Return to Fender

by Virginia Brown

  Diva had always been spiritual. Not just with her gift but with her entire being, at one with nature and the elements, in tune with those around her. Harley had blundered through life so far. Somehow she’d escaped serious harm. Until now. And look where she was, at the bottom of a grave meant for someone else, waiting for the inevitable.

  Tears threatened, and she blinked them away. This was no time to get maudlin. If she got out—when she got out—she was going to do things differently. She’d appreciate her parents more, be cautious instead of acting like she was immortal. She’d even be nice to her brother. Then she thought of Mike Morgan. Despite their differences, he was the one really good relationship in her life. She’d mucked up all the others. Afraid of getting too attached, afraid of commitment, just afraid the guy would bail on her and she’d get hurt. Maybe there were some things in life that were worth the risk.

  Time stretched interminably, the sky changed from gray to blue and back to gray, then began to fade. No one had come for her. No one had missed her. She’d drifted in and out of sleep, sinking deeper into the muck, grateful it hadn’t rained but realizing she may never get out. Every time she moved, more mud slid dangerously and threatened to bury her completely. She was still twisted like a pretzel, legs up, shoulder wedged into the dirt wall, and her left arm under her. Only her right arm was free.

  Next time she heard someone up there she’d call out, risk it being the killer. It was better than this slow dying. If there was a next time. Hot tears stung her eyes. Dammit, it just couldn’t end like this!

  Determined not to spend another night in the grave, Harley decided that doing nothing was worse than at least trying to get out. It may collapse on her, but at least she wouldn’t just sit there waiting to die.

  Slowly, so as not to trigger a mudslide, she pushed her hand up the wall, fingers digging into the dirt. It hurt to move; she’d been in the same position for so long, but she inched up enough to push away some of the mud from her chest. She could breathe more easily. Her legs and feet were numb. All the blood had rushed downward. The only part of her that still seemed workable was her right arm. Good thing she was right-handed. That helped.

  Several chunks of mud slid from the wall and spattered onto her chest and head. She paused, afraid to move until it stabilized. She looked up at the sky. A slate gray rectangle lent a little light to the hole. Something stuck out not far above her head. A stick or something—no, a tree root. Maybe she could get to it, pull herself up if it held. The tree was pretty big, so the root should be sturdy.

  She inched upward, pulling her weight with one hand, fingers dug into the side as far as she could get, closer and closer to the root. Some of the mud on her chest shifted, but she was still twisted into the ground like a corkscrew. It felt like her spine might snap in two if she moved too far or too fast. Determined, gritting her teeth against the pain, she finally reached the root. It was slick, and her hand was so cold it was hard to grip tightly. Every time she tried to hold onto it, it slid right out of her palm. One handed, it was going to be a miracle if she made it work.

  Still, she wasn’t about to give up. Not yet. Not while she still had a breath left in her body. It was torturous, and the light dwindled as she kept trying to use the root to pull herself up. She panted now, her breath harsh. Her mouth was so dry she almost wished for rain. Her palm was scraped and probably bleeding. Yet she couldn’t quit.

  She grabbed the root again and jerked hard to lift her body up from the mud. To her horror the root snapped in two, and she slid right back into the pocket of dirt. Angry and frustrated, she realized she was crying. This time she gave into it. Hot tears slid down her cheeks, and her chest ached. There went her last chance.

  Laying her head against her still uplifted arm she pressed her face into her sleeve. The jacket was smeared with mud, but she didn’t care. It didn’t matter now anyway. After a moment she let her head fall back against the dirt wall.

  That was when she heard a loud bark. Then a howl. Then another bark. Her head came up. Someone was out walking their dog. This was probably her last chance, and she went for it.

  “Help! Help me! Please!”

  Now the barking was frenzied, closer and closer, interspersed with excited howls. Harley yelled even louder for help, and after a moment a furry face appeared above her. She blinked. She knew that furry face!

  “King! Ohmygod, I never thought I’d be so happy to see you! King, here boy! Come on . . . where’s Yogi? Go get Yogi!”

  Still barking, the dog pounced on the dirt mound and sent a cascade of mud flying down into the hole. It peppered Harley with a few pellets, then King disappeared from the opening. Her heart clutched. No, he couldn’t have left—he had to be with her father.

  A few seconds later Yogi peered over the edge of the hole, and she thought she’d pass out with relief. “Stay there, Harley,” he said unnecessarily. “We’ll get you out.”

  She couldn’t speak for a moment, could only nod as if he could see her. It was nearly dark. Another night spent below ground would have finished her. She was nearly frozen as it was, even though the temperatures had been mild. All the rain had soaked into her clothes and probably down to her bone marrow.

  In what seemed like hours but was probably only minutes, Yogi was back with a loop of clothesline. He fashioned a noose and lowered it.

  “Can you put it around you? Under your arms, maybe?”

  “I don’t know. It’s pretty tight down here. I can try.”

  Several minutes passed in frustration as she did her best to slip it over her head and under her arms. Her left side was still half-buried in the muck, and she couldn’t feel that arm, much less get it to cooperate with such a technical move.

