Play Dead

by Anne Frasier

  She imagined lifting a hand to her throat, but was unable to do so.

  The floor shifted beneath her.

  The room slanted. And kept slanting . . . until her face was smashed against the gritty wood of the kitchen floor, her body pressed down, seeming ten times its weight.

  It was such a relief to be horizontal, such a relief to be over the fall.

  Her eyes were wide open. She tried to blink but couldn't.

  LaRue—because of course the disheveled man in front of her had to be LaRue—arranged himself beside her on the floor so he could look into her open eyes. With his face inches away, he said, "I've found that the best way to learn about TTX is to experience it firsthand."

  She was going to die.

  How strange.

  For some reason, she found the whole situation hysterically funny. She would have laughed if it had been physically possible. A shame, because she needed a good laugh.

  "I'm not what you expected, am I?" LaRue asked. "Not what you expected from a Harvard graduate? That's okay. Don't feel bad. I've never been what anybody expected. I don't take it personally."

  She knew people were often chameleons, ever changing, never what they seemed, even to themselves. She would have liked to apologize, explain that it wasn't his appearance or circumstances that had thrown her; it was his age. She'd been expecting someone much older.

  "Close your eyes," he said, still on the floor beside her.

  He reached out and forcefully pushed her eyelids down with his fingertips.

  "Don't fight it. Fighting makes it worse. Just close your eyes and enjoy the ride. That's it," he said in a soothing voice, coaching her, guiding her through new terrain. Her own Timothy Leary. "There you go. That's better, isn't it? Much better. The first time's the toughest because you don't know what to expect, and because you're scared shitless. Kinda like sex," he said with a laugh. "The second time will be better. You'll see."

  Second time?

  She felt something against the side of her face, a sensation she couldn't quite place, then realized he was stroking her numb cheek as he mumbled soothing nonsense, whispering words meant to calm and hypnotize as if trying to talk her down from a bad acid trip.

  It worked.

  She began to relax.

  She began to float.

  Float out of her body, up, up to the ceiling, where she could see herself on the floor with James LaRue beside her, one arm looped around her head, his fingers stroking her cheek.

  "It's like playing dead, isn't it?" he whispered seductively.

  She was looking down on them both, but his words were tickling her ear, stirring her hair. "As close as a living person can get to the real thing."

  He was insane. Completely, totally insane.

  "Let go," he coaxed. "You have to let go."

  She let go.

  Chapter 25

  Elise gave a scissors kick and broke the surface of the black-water swamp. A stale breeze skimmed her cheek. The hypnotic croak of frogs floated to her in waves.

  She collapsed faceup on shore and lay there breathing hard. Fan blades circled above her, struggling to push the heavy, stagnant air.

  She was where she'd always been: in the kitchen of LaRue's cabin, a hard floor beneath her, pressing into her shoulder blades.

  She tested herself, lifting her head a couple of inches, then letting it drop. She shifted her arm and heard something scrape, vaguely recalled the broken glass.

  LaRue.

  Where was he?

  Her head was thick as she automatically reached for her gun.

  Still there.

  Fumbling, she slipped her hand inside her jacket.

  Her fine motor skills suffering from the effects of the drug, she struggled with the snap of the leather case to finally pull the weapon free. She rolled to her side and shoved herself to a half-sitting position, steadied by one hand.

  The sudden movement sent nausea washing over her.

  She strained to listen for peripheral sounds, her ears ringing. With her gun drawn, she made an assessment of her surroundings, then staggered to her feet, gun hand trembling.

  "LaRue?" Her voice came out a faint croak.

  She slowly made her way through the cabin, making sure the bathroom and bedroom were empty, doors banging as she shuffled from one room to the other. Returning to the kitchen, she looked outside.

  Her car was still there.

  She checked her pocket and felt the rough edge of her keys.

  Her fingers were sticky.

