Guarding Suzannah

by Norah Wilson

  ~*~

  Suzannah couldn’t stop shaking. She was safe here in the employees’ break room with a constable posted outside the door. She knew she was safe, but it didn’t seem to matter. She regarded her reflection in the mirror over the kitchenette’s sink and despaired. Her eyes looked huge and haunted, her face pinched and frightened. God, she had to get this trembling thing under control before Ray Morgan showed up. Bad enough to look like an emotional basket case in front of the young patrolman who’d responded...

  The door to the staff room flew open and John burst into the room, followed by Ray Morgan.

  “Are you okay?”

  She met burning brown eyes. “I’m fine.”

  It was all she could do to get the words out before he crushed her in a bear hug. Twenty-four hours ago, she might have thought the gesture was intended as much for Ray’s benefit as for hers, but she knew better now. This was real. It had to be.

  “Oh, baby, you scared me.”

  “Scared me, too.”

  “I wouldn’t have left you here if I thought there was any risk.”

  “I know.”

  Ray cleared his throat and John released her.

  “Think you could answer some questions for me?” Ray said.

  Suzannah brushed her hair back and took a deep breath. “Of course.”

  They sat, she and John on the couch and Ray in a worn chair. For the next half hour, she related the details, reliving the ordeal. She’d almost finished the title search Vince had sent her to do—a multi-million dollar corporate mortgage transaction, he didn’t trust it to the title abstractors they usually used—when the two coffees she’d had throughout the morning drove her to seek out the washroom.

  The sound of her own footsteps had echoed hollowly as she strode down the abandoned corridor. However, soon after entering the washroom stall, she’d heard the room’s door open and close. She was instantly gripped by a sense of disquiet. Yesterday’s experience fresh in her mind, she groped for her personal alarm, only to realize she’d clipped it to her briefcase which she’d left in the main records area. She never carried a purse when she carried her briefcase, and it never occurred to her to lug her briefcase to the washroom.

  Telling herself she was letting her imagination run away with her, that there was no one out there lying in wait to pounce on her, she straightened her suit. But no matter how she tried to steel her spine, she couldn’t bring herself to open the stall door. Humiliated by her fear but still frightened, she decided to out-wait the other patron.

  Then a hand came up to grip the top of the stall door. She screamed, a small, involuntary reaction. But he didn’t try to kick the door in or rip it off, or any of the dramatic things she envisioned. Rather, he held it firm as though to trap her, to make her aware that she was cornered, at his mercy.

  “Who are you? Why are you doing this?” she cried.

  “Because you owe me,” came a hoarse whisper. “Because I want you to suffer like I’ve suffered.”

  She owed him? What did that mean? If she only had her alarm. It had scared him away once. She blinked. Maybe it could scare him away again.

  “I’ll activate my alarm!”

  “Nice try, but I know you left it out there.”

  Oh, shit. He’d been watching her! “I’ll scream.”

  “I know you will.” The voice held genuine pleasure, no fear. “But I’m willing to bet no one can hear you from here over that noisy air conditioning unit. And I didn’t see many females who are likely to come along and disturb us.”

  God have mercy, he was right. Was she going to die here?

  Or was he just trying to terrify her some more?

  And omigod, he was wearing latex surgical gloves.

  Her hands contracted into fists. A weapon. She needed a weapon. Her hands flew to the pockets of her lightweight suit. Yes! A pen, shoved in there absently and forgotten.

  Before she could rethink her decision, she drew the ballpoint pen from her pocket, lifted her arm and drove the pen point as deeply as she could into the flesh of the back of his hand. He yowled, part pain, part anger, and cursing her viciously, jerked his hand back. She heard him rip paper towels from the dispenser.

  “This isn’t over, bitch.”

  Then the door opening and closing behind him.

  She waited a few heartbeats, until she was sure her legs would bear her, then let herself out of the stall. Heart hammering against her ribs, she pulled the washroom door open and risked a look up and down the corridor. Just as deserted as before. Taking a deep breath, she raced straight to the Registrar’s Office.

  Now, here she was.

  Quigg breathed a word that was usually a profanity on his lips, but it sounded more like a prayer this time. Then he took her hand and squeezed it. Tears burned the back of her eyes.

  “Okay, a few questions, if you’re up to it.”

  This from Ray. She turned to face him, nodded, felt the reassuring squeeze Quigg gave her icy fingers. “Of course.”

  “Did you get a glimpse of him at all, or just the hand?”

  “Just the hand.”

  “What’d it look like?”

  “Through the surgical glove? Clean, I guess. Blunt fingers. I got the impression the nails were on the longish side, maybe. Like he might enjoy the occasional manicure.” She watched him make a few scribbles in his notebook which must have meant something to him.

  “Caucasian?”

  “I think so, but the latex may have influenced that impression.”

  “How tall, do you think?”

  “Not exceptionally tall. Not tall enough for me to see the top of his head over the stall’s door when he gripped it.” At the memory, her fingers flexed in Quigg’s grip and he gave her a hand an answering, reassuring squeeze. “Of course, I don’t know how far away he might have been standing, or whether or not he might have been crouching down...”

  “It’s okay. We can work with that.” Ray made another hen-scratch, then looked up at her again. “What about his voice?”

  She thought for a moment. “It’s hard to say. He talked in a harsh whisper, like he was disguising his voice. At least until I stuck him with my pen. He dropped the whisper then.”

  “Don’t suppose you recognized it then?”

  “No.” She shook her head. “His words sounded thick, guttural, but I think it was rage that made his voice that way. I have no idea what his normal speaking voice might sound like.”

  “Anything else you can think of?”

  “Just that I can’t figure where he came from. I mean, I really didn’t feel at risk here with so many legitimate people milling around—abstractors, lawyers, articled clerks—but I was ... I don’t know ... aware of comings and goings. I swear I didn’t sense anyone out of place. And he had to have been lurking, watching me,” she pointed out. “He knew I’d left my alarm with my briefcase.”

  She saw Ray and Quigg exchange a glance over her head.

  “Could you identify everyone who came and went?”

  “Oh, yes,” she replied. “The men, anyway. A few women came and went, but I didn’t take particular note, although I could probably name most of them if I thought about it. As for the men, if I can’t dredge up all their names, I certainly know who they’re affiliated with. Names wouldn’t be hard to get.”

  “Good. Include Record Office staff, too. Hell, include the Pope if he happened to hobble past. Your mother, your neighbor, your old law professor. We need to look at everybody, okay? Everybody.”

  She nodded. “Okay.”

  “I’ll need you to produce a list of those people for me, everyone you can remember. And I’ll need a statement.”

  “I’ll produce both, list and statement, and send them down to you.” Anything to wind this up.

  “That’ll work.”

  God, she needed to crawl onto John’s lap, feel his arms tighten around her, lose herself in his heat. “Are we done for now, Ray?”

  “You are. I’m gonna go get a p
rogress report from the forensic investigation team.” Ray closed his notebook and secreted it in an inside pocket of his suit. “By the way, great work with the pen. Nothing like blood and tissue.”

  On that cheerful note, he left.