A Question of Ghosts Read online

  “They,” Jo said. “Your parents?”

  “Right.”

  “Would you go there, please? Where you were sitting.”

  Becca hesitated. She crossed to a distant corner and settled on the floor. She was far away from Jo across the large room and looked as small and forlorn as she must have felt that night.

  “Do you remember what your parents were arguing about?”

  “Money. Mitchell.” Becca shrugged with a casual note that rang false. “Dad working too much. I really don’t remember, Jo. All the arguments kind of blended together in those years. I learned not to listen.”

  Jo resisted an urge to press her on this point. “And you were drawing in a book?”

  “Coloring. I had my new coloring book.” Becca swept her palm across the wood floor in front of her. “My mother must have realized I was upset, and she brought me my favorite present, the…doll. Then she went into the kitchen. Then my dad followed her. Then there were two shots.”

  Jo knew they had to dissect this pedantic narration, but she dreaded this. “Do you remember where your parents were standing? Before your mother handed you the doll.”

  Becca gestured briefly at the open area in front of the sofa. “I’d gotten the doll for my birthday, and I loved it. Mom must have wanted to comfort me. She brought me the doll and then she went into the kitchen.”

  Jo walked to the sofa and picked up the small pillow resting against its arm. She made her movements slow and gentle as she crossed the room to Becca. Becca’s gaze was locked on the pillow, and she looked bleak and afraid. Jo reached her and held out the pillow. Becca started to lift her hands to take it.

  Two pops sounded from the small globe radio, and Becca’s hands froze in place.

  Two quick, muted snaps. Their sound didn’t boom through the room. They were more distorted, elongated echoes, but Jo still felt ice water sluice through her veins.

  “J-Jo?”

  “Listen,” Jo snapped. Silence was crucial right now. She clenched the pillow and stared at the radio, but there was only a brief crackling of static and it lost the signal. Jo let out a stale gush of air and looked down at Becca. “You’re all right?”

  “Yes.”

  “Sonic remnants are quite rare in the literature.” Jo walked quickly to the Spiricom and studied its backlog, her scalp prickling. “I’ve never personally heard one recorded. It was a kind of echo, Becca. A reproduction of crux indices that match your mother’s—”

  “English, Joanne?”

  “I’m sorry.” She brought the Spiricom back to Becca, quelling the excitement in her chest. “Sometimes it’s possible for a messenger to project other sounds, other than their voice. That’s what happened here. I think we just heard the shots that killed your parents.”

  *

  “Yes. I gathered that much.” Becca’s stomach was still roiling. She was desperately glad that she hadn’t had to touch that pillow, and the relief was even stronger than her shock. “Those sounds are contained in this house, then?”

  “No.” Jo sat next to her, and that suited Becca fine. “This message wasn’t generated by the house; it came directly from your mother. Would you like to see how I know?”

  I’d like to keep hearing your voice. “Show me.”

  Jo displayed the small glowing screen of the Spiricom, which was laced with two identical patterns, two waves made of thin spirals of color. Jo touched the one on the left. “This is a sonograph of your mother’s voice, three days ago, telling you to run.” She touched the other wave. “And here is a graph of those two strange shots.”

  Becca stared at the screen. “They’re exactly alike.”

  Jo nodded. “Completely disparate sounds, but they both originated from the same source. Broadcast from the same radio station, as it were. Becca, the timing of this capture is interesting to me. I was just about to hand you the doll when we heard the—”

  “You know, it’s nights like this that I’m bummed I forgot to get married.” Becca had absolutely no notion where that had come from, and judging by Jo’s puzzled expression she wasn’t alone.

  “I’m sorry?”

  “No, I’m sorry. Stupid, random thought.”

  She’d just felt so lonely, suddenly, even with Jo seated beside her. Staring at a graph of her dead mother’s voice, Becca had been swept, not for the first time or the hundredth, by an old longing for the familiarity and comfort of a life mate. A wife she had lived with for years, someone who knew all about her, knew what this meant to her. Someone she’d never found, and she’d stopped looking.

  Becca made herself focus, and she rubbed Jo’s forearm as if brushing away lint. “What were you saying?”

