were still shaking. I took a deep, shuddering breath. On me was a smell I couldn’t shake. Soil and dirt and something else. Death.
I needed a drink.
The casket had been snug. Although it had clearly been built for a woman, it was surprisingly comfortable. The makers had not held back on the padding, either.
Prior to climbing in I had examined the lid’s closing mechanism. There was nothing on it that would indicate it would lock from the inside. It seemed to swing open and shut readily enough.
Once inside the casket, I reached up and lowered the lid slowly.
Sealing myself in.
Traffic was backing up as the 134 East merged with the 5 South. Someone honked. Someone answered with another honk. A car nearby was thumping the bass. I ignored them all.
As I shut the lid, an overwhelming sense of panic overcame me and immediately pushed the lid back open, relieved beyond words that the lid had opened easily enough.
Thank God.
Lowering it again, I lay back on the slightly dirty pillow, my skin crawling, and certain that I was going to heave at any minute. But in the meantime, I went to work. I turned on my key chain light again, casting a powerful blue-white beam into the enclosed space.
I was all too aware that I was lying in something that was meant to be buried six feet deep. In something that was supposed to contain the corpse of a murdered young woman. I was all too aware that this disturbingly cozy box was supposed to have gone undisturbed for perhaps all eternity.
All of it added up to some serious goosebumps, shivers, and an inability to control my breathing.
I was on the 5 Freeway now, moving faster, but knowing the freeway could stop at any moment—as it suddenly did now. I drummed my fingers on my steering wheel as I relived those final moments in the casket.
With my key chain light casting an eerie blue light in a setting that didn’t need to be any more eerie, I noted there was just enough space for me to raise my right arm. Which I did.
Aiming the small light with my left hand, I raised my right fist and placed it where it would have been most comfortable knocking on the inside of the casket.
It landed, of course, in the same area of the depressed cushion. The area of the slight discoloration. Someone, I was certain, had been knocking from the inside of the casket.
Breathing hard, I opened the blade to my small pocketknife. Hammer’s evidence, be damned. I cut through the fabric of the cushion above my chest, and soon spread it open, revealing the unpolished wood beneath.
The wood behind the cushion was split and seriously damaged.
And when I raised the lid and sat up, gasping for fresh air, I was not too surprised to see Boyd the coffin-maker standing inside the storage room doorway, watching me.
Chapter Nine
Dr. Vivian Carter was recommended by a new friend of mine, an older investigator I had recently worked with on an unusual case a few weeks back.
Aaron King, who also specialized in finding the missing, had produced her card and tucked it in my shirt pocket. He said only that she would help me, and that she was helping him, too. I hadn’t asked for help and I had been mildly offended, but who was I kidding? I was a royal mess, and an old guy like Aaron saw through my feeble charade.
Now I was sitting across from her in a lounge chair, unable to meet her direct gaze. She was a lovely woman, older than me by perhaps five or ten years. But I wasn’t here to admire her loveliness. I was here because my life was spinning out of control.
“ How are you, Mr. Spinoza?”
“ I’ve been better.”
The light from her desk lamp reflected off her own thick glasses. Her hands were folded neatly in front of her. She was unmoving and stoic, but also so calm that I found my shyness slipping away quickly. She tilted her head slightly to the right and some of the desk lamp light caught along her slightly upturned nose.
“Tell me about when you’ve been better.”
And so I did.
I needed a drink.
The casket had been snug. Although it had clearly been built for a woman, it was surprisingly comfortable. The makers had not held back on the padding, either.
Prior to climbing in I had examined the lid’s closing mechanism. There was nothing on it that would indicate it would lock from the inside. It seemed to swing open and shut readily enough.
Once inside the casket, I reached up and lowered the lid slowly.
Sealing myself in.
Traffic was backing up as the 134 East merged with the 5 South. Someone honked. Someone answered with another honk. A car nearby was thumping the bass. I ignored them all.
As I shut the lid, an overwhelming sense of panic overcame me and immediately pushed the lid back open, relieved beyond words that the lid had opened easily enough.
Thank God.
Lowering it again, I lay back on the slightly dirty pillow, my skin crawling, and certain that I was going to heave at any minute. But in the meantime, I went to work. I turned on my key chain light again, casting a powerful blue-white beam into the enclosed space.
I was all too aware that I was lying in something that was meant to be buried six feet deep. In something that was supposed to contain the corpse of a murdered young woman. I was all too aware that this disturbingly cozy box was supposed to have gone undisturbed for perhaps all eternity.
All of it added up to some serious goosebumps, shivers, and an inability to control my breathing.
I was on the 5 Freeway now, moving faster, but knowing the freeway could stop at any moment—as it suddenly did now. I drummed my fingers on my steering wheel as I relived those final moments in the casket.
With my key chain light casting an eerie blue light in a setting that didn’t need to be any more eerie, I noted there was just enough space for me to raise my right arm. Which I did.
Aiming the small light with my left hand, I raised my right fist and placed it where it would have been most comfortable knocking on the inside of the casket.
It landed, of course, in the same area of the depressed cushion. The area of the slight discoloration. Someone, I was certain, had been knocking from the inside of the casket.
Breathing hard, I opened the blade to my small pocketknife. Hammer’s evidence, be damned. I cut through the fabric of the cushion above my chest, and soon spread it open, revealing the unpolished wood beneath.
The wood behind the cushion was split and seriously damaged.
And when I raised the lid and sat up, gasping for fresh air, I was not too surprised to see Boyd the coffin-maker standing inside the storage room doorway, watching me.
Chapter Nine
Dr. Vivian Carter was recommended by a new friend of mine, an older investigator I had recently worked with on an unusual case a few weeks back.
Aaron King, who also specialized in finding the missing, had produced her card and tucked it in my shirt pocket. He said only that she would help me, and that she was helping him, too. I hadn’t asked for help and I had been mildly offended, but who was I kidding? I was a royal mess, and an old guy like Aaron saw through my feeble charade.
Now I was sitting across from her in a lounge chair, unable to meet her direct gaze. She was a lovely woman, older than me by perhaps five or ten years. But I wasn’t here to admire her loveliness. I was here because my life was spinning out of control.
“ How are you, Mr. Spinoza?”
“ I’ve been better.”
The light from her desk lamp reflected off her own thick glasses. Her hands were folded neatly in front of her. She was unmoving and stoic, but also so calm that I found my shyness slipping away quickly. She tilted her head slightly to the right and some of the desk lamp light caught along her slightly upturned nose.
“Tell me about when you’ve been better.”
And so I did.
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