A Scrying Shame

by Donna White Glaser

  O’Shea pulled out his notebook.

  Oh, crap.

  It wasn’t wariness Arie saw in Connor O’Shea’s eyes. Or was it? No, it was an absence of emotion, a neutral professional blankness that had encapsulated the detective like a thin layer of galvanized steel. That someone could have such complete control over his emotions made Arie shiver with superstitious awe.

  “Last night,” O’Shea began, “when you attended Marissa Mason’s funeral, you were seen talking to a gentleman. His name is Brant Stiles. Blond, blue eyes, about six feet. What do you know about him?”

  Arie felt her mouth fall open, an inherently unattractive look, she knew. “Brant? Is he a suspect?”

  “You know him?”

  Oh, more crap. He was serious.

  “I do.”

  An image of O’Shea taking his wedding vows inserted itself into Arie’s mind, and she almost giggled. She started to put her hand over her face and then remembered she was holding the key. For some reason—and it might not have been her own—she didn’t want O’Shea to see the key.

  “He’s my brother.”

  “Your brother,” O’Shea said. It wasn’t a question. Now his face did register something. His lips thinned briefly, and he looked off into some middle distance. “I thought you said you didn’t know Marissa Mason.”

  “I didn’t. I mean, I didn’t know I did. I only met her once, and it was two years ago. I didn’t recognize her from the little picture on her book, and the funeral was closed casket.”

  He finally showed an emotion. Unfortunately, it was incredulity.

  “They were engaged. Do you really expect me to believe you didn’t know her?”

  “I really didn’t.”

  Arie clung to the truth, even though she knew how ridiculous it sounded. But it was the truth. Besides, her mind was racing so fast she couldn’t have come up with a decent lie if her life depended on it.

  There was a long pause while they both assessed the new situation and took measure of the other. After a few moments, O’Shea nodded slightly to himself.

  “So you didn’t know Marissa Mason, even though you had met her at least once, and even though you say she was engaged to your brother for a period of time. You showed up at her funeral, even though you didn’t know her, out of some altruistic desire to care for the dead.”

  The words hung between them, adhering themselves to the bitter chemical smells and the underlying coppery odor of blood that still lingered in the room where Marissa Mason had died.

  Arie swallowed. Her mouth had grown so dry her lips were gummy. “I didn’t know her well enough to recognize her. I met her once, as you said, and it was over two years ago. Yes, she was engaged to my brother, but it was a secret engagement. Why do you think Brant has anything to do with this?”

  Without answering, O’Shea nodded again. He opened his notebook and said, “I’ll need your full name.”

  Arie was already shaking so hard she thought she might rattle the remaining floorboards loose. She took a deep breath and reminded herself that, whatever he had done to make O’Shea think he was guilty of murder, her boring, staid, predictable brother was not a killer.

  O’Shea was waiting. Reluctantly, she told him her full name—no initials this time—and endured the blank stare he gave her.

  “It’s a family name,” she whispered. “That’s why I just use the initials.”

  “I don’t blame you,” O’Shea said.

  It could have been a bonding moment. It wasn’t.

  “Address?”

  After Arie had answered all of the detective’s questions, the two stood in indecision. Arie’s heart knocked against her chest as if it were trying to escape her body. Was she going to get hauled in for questioning or something? A bigger, deeper fear lay curled in the bottom of her stomach. Brant, what have you done?

  And how was she going to find out?

  Just as the tension became almost unbearable, Grady walked in. Apparently sensing the crackling energy, he swung his gaze back and forth between the two. As soon as O’Shea turned to look over his shoulder at Grady, Arie slid the key into her glove. The metal felt cold against her sweaty palm. Strangely, a feeling of peace—the kind she hadn’t felt since she’d gone to the OS—settled over her.

  “Uh,” Grady said. “You about done in here, Arie?”

  O’Shea turned back, his eyes assessing her.

  “I’m not sure.” Staring at O’Shea, Arie asked, “Am I?”

  Another long pause. Then O’Shea said, “For now.”

