Dragon Dreams

by Chris A. Jackson

  Jasper! He brought cops back with him! She was moving before she even thought about what she was doing. Bag, computer, coat, phone, charger.

  "With both of our primary murder suspects missing, you must understand that we have to exhaust all the possibilities."

  She zipped her bag closed and swept the room with her eyes. Nowhere to hide…nowhere to run. Only one door, and Sergeant Jasper was on the other side. Then her gaze fixed upon the sliding glass door of the living room balcony. She slipped her arms into the straps of her bag and moved.

  "You think Aleksi and Derrick are hiding in my home? That's just a little ridiculous, isn't it?"

  She was at the glass door when his key rattled the lock and through it when it clicked open. Running on adrenalin and instinct, Aleksi vaulted the wrought iron railing as light from the hall scythed through the living room.

  She fell.

  Light exploded from the balcony overhead as the bracing wind of her decent ruffled her coat and hair. Four floors and a hard parking lot below. She had time to think on the way down, but her thoughts were not panicked, not horror stricken that her bones would be broken and she would lie there bleeding until the police came to drag her corpse away. Instead, she heard Jasper's voice from above…

  "Not so ridiculous, Doctor."

  …saw she was going to land in an empty parking spot…

  "We get lied to all the time."

  …and absorbed the impact with her legs. She stepped behind a minivan and stood there, utterly still, her heart beating hard in her ears but not quite drowning out the voices overhead.

  "Well I haven't been lying to you, Sergeant." Hutch sounded angry. She heard his keys clatter into the bowl beside the door. "And as you can see, my home is empty."

  Their voices were so clear, she wondered if she had closed the balcony door. She had…of course she had…maybe.

  "Mind if we look around?" Jasper asked, and she could imagine the thoughtful, raised eyebrow look on his face.

  "Oh, I mind plenty, but we've already played that game. I'd thank you not to touch anything, though." She heard the refrigerator door open and the 'Tssst' of a bottle being cracked. "I'd offer you a beer, but you're on duty, so I won't bother."

  "Nice place." Jasper's voice was closer. He'd moved nearer the windows. Evidently, she had closed the door after all. "A lot nicer than I'd expect from a college professor."

  "Not that it's your business, but I got this place in my divorce settlement. My ex-wife has money, and this place was more mine than hers anyway."

  "Divorced, huh?" That was another voice, the other cop, Willis. "'Old Path White Clouds'? You read some weird shit, Doc."

  "You think Zen is weird?" Hutch laughed without humor. She heard the book she'd been reading thump down on the kitchen counter.

  "No offense, Doc."

  The voices became muffled as they moved into the bedroom, and Aleksi took the opportunity to walk quietly away, her mind a tornado of emotions. Hutch had brought the police back with him, but it didn't sound like he'd done so willingly.

  But why not call ahead to warn me? She rounded a corner and started toward her apartment out of reflex. She remembered the message on her phone and realized that he was worried about the police finding out. But he could have called from a different phone before he got home.

  Home…

  She stopped, realizing that she couldn't go home. If the police were looking for her, they would undoubtedly be looking there. And the lab would be watched, too.

  Nowhere to go…

  She turned and headed for the nearest subway station, thinking only to put as much distance between her and the police—and Hutch—as possible.

  What do you think?" Willis asked as the elevator doors closed and they started down.

  "I think Dr. Hutchinson's a tough nut." Jasper stretched his aching neck and sighed. "He's lying about something, but I don't know what."

  "Think he's fucking her?"

  "Maybe. There was a lot of hair in his shower drain, but I couldn't very well take a sample with no warrant and him looking over my shoulder. Even if he is, I don't know why he'd protect her from a murder rap. That's some serious shit."

  "Wouldn't be the first time a man did something stupid for a woman." Willis said it like he thought every heterosexual man on the planet was doomed.

  Maybe we are, Jasper thought. As they headed for the car, he went over the hours of the interview in his head. He'd watch the recording again before he went home tonight. Hutchinson hadn't flubbed a single answer, almost as if he had rehearsed them. Or he's smarter than I give him credit for.