  “The timing of the…” Jo was quiet for a moment, watching her. “I’ve wondered about that. Wondered why.”

  “About?”

  “Why you’ve chosen to be single.”

  Becca grasped this gift of distraction from painful memory and was grateful Jo allowed it. “You’re assuming being single is my choice?”

  “Of course.”

  Jo’s confidence in her desirability made her smile. “Eh, I’m not sure about that. I’ve always wanted what Marty and Khadijah have. Even what my aunt and uncle have. They really care for each other.”

  “Then why don’t you have it?” Jo sounded logical, as if asking why Becca didn’t have a Bentley. A partner seemed just as remote a possibility at this point in her life.

  “Not really sure. Maybe because no one can claim my parents modeled a happy marriage.” Becca had relied on this psychological chestnut all her life to explain her loneliness, but it had felt like an excuse, never entirely honest. “I haven’t dated many people. Never been with anyone for more than six months. I’m still good friends with most of them.”

  “That doesn’t surprise me.” Jo set the Spiricom at her side.

  “I haven’t been Sister Becca, mind you.” Becca wanted to lighten the mood a little. “I’ve had enough sex, especially in my wanton youth, to satisfy a…”

  Becca trailed off, feeling her face warm with color. Jo hadn’t asked about her sex life, for heaven’s sake, and given their previous conversation about attraction, she’d rather not go back there tonight. She rested the back of her head against the wall.

  “Anyway. It’s probably not going to happen for me, the partner thing, and I’ve accepted that. I thank whatever gods may be that I have so much love in my life, married or not. I’m so lucky, Jo, in my friends.”

  “Your clan.”

  “Yes. Exactly.”

  They sat quietly together, and Becca felt her eyes drifting shut. It was late, and she knew it was time they got up and stretched out on their nice comfy living room furniture. They should sleep and dream among the radios and the Spiricom, and wait for shots to be fired or women to scream or weep. Becca shuddered with misery.

  She was vaguely aware of her head sliding slowly, then resting on something both soft and firm, something like Jo’s shoulder. She started to apologize, but realized she was asleep, and dreaming of the gentle brush of Jo’s lips in her hair.

  Chapter Twelve

  The night passed badly. Jo doubted Becca slept at all, despite the comfort of the living room’s deep couch. The crease in her brow never quite disappeared, her body never fully relaxed into the cushions. Jo knew this because she kept watch over her from her armchair, their wakefulness accompanied by the soft hum of empty static from the radios. She was beginning to realize how much she was asking of Becca, these long nights in the house of her nightmares.

  Thursday dawned hot and clear and remained so, a trend Seattle’s burgeoning LGBT clan prayed would last through Pride weekend. Jo weaved around another couple seated in the grass in Volunteer Park, still stymied by their destination. She had her preconceptions about meeting with a retired police detective, and they involved huddling around a small table in a dark bar, not traipsing through the gayest park in the city, the busiest week of the year. She glanced behind her to make sure B
ecca was keeping up.

  “Was Pam Emerson specific about this little rendezvous? It’s a rather large park.” Jo knew she sounded testy, but stepping over the legs of yet another pair of men engaged in full liplock did that to her. Did none of these people hold jobs? This was more of a crowd than she would ever willingly tolerate for long.

  “Pam said they’d be down by the reservoir.” Becca took Jo’s hand, a gesture increasingly common between them that pleased her inordinately. They passed the Asian Art Museum and headed downhill, toward the large cement pool of crystal blue water dancing in the sunlight. Jo vaguely registered the beauty of the Olympic range in the distance before she heard a sharp whistle.

  “Hey, Healy!” Pam Emerson waved at them, a friendly enough welcome. She was seated on a blanket in the thick grass beside a portly man who proceeded to dash Jo’s remaining preconceptions about retired police detectives.

  Luther Emerson didn’t bother to greet them as they joined him. Clad in a voluminous yellow and red Hawaiian shirt, he reclined on the blanket, braced by a portable backrest, head back to receive the sun. His full jowls were dusted with white bristles. Large sunglasses masked his eyes, and a truly disreputable cloth fedora perched on his head. The only note stereotypical of police officers was the open box of Mighty O doughnuts balanced on his formidable stomach.

