Final Words (10 page)

“Us?” His stomach knotted. “I thought we were getting
together for a little fun.”

Her eyes flashed. “You think I agreed to spend two weeks in
this gritty little tourist trap for fun? I only agreed to come here because I
knew I could see you. I think it’s time we take this relationship to the next
level.”

He tempered his own rising annoyance. “Let’s not complicate
things by talking about relationships.”

Narrowing her eyes, she glared at him. “You’d be lucky to
have me and you know it!”

He noticed other diners giving them curious glances as Layne’s
voice rose. “Of course I would. If I was looking for something on the next
level. But I’m not and neither are you.”

“You’re just blowing me off!” Her hand shook as she drank. Wine
sloshed down her chin.

Jason reached inside his jacket for his wallet. “Why don’t
we go? We can talk about this in the car.”

“Are you afraid I’ll cause a scene?” Her voice rose on the
last word but she didn’t resist as he pulled her out of the booth. “Are you afraid
I’ll draw attention in public?”

Jason dropped some money on the table. “You are causing a
scene, Layne. Calm down and let’s take this outside.”

“Yeah.” Stumbling into him, giggling suddenly, she grabbed
his shirt. “Let’s take this outside. Then, let’s take it in the car.” Her hand
slipped inside his shirt and her fingernails scratched his chest. “You know you
want it, Jason. You always want it from me because I’m the best you’ve ever
had.”

Clamping one arm around her waist, he hustled her across the
restaurant. He knew he would have to fight her off all the way back to her
hotel. Most men would have been thrilled to have a beautiful woman like Layne
Simmons pawing at them but tonight the notion made him sick.

* * * * *

Lying on her stomach in the middle of her bed, Emma flipped
through the TV channels without really seeing what was on each one. Her
thoughts continued to churn, trying to make sense of what had happened to her
life in the past year. She’d been a fool to trust Alan. Even tonight, after subjecting
her to his wandering eye and arrogance, he’d had the nerve to ask her to pay
for dinner, claiming he’d forgotten his wallet.

“Yeah, right,” Emma muttered and hit the channel button on
her remote. Police drama, sitcom, Old Spice commercial…

Jason MacKenzie wore Old Spice. Although it suited his
masculine physique, she would have expected something racier for a man of his
reputation. A man who dated a different woman every night. A man who wouldn’t
stay out of her dreams.

Frowning, she pressed the channel button again. Weather
forecast, SUV commercial, sport fishing competition…

Emma sat up. She had known the dead fisherman’s name was
Robert Harris. She’d known that his wallet was in his cooler of beer. He’d
stood right in front of her, wearing a fishing vest and a drooping hat covered
in hooks and told her those things.

Stop it!

Rising, she paced the bedroom with the remote control in her
hand and pushed the channel button again. Advertisement for a new sci-fi movie,
a sports car, Mexican soap opera…

Jaime Campanero’s name had come to her too and she’d known
about the argument he’d had with his sister over the television program. A
woman in white had told her so. How was that possible?

“It wasn’t,” she muttered, hitting the channel button again.

Seinfeld
rerun, anti-aging skin-care cream, special
investigative report on near-death experiences…

Emma stopped pacing as a familiar image appeared on the
television screen—the image of a long tunnel stretching toward a gently
pulsating light. Shadowy figures crossed in front of the light.

A chill crawled through her as the announcer described what
she’d experienced that night in the emergency room.

“Dream or something more?” the announcer queried. “Evidence
is mounting that it may be possible to catch a glimpse of Heaven and not only
live to tell about it but to bring back some amazing abilities. Stay tuned to
hear the personal stories of people who have died and come back.”

Emma sat on the bed again and turned up the volume.

* * * * *

Driving his Mustang through the dark streets of Clear
Harbor, Jason frowned. Fending off Layne’s advances had proven as difficult as
he’d expected. And her anger when it finally sank in that he really wasn’t
interested…

Lifting one hand off the steering wheel, he touched the raw
streak on his cheek where she’d raked him with her fingernails. No, she hadn’t
been happy.

