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CHAPTER 1

Ariel Anderson Arts on Main was one of several boutique galleries in downtown Ventura. Its high-ceilinged airiness and polished teak floor made it the one Jessica Mack loved best. She backed through the door, cradling a cardboard container the size of a cake box, and set it on the counter as carefully as if it contained the crown jewels.

Ariel's impatience to see what was inside was written in her body language. Without waiting for an invitation, she lifted the lid and removed the contents, beaming down at the miniature English garden cleverly housed in a vintage watch box.

"You've done it again," she said with a satisfied sigh. "It's exquisite. I already have a buyer who'll go wild for this."

"I'm glad you like it," said Jessica, reminding herself that Ariel paid well, and the insurance money from the accident would not last forever. Still, the miniatures she created were infused with pieces of her soul. Relinquishing them always hurt like a bastard.

Sculpting the tangle of roses and hollyhocks that climbed the trellis arch had taken days. The wren perched on the rim of a sundial, hours more. Crocus, lavender, and heliotrope, each tiny flower was a work of art.

Ariel opened a drawer behind the counter and took out a large magnifying glass to inspect the miniature up close. "Look at that gown," she exclaimed.

The matchstick-sized Edwardian lady seated at a café table held a tea cup to her teeny-tiny lips. She was outfitted in a pink satin afternoon dress with a long gold-colored lace jacket and wide-brimmed hat, an orange tabby at her slippered feet, begging for treats.

Each item had to be held with tweezers under the lens of a microscope so Jessica could painstakingly paint the delicate roses and garlands around the edges of the tea service.

"How did you ever sew that lace?" asked Ariel.

Jessica smiled. "Very, very carefully."

"I adore the teapot. You painted it yourself?"

"I did. And yes, I sculpted the cookies, too."

"They look so yummy. I can't imagine a more wonderful spot to sit and have tea than that garden. Jessica Mack, you are one talented artist. The check will be in the mail by Friday."

The sheer delight on Ariel's face made it the slightest bit less painful to leave the miniature behind. At least her art would be enjoyed by someone who appreciated it.

Jessica picked up her empty carry box. She started to say goodbye, but the words that came sounded slowed down, distorted. Her tongue was thick and slow in her mouth.

Oh, no. Please not now.

"Jessica? Are you all right?" Ariel's voice came from miles away. "Hon? You're all pale; are you —"

Her hands were alien things attached to arms that refused to obey. As the box clattered to the floor, a voice whispered in Jessica's head. "My grandma. Tell her I'm here,"

Leave me alone.

Her vision was clouding over, growing rapidly darker. The appalling noise would soon follow. She knew Ariel was staring but there was no way she could explain ...

Leaving the box where it lay, Jessica whirled around and dashed across the gallery. She pushed past a startled customer entering the door. The darkness that only she could see was almost complete now. Fumbling the key fob from her jacket pocket, she pointed it at the Mini Cooper parked at the curb and collapsed into the driver seat.

Focus on the breath, Dr. Gold had taught her. Focus on the breath until the noise stops and vision returns.

Breathe in slowly to the count of four. Hold it. Out to the count of four.

Ninety seconds passed. She counted them, blessing silence when it came, then checking in to make sure she still knew who she was.

The answer came with a flood of relief: I'm Jessica Mack. I live in Ventura, California. I have an identical twin sister named Jenna Sparks. One more breath. In. Out.

Two more minutes passed before her breathing slowed to normal, her body stopped its violent trembling.

Through the gallery window she could see Ariel glance repeatedly at the Mini as she spoke with her customer. The blackout episodes were a secret Jessica had not shared with anyone, not even her twin. No way would she tell her client about them.

Syncope. That's what Dr. Gold called the episodes. Syncope. The word sounded almost romantic. But there was nothing romantic in blacking out at random. It used to happen rarely. Lately, the episodes seemed to be exploding out of control.

Before Ariel could come out and ask what the problem was, Jessica backed out of her parking space and threaded her way along Main Street, past the antique shops and the thrift shops and the restaurants. Not ready to go home and face her fear, she hooked a right at California, another at Harbor.

For once, parking at the beach was easy. She pulled a heavy cable knit sweater over her head and stepped out of the car.

The cadre of homeless folk who frequented the area was nowhere to be found on this cheerless day. June gloom. That's what Southern Californians called it when the hazy clouds formed a marine layer over the coast, hiding the sun until three o'clock in the afternoon.

She had the promenade mostly to herself. Turning north, she walked past the Crowne Plaza and the short row of condos beyond it. No children ran around the playground in the sand today. Even the ground squirrels that acted like they owned the place were hiding from the wind in their burrows. No foraging among the boulders for peanuts or other treats.

Jessica walked fast. At high tide, the water rushed all the way up to the barrier between the ocean and the promenade, sending spray into the air. From time to time she stopped to lean over the wall, lifting her face to meet the stinging drops that fell like rain. The discomfort of the cold water on her hair and skin gave her a perverse pleasure — something to think about besides the whispers, and other thoughts she would sooner avoid.

