Criminally Handsome

He asked, “What else can you tell me?”

“You play guitar.”

He held out his right hand. “You saw the calluses.”

“You’ve got a fresh grease stain on your jeans. Maybe you ride a motorcycle.”

“A Harley,” he confirmed. “You’re using logic. Not psychic intuition.”

“Does it matter if I find the answers with logic or by a vision?” she asked earnestly. “Both are methods of observation. Different paths that lead to the same truth. You’d understand if you could be inside my head, walk a mile in my shoes.”

He glanced at her feet. “Purple sneakers with white stars? I don’t think so.”

“They match my jacket.” She ran her fingers down the zipper of the purple leather jacket she’d bought on her last trip to New York. The style was so not from the Southwest, but she loved it.

As her tone lightened to match his teasing, she realized that she was enjoying this conversation. Moments ago, she’d been tongue-tied. Now her wits were fully engaged. How lovely to talk to an adult who wasn’t a nagging ghost. “We have more in common than you think, Miguel. We’re both investigators.”

“But you see things that aren’t visible to the naked eye.”

“So do you. Every time you look into a microscope.”

“You make a good point.” His brow furrowed. “So much of forensics, like DNA testing and trace evidence analysis, isn’t readily visible.”

“Paranormal phenomenon is the same thing. It exists, but nobody has invented the tools to accurately reveal these signs and symbols.”

Until someone created a reading device, it was up to people like her—psychics and mediums—to interpret.

They parked outside the ten-foot-tall chain-link fence surrounding the police impound lot. The person in charge wasn’t a police officer in uniform, but a crusty gray-haired man who looked like he knew his way around a junkyard. As soon as Miguel showed his badge, the old man unlocked the gate and slid it aside.

After a brief discussion, Miguel agreed to hold the baby so she could concentrate, but he refused to wear the colorfully patterned designer baby sling she’d ordered online. Instead, he tucked the baby in the crook of his arm as he answered his cell phone.

Emma picked her way across the gravel lot where most of the snow had melted. Some of these tightly parked cars and trucks looked like they’d been here for years with their tires gone flat and the paint jobs dulled by constant exposure to the elements. Aspen’s beat-up sedan seemed new in comparison.

The last time Emma saw this vehicle, shortly after her cousin disappeared, she’d felt confusion and fear as she imagined the desperation Aspen must have experienced as she fled. Similar emotions roiled inside her, but this fear came from her own terrible foreboding that her cousin was never coming back. Please, Aspen, you have to be alive. She had so much to live for. Her son. Her new job as a teacher on the rez. After years of struggling and working lousy jobs at the Ute casino and in Las Vegas, Aspen had finally finished college at the University of Nevada. She’d been so close to reaching her dreams.

Miguel strolled up beside her. His calm, no-nonsense attitude reassured her. “That was Patrick on the phone. He has other police business and won’t be joining us. When we’re done here, can you give me a ride back to the lab?”

“Sure.” She circled the hood of the car, hoping to get a clue that would lead to her cousin.

“What are you doing?” he asked.

“Sometimes, when I touch things, I can tap into a spirit energy. In my vision, I saw the car. It must be important.”

“If your cousin isn’t dead…” He shook his head. “I can’t believe I’m saying this.”

“Keep going,” she encouraged. “A mile in my shoes.”

“If your cousin isn’t dead, what spirit are you hoping to contact?”

“I saw a woman wearing an FBI jacket. I’m not sure, but I think her name is Julie.”

He reacted with a start. “And she’s dead?”

“Yes.”

His jaw tensed. “Don’t play games with me, Emma. You heard something about the FBI investigation. Correct?”

“I haven’t heard anything. Why would I?”

“The sheriff mentioned it. Or you heard local gossip.”

His accusations irritated her. “I’ve barely been out of my house for five weeks, ever since Jack came to live with me.”

“What about before that?”

“I live alone, and I work at home. When I get together with friends, we don’t discuss FBI investigations.” She confronted him directly. “Who is Julie?”

“Agent Julie Grainger. She was murdered in January.”

She heard the cry of a bird and whirled around. Crows symbolized death for her. When her aunt Rose passed away, a flock of the big black birds had blanketed her yard. Their cries had been deafening.

