Second Grave on the Left

Chapter Thirteen

The next morning, I slept until nine, which was understandable since I didn’t go to bed until well past five. My mental state was still leaning toward fluffy when I searched out the coffeepot.

“Morning, Mr. Wong,” I said, my gravelly voice sounding as sleep-deprived as I felt. As I was reaching for the coffee can, I noticed a note lying on Mr. Coffee. He was so romantic. I paused to open the first fold.

What do you call a PI who doesn’t give up?

Hmmm. Several options came to mind. Aggressive. Dependable. Stalwart. Somehow I doubted any of those would be the answer they were looking for. I opened the last fold of the note.

Dead.

Dang. I should have stuck with monosyllabic guesses. Criminals weren’t keen on big words.

As enlightening as that was, I had work to do — so many lives to destroy, so little time — and new locks to buy. Having approximately three minutes to spare after I turned the pot on to brew, I decided to pee. But as I walked past my front door, someone knocked. I stopped, looked around, waited. After a moment, another round of raps echoed in my apartment.

I tiptoed toward the door, vowing that if they were already there to kill me, I was going to be really pissed. I peered out the peephole. Two women stood there, Bibles in hand. Please. That was such a bad disguise. They were probably expert assassins, sent to put two in my head before noon.

But there was only one way to find out. I slid the chain on my door into place and cracked it open. The older woman smiled and started in right away. “Good morning, ma’am. Have you noticed how the world is plagued with bad health right now?”

“Um—”

“That disease and illness have spread to every corner of God’s green earth?”

“Well—”

“We’re here to tell you that it is not always going to be that way.” She opened her Bible and thumbed through it, giving me an opportunity to speak.

“So, you’re not here to kill me?”

She paused, crinkled her thin brows at me, then glanced at her friend before saying, “Excuse me? I don’t think I understand.”

“You know, to kill me. To assassinate me. To put a gun to my head—”

“I think you have us confused with—”

“Wait! Don’t leave.” I closed the door to unchain it. When I swung it open, they took a wary step back. “So, you’re not assassins?”

They both shook their heads.

“You’re Jehovah’s Witnesses?”

They nodded.

This could be a good thing. Maybe they knew something I didn’t. “Perfect. Let me ask you,” I said as the younger one in back let her gaze wander over my attire, which consisted of a Blue Oyster Cult T-shirt that advised people not to fear the reaper and a pair of plaid boxers, “as Jehovah’s Witnesses, what exactly have you witnessed?”

“Well, if you’ll take a look…” The older one was rifling through her Bible again. “As a witness, it is our obligation to separate ourselves from wrongdoers, to purge evil persons from among us, and—”

“Right, right, that’s great.” I interrupted her with a wave of my hand. “But what I really need to know is, can you see, or witness,” I said, adding air quotes for effect, “demons?”

They glanced at each other. The younger one spoke this time, her shoulders straightening in confidence. “Well, demons are simply fallen angels who sided with Satan, the ruler of the world in these end times. It is our responsibility to remain chaste and faithful—”

“But have you ever seen one?” I said, interrupting again. At this rate, I would never get invited to a service.

“Seen one?” the older woman asked hesitantly.

“Yes. You know, in person?”

They shook their heads. “Not physically, no. But if you’ll look at this passage—”

Man, she liked that Bible. I’d read it and could definitely understand its appeal, but I didn’t have time for this. My three minutes were probably up as it was. “No offense, but — and I mean this in the most respectful of ways — you’re not helping.” I closed the door, a little saddened by the confusion on their faces. I just thought that maybe they had happened upon a demon or two on their treks through the city. If I was alone in this, if Reyes was really gone, I needed a way to detect them. But surely Reyes wasn’t gone. He couldn’t be.

I continued my trek to the outhouse and realized the old saying was right: Denial really wasn’t just a river in Egypt.

After dragging my boneless body into the office an hour later, I stood studying Cookie’s attire. She was wearing a purple sweater with a red scarf thrown around her neck. I tried not to worry.

She looked up from her computer. “Okay, I got a hold of Janelle York’s sister. She was on her way home, but she was kind enough to answer a few of my questions.”

Cool. “And?” I asked, pouring myself a cup. Because sometimes three just isn’t enough.

