Kill Six

by C. E. Nelson

  “Good. You’re awake.”

  Carlisle tried to look up, moving her chin slightly higher, the pain cursing through her with each centimeter. The pain too great, she let her chin settle back to her chest only to have a hand grab the hair on top of her head and yank her head back. Carlisle screamed.

  “Agent Carlisle. We need to talk.”

  It was the voice of a male. He sounded younger. She’d heard his voice before but found it impossible to focus, the pain in her head to great.

  “Agent. Can you hear me?” said the voice. “I need to know you can hear me.”

  It was a sing-songy voice. She knew it. Carlisle opened her eyes half way to see James Maples seated in front of her, straddling a chair.

  “Agent, if you don’t answer I’m going to have to let my sister try to wake you up some more, and I’m pretty sure you won’t like that. She will, but you, not so much.”

  There was a girl’s giggle behind her, and Carlisle felt a hand on her cheek. “Yeah.” Her voice was hushed.

  “I can’t hear you.”

  Carlisle felt the hand on her cheek slide to the top of her head, clutching her hair and pulling. Carlisle winced. “Yes.” James nodded, and the pressure lessened.

  “Now, we need to know who, besides you, thinks that someone may be stealing drugs from the Hillside residents.”

  “The BCA.”

  “No, no. That’s much too broad an answer. Obviously, your partner knows, but who else?”

  “You’re not going to get away with this.”

  James grinned. “Oh, I think we will. Now, who else?”

  “The Duluth Police, the Lake County Sheriff, the BCA.”

  James stood and slapped her hard across the face. “I said I wanted names,” he growled. James turned away and then looked back at her. “Sorry if I don’t believe you, Agent. Who in the BCA knows about this besides your partner?”

  Carlisle was trying to ignore the pain, think about what she should do, what she should say. “My boss.”

  “Good, good. Now we’re getting somewhere. And what is your boss’s name?”

  Carlisle’s mouth remained closed. Janet’s hand was going through her hair, each stroke fiery pain. She felt Janet’s hand stop, clutch the hair on the top of her head, and begin to pull.

  “Come on, Agent. Why do you make this so hard?”

  James was pacing in front of her. The hair on the top of her head suddenly went taut. Carlisle yelled in pain again, trying to lift up to lessen the pressure. “Robert Farmer.” The pressure decreased, and she blew out a breath.

  “Hmm. Now that wasn’t so bad, was it? Is that really all?”

  “Yes.”

  “I don’t know. Don’t you have like analysts or assistants who would know?”

  “No.” This time Janet grabbed Carlisle’s hair in both hands on either side of the back of her head, pulling in opposite directions. Carlisle closed her eyes as tight as she could as she yelled. “NO! No one else.”

  James kind of tilted his head to the side and shrugged his shoulders. Janet released Carlisle’s hair. “Well, I know people who would be happy to take care of more than just your partner and your boss, but if that is really all?” James was standing now, and he bent at the waist, his face inches from Carlisle’s. “I mean, I’d hate to see something happen to that big strong boyfriend of yours if there turn out to be more.” Carlisle’s eyes were laser beams of hatred. “OK, well you think about it for a bit. Janet and I are going to have some dinner, and then we’ll come back to see if your memory has improved.”

  The brother and sister both stood in front of Carlisle now. “Why?”

  “Why?” said James. “Money. Duh.”

  “You can’t be making that much just from Hillside.”

  “Of course not. Old people need a lot of drugs, but one facility would never be enough. I mean, we started with Hillside, but it was obvious we needed more to really grow the business. That’s why we have a whole chain of facilities working for us.”

  “You killed your own mother?”

  “Oh no. We loved our mother. We did not do that. But I can assure you that if you ever catch the person who did, we will see that they suffer a most unpleasant death.” James laughed, a high, twittery laugh. “Oh, silly me. I’m afraid you won’t have an opportunity to catch the person. Too bad. You seem very good at what you do.” James looked at Janet, holding his arm away from his side. “Shall we?”