  “It’s not working,” she said, and Yogi waggled the line as if to help.

  “Just put it around you. Never mind. I’ll get help.”

  King perched on the lip of the grave and stared down at her, tongue lolling out one side of his mouth. He wore something orange around his body. He looked like a furry Halloween pumpkin.

  By the time Yogi got back from wherever he’d been Harley’s patience had gotten shorter. “Can’t you get me out of here? I’m not sure I can last much longer.”

  “Hold on, Harley. Morgan is on his way with a ladder. He’s not that far away. He found your bike in the alley and has been looking around there for you.”

  Harley craned her neck to look up at him. “What alley?”

  “The one you left it in, I guess.”

  “I didn’t leave it in an alley. I left it on the street—how far did you say he is?”

  “Not far, baby, not far. I’m just so damned glad you’re okay—you are okay, aren’t you?”

  She nodded, then realized her father couldn’t see her and said, “Yes, I’m okay. Cold. Wet. Thirsty. But okay.”

  “Your mother said you would be, but we’ve been worried anyway. King found you. It’s that rescue vest I made him. He’s really good at finding bodies. People.”

  Harley managed a weak laugh. “He did good. Stop at McDonald’s and get him a hamburger. He deserves it.”

  “Yeah, he does. I’ll do that—hey, here comes Morgan. Hold on, baby. We’ll get you out.”

  It didn’t take long after Mike slid the ladder down into the hole, then climbed down to get her. He had to dislodge her from the mud by scraping it off her, then pushing her body around until he could get his arms under her and lift her. The cramped muscles in her legs and back groaned a protest, but Harley clamped her lips tightly together and didn’t make a sound. It was awkward, edging her up the ladder so that her position didn’t put too much strain on her bones. The ladder sank a bit under both their weights but held long enough for him to get her above ground. He laid her gently on the lip of the hole.

  “You gave me one hell of a scare,” he said softly and brushed a strand of her mud-caked hair out of her face. “Remind me to yell at you later.”

  “Right.” Harley sucked in a breath of fresh ai
r that didn’t smell or taste like mud and went limp. Sirens screamed in the distance, coming closer. King licked mud off her nose, and she didn’t even care. She felt lightheaded. Relieved. Sapped of energy. Glad to be alive.

  Yogi hovered anxiously around her, asking if she was okay several times, fussing with a coat Morgan gave her. He put it over her, wrapped her in it and just held her for a few minutes. Harley didn’t mind at all. There were times it was good to be a daddy’s girl.

  Morgan hauled the ladder up out of the grave and pushed it to the side. Then he knelt down next to them. “Okay, so where the hell have you been?”

  She gave him a “what a dumb question” look, and he sighed, raked a hand through his hair, and tried again. “Sorry. Stupid question. I’ve just been looking for you the past eighteen hours, and I’m not thinking too clearly. How did you manage to fall into an open grave? What were you even doing in this cemetery?”

  That reminded her of her awful discovery. She glanced over at the mound under the tree. King was busily digging at it, and she gasped. “Stop him! King, no! No!”

  The dog ignored her as usual, but Mike caught on pretty quick. He got up and went to the mound, then reached for the hat King had in his teeth. King took that to mean he wanted to play. He bounced over the mound, shaking the hat and growling. Then he crouched, rear in the air, tail wagging and his paws braced against the foot of the mound.

  But Mike had lost interest in the hat. He stared down at the dirt where King had uncovered the grave, then carefully stepped away from the mound and looked at her over his shoulder. “Do you know the deceased?”

  She nodded. “Yes. Her name is Felicia Cleveland. I found her just before I ended up in the hole.” Pausing, she frowned. “I think I was pushed. I know someone tried to kill me by burying me alive.”

  Morgan didn’t say anything for a moment. He looked from Harley back to the body under the tree, then over at the dog. King still playfully wagged the hat at him. He shook his head. “This crime scene is pretty ruined. I’ll get all the details from you later. Your ride is here now.”

  Two EMTs headed their way, threading through the tombstones, carrying a fold-up stretcher. A squad car pulled up by the ambulance. The street was lit up like Christmas Day. Blue and red lights flashed, the curious began to stop their cars or walk up the street to gawk. Harley was glad that the EMTs tucked a blanket around her and strapped her to the gurney. Yogi walked next to them as they carried her out, then wheeled her down the slope to the ambulance. King followed, sans hat. Morgan must have convinced him to let it go. The dog tried to jump up on the gurney, but Yogi caught him in time.

  “No, King,” he said, “bad dog.”

  There was a small confrontation at the ambulance when Yogi was informed that he could ride to the hospital with his daughter, but the dog couldn’t. Incensed, Yogi said that King was a rescue dog, but it made no difference. The EMTs were quite firm in their decision.

  “Yogi,” said Harley, “just take him home and come up later. I’m fine. Really, I am. Just cold, thirsty, and hungry. Bring me some Taco Bell, okay?”

  “I can leave King in the van and ride with you,” he offered, but she shook her head.

  “No way. If left alone King eats upholstery, remember? Besides, these guys are trained professionals. They’ll take good care of me until you can get there.”

