Buried Innocence - A Mary O'Reilly Paranormal Mystery - Book Thirteen (Mary O'Reilly Paranormal Mystery Series) (15 page)

Bradley and Mary
stood in front of the building that housed the Galena Police Department. “Are
you really sure you want to go in there?” Bradley asked.

Mary nodded. “Yes.
As difficult as this might be, I really need to get the search for Steve
started.”

“Well, I’m right
here to back you up,” he said, placing his hand on the small of her back and
guiding her into the building. “So, if they think you’re crazy, they’ll have to
think I’m crazy, too.”

She grinned at him.
“That’s so reassuring, darling,” she said.

They opened the
door to the reception area, and the same officer that had panicked the last
time Mary was in sat behind the desk. “Hi again,” Mary said. “I’m here to see
Chief Chase.”

The young officer looked
beyond Mary to Bradley. “Have you taken her under custody, sir?” he asked.

Bradley stared down
the young man with the same look he used on young recruits in the service.
“Actually, officer, this is my wife,” he said. “And I’m here to help her
resolve an issue regarding one of the citizens of your town.”

The young man
swallowed hard and nodded. “I apologize, sir, ma’am,” he said. “I’ll call the
chief right away.”

A few minutes later
they were both sitting on the other side of Chief Chase’s desk. “Chief Alden,
Mrs. Alden, what can I do to help you?” she asked, sitting back in her chair
and studying them.

Mary smiled
inwardly, recognizing the posture as a typical interrogation position. So,
Chief Chase still wasn’t sure about her abilities. Well, that was
understandable; it had taken a decapitated ghost and a haunting in her own home
to convince Bradley.

She leaned forward
and smiled, another interrogation pose. Two could play this game.

“If I were sitting
in your chair, I would think the people sitting across from me were nuts,” Mary
said. “So, I appreciate you taking some time out of your day to visit with us.”

Chief Chase merely
nodded but didn’t change her position. “Well, I consider it a professional
courtesy,” she replied.

Ouch, Mary thought.
Well, let’s see how far that courtesy goes.

“Well, whether you
believe me or not,” Mary said, “I can see and communicate with ghosts. It began
after a near-death experience when I was shot in the line of duty as a Chicago
police officer. I’ve had psychological screenings and I can give you the
personal phone number of the doctor who met with me. Her official report states
that she does not feel that I have any psychological or physiological effects
from the shooting, but because of my new ability, I would be distracted while
on the job.”

She sat back in her
chair. “So, we can take the time for you to call Dr. Gracie Williams and have
her convince you, or you can, for a few minutes, have a willing suspension of
disbelief and listen to what I’m going to say with an open mind.”

Mary waited,
watching the chief for any signs of agreement. Finally, with a loud sigh, Chief
Chase sat forward, her elbows on her desk and nodded. “Okay, convince me.”

“Earlier in the
week I was in Galena on another case,” Mary began. “And I saw a movement out of
the corner of my eye. I ended up on High Street speaking with the ghost of
Steven Sonn. All he could tell me at the time was his first name and that he
was in a dark place.”

“Like hell?” Chief
Chase asked, not bothering to hide her sarcasm.

Mary glanced up at
the clock in the Chief’s office. “I thought I had at least a few minutes of
suspended disbelief,” she countered.

The chief raised
her hands in capitulation. “You’re right,” she said. “Continue, please.”

Mary nodded. “After
doing a little investigation and with the help of your department, I was able
to narrow down the possibilities of who he was. When he appeared in my office—”

“He traveled to
Freeport?” the Chief interrupted. “Did he use a broom?”

Mary merely glanced
back at the clock.

“Okay. Okay,
continue,” the chief said.

“When he was in my
office, I was able to show him the report, and he recognized his name,” she
said. “Then we searched for his son on the Internet, and Steven recognized him.
Well, actually he thought his grandson was his son. Then a portion of his
memory returned, and he believes he fell down an abandoned mine shaft on his
property.”

