Grave Echoes: A Kate Waters Mystery (16 page)

“What about the climb today?”

“You know where you’re going, Sean, and Eric is good with the topography. I promise I’ll explain everything to Stewart. We got the satellite systems set up, that was our main goal.”

Without a word, Sean disappeared behind the cabin door momentarily, coming back with his keys in hand.

“Thank you,” Kate said.

He wore a poker face. “Can you drive it in the snow?” he asked.

“Yes. I’ll go slow.”

Sean shifted, leaning against the doorway, as if eager for her to leave. But Kate had to clear things between them. “Look, Sean, I’m sorry about what happened on the mountain, about the things I said. I needed to hear it from you.” He gave her a bored look. Either he didn’t believe her or he just didn’t care anymore.

“Now you do.”

Kate nodded her head and then stepped off the porch. Or do I? she thought. She turned to him. “I’ll leave your truck at the Ranger Station where my jeep is parked.”

Sean expressed a fake smile and then shut the door. It was obvious he was still mad, but at least he would recover. Kate wasn’t so sure about David.

***

Yellow arrows escorted Kate toward the MRI section of the hospital. She frowned underneath the harsh fluorescent lights overhead, a striking contrast to the natural light of day she had grown accustomed to over the past 36 hours on the mountain. Even with the warm glow of autumn gleaming through the windows, the hallways and waiting rooms still felt cold and alienating. Ahead, a set of doorways swung open and a tall, slim nurse in a green smock directed her to the front desk.

“He’s in room 318,” the receptionist said, gesturing to Kate’s left.

Swallowing back her fear to see David’s condition, Kate walked to his room and opened his door. A blue curtain drawn for privacy. She peered around the fold, expecting to see him sitting up impatiently in the hospital bed, channel surfing, or picking at his breakfast, but he was far from that. The TV was off, the lights were dim, and he lied down with eyes closed and head swathed in white gauze bandages. One area above his left eye protruded out, what Kate hoped was just additional padding and not an actual protrusion of his head. The left eye, now a magenta blue, had swelled so much, he could barely open it. Stitches extended from underneath the gauze, and she imagined they cut through his eyebrow.

“It looks worse than it feels,” he said, pushing his breakfast tray aside.

“Oh my God…David,” Kate cried. “What happened?”

“I fell off a ladder and hit my head on the desk upstairs. I was trying to fix that damn window.” He tossed the television remote on the table stand next to the bed. A black and white episode of the Twilight Zone played.

Kate sat down next to him, grabbing his hand in both of hers. The hospital gown and IV through his left arm made him look vulnerable, a certain frailty she’d never seen on him before.

“How did you get to the hospital?” She knew he couldn’t have driven.

“When I brought the ladder in from the garage, I left the front door open and Mr. Burton heard me holler.”

“You are lucky beyond fortune—you could still be there on the floor.” Kate laid her hand on his shoulder, peeking at the side of his head. “But how did you fall? That’s not like you.”

David frowned with a seriousness that made Kate sit back. “I think it’s time we talked,” he said.

The last time she had heard those words was in her last relationship, just before she’d learned of another woman. Already under the impression she had heard the worst of the news with his injuries, her throat choked up. “What do you mean? Have you met someone else?”

David gripped her hand and let out a small chuckle. “You could say that.” Kate tried to pry her hand away from his to hide the tears swelling in her eyes, but he stopped her. “Not like that, Kate. I love you and only you.”

She looked over to him, confused. A warm tear wet her arm.

“Hey, I’m sorry,” David said, reaching for her hands. “I didn’t mean to upset you. What’s going on?”

Kate stood from the bed, relieved he wasn’t in love with someone else, but frustrated for jumping to conclusions—again. “Just…so much has happened, with Jev…, and my trip up Mt. Hood didn’t go so well.”

“You’ve got a lot going on, Kate.”

She wiped the tears from her face. “Everything is so wrong, and now you're sitting here in the hospital looking like Tutankhamun.” Kate searched for a tissue in her pocket.

