Gulf Lynx

by Fiona Quinn

  I looked Avril in the eye. “Stay in my body with its pain and learn some more lessons.”

  Avril tipped her head to the side. “How much of your time are these thoughts predominant? Thinking about what happens to a soul after it has left the body. Would you say it’s the topic that bubbled up for our session today as one end of the spectrum?” She set her hand out to her left. “Or are they pervasive thoughts on the other end of the spectrum?” She set her other hand out to the right.

  “I’d say over the last week, thoughts about Angel in Hell have sucked up most of my free brain space.”

  “Is there a specific reason?” Avril posted her elbows on her pad. She brought her pen to her mouth, held in her fingers like she was chewing on a corn cob. This was the position she took when I started off a topic and she’d just hunker in and listen.

  “Do you believe in Heaven and Hell?” I asked. Shifting around on her leather sofa.

  “What I believe has no consequence in this conversation. While you were dating, and after he left for the Middle East, did you and Angel talk about his beliefs of the afterlife? What did Angel think would happen to him when he died?”

  “He thought he was going to Hell. Catholic Hell in the bowels of the Earth to burn. He thought it was a possibility, anyway. He believed in the Ten Commandments, and ‘Thou shalt not kill.’ He killed a lot as an Army Ranger. He would confess his sins and receive absolution from the priest, knowing that he’d be called to kill again. Every time he killed, he apologized to God. I’m not Catholic. These aren’t my beliefs.”

  “How do your beliefs square up with Angel’s job that entails killing others?”

  “I think about it like the Native American hunters who thank the deer for giving up its life to provide food and sustenance for the tribe. Something like that. It doesn’t work out seamlessly. But in my mind, the terrorist had to die so that non-violent people can live. I believe there was some kind of spiritual contract that Angel decided on before he was born. He was assigned to kill those that were meant to be killed. Angel was the weapon and hand of God. It was that person’s time and place…” I paused for a long moment, wishing I had a cup of tea to wrap my hands around and feel the radiant warmth, to breathe in the spices, to give myself a moment to sip and not talk. “A belief system is hard to put into words. Those thoughts are formed in a different part of my brain.”

  “I’m following. You’re doing just fine. But it seems your belief system and your experiences aren’t lining up in a linear way like you want them to.”

  “People have tried very hard to kill me. I’m not completely comfortable thinking about who has the right and duty to kill. I really don’t know.” I turned to the plant like it was another person in the room and reiterated. “I really don’t know.”

  “Did Angel believe that? That he was the instrument of God, doing what he was destined to do, but that it put his soul at risk of going to Hell?”

  “He believed killing would send his soul to Hell, unless he asked forgiveness and was given absolution from a priest.”

  “And you think that on the day Angel was killed that he had also killed someone?”

  “Yes.”

  “And he had not yet been absolved of his sins.”

  “Right. His team was on the road headed back to their post after a successful mission, that’s what I was told.”

  “Following your thought continuum, if Angel died thinking he was going to Hell, then he would go to Hell while his soul acclimated to leaving his body and his terrestrial life behind.”

  “Yes.”

  “You believe that Angel went to Hell.”

  “Yes.” I kneaded my hands together. “I think that’s what’s happened. And now, I think he wants me to save his soul. And I have no idea how to do that.”

  Chapter Six

  I was slowing for the red light when my phone rang. I thumbed the button on my steering wheel to answer.

  “Lexi! Good.” It was Miriam. “I’m so glad to reach you. You’ve been on my mind all week. How are you?”

  If I was on her mind all week, then she already knew. “I don’t feel like going through pleasantries. Is it okay with you if I tell you the truth and tell you I’m struggling?”

  “It feels like you’re having a rough time. You’re driving your car. Can you pull over for a moment to be safe, so we can talk?”

  “There’s a strip mall up ahead, two seconds.”

  Silence fell.