  “This courtly gentleman here is my dad, Luther.” Officer Emerson was more readily Pam today, casual in frayed shorts and a halter, apparently on a day off. Jo would have preferred her to be finding the men who broke into her office, but she had to appreciate her setting up this meeting.

  “I retired in two-aught-aught-two.” The man’s voice was a rumbling bass, and that appeared to be all that he had to contribute to the conversation. Somewhat prissy lines had formed on either side of his mouth, and he kept his sunglassed gaze on the water.

  “It’s nice to meet you, sir.” Emerson was clearly in his seventies, and Jo had been raised to speak respectfully to her elders. If this elder had unclasped his hands from atop his large stomach, Jo would have shaken one of them exactly twice, but he didn’t. Becca sat in the grass beside Pam, and Jo glanced at her to be sure it was all right if she took the lead, because she was learning to do such things. “We want to talk to you about the deaths of Scott and Madelyn Healy, in nineteen seventy-eight.”

  “So my daughter tells me. And I believe I have just stated that I am retired.” Luther freed his hands long enough to scratch his throat with two blunt fingers. “I have been retired for ten wonderful years.”

  “Yes, your daughter also mentioned your retirement.” Jo slipped her recorder from her pocket and switched it on. “I’d like to record our conversation.”

  Luther lifted his sunglasses a bare inch and stared at the recorder balefully. Jo caught a glimpse of yellowed eyes before he lowered the glasses again, but he didn’t protest.

  “You’ve just got to give him time to warm up,” Pam said. She leaned back on her hands, apparently enjoying the sun herself. “He’s like a real rusty old car. Go ahead, Pop, have another doughnut. I think there’s one tiny little vein in your left foot that isn’t clogged all to hell.”

  “Good-bye, tiny vein.” Luther reached into the box and drew out a chocolate iced monstrosity that Becca regarded with rapt fascination. To Jo’s surprise, he offered the doughnut to Becca, and his voice changed entirely, warming with courtesy. “Hello, Miss Healy. It’s good to see you’ve grown up into such a strong and lovely lady.”

  “I’m Becca. And you’ve just answered my heartfelt prayer, sir.” Becca accepted the doughnut with equal friendliness, not to mention overt greed. She broke the pastry apart and handed half to Pam. “I’d say you’re very good at your retirement, Mr. Emerson.”

  “Luther. I am indeed.” He pulled a jelly doughnut out of the stained box and bit into it. Jo supposed that if she wanted one, she’d have to help herself. “I’ve had ten blessed years away from midnight calls to homicide scenes, Becca. Threw my pager in the terlit my last day at the station. I leave all the flatfoot work to this one now.” He waved his doughnut at Pam.

  “He thinks he’s insulting me with the flatfoot thing.” Pam edged one dab of icing from the corner of her mouth delicately. “I’ve been almost twenty years on street patrol.”

  “Gonna be walking a beat the next twenty, too, you can’t stop playing lesbian avenger at the station.” Luther regarded Becca over his sunglasses. “Miss Thang here thinks she has to be the voice of social justice at every roll call. Gets damn tiresome, and it holds her back.”

  “As he still bitches to all and sundry who will hear.” Pam snickered. “He’s jealous I look so good on my bike.”

  This had the tone of an old and loved bickering between father and daughter, with no real malice. The man was obviously comfortable enough with gay people to sunbathe in their midst, and there was pride in his voice when he referred to Pam. Which was all nice for them, but Jo had the urge to move them on to actual information. Besides, Pam Emerson was smiling at Becca with a familiarity she didn’t especially appreciate.

  “Luther, you performed the preliminary investigation at the house on Fifteenth Avenue that night, correct?” Jo positioned the recorder on the blanket.

  “Lord, she’s that Mariska Hargitay woman,” Luther muttered. “Yes, your honor. I’d just made grade. Not easy back in the seventies, a black man making detective.”

  “I hear that,” Pam murmured.

  “And do you feel you conducted a thorough and conclusive investigation into these deaths?”

  “You were one lost little girl, the first time we met.” Luther’s tone mellowed again as he spoke to Becca. “I sure felt bad for you and never forgot your face. Wondered about you, over the years.” He jutted his chin at Pam. “We both have.”