  Didn’t look like they’d be getting that cup of coffee anytime soon.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  As soon as Grady cleared Arie from her duties, she jumped in her car and sped to her parents’ house. She was in no shape to deal with her mother, but this couldn’t wait. How well did she know Brant after all? They traveled in different circles; they had different lifestyles; they had different lives. Brant was always . . . Brant. He got good grades, followed the rules, and met or exceeded expectations of anyone in range to set them.

  And he was as boring as hell.

  Arie couldn’t believe that Brant would ever be swept away by any emotion long enough to kill another human being.

  But did she really know him?

  Doubts and worries bounced around in her head like the Fisher-Price vacuum popper she’d pushed from room to room as a toddler—until her mother had donated it to their church’s rummage sale, that was.

  When Arie pulled in the driveway, the garage door was open, and so was the trunk of her dad’s Buick LeSabre. Bags of groceries were loaded in the trunk, awaiting the last leg of their journey. Arie sighed and grabbed two of them, the brown paper crinkling in her arms.

  Ed opened the door as she neared it.

  “Well, look who showed up in the nick of time.”

  Her father’s smile was like a soothing balm. He held the door for her, and Arie pecked his cheek as she went by. Her mother, she knew, would be moving back and forth between the kitchen table and the cabinets, stowing the food in its proper place. Her parents had long ago fallen into a pattern of sharing household duties. Her father probably didn’t even know where the tomato soup was stored. His job was to show up for the expedition to the grocery store, tag along behind his wife so he could reach the items that were shelved too high for her, and finally, to haul the bags to the kitchen table. Evelyn was in charge of everything else.

  “What are you doing here?” Her mother softened the question with a bright smile.

  Sometimes, Arie had to remind herself that her mother really did love her, despite her bustling, energetic, controlling nature. An almost overwhelming urge to lay her problems on her mother’s table, the place where so many other problems had been dumped then solved over the years, rose in Arie’s chest.

  But this problem? This wasn’t like failing algebra (Arie) or who dented the side panel on the station wagon (Arie) or which of the four colleges offering scholarships should be chosen (Brant, of course.) This was a frantic woman chased from room to room, her blood sprayed across walls. This was death. And it had no place at her parents’ kitchen table.

  But if her mother ever found out that Arie knew Brant was in this kind of trouble, and hadn’t told her? Arie shuddered at the prospect. She had to find another way of digging into Brant’s past without asking her parents. Not yet, anyway. And she wanted to talk to her brother first.

  Thinking about Brant’s college decision had given her an idea.

  Belatedly answering her mother’s greeting, Arie said, “I thought I’d stop in for a few minutes. I have some things I thought would be nice to have at Grumpa’s.”

  Her mother frowned. “What things? And don’t call him that. You know he hates it.”

  “Well, let’s not tell him. I made him chili the other night for supper, if that helps. Homemade, even, not from a can.”

  Ed walked in, carrying the last of the groceries.

  “Goodness,” Evelyn said. “Chili? Is
n’t that too spicy? You have to remember, Arie, you’re supposed to taking care of your poor grandfather.”

  Ed snorted at the description of his father-in-law.

  “I think you should be more careful about his meals,” Evelyn said. “But I’m sure you two will overrule me the way you always do.”

  Arie’s eyebrows rose nearly to her hairline. Had anybody ever overruled Evelyn Stiles? But there had been a plaintive tone in her mother’s voice that Arie had never heard before. In fact, Evelyn looked almost teary-eyed. It scared Arie a little.

  “Now, Evelyn,” Ed said. “I’m sure Arie is taking good care of Dad.”

  “He actually liked it,” Arie said. “In fact, he ate the whole pot and all the cornbread.”

  Evelyn rubbed her temples. “Well, that’s good anyway. I just think—”

  “I’ll be careful about spicy foods, Mom.”

  Evelyn folded the last paper grocery bag and stored it under the sink. “I know you will. I’m just a little tired today. I’m going to go lie down for a bit.”

