Killer Karma

Sherrie silently rinsed her sponge in the bucket.

“Does he still think Cole went off with her?”

What! Anger and horror sent heat and ice through Cole. Leach was accusing him of an affair!

“Sherrie, no!” He ran to the stove and dropped to his knees, coming to her eye level. If only he could turn her to look at him. “Don’t believe Leach. I wouldn’t do that to you!”

Not when it was one of her biggest nightmares and he knew the cost of screwing around. Goodbye Sherrie. She made that clear when he convinced her to marry him. After growing up with a father whose zipper automatically dropped for anyone female, she had zero tolerance for infidelity.

If she believed he cheated on her, that explained this cleaning mania. Without memory, though, how could he be sure what happened? He felt guilty about something. Heartsick, Cole watched her wipe under the oven’s lower heating element. “Sherrie, no matter what, I’d never leave you.”

Suddenly, the real meaning of Leach’s assumption hit Cole. No one knew he was dead! He jumped to his feet. He had to find a way to tell them.

Joanna sighed. “Listen to me. If anyone knows the signs of an affair, I do, and one phone call means nothing.”

Cole groped for memory of a phone call…or a name or face. Anything. In vain.

“Not just one call.” The words came in brittle syllables. Sherrie scrubbed at the oven. “Now Leach says there were three. She called Cole twice Wednesday evening before he made that call to her. When he phoned me to say he had ‘something to do’ before coming home, it was the second time in three days he’d done that.” She dunked the sponge and wrung it out with a savage twist. “Cole was on edge since Monday. A case bugging him, he said…but those make him distracted, not jumpy. How would you call it?”

Cole winced. Damn! Was there another explanation for why he acted that way? “Sherrie, help me remember. Mention a name.”

Joanna said, “At least guilt would indicate it’s probably the first- ” She broke off as Sherrie shot her a withering stare. A moment later, she frowned. “Aren’t people supposed to be innocent until proven guilty…even husbands?”

Sherrie scrubbed savagely at the glass in oven door. “I’m not letting him turn on the charm and blind me with bullshit until I’m alone in ICU with a dying child while he’s off- ”

Joanna choked.

Immediately, horror filled Sherrie’s eyes. She choked, too, and rushed to throw her arms around her mother. “I’m sorry! Please forgive me. I wasn’t thinking.”

While they clung together, the front door began beeping. Someone punching the entry code on the keypad. Mother and daughter looked at each other, pulled apart, and took deep breaths. By the time the front door banged open and the thump of dumped objects came down the hall, they had put on calm faces.

“Mom, we’re home!” Kyle’s voice yelled.

Sherrie stripped off her gloves. “We’re in the kitchen!”

Cole moved to the far end of the island, away from the danger of walk-throughs.

Feet ran their direction, accompanied by the scrabble of claws on wood. Tiger bounded into the kitchen first and threw his square body at Sherrie, tongue lolling, stubby tail a frantic metronome.

Kyle and his virtual twin Holly arrived seconds later. Even at ten Kyle had the Dunavan lankiness…topped by his mother’s hair. “Have they found Dad?” he asked eagerly.

“Not yet.” Sherrie reached down to pat the dog’s blunt head. “How was sailing?”

That would be on the Chimera, the sloop Razor co-owned with his sister Denise.

The light died from Kyle’s face. He shrugged.

“We had a delightful time,” Holly said. “We went north as far as San Quentin. Daddy let Kyle take the helm all the way back and he was splendid. No one fell overboard, not even Tiger when gulls dive-bombed him.” Then her pixie face lit with mischief. “And Travis thinks Denise’s new girlfriend is a real babe.”

Joanna’s mouth tightened. Sherrie sent her a sharp Don’t say a word! glance.

Tiger spun from Sherrie and ran down the island to dance in front of Cole, his eyes and tail declaring: Fearless leader, you would have been proud of me! I chased a bizillion killer seagulls and watercraft away from the boat!

Cole stared. The dog saw him?

Travis, the male half of the twins, came through the doorway…the Dunavan coloring his only similarity to Renee…built like a middleweight wrestler, and winner of high school trophies proving it. “What’s with Tiger?”

Cole said, “Tiger, freeze. Get on the ground.”

The dog dropped to a sphinx position on the floor.

Razor followed Travis, and stopped in the doorway to polish his glasses on the tail of his 49ers sweat shirt. He should have been the one nicknamed Bulldog. When they were all out somewhere together, his stocky build sometimes made strangers mistake Travis for his son.

“You’ve probably worked up an appetite,” Sherrie said. “Please stay for supper. We have enough of my famous Italian soup to feed a battalion. Or do you have to get Holly back to Lauren?”

Cole came on alert. That was her I-want-to-talk voice.

“No.” Razor shook his head. “I have her for the night.”

Cole pumped a fist. Yes! Now maybe he would learn some answers.

Sure enough, Sherrie said, “Mother, will you see if Hannah’s finished her nap? The rest of you, pick up your stuff in the hall and put away Tiger’s life jacket. Then go wash up. Except you, Razor.”

Travis wheeled from checking out the soup. “Have you heard something about Dad?”

Cole grinned. Travis had cop instincts…watching everything around him, a natural at reading body language and hearing what lay behind the words people said.

Which Sherrie well knew. The shake of her head signaled ask me later.

Joanna’s frown said she wanted to stay, too, but after a sharp look from Sherrie, she slid off her stool and followed the kids out. Sherrie took it over. Razor straddled another stool, resting his arms on the back. Cole leaned on the island where he could see both their faces. He expected Tiger to follow the boys, but the dog stayed, sitting against Sherrie’s legs.

She leaned down and rubbed his head until footsteps faded up the hall. “Is there anything about Cole’s disappearance you aren’t telling me?”

Behind his glasses, Razor’s eyes narrowed. “No. Why?”

“Leach called earlier. He asked if Cole loses his temper with the kids and me and has ever been physically abusive.”

Cole stiffened. What!

Sherrie straightened from petting the dog. “Can you find out what’s going on?”

“From Leach?” Razor grimaced. “I doubt it. But…” He pulled his cell phone off his belt. “…there’s someone else I’ll try.” He looked up a number and punched it in.

Sherrie released the clip on her hair, letting the kinky mass spring loose. “See if they’ll give you any details about this Benay woman.”

Benay! The name hit Cole like a physical blow. The Black Hole collapsed, spewing a tidal wave of memory. He reeled before it, remembering everything…about his murder, and about his relationship with Sara Benay. In horror, he realized Benay was the unfinished business that brought him back…that the majority of the foreboding and urgency arose from danger he brought on her. But for all he had to feel guilty about, at least none of it came from affair.

“Sherrie,” he said in relief, “she was just an informant! Nothing happened between us.”

How did he make Sherrie hear, so she knew he had not turned into Eddie Trask?

He came around the island to their stools. “Can you tell at all that I’m here?” Tiger whined and he bent to scratch the dog’s ears. What let Tiger see him when they did not? “Razor, do you hear me?”

Apparently not. Razor stared into space as he talked into the phone. “Jer, you’re the man who’ll know. I