Until I Die Again [On The Way To Heaven] (Soul Change Novel) (35 page)

She gave him a tight smile. “You’ll find out my secrets when I find out yours.”

At quitting time, Hallie slammed the checkbook shut and leaned back in the chair with a sigh. She glanced at the bottom drawer of the file cabinet, then out the glass window to the shop. Randy was watching her. Oh, he was pretending to be working on the Jeep, but his hands were only moving enough to perpetuate the notion. Was he waiting for her attempt to put the newspaper article back?

She leaned out into the shop. “I’m taking off now.”

“Sure. Have a good one.”

“Thanks. Have fun with the Poker Putzes tonight.”

She turned and started to leave, but he grabbed her arm just as she reached the door.

“How did you know about the poker group? And why did you call them the Poker Putzes’?”

She shrugged. “I don’t know. Those words just came out. I have no idea where they came from.”

His eyes widened, and he backed up a few inches.

Until I find out what you had to do with my wreck, and until I can prove it, I might as well have some fun with you.
Only Chris had called his buddies the Poker Putzes.

“G’night.” She left him standing there gawking.

Once the cold wind whipped around her, the smile faded from her lips. She was playing with matches and she knew it. The dynamite was just around the corner. No more psyching out; she had to find some answers.

The junkyard was closed, and no wonder, with snow piled all over the cars and metal remnants. She stood in front of the gate, trying to find Chris’s old GTO. The cold metal fencing bit into her bare hands as she searched. The crunched up trunk of a white car in the back caught her eye. She shoved her hands into her coat pockets and walked nearer to get a better look. The car was obscured between two other piles of flattened cars.

“Hello!” she called, but only the sound of the wind whistling its way through car bodies howled back.

She looked for signs of a recent presence at the junkyard but saw none. The chain that held the gates together was loose, as though the person securing it was in a hurry. Hallie pulled at the bottom of the gate, stretching it away from its mate. The bottom hinge was rusted, and with a little effort, she pulled the lower portion far enough for her to crouch down and slip through.

The snow crunched beneath her boots, and she was sure that everyone in Maven could hear it. She picked her way between the piles of cars to the one on the far side and stopped short. The sight of the monstrosity squeezed the air right out of her lungs. With her arm, she shoved the snow from the hood and trunk, careful not to snag herself on the jagged metal. She stood back to survey the twisted horror.

Not one inch of her car remained unmarred. Shards of glass clung to the outer edges of the windows like thousands of broken teeth. The hood was smashed in enough to encroach on the passenger side. She inched up to the window and looked inside. The driver’s door was ajar, still bent from the jaws of life apparently. The driver’s seat was flattened out and pushed sideways. She almost expected to see blood, her blood, all over the seat, but there was none.

How did I even make it to the hospital?

Once the shock of the twisted metal wore off, she remembered what had led her there. She needed to find clues that a truck had hit the car. One side of the car was smashed in, flatter than the other areas. She couldn’t tell where the truck had hit her, the side or back. If her nightmares weren’t so vivid, she’d wonder if the semi hitting her wasn’t her imagination.

Hallie stomped away from her car, not ever wanting to see it again. She wandered from pile to pile, plowing through snow drifts. The metal creaking in the wind made her jump and look for another intruder, but she was alone. Some piles rose so high, she wondered how long it would take someone to find her if one collapsed on her. She kept walking, looking for—she halted, sucking in a deep, cold breath.

The truck.

If the truck from her nightmares was black, this one was ashen gray from the torture of flames and intense heat. The paint was bubbled up in some places, non-existent in others.

The front corner was smashed in, and all along the side were dents. It had definitely been in a wreck. She walked around the other side, and her heart stopped beating for a moment when she saw the faint outline of green elf shoes beneath the crackled finish. Below that in green letters:
ELF PRODUCE. FRESH TO YOU.

Her teeth chattered, but not from the cold. She had been murdered by whomever had driven this truck last. Her stomach churned. She had to tell someone. But who was going to believe her connection between the truck and Chris’s car?

She would make someone figure it out, she thought, icy wind chilling her bones.

