Chapter 6 Jasper
Jasper
Ifeel nothing.
That's the first thought that crosses my mind as I slam the truck door closed and begin my stride ahead on the moonlit path, my footsteps crunching in the gravel beneath my feet.
Delia follows behind me, her breathing shallow and quick like she's afraid I might disappear.
Her desperation leaves a sour taste in my mouth.
I know who she is, I know she's my wife, but the knowledge sits cold and inert in my brain, a fact with no feeling attached.
"Beautiful night," she says, her voice straining for normalcy. "The stars are so clear."
I glance up. Stars. Tiny points of light.
Irrelevant.
"Yes," I reply, not breaking stride.
The silence stretches between us like a fault line. I can feel her scrambling for another thread of conversation to pull.
"The pumpkins should be ready for the second harvest next week," she tries again.
"Fine."
Her footsteps falter slightly, then quicken to keep up, but I don't slow down.
Whiskers darts between us, his teeny paws leaving no trace on the ground. "Quite the tender reunion," he chirps, red eyes flicking between Delia and me. "Midnight escapades from the morgue really set the mood, don't they?"
Can’t say I missed the rat.
I shoot him a glare that would freeze hell. "Quiet."
"Oh sure, because you're such a sparkling conversationalist," Whiskers retorts, scampering ahead. "Hard to believe you're not drowning in friends with that winning personality."
His sarcasm bounces off me like hail on a tin roof. Noisy, but ultimately meaningless.
The pumpkin patch materializes ahead, and a memory snaps into focus like a key turning in a rusty lock. I halt mid-stride, causing Delia to nearly collide into my back.
"What is it?" she asks.
"I remember coming through here," I say, my voice flat despite the significance of the recollection.
"It was early morning. Still dark. Something woke me up.
A sound out by the barn. I checked out the window, and I thought I saw—" The words catch in my throat, sticky with the sensation of a memory that isn’t mine anymore.
"Someone was out here. I thought it might be kids from town, maybe stealing pumpkins, so I came outside on the back porch. "
"And then what?" Delia asks softly, stepping closer. Her hand hovers near my arm but doesn't make contact.
Smart woman.
I close my eyes, trying to capture the elusive memory. "I called out. Asked who they were, what they were doing on our property." My brow furrows as I push against the edges of the memory. "They turned and started walking deeper into the patch, so I followed."
My legs carry me forward through the rows without conscious thought, muscle memory guiding me along a path I walked once before.
Delia trails behind, her presence a constant weight I can feel but don't particularly care about.
The pumpkins sit like fat orange moons in the dirt, their vines twisting, grabbing at my ankles as I pass by.
“They were fast.” I continue. “Too fast to be just human. They never let me see their face. They were cautious.”
“Do you remember what they were wearing?”
I search the edges of the memory, trying to catch a detail.
"A coat, or hoodie, maybe. Dark. And a hat. The brim was pulled down and shadowed their face. Could have been a man, could have been a woman. Not sure. But they were tall, and they—they didn’t have a scent.
" The memory flickers, refusing to resolve. “I caught up to them here.” I say, gesturing over to where pumpkins lay smashed, they’re guts spread out across the dirt.
“Knocked them down and we wrestled on the ground. They fought like hell. I got in a punch or two, and I remember thinking they shouldn’t have even been able to get out of my grip, but they did.
” I come to a stop when the scarecrow’s shadow falls over me.
Here," I say, my voice hollow, "This is where it happened. "
For a second, I swear I can feel it happening all over again. My hand instinctively goes to the scar on my chest, a phantom pain aching there, a cold fear crawling up my spine, however, it vanishes as quickly as it came, leaving only the clinical detachment.
"I caught up to them here," I continue. "They pulled out a gun and—" I trail off, the memory fracturing. "And that’s the last thing that I remember.” I stare at the dirt, at the splattered remains of a pumpkin with its seeds and pulp splayed in a rough circle, like a crime scene chalk outline.