“She said that Janelle got heavily into drugs after Mimi moved to Albuquerque. Her parents thought it was because they’d had a falling out, but when I asked about Hana Insinga, the sister said she’d tried to talk to Janelle about the disappearance when Hana went missing. Janelle, Mimi, and Hana were in the same grade. But Janelle was outraged when she asked, told her never to mention Hana’s name again.”

“Wow, that’s a volatile response to such an innocent question.”

“That’s what I thought. And Warren’s cousin Harry who always asks for money?”

“Yeah.”

“Dead end. He’s been in Vegas for over a month, working at a gambling casino.”

“As opposed to a nongambling casino?”

“I also spoke to our murdered car salesman’s wife,” she continued, ignoring me.

“You’ve been busy.”

“She had the exact same story as Warren. Her husband started to withdraw, to get depressed. She said he worried constantly and told her the oddest thing.”

I raised my brows in question.

“He told her that sometimes our sins are too great to be forgiven.”

“What the hell did they do?” I asked, thinking aloud.

Cookie shook her head. “Oh, and she thought the same thing that Warren did. She thought her husband was having an affair. She said large sums of money went missing from their savings. I assured her he wasn’t having an affair.”

I cast her a teasing glance. “Just because he wasn’t having an affair with Mimi doesn’t mean he wasn’t having one at all.”

“I know, but that woman was a wreck. No need to make her suffer more. He wasn’t having an affair. I’m sure of it. Speaking of wrecks, how are you doing?” she asked, concern drawing her brows together.

“Wreck?” I balked, feigning offense. “I’m good. The sun is shining, the superglue is holding. What more could a girl ask for?”

“World domination?” she offered.

“Well, there is that. Have you talked to Amber today?”

She sighed heavily. “It seems my daughter is going camping with her dad this weekend.”

“That’s cool. Camping’s fun,” I said, careful to keep my tone light. I knew why the thought upset her, but chose not to mention it. When Amber stayed with her father, Cookie went into a kind of depressed state. Come Friday, that would have changed. Now her happy fix would have to wait until after the weekend. I felt for her.

“I guess,” she said, her voice noncommittal. “You look tired.”

I picked a couple of file folders off her desk. “So do you.”

“Yeah, but you were almost murdered last night.”

“Almost being the pertinent word in that independent clause. I’m going to do some research and then I’ll probably go talk to Kyle Kirsch’s parents in Taos. Can you call and make sure they’ll be home?”

“Sure.” She dropped her gaze and started thumbing through some papers. “He lived,” she said as I turned to go to my office. “Your attacker. After five pints of blood.” I paused midstride, restrained the emotion that threatened to surface, then continued into my office. “Oh, and I’m going with you to Taos.”

I figured she’d want to go. Just before I closed the door, I leaned out and asked, “You didn’t happen to leave me a note, did you? On Mr. Coffee?”

Her brows furrowed. “No. What kind of note?”

“Oh, it’s nothing.” I didn’t figure Cookie would threaten my life, but I had yet to find out if she was a black widow. She did have a dead guy in her trunk, and one could never be too certain these days.

I sat down at my desk, my thoughts cloudy with a chance of rain. He lived. That was good, I supposed, but he would always be a threat. I almost wished Reyes had been there, had taken him out, or at least incapacitated him so he would never be able to hurt anyone again. An age-old question surfaced despite its uselessness. Why did monsters like that get to live when good people died every day?

A soft knock brought me out of my musings as Cookie poked her head into my office. “Somebody’s here to see you,” she said, as though annoyed.

“Male or female?”

“Male. It’s—”

“Does he look like a Jehovah’s Witness?”

She blinked in surprise. “Um, no. Do we suddenly have a problem with Jehovah’s Witnesses?”

“Oh, no. Not at all. I closed the door on a couple this morning. Thought they might send their homies after me.”

She shook her head. “It’s your uncle Bob.”

“Even worse. Tell him I’m out.”

“And who do you suppose he’s going to think I’ve been talking to all this time?”

“Besides,” Uncle Bob said, pushing past Cookie, “I heard your voice.” He leveled a chastising glare on me. “Shameful, asking Cookie to lie for you. What did you do to those Jehovah’s Witnesses?”

