A Matter of Time 03 - 04 (Volume 2) (MM)

by Mary Calmes

  "Shit," I said. "Why am I so fuckin' scared of nothing?"

  "Jory," he pleaded. "Baby, it's not nothing. You've been fearless so far but really, this is stupid. Lemme check with Hefron and see if they found an attic. Go to the car and I'll call ya right back."

  "Okay," I said to placate him before I hung up and willed myself forward, to the back door. I could feel my chest tightening; I was having trouble moving air through my lungs. I was so close to hyperventilating.

  In the kitchen, leaning on the refrigerator and hearing it cycle, I calmed down. Normal noises, things that made sense.

  I still wanted a gun. I had never wanted one before. And even though I was calmer than I'd been all night, my phone ringing scared the hell out of me.

  "Shit," I said as I answered it.

  "Babe, they didn't find an attic. I told them you had and everyone's on their way back. You're gonna be knee-deep in police officers in like ten minutes, so just drive back to me, okay?"

  But I knew his voice too well. He was lying. "Sure," I played him along before I hung up again. It rang seconds later.

  "Where are you?"

  "Caleb," I sighed, letting out a deep breath.

  "Yeah. Who else?"

  "Sam's givin' me shit."

  "As well he should—you're terminally stupid."

  "Do you remember ever being in an attic?"

  "An attic? I don't think so."

  "When you got taken to talk to Dane on the phone—

  where'd ya go?"

  "I don't really know because I was blindfolded, but if I had to guess I'd say it was a kitchen. It just smelled like a kitchen, ya know?"

  Which made sense. The walk from the shed to the kitchen was close and there was a phone in the kitchen. Not that they had used that phone. They had used one of those cell phones you buy and put money on. And they had used cash. The police had run down that lead and found only a dead end. No one remembered seeing anybody; there was no paperwork and no surveillance cameras in the store.

  "So you remember being outside and then inside when he moved you."

  "Yeah."

  "God, I wish you were here to see the shed and the kitchen."

  "I'll be there tomorrow morning. You can pick me up."

  "I will. What airline?"

  "I dunno, I'll look in a minute. Can I just say I've been on more airplanes this past year than I think I have in my whole entire life?"

  And as he rambled on I calmed. Even though I was in a dark, creepy house, I was at ease because we were talking about normal things. But when I came around the corner I saw something move. There was no way to stifle the scream.

  "Jesus, what?" Caleb yelled.

  The living room had double French doors, both glass. I had seen my own reflection. "Crap," I said. "Sorry."

  "Are you kidding?" he chided me.

  "Shit."

  "Maybe you should leave and—"

  "No, I'm just freaked out."

  "Oh, no shit."

  "Should I just call you back when—"

  "No. Do not dare hang up. Just—go to the attic."

  "Okay," I agreed, hoping that there would be no more girly screaming on my way up the stairs.

  I walked all over the second floor—which was technically the third if you counted the basement—looking at the ceiling, looking for the ladder that led to the attic. I finally found it by checking the seams in the ceiling tiles. One was not sealed like the others. I jumped up and hit it until I got it right and it slipped down enough for me to get my fingertips on the edge.

  As soon as it moved a little, the long cord dropped and I was able to pull on that to get the stairs to fall out of the ceiling. I had been giving Caleb a play-by-play account, and was now ready to go up there.

  "An attic... how Thirty Days of Night is that?"

  "Oh fuck you," I snapped at him.

  "What? You know there's not actually vampires up there."

  "Shit."

  "Ohmygod, boy, calm the fuck down," he chuckled. "Your imagination is spinning completely out of control. At worst you have a crazed maniac with a gun or a knife up there, just waiting for you because he never left the house in the first place."

  "You should give seminars on fear management."

  He laughed at me as I started up the stairs.

  "God, I hate this."

  "Which begs the question—why are you doing it then?"

  I tried to see everything at once but my flashlight was too small.

  "What do you see?"

  "I can't see shit."

