by Dale Mayer
He just smiled, reached out an arm and wrapped it around her shoulders, gently tugging her toward him.
She went willingly, resting her head against him as she had done many times already, and cuddled closer. “I knew I would come back feeling different,” she explained. “But I didn’t expect this.”
“I don’t know what this exactly is,” he said, “or why. I mean, obviously what happened affected you. And we know you died. We know you came back, and people who do often completely change their lives.”
“But I wasn’t a bad person. It’s not like I was a thief, and now I’m determined to go straight. It’s not like I’m looking for redemption because I was given a second chance,” she said in confusion. “Why does this previous life feel so far from me now?”
“We don’t know,” he said. “This is unique to you, unique to a very select few people in the world.”
She looked up at him, her lips trembling. “I didn’t see a white light or any of my family members with their hands reaching out to help me cross over.”
“That’s a good thing according to what I’ve heard,” Samson said seriously. “I’m grateful you’re still alive. There is much you can do to enrich the world of those around us.”
At his wording she looked up at him, startled. “I feel like I’m lost and don’t have any purpose.”
“You just finished defending your dissertation for your PhD, correct?”
“Yes, and I’m so glad to have that long arduous process over with. It’s a bright new world out there for me, and, for that, I owe you and the dogs apparently.”
She glanced back to see Ned putting his phone away. “And?” she asked him.
“Your ex is a bit of a weasel. He says he hasn’t touched any bank accounts, but we’ll confirm that pretty fast. He did say he didn’t think you would mind him having the furniture because you were dead.”
She scrunched her face up again as she thought about that. “Any idea what he took?”
“He took your laptop for starters,” he said sourly. “I told him we’ll be there in ten minutes to pick up everything he’s not entitled to.”
She nodded. “Thank you. I really need my laptop back.”
“He also took an older phone. Apparently you were having trouble with it and got a new one. But your old one still works, so it might be something we can set you up with temporarily.”
She looked at him in delight. “You really are a marvel, aren’t you?”
He shrugged. “Just part of my services.” He looked around the apartment in disdain. “If he’d cleaned up behind himself, it wouldn’t have been too bad. But apparently, he just upended things and took what he wanted.”
“I’m still responsible for cleaning up this place, and I have to get more furniture now,” she said sadly. “I don’t even know if I have money in my accounts.”
“You can bet there will be money within a few minutes of our face-to-face conversation with your ex-fiancé,” Ned said. “Otherwise, your ex is going up for theft charges.”
“Do you think he really got into my accounts?”
“You left your purse behind in his car.”
“Oh! My purse! Oh, my God!” She stared at him. “I didn’t even think about it.”
“He has your debit cards, your credit cards, and he mentioned something about thinking maybe you didn’t want your jewelry either.”
“I don’t even know what to say. For one, I would never have thought he would have done something like that, and, two, I don’t remember half of the items you’re listing.”
“You will though,” Samson said. “You will as soon as you see them.”
“I hope so,” she said. “Apparently, I don’t have very much left of family or memories.”
Ned led the way to the door. “Come on. We don’t want to give this guy any time to think about his actions.”
As they got back into the vehicle, she said, “Will you guys give me a ride back home again?”
“We’ll talk about it later,” Samson said. “Probably be better if we come back and pack you an overnight bag.”
“Later,” Ned said. “We’re on a mission now.”
He drove through the traffic with a finesse and determination Whimsy was astonished at. She looked at Samson, who just grinned like a crazy man. “He’s really determined, isn’t he?”
“Ned hates, absolutely hates, lowlifes who take advantage of people,” Samson said. “Honestly, I believe he probably thinks you’ve already been through enough, that you don’t need to have an ex-fiancé clean out your apartment, instead of even checking to see if you were dead.”
They pulled up in front of another apartment building minutes later. She hopped out with Samson, and Ned led the way.
She recognized the building. “He’s on the first floor in the back corner by the exit.”
When they got there, she knocked on the door. It opened immediately, and there he was. She studied his face for a long moment, seeing the shock and then the fear on the face she recognized. Memories flooded back. Fights, lonely nights. Doubts. Kayaking. “Did you really clean me out?”
“I thought you were dead,” he said, holding up his hands. “Jesus Christ! I mean, I thought you were dead. It’s been five days, maybe six.”
“Seven. And it’s been on the news,” Samson said quietly, “that she’s alive. Are you telling me none of her friends contacted you?”
He slid a glance at her sideways.
She snorted. “You never did like my friends. You probably wouldn’t have accepted a call from any of them anyway.”
“Hey, look. It’s not my fault,” he said. “I honestly thought the sound had claimed you forever.”
“So you came to my apartment, took everything you wanted, including my laptop, and kept my purse. And I understand you probably cleaned out my bank accounts.”
He hurriedly shook his head. “No, no. Yes, I borrowed some money, but I just paid that back now.”
Ned stepped forward into the apartment, forcing Mark to walk backward. “Prove it,” he said. “Right now. Before I call the cops. That’s pretty low to steal from your missing-presumed-dead fiancée.”
