Connection, page 8
“Won the league last year,” Grace Cowan said from behind her. Remmy glanced at the detective from over her shoulder, nodding acknowledgement of the factoid. “Glad you could come. Come with me, please.”
Remmy followed her through the office, into an interview room much like the one she’d been in with Brian Wong. No need to explore this time, she flopped into the chair across from Grace, who sat tapping the tabletop with her fingers and glancing at her watch.
“So, what exactly are we waiting for?” Remmy asked.
“Not a what, but a who. My partner will be here any minute, with Julie’s brother, Matt Wilson. He wants to meet you.”
Dark eyebrows drew over narrowed blue eyes. “Why?”
“He has some questions for you,” Grace said simply. She was saved from explaining further when the door opened and Brian Wong appeared, carrying a bag from a Sonic restaurant. He gestured for a good looking guy to enter ahead of him, a man with sandy hair falling into his eyes. Remmy would have immediately known who he was, even if she had happened upon him on the street. She was suddenly filled with a sense of peace, of pure joy, and knew it was coming from Julie, her energy. For a moment she worried that perhaps Julie had been killed, and was in the room with them. Allowing her senses to stream out, searching with finger-like radar, she felt Julie in the form of a sudden and massive headache that seemed to extend all across her forehead.
Shaking off the ill effects, Remmy concentrated on the group that was making the small room feel downright claustrophobic.
“Well, I guess we’re all here,” Detective Wong said, setting his bag on the table and pulling out his breakfast, oblivious to the three pairs of eyes that were watching him. He set his coffee and breakfast sandwich off to the side, pouring the container of tater tots onto a napkin.
Remmy was amused by the daggers Grace sent his way. “That we are, Columbo,” she muttered, ignoring the glare she got from him. “Why, exactly, are we all here?”
“Brian? Why don’t you do the honors?” Grace turned hard eyes on him. He refused to look at her, instead taking his time fixing his coffee—three sugars and a touch of honey.
“That’s disgusting,” Matt said.
“Don’t knock it,” Brian said, still not looking at any of them. Finally he sighed and looked across the table at Remmy. “We need help in this investigation and we’d like to ask you some questions. About your...visions.”
Remmy held his gaze, not wavering as she reached across the table and snatched a tater tot. Popping it into her mouth, she chewed, swallowed, then spoke. “Okay. I’ll help you.”
****
Grace sat in the recliner where she’d been planted all evening, reviewing the notes she had taken that day. She closed her eyes in pleasure as her husband leaned down and gave her a tender kiss.
“Don’t stay up too late,” he said, heading off to bed.
She returned her attention to the yellow legal pad, flipping back a couple of pages and re-reading what she’d already gone over:
Another person there—
Chained to the wall—
Cold, gray area, cement-like—
Basement?—
Suspects sexual violation—
Does not know offender—
Grace came back to the first point of more than one person being with Julie. She tapped her pen against the pad, brow wrinkled in thought. What does that mean? Is the other person alive or dead? Male or female? Remmy felt it was another woman, but wasn’t sure.
Grace sighed in frustration. “Where are you, Julie?”
****
Matt was nervous, sitting at a table, waiting for the unusual young woman he had met earlier that morning at the police station. The two of them, and the two detectives, had sat in that little room for more than four hours, Grace and Brian grilling Remmy. He could tell that Wong was not entirely convinced by Remmy’s information, but Cowan seemed to buy the woman’s story hook, line, and sinker. Matt wasn’t sure, so he’d invited Remmy to have coffee with him. She agreed to meet him after she got off work, which was just about now.
He sat at a back table, heels of his shoes hooked over the bottom rung of the tall stool, tall enough to reach the bistro table. A young, red-haired waiter stepped up to the table.
“Can I get you a refill, sir?” he asked, nodding at the nearly empty mug on the table.
Matt smiled. “That’d be great, thanks.”
“Caramel macchiato, right?”
