The Heart of the Matter
Prologue
Sleep. Never before had he found it so hard to sleep. You're tired, you lay your head on the pillow, close your eyes and sleep comes. Why isn't it coming now?
What am I missing?
Sitting on the same bench he'd come back to for days, he looked out, searching for the answer to that question. He'd stared out at the foggy ocean for so long his eyes burned from the salt wind and grit in the air.
When he started mumbling, the walkers and joggers and especially the children took the extra time to make a wide arch away from the smelly, haggard man he had become. After all, they had no idea who he was…how important he was.
If I'm so important, why can't I think? What am I missing?
Over and over again, he reached out. If she had been in the ether, he would feel her there. But he felt her here.
Taking a long breath of the almost palpable, life-giving oxygen around him, a cocktail of heavy, salt-laden humidity mixed with a good measure of fishiness and a touch of motor oil, he stood and took pause at the stench that wafted up from himself, then smiled at the sound of her voice inviting him to the bath, only to realize it was all in his head. She existed only in his head.
He'd made his way over the hill before he stopped talking to her. People expected him. Funerals were for the living. The dead no longer cared. She wouldn't be at her funeral whether she was there or here.
Chapter One
Cracking the door just enough to peek in, Nurse Ernie Shoop found Trapper asleep on his sofa and quietly tiptoed over to him. She didn't want to startle him out of his sleep. The first time she had done that, he'd been…Ernie didn't really know if it was a dream or a nightmare, but the awakening was sad either way. She wasn't here whenever he woke up. She existed only in his dreams.
She gently shook his shoulder. "Trapper. Trapper, wake up. It's time to get ready for the funeral."
His reaction surprised her this time. Rather than the sudden jump to his feet declaring she was all right and that it was all a mistake, or those times when he awoke with that question, "What am I missing?" he opened his eyes and smiled.
Sitting up, he ran his fingers through the hair on the sides of his head, and then over the smoothness on top.
"Another dream?"
In his deep baritone voice, he said quietly, "One more of thought. I've let myself go. If she were here, she'd disown me."
"Do you remember the funeral is today?" Ernie asked, passing him a cup of black coffee.
"Mm hm. I was reminded." Slowly rising up off the sofa, he went into his private bathroom and looked into the mirror, running his hands over his beard. "I haven't trimmed this thing for days." In fact, Trapper hadn't done much for days except sleep on the sofa in his office. He couldn't face going home just yet. Even though she hadn't yet moved in, she lingered there. The night he identified her in the morgue was the last night he would ever step foot in her pool house. She permeated everything in it. And today, he would see her for the last time on this Earth, and he wanted to look his best for her. Then he remembered. Funerals are for the living. The dead don't care.
That foreboding feeling he'd had ever since he'd left her place flowed over him like a veil. Something's not right. What am I missing? Then that one thought that he had pushed away so readily the last few days sprang forth, adamant to get out. She's not dead. She would never have drowned. If she had gotten in trouble in the water, she would have relaxed and floated. But she was on the slab at the morgue, cold and lifeless. What am I missing?
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Even though Boyd Stephens, the Chief Medical Examiner in San Francisco, had been forbidden to perform the autopsy because of his closeness to the case, no one could deny his access to the results. She had drowned. The autopsy confirmed it, and there were no signs of foul play. The body had been released two days ago to the funeral home, and the funeral was today.
Trapper had stopped eating, drinking, working…functioning, except that he had forced Boyd to give him the particulars about the autopsy as if he were looking for something that said this was not her. But he'd identified her himself. And Boyd had met her. The woman that had been in his morgue was the same woman Trapper was going to marry. All Trapper could say in response was, "What am I missing?"
How could they have missed anything?
"Tracy, would you bring me Leah Haverty's file? I want to take one more look at it before I go to the funeral."
Boyd's secretary shuffled into the office and tossed the file on Boyd's desk. "I'm going to find another cover for that file. You've pretty much worn it out."
Boyd never heard her. He opened the file and stared at the report sitting right on top; the dental report. It hadn't been there earlier. Because they had already positively identified her, they released her to the funeral home before the dental report came back.
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Just inside the door of the funeral home, Trapper stood with his head bowed and his hands clasped in front of him wearing his black three-piece suit; the one that Leah liked so much. He even wore the tie she had purchased for him. Funeral homes never really bothered him. He was used to death. After a stint as a surgeon in a MASH unit during the Korean War, and then in his capacity as Chief of Surgery at San Francisco Memorial Hospital, death was a natural part of his life. Today, he dreaded going into the room where her body lay, because seeing her there only confirmed that she's not here. But she is.
A hand moved across his shoulder, and a familiar voice greeted him. "Trapper, how are you holding up?" asked Albert Shaefer, Leah's attorney.
Trapper gave him a weary smile, but said nothing.
"I understand. When you have some time, I need to discuss some things with you. Leah had a will and a trust, and she named you the trustee and beneficiary. And I wanted to share a recent discussion I had with her. An important one."
"How long will you be in town?"
"As long as it takes. Don't worry about the time."
Melanie McIntyre, Trapper's ex-wife, had joined Ernie, Dr. Gonzo Gates and Nurse Gloria Brancusi as they approached Trapper. She slipped her hand into his, and when he looked, she smiled, but her eyes were red from tears. Not so much for Leah. After all, she barely knew the woman. But because she knew what Leah Haverty had meant to Trapper, she understood his pain.
"Trapper," said Ernie, taking the lead. "The director would like you to go in first to make sure everything is the way you want it. You can go alone, or any of us can go in with you."
With his eyes slowly becoming moist, Trapper smiled at each one of them and simply nodded, and with Ernie on one side, Melanie on the other and Gonzo and Gloria behind him, they walked into the room together and over to the casket.
Furrowing his brow, as did everyone around him, he spun around toward the door, but before he could exit the room, Boyd Stephens strode in. The two men glared at each other for a moment before Boyd said, "Let me guess. It's not Leah. Who is it?"
Flaring his nostrils, Trapper answered, "Angela Bedford."
