LITMIR.BIZ

       Chapter Two

      On their way to the impound lot where Aspen’s car was being held, Emma rode with Miguel in her little gas-saving hybrid so they wouldn’t have to switch the baby seat in and out of the sheriff’s cruiser. Though they were in her car, she let Miguel drive so as not to further affront his authority. His sarcasm clearly told her that he didn’t much care for mediums, psychics or spirit visions. The only thing that sparked his interest was that VDG scribble.

      She stole a glance at this dark, lean man with the shaggy black hair and dark green eyes—the color of a cool, deep forest. When he wasn’t making smart-alecky comments, he was attractive. And she wasn’t the only one who thought so. Baby Jack adored him; they’d bonded in seconds. After finishing his bottle, Jack wiggled cheerfully in Miguel’s arms and made gurgle noises that sounded like an alien language. Riding in the backseat, Jack still hadn’t stopped burbling. His was the only conversation in the car.

      Emma couldn’t think of a word to say. Though she’d always been terminally shy, this long silence was ridiculous. She cleared her throat. “The snow is melting fast.”

      “Yeah, it’s about time it started feeling like spring,” he said.

      More silence.

      “So, Miguel, are you new to Kenner City?”

      “I’ve been here about a year. I was one of the first employees at the new crime lab.”

      “Where are you from?”

      “You tell me.” He shot her a wry glance. “You’re the psychic. You’re supposed to know these things.”

      Usually, she paid no attention to those who doubted her visions or—even worse—those who treated her with great deference as if she were the Oracle of Delphi. But she wanted Miguel to accept her. Maybe because he was good with the baby. Maybe because he could help her find Aspen. And maybe…just because. “Are you challenging me?”

      “Go ahead. Astound me.”

      “Fine.” She studied him for a moment. His identity shouldn’t be so hard to figure out.

      The sheriff had mentioned that most of the employees at the lab were from Colorado. She assumed that Miguel wasn’t newly transplanted from a big city like Denver; his cowboy boots were well-worn and looked like his habitual footwear. He didn’t have the roughened hands of a cowboy or a farmer from the San Luis Valley, but she noticed calluses on his fingertips, typical of a guitar player.

      She figured that he’d gone to college to study forensics. But where? Which school? She remembered that when he looked at the design on her pursuer’s necklace, he identified the marking as a grizzly claw. Not a bear, but a grizzly. And the grizzly was the school mascot for Adams State College in Alamosa.

      “I’m not sure if you were born there,” she said, “but you lived in Alamosa.”

      “Correct.” He arched an eyebrow. “The sheriff told you, right? Everybody thinks Patrick Martinez is the strong, silent type, but he can’t keep his mouth shut.”

      “I never heard your name until I met you this morning.”

      He pulled up at a stop sign, pushed his sunglasses up on his forehead and stared at her with an intensity that she found both intimidating and sexy. As his gaze scanned her face, searching for a hint that she was lying, she faced him without flinching.

      He asked, “What else can you tell me?”

      “You play guitar.”

      He held out his right hand. “You saw the calluses.”

      “You’ve got a fresh grease stain on your jeans. Maybe you ride a motorcycle.”

      “A Harley,” he confirmed. “You’re using logic. Not psychic intuition.”

      “Does it matter if I find the answers with logic or by a vision?” she asked earnestly. “Both are methods of observation. Different paths that lead to the same truth. You’d understand if you could be inside my head, walk a mile in my shoes.”

      He glanced at her feet. “Purple sneakers with white stars? I don’t think so.”

      “They match my jacket.” She ran her fingers down the zipper of the purple leather jacket she’d bought on her last trip to New York. The style was so not from the Southwest, but she loved it.

      As her tone lightened to match his teasing, she realized that she was enjoying this conversation. Moments ago, she’d been tongue-tied. Now her wits were fully engaged. How lovely to talk to an adult who wasn’t a nagging ghost. “We have more in common than you think, Miguel. We’re both investigators.”

      “But you see things that aren’t visible to the naked eye.”

      “So do you. Every time you look into a microscope.”

      “You make a good point.” His brow furrowed. “So much of forensics, like DNA testing and trace evidence analysis, isn’t readily visible.”

      “Paranormal phenomenon is the same thing. It exists, but nobody has invented the tools to accurately reveal these signs and symbols.”

      Until someone created a reading device, it was up to people like her—psychics and mediums—to interpret.

      They parked outside the ten-foot-tall chain-link fence surrounding the police impound lot. The person in charge wasn’t a police officer in uniform, but a crusty gray-haired man who looked like he knew his way around a junkyard. As soon as Miguel showed his badge, the old man unlocked the gate and slid it aside.

      After a brief discussion, Miguel agreed to hold the baby so she could concentrate, but he refused to wear the colorfully patterned designer baby sling she’d ordered online. Instead, he tucked the baby in the crook of his arm as he answered his cell phone.

      Emma picked her way across the gravel lot where most of the snow had melted. Some of these tightly parked cars and trucks looked like they’d been here for years with their tires gone flat and the paint jobs dulled by constant exposure to the elements. Aspen’s beat-up sedan seemed new in comparison.

      The last time Emma saw this vehicle, shortly after her cousin disappeared, she’d felt confusion and fear as she imagined the desperation Aspen must have experienced as she fled. Similar emotions roiled inside her, but this fear came from her own terrible foreboding that her cousin was never coming back. Please, Aspen, you have to be alive. She had so much to live for. Her son. Her new job as a teacher on the rez. After years of struggling and working lousy jobs at the Ute casino and in Las Vegas, Aspen had finally finished college at the University of Nevada. She’d been so close to reaching her dreams.

      Miguel strolled up beside her. His calm, no-nonsense attitude reassured her. “That was Patrick on the phone. He has other police business and won’t be joining us. When we’re done here, can you give me a ride back to the lab?”

      “Sure.” She circled the hood of the car,

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