When Matt nodded, the waiter grabbed the mug and hurried off to get his order. The bells chimed above the door and Matt was glad, albeit anxious, to see Remmy step through. She looked around the coffeeshop until she spotted him waving at her.
Smiling in acknowledgement, Remmy went back to Matt’s table and climbed up onto the high seat. “Hey,” she said, allowing her light jacket to slide down her arms. It was starting to get chilly out after dark. “Sorry I’m late. My relief was late.”
“No worries.” Matt waved the redheaded waiter over. The boy held up his mug in acknowledgement, but then his gaze fell on Matt’s companion. Matt was amused as the boy seemed to trip over himself to get to their table.
“Hi, Remmy.” He smiled, resting his hand on the table, but the table was wobbly, nearly resulting in landing the enamored young man on the floor. He managed to catch himself, but not before his face flamed as red as his hair.
Remmy tried to hide her smile by clearing her throat. “Hi, Roman. How are you?”
“I’m great.” He turned to Matt and set the steaming coffee in front of him. Turning back to Remmy, his smile returned full force. “Can I get you something?”
“Just water, Roman, thanks.” She gave him a polite smile. The boy scampered off, leaving Remmy and Matt alone.
“I think that kid has a crush on you,” Matt said, thoroughly amused.
She rolled her eyes. “I know. He’s a nice guy, but damn.”
Matt wanted to get directly to the reason he had asked for the meeting. Taking a careful sip of his drink, he wrapped his hands around the large mug. “You never knew my sister, huh?”
Remmy recognized the change in his demeanor. She shook her head, not surprised by the question and certainly not by the topic. “No. I just met her the one time, when she was kind enough to give me a ride into town.” She sat back while Roman set a large glass of ice water before her, a lemon slice anchored on the rim. “Thanks, Roman.”
The boy hung around, bouncing from foot to foot. “Uh, Remmy?” he said, excitement and nerves making his voice breathy.
“Yes?”
“We kinda got interrupted when I came into the store the other day.” He glanced over at Matt with every intention of telling this older guy to back off.
Remmy searched her mind then nodded. Right, Detective Cowan came in and saved the day. “Right. I remember.”
“Yeah, so I was just wondering if maybe you’d like to go to the movies. With me.”
Remmy groaned inwardly, but smiled up at the anxious suitor. “Sure, Roman. We can go as new friends, okay?” she said, putting emphasis on the word friends.
“Friends. Right, yeah, okay.” He grinned, nodding excitedly, then hurried back to work.
“Anyway…” Slightly annoyed at the kid’s bold move, she turned her attention back to Julie Wilson’s brother. “Just the one time.”
Matt studied his mug, running a thick finger around the rim. “I don’t mean to be rude, Remmy, I think you’re a nice girl, but I just don’t believe Julie would have given you a ride. It’s just not like her.”
He looked up at her, green eyes cloudy with a variety of emotions. Remmy couldn’t quite dissect what they were. “Well, Matt, if she didn’t give me a ride, which she did, how do you surmise I know what I know?” Remmy’s voice was soft. She knew it all sounded crazy. Hell, she thought it was crazy.
“I don’t know. What proof is there that anything you’ve said is true? You said you have visions, right?” At Remmy’s nod, he continued. “What proof, what concrete proof is there that they’re real?”
Remmy shrugged, sipping from her water. “Well, I guess the day Julie comes home and tells her story, we’ll know.”
Matt studied her. She had beautiful eyes. He hadn’t noticed that at the police station. “You think she’s alive?” He couldn’t keep the hope out of his voice. The whole thing was far too “hocus pocus” for him, but for some inexplicable reason, he felt a sense of peace around Remmy, as if he could somehow feel his sister. If he believed in such stuff, and if he was willing to go there, he would’ve thought Julie’s spirit was with the woman sitting across from him.
“Why don’t you tell me about her?” Remmy said, reaching across the table and touching Matt’s hand. She could see the war within him, as well as the pain.