  "What next?" Willis asked as he turned the key and cranked the heater to full blast to defrost the windows.

  "We search, watch, and get forensics to go over both Rychenkna's and Penningly's apartments with a microscope." He buckled his seatbelt and tried to order his mind. "Surveillance on Hutchinson, too. Twenty-four seven on the apartments and Rychenkna's lab."

  "APB's on the suspects?"

  "Yep, and approach with caution. Whoever tore Bob Tomlin's throat open is certainly dangerous."

  "Yeah, no shit." Willis put the car in gear and pulled out of the lot. "Anything else?"

  "Yes. Email and phone warrants for the suspects, and bank account and credit card activity, too. They're going to need money, and we should be able to track their movements, maybe find them if they're stupid."

  "You thinking the two are in this together?"

  "Rychenkna and Penningly?" Jasper shook his head, remembering the looks in their eyes, the tones of their voices. "No, they hate each other, all right. I just can't figure where Hutchinson fits in."

  "Caught in the middle, maybe." Willis drove gingerly on the icy streets.

  "Yeah, maybe. Gotta admit, his precious research has been shot to hell by this whole thing."

  "And both students' academic careers, too. If the murder had happened after Hutchinson sent that email, we'd have had our motive on Penningly, but to kill another student just to make yourself look better? That's just insane."

  "Damn straight, it is. And I'm starting to wonder if Derrick Penningly is loony enough to do just that."

  Hutch picked up the book and ran his fingers over the cover. "Reading Thich Nhat Hanh, Aleksi?" He put it back down, finished his beer and went to the fridge for something to eat. The chicken, roast beef, bacon and half the eggs were gone. He had missed lunch and knew he should eat, but he didn't feel much like cooking, and certainly didn't want to go out. He grabbed another beer and an apple, and closed the fridge. Tossing the cap in the trash, he saw the empty chicken container.

  Evidence, he thought. Shit!

  Putting beer and apple aside, he did a slow circuit of the condo, looking for traces of Aleksi that the cops may or may not have seen. The spare bedroom was thankfully empty, but she hadn't spent much time there. He did a quick clean up in the bathroom, scouring both sink and shower for her long hair. The drain had quite a lot, actually, and he scooped it into the trash, then bundled up the trash to take out. The bedroom stopped him in his tracks. He had not made the bed, and it was still rumpled.

  Should wash the sheets, he thought, and went to the side she'd slept on. He found a few more hairs on her pillow, and, unable to stop himself, lowered his face to inhale the faint remnant of her scent.

  His heart skipped a beat.

  "Goddamn it, Aleksi…"

  He methodically stripped the bed, wading everything into his pillow case, and took it to the washer. When it was running, he gathered up all the trash, including the eggs from the fridge, and took it down to the dumpster. When he got back, his beer was warm. He picked it up anyway, took the book from the kitchen counter to his favorite chair and sat down to read. The white noise of the washing machine, the warm beer, and the simplicity of Zen eased his mind. He didn't think until later that it seemed unfair that he had just removed every trace of Aleksi from his home. He knew he could never expunge her from his memory.

  30
/>   Downtown Boston, Saturday night. If ever there was a place to be anonymous, Aleksi had found it. Every sports bar in town was packed, with the Celtics and Bruins vying for attention on every flat-screen in the city. She walked through crowds, invisible among so many hooded coats, hats, scarfs and backpacks. She'd been doing this her whole life in Manhattan, ignoring and being ignored, one face among thousands. Before, she'd simply avoided human interaction to shelter herself from her own insecurities; now, she was hiding from the police, running for her life. She didn't know where she was going, where she would sleep, what she would do, but she knew nobody would find her if she just stuck to the crowds.

  Her stomach growled at the smells of chicken wings and baby back ribs on the air.

