to the floor. Tubby, Shelby, those names he’d heard before, too—at his mother’s house when Hallie was crying to go home.

He ran his fingers through his hair, his eyes wide in confusion. She must have read those names in this article. He wasn’t even sure they were attached to dogs. So she read the names and pretended they belonged to three dogs she never had. Okay, that was a good explanation. He looked at Phoenix, whose ears perked up at his glance.

“But why, why would she pretend to have three dogs? Why did she cry that night when she saw one of you guys at the dock? That was real. Say, where did you get this stuff, anyway?”

Jamie crawled down on the floor, exciting the pup who promptly retrieved a bone to play fetch with. After searching for a few minutes, Jamie found a piece of tape still clinging to the bottom of the dresser. He pulled it off and matched it to the rips on the pieces of paper. Obviously the pup found it and thought it might be fun to pull it down and shred it.

He sat back down on the bed and stared at the article again, studying the word “MURDER!” She’d written a question mark first, then made it into an exclamation point. She had come to the conclusion that this Chris had been murdered. Except that nothing in the article hinted that she might have been murdered. Why did Hallie think that? Where did she fit in with this Chris?

His gaze went back to the article. Chris Copestakes drove off a bridge. Hallie’s nightmares. They had to be connected. But how?

The next afternoon, Renee walked into Jamie’s office and stood in the horizontal shadows the blinds cast. He was staring at a blank space on the wall with an even blanker expression.

“Hello. Is anyone in there?” she asked, knocking on air.

Jamie slowly pulled his gaze to the doorway. “What can I do for you?”

His voice sounded faraway to him, as far away as his thoughts had just been. He blinked, then focused in on Renee. She looked at the open door, then back at him with narrowed eyebrows.

“I’m sorry to disturb you, but I found something you should see.” She stepped forward and laid the bill on his desk, pointing to a highlighted entry. “I thought it was an error and called the hotel. They said it was charged by Hallie. She wanted to pay cash, but they only take credit cards. I thought you’d want to know.”

When his gaze saw the line, his heart stopped for a beat: Maven Inn, Maven, Colorado.

Hallie sat in the car near her parents’ house. Her trembling fingers smoothed out the crinkled newspaper over her knee. She held it there to read, knowing her hands would be too jerky to hold it still.

Local Man Still Missing After Four Days.

Alan Messino, a carpenter who has lived in the area for two years, is still missing after four days of searching. His only family, sister Marie Messino, suspects foul play. “We were very close. He wouldn’t just take off like that. Yesterday I got a strange phone call, some guy mumbling that he was Alan and he had to get out of town for a while. It didn’t sound like my brother.” Investigators and volunteers have sent search parties out into the desert and will continue to look for Messino.

The picture of Alan Messino was torn away, but she remembered how the man looked. Not like her Alan. Wait. She remembered. Pieces and flashes of memory from her last day as Chris filled in the holes.

She had ordered an Indian jug from a store in Southern Utah for her parents’ anniversary. When she pulled the piece out of the box, several wads of newspaper fell onto the floor. The name Alan Messino caught her eye, the same name as her boyfriend.

She had been sure the name was a coincidence, but the date on the newspaper header was right around the time Alan had popped into Maven. She had wondered what he was running away from, feeling obligated to mend things between he and his sister. She decided to visit Marie, but first wanted to make sure this Alan was the same man she was dating. That town’s newspaper was online, and she looked up the article.

Alan Messino was not her Alan. Or rather, her Alan was not Alan Messino. She had scrolled back two days to find the original article on Alan’s disappearance and had nearly fallen off the chair when she read the headline next to a picture of a face she knew well.
Randy Vittone killed in fiery crash. Linked to bank robberies.
But Randy Vittone wasn’t just a bank robber—he was the man Chris had been seeing for eight months!

The eerie realization had crept over her like a slimy monster from a horror flick. If Randy was living under Alan’s name, and living period, then Alan must have taken the fiery fall for him. There had been a chance, a wee chance that the picture just looked similar to her Alan, and that Alan just happened to have the same name as the missing man’s. She had to give him the benefit of the doubt before going to the police.

She had gone to Alan’s shop and found him beneath the car, where she’d kicked his leg to get his attention. He’d taken the article from her, and the expression on his face told her his guilt. He was Randy Vittone. He had clutched her in his arms, begging for a chance to explain in the conversation she had remembered at Caterina.

“My name is Randy Vittone. Alan Messino isn’t dead. He’s the one behind this. Chris, he’s blackmailing me into robbing the banks for him. I can’t go to the police, but you can. Now that you know, I’ll get you the proof you need, and I’ll show you that Alan’s not dead. If you turn him in, then I’ll be free, and we can get married.” He’d taken her hand, bowed over it. “You don’t know how hard it’s been, all this time wanting you, but not wanting to drag you into my problems. It’s actually a relief to get it out into the open.”