Matt glared up at her. “Who’s to say you won’t use what I tell you—”
“Matt,” Remmy said, gently chiding, “just talk to me as a human being.”
Matt stared into his cup. The time since Julie had gone missing had been the most painful of his life. Even losing both his parents couldn’t compare to losing his baby sister. “My son is struggling with this every day,” he said, almost too softly for Remmy to hear. He smiled sadly. “We lost my wife when he was just a little guy, so Julie kind of stepped in, you know?” His tortured eyes lifted, meeting Remmy’s unflinching gaze. If she knew something, or was in some way responsible, could she truly look me in the eye like that? No remorse? No guilt? Just look me in the eye like nothing?
“I feel that your sister is a really great person. I mean, hey, she stopped and gave me a ride, and I didn’t even have my thumb out. Shit, I’d been walking for half the day, and no one, I mean no one would stop. Then poof. There she was.” Remmy’s grin was blinding.
“She was always so giving that way. Always thinking of others first. You know, she was going to take my son for the week. Man, they loved each other. Skylar looked up to her like you can’t believe. Want to spend time with his aunt? Oh yes! But with Dad? Dad, who.”
They both laughed at that. Remmy was charmed. “Don’t talk about her in the past tense, Matt.” As she studied his eyes, so much like his sister’s, she felt a surge of energy, a determination like she’d never felt before. “I’ll bring her home to you. I swear it.”
Inexplicably, he believed her. His smile was genuine. He nodded, and in that moment, felt a connection to Julie that was as strong as ever. “So,” he said, clearing the emotion from his throat, “you wanted to know about Julie?”
Chapter Twelve
Her heart pounding in her chest, Grace pressed the phone to her ear. The detective in Beaumont County was prattling off the details of a Missing Person’s case that was two years cold.
Pamela Beecham, age forty-six, snatched from her driveway at nine-thirty p.m. after she’d come home from having drinks with a male friend. Just prior to her disappearance, Pamela had filed charges against her second husband, claiming he had started stalking her again, as he’d done right after their divorce, eighteen months before. Pamela lived alone, her only child, a son, grown and going to college in another state.
Next, Grace spoke with Detective Ron Piltzer of Daycum County about a case that was nearly eight months old. Roxie Carmichael, forty-one, married for more than twenty years with three children. A stay-at-home mom, Roxie disappeared during a drive home from a cousin’s wedding, which she had attended by herself, as her husband couldn’t get the time off work and her children were all in school. Roxie’s minivan was found at a truckstop thirteen miles from town.
There had been no trail left in either case, no evidence, just simply a matter of both women disappearing off the face of the earth. Unlike Beecham, Roxie had no enemies, no one at all for the police to look at. The ex-husband in Beecham’s case was grilled time and time again, but there was never enough evidence to implicate him. Just like in Julie Wilson’s case.
Late in the day, all her phone calls made, Grace sat back in her chair, the information she had absorbed rushing around in her brain like a whirlwind. The three counties covered only a twenty-mile radius, not very large, something that a single perp could easily cover. Grace sat at her desk, the pictures she’d downloaded from the system lying side by side. She eyed all three women with drawn eyebrows, trying to make some sort of connection, something, anything.
At only twenty-eight years old, Julie was the youngest. She was a very attractive woman with short, blonde hair and a bright, friendly smile. From what they’d been told, Julie was widely liked by both faculty and students, and had many friends within the community of Woodland. She was active in the community, had worked with Habitat for Humanity two summers in a row, and was very close to her brother and nephew. Parents dead, the few other living relatives were scattered across the country.
Pamela Beecham had been twice divorced, the second one quite messy, as the ex had been a short-haul trucker, and a vicious drunk with a mean temper. Pamela, a dental assistant for more than fifteen years, liked to drink herself, and was often found in the local bar or drinking heavily with friends. She had a volatile personality, though her friends and family said she had a kind, generous spirit. She was beginning to show her age from a difficult life with two difficult men. Hair, once dark brown, was streaked with gray, and the lines around brown eyes gave away her age. She was not unattractive, but certainly not in the spring of life, either.