She looked up, searched the blue skies and saw nothing. No birds at all. But she’d heard something.

There was another chirp, and she realized the sound came from Jack. Miguel stroked the baby’s head. “It’s okay, mijo. You’re a good boy.”

“Did you know Julie?”

“A little.” His jaw unclenched. “Are you okay, Emma? You look pale.”

“As if I’ve seen a ghost?”

When he smiled, his demeanor changed from hostile to gentle. “I guess that happens a lot to you.”

“Too much.” She glanced at Jack when he made another chirp. “Maybe you should take the baby back to my car. I don’t want to frighten him.”

“Are you going to do something scary? Roll around on the ground? Squawk like a chicken? Do a voodoo dance?”

When she glared at him, he grinned.

“You like to tease,” she said.

“Life is too sad not to laugh. I mean no disrespect.” He rested his hand on her shoulder. His touch was steady and strong as an anchor in a storm. “Do whatever you need to do. I’m here for you. Nothing bad is going to happen.”

A dark mist rolled in at the edge of her vision. She’d just told him to go away, but now she wanted him to stay close, wanted to maintain physical contact. “Don’t go anywhere.”

“You got it.”

She laid her palm on the hood of the car. Her sight narrowed. Though still aware of the cars and snow in the impound lot, she seemed to be peering down a tunnel. At the end, she saw the tall woman in an FBI jacket. Julie Grainger. Beside her was a teenage girl in a lovely white gown. Words and images raced through Emma’s mind. Rapid-fire. Like film on fast-forward.

Then the vision was gone.

“What is it?” Miguel asked.

Her brain sorted the jumbled impressions. The aspen had been leafy and green. Her cousin was still alive. Julie told her Aspen had escaped. Then she’d made a weaving motion with her hand. A river? A snake? “A trail,” Emma said. “I should start at the beginning and follow the trail.”

“From the crime scene.”

“Yes. We should start there.” Emma had also seen the VDG symbol again. “VDG is important.”

Again, Miguel’s interest picked up. “Is VDG connected to your cousin’s disappearance?”

“It could be.”

She remembered the girl in the white dress. Her presence had nothing to do with Aspen. She was Miguel’s sister. Teresa. She had died young, less than a year after her quinceanera, the ceremony and party that celebrated the fifteenth birthday of a young woman. Teresa wanted her brother to know that she was all right, that she’d found the light and gone to the other side. Teresa believed that Miguel would understand.

But Emma wasn’t sure. Though Miguel seemed more open to her ability as a medium, he might not be ready for contact with his tragically dead sister, and she didn’t want to alienate him. She needed Miguel to help her find Aspen.

Looking into his eyes, she measured her words, trying to find a balance between proving to him that she wasn’t a phony and not freaking him out. Teresa had shown her a family photo with Miguel standing beside his brother, who appeared to be the same age. She said, “You’re a twin.”

He nodded slowly.

“Fraternal, not identical. Alike, but different.”

The silver medal he wore around his neck on a chain glittered in the sunlight. Though she couldn’t make out the design, it didn’t appear to be a saint. Instinctively, she reached toward it. When her fingers touched the surface, her hand glowed. She identified the image on the front: El Santuario de Chimayo, near Taos in New Mexico.

“Chimayo,” she said. A legendary healing place like Lourdes. The words etched on the back of his medal were Protect and Heal. Teresa wanted her to know that Miguel had been near death, close enough to see the light.

His near-death experience was why her ability to communicate with dead people threatened him. He knew she was telling the truth, knew there was something beyond this world. He’d been there.

IN THE BACK OF HER CAR, the baby had begun to fuss, and Miguel knew their time for further investigating was limited. He didn’t want to believe that Emma’s pronouncements were anything more than random guesses, but he couldn’t ignore her accuracy. How the hell did she know he was a twin? How had she described his relationship with his brother, Dylan, so accurately? Alike but different. That pretty much summed it up. They were both in law enforcement, but Miguel relied on forensic science while Dylan was a supermacho FBI agent.

Emma reached toward the backseat, hoping to calm Jack. “I should get him back home.”

“Mijo,” Miguel said. “Give us a break. You’ll be okay.”

Immediately, Jack’s cries modified to quiet little sniffles. He was a good baby, a good boy.

