by Paula Graves
An image flashed into his head—a wooded cove on Lake Gossamer where he sometimes went when he was fishing alone, just for his own pleasure. The water was shallow there, and clear enough to see the round spawning beds of the fat little bluegills he was fishing for. A light breeze rippled the water, bringing with it the faint, watermelon-like scent of bluegills on their beds.
“I’m fishing,” he answered. “It’s warm with a little breeze, and the bluegills are on their beds.”
“Can you sit down in your boat?”
He felt the vinyl seat beneath him. “Yes.”
“Good. I want you to sit down and let all the tension leave your legs.”
He tried to do as she asked, focusing his mind on making his legs feel weightless and limp.
Alicia’s warm words bathed him in serenity. “The seat will take all your weight. You want to let it hold you up. Stop fighting—just let the seat take all your weight.”
The fishing seat on the prow of his boat seemed to grow larger, stronger, enveloping his legs until he could barely feel anything but the softness swaddling his limbs.
But the knot in his gut was as tight as ever.
“That’s good,” Alicia murmured. “Are you ready to leave the boat now and go take a trip to the past?”
His chest tightened. “I’m not sure.”
“We don’t have to go straight there. We can go somewhere else for a bit. A happier place and time. What were you doing that night before you went to the trucking company?”
He was suddenly in a hot, loud bar in Borland, a town just across the county line. Chickasaw County was a dry county, but you could get a beer over in Borland. That’s where his friend Cam had wanted to meet his old high school buddies for an impromptu reunion during his brief trip back to town before he headed to New York to start his Wall Street job.
“I went to a bar,” he answered. “A place called Lucky’s. Cheap beer, pretty girls, a couple of pool tables and nobody calling the cops if you make a bet or two.”
“Were you alone?”
He shook his head, surprised by how loose the muscles of his neck felt. “A friend from high school was home for a couple of days. He’d just graduated from Texas and was heading to a brokerage firm in New York. All the guys got together to give him a little send-off.”
“You were glad to see him?”
“Yeah.” Gabe smiled. “It was strange. In a lot of ways, he was the same old Cam. But I also knew I’d probably never see him again, once he went to New York. So I felt sad at the same time. For myself, I guess. I knew my life had changed and would never be what it was before.”
“Were you drinking?”
“A beer. I wasn’t drunk.” He heard the defensive tone in his voice but felt oddly detached from the emotion behind it. It was like listening to someone else speak.
“When did you leave the bar?”
The big, round clock on the bar wall flashed in his head, the hands on the eleven and the five, filling him with dread. “I realized it was after eleven, and that’s when Brenda got off work. I was twenty minutes away. I knew I was gonna be late.”
“What time did you get to the trucking company office?”
He struggled to remember. He’d looked at the clock on the dashboard, hadn’t he? What time had it been?
He saw the glowing light change from 11:22 p.m. to 11:23 p.m. “11:23 p.m.,” he answered grimly. Too late.
“Tell me about the trucking company office. Was it on a main highway?”
“No. It was off the highway, on Piedmont Road.”
“Was there anyone else around? Do you remember passing anyone on Piedmont Road?”
“No. Piedmont dead-ends at the trucking company. I’d have remembered—” The sudden image of bright lights made him wince. “Wait. There wasn’t anyone on Piedmont, but just before I got there, I passed another car coming the opposite direction. They had their high beams on. Nearly blinded me.”
“Could the car have turned onto the highway from Piedmont?”
“I don’t know. Maybe.” He’d rounded a curve and the car had just been there. It could have been on the highway already or it could have just turned onto the highway from Piedmont or any of the other side roads in that area.
“Do you remember anything about the car you passed?”
Gabe crinkled his brow, trying to picture the vehicle. That stretch of the highway didn’t have lamps to illuminate the roadway. He’d caught a quick glimpse of the other car as it passed, lit by the headlights of his old Jeep. Distinguishing color in the low light was next to impossible, but had he seen more than he remembered? “I’m not sure—”
“Why don’t we try slowing things down? Imagine you’re in a movie, and the scene is playing out in slow motion. Everything winds down.” Alicia’s voice slowed as well, going low and fluid, as if she’d entered the slow motion scene with him.
He saw himself rounding the curve. The headlights coming down the highway shimmered into view, and for a second, they were all he could see. He slowed the scene down in his mind, until everything seemed to freeze in place.
“It’s a sedan, I think,” he murmured, taking in the oblong shape of the headlights.
“That’s good.” Alicia’s voice seemed closer. He could smell her, too, the sweet, heady scent of honeysuckle on the vine. He wanted to open his eyes and see if she looked as good as she smelled, but his eyelids felt leaden, unable to move.
He dragged his mind back to the scene spread out before him like a still life. The car beside him was dark—blue or black, perhaps. He counted the door handles—two, which meant it was a four-door. The windows were tinted, making it hard to see inside, but there was a light glow from within, as if there were a dashboard light on. He could make out the driver’s silhouette. And there was someone in the passenger seat.
Excitement rippled through his chest, bubbling in his throat. “It’s a four-door sedan. And there were two people in the vehicle. The driver and someone in the passenger seat.”