“Nothing. They started it.”

He sat across from me. “I need your statement about last night.”

“No worries. I typed it up.”

“Oh.” He brightened and took the paper I handed him. His face fell as he read. “I heard a sound. A bad guy swung a knife at me. I ducked and cut his throat. The end.” He breathed in a heavy sigh. “Well, that needs some work.”

“But I’m just a girl,” I said, a bitter edge to my voice. “It’s not like I’ve solved dozens of cases for you and my father both. It’s not like I should have to worry my pretty little head with nasty things like details. Right? God forbid I know anything about anything.”

He worked his jaw a long moment, probably calculating his odds of getting out of my office unscathed. “How about we do this later?” he asked, tucking my statement into a folder.

“How about?”

Just as Uncle Bob stood, Cookie buzzed me on the speakerphone.

“Yes?”

“You have another visitor. It’s Garrett. I’m not sure if he’s a Jehovah’s Witness or not.”

Oh, the other traitor. Perfect. “By all means, send him in.”

As Garrett and Uncle Bob passed each other, Ubie must have tipped him off with a warning expression. His brows shot up in curiosity just before he strode over to pour himself a cup of java and folded himself into the chair across from me. I sat tapping my fingernails on my desk, waiting for the opportunity to tear into him.

He took a long draw then asked, “What’d I do?”

“You knew about the guy threatening my dad?”

He paused, shifted in his chair, so freaking busted, it wasn’t funny. “They told you?”

“Why, no, Swopes, they didn’t. Instead, they waited until the guy knocked the fuck out of my dad and readied him for spaceflight with duct tape then tried to kill me with a butcher’s knife.”

He shot out of his chair, cursing when he spilled coffee in his lap. Apparently nobody had called him. “What?” he asked, swiping at his jeans. “When? What happened?”

“I can print my statement out for you, if that would help.”

He sat back down, eyeing me warily. “Sure.”

I printed my statement, happy that all the work I’d put into it wouldn’t go unnoticed. He took it, read my four sentences for a really long time that had me wondering if he was dyslexic, then looked back at me. “Wow, that’s a lot to take in all at once.”

“It was for me, too,” I said, the sarcasm dripping from my tongue unmistakable.

“You cut his throat?”

I leaned toward him, my voice menacing as I said, “I do things like that when I’m angry.”

He worked his jaw a moment. “How about I come back later?”

“How about?”

As he strode out the door, he paused and turned back. “We need to interview the previous owner of Cookie’s Taurus. She’s going to be home late this afternoon. You in?”

I unglued my teeth to answer. “I’m in.”

“I’ll leave the info with Cookie. Right now, I have a phone call to make.”

When I gave myself a minute to calm down, I realized that an anger had come over Garrett just before he left. An explosive kind of anger one would be wise to steer clear of. I’d have to find out who’d rained on his parade later.

“Mr. Kirsch is expecting us this afternoon,” Cookie called out from her office, since the door separating our offices was open. “His wife is out of town, but he said he’d be happy to talk to us about the Hana Insinga case.”

I stood and walked to the doorway. “It’s almost three hours from here. We should probably get on the road.”

“He asked that we bring the case file.”

“Of course.”

We packed up and headed out the door for our journey to one of the most beautiful places on Earth: Taos, New Mexico.

“I handed Garrett Mistress Marigold’s e-mail address and gave him the short version,” Cookie said when we jumped into Misery. “He’s going to e-mail her, try to get her to spill about why she wants the grim reaper to contact her. But for now, I could tell you dirty jokes on the way, if that would help cheer you up.”

I turned the key with a smile. “I’m okay. Just annoyed.”

“You have every right to be. I’m annoyed and I wasn’t attacked. Or slashed open with a butcher’s knife. Stevie Ray Vaughan?”

We both looked down at my stereo, slow grins coming over our faces. “This should be a good trip,” I said, turning it up. Any trip starting out with Stevie Ray was good.

Most PIs would simply call the former sheriff of Mora County instead of driving three hours, but I could tell much more about a person with a face-to-face. There would be no question as to what Mr. Kirsch knew about the case by the end of the day. If he knew his son was involved in something illicit, I’d know. Maybe not the finer points, but I’d have a good idea if he was involved in any kind of cover-up.