“Amazing,” Emma said. “I can’t believe the way he responds to your voice. It’s almost like you’re his father.”

“His father is a pig. If mijo was my baby boy, I would never abandon him. Family is everything.”

“But you’re not married.”

“Don’t remind me.” Though he and his brother were thirty-three, neither of the Acevedo twins had found a wife and settled down. “I get enough nagging from my mama.”

The leftover snow had melted enough that he could pull onto the shoulder at the edge of the road. This area—where Aspen’s vehicle had been found—was outside Kenner City, but there were houses within sight. There had been no witnesses, no one who stepped forward and said they heard her scream.

“This is it,” Emma said. “The start of the trail.”

“We won’t find anything here. I did the crime scene analysis. There’s nothing more to be learned.”

Not unless she did that weird vision thing. When she’d touched the car in the impound lot, he’d felt the tension in her body. She seemed to catch her breath. Her blue eyes went blank as a corpse. Muy loca, like a trance. But it had lasted less than a minute. If he hadn’t been standing beside her with his hand on her shoulder, he wouldn’t have noticed.

She shoved her car door open. “I want to take a look around. Jack seems okay. We can leave him in his car seat.”

Reluctantly, he joined her. If she managed to somehow turn up evidence that had been overlooked, he needed to be with her to verify and to maintain proper procedure.

Her gaze scanned from left to right and back again. What could she possibly hope to find? The blizzard had erased any footprints. He and the other crime scene investigators had already measured and photographed the skid marks on the pavement.

She lifted her chin and gave a sniff.

“Now what?” he asked. “Are you channeling a bloodhound to scent the trail?”

Instead of bristling, she chuckled. “Might be handy to have a ghost dog. I wouldn’t have to pick up the poop.”

“You made a joke, Emma.”

“But you didn’t laugh.”

“On the inside, I’m in stitches.”

“Seriously,” she said, “were search dogs involved?”

“There wasn’t time before the blizzard hit.” And he regretted that they hadn’t been able to call on that resource to locate her cousin. “We only had a few hours to process the scene, and the sheriff’s first concern was taking care of Jack.”

“I know. As soon as he checked the car’s registration, he came to me with the baby.” Guilt furrowed her brow. “I should have been here, should have gone out into the snow to look for my cousin. But I was overwhelmed. I wasn’t prepared to care for an infant.”

“You managed.”

“Only because I could order all the baby equipment online. I hired someone to come in four hours a day so I can get my work done, but I’m still sleep-deprived. Sometimes I’m so exhausted that I think I’m losing my mind.”

“Losing your mind?” He couldn’t resist teasing. “How can you tell?”

“Very funny,” she said. “Laughing on the inside.”

She walked to the intersection, turned and walked back toward him. Her purple sneakers dug into the snow and mud. Then she went in the opposite direction.

Noises from the baby seat in the back of her SUV reminded him that they didn’t have much time. “We can come back here later.”

She hunkered down beside a pile of dirty snow. “Over here.”

He joined her. The dark leather of the medallion stood out against the snow. The black design, etched into the leather, was a grizzly paw print.

Chapter Three

The coffee at the Morning Ray Café on the main street of Kenner City wasn’t as good as the cinnamon-flavored brew at Emma’s house, but Miguel signaled the waitress for a refill as he checked his wristwatch. Dylan was more than fifteen minutes late.

It wasn’t like his by-the-book, precise twin to be off schedule by more than a couple of seconds. Ever since Dylan had arrived in Kenner City, he’d been preoccupied; the inside of his head was crammed full with old guilt and new grief. Numero uno was the recent murder of Dylan’s friend and colleague, Agent Julie Grainger. He and three other FBI agents were working overtime on their investigation of Vincent Del Gardo, the former Las Vegas crime boss suspected of Agent Grainger’s murder.

Miguel gave a nod to the cute, red-haired waitress who filled his coffee mug. When she grinned and crinkled her nose, her freckles danced. “How are things at the lab? Solve any big crimes lately?”

“Have you committed any?”

“Not today.” She took her order pad from her apron pocket. “What else can I get you?”

“Nothing now, Annie.”

