“Did you park nearby?” he asked, matching his stride to hers. “I’ll walk you to your car.”
“That isn’t necessary. It’s just down the street.”
“No trouble. I parked down the street too.”
He shifted closer to her to avoid bumping a pedestrian coming from the opposite direction. His bare forearm brushed her wrist and the short, dark hairs that curled over his forearm flexor muscle made her stomach tighten again as they tickled her flesh. She walked faster.
“I’ll be all right,” she said, grateful for the darkness between lampposts that hid her deepening blush. If he didn’t leave soon, she’d have to hunt down a street vendor selling pretzels or ice cream.
“I need to talk to you,” he said, catching up with her at the corner.
She had both hands around her purse strap now and bounced on her toes as she waited for the crosswalk sign to change. A popcorn vendor rolled his cart away just up the street, the scent of fresh popped corn and butter enticing her to run after him and gorge herself until the hunger in her lower body eased.
If it would.
“I’m tired.” She stared straight ahead. “Can it wait until tomorrow?”
Before he could answer, the light changed and she darted across the street. But she couldn’t shake the man. His long legs brought him even again as she gained the opposite curb.
“Jaime Campanero recanted his confession,” he said almost conversationally.
That was bad news. Slowing her steps, she looked up at him. “He can’t do that, can he?”
He pushed his hands deeper into his pockets. His mouth tightened. “Unfortunately, we have no physical evidence to link him to his sister’s murder. He confessed before his lawyer showed up.”
“But after you read him his rights?”
“Of course. But a smart public defender can get around that. A smart public defender will insist that we coerced the confession out of his client without counsel being present.” His dark eyes glinted beneath the streetlights. “A smart public defender will claim that we went for the most obvious suspect, a poor immigrant with no means to defend himself. We have lots of smart public defenders here in Clear Harbor.”
His bitter tone surprised her. “I’m sorry to hear that.”
One of his eyebrows inched upward and his gaze seemed to focus more intently on her as a smile curled his sexy lips. “Sorry to hear that we have lots of smart public defenders?”
“No.” She realized she’d slowed her steps further. They were walking along the broad sidewalk that paralleled an open stretch of beach. Pole lights had been set up in the sand and a group of young people had gathered for Clear Harbor’s Friday night beach party. Fifties rock-and-roll music played through the cool sea air and on its gentle breeze she could smell all kinds of food now.
“No,” she said again, holding her free hand against her empty, growling stomach. She wished she could press her palm lower and provide some counter to the sexual tension curling deep inside. “I meant I’m sorry that Campanero could get off.”
“Actually…” He moved closer to her as a couple on a bicycle-built-for-two approached, their handlebar bell ringing a gentle warning on the evening air. “Actually, Emma, I’m hoping you can keep that from happening.”
The bell rang again. As Jason’s body heat reached out to her, Emma felt herself start to melt and she wondered if that ringing warning was for her personally.
Jason stood with his back to the beach and its lights. His shadow fell over her face and shoulders, casting her into darkness.
His shadow.
His darkness.
Despite the lack of physical contact, it was an intimate joining that had him shaking with a need he hadn’t allowed himself to feel in a long time. A need he feared he couldn’t control. A need he no longer wanted to control.
But then she shifted away, into the light. The pupils of her eyes shrank but retained a wide, hollow look that once more made him want to wrap his arms around her and keep her safe.
“But I don’t know anything,” she said. Her tone and expression told him that she had experienced that same sense of intimacy that he’d felt.
Jason tightened his hands, feeling the lint in his pockets against his knuckles, feeling the tightness of his jeans around his thighs and his waist and everything in between. If she glanced down she would see her physical effect on him. He’d gone as hard as a brick. Would that please her or scare her off?
He knew the answer. She’d been practically running from him since they’d left the bookstore. He couldn’t blame her. No doubt her friend, Marta, had made sure that Emma knew all about his reputation with women. Brian might even have mentioned some of his more colorful romantic escapades. And he’d been sending her mixed signals, he was sure. He certainly knew what signals he wanted to send.
