Eye of the Storm

by Sara Reinke

  Grandma, who is Claire Boyett? Emma cried. You told me her name, but I don’t know who she is!

  You have me to tell you things, show you things, Grandma said. Paul has Claire Boyett.

  But who is she? Emma shouted. Grandma, I asked Uncle Paul about her, but he didn’t know!

  Grandma looked up at the sky as a particularly loud crackle of thunder sounded. She hunched her shoulders, her expression fearful. We should go inside, she said. We should―

  And then a flashing spear of lightning lanced across the sky and Emma jerked, startled. Her eyes flew wide, and she found herself back in the bedroom at Uncle Paul’s apartment, with Mr. Cuddles tucked against her. When she had fallen asleep, it had only just turned night, and the sky beyond her window had been a dusky purple. Now, hours had passed, it seemed; the sky was black, and the streetlight’s glow seeped through her curtains.

  Emma sat up. Grandma? she thought. There was no reply, and she felt anxious and scared. Grandma usually answered her. The storm had frightened Grandma for some reason. The hurricane, she thought, and she remembered her grandmother’s earlier admonition. A storm is coming. Something bad is going to happen and your daddy’s going to be hurt.

  But he’s coming home, Emma thought. He told me so tonight―he and Jo are leaving tomorrow and they’re coming home to get away from the storm.

  She crawled out of bed and opened her door. The apartment was quiet and still. Emma carried Mr. Cuddles by the paw and padded down the corridor to Paul’s room. His door stood open, the room draped in darkness. Light from beyond the window spilled across the floor and bed in erratically shaped splotches of stark, pale light. The covers were turned back on the bed, pushed to one side as if Paul had been sleeping there, but had gotten up. The digital clock beside his bed said 12:47 in the morning.

  “Uncle Paul?” Emma called softly. She tiptoed into the room and looked all around, but Paul wasn’t there. He wasn’t in the bathroom. He wasn’t in the kitchen, or the living room. He wasn’t sitting at the dining room table, or smoking a cigarette out on the patio. He was gone.

  “Uncle Paul? Emma called again, her eyes filling with tears. She knew he wouldn’t answer; he wasn’t there, but she didn’t know what else to do. She hugged Mr. Cuddles against her belly and struggled not to cry.

  You have me to tell you things, show you things, Grandma had said. Paul has Claire Boyett.

  Is that where Uncle Paul is? With Claire Boyett? Emma wondered. It didn’t make sense. He hadn’t known who Claire Boyett was. Maybe she’s not a person, she thought. Maybe she’s like Grandma―a ghost. Maybe she shows him things the way Grandma shows me.

  She didn’t know, but if that was true, it didn’t explain where Paul was, where he had gone. Emma went back to her room and closed the door. After a moment’s uncertain hesitation, she pushed the button-lock down on the handle, and locked the door behind her. She scurried back to her bed and ducked beneath the covers, burrowing deeply, dragging Mr. Cuddles with her. All she could imagine in her mind was Uncle Paul from the night before, sitting in his room, smoking a cigarette, his face twisted and different and scary somehow.

  Like he was someone else.

  She shivered, her tears spilling. She thought about going and getting the cordless phone, calling her daddy, but she didn’t move. Instead she closed her eyes and repeated in her mind a sort of frantic, frightened mantra. Daddy will be coming home soon. Nothing’s going to happen. Daddy will be coming home soon. Nothing’s going to happen.

  * * *

  “Here.”

  Bethany jerked awake, startled by her sister’s voice. A flutter of movement near her face startled her all the more, and she sat up, eyes flown wide, her breath caught in a surprised gasp.

  M.K. giggled, switching on the bedside lamp. Bethany immediately winced, squinting against the glare. She was still half-asleep and more than slightly bewildered. “What time is it?” she asked, her voice croaking.

  “Quarter after two or something,” M.K. said. “Look on your pillow.”

  Bethany looked and saw what her sister had dropped there; the flicker of motion that had startled her. It was a driver’s license. Bethany picked it up and blinked in new surprise to find her high school yearbook picture looking back at her, beneath the name Allison Jane Deavers.

