“Let me handle this,” I called out to the serious detriment of my headache. Slowly, I twisted in the seat, so I could face Albright. She turned back to face me, wearing a look of disdain. I carefully leaned forward, resting my elbows on my knees and held my head between my hands as I muttered, “What is it you want from me, Barbara?”
I knew from past experience that she hated it when I called her by her first name, but I wasn’t in the mood for honorifics at the moment. Especially those I felt were undeserved. If she wanted a one-on-one with me, then that was what she was going to get-raw, unabashed, and as close to being on my terms as I could get.
“I want to know what you’re doing just sitting there?” she snapped. “You’re supposed to be helping find my niece.”
“What makes you think I’m not?” I asked, my voice a pain-wracked mumble.
“You’re just sitting there,” she insisted. “And you sound like you’re intoxicated.”
“I wish I was, but I’m not. I’m just in a lot of pain.”
“Well don’t expect me to feel sorry for you.”
I snorted then said, “I wouldn’t dream of it.”
“I can’t believe you’re just sitting there,” she repeated.
“And exactly what is it you do when you pray?” I asked.
“Don’t you dare compare my religion to your Godless heathenry.”
I let out a heavy sigh. “You know, I’m not even going to waste my breath explaining to you everything that’s wrong with that statement. However, I am going to say this: We both know you hate me, but we also both know that you’re the one who insisted on my being here. My guess is that your love for your niece outweighs your contempt for me. In any case, here I am. Now do Judith a favor, back off like my wife asked and just let me do what I do.”
“You’re pushing your luck, Gant,” she snipped.
“No, Barbara. You are. If this killer really has your niece, then right now you’re screwing with her life by wasting my time. Like I said, do her a favor. Let me do my job. If you really want to help then go home and pray.”
I hadn’t bothered to look up at her for the entire span of the conversation, relying instead only on auditory cues. I didn’t move to do so now. I simply continued holding my head between my hands, kept my breathing as even as I could manage, and listened to the relative silence in the wake of her non-response.
Finally, I raised my voice slightly and called out, “Did the salt get here?”
“Aye,” Felicity returned, bitterness still in her voice, though I knew it wasn’t directed at me. “It’s here.”
“How about the forensics? Are the crime scene techs finished?”
“Yeah,” Ben answered. “They were already done when we sent for the salt.”
“Last question. Do they have any problems with me touching the car?”
“I’ll check again, but it’s already been okayed,” he assured me.
“Good,” I grunted, shifting forward and starting to climb out of the van. “Then let’s do this thing before my fucking head explodes.”
CHAPTER 27:
“Ya’know, I bet I’m gonna have a bruise on my shin,” Ben complained aloud as we walked.
“Aye, you’ll get over it,” Felicity replied, no sympathy in her voice whatsoever as she glanced over at him for a second and watched his stride. “It’s not like you’re limping or anything, then.”
“Yeah, but I could be.”
“Quit being such a crybaby. You don’t hear me whining about my arm.”
“I didn’t do that to ya’,” he reminded her.
“Doesn’t matter, it still hurts and I haven’t complained,” she replied. “Unlike you, the big, tough cop.”
I tried to ignore their verbal sparring because as long as they were at it like this I knew everything was okay between them. If either of them were truly angry with the other, they would be sulking in silence and that would be cause to worry.
We rounded the end of a highway patrol cruiser and aimed ourselves to the right. A small clutch of officers next to it parted without a word to allow us through. We paused when we reached the crime scene tape. Ben reached out and lifted the yellow plastic ribbon so that Felicity and I could slip beneath it a little more easily, then he ducked under the barrier himself and followed us into the no man’s land of the cordoned off zone.
From the looks of the asphalt landscape, it appeared as if the crime scene had now become akin to a small arena, and the surrounding cars and sidewalk were the stands filled with uniformed spectators. Cops and crime scene technicians alike stood next to or leaning against their vehicles, chatting quietly among themselves as they watched us make our way across the empty expanse. There was even a paramedic propped against a life support vehicle that had been called out to the scene at Ben’s request, just in case things didn’t go as we planned. Of course, they rarely ever did, so that was probably a smart move on his part.
I noticed one of the troopers point in our direction then make a comment to a nearby colleague who chuckled and nodded vigorously before passing it along to the cop next to him. I could only speculate about what they were actually saying. Thus far they were making it a point to keep their voices low, so the occasional staticky blip of a radio combined with the constant drone of the traffic on the nearby highway prevented me from actually hearing them. Even so, it wasn’t hard to make an educated guess each time I saw their lips moving. I’d been down this road too many times before, although I had to admit that this time around I felt much less like a part of the team and more like I was a curiosity on display.
I gave the small crowd a second cursory glance and noticed Captain Albright hadn’t bothered to take my advice, not that I even began to imagine she would. She was standing front and center among the other officers; however, she didn’t appear to find anything they were saying to her amusement. She simply watched us with a stoic expression creasing her face; although, even at a distance I could see the inner worry in her eyes.
