Dying to Know

by TJ O'Connor

  “I understand.” Angel stood up. “Does anyone else know about this—the bracelet, I mean?”

  “Just Iggi.”

  Angel gently squeezed her arm, making her point crystal clear. “You cannot tell anyone about this. No one. It could be dangerous.”

  “Yeah, okay.” Sarah lowered her head, rubbed her empty wrist, and began to cry again. “Poor Ray. Why did this happen? Just ’cause some old bones got in the way of that highway? ’Cause of some road?”

  We both knew the answer to that question, but Angel answered her. “I don’t think so, Sarah. I don’t think it has anything to do with the highway.”

  fifty-four

  As soon as Sarah Salazar left, Angel called Bear. I tried to get her to put the phone on speaker but she waited until after she told him about Sarah, and Bear’s mumbled update about my case.

  “Nothing new,” she said to me, covering the phone. Then she clicked on the speaker. “Bear, I think I saw this bracelet in one of the sketches from Liam McCorkle’s safe.”

  “Are you sure? I mean, just from a sketch?”

  “Trust me. Can you get Jack to email copies of them?”

  “Yeah, I’m supposed to call him anyway. What are you thinking?’

  “If this bracelet is in those sketches, then someone was looking for it. Maybe that’s McCorkle’s secret project. Maybe that’s why Salazar died—because he found it.”

  I said to her, “Angel, the word is ‘murdered’ not ‘died.’ There’s an important difference.”

  “Angela,” Bear’s voice seemed strained, almost irritated. “The captain is pretty pissed at me. You better be right about this.”

  Angel took the phone off speaker. “What’s wrong with you? No, what? I do understand. Do you? Just hurry.”

  Bear grumbled for a long while and I couldn’t make it out. She hung up.

  I asked, “What’s he got, Angel?”

  “Nothing, really. Captain Sutter thinks the sheriff is bringing in the BCI, too. We’re running out of time.”

  “Some of us already have.”

  She looked toward me—truth be told she was looking at the couch where she heard me speaking from—and her face was ashen. “I know that, Tuck. Don’t you think I know? What do you want me to do? I’m trying to help you—to help Bear, too. It’s hard, though. It’s very hard on me. You just don’t understand.”

  “Then explain it to me.”

  She stood up. “I can’t. You just wouldn’t understand. And it might make things worse.”

  Worse? Worse than being dead?

  For the next hour, Angel and I stayed silent. I laid on her couch, trying to figure her out. When I had first reappeared to her, she seemed ecstatic—confused but happy. She called for me to save her that night in the rain, and later, she cried when she realized I was back. Lately, however, she seemed at odds with that; frustrated and distant.

  Was it stress? Or was it something else?

  My headache took flight with the famous “you’ve got mail” ding on Angel’s computer. It was from Bear. She clicked on his email attachment and sent the entire file to the printer. It took several minutes—five after Angel put paper in the printer. Finally, the thirty or more sketches began spitting out. Angel sorted through them. Her face brightened.

  “It’s here, Tuck. I knew I’d seen this.”

  It was there—a hand-drawn sketch of a bracelet with musical notes and two G-clefts around the band. The G-clefts were set with gemstones in their center and several more around the band. Even in this stark, black and white artist’s sketch, it was beautiful and distinctive. At the bottom of the sketch were hand-printed notes explaining the position of the rubies and emeralds. There was another handwritten notation, too—“Paul Livingston—May 1966.”

  Angel asked, “Paul Livingston? Could he own the bracelet?’

  “Hell no.” The name, and the man, were very familiar to me. “Paul Livingston is retired—the hard way. He used to be a jeweler in Old Town.”

  “The hard way?”

  I laughed—which was rude under the circumstances. “Yeah, when Bear and I were rookies, we put him away for fifteen years. Livingston Senior was more than just a good jeweler; he was a great fence. He handled stuff all the way from Washington to Philadelphia. Who would ever suspect a small town goldsmith would be moving hot goods—other than Bear and me that is. He died a couple years ago.”

