Echoes of the Past (4 page)

“I know why you’re really annoyed, and it has nothing to do
with my fear of water.”

“What do you mean? I’m not annoyed. I’m worried about you.”

“You’re mad because if I do get sent on this case, I won’t
be able to go on that double date tomorrow night with the guy who works with
Simon. You’ve been trying to set me up with him for weeks now. Every time I
emailed, all you wanted to know was when I’d be home.”

“I asked because I missed you. I do think you and David
would be great together. You’re alone too much. For the record, I’m worried
about the water thing. Consider learning about the eye candy a bonus—my treat.
Audra’s big on chakras and chi, and she’ll tell you how to balance things so
you can get over your fear and move on. You can find your calm again. Don’t you
want to?”

“More than you’ll ever know.” Michelle sighed, defeated.
“Fine.
We’ll go see Audra, but after I do this, you have to
let it go. No more witches, no more psychics, no more magic crystals, no more
anything! I can still go to the Dominican with you. I’ll just sit and bake on
the beach while you turn yourself into shark bait.”

Tasha laughed. “You have such a way with words, but I agree.
I won’t mention it again—well, at least not until your next meltdown.”

* * * *

Tony sat in his SUV outside
Picton’s
town hall. His head pounded, and his hair hurt. The throbbing headache he’d
nursed all morning had grown into a migraine, and as much as he’d like to crawl
into a room and hide from the light and all sounds, he couldn’t. He undid the
leather thong holding his hair back in the classic ponytail he wore and
massaged his scalp hoping to ease the tension on his skull. Reluctantly, he finger
combed his tangled hair and pulled it into a low, loose ponytail.

He’d taken two migraine relief tablets mid-morning and had put
his head down on the table. A sound had alerted him, and he’d sat up. Remembering
the brief encounter convinced him it hadn’t been a hallucination, but what else
could it have been?

She’d stood in the kitchen dressed in buckskin, with that blanket
of hers wrapped around her shoulders, her hair plaited into two braids, one of
each side of her beautiful face. On her feet she’d worn a pair of intricately
beaded buckskin moccasins. She’d crossed the floor, and he’d stood and opened
his arms to her. She’d raised her hand to his face, traced the scratch on his
cheek, and smiled up at him, the unspoken request clear in her eyes. He’d
kissed her as he had so many times before. As his tongue invaded her mouth,
plundering her sweetness, he’d hardened with desire. She’d pulled away
slightly, giggled softly, and pointed to the obvious bulge in his jeans. Her
eyes shone with happiness.

“Who are you? How did you get here?” He’d tried to capture
her mouth again, but she shook her head.

“
Tohsa
sata
:ti
.”
She’d pressed
her finger against his lips for silence.
“
Satahon'satat
.”
She’d touched his ears.
“
Senehia
:rak
.
Eniorhen'ne
iotohetston
nen
:tie
.
Senehia
:rak
.”

He hadn’t understood the words and had asked her name.

“
Tayouroughay
.”

“
Tayouroughay
”
He’d repeated the strange word. He’d reached for her, but she’d faded away
right before his eyes.

He’d stood there, shivering, staring at the empty space
where she’d stood seconds before. What had she said? What did it mean? If he’d
imagined it all, the words would be gibberish, but if it had been real
somehow—and he couldn’t imagine it had been—the words would be Mohawk. He’d
stop and see his friend Joseph Smoke, an elder on the
Tyendinaga
reserve, before returning to the inn. He’d find out the truth once and for all.
Why the hell was a Mohawk ghost haunting him? He didn’t know why, but he had a
sense of anticipation he couldn’t suppress. Something was going to happen, and
it was going to happen soon.

He ran his hand down his cheeks. The scratch was red and
swollen. Damn! With the morning he’d had, he’d forgotten to shave, and it
looked as if he’d slept in his clothes. Could he look any less professional? No
wonder the mayor and his toadies didn’t take him seriously.