David smirked and adjusted himself upright in bed. “Sit down,” he said, patting the bed beside him.

“I'll tell you all about it later,” Kate said. She sat next to him. “So, who is this person?”

“Some other time,” David replied. “You're not feeling well.”

“No, I want to know. I'm fine, really.”

He took a deep breath and fixed his eyes on her. “I fell off the ladder because I saw a face in the window.”

“In the window?” she repeated. “It's a two-story window.”

“It wasn't outside the window.”

A feathery sensation bristled across Kate's arm. “Someone was in the room with you?”

He nodded, then turned to the verdant-green lawn outside the hospital window. A row of leaf-stripped cherry trees and decorative concrete benches surrounded the grassy corner. “I can't be certain,” he continued, “but I think it was Jev.” His eyes drifted back to her.

“Jev?” Kate's worry burned into aggravation. She stood from the bed. “I thought we'd already discussed this.”

“I swear, I'm not trying to make you mad, but she was there, Kate. I saw her.”

“No, you think you saw her, David. Ghosts do not exist.” Kate felt their relationship unraveling again, but couldn't seem to stop it, no matter how patient and understanding she tried to be. Jev's warning, about moving in with David so soon, rang loud and clear in her mind now.

“Just because you don't believe in ghosts, Kate, doesn't make it untrue.”

She walked over to the window, biting off a layer of skin from her lip until it stung from exposed, raw flesh. She knew what she wanted to say, that just because he believed in them didn’t make them true, but what would it get her?

“Last night was Halloween,” David said, “the most opportune time for spirits to come back from the dead. I believe Jev tried to contact us.”

Kate couldn't believe he was serious and turned to study him for a moment, realizing the bump on his head might be more severe than she thought. “What kind of medication are they giving you?”

She went over to his IV station and checked the labels on the clear bags hanging from the pole. One of them was Demerol, and it was nearly empty.

“Yes, it is Demerol, and no, it doesn't cause hallucinations or delusional thoughts. I didn't hit my head that hard. I know what I saw.”

“Well…I was told that not all of your tests were in yet, so until then, let's just forget about the ghosts. Okay?” She sat down in a chair next to his bed and sighed. “Besides, there's a simpler explanation to what has been going on around the house.”

“Have you ever heard of Occum's Razor?” David asked.

“Yes. The simplest explanation is probably the correct one,” Kate said, with emphasis on the world simplest. Her stomach growled and she helped herself to the blueberry muffin on his tray.

“But your explanations are not simple anymore. The face in the window wasn't a hallucination, windows don't open by themselves, little girls don't appear and then vanish, and picture frames don't mysteriously fall off a shelf.”

“You're right. You didn't hallucinate, but maybe you were so exhausted from all your long hours at work, you misunderstood something you saw, just like the little girl I thought I saw. Someone—a real person—has to be opening the window, and a gust of wind is probably to blame for knocking over the picture. There is no such thing as ghosts, and I can't believe you keep insisting that there is.”

“You're digging for something logical, Kate, but the world isn't always logical.”

“Yes, the world is logical, but our brain is not,” she argued, remembering Sarah saying something similar. “We don't always see the truth.” Kate thought about her accusations toward Sean. “Even when we want to see it.”

David lay back in the bed with his hand tucked behind his head. “Maybe I am seeing things that aren't really there.” He touched his swollen cheek and purpled eye. “But I didn't just see them; I felt them too.”

Kate felt a tickle in her belly.

“You know that feeling you get when someone is watching you?” David said. “You can almost feel the pressure of their stare; it's like walking into a spider's web. You catch a glimpse of it and then it disappears, but you can still feel it wrapping around you.”

Kate stared hard at David, unsettled by his last statement. She had felt something similar when she saw the little girl. A spider's web. That's essentially what she felt she was being pulled into—wrapped and bound with secrets, death, and ghosts, and then left to dangle precariously for a creeping darkness to sip the life out of her ever so gently.