  I knew that Miriam would be using the time to search the ether for information. She did that for a living. Miriam was an Extrasensory Criminal Investigator, working cold cases by clairvoyantly reading events that had happened. When she held something in her hand that was there at the time of an event—touching the walls of a room, fingering a piece of cloth, even a shard of bone—she’d read the vibrations. Almost anything attached to the crime could become a vehicle by which she could gather information that might drive the investigation forward.

  Miriam was less successful reading the present in terms of specificity. She couldn’t, for example, read my mind and know about the Kaylie Street case, or that Angel was haunting my every thought.

  She could get a good enough impression that she’d guess.

  I pulled into an empty space and shifted into park. “Okay.”

  “I don’t like how you feel to me right now.”

  “You caught me on my way out of my shrink’s office.”

  “Avril was pulling out uncomfortable threads?” she asked. I could imagine Miriam, pushing her long curly blonde hair back over her shoulder as she tucked her chin and closed her eyes to focus on this conversation.

  “We were talking about Angel’s death.”

  “Ah, that would explain why his energy is swirling around you so forcefully.”

  “She thinks I’m having trouble because the anniversary of his death is coming up.”

  There was a long pause. “Do you agree?”

  I powered my chair back, so I wasn’t staring into the sun’s glare. “It explains things as much as anything else.”

  “Funny how things work out. I was actually calling about Angel. Well, about Abuela Rosa.”

  “Oh?”

  “I have a contract on a cold case. I was scheduled to go down to Puerto Rico, but the week before I was to head out, Hurricane Maria struck. They’re just now getting back to me about that case.”

  “They had other priorities.”

  “Just terrible, the devastation. The lives lost. I’m heading down tomorrow night and was wondering if you wanted to come with me? I bet Abuela Rosa would be thrilled to see you. And the anniversary of Angel’s death is probably hitting her as hard as you, just differently.”

  I wondered if there were a bone fragment from the Kaylie Street case that I could hand off to Miriam, and she could see if there were pictures that she could bring up from that day. Some piece of the puzzle as to what happened that Kaylie’s remains weren’t found. Of course, even if Prescott had a stray piece of evidence sitting in a locker somewhere, that wasn’t a for-sure thing. Pulling up psychic impressions, after all, wasn’t like pulling up a computer program or turning on a TV channel.

  Big energy, life-or-death energy was clingy; it left a stronger vibration. That was important, or Miriam would be weeding through every bump and bruise that a bone experienced.

  Miriam might pick up on the woman choosing her peach-colored skirt that day, see her clearly examining her image in the mirror and that was it. No clue as to what happened next.

  It was a tricky thing. And Miriam did a great job of not speculating. She said what she got in the way of information and didn’t try to fill in the holes or even to narrate the information. Miriam’s interpretation might convolute the data and take the investigator farther afield. It was hard not to try to form a picture, a sensation, or add words into a story. I knew that personally. I had trained to be Miriam’s protégée.

  After years of training, we had learned that while Miriam had
dexterity with the past, I was much more able in the moment. If the person had the shimmer that told me they were in a life-or-death situation, then with a picture, BOOM, I was there, seeing what they were seeing, hearing what they were hearing.

  This ability would be a marvelous tool for missing persons, in theory. In reality, not so much. In order for me to access information in the ether, I had to become so energetically entangled with the victim that I felt what they did.

  “Lexi? Did you hear me?”

  “Oh, uhm, sorry. My mind wandered.”

  “I was asking if you can come down to Puerto Rico with me. I leave tomorrow night.”

  “I so want to!” I scratched my fingers into my hair, shifting the strands from where they tickled my face. “This morning, I was handed a case. I’m kind of it when it comes to the team. Me and an FBI agent are working a very cold case where the woman involved might have turned up in a surveillance photograph, alive and in danger. If it’s her, her days could literally be numbered. I’m on my way to check on a piece of evidence, and then I’ll have a better idea if I need to stick close to home. You already called Abuela Rosa?”