Why in hell had Aaron and Lindsay been out in that storm? If
they’d been in that canoe, like the police suspected, then where were their
damn lifejackets? No one was to go out on the lake without a personal
floatation device. How many times had he repeated that litany? Guilt ate at
him, and he popped another antacid tablet into his mouth. Only a crazy person
would have gone out on the water last night, and those two hadn’t been crazy.

He’d argued with Aaron and Lindsay at lunch yesterday. They’d
asked to go to the police, but he’d cautioned them to wait. The last thing anyone
needed was misinterpreted findings like those. Could one of the locals have
overheard them? He’d wanted to check the results himself. He’d never doubted
their work before, why yesterday? Last night he’d run those water samples
himself a dozen times, and the results were the same. Aaron and Lindsay were
right. Someone was cooking methamphetamine and dumping the waste products
directly into the lake.

Nothing else could account for the high levels of ammonia
hydroxide, one of the by-products in the production of the synthetic drug. If
one of the locals was involved…They’d gone to the drug store in
Picton
. Had they inadvertently discovered something that
had gotten them killed? Cold medication was
key
in
synthesizing the drug. There was no way he’d believe this had been an accident.

He should have contacted the police, but with what?
Unsubstantiated data wasn’t necessarily proof, and the meth lab could be
anywhere on the island. He closed his eyes and rubbed his temples. His
hydrology project had morphed into a potential ecological and environmental
disaster. Water from the Lake of the Mountain fed directly into the Bay of
Quinte
and Lake Ontario. Hell, the entire Saint Lawrence
River could be poisoned. How many towns and cities between here and the ocean
drew their drinking water from the river? How could anybody be so
irresponsible? Every pound of meth created meant five pounds of poison dumped
into the water. Assuming the lab was new, the level of toxins in the water had
no way to go but up.

He planned to share their findings with the mayor as soon as
the cocky son of a bitch granted him an audience. He couldn’t stand the man,
and for some reason Mayor Ron didn’t like him either, but maybe the guy would
lighten up and cut him some slack since poisoned water wasn’t something he’d
want either. The mayor could alert the police to be on the look-out for
increased meth sales in the area, and maybe they’d consider whatever had
happened to Lindsay and Aaron hadn’t been an accident.

Cooking meth was extremely dangerous, but there were big
bucks at stake in the sale of illegal drugs. The last he heard, it cost about a
hundred dollars to make an ounce of meth, which sold on the streets for about
eight hundred bucks. That was some return on your investment, and the sellers
didn’t care about the collateral damage they caused.

Tony’s head pulsed, and he searched his backpack for his
migraine medication. It was probably a little early for a third dose, but he
was dying here. The last thing he needed was a crippling headache. He massaged
his temples and tried to focus his attention on Aaron and Lindsay again. He
shivered.

He hated the “someone’s walking over my grave feeling” he’d had
ever since he’d arrived on the island. Between the heebie-jeebies and the
X-rated dreams…It was like a visit to the
Twilight
Zone
. All he needed was the eerie music and a Rod
Serling
look-alike to make the strangeness
complete.

He checked his watch. The lord almighty, Mayor Ron Davies,
had agreed to see him at two. It was ten to two. He hoped the man wouldn’t
leave him sitting there cooling his heels like he had the last time. It was
like being put on hold on the phone. If you died on hold, would anyone notice?
He shivered.
Bad choice
of words.

He got out of the vehicle, locked the door, and crossed the
street to the municipal building.

* * * *

Michelle glanced at her watch. Two o’clock. She felt disconnected,
as if she wore someone else’s skin, and the fit wasn’t a good one. Pictures of
men didn’t usually
phase
her, but she’d almost had an
orgasm just looking at Dr. Tony Steele’s photograph. As if that wasn’t bad
enough, she was attracted to the other man, Ron Davies, too. Maybe not as
deeply, but she wouldn’t walk away if he showed any interest in her. Maybe she
should ask Colin for time off, and let him assign the new case to someone else.

Who are you kidding?
Her conscience prodded.
You want to see
this through. You have to know who drowned, and if it’s him, then you have to
solve the puzzle.
She sighed.
Has
everything that’s been happening led to this? It makes no sense.

