Free Kiss of the Sun by R.K. Jackson

the engine start. The Lexus began to back up.
    “Yeah?” Jarrell asked.
    Martha watched in the rearview mirror and saw the black car leave the parking lot.
    “Nothing. I guess I’m just feeling a little paranoid.”
    “Yeah, me too,” Jarrell said. “Let’s get out and watch for Somis.”
    They stepped out of the car and looked around. The parking lot was almost empty when a Subaru pulled into the circle. “That’s probably him,” Jarrell said. “He told me he’d be driving a blue Forester.”
    The SUV rolled up and Somis lowered the window.
    “Hop in,” Somis said. The lieutenant was dressed in plain clothes—a flannel shirt and jeans.
    “Where are we going?” Jarrell asked.
    “Just someplace private, where we can talk.” Martha thought he looked even more haggard than the night before at the party—more drawn, the circles under his eyes deeper.
    Martha took the front seat and Jarrell climbed into the back. They left the parking lot and followed a wooded surface street for a short distance. Then Somis pulled onto a dirt road. In another half mile they reached an embankment where the road overlooked a low field overgrown with kudzu. Behind the field was the beginning of a forest, and the kudzu vines had climbed to the highest reaches of the first stand of trees, enveloping them with potbelly swags and draperies of pea-green leaves. In the foreground stood the remains of a partially collapsed chicken house, also enshrouded by vines.
    “Why here?” Jarrell asked.
    “I just wanted to make sure no one was following us,” Somis said. He lowered his window and pulled a pack of Camel cigarettes from the pocket of his windbreaker. “Mind if I smoke?”
    “No, it’s fine,” Martha said.
    “I know it’s a nasty habit, but I wandered back into it over the past year. Probably because of stress. Right now I need the nicotine just to keep going. I’ve been averaging two hours of sleep per night this week.” He lit the Camel.
    “What is it you want to tell us?” Jarrell asked.
    “For starters, I’d like to have a look at that amulet you found.”
    Martha pulled the folded paper from her handbag and passed it to him. The lieutenant opened it and looked at the medallion, tilting it one way and then the other, catching different angles of light. Then he folded the paper and tucked it into the pocket inside his windbreaker.
    “Did you see anyone else in the area when you were down in Lineville?”
    “Not a soul,” Jarrell said. “The place was deserted.”
    “Can you tell us what this symbol means?” Martha asked.
    Somis took a pull on the Camel and gazed toward the field of kudzu. “I don’t know yet. But I can tell you that I’ve seen it before. There’s only a certain amount I can tell you, and I need to trust you to keep this quiet. I have to tell you just enough so that you’ll understand what you need to do.”
    “What do you want us to do?” Jarrell asked.
    “I’d like for you to leave town for a couple of days. Both of you.”
    “What’s going on?” Martha asked. “Are we in some kind of danger?”
    Somis turned in his seat slightly and looked at Martha. “At the fundraiser last night, when you drew that symbol on the napkin, I thought that it seemed familiar to me, but I just couldn’t quite make the connection. Not at first. Then when you sent me the photo of the amulet, I had a flash. Something came back to me.”
    “You’d seen it before?” Jarrell asked.
    Somis nodded. “Yes. I remembered that I’d seen that symbol, or something similar to it, tattooed on the wrist of a murder suspect last year. I went back to the case file to make sure I was right. We photographed each of his tattoos individually. It’s standard practice, because tattoos can be used as identifiers. I still might not have remembered that particular detail if that had been just any case, but this was one that nearly cost me my career. I’ve been rehashing it ever since.”
    Martha heard tires crunching