Brain Storm (A Taylor Morrison Novel Book 1) (5 page)

It felt good to be back at work. After what I had learned the night before in my research, I felt fairly confident that there wouldn’t be any surprises today, but I was keeping my guard up anyhow and ordered at the drive through. Better to keep a few panes of glass between me and the other customers. At least until after I had my first cup of joe.

I turned onto Shackleford and then merged onto 430 right in front of a black BMW 325i. Normally, I wouldn’t have been able to tell you one BMW model from another. I wasn’t a car person at all, but in my line of work, I needed to know one make from another. I had the basics down pretty good, but it wasn't until I met Keith and his absolute adoration of the German sports car line, that I learned the difference between a 300 series and a 500 series. I now recognized the car without any problem, because that was what Keith drove. He said that was BMW’s smallest sedan. Four doors, an engine that roared and handling like a race car. It was his way of having a sensible business car while fulfilling his sports car needs. He loved that car and I loved to see the joy in his face when he drove it. It was the car he was driving when he went off the I-30 Bridge into the Arkansas River. Every time I saw one, it brought it all back.

We had been in the middle of a severe weather alert. Tornado watches were in effect and violent storms were passing through the area. Keith was heading back into town when a monster weather cell broke loose with a torrential downpour. He had lost control of the car on the bridge, a fact I still had trouble reconciling, and had crashed over the guard rail. With the storms, the Arkansas River was swollen and the current deadly. A witness reported the car had gone over, but with the flooding waters, rescue attempts were delayed and before I could begin to contemplate the possibility that he might be gone, the rescue mission status was changed to one of recovery. The search went on for weeks, the banks and river combed for miles down river. Neither the car nor Keith’s body had ever been recovered. The river had taken them. If not for the witness who saw the accident and the marks on the guard rail, I would have never known what had happened. He would have just vanished.
 

I had a hard time not breaking down every time I saw a BMW for months after that. The black BMW 325i is a very popular car in Little Rock and they seemed to be everywhere. I knew Keith was gone, but still, each time I saw the car, my breath caught and I looked, searching for the drivers face. Now, over a year after his death, I had quit searching, but still... I always noticed the car and I always remembered, the car a constant reminder. This was the second or third one I’d seen this morning and the day was still early.
 

Maybe it was because of that and the emotional roller coaster yesterday, but I found myself slipping into the past. The feeling of loss and loneliness that assaults you when your guard is down. Keith and I hadn’t been together for that long, but we had been so close. I had been working hard, minding my own business and suddenly, one day, there he was, right out of the blue. I had my career, good friends, dated when I felt like it or had time, which truthfully wasn’t often. I was happy and things were going great.
 

If he hadn’t happened into the picture, I would have never known the difference. But he had. It’s amazing how everything changes, how, although hard, life gets easier, dreams become bigger and the routine of life takes on new meaning when you find someone to share it with. Oh, I had Trinity, and she was and is so important, but it’s not the same as the person you know you’ll be with for life. The person you work with to accomplish something together. Keith understood my need to help people, to stick up for the little guy, to stop the bullies in life. To the outside world, I was cool, confident, logical. Keith knew me better than that. He held me when I failed, and cried for the child I was too late to save. Rejoiced with me in the little victories like discovering a clue that reopened a case that had been considered hopeless. He knew how I doubted myself, my ability to make sense of the mess, my fear of being too late to make a difference. He knew the Taylor that I kept hidden from the world and loved me anyway. My dreams, my fears, my needs. Things even Trinity didn’t know about. Now he was gone. Ripped out of my life almost as fast as he appeared in it.
 

I was left to pick up the pieces.That meant dealing with yesterday on my own and I had to admit, I hadn’t done a very good job of it. I had fallen apart, badly, and scared Trinity in the process. Keith was gone, and I had to handle this one on my own. Trinity would be there to help. No, she wasn’t Keith. No one was, but at least I wasn’t alone in this.