Cookie worked the entire way, gathering intel and making calls. “And you worked for Mr. Zapata seven years?” she said into her phone. Mr. Zapata was our murdered car dealer, and she was speaking to one of his former employees. “Mm-hm. Okay, thank you so much.” She closed her phone and cast me a weary gaze. “I hope when I die people only remember good things about me as well.”

“Another testament to Zapata’s pending sainthood?”

“Yep. Same story, different day.”

“Whatever they did back in high school,” I said, taking a right on Mr. Kirsch’s block, “nobody but nobody is talking about it. At least we know one thing about this group of kids.”

“What’s that?” she asked, making notes on her laptop.

“They were all really good at keeping a secret.” I pulled into Mr. Kirsch’s drive. “Where did you say his wife is?”

Cookie closed her laptop and looked up. “Wow, nice house.” Most houses in Taos were nice. It was an expensive place to live. “She’s up north visiting her mother.”

“You know what?” I asked, climbing out of my Jeep. “When this case is over, I vote we join her. I mean, north is a good direction.”

“We should go to Washington State.”

“Sounds good.”

“Or New York,” she said, changing her mind. “I love New York.”

I nodded my head. “I only like New York as a friend, but I’m in.”

Congressman Kyle Kirsch’s father looked as though he had been a force to deal with in his day. He was tall and lanky, solid muscle even now. He had graying sand-colored hair and sharp cerulean blue eyes. Retired or not, he was a law enforcement agent through and through. His stance, his mannerisms, every unconscious habit pointed to a long and successful career bringing down criminals. He reminded me of my own father, which forced a pang of sadness to surface. I was so angry with him and yet so concerned. I decided, for the good of all present, to focus on the concern. We were going to have a long talk, the two of us. But for now, I needed to know if Mr. Kirsch was involved in Hana Insinga’s disappearance.

“I remember the case like it was yesterday,” Mr. Kirsch said, his eyes scanning the file like a hawk eyeing a meal. I doubted much got past him. “The entire town banded together to find her. We sent search parties into the mountains. We had flyers and bulletins in every town for a hundred miles.” He closed the file and settled his startling gaze on mine. “This, ladies, is the one that got away.”

Cookie and I glanced at each other. She sat beside me on a leather sofa, her pen and notebook at the ready. The Kirsches’ home was decorated in the blacks and whites of Holstein cows and the subtle tans of the New Mexico landscape. The décor was a charming mix of country and Southwest.

I could feel the pain in Mr. Kirsch’s heart, even after all this time. “The report said you talked personally to every single high school student. Did anything stand out? Anything you didn’t think important enough to put in your report?”

His mouth thinned into a solid line. He unfolded his towering frame and stepped to a window overlooking a small pond. “Lots of things stood out,” he admitted. “But try as I might, I just could not put my finger on what any of it meant.”

“According to witnesses,” I said, taking the file folder and opening it on my lap, “Hana may or may not have been at a party that night. She may or may not have left early and alone. And she may or may not have walked to a gas station down the road from her house. There are so many conflicting testimonies, it’s hard to put the pieces together.”

“I know,” he said, turning toward me. “I tried for two years to put them together, but the more time went by, the more vague everyone’s stories became. It was maddening.”

Situations like these always were. I decided to go for the gold. At that point, my gut told me the former sheriff had nothing to do with any cover-up, but I had to know for sure. “In your report you say that you interviewed your son, that he had been at that party, yet he was one of the students who said he never saw her there.”

With a heavy sigh, he sat across from me again. “That’s partly my fault, I think. His mother and I were on vacation that weekend, and we basically threatened his life if he left the house. At first, he said he didn’t go to the party for fear of getting in trouble. But when I had several kids tell me he’d been there, he finally admitted he’d gone. However, that was about all I could get out of him. Just like several of the others, I was getting mixed signals. Odd mannerisms I couldn’t get a handle on.”

Mr. Kirsch was telling the truth. He was no more involved in Hana’s disappearance than I was. “Sometimes kids are covering up other things they think they will get in trouble for that have nothing to do with our case. I’ve run into that several times in my own investigations.”