“It’s not like she has any family.”
“I have a mother,” Whimsy said.
He slid a glance her way. “Yeah, but you guys don’t get along. So it’s not like she would expect to get any money from you.”
“And, of course, as my ex-fiancé, you’re expecting to? Did you also take care of my student debt while you were at it?” she asked him.
“Oh, no, no, no, no, no,” he said. “No way I’m touching that. That’s your deal.”
“Right,” she said. “You just seemed a little too eager to see me go under. Did you even look for me?”
He tried to feign outrage. But it wasn’t convincing either. “Of course I did,” he said. “I almost drowned myself.”
Samson shook his head and wandered around, looking at the pictures on the wall. “Did you see what happened to her?”
“We got separated in the sound. I was fighting for my own life,” Mark said, starting to get angry. “I don’t like what you guys are implying.”
“You mean, implying that you let your girlfriend drown in the ocean, and then, as soon as you figured she was gone, you cleaned her out, including all her money and assets?” Samson snorted. “Not exactly a model citizen, are you?”
“Look. She didn’t have much, and I needed what she had,” he said. “I’ve got to get out of town.”
At that note in his voice, Samson, who had been looking at the pictures on the wall, spun once again to look at him. His voice was deadly soft. “Why?”
*
Samson might understand the initial attraction—Mark was six-feet tall, physically fit, an athletic sports-jock-looking guy. Didn’t mean he had any substance though. Samson would have really preferred that she had picked somebody who had a little more to him than just looks.
“My business,” he said, plunging his fists
into his pockets.
“No, not yours now. Gambling? Did you get into trouble over gambling debts?” Her voice rose as she looked around the apartment. “What did you do with my furniture?”
He shrugged.
“Did you pawn it?”
A flush rose up his cheeks.
Samson stared at him, an ugly picture forming in his mind. “I want to know why you’re running.”
“I’m not running anywhere,” Mark said defensively, turning to face Samson, yet backing up slightly. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“You said, you had to get out of town,” Samson said.
“Yeah, it was pretty traumatic losing her. And then, of course, this phone call today,” he said resentfully, looking at Ned. “That was enough to terrify anybody.”
“Particularly after you stole from me.” Whimsy looked around the apartment. “Your furniture is gone as well as mine. Did you really sell it all?” Her voice rose in anger.
Samson figured Mark was trying to raise as much money as he could. “They didn’t pay you enough?” he asked out of the blue. He watched as the red flush on her ex-fiancé’s face rose and, when it slipped away, left sheer pale skin behind.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he cried out. “Look. You need to leave.” He motioned at a stack of belongings on the floor. “These are hers. That’s all I took.”
“You took a hell of a lot more,” Whimsy snapped. “Like my furniture and my bed.”
“They’re gone,” he said. “I sold them. And you can’t get them back. So deal with it.”
Her jaw dropped.
Samson chuckled. “Wow. The things you have to do in order to see who somebody really is.”
“Apparently, you have to die,” she said slowly, looking at Mark as if she’d never seen him before. “I didn’t have much money. It was supposed to be enough for me to live on for the next few months, so I could recuperate from the schedule I’d had.”
“Is that the money you stole?” Ned asked. “I’m calling the police right now.”
“No, no, no,” whined Mark, but he silenced when he heard Ned speaking to the 9-1-1 operator. “Look I got into trouble with a loan shark to pay off some gambling debts but now he’s after me as I can’t pay him.”
She looked at the pile of belongings on the floor. Her purse was there. She picked it up, opened it. There was her wallet. But, of course, no cash and no credit cards were there. “Where are my cards? The cash?”
He flushed again, grabbed his wallet from his pocket and pulled out her cards.
She snorted as she watched him. “You really did get into my accounts, didn’t you? How much did you charge on my credit cards?”
His head jerked to the side. “Nothing,” he said. “Nothing.”
“I don’t believe anything coming out of your mouth.” She looked over to Ned. “Can we get into the laptop and see what he might have charged?”
Ned handed her the laptop from the pile. “I’ve already checked your bank accounts. He left them open. You had $4,787. He left you three dollars. That’s it.”
She turned to Mark. “You took it all?”
“You were dead,” he said. “How many times do I have to tell you that?”
“A lot,” she said, “apparently. I mean, I’ve never been dead with a fiancé before, so I don’t really understand how people act when dead.”
Samson chuckled. “Ned, did he reverse the money?”
“Yes, but I don’t have access to his account to see what else he might have taken. But he did put exactly the same amount of funds back into her account.”
“What about the money from my furniture?” Whimsy snapped. “And my credit cards?”
“Look. I don’t have any more money,” Mark said. “I cleaned out my accounts, and I’m leaving. I don’t have anything else to give you. You always end up smelling like fucking roses anyway, so turn around, put out a plea for help, and I’m sure you’ll get all kinds of furniture. It was just shitty stuff anyway.”
“I’m much less concerned about my furniture,” she said, “than I am about my jewelry.”
