by Pam Richter
She just nodded and followed him outside. The sun surprised her, already warming the day. She didn't want to see the light. It shouldn't be shining on this horrible day. It hurt her reddened eyes. She felt like she was sleepwalking to her car.
Nakamura looked exhausted himself as he took the keys from her hand and unlocked the door to the passenger side. He could drive. She didn't care. She felt such a heavy burden of guilt she didn't think she would ever straighten her shoulders again.
Nakamura took off at a sedate pace for him, through the Honolulu General Hospital guest parking area and out of the hospital grounds. He continued on into Waikiki. Neither spoke, each caught up in thoughts of the sight of Heather in a large hospital bed, comatose.
"I'll get you a room."
Michelle looked around and noticed he had parked at the Sheraton Hotel, where he was staying.
She shook her head, "I want to go home."
"You can't."
"But I want to."
"I know. We'll both go. Later. You need some rest." He got out of the car.
Michelle was not moving. She felt too tired to make her rubbery legs work. Nakamura was on her side of the car and he took her hand and pulled her out.
"I want the room next to yours," Michelle said. She knew she sounded childlike and demanding but didn't care.
She sat in a soft green club chair in the lobby while Nakamura made arrangements at the front desk.
Heather would be fine. She kept telling herself that. But Heather was still unconscious. This was not unusual in a case of electrocution, when it didn't result in death. A brain scan had shown unusual activity, though, whatever that meant. Thousands of volts of electricity had gone right through Heather's body, practically burning a hole through her. Heather had been seen by burn specialists, neurologists and internists. Specialists of every sort. All they could say for sure was that they didn't know how serious the damage she sustained was, at this point. The physicians had nodded sagely and pronounced Heather lucky to be alive.
Nakamura led Michelle to the lobby elevators and produced a key for a room on the twentieth floor. He opened the door and let her in. Wide windows facing south overlooked Waikiki Beach. Michelle walked over and gazed outside blindly, not really seeing the sparkling ocean and the beach, clean and almost devoid of tourists at this early hour. Diamond Head was to the left. It looked huge, like in the photographs, but Michelle had hiked to the top many times for the view and the mammoth appearing mountain really wasn't very tall or even very steep. She could see all two and one-half miles of Waikiki, from Diamond Head to the Ali Wai Yacht Harbor. Sail boats were already dotting the ocean and she wished she was on one of them. Anywhere her mind would be absent.
Nakamura had gone into the room next door, through an adjoining door. He left it open and she wandered over and looked inside. He was letting bellhops into the room with suitcases. She was confused, then realized he had moved his own room so he could be next to her.
As he was opening a suitcase she wandered into his room.
"I ordered breakfast and some coffee. You really ought to get some sleep," Nakamura said.
He was closing his suitcases and hanging up some things. She sat on the edge of his bed.
"I don't have anything to wear." Michelle looked down with distaste at the wilted sundress. She didn't want to sleep in it. It was filthy.
Nakamura reopened a suitcase, rummaged around and then handed her a large silk button down shirt with garish red parrots on a green jungle background. "Don't get too attached. It's one of my favorites."
Michelle almost smiled. She took the shirt into her room and closed the door. She took a fast shower and combed her hair. She really liked the silly shirt.
When she went back into Nakamura's room he was ladling scrambled eggs on two plates. He added bacon and toast. She watched him perform the duties. Pouring coffee and orange juice. He finally looked up.
"God dammit," Nakamura said angrily.
"What's wrong?"
"You'll have to keep the damned shirt. You look much better in it than I do. It was my favorite, too." He sounded upset.
Michelle caught herself smiling and stopped. "You're too smart for your own good. And you just lost your shirt."
"Knew it was a mistake, the moment I gave it to you," he muttered shaking his head, loud enough for her to hear, thinking he had lost much more than a shirt. "Hell. Lets eat."
He saw Michelle looking down at her plate with distaste as she sat down. "Maybe a little coffee."
"Try to eat. It'll turn your mind off. Make you sleepy."
Michelle sipped her coffee.
Nakamura was quickly eating his breakfast, not looking at her.
"Styrofoam," Michelle said, after a while, slowly chewing the scrambled eggs. "Cardboard." She took a sip of coffee and said, "Battery acid." She held up a piece of toast, bit off a huge corner. "Wood shingles."
"Watch out for splinters," Nakamura answered, nodding unhappily. She sounded so sad.