He nodded. “Me, too. But adults do the same thing,” he said with a grin.

“Yes, they do.” We stood to leave. “Congratulations on your son’s vie for the Senate, by the way.”

Iridescent rays of pride emanated from him. The warmth surrounded me and my heart sank just a little. If I was right, his son was a murderer. He was not going to take the truth well. Who would? “Thank you, Ms. Davidson. He’s speaking in Albuquerque tomorrow.”

“Really?” I asked, surprised. “I had no idea. I don’t always keep up with these things like I should.”

“I do,” Cookie said, raising her chin a notch. I tried not to giggle. “He’s going to be giving a speech on the university campus.”

“That he is,” Mr. Kirsch said. “I can’t go, unfortunately, but he’s speaking in Santa Fe in a couple of days. I hope to make that one.”

I hoped he would make that one, too. It might well be his last chance to see his son shine.

After grabbing a bite in Taos then driving the three hours it took to get back to Albuquerque, Cookie and I went straight to the address Garrett had left us. He was already there, waiting down the street in his black pick-’em-up truck. We pulled in behind him as he stepped out.

“How’d your phone call go?” I asked in reference to the call he suddenly had to make when leaving my office that morning. I was curious whom he’d called and why.

“Wonderful. I now have one less employee.”

“Why?” I asked, a little startled.

He turned a mischievous grin on me. “You made me promise not to follow you. You didn’t say anything about me having you followed.”

I gasped. Aloud. “You slime.”

“Please,” he said, going around my Jeep to help Cookie out. Admittedly, Misery was not the easiest vehicle to maneuver oneself in and out of.

“Thank you,” Cookie said, surprised.

“Not at all.” He led us down the street toward a small white adobe in serious need of a weed whacking. “I’ve been keeping a man on you twenty-four/seven.” He glanced down at me as I walked beside him. “Or at least I thought I was keeping a man on you twenty-four/seven. Apparently, the one from yesterday evening felt he needed to break for a late-night snack without waiting for his relief. Around three in the morning?” he asked. I nodded, my teeth clamped together in anger. “Your life was in danger, in case you didn’t get the message.” He fished out a paper from his back pocket.

“I got the message loud and clear when I was stabbed in the chest.” I glanced to my side. Cookie totally had my back with a determined nod.

He rolled his eyes. It was very unprofessional. “You weren’t stabbed. You were sliced. And I heard back from your Mistress Marigold — speaking of which, really? Mistress Marigold?”

“What did she say?” Cookie asked, enthralled. It was funny.

“Well, I told her I was the grim reaper, like you said—” He hitched his head toward Cookie. “—and she told me that if I was the grim reaper, she was the son of Satan.”

I tripped on a crack in the sidewalk. Garrett caught me as I glanced back at a wide-eyed Cookie.

“I tried to e-mail her back,” he continued, eyeing me warily now, “but she’ll have nothing to do with me.”

“Can you blame her?” I asked, faking nonchalance. Holy cow, who was this woman?

“This woman’s name is Carrie Lee-ah-dell,” he said, struggling with the pronunciation.

“Mistress Marigold?” How the hell did he know that?

He frowned. “No. This chick.” He pointed to the house. “She’s a kindergarten teacher.”

Oh, right. I drew in a deep breath, then glanced at the paper, at the name Carrie Liedell, and giggled. “It’s pronounced Lie-dell.”

“Really? How do you know?”

I stopped my trek up the sidewalk and pointed to the paper. “See this? This i-e? When two vowels go walking, the first one does the talking.”

He furrowed his brows at me. “What the fuck does that mean?”

I started for the door again, casting a humorous glance underneath my lashes at Cook, and at that very moment in time, I realized how ultracool the click of my boots on the concrete sounded. “It means that you never learned to read properly.”

Cookie hid a giggle behind a cough as Garrett met me at the door. He waited while I knocked. Just as the doorknob turned, he asked in a low voice, “Where does that leave freight?”

He had a point.

“Or said.”

A thirtyish woman with a short, dark bob that squared her already square jaw to a harsh extreme cracked open the door.

“Or, I don’t know, blood.”

Now he was just showing off.