  "Jory, fuck it. Even if the police catch you, who cares? Turn on a light."

  I had to agree. I just didn't have the nerve to hunt around in the dark, so I found the switch on the wall and instantly light illuminated the attic. Immediately I pulled up the ladder, making sure the cord was on my side, and tried to breathe.

  When I turned and saw the man, I screamed and raised my hands. It took me a few seconds to realize I was looking at a CPR dummy.

  "Fuck!" I yelled, kicking the wall closest to me as hard as I could. I sat down after a minute and tried to breathe. When I could, I realized that I had dropped my phone. I found it halfway across the room beside a metal chair. I picked it up and spoke into it, telling him I was all right.

  "Are you kidding me? Jesus Christ, Jory, you just took ten years off my life!"

  It was funny, but I kept my eyes on the dummy to make sure it didn't all of a sudden turn its head and look at me. I was maybe a little paranoid, just a trifle unhinged.

  "No more screaming!"

  "Sorry."

  "God! Just get out of there. I can't take any more of this."

  He couldn't take any more?

  "Just leave and go camp out at the airport and wait for me."

  "Lemme look around first."

  "If you can without scaring the shit outta yourself."

  I ignored the snide remarks, instead concentrating on the room. It was perhaps the cleanest place I'd ever seen in my life. Besides the creepy CPR dummy hanging on what looked like an IV stand, and the chair, there was nothing. I walked around, making sure I didn't miss anything, but there were no hollow walls or hidden rooms. It was just an empty attic.

  The only thing scary about the place was me, all psyched up and frantic. I sent Caleb a picture and he was disappointed.

  His grunt told me everything.

  "What?"

  "Kinda boring, right?"

  And it was.

  After a few minutes I climbed back down and left the attic stairs down when I bolted from the house. I definitely needed a partner in crime. I was looking forward to having Caleb there the next day. Following up on leads in dark houses was way freakier than it looked.

  I checked the car before I got in it and then locked all the doors and drove away fast before anything happened. I saw the line of police cars that passed me, and there was relief knowing that they actually made it.

  "What are you gonna do now?" Caleb asked me, yawning loudly.

  "I dunno. I'm afraid if I go home that the detectives working the case might not let me pick you up alone tomorrow morning. I don't wanna go to Dane's or—"

  "Why don't you get a room somewhere, and tomorrow we'll get another room together."

  "That sounds good."

  "Okay. I'll see you in the morning. I'll call you when I get in."

  "I thought I was gonna pick you up at the air—"

  "You will, but just wait for my call. That way you'll know I'm there and you don't hafta check. Try and sleep as long as you can... you sound really weird."

  "I'm just tired."

  "See, so... sleep."

  "Okay, call me in the morning."

  "I will—night."

  "Sorry to keep you up all this time."

  "It's fine. Later."

  I felt better because talking to him was somehow normal.

  We had been though a lot together lately, and in some ways he was closer to me than anyone. We were like war bu
ddies, and the thought of seeing him was comforting. As I drove toward the airport in search of a hotel, my panic subsided and I started to calm. By the time Dane called I had checked into a room and was lying down, fully dressed, on the bed. I had locked all the doors and felt pretty safe ten floors up.

  "Hey."

  "Where are you?"

  "Why are you up?" I yawned, my eyes drifting closed. "It's so late."

  "I want to know where you are."

  "I'm fine."

  "Not what I asked. Where," he enunciated the word, "are you?"

  "I'm safe. Where are you?"

  "I'm at the hospital with Sam, watching over him as you asked."

  "You should go home and get some sleep. I didn't mean that you should—"

  "He's sleeping. You exhausted him with your antics at the house. He tried valiantly to stay awake, but his body's healing and he just can't expend that much energy and not be knocked out. You should think about what you're putting him through."

  The guilt wasn't going to work. "Okay."

  "Okay? This is all you have to say?"

  "Dane."

  "What?"

  "I have to sleep, I can barely form words."