  Carlisle watched them leave the room and then took stock of her location. She was in a room that was nearly square, roughly twenty by twenty. She was in the room's center. Her chair and the chair James had used seemed to be the only furniture besides a small wooden table to her left. The walls were papered in a flowered pattern with long vines. The high mop boards and door and window trim, all a faded white, made her think she was in an older house.

  Carlisle could hear the siblings talking and laughing occasionally but could not make out what they were saying. There were the sounds of pots and pans and soon she could smell something cooking. There was nothing here that might help her escape. The thumb on Carlisle’s left hand went to the ring still on her finger, spinning it, making her angry again. But then she stopped spinning it, running her thumb over the stones. The stones with the sharp edges. She pulled her arms apart, and then her wrists, alternating, stopping only when she had created enough space to allow movement of her hands. She turned the ring towards the tape around the back of the chair and rubbed.

  Chapter 43

  Marcy Green was bored. She had it all planned but things hadn’t worked out. Her husband was playing cards with his buddies. His mother had the kids for the night. This was going to be her night just to veg. She rented a chick flick, had a bottle of Chardonnay chilled and opened in front of her, cheese and crackers on the table too. But the movie was a dud. Her friend Ginger had recommended it, but after ten minutes she remembered the last movie she had rented that Ginger had recommended. Not good.

  After fifteen minutes she shut off the movie and opened up her laptop. She was almost done with the last project Trask had given her, and she just wanted it out of the way. After logging into the Sheriff’s Office system, she pulled up her spreadsheet of the names she was researching for car registrations and gun ownership. She had all the vehicles listed, and only two names left to check for gun ownership, Daniel West and Ken Bishop.

  West turned up nothing. Nothing registered legally anyway. Bishop was a gun owner. He had a Ruger American, a rifle she assumed he would use for deer hunting, and a pistol, a Glock. Nine Mil. Green’s finger ran across her spreadsheet. Ford Focus. Gray. “Shit.”

  Trask was in the waiting room, his wife in surgery. His wife and unborn baby in surgery. He had never felt like this before. Helpless. There was absolutely nothing he could do. He was not allowed into surgery even to hold his wife’s hand. The seconds crawled by. Marcy Green called, and he ignored it. When she called again only a minute later, he picked up.

  “Marcy.”

  “You don’t sound well, Sheriff. Are you OK?”

  He didn’t really want to talk about what had happened, was happening. “I’m at the hospital with Linda.”

  “The baby is coming?”

  “I hope so.”

  “OK, well I won’t keep you, but I thought you should know this. Ken Bishop, the brother of Dan Bishop, he has a gray Ford Focus and a Glock, nine mil.”

  Trask was trying to shift back into cop mode. “You’re at work?”

  “No, working from home. Just got kind of bored.”

  It hit Trask now. “OK. This could be the guy. He has a place in Duluth?”

  “Yeah, um, 6th and 41st.”

  “All right. Call John and tell him to get a team together. Tell him he needs to contact Les Berger of the Duluth Police and let him know what’s happening. Tell John to tell Berger he needs a perimeter set up. They are going to need to quietly remove the next-door neighbors. We don’t want any hostages.”

  “What
if Bishop isn’t home?”

  “That’s OK. What we do is have John walk up to the house and knock on the door with another deputy. Bishop has no reason to suspect we are on to him. When he answers the door, John just says he wants to ask Bishop a few questions, and they take him down. If he doesn’t answer, we wait until he shows.”

  “OK, Sheriff. Um, shouldn’t we notify the St. Louis County Sheriff?”

  Trask had missed that. Duluth wasn’t in his county. He wondered now what else he hadn’t thought about. He wasn’t exactly sure what he had told Marcy now that he thought about it. “Yeah, you’re right. But let Berger make that call, it’s his city. John should tell him that too.”

  Marcy was quiet. “Um, OK. Should John call you?”

  “About what?” Trask’s response was abrupt.

  “Well, to keep you updated on the operation and if he has any questions.”

  “Yeah, sure. Listen, I have to go. Good work, Marcy.”

  “Are you sure you’re OK?” There was no answer. Trask had disconnected.

  James Maples walked back into the living room with a glass in his hand. Carlisle was concentrating so hard on cutting the tape behind her that she almost didn’t hear him enter.