Grace’s gaze moved on to Roxie Carmichael. The forty-one year old housewife was cute, with pixie-cut red hair and a cherubic face. Her body, though slightly heavy, was not unappealing. Her blue eyes twinkled, and according to her husband and children, she was a kind and loving woman, who belonged to the local church ladies group. She selflessly took her two sons back and forth to soccer practice and her daughter to ballet.
Grace brought a hand up, a single finger tapping her chin. She was trying to draw any sort of parallel between the three women and their cases. Her gut was telling her they were connected, even though the circumstances of their lives and disappearances were different. One had been taken from the parking lot at her work, the second from her own home, and the third from a random truckstop, which the family insisted she would never have stopped at.
“Talk to me, ladies,” Grace murmured, eyeing all three women again. “Talk to me.”
****
Remmy had been sitting on her bed for the better part of an hour, looking at the picture Matt Wilson gave her. It was a photo taken the previous year for the school year book. The five by seven was a wonderful shot of Julie, her smiling face and twinkling green eyes captivating Remmy.
She and Matt had sat and talked at the coffeehouse for more than three hours, and she found him sweet, with a brilliant mind. She wondered whether Julie was like him. She knew they were close, and part of her was envious of that, as it was something she’d never had. Especially since Monica had been gone for so many years. All the same, sitting and talking with Matt, learning about Julie, had deepened Remmy’s resolve to help in whatever way she could. As she stared at the photograph, looking into Julie’s eyes, she felt their connection grow stronger.
Remmy decided to try something. She laid back on the bed and stretched out, getting comfortable. Placing the picture face down on her chest, she began to breathe deeply, relaxing her body and mind. Closing her eyes, she took in several deep, cleansing breaths, allowing her lungs to fully expand, the full rise and fall of her chest slow and measured. Her hand reached up and covered the picture as she felt her awareness begin to slip away.
As her mind began to explore the darkness behind her eyes, the picture seemed to take on a weight of its own, pressing into her, a comforting weight. Images began to flicker, like a light bulb tapped into existence by impatient fingers.
A field. Flowers, purple against the green of their stems and the blue of the sky. Soft, flowing movement from an unseen breeze. Fresh air, cool wind.
Just ahead in the endless field stood a figure, her dress flowing around legs that were screened from view by the height of the flowers. The figure, blonde hair golden against the bright colors of the day, stood with her back to Remmy, though she turned her head slightly, almost placing her in profile.
Remmy felt compelled to walk toward the figure, her bare feet leaving footprints in the rich soil, though she barely noticed, her focus solely on the figure. She knew it was Julie; she could feel it. As she got closer, she could see the design on Julie’s dress, the way the material hugged her hips, upper back and shoulders bare.
Julie began to turn, her eyes wide and frightened when she spotted Remmy, not twenty feet behind her. Remmy raised her hands in reassurance. “I won’t hurt you,” she said, voice soft, whispered on a dream. “I’m Remmy. I’m here to help you.”
Julie turned to face Remmy fully, fear still in her eyes, but there was also curiosity. “Remmy?” she whispered.
Remmy nodded, mustering her best smile. “I’m Remmy.”
****
Julie moaned softly, sleep beginning to fade as the ache in her forehead wrinkled her brow. She could feel the cement against her buttocks and upper shoulders again, her body sore and screaming to move. Dark blonde eyebrows drew together, something echoing through her mind and bouncing unbidden into her thoughts.
Green eyes opened. “Remmy.”
“Who’s Remmy?”
The question startled Julie. She scanned the darkness, sensing Pamela’s presence across the scant space. “What?”
“Remmy. You said that name. Who is that?”
Julie thought for a moment, trying to clear her head, which was pounding. She cringed at the feel of dried blood on her forehead and temple, which she discerned by the tightness in her skin. She thought about the question, then the name, barely remembering having spoken it. “I don’t know. I think I was dreaming.”
