Play Dead

Chapter 2

In the Savannah Historic District, Elise Sandburg pulled orange juice and milk from the dark refrigerator while lightning flashed and thunder rattled the windows of her old Victorian house.

"I was going to make French toast." She closed the refrigerator door with her elbow and placed the cartons on the antique table where a hurricane candle burned in front of her thirteen-year-old daughter.

Audrey stared straight ahead with bleary eyes, her shoulder-length curly auburn hair tangled from sleep.

"Guess we'll have to settle for cold cereal," her mother said. "A substation was hit, which means we might not have any power until tomorrow."

Audrey didn't care. Tomorrow she would be home again. Her real home. French toast wouldn't have made everything suddenly wonderful. Why did her mother think that? She wasn't a little kid anymore. French toast wasn't going to make staying at her mom's any better.

She wanted to be home, at her dad's, in her own room, her own bed, near her friends. Not here, where everything was weird even when the electricity was on.

Years ago, Elise-Audrey called her mother Elise, at least in her mind-Elise had started restoring the place, digging into rooms, tearing the walls down to stinky old boards, and stinky, stained wallpaper and holes big enough to crawl through.

Then one day she just stopped.

The floors still creaked, and doors opened by themselves. Her mother-Elise-blamed it on gravity, said the building had settled, and the doors were now hanging wrong, but that didn't make Audrey feel any better when one would swing open behind her.

Elise was coming at her now, with stacked bowls in one hand, a box of cereal in the other, another tucked under her arm. Wearing an old gray Savannah Police Department T-shirt and flannel pajama bottoms. No bra.

Her chin-length hair was straight and dark; her eyes had strange lines going through them.

"This is cozy, isn't it?" Elise asked, sitting down at the table.

Cozy?

Sweet kitty!

Audrey liked to make up phrases. Sweet kitty was her newest, and a big hit at school. One day she hoped she'd turn on the TV and hear somebody say one of the cool phrases she'd invented. One day, maybe she'd turn on the TV and David Letterman would shout, "Sweet kitty!"

Audrey poured herself some juice, then reached for a box of cereal.

"I read about a girl who got her name changed," Audrey said, cereal spilling on the table. "Said it was easy." She poured milk and picked up a spoon.

"Do you want to change your name?"

Audrey shrugged, trying to look unconcerned even though her heart was racing. "I've been thinking about it."

"Some cultures believe children should be able to name themselves," Elise said. "I always kind of liked that idea except a child might go for years with no name. Or end up with baby's first word, which would most likely be Mama, or Dada, or a favorite toy or food."

Audrey should have known Elise would actually like the idea. Her dad had freaked when she'd mentioned it to him.

"Have anything in mind?" Elise asked around a mouthful of food.

"I kind of like Bianca. And Chelsea. And Courtney."

Elise gave it some thought. "Those are nice names." She nodded.

"What do you think about SavannahV Audrey asked. "Then I could be Savannah from Savannah."

Elise leaned closer, forearms braced on the edge of the table. "Or how about Georgia from Georgia?"

This wasn't going the way it was supposed to. But then, nothing involving Elise ever did. Audrey had been anticipating an argument. Looking forward to an argument. Didn't Elise care what she called herself?

"In school, we looked up our names to find out what they mean, you know." Audrey frowned, confused and annoyed. "Mine means nobility."

Elise put down her spoon. "Not nobility. Noble strength."

"Anyway, who thought of that name?" It couldn't have been her dad. No way could it have been her dad.

"I did. But your father agreed it was lovely."

The phone rang.

Elise picked up the portable, remembered the power was off, then hurried down the hallway in the direction of the land phone.

Did Audrey really hate her?

Or did her attitude have to do with age? How much was typical thirteen-year-old behavior?

Thirteen was a horrid age. The only thing worse was fourteen, which Audrey would be in seven months. Elise had smoked her first cigarette at eleven. Thirteen-year-olds were doing drugs. Having sex. Having babies.

She hates her name.

What was wrong with the name Audrey? It may not have been something Elise would choose now, but she'd been eighteen when her daughter was born, and the name had seemed pretty damn cool.

The call was from Major Coretta Hoffman, head of Homicide. "I want you and Detective Gould to stop by the morgue before coming in this morning," the major said. "We've had another body come to life."

Another body.

The hair on the back of Elise's neck tingled.

Two "awakenings" in a single month. The first had been an accident, a mistaken call in the emergency room, the unfortunate patient an overdosed prostitute with a record who'd come around in the morgue.

She'd heard about it. Read about it.

It wasn't common knowledge, but occasionally people were pronounced dead when they weren't. Not something people liked to think about, but it happened.

But two times? In a month?

Was there a connection? Or was it simply an extremely strange coincidence?

"I'll be there as soon as I can." Elise hung up and made her way back to the kitchen.

"David Gould?" Audrey asked.

"Major Hoffman."

"Oh." Audrey seemed disappointed. "I like your new partner."

"Hmm," Elise said. Audrey was definitely part of a minority. "What makes him so special in your book?"

"He doesn't treat me like a little kid. And he doesn't ask stupid questions like 'How's school?' Or 'Where'd you get that curly hair?' And he doesn't seem like a cop at all." She thought a moment, then added, "He doesn't really even seem like an adult."

Unfortunately, Elise had to agree.

Elise had planned to spend more time with Audrey this spring and summer. Toward that end, she'd hoped an enthused new partner would be sent her way. One who was eager to dive in and give her the assistance she so desperately needed.

A pipe dream.

Her new partner seemed barely able to get his own paperwork done, let alone help Elise with a backlog of reports, filing, and cold cases.

David Gould. Used to be an FBI agent, but claimed he'd been in the market for a less stressful job. Translation: an easier job.

And while she wasn't into gossip like so many others in the police department, she liked to know who was watching her back. All she knew about Gould was that he'd been shipped down from Cleveland, Ohio, where he hadn't been all that long.

And she was beginning to suspect they'd been glad to unload him.