  “I’m sorry, Agent. I’m not being a very good host. You must be thirsty. I’ve brought you a glass of water.”

  Danny’s tongue immediately went to the roof of her mouth, and she tried to swallow. He was right; she was very thirsty. He brought the cup to her lips and tilted it toward her. She swallowed greedily, some spilling down her chin. Maples giggled.

  “My, you were thirsty, weren’t you?” He turned, took two steps towards the kitchen, and stopped. He turned back to Carlisle. “Oh, by the way, that tinny taste you may have noticed isn’t from the water here. You just swallowed something from a prescription of my mother’s. I expect you’ll feel just wonderful in a few minutes. Have a nice trip.” Maples giggled again and left.

  Carlisle watched him go, the tinny taste he mentioned now evident as she rubbed the roof of her mouth with her tongue. She immediately increased her efforts to cut through the tape, but after only a few moments, felt the initial effect of the drug. She tried to focus on her task but found her mind wandering. Her vision was being impacted too. She was back in the funhouse at the state fair, the wavy mirrors distorting everything. Carlisle shut her eyes tight and then opened them as wide as possible. The flowers on the wallpaper were waving in the breeze, the vines crawling across the walls. Her head fell back, the ceiling now miles away, shooting stars going around and around. Carlisle wanted it to stop, but her eyes wouldn’t shut, her eyelids too lazy.

  At some point, she didn’t know when, her head had rolled to her shoulder and then to her chest. The chair James had used was still in front of her, but it was moving, dancing. The legs moved up and down, side to side. The arms of the chair came together, clapping to the rhythm of music she couldn’t hear.

  But then she could hear something, someone calling to her, a voice far away down a long tunnel. Her sister? They had stood at opposite ends of a culvert on their grandparents’ farm as children, calling back and forth. The sound echoed and swirled. And now it was here. Only she didn’t remember going back to the farm. She hadn’t been there since she was a child. Maybe a dream?

  No, someone was calling to her now. A high melodic voice. “Agent Carlisle. Agent Carlisle. Can you hear me?”

  Carlisle lifted her head. Forced her eyelids, heavy as lead, to open just a bit more. Someone was there, by the chair. Golden hair waving in the wind. An angel? Laughter now, floating high to the ceiling, and she lifted her head to follow it.

  “Agent Carlisle. I’m right here. In front of you.”

  Carlisle lowered her head again. The angel was smiling now, a beautiful shining smile that was almost too bright to look at, but she couldn’t look away. And then the angel floated closer. Carlisle felt a weight in her lap and looked down trying to figure out what it was. And then a light pressure on her chest, on her breasts. A warm feeling, spreading through her. It felt good to be warm.

  “Do you like that, Agent? I think you do.”

  The angel laughed, the laugh seeming to circle Carlisle’s head, and then there was another, deeper laugh, somewhere far away.

  “How about a kiss, Agent? Would you like that too?”

  Carlisle had been somewhere far away but now the face of the angel filled her vision, the eyes of the angel staring into her soul. Soft touches on her cheeks, angel wings, warm and silky. It felt wonderful. Eyes shut, she was floating on her back, in the lake on a warm summer day. The sun was shining down, caressing her face, and she took a big breath to keep her floating. But she couldn’t breathe. And she started to sink, the water rushing over her. She tried to move her arms and legs to swim, to push her back to the surface, but they were frozen. Carlisle screamed, her eyes wide.

  Laughter filled the room, cascading down the walls in shimmering colors and then rising to the ceiling. The angel floated there, a dark figure floating next to her.

  “I guess you didn’t like that. Well, what if I come back in the morning and we try again?”

  The angel turned to the dark figure, and they both drifted away, disappearing into the night.

  Chapter 44

  Pearson had waited twelve minutes according to his Rolex. He had set the timer. As he put his vehicle in gear, an SUV pulled up behind. Pearson climbed out, meeting two BCA agents at the rear of his SUV. One was Mike Lerner, Danny’s partner, the other an agent named Ray Stahl. Pearson had not met either man although he would have recognized Lerner from Carlisle’s description. Stahl was in his mid-thirties, lean and tall, with thinning red hair and intense brown eyes. They dressed casually, both in jeans, Lerner in a navy jacket, Stahl wearing a zip-up black fleece.