“I don’t have your jewelry,” Mark said jerkily. “And you hated it anyway.”
She rubbed her forehead. “What pawn shop did you take it to?”
“The one on Elk Street,” he snapped. “Go buy it back if you give a shit.”
Samson watched as she took several deep breaths. He admired her restraint. He would have plowed this guy into the ground before now.
“And other than my jewelry and my furniture and anything else, small knickknacky stuff that you thought you could sell, did you take anything else?”
“No, of course not,” he said. “There wasn’t anything else.”
Samson snorted. “But, if there had been, you would have gotten it.” He looked at her. “We need to check the charges on your credit cards.”
She opened her laptop, sat down on the floor and, with her card numbers, brought up her accounts. She gasped. “Holy shit,” she said. “You charged over four grand to my cards in just seven days?”
“Like I said. I owed some guy some money,” he said, “and I had to buy some plane tickets to get the hell out of here.”
“And then you took cash advances,” she said.
“I said, I owe some guys some money.”
She shook her head. “And then took the rest to line your own pockets. You should have been happy with what you had. Paid off the loan shark and then split.” She held out a hand. “Give it to me now.”
With the other two men looking on, Mark sputtered and finally said, his shoulder sagging, “You’re just signing my death warrant, you know that?”
“You can take a bus to wherever the hell you think you’re going,” she said, “because I just canceled your tickets and reported those charges and the cash advances as thefts. I suggest you start walking.” She looked up. “Have you still got your wheels?”
“Yes,” he said. “But I have to sell it this afternoon.”
“I wouldn’t if I were you,” she said, “because you’ll need it to get out of here.”
“You don’t understand,” he cried out in desperation. “These men are going to kill me.”
“You mean, like they tried to kill her?” Samson asked.
Chapter 13
It never occurred to her that her drowning might be related to what was going on here, and she stared at Mark. “Did you have something to do with that?”
He stared back, his eyes wild. “No. No, no, no. Not those men.”
“Ah, so you knew what they were going to do?” Samson wanted to pummel the weasel into the ground.”
“No, no! I didn’t know anything about it.”
“But you knew she’d been shot, right?” Samson asked, taking two steps toward him.
Her ex-fiancé yelped and backed up several steps. “Don’t touch me,” he yelled.
“Why not?” Samson asked. “I mean, you were part of a plot to kill your ex-fiancée.” He looked around at the mess in the apartment. “She didn’t have any money for you. She didn’t have anything worth killing for. So why?”
“I didn’t have anything to do with it,” he cried out.
“But you did see it happen.”
He froze. “I’m not sure.”
Whimsy gasped. “Holy crap. So not only did you decide to clean me out, you watched as somebody tried to kill me? And you did nothing?”
“They came after me after that,” Mark said.
“You talked to them?”
He shook his head. “No. But I heard them yelling at me. So I knew they were coming.”
“If they were coming, they would have come already,” Whimsy snapped. “That was days ago.”
“I know it was,” Mark snapped. “I’m still trying to get out of here. I’m just trying to raise as much money as I can.”
“And then what?” she asked. “These tickets are for New York.”
“I figured, if I disappea
red in New York for a while, I could take another ticket to somewhere else. But I needed cash.” He ran his fingers through his hair, and then, as if in a wild moment of frustration, grabbed two handfuls and pulled, almost screaming silently. “Do you know what it’s been like? We went out for a fun day. Our friends left early, but, no, you wanted to keep going. You always were stubborn. You just had to get back into that damn water. All you had to do was leave everything alone. We could have had a couple hours, come back, and nothing would have happened. But you destroyed my life.”
“Your life? What about my life? I’m the one who died, drowned. But I didn’t even hear you say, Thank God, you are alive. No, you’re looking at me as if I’ve ruined your life. As if I could have just stayed dead, you would have had a chance to get away scot-free.”
“Yes, that’s exactly right,” Mark said. “If you’d have stayed dead, I wouldn’t be in this horrible situation.”
“But, if you hadn’t done anything wrong in the first place,” she said, taking a step toward him, “then you could have gone to the cops. But you haven’t. Why is that?”
“Very good question,” Ned said from behind her. “Why is that?” He looked at her ex-fiancé.
Mark shook his head. “I didn’t do anything wrong,” he cried out. “I did nothing wrong.”
“I’m not sure I believe you. It makes more sense that you hired the killers.”
He stared at her, his jaw dropping. “I loved you,” he said. “Why the hell would I kill you?”
“I don’t know,” she said in a sad tone.
“We were always very close. We were supposed to get married this fall, remember?” he asked bitterly.
But he was talking to her as if it were all past tense, months and months ago. And yet, it had only been seven days. She took several steps back, her chest constricted, and she had trouble breathing.
Samson stepped up behind her, grabbed her by her shoulders and whispered in her ear, “Calm down. It’ll be okay.”
She took several deep breaths and swallowed hard. She looked at Ned. “Is there anything else I need to do?” She hoped he understood she was really asking for somebody else to gain some clarity in this situation because she couldn’t.