  Again already? She wondered if she could find an open table at any of the eateries. They were all standing room only. She found a small grocery doing a brisk business selling beer in small paper bags and walked in. She kept her hoodie up and her face down, knowing there would be security cameras, though she doubted the police would be able to view them all looking for her. In the meat case she picked up a one-pound package of ground beef and took it to the counter. She paid cash. The clerk was so busy he didn't even look at her.

  Outside, Aleksi strolled the darker areas, ignoring the fondling couples and exchanges of wrinkled bills for small Ziploc bags. She kept the package of meat under her coat, tore back the cellophane, and ate the raw hamburger in luscious bites, barely chewing. She knew that eating raw meat was not normal behavior, but it tasted so good. When it was gone, she ditched the Styrofoam and plastic in a bin and kept walking. She felt better, sated, at least for now. Now, she could think.

  "Money."

  The police would freeze her account if they hadn't already. She had a credit card, too, but they could block that as well. Could they track her if she took money out of an ATM? Probably, but she had no choice. She found an ATM and took out as much as she could. She stuffed the wad of twenties into her jeans pocket and walked on.

  With my luck, I'll get mugged, she thought, watching the crowds for eyes following her.

  When she saw an all-night coffee shop slightly less crowded than the sports bars, she walked in without thinking. She bought a large coffee and found an open table in the corner with an outlet nearby. She sat down, plugged in her laptop and phone and logged onto the free Wi-Fi. She wondered briefly if the police could track her down through her email server, but doubted they would have a quick response.

  She had a pile of emails, mostly students asking about lab class. She cringed, knowing she would be leaving a lot of people hanging, but unsure what she could do about it. She trashed them one by one, then came across one from Lonnie Westinghouse. She didn't want to get anyone in trouble by sending them a message, but she had to let someone know something. She opened the email and read it.

  "Crazy stuff going on. Hutch emailed and said cops were looking for you, and that Penningly accosted him. What a serious dickhead! Are you okay? L."

  Aleksi hit reply, and typed, "Not okay. Out for a while. Can't explain. Help Hutch pick up the pieces. The projects are on hold. He needs help. Thanks. A." She read it through once and hit send, wondering if Jasper would be on Lonnie's doorstep in the morning.

  Then she saw the last email on the list; it was from Sergeant Jasper. She read it and cringed. She was wanted for the murder of Bob Tomlin. She was to present herself to the Cambridge Police Department as soon as she got this email.

  Right, she thought, looking at the tiny golden scales on her fingers. And monkeys will fly out of my ass! She hit delete.

  She did some surfing, looking for anything she could find about retroviral infections, which got her nowhere, then did some looking into Derrick Penningly's past. Nothing remarkable there; he'd gotten high grades at Princeton. His father was an alumni supporter. Then she found something else; something deep in the old copies of the Princeton student newspaper. There had been allegations of plagiarism involved in one of Derrick's senior research projects, then an assault charge. The allegations and the charge had been dropped for no reason, and Penningly had been exonerated of all wrong-doing. Nothing prior to that except good grades and lots of activities.

  But plagiarism and assault were a long way from murder.

  Something caught her eye, and she looked up to see two uniformed police officers at the counter. She froze, watching them from the shadow of her hoodie. Neither of them looked too attentive, and they certainly weren't responding to a call. They ordered coffee and Danish, weren't even looking around.

  Aleksi unplugged her phone and laptop without taking her eyes off them, just in case she had to run. Thankfully, they didn't sit down to eat, but took their coffee and sweets out the door.

  She took a deep breath and let it out slowly. Five minutes later, her heart had slowed, and she could type without her hands shaking. She shut her computer down, packed it up, and left the shop, still unsure of where she would go, who she could trust, and what she would do. With those questions rattling around her mind, she added one more.

  "And what the hell are you doing, Derrick Penningly?"

  When daylight finally lightened his bedroom enough to see, Hutch got out of bed. He had not slept much, and had been plagued by dreams of making love with Aleksi and her changing into some kind of monster. He did a few light stretches, vowing to treat this like any other Sunday until proven otherwise. He needed to clear his mind, to think, to reason this out, figure out what to do.