  “She knows I’m coming. She hinted that she’d really like you to come to. She said she had something she wanted to do but needed you there. Her energy says she’s in bad shape. I’m pretty concerned.”

  “If I can’t come with you tomorrow night, I’ll go as soon as I’m freed up. Can you text me your flight and hotel information?”

  “Yes, I’ll do that now. We’ll trust the universe to put us where we need to be, when we need to be there.”

  “Amen to that. I’ll call you tonight and let you know. Thank you!”

  As soon as I pressed the end button on my steering wheel, a knowing swirled my vision. Knowings come over the emergency channel on my psychic communications system. I wondered if talking to Miriam or talking about Abuela Rosa had floated this to the top of my consciousness.

  This one sang, “As I was going to St. Ives, I met a man with seven wives.”

  Panting, I pressed the phone button. “Hello?”

  It was Zoe. “Letting you know I’m back in my lab.”

  “I’m about twenty minutes out, depending on traffic.”

  “It’s cool. See you soon.” She hung up.

  “As I was going to St. Ives,” cycled through my brain again. Bigger this time. Bright red oscillating letters. I had no idea why most of the messages came to me from children’s rhymes and sometimes children’s stories. The only thing I could figure was my subconscious was harkening back to the time before too many facts got in the way of my connection to my higher self. The time when I had the clearest communication with the divine. Or what Miriam called my “pre-schmutz-age.”

  It was a theory.

  There were lots of theories when it came to what was ultimately unknowable.

  Maybe this warning had bubbled up from my discussion with Avril, and it had to do with Angel.

  The thing about knowings was it wasn’t until after the fact when I could see what clear messages I was receiving. Once I had heard the warning, “Jack be nimble, Jack be quick, Jack jump.” I texted it to Jack when he was standing on the roof of a three-story building. I had no interpretation, I just sent the warning to Jack because of the name similarity. Jack read it and jumped off the roof of the building onto a car below. That jump had cost him leg surgery but saved his life. The building exploded as he leaped. Something in Jack’s own psyche must have interpreted the message and made his body act. He said he pulled it up and next thing he knew, he was flying through the air.

  It didn’t usually work that way.

  Usually, my psychic warning system was encrypted and needed to be deciphered.

  St. Ives.

  St. Ives, that was in England wasn’t it? I met a man with seven wives…

  This didn’t have to be about me.

  Sometimes I got information for the men on my team—like I did for Jack—and it helped to keep them safe.

  Strike Force was headed overseas. But Poland, not England.

  I shifted around in my driver’s seat uncomfortably. Getting information without context revved my limbic system but left me flailing for answers.

  Knowings should never be ignored.

  They saved lives.

  And more often than not, my own.

  Chapter Seven

  Zoe was heading down to meet me at the security desk at Montrim where her lab was housed. Her contract was with DARPA, Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency.

  Montrim was contracted by the Defense Intelligence Agency to send out medical teams in the Middle East to do health checks on the population, providing immunizations and basic care as a cover, surreptitiously collecting biomarkers for Zoe’s BIOMIST data base that the DIA shared with the CIA to keep tabs on terrorist networks by tracking family ties.

  Zoe had never envisioned or intended for her work in identifying blood biomarkers to be used this way. Originally, she was working to develop a presumptive field test so that innocent people were less likely to be arrested. Here, I meant for it to work the same way. If Zoe’s system got a hit, then I would know that Kaylie had survived Nigeria. But if Zoe’s system didn’t find a match, it wouldn’t lead to any conclusions.

  It wouldn’t mean that Kaylie was dead. It simply meant she wasn’t in the system.

  If this came up a null set, I’d be right back to where I’d started this morning. Which was nowhere.

  If the CIA, the FBI, the NSA, the DIA—no one had heard of this American scientist, it seemed improbable that she survived. But never say never, right? I mean, I’d come through some events where I was surprised to wake up to a new day.