“Mrs. Alden, don’t
you think the property was checked for mine shafts?” she asked.

Mary shrugged.
“Well, I guess you missed it,” she said. “I know he’s down there.”

“Okay, your few
minutes are up,” she said. “I can’t get a warrant to search that property with
only a request from you.”

“So, what do you
need in order to search it?” Mary asked.

“I’d need a request
from his family,” Chief Chase replied. “So if you can convince them that you’re
not nuts, we’ll take it from there.”

The chief stood up.

“Once we get their
permission, how long will it take you to get the equipment to search the mine
shaft?” Mary
asked,
standing and looking across the
desk at the chief.

“We can get a water
department sewer camera out on the property within thirty minutes,” she said.

Mary nodded. “Thank
you,” she said. “And if I were you, I’d let the water department know that
you’re going to be
needing
them this afternoon.”

“If you’re able to
get permission that quickly, Mrs. Alden,” the chief said, “I’ll go out to the
property and operate the camera myself.”

“Make sure you wear
boots,” Mary said as she and Bradley left the office.

“You sounded pretty
sure in there,” Bradley said as he put the key into the cruiser’s ignition.

Mary nodded,
settled into her seat and put her seatbelt on. “Yeah, I did,
didn’t
I?” she replied. “I sure hope I didn’t just put my foot in my mouth.”

Bradley shrugged.
“It’s been in there before,” he teased. “You’ll get over it.”

“Oh, thanks for the
vote of confidence,” she replied.

“Hey, I’m still
here with you,” he protested. “I didn’t jump up and run out of the office when
she thought you were crazy.”

“No, you didn’t,”
she agreed, and then she sat up and looked over at him. “But you stayed pretty
quiet.”

He nodded as he put
the car into drive and pulled away from the curb. “Yes, because I knew you
could handle yourself, make your point, act like a professional and make me
proud,” he said. “And you did. I figured anything I said would either detract
from what you were saying or make it look like you needed my defending. You
didn’t. You were amazing.”

A little
flabbergasted, Mary sat back in her seat and was silent for a few moments.
“Well, thank you,” she finally said.

Smiling, Bradley
turned to her. “You’re welcome,” he said. “By the way, you’re sexy when you’re
in charge.”

Her smile grew into
a grin. “Wow, I need you to work with me more often.”

Laughing, he pulled
to a stop at an intersection. “So, what’s next, partner?”

She pulled a
notebook from her purse and gave him an address on the other side of Galena.
“We need to end up there,” she said. “But first, we need to drive over to High
Street to see if Steve will come along with me to convince his son to give us
permission.”

Bradley turned
left, drove up the hill to High Street and then turned left again to go back to
the location where Mary and Mike had seen Steve several days earlier. He parked
the car in the lot next to the Galena Historical Society, and they both got out
and walked to the curb. “He was in this area,” she said.

She looked up and
down the street, but she couldn’t see him. Finally, she stepped out onto the
street and looked down the hill. “Steve,” she called, looking down the hill and
waving. “Steve Sonn, is that you?”

Bradley looked
around. “Can you see him?” he asked.

Mary looked over
her shoulder at him. “No, I can’t, but I thought I would look a little less
crazy if I pretended I saw someone I knew,” she said.

Bradley nodded.
“Yeah, that makes sense,” he said, and then he walked over to Mary, leaned over
her, looked in the same direction and called out. “Steve. Hey Steve, do you
have a minute?”

Mary smiled at him.
“Thanks.”

“No problem,” he
replied.

“Are you looking
for me?” Steve asked, appearing a few feet behind them.

Mary put her hand
on Bradley’s shoulder and turned him, so he could see Steve.

“Whoa,” Bradley
said, stepping back instinctively and then lowering his voice, “I understand
why you couldn’t eat those ribs now. This guy’s in bad shape.”

“Steve,” Mary said.
“I need your help.”

“What can I do?” he
asked.

“In order to do a
search to find your body, I need to convince your son, Gregg, to call the
police and request the search,” she explained.