“Why do I suddenly feel like the new kid who’s about to get the crap beat out of him on the playground?” I mumbled as the three of us continued on toward Judith Albright’s abandoned Hyundai sedan.
“Prob’ly ‘cause ya’ pretty much kinda are if ya’ don’t come up with somethin’,” Ben replied.
“That’s not very encouraging,” I told him. “You of all people know how this works. There are never any guarantees.”
“Yeah, I know.” He nodded. “But you’re the one who said it. I’m just agreein’ with ya’.”
“Ignore them,” Felicity interjected.
“Yeah… That was pretty much my plan,” I returned. “Let’s hope it actually works.”
I was still fighting the hammering inside my skull and doing so without the benefit of aspirin or anything else for that matter. Once the escalating altercation at the van had been dialed back to a manageable level, everything else had started moving fairly quickly, so I hadn’t had a chance to ask Ben where they were hidden or even if he actually had any to offer. Almost immediately following my insistence that we get started, two plastic grocery bags, both filled with unmistakable cylindrical containers, had been unloaded from the passenger seat of a deputy’s patrol car. Then, everyone backed off and waited for something to happen. I suppose it was a good thing their tickets to this show were free because special effects-wise I was fairly certain they were going to be disappointed.
The three of us came to a halt a few steps away from the sedan and simply stood there. Staring at my faint reflection in the driver’s side window, I struggled not to think too hard about the dog and pony show this had now become. I was used to letting the psychic events occur of their own accord, which never seemed to be an issue. Now, however, there was an enormous amount of pressure for me to make it all happen on cue, complete with a skeptical audience. While I had forced such to occur before, doing so was a rarity, so I had to hope that whoever was murmuring inside my head would listen and seize the opportunity to sp
eak up instead of just endeavoring to make me miserable.
After a substantial pause where I had scarcely moved, Ben asked, “You goin’ all Twilight Zone? ”
“No,” I replied, sighing as I reached up to massage my forehead from sheer force of habit. “I was just thinking that a double extra huge bottle of aspirin would be good right about now.”
“Why didn’t ya’ say somethin’ earlier?”
“Things got a little crazy, if you recall.”
A few seconds later I heard a soft rattle, and his large hand appeared in front of me, holding a generic brand bottle of the pain reliever that had apparently been stashed in his jacket pocket all along.
“Thank the Gods,” I mumbled as I took it from him and immediately twisted off the cap.
“Rowan, you really shouldn’t…” Felicity began to object.
Before she could complete the sentence I had already swallowed something on the order of a half dozen of the white pills, dry. After choking them down and gagging on the bitterness at the back of my throat, I held the bottle back out to Ben and said to her, “You can yell at me later.”
“You know those aren’t going to help matters if you start bleeding again,” she admonished. “Aspirin is a blood thinner.”
“So I’ve heard,” I replied. The recollection of having chronically overdosed on the analgesic some months back for a very similar reason was still fresh in my mind, so I knew the risks all too well. I sighed then added, “I know it’s dangerous, honey. But, right now I need to be able to see straight, or we aren’t going to get anywhere with this.”
“I understand,” she replied softly. “No bleeding then, okay?”
“Okay. No bleeding.” We both knew there was no way I could guarantee such a thing, but if it made her feel better to hear it, then I was good with making the empty promise.
“So, whadda we do now?” Ben asked. “Just stand here like the stooges or somethin’?”
“Aye, give me the salt and stand over here next to me,” Felicity said, motioning to him.
“Since you’re givin’ orders I take it you’re Moe,” he replied with a small laugh in his voice.
“Just give me the damn salt and quit being a comedian,” she countered.
“Hey, chill out. It’s been one of those days, ya’know,” Ben said as he hefted the bags toward her. “It’s just a little humor. It’s how I cope with this shit.”
Felicity took the weighty bags from him with much less ease than he had displayed when he held them out to her. As she settled them to the ground she muttered, “ Umpaidh.”
Fortunately, Ben didn’t appear to catch the Gaelic insult, not that he would have understood it if he had. At any rate, while over the years I had personally come to understand his use of humor at somewhat inappropriate moments as a safety valve for the stress, we really did need to get on with things. And, in this particular case another round of bickering between the two of them, no matter how good-natured, simply wasn’t on the short list.
My wife fished out two containers of salt and handed one of them to him as she said, “Just open them and keep them coming when I tell you.”
“Do you want me to help?” I asked.
“No, I want you to concentrate on staying grounded,” she instructed me in no uncertain terms. “We can handle this part.”
Then, breaking the seal with her fingernail, Felicity flipped up the metal spout on the top of the carton, then knelt and began to draw a thick line on the asphalt with the contents. As soon as the container was empty, she handed it to Ben and took the fresh replacement from him. After a minute or so, she had scribed almost two-thirds of a wide circle around the three of us.
Just as she was taking a newly opened carton from Ben, one of the cops on the perimeter called out, “You want some pepper to go with that?”
Even with the road noise, there was no missing the burst of chuckles that skipped through the group. Felicity paused for a second, shook her head slightly as she muttered something unintelligible, and then continued on with her task.
“I’ll be right back,” Ben grunted.
