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THE RIDE FROM HOUSTON to Jasper was not as long as she expected. Although the ride was several hours, the scenery was beautiful and seeing nature in its purest form made her spirits rise and gave way to hope. If there could be things of such horrible nature in this world, she would take comfort in knowing that there was much beauty, as well.
Eventually, the city limits gave way to trees and natural springs and lakes. Wildlife was apparent in the sky and in the surrounding trees and landscape. Even the air seemed different as they left the hustle and bustle of the urban setting and traded it for rural surroundings.
David enjoyed the outdoors and was always pleased to see nature untouched by humans. In his free time, he loved to camp and fish. He had been all over the world, in some of the greatest fishing hot spots on the planet. She went with him, although she did not care much for the sport of fishing. But she took great pleasure in watching him pit himself against nature. For him, the sheer joy of pulling in a monstrous bass and releasing it back into the water was wonderful, and to her it was well worth it to see him so happy.
They had camped in the Australian outback and made love beneath the stars with desert critters and scrub surrounding them. They hiked through the Amazon jungle, entrusting their lives to their guides. When that trip was over, she counted at least one hundred and fifty bug bites, but she was proud of each of those, because they symbolized a great accomplishment. Now, they were tracking a killer in rural Texas. This was in a different ballpark, more dangerous than anything they’ve done before, but it was another adventure.
After pulling into Jasper early this morning and having breakfast at the Kountry Kitchen, they sat beside each other on two folding chairs that faced the sheriff’s empty desk. The room itself was very small, about the size of an office cubicle, but it was the only private office in the building, except for an interrogation room on the second floor.
The furnishings were sparse: an old metal desk that had seen better days, atop which sat an outdated laptop computer. A file cabinet stood in one corner and a small typewriter stand beside the desk supported an old IBM Selectric. And for seating, the two folding chairs in front of the desk. On the wall behind the desk was a 3’ by 5’ chalkboard on which several names were scribbled. She recognized Deputy Soames’ name, and decided it must be a duty roster.
“Quite the interior decorator this sheriff is, don’t you think?” David said.
She smiled at him, but the butterflies in her stomach were flitting around. “It’s a small town. The budget is probably just as small.”
“Then you would think that they would spoil their only means of law enforcement a bit then.”
“I suppose they have more important things to spend their money on,” she replied.
“Sure,” he said. “I bet refurbishing the rest rooms at the local tavern is on the top of that list. Followed closely by revamping the library.”
She spit out laughter and he found himself laughing right along with her. It was wonderful to see her laughing instead of frowning and stressing.
Marlena poked her head in with a curious expression on her face. “Is everything all right in here?”
They stopped laughing.
“Yes, please excuse us,” Susan said. “We’re just a little nervous meeting the sheriff.”
Marlena smiled, and nodded her head. “Oh, that’s okay. Sitting in this office makes everyone nervous. Even if you haven’t done anything, you feel like you have.”
“I know what you mean.”
“The sheriff will be with you in a few minutes. He’s back from his interview, but he is talking to one of the deputies.”
“Thank you,” she said.
Marlena left without inquiring about who shot JFK or if Area 51 really did exist. Susan looked at David who had a stupid smirk on his face. They both blurted out laughter again. They knew they should stop before the sheriff walked in, because the sheriff would be less likely to believe the story of two people who laughed hysterically for no apparent reason.
After a minute, the laughter began to taper down, until finally they sat wiping tears from their eyes and trying to catch their breath. When they were calm for a few minutes, in a serious voice that she was grateful for, David said, “Maybe if they solve this case and catch this killer, we could donate to the Jasper Sheriff’s Office.”
She grabbed his hand and kissed his cheek. “That’s a wonderful, thoughtful, and caring idea.”
He nodded his head and his cheeks began to color. Although he was full of sarcastic humor and made jokes every chance he could, he was really a dear man with a soft spot in his heart for people and animals. He was a true humanitarian and he always thought of helping others before helping himself.
“I love you.”
“I love you, too, sugar pops,” he said.
She kissed him again and he pulled her close, hugging her.
“I’m sorry to interrupt such a tender moment,” the big black man said. He stood in the doorway, a hulking figure of a man, both shoulders touching the jams on either side of the door.
David stood up. “Sheriff Ames?”
“That would be me,” Ames said and stuck out his hand.
David put out his own hand and watched as it was swallowed up.
“I’m David Moore, and this is my wife, Susan.”
Ames released his hand and shook hers. “Pleased to meet you, Mrs. Moore.”
“It’s good to meet you,” she replied.
Ames walked behind his desk, pulled out his chair and motioned to the metal chairs. “Please, sit down.”
They all sat, Susan first and the two men after. For a moment there was an uncomfortable silence that Ames broke with his booming voice.
“Deputy Soames tells me you two spoke the night before last, Mrs. Moore.”
“That’s correct, sir.”
“Frank told me that you had some information on a case we’re currently investigating,” he said. He read silently from a few pages of paper in a file folder and then looked back up at her. “You faxed us this information.”
“My husband faxed it actually; I just told him what to say.”
Consulting his notes again, Ames asked, “You’re from Chicago?”
“That’s correct.”
“Chicago is a long way from Jasper, ma’am.”
“Yes, it is.”
“About twelve hundred miles if you drive.”
“I guess that’s about right,” she said. She had no idea where he was leading her, but she knew that he was leading to something.
“About a two-and-a-half-hour plane ride to Houston, then a two-hour car ride to Jasper?” Ames asked.
“About.”
“Tell me what you know about what happened, Mrs. Moore.”