“
Greggie
?” he asked, shaking his head. “I don’t know. I
don’t want to bother him, disturb his life.”

Frustrated, Mary
took a deep breath before she spoke. “Steve, you came to me because you wanted
to be found, and the only way we can get you out of that hole is if your son
requests that we search the property again,” Mary said. “So, you have a choice.
Help me talk to your son, or always have him wonder if his dad walked out on
him.”

“But what if he
doesn’t believe us? What if he hates me?” Steve cried.

“Then we’ve both
done all we can do,” Mary said. “But I think we have to try, for both of you.”

A few minutes
later, the cruiser pulled up to a modest residential home on the west side of
Galena where a man and his son where in the front yard tossing a baseball back
and forth. Mary recognized the man as Steve’s son, Gregg.

Seeing the cruiser,
Gregg held the ball in his glove and turned to his son. “Hey, Stevie, why don’t
you run inside to Mommy and see if she’ll make us some lemonade, okay?”

“Kay, Dad,” the six
year-old replied.

Turning towards the
cruiser, Gregg walked towards the curb. “Hi, can I help you?” he asked.

Mary and Bradley
got out of the car and introduced themselves.

“So, I don’t
understand, why
are a Freeport Police Chief and a private
investigator here
in Galena?” he asked.

“We have some
information about your father,” Mary said.

She hadn’t expected
the shocked look on his face. “My father?” he gasped as he sat down on the
lawn. “Did you find him? Where has he been?”

Mary knelt down
next to him. “Gregg, actually, I need your help to find him,” Mary said. “I
need you to call Chief Chase and ask her to search your old property.”

“We searched the
old property,” he insisted. “Why should we look again?”

“Because they
missed it,” she said. “They missed the abandoned mine shaft he fell down.”

Gregg shook his
head. “No, he didn’t fall down a mine shaft,” he said. “He left us. He was
angry with me, something I had done, and he just left us.”

“Oh,
Greggie
,” Steve said. “I was never angry with you. I would
never leave you.”

“Gregg, your dad
wasn’t mad at you,” Mary said. “He loved you. He never would have left you.”

Gregg looked up at
her, confusion and anger on his face. “How the hell would you know?” he asked.
“You’ve got a lot of nerve to come to my house and act like you know what he
was like.”

“I don’t know what
he was like,” Mary said. “But I do know what he wants now, and he wants someone
to find his body.”

He stared at her.
“What did you say?”

Mary sighed. “I
said he wants his body to be found,” she said. “And yes, I know that makes me
sound like some kind of a nut. And I can’t help that.”

Gregg started to
stand up and move away from her. “You need to leave,” he said. “You need to
leave, or I’ll call the police.”

“Okay, Steve, I
need some help here,” Mary said.

Gregg stopped.
“What did you just say?”

“I asked your dad
to give me some help here,” Mary said. “He came to me asking me to help him.”

“Lady, you are
crazy,” he said, hurrying towards his house.

“Tell him his favorite
book was Curious George, and he made me read it to him every night,” Steve
said, appearing next to Mary.

“He said your
favorite book was Curious George,” she called after him. “And you made him read
it to you every night.”

Gregg stopped and
turned. “What?”

Mary shrugged.
“Curious George,” she said.

He came closer.
“How did you do that?”

“I wish I could
tell you,” Mary said. “For some reason ghosts are drawn to me.”

“My dad’s a ghost?”

“Yes, he’s been a
ghost for about twenty years,” Mary said. “He didn’t leave you. He fell down a
hole. He tried to get back up, wanted to get back to you and the rest of your
family.”

“What if I don’t
believe you?” he asked.

“Well, the only way
you can really find out if I’m a fake is to call Chief Chase and search your
old property,” she said. “If they don’t find anything, then you can ask her to
arrest me. And believe
me,
I’m sure she would be
delighted to do it.”

He pulled his cell
phone out of his pocket and called the non-emergency number for the police
department. “Hi, this is Gregg Sonn,” he said. “I’d like to speak with Chief
Chase.”