Wake to Darkness. Maggie Shayne
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lifted my brows at him, slugged a little coffee down to clear my mouth. “What do you mean?”
“I can see you’ve got something on your mind.”
How could I have forgotten, even for a minute, that he was every bit as good at reading people as I was? Especially me.
I lowered my voice. “I had a dream.”
His eyes widened. “About the case I was telling you about? The missing soccer mom?”
“I don’t know. But if it was, she’s dead.” I looked toward the living room, then back at him. “I was inside her head, Mason. I was there with her while she was murdered.”
He looked horrified, then glanced toward the living room just like I had done. “How?”
“She was paralyzed. Drugged, I think. It was impossible for her to move. And the killer cut into her and ripped something out.”
He stared at me. “And you felt it? You experienced it like before?”
I averted my eyes, nodded. I put my hands over my rib cage, poking the soft area where she—I—had been stabbed. “The knife went in here and ripped left, then right. God, the pain was just...” I’d started breathing hard and had to stop myself, rein it in.
“Dammit, Rachel.” He put his hands on my shoulders. “Are you all right?”
“Yeah. I’m okay.”
“I thought you said you weren’t having the dreams anymore, that your brain was startling you awake every time one started?”
I nodded. “I took a sleeping pill. Figured I had to know what it was my brain didn’t want to let me see. Now I know.”
He shook his head slowly and started to say something, but his cell phone rang. He picked it up, spoke briefly, but mostly listened. When he put it down again he looked at me. “They found a body.”
I closed my eyes. “Was it...?”
“No details, but Rosie said it wasn’t pretty. I have to go.”
“I’ll stay with the boys.” I blurted it without even thinking first, then realized I was effectively shooting our agreement not to see each other right in the foot. He noticed it, too; I could tell by the way he was looking at me, his eyes all questiony. “I’ve missed those two more than I thought, and Myrtle’s in seventh heaven with Josh. We’ll hang out. Go take care of this. I’ll see you later.”
“Thanks, Rachel.” He put a hand on my cheek, then took it away, suddenly awkward, like he didn’t know why he’d put it there to begin with. “Thanks.”
He walked away, into the living room to tell the boys what was up, then up the stairs to grab his things. Then he came back down, shoving his wallet into his back pocket, his shoulder holster over his button-down shirt, gun in easy reach. And I was still sitting there with my half-eaten sandwich and my coffee, wondering how I’d gone from “We should stay apart” to “I’ll spend the day in your house with your nephews, awaiting your return.”
He came through the kitchen, looked me in the eye, and I knew he was thinking the same thing I was. I ought to say something. Clarify things. Right?
“I’ll get back as soon as I can.”
“Do what you need to. I’m not going anywhere.”
He nodded, like that was enough. For now. It would have to be, because I didn’t know what else to say. If I was having visions and people were dying and the two were connected, then we didn’t have much choice but to be together until we got to the bottom of things.
I could have thought the freaking universe wouldn’t take no for an answer. You know, if I believed in that sort of shit.
3
Saturday, December 16
The body had been found in a wooded area off I-81, a few miles north of the Binghamton area. Traffic was being detoured for a mile-long stretch, so the highway was eerily quiet.
Mason skirted the detour sign and drove right up to the cop whose car was enforcing it, bubble gum light flashing. He lowered his window, slowed down and flashed his badge, and the officer waved him by.
The scene was already swarming. The state police forensics team was already there, and Rosie was waiting for him on the shoulder, hunching into his police-issue overcoat and wearing a completely non-regulation furry hat with earflaps pulled down. Yeah, it wasn’t a warm day. The sun was shining, and the official temp was allegedly thirty-five, but it felt like single digits the way the wind was blowing. It was a cold wind, too. Icy.
Mason parked his new-to-him Jeep and got out, then walked onto the shoulder to stand beside his partner, the oversized and ready-to-retire, shaven-headed Roosevelt Jones. He followed Rosie’s gaze down the steep slope to the bottom, where a New York state trooper supervised while two forensics guys worked. One was taking pictures, the other, measurements. The body was still there, bent and twisted unnaturally. “Looks like they just tossed her and let her roll down and stay the way she landed,” he said.
Rosie nodded. “Looks like. Snow’s covered up any evidence on the bank here.”
“Tire tracks?”
“First responders ruined ’em.” Rosie shrugged as he looked toward the ambulance and police cruiser parked a few feet ahead on the shoulder. Their tire tracks were fresh in the soft ground, right where whoever dumped the body would probably have parked.
Mason shielded his eyes as he watched the men below. “Who called it in?”
“College student. Had a flat, pulled over a few yards back to change it and saw her lying down there. I got his statement and contact info, then let him go.”
“All right.” Mason turned up his collar. His coat was lined denim, but he hadn’t grabbed a hat and his ears were already freezing. “Ready to head down there, then?”
“I’ll wait up here,” Rosie said, eyeing the steep climb warily. “Man my size gonna trip and roll right down on top of her. I don’t wanna contaminate the scene.”
Mason shook his head. “Creative way to get out of climbing back up, but I’ll let you off the hook.”
“You better.”
Mason headed down, taking a route a few yards from the one the body had probably taken. The state cop on the scene was Bill Piedmont, a man Mason knew and liked. He didn’t know the two forensics guys, but then, they tended to move around a lot.
“Hey, Bill. What’s your take?”
“Mason.” Piedmont gave him a nod from beneath his wide-brimmed gray Stetson. Trooper standard issue. “Looks like she’s been here a while. Body’s frozen to the ground. Probably was hidden by the snow until the wind came up and blew it clear enough so she could be spotted from the road. Ground underneath her is bare.”
Mason was looking at the woman. She wore a blue dress, torn nylons, one shoe. The other was probably around somewhere. Most likely flew off her as she tumbled down the hill. She’d landed on her left side, left leg bent unnaturally beneath her, the right one folded up. Right arm extended, left one in front of her body. She had a wedding ring on her finger. Her hair was frozen to her skull. Red, he thought.
“So she was dumped before that first snowfall. What was that, a week ago?”
“Six days,” Piedmont said.
“Look like she was dead before she was dumped?”
Piedmont nodded and walked around the body, giving it a wide berth so as not to disturb evidence. Not that there would be any. Mason was already certain the killer had stayed up on the road and never set foot down here. Still...
“Oh, shit.” He could see the front of her now. The dress was torn from the hem up to her