Fourth Grave Beneath My Feet

by Darynda Jones

If the heat of anger could manifest outside my body, she’d have been nuked right then and there. A charcoal briquette in the shape of Hitler, because she really did resemble him in an odd, disturbing kind of way. What I did? How dare she.

  “And if you will remember, I wasn’t even aware that my father had died when you told me you had a message from him from the grave. How was I supposed to respond to that, Charlotte?”

  “By spitting in my face, apparently.”

  She lowered her head. “If I apologize, will it help?”

  “Not especially.”

  “Will you tell me anyway?”

  The sadness in her eyes, the remorse, ate at my resolve. Not much. Kind of like a mouse nibbling a tiny speck off a hunk of cheese the size of Mount Rushmore. But enough to have me saying, “I honestly don’t remember the exact message, since you’re asking. It was something about blue towels. Or maybe towels that weren’t really blue. Fuck, I don’t know.”

  Okay, I only used the F-word because I knew how much she hated it, but it did little good. She was lost in thought, trying to remember what I could possibly be talking about. Then something sparked in her memory. Recognition flitted across her face. “Wait,” she said.

  “How long, because I really do have things to do.”

  She stood and turned her back to me. “What did he say about the towels?”

  After taking a deep breath, I said, “I told you, something about the fact that they weren’t really blue. I think he said it wasn’t your fault.”

  The sadness hit me like a blast of acid. It caused my eyes to sting. My chest to contract. I closed against it, shut down my ability to absorb emotion, and forced nonacidic air into my lungs.

  Then she turned and kneeled in front of me. Kneeled. On her knees. Awkward. I tried to scoot away from her, but I was already at the end of my sofa—which might or might not go by the name of Consuela. My expression had to show the distaste I was feeling.

  “It wasn’t even about me,” she said, her face glowing with awe. “It was about you. He was trying to tell me about you.”

  “You’re in my bubble.”

  “He was trying to tell me how special you are.”

  “And you didn’t listen.” I tsked. “How surprising. But, no, really, you’re in my bubble.”

  “Oh,” she said, glancing around in surprise. “I’m sorry. I’m—” She sat back on her chair and smoothed her slacks. “I’m sorry, Charlotte.”

  I had no idea how her father had sent her a message about me from the grave, or how she made such a connection when it was apparently about blue towels. And, sadly, I didn’t much care.

  “Is that all you needed?”

  “No.”

  “Well, that’s the only message I have for you today. Unless you want the one about how much work I have to do. That’s an important one.” I picked my bag up off the floor, replaced my sunglasses, and stood to walk out.

  “Can you tell when someone is about to die?” she asked before I got far.

  I knew it. With bowed head and gritted teeth, I said, “I’m not sure.” Sadly, I had the uncomfortable feeling that I could. That I always could. But it was one of those nagging little notions in the back of my mind that I ignored. Like when Cookie wore purple, red, and pink together. I just pushed it to the back of my consciousness. I didn’t know how to explain that to someone like her, so I didn’t try. “It’s possible.” I tilted my head to the side and looked her up and down. “Yep. I’d start looking at burial plots if I were you.”

  She didn’t take me seriously in the least, which was probably a good thing, since I was pulling her spindly leg.

  Standing as well, she stuffed her tissue in her bag and said, “If you notice anything of that nature, will you please give me a call?”

  “Absolutely. I’ll put you on speed dial.”

  She walked to the door, then turned back. “And just for the record, I wasn’t asking for me.”

  I let her leave, waited a good five minutes, then headed out the door myself, dismissing her from my mind completely. Or doing my darnedest to.

  * * *

  According to their sign, the Veil Corporation was dedicated to the exploration and development of alternative fuel, and Harper’s stepbrother, Art, was apparently a big deal there. Since I didn’t have an appointment, I was told to wait in the lobby. Not a place I liked to wait. So I told the receptionist who I was and explained that if Art wouldn’t see me, I’d come back with a couple of officers and a warrant. I was shown up to his office in a matter of minutes. I loved it when that crap worked. Honestly, a warrant for what? Art must have something to hide.