Resolved, I pushed the pedal down and took a last glance in the rear view at the BMW as I sped down 430 to the I-30 interchange and my first appointment.

FOUR

“SO WHAT YOU’RE saying, after spending all night researching, is that you still don’t know the answer? Have I got that right?”
 

Trinity forked up a chunk of pork along with some lettuce. We had both gotten pulled pork salads. Honestly I don’t know why we bother with the salad part, or rather, why I did. Trinity was into eating healthy and
 
she wore it well. On the occasion that she did drop off the healthy wagon, she tried to counteract it with eating something nourishing along with it. Like salads with pizza. Salad with pulled pork. I just didn’t see the point. Lettuce was just more calories and a waste of space in this case. The smoked pork was spiced perfectly and so tender it was hard to keep on your fork. Unlike Trinity, I had eaten most mine off the top and left the lettuce sitting there.

“That pretty much sums it up.” I had managed to pull up quite a bit of information on the internet. My first discovery being that my possible ‘mind moving’ skill was technically called telekinesis, a form of psychokinesis. Although I feel my label was more descriptive, I found the term psycho was appropriate or at least in my case I thought it was.
 

Uri Geller was perhaps the best known person who appeared to have the ability. He was the guy I remembered seeing on television. He did indeed bend spoons with his mind, but he wasn’t from Tibet and he could never replicate his ability in a scientific setting. Science fiction literature and movies were rife with talented people who threw things around at will, but whether or not it was a real ability, remained to be proven. Many claim to have it and there’re even videos of them passing the ‘spinning the pencil on the bottle’ test on the web, but I found just as much information refuting the test results, saying air movement from heating and cooling systems does the same thing. After hours of combing the far reaches of the internet, all I had to show for it was the name, some history and the fact that there is no proof Telekinesis exists. But there was no proof it didn’t exist either.
 

 
“I’m in the same boat as yesterday,” I confirmed, rooting around in the lettuce hunting for more pork. “Either I have Telekinesis or I’m crazy.”

“Or the guy threw the coffee on you. The keys could be just coincidence.” Her comment brought my gaze up in disbelief, distracting me from my pork search, but she was completely serious.
 

I wished he
had
thrown the coffee at me. How neat and tidy would that be? But that’s not what happened. I hadn’t imagined the look of horror on his face when it happened or the anger that followed when he was blamed. I also hadn’t imagined the calculating gaze he’d leveled at me or the feeling I’d had that he knew what was going on. I wasn’t sure where or if he fit into the picture, but I knew he hadn’t thrown the coffee. I had so totally crossed that possibility off the list that it never even occurred to me that Trinity was still hanging onto it.
 

“That’s not what happened. Why would some guy I’ve never seen before, throw coffee at me?” It wasn’t so much the words as the tone of my voice that set her off. Even to me, I had sounded incredulous that she would even think such a thing, and I winced as soon as the words were out of my mouth.

“I have no idea,” she shot back, obviously offended, “but what’s the likelihood of you suddenly developing Telekinesis? You’re good, Taylor, but you are not infallible. You may have read the whole thing wrong. I’m just saying, there could be something there. It is the most likely explanation.”

Snap and ow! Where had that come from? In all the years I had worked with and known Trinity, she had never doubted my judgement. Oh, we have more than our share of disagreements, but where my work is concerned, she has always trusted me. Now, not only was she questioning my judgement, she was downright insulting me. I know I’m not infallible, but really, who needs their best friend pointing it out. I may have been out of things yesterday, but I was back on top today. Okay, maybe not on top, but way better than I had been.
 

Confused, I just sat there staring at her, nursing my wounded pride, while she glared back at me. She was more than offended. She was downright angry. There was something more going on and I racked my brain trying to sort through the possible excuses that were rushing through my mind, when suddenly, comprehension dawned. I snapped my mouth shut and sat back, finally understanding.
 

