Last Impressions (The Marnie Baranuik Files) Read online

  Schenk glanced at me and hesitated.

  “She’s safe here without you,” Scarrow said.

  “I don’t doubt that,” Schenk said (lied, my empathy reported, he doesn’t believe you’re safe).

  He didn’t make a move to go until I shooed him out with a scowl and a heartfelt, “Piss off, eh?” Oh, Goddess, I'm turning back into a Canadian.

  Once Schenk was outside and ambling across the yard, Scarrow closed the door to his office and visibly relaxed. He strolled back to his desk, placing its heavy walnut bulk between us.

  “You’re no cop,” he said.

  “Nope,” I answered. “Different kind of pro.”

  He looked uncertain, which was fair, I suppose, considering I was wearing jeans with a little bouquet of skulls embroidered on one thigh, and he’d met me in a hat with big, googly frog eyes. Belatedly, I realized what I'd said; who knows, maybe Sesame Street had started featuring a friendly neighborhood hooker as part of their human cast.

  “Well,” I said, a little defensively, “you believe in homicidal ghosts and quote the bible. What’s up with that?”

  “As I tried to explain to Constable Schenk, shortly before the millennium, prize-winning physicist Dr. Levi Uri's Greenwade Experiment demonstrated repeatedly that, upon death, the energy released from the victim of a violent end can linger outside the body. Laymen might call this bundle of energy a ghost, but in my field, we call it an incorporeal human entity, or IHE.”

  “I’m not disputing Uri’s findings,” I said patiently. “Though he was a sick, sadistic maniac completely lacking any ethics at all, he was still a top-notch scientist.”

  Scarrow’s eyelids fluttered rapidly with surprise. “Agreed.”

  “I mean, sure, he tortured three generations of the Greenwade family to death to find out if a bad end made a spirit linger, but nobody’s perfect.” I tapped my temple with a gloved finger. “He had an IQ of one-ninety. People that smart are rarely sane.”

  Scarrow looked profoundly uneasy with the direction our discussion had taken, and the Blue Sense reported that he was disappointed. By what, I wasn’t sure. Disappointed in Uri’s choices? Disappointed that I knew this sort of thing? Disappointed in my lack of innocence, perhaps. I looked down at the files and pictures spread on his desk. His was a scattered kind of organization, with piles and tabs and clips and highlighters, nothing at right angles. I suspected SSA Chapel would have been deeply uncomfortable at such a desk. There were grave rubbings, black and white photographs, newer pictures of blurry patches of fog, weird lights under water, and local maps.

  “The salient portion of Dr. Uri’s findings, to whatever's going on here,” I continued, “is that they do not support the claim that a ghost can manipulate the physical realm or affect the living in any bodily way. The energy is released, it can linger, it can unbalance local temperature on a tiny, measurable scale, and that’s about it. So unless Britney Wyatt took a swan dive to counteract a spontaneous case of chilly nipples, I think you're full of sh—enanigans.”

  One of his eyebrows went up but he didn't comment. “I’ve found that’s not true.”

  “I bet it is. You're probably packed to the rafters with shenanigans.” Is that what was giving me the chuckles? Nothing here is funny, Marnie; stop it with the fucking giggles. “As far as spirit/body interactions, there’s never been any evidence—“

  “Personal observation. I have hundreds of EVP recordings.”

  “Would you like me to debunk those for you?” I offered. “I’ll have time after this missing girl is found.”

  “Murdered,” Scarrow said softly. “And I assure you, this is a case of a poltergeist.”

  “You sound pretty sure, but I'm pretty not sure that the law can convict the dead of murder. And by 'poltergeist,' you mean a spirit held on Earth by manipulation by a demon?”

  “No.”

  “That’s what a poltergeist is, Mr. Scarrow.”

  “Not always. In this case, by poltergeist, I mean an IHE showing independence, remaining by choice, for malicious purposes.”

  I didn't feel like debating terms of art with this stubborn dick. “Malicious purposes?”

  “The murder of Britney Wyatt.”

  I felt my own kneejerk, stubborn certainty, the certainty of a scientist holding to current theories, and tried hard to keep an open mind. “I see. How do you imagine a spirit could have summoned the kind of energy required to actually murder someone? And under whose direction? By your own logic, this spirit is its own murder weapon.”