  She lifted her hand to find a shard of glass embedded between two knuckles. She pulled it out and shook more glass fragments from her jacket. On the floor where she'd been lying was dried blood.

  She'd let LaRue get the better of her.

  Shameful.

  She wanted to go home, shower, crawl into bed. Instead, she made herself take another pass through LaRue's house. Without a search warrant, she couldn't touch anything. She had to suppress the urge to open the books that lined the walls, to read his e-mail.

  Her phone rang.

  She pulled it out and stared blankly at it for an undetermined length of time before finally lifting it to her ear.

  Gould.

  The signal was weak, and his voice broke.

  "Where the hell are you?" was what she finally deciphered.

  "Gone where the goblins go..." The words came out a harsh whisper.

  "What? I can't hear you."

  He went on to say something about trying to reach her all afternoon.

  She looked at her watch; she'd lost four hours.

  The signal fell from one bar to none and the phone went dead.

  She tried to call him back but couldn't connect. She shut off the phone and dropped it in her pocket.

  An enormous amount of energy exerted for nothing.

  She slid her gun into the shoulder holster, jacket open and the leather strap free. Before leaving the house, she collected several pieces of broken glass and wrapped them in the fake map LaRue had drawn.

  Then she stepped onto the front porch and scanned the area. Was he out there watching? Waiting for her to leave?

  Her tires were okay. He hadn't slashed them or let the air out.

  With the shards of wrapped glass in her pocket, she slipped into the driver's seat.

  It was getting late.

  It would be dark soon.

  After locking the doors, she forced herself to proceed at a sedate pace. The nausea had passed and she felt she was thinking clearly until she found herself half asleep at the wheel in the middle of the deserted road with no sense of how long she'd been there.

  She turned up the air-conditioner of the idling car, letting it hit her full in the face, and continued to Savannah. At one point, she deliberately stopped and pulled out her mobile phone. The signal was strong. There were at least ten messages from Gould, left over the course of the afternoon. The latest said he was heading home and to get in touch with him as soon as she got his message.

  She called his cell phone, then his home number, getting voice mail at both.

  She'd been to his apartment only once, but Mary of the Angels was easy to find. A place all Savannah residents knew about. A bleak, compelling piece of architecture with a dark past, clinging to the edge of the Historic District.

  Time was weird, and it seemed she'd just made the decision to head for Gould's when she found herself there—pulling into the parking lot adjacent to the four-story building.

  Darkness had arrived.

  There were no stars.

  At the front door, she found Gould's name on the intercom and buzzed his room.

  No answer.

  She leaned against the stone wall and closed her eyes, legs trembling. Why had she come here? Why hadn't she driven to the police station?

  She couldn't think.

  Sleep. She just wanted to sleep. Could she even make it back to her car? Could she drive herself home?

  She pressed the button again ... and k
ept pressing.

  A voice crackled over the intercom.

  "Yeah."

  Gould. Annoyed.

  Elise leaned close to the speaker. "Let me in."

  "Elise?" His annoyance was gone, replaced by confusion. "I was in the shower. Come on up."

  The entrance door buzzed and Elise stumbled inside. She took the elevator to the third floor, went down a dark hallway of red carpet and wall sconces, to 335. The door was unlocked.

  Inside the apartment, she heard a shower running. A puddle of water had been left on the wooden floor near her feet. The only illumination was a small light attached to the hood of the stove. Nearby, a window air conditioner hummed.

  The apartment was a corner unit that probably would have been light during the day if the windows

  hadn't been covered with ivy. Near those windows was an overstuffed rocking chair. She shot straight for it and collapsed, tipping back her head with a deep sigh.

  Something landed on her lap. She looked down to see Gould's Siamese cat. What was its name?

  The cat began to purr loudly. Elise stroked its soft fur and closed her eyes.

  What a lovely, peaceful place ...

  *

  David dried off and put on a white T-shirt and a pair of jeans, then wandered back into the living area. Elise was sitting in a dark corner, Isobel on her lap. There was actually something tranquil and domestic about the little scene.