Across the sand, several dozen people shifted from wild gyrations to cheek-to-cheek dancing. The strains of “Stardust” softened the night air.
“My parents loved that song,” Jason murmured, forgetting for a moment that they were involved in a murder investigation, forgetting everything but her look and her scent and her warmth.
She took in a slow breath as if trying to match the rhythm of the sea. “It’s my mother’s favorite too,” she said quietly.
Her eyes reflected light from the beach. Or was it real stardust? Whatever it was, the glow there made him feel warm and alive for the first time in a long, long time.
Unfortunately, coming back to life wasn’t a totally pleasant sensation. The tightness in his lower body hurt and his heart beat fast enough to make him slightly breathless.
“How did you know Amalia had a brother?” he asked, trying to focus his thoughts on business. He hadn’t meant to run into Emma tonight but he might as well take advantage of the opportunity. For business, of course.
Emma looked away, seeming to study the couples dancing in the sand. She drew her lower lip between her teeth then took a deep breath and spoke even more quietly. “Don’t you ever get a hunch? A sense of something?”
“I’ve had a hunch or two,” he answered, trying not to imagine what her lower lip would feel like between his teeth.
“That’s all I had that day.” She looked up at him. “Just a hunch.”
He searched her eyes, hoping to see some sign of truth there, some sign that she was holding nothing back. But he saw the opposite. She was holding something back. Something big.
“Emma.” He moved closer, further into her space. She didn’t draw back but her eyes went a millimeter wider. He chose to take that as encouragement. “Why don’t we go somewhere and talk?”
The palm of one hand went to her stomach. No, he realized. Just below her stomach. Her fingers splayed over her lower abdomen as if she pressed against the same inner pressure he felt. He started to move in closer but she abruptly shook her head.
“I need to get home.” Unconvincing, hardly more than a whisper, her words hung between them.
Desperation shot through him and he said the only thing that he felt might keep her here. “I’d really like to talk to you about Brian.”
“Oh.” Some of that fearful darkness faded from her eyes. “No one else seems to want to talk about him. The people at work, I mean. I guess it hurts too much.”
“Maybe they’re afraid it would hurt you to be reminded. But you don’t need to be reminded any more than I do.” He paused, thinking it was true. “Every day something reminds me of Brian.”
Her shoulders relaxed a fraction more. “Me too.”
“Why don’t we go somewhere and talk? I promise, all we’ll do is share a few stories about our mutual friend.” He meant it. He was willing to do anything just to keep her close for a little while longer.
She gazed into his eyes and he saw the debate going on inside her. She was going to give in. All she needed was a little more encouragement.
“Emma—”
He broke off as a woman walked up the beach toward them. Recognizing
her, Jason bit back a groan. Spotting him, the pretty blonde grinned and exaggerated the sway of her hips as she climbed the last few feet of sand.
“Hello, handsome.” Officer Miranda Dennison, out of uniform in a spectacular way—hot pink shorts and a polka-dot halter—barely glanced at Emma before she winked at Jason. “Warm night, isn’t it?”
“Hey, Miranda,” he said as the very feminine police officer stroked a hand down his arm before moving along. The thong sandals on her feet slapped the pavement, drawing his gaze down her endless legs. But it was merely an instinctive act and he easily returned his gaze to Emma. He saw disappointment flash through her eyes.
“Miranda works at the station,” he quickly said. He owed her no explanation but found himself stammering one out anyway. “In the admin department. She takes phone messages and—”
“You don’t have to explain anything to me, Detective.”
Loneliness filled him and suddenly business and talking about his recently deceased friend were the last things on his mind. “Maybe I want to explain,” he said.
Emma turned just as Miranda looked back and winked at Jason again. His hopes sank as Emma’s shoulders stiffened.