She was one of the few people in town he knew by name. He ate a lot of his meals at this cozy little diner where the burritos were good, and the posole was primo. The head cook and owner was Nora Martinez, the sheriff’s mother.

Because it was after three o’clock with the lunch rush over and only four other people in the place, Annie lingered at his booth. “Waiting for somebody?”

“My brother.”

“The FBI agent.” Her smile grew ten times brighter. “He’s really cute.”

Women had always responded to Dylan as if he were a rock star, which never made sense. They weren’t identical twins but resembled each other a lot, and the chicas never threw themselves at Miguel. “Better not let Dylan hear you call him cute. That’s a word for baby ducks and puppies.”

Annie laughed. “Handsome is a much better word.”

If anyone had heard about the FBI investigation, it would be Annie or the people in the café, which was frequented by many of the local law enforcement people. “How much do you know about Dylan’s investigation?”

“An agent got murdered. A woman agent. One of the other FBI guys was showing her picture around, asking if we’d seen her or noticed her talking to anyone.”

“Thanks, Annie.”

Miguel thought Emma might have picked up Agent Julie Grainger’s name from talking to someone at the café or someone else who had seen the photograph. That’d be a logical explanation for how she came up with Julie’s name. But it didn’t explain the VDG symbol or the grizzly paw necklace.

Later this afternoon, he and other forensic technicians would process the necklace in the hope that they might discover the identity of the owner. They probably wouldn’t be lucky enough to find fingerprints—not after it had been buried in the snow at the side of the road all this time.

How the hell had he missed finding the necklace when they first swept the scene? Sure, the leather was the color of dirt and would have blended in when there wasn’t snow on the ground. Sure, they’d had other urgent tasks—dusting for prints, measuring skid marks, photographing footprints. Sure, there was a blizzard on the way. But he wouldn’t easily forgive himself for overlooking such an obvious clue.

He had to be shown the way by a medium. By Emma. La loca bonita. A crazy, beautiful lady in a purple leather jacket.

Dylan came through the front door of the café and joined him in the corner booth. “Sorry I’m late.”

“No problemo. You okay?”

“Don’t worry about me, vato.”

Dylan had always been the tough guy, the star athlete, the macho leader of the pack. It bothered Miguel to see his brother rattled.

Annie rushed to their booth as soon as Dylan sat down. She placed a steaming mug of coffee in front of his brother and set down two pieces of apple pie.

“On the house,” she said in a throaty voice. She leaned close to Dylan, giving him a glimpse of cleavage. “Is there anything else you want?”

Miguel couldn’t resist this setup. “My brother likes whipped cream. All over his pie.”

Dylan raised a hand. “Not necessary.”

The waitress fluttered her lashes. “You can have all the whipped cream you want. Your name is Dylan, right? And I’m Annie.”

And I’m yesterday’s fish stew. Amused, Miguel leaned back in the booth and watched as his brother doled out the charm. The guy couldn’t help it. He was a chica magnet.

When Annie finally moved away, Dylan said, “What’s so important that I had to see you right away?”

“The sheriff and I met with a woman today. Her name is Emma Richardson.”

Annie rushed back to their booth. “I love Emma,” she gushed. “She’s a real psychic, you know. She sees things. And she finds missing people.”

“Thanks for your opinion,” Miguel said in a quiet, firm tone of dismissal. The time for fun and games was over. He needed to talk seriously with his brother. “We’ll call you if we need anything else.”

“Enjoy your pie.” She turned on her heel and flounced back toward the counter.

“A psychic,” Dylan grumbled as he dug into his pie. “You interrupted my day to talk about a psychic.”

“I was skeptical, too.” Miguel kept his voice low so Annie wouldn’t come running back over to them. “You know I don’t like things that can’t be explained by logic or science.”

“You were always the smart brother. El Ganso.” He smirked. “El Nerdo Supremo.”

“Because I think with my head, not my huevos.” Miguel fixed his twin with a cool gaze. This wasn’t a time for joking. “I took the psychic—actually, she’s a medium—back to the crime scene where Aspen Meadows disappeared. She had a vision that turned up an important piece of evidence.”

Though Dylan continued to eat his pie, Miguel sensed that his brother was interested. “The sheriff still doesn’t have any leads on the missing woman?”

