Death Prophets

by Steve Armstrong

  “I think so. I saw them drive off together the day before John was shot. I’m pretty sure she’s the one who called John to the house that night.”

  “Really? What was she doing there?”

  Lansky shrugged. “I don’t know. But I did hear that she shot the perp’s brother in the leg.”

  “So the reporter packs heat?” Matt grinned. “Sounds like my kind of girl.”

  Lansky smiled back. “She’s kind of a pistol. That’s what John said.”

  Matt gave Lansky a sideways glance. “John used the word ‘pistol’?”

  “Something to that effect. She’s really pretty, too.”

  “Did John say that?”

  “He didn’t have to,” Lansky replied, his smile spreading wider.

  Matt extended his hand to the officer. “Thanks for your help. If you ever remember anything else that you can tell me, give me a call.” He reached into his hand and pulled out a business card and handed it to Lansky.

  Harrison headed back to his car. Spending time with a beautiful firecracker of a woman who didn’t mind shooting people sounded like an ideal way to spend his day. And if she had answers about what happened to John, all the better.

  6

  Josh Williams sat outside the small house, waiting for some unknown moment to arrive. He should’ve been miles away, tucked away in some anonymous small town out west, where he was unknown—just another regular looking guy whom people might have seen drinking in a bar and thought, “He has secrets”. Instead, Josh was in Windfall, NY—a scant thirty minutes away from a town where an overzealous reporter and a diligent detective might have recognized him—locked in an orbit that he couldn’t seem to escape. Since the catastrophic events at 13 Prospect Street, he had moved from town to town, paying for rooms in rundown motor inns with cash.

  Billy Hunt, dressed in a warm winter hat, Carhart jacket, and jeans, emerged from the small, red house. Williams had first discovered Hunt’s name in the newspaper: he’d been arrested on suspicions of domestic abuse. Two days later, Williams put a face to the name at the arraignment. Hunt had been released with no bail set. Now the man walked free, as the long arduous journey from arrest to trial unfolded—provided the victim, presumably Hunt’s girlfriend, didn’t request the charges be dropped first.

  As Williams pondered Hunt’s potential guilt and fate, his mind wandered to the person he would rather be with at the moment: Jessie Rodgers. The young, ethereal blonde probably still bore the bruises on her arms and legs caused by a horrific year of abuse from her ex-boyfriend. Josh had helped her escape the clutches of the sadistic Mike Sullivan and had been only moments away from embarking on a new life together with her.

  Unfortunately, Williams’ power had spiraled out of control, leading him to assault a reporter and dispatch Rodgers’ ex-boyfriend and his brother. Williams still didn’t regret that, not really. But it had given Jessie pause; so despite the tumult of his desire for her, Williams released her. He chose to let her find a new life without him.

  Hunt boarded his car, an older model Ford Mustang, and revved the engine to life. Whether guilty or not, the odds suggested Hunt would remain free, let off of the hook because his victim dropped the charges or because the failures of an inefficient and defective criminal justice system that particularly struggled with he said/she said cases.

  Josh Williams turned the ignition of his own car—a beater that he paid for in cash after he killed Mike Sullivan. Though a hundred thousand miles older than his previous car, no one recognized this sedan or had put out an APB for it, yet.

  Williams could have fled. Even at that moment, as he watched Billy Hunt go about his day. All Williams needed to do was stop by a nearby bank where he kept some important papers and cash stashed away in a lockbox, and he could have kept driving. He’d been prepared for such an escape for years. He even had a false birth certificate and driver’s license in the safe deposit box, a new identity he could step into at any moment. Instead, he proceeded to stalk Hunt through town.

  Williams tailed Hunt to O’Malley’s Sports bar. The afternoon hour seemed a little early for a drink. He watched as Hunt shuffled into the bar.

  Josh’s phone chimed. He glanced down at the new text: What are you doing, Josh?

  Williams checked the number; it was the same number someone had texted him from the night he left Jessie and her dead ex-boyfriend—a text that promised answers to his unique problems.

