Ashes to Ashes

by Nathaniel Fincham

  Chapter 31

 

  When Ashe made it back to his Mazda he was filled with intent and purpose, but when he got into the vehicle he felt himself deflate. The feeling of betrayal was like poking a pin into his skull, letting out whatever air and blood was in his brain. Katherine had betrayed him…for a story. Why? She had told Ashe that she was a writer, but he had assumed that she had meant a fiction writer. He was angry at her and also angry at himself for believing that he had actually found another person to connect with.

  Why was he surprised?

  The truth was that Ashe barely knew Katherine…and sex doesn’t automatically make two people close on a level beyond the physical realm. Sometimes the physical made people believe in the illusion of deeper emotions when those emotions were not present. No matter how much he wanted them to be. Maybe he had simply wanted that connection so badly that he had seen it in a place where it never existed.

  How stupid could he be?

  Last night had meant nothing, apparently. And yet he could still taste her skin.

  Ashe questioned his decision to tell Katherine about Scott. But he had needed a shoulder to lean against. He had needed a set of ears to hear him out.

  Had he been wrong to trust someone?

  Ashe sat in the driver’s seat, still parked outside of the police station. He didn’t know where to go. He put his head back. Closing his eyes, he wanted to block out all the light of the day, but some light still managed to penetrate his eyelids, creating flecks of reds and yellows and purples.

  A short melody came from his pants pocket. Groaning, he dug for his cell phone and checked the display. A text had come. Opening it, Ashe saw that it had come from his sister, Sarah. The text said: CALL ME.

  Ashe was happy to oblige.

  Swiftly, he searched his CONTACTS and found his sisters name. Hitting the call button, he listened and waited as it rang. It rang and rang and he wasn’t sure if she was going to answer. Just before he flipped the phone closed he heard Sarah’s voice, “Ashe?”

  He hated caller ID. It took away the surprise.

  “Sister,” Ashe replied.

  “What the hell is going on? Where the hell are you?”

  “Leaving the police station,” he said.

  “Why is my nephew’s picture all over the news?” Sarah asked. Ashe could hear the panic in his sister’s voice. She was always excitable. But, in that instance, she had the right to be. “Please tell me that is why you were at the police station. Tell me that you are handling this. Scott didn’t do those things…did he? Tell me that Oscar was wrong.”

  “Sarah…calm down,” Ashe requested.

  “Calm down? Really? Tell me something, Ashe,” Sarah said. “Will you give me some news?”

  Ashe took a breath before he told her the basics. And then he listened as she gasped, cried, and then recovered. “It’s going to be okay, Sarah. I was just meeting with Oscar and we are working on figuring things out. I can’t tell you any more than that. It’s an ongoing investigation. You know how that goes.”

  “Did Scott really kill someone?”

  “Looks that way,” Ashe replied. He wanted to tell her more. She deserved to hear more. Sarah was a name on a short list of family members that he had, due to the fact that she was his only sibling and their mother was deceased and their father was in a home for Alzheimer’s. He just knew that he couldn’t. He knew that he shouldn’t.

  “But why?” Sarah asked.

  “That is what we need to figure out,” Ashe replied.

  “And you’re trying to do that?”

  “I’m trying to,” he said. “But first we need to find Scott.”

  “Anything that I can do?”

  “Let me know if he calls you?”

  “I can do that,” Sarah said. “Ashe…if anyone can find Scott and sort this whole mess out…it is you.”

  “I’m not so sure,” he admitted.

  “Is there any way that Scott is still innocent? Any way at all?” Sarah asked. “It is all surreal. Scott is such a sweet boy. As sweet as it gets. He would never have blood on his hands. Would he?”

  “Evidence points in that direction,” Ashe told her.

  “Are you okay?” his sister asked.

  He was surprised by the simple question. “I’m still breathing, even though it is getting harder and harder to do.”

  “You must be a mess.”

  “As good a word as any, I guess,” he said. “Listen, Sarah, I need something from you.”

  “What? I will help in any way that I can,” she said.

  “How well do you know Katherine?” Ashe asked.

  “Katherine? Why do you want to know about Katherine?”

  “It is important,” Ashe replied.

  “Does it have to do with Scott?”

  “No,” he lied.

  “Katherine is a sweetheart,” Sarah said. “Hence…me hooking you two up. Why do you ask? Did it not go well?”

  “It went fine,” Ashe said. “Where did you meet her?”

  “She is a regular at one of the hole-in-the-wall dives where I like to drink,” Sarah replied. His sister was in her mid-thirties but still lived her life like a younger person, going by whatever strong emotion is overtaking her, to hell with the consequences. And those emotions often took her to the bar where there was loud music and dancing. Her emotions also took her into and out of many turbulent relationships. She had low impulse control, along with other issues, but Ashe chose to be her brother and not her psychologist, her shoulder instead of her conscious, at least until he felt she needed it. “We just started talking one night over a shot of Jaeger. Talked a few more times after that and I figured you two would hit it off. She is cute, funny, spontaneous, and a little crazy. She was everything that you are not but should be. You know?”

  Ashe rolled his eyes. “What bar?” he asked.

  “Suds,” his sister answered. “Why?”

  The bar name sounded familiar but he couldn’t place it. “I just need to talk to her,” he said. “It is important.”

  “Why don’t you just call her?”

  “I tried,” Ashe lied, again. “No answer. Do you know where she lives?”

  “Lives?”

  “Her place of sleep?”

  “We only met up at Suds,” Sarah told him. “Do you want me to try and call her?”

  “No,” he blurted. “Where does she work? I can try there, instead.”

  “She is a writer,” she told him. “She works from home…I think. I’m not sure though.”

  Ashe wished that he would have stayed with Oscar long enough to ask what newspaper that Katherine worked for, but he had stormed out of the room like a rushing wind. He considered calling him and asking, but knew that it would appear weird to the paranoid homicide detective. He didn’t want Oscar to know that the leak was not one of his own men, but the person that he had previously accused of being compromised.

  He had been right. And Ashe felt embarrassed.

  “Did things go good, at least?” Sarah asked.

  He could again taste the softness of Katherine’s freckled skin. “They went good.”

  “Ashe?”

  “Sarah?”

  “I love you.”

  “I love you, too.”

  “Find Scott,” she said. “Keep him safe.”

  “You know I will,” Ashe said. “Bye.”

  “Bye.”

  He closed the phone and immediately reached to the dash of his car. Built into the dash was a GPS navigator. Pressing the touch screen of the device, Ashe searched for and found the address to Suds. He touched the green start button and it calculated his route.

  “Please follow the highlighted route,” the robotic male voice instructed.

  Ashe pulled out of the parking lot and followed the preferences of the dashboard computer
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