Gone and Done It (3 page)

I let out a string of cuss words.

The unexpected sound of my voice startled me. I had to pull myself together or my career as a psychic consultant to the sheriff would be over before it started. Trying to find out who this person was from the bare bones would be a first for me. For years I’d denied having anything other than intuition. I’d recently found out how my
intuition
worked, or at least one aspect of it.

The whole of it had not been explored. One thing at a time. That was all anyone could do. One thing at a time.

I touched the green pendant at my neck, the moldavite necklace that had been a gift from my late husband. I didn’t believe Roland was dead, despite what the Army said, and this touchstone reminded me of his love. A sense of calm washed over me. I didn’t understand how the stone soothed me, but I was grateful for order coming to my thoughts.

I scrubbed my face with my hands and stepped closer to the skull I’d unearthed. How would I do this? I’d already tried reading above the hole, and hadn’t learned anything. Way I saw it, I had two choices. I could lower my shields and touch the skull. Or I could meditate and seek out the soul of the deceased. I hadn’t tried dreamwalking in some time, but going into a trance out here in the woods was dangerous. My physical body would be unprotected, which is why dreamwalkers worked their craft in their home environment.

With Virg and Ronnie sitting on guns and Tasers, and God only knew what else, the vulnerability of a dreamwalk was too great a risk.

That meant I had to touch the skull.

I shuddered and edged closer to the hole.

Fast. Just do it and get it over with.

Doubt edged into my thoughts. What the hell had I gotten myself into? I’d sold myself and my abilities like a carnival sideshow freak. But then, people like Virg and Ronnie thought I was a freak anyway, so what did it matter? Especially if using my perceptions garnered me the income I needed to pay my bills and take care of Larissa.

The sun clouded over as I dropped to my knees beside the hole. Behind me I heard car doors open.

“Ma’am,” Virg hollered. “Walk away from the hole.”

I waved him off. “It’s okay. The sheriff asked me to examine the bones.”

Virg crept closer, his hand on his weapon. “Step away from the deceased.”

“I’m doing my job. Call the sheriff.” Taking a deep breath, I turned my back on Virg and lowered my chest to the ground so that the skull was within arm’s reach. Memories flashed in my head of the last time I’d touched an object belonging to a murder victim.

Horrifying, gut-wrenching, nauseating memories.

My body chilled. The smell of the freshly dug earth wafted up through me as if I wasn’t even there. I splayed my hand above the empty eye sockets, focusing my awareness to my trembling fingertips. Virg muttered something else, but his words didn’t register. I was doing this. For me. For Larissa.

I dropped my mental shields and reached for the skull. Light flared around me as if I were at the center of an orb, brighter than I could stand. I squinted into the glow. Energy pulsed above me, but only a faint trace ebbed through my hand. There was a soft sound, mournful, the way the wind sighs through the pines, but fuller. Like restrained weeping.

Hazy images flashed into my thoughts.

A man and a woman burying a child. A daughter. The man held his hat in his hand; the woman clung to an infant and wept as if her heart were cleaving in two. The image shifted, and I saw the same grieving man throwing dirt on two bodies in a hole. The sun hung low in the sky. He shoveled fast, with a grim expression and terse movements. A name slipped from his lips, too soft for me to catch.

The image winked out. Darkness filled in behind the image. Dismay roared through me. I was so close. I almost had it. I fumbled for the skull, but I flailed in vain.

Suddenly my back arched as excruciating pain shot from head to toe and back again. Screams ripped through the air. My screams.

Fragmented voices drifted through the void. Voices raised in anger. Voices quivering in fear. I strained to hear the words, but they faded without warning.

I floated in the nothingness, bobbing along, blindly bumping into unfamiliar objects. I tried to reach out to steady myself, but my arms wouldn’t work. Legs either.

What was wrong with me?

Was I dead?

No! A soundless roar erupted from my lips. This wasn’t right. I had a daughter to rear. I couldn’t die.

A pinprick of light appeared. Was that heaven? I edged toward the shadows. I couldn’t leave now. Larissa needed me.

I fought the tide of the light, but its purity drew me forward. My head refused the call, but I was drawn to the beam, a hapless steel shard in a strong magnetic field. Panic rose in my throat; my pulse thundered through my ears.

This is not what I wanted. I want to live.

A voice threaded its way into the darkness.
Let go, Baxley. Don’t fight it. Let go and let fate guide you. You can do this. Release control and listen to the sound of my voice.