As he turned onto Seadrift Lane, his headlights swept over
the apartment building on the corner. The light illuminated the empty
second-floor balcony facing the street and then shot across the broad green
lawn that circled the building.

Slowing, he pulled to the curb between a rusted red pickup
and a small sedan. Then he shifted into park and turned off the engine. He cut
his headlights. Darkness enveloped him.

Through the open window, he heard the muted throb of music
from a nearby apartment. The desk sergeant at the station would probably get a
complaint call from a neighboring tenant soon but the music didn’t bother
Jason. The dragging bass met the rhythm of his heavy heart and he listened
beyond it to the crickets and the night crawlers and the past.

He stared through the Mustang’s windshield. The mystery car
had leapt the curb a few yards ahead of where he parked now. If the driver had
been paying attention that night, he would have seen Rose crossing the lawn. If
he’d been sober he wouldn’t have jumped the curb and shot across the grass to
where she’d been walking. If he’d been honest—if he’d cared—he wouldn’t have
sped away afterward.

Jason pressed a hand against his unsteady stomach. Standing
on the balcony that night, he had been above the scene. Down here he could see
it from the mystery car’s perspective. It hurt to come here, to remember what
had happened but Jason figured he deserved a little mental anguish.

He unbuckled his seatbelt, picked up the rose that lay on
the passenger seat and then stepped out of his car. Fine gravel crunched under
his boots. Letting the door fall quietly closed, he walked around the Mustang.
Stepping up on the lawn, he felt the cool crispness of the grass and the gentle
rise of land. No evidence existed of the gouges the mystery car had left a year
earlier but Jason knew exactly where they started.

And exactly where they ended.

He walked until he reached the place where his sister had fallen.
She hadn’t been thrown as Emma and Brian had been. Rose had simply crumpled
about a yard from the car’s grill.

The off-white compact had sat motionless for several
seconds. Seconds in which Jason could have run down the stairs. Seconds in
which he could have at least gotten the license plate number and make and model
of the car. Instead, he had used those seconds to stand on his balcony and
stare in shock at his sister’s still body. And then the little car had backed
up and driven off into the night.

Jason had often considered putting up a small white cross
for Rose on the place where she’d died but the guy who owned the apartment
building wouldn’t have liked that. So instead he drove past the spot every day.
Once a month, he left a single red rose there. Fourteen months’ worth of roses.
No one had complained yet.

Kneeling, he placed the rose on the grass. The music
stopped. The crickets and the night crawlers fell silent too. But the past
would not be silent. It echoed inside his head. He heard his sister’s sobs, the
grinding of earth beneath thick rubber tires, the impact of metal on flesh.

Jason lifted his hands to his ears but could not block out
those sounds from his past. He could not block out the memory of his own
thoughtless words that had driven her from his apartment and to her death. He
could not ignore the whispers of anger he felt because she’d left him to face
life alone. He couldn’t ignore his guilt in her death…or his failure to find
her killer.

He wanted the guilt and anger to go away. He wanted Rose to
come back.

He wanted his life back.

“I think I had a near-death experience.” Emma settled into
the leather chair in Paul Sanders’ office Thursday morning. “And I think it
left me with the ability to communicate with the dead.”

Paul raised one eyebrow but before he could speak, she
rushed on. “I caught a documentary on the subject and then I did some research.
A lot of people—millions, in fact—believe they’ve had such experiences.” She
forced her clenched fingers to relax against the nubby gray skirt that covered
her thighs. “The descriptions I’ve read sound like what happened to me. And it
would explain what’s been happening since that night.”

Paul crossed one leg over the other, getting comfortable in
his wide chair. “After our first meeting I thought you might begin to think
along such lines, so I did some research on that topic too.”