  “Now you can go with us this weekend,” M.K. said with a smile. She was dressed from a night of clubbing, smelling like beer and cigarette smoke, her blue jeans too tight and too low, her slip of a tank top cut to her midriff.

  “This weekend?” Bethany asked, still staring at the driver’s license. It sure looked real, down to the computer-embossed holograms on the plastic cover. Whoever she was, Allison Jane Deavers had been born in 1985, making her twenty-one years old.

  “Yeah. I told Nathan you were coming and he was really stoked.”

  Bethany looked up at M.K. “But…we’re going to Dad’s this weekend.”

  M.K. shrugged. “So? We can still sneak out. He won’t know. I do it all the time. He sleeps right through it―and so do you.”

  “I…I don’t know,” Bethany said, looking uncomfortable. She didn’t like the idea of lying to their mother, of sneaking out of the house, and she sure didn’t want to get caught doing either by their father. Besides, their dad would be hurt if he found out they were sneaking out of his apartment, and she didn’t want to hurt him.

  M.K. frowned, crossing her arms over her chest. “Bethany, Nathan went to a lot of trouble to get this for you, so don’t tell me you’ve changed your mind.”

  “Nathan?” Bethany asked, surprised.

  M.K.’s frown deepened. “Yes, Nathan. I told you he was excited about you coming. He got that so you could.”

  Bethany blinked in new surprise at the license in her hand. She’d been watching Nathan Darcy surreptitiously in band ever since M.K. had told her he wanted her to come to Snake Eyes. She’d never once seen him as much as glance in her direction. She’d nearly convinced herself that M.K. was full of shit; that Nathan wasn’t going to ask her to the homecoming dance after all. But all at once, she was no longer so certain.

  M.K. hopped momentarily on each foot, slipping off her wedge-heeled sandals. “I’m going to bed,” she said, walking toward the door, barefooted. “You let me know what you decide. I don’t give a shit either way.” She glanced over her shoulder as she left Bethany’s room. “But Nathan will be awful disappointed if you’re not there,” she added with a wink, twisting Bethany’s stomach in a whole new, anxious, uncertain knot. “See you in the morning.”

  CHAPTER SIX

  “Are you alright?” Susan asked Paul as he met her on the front walk running between their adjacent apartment buildings. It was ten after six, the sun barely a pastel glow in the sky, the streetlights still shining with pale coronas of light in the misty, foggy new morning.

  “Yeah,” he replied. “Sorry I’m late.”

  He sounded weary. Hell, he felt weary. He had gone to sleep sometime after eleven, tucked beneath his blankets in his bed, and had woken up nearly four hours later sitting behind the wheel of his truck, parked on the side of the road. Although it had been dark, and he’d had nothing but the twin beams of his headlights to orient him, he was pretty certain he had been at about the same point as where he’d pulled off the highway with a nosebleed.

  He still didn’t know what terrified him more―the fact that he’d apparently been sleepwalking―hell, sleepdriving―again, that he’d come to his senses in a place wholly unfamiliar to him, and just as well the goddamn dark side of the moon, or that he’d been dreaming again, his mind tormented while his body had acted of its own apparent accord. He’d dreamed of the girl, Aimee, bound and gagged in the straight-backed chair in a basement someplace where horsehair plaster, lead-based paint and asbestos abounded.

  He’d seen her in his mind. He’d secured the piano wire garrotte around her neck, tying it to her ankles. He’d finished with his preliminary tortures―burning her with cigarettes, punching the need
les into her body; he knew this in his mind, as distinct as memories, just as he knew he was tired of her…in that fashion.

  Now to get down to business, he’d thought, as he’d taken the stainless steel gardening shears in hand and set to work on her fingers.

  Paul had vomited in his truck at the memory of this, the choked garble of her cries as she’d screamed around the rubber-ball muffle, and the way her eyes had bulged, her face flushing purple with the desperate need for air as she’d struggled, her legs jerking reflexively, tightening the noose around her neck. He’d thrown open the door of the Explorer and leaned out over the road, his stomach heaving.

  Oh, God, he had thought. What’s happening to me? What in Christ’s name is wrong with me?