  Another text came: We should meet up sometime. Let me know when you’re ready. A lion can only stalk a mouse for so long.

  Josh struggled to understand the last text. Was this mysterious texter claiming to be the lion and Josh to be the mouse? No, that didn’t make sense. The texter had said Josh was more powerful than he knew. Then he realized the text’s meaning: he was the lion and Billy Hunt was the mouse. This anonymous texter knew what Josh was doing. Though that thought disturbed Josh, it also made him curious. Perhaps a meeting with the texter was in order.

  7

  Grace turned the key to her apartment and pushed the door open. Jason and Amy followed her into the small one bedroom apartment. Closing the door behind them, she waited for their reaction to the piles of books stacked on the coffee table in the living room, the various coats and sweatshirts strewn about the backs of her furniture, and the fine sheen of dust that coated every surface. When neither Jason nor Amy said anything, Grace preemptively apologized.

  “I’m sorry the place is such a mess. I just haven’t had the energy to clean, lately.”

  Amy gave Jason a brief glance before smiling at Grace. “Don’t worry about it. House cleaning is one of the last things on my list, too.”

  Jason skeptically surveyed the room. “Maybe I need to reconsider our relationship, then. I demand my women be skilled at housework,” he said with false bravado. Amy glared at him. “Kidding,” he said, giving her an exaggerated grin.

  “The sketches are in my room,” Grace said, walking down the short and narrow hallway that attached to the living room.

  “You stay here,” Amy commanded Jason.

  “I don’t see why I can’t look too,” he complained while dropping down on the couch. “Did you draw pictures of naked men or something? Is that why you don’t want me to see your work, Grace?”

  Both women ignored his question as they made their way to Grace’s bedroom. The room, painted a pastel aqua color, existed in much the same state of disorder as the rest of the apartment. A small wooden desk in the corner offered no available surface area to work on and piles of clothes lined the side of Grace’s bed, which butted up against the wall.

  Grace lifted the sketch pad and thumbed through its pages until she found her most recent project. She analyzed the drawing again on the off chance that her mind had jumped to conclusions and the image of the man in her dreams bore no resemblance to the photo in the obituary that she had stashed away in her purse. But a second glance only confirmed her opinion. The two men were unmistakably one in the same.

  As her heart sank further, she handed the two images to Amy, whose brow creased as she scrutinized Grace’s handiwork. Amy alternated between holding up each picture individually, then placed them side by side. She pursed her lips as Grace waited for her judgment.

  “They are really similar,” Amy conceded at last. “It’s kind of hard for me to tell, though. They’re two different kinds of pictures, but they could be the same person.”

  Grace chewed on her thumb as Amy dispensed her judgment. She wished for something more definitive: either a hard ‘yes’ or an absolute ‘no’. But Amy was right to shade the matter with uncertainty.

  “So you started having these dreams over a week ago?” Amy asked, her countenance even.

  “Yes. And I had one each night until two nights ago. The same day this guy died,” Grace said, sweeping her hair behind her ear.

  Amy held the images up again as if she scrutinized the details she’d render a different verdict.

  “Maybe it’s all just some
kind of coincidence. Think about it: this guy looks pretty normal. He could be on a TV show or movie.” Amy looked up at Grace and smiled. “This guy’s actually pretty cute. Under normal circumstances, I’d understand why he’d be showing up in your dreams.”

  Grace shook her head. “They weren’t that kind of dreams. They had this foreboding kind of feeling, like something bad was going to happen.”

  “In your dreams, how did he die?”

  “I don’t know—I never saw, for sure.”

  “Then how do you know he died?”

  “I just knew. I knew he was dying.”

  “But you never actually saw him die?”

  Amy was wise to pursue this point. Grace had never seen anything happen to the man across the street. Maybe she had gone too far in extrapolating that part of the dream. She recalled the light coming and the man turning around to see it, but that was where the vision ended.

  “No. But there was a light,” Grace said.

  “Like from the sky?”

  “Like a train coming toward him.”

  Amy nodded. “Did you have the same dream every night?”

