Linda Johnston - Back to Life

He was glad they didn’t ask how he felt and what he saw when he was down.

How could he have possibly explained the agony he had suffered, the bright light he’d seen, the compulsion to open his eyes and look into the blue, concerned depths of Skye Rydell’s eyes, or the sensation that she had been calling to him, insisting that he live?

He couldn’t. It seemed so ridiculous.

Soon, the questions ended. “We’ll be in touch if we need anything more from you, Trevor,” the captain said. “Meantime, take the time you need to heal. We’re all pulling for you to get back, but not before you’re ready.”

“We’re all glad you’re okay,” Theresa Agnew said again. “Any questions for us before we adjourn?”

“One,” Trevor said grimly. “What’s the word on Marinaro’s location?”

“Unknown,” Captain Franks said, “but we’ll get him.”

“Yeah,” Trevor said. He hoped they’d get him fast. Before he could hurt anyone else—civilian or cop.

Best of all would be if Marinaro stayed at large just long enough for Trevor to apprehend him…his way.

He should have left well enough alone and gone home as he was supposed to. But Trevor poked his head into a few offices at the station, receiving the applause of coworkers who were glad to see he was alive.

He couldn’t resist going over to the K-9 officers’ domain, which was filled with closely spaced cubicles and hooks from which leather leashes hung. There was a slight doggy aroma and an atmosphere of readiness to run that must have been created by the dogs sitting at attention near some desks.

Trevor was glad to note that one of the dogs was the black one assigned to Skye Rydell. Seeing Trevor, she stood and wagged her tail eagerly. So did a few other dogs. The K-9 handlers did as other people in the station had done.

“Good to see you, man,” said Tritt, who was near retirement and as mangy-looking as his dog.

“Glad you’re okay,” said Igoa, a huge grin lighting his narrow face.

But even while receiving their kudos, Trevor let his gaze remain on someone else. Skye was on the phone. She looked up, nodded cordially, but seemed in no hurry to congratulate him again on surviving.

On impulse, Trevor approached her when she hung up. “Hey, Skye.” He patted Bella on her sleek head. “Wanna grab a cup of coffee with me? I’d still like your opinion on what happened at that warehouse. What you saw, and all.”

“I just told the FID committee everything,” she said. “I’d really rather not go over it again.” She let her gaze rise just a little, but wouldn’t allow herself to completely meet his eyes.

Skye had seemed a little uneasy when she’d visited him at the hospital, but now she appeared really uncomfortable.

Why? What was she hiding? Had she known the suspect? Somehow been involved?

Unlikely, but she was definitely concealing something.

Right now they had an audience of her coworkers, so he wouldn’t press the point.

But he was definitely going to find out what Officer Skye Rydell wasn’t telling him.

It was Monday, a week after the warehouse incident, and along with everyone else in the Angeles Beach P.D., Skye was edgy. Marinaro was still at large.

Stories and questions kept appearing in the news. Tips poured in. But no lead had resulted in locating Marinaro.

The person who’d phoned in the tip that led them to the warehouse had finally been found. She worked in the warehouse and was offered witness protection until Marinaro was caught and convicted.

And talk about media frenzy: today was Officer Wesley Danver’s funeral. Reporters were everywhere.

At the moment, Skye stood on a paved path along the cemetery’s steep hillside that faced the Pacific below. She had arrived early with the rest of the K-9 unit, ostensibly to help keep order among the masses of people attending the interment. Members of law enforcement departments from across the country filed in to pay their respects to the officer killed in the line of duty. The parade of vehicles had begun early that morning along the city’s thoroughfares and hadn’t stopped, though the funeral was scheduled to begin in half an hour.

The Angeles Beach Police Department was on alert, observing attendees. Killers often came to their victims’ funerals. Even cop killers.

Jerome Marinaro might be hiding in plain sight, in a uniform or suit. The best way to penetrate a good disguise would be for one of the dogs to identify him by scent.

Since Bella had been the only dog at the scene that day, she had an edge over the others.

“Lotta people,” said Ken Vesco, who stood beside Skye holding his German shepherd’s leash. Like Skye, he watched the crowd enter through the gates at the cemetery’s entrance and spread out over the hillside.

“Sure are,” Skye agreed.

A lot of living souls, but they weren’t the only people Skye was thinking about. Below green, manicured grass lined with stone markers were a lot of deceased people. This was the main Angeles Beach cemetery, and it was huge. Buildings held crypts containing multiple layers of decedents’ remains, often grouped in families with spaces reserved for those to follow.

Skye inhaled slowly, sadly. She was far from a stranger to death and its ultimate inevitability, but despite all her childhood training with family members and others who understood, she still felt every loss personally—even when she was unable to do more than assist a worthy, dying person to the best of the other side. Especially then.

Her decisions were critical, though. They were irrevocable and based on immediate impressions of the person at the crossroads between life and death. Often, she chose to restore life. Sometimes, she didn’t.

Too bad the ancient legends were only partly true. Some form of existence lay on the other side, of course, but not exactly the exalted Valhalla of stories—or so today’s Valkyrie descendants believed.

Skye’s ancestresses may have chosen which valiant soldiers would live and which would cross over, but descriptions of what Valkyries in those days looked like, how the dead were treated in the halls of Valhalla and why…The variety and inconsistency of tales proved that no one who knew the truth had disclosed it to the living—or, if they had, it had not been glamorous enough to be passed down through time.

As she was growing up, Skye’s family and friends often discussed the legends, but despite their important role in end-of-life decisions, no one could describe the afterlife for certain. No one who completed their crossing of the rainbow bridge, with or without assistance, ever came back to tell. But today’s descendants were sure there was a pleasant plane of existence to look forward to on the other side.

Some people did not deserve to be there. A fortunate few of them had their forevers saved by being assisted across the bridge by a Valkyrie descendant who sensed something salvageable within them. The rest wound up elsewhere, the equivalent of purgatory or hell—someplace too awful to describe.

Maybe if she knew for certain, it would make her chosen path easier, give her even more hope to pass along to those she helped to die.

Skye realized that she had been craning her neck, watching for the other person she had helped that day…really helped.

Almost as if he had heard her, Officer Trevor Owens emerged from the crowd just below and walked slowly up the path, past the open grave, toward where she stood.

He wore a dress uniform, and despite the ocean breeze, the hillside climb was obviously a challenge for the still-recuperating man. Skye couldn’t help admiring him. Despite the effort it obviously cost, he didn’t falter, didn’t miss a step.