  “Under normal circumstances, I completely concur that we could rule out classic haunting,” Scarrow said, “especially in the winter. But I’m willing to bet our wandering constable has neglected to mention to you the rather unusual meteorological conditions on the night of the murder. We had thunder-snow.”

  In the next room the dogs started a high-pitched yapping, their noise muffled by old plaster walls. Scarrow’s head turned; a frown dipped his brows for a moment, but he apparently wanted to hear my reaction to the weather.

  “Thunder-snow is awesome,” I conceded, “and he totally should have mentioned it, but what does the weather have to do with ghosts? Unless they're dead meteorology buffs, why would they give a da– rn?”

  The dogs’ barking became more frantic, and one of them started loudly digging at a door, rattling the door in its frame as it scratched. “Ionized air during a lightning storm offers more energy for the incorporeal human entity to draw upon. November fourth’s—”

  There were clumping noises in the front hall seconds before the office door banged open and a young man stumbled into the room with an anguished cry. Scarrow vaulted toward him, and at first his arms reached out to catch the man, should he fall. The Blue Sense woke with a roar and I felt my feet launch into motion, too. Coming around behind the desk, I stubbed my boot hard on something that rolled heavily and noisily away. Bowling ball? When the gun came out from behind the young man’s back, Scarrow and I froze. The throb in my toe disappeared like magic. So did my bizarre case of the giggles.

  “Simon,” Scarrow gasped, “what in God’s name are you doing?”

  “Where is she?” His voice was ragged, squeezed through a windpipe tight with emotion. He shook the gun as though that would get him answers. “I need to know. You tell me right now!”

  I recognized him from Schenk’s notes and photos: Britney Wyatt’s boyfriend, Simon Hiscott. He was not dressed for the weather, wearing only socks on his feet, no boots or shoes, just a mismatched pair of argyles, and they were soaking wet, clumped with chunks of dirty snow. His boxy torso was squeezed into what I assumed was his girlfriend’s princess-pink ABBA t-shirt, like too much sausage in a pastel casing.

  Scarrow’s voice sank to a soothing low. “Simon… I’m afraid Britney has passed on.”

  “You fraud. Phony. Con artist,” he said, hitting each word with more and more force until he was frothing. “I’ll expose you.”

  “Simon, please calm down. We can talk about this. I’m here to help you.”

  “Heaven or Hell?” Simon performed a funny, desperate burp-sob combination that was more terrifying than it should have been. “Tell me where she is, priest!”

  Priest? I craned to gape at Scarrow, who gave me a little shrug with his palms up, as if to say whoops, did I neglect to mention?

  Damn it. I couldn’t let a holy man die on my watch, even if he was a smug, know-it-all exorcist in skinny jeans. I would have preferred to dive bodily through the window behind me and log roll to safety under a big evergreen bush, but instead, I side-stepped in front of the priest as a Marnie meat-shield. In my head I imagined Harry’s crisp, bleating admonishments, and what would come out of Batten as a disgusted groan. I ignored my too-honest imagination and swallowed hard.

  “You should have helped her,” Simon demanded, trying to see past me like I was an inanimate obstruction. Then he focused on me, noticed I had human shape and a face, and scowled. “You should have helped her, too,” he
told me, like I was in some grand conspiracy with Scarrow. “Now it’s too late. I need…” He looked around the office helplessly, panting, and then roared his frustration. “I need to fix it. I need her things. Give me back her things.” He did a double take at me, although he’d already noticed me once. “Hey,” he said angrily. “Who the hell are you?”

  “Is that a real gun?” I asked the bleary-eyed man.

  Simon fired off a round into Scarrow’s stereo, causing an impressive show of sparks and a bang-crack of metal through plastic.

  “Now we can’t listen to ABBA, dingbat,” I said.

  “Fu—fucking funny.” He slurred it together as one word: fufuckinfunny. He belched, sending a waft of booze breath my way. The muzzle of the gun shifted towards the priest over my shoulder, then back to me, weaving and bobbing.