I recognized that voice. “Mama?” I craned my neck up, cursing my sightless eyes. “Mama? Where are you?”

It’s all right, dear. Listen to my voice. Follow the sound of my voice. You can do this. Come on, Baxley. Do this for your family. Listen and let go.

I didn’t want to let go, but I trusted my mother. I angled toward the sound of her voice. The light was brighter now, the air cooler on my skin. “I’m coming, Mama. Keep talking.”

My fingertips tingled. My legs twitched. A nauseating sense of disorientation swept through me. I’d been there before. The gate between the living and the dead. I’d gotten trapped at this passage after Uncle Emerald died and again when I’d tried to find Roland on the night of his funeral. Mama had talked me back to life both times.

Blurred shapes moved in the gloom. I dialed in the sight, keeping Mama’s beacon of a voice as my focus. Muscle spasms wracked my limbs, but I persisted. One foot in front of the other. I couldn’t get discouraged about how far I had to go. Just one little step at a time.

That’s my girl. Come on, Baxley. You’re doing great. Listen to the sound of my voice. Listen and follow it to the light.

“You killed her, Virg.” Ronnie’s concerned voice wafted past my ears.

“She should have come around by now,” Virg said. “Three seconds. That’s all anyone stays out when we nuke ’em.”

“Good thing I answered her phone,” Ronnie said. “How you reckon her mama knew to call her? You think it’s that hinky woo-woo stuff going on? Think them Nesbitts got their own psychic hotline?”

“Who the hell cares, long as I didn’t kill her. Look at her eyelids. They’re twitching now, and look at that. Her finger moved.”

The darkness lifted from my head and my shoulders, then cleared from my waist and feet. I strode confidently on a well-trod path toward the light. I recognized this veiled place, and I knew my way home from here. I wasn’t dead. I was very much alive.

My steps hastened. I raised my head to the warmth of the light, hugging my arms to my hollow belly. Summoning energy into my core, I stepped through the thin veil.

White light ebbed into the glare of sunshine. Overhead, a solitary hawk soared in a cloudless blue vault. Beside me, oaks and fragrant pines stretched high toward the sky, bending the rays of the setting sun. Two round faces orbited over me. Virg and Ronnie. The sheriff’s deputies.

“She’s back.” Ronnie’s toothless grin brought warmth to my heart.

But his words confused me. I glanced over at Virg’s grim face. “I’m back? I didn’t go anywhere.”

“You went somewhere, ’cause you shore weren’t here,” Ronnie said.

“Is Mama here?” I lifted my head up to peer around the wooded area. I saw the two cops, two police cruisers, my truck, and the gilt-edged sign on the tabby wall. Understanding dawned. I was at Carolina Byrd’s new place, Mallow.

“Nope.” Ronnie removed my phone from his ear and flipped it shut. “She called on your phone and insisted on talking to you.”

Warmth flooded back into my limbs. Wonderful, life-giving warmth. Mama had known I was in trouble, and she’d come to my aid. I would definitely thank her later. I pushed myself up on my elbows. I may be a weird Nesbitt, but I wasn’t entirely without resources.

“Hold it right there,” Virg cautioned. “EMS is on their way.”

A jolt of panic shot through my singed nerves. No doctors. I wasn’t a lab rat. One experimental animal in the Nesbitt family had been enough. “Stop ’em. I don’t need medical attention. I feel fine now. What happened to me?”

After Ronnie relayed that I’d refused medical attention to dispatch, I breathed easier. The muscles in my legs twitched as if they’d animated themselves. I stared at the odd sight, trying to understand what had happened. My distress returned full fold, and I glared at Virg.

He retreated. “Uh, I’m sorry, ma’am. I’m trained to protect the crime scene. I didn’t know you were operating under the sheriff’s authority.”

“I told you it was okay.”

His head bobbed in agreement. “Yes, ma’am, ya did. But people lie to us all the time. Noncompliants have to be subdued. Rule ninety-eight ten. I was within my rights as a LEO.”

My brow furrowed. “You’re guided by your astrological sign?”

“No, ma’am. LEO that’s L-E-O. It means Law Enforcement Officer.”

Heat rose to my face. Note to self: brain doesn’t work well after passing out. Virg must be quoting from a policy manual, and I was on the wrong end of the law.

Just another crazy Nesbitt.

Hell, I’d always be a crazy Nesbitt. I couldn’t change that, though Lord knows, I’d prayed for it often enough when I was a teen.