  He’d sat at the roadside for a seeming eternity, ashen and shaking, gripping the steering wheel with cold, clammy hands. It was a dream, he’d thought, over and over again, desperate to convince himself. Even with the smells, the sounds, the memories…it wasn’t real. It can’t be real, because if it is, it means…it means…

  “Christ,” he had whispered, shoving the heels of his hands over his eyes, trying to physically restrain his mind from considering any further. “What’s happening to me?”

  “Paul?” Susan asked, cocking her head slightly to attract his gaze, snapping him out of his reverie. “You okay?”

  “Yeah,” he said again, and this time, he forced a feeble smile. “Rough night, that’s all. I didn’t sleep good.”

  “You still feel like running?” she asked. She wore loose-fitting nylon jogging shorts that did nothing to camouflage her long, shapely legs, and a form-fitting, cropped tank top. He had never noticed how strong she was before; her arms and shoulders, visible in full, were toned and sculpted with lean, firm musculature. A momentary admiration of the swell of cleavage spilling out over the tank’s scooped neckline was all it took to help him clear his thoughts. Or at least, redirect them.

  “Yes,” he said, because all at once, the idea of stretching his legs, of feeling the pounding rhythm of the pavement beneath his feet, the resounding impact shuddering through his knees and thighs, and all while watching Susan’s breasts bouncing beneath the confines of her shirt, sounded like a blessed escape to him, the perfect way to forget the night before, and what had happened―both real and imagined.

  They ran together, side by side, their feet falling nearly in tandem against the black-top. “So how’s your brother?” he asked.

  “He’s good,” she replied. “Doped up on painkillers, he told me, so I didn’t stay long.”

  Paul nodded. They continued on in silence for a moment, and then she looked up at him. “Would you like to come over tomorrow night?”

  He stumbled, hopping to a surprised halt. “What?”

  Susan blushed brightly and burst out laughing, covering her hand with her mouth. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I didn’t mean to startle you. I just…I thought we could have dinner together. I could fix some more lasagna. I figure I kind of owe you, since I faked you out last night, with the plate and all…”

  God, she’s trying to make up for that, he thought, and he leaned over, placing his hands against his thighs while he laughed breathlessly. Jesus, and for a second, I thought she was asking me out on a date…coming onto me…

  “That’s really nice, Susan, but you don’t have to do that,” he said, glancing up at her.

  “I know,” she replied. As he straightened, she stepped closer, keeping her eyes fixed on his, the corners of her lovely mouth upturning slightly. “I want to.”

  All at once, Paul’s throat constricted, and he gulped audibly for breath. “Are…you asking me out on a date?” he asked, feeling somewhat ridiculous and more than a little astonished.

  Her smile widened, her eyes flashing with mischievous good humor. “I am, yes,” she said. “Are you accepting?”

  He blinked, staring at her for a long, disbelieving moment, and then he laughed shakily, forking his fingers through his thinning blond hair. “Susan, that…that’s sweet,” he said. “That’s actually damn near the sweetest thing anyone’s done for me in awhile, but you… It’s just that you’re…”

  “Younger than you?” she asked, arching her brow.

  “A lot younger than me,” he clarified. “I’m old enough to be your father.”

  She continued to hold his gaze, at once challenging and engaging him. “Yes,” she said. “But you’re not.”

  She stepped even closer, pressing the wondrous swell of her breasts against his chest. He could feel the points of her nipples straining through the thin layers of fabric separating them. He could smell her, a heady, intermingling fragrance of perfume and perspiration, and he could feel her heat seeping through his T-shirt and sweatpants, infusing into his form, stirring him to immediate, uncomfortable arousal.

  “Susan…” he began, and then she stood on her tiptoes and kissed him. Her lips pressed against him, lightly, sweetly, and then her tongue slipped against his own. The kiss deepened; she stepped more closely against him, her hands cradling his face. He hadn’t kissed any woman but Vicki in more than twenty years. The emotions that rocked through him were rapid-fire and bewildering―amazement, shock, delight, lust, shame, remorse. He didn’t know if he should kiss her back or run away. Or worse―pull her into the woods lining the stretch of road they had been jogging alongside, rip aside her thin nylon shorts and bury his sudden, throbbing, aching arousal deeply within her.

