Stirred

by Nancy S Thompson

  “This is ridiculous! You need better control. They never should’ve been allowed to step foot onto this property!”

  Monroe nodded. “I apologize, Mr. Bennett, but they’re gone now. No harm, no foul.”

  My mouth gaped open. “Are you fucking kidding me? Did you hear the filth they were spewing, the accusations?”

  “That’s their right, Mr. Bennett, as well as their job.”

  “You have one, too, Lieutenant, which you’re doing pretty piss-poor at at the moment.”

  Her eyes narrowed, and, with her hands at her hips, she cocked her head to the side. “I think you need to take a deep breath and relax, Mr. Bennett.”

  I snickered at her attitude. Relaxing was the furthest thing from my mind. But there was nothing I could do about it, so I let it go. Still, I was now beginning to think it had been a mistake to come here. I didn’t expect Eden and me to be separated like we were. I had no idea what Reed was telling her or what she was sharing with him. I could only hope and pray she wasn’t disclosing what she’d found at Aurelia Wylde’s place or what I’d told her about the girl in the photo. While I was sure Trinitee was behind everything, and I had what I believed would prove it, I didn’t know how she’d pulled it off, why, or if she’d left anymore surprises that might implicate me and Eden. I needed to confront her myself, before the cops did.

  If only I could find her.

  Almost as if Monroe were reading my mind, she moved in closer and started asking me questions about Trin. Had I heard from her at all since leaving her apartment that night? Did I know where she might’ve gone? What did I think could’ve happened to her?

  I tried to at least appear cooperative and answer her questions, but I was sure, not having any solid answers made me come off as evasive. Not much I could do about that, however, and Monroe’s attitude went from amicable to authoritative to downright accusatory, like she didn’t believe a word I said. Truth was, though I definitely knew more than I was letting on, I didn’t have answers to her questions, which troubled me, as well.

  Lieutenant Monroe stepped toward the edge of the woods, but stopped short, spun around, and faced me. “Would you mind coming with me, Mr. Bennett?” she asked politely, like I had a choice.

  But I knew otherwise and asked, “To see the body? Why? So you can gauge my reaction?”

  She shook her head with a roll of her eyes. “Not a bad idea actually.”

  I lifted my arm toward the lights. “Who’s buried in there? Do you even know?”

  “I’m not at liberty to say at the moment, Mr. Benn—”

  “Then why am I here?” I interrupted. “Why should I go with you?”

  “Well, I was just hoping you could show me where you fell that night you ran through here. You know, so we can get a better idea of where that was in relation to the house.”

  “Yeah, right.”

  She waved me toward the forest. “Come on, let’s give it a try,” she suggested and proceeded without me.

  With a huff, I caught up to her. “It was dark and rainy that night. I don’t see how I can possibly remember,” I said, but she was undeterred and led me deeper into the woods toward the busy, illuminated scene at its core.

  As we marched through the ferns and between the tall pines, I kept looking back over my shoulder to keep a line on Eden’s property to my left. All the while, I knew damn well that whoever had left this latest body knew exactly where I’d collapsed that night, and I couldn’t help but curse Trinitee for ruining any prospect I once had of a decent life.

  Monroe peered over her shoulder at me. “You okay, Mr. Bennett. You look a little…pale.”

  I trudged along for another twenty yards or so before reaching for her shoulder. “Wait. Please.”

  She stopped and turned to face me. “Do you recognize this spot? Are we close?”

  I glanced around and shrugged. “I don’t know. Doesn’t really matter anyway.”

  Her brow rose high. “Why’s that, Mr. Bennett?”

  I hitched my hands on my hips and looked down at the forest floor with its thick bed of pine needles and decomposing leaves. “Well, um…I might…know something…”

  I was clearly reluctant to share any information and hated that I felt forced into disclosing any of what Eden had found, but I needed the cops to change their focus from me and Eden to Trinitee. I figured I could tell them just enough to lead them in the right direction, then let them figure out how it was all connected. But before I could share what I knew, a voice from the scene up ahead called out to Lieutenant Monroe.