  “We’re at a dead end.” Angel dropped the sketch atop the bracelet on her desk. “Again.”

  “No, not yet. Livingston Senior died in prison—Paul Junior runs the family business. He has a shop down in Strasburg.”

  “And what if Livingston doesn’t know anything? What then?”

  I thought about that. “If these sketches are the path to our killer, you can bet Livingston knows the way, too.”

  fifty-five

  “All right, I’ll go see Paul Livingston for you.” Angel’s voice was flat and without emotion. “But that’s that. Anything I get, I give to Bear.”

  She sat on the couch sipping a glass of wine and I was in the chair adjacent to her. She couldn’t see me of course, but she knew where I was by my voice. I knew, by her voice, that she was growing disenchanted with being my deputy.

  “Okay, Angel, okay. I really don’t understand.”

  She took a long pull on her wine. “Why can’t you let this go? Let Bear handle it—just leave it alone, please. Why can’t you be content the way things are?”

  The way things are? “Because, Professor, I’m dead. I don’t particularly like the way things are.”

  She jumped to her feet and headed for the living room door. “Neither do I. But finding your killer isn’t going to change anything. Anything for you, that is.” And she was gone out of the room.

  A moment later, I heard her on her cell phone in the kitchen. She was talking with Ernie and venting about everything she’d learned from Sarah. She even invited him along to Paul Livingston’s the next morning. Just what I needed.

  Ernie might be her boss and longtime family friend, but sometimes he was just a plain pain in the ass. His commiserating about her chasing my killer wasn’t going to help my cause. I needed Angel to do my bidding and help find whoever was responsible for all the pandemonium. Good old Ernie was going to pour cold water on any spark I had lighted in her.

  That wouldn’t do.

  Listening to Angel debating with Ernie, I began feeling jittery, as if the house was sitting over the San Andreas Fault and it was becoming unhappy. The room shifted from side to side and Hercule faded from my sight. That strange, tingling invaded me as it always did when it sent me elsewhere.

  And it did again.

  _____

  When the electricity subsided, I was standing in the familiar haze of nowhere. Through the emptiness, Doc Gilley seized my arm and shook me. He looked perturbed. There was intensity in him—his face agitated and his eyes grave.

  What did I do now?

  “Hey, Doc, where you been? Boy do I have questions …”

  “There’s no time.” Doc kept looking over his shoulder as if he was expecting someone to appear. “Get back to the hospital—now.”

  “What’s wrong?”

  “Oliver, focus.” He pointed off into the haze. “I can’t do this for you. I’m not connected to them—just you. I can’t intervene.”

  “Doc, you’re freaking me out. What is it?”

  He pointed into the haze again, but now it was starting to take form. “Don’t you feel it? Don’t you feel the danger? Focus, Oliver.”

  Just once, I wish he’d call me Tuck. “Come on, Doc. I want to ask you about …”

  The lights flashed on and the haze evaporated. The beeps and hums of electronic monitors and André’s respirator startled me. I was standing in the ICU hall, outside André’s observation window into his room.
The inside curtain was drawn and only a shadow shown through. There was no one nearby except a duty nurse at the far end of the hall, and she was busy banging away on a computer behind a chest-high counter.

  Something was wrong.

  There was no cop outside André’s room. Even the chair was gone. Inside the room, a shadow began moving and I felt a pang of danger. Oh, shit.

  In a blink, I was standing beside André’s bed. He was still unconscious and unable to summon help—he didn’t even know he needed it. Across from me was the one man every cop in the county was looking for—Lucca Voccelli—Lucca Tuscani. He was fiddling with the medical control panels surrounding André. He read the switches while his fingers flipped from one to the other—

  he was trying to find the fastest way to finish André Cartier.

  “You bastard.” He didn’t hear me. “Stop.”

  Tuscani’s efforts sent out a warning beep and realizing his error, he grabbed the cords and began ripping them from the wall sockets, flipping buttons to silence their alarms. After the third plug, the monitors went dark and I knew we were minutes from André’s last breath.