“Not yet. I don’t have much hope. Somebody who’s missing for over a month is either dead or doesn’t want to be found.” He frowned. “But Emma Richardson is certain that Aspen is alive. They’re cousins, and Emma is the guardian for the baby.”

“The father hasn’t come forward?”

“Not yet.” Miguel took out the piece of paper Emma had used to make her notes from the vision. He spread it on the table in front of his brother. “She drew the design of the leather necklace we found at the scene. And also, she drew this.”

Dylan picked up paper. His eyes narrowed. “VDG. Vincent Del Gardo.”

“There was a symbol like this on that map you showed me—the map that Agent Grainger sent before she died.”

Miguel and everybody else in the crime lab had tried every way possible to decipher that map. From satellite GPS to old-fashioned cartography, no one could make sense of those weird twists and turns. It didn’t match any known roads. The map could have been the path of a spreading river. Or trails through the forest.

At the counter, Annie was joking and laughing too loudly with a guy who had been sitting there since Miguel came in. He overheard the word psychic and glanced toward them. They had to be talking about Emma, and that bothered him. He checked out the guy so he’d remember what he looked like. He wouldn’t be easy to forget. Though big and barrel-chested, he was a sharp dresser in a fringed leather jacket with a turquoise yoke. The band around his cowboy hat was snakeskin with the rattles still attached.

Dylan tapped nervously on the tabletop. His voice went low and quiet. “What does this part of the note mean? A tall woman in an FBI jacket.”

There was no easy way to say this. “Emma’s spirit guide for this vision was Julie.”

“She saw Julie?”

“In the same sense that she sees everything. In her head.”

“If this is true,” Dylan said, “it means that the missing woman is connected to Vincent Del Gardo. Connected to Julie’s murder.”

“Sí, I know.”

“This is big. It opens a whole new line of investigation.”

“Are you still searching for Del Gardo?”

Dylan nodded. “And for the money he’s got stashed away.”

Miguel had heard that Del Gardo’s illegal fortune was in excess of fifty million dollars. Not an amount that could be tucked away in a tidy little suitcase. “Your map with the VDG symbol might lead to both.”

“Let’s see if your psychic can point us in the right direction.”

BEFORE BABY JACK showed up on her doorstep, the bathroom in Emma’s house had been tidy with feminine decorative touches. Now, she had no time for long baths, scented candles and fresh flowers. Her mosaic-tiled countertop held a variety of baby products. She’d known that her life would be different if a man moved in, but she hadn’t expected pacifiers and butt wipes.

Confronting her reflection in the mirror, she dabbed a glob of spit-up off the shoulder of her beige turtleneck and ran a comb through her chin-length brown hair. Miguel had called and asked if he and his FBI brother could stop by and ask a few questions.

Miguel. She sighed. Miguel Acevedo. She wouldn’t mind having him as a houseguest. He was definitely handsome with those green eyes and strong features, but his greater appeal came from his quick mind. She had to be alert when she was around him. He was a challenge.

Also, she needed him to find Aspen. To follow the trail. But where was this trail? Discovering the necklace in the snow was a start, but Emma had no idea what came next.

In the mirror, standing beside her, was Grandma Quinn. The resemblance between her and this blue-eyed, elderly lady made her smile.

Grandma said, “Why don’t you change that shirt, dear?”

Emma didn’t need fashion tips from the other side. “You know I had a vision about Aspen.”

“About time.”

“I’m supposed to follow a trail or a path. Do you know anything about that?”

“Change the shirt.”

Grandma faded and vanished, leaving Emma frustrated. All too often, her spirit visits were cryptic hints and vague impressions instead of direct instructions. Why couldn’t Grandma Quinn give her a street address or a phone number?

Grabbing the baby monitor, she hurried to the front door and onto the porch to wait for Miguel and his brother. Jack had finally fallen asleep, and she didn’t want the baby wakened by two grown men tromping through the house.

When the car pulled into her driveway, a shiver of anticipation went through her, making her realize how glad she was to be seeing Miguel again. He gave her a lopsided grin that made her heart beat a little faster.

His twin brother resembled him, but she would never confuse these two men. There was something about Miguel that drew her closer. His was a healing presence, like the words inscribed on the back of his silver Chimayo medal.