Echoes of the Past

by Susanne Matthews

  “Honey, I’m home. Just kidding.” He expected her to say something snarky. Instead, he heard her voice coming from the bedroom. She sounded uneasy.

  “I’ll be right out.”

  He looked at the door and frowned. Had there always been two night chains on it? He looked closely. No, the second one had just been added, and judging from the marks on it, it hadn’t been done by a professional carpenter. Why had she put a second chain on her door? Did she think she was in danger? From whom? The old night chain was like the one on his house. It could be locked and unlocked with a key from the outside. What the hell had happened since he’d seen her before lunch?

  He put the bottle of wine in the fridge and slipped the sample kit under a side table next to the couch. Michelle had moved her laptop to the coffee table. The appetizers had been cleaned up, a tossed salad sat on the counter next to some bread rolls and a couple of baking potatoes. The table had been set. There were a couple of T-bones on the counter.

  He heard the bedroom door open and turned. His heart stopped. In the doorway stood his mystery woman, his Mohawk princess. She wore the beaded moccasins he recognized, and around her shoulders she carried a woven blanket. Her hair was braided into two braids, one on each side of her face as it had been Friday morning in his kitchen. The only thing missing was the buckskin dress. Anger flooded him. Had it all been some elaborate joke?

  “What the hell are you playing at?”

  “I’m not playing at anything.” Her voice was quiet, defeated. “I’d hoped you’d remember. Joseph said you would.”

  “Remember? How the hell can I forget? How did you do it? How did you pull it off? You and Ron must have had a hell of a laugh at my expense.”

  “This doesn’t really have anything to do with Ron, at least not the way you think it does.” There was hurt and frustration in her voice. “It’s between Gowanda and Tayouroughay, between you and I. Joseph said you’d recognize these things. He said you’re the one just as I’m the other.”

  Tony collapsed into the chair as if someone had smacked him in the back of the knees.

  “What the hell is going on here, Michelle? I want the truth. I deserve it.”

  “You do, and until you understand what’s going on, you won’t be able to help me, and I need your help.”

  He heard the resignation and sadness in her words. Could she really believe they were some kind of reincarnated lovers? The thought of her naked in his arms pleased him, and he closed his eyes to hide the longing he didn’t want her to see.

  “A lot of lives depend on us.” She reached out and touched his arm.

  Electricity coursed through him, and his body quickened.

  “We have to save the lake, and to do that, we have to accept who and what we are.”

  He stood, shook off her arm, and moved away from her. “You’re talking in riddles. Let’s start with some straight answers. Where did you get those moccasins and that blanket?”

  “The slippers and blanket were given to me by my aunt. I didn’t know I was Mohawk until five years ago. These are supposed to have been made specifically for me. The woman you’ve seen walking on the beach wasn’t me. I didn’t lie about that. The woman you saw is a ghost. Her name was Tayouroughay. She was me or rather I was her two hundred years ago, just as you were Gowanda.”

  “I know the names. Joseph told me all about the legend, remember? I’m the one who told you.”

  “Not exactly. I went to see Joseph after I left the morgue this afternoon. I had to know the truth.”

  “The truth about what?”

  “About us—you, me, and Ron.”

  “What the hell does he have to do with this? I thought you said he wasn’t part of it.”

  “He’s involved somehow—I’m not sure exactly how, but he is. Let me explain and then we’ll see if we can figure where he fits in. You know about Gowanda, and how Tayouroughay betrayed her people and the man she was supposed to marry. You know what happened to her—you told me so last night when we met at the lookout. She was swept over the waterfall to her death, separated for all time from the man she loved.”

  “And he drowned in the lake trying to save her, and his spirit’s been imprisoned here ever since. I know the story, but how can you believe that? You’re a scientist, just as I am.”