She might have said it was the most likely explanation, but what she really meant was it was the explanation she could accept. Good friend that she was, she’d rather think the coffee incident was the result of a vindictive stalker than think that I was losing my mind, or had developed some sort of weird super power that there was no proof actually even existed. It did sound pretty far out there, even to me and I had experienced it firsthand. She hadn’t been there, hadn’t seen it what happened. As hard as this was for me to contemplate, it had to be nearly impossible for her. She was desperate for a logical explanation and I was usually the one to give it her. I felt my heart sink, because I was fairly certain that this time, logic had little if anything to do with it. I was going to disappoint her if that’s what she was looking for and I just had to hope she could forgive me for it.
 

“OK. I agree. There might be something there,” I hedged, choosing to use her own words, as they were obtuse enough for my purpose. It wasn’t exactly a lie. True, my idea of how he might be involved was completely different from hers, but there wasn’t any point in bringing it up and getting in a bigger argument. I weighed my guilt over the small deception and decided I could live with it. I gave her a small smile, hoping to reassure her. “I’ll look into it.”

From the cocky look she threw me, it was obvious she thought she had just solved the whole mystery. I knew better, but she was happy for now and there was no reason to rain on her parade until I had honed in on what was really going on. My working theory was that if you couldn’t find an obvious answer right off the bat, the best thing to do was start eliminating the alternatives until you could pin it down. Finding out where Denzel fit into this be a good start.
 

On a better footing, now that I had agreed to take a better look at Denzel, I thought it prudent to change the subject. I filled her in on the latest information I had obtained on our current case and then Trinity and I made plans for dinner at her grandmother’s after church on Sunday.
 

Trinity’s grandmother, or Mama D, as she was known to those of us who loved her, had pretty much adopted me into the family when I started working with Trinity. She always made sure I had at least one home cooked meal a week and was the only person I knew that could tell you what to do without you realizing she was doing it. I was convinced Trinity got her tricky lawyer ways from Mama D, but Trinity didn’t see it. Good as Trinity was, Mama D could wrap her around her little finger and Trinity always thought it was her own idea. It was a joy to behold when it was happening to someone else. I couldn’t complain though. Mama D had what I called “wise ways”. She would impart her wisdom and leave it to you to accept it or not, happy to help pick up the pieces when you chose wrongly.

When Trinity had graduated law school and started making some decent money, one of the first things she had done was get Mama D a house all her own. Nothing fancy. Mama D wouldn’t like that. But a cute little house. Neat and tidy with a nice front porch and a swing out front, it was close enough to the old neighborhood that Mama D could visit with her friends, but far enough away to put the memories of barely scraping by and living on welfare behind them. Back then, her brother, Kevin was still alive. He and Trinity had planted trees and bushes and painted the house a pretty pale yellow with black shutters and a red door. Mama D had retired from her multiple jobs and spent her days gardening, gossiping and feeding other people. Namely me, who, she was convinced, was wasting away to nothing but skin and bones although in my opinion, I could easily drop 5 to 10 pounds and still look quite healthy. Sunday dinner was her opportunity to ply me with fabulous temptations and I was totally happy to give her a free hand. I wasn’t much for cooking and didn’t give much thought to food, so I could easily make up for the calorie onslaught the following week and be ready for the next Mama D meal.

I assured Trinity I would be there with bells on and headed back to my car, leaving her obsessing over some candlesticks she had spotted in the shop window next to the restaurant. By the time I got the car door open and was settled inside, my mind was already on my next stop and I had pretty much put the whole Telekinesis thing on the back burner.
 

FIVE

MY APPOINTMENT EARLIER
in the morning with the witness had turned up some interesting information. I was working on finding a divorced Dad, who had taken a hike on his child support and alimony. Trinity became involved when dear old Dad skipped. Ignore a court order and it becomes a crime. A divorce lawyer may get your money, but a criminal lawyer will get your rear thrown in jail.