Play Dead

Chapter 8

Officer Eve Salazar was thinking that the night had been fairly quiet when the police scanner flashed and the dispatcher spit out a suspicious-person code. The location, an abandoned cemetery where kids liked to hang out, was close. Her partner, Officer Reilley, flipped on the siren and swung the car around in the middle of the deserted street, tires squealing.

Kids thought cops liked busting parties, but Eve hated it. It made her feel like such a hypocrite.

Two miles later, Reilley executed a sharp right turn, leaving the blacktop behind. He barely slowed as the car bounced roughly over a narrow, rutted lane, the road eventually opening to a clearing.

Directly in front of them was a blue van.

Reilley jerked the patrol car to a stop while Eve scanned the area with the searchlight.

Silence, fog, and broken gravestones.

"This place is creepy," she said.

"Didn't you ever come to a cemetery to make out?" Reilley asked, stepping from the squad car. Eve ignored his question, called in their position, then followed, panning the clearing with her flashlight, the fog creating a glare.

"What's that?" she asked, freezing the light.

She shifted the beam up and down; the movement made the shadows jump.

"Let's check the van."

Eve shone her light through the passenger window into the front seat. Empty. She knocked on the glass. "Police. Anybody in there?"

She heard scrambling; then the door burst open and a girl of about seventeen tumbled out.

"Oh, my God! Am I glad to see you. I always hated cops, but I love you." She threw herself at Eve, hugging her tightly. "I love you!"

A blond-haired boy fell out behind her.

Both kids began babbling at once, trying to tell them what had happened.

"Somebody grabbed me," the boy said, his chest rising and falling, his words rapid-fire. "We ran back to the van and called the cops."

As the story progressed, it became more ridiculous. Eve began to think the kids were victims of a practical joke. She looked up to see Reilley standing with a hand pressed to his mouth, trying not to laugh.

So much better than finding somebody dead, Eve thought. Give her a practical joke any day.

"Then this guy in a black cape-" the boy said, gesturing wildly. "He comes swooping out of the woods and slams into the van. Just throws himself at the van. Attacks it. Isn't that right, Amy? He attacked it, didn't he?"

"Yeah. He came outta nowhere. He was flying."

"And I couldn't find the van keys." The boy reached in his pocket, pulled out a set of keys, and stared at them. "They weren't there before."

Reilley turned his back to them.

Don't laugh, Eve prayed. If she as much as heard a smirk coming from him, she'd lose it. The kids were scared to death. They didn't need adults laughing in their faces.

"Where did he hit?" Eve asked, moving toward the van.

"On the passenger side. Near the door."

Eve ran the flashlight beam over the indicated area. "It's dented," she said with surprise.

Reilley turned back around to join them. "Is that blood?" He pointed to a dark smear.

Eve leaned close. "Maybe. Or makeup."

"Makeup?" the girl asked. "What do you mean, makeup?"

Reilley let out an exasperated sigh. "Somebody's playing a trick on you." He was growing tired of the situation.

"This was no joke," the boy insisted. "If you think it's a joke, why don't you find the guy? He ran off that way. Into those trees."

The kid was cocky. Reilley wasn't used to being challenged like that. Before he had a chance to jump all over him, Eve nodded. "Good idea." She began moving in the direction he'd pointed, her flashlight trained on the path before her. She heard Reilley following behind.

Poor kids.

She stopped abruptly, panning her light across the ground. Reilley ran into her, grabbing her by the waist. "You never answered me about making out in a place like this," he said, his breath against her neck. His hand moved up to her breast.

They'd been dating for two months, but she disapproved of sexual contact on the job. She knocked his hand away. "Look, Romeo."

"Reilley. Name's Reilley."

Directly in front of her, in the glow cast by her flashlight, was a dark heap.

Something left by the merry pranksters? Eve wondered. A blanket arranged to suggest the shape of a person? Or was there actually someone under it?

The air was wet. She could feel the dampness on her face.

Without hesitation, Reilley stepped around her and approached the heap. Eve remained where she was and reached for her gun, releasing the snap on the leather case. "Careful," she warned.

