Twisted Whispers

by Sheri Lewis Wohl

  “My girlfriend?”

  “You know, the cute sister of the missing broad.”

  Now he did hit her last good nerve. Technically he might be her superior, but that didn’t give him the right to be a sexist pig. “When was the last time you took sexual-harassment training, Vince?”

  His voice took on a weary note that was so different from his usual cockiness. “Christ, Carlisle, you take everything frigging personal. Here I thought I was being a good guy letting you know she was out there again, and you give me shit.”

  Okay, he might have a point. She did want to know Thea had gone up north in what was essentially the middle of the night. But why was he out there again? Seemed like he was spending an awful lot of time in the vicinity of Alida’s last known point, and she couldn’t come up with any particular reason why he should. The case was hers, and she was accustomed to working her cases without micromanagement from him. Even for Vince this was excessive.

  She didn’t care to ask him to explain. He’d get defensive in a New York minute. The guy’s skin was the thickness of rice paper. With that kind of sensitivity it was a miracle he’d risen to the rank of undersheriff. The politics involved there typically required the strength of hippo skin. Instead of treading on dangerous ground she shifted gears. “Thanks, Vince, I do appreciate the heads-up.”

  “Thought you would.” The cockiness returned. The man’s mood could turn on a dime, another thing that annoyed her about him.

  She took a deep silent breath and counted to five. “When did you see her there?” No hint of her irritation. She was good.

  “About five minutes ago.”

  Again, she wondered what the hell he was doing up that way this time of night. Again, she wasn’t going to ask. “Thanks, I’ll check it out.” She clicked off and shoved her phone in her pocket. No sense in dragging the conversation out. Better to cut it off before he said something else asinine and she responded with something that would land her in the chief’s office. Whether she liked it or not, he still outranked her.

  Wasting no time, she put on her shoes, grabbed her jacket, and raced for the car. In the strictest sense, the transfer station wasn’t considered a crime scene any longer, and nothing prevented Thea from going there whenever she wanted. Nonetheless, she wanted to know why Thea would be there at this time of night and, more importantly, alone. Even if someone hadn’t committed a crime there, it wasn’t a good idea to wander around late at night by herself. Thea should know better.

  Unease rippled up her spine as she took the thought even further. Thea and Alida were identical twins. While they were definite individuals, they still looked amazingly alike. If this situation turned out to be a case of obsession, she worried Thea could be a target too, simply because she looked like her sister.

  From her house on the north side of town, it only took about twenty minutes to make it to the turnoff leading to the transfer station. Ignoring the ruts in the gravel road, she drove quickly. The bumps were so jarring she was surely going to have a headache. She didn’t have time to worry about that and pushed on. At the end of the road, just as Vince said, Thea’s car was parked with the doors closed and the lights still on.

  The sweep of her headlights as she brought her car around to park next to Thea’s illuminated not one person but two. Her impression from the brief conversation with Vince was that Thea had come out here alone.

  On the spot where Alida’s empty truck had been parked and where the distinctive drag marks were worn deep into the gravel, Thea sat on the ground holding another woman in her lap. The prone woman appeared to be fairly tall with short dark hair, wearing jeans and a polar-fleece pullover. Her eyes were closed and she was still as death. This didn’t look good—at all.

  Jamming the car into park, she turned off the ignition, jumped out, and trotted over to Thea. “What’s happened? Is she all right?”

  Thea looked up, her face pale though calm. Slowly she nodded. “I think she’s having a vision.”

  Of all the things Katie expected Thea to say, that one wasn’t one of them. “A what?”

  “A vision,” Thea said, her eyes back on the woman in her lap.

  “Thea, I don’t understand.”

  “She’s a psychic,” she said softly without looking up.

  Good God, not another one of those. Every time someone disappeared or a child was abducted, so-called psychics called or, even worse, came to her office. They always offered to help law enforcement, and some on the force felt any kind of help was help. She wasn’t one of those open-minded officers. As far as she was concerned, they were all a bunch of fakes who only came out for the attention. It was never about finding the missing; it was about publicity for themselves.