  As Evelyn walked away, Arie turned to her father, a question in her eyes.

  He reached over and patted her hand. “She’s fine. I think she’s fighting off a cold.”

  “Oh, okay. Listen, I just need to grab a few things from the basement. I’ll be quiet.”

  “Don’t worry about that. She likes to read for a bit, anyway. I’ll be in my chair if you need anything.”

  Although the incident with Evelyn, slight though it was, left Arie a bit uneasy, the thought of Ed resuming his usual place in his easy chair, surrounded by his military adventure novels and crossword puzzles, reassured her.

  The basement had been finished long ago. Fake wood paneling covered the walls, and the cement floor had been covered with kid-friendly, durable carpet. The air felt damp. Arie would have to remind her father to get the dehumidifier going.

  She went into the storage room, with its jerry-rigged plywood shelving that sagged with boxes of Christmas decorations, gardening tools, and miscellaneous boxes filled with knickknacks that had survived the move from the old house eighteen years ago, but had never been deemed worthy of a spot in the new. Arie pushed boxes around until she found the one she wanted.

  She knew it was the right one because it said BRANT—STAY OUT in black magic marker with three exclamation marks. It reminded her of the Keep Out signs they used to tape to their bedroom doors, whose only purpose had been to fan the flames of each sibling’s desire to breach the barrier and see what was on the other side.

  It was the box Brant had lugged home after graduating from Marquette University in Milwaukee. Just one box. Brant wasn’t the sentimental type, but Arie hoped it would give her some clues about what her brother was like back then. It embarrassed her how little she knew of him—the real Brant—but she set the thought aside for now.

  Opening the box, she found a tattered, well-read copy of Stephen King’s The Stand as well as a white mug decorated with the entwined navy-blue-and-yellow M and U college logo. A coffee stain decorated the inside like a lacy brown spiderweb. She pulled out several textbooks and set them in a pile beside her.

  The next layer was paperwork: old essays, a class schedule, and a dusty old day planner. Arie wiped off the planner, then realized she was staring down at her own reflection on the glossy black cover. She braced herself for the vision she knew would be triggered. Nothing happened. Puzzled but relieved, she set the book aside and hurried over to the downstairs bathroom.

  Despite its no-nonsense functionality, hardly anybody liked to use it. Evelyn kept the white porcelain clean, of course, but since the room was barely used, it gathered a slight layer of dust. It didn’t appear to have spiders, but with the chill, dank basement air, it felt spidery. Potential spiders were almost worse than ones you could see and therefore avoid. Still, it came in handy at the family Christmas parties or when some—always unidentified—person stunk up the upstairs one.

  Arie approached the mirror with care. She’d had trouble looking into any mirror since the death vision at Marissa’s. She stood in front of the sink with her eyes squinched shut, quickly opened them, peeked into the mirror, and immediately squeezed them shut.

  Nothing.

  She opened them again and risked a longer look. Still nothing. She breathed a sigh of relief. Were the visions over?

  Backtracking, she realized the pressure had lightened the moment she’d pocketed the key in Marissa’s bedroom. The moment, in fact, when she’d unconsciously committed herself to uncovering Marissa’s murderer.

  Arie leaned on the counter and considered this new idea. What did it mean? Did she have to choose between being haunted by a murder victim’s memories or putting herself at risk by trying to track down a killer? That was a choice?

  And what would happen if she couldn’t figure it out?

  Arie straightened up and decided to pull a Scarlett O’Hara. She’d “think about it tomorrow.” Maybe.

  Still shaken, she went back to the box of Brant’s stuff and picked up the day planner. As she did, a thick white square slid out from between the pages.

  A Polaroid picture. Only Brant would still be using a Polaroid.

  Arie flipped it over and realized she’d found what she’d been looking for. A much younger version of her brother—although he couldn’t have been, really; it had only been two years ago—sat on a blanket with a beautiful blonde curled in his lap. Marissa Mason, of course. A bottle of wine, glasses, and a Tupperware container filled with red strawberries completed the picnic. Arie couldn’t tell for sure, but she guessed they were at an outdoor concert. She thought she could see a stage in the background.