One of these days he was going to jump into a situation too quickly and wouldn't live to tell about it.

Reilley touched the shape with one booted foot. He gave it a nudge. Eve could see it was heavy and solid. "A body?" she asked.

In all of her years as a cop, she'd never gotten sick, but now a surge of nausea swept through her.

To her shame, she believed in ghosts. She'd seen ghosts, and she didn't like them. Not a damn bit.

This is a spooky place.

Her heart began to hammer, and she felt twelve years old again, sneaking into an abandoned house that was supposed to be haunted. She'd come face-to-face with the ghost of a young woman who'd killed herself after being forced to marry a man old enough to be her grandfather.

Eve wanted to call for assistance, but she didn't have any reason for such action other than an irrational fear of the unknown.

Reilley crouched near the pile. Eve pulled her gun, but didn't release the safety.

Reilley tugged at one corner of the mud-caked blanket to finally expose a bloody, smudged face.

The stench of death hit her.

No ghost.

"Whew," Reilley said, recoiling.

A moment later, he forced himself to lean forward again. He examined the body in silence, then finally let out a frustrated sigh and rocked back, sitting on the heels of his boots, one arm dangling over a bent knee.

"Dead?" Eve asked, even though her nose had already supplied her with the answer to that question.

"Yep. Better call Homicide."

"Don't touch anything."

"I know, I know."

She radioed the dispatcher with her shoulder mike.

"How old, do you think?" she asked once she'd finished the transmission.

"Just a kid. Not over nineteen or twenty."

Reilley's voice was sad as he continued to consider the body in front of him. It was times like these, when he allowed her to see his sensitive side, that Eve could almost imagine loving the guy. Almost.

"Jesus!" Reilley dropped his flashlight and scrambled backward, landing on his ass.

"What?"

"His eyes. Weren't they closed a minute ago?"

She trained her light on the muddy face. Eyes that had been closed were now wide open.

Something woke him.

Jordan Kemp felt cool air against his skin. Even though his eyes were closed, he could sense a light shining in his face. Was that the tunnel everybody always talked about? Would there be dead relatives waiting for him on the other side? Relatives he'd-always hated?

He wanted to explain that the prostitution thing had started out as something temporary. Quick money so he could get his life on track. But once he'd started living that kind of lifestyle, he couldn't go back because he was already tainted. And truthfully, he hadn't wanted to go back, because prostitution had become his reality.

But he didn't want to go to hell for it. If he'd known Death was going to come knocking so soon, he would have been good.

"Yep," interrupted the voice of a man. "Better call Homicide." That was followed by, "Just a kid." The guy sounded sad.

Not dead. Couldn't they see he wasn't dead? Not yet.

Hafta tell 'em. Hafta let 'em know.

People always said he was bullheaded. That he could levitate if he ever set his mind to it. He didn't make himself levitate, but after a bout of skull-exploding concentration he managed to open his eyes.

That's when all hell broke loose.

"Radio the paramedics," the man shouted.

Too late, Jordan would have said if speech had been possible.

Too fucking late.

The passenger-side tire dipped into a rut, and the steering wheel was wrenched from Elise's hands as she maneuvered her car along the overgrown road leading to the abandoned cemetery. Beside her, Gould let out a curse as his head smacked the window.

"Sorry," Elise said.

Inside the wrought-iron cemetery gates, Elise pulled to a stop. Through silhouetted live oaks and draperies of dangling Spanish moss, people moved in front of headlights, creating beams of diffusion. A low-lying fog shifted and swirled like a staged special effect while police cars parked erratically and an ambulance waited, light flashing, doors open. Yellow crime scene tape wrapped around trees and cemetery statuary.

She and Gould were met by one of the first officers on the scene. "Paramedics pronounced the victim dead," Officer Eve Salazar told them, hand resting on her belt. "They worked for ten minutes, but weren't able to revive him."

"Where's the body?" Elise asked.

"Waiting for the ME." She jerked her thumb behind her. "Due to the circumstances, the crime scene's been compromised."

