Leaving Time(48)

He raises a brow. “Ever testified in court?”

My cheeks pinken. “No.”

“Big surprise.”

Jenna steps in front of him. “If you two can’t play together, there’s going to be a time-out,” she says, and she turns to me. “So what’s the plan?”

Plan? I don’t have a plan. I am hoping that if I walk around this wasteland long enough, I’ll have a flash of recognition. My first in seven years.

Suddenly a man walks by, holding a cell phone. “Did you see him?” I whisper.

Jenna and Virgil lock eyes and then look at me. “Yes.”

“Oh.” I watch the guy get into his Honda and drive away, still talking on his cell. I’m a little deflated to find out he’s a living person. In a crowded hotel lobby, I used to see maybe fifty people, and half of them would be spirits. They weren’t rattling chains or holding their severed heads but rather talking on their cell phones, or trying to hail a cab, or taking a mint from the jar at the front of the restaurant. Ordinary stuff.

Virgil rolls his eyes, and Jenna elbows him in the gut.

“Are spirits here right now?” she asks.

I glance around, as if I might still see them. “Probably. They can attach themselves to people, places, things. And they can move around, too. Free range.”

“Like chickens,” Virgil says. “Don’t you think it’s weird that with all the homicides I saw as a cop, never once did I see a ghost hanging around a dead body?”

“Not at all,” I say. “Why would they want to reveal themselves to you, when you were fighting so hard not to see them? That would be like going into a gay bar if you’re straight, and hoping to get lucky.”

“What? I’m not gay.”

“I didn’t say—Oh, never mind.”

In spite of the fact that this man is a Neanderthal, Jenna herself seems fascinated. “So let’s say there’s a ghost attached to me. Would it watch me when I shower?”

“I doubt it. They were alive once; they understand privacy.”

“Then what’s the fun in being a ghost?” Virgil says under his breath. We step over the chain at the gate, moving with unspoken agreement into the sanctuary.

“I didn’t say it was fun. Most of the ghosts I’ve met haven’t been too happy. They feel like they’ve left something unfinished. Or they were so busy looking into glory holes in their last life they have to get their act together before they move on to whatever comes next.”

“You’re telling me the Peeping Tom I arrested in the gas station bathroom automatically develops a conscience in the afterlife? Seems a little convenient.”

I look back over my shoulder. “There’s a conflict between body and soul, sometimes. That friction is free will. Your guy probably didn’t come to earth to spy on folks in a gas station bathroom, but somehow ego or narcissism or some other garbage happened to him in his life while he was here. So even though his soul might have been telling him not to look through that hole, his body was saying Tough luck.” I push through some tall grass, untangling a reed that has gotten snared in the fringe of my poncho. “It’s like that for drug addicts, too. Or alcoholics.”

Virgil abruptly turns. “I’m going this way.”

“Actually,” I say, pointing in the opposite direction, “I’m getting the feeling we should go this way.” I am not really getting that feeling at all. It’s just that Virgil seems like such an ass that if he says black I’m determined to say white right now. He’s already judged and hanged me, which leads me to believe he knows exactly who I am and can remember Senator McCoy’s boy. In fact, if I weren’t so completely convinced that there is a reason I have to be with Jenna at this moment, I would bushwhack back to my car and drive the hell home.

“Serenity?” Jenna asks, because she’s had the good sense to follow me. “What you said about the body and the soul back there? Is that true for anyone who does bad things?”

I glance at Jenna. “Something tells me that isn’t a philosophical question.”

“Virgil thinks the reason my mother disappeared was because she was the one who killed the caregiver at the sanctuary.”

“I thought it was an accident.”

“That’s what the police said back then, anyway. But I guess there were some questions Virgil never got answered—and my mother up and left before he got the chance to ask them.” Jenna shakes her head. “The medical report said blunt force trauma from trampling was the cause of death, but, I mean, what if it was just blunt force trauma caused by a person? And then the elephant trampled the body once it was dead? Can you even tell the difference?”

I didn’t know; that was a question for Virgil, if we ever found each other in the woods again. But it didn’t surprise me that a woman who loved elephants as much as Jenna’s mother had might have one of her animals trying to cover up for her. That Rainbow Bridge pet lovers always talk about? It’s there. I’d occasionally been told by those who’d crossed over that the person waiting for them on the other side was not a person at all but a dog, a horse, once even a pet tarantula.

Assuming that the death of the caregiver at this sanctuary wasn’t an accident—that Alice might still be alive and on the run—it would explain why I hadn’t gotten the clear sense that she was a spirit trying to contact her daughter. On the other hand, that wasn’t the only reason why.