  She raised a finger at me. “Hold that thought and follow me, please.”

  We walked the last thirty yards or so to the sealed-off crime scene, where Monroe lifted the yellow police tape and, with a hand above my elbow, escorted me closer to the shallow, canopy-covered pit the forensic team was gathered around. She stopped ten feet away and held me in place.

  “Stay here while I go see what they want.”

  I nodded without a word and diverted my attention to the grave once Monroe walked away. While I waited, I took the time to decide exactly what and how I would tell Monroe what I knew about Trinitee Marsh, but it was hard to wrap my head around how she’d used and manipulated me over the last few years. It didn’t help that I was distracted by Monroe and the forensic investigator, who was pointing out several things inside the open cavity.

  Curiosity made me disobey Monroe’s order to stay put, and I took a single step closer and craned my neck to peer into the grave. But I couldn’t see what they were looking at, so, glancing around, I took another tentative step, then another, until I could see a pair of partially charred shoes. Not just shoes, but boots, combat-style, and though they were heavy, they were too small to be a man’s. I inched forward another foot and studied those boots. A desperate, hollow feeling carved a space in my gut, for hanging from the shoelace was a soot-covered, silver charm, and I feared, if I looked closer, I’d see the tiny scales-of-justice.

  A dark foreboding welled up from my chest, its ghastly tentacles slinking deeper into my stomach. It pushed me yet another step closer, until I could see more of the body within. It laid on a blue plastic tarp that had been pulled back, exposing the victim, which wasn’t fully burned as I first imagined when Eden had read that Google alert. The fingers, especially the tips, and the entire face were grotesquely disfigured, not burned with fire, but rather melted, like from acid or some other corrosive material.

  There had been an attempt to burn what remained, but the effort had been cursory, and more than half the body remained mostly intact. I noticed all these details in the instant it took to scan the remains, and in the next, what I saw broke my heart.

  Though the face was destroyed, long hair remained along the back of the body’s head. Long, dark hair…with a single purple streak on one side. On one of the fingers laid a ring. And though the metal was fused to the flesh and bone beneath it, and the stone was dimmed with filth, it still shone a dark ruby-red.

  There was no doubt in my mind. I’d finally found her.

  Trinitee Marsh was dead.

  “Oh, God, no!” I mourned as blood rushed from my head to my stomach. Instantly dizzy, I fell to my knees and puked.

  “Hey, you’re contaminating the scene!” one of the cops yelled.

  Lieutenant Monroe chuckled. “Aw, leave him alone, Conley. The poor kid just saw a ghost.”

  Oh my God, Trinitee! It can’t be. She can’t be dead. How could she be dead?

  Murdered. Burned.

  I puked again, while the nearby cops heckled and laughed. I didn’t care. What did it matter? Trin was dead. All the anger and resentment I’d been harboring over the last week vanished, and grief swept in in its place.

  Cold. Hard. Jagged.

  Relentless.

  But that was nothing compared to the wave of guilt that enveloped me. I didn’t understand how she could be gone, how she was a victim. I thought this was her game, her revenge. But I must’ve been wrong. So very w
rong. And I’d abandoned her over it. Forsaken her. How could I have done that? How could I have let it all get so far away from me, so far out of control? She’d probably still be alive if I’d just hashed things out with her, confronted her about using me in one of her games. But I just walked away.

  I let out a sob as another spasm curled my gut, but there was nothing left inside me. I felt empty, weak, like I could seep into the earth and disappear.

  “You all done, sport?” Monroe asked, her muddy boots slipping underneath my nose.

  I took a deep breath, let it out slow, then glanced one more time at Trin’s body in the grave before finally sitting back on my heels and looking up. I locked eyes with the lieutenant standing above me. Hands on her hips, chin out, and her head turned slightly to the side, she watched me carefully, gauging my reaction, just as I’d predicted.