"What about the kids? We're going to need to get their statements."

"Taken down to the police station. They were pretty upset, and we thought it would be better for them to wait there."

Elise nodded. She wouldn't have wanted Audrey to remain at the scene any longer than absolutely necessary.

What had at first appeared to be a practical joke had turned into a homicide, with two innocent kids inadvertently stumbling across a body that was still alive.

Not an unusual scenario. Sometimes victims of crime were dumped because they were thought to be dead. And it wasn't all that strange for kids to come across bodies, since the same kind of seclusion appealed to both teenagers and killers.

Elise and Gould followed a path that had already been tagged with yellow markers as Officer Salazar led them to the body. A small group stood around it, the area illuminated by high-powered lights run by small generators. Elise recognized Abe Chilton, head crime scene investigator.

"Smells like he's been dead a few days rather than a few minutes," Elise said, hand to her nose. She turned to Salazar's partner. "Are you sure the victim was alive when you found him?"

"He opened his eyes," Officer Reilley insisted.

"Could that have been a postmortem muscular response?" Gould wondered aloud.

"The guy was alive," Reilley insisted.

"What about the site where the teenager was grabbed?" Elise asked.

They doubled back, then veered off to follow another path lined with markers.

"This is the place." The glow of Salazar's flashlight revealed a shallow grave. "Kid said a hand came out of the ground."

An indentation revealed where the body had been.

Nearby stood an unopened bottle of whiskey. Beside it, a silver dollar.

"Gifts for the dead," Elise commented. "Or in this case, the undead."

"A killer who leaves presents?" Gould asked.

"So the victim doesn't come back and haunt him."

"Nice." Gould trained his flashlight away from the disturbed earth. "Drag marks."

"It starts at the water's edge," Officer Salazar told them. "Musta come by boat."

"Any evidence?" Gould asked.

"So far, a couple of footprints." Salazar shrugged. "Maybe a man's nine or ten."

"There's some weird shit going on in this city," Reilley said. "Some really weird shit."

Gould nodded. "Weird shit happens."

Abe Chilton and some of his team appeared out of the darkness. "I want you to see this." Chilton raised his flashlight, pointing the beam at a nearby tree. Nailed to the trunk five feet from the ground was a small twisted figure.

"Mandrake root," Elise said. The human-shaped root was said to scream when pulled from the ground.

"Nightshade?" Gould asked.

"One and the same."

While Chilton kept his flashlight beam directed on the tree trunk, Elise continued to visually examine the small figure. It was wrapped in brown paper, probably torn from a grocery sack.

Root work. "This might reveal our victim's identity," Elise said.

Somebody handed her a pair of latex gloves. She snapped them on, then stepped closer. Others stepped back.

Elise removed the root from the rusty nail, then unrolled the paper to reveal a name written over and over in black ink.

Seven times seven. The root worker knew his or her stuff.

"Jordan Kemp," Elise said. "Somebody call that in."

Two minutes later, they had a report. "Jordan Harold Kemp," Officer Salazar reported. "White male. Age twenty-one."

"Any record?" Elise asked.

"Arrested twice for prostitution."

"Should have a print on file, then."

Officer Salazar shot a worried look from Elise to the root she cradled in her palm. "I don't like the looks of that," she said nervously.

"It won't hurt you," Elise assured her. "It has nothing to do with you."

People often got curses, spells, and root work confused. "See this?" Elise pointed to a leaf that had been glued to the body of the root. "It's acacia. Ancient Egyptians made funeral wreaths out of acacia leaves."

"So it's a tribute," Gould said.

It was amazing how quickly Elise's years of study came rushing back. As if the knowledge had always been there. As if she hadn't spent over a decade trying to forget everything she'd ever learned.

"A single herb can be used for a lot of different things, in a lot of different ways," Elise said. "It all depends on how it's handled and what it's with."

"And acacia with nightshade… or mandrake root…?" Gould prodded.

With a rotting corpse just yards away and an ancient spell in the palm of her hand, Elise suddenly felt bathed in certainty. "That particular combination," she explained, "is used to resurrect the dead."