  "Just tell me where you are."

  "I'll call ya tomorrow, okay? Caleb's coming to—"

  "What? Caleb's in town?"

  "Tomorrow. He's coming tomorrow but don't tell him I told you. He didn't want me to tell you." I sighed.

  "Why the hell not?"

  "He doesn't wanna get in trouble."

  "Get in trouble with who?"

  "You. He thinks you'll be mad at him for going along with me."

  "Which I am. He's supposed to be the grown-up."

  I laughed at him.

  "When I get a hold of you—"

  "I love you," I blurted out. "I gotta sleep now, okay?"

  "Jory, did you know my name's on all your credit cards?"

  I had no idea what that had to do with anything but I was too tired to care. I might have grunted before I hung up and rolled over. I didn't even turn off the light.

  Chapter Nine

  My phone woke me at noon and Caleb was on the other end. He wanted to know where I was. After I told him, he said he'd come to me. I appreciated that, since I was barely awake. I got up an hour later and went to take a shower. My body hurt all over and I had a raging headache. I needed food and a bucket of Tylenol and gallons of water. When I answered the door thirty minutes later, Caleb seemed startled to see me.

  "What?" I asked him, standing there, waiting.

  He walked into me, hugging me tight for just a moment before brushing past me into the hotel room.

  "You look like shit."

  "Yeah, well... I feel like shit."

  "C'mon, let's check outta here before somebody figures out where you are and go eat."

  I was all in favor of his plan.

  We had a huge breakfast of pancakes, sausage, eggs, and hash browns before driving to a motel and paying for the room in cash. As I drove us back toward the house in Oak Lawn, I told him that I thought we should try and find out if Greg Fain had any relatives living in the city.

  "Why?"

  "Maybe they'd know who he hung out with."

  "And how're we gonna find that out?"

  "I think we should start with his neighbors," I said, driving past now-familiar sights on my way toward Oak Lawn. "They might know who his parents were or just who came around the house."

  "That makes sense." He yawned, stretching his arms.

  "You know, I really appreciate you coming all this way just to help me."

  "'Course. I wanna figure this out too. I hate looking over my shoulder all the time."

  "Me too."

  After a few miles in silence he asked me how Sam was.

  "Better. He must still be sleeping or I'm sure I'd be getting threatening phone calls by now."

  "He just worries about you."

  "Which is nice, but I'm not a kid, right? I actually am a grown-up."

  "You're what now?"

  "I don't under—you mean like, how old am I?"

  "Yeah."

  "I'm twenty-six."

  He made a noise. "And how old is Sam?"

  "He's thirty-eight—three years younger than Dane."

  "You worry about that age gap between you and Sam?"

  "No. I figure I'm actually older than he is—I'm more mature."

  "Yeah, running around in dark houses in the middle of the night is real mature."

  "Bite me."

  He laughed at me and I concentrated on the road.

  I could only imagine what we looked like—me in my hoodie and parka, Caleb in his trench coat and scarf, both of us wearing sunglasses to block out the afternoon light. Still, we must have come off as nonthreatening because as we went door-to-door, people still talked to us. Caleb said it was because I was so cute and I countered with the fact that he looked like the boy-next-door with his aww shucks ma'am smile and his Texas accent coming through. I had never really looked at Caleb closely before, but the light brown hair and dark blue eyes were very appealing and the cleft in his chin and the laugh lines made his face interesting. Whatever the reason, people talked to us, and we found out that Greg's mother's name was Joyce and she had moved, Mrs. Ogden thought, to Schaumburg. Mrs. Ogden had lived on the corner for over thirty years and was almost positive that's what she had been told. The snickerdoodles she gave us were very good, straight from the oven. She went on to say that there had never been a Mr. Fain, only Joyce and her son. Once Greg had been old enough to live alone, Joyce had left the house and Greg had lived alone ever since.

  We drove to an Internet cafe and pulled up every Joyce Fain, J. Fain, and plain old Fain in Chicago and Schaumburg.