Kate rolled the window down in her jeep, hoping the cool air would enliven her spirit as she drove across the Ross Island Bridge, headed to Jev’s house for the wake. Today was the last official good-bye to her sister. After this, she would be alone to grieve, without group condolences and encouragement delivered in casserole dishes and baked goods, where people gave solace in a story or comfort through mere presence.

She looked out over the bridge, at the water below. Today, it looked like a smoky mirror from the dark clouds overhead. “Water under the bridge,” she said to herself, thinking about her attempts to stop the growing distance between her and David.

They both steered two different directions, and Kate knew David’s estrangement stemmed from her skepticism about his beliefs. His insistence that Jev haunted them only pushed her further away, and even though she wanted to put the past behind them and move on, their differences continued to surface, stifling their affection for one another.

David trekked down his own rocky trail—one that currently she didn’t have the footing for. She had other troubles demanding her attention. Besides the obvious threat of someone following her, the volcano threatening to blow, and her increasing, excessive sleepiness, which no amount of coffee could help, only worsened. She'd called the pharmacy this morning to refill her prescription, but it wouldn’t be ready until after the wake. Hopefully, she could stay awake.

Kate turned her mind back to the wake as she pulled into the driveway behind Jack and Louise’s car. Outside, a wet crispness chilled the air, sharpening her senses with refreshed energy. The rain and wind subsided, leaving the streets and neighborhoods blanketed in a quiet fog, and most of the leaves had fallen off the two oak trees in Jev’s yard, which someone had raked into three big piles. Kate lifted a fruit platter and a sack of baguettes from the back of her Jeep.

Louise greeted her at the front door. “Do you need help?” she yelled from the steps.

“No, I’m fine. I’ve got it.”

Jack appeared in the doorway, holding out his hands to take the platter from Kate’s arms. “Where’s David?”

“He fell off a ladder the other night and hit his head pretty good. He’s all right, but has a headache and needs to rest.”

“Fell off a ladder…What was he doing?”

“Trying to fix a broken window and lost his balance,” Kate replied, leaving out the details that his deceased daughter was purportedly haunting her boyfriend. She set the baguettes down on the kitchen table, scoping out the house—specifically searching for the urn. Her dad and Louise had said they were going to pick it up that morning.

Louise clasped her hands together, big, gold hoops jingled at her wrist. “How did he lose his balance?”

“He must have been tired.” She glanced around the room. “Where is the urn?”

Jack and Louise turned toward the fireplace.

“We thought it would be a nice place while people visited,” Louise said.

Kate walked to the hearth and stood in front of the urn, where it was tucked next to an Arrowhead houseplant and a large rose quartz crystal. Jack and Louise came up next to her. For a moment, they all stood silent, deep in their own thoughts.

“It’s a beautiful vase, Kate,” her dad said.

“Thanks. I thought it fit her.” She grimaced at her choice of words.

“It’s very earthy, just like Jev,” Louise commented.

Jack turned to Kate. “Maybe we could forget about our differences today and celebrate Jev. That’s what she would have wanted.”

“Just today?” Kate commented. “She would want us to do that every day.”

“Yes, she would want that.” He steadied his gaze on her. “And so would your mother.”

Kate’s heart jumped. “You’re right,” she said, holding out her hand to him. He grasped it in both of his and pulled her to him, giving her a small hug. Then Jack and Louise retreated into the kitchen to finish prepping the food. Kate stayed in the living room for a moment, in front of the urn. Reflecting.

She knew some of her troubles between her and her dad were the result of her own bitterness, from not knowing her mother was dying of cervical cancer until just days before her death. It was her mother’s choice to keep it a secret, Kate knew this, but her mother had been sick and dying and wasn’t thinking rationally, so it was up to her dad to make the proper decisions for the family. Yet Kate felt he’d betrayed his daughters and stole precious time with their mother from them. Staring at the urn, she remembered what Adam, the funeral director, had told her, ‘Death can turn people into different people.’ It had, and was.

