Mercurial Dreams Read online

  I knew Bob pretty well, he wasn’t exactly level headed. He had quit his job as an architect to become a professional boxer at the age of 47. This hadn’t exactly worked out and now he ran a gym that was always hovering on the brink of disaster. Mainly because Bob didn’t know the first thing about business, boxing or anything else about running a gym.

  All I could say was either the step-mother to-be didn’t know what she was getting into or didn’t care. That intrigued me.

  My phone rang again. This time it was Gabriel. My heart fluttered. We were going to work.

  “Cain,” I answered.

  “Why do you answer your phone that way when you know it’s me?”

  “Because it’s work related.”

  “Actually, it isn’t. We are getting together for a barbecue and thought the sunshine and warmer temperatures might do you some good.”

  “So you aren’t calling to tell me we are going to Death Valley?”

  “Aside from the possibility of a serious sunburn and baked dirt, what’s in Death Valley?”

  “Dead bodies.”

  “I haven’t heard anything about dead bodies in Death Valley.”

  “Oh, well then, what were you calling about again?”

  “Food, Ace, a barbecue. You know, getting out of your house, socializing with people, eating with your fingers and plastic forks on disposable plates. Alcoholic drinks in odd glasses with pretty little umbrellas stuck into them, like a picnic in someone’s backyard.”

  “I know what a barbecue is,” I scoffed.

  “You don’t act like it.”

  “I don’t drink,” I said.

  “You don’t have to drink, the rest of us will drink enough for you. You can still come for food and entertainment.”

  “You aren’t going to let Xavier get drunk enough that he disrobes and jumps into the pool again?”

  “I make no guarantees.”

  “Time?”

  “We are eating at seven-thirty, but get here early.”

  “How much early? Ten minutes or two hours?”

  “How about a compromise and we say an hour before the food?”

  “How many people?”

  “Ten, if you come.”

  “Who?”

  “Good grief,” Gabriel sighed.

  “Well?” I asked ignoring it.

  “Xavier, Lucas, Trevor, Nyleena, Xavier’s new girlfriend, a friend of mine named Gary and his wife, a friend of Nyleena’s, and myself.”

  “Ok.”

  “You aren’t coming, are you?”

  “I’m considering it.”

  “You are the most paranoid person...” Gabriel stopped. “Ok, the paranoia is justified, but still. It will be a good time and I promise that no one is going to try to kill you.”

  “Except you?”

  “Well, that is always a possibility. The possibility rises if you don’t come over.”

  “You are blackmailing me into coming to your gathering?”

  “Yes, I am. If I was really mean, I’d order you, because technically, I’m your boss.”

  “You can’t order me to go to a barbecue.”

  “Yes, yes I can. You are in need of some release and socialization. You cannot sit in your living room playing Pharaoh and watching BBC movies until our next case.”

  “I’m not sure which part I find more disturbing. The fact that you know I play Pharaoh or that you know I am watching BBC movies. Are you spying on me?” Since Gabriel was my neighbor, this was a very real possibility.

  “No, I just know what you do when left alone for days at a time. You’ve been in your house, alone, since we got back from Detroit. It is time to come out and play with the others.”

  “Yes, boss, I’ll be there at six-thirty.”

  “And change out of your pajamas before you come. Wear something casual, shorts or something.”

  “I don’t wear shorts.”

  “It’s June and it’s hot, you could wear shorts. Might help those pearly white legs of yours. They need some sun.”

  “Gabriel, I will come to your barbecue, but I am not wearing shorts.”

  “You are going to bake to death if you wear jeans.”

  “Then I’ll bake to death. Are we done?”

  “You are going to need to shower before you come over.”

  “How do you know I didn’t shower this morning?”

  “Because when we got back, you mentioned it was barely sixty degrees in your house. I know you, Ace, and you are not going to shower with it being that cold in your house. If you want to use mine, you can come over around five-thirty. Bring clothes to change into, I’ll even let you wear your pajamas and hoodie over.”