“Don’t worry about it,” I told him. “They just don’t understand.”
“I ain’t worried,” he replied. “And, I’m gonna make ‘em understand.” With that he turned and strode away in the direction of the cop who’d made the comment.
“Just ignore them, Ben,” my wife instructed, but she was too late. With his long stride he was already a quarter of the way to the boundary tape and didn’t hear her. Of course, even if he had he wouldn’t have listened. I could tell he was on a mission; I’d seen the look before.
I watched on as he gestured in our direction and engaged the officer in what appeared to be a deeply earnest conversation. At one point he held his right hand over his heart for a second then held it up palm outward as if taking an oath. A minute or two later he was purposefully striding back toward us. Looking past him I could see that the cop he had just spoken to was staring at my wife with a quizzical and maybe even slightly fearful expression in his eyes.
“Sorry ‘bout that,” Ben said as he reached down into one of the bags then withdrew a container of salt and broke the seal. “You ready for another one yet?”
“What did you just say to him?” Felicity looked up and asked.
“I just gave ‘im some friendly advice.”
“Did you threaten him?”
“Not exactly.”
“What then?” she pressed.
“Don’t worry, nothin’ bad… Well, not too bad I don’t guess… I just told ‘im that one time I saw you do some kinda evil eye thing on a copper I worked with who was givin’ ya’ shit. Then the next day all his hair fell out real sudden like,” he replied in a low voice. “And, I made sure he understood I meant all of it fell out.”
“You didn’t…” she replied.
He gave her a half shrug. “Yeah, well, actually I did. I mean, I didn’t figure he’d believe the turnin’ ‘im into a cockroach bullshit ya’ threatened me with, so I hadda tell him something.”
My wife shook her head as she gave him an empty carton then took the new one out of his hand. “You’re incorrigible.”
“Yeah, I know,” he grunted. “But I’m bettin’ that copper would piss himself if you leaned over and gave ‘im the look.”
“The look?”
“Ya’know… The one ya’ always use when you’re pissed at me.”
“Oh. That look,” she said in a flat tone. “Maybe some other time. I’m almost finished and we have more important things to do. How much salt do we have left?”
“Another whole bag,” he replied. “Looks like ten… maybe twelve containers.”
“Good, that’s more than enough,” she announced as she bent back down and continued scribing the salt circle on the parking lot. “This should be the last one I need for the moment.”
“Then what?” Ben asked.
“Then you get your wish,” she told him.
“What wish?”
“As you put it, I say a poem.”
“Yeah,” he replied, starting to nod. “See, I knew I was…”
Felicity cut him off quickly, “Don’t push me, Ben. I’ll still hurt you.”
“Yeah, I keep forgettin’ that’s your thing.”
She stood up and handed him the empty salt container. “Yes, but since we’ve seen that you don’t take pain all that well, it probably wouldn’t be much fun for me.”
He snorted out a light chuckle. “So that’d mean I’m safe.”
“Oh no,” she told him. “I’ll do it just for spite.”
“Jeez… You’re a friggin’ piece of work.” He shook his head then diverted the topic by glancing around at the circle. “Wait a sec, I think ya’ missed a spot. Don’tcha need to fill this in over here?” he asked as he pointed toward a void in the salt that measured almost three feet in width on the side nearest the car.
“No,” Felicity replied as she turned slowly in place while surveying t
he circle herself. “That would be the door.”
“The door?”
“Aye.”
“Okay… Whatever you say,” he muttered.
“Stand over here,” my wife told him as she took his arm and led him into the center with me.
“Don’t you want me ta’ go over there or somethin’ while ya’ do the hocus-pocus?” he asked, pointing toward the tape line.
“No,” she replied with a shake of her head. “I want you to stand right here so you can help.”
“Whaddaya mean help? I ain’t a Twilight Zone freakazoid like you two. What am I gonna be able ta’ do?”
“If I’m following her logic, I think you just became an honorary signpost,” I groaned out between waves of pain.
“Pretty much,” she acknowledged.
“What’s that s’posed ta’ mean?”
“It means that you’re now Rowan’s anchor,” she replied. “Obviously you have more physical strength than I do, so if this starts to go bad, I’ll tell you to pull him into the circle. Once you do that I’ll handle closing the door.”
He made a sweeping motion toward the salt with one of his hands. “So I just grab ‘im and pull ‘im in here?”
“More or less.”
“Uh-huh, so what’s the more part, or do I not wanna know?”
“Well, if you have to pull him in, he’s likely to start grounding through you as soon as you touch him. Initially, anyway, until I can take over.”
“Yeah, okay, but now you’re talkin’ la-la land stuff and I don’t know what that means.”
“It’s kind of like having electricity pass through you,” she explained. “But different.”
“Yeah, wunnerful, now I understand perfectly,” he said with a heavy dose of sarcasm. “So how’s the Twilight Zone shit gonna affect me since I ain’t like you?”
“It probably won’t.”
“Whaddaya mean prob’ly?”
She shrugged. “I can’t be sure. I’ve never actually done it this way before.”
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