Excitement coursed through Emma when he didn’t automatically
dismiss her idea. “Do you think it’s possible?”

Paul lifted one hand and then lowered it gently to his lap
again. “There are common traits running through almost all reported near-death
experiences and yours certainly falls in line with them. The sense of leaving
your body, the light in the corridor—or tunnel as it’s often referred to—the
message you received from your friend, Brian.”

“And that woman with the rose,” Emma added. “I’ve never seen
her before but somehow she’s important.”

“I suppose that’s possible,” he said quietly.

“So you think I did have a near-death experience?” Emma crossed
her arms over her stomach and tried not to shiver as her excitement grew. “That
I saw God in that golden light and that I came back with the power to
communicate with the dead?”

“No.” His pale blue eyes glowed with sympathy. “I believe
that cases of near-death experience are examples of delusion or simple chemical
reactions in the brain.”

Disappointment jolted her. “Oh.”

“Emma.” His voice softened. “You want to believe that you
had a near-death experience and as a result of it you now experience psychic
incidents. You see the spirits of those you autopsy and they tell you truths
regarding their deaths.” He tilted his head. “But consider this—perhaps you
feel guilty for surviving the hit-and-run when your friend did not. In your
mind, it isn’t fair that you didn’t die too. So your subconscious fabricates
these incidents to justify your survival.” He steepled his fingers under his
chin. “In other words, subconsciously you’ve convinced yourself that you
survived because God had a purpose for you. That purpose being to solve how
other people died. But the truth is that there are no hard facts to support the
theory of near-death experiences, any more than there are facts to prove that
ghosts exist.”

Emma wasn’t ready to give up. “But how did I know about Amalia
Campanero’s brother?”

“It’s a well-known fact that most murder victims are killed
by people they know, often by relatives. It wouldn’t be difficult for your
subconscious mind to suggest that one of Ms. Campanero’s relatives killed her.
You knew from her file that she wasn’t married so a sibling would be the next
logical choice as a suspect. And since most murders are committed by men, it
had to be a brother.” Picking up his pen, he tapped it gently against the
notepad. “Your mind simply made connections that, in this case, were
coincidentally true.”

“But I knew his name. Jaime.”

“Not an uncommon Hispanic name along the Texas coast.”

“But how did I know they had argued?”

Paul lifted one shoulder. “A coincidence?”

Frustration seized her. Rising, she paced around the office,
twisting her fingers together. “Okay but what about Robert Harris?”

“Robert Harris was well-known in Clear Harbor. He was an
award-winning fisherman.” Paul drew checkmarks in his notebook, as if ticking
off points. “Once I saw the photograph in his newspaper obituary, even I
recognized him. He’d won several awards and was active in community services,
as are you. It’s likely that your paths crossed at some time in the past or
that you saw his photo in the local newspaper. You probably recognized him on a
subconscious level and, again, your imagination made the connection for you.”

He was making too much sense, which only increased her
frustration. She swatted one hand at the drapes as she paced by the window. “But
what about his wallet? How did I know where it was?”

“Perhaps Mr. Harris mentioned in some interview that he kept
his wallet wrapped in plastic inside his cooler. It was probably a fact that
was filed away in the recesses of your mind. Or it was just your own common
sense at work.” He watched her as she came back around his desk. “A cooler
sounds like a logical place to keep a wallet dry during a fishing trip. When
you saw him lying on the table, your mind—which is trained to solve medical
mysteries—pulled forth what clues it had and solved a different kind of mystery
for you.”

Emma sat back in her chair. “Blast it.”

Paul chuckled. “It’s more romantic to believe you’ve been
given a gift to use for the benefit of mankind. As doctors, we’re already
inclined to believe we possess divine powers, that we can save the world. You
want to learn why people die so your subconscious mind comes up with a way for
you to do it.”

Emma looked him straight in the eye. “I guess there’s only
one way to find out if you’re right.”

Paul tilted his head again. “How’s that?”

