by Celia Ashley
He frowned. “Damn it, I know you didn’t. I had my eyes on you the whole time you were in here last night…this morning. But somebody did it.”
That somebody could have been her. He didn’t know that. She could never let him know that. But when she left the house this morning, the cards were where they had been.
Alva?
Nothing.
Maris wiped the back of a hand across her mouth. “Why did you want me to see this? I don’t understand.”
Dan came in close again, brushing her cheek with breath scented with juice and the smoky smell of bacon. “Does it mean something, the layout? I’m trying to figure out if someone might have left this as a message. A taunt, perhaps. You’re into this type of thing, aren’t you? Tarot reading?”
The condescension, the skepticism, had returned. Maris tucked her hair behind her ear, running her index finger along the length of the small white feather. Peace, Maris. Peace.
She nodded at the table once more. “May I go closer?”
“Don’t touch anything.”
“I think I got that message already, Detective.”
He made a noise in his throat. Shock, disapproval, amusement? She couldn’t follow him anymore. Better to leave her thoughts away from his and concentrate on what was being shown to her.
Through narrowed eyes, she studied the array of cards. Her fingers tingled, longing to reach out and handle them. She could sense the energy even with her hands tucked deep into her pockets.
That’s right, Maris, you extraordinary child. Close your eyes and feel the narrative unfold…
“What are you doing?”
Maris jumped, eyes flying wide. She pulled her open hands back from the static-filled air above the table, forcing their return to the warm folds of her skirt. “Sorry. I wasn’t touching.”
“You were pretty damned close.”
“Right.” When Maris had seen the spread before, the layout had been somewhat confusing to her, but now ten cards were positioned in the most common form of the Celtic cross. She chewed her lower lip as she again studied the cards. Her heart rate slowed, her respiration evened out. “What is it you want me to tell you?”
“Is there any significance to what’s on the table?”
There’s always significance, she wanted to say. “If you’re trying to determine some message left for you, I have no idea.”
“That card there is fairly obvious,” Dan said, pointing. “A confession, perhaps?”
Maris curled her lips at his words. “The Death card? You think someone is saying ‘I killed her’ with that card? There are many meanings to the Death card. It could mean something as positive as becoming a new person.” One of the officers standing nearby snorted. She ignored him. “This one here, the Hangman, could imply the suspension of disbelief.” She gave a significant look first to the amused officer and then Dan. “Here, the Seven of Wands, one of the Minor Arcana, could be interpreted as being true to yourself, your principles, despite the pressure of others to make you see differently. This, taken alone? Possibly a truce of sorts. This one? Despair. However, these cards together tell a story I cannot see because I didn’t lay them out. The psychic connection is missing.”
This time the officer laughed out loud. Dan turned to him with a word of dismissal, sending him away. “What about that one?”
Maris sighed, pushing down the image that came to mind. “Desire.”
She heard his breath catch behind her. “That card means desire? It looks like—I don’t know what it looks like.”
“That is the impression I get from it.” Heightened, of course, by the fact he had pointed it out. She couldn’t control the visualization. “Of course, it could mean many things. Like I said, I didn’t have any command over the cards. This is a cold reading. All I can tell you is that I don’t think someone sat here and thought to lay out a confession to a crime with pictures.”
Even so, there was more to what she saw on the table, what had crashed through her, leaving her staggered and breathless and sprawled on the floor, but she would hold that close. Now was not the time. All of it related in some fashion to the man standing beside her, and she needed to sort through what she had seen. Part of what she had witnessed burst out, however, almost of its own accord. “If the High Priestess card were lying here, I’d say the entire spread had to do with secrets and the choices we make.” She closed her eyes. Maris, just shut up.
“The Priestess card?” Dan cleared his throat. “What is the significance of that card?”
She fisted her hands in her pockets. “In what I see before me, I would say a prediction of an event that could disrupt everything in your world.”
A floorboard creaked as Dan moved closer. “My world? What the hell do you mean?”
Maris turned her face from him. “I didn’t mean your world in particular. I meant in a general sense. And it’s not in the spread, anyway. It just came to me for a moment, an image of the card in my mind’s eye. And now, if you’re through with me, I’d really like to go lie down. My head is hurting.”
He touched her arm. At the charge that radiated along her skin, she wanted to shake him off, to yell, but she managed to remain still.
“Maybe you should get checked out,” he said, for her ears alone.
“No.”
“Maris.”
She frowned. He needed to stop that tone of tenderness in his voice. It popped up in ways it shouldn’t, indicating an emotion that did not—could not—exist. There was no caring here. There was suspicion and mistrust and a vague, undefined attraction they both felt and she knew made no sense to him. She could put a stop to the latter with a single word, but somehow, she didn’t want to.
She turned without speaking and headed out the door. He accompanied her as far as the sidewalk, dogging her steps. “Are you sure you’re all right to drive?”
“Yes, I’m fine. An aspirin, and I’ll be perfect.” She spoke with deliberate detachment. “You’ll keep me posted about my aunt?”