“Who the hell
are
you?”

Hallie’s shoulders hunched up, and she fought the lightheaded feeling that threatened to make her faint at the sound of Randy’s voice. She turned around, knowing her face was pale. He stood there, narrowed eyes filled with something akin to fear and anger. She glanced at the truck, then back at him, unsure how to play her hand. The wind picked up, howling viciously.

“I told you who I was.”

He stepped closer, his own gaze flicking to the truck before zeroing in on her again. “Yeah, I know what you told me. But who are you really? Who sent you here?”

She pulled her hair out of her eyes. “No one sent me. I came here on my own.”

“Because you dreamed of living in a town like this?”

“Yes.”

“No. You show up at my garage and offer to do my books,
guessing
that I need help. You go snooping through my files,
taking
things from my files.” He leaned closer, so close his warm breath fogged in front of her nose. “And now you’re here, of all places, in the junkyard, looking at one particular car, and one particular truck.”

She backed away. “I’ve looked at a lot of cars here. What’s the big deal?”

He nodded toward the truck. “Ever seen that truck before?”

“Maybe I have, and maybe I haven’t. What’s your interest?”

He took another step closer. “It was stolen awhile back. The thief ran it into the side of a mountain, and it burst into flames. Maybe you know who stole it.”

“You don’t look like a cop to me,” she said, standing tall and straight. “And you never answered my question. What’s your interest in it?”

Before she could move away, he grabbed her arms. “Tell me who you are,” he hissed.

“Get your hands off her,” another voice said from a few feet away.

She knew that voice. Her heart jumped before she even looked to see Jamie standing there, rigid and ready to kill.
Jamie.
But… how?

Randy’s grip relaxed, but his fingers remained around her arms. “I don’t know who you are, but I’m having a little fight with my girlfriend, so if you know what’s good for you, you’ll leave.”

Jamie took a step closer. “I don’t know who
you
are, but you’ve got your hands on my wife, and I’m not going anywhere without her.”

Surprise registered on Randy’s face, and with Jamie’s bruises, he looked like a man who regularly tangled with others. Hallie took the opportunity to twist free and race to Jamie’s side. Strong arms encircled her, but he remained facing Randy with stiff shoulders and a challenging stare. When Randy did nothing, Jamie steered her away to the front gates.

“Hallie DiBarto,” Randy’s voice called after them. Jamie kept walking, and she didn’t look back. “We’re not done yet. I will find out who you are.”

She shuddered, but the security of Jamie next to her injected the courage that was now faltering inside her. They walked past her rental car to his, and before they reached it, Randy stalked to his truck, shooting her a threatening glare before jumping in and driving off.

Before she could turn back to Jamie, he wrapped his arms around her and pulled her into his warm embrace. “Before I say or ask anything, I just want to hold you.”

She wanted to laugh, cry, scream. Instead, she soaked up the feeling of being with him again. It was stunning, unbelievable. It was a full minute before he finally moved back to look at her.

She ran her numb hands over his head. “You must be freezing!”

He glanced down absently. “I don’t have many coats in Caterina. You’re the one who’s cold. Your teeth are chattering Let’s get in the car.”

He’d left it running, and the heat felt wonderful. But not nearly as much as seeing him did.

“How did you find me?”

His eyes widened. “You’re going to ask
me
questions first?” He took a deep breath. “I found credit card charges from the Maven Inn.”

“They wouldn’t take cash. I couldn’t believe it.”

He shook his head. “You paid cash for everything so I wouldn’t find you.”

“It wasn’t to hide my tracks. I didn’t want to stick you with the charges.”

He gave her an exasperated sigh, and she saw the raw pain in his eyes. “I don’t care about the money.”

She touched his cheek. “You thought I was hiding from you. I’m sorry. It never occurred to me that you’d try to find me, especially after you told me not to come back.”

He took a deep breath. “And you weren’t going to give me a chance to change my mind?”

She smiled then, biting her lower lip. “Do you think after all we’ve been through I would give up on you that easily? I just… I had to take care of some things here before I could live in peace. I couldn’t explain it to you because you would think I was crazy and send me away to the Sharp Rehabilitation Center.”

