One Good Man(16)

“O…kay. “Well, looking into the kitchen from the living room, there’s an exit to the right that leads into the hallway, and the refrigerator sits on the other side of that. There’s a small strip of countertop, it’s a light oak butcher block, between the fridge and the stove, then another larger section that runs into the corner. On the next wall is a window that looks out over the driveway. The sink and dishwasher are there, then the back door.

“The table butts up against the third wall. It can seat four people if pulled out, but I usually eat alone, so I don’t bother.” She stopped herself from mentioning that she’d eaten there last night with Kell. Even thinking about that right now was too much. “Against the last wall, the one with the door into the living room, is a desk with drawers and shelves. It’s where I pay bills and keep cookbooks, stuff like that. The walls are a buttery yellow, the floor white tile, the cabinets the same light oak as the countertops.” She opened her eyes, met Greenley’s gaze and shrugged. “I guess that’s it.”

“Good. Very good.” The captain nodded. “While you’re under hypnosis and I ask you to describe a scene the way it looks in your mind’s eye, that’s what I want. A detailed visual account of what you see. Understand?”

“Yes. I understand,” she said, exhaling deeply as he handed her a form to read through and sign, giving her voluntary consent to participate in the session for the sole purpose of aiding in the criminal investigation.

That done, Captain Greenley went over what she assumed was a standard cover-your-ass checklist, determining that she was not under the treatment of a psychologist or psychiatrist, suffering from any serious physical ailments, taking any stimulants or sedatives without her physician’s consent, or subject to any phobias.

The last one made her laugh, but she answered no, and assured him when he reached the end of the questionnaire that she was not wearing contact lenses either. He finished making his notes, then considered her seriously, his brows lowered, and asked, “Do you know where you are right now?”

“Yes, I’m in the Texas Rangers station in Midland, Texas.”

“Who asked you to come here today?”

“Ranger Sergeant Kellen Harding.”

“What is your understanding of the purpose for coming here?”

“I’ll be hypnotized to see if I can remember anything about the murders at the Sonora Nites Diner that will help Sergeant Harding in his investigation of the case.”

Greenley’s frown softened. “Before we get started, do you have any questions?”

“No, not really. You’ve been very thorough.”

“Very good. Now, Jamie, using your own words, I want you to review for me what you do remember about that night and the events that occurred, in order, exactly as they happened.”

“Where do you want me to start?” she asked, shifting in her chair, fighting the return of the tension along her spine.

“Wherever you would like,” he said, then sat back as if he’d paid for a show.

She told him the same story she’d told anyone who’d ever asked. The time she’d clocked in, how she’d waited tables and manned the register with Julio and Elena while Lacy worked in the kitchen with Kass. She’d told him about the last customer they’d never thought would finish his burger and leave, how he’d taken an hour to read the paper, how Julio and Elena had danced up and down the aisle with their mops and brooms after they’d locked the door behind him.

She told him about Kass hurrying all of them to finish because he wanted to get home to Helen. His wife had made his favorite black-forest cake, and he wanted to sit back with a glass of milk, a huge slice of the chocolate-and-cherry layers, and watch the Celtics NBA game on his VCR. He missed Boston a lot, Kass did.

She told Greenley about it being her turn to run the day’s closeout tape on the register while balancing the till and preparing the nightly deposit of cash and checks. The credit-card slips went into a separate bag for Kass’s bookkeeper, and Jamie had been sorting them, reaching for a paper clip, when the front door’s glass had shattered from a spray of bullets and the killer had walked through.

She’d dropped to the floor, her forehead grazed and bleeding, her shoulder, too. The blood from her head wound had puddled around her profusely, and she’d taken short shallow breaths and held them as long as she could, her eyes closed the whole time. That was all she could remember, and she told Greenley that, too.

What she didn’t tell him was how she’d felt then, the fear that had been like icy fingers crawling over her skin, the blood that had trickled into her mouth and tasted of death, fearing she would vomit and the killer would realize she was alive, hearing the screams of her friends, the choking, gurgling sounds Elena made as she died.