  “You are spying on me,” I said taking a moment to look over my shoulder out the sliding glass door. If Gabriel was spying, he was doing a good job of hiding while he did it. I didn’t see him, even though I could see into his backyard.

  “I’m not spying on you. I just know how you are. See you in a bit.” He hung up the phone.

  I considered dialing Nyleena to ask how much she had bet I wouldn’t go to the barbecue and decided against it. I did need a shower and I wasn’t going to shower at my house. Being wet in sixty degree weather was not my idea of a good time. I got up and trudged upstairs to the bedroom. I grabbed some clothes and shoved them into a duffle bag. I slipped on my tennis shoes and grabbed my keys. I walked across the street and rang the doorbell.

  “Aislinn!” Trevor nearly squealed my name.

  “I need to use your shower,” I told him.

  “Still haven’t fixed the air conditioning at your place?” He raised an eyebrow.

  “Nope,” I sighed.

  “Well, come in, come in. Don’t stand there in your pajamas looking sullen. I take it you are going to Gabriel’s this evening?”

  “Yes, I got the feeling I didn’t have a choice.”

  “You don’t,” Lucas yelled from another room. “You’ve been holed up for days like a child who lost its puppy.”

  “Thanks!” I shouted back. Lucas walked into the hallway.

  “You look terrible,” he shook his head at me. “When did you shower last?”

  “The day I borrowed your shower.”

  “That was three days ago,” Trevor tutted. “Your hair is going to be a disaster. We’ll have to use a little extra conditioner and a special comb to get through it. And I just bought a fabulous new dress for you. You can show it off tonight.”

  “A dress?” I narrowed my eyes at him.

  “A summer dress, yes,” he gave me a stern look in return. “It is very pretty and very you.”

  “He’s a monster,” I said to Lucas.

  “I don’t know what to tell you,” Lucas shrugged back. Trevor laughed at us, even though we were talking about him. I was his human doll, the sister he had never had but always wanted. It worked, I hated shopping.

  Two

  Gabriel’s backyard looked like all the other backyards on the block. He had a large concrete patio, patio furniture, a large tent like thing that covered the patio furniture, an in-ground swimming pool, a barbecue grill and manicured flowers.

  My backyard would have looked like a jungle if it weren’t for the fact that neighborhood kids had a co-op going on yard mowing. I had an arrangement that included a big fat check at the end of every month. They mowed it every week and tended the flower beds that had been pre-installed.

  There are three things I hate about summer; surprisingly, none of them are the humid hot Missouri air; I look forward to that each year. Winter brings aches and pains that settle deep into the joints and bones ensuring that my body suffers throughout the season. Spring and Autumn improve the bone-crushing pains of winter, but there are still twinges that shoot through them preceding the terrible storms that sweep across the state. Summer was like being swaddled in a compress that soothed the pains and made them disappear, at least for a few months.

  Currently, I was enduring all three of my summer dislikes; bare feet, ba
thing suits and barbecues. I couldn’t eat barbecue sauce, it caused migraines. My chicken was lightly seasoned and smoking on the grill that Gabriel was manning. However, next to my chicken was a couple of slabs of pork smothered in sauce.

  Nyleena was in sandals, shorts and a bathing suit top, wearing it like it was a shirt. Her friend was dressed much the same. Xavier had forgone the shirt and was topless and barefoot. He was also consuming large quantities of a cold alcoholic beverage that lead to him attempting to do an Irish Jig on the pool’s edge. I was secretly hoping he fell in.

  I had lost the battle with Trevor and was wearing the sundress. Paranoia kept me from going barefoot or wearing sandals and I had managed to slip on a pair of canvas shoes.

  The newest scars were barely nine weeks old. Seven small stab wounds to the shoulder with a serrated steak knife from a hysterical victim. I couldn’t sympathize with her hysteria, but I could see how my being dressed in tactical gear and storming through a door might confuse her into thinking I was a bad guy.

  The group was chattering around me. I had nothing to add to the conversation, so I drank my soda and pretended to be interested in whatever asinine topic they were discussing. I was hoping the unknown attendees didn’t try to drag me into their conversation and get to know me. I wasn’t good at that sort of thing.