Jenna — older by a mere ten minutes — was fond of chiding her about it.

"If you'd just face the truth, Jess," she liked to say. "It would get easier. Of course it's painful, but you need to stop pretending it didn't happen."

Face what truth? That it's been five years since my ex-husband's drunken road rage stole my son's life? Is that supposed to be some kind of milestone?

It was, in fact, a truth Jessica had been facing every day for one-thousand, eight-hundred and twenty-five of them. What good did it do to memorialize the anniversary of the day Justin died when it was with her every minute of every day?

Jessica had emerged from a coma with questions that nobody wanted to answer. Of course, she knew. Impossible for a mother bereft of her child not to know that he was no longer breathing the same air, that the atoms and molecules that made up his physical form had ceased to exist.

Gregory Mack, Justin's father, had, like too many drunks who cause fatal crashes, suffered no significant injury.

He had been arrested on a DUI. In California, the maximum sentence for gross vehicular manslaughter while intoxicated was ten years. The trial judge, appalled by the reckless disregard for his family's lives, had brought down the gavel with the wish that she had the power to double it.

The day after leaving the hospital, Jessica filed for divorce.

Greg still wrote to her every few months, but nothing he said could undo what he had done, give back the life his actions had taken. She burned every jailhouse letter unopened.

The anniversaries were never easy, but this was even more agonizing than the four that preceded it. Five years. Yes, it was a milestone. A milestone of misery.

She had given up trying to make Jenna understand. You think that, considering that a few months after the accident, her twin had survived a violent kidnapping, she might have shown more compassion.

Compounded by the aftereffects of the head injury and coma, the belief that Jenna had been killed was added trauma that had propelled Jessica into a terrifying period of retrograde amnesia. Although she regained most of her memory over time, dying in the accident and coming back to life without her child had changed her fundamentally in ways that were beyond her ability to put into words.

And then, there were the whispers.

They had plagued her since soon after she left the hospital. Brain scans and EEGs showed no abnormality, and until a few weeks ago, she had mostly succeeded in ignoring them. Millions of people had tinnitus, she told herself — hearing strange noises day and night. Maybe what she was hearing was a form of tinnitus.

She had become accustomed to sporadic syncope episodes like the one at Ariel's gallery. Usually, they came when she was under stress. This one was different and its randomness shook her.

By the time she covered the mile to Surfer's Point, the tips of Jessica's ears were burning with cold. She sank onto one of the concrete benches to catch her breath and pull her sweater higher around her neck, doing her best to shut out the unwelcome thoughts about what was happening to her.

Despite the foul weather, a dozen or so die-hard surfers were out riding their boards on the rough waves, looking like tasty shark snacks in their black wetsuits. The ocean, which on most days sparkled like diamonds on blue silk, was the color of a Brillo pad and matched Jessica's mood. She had slept poorly the night before, which was not unusual. Her dreams had been haunted by Justin.

Today should have been his seventh birthday.

Jessica imagined him sitting beside her. He would have been bouncing up and down, excited by the surfers. She would have bought him a boogie board to get him started. He loved to splash in the ocean when she and Jen each took a small hand and dangled him above the shoreline ripples, or he paddled in a tide pool under their watchful eyes. She had been so watchful, so careful to protect him from danger.

If only she had protected him from the biggest danger of all — his father.

She watched the surfers until the soothing white noise of the ocean's steady roar began to melt the tension from her shoulders. Her eyelids drooped ...

... The sun is a brilliant disk in a sky the same blue as Justin's eyes. Apart from one cottony puff that seems to follow two youngsters playing football, the day is cloudless. Shouting, kicking the ball to each other, having fun, they run down the field, coming closer. The taller boy is African American, the other is pale and flaxen-haired.

There's a familiarity in the way the smaller boy moves, the way he laughs. She reaches out to him with her thoughts. Please come over here, I need to see you.

As though she had spoken aloud, the boy turns and runs toward her. His eyes, the same blue as the sky, are alight with mischief. His grin is achingly familiar, but he's five years older now, growing up without her.

He calls out, "I'm fine, Mom, you don't have to worry about me," then spins back around with a wave and kicks the ball to the other boy.

Justin, come back.

Her son dissolves like sugar in water, leaving the other boy alone with her and her mangled heart.

As much as she yearns for her child, this other boy needs something from her. He drifts over and lifts his head for her to see ... empty eye sockets, melting pink flesh, scarred and terrible.

A strangled scream bursts from her throat.

Jessica stared at the roiling ocean, dazed and confused. Where was the sunshine-drenched field? The two boys?

"Hey, hey, lady. You okay?"

She spun around, her eyes flicking over the man on the promenade behind her, straddling his bicycle, no helmet on the untamed greying hair escaping from a short ponytail. Despite the temperature, he wore cargo shorts with a sweatshirt, and sandals.