  Even worse, at least in her mind, was that they approached the families, who were in the middle of the gravest possible kinds of crises. These moochers offered them all sorts of unrealistic hope, but did they ever deliver? Not once, as far as she knew. These people caused immeasurable damage and heartache. They were the most horrible of narcissists.

  It should be criminal for anyone to approach families and offer them something they knew damned well they couldn’t produce. Like this crazy-ass woman on the ground. She wanted to kick her, drag Thea back to the car, and get her away from here as quickly as possible. This was not going to end well.

  But she couldn’t do any of those things, not even say a word. What a private citizen chose to do was none of her business, even given her experience. Besides, if she did say something, Thea wouldn’t believe her. They never did. The false hope these imposters dangled in front of desperate families was too much to pass up.

  Thea looked up at her as she stood in silence, trying to figure out what to do next. With one hand she smoothed back the hair of the woman in her lap. “It’s not what you think,” she said softly.

  Katie tried to look neutral and lie convincingly. “I’m not thinking anything.”

  Thea’s smile was rueful. “Your expression says the opposite.”

  Oops. So much for her attempt at neutrality and she never was a very good liar. “Sorry.”

  “No need. If I were in your shoes, I’d be thinking the same thing. That I’m crazy for listening to a psychic. That’s she’s a fake. That I’m grasping at anything to find Alida, no matter how insane. And you’d be right, at least about trying anything and everything to find my sister, because that’s exactly what I’m doing.”

  Her honesty surprised Katie, as did her clear understanding of what she was doing. “Then why even try this?”

  Thea looked down at the woman whose eyes were beginning to flutter open. “Because she’s my friend, and I know she’s anything but a fake.”

  Chapter Seven

  It was dark, the moon partially obscured by clouds. The sound of an owl hooting as it soared overhead sent shivers sliding down her spine. It was cold, and the wind carried dampness that hinted rain was on the way.

  In the distance, a solitary figure stood. She squinted, bringing the image into focus. It was a man, judging by his size and shape. His head was tilted up to the sky, and she wondered if he was thinking rain as well. He leaned on something, and when he stood straight, picked it up, and began to move, she realized it was a shovel. He set it aside before leaning down to pick up a bundle, long and dark. He let it slide from his arms and it disappeared at his feet. A hole, it must be a hole.

  Once more he picked up the shovel. The swish of the garden tool as he shoved it into a big black pile cut across the night. Dirt, had to be. Again and again he pushed it into the mound, moving the dirt on top of the bundle until the earth was once more level. He patted it several times as if to get it just the way he wanted it before setting the shovel aside so he could place what—sod—over the hole he’d just filled. It was a grave.

  Finally, he turned away, leaned down, and began to fold what she presumed was some kind of tarp. When he was done, he picked it up, grabbed the shovel, and walked to a truck parked nearby. He placed the tarp and sho
vel inside it, and she thought he’d get in and drive away.

  He didn’t. As if a second thought occurred to him, he retraced his steps to the spot where he’d shoveled the hole full of dirt. For a long time he stood with his head down and his body shaking. Was he crying? At what? For what? Or for whom?

  After what felt like a long time, the shaking of his body calmed and his head came up. He turned his back on the grave and returned once more to his truck, where he crawled in and drove away into the gloomy might. She watched as his taillights grew smaller and dimmer until they finally disappeared altogether. Rain began to fall long before the man drove away, and coldness seeped into her bones. She wasn’t sure the rain that dampened her hair and her clothes caused the chill. Step by step, she walked to the place where only moments before the man stood crying. All she saw was grass. A bit of loose dirt was the only sign that something here had been disturbed. Moisture soaked through the knees of her jeans as she kneeled down and placed her hands on the ground.

  Shock sent a blood-curdling scream past her lips.

  *

  Lorna cut off the scream. “Motherfucker,” she said, and shot up to her feet, surprised that she was perfectly dry. No rain soaked clothes, no sopping-wet hair. No goose bumps up and down her arms.