  He didn’t seem especially happy to see me when his assistant showed me in. He stood and offered his hand, but he wasn’t happy about it. Unfortunately, the guy was good-looking. He wore a three-piece suit and had a movie star face with short brown hair and naturally tan skin. But the pièce de résistance was his eyes: silvery gray with a hint of blue, fringed in long, dark lashes. Damn it! I hated it when bad guys were that good-looking. It was so much easier to think the worst of them when they looked the part: scraggly with a greasy smile and rotting teeth.

  Though it did help that I could see hints of his mother in him. Oh, yeah, he was scum. And I would prove it the first chance I got.

  After offering me a quick shake, he gestured for me to sit, then did the same. “Mind explaining why you felt the need to threaten me, Ms. Davidson?”

  “Not at all. I needed to see you and I needed to see you fast. I’ve been hired by your stepsister—”

  “I know, I know.” He held up a hand to stop me. “Mother told me all about it.”

  I was the talk at dinner? Cool. I loved when that happened. But I had a personal bias against grown men who called their mothers Mother, so that was another strike against him. Maybe it would counteract the good-looking-as-heck thing.

  “As I’m sure she did you,” he added.

  “Me?”

  “Yes. I’m sure you got an earful about how Harper just wants attention and how it all started right after my parents’ marriage.”

  I assessed his emotions, but he wasn’t angry. Or particularly guilty. Until I said, “Harper said you set fire to her dog’s house. With him in it.”

  “She said that?”

  Guilt radiated off him, but something else was stronger. Anguish. His feelings were hurt. He stood and faced the window. “It was an accident. She knows that.”

  “And she told me as much.” I could make out the faintest of smiles on his face from the reflection in the tinted glass when I said that, and realization struck. Hard. “Holy crap, you’re in love with her.”

  “What?” He turned to me, his face a mask of indignation.

  My mouth thinned. “Really?”

  “Shit.” He came around his desk and closed the door to his office before continuing. “How did you—? Look—” He raked a hand through his hair as I tried not to grin. “Of course I love her. She’s my sister.”

  “Art, she’s your stepsister, and she’s gorgeous. I’ve seen her, remember?”

  He sat back down. “She doesn’t know. Not really.”

  “Why?” I asked, flabbergasted.

  “It’s complicated. But we’ve been close for years.”

  “Wait a minute,” I said as realization dawned. “You were her contact. You helped her when she disappeared those three years, didn’t you?”

  He pursed his lips. “How much of this will get back to my mother?”

  “Unless it involved this case directly, none of it. And I can’t see how knowing you’d help your stepsister is her business.”

  “Yes,” he said with a reluctant nod. “And it was the hardest three years of my life.”

  He really did love her. “Well, I have to admit, you’ve just thrown a wrench into my theory. I really thought it was you.”

  “Sorry.”

  He wasn’t. I could tell.

  “But you believe her, right?” His brows rose, his expression ful
l of hope.

  “I do. Can you give me your thoughts? I mean, surely you’ve formed a few theories over the years.”

  “Nothing that ever panned out,” he said, seeming disappointed in himself. “I’ve tried for years to figure it out. One time I’d think it was the kid from next door who had a crush on her, then I’d think it was the furniture delivery man. Things would happen at the oddest times. Sometimes Harper would be home, sometimes she wouldn’t, so my mother’s theory about Harper just wanting attention is bullshit.”

  I was glad he thought so. “Was there anyone else in the house growing up? Anyone who would have easy access to Harper’s room?”

  “Sure, all the time. We had relatives, cousins, maids, cooks, gardeners, caterers, event planners, assistants, you name it.”

  “Did any of those people live in the house?”

  “Just the housekeeper and sometimes a cook. We went through a lot of those. My mother is not the easiest person to get along with.”

  I could imagine. “I need to ask you something difficult, Art, and I need you to keep an open mind.”