  We all turned as Xavier gave a strangled grunting noise. His feet went one way, his ass slammed onto the edge of the pool and he toppled over backwards into the water. Trevor snorted. Lucas stood, walked over to the pool and pulled the soaking wet drunkard from the water. Xavier’s new girlfriend raised an eyebrow. I was betting she would be an ex-girlfriend by the end of the month. Women never stayed with Xavier very long.

  “I think I broke my tail bone,” Xavier said, turning to show all of us the back of his swim trunks, like we could see the bone through his skin and shorts.

  “Let’s eat,” Gabriel ignored Xavier and began removing things from the grill. “Ace, do you want to give me a hand?”

  “Not really,” I stood up, walking towards the fiery hot grill.

  Next to the grill the temperature jumped several degrees. Gabriel had a healthy sheen of sweat on his face, emphasizing his freckles. It was easy to forget that Gabriel was a red-head. The freckles were usually hidden under a heavy tan. The hair was always neatly tucked under a baseball cap that said US Marshals.

  This summer, he had decided to grow some sort of mustache/goatee thing. Stubble lined his chin and lip, making him look like a chunkier, red-headed version of Xavier. Not that Gabriel was chunky, but few people were thinner than Xavier. Michael was the only one I knew.

  I held a plate as Gabriel filled it with pork steaks. I frowned at it, hoping he wasn’t going to put my piece of chicken on top of it all. Eventually only my chicken was left on the grill and he placed it neatly and alone on a paper plate before handing it to me.

  Everyone but me had been tasked with bringing a dish. Trevor had made mine, all of them terrified by the thought of eating something I had cooked. I hadn’t protested. I’d just let Trevor tell everyone the pasta salad was mine. I scooped a heap of it onto my plate and ignored the rest of the sides. One of them had been made by Xavier, but I didn’t know which one. While I wasn’t the best cook on the planet, I had nothing on Xavier. I had been in his house a few times and I was sure there had been mold in the kitchen.

  Everyone seemed to be avoiding the deviled eggs except Xavier. He ate three before he filled his plate with anything else. Then followed that with three more after he had tossed a pork steak that looked like the entire side of a hog onto the paper plate, getting barbecue sauce on the table.

  “Aislinn, Gabriel tells me you two work together,” Gary, the friend, finally engaged me in conversation. I gave Gabriel a look.

  “Uh, yeah,” I eventually said, pointing to the corn on the cob. Lucas gave me a small nod, I grabbed an ear of it.

  “Are you the secretary for the Serial Crimes Tracking Unit or what exactly do you do?” Gary pressed forward. I gave Gabriel another look. Gabriel was turning red and had a hand over his mouth. The table fell very quiet as everyone turned to look at me.

  I turned my attention from Gabriel, who was trying not to giggle out loud, to Gary. For several seconds I remained quiet, summing him up. He was roughly five foot, ten inches and pushing 210 or 220 in the weight department. He had a paunch that wasn’t hidden behind his perfectly tailored shirt. His hair was starting to gray. His face was completely shaven, showing smile lines around his mouth and crow’s feet at his eyes. I could easily take him down from his chair and show him what I did for the Serial Crimes Tracking Unit, but I figured my boss would frown at me if I injured his friend.

  “What do you do Gary?” I turned the question around instead.

  “I sell insurance,” Gary answered.

  “Insurance, how exciting,” I went back to my corn on the cob. The butter had melted from the heat of the corn or the heat of the sun, either was a possibility. “And you?” I turned my attention to Gary’s wife. She had done nothing but smile the entire day.

  “Oh, I’m a stay-at-home mom,” she told me. “We have two boys and a girl.”

  “Now, what do you do exactly? Is there a lot of paperwork with Gabriel’s job or do you have to make travel arrangements and that sort of stuff?” Gary asked.

  I stood, hiked up the hem of my summer dress to just above mid-thigh and let him look at the scars that decorated my legs. A few of them were pre-Marshal, most of them were not. I didn’t get injured on every case, but it felt like it most of the time. Serial killers do not like being handcuffed by a woman.