“I think you’ve got a date if you want one,” she said, looking back at him. “As for me, I’ll be going on home.”
Turning, she left him standing at the edge of the beach. As the laughter of the dancing couples drifted on the breeze around him, Jason felt more alone than ever.
Chapter Seven
“Recorders on.” Skitch pressed the switch above the autopsy table. “Monday morning. May eighth. Nine o’clock.”
Standing opposite him, Emma lowered her face shield. Her gloved hands trembled and she felt the flesh on her shoulders trying to crawl up her neck. Apparently a weekend spent soul-searching had not soothed her nerves after all. Or maybe her shivers simply came from the chill of the heavily air-conditioned room.
At least I’m not thinking about Jason Mackenzie anymore, she realized and then winced as thoughts of him flooded her mind. Since that night on the beach, she’d struggled not to think about his muscular forearms and gleaming eyes that could look right inside a woman. Or that sexy smile and the sense of warmth she felt whenever her thoughts turned his way. A warmth much nicer than the chill she got from thinking about ghosts.
A warmth that could quickly heat to a boiling pot of trouble, she reminded herself. No matter how she wanted to distract herself from her hallucinations of spirits, she couldn’t use that man to do it.
Flexing her fingers, she hesitated another moment and then gripped the sheet and drew it down to the dead man’s waist.
“He’s a John Doe,” Skitch said, reading from a file. “His body washed ashore down at the Pelican Street Pier. His wallet was missing and there’s been no sign of his fishing gear, either. The cops have labeled his death a robbery-homicide.” He looked up with a glitter of amusement in his eyes. “Get that. Piracy on the high seas.”
“Let’s do the external.” Emma kept her voice low so Skitch wouldn’t hear the quaver in it. “The deceased is a white male, approximately sixty years old. Weight is…” She glanced at the scale. “Two-hundred-ten pounds.”
“No marks on his chest or arms.” Sober once more, Skitch put the file on a side table. “His torso appears swollen, though and his flesh is discolored. Looks like he was in the water a while so that weight probably isn’t accurate.”
Emma took a deep breath. Nothing unusual had happened. She’d been in the autopsy suite with the body for almost five minutes now and nothing had happened. Nothing was going to happen.
She gestured toward the neck of the deceased man. “There’s bruising along both sides of the throat. Looks like it might extend around the back. Let’s take a look.”
As Skitch lifted the man’s head, Emma adjusted one of the overhead lights and then leaned down. “Trauma to the back of the head. See the bleeding? The blow was obviously a precursor to death.”
Studying the wound, Skitch nodded. “Could have been accidental or intentional.”
“We’ll get back to it after we finish the external body check.” Straightening, Emma pulled the sheet further down and did a visual inspection of the front of the dead man’s body.
“No obvious signs of anything else abnormal.” She placed one hand on the man’s left ankle to examine the suppleness of his skin.
“Of course not. I slipped, that’s all.”
The hoarse voice snapped Emma’s head up. She stumbled back several steps, her gaze riveted on the middle-aged man standing on the other side of the autopsy table.
Raising both hands to her chest, she choked out, “Skitch!”
Still standing near the dead man’s head, Skitch looked up at her and frowned. “Something wrong, Doc?”
Emma’s heart slammed into her ribs and she gave her assistant a disbelieving stare. “Is something wrong?”
“He can’t see me, Dr. St. Clair,” the man said. “I’m here to talk to you.”
Emma’s stare swung back to the stocky figure standing less than two feet from Skitch. Garbed in baggy, faded blue jeans and a lightweight, long-sleeved cotton shirt with a fishing vest and hat, he looked like a weathered old fisherman.
She looked back at the corpse on the table. This weathered old fisherman, she realized with another jolt of panic.
“My name is Robert Harris.”
As he spoke again, Emma tried to calm down. She forced herself to study the figure, to determine if he was more than a figment of her imagination. Although she could see every detail of his form and features—down to the feathers on the lures attached to his vest—there was something insubstantial about him. She realized abruptly that she could see through him.