“Did you see their faces?”
“No. I’m sorry. Tinted windows.”
“That’s okay, you’re doing great.”
“I can’t tell the model of the car, but I think it’s an Oldsmobile. From the shape,” he added. The freeze-frame in his mind released, and the sudden resumption of movement made him feel off-kilter. He clutched at the sofa cushion beneath his hands to regain his balance.
“That’s wonderful. You’re doing so well.”
The flicker of pleasure her praise elicited faded into growing dread. “I have to keep going, don’t I?”
“Just a little further,” she confirmed, sympathy softening her words. “Do you want to take a rest? We can go back to the boat for a while.”
He was tempted to say yes, to go back to his safe place, just to regroup. But he was afraid if he retreated now, he wouldn’t find the courage to go back to the place where the whole nightmare had begun.
“No. Let’s keep going.”
He felt the lightest brush of fingertips across the back of his right hand. “Okay,” Alicia said. “Are you ready?”
“I’m turning off the highway onto Piedmont Road.” He forced himself forward, trying to memorize every detail of his surroundings. The leaves were almost gone from the trees flanking the road, rendering them dark skeletons stretching thousands of bony black fingers skyward toward the waxing moon.
The skin on the back of his neck crawled relentlessly.
Ahead, Belmont Trucking Company sprawled, its dingy gray facade silent and still. There was no life there, Gabe knew, his pulse hammering in his temples.
No life at all.
“Can you see anyone around?”
He forced his gaze to scan the landscape of his memory. There was no sign of movement. Nothing out of place.
Nothing but the nightmare he knew lay just ahead, waiting for his discovery.
“No,” he said. “There’s no one else here.”
He felt her hand on his again.
Her touch was firm this time. Firm and warm.
“Let’s go back to the boat,” she said.
He turned his hand over, catching hers. Her soft palm settled into the cradle of his own. He closed his fingers around her hand, not ready to release her.
Letting go of the darkness, he returned to the boat.
Blinding light filled his mind, clean and sweet, its heat driving away the memory of the November chill. The rippling water around him glittered with sunlit diamonds, rocking the boat like a cradle.
Standing close enough to touch, in a fluttery white dress that showed off her delicious curves, Alicia smiled at him. The breeze over the water tousled her hair, driving tendrils around his own head until he felt ensnared by her.
“I’m in the boat,” he murmured, his heart pounding. “Can we stay here a little while?”
Her hand flexed against his, her thumb sliding gently across the side of his hand. “We can stay as long as you need.”
He smiled faintly. “I don’t know about that—I can stay on the water all day.” Especially with you standing so near, smelling like summer honeysuckle.
“Well, we can stay another hour until I have to go to work,” she amended, her voice light with humor.
With a sigh, he left the boat behind and opened his eyes. Alicia was closer than he expected, her hand still clasped in his. Her dark eyes met his, wide and liquid.
The urge to kiss her swamped him, stealing his breath.
Those dark eyes widened suddenly, as if she’d read his intent in his blistering gaze. She tugged her hand away and rose from the ottoman, her gait unsteady as she made her way toward the kitchen.
“Can I get you a glass of water?” she asked.
“No, I’m okay.” He dragged his gaze away from her curvy backside and concentrated on remembering the details of his recent foray into his subconscious. “A four-door Olds. Do you think it could be connected?”
“Well, at the very least, maybe we can figure out a way to track down Victor Logan’s driving history. If he ever owned an Oldsmobile, we may be on to something.” Alicia sipped the glass of water she’d poured for herself, remaining at a safe distance, her back pressed against the kitchen counter.
“I wish I’d remembered more.”
“You did great. Seriously. Hypnosis is pretty hit and miss, and you cooperated every step of the way.”
Maybe a little too much, he thought, remembering his last vision of her on the boat. He needed to get out of here, at least for a little while. Go back to the motel, get something to eat. Maybe make a few calls back home, see how things were going at the marina.
Anything to ground himself in his life away from here.
Away from her.
He pushed to his feet. “Listen, I need to get out of your hair for a while. I know you need to get ready for work and I should touch base back home and see what’s going on at the office. Make sure they’ll be okay if I stay here another day.”
“Oh.” Alicia set her glass on the counter. “Okay, that’s a good idea. So you’re thinking of staying another day?”
There was a small voice in the back of his head yelling at him to get the hell out of Millbridge. He had a life back home in Gossamer Ridge. A job he loved. A family who needed him almost as much as he needed them.
A life that was settled and uncomplicated.
“Yeah,” he answered, ignoring the voice. “At least another day or two. The police may have more questions for me about last night’s murder.”
And I may have more questions for you about your research into Brenda’s murder, he added silently.
“Probably,” she agreed, returning to the living room. “You’re sure you’re not a suspect? Because if you need someone to go to bat for you—”
“I’m not a suspect,” he assured her. “I told you, I had them call my brother Aaron, who’s a sheriff’s deputy. He convinced the officers I’m an upright, tax-paying citizen. Cops seem to listen to other cops.”