“The bridge nightmares?” She nodded. “Well, I’m here now. Can you explain now why you left? Why I found my wife standing in a junkyard clutched in the arms of some greasy thug?”

She inhaled deeply, giving herself a moment to think. Jamie would never believe the truth. Maybe a half truth would be easier to digest.

“A little more than three months ago a woman was run off a nearby bridge and died.”

“You mean Chris.”

“You know? About Chris?”

“I found the article and her obituary.”

“How in the world did you find them?”

“Phoenix outed you. Remember, he has a paper fetish. He also likes to crawl under dressers and things. So go on, what about Chris? The article never said anything about her being run off the road. Her boyfriend,
Alan
, said she lost control of the car because she was upset.”

She felt the blood rush to her cheeks. “I—she was not upset. Well, she
was
upset, but she didn’t lose control of the car. A truck ran her off the bridge.”

“How can you be so sure? Three and a half months ago you were in California. You’ve never even been in Colorado.”

“I, well, in a way I was. You see, I had these dreams about the accident, you know, the ones about being run off a bridge. And I knew Alan—Randy, had something… back then I thought he… I had…” She dropped her head, rubbing her fingers across her temples.

When she lifted her head, her insides tightened at the penetrating look Jamie was giving her. In an exhale, she said, “I’m Chris. I know you’re not going to believe me, and I don’t expect you to. I just—I can’t dance around it anymore, and now that you’re here…” Tears flooded her eyes, tears of relief and of sadness that when he knew the truth, he wouldn’t want anything to do with her.

She waited for something, a word, an action. He just sat there and looked at her. Behind those blue eyes raced a thousand thoughts, all hidden from her. Then he reached out and touched her wet cheek with his thumb.

In a ragged whisper, he asked, “How?”

Her heart filled like a helium balloon, causing her to inhale sharply. “You believe me?” she whispered.

“I knew you were different, but I never imagined…” He shook his head. “I don’t know. I couldn’t imagine anything like this. But when I read that obituary, it was you. The dogs, the way she was. And the accident, your nightmares about bridges. And that time you screamed out Alan’s name. You looked like my wife, but you felt different.” His fingers traced the lines of her face. “You’re really someone else in there? A completely different person?”

“Yes. I’m Chris Copestakes, I was born here in Maven, I went to the community college to become a forestry technician, I had three sisters, three shelties, and when I was twenty-three, I was killed.”

His eyes looked luminous, taking in every word, every movement. “But you came back?”

She touched the hand that was pressed against her cheek. “Do you remember that night at Captain Morgan’s in California? When I told you that I had come back from death for you? That was true. On the way to Heaven, God told me I had a task, and I heard a voice say, ‘Find his heart.’
 
Then I woke up in Hallie’s body, and you were there in my room. I came back for you, Jamie. Because you needed a second chance, too.”

She realized that the gleam in his eyes was actually a film of tears, and that made her eyes water even more. His hand slid down her arm, taking her hand and pressing it against the softness of his lips.

He squeezed his eyes closed. “Everything I said, everything I did… I said a lot of mean things to you, I told you to leave me alone. But you stayed.”

She leaned over and touched her mouth to his. “Because I loved you. I wanted you for me, not just because you were legally my husband.”

“Then why did you leave me when everything was perfect?”

“Because inside me, it wasn’t perfect. The nightmares kept telling me that my death wasn’t an accident. I knew I wouldn’t have any peace until I found out what really happened.”

“And the jerk I found you with?”

“That’s Randy. The man I knew as Alan Messino.”

“The Alan in the article? Chris’s—your boyfriend?”

“Former boyfriend.”

She told him what she’d found out months earlier, filling him in on all the pieces of the puzzle except one. “I don’t know how he could have stolen the semi and caught up to me by the time I reached Crystal Bridge.”

Jamie pulled at a loose thread on his green sweater, deep in thought. “According to the article, Paula said you were meeting Randy, which he denied. She couldn’t prove… hey, wait a minute. Where did you call her from?”