  “I know a lot more about the spirit realm than you can imagine. The Three Sisters punished Tayouroughay and Gowanda for their sins. Now, those spirits need our help, and are willing to rescind their curse and punishment in exchange for it. They want us to save the lake—it’s got to be from the meth lab poison—and I know you want that too. Joseph says time isn’t linear in the spirit realm. I’m Tayouroughay reincarnated. I have her memories, and I know you’re Gowanda’s reincarnation.”

  “You’re crazy and so is Joseph. My memories are my own.” But even as he whispered the words, he knew she was telling the truth. All of this sounded right somehow. The dreams, the resemblance. It had all started here. He’d always felt connected to this place, and if part of him was imprisoned here, it all made sense. Why shouldn’t the spirits be involved? Defeated and confused, he turned to her. “What happened to you this afternoon? What caused you to trust me like this?”

  “Let me start at the beginning. Nothing will make sense unless you understand this part. I’ve never told another soul this, and believe it or not, I’m not crazy. I see ghosts, specifically those of people who’ve drowned.”

  He stared at her, his mouth gaping open. Was she kidding? She certainly looked serious.

  “Why are you telling me this?” He wished he’d brought the scotch over too.

  “You need to know it all. It’s the only way to make you understand. Tony, I know about your dreams. I’ve had the same ones.”

  His head snapped up, and his face heated.

  She smiled shyly. “Yeah, those ones too.”

  “Go on.” What else could he say?

  “When I went to the morgue yesterday, I realized Lindsay hadn’t died in the water because her ghost wasn’t there. Aaron told me everything he remembered, but it wasn’t a lot. I knew about the pregnancy, the toxins, and the meth lab before you told me. I know those specimens existed. I also know someone took them, the same someone who searched my room while I was out running, the person who probably killed Isaac looking for this.” She held up the USB drive.

  “What’s on that?”

  “The pictures Isaac took of the crime scene Thursday morning.”

  Michelle sat on the sofa, put the USB drive in the computer, pushed various keys, and opened her email program. She turned to him.

  “Here are the pictures the police sent me.” She opened each in turn. “Here are the ones Isaac gave me early this morning, a couple of hours before he was killed.”

  “You think he was murdered?”

  “I do. I think he was killed because of these.”

  Tony looked carefully at the photographs. The first two were identical, but the third one…

  “The wine bottle. It isn’t here.” He pointed to the third picture.

  “Someone altered the picture, but that’s not all. They went through my things—my computer. I’m very good at hiding things when I have to, so I don’t think they know I have these.” She motioned for him to sit on the couch beside her.

  Knowing she believed herself to be the woman in his dreams made it hard for him to stay focused on what she was saying. He wanted to take her in his arms, run his hands along her body, and do the things he’d done to her in his fantasies. His lips ached to feel hers against them. He hardened and reached for a throw pillow to hide the evidence of his desire. She might talk to ghosts, but he hoped she didn’t read minds.

  “I was furious when someone disturbed my crime scenes. As you heard me tell the parents, the local police claim to have no knowledge of it, but the owner assured my boss it was the police number on the phone’s call display. He gave it to him and when my boss called the number, it was indeed the police station.” She p
ushed her bangs to the side. He got the impression she wasn’t quite used to them. “I found a cork in Lindsay’s pocket. Did she drink wine?”

  Tony laughed, surprised by the change in topic. “No, she hated the stuff, but she liked free swag. She went on a wine tour just to get a sweater. She must have gotten the cork then.”

  “That’s what I figured. I got one too.” She handed him the two corks.

  “They’re identical, except for the red “x” on this one.”

  “That’s mine—the one I got today from the Whippoorwill Winery. I didn’t want to believe it. I actually liked the guy.”

  Tony felt his anger rise.

  “Don’t go all caveman on me again. I said liked. Something about him didn’t feel right this afternoon. I believe Ron knows more about what’s going on than he’s shared with me. I got some strange vibes from him today. As pissed as I am about my crime scene, I’m even more irate about the fact someone’s messing with my bodies and lab reports. Why don’t you cook the steaks while I nuke the potatoes, and then I’ll tell you about the straw that broke the camel’s back—what made me realize the truth—over dinner?”