Louise came out of the kitchen carrying two hors d'oeuvre trays and set them on the coffee table. “I made my special ham roll-ups. Would you like to try one Kate?” she said, holding one up to her.

Having suddenly lost her appetite, Kate doubted she would want to try one anyway, and declined Louise’s offer. “No thanks. Maybe later?” Terry walked into the living room, and Kate went over to say hi.

Terry bent close to her when she approached. “A detective came to visit me yesterday, Kate. Is everything all right?”

Kate didn’t know how much to say, or what Detective Wells had told her, so she acted vague. “The police are just trying to clear some things up with Jev’s accident before they can submit the report.”

“I’m confused…the Detective asked me questions about Sean. Did something happen?”

“We haven’t been able to find Jev’s cell phone and house key,” Kate said. She shifted the direction of topic. “You haven’t seen anybody over here, have you?”

“No, I haven’t, but I’ll let you know if I do.”

More people were arriving, and Kate thought she should introduce herself.

“Thanks, Terry. I appreciate your help.”

It was another half hour before the living room and kitchen were congested with hungry, rueful bodies. Sarah arrived with a big vase of sunflowers, some of Jev’s favorites, and wanted updates on Kate’s health, David’s fall, and if she’d learned anything more about the mysterious key. Kate told her she hoped to ask a few of Jev’s friends to see if they might know anything about the key or Jev’s whereabouts before her accident, otherwise there wasn’t much more they could do.

“Hang in there,” Sarah told her.

Most of the guests gathered in the living room, telling stories of Jev and the adventures they’d had with her. Though bittersweet, Kate enjoyed listening to them recount all the wonderful and comical stories of her sister’s life, especially those she had never heard before. Kate spent time getting to know some of her sister’s friends who she hadn’t met, but the one that interested her the most was Thea, the witch.

She exuded mystery. Thea dressed in a long, green wool sweater, cinched at the waist, tall, black suede boots, and a hat that capped her dark eyes. Large red jasper earrings dangled around her chestnut hair. Though her features were delicate, her demeanor suggested a woman with intelligence, independence, and a mysterious nature from the way her eyes calculated her surroundings.

Kate wondered what kind of memories Thea shared with Jev and suddenly felt stabs of jealousy at having been excluded from part of her sister’s personal life—one that at the moment, she needed access to. Intending to converse with Thea alone, Kate positioned herself next to her, but the large attendance of friends prevented an ample opportunity to discuss anything beyond common small talk.

By four o’clock, Kate felt exhaustion smothering her. She had difficulty keeping her eyes open, and several people had commented on her sluggish appearance. Kate sat down to rest her legs on one of the spare chairs brought in from outside. But as soon as she did, her strength plunged, her hearing fragmented into incoherent burbles, and the room started to tilt before it all went black.

The blackness faded…into a forest, alive and crisp with trees and a kaleidoscope of green leaves. Kate stood on a path in the middle of a thick forest. She heard a faint sound, Jev talking, “Come here...,” she heard Jev say. Kate followed Jev’s voice through the trees, but giant brown spiders dangled in webs around her. She heard Jev’s voice turning urgent. She ran toward her, batting the spiders away. Jev shouted Kate’s name—something was wrong. The pungent smell of the earth saturated the air, and wild berry twigs scraped her arms and legs as she ran down the trail. Kate didn’t slow. She had to find Jev. Blood in her veins drummed, and she strained to hear other sounds around her.

About ten feet in front of her, through the trunks of ash and maple, Kate saw Jev cornered in front of a giant wolf. The huge canine turned toward Kate before it bounded into the woods. Jev, camouflaged in a brown dress, smiled at Kate, and then followed the wolf. Kate chased after her, telling her to stay away from the wolf, but Jev didn’t seem to hear her.