She had wanted to believe he was an innocent pawn in a dangerous game. Now she just wanted the truth. Looking back, she could see the desperation in Randy’s eyes as he’d told her about Alan being alive. Alan was dead, she knew that. Somebody had died in Randy’s car. Sitting in the car, his parting words rang in her ears: “Goodbye, Chris. Drive carefully.”

Hallie swallowed hard, and the words sank to the pit of her stomach. The way he’d said those words, his last words to her. “Goodbye, Chris.” Goodbye. As in forever.

Her gaze darted around to make sure Randy wasn’t standing there outside her car. The windows were fogged up, and everything looked eerie, white and blank. Her fingers wrapped around the steering wheel, helping to hold back a scream. Fear, anger, confusion. Those feelings had been with her all along, haunting her dreams and her life. Now she knew why. But wait.

She gained control of herself and took a deep breath. Chris had left Randy’s and headed to Amberville via the Crystal Bridge. Presumably straight to Amberville, and probably driving rather quickly. How had Randy procured a truck and caught up with her that fast, only twenty-five minutes from his place? The only place that catered to trucks that size was Sweet Alice’s, and that was at least ten minutes in the opposite direction. It was impossible.

She drove back to Paula’s in a daze. Bernice was visiting, and the two women were in the kitchen laughing and cutting up potatoes.

“Hi, Hallie. Have you met my sister, Bernice? Hey, you all right?”

Paula stood at the foot of the stairs as Hallie walked straight to her room. “I’m fine. Just tired.”

Not to mention confused, angry, lonely, dying from missing Jamie, and almost wishing she hadn’t gotten that second chance. She quickly glanced up at the ceiling.
I take that back.

Randy regarded her quietly when she walked in the office the next morning. She hoped he couldn’t hear her heart slamming against her ribs, hoped he couldn’t see the knowledge in her eyes.

“Good morning,” she said softly.

“Mmhm,” he answered.

He stood in the corner of the office with a clipboard in his hand, checking items off a list. She glanced at the bottom drawer in the file cabinet. She had the crumpled article in her purse and a keen desire to get it back where it belonged before he realized it was missing.

His green eyes surveyed her above the clipboard. “Hallie, you didn’t take anything out of this office yesterday, did you?”

Too late. Her heart stopped, but she gained control over the fear that threatened to creep into her features. “No, why?”

“Just wondered.” He smiled that phony smile again. “We’re still on for lunch, aren’t we?”

She returned a smile she hoped looked more genuine. “Oh, lunch. Sure, I’m planning on it.” Under no circumstances could she give away her fears or suspicions. “Are we going to Alice’s?”

He set the clipboard down and walked over.
 
“Actually, I thought we’d go to my place for lunch.”

She couldn’t hide her discomfort at that suggestion. Especially remembering that the travel trailer he lived in sat on a rather desolate patch of land. “Uh, I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

“Sure, it is. Besides, I already bought some fresh hamburger and rolls yesterday, a head of lettuce and tomatoes. Oh, you think I’m after a bit of afternoon delight, eh? Don’t worry, I won’t try anything.”

He smiled and walked out of the office. It wasn’t seduction she was worried about.

All morning she watched the minutes fly by, dreading each time the hand moved around the face of the clock. At noon, Randy washed his hands and sauntered into the office to fetch her. When he lead her out to his new truck, she felt like the proverbial lamb.

The trailer was sloppy, but not disgustingly so. Pretty much like it had always looked. After they ate, he put his feet up on the edge of the table and lit a cigarette.

“Where are you from anyway?”

“California. A town called Oceanview.” Her gaze darted everywhere except at Randy.

“Why did you come to Maven?”

“I told you, I’d always dreamed of living in a small town in Colorado.”

His cigarette bobbed up and down between his lips as he eyed her through the smoke. “Why Maven, exactly?”

“Why all this chitchat?” she asked, perhaps too tersely. But, after all, she remembered how little of his past he had revealed to Chris.

He lifted an eyebrow. “Ah, do we have a past to hide?”

She leaned forward and met his gaze. “I don’t know. Do we?”

His feet dropped from the table’s edge, and he stood up. “Let’s go.”

Her heart jumped. “Where?”

“Uh, back to work.”

He was watching her, and she assumed an easy smile that pushed her anxiety from the surface.

“Co-ool. I’m ready.”

Randy froze in the middle of slipping the coat over his shoulders. She bit her lip but managed to keep a casual expression on her face. After a moment of tense silence, he put the coat on and walked right up to her. She stared at him, forcing herself not to back away, even an inch.

“You know, Hallie, there’s something about you. I don’t know what it is, but I’m going to find out.”

His voice carried a subtle threat, and his green eyes were like emeralds flashing with danger. Her courage ebbed, and she turned and walked toward the door, opening it. Then she turned back to him once she was breathing the cold, icy air.