  “You son-of-a-bitch.” I tried everything—shouts, the ghost-mind meld, and I even returned to the hallway to seek help. The nurse at her station was oblivious to me. There was a doctor with her now, but neither saw nor heard me, and they were too far down the hall to see the danger in André’s room. No one knew. No one knew he was being murdered.

  Tuscani leaned over André’s motionless body to check his breathing. André grimaced and I knew he was fighting back. Something was awakening in him and his body was trying to defend itself. His eyes fluttered but didn’t open. His muscles twitched, but no arm rose to defend himself.

  “Leave him alone, you bastard.”

  I tried grabbing the power cords for some juice and energy—they were unplugged and no power brought me to the rescue.

  Panic surged.

  Tuscani snatched a pillow from behind André’s head and covered his face. He leaned his weight forward and began to kill right

  in front of me.

  No.

  Flailing everywhere, I found the nurse call buzzer and grabbed hold of it. Desperately, I tried to suck in the power—command enough strength to stop Tuscani before André succumbed. The buzzer above the door flashed and I held on, draining all I could from the mere trickle of electricity flowing through it.

  I felt it.

  An almost unnoticeable tingle of strength spread from my fingertips and moved upward. It wasn’t much, but it was building, ebbing up my arm and deeper into me. André coughed and tensed beneath the pillow stealing his life. I couldn’t wait any longer and lurched forward, grabbing Tuscani’s hands. I squeezed them hard and funneled the power in me into him. Rage clamped my fingertips deep into his flesh and I twisted hard and violent.

  It worked.

  His eyes bulged and he jumped back from the bed in panic—the pillow fell to the floor. He went pale and he looked right at me. His mouth opened for a scream, but no sound erupted.

  The bastard saw me.

  “Boo.” I lunged at him.

  “What in the hell?” He tripped backwards, collided with the medical cart, and stumbled again. “Get away from me. It’s you. Damn, it’s you again.”

  It was nice to be remembered.

  Weakness ebbed in and that damning lethargy started to ooze into me. The power that had just saved André was waning and bleeding me out. In a second, he would be alone and vulnerable.

  No. I had to fight. I had to keep André safe … alive. I had to. I focused all I had left on Lucca Tuscani as he stood frozen facing me. I had to fight him.

  No, it would be okay.

  The door burst open and Mike Spence charged in. He lunged forward and grabbed Tuscani’s arms. He spun him around and away from André’s bed. Spence yanked Tuscani forward, drove a knee into his abdomen, and landed a crushing left into his face. Another knee. Another left.

  Tuscani belched air and staggered, trying to free himself. Spence slammed him face-first into the observation windows. The curtain fell away as Spence hammered several more blows into his kidneys.

  Tuscani whirled, twisted free, and landed a powerful punch into Spence’s face. He followed with a groin kick and a two-fisted hammer drive into the side of his head. Spence faltered and fell back down to one knee, fighting for breath—pain exploding on his face.

  Tuscani pounced.

  I tried to intervene but my energy was spent. There was nothing left. Surprisingly, I didn’t disappear from the room as I had before whenever my energy was drained too thin. Yet, all I could do was watch as Tuscani pummeled Spence with punch after punch—kick after kick. I was helpless.

  We were in trouble. Spence was down, and once out, André was next. Spence tried to rise and draw his handgun but Tuscani anticipated him. He lunged and kicked the gun from Spence’s grasp just as it cleared his holster. He kicked Spence in the midsection. Spence staggered and fell. Tuscani grabbed one of the medical carts and smashed it atop him, stomping it down into his body with crushing force.

  There was no fight left—Spence was done.

  “Freeze, Sheriff’s Department.” Detective Calvin Clemens ran up the hall with a uniformed deputy two steps behind. Clemens’s gun was out, determination raging. “Freeze.”

  Tuscani groped beneath the cart and returned with Spence’s nine-millimeter. Instead of finishing him or André, he fired two shots out the door to clear his path and made his escape in the wake.