  “Motherfucker,” she muttered again as she gained her bearings. Definitely a classy response to what just happened, guaranteed to impress the woman standing behind Thea. Didn’t have a clue where she came from, but she did know one thing: she was a cop. It all but shouted from her pores.

  “What happened?” Thea asked, her voice full of fear.

  Exactly what could she tell her, or perhaps more accurately, what should she tell her? Either way, it was the same answer: the truth. Wasn’t that always what people wanted to hear? To say anything less wasn’t right. But she didn’t know if what she had to say would help or hurt.

  Lorna turned and nodded toward the woman, opting for diversion. “And you are?”

  “Deputy Sheriff Katie Carlisle.” She didn’t extend her hand.

  Neither did Lorna. “Deputy Sheriff?”

  “Yes, and you’re the psychic, I presume.”

  Lorna took offense at the scorn-laced delivery of the words. “I’m Thea’s friend,” she shot back. Fuck her if she had a problem with Lorna. She was here for her friend and could care less about some cop.

  “Ladies.” Thea broke in. “We’re all on the same side here. Different skill sets, same objective. Pull the claws back in, please.” Her eyes were pleading and Lorna knew she was right. At the same time, she didn’t like the way Deputy Sheriff Katie Carlisle looked at her.

  Lorna narrowed her eyes and studied the deputy, who met her gaze with narrowed eyes of her own. “If you say so.”

  Thea sighed loudly. “I do. Please, Lorna.” She put a hand gently on her arm. “Now what did you see?”

  She relented on the stare-down with the deputy. Thea was right. They needed to concentrate on what she just saw, though she’d prefer to do this when the other woman was gone. She looked between Thea and the deputy and then back again. From all appearances, Thea wasn’t going to give it up so she plunged ahead. Might as well lay it all out there and see where it would lead. As clearly as she could, she gave them both a blow-by-blow of the vision. Thea’s face grew paler as she spoke.

  When she finished, Thea whispered, “So she’s dead.” It wasn’t a question.

  The deputy didn’t waste a second, her words almost angry. “You don’t know that. There’s no way to know any of what she said actually happened.” The look she shot Lorna’s way was not friendly.

  Though Deputy Sheriff Carlisle got her back up, Lorna didn’t disagree with the first part of her statement. The second part, well, if her recent history was any example, she was just plain wrong on that one.

  Lorna kept her own temper in check as she directed her words to Thea. “She’s right about not knowing if Alida is the one I saw. What I know for sure,” she cut her eyes to the deputy, “is that he buried someone there, but I have no real sense of whether it was Alida. The only thing that came to me with any amount of certainty is that he dug a grave and was burying someone in it.”

  Thea took Lorna’s hands and held them so tight they nearly crushed her fingers. “But it has to be her. Why else would you pick up that vision from this place?”

  The same thought occurred to her, and the explanation left her cold. The only other alternative left her even colder. “Because Alida is probably not the only woman this man has taken.”

  Thea’s sharp intake of breath cut through the night, and she released her grip on Lorna’s hands. “Oh, my God.”

  “Come on,” Carlisle said at the same time. “This is a crock. You have no way of knowing any of that, and throwing out that kind of crap is just plain stupid.”

  Lorna shifted her head slightly so that she stared the deputy straight in the eye. “You don’t have to believe me. Lord knows I didn’t believe it when this shit started to happen to me. I thought I was losing my flipping mind. But you know what, sister? A whole lot of stuff in this world can’t be rationally explained. What I can see is one of those things. Whoever this guy is, he killed and buried at least one person. I don’t know who he is, I don’t know where he buried him or her, but I know without a doubt that he did it. You can take that”—she jabbed her index finger into the air between them—“to the bank.”

  A subtle change came into the eyes of the deputy as she spoke. She might be wrong, but it appeared the deputy’s disbelief was fading, though not completely erased. Instead, the stone wall in place moments before eased slightly. She’d take it.

  “There are no real psychics.”