  “Okay,” he said, growing suspicious.

  “Do you or have you ever suspected your mother?”

  His face froze in thought. “No.” He set his jaw. “No way.”

  “But your stepdad’s health is failing, right? If anything happens to Harper, you and your stepmother get it all.”

  He shrugged a shoulder in resignation. “That’s true, but we get a small fortune anyway.”

  “Maybe a small fortune isn’t enough. Maybe your mother has been trying to, I don’t know, drive Harper insane so she can declare her incompetent or something.”

  “I understand why you’d think that, but she’s not that greedy. I’ve been thinking about this for a long time. My mother wasn’t lying. It all started right after they got married. I’d only met Harper a couple of times before the wedding, but she was just a normal girl.”

  “And afterwards?”

  “Afterwards, she’d changed. And despite what my mother thinks, I don’t think it had anything to do with their marriage.” He leaned forward and leveled those hawklike eyes on me. “I think something happened to her during my parents’ honeymoon. Something that’s connected with all of this.”

  “She didn’t mention an incident.”

  “I’ve done research on PTSD, Ms. Davidson, and looking back, I think Harper had the symptoms. She was only five, for God’s sake. Who knows what she’s repressed.”

  “Well, you’re definitely right about that. Bad memories can be repressed. I’m glad she had you, though. Someone in her corner.”

  “Me, too.” He grinned and sat back. “I wonder if she’s ever going to let me live that fire down.”

  “I wouldn’t count on it.”

  11

  Since killing people is illegal,

  can I have a Taser just for shits and giggles?

  —T-SHIRT

  Maybe Art was right. Maybe Harper had repressed something. An inciting incident that set this whole thing into motion.

  If anyone would know, it should be her first therapist.

  I called Cookie and after going through verbal instructions on how to turn the ring volume down on her phone, I got the information for Harper’s first therapist, a psychologist named Julia Penn. She was retired, and Cookie couldn’t get any contact information other than an address. She lived in Sandia Park just over the mountains. I had a thousand and one things I wanted to do today, including check on Harper and Quentin, and pay a couple of old friends a visit, namely Rocket, a departed savant who lived in an abandoned mental asylum. But I decided to pay her a visit anyway. It shouldn’t take too long.

  I drove on the historic byway of Turquoise Trail through a rich landscape to the prestigious San Pedro Overlook, an affluent community at the base of Sandia Park.

  Struck by its beauty, I called Cookie back.

  “Did I not mention the ring thing is bothering me today?”

  “Cook, how can you have a hangover? You were fine at four-ish this morning.”

  “It hadn’t hit me yet. It hit me later. Around seven twenty-two. Are those Gemma’s pants?”

  “Yep.”

  “How did she—?”

  “I have no idea. Look, I just called because screw this apartment building crap. Since we can’t have the cool apartment, I say we move out here.”

  “That’s a great idea,” she said.

  “I know, right?”

  “Except, you can’t pay your rent.”

  “All the more reason to move.”

  “And houses out there are priced higher than you can count.”

  “It sounds silly when you put it that way.”

  “You know those women in nursing homes who have to be restrained around the clock because they mix up everyone’s medication and steal all the bedpans?”

  “Yes,” I said, wondering what I was walking into.

  “That’s going to be you.”

  She was probably right. If I lived that long.

  * * *

  I drove up to a stunning adobe casita with a three-car garage and a manicured lawn, wondering if I could afford something like that if I sent all my purchases back and sold Misery. Behind it were the Sandia Mountains and in front, gorgeous red-rock canyons. Julia met me out front and led me around the house to the back.

  “I got a call from Mrs. Lowell,” Dr. Penn said as she showed me to an outside patio behind the house. She had a fire burning in a kiva fireplace. “I’ve been expecting to hear from you. But I didn’t expect you to show up on my doorstep.”

  Wonderful. Had Mrs. Lowell called the PTA as well? Maybe Harper’s childhood friends? Or her second-grade teacher and high school volleyball coach. She must have been on the phone for hours.