  * * * *

  Michelle put the potatoes in the microwave while Tony carried the meat out to the grill. She placed the blanket back on the bed. Joseph was right. It had been a lot easier than she’d thought it would be. The events at the morgue had infuriated her, and she’d needed to know the truth. She hadn’t been able to wait any longer for the spirits to open her eyes or whatever the hell they had planned. Now, Tony understood his destiny and hers, so perhaps they’d be able to figure out the truth.

  The microwave beep pulling her back to the present, and she returned to the kitchen to check the potatoes. After placing the salad on the table, next to the rolls she’d purchased and the butter and sour cream, she grabbed two wine glasses out of the cupboard and added them to the table next to the chilled bottle of wine. How would this night end? She hoped it would end with the two of them in the bed in the next room, but he’d given no sign that he felt the same way. Was this too big a shock for him? Maybe the spirits were wrong, and his love hadn’t survived two hundred years apart.

  The door opened, and Tony came in. The smell of the steaks made her mouth water. She walked over to him, took the platter from him, and placed it on the table. Behind her, she heard him lock the door and put on both security chains.

  “Smells delicious.” She was suddenly nervous alone with him.

  “You know, I did some thinking while I was out there. There’s one way I can tell if what you’ve told me is true.”

  Michelle’s heartbeat increased. She turned toward him and chewed her lower lip as she always did when she was nervous.

  “What’s that?”

  Quickly, he pulled her unresisting body into his arms, bent his head, and claimed her lips. He kissed her with a savagery she hadn’t expected but welcomed. The kiss demanded her response, and she readily gave it. Unlike with Ron, she was on fire for this man. His tongue sought admission to her mouth, and she opened to him willingly, reveling in waves of sensations so much stronger than the ones she’d experienced in her dreams. Their tongues battled, both claiming victory and ceding it.

  He fed from her, like a man deprived of life-giving sustenance. The kiss was full of frustration and need, but it was also tender, feasting from her with holy reverence. He pulled away slowly, his breathing as ragged as hers. His aquamarine eyes burned with desire just as they had in the vision earlier in the day. If she’d had doubts, the comparison between her reaction to Ron’s kiss and this one sealed it. This was Gowanda. This was the man she loved.

  “Well, I guess that answers that question.” He bent his head and kissed her again, tenderly this time, and she could feel his love. She responded with all the love she’d carried within her for so long. He slowly pulled away, and the bulge in his pants showed he was as moved as she was.

  “As much as I’d like to take you into that room and do everything to you I’ve done in those dreams, I think we have to talk. I’ve waited two hundred years, I can wait a couple of hours more. I want to know about this camel with the broken back.”

  She chuckled wryly. “Okay, but you have to promise not to get angry. Let’s eat, and I’ll tell you all about it.”

  She served the food and while they ate, she told him about her near-drowning, the ghost who’d come to her in Thunder Bay, and the shock she’d gotten when she’d seen his photograph. She described her encounter with Audra, and then moved on to the tour of the winery, the truck going to Happy Valley, and had just started on events at the morgue.

  Tony leaned back in his chair and shook his head.

  “Did Aaron, or rather Aaron’s ghost, recognize the man?”

  “No. He didn’t, but it had to be someone who knows his way around, someone who thinks I’m a bloody idiot. When I looked at the blood results for Lindsay, I was confused because those weren’t the results I’d expected, but they got sloppy. Obviously, they switched the samples, but they didn’t do their homework. I don’t know where they got the blood, but not only was the level of meth way off, they didn’t check the blood type closely enough. She’d had to have been a long time user for results like those. I had Lindsay’s medical records from Toronto, and she went through her mandatory tests six months ago. She was clean. I brought those results with me. I checked them when I got the ones from the lab. That’s when the biggest inconsistency hit. Lindsay was O negative. The results they gave me were for someone with O positive blood. The Rh factor doesn’t lie. I’ve drawn more blood and taken more tissue samples, and I’ve sent them to Kingston with an RCMP officer who’s part of a task force investigating a meth lab they believe has been in operation here on the island for almost a year. He’s the one who has the canoe and Aaron’s car. I also gave him the chunk of rock Isaac’s head was bashed in with.”