  A car flew by, its horn blaring, startling them apart. Susan stumbled, losing her footing in the soft loam of the road’s shoulder, and he caught her arms, sparing her a fall. She looked up at him, smiling, and oh, Christ, he suddenly found the latter of his options being the most immediately tempting.

  “So is that a yes?” she asked.

  “To what?” he asked, shell-shocked and dumbfounded from her kiss.

  She laughed. “To dinner,” she said. “With me. Tomorrow night. Is that a yes?”

  He nodded. “Yes,” he said. To that, to anything, whatever you want, he thought. For the first time in a long time, he found himself thinking, Christ, if this is a dream, don’t let me wake up. Just let me keep dreaming until after tomorrow night.

  * * *

  “You look like hell,” Jason said as Paul walked past his desk for his office.

  “Good morning to you, too,” Paul grumbled, pausing long enough at the department coffee maker to pour himself a large, steaming mugful of straight-black joe.

  “No, seriously,” Jason said. “Are you alright? You look―”

  “Like hell, yeah, you’ve mentioned,” Paul said, kicking the door to his office closed behind him, cutting short any further commentary from his partner.

  He sat down at his desk and leaned over, turning on his computer from the tower. He blinked in surprise to notice three stapled sheafs of paper neatly arranged on his desk blotter. They hadn’t been there when he’d left the day before. He perused through them while his computer booted, and realized they were property title and deed histories for the three houses owned by Arthur Sinclair, the chairman of the Greater Metropolitan Historical Preservation Society.

  Paul checked the date and time stamp on the printed pages and realized that Jason had pulled the information together earlier that morning. The kid must have been in here before the crack of dawn working on this, he thought, momentarily and absurdly touched. Why in the hell?

  He was the first to admit he was probably too hard on the younger man. He simply had little time, patience or energy to expend on someone who had never spent a day of his life in the field as a street cop; someone who didn’t understand the first thing about the real responsibilities that came with the job. Jason was a paper-pusher, representing everything about the public affairs department and the aspects of Paul’s job that he disdained, and in truth, he judged the young officer unfairly for that.

  He glanced toward the narrow window flanking his office door and spied Jason looking at him from his desk. At Paul’s notice, Jas
on immediately stiffened, his eyes darting back to his computer monitor. Subtle, kid, Paul thought with a frown. Real subtle.

  His phone rang, and he tucked the receiver between his shoulder and ear as he set about dressing his coffee, adding in three packets of sugar simultaneously to the dark, steaming brew. “Frances,” he said. “Public Affairs.”

  “Hi, Paul,” his wife, Vicki, said on the other line.

  My ex-wife, she’s my ex

  He felt his face and heart soften, and a deep, visceral ache stoke in his gut. For a fleeting moment, no longer than a second or two, his throat tightened and he couldn’t find his breath or voice. “Vicki,” he said, with a slight cough to recover. “Hey. How are you?”

  He closed his eyes and remembered her, the fragrance of her skin, the flavor and texture of it―of her―against his mouth and tongue, the way she would hiccup for breath when climax came upon her while they were making love, the way she’d always hook her fingers into the meat of his back and sink her teeth lightly, deliberately into his shoulder to keep from crying out loud in release and alerting M.K. or Bethany.

  “I’m good, Paul,” she said. “How are you?”

  I’m nothing, he thought, and again, his chest tightened with pain. God, Vicki, I’m lonely and sleep-deprived and I hate my fucking job and nothing makes any goddamn sense anymore without you and the girls.

  “I’m fine,” he said again, and he took a sip of the scalding coffee to wrench his mind from thoughts of her, to give it physical pain to focus on as his lips were burned, because that was an easier distraction to bear than a broken heart. “It…it’s good to hear from you. What’s up?”

  “I wanted to see if you’d heard from Jay and Jo,” she said. “That hurricane is all over the news. It’s a Category Four this morning, they’re saying.”

  “Yeah,” he nodded. He looked down at the papers Jason had left for him, and realized he’d also printed off some copies of online articles about Arthur Sinclair. “I talked to him last night, in fact. They’re flying home early. They’ll be in tomorrow night.”