"Are you okay?" the man repeated, his face full of concern.

What did he think she might do? Jump over the railing into the water? Mortified at being caught having an episode for the second time in the same afternoon, Jessica shook loose the horrific image of the boy. The vision she had just experienced was nothing like the episode in Ariel's gallery but the result was the same — to anyone watching, she must look deranged.

Resting his bike on its kickstand, the man came around the bench to where she stood. "Want me to call 911?"

"No, please don't. I'm fine." Her temples were throbbing, her heart racing.

"I hate to say it, lady, but you don't look fine. Why don't you sit down, take it easy for a minute."

Wordlessly, Jessica followed his advice but the image of the boy's melted face stayed with her. Had she fallen asleep and had a nightmare? No. The boy was real and he had died in a fire, she was sure of it. Questions rolled like film credits:

Who was he?

Why was he with Justin?

Why did he show himself that way?

Will Justin come back again?

The man took a seat on the bench beside her. She was conscious of him speaking but her mind had room for nothing but the two boys. The shock of the older boy's ruined face had launched her out of the vision before he could give the message he wanted her to hear.

How do you know there's a message?

I just do, dammit.

The inner argument was with an obnoxious voice that was different from the whispers. It had lived inside her for most of her life, criticizing, nitpicking without mercy.

Jessica turned to face the man, whose kindly hazel eyes were worried.

"I'm fine. I just need to eat." As she said the words, she realized that they were true. She could not remember her last meal. Lunch, yesterday? Maybe.

"I'm Jay," the man said, holding out his hand.

"Jessica."

His big paw closed around hers, soft and warm. "Nice to meet you, Jessica. Is there anything I can do to help?"

"No, nothing. But thank you for stopping. That was nice of you."

"No problemo, senorita," he said with a friendly wink. He rose from the bench. "May I suggest you get something warm inside you? The sooner the better."

"I will. Thanks again."

Thus dismissed, Jay climbed back on his bicycle and pedaled away with a cheery wave. Jessica watched his broad back fade into the distance. Tears welled up and clouded her vision. Tears for the burned boy. Tears for Justin, who had taken her heart with him to the Afterlife. Tears for her own pitiful self, a young woman whose head was crowded with strange voices and visions.

Dammit.

She had forgotten Zach Smith was coming over this afternoon. His silver Acura was parked in front of the grey and white Victorian. She was fifteen minutes late and in no mood for company. Not that Zach was exactly company.

Maneuvering around his car, Jessica parked on the driveway, emotional exhaustion dragging on her like a sack of rocks as she climbed out of the mini. His early morning text had said he needed to see her, no reason given. She didn't have the energy to wonder what he wanted.

Behind the Victorian was the cottage Jessica rented, a studio-sized refuge where she hid out from the world and made art.

Her studio area claimed a generous amount of space in the cottage, with a work table that bore the tools of a miniaturist — dental tools for carving away the extra bits of clay and creating fine detail lines, loop tools for creating texture, a small rolling pin and cutting board, a strong magnifying lamp. Art supplies. Floor-to-ceiling shelves for sculpting clay, stacks of fabric squares, plastic bins filled with spools of thread, buttons, doll heads, limbs. Armatures that supported sculptures in progress — human and animal — in various stages of completion.

Pushing through the wooden gate, her heart lifted at the sight of the pocket-sized garden she had created. Pineapple sage, mint, rosemary, anemone, carnation, amaryllis, all running riot along the path.

Therapy for the soul.

Zach Smith, who had a talent for blending into the scenery when he had a mind to, materialized from the shadows of the jasmine arbor near the door.

"I was about to call out the cavalry," he said, pointedly dropping his phone into his jacket pocket.

"You are the cavalry," said Jessica, referring to his status as a FBI Special Agent. "Sorry I'm late."

He put on a sad face. "You forgot me again, didn't you?"

"I went for a walk at the beach."

"I guess you turned your phone off."

She dug for it in her pocket and checked the screen. Three text messages and a voicemail from Zach, two voicemails from Jenna. "Left it in the car," she said, unlocking the door.

"How convenient." Zach followed her inside. The garlicky aroma coming from the pizza box he was carrying made Jessica's stomach growl. She was about to fulfill her promise to the man on the promenade and get something warm inside her.

Zach unloaded a six-pack of Longboard Lager on the work top and flipped open the pizza box. "Extra cheese, olive and mushroom," he said. "No meat, the way you like it."

"Omigod, Zach, you are the best."

"You look pretty wasted, chickadee. Sit. I'll bring you a slice and a brew."

Jessica plopped onto the armchair, legs over the side, and watched him make himself at home looking for the bottle opener. "You know what? You'd make someone a great wife,"

He threw her the stink eye over his shoulder. "Why do I bother?" he said with feigned disgust.

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Excerpted from "Proof of Life"
by .
Copyright © 2019 Sheila Lowe.
Excerpted by permission of Suspense Publishing.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.

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