“Yes?” she asked, her tone wary. She probably thought we were selling something. Vacuum cleaners. Magazine subscriptions. Religion by the yard.

Before I could say anything, Garrett leaned down to whisper in my ear. “Or should. And yes, Charles, I can do this all day.”

I was fully prepared to beat him to death with serving tongs. “Hi, Ms. Liedell?” I held up my laminated PI license. Mostly ’cause I looked cool doing it. “My name is Charlotte Davidson, and these are my colleagues Cookie Kowalski and Garrett Swopes. We’re investigating a hit-and-run that happened about three years ago.”

Having no idea what actually happened to Dead Trunk Guy, I was taking a huge risk. If she was involved with his death, any number of things could have happened. But since he probably died in the trunk, a hit-and-run made the most sense. I figured she was driving home late one night and just didn’t see him. Fearing she would get in trouble, she coaxed him into her trunk? It was thin, but I had nothing else.

My gamble paid off immediately. I felt a surge of adrenaline rush through her, a sharp spike of fear as guilt descended like a dark cloud, though her face showed only the slightest hint of distress. Her eyes widened ever so slightly. Her mouth pursed the tiniest degree. She’d practiced this moment, which made her a murderer.

I decided to push forward, to deny her system a chance to recover. “Would you care to explain what happened, Ms. Liedell?” I asked, my voice knowing, accusing.

A hand closed the collar of her blouse self-consciously. Or it could have been the sudden chill of having a dead homeless man standing over her, staring down with a spark of recognition coming to light in his green eyes. I’d never had a departed hurt a living human — I didn’t even know if they could — but I was really hoping I wouldn’t have to tackle the guy. He was huge. And since I was the only one who could see him, it would look odd.

“I–I have no idea what you’re talking about,” she said.

Noting the telltale quiver in her voice, I said, “You hit a homeless man, locked him in the trunk of your 2000 white Taurus, then waited for him to die. Does that about sum it up?”

Garrett’s jaw clenched in my periphery, and I honestly couldn’t tell if he was concerned about my line of questioning or if he was angry at what she’d done.

“It was on Coal Avenue,” Dead Trunk Guy said, his deep voice clear and sharp. It startled me at first, but even crazy people had their lucid moments. He turned to me then, pinning me to the spot with his fierce gaze. “In a parking lot, believe it or not.”

“You hit him in a parking lot?” I asked, my pitch high with surprise. Garrett shifted beside me, wondering where I was going with this. I was wondering, too.

This time when her eyes widened, the guilt on her face was undeniable. “I–I never hit anyone.”

“She was wasted,” the guy said, memories lining his face, “falling down drunk, and she told me to sit on the back of her car, that I would be fine.”

“You told him to sit on the back of your car,” I said, dissecting her with an accusing scowl. “You’d been drinking.”

Ms. Liedell looked around, as if making sure she wasn’t on Candid Camera.

“I must have had a concussion. I couldn’t focus. I was talking to her one minute, then dying in her trunk the next. She hit me again, only with a brick that time.”

“What the hell did you say to her?” I asked him, no longer worried about appearances.

His bitter gaze traveled back to me. “I told her I was a cop and that she was under arrest.”

“Holy fuck,” I said in full freak-out mode. “Are you serious? You were a cop? Like undercover?”

He nodded, but Liedell gasped, covered her mouth with both hands. “No, I didn’t know he was a cop. I thought he was a crazy homeless guy. H-he was filthy. I thought he was lying to get money out of me. You know how they are.” She was panicking. Under more normal circumstances, it would have been funny. “You’re not cops,” she said to us. “You can’t do anything.”

Just then, Uncle Bob pulled his SUV to a screeching halt in front of her house, followed by two patrol cars, lights flashing. His timing, though impeccable, had me stumped.

“No,” I said, unable to wipe the astonishment from my voice, “but he is.” I hitched a thumb over my shoulder toward Ubie, aka Man on Fire. He was walking toward us with a purpose. A mission. Or hemorrhoids. Or both.

“Carrie Liedell?” he asked as he barreled toward us.

She nodded absently, her whole life most likely flashing before her eyes.