“Good.” She was close enough to touch again and Gabe felt his fingers itching to reach out and pull her closer.
He forced his reluctant feet toward the door. “I really appreciate your offer of the sofa last night.”
“No problem,” she said with a smile that carved a pretty dimple in her cheek. She followed him to the door, gazing up at him as she opened it for him. But if he hoped to read her mind in that liquid gaze, he was thwarted. Whatever thoughts and emotions writhed beneath the surface were unfathomable, hidden in the depths of her dark eyes.
He stepped outside into the pleasant May morning, wincing a little as the door closed behind him. When he reached his truck parked on the curb, he was only slightly surprised to find his niece sitting on the bumper, waiting for him.
“I thought you had a class this morning.”
Cissy glanced at her watch. “Not for another thirty minutes.”
Gabe hit the lock tab on his keychain, disengaging the truck’s locks. “Get in. I’ll drive you.”
Cissy settled into the passenger seat, buckling in while Gabe slid behind the steering wheel. “How did it go?”
“Okay.”
“Did you remember anything new?”
He didn’t want to get her hopes up. “I’m not sure. I remembered seeing a car on the highway just before the turnoff to the trucking company where your mama worked. But I can’t say for sure the car was related to what happened.”
“But it could be,” she pressed.
“Maybe.”
Cissy fell silent a moment while he put the truck in gear and edged out onto the street. They reached the intersection ahead and Gabe turned right, heading toward the university.
“Are you heading back home now?” she asked as they neared the campus.
“No, I’m going to stick around another day or two.”
She released a soft breath. “So you think Alicia’s onto something? With her theory?”
A memory flashed in his head—the darkened sedan, with two occupants in the front seats. “I think it’s possible.”
But did the new knowledge get them any closer to catching the killers?
Chapter Seven
For the most part, Alicia’s classes were fun if not particularly challenging to teach. She handled a couple of first year psychology courses that the college required all students to take, and most of the students were there because they had to be, not because they were really interested in psychology. But Alicia saw their apathy as a challenge, taking pride in coaxing real interest out of all her students.
Other students took to the courses right away, digging into the subject matter with a real intellectual hunger that made her understand a little better her own parents’ passion for their careers as professors. Alicia herself didn’t have plans to stay in academia; she’d been thinking of applying to the FBI or the Diplomatic Security Service once she had her doctorate. But she finally understood the appeal of teaching after all these years of swearing she’d never turn into her parents.
Her busy course schedule gave her little time to think about the new murder—or about Gabe Cooper and what he might be doing with his day. But when she headed back to her tiny office after her last class concluded at three, her thoughts returned to Gabe and their hypnosis session that morning. She couldn’t be sure his memory of the second vehicle had anything to do with the murders, but a little hope never hurt anyone. So she hoped like hell that Tony would call her with news that Victor Logan had once owned and driven a four-door Oldsmobile.
She wondered if Gabe Cooper was serious about sticking around Millbridge for another day or two. He had work he was neglecting in Gossamer Ridge, and it wasn’t like he couldn’t follow the Millbridge cases from across the state, especially since he had a brother who was a cop.
Maybe he’d decided to leave, after all. Maybe she’d get home to find a message on her answering machine, saying good-bye.
Or maybe he’d just leave without telling her anything at all. It wasn’t like he owed h
er anything, was it?
She pushed her sweat-damp hair away from her forehead, irritated. The air conditioning in the behavioral sciences building was temperamental and, in her opinion, vindictive, choosing the warmest days of the year to be at its most uncooperative. The air coming from the vent by her desk was tepid at best. With unseasonably warm temperatures soaring to the mid-nineties, tepid wasn’t good enough.
She needed a shower. A nice, cool shower, a glass of ice water and maybe an early dinner of fresh fruit and cheese. She had another hour’s worth of paperwork to do, which she normally tried to handle here at the office so she could devote her time at home to her dissertation. But she couldn’t bear another hour stuck in this cluttered little sauna. She packed the papers into her briefcase and headed for home.
With the sun still high in the sky, the tree-lined streets held no threat of danger, only scenic pleasure. She was almost to the corner of University Drive and Dogwood Street when she heard someone call her name.
Turning, she saw one of her students, Tyler Landon, approaching at a fast pace. “Alicia, wait up.”
She frowned at his easy use of her first name. In class, she maintained control by adhering to formal address. She was Ms. Solano. She addressed the students in kind—Ms. Cooper, Mr. Landon—to maintain that formality.
Of course, Tyler Landon was only three years younger than she was, having started college late after spending a few years traveling. She supposed, since they weren’t in the classroom, Tyler Landon might find it easier to address her as an equal.
“Can I help you with something?” she asked as he drew near.
“Just wondering why you were headed home so early. You usually stay later than this, you know, working on your papers and all.”
Tyler had a lazy drawl and a pair of bright blue eyes that she supposed more than a few young coeds would describe as dreamy. But neither attribute did anything for Alicia, proving that she wasn’t susceptible to all good-looking Southern men.
Especially not young men who seemed to harbor an inappropriate amount of interest in what she did with her time.