  “Yes. But it was like every night I saw a little more. The first night, I only saw his face, and even some of those details were hazy. But I knew I was watching something important. His face stayed with me when I woke up, and I couldn’t get back to sleep.” Grace’s mood became even more unsettled as she recalled the haunting visions.

  Her new, surprising confidant handed Grace back the sketchpad and torn out obituary. “It’s really strange,” Amy concluded.

  Grace received the pad and dropped it on the nightstand. She ran both hands through her hair, pushing her long straight hair behind her ears, again. “What am I supposed to do with this?”

  “I don’t know.” Amy shrugged. “Pass it off as a coincidence and try to forget about it? There’s not much you can do about it. It’s not like you can change what happened.”

  Grace wished she could accept such a simplistic solution, but her mind revolted at such a thought. “If it had happened to you, wouldn’t you want to know why, though? Wouldn’t you want an answer or an explanation?”

  “Sometimes there are no answers or explanations. Weird things happen, and you can’t tell why.”

  Grace sat down on her bed. “But I have to know why.”

  Amy sat down next to her. “Maybe before you get caught up with asking why, you should try to figure out if this really was the guy you saw.”

  “I’m sure that it is-”

  Amy silenced Grace by gently placing her hand on the troubled woman’s wrist. “The mind is a powerful thing. We can convince ourselves of a lot of things. Maybe if you got a better look at this guy, you’d realize he wasn’t the one you saw in your dreams.”

  “How do I get a better look at him? He’s dead now.”

  “You could try looking him up on social media,” Amy suggested.

  Grace immediately jumped up and retrieved a laptop from the cluttered desk. She opened it and navigated to Facebook. The name brought back a plethora of different search results, but no one who fit Thomas Wilson’s appearance. Amy waited patiently while Grace attempted different searches, occasionally pointing out a promising result. But in the end, they found no new photographic evidence to corroborate Grace’s dream.

  “Well, there is another option,” Amy said. She seemed hesitant to disclose this last resort, even though she had suggested it.

  “What is it?” Grace asked.

  “We could go to his wake. According to the obituary, it’s going to be Monday.”

  Grace narrowed her eyes at Amy. “I can’t go to his wake,” she said, disregarding Amy’s use of the first person plural pronoun. “I didn’t even know this man. It wouldn’t be right to go.”

  “Look, I’m not saying you should tell his family that you saw him die. But it’s your last chance to see him. Maybe when you do, you’ll realize he’s not the guy from your dreams.”

  “And what if he is?”

  “Then you can ask the same questions you are now. Or you could forget all about this.”

  “I’m not going to forget what I saw.”

  Amy placed her hand on Grace’s. “What was life like before these dreams, Grace? Were you okay?”

  Grace scanned her memory. She had asked the same question of herself many times. When she couldn’t generate an answer, her tone became irritated. “Why did you ask me that?”

  Amy smiled. “Just wanted to know if you were okay. Life can get hard sometimes. For a long time, it was for me. I was really depressed. I had to get help.”

  Grace closed her eyes. “Everything will be fine if I can figure out why this is happening.” Even as she said these words, she doubted their truthfulness. Would she really be okay? Or would she still be lonely? Or sad? Restless, even?

  “I’ll come with you to the wake,” Amy said. Grace turned toward her. “If you want me to, that is.”

  The distress in Grace’s features dissipated, if only momentarily. “You’re a really nice person. My brother’s lucky. I just hope he doesn’t screw this one up.” She almost added, “like the rest of them” but stopped herself just in time. Perhaps Amy was already aware of Jason’s checkered past with women. At any rate, she didn’t need to hear about it from Grace.

  “Thanks, Grace.” Amy’s expression matched her golden hair, which managed to catch just enough of the late morning light to shimmer. “Speaking of your brother, I guess we better go check on him. I’m surprised we haven’t heard him complaining, yet.”

  The two ladies emerged from Grace’s room into the main living space. Jason sat sprawled out on the couch, sound asleep, his head leaning over to one side. It seemed that the copious amounts of food he had consumed had caught up with him. Amy shook her head. “I guess this explains why he’s not complaining.”