The temperature of the air around her dropped several degrees, chilling her to the deepest marrow of her bones.
“Doc?” Skitch moved down the table and his right arm swung through the figure.
Emma pushed up her face shield, squeezed her eyes shut and then opened them again. The man—the image—still stood to the left of Skitch.
“Doc, you don’t look good.” Skitch rubbed his right arm. “Of course that could be because it’s so dang cold in here.”
“I want someone to know what happened.” The faint figure of the man settled his arms across his chest. “There ain’t nobody to blame for this ’cept me.”
Skitch came around the table to where Emma stood, still staring. “Maybe you ought to sit down,” he said.
“I had a few beers,” the figure went on, talking slower and with a little difficulty. “I stood up to relieve m’self over the side of the boat. Lost m’ balance when this big swell pushed through and I fell. Hit m’ head on the bow. Boat flipped. I sank.” His chest rose high and fast as if he labored to catch a breath. “End of me. End of story.”
Skitch took Emma’s arm and eased her toward a stool. As she continued staring at the old man, he began to fade.
“Wait!” Desperation gripped her. She needed proof that this was really happening. “Your wallet?”
“Under the beer in my cooler. Wrapped in plastic. It should’ve floated to shore. Now, I’m too tired to talk anymore.” And then he was gone.
Emma blinked and dropped onto the stool.
Skitch knelt beside her, both gloved hands around hers, rubbing gently. “Doc? What about my wallet?”
Emma kept staring at the place where the figure had stood. “You didn’t see?”
Skitch glanced over his shoulder and gave the room a quick scan. “See what?”
Her gaze flickered toward the body on the table. The dead man’s face was definitely the same as that of the apparition. Either her imagination had projected that image into ethereal form or…
“See what, Dr. St. Clair?”
Looking at Skitch, Emma saw worry and suspicion in his dark eyes. Worry for her health and suspicion that she couldn’t handle her job anymore. If she told him what she’d seen, he would go straight to their boss with th
e information. And Edgar would forbid her to do any more autopsies. He might even relieve her of duty completely. Without her job, she really would go crazy.
She forced a smile and tried to think fast. “I saw someone’s wallet…under a chair in the break room. I-I just remembered and wondered if it was yours.”
“No. I have mine.” He studied her with deepening concern. “You’re kind of pale. Are you okay?”
“I just got a little dizzy for a second. I guess I haven’t been eating right lately.” Gently, she tugged her hands free of his. “I just need some protein, that’s all.”
“I have some snack bars in my cubicle. I’ll get you one.” He stood. “You should wear a smock over your scrubs too. It’s too cold in here.”
“I’ll be all right. Let’s finish up with—with this gentleman first.”
Skitch took her arm again as she rose. “You sure?”
Steady on her feet, she patted his hand. “I’m okay, Skitch. Really. But you’re right. The room is cold.”
“Whatever you say, Doc.” He led her to the table, his eyes still dark with worry. “Whatever you say.”
* * * * *
“What you need, my friend, is the love of a good woman.” Charlie dropped into a deck chair late Monday afternoon and handed a bottle of beer to Jason. A breeze whipped in off the bay to stir his thick, gray hair.
Jason kicked back in his own chair and propped his feet up on the railing surrounding his deck. He twisted off the bottle cap. Weariness rolled through him. He and Charlie had been on the move all weekend, chasing down leads that went nowhere. The car that had struck Emma and Brian must have been invisible because they couldn’t find one witness who’d seen anything. And they’d come up with nothing on the Campanero case, either. Or any of the other cases they were working.
“You need someone to share your life,” Charlie said.
Jason looked at the waves rolling in less than thirty yards from his stilted house. “And what you need is a hobby. Something like model railroading or collecting butterflies. Anything but matchmaking.”
Final Words Page 8