Delia's brow furrows, her lips parting slightly. "But that doesn't make sense," she whispers, "If there was a gun…where are the bullet wounds? The only mark on your body was where they…" Her voice trails off, unwilling to complete the thought aloud.
“There was a giant hole in my chest, Delia. The bullet hole was probably scooped out along with my heart.”
“There was no exit wound, though.” She argues.
I stare at her, a mild irritation burning somewhere in my chest. “What’s your point?”
“My point, “Delia rolls her eyes, her hand moving to rest on her hip, “is that I don’t think they shot you with a bullet. I think it may have shot you with a tranquilizer.”
She makes sense.
I hate it.
But I also have to acknowledge it. If what she’s saying is true, this bastard took the coward's way out. They knew better than to face me with my eyes open and my fists ready. Smart, I guess because they'd have walked away bleeding otherwise.
“You’re saying I got roofied with a mother-fucking dart gun?”
She shrugs, the movement full of casual challenge. “Why not? If you wanted to subdue a supernatural with minimal mess, that’s what you’d do. Isn’t it?”
I cross my arms, glaring at the moon, like it’s somehow responsible. “So, they shot me, I fell, and then they took my damn heart.” The thought of being taken down like some kind of animal on a wildlife documentary makes my jaw clench.
Delia nods slowly, her green eyes reflecting the moonlight. "That's what I'm thinking. Which means whoever did this came prepared. They knew what you were capable of and planned accordingly."
The realization creeps over me like a shadow at dusk. Someone studied me. Watched me. Knew my weaknesses and came with the tools to exploit them.
"We need to figure out who did this," she says, her voice gaining strength. "We need to figure out who did this and why. Someone in this town is killing people and you're the only one who's come back to tell us what happened."
"We?" I turn to look at her fully for the first time since we left the morgue. “There is no we and I sure as hell don’t need your help to find out who did this to me.”
Her mouth hangs open, a little piece of drama she probably doesn't even realize she's doing. “You couldn’t even figure out you weren’t shot by an actual gun,” she laughs bitterly.
You misjudge me," I counter, my words clipped, "if you think I need a soft-hearted hobbyist witch to solve my problems." I can feel my voice, unfamiliar and cold, vibrate through the air between us like a tuning fork struck hard.
Delia’s face goes white, then flushed, the freckles standing out on her nose like they might leap off and punch me themselves.
“Okay,” she throws her hands up, pushing past me, her boots squelching in the mud.
“You don’t need my help. By all means, figure it out yourself.
” She storms off in the direction of the house.
I run a frustrated hand through my hair, “Wait!” The word slips past my lips before I can swallow it back down.
She spins, her arms crossed over her chest, “What?” she glares.
For a moment, I don't know what to say. I didn't plan to call her back, but something about watching her walk away triggers an uncomfortable pressure in my chest. Not emotion, but more like a tactical error I need to correct.
Also, I have to admit she caught something I missed.
Having her around might be useful, at least until I figure this out.
I exhale through my teeth. "Fine. You're useful. We'll collaborate. But whatever we had before—" I gesture between us with a sharp cutting motion, "—that's gone. This is strictly business."
I can see the pain welling in her eyes at the lash of my words in the soft tremble of her chin, but she levels her gaze at me, hard as obsidian. "Yeah. I got it, Jasper. Message received."
She stalks ahead, not looking back, shoulders squared against the world. I follow, pacing my steps to match hers. Whiskers shoots me a look like he’s torn between feeling sorry for me and wanting to bite my nose off.
“Look.” I start, but don’t know where it’s going. “I—”
How do you explain to someone that their touch feels wrong on your skin? That their love feels like a weight you never asked to carry?
"I know," she says quietly. "You're not the same."
"No," I agree, looking back at the spot where I died. "I'm not. And I don't think I ever will be." The makeshift heart in my chest beats steadily, mechanical and foreign.
It keeps me alive, but it can't make me feel what’s no longer there. And right now, as I stand in the place where my old life ended, I'm not sure that's such a bad thing. Emotions would only get in the way of what I need to do next.
Find who did this.
And make them pay.