  “Thank you.” Becca patted his gnarled hand. “I understand Pam was sweet to me that night, too.”

  “In any case,” Jo snapped, flapping a butterfly out of her face. “Luther, did you ever consider the possibility that Madelyn Healy didn’t fire the gun—that there was an outside shooter?”

  “Oh, I always liked the sister-in-law for it.”

  Jo stared at him. Then she and Becca stared at each other. Becca summoned words before Jo could.

  “The sister-in-law. You mean my aunt? My Aunt Patricia? Patricia Healy, that aunt?”

  “Patricia Healy, wife of Attorney Mitchell Healy of Kirkland.” Luther’s mouth was brooding now, his eyes hidden by the black glasses. He sucked jelly from his thumb with a wet slurp. “So look. There was no forced entry. There was an outside door giving access to the kitchen, and it was unlocked. The Healys weren’t known to own a handgun. The thirty-eight was unregistered. We never traced it. Yeah, a third party could have come in, fired the shots. I wrote all this in my reports.”

  No, he hadn’t. He definitely hadn’t. Jo cleared her throat. “Not in the reports I’ve seen, sir.”

  A humorless smile crossed his whiskered face. “Oh, I’m not doubting my words got changed around a bit. I was new on the unit, which made me both green and black. Besides, Mitchell Healy, Esquire, had some powerful contacts, even back then. He was making a run for a state senate seat at the time. We weren’t encouraged to look into things real close.”

  He tipped his glasses and looked at Becca. “I’m sorry if that means I did a disservice to you, those many years ago. I guess it bugged me enough for the details to stay clear in my mind. But it’s also possible the call on that case was right on, ma’am. I’m afraid your mama was just not real well.”

  “I understand that.” Becca still looked disoriented. “But my aunt?”

  “Oh, that.” Luther pulled another doughnut out of the box, frowned at it, and dropped it back in. “That’s just one of them snapshots. Don’t mind me. I’m old.”

  “No, tell her, Pop.” Pam was watching Becca sympathetically. “I don’t care if it is far out. You had good instincts, even back as a rookie.”

  “Okay.” Luther sighed d
eeply and hunched lower against the backrest. “So cops get these snapshots in their heads. Just glimpses, fast impressions. And when your aunt and uncle came over to pick you up that night, Becca, Patricia Healy insisted on seeing the bodies. Wasn’t necessary. Her husband already ID’d them. But I took them both back in that kitchen, and that’s when I got that snapshot. Their faces stay with me, almost as much as yours did.”

  Jo glanced at Becca uneasily.

  “Far as I remember, neither of ’em looked at your daddy, Scott Healy, not even a glance. That stuck with me at the time. Both Mitchell and Patricia zeroed in on Madelyn Healy right away, and that camera went off in my head, pop. I saw this flash of…anguish pass over your uncle’s face, Becca. He couldn’t hide it. And in that same quick second, your aunt? She looked satisfied. Just as pure and strong as her husband’s grief, was that woman’s look of satisfaction.”

  “Luther.” Becca folded her legs beneath her, elaborately calm. “Why in the world would Patricia Healy shoot my parents?”

  “Are you aware of the fact that Mitchell had romantic feelings for your mother?”

  Becca looked at Jo and closed her eyes. “I’ve heard a rumor to that effect.”

  “Well, whoever passed on that rumor spoke the truth, I’m afraid.” Luther yawned hugely. “S’cuse me. I did get to dig that far. Gossip with the hired help was that Mitchell Healy’s eye had strayed more than once in his marriage. He’d had several ladies on the side. His wife seemed capable of overlooking this, but then she’s an odd duck. Word was Mitchell had been putting the moves on Madelyn Healy, but she wanted nothing to do with him.”

  “So you’re describing a motive for Becca’s uncle for these deaths.” Jo, who distinctly disliked Becca’s uncle, was more than willing to go there again. “He was a spurned lover. A passion killing.”

  “Could be.” Luther scowled at the beautiful view. “But I got to go by that snapshot in my gut. Mitchell Healy wasn’t the one looking pleased with himself that night, looking down at that dead woman. That was Patricia.”