  More fractious orders—two more shots—three. Running feet. Shouts. Crashes. Nothing.

  It was over. Tuscani was gone—for now.

  Had I not witnessed it, no one could have convinced me—Detective Mikey Spence had saved the day. Was anyone who I thought they were?

  fifty-six

  By eight the next morning, Angel had finished her breakfast and I the third rendition of Tuscani’s attempt to kill André. We were waiting for Ernie to arrive for our trip to Strasburg and he was late. Angel called Bear for an update on André, and I could tell he was not thrilled that she learned of the attack before anyone—including the media—got wind of it.

  “And how in the hell did you know all that?” he groaned. “Never mind, you’ll just tell me …”

  “Tuck was there. Spence saved André.”

  He didn’t answer.

  “Bear?”

  “Angela, listen. Spence pulled the guard off André’s door. He was waiting down the hall. I’ve already complained to the captain.”

  “He set a trap?” Angel’s face turned fiery red. “Using André?”

  “You know Spence. He figured someone might try to get to André a second time. And while I hate to say it, it almost worked.”

  “Please check on André again,” she said, and then sent Bear into a fit. “I’m going to Strasburg to see Paul Livingston.”

  “Livingston?” Bear shouted through the speaker. “What about Livingston?”

  She explained about the clues from McCorkle’s sketches and Sarah’s bracelet. He wasn’t amused he was just hearing about it all. In fact, he wasn’t amused at anything she’d said this morning.

  “Jeez, Angela. You gotta tell me when things happen. Not the next day. You stay away from Livingston. And that bracelet is evidence—so I want it. No, you’re not going.”

  “Ernie’s going with me.”

  “No, Angela. I’ll check him out myself. You stay away from him.”

  Silence. Then, Angel said, “Fine. But let me know what happens.”

  “Good. I’ll call later. I’ll come by for the bracelet later this morning.”

  When Bear hung up, she retrieved her purse and picked up her keys. “If he thinks he can tell me what to do, he’s wrong.”

  Bear touched a very sensitive nerve in my Angel—she never liked bei
ng bossed around. A few minutes ago, she wanted no part in my investigation. Now, thanks to him, she was all about crime fighting.

  “Okay, Angel, I guess you’re going anyway.”

  “I can handle myself just fine. We’ll see what I can find out without him.”

  There was a knock on the front door and Ernie walked in. He looked like a wreck. His hair was disheveled, his face pale, and he was out of breath. When he trudged into the kitchen and plopped down in a chair in front of the coffee pot, he let out a heavy sigh and dropped his head into his hands. I’d never seen him as disjointed as he was now and it was unnerving.

  “Angela, did you hear about André? Incredible.”

  “I just spoke with Bear,” Angel said. “Spence set a trap for Tuscani. They nearly caught him.”

  “Oh? They’re sure it was this Tuscani fellow? This is out of control and getting worse. I hope they know what they’re doing.”

  “They’ll figure this all out, Ernie. They have to.”

  “Yes, yes, you’re right.” Ernie changed the subject. “Show me what that girl, Sarah, gave you.”

  Angel went into the den and returned with the folded paper bag Sarah had given her. She emptied it on the kitchen table and handed the silver bracelet to Ernie.

  “It was very beautiful once,” he said, toying with it in his palm. “Handmade, too.”

  “Sarah gave us these gold coins, too. They’re very rare, 1881 twenty-dollar pieces. Are they similar to those you had?”

  “I think, perhaps, they are.” He held one and studied it. “I’m certain of it.”

  “Poor Nic has a collection of these in his den. And he’s missing several of them, too. I think …”

  “No. Take them away.” Ernie closed his eyes and dropped the bracelet onto the table. “Please, I don’t want anything to do with them if they’ve caused all this misery.”

  Angel sat down beside him and moved the coins around the table like chess pieces on a board. “Ernie, you probably can tell me more about these than anyone. I’d like to know what you can tell me before we go see Livingston.”