  I couldn’t tell what she was thinking, but I prayed she was good at her job, at reading people. If she was, she knew damn well how stunned I’d been to see that body. If she’d been observing me the whole time, she would’ve noticed my slow transformation from dark curiosity—which must’ve proved interesting if she thought I was the one responsible—to shock at either seeing the condition of the victim or recognizing who I thought it was.

  Either way, if she put it all together like a good cop should, then she knew I had nothing to do with this. But I wasn’t convinced of Monroe’s capabilities, and, knowing she’d done this to me on purpose, I didn’t trust her motives either.

  “You’re making a habit of this, Mr. Bennett,” she said, then glanced left and waved at a young, uniformed cop on guard near the perimeter. “Henderson, please escort Mr. Bennett here back to the Ross house. Tell Reed I was right; see if he wants the kid returned to the precinct.”

  I wiped the back of my hand across my mouth as I watched the uniform stride over.

  “Let’s go,” he ordered and helped pull me to my feet.

  But I shirked free and spat, “Don’t fucking touch me. I’m not under arrest.”

  “Watch that one, Hen,” Monroe said. “He’s only a few months shy from passing the bar. A real constitutional law specialist, that kid.”

  “Enough to know when a cop is skating the thin line of entrapment, Lieutenant,” I spat.

  With a snicker, Monroe turned around and got back to business with the forensic team. The uniform held his arm out, directing me back the way I’d just come.

  As I made my way through the woods, I tried in vain to sort through it all, every last startling revelation, to put it all together so it made some sort of sense. My guilt and grief made that difficult though. It was just too much to comprehend. I thought I’d had it all figured out, at least that Trin was the mastermind, but God, she was a victim now, too. Poor Trin, what she must’ve gone through, how she must’ve suffered.

  “Stop. Think,” I muttered under my breath.

  I scrubbed a hand down my face, determined to hold it together, to clear my head so I could try to fit all the pieces into something that made sense. At this point, I couldn’t imagine who was even left, who had any stakes in this—except for me and Eden. On the surface, we both made perfect suspects and had everything to gain from Declan and Aurelia’s deaths, but unless Eden actually was duplicitous in Ivy’s abandonment and knew about Trin’s real identity, her affair with Declan—and I didn’t think she did—then Eden had no reason to take Trinitee out. I didn’t think Eden even knew about Trin, except for what little I’d told her.

  That left only me. And while any sane person knew whether he’d committed murder or not, with the unexplained blackouts and my own experience with Hayley’s mental illness, I knew it was entirely possible that I could be responsible and simply not remember. If that were the case, then my obsession with Eden was the switch that’d set me off.

  So how could I ever trust myself again? More importantly, how could Eden?

  Christ, this was driving me crazy. I shook my head to clear it, tried to take a virtual step back, to look at this from a distance, to see only what Reed could see, and wade through the most likely scenarios. Perhaps he believed Eden had set me up to do her dirty work. Or maybe he thought she and I had conspired together. Or, in his mind, it could be as simple as a lover’s jealous rage. God knows, I’d given him that much.

  If that were true, and Reed and Monroe had credible suspicions about me, as Monroe had indicated, then Reed was probably filling Eden in right now, polluting her mind and corrupting what little trust she might still have. Nevertheless, suspicions aside, love and lust went a long way at driving people’s actions. No matter my own doubts about Eden, I wasn’t about to turn on her. Then again, the police could throw their considerable weight around, and, even if I were reluctant, if my life and freedom were on the line, I could be forced to testify against her, and she against me.

  We might be each other’s best ally, but the cops could easily turn us into adversaries. And separating us, as the cops had just done, told me they were on the cusp of doing just that. Then we’d have no recourse to testifying except to refuse and take the fifth, which would only make us both appear guilty and put us at risk from whatever threats the cops might use against us. We’d be backed into a corner, with very little choice.

  Unless…

  What if…?