  David opened the refrigerator. "Wanna beer?" he asked over his shoulder.

  She mumbled a negative.

  "Soda?"

  Another negative.

  "I have some news." He retrieved a diet cola, popped the top, and took a drink. "There have been four other confirmed cases of poisoning in the area in the past year, all by undetermined toxins. All in different jurisdictions, so nobody compared notes."

  He sat on the stool at the kitchen counter, one bare foot braced against the crossbar, leaving the length of the small apartment between himself and Elise. "Unless it involves a case that's going to trial, most morgues don't keep tissue and blood samples over a certain amount of time, but I asked them to double-check just in case. If they come across anything like liver tissue, they're going to retest it for a broader range of toxins, then get back to us."

  He took another swallow of soda. “Alcohol can be a toxin. If some alcoholic showed up dead and his liver was toxic, chances are they didn't look any deeper, thinking he simply died of acute alcohol poisoning."

  His partner seemed completely disinterested in the information he was relating.

  "I can't remember your cat's name."

  "Isobel."

  "Isobel. That's a nice name."

  "Let's forget about the cat a minute. Where have you been?"

  "To see the TTX specialist."

  "Without me?"

  "Bad idea, I know."

  "Is he willing to help? Did he have any relevant information?"

  "We didn't get around to discussing it."

  He frowned. Was she acting a little weird? A little out of it? "So, what happened? What did he say?"

  "He offered me a drink of water."

  She rocked and continued to stroke the cat. "In hindsight, I can see it was foolish of me to accept, because I believe it contained tetrodotoxin."

  Everything stopped.

  David replayed her last sentence in his head.

  I believe it contained tetrodotoxin.

  That's what she'd said. Exactly what she'd said.

  He put down the soda can and slipped from the kitchen stool.

  He rarely used the ceiling light because it was so blinding and unforgiving and made his place look stark and shitty.

  He flipped it on now.

  Elise raised her arm to shield her face. "Do you mind?"

  He crossed the room and crouched in front of her, every cell focused on Elise. "Tell me what happened," he said levelly.

  The cat let out a little meow of alarm, jumped from her lap, and disappeared down the hall.

  "You scared Isobel," Elise chastised.

  She had a gash on the back of one hand. It was no longer bleeding, but it looked as if it might need stitches. "Why didn't you say something?" He picked up her hand. "How did you get this?"

  "I only took a swallow. I dropped the glass. It shattered. I fell on it. That's where I was when you were trying to call me. Paralyzed."

  "Jesus."

  The overhead light was still bothering her. She squinted against the brightness.

  He grasped her chin with one hand and turned her face toward the light, examining her eyes. Her face, framed by dark hair, was ashen. Even her lips were colorless.

  She pulled away.

  "Your pupils are dilated."

  "My system is messed up, but I'm not high."

  He nodded. She seemed lucid. Exhausted, but lucid. "You should be in a hospital."

  "And let the media get hold of this story? No, thanks. I'm fine."

  He wanted to believe her. "That hand might need stitches."

  She looked at it, turning it back and forth. "Think so?"

  "Have you filed a report?"

  She shook her head. "Not yet."

  "Where's LaRue now?"

  "I don't know. He was gone when the drug wore off four hours later."

  David's emotions had been shut off for so long that now, when a wave of despair and anger hit him, he didn't know how to deal with it.

  He sprang to his feet and turned away, hiding his face. Too much reality. If LaRue had stepped into the room at that moment, David would have killed him.

  The intensity of his reaction scared him.

  Get a grip, Gould.

  Focus.

  Put it away for now and do what you have to do.

  He pulled in a deep breath and turned back around.

  "Elise ..." He paused, swallowed, then asked, "Do you need a rape kit?"

  She looked surprised, as if it was something she hadn't considered. "N-no."

  "Are you sure? Can you remember what happened during those four hours?"