  Dr. Penn, an averaged-sized woman with long gray hair pulled back into a hair clip, motioned for me to sit, her outdoor furniture elegant to the extreme. “I can’t talk about the case. I’m sure you know that.”

  “I’m aware that you can’t talk specifics, so I was going to ask some more general questions. You know, things that could apply to anyone.”

  She offered me an impatient smile.

  “Do you know what the symptoms of PTSD are?”

  “Are you going to attack me, Ms. Davidson?”

  “Not at all. I just want to make sure you know the symptoms.”

  “Of course I know the symptoms.”

  “Did you not recognize them in Harper? It sounds to me like they were genuine.”

  “Do I come into your office and tell you how to run your investigations?”

  I thought a minute. “Not that I’m aware of, but I haven’t been in my office for a while now.”

  “Then please, Ms. Davidson, don’t tell me how to diagnose a patient. I think I’ve had a few more years of experience than you.”

  Snobbish much? “So, what you’re trying to tell me is that you screwed up but you can’t take it back because it would look bad.”

  “You can see yourself out, yes?” She rose and started for her back door.

  I stood as well. “Or did Mrs. Lowell pay you to misdiagnose Harper? To keep her drugged and compliant?”

  If my stepmother’d had money, I had no doubt in my mind that she would have done that very thing. To shut me up. To keep me from causing trouble or embarrassment.

  She turned on me. “I am a psychologist. I rarely recommend drugs and am not licensed to prescribe them.” She turned to her fireplace. “Every psyche is different. Some are more fragile than others. Harper missed her father, what she once had with him. She saw Mrs. Lowell as a threat. It’s all in the timing.”

  “Ah, the marriage. But what if something else happened? Looking back, knowing what you know now, could she have had a form of PTSD?”

  With a sigh of resignation, she said, “It’s possible. But I even tried regression therapy.”

  “You mean hypnosis.”

  “Yes. I shouldn’t be telling you this, and
I only am because Harper hired you and her stepmother said to cooperate, but she lost a chunk of time. A week, to be exact. She couldn’t remember anything about the week she spent with her grandparents. Nothing at all.”

  “And she’d stayed with them during the Lowells’ honeymoon, right?”

  “Yes, but they doted on her hand and foot. Now, that is all I can tell you. The Lowells are very good friends of mine. I’ve already overstepped the bounds of confidentiality.”

  “I just have one more question.”

  With a beleaguered sigh, she said, “Fine. What is it?”

  “Are you renting or did you buy this outright?”

  * * *

  When I’d asked Dr. Penn about her house, she became slightly volatile, accusing me of accusing her of taking payoff money to be able to afford her luxurious lifestyle. I really just wanted to know if she was buying or renting. Clearly we’d gotten off on the wrong foot.

  On the way back to the big city, I called Gemma for more intel. “So, how’s the head?” I asked.

  “What the hell did Cookie put in those margaritas?” She sounded like she had a cold. It was funny.

  “Your guess is as good as mine, which is why I only had one.”

  “Oh, my God, I had like twelve.”

  Being the loving, nurturing sister that I was, I laughed. “Let that be a lesson.”

  “Never drink twelve margaritas in a row?”

  “No,” I said with a pfft. “That’s totally acceptable. Never trust Cookie.”

  “Got it. Have you seen my pants?”

  “Speaking of which, how did you get home without them?”

  “I borrowed a pair of your sweats. I ran into a convenience store with them on. I talked to neighbors out in their yard when I pulled up. And only after I got inside did I realize they had ‘Exit Only’ written across the back.”

  “You stole my favorite sweats?”

  “I wanted to die.”

  “It’s weird that sweats would make you suicidal. I’d analyze the crap out of that if I were you.”

  “Do you actually wear those in public?”

  “Only when I go out in them. Hey, how hard is it to diagnose PTSD?”

  After a long pause, she said, “Charley, I know why you’re calling, and yes, hon, it’s painfully obvious you’re suffering from posttraumatic stress disorder.”