  “Yeah, six months ago I’d have been right there with you, Deputy. I’ve learned a lot since then, and I’m here to tell you, I can see things. You have no idea how I wish I didn’t, but my wishes don’t seem to matter, and since they don’t, all I can do is roll with it. My friend needs my help, so here I am. I’m not asking you to believe me. All I ask is that you respect my friend and what she wants. This isn’t about you or me. It’s about Alida.”

  For a moment silence hung between them. Then Carlisle asked, “You really can see things?”

  Lorna nodded. “I really can.”

  Sighing loudly, the deputy stared at her for another long moment. “Well, what are we waiting for? Let’s figure out who this bastard is and find Thea’s sister.”

  Lorna began to think there might be hope for this cop after all.

  *

  When Lorna walked out to the deck to make a call home, Thea went into the kitchen to pour some more wine. Katie followed her.

  It didn’t take much more than a single invitation to get the deputy to follow them back to the house. It was too cold, too dark, and too late to stay out at the transfer station. At least here, they could do a little brainstorming, and well, the wine didn’t hurt either.

  Located on the bluff of Five Mile Prairie, Thea’s house looked out over the city, the lights twinkling like stars in the night sky. Thea liked it here, always had. Granted, in the years since she’d built her own little bit of heaven, changes were all around her. Early on, much of the prairie was still active farmland, with acres of golden wheat waving in the gentle breezes and small herds of cattle grazing in fields of alfalfa. Sadly, most of the farmland had disappeared at the hands of greedy developers and encroaching habitation over the last decade.

  Though it made her sad, it didn’t quench her love for the area. No matter how much it built up, she would see the beauty that still remained and remember the beauty that was. She didn’t see ever leaving this oasis she’d created for herself.

  “It’s a nice house,” Katie said when Thea handed her the wineglass topped off with a beautiful ruby Shiraz. Their fingers touched for a fraction of a second.

  She smiled. “I think so too, and I thank you for noticing.”

  Katie’s laugh was hearty. “I love your confidence.”

  She shru
gged. “Not confidence as much as knowing what I like. This house is me. It took me a long time to find just the right place. I knew this was it the moment I stepped inside.” It was true too. She couldn’t count how many homes she’d looked at or open houses she’d attended. Lots of them were dogs, quite a few really nice, and some just plain exceptional. Yet until she walked into this place none of them felt like home.

  “Yeah, I agree. It suits you.”

  Back in the living room, Thea glanced out the French doors to where Lorna stood with her back to them, one hand holding a phone to her ear and the other gesticulating as though the person on the other end could see her. She was very animated, and she thought of when they were kids. Lorna had always talked with her hands. With her face turned away it was hard to tell if the call was going well or badly. Given it was now almost one in the morning, maybe whoever she’d called wasn’t particularly happy about being awakened. None of her business really, but that didn’t lessen her curiosity.

  “So,” Katie said as she sat down in one of the armchairs, drawing Thea’s attention away from Lorna. “You think this Lorna really can see into the great beyond.” The bit of sarcasm that earlier threaded through her voice was gone. It almost sounded like a legitimate question born of true curiosity. Definite progress from a mere hour ago. For a long moment she studied Katie. Her dark eyes were intelligent and direct, and she didn’t flinch at Thea’s steady gaze. Some might call that kind of response aggressive. Thea preferred to call it confident. She liked it quite a lot. “Yes, I do.”

  Katie seemed to mull over her simple answer before giving her a tiny nod. “Tell me why. I want to understand. Honestly, I’m still a skeptic. One willing to listen though.”

  It was the opening she hoped for, and before Katie could change her mind she leaned forward and started talking. She explained about the two women of a century past who dared to love each other and who went to their graves because of it. She told her how the beautiful Catherine from the Makah tribe was murdered and buried in a secret grave, of how the love of her life, the wealthy and privileged Tiana McCafferty, threw herself off a cliff to her own death because she couldn’t bear the grief of her loss. Then she explained how they came to Lorna and how she brought them both home again. When she finished, she let out a long breath and then took a swallow of her wine.