“You are under arrest for the murder of Officer Zeke Brandt. Do you have anything in your pockets?” he asked just before he turned her about face and frisked her. A uniform quoted the Miranda as Liedell started bawling.

“I didn’t know he was a cop,” she said between sobs. “I thought he was lying.”

When the uniform took her away, Ubie turned to me, his expression dire. “Officer Brandt has been missing for three years. Nobody knew what happened to him. He was investigating a drug ring that used homeless people to sell for them.”

“But, how did you know?” I asked, still stupefied.

“Swopes told me what you were investigating, the case you’d put him on while he was supposed to be watching you.”

I scowled at Garrett. “Is nothing sacred?”

He shrugged.

“I take it you dealt with that little problem?” Ubie asked him.

“I have one less employee, but I’ll get by,” Garrett said, referring to the employee who was supposed to have been keeping an eye on me when I was attacked.

“Wait a minute,” I said, raising a palm for a time-out. “How did you know Carrie Liedell killed your officer?”

Uncle Bob moved closer, not wanting anyone to hear. “When Swopes told me about your departed homeless guy in the back of Cookie’s white Taurus, I remembered that during the investigation of his disappearance, one of the surveillance tapes we’d acquired from a local video store had footage we thought could have been a hit-and-run. But it was so grainy, and almost all of it occurred slightly off camera, we couldn’t pinpoint what happened. We revisited the tape, figured out it was probably our guy as he’d checked in that night from that very video store, and had the footage enhanced to show this woman’s license plate.

Ubie reached over and took Garrett’s hand in a firm shake. “Good work,” he said before taking Cookie’s. “Nice work. Sorry about your car. We won’t keep it long.”

She gazed at him, still in stunned-speechless mode.

Then he turned to me. “Are we friends again?”

“Not even if you were the last hero cop on Earth struggling with hemorrhoids.”

He chuckled. “I don’t have hemorrhoids.” Then the butthead leaned down and kissed my cheek nonetheless. “This guy meant a lot to me, hon,” he said, whispering into my ear. “Thank you.”

As Uncle Bob hoofed it to his SUV, Cookie stood with mouth agape. “Did that just happen? ’Cause that was really unexpected. I mean, I thought kindergarten teachers were nice.”

“If we stay in this business long enough, Cook, I think we’ll find every profession has its bad apples.” I grinned and elbowed her. “Get it? Teachers? Apples?”

She patted my shoulder without so much as a glance my way then walked to Misery.

“I totally owe you one,” I called after her. I turned to Dead Trunk Guy, or, well, Officer Brandt. “So, you’re not nuts?”

A grin as wicked as sin on Sunday slid across his face, and he was suddenly handsome. I mean, he still had matted hair and crap, but dang those eyes.

“And the showers?” I asked, almost in fear.

His grin widened, and I was torn between lividity and admiration. I’d never been duped like that by a dead guy.

“You can cross through me,” I said, still playing nice.

“I can?” He was being sarcastic. He already knew. He stepped toward me. “Can I kiss you first?”

“No.”

With a soft laugh, he reached around my waist, pulled me to him, and bent his head. I breathed in softly as his lips touched mine; then he was gone.

When people crossed through me, I could feel their warmth, sense their fondest memories, and smell their auras. After he disappeared, I lifted the collar of my sweater to smell him again. His scent was a mixture of cotton candy and sandalwood. I breathed deep, hoping never to forget him. When he was twelve, he risked his life to save a neighborhood boy from a dog attack, resulting in twenty-seven stitches for himself. The fact that neither he nor the boy died was slightly miraculous. But that’s all he’d ever wanted to do. To help people. To save the world. Then along came a drunk kindergarten teacher named Carrie Liedell to rob us of one of the good guys.

And he had been lost. For three years, he’d lost who he was, what he’d grown up to be. Until Cookie opened that trunk and my light found him, he lay in confusion and darkness. Somehow, according to his memories, my light had brought him back. Maybe there was more to being a grim reaper than myth would have me believe. I totally owed Cookie a margarita.

“Do you kiss dead people all the time?” Garrett asked.

I’d forgotten he was there. “I didn’t kiss him,” I said defensively. “He crossed through me.”

“Yeah, right.” He shouldered me as he walked past. “Remind me to cross through you when I die.”