I sat all the way up, flexing my feet, stretching my arms, realigning my ponytail and ball cap. My back stung. But I was whole, which was more than I could say for my frayed senses.

The sunlight was too bright, Virg and Ronnie a little too loud. I tasted blood. Feeling around in my mouth, I found where I’d bitten my lip.

I tried to piece together the events before I blacked out. I’d come here to plant the weeping cherry tree. I’d dug the hole, had help removing the big root, and found a human skull. I’d called the cops. I had no recollection of passing out. “I don’t get it. What happened?”

“Virg shot you with the Taser. You got tased, Baxley.” Ronnie slapped his thigh and laughed as if it were the funniest joke he’d ever heard. “Yessiree, Bob. He shot fifty-thousand volts through your body.”

That explained a lot. My emotions crested and surged dangerously. I glanced up at Virg. “Why did you shoot me?”

“I was protecting the scene.” His hand rose from a pocket to hover above his weapon.

Was he going to shoot me now? My voice rose an octave. “From me? I’m the one who found it in the first place. You wouldn’t have a scene if it weren’t for me.”

“You didn’t follow orders. I had no choice.”

If only my head didn’t throb, I could make sense of this conversation. My fingers curled into fists, nails digging into my palms. “What orders? And who are you to order me around?”

“Once a LEO is on the scene, civilians must respect their authority.”

“Or else you shoot them?” At the sound of a siren approaching, I winced. The sound magnified within my head, echoing through pain sensors at the speed of light. I clutched my head and rocked into a fetal position. “Oo-oohh. Make it stop. Make it stop.”

“She’s gone crazy, Virg. Should we cuff her?”

“You moron. She was okay a second ago. Somethin’ changed. Look at the way she’s holding her ears. Do you think she got a bug in there?”

“I ain’t scared of no bug.” Ronnie dropped down beside me and tried to move my hands.

I cupped my fingers tighter. I tried to focus on his rounded face. “Noooo,” I whispered urgently. “The siren. Make it stop.”

Ronnie flipped the switch on his com unit. “Cut the siren.”

Blessed silence followed. Even so, it took a few seconds for my hypersensitive nerves to relax. Cautiously, I removed my hands from my ears. My gaze flitted around the area, assessing the next threat. My heart tried its darnedest to escape from my chest. Oh God, I needed to be far away from here.

“Better?” Ronnie leaned over, concern etched on his round face.

I swallowed hard and nodded. I wasn’t okay, but I was better. My senses were too jacked up. That was the problem. I tried to dampen my senses, but nothing happened. The Taser had scrambled my electrical system, which is where my protective shielding originated.

I heard the ants marching over the sand, the whir of mosquito wings, and the slide of air over each leaf. I pressed my hands to my throbbing temples, but it didn’t help. Biting down on my lip, I sought a way to protect myself from sensory overload.

I wanted to go home, to curl up in my bed in a dark room, and sleep until this mistake was corrected. What was I doing? This wasn’t a mistake. This was life. Sleeping too much didn’t work when Roland was declared dead by the Army, and it durned sure wouldn’t work now.

I tried to stand. Ronnie planted a beefy palm on my shoulder. “Don’t get up. We got to check you out first.”

That should have put the fear of God in me, but my circuits were crossed and I laughed until I cried. How the hell could these idiots check me out when I didn’t know what was wrong?

I was still rolling in the sand, laughing with tears streaming down my cheeks, when the sheriff and the coroner arrived. Great. Dr. Sugar.

Would he pronounce me dead or insane?

I shrank back from the skinny coroner. Even though he routinely dealt with dead people, Dr. Bo Seavey, aka Dr. Sugar, had quite a womanizing reputation. His natty pants and bright shirt didn’t fool me. The dark places I’d glimpsed inside his head on occasion made me shudder. I didn’t want to know more about him, and in my hyperaware state, his personal information could leak across any physical contact we might have.

I felt along the ground for a weapon. Where was a sharp stick when you needed one? Too bad I’d chucked that fat root in the woods. “Don’t touch me.”

“Sounds like she’s back to normal, Doc.” Sheriff Wayne Thompson strutted closer, a gold badge gleaming at his trim waist. He was handsome as sin, with dark hair, bedroom eyes, and a muscular build. Trouble was, he knew precisely his effect on women. “She’s breathing fire, and she’s got two fists full of dirt.”