She looked at David who smiled at her. He took her hand to reassure her and she let out a long sigh.
“A girl was murdered two nights ago. She was sitting in her car and a very evil man stabbed her until she was dead, then he burned her body.”
Ames set down his notes and folded his hands-on top of them. He leaned forward. He seemed more serious now. He was quizzing her, trying to determine if she were a nutcase who would end up confessing to a crime she did not commit, or if she really believed what she was saying.
“Are you sure she was stabbed?”
“Yes, I’m very sure of that,” she said.
Her left hand moved absently to her stomach where the phantom wounds were inflicted the night of Leslie Jackson’s murder.
“And how many times would you say this woman was stabbed?” he asked. “Five times? Maybe ten?”
She closed her eyes and vividly recalled what she’d seen in her vision. The long black hair whipping around like a horse’s tail, the rise and fall of the knife as it continuously rent the poor girl’s flesh.
“Maybe fifty or sixty times,” she answered.
Ames sat back in his chair and put a hand beneath his chin. He looked at Susan for a long moment, considering his next question.
Finally, he asked, “How did you come by this information?”
“Is that file about me?” she countered instead of answering his question.
He was a little surprised by the question and looked down at the folder beneath his hands and then back up at Susan. Her eyes stared boldly back at him—there was no shame or fear in her eyes. She didn’t have the guilty look of someone who was telling lies and trying to pass them off as the truth.
“Yes. Deputy Soames ran a background check on you after your conversation. He compiled this file for me.”
“And you’ve obviously read the fax my husband sent.”
“Yes, I have read it.”
“Then you know how I saw.”
Ames was silent. He had read both her fax and the information in the file that Soames had been able to put together for him. Susan Moore had been documented in numerous police reports as having aided in a variety of investigations. While he’d read the reports, his first reaction was to take what he was reading with a grain of salt, but he soon realized the reports were written with much conviction.
In San Francisco she’d aided in an investigation that saw the recovery of millions of dollars in stolen bonds. In Colorado she’d helped find a man buried in snow during an avalanche. In Houston she found missing pieces of art that had been hidden in the basement of a dead man’s home. These were all impressive cases, but what really drew his attention was the Altman investigation last year. A conviction was made because of information passed from Susan Moore to Virginia authorities.
He stood up and tossed the file onto his desk. Several of the papers slid out helter-skelter and he left them where they lay. He moved around to the front of the desk and sat at the edge, his large legs almost touching Susan’s knees in the narrow gap between the desk and the folding chairs.
“I don’t care what those reports say, Mrs. Moore. Those papers could have been written by the damn pope for all I care. I don’t believe in psychic abilities. I don’t know how you do your “thing” and I really don’t care. What I need are answers to questions, but I won’t accept answers that are based on supernatural activities.”
“Sheriff Ames, I can assure that those law enforcement agents who wrote those reports were non-believers, as well,” she said. “There’s nothing wrong with not believing, but when a case is going nowhere, even the impossible seems reasonable.”
“You have no idea where I am on this case and I don’t appreciate you assuming how I’m doing my job.”
He stood up from the desk and started to arrange the sheets of paper that spilled out of the file. “I have your background and now I’ve spoken to you. I want you to stay here in town until I tell you to leave. Is that understood?”
“Yes. Does that mean you want my help?”
“No, that means I haven’t dismissed you as a person of interest just yet.”
“Sheriff, please. Let me at least tell you what I know, what I’ve seen. There’s more to this than what is in that faxed letter.”
He opened a drawer on the old metal desk and slid the file in. “How do you mean?”
She looked at David, who nodded, as if telling her it was okay to continue. She took comfort from his acknowledgement and said, “I’ve had another vision.”
“More hocus pocus,” Ames said and slammed the drawer shut. “Look, Mrs. Moore, I’ve been doing this job for a long time. I know a lot has changed in law enforcement over the years; we’ve got better computers and laboratories. We even have state of the art investigation techniques. Technology is changing every day, no doubt about it. And I’ve come to learn these and use these, and I have to admit these newfangled techniques save a lot of time and manpower.”
He sat back in his chair and pulled in close to the desk. He leaned forward and said, “But the last time I checked, psychics and mystics were not in the procedural manual.”
“Sheriff Ames, you seem like a reasonable man,” David interrupted. “And we’re sure that you’re an excellent peace officer. You can dismiss us if you like, but at least let my wife tell you what she knows. After that, we’ll feel better knowing we did what we could do, and you’ll feel better knowing that you’re a fair man and you at least gave us an opportunity to present our information and you’ve looked at things from all angles.”
Ames leaned back in the chair and folded his hands on his flat stomach. Looking at Susan, but pointing his thumb toward David, he said, “This one should run for office. Spoken like a true politician, I tell you.”
David smiled, but she did not.
“Look, Mrs. Moore,” Ames said. His brusque exterior was now fading, and he seemed more approachable. “Your husband’s right, I’m not an unreasonable man. But this stuff is just way out there.”
She remained silent, taking the situation in.
“I’m not trying to impugn you in anyway, ma’am. I just find all this psychic stuff hard to believe. And with that said I think you can see how it would be hard for me to continue to do my job if I start using tactics that I don’t believe in.”
“We’re not asking you to believe,” David said. “Just hear what we have to say.”
“Thank you for your time, Mr. and Mrs. Moore,” Ames said.
“I’m right about this, sheriff,” she said. She stood, and David stood with her. “I just hope that another person doesn’t have to die because you didn’t have the decency to at least hear me out.”
She turned abruptly and left the room. David immediately followed her, leaving Ames alone in his office.