  With a small measure of hope buoying against the grief of Trin’s death weighing me down, I pulled out my phone and found the photo of me and Eden I took at Snoqualmie Falls. Just staring at us together reinforced my feelings for Eden, as well as my trust. I had to hope she felt the same. Believing so, I knew I was doing the right thing and couldn’t wait to discuss it with Eden.

  Disregarding Monroe’s order, Officer Henderson escorted me as far as the driveway, then joined the handful of cops still loitering around. I strode up to Eden’s front door and knocked, expecting Reed to answer, but was pleasantly surprised when Eden appeared behind the glass. She opened the door with a relieved smile, but before I could share in her respite, I had to make sure we were alone. I pushed inside, then closed and locked the door.

  “Where’s Reed?” I asked as I dashed first into the kitchen, then peered down the halls. “Is he still here?”

  Eden shook her head. “No, he left a couple minutes ago.” She followed me as I poked around, looking for anyone who might overhear. “Where’ve you been, Sean? I was worried.”

  I finally faced her, trying my best to reassure her. “I was with Lieutenant Monroe, and let me tell you, she’s a little creepy.”

  Eden chuckled, and even though her smile was wan and reluctant, at that moment, it was the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen. I couldn’t help but take her face between my hands and kiss her. I only meant for it to be momentary, to reassure us both that everything would be okay. But the feel of her lips, the taste of her sweet breath, the soft lushness of her tongue as it swept against mine, it all reminded me how fragile life was, and how long it had been since I’d last enjoyed her company, since I’d cradled her in my arms and plunged into the velvety depth of her body. Sorrow and desperation mingled with the promise of hope, and I just couldn’t hold back any longer.

  I laced one hand into her hair as the other slid down her body, pushing the curve of her hip into mine and pressing my entire length along hers. I felt her arousal in her rapid breathing and eager response, the way she pulled me in, the fever in her kiss. It had been so long. I had little control over my body, and it hardened with the memory of Eden beneath me. But just as quickly as our kiss grew heated, it cooled when Eden began to pull away and push at my shoulders.

  “Wait…Sean, please,” she mumbled against my hungry lips.

  But, with the black and white of my emotions warring against each other, I couldn’t seem to stop. I urged her backwards until she was up against the wall, and, for a moment, she gave in again. But only for a moment.

  “Sean, please…stop. Stop!” she insisted and pushed hard against me.

  With a despondent groan, I released her mouth a
nd relaxed my grip on her body. I inhaled a bolstering breath and allowed a few inches of space between us, though I rested my forehead against hers while I regained my composure.

  “I’m sorry,” I said. “It’s been so long, I almost forgot how good you feel.”

  She smiled and patted me on the shoulder. “I know what you mean, but…we really need to talk.”

  I released a long, deep breath and pushed away from the wall and Eden. From there, I turned and walked away a few steps, my eyes on my own fingers as they fumbled around each other.

  “He got to you, didn’t he?” I asked with a single shake of my head. “Reed. He turned you against me.”

  Eden moved closer. “No, not at all. It’s just—”

  “You don’t trust me. I can feel it.”

  “No, Sean…it’s just…I have some questions, is all.”

  “Okay. Go ahead and ask,” I said as I dropped down into one of Eden’s sleek chairs.

  Eden took a seat close to me at the end of the sofa. Her face was pinched, her brow tense, and she kept chewing on her bottom lip.

  “Spit it out, Eden.”

  “Well, remember when we met at the bookstore and you told me your name was Daniel?”

  I leaned forward with my elbows on my knees. “I apologized for that.”

  “Yes, I know, but…later, when you came to pick Robbie up at school and I found out your real name, I accused you of stalking me, and you assured me you weren’t, that it was just dumb luck. Serendipitous, you said. Fate throwing us together. You swore it was happenstance and accused me of being so jaded by Declan that I couldn’t remember what true passion and desire felt like. You said it was our destiny to be together.”