He took a step back, sensing the space she was putting between them. The crease between his brows indicated his inability to discern why, the stern set of his jaw his willingness to accept it nevertheless. “We won’t be able to release the body for burial just yet, of course. And there will be questions for you later.”
“Understood.”
“And like I said, don’t leave town.”
“I didn’t plan on it.”
He nodded and turned away. At the top of the porch steps he looked back at her. A shadow aligned itself with him, almost like an aura of smoke. His shoulders jerked as if trying to shake off his sense of the shadow enfolding him. Then he raised his hand in a quick wave and went back inside.
Maris hurried into her car. Clutching the wheel, tears of dread and deep, chilling sorrow ran down her cheeks.
Chapter 7
Dan let the curtain hooked by his finger fall back into place against the glass in Alva Mabry’s front door. His skin shifted between his shoulder blades in a brief shiver, the kind that made people pass comments about a soul walking over one’s grave. He blew a breath from his lips with a small noise.
“A strange bird, that one.”
Dan turned to see who had uttered the remark. He couldn’t distinguish which of the officers gathered in the house had spoken. Better to let the quiet statement pass without comment rather than call attention to his displeasure at hearing it. He couldn’t even be sure why the sentiment bothered him. Maris was a strange woman, but the observation had seemed particularly disparaging.
“All right. Let’s dust the place for prints. Upstairs and down since we don’t have any idea where the perp might have been. You’ll find mine on the door, the knob, the light switch plates, possibly elsewhere. Green’s and Whitley’s, too. Rankin. His assistant. We’ll need to get comparison prints off the deceased.”
And Maris. Shit, and Maris. He’d have to bring her in for elimination purposes. She h
adn’t touched anything but the plate and switch for the light over the table in the parlor, if he remembered right. Yes, she’d been walking with her hands behind her back, and today they’d been in her pockets.
“Gather any hair, fibers, grab the trash. Somebody check outside for footprints, cigarette butts, smudges on the windows. Poison seems a personal means of killing someone, but it could have been a random act. The front door was intact, but we didn’t check for signs of break-in. Shit.” Two of the men turned his way, Henderson with a look of sympathy, Whitley smug. Yeah, they knew he’d fucked up. Times like these would tell whether a man could be trusted to stand by him or turn him on his ear.
His cell phone rang in his pocket. “Rankin, what have you got?”
“Small puncture wound in the side of her neck. If I hadn’t been looking, might have mistaken it for a freckle. Don’t know what kind of poison yet.”
Dan glanced toward the chair in the parlor where Alva had been found. “So what are you thinking? Whoever did it was standing behind her, to the side? It didn’t look like there was any struggle, so it must’ve been quick. Of course, she was nearly a century old. How much of a struggle could she have put up? The guy didn’t even have to be big.”
“Or the woman.”
Dan’s stomach did a slow roll beneath his diaphragm. “Or the woman,” he agreed with massive reluctance. He didn’t like where his mind was going, to the one person who had claimed she’d known Alva Mabry was dead. No way it was Maris. No freaking way. She just…No. The woman had come to the station looking for answers. Was that the action of a guilty person? Shit, sure it was, if they were trying to make themselves look innocent. Damn it, it could be Maris. He swore again, softly this time. Only Rankin heard him.
“You got an idea, Stauffer?”
“I don’t know.”
Rankin breathed heavily into the phone. “I’ve got prints. Figured you’d need ’em.”
“Right. Thanks.”
Dan hung up. So much for days off.
Hours later, everything bagged, tagged, and heading back to the station, Dan locked the door and descended the porch steps, looking back toward the yellow police tape crossed over the door. He considered the purpose behind the crime. Revenge for a fortune that hadn’t turned out quite as predicted? Not funny. The place didn’t appear to have been rummaged through, so if robbery was the motive, the murderer had something particular in mind and knew where to find it. An old woman like this could have had funds stashed around the house. He’d seen it before. And any of the neighbors could have known about the money, or anyone in town, really. Word of mouth, especially among criminals, could spread and grow at even the smallest hint of cash unprotected except by a ninety-three-year-old soothsayer.
He pulled out his phone and called Maris’s number, but received no reply. After four rings, he left a vague message for her on voicemail. She’d have to come in, of course, but he didn’t want to leave anything she would view as accusatory. He merely reminded her she hadn’t called him with the information about where she was staying and left it at that.
And if she didn’t call him back? What then?
He shoved the phone back in his pocket without answering that question. He didn’t want to go there. Not yet. Yes, the crime seemed personal, but if Maris’s story was true, she’d had no contact with her aunt for years. Certainly no one harbored a grudge that long, and what type of offense would burrow in like that from the time of childhood? Well, he could think of several, but he set those aside as well. In addition to canvassing the neighbors for anything they’d seen or suspicious behavior, he’d check out Maris’s story about the estrangement, seek proof of her whereabouts the past couple of days, and clear her from whatever list of suspects was formulated. She hadn’t killed her aunt. No way could she commit a cold-blooded crime like that.