  She could hardly take her eyes off Brant. She’d never seen him so relaxed. Or happy. No wonder she barely recognized him. Suddenly, Arie felt herself grieving for the brother she never knew.

  And it was certainly Marissa sprawled across her brother’s legs. She seemed happy, too. They matched. They belonged.

  Arie wondered what had happened to take the smiles off those two young, joyous faces.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  Arie waited until after she’d gotten home, fed Grumpa a healthy meal of lean pork chops, brown rice, and broccoli—whereupon he accused her of trying to kill him—and took a long hot shower before she tried calling Brant. She’d had to look up his number in her mother’s address book. That said something about their relationship.

  When Brant’s phone clicked directly to voice mail, Arie hung up. There was no way she could leave any sort of message that would make sense.

  Instead, Arie called Chandra to fill her in on Detective O’Shea’s visit.

  “Holy cats,” Chandra said. “Is he going to arrest both of you?”

  “I think if he was going to bring me in, he would have. Besides, he can’t arrest me. I didn’t do anything.”

  A dubious silence hung on the line. Chandra said, “It sure looks bad, though.”

  “You don’t have to tell me.”

  “What are you going to do now? I mean, you don’t really believe Brant would . . .”

  “No. Of course not.” Another long pause. “Do you?”

  “Not really,” Chandra said. “He’s so blah. It’s . . .”

  “What? Just say it.”

  “Well, it’s always the quiet, boring guy who turns out to be the serial killer. I mean, I really don’t think Brant’s a killer, but . . . I mean, if he did do it, it’s probably because he, you know, snapped.”

  “Brant doesn’t snap,” Arie said. “That’s exactly what Brant doesn’t do. He’s the most un-snappy person on earth.”

  “Then why does O’Shea think he’s involved?”

  “I don’t know. He wouldn’t say. That’s what I need to figure out.”

  “Can’t you just ask Brant?”

  “I tried calling him, but it’s not that easy.” Arie sighed. “He’d never trust me with this kind of thing. The only reason he told me about his engagement in the first place was because I a
ccidentally ran into them. From the look on Marissa’s face, she didn’t know he had a sister. And you saw how he acted at the funeral. Besides, he’s going to want to know why I’m involved. What am I going to tell him? I stared into a pool of his ex-fiancée’s blood and had a vision of her murder? How is that going to go over? He doesn’t even believe I had a near-death experience. In fact, he told Dad I was making it up to get attention.”

  “Does he think you mugged yourself, too?”

  “No, but he probably thinks I was irresponsible and placed myself in harm’s way.”

  Chandra laughed.

  “But you were just walking to your car after work. How is that irresponsible?”

  “Because it was a stupid job in a risky part of town.”

  “You know, about that. I wanted to ask you something.”

  “About . . . that night?” Arie’s stomach muscles cramped. “What about it?”

  “Well, I was just wondering, if you’ve tried this vision stuff on yourself. I mean, that’s only natural, right? Maybe you could—”

  “I can’t.”

  “Can’t? Or won’t?”

  “I tried, okay.” Arie sighed and confessed to having pricked her own finger with a needle to get a sample of blood.

  “Holy buckets! What did you see?”

  “Blood. That’s it. And listen, Chan, I know you’re trying to help but I don’t want to—”

  “You can’t avoid it forever.”

  “I can for now. So forget that. Didn’t you say you knew that friend of hers—Diane?”

  Chandra sighed, but capitulated. “Riann. From college. But it’s not like we—”

  “Can you figure out some way to introduce me to her?”

  “Oh, boy. What are you—”

  “Can you?”

  Chandra didn’t answer right away. Arie waited. If there was anything she had faith in, it was her friend’s complete inability to resist poking her nose into other people’s business.

  “I’m not promising anything,” Chandra finally said. “I have an idea. What are you doing tomorrow night?”