  Winter seemed to have loosened its hold a bit. The temperature was above freezing, and the day promised to be clear and cool. A perfect day to go for a nice long run to clear his head.

  As was his usual routine, he made coffee and a breakfast shake, then sat down to do his email. There was nothing from Aleksi, but he couldn't blame her. He did get a reply from Lonnie, however, the content of which caught him off guard.

  "Hutch. Msg from A that she is NOT okay. Said you might need some help picking up the pieces. Let's talk. L."

  He hit reply and typed, "Monday 0700 her lab. Thanks! H." He hit send, wondering why Aleksi would send an email to Lonnie but not him. Well, at least Lonnie was on his side, and he knew he could depend on his other students to help out with Aleksi's workload, at least through the semester. The research, however, was at a standstill.

  "Maybe just pack the whole damn thing up and send it back to the MCZ," he said to himself as he shut down the computer. Then he remembered their conversation about the cause of Aleksi's malady: infection from the Kamchatka specimen. There was no way he could let that out of his hands. He had to get it analyzed properly. Maybe with some work they could figure out some kind of treatment. Maybe, if he could keep this quiet and in the right hands, he could get Aleksi back.

  He realized that his thoughts were performing the same spirals that they had been doing all night, so he finished his breakfast, donned running gear and left his apartment.

  This is going to be a problem, Aleksi thought as the sun rose above the eastern skyline. Sunday morning, relatively mild temperatures, no real crowds, and anyone who had come out seemed determined to get some exercise. And few wore hoods, parkas or scarfs. She was no longer invisible.

  The night had been easy. Daylight was harder. She needed to hide, but where?

  Aleksi had never noticed before how many security cameras there were in the subway stations, bus stations, street corners, convenience stores, ATM's, bridges, and even bookstores. Worried about facial recognition programs, she tried sitting for a time, reading a paper on a park bench. Her exhausted mind wandered, and her eyes drifted closed, the snippet of a dream teasing her.

  Skin…warm…salty…strong hands on her hips…warmth filling her…Hutch!

  She snapped awake, his scent tearing through her mind like a gunshot. Every sense tuned to maximum, she looked around, listened, breathed deep through her nose with her mouth partly open.

  There!

  She was sitting along the Esplanade, Boston Universi
ty behind her, the Charles River and MIT filling her view. The bike path was streaming with runners, bikers, and rollerbladers. The false hint of spring had brought them all out, and right there, gliding along like he could run forever, Hutch passed by.

  Familiar but recently absent indecision grabbed her. Should she follow him? Chase him down and talk to him? Find out why he brought the police back to his place without warning her? Was he being followed by the police? Was this a trap? There were too many people to tell if anyone was following him, but if there were, she would probably remain unnoticed if she just sat quietly. But watching him, seeing the muscles play in his legs and arms, remembering how they felt under her hands… It was all she could do not to cry out his name.

  Don't be stupid! She tore her eyes away and forced herself to relax. Deep breaths. His scent faded. She thought for a while; if she stayed put, he might pass back the same way, or he might cross over the Harvard Bridge and run back on Memorial Drive. Should she wait here, or move in hope of seeing him again?

  Too risky, she decided. Got to find a better hiding place.

  She got up and shouldered her pack. Her aching feet found their rhythm easily as she made her way east, across Storrow Drive, and over to Kenmore station. She boarded the first inbound train, intending to go back downtown, maybe find a dark bar or restaurant where she could wile away the day. Invisible…unseen…alone.

  31

  Hey Lonnie. Thanks for coming."

  "Thank me by telling me what the hell's going on." Lonnie had her 'no bullshit' face on, and Hutch knew better than to beat around the bush.

  "Inside." Hutch pulled his keys from a pocket and opened the door to Aleksi's lab. He flipped on the light and turned to her. "Aleksi's disappeared. The police put a warrant out for her arrest for Bob's murder."

  "You are fucking kidding me!" Lonnie's eyes widened. "Aleksi's wanted? What about that dickhead Penningly?"