  She walked over to him and poked him in the chest. While Amy struggled to wake Jason, Grace pondered what she would witness at the wake and if she should really go. Part of her wanted to see Thomas Wilson in person, but the rest of her feared viewing his lifeless body. Then again, she saw death wherever she went these days. She might as well go look it in the face.

  8

  Matt Harrison paced outside Felicia Monroe’s door. He had already knocked, but no one had answered, yet. He was about to leave when a voice from the inside called, “Who is it?”

  Matt stepped up to the door, standing directly in front of the peephole. “I’m Matt Harrison, John’s brother.”

  The deadbolt lock turned and the door opened until the chain caught it. Felicia Monroe’s green eyes peered through the sliver of an opening at him. Her eye color was the detail about her that stood out the most. But they were green in a hard, standoffish kind of way. Her blonde, gently curly hair framed her roundish face well, but Harrison kept returning to those green eyes.

  “I thought you looked familiar,” she said, before closing the door. For a moment, Matt thought she was shutting him out, but he heard her undo the chain on the inside. A second later, the door opened and Felicia stood out of the way so he could enter.

  Matt walked into the small, impeccably neat apartment. The floor was composed of hardwood, a black leather couch sat against the back wall of the living room, and hipster style artwork lined the walls. Every accent of the apartment—from the lighting to the various objects sitting on the tables and shelves—was clean and modern.

  “Shoes,” Felicia said.

  “I’m sorry, what?” Matt asked, turning back toward the reporter.

  “Please take your shoes off.” She motioned to the mat next to the door where a pair of sneakers and sandals already lay.

  “Oh, sorry.” Harrison shimmied his running sneakers off and lined them next to Felicia’s. Now satisfied, she walked past him and sat down on the couch.

  “What do you want?” she asked, foregoing inviting Matt to sit or inquiring about John’s health, which everyone else seemed to do when they met Matt.

&nb
sp; The woman in front of him was not the person he expected. Beautiful, yes. Despite the general rigidity that marked her eyes, her face was lovely and her body well proportioned. But a pistol? No, that word that Justin Lansky had ascribed to her didn’t seem to apply. Her expression remained impassive, devoid of mirth, spark, or interest.

  “I heard you were there when my brother was shot. I was hoping you could tell me what happened.” Matt cut straight to the point in order to not test Felicia’s razor-thin patience.

  “I was in the other room, so I didn’t see it,” she said, crossing her legs.

  Though she never offered, Matt sat down in the chair across from her. “Then what did you hear?”

  Felicia hesitated before answering. “Mike Sullivan shot John, then turned the gun on his brother and himself. Just like it said in the newspaper.”

  “Doesn’t that seem strange to you that Sullivan didn’t kill his girlfriend?” Matt asked, raising the same objection he had to Justin Lanksy.

  She shrugged. “Mike Sullivan was not exactly a rational kind of person. Besides, I was in the room with his girlfriend and had a gun. Maybe he didn’t want to lose the ability to determine his own destiny. Anyway, it doesn’t matter; he’s dead. And believe me, that’s no great loss to the world.”

  “Hmm.” Matt scuffed his socked foot on the hardwood floor. “It still seems off to me.”

  “What do you care for, anyway?” Felicia asked, her tone sounding more annoyed than curious.

  “He’s my brother. I want to know what happened.” Felicia stared at him without blinking, waiting for something more. “And I’m starting to think that maybe someone else was there, too.”

  Felicia continued to glower at him. “So what, you think someone else shot Sullivan and his brother and made it look like a murder-suicide? Seems a little unlikely, don’t you think?”

  “Probably. But the official story doesn’t make sense to me, either.”

  She rolled her eyes. “Well, there’s always someone like you, isn’t there? Someone who sees a conspiracy when the pure, brutal facts of how screwed up human beings are explain everything just fine. You’d rather root around for some phantom then close the file on an open and shut case.”