  There were more than I would have liked, but as I drove, Caleb made calls, and I realized again how great it was to have a partner in crime. Just one more person working on the same thing as me was a great big help.

  "Oh-oh-oh," Caleb said excitedly, and held out his phone after turning it from handset to loudspeaker for me. "Listen-listen."

  The answering machine was clear as I listened. The woman's voice quavered just a little as she announced that the caller had reached Joyce with Our Sisters of Saint Andrew's prayer line. We were to leave a prayer request or message and Sister Joyce would return our call.

  "That's gotta be her," Cable assured me. "Right?"

  I didn't remember seeing any crosses or religious items in the house, but it was dark so maybe I had missed them. Or maybe when his mom moved out, Greg had sent all her paraphernalia with her. Maybe Mom was devout but not the son. "We might as well check it out, but keep calling the others too."

  He agreed and stayed on his cell as I drove.

  "Why do you think Greg didn't just move in with his mom?

  Why take over the house and make her move out? Don't people usually take care of their parents, since they took care of them?"

  "I think that's how it usually works, yeah."

  "So then?"

  "Jory, I know the Fains as well as you do," he chuckled.

  "The inner workings of the family life of one of the men who kidnapped us is a mystery to me."

  "Sure—I was just thinking out loud."

  "Why don't you ask his mother when you meet her?"

  "I don't wanna pry."

  For whatever reason he found that very funny.

  It was a long drive up to Schaumburg, but Caleb kept busy on his phone while I answered mine. Dane wanted to know what was on my kamikaze mission for the day.

  "I had this idea," I began.

  "You know, of course, that I will find you. And when I do, you will never-ever get out of my condo without my permission. I hired Aja a bodyguard until this is over and I'm going to do the same for you."

  "Yeah, okay," I sighed, realizing that my headache just did not want to let me go. It hurt up the back of my neck and over the top of my head. I felt the tension deep in my shoulders.

 
"Is Caleb with you?"

  "Caleb? No."

  "Put him on the phone."

  I shoved my phone at him and after a minute he took a breath and squinted as he said hello. He groaned deeply ten minutes later when he hung up.

  "Jesus, that man is mad."

  "Yeah well—"

  "He's mad at you, at me—he's just pissed off all the way around. You know he traced you to that hotel last night already."

  "That's because I was tired and I used the AMEX instead of my Visa. He pays the bill on the AMEX."

  "That was brilliant."

  "Hi, tired, fuck you."

  He laughed at me and told me where to get off the expressway.

  * * * *

  The house was at the end of a narrow street with enormous potholes and trees that lined both sides. The sidewalks were cracked with overgrown roots, and the houses were all run-down. Standing in front of the chain link fence with Caleb, I shivered hard.

  "What?"

  "I dunno, feels weird."

  "Why?"

  I shrugged.

  "C'mon." He smacked my shoulder before lifting the latch to step into the yard.

  I followed him up the path with weeds growing through the cement to the front door. He rang the doorbell and knocked on the door. The porch was tiny, the wrought-iron railing framing what was basically a stoop.

  "I'll go around the back," he said, taking the four steps back down.

  "I'll go with you."

  The yard was a mess, full of weeds, with grass that hit my knees. There was a fenced-off garden now dormant in winter and a barren oak tree. It didn't look like Greg had made it to Schaumburg to help his mother with the upkeep of her place.

  I thought about Sam and his brothers cleaning out their mom's rain gutters, mowing the lawn, painting, raking leaves—it was so different. I wondered what Joyce Fain had done not to receive the same treatment that Regina Kage did.

  "God, could it be more grim back here?" Caleb shook his head.

  I followed him up the four stairs to the back door, and when he turned the knob the door opened.

  "Oh shit," I groaned, stopping Caleb from going inside.

  "What?"

  "We can't just go in there. She could be taking a shower or something. She'd totally freak if we just showed up in her living room."

  "No one's home, J," he assured me. "I just called, remember?"