  After introductions, Pearson took them on a tour, blocking open the entry door to the apartment building with a rug, giving them access to Carlisle’s apartment. They followed him outside where he showed them her vehicle and the bloodstain on the walk. As they were all bent on the walk, the BCA crime scene van pulled up. The men stood.

  “Thank you for your help, Mr. Pearson,” said Lerner.

  “Danny says you’re a good agent, Mike. Got a good attitude about life.”

  Lerner looked up at the bigger man. “Thanks. Don’t worry about Danny. She’s the most determined person I know. We’ll find her. And she’ll be fine.”

  Pearson wanted to think Lerner was right, but he wanted to make sure that he was, and standing here would not make that happen. “Thanks. I got to go.”

  Trask paced the halls. Back and forth in front of the nurses’ station, staying close to the operating room. Finally, adrenaline slowing, he sat in the adjacent waiting area. He picked up a copy of ‘In-Fisherman Magazine’. Tried to read an article on smallmouth fishing in the winter, something he wanted to do more, but could remember nothing of what he read. With each person that came to the nurses’ station, Trask was standing. Another stretcher came off the elevator, a crowd of nurses around it, a doctor in the lead. Trask watched it disappear down the hall. He did not see the doctor that had been at the nurses’ station.

  “Mr. Trask?”

  Trask jumped up. “Yeah?”

  “I’m Doctor Merta.”

  Trask searched the Doctor’s face for some hint of what was to come, but there was nothing there.

  “Well, first, congratulations. You have a baby girl. A healthy baby girl.”

  Trask felt some relief, but there was no smile on Merta’s face. “Linda?”

  “We have your wife stabilized, but she needs more help than we are capable of here. We’ve called for a helicopter to take her to Abbott in Minneapolis for further examination.”

  “Minneapolis?”

  “They are much better equipped to handle an emergency like this.”

  “Can I see her?’

  “Your wife, or daughter?”

  Daughter. He had a daughter. “Um…”

 
; “Your daughter should be in the nursery shortly. I’m afraid your wife is being prepped for the trip.”

  Trask was trying to handle the flood of emotions. “Is there anything else I can tell you, Mr. Trask?”

  “What is wrong with Linda?”

  “We’re not sure, that’s why she will be going to Abbott. She’s lost a lot of blood.”

  “Will she be all right?”

  “I’m sorry, but I don’t know anything more.”

  Merta walked away, Trask left in a state of limbo. He walked to the nurses’ station.

  “Excuse me. Can you tell me where the nursery is?”

  “First floor, north wing,” said the woman there in a faded blue top and matching pants, barely looking up from her computer monitor. Her name tag said ‘Judy Miller’. Her focus returned to the screen as if she had been watching the latest episode of her favorite show on Netflix.

  Trask wanted to scream at her, to tell her there were more important things in life than what she had on her computer. He muttered ‘thanks, Judy’ and went to the elevator. With only one wrong turn and the help of a nurse, he found himself in front of the viewing window for the nursery. Three plastic bins, not much different than the ones in the Sheriff’s Office Evidence Room, sat in a row on rolling carts. Inside each was the pink face of a baby inside a cocoon of white blankets. Large cards were at the end of each bin, facing the viewing glass, the cards with the last name of the parents in large letters, along with birth date, sex, and weight.

  Trask looked at each card and did not see his name. He wondered if his daughter hadn’t made it here yet and turned to look down the hall towards the nurses’ station. A nurse was talking to a doctor there, and Trask took two steps in that direction before stopping. He walked back to the window and looked again. JAMES. Linda’s name. Pressing to the glass, he put his hands up to his forehead trying to get a better look. Suddenly, there was a nurse tapping on the window. She had been sitting at a desk at the back of the room, but Dave hadn’t noticed. She pointed at Trask, and then at the baby, and then folded her arms across her chest, moving her elbows side-to-side. Dave nodded, and she pointed towards a door to Trask’s right that opened into a room adjacent to the nursery.