“Perform another autopsy.”

* * * * *

Jason slammed a file folder down on his partner’s desk. “Can
you believe that Hosken is giving us another case?”

Charlie looked up from the bagel he’d just smothered with
cream cheese. “That, my friend, is because we’re the best.”

“Bull. He just wants to keep us from following up on Ty’s
case so we won’t notice he’s made no progress. And Emma’s hit-and-run—”

“Emma, is it?” Charlie lifted one eyebrow.

Jason glared at his friend. “Don’t start.”

Charlie smiled innocently. “I was just wondering how your
date went with Detective Simmons.”

“Don’t ask.”

Charlie gestured left and right with his bagel. “Don’t
start. Don’t ask. Is there no topic we can discuss?”

Jason grabbed the folder again. “I can see you’re gonna be
impossible today.”

“Sorry.” Charlie placed his bagel on a napkin. “A night with
a beautiful woman should make a man happy. Mine did.”

“Well, I didn’t spend the night with a beautiful woman. I
spent part of the night with a…” He cut off the derogatory term that tipped his
tongue. “Layne went wacko on me last night, Charlie. She had too much to drink
and started talking about relationships. She’s never done that before. Our
times together have always been completely casual.”

“Don’t let one bad experience put you off all women. Now,
Emma St. Clair—”

“Is not up for discussion.” Dismissing the topic, Jason
opened the folder. “Here’s our new case. Dennis Turner, a known drug dealer—”

“I certainly knew him,” Charlie interrupted, growing serious
at last. “He killed someone?”

“Someone killed him.” Jason scanned the preliminary report. “He
was gunned down at point-blank range.”

“Any obvious suspects?”

Jason flipped a couple of pages and sighed. “Oh, yeah. We’ll
be all week running these guys down.”

* * * * *

“Campanero still claims his confession was coerced.” Marta
kept her voice low as she and Emma wandered among the members of the Clear
Harbor Women’s League gathered at the Civic Center dining room. “Right now it’s
his word against that of the detectives on the case. Without evidence, we can’t
hold him much longer. We’ll have to turn him over to Immigration and they’ll
just send him back to Mexico. He’ll probably sneak back across the border
within a week.”

Passing a side table, Emma picked up a program for the
fundraiser. “You’ll find a way to get the evidence you need.”

“You bet I will.” Marta gestured toward a table near the
front of the room and then pushed through the group of women who had paid fifty
dollars a plate to support a local literacy program. “But it’s going to be
tough. The murder weapon hasn’t been found and there was no physical evidence
at the scene. We know the caliber of the weapon that killed her and we know
when and where she died. But that’s all.”

Amalia’s image crept into Emma’s mind as she sat at the
table with Marta. She heard again the elderly woman’s voice as she implicated
her brother. Paul believed the image had been a hallucination from Emma’s
guilty subconscious and that the information she’d “received” from that image
had simply been coincidentally true.

But Emma wondered what would have happened if she hadn’t
experienced that hallucination. Without her suggestion, would Jason have
thought to check Amalia’s family background or would Jaime Campanero have
escaped justice forever?

And as for Robert Harris…

She did draw comfort from Paul’s theory on that one. She
probably had read about the fisherman or seen him on television. But that didn’t
make the prospect of performing another post mortem any easier to bear. Part of
her looked forward to her next autopsy. The curious part. But another part of
her, the part that lacked self-confidence…

“Ah, well.” Marta reached for a poppy seed roll in the
basket on the table. “If everything was too easy, the DA’s office wouldn’t need
so many assistant district attorneys like me.”

Too nervous to eat, Emma pushed her own bread plate aside. “What
would you do then?”

Biting into her roll, Marta considered as she chewed.
Finally, swallowing, she nodded. “I’d probably be a cop.”

Emma smiled at her friend. “You’d have to be involved in
getting the bad guys somehow, wouldn’t you?”