  “I beat up the bad guys,” I said and sat back down.

  “Aislinn Cain!” Trevor used my name to admonish me.

  “Hey, you bought the dress, what did you think would happen?” I snapped at him. “Besides, administrative assistants don’t get scars like mine from making travel arrangements and filing paperwork.”

  “Oh, are you two a couple, we were under the impression...” Gary’s wife let the words trail off.

  “No, we are not a couple, him and Lucas are a couple. I’m just his living doll,” I smiled at her. She stared at me, mouth slightly open, brain working to salvage the situation. Nyleena giggled. Gabriel excused himself from the table before he choked to death. Lucas put an arm on the back of my chair. Trevor shook his head. Xavier continued to eat like nothing had happened.

  “Xavier,” Gary decided to switch his focus.

  “I’ve already seen her scars,” Xavier shoved a forkful of pasta salad into his mouth, still not looking up from his plate. Nyleena giggled again.

  “Um, no, actually I was going to ask what you did before you were a Marshal,” Gary was still struggling to overcome my social faux-pas.

  “I was a SEAL, same as Lucas,” Xavier answered.

  “Ah, I was a Marine,” Gary found some footing and tried to step forward. “Where’d you serve?”

  “It’s classified,” Lucas answered. “How do you know Gabriel?”

  “His ex-wife is my sister,” Gary said.

  “I see,” I said. “And you guys still talk?”

  “It isn’t really Gabriel’s fault that the Bureau had him working all the time or that my sister couldn’t see the benefits of being married to a federal agent,” Gary said.

  “Benefits?” I asked.

  “Housing, large salaries, life insurance, health insurance, the whole package,” Gary said.

  “Ace, why don’t you help me,” Lucas stood up from the table before I could reply to Gary. I stood, helped Lucas with a few empty plates. He guided me into the house.

  “I know you would like nothing more than to shove his head up his own ass, but don’t,” Lucas said once we were alone.

  “I’m beginning to think I dislike men in general,” I told him.

  “We aren’t all misogynistic jackasses,” Lucas reminded me.

  “Well, you aren’t, Xavier isn’t, Gabriel and Michael are fine, but most
of them suck,” I said.

  “Only because you look at the world with a very jaded point of view. Men tend to try to kill you, it makes you stand-offish to begin with,” Lucas said.

  “There is that,” I answered.

  “Just be nice to Gary and Janet,” Lucas said.

  “Who’s Janet?”

  “Gary’s wife,” Lucas said.

  “When were we introduced?” I asked.

  “When you first arrived,” Lucas frowned at me.

  “Ok, I’ll be nice to them, but I really wish I had brought my bathing suit now.”

  “Trevor bought you a bathing suit. You won’t like it, but it’s here.”

  “It’s a two-piece isn’t it?” I asked.

  “Baby, it’s a bikini. Trevor thinks you should show off your scars like medals of valor.”

  “How small of a bikini?”

  “I disapprove of it,” Lucas answered.

  “That small?”

  “That small.”

  “Well, damn, could we somehow sneak over to my house...” I stopped. I had thrown out my bathing suit when I moved to Seattle. I had never replaced it.

  “You don’t even own a suit, do you?”

  “I used to,” I admitted.

  “Here,” Lucas pulled a bag off of Gabriel’s kitchen counter. “But you’re probably not going to like it.”

  I slipped into the bathroom. Lucas didn’t move from the kitchen. I could still hear him in there, rustling like he was shuffling his feet.

  The bikini was actually not as bad as I thought. It wasn’t a string bikini. The bottoms had a little frilly skirt. The top came down from my neck in a v-shape and tied behind my head and behind my back with straps that were about an inch wide. I struggled to get into it.

  There was a small knock on the door.

  “Need help?” Lucas asked, not opening it.

  “Um, maybe,” I admitted. I opened the door, Lucas shut his eyes and felt along my back for the straps. “You can’t tie with your eyes closed. You’ve seen me in less than this.”

  “True, but you seem more vulnerable now,” Lucas said.