  “How can the lab be a year old? The lake was clean three weeks ago.”

  “I know. I asked him that. He thinks they may be sinking the waste in weighted sealed containers and one of the containers leaked. This could be huge. Far worse than anything you imagined.”

  “Decaying meth waste containers would be an environmental disaster of enormous proportions. You think these guys killed Isaac too?”

  “I don’t think it; I know it. There were skin and hair fibers imbedded in the rock and rock crystals in the wound. The angle was all wrong for a fall, and if he had hit his head falling, it wouldn’t have hit hard enough to kill him. The stone was brought down on his head with a lot of force, by someone stronger and taller than him. I haven’t met a likely candidate yet, but when I do, I’ll recognize him. Most people don’t realize you can learn a great deal from a murder weapon. There may be fingerprints on it. We’ll see.”

  “So that was the straw?” He reached across the table and took her left hand in his.

  She reached for her wine glass, sipped, and then shook her head.

  “No. Those things raised a dozen red flags, but I’d gone to the morgue to speak to Aaron. I wanted to know about the wine bottle. I pulled open the drawer. I need to touch the body to release the ghost. I guess it’s a way to keep from being flooded with demanding voices the way it was when I was a child. The first thing I saw was that his clothing had been disturbed. Someone had searched the body. When I touched him, he told me a man had been in the morgue. He’d described him as a short, olive-skinned man with a scruffy beard and mustache. He searched him, searched all of Lindsay’s belongings. They were scheduled to go to the police forensic lab—I thought they’d gone—but apparently the request wasn’t filed. I don’t know if it was Milo or Jamie, the guys helping me, or if the papers disappeared further up the food chain. I think they were looking for the cork.”

  “Did Aaron have a cork too?”

  “I don’t think so, but they weren’t looking for anything on Aaron. They were putting things there, things that hadn’t been there before.”

  Tony frowned. “You me
an they were trying to plant evidence?”

  “Yes, evidence to implicate you.”

  He choked on his mouthful of wine. His eyes watered.

  “Me? How? Why?”

  She held out a piece of paper. “This is one of the things.”

  He reached for the note. The paper had been in the water, and the ink was blurred. As she expected, he paled when he read it.

  “I didn’t write this! It’s my signature, but I swear to you, I didn’t write it.”

  “I know you didn’t, and so does Aaron.”

  “This note is enough to get me convicted.”

  If you want to graduate so you can support the bastard your girlfriend is carrying, you’ll keep your mouth shut or else. The results are what I say they are. Meet me by the lake at midnight. Bring Lindsay with you. Don’t be late.

  Tony.

  She reached for the note he’d written this morning, the one she’d shoved in her jacket pocket. Would it have vanished if she’d left it on the counter?

  “I’m trained to look for what’s there as well as what isn’t. Look at them carefully. On the surface they look the same. The forger is very good, and since the paper was wet and then dried, the words and letters are slightly blurred, but there are slight variations.”

  He stared at her in amazement.

  She smiled. “I told you I’m thorough. Plus I know it was planted. There was this too.” She showed him a few long hairs. “They placed them on his jacket and on his sleeves. Yours, I assume. When did you have your hair cut?”

  “Saturday morning. I guess it makes me look even guiltier.”

  She nodded.

  “Where would they have gotten these?”

  She could see his confusion, and her heart went out to him.

  “From your hairbrush, probably. As I learned earlier today, people seem to be able to come and go from these places quite easily. The only reason anyone would want to frame you this badly would be to protect themselves.”