Those things she kept to herself because they were the hardest memories, the ones that sat like a crushing weight on her chest until she could no longer breathe and went numb. It was the numbness that she hated. She should suffer unbearably for those who had died; the fact that she couldn’t caused an embarrassing guilt.

“Good. Very good,” Greenley said again, his tone attentive, respectful, his pen silent as he took notes. He looked up then, and met her gaze, smiling as if they had all the time in the world, as if they were old friends catching up on things that had happened in their lives. He made it easy not to give in to her fears and panic.

“Now, Jamie, I want you to relax. Sit back, get comfortable and close your eyes. Good, just like that,” he said when she leaned into the chair and let the cushions swallow her up, the feeling heavenly. “Let the tension drain from your limbs. Let your eyelids grow heavy. Breathe in slowly, exhale. That’s it. Very good. Become aware of your arms. Allow them to relax. Your hands, too, and your fingers, one by one. That’s right. You’re doing just fine. In a moment, I’ll ask you to count backward from ten. With each number, you’ll become even more calm and relaxed until your mind feels like it’s floating on a cotton-ball cloud.”

That’s exactly how Jamie felt, like she was on a cloud, the sky around her calm and blue. She heard her voice from a distance, counting, “Ten, nine, eight…seven…six…” Then she heard Captain Greenley again, telling her there was a television set in front of her, and it would play the movie of the Sonora Nites Diner murders while she told the story again, just like before, only this time she held a remote that could control the picture, speeding it up or slowing it down or pausing it when she needed a closer look.

She went through the same narrative as before, the captain asking her the occasional question about what she was seeing. She saw things she hadn’t mentioned the first time, tiny little things she couldn’t imagine were important, but were clear and easy to spot when the replay slowed.

And though she’d expected to feel the need to fast-forward through the worst of that night, the truth was she felt detached with Greenley’s calm voice assuring her she was safe. Viewing the gory parts was no worse than watching an episode of CSI.

When the killer grew closer, however, her heart gave its first jolt, her breath catching in the constriction of her chest. Captain Greenley calmed her, encouraging her to breathe deeply and relax, to take her time describing the scene from her mind’s eye.

Wearing blue jeans with ragged hems, the killer stood over her, smelling like diesel fuel and patchouli, and unzipped the deposit bag before banging the register. Coins rained down and pummeled her, the leather pouch landing in front of her face, the sharp corner of the till glancing off her elbow when he knocked it from the counter.

Cursing in Spanish, he kicked her to move her out of his way, and she saw the bloody heel print he left on the floor Elena had mopped and the Nike swoop on his untied black-and-red shoe. His next step, he slipped in a puddle of soapy mop water, reached out to catch himself on the edge of a table, and she saw the tattoo of a coiled rattler on the inside of his wrist.

Once he was out the door and she’d reached the end of the story, Greenley’s questions stopped, and in a voice as soothing as ever, he said, “I’m going to bring you back to the present, Jamie, by counting to five. When I finish, you’ll remember all of your refreshed memories, understand? Good. Now, one, two, three, four…five.”

Jamie opened her eyes, and saw Captain Greenley’s smiling mouth beneath the brush of his mustache. He studied her a moment—or maybe he was just giving her time to orient herself in the present—then asked, “How do you feel?”

“Fine,” she said as she scooted to sit on the edge of her chair. “I never realized that I’d opened my eyes while I was on the floor. I thought I’d kept them closed until the police arrived and found us. I thought that’s why I didn’t remember anything but flashes of colors and sounds.”

Greenley spent a few more minutes talking to her, then signed off officially for the tape. He got to his feet, and Jamie did the same.

The technician continued to concentrate on her monitor as Jamie turned to follow the captain, leaving the room where she’d spent the last hour and a half and walking into the one where Kell had been watching the hypnosis session—and was now waiting for her.