Yet, how well did he know her? Not at all, really. Gut feeling counted for something, but people could put on a convincing show, good enough to mislead. He’d seen it before. Deceptive prevaricators who kept a straight face or broke down in what he could swear were honest-to-God tears and lying all the while.
His stomach twisted anew, to the point of making him want to vomit. He fought the sensation down with a few deep breaths, realizing he hadn’t eaten anything since his impromptu breakfast with Maris.
Am I a fool?
No. Only once, and he’d never let it happen again.
His phone rang. “Maris?”
“I’m sorry, who? Is this Detective Stauffer?”
“Yes. Who’s this?”
“It’s Ed. We met last night—this morning. Dr. Rankin wanted to know if you’re coming by for those prints tonight or if he should just store them until tomorrow.”
“Tomorrow’s good enough. I need something to eat and a good night’s freaking sleep.”
When he hung up, Dan tried Maris again, cutting the call as soon as her voicemail came on. Son of a bitch, she wasn’t making this easy.
Deciding he would give her half a chance to call him back, he went to grab dinner before heading home.
* * * *
Maris ran her fingers over the scarred, wooden table, digging her thumbnail into the letters someone had carved there. A name, she thought, interrupted before completion, possibly by an irate barman. Defacing property in this place, however, didn’t seem to be doing the table any disservice. A point of interest in an otherwise clichéd sort of establishment, somewhere to focus one’s attention, curlicues and smiley faces and half-formed words with their own story, their own mystery. The rest of the bar impressed her as a beige and brown amalgam of aged wood, old nicotine stains from when smoking was still allowed, and the prerequisite, faded posters on the wall advertising various types of beer with the assistance of scantily clad women or dogs. The type of bar where working men came to relax and enjoy masculine company, not a family restaurant. The sign outside had been misleading.
But the little motel next door had matched the description she’d given Dan, and she didn’t want to be caught in a lie.
Funny thing, though, she hadn’t called him as promised with the information and had ignored both of his calls when they came in. A chill had settled into her bones she couldn’t shake, and she didn’t want him to hear it in her voice. Because he would. She knew he would. Around him, the cloak concealing her soul became insubstantial, making her feel naked and vulnerable and very much afraid. Afraid he would hurt her, she supposed. Not physically, but in a way no one had because she’d never allowed it. With him, she would. And that could invoke a perilous chain of events.
“Oh, stop feeling sorry for yourself, you idiot,” she said.
“Pardon me?”
Maris glanced up at the waitress, a woman in her twenties with blond hair pulled up into a ponytail and a sweatshirt stretched across her bosom emblazoned with the words Can’t Touch This. A mixed message, that one.
“I was talking to myself.”
“Are you eating?” the woman asked.
Maris lifted the menu. She hadn’t even looked at it.
“What’s good here?”
“The meatloaf special is tasty. Comes with mashed potatoes. From scratch, not instant. And peas. Sorry, we don’t give a choice of sides with our specials.”
“That’s fine. I’ll take it.”
A handful of men sat on high stools at the bar, trying not to look in her direction. Maris appreciated their efforts. She tried not to look at them in turn. She didn’t want them to know how out of place she felt in an establishment that obviously gave them comfort and possibly a sense of bravado to go with their camaraderie. She went back to deciphering the hieroglyphs on the table.
For the first time in a good many years, loneliness had breached her solitude. True loneliness, not the type one felt when one realized one’s friends could be counted on five digits. A loneliness enhanced by the constant interruption of strangeness in her life, stealing away the time people normally devote
d to friendships. Those relationships had been a changing collage, and only one or two were longstanding and true. Her own fault, she knew, but once upon a time she had blamed her Aunt Alva for exposing her to her supposed gifts and the barrier they made to a normal life.
Yet, Aunt Alva hadn’t given her the family aptitude. Not like a wrapped present. Maris had been born to it and once realized, it couldn’t be forsaken. No matter how hard she tried.
“Mind if I join you?”
Maris closed her eyes. “Are you following me?”
Metal feet scraped across the floor as Dan pulled out the chair next to hers. He flopped onto the seat. “Hardly. I like to come here when I’m looking for, I don’t know…”
“Anonymity?”
He scoffed. “I was going to say good company, but it’s not even that.”
“No pretenses.”
“What?”
Maris moved her head to encompass the entire bar. “No pretenses. You are who you are here.”
“Yeah, I guess that’s it. And the food’s good.” He waved at the waitress, asking her to bring him a glass of water and the meatloaf special.
“Water?” Maris said.
“Something wrong with water?”
“Nope.”
For several seconds, Maris silently toyed with her sweating glass of beer, twirling it back and forth in the ring of condensation on the table. It was more than two-thirds full. She didn’t know why she’d ordered it except that’s what people did in a bar. Although Dan hadn’t. Water. Perhaps he was still dehydrated from his night out. Or he could be normally abstemious. She knew nothing about him,
As she shot a quick glance in his direction, expecting him to be gazing at the television muted across the room, she found him watching her instead.
“I honestly didn’t follow you. I apologize if I’m disturbing your solitude.”
Maris shrugged. “I would have told you not to sit if I had a problem. It’s okay.”