  “This escalated quickly,” Father Scarrow whispered, looking out the window, probably hoping to see Schenk. He touched my elbow, thinking to move me aside, but I shrugged him off.

  “Who are you?” Simon slurred at me.

  “Someone who really shouldn’t be standing this close to a man of the cloth,” I muttered, scratching an itch on my lower back, wondering if I was going to get a rash.

  “You kinda look like that one chick from ABBA,” Simon told me, and pointed helpfully at the washed-out face on his left pectoral.

  “I am that one chick from ABBA.”

  “Oh yeah? What’s your name?”

  I squinted, which helps me think sometimes. “Olga … Yorsenflorgen.”

  “I don’t think that’s right.”

  “Hey!” I slammed my hands on my hips. “Don’t you tell me who I am, you festering dongbasket. I think I know whether or not I was in ABBA.”

  “Mary, mother of Christ,” the priest whispered against the back of my head and tried again to take my elbow.

  “Prove it,” Simon said, and his other hand cupped the gun to steady it.

  Schenk had to have heard the shot. Stall! Stall! “I can.”

  “So do it.”

  “I will!” I started to shimmy shake my booty, but couldn’t remember the words to Dancing Queen, so just hummed the first part.

  “That’s not how ya sing a song, Yorsenflorgen!” he roared, and fired off another round. It thumped into the wall between me and Scarrow.

  The priest swallowed audibly, and when I glanced at him his wide eyes demanded I do better.

  Over Simon’s shoulder, I saw a shadow inch across the floor by the door. A tall shadow. A tall, big-shouldered shadow. It was too quiet in the silence following the shot. I had to keep Simon’s focus.

  “Fine, this is how we did it, back in the day.” I flung my parka off my shoulders and whipped my sweater off over my head, belting out ABBA like my life depended on it. “My-my! At Waterloo, Napoleon did surrender!” I swung the sweater over my head before flinging it to my audience of one man. One very drunk, unimpressed man. I added a sassy boob shake and gave Father Scarrow the you-strip-too eyes, but he just stood there looking horrified.

  I began an enthusiastic Can-Can and clapping routine. “Waterloo! Promise to love me forever more! Wait, is that ‘forever more?’ Or ‘for evermore?’”

  “Don’t stop to analyze,” Father Scarrow advised, motioning with short jerks of his head to the dude holding the gun.

  “Right.” I switched to the only dance I’m really good at, the Funky Chicken, happy to blame my choices on the hostage situation.

  Simon’s lips pinched, and to my alarm, tears sprang from his eyes. “Waterloo’s her favorite.”

  I pointed at him and used my gloved left hand to hold an invisible microphone, switching songs immediately to prevent the waterworks. “Knowing me, knowing you! (uh huuuuuh). There is nothing we can do! Knowing me, knowing you! We just have to face it this tiiiiime weeeee’re throoooough! (this time we’re through, we’re really through).”

  Simon dropped his gun arm to his side, and the gun fell to the floor. Schenk inched one step into the room, and I could see him hesitating to put his own gun away.

  Simon let out a sob and sank to his knees in defeat, a great blubbering child, pulling at the front of his t-shirt as though the fabric touching him was adding to his agony in a way he could no longer abide. Father Scarrow bolted forward to kick the gun away, while Schenk rushed in from behind and scooped Simon’s arms in some funky, yanking submission hold. Schenk repeated over and over some commands that sounded super serious; I didn’t hear them, as I was still singing pretty loud. Seemed wrong to stop before the chorus. Simon didn’t fight Schenk. Simon’s fight had gone bye-bye. ABBA had been a better weapon than the deadly combination of booze and firearms.

  “You knew all the words,” Schenk said, whipping out his handcuffs and snapping them on Simon’s waifish wrists.

  “One of my lesser-known talents,” I said. “Figured it would save my life someday. Like if I got kidnapped by a backwoods Swedophile cult.”

  “Yes. Then,” Father Scarrow deadpanned.

  Suddenly aware that I was in only my tank top, I turned on the priest with a demanding scowl. “What I wanna know is, how come I’m the only one stripping to ABBA?”

  “Hard to believe,” Father Scarrow said.

  “You sang both the male and female parts,” Schenk noted.

  “Like a boss,” I added.