“We can’t let people get away with crimes.” Marta paused
while a passing waitress filled their water glasses and then she said, “I hate
to lose a case where I
know
the defendant is guilty. Sometimes I want to
just grab the nearest bailiff’s gun and execute my own sentence on an acquitted
scumbag.”

Startled, Emma sat back. “Marta!”

“Oh, I wouldn’t really do it.” Marta’s dark eyes gleamed as
she reached for the butter. “But I can fantasize about taking out someone the
system doesn’t punish properly. You probably think the same whenever you
perform an autopsy on a child who’s been abused to death by some Neanderthal
who should’ve been castrated at puberty. Anyone with a trace of compassion or a
sense of justice would want to make sure that evil people get the punishments
they deserve. Take what happened to you and Brian as an example. Don’t you want
the person responsible to pay?”

“I want justice, Marta but I just can’t make myself feel
bloodthirsty about it.”

Marta’s eyes widened as she licked butter off her thumb. “Do
I sound bloodthirsty?”

“You certainly make it sound as if it would be all right for
a person to take matters into their own hands.”

“I don’t believe in violent revenge, Emma but it eases a lot
of stress to fantasize about dealing personally with a bad guy. It’s just a
mental exercise.” Lifting her chin, Marta glanced around the crowded room. “Are
we going to get this fundraiser started or what?”

Sipping her water, Emma pondered her friend’s words. She’d
known that Marta was gung-ho about her job but she’d never realized her friend
had such violent fantasies. Marta claimed that Emma was the same. Considering
what her brain might be doing on its own, Emma realized that Marta might be
right.

* * * * *

Jason stepped inside the gloomy bar and paused to get his
bearings. This was his fifth stop of the day and he was getting tired. He had
to remind himself that it wouldn’t be smart to walk into a place like this
blinded by the noonday sun. Once the heart of Clear Harbor, this area of town
had degenerated in recent years so that few legitimate businesses operated
there. A few bars had sprung up along with tattoo parlors and a liquor store
but most of the buildings stood empty. The dock lay about two blocks south,
close enough to make this the perfect environment for drug runners like Dennis
Turner to ply their trade.

Jason’s eyes adjusted to the gloom and he approached the
sagging bar. The bartender, a fat guy with fewer than a dozen scraggly hairs on
top of his shiny white head, looked only slightly more reputable than the
handful of patrons he served. But Jason trusted bartender Willy Berber to tell
him the score and Willy trusted Jason to treat his regular customers with at
least a pretense of respect. Willy didn’t really care how Jason treated the
non-regulars.

“Hey, Willy.” Jason eased down on a wooden barstool that
rocked beneath his weight. Leaning forward, he spoke quietly. “You heard about
Dennis Turner?”

“Young kid who got popped night before last?” Willy answered
just as quietly. “Scraggly-haired blond with a droopy eye? Pushes or pawns
whatever he can lay hands on?”

“That’s him.”

“Yeah, I heard.” Willy grabbed a can of cola from under the
counter and passed it to Jason. “Nobody’s owned up to it.”

“You haven’t heard anything? Not even a rumor?”

Willy shifted bloodshot eyes toward the back corner of the
room and murmured, “Carrot-top back there has been whinin’ about a lost piece.
Said he’s worried somebody might’ve used it to pop someone and then dump the
blame on him. The way he told it sounded like something that might’ve already
happened.”

“Did he mention who that somebody was?” Jason ran a finger
down the condensation forming on his soda can.

“Naw, he was blubberin’ so bad I couldn’t catch half what he
was sayin’.”

“Thanks.” Rising, Jason strolled toward the restrooms at the
back of the bar. He passed a small table where a redheaded youth sat with a
couple of tougher-looking guys. None of them seemed to notice him as he passed,
so he caught them off guard when he whirled, shoved the table aside and lifted
the redhead against the wall. The kid squealed in fright while his friends
tumbled onto their backsides.