  Just before the doors were shut Morgan stuck his head in and said, “Don’t go anywhere but to the hospital. Stay there until I get there. Got it?”

  “If that’s your bedside manner, it needs some work,” she said, and he gave her a lopsided grin, then shut the ambulance door.

  “He loves me,” Harley said to an EMT the size of a small refrigerator.

  “I’m just going to check your blood pressure,” the EMT replied and proceeded to put the cuff on her arm.

  She didn’t feel like arguing. It seemed the best thing.

  “ARE YOU SURE you’re all right?” Yogi asked for what was probably the tenth time in as many minutes.

  Harley pried open one eye with a finger that wasn’t attached to a machine. “Very sure. But if you insist on worrying, no one has brought me any food. Where’s my Taco Bell?”

  “Diva said they may not want you to have it.” He gave her mother a reproachful glance. “I tried.”

  She let her eyelid close again. “They say I’m dehydrated. You’d think they would want me to have food.”

  “That’s what the IV is for,” said Diva calmly. “Just rest, Harley. You’re safe for now.”

  She managed to open one eye without her finger. “What do you mean—for now?”

  Diva smiled. “You’re safe. That’s all you need to think about. Rest. Morgan will be here soon to answer questions.”

  “Have you talked to him?”

  “No. He’s busy. The graveyard holds so many clues, but none will lead to the killer.”

  Harley once more closed her eye. “I hate it when you talk in riddles. I don’t suppose you know who the killer is? It’d save so much time and trouble if you do.”

  “That knowledge hasn’t been given to me. I’m told that you know the identity of the murderer.”

  “I do?” she asked blindly. Some of the meds they’d given her were beginning to regroup and attack. She felt like she was moving through water, her limbs heavy and her head all blurry. “If your spirit guides are going to say things like that, they need to be more specific. Can you ask for specifics . . .?”

  As her voice trailed off, and she drifted into sleep she heard her mother say, “You already know everything.”

  When she woke up, the room was dark except for a low light over the head of the bed, and only Mike Morgan was in the room. He was stretched out on a couch that looked very uncomfortable, a thin pillow under his head and one arm bent over his eyes. She sat up to peer at him.

  “How long have you been here?”

  The arm came down, and he turned to look at her. “An hour, give or take fifteen minutes. How do you feel, Sleeping Beauty?”

  “Like I’ve been wallowing in mud and sat on by a hippo. Nothing is broken, they tell me. And the blood to my legs wasn’t cut completely off, so they’ll be okay.”

  Mike sat up, swung his legs off the couch and rubbed at his eyes with both hands. “You’re damn lucky. What were you doing in that cemetery after you’d been attacked at Tootsie’s house? Do you know who hit you? Do you have a death wish?”

  “Which question do you want me to answer first?”

  He slumped back against the couch. “Your choice. Just pick one.”

  “I was looking for my cell phone.”

  He shook his head. “As many as you’ve destroyed since I’ve known you, and you risked your life to look for it?”

  When he didn’t say anything else, she asked, “Is that another question?”

  “No. It was an observation. So you were looking for your cell phone. Why didn’t you do that when your brother or Tootsie was still there?”

  “Because I didn’t know I’d lost it until they left. And my bike wouldn’t start, and I had to have a phone to call for someone to come get me. Only I didn’t have my phone, so I went to look for it. Have I said that already?”

  “In a roundabout way. So, your bike wouldn’t start, and you looked for your phone in the cemetery. Why there?”

  “Because that’s where it was ringing. Oh! If you look at my call log you can find out who called me. Maybe it was the killer.”

  “Your phone is in a dozen pieces. I’ll have to contact your service provider.”

  “How can it be broken? It was working until I dropped it.”

  He gave her a steady look that made her sigh. Then he said, “It looks like it’s been stomped on. Did you stomp on it?”

  “No, it flew out of my hand when I fell into the hole. Don’t call it a grave. Now that I’m not in it I don’t want to think of it as my final resting place.”

  “Any idea who tried to bury you?”

  “Actually, I
was thinking about that while waiting for someone to find me. Yes. I think it was Harvey Fine.”

  Morgan looked alert now. “Why?”

  “Because he was very ugly to me earlier, and there’s just something about him that I don’t like. I think he’s involved in the construction thing, the money laundering or whatever is going on. Tootsie has all the details. Ask him.”

  For a few moments Morgan didn’t say anything. Then he shrugged. “I’ll pass on your information to Bobby.”

  She looked at him curiously. “I thought you were working this case.”

  “What made you think that? I do undercover work. That requires that I remain unknown by anyone who might think I have anything to do with law enforcement. Since meeting you, my former anonymity has disappeared down the same rabbit hole as my job. I’m going to end up on desk duty if I don’t figure out how to keep you from blowing my cover every time I step outside my door.”

  “I didn’t do that,” she defended herself.

  “Not intentionally, no. The result is just the same, unfortunately. Why do you think I suggested we partner? Not because I’m trying to be unnoticed. There’s not a hope in hell of that happening when you’re around. I just wanted to minimize the inevitable disaster.”

  “Keep talking like that, and you’re going to hurt my feelings.”

  “Will that make you be more careful?”