  My last chance where I might be able to be pull a rabbit from my magic hat was to head over to Sophia Abadi’s house after I was done checking the blood sample and see if Sophia had some contact in her Syrian underground network who might have heard a rumor at some point.

  Honestly, this was worse than the proverbial needle in a haystack. It was a needle in the haystack if that haystack was being blown about by the winds of war.

  Zoe walked out of the elevator. Her long black hair was in a bun at the nape of her neck. It looked like she was using it as a pin cushion with the three pencils sticking out of it. She had on yoga leggings and track shoes under her white lab coat and she finished off the look with her oversized geek-girl glasses.

  The security guard looked over, then gave me a nod. I headed Zoe’s way.

  “Hey there.”

  She smiled in reply then pushed the button to take us back up to her lab.

  Up we went without a word. Zoe wasn’t big into words. And I didn’t mind the silence between us. It felt comfortable.

  As the doors opened, I glanced at my watch. “What are you up to this evening, do you want to grab some dinner when you get off?”

  She swiped her badge across the sensor, then pushed the door wide. This was why I couldn’t just go up to Zoe’s lab by myself. She worked under all the bells and whistles, locks and alarms that were associated with having a designation of Sensitive Compartmented Information, one of the highest security clearances in the US government.

  “I would, but I can’t. Gage and I have an appointment with the wedding planner this afternoon.” She stopped by her door and pressed her palm onto the plate, waiting for a beep. “For me, a trip to the judge would be fine. But my parents want the big wedding with the swords and the pageantry. I’m not going to plan it,” she said, pushing the door open after the signal buzz. “But I’ll show up, wear the dress, and cut the cake to make them happy.”

  “It’s a long distance to plan a wedding from Hawaii.”

  “Mom flew into town for the week.”

  I sat on the stool that she indicated with a flick of her finger. And opened my bag to get the blood sample that Leanne coerced out of Melody Foley this morning.

  “Gage told me you and Striker are getting married in June. If you need any of the names of the p
eople Mom hires,” Zoe said, “let me know.”

  Why did that wash of dread just douse me?

  “Are you and Striker going to have a big wedding?” she asked.

  I pulled out the biohazard box. “We haven’t gotten past the June date. I have family as far away as India that I need to fly in, and I wanted them to get it on their calendars. But I’m with you, simple is happy. My first marriage, it was just me and Angel in front of a judge. That did make me a little sad. I wished at the very least that his great aunt, my Abuela Rosa could be there. Some friends would have been nice. It just didn’t work out that way. The support of loved ones is important.”

  “If I asked you to be a bridesmaid, would that be something comfortable for you? Uncomfortable?”

  “I…”

  “I didn’t do that well. Let me try again.” She looked up from the blood sample and smiled. “Gage and I are planning our wedding party. I’d like you to be one of my bridesmaids. But I know I’d cringe if someone were to ask me. I don’t want you to feel obliged. But if you didn’t mind, I’d like you to be an attendant. Gage is getting his best friend Holden to be his best man, then he’s inviting the Panther Force to stand with him. On my side I have three close friends from childhood. Then I thought—you, Sophia, Arya, and Meg. The bride’s party will wear white dresses and leis.” She walked over to a side counter next to a small machine, pulled on a pair of Nitrile gloves, and picked up a bottle of test strips.

  “I’d be honored to stand with you. Just tell me when and where to show up.”

  Zoe smiled.

  “Seven. That’s a big wedding party. I’m surprised you agreed to that,” I said.

  “I agreed to taste the cake, try on the dress, and show up at the event. I’m not obligated to do any other planning, or pre-parties. And Gage said he’d make sure that our honeymoon will be someplace where there are no other people and a good dose of introversion to balance things out.”

  Her gaze moved to the box in my lap. “I thought you wanted to meet here because you needed access to BIOMIST.” Zoe stretched out her hand, accepted the red biohazard box, and popped the lid. She looked down at the vial