everything. Even what yer gonna say next.”
I sped immediately into an explanation, hoping to overshadow his words and more importantly, his tone. “I was only going to recommend we do a regression.”
“Like a past life thing?” Constance asked. “Hypnosis?”
“Similar,” I nodded as I answered her. “But instead of past life, I’d just be going to a previous point in my own.”
“Breugadair,” my wife spat, resorting to a Gaelic epithet for liar. “Someone else’s death is what you mean.”
“We don’t have much choice in the matter,” I contended.
“Rowan, not an hour ago your heart stopped beating for almost two minutes.”
“DO WHAT?!” Ben exclaimed, whipping his gaze back around to me.
“You were still passed out,” I explained quickly. “Besides, she’s making it out to be worse than it is.”
“I am not,” she defended herself.
“Yer fuckin’ heart stopped?” Ben pressed.
“Not according to the paramedics,” I said.
“Paramedics?” he exclaimed. “Jeezus H. Christ! What the hell else did I miss?”
“Rowan,” Constance said, ignoring Ben’s query. “Maybe Felicity is right.”
“It’s not as dangerous as she’s wanting you two to believe,” I appealed.
“All right. Fine.” Felicity leveled her determined gaze directly on me and pushed away from the counter as she announced, “Then how about if I do it.”
CHAPTER 16:
Talking myself into corners was something I excelled at on various occasions. Most especially when it came to trying to convince my wife that I was prepared to handle anything the ethereal world could throw at me. Of course, over the past few years she had seen more than her share of my experiences with such, and she knew better than to believe me. Therefore, it always took some creative explaining to convince her otherwise; or try to at least, because as of late, invariably I would lose the verbal scuffles.
So, getting into the corner was easy. Escaping from it once I found myself pinned was definitely something at which I needed more practice. As it happened, this was rapidly becoming a perfect opportunity for just such an experience. Since my back was now so firmly pressed into the metaphorical niche that it was beginning to take on a similar angular shape, I had nothing to lose by trying.
I blurted the second thing that came to mind, “No way.”
I chose the second thing to pop into my head because the first phrase was more along the lines of, ‘it’s too dangerous.’ Quite obviously, echoing my wife’s very sentiment would have been equivalent to surrendering my king before the first pawn had been moved. I already wasn’t sure that I was going to be able to talk myself out of this one, but I wasn’t going to simply give up. I knew my response was less than inspired, but my creative juices were failing me miserably at the moment. Still, I charged ahead, making a bid to break free of the ‘rock and a hard place’ of my own making.
“Why?” Felicity asked coolly and then baited me with, “Because it’s too dangerous?”
“No. Because it wouldn’t do any good,” I told her. “You didn’t see the things that I saw.”
“How do you know that?” she asked, crossing her arms beneath her breast. “Neither one of us can remember anything except what the other one said.”
“Right,” I agreed. “And you didn’t mention anything about her being headless.”
She arched her eyebrows as she gave her head a slight shake. “So?”
“So I must have seen more than you did.”
“Oh come on,” she exclaimed. “You don’t buy into that any more than I do.”
Ben voiced his own observation. “Jeezzz, Row, even I know that’s a lame argument.”
“You aren’t helping,” I returned.
“Look,” Constance spoke up. “I don’t know as much about this as you two do or even Storm for that matter…”
“Hey, you see a broom between my legs?” Ben objected. “Leave me outta this.”
“…What I’m trying to ask,” she continued, glossing over his interruption. “Is that if it’s dangerous for Rowan wouldn’t it be dangerous for you too, Felicity?”
“Not as much,” she replied.
All bids to get myself out of the corner were immediately null and void. I knew the next words out of my mouth would sabotage my own argument, but I was unable to keep myself from calling Felicity on her comment.
“Okay, so who’s blowing smoke now?” I chided.
“All I did was pass out, Rowan,” she asserted. “My heart didn’t come to a screeching halt like yours did.”
“Will you get off that? The paramedics told you I was fine.”
“Aye, they did,” she shot back. “But I didn’t believe it then, and I don’t believe it now.”
I literally threw up my hands in exasperation. “Okay, so what do we do then? You don’t want me doing a regression, and I don’t want you doing one either. So where does that leave us?”
“Okay, like I said, I don’t really know that much about all this,” Constance started in again. “Just what I’ve seen you do here and there, and, well… It’s usually pretty freaking bizarre to be honest… But, that’s beside the point. Anyway, here’s my idea. What if you still did it, but in a controlled manner?”
“What do you mean by controlled?” I asked.
“Yeah, Mandalay,” Ben voiced. “I think I know where you’re headin’ with this.”
“I mean what if you, or Felicity, or even both of you underwent hypnosis by a third party. That way if it gets too weird then you could be snapped out of it right away.”
“That’s a thought,” Felicity said.
Constance shrugged. “We sometimes use various forms of forensic hypnosis with witnesses to help jog repressed or misplaced memories, so why not with you two?”
“She’s right,” Ben added. “Charlee McLaughlin was tellin’ me she used it with a rape victim a few months back. What they got from her was inadmissible in court, but it gave ‘em enough to get a decent lead on the asshole. After that, all they had to do was gather evidence.”
“The rules of evidence are pretty dicey when it comes to information retrieved via hypnosis,” Constance agreed. “But we aren’t after that in this case. We’re just looking for a location on Larson’s remains.”
“I’m not sure it would work.” I shook my head. “Since the experiences were ethereal to begin with, for all intents and purposes, they took place on another plane of existence.”
“But wouldn’t the memories still be there?” she asked. “Just inaccessible to the conscious self.”
“That’s the unknown variable here,” I replied.
“But, they could be there, right?” she reiterated.
I pondered the question for a moment. I’d never really given the idea much thought, until now.
“She might have a point, Row.” Felicity broke the short silence. “You’ve always retained memories from psychic episodes before.”
“Yeah,” I replied slowly. “That’s true.”
“Aye, so it’s worth a try at least,” Felicity said.
Mandalay glanced at her watch and looked thoughtful for a second then said, “I can make a couple of calls. I’m not sure if we have anyone available on this short of notice though. It may have to wait until tomorrow or even Monday.”
“But wouldn’t there be a better chance of any latent evidence still being intact if the scene is located sooner?” I asked.
“Of course,” Ben answered for her. “Fresher the crime scene the better. That’s a given.”
“Then we need to do this now,” I declared.