  “Like a lunatic,” Schenk said, and offered me his leather jacket to temporarily cover up with. It fell to my knees and swaddled me in body-warmed leather-scented goodness that smelled faintly of beer and maple syrup, although that was probably my imagination. “Nicely done, Cinderblock. Next time, maybe don’t flail around directly in front of a disturbed gunman. Gonna get yourself killed.”

  “You’d rather I let Skinny Jeans here get shot?” I challenged. “I was covering his ass. If anyone’s going to hurt Ren Scarrow, constable, it’s going to be me.”

  “I’m right here, Ms. Yorsenflorgen,” Scarrow drawled. “I can hear you.”

  “You okay?” Schenk frowned down at me. “When the paramedics get here, I’d like to have them check you out.” His accent thickened as the tension of the standoff abated, and his out sounded like oot, though I doubted he noticed.

  “They can diagnose mental illness, now?” Scarrow marveled, and went to check the dogs, which were still going ape-shit in their rooms. I gave his retreating back a sour look, and bent to fetch my sweater.

  “I’m gonna deck a priest,” I told Schenk, returning his jacket by passing it over the sobbing lump on the floor that was Britney Wyatt’s boyfriend. I pulled my sweater back on. “Wanna watch?”

  “Nah, I’ll read about it in the police report.” He hauled Simon to his feet and led him to the front door.

  Out front an ambulance was pulling up with a patrol car right behind it. Dark Lady bless first responders. Schenk marched Simon out. A car that hadn’t been there when Schenk and I first arrived, some silver sedan, was buried nose deep in a snow bank, and I chalked a drunk driving violation up on Simon’s future rap sheet.

  As the adrenalin began to drain from my system, the Blue Sense rode the fading waves to slap me in the face with Simon Hiscott’s agony. He didn’t care about being in cuffs, or being hauled out by his armpits, or going to jail. He didn’t care about anything, anymore. He could have killed us all and not blinked, could have blown up the entire world with the force of his anger and frustration. Simon had never been a violent man, but felt like he had nothing left to keep him anchored, and the dark wolf that lives inside us all had completely overrun him; black hatred and desperation surged through every unexplored hallway in Simon’s mind, chewing open doorways to boiling rooms of rage and heartache. The love of his life had disappeared into the cold, dark canal, and with her, everything he cared about.

  Blocking that level of misery was a struggle for me, and for a moment I swayed back on my heels, physically repelled. Schenk glanced back at me, almost like he’d felt it, too.

  The paramedics and the uniformed cops took over c
are of the sobbing mess in the sock feet and the ABBA shirt. Scarrow returned with my parka, and I took it from the priest’s outstretched hand.

  “So,” Father Scarrow said companionably, “how long have you been rubbing shoulders with demons?”

  “I do not,” I hissed, watching Schenk in the distance as he filled the uniforms in on the situation, “and I’ll thank you not to say that again.”

  The priest’s dark eyebrow crooked up.

  “I avoid demons,” I reaffirmed. And I hardly ever summon them. And we totally never rub shoulders when I do, anyways.

  Ren motioned to my wrist. “May I?”

  Curious, I gave it to him. I shouldn’t have. With his left hand he took my gloved hand, turned it palm-up, pushed up the cuff of my coat to expose the skin of my inner wrist. With his right hand he made the sign of the cross in front of himself, and then waved that palm in front of my face before laying it on my inner wrist. I felt nothing peculiar, only the mundane touch of soft, masculine hand, but when he removed it, my wrist was speckled with an unhappy rash.

  “Thou shalt not lie, minion,” he said, but his lips curled into a frankly devious smirk. “I know demon bait when I see it.”

  “Since when does the Church hire guys like you?”

  “Guys like what?”

  I whisked my wrist out of his grasp and he let go with an easy smile. “You’re a far cry from saintly.”

  “I could say the same to you, Ms. Baranuik,” he said, and indicated with his left hand to where Schenk was waving me over. “Your ride is ready.”

  I studied him for a long moment. “I’m going to want to talk to you again.”

  “Of course you will.” The sardonic smile returned. “And I’ll even let you.”

  Gee, thanks. “What did Simon want from you? How did he know you?”

  “I took his confession once.”