  She seemed uncertain. "Yes ... and no."

  She struggled to pull everything together. He imagined she was going over possible signs of rape in her head.

  "I was there, and I wasn't." She gave it more thought. "No," she finally said. "It didn't happen."

  "Okay. Good." He let out a breath and relaxed a little. "We've got to get you to the police station. You have to file a report. We need to catch this guy. Bring him in. Jesus. He's probably the one killing all these people."

  "I don't know. Seems too easy. Too obvious."

  "Every crime doesn't have to be hard to solve. Not if the perpetrator is a fucking idiot."

  She closed her eyes and leaned back. "Too much anger," she said, her voice weak with exhaustion. "I don't feel like arguing."

  "Right. Sorry." He raised his hands as if to choke an invisible person in front of him. "I'm upset." He dropped his hands.

  He crossed the room, grabbed the phone receiver, and began punching numbers. "I'm ordering a crime scene team to LaRue's. They have to scour—" He stopped midsentence to direct his attention and dialogue to the person on the other end, making the arrangements that needed to be made.

  "You should go to LaRue's and oversee the search," Elise said once David disconnected.

  "I'm taking you to headquarters." He picked up the receiver again. "A late night visit to LaRue's seems just the thing for Starsky and Hutch."

  After telephoning Starsky to give him an abbreviated version of what had happened, he packed Elise in his car and drove to the police station.

  She wasn't accustomed to being on the victim side of the desk. It felt strange and a little surreal, the remnants of the drug in her system giving everything the sensation of a waking dream. After she signed the forms she needed to sign, they sent her to the crime lab to get six tubes of blood drawn.

  While Gould waited in the break room, residue swab tests were taken of her mouth, lips, hands, and rando
m places on her body. After that, she was stuck in a shower for fifteen minutes in case any small grain of TTX remained on her skin. That done, she was given a set of clean scrubs, her own clothes kept as evidence.

  Butterfly bandages took care of her hand. On the way home, Gould swung by a Chinese restaurant, left the car idling by the door, and ran inside. He reappeared two minutes later with a white paper bag. "I called ahead," he explained, getting back in the car and passing the bag to her.

  At Elise's house, they sat on the floor in the living room and ate from carryout containers.

  She wore the green scrubs the lab had given her, hair still damp from the shower. Gould was dressed in jeans and the T-shirt he'd thrown on. His hair had dried funny.

  Elise opened her fortune cookie.

  Ah, she thought. Generic Fortune Number 75. Good deeds bring rewards. She should write fortunes. She could come up with much better ones.

  "Damn," she said. 'Too bad I didn't read this earlier."

  Gould paused, chopsticks in his hand. "What?"

  Elise pretended to read the slip of paper. "An unquenchable thirst leads to an overabundance of knowledge.”

  He put down the cardboard container and chopsticks, then opened his fortune cookie, popping half of it in his mouth while smoothing out the tiny strip of paper. "A wise person refuses candy from a stranger."

  "Ha-ha." She pulled the paper from between his fingers. "You always have to one-up me, don't you? What does it really say?"

  He tried to get it away, but she turned her back to him, the paper clutched to her stomach. " 'The past is never really the past.'"

  "Hmm," Gould said. "A fortune cookie that paraphrases Faulkner. I think the actual quote is "The past is never dead. It's not even past.'"

  "Do you think that's true?"

  "Unfortunately, yes."

  It was late. After midnight.

  "Where do you sleep in this place?" Gould asked, looking around.

  "Upstairs. On the third floor. Why?"

  "I'm not leaving you alone with TTX in your system."

  "That's completely unnecessary." The thought of Gould holing up in her house was a little too personal. They'd gone from I-hardly-know-you to a sleepover in a nanosecond.

  The phone rang, and Elise picked up. It was crime scene specialist Abe Chilton.

  "I'm at LaRue's place right now," he explained. "We're almost done collecting evidence."