“Sorry I’m late. Sheila said you wanted to see me?”

“Yes. Come in, and close the door.”

Michelle entered the Provincial Coroner’s Office. Colin sat
behind his desk shuffling the inevitable piles of paper dwelling there. She
frowned. He appeared more preoccupied than usual.

“What did you make of the photo I sent you?” Not a people person
at the best of times, he was more abrupt than usual, and she furrowed her brow
deeper.

“Which one?”

“Damn it. You know which one I mean—the drowning victims.”

His quick flash of temper surprised her. She’d never seen
Colin flustered like this.

“It wasn’t very helpful. Is it the only one we have?”

He nodded. “The police officer who responded to the scene dropped
his phone into the lake. The caretaker took the picture and a few others. We should
get them shortly.”

“You’d think whoever fished the bodies from the water would
have pulled the upper torsos out. Leaving them half-in, half-out like that is
just wrong.”

“Nobody pulled them out. The current pushed them ashore.
This is how they were found, and no one dared touch the bodies before the
police arrived.”

Colin reached for a green sheet in the open folder on his
desk.

“Local law enforcement and the mayor want to rule it an
accidental drowning and release the bodies immediately. I’ve put the kibosh to
that. I’m sure you agree, based on that picture
alone,
there are too many unanswered questions to rubber stamp this one.”

Michelle nodded, and slipped into the chair in front of
Colin’s desk.

“The nine-one-one call came in at eight-twelve. The police
got there within fifteen minutes, paramedics shortly after. The local medical
examiner is on holiday, and the G.P. sitting in for him didn’t feel justified
in handling this on his own. He called it in. Damn good thing he did. Paramedics
loaded the bodies into the ambulance for transfer. On my orders, they were
taken to the morgue in Belleville, not
Picton
.”

Michelle frowned. That wasn’t standard procedure. Bodies
usually were sent to the nearest city or hospital morgue, and Colin was a
stickler for following procedure. She opened the file on her phone and stared
at the photograph again as if looking at it long enough would somehow change it
into an image that made sense and could easily be explained. The bodies weren’t
bloated as most floaters were.

“I can see why the police would think they’d drowned, but
don’t local authorities read the information leaflets we send out? Drowning is
no longer sufficient as the cause of death. People don’t just drown. There’s
always another reason why they succumb to immersion. The local LEOs might want
to close this case quickly, but if this photograph is anything to go by, it
doesn’t look like that’s going to happen. Nobody willingly goes into the water
this way, not even to commit suicide.”

She looked at the photograph again and shook her head.

“Something’s off. People bundle like that to stay warm. It’s
something I’d have expected in a remake of the
Titanic
movie—lovers knowing they were doomed, or a parent and
child, jumping into the ocean, snuggled together so they wouldn’t drift apart.
It would have added poignancy to a tragic scene. Why are you showing me this?”

“I know you just got back, but I need you to lead the
investigation on this one. You’re the best forensic pathologist I have, and
cold-water immersion is your specialty. This is a high profile case, and I need
my best person on the job—that’s you.”

She sighed. “How long have they been missing?” It would give
her a time frame for the deaths.

“They haven’t. They were seen around six-thirty last
night
and were found on the beach this morning.”

“That’s impossible. If they’d gone into the water this way,
their combined body weight and the wet clothing would have dragged them down.
In this temperature, it would take weeks for sufficient gases to form to allow the
bodies to surface. So are we to believe they were standing on shore, snuggling,
fell head-first into the water, and didn’t make any effort to get up? That’s
ridiculous. It’s possible, given the recent storm activity, a rip tide sucked
them into the water, but I can’t see it. The tide would have pulled them to the
deepest part of the lake, not left them like this.”

She stared at the picture again, her heart in her throat.
“Do we at least know who they are?”

“Unfortunately, we do. Meet Aaron
Hart,
age twenty-four, and Lindsay Miller, twenty-three.”