The trail narrowed and darkened and the trees grew taller. Catching only glimpses of Jev’s hair and dress, Kate struggled to keep up. She neared the top of a hill and stopped, looking around. Jev was nowhere in sight. The trail descended on the other side of the hill, into an open ravine, but Kate couldn’t see her anywhere. Branches rustled, and the wolf emerged around the large trunk of a cedar. Kate tried to scream, but she’d lost her voice. She tried to back up, but her feet were frozen. The wolf watched her, with enormous teeth cradling its long tongue. Her limbs jerked, almost like she was being tugged on and pulled down.

“Kate? Kate?” someone called out. It was her dad.

Kate blinked her eyes, dizziness tingling in her body. The forest was gone. The crisp greenery had vanished, along with her sister. But in front of her, she could still see the wolf, though now in the painting above Jev’s fireplace.

“Kate? Are you all right?” Her dad’s face was so close to hers, she could see the fine wrinkles in his tanned skin, accentuating the handsome features around his eyes.

She felt the coarse fibers of the carpet with her hand and realized she’d fallen off the chair. A group of family and friends huddled around her, gaping with concerted expressions of worry. The attention heightened her embarrassment.

“I’m fine. Just a little tired,” she said, noticing Sarah behind her dad, wearing a scowl.

Her dad reached for her arm and helped her up to the couch. “I’ll get you some water,” he said, before heading into the kitchen.

Kate turned to Sarah, knowing exactly what she thought. “My prescription is going to be ready at 4 pm today,” she told her.

“Good,” Sarah said.

“I’m just tired from my trip to Hood. That’s all.” Kate took the glass of water from her dad, relieved to hear conversations picking up in the room again. She scanned the crowd for Thea but couldn’t see her anymore. “I’m going to go freshen up,” and then she headed down the hall to the bathroom.

The noise of the guests quieted once she was in the hallway, and Kate yearned for seclusion in the back rooms. She needed a few minutes alone, to collect her thoughts. She looked down the hall and noticed the door to Jev’s bedroom was cracked. That’s strange, she thought, having remembered shutting it earlier today before the guests arrived. Kate stopped in front of Jev’s bedroom door and pushed on it softly. A shadow moved. She opened the door wider and found Thea snooping through Jev’s dresser drawer.

***

Wells sat across from his daughter Julie, watching her scrape mayonnaise off her sandwich. They’d met for lunch downtown at McMenamin’s, a local chain of pub and grub breweries known for their original artwork, historic buildings, and delectable beer. Plants hung from vaulted ceilings crafted with cedar rafters and iron-rod accents. Paintings of wine country, moons with smiley faces, and farmers content next to their family, pets, and tractors festooned the walls above wooden bench-seat booths. Julie still wore her soccer uniform from Oregon State University and fixed her hair into two large braids that fell, one to each side of her neck, only emphasizing the youth she desperately tried to escape, Wells thought. She was nineteen, becoming a woman in a world full of dangers, of which she was oblivious to, and he often wished time would stop or speed up.

“I said no mayo,” Julie said irritably. “Why’s that so difficult?” She looked to her dad.

He smiled. “Listening skills are a rarity.” He looked around the restaurant at some of the customers and waiters. “Especially in this joint.” Most of the staff had tattoos, black clothes, piercings, and drove old BMWs with bumper stickers that read, Keep Portland Weird. “If it weren’t for the soup and fries, I probably wouldn’t come here.”

“Or the beer,” Julie responded.

Wells tossed her a frown. “But you wouldn’t know about that,” he said.

“I’m just telling you what I’ve heard.” She stuffed a wad of fries in her mouth. “They do have good fries,” she admitted between chews.

“How are your classes?”

“They’re fine.” She took a sip of her coke. “I’m in a biology class that I’m probably going to fail, because Mom and Pete are taking a vacation, and they want me to go with them.”

Pete was his ex-wife’s new husband, and though Wells was happy Sheila had moved on, he wasn’t happy about her selecting his accountant. “Do you want to go?”

“I don’t know.” Her eyes rolled. “I wouldn’t mind skipping a few classes, but I don’t really feel like spending it in the boondocks with no one to mingle with.” She pulled her turquoise phone from her pocket to check a text and then set it back down on the table.