Michelle took a bite of bacon. "Crispy critters."
Then she was crying, large tears dropping out of her eyes. "I didn't mean that," she whispered. She got up and ran into her own room.
Nakamura sighed deeply. Heather had been placed in a burn ward where the macabre name for the patients, among the doctors and nurses, was 'Crispy Critters.' He walked to the adjoining door, waited for a minute and then knocked.
"Come in." She was sitting on the couch, legs folded under her, holding a Kleenex and dabbing her eyes. "I'm really sorry. You're being so nice. I have to apologize."
"No, you don't. But you do have to stop feeling responsible. You didn't do anything wrong. And I want to talk to you about that. Because I saw something last night I really don't understand."
"The way he pointed the sword," Michelle said, blinking tears out of her eyes.
"Exactly." Nakamura went across the room and sat down on the couch beside her.
Michelle turned sideways to face him. "Omar's supposed to be a warlock. The male equivalent of a witch. But they don't have real supernatural powers. And that's what it looked like to me. Suzanne called him a Necromancer."
"One who converses with the dead," Nakamura said.
Michelle nodded. "I had to look it up in a dictionary."
"Maybe he conjures up dead spirits or something. I have trouble believing in that sort of thing. There are all kinds of legends about sorcerers. But the way he used that sword gives me chills."
"I know."
"You really surprised me. Running toward the circle. You seemed angry at Omar." He paused for a moment. "Do you mind telling me why?"
"Pure stupidity."
"You had a reason," Nakamura persisted.
"I remembered something I must have repressed for years when I saw the big man, Samson Stoker, raping the girl in the circle."
"You have to put that out of your mind. It was... repulsive."
"No. I kept dreaming about it. I repressed it for too long."
Nakamura shook his head. "You've lost me."
"He was in the hotel room in Las Vegas."
"You mean Omar's the one who raped you? Or the giant?" Nakamura was staring at her, his eyes concerned.
"No. Not Omar. It was Samson Stoker. I knew it, finally, when I saw them together. The thing I didn't remember was that Omar was there too, in the room while it was happening."
"You're sure?"
"I know it sounds fantastic. It all clicked into place while I was watching them in the magic circle."
"But why harm Heather?"
"I don't know." She didn't want to tell him she thought it was to hurt her personally. It sounded paranoid and egocentric. But it's exactly what she thought.
"We have no proof, damn it," Nakamura said. "I can just imagine what the police would say if we told them Omar pointed a sword, causing a lightening bolt to come directly out of the sky and strike Heather. Or that he had his giant rape you in Las Vegas. Can't get them for performing their reli
gion, it's unconstitutional."
"Can get them for nakedness on the beach," Michelle said tartly. "There are laws against that. And public drunkenness. Public fornication."
"Too paltry. They'd just move their activities inside and keep on hurting people. I hate to say it, but there's a good possibility he killed the woman living in your building."
"Yes." Michelle nodded seriously. "Probably did. I have the awful feeling it was her organs that he gave me to feed Lucifer."
"Oh, no." Nakamura looked repelled.
"Where does he get them?"
Nakamura just shook his head and got up. He closed the drapes to dim room. Then he went into his room and came back with a glass of orange juice and a bottle of pills.
He handed Michelle the glass and poured two yellow pills into his hand. "Valium. Not very strong. You're too tired to sleep, too hyped."
He swallowed one pill with a gulp of orange juice and gave the glass and the other pill to her. She took it. She wasn't supposed to take sedatives. It was one of the rules when you were an alcoholic. One little guilt on top of a gigantic one seemed like nothing.
Nakamura stood up. "I'm going to bed for a few hours."
Michelle didn't move.
"You should too."
"I'm not sleepy yet." She turned to stare out the window.
He sat back down. "Want to talk?"
Michelle nodded. She didn't say anything for a long time. "There was always something so awful that I remembered in the corner of that hotel room in Las Vegas. The corner near the door, in the darkness. It was so frightening, I couldn't look. But I did in my dreams, and then I would wake up screaming or crying. I had repressed the fact that Omar was there."
"You're absolutely sure?"
"Yes. I remembered something else, too. He was hidden behind the door when the bellhop came in, after the rape. But when the bellhop left he came over and talked to me."
"You remember that?"
Michelle nodded.
"Can you tell me?"
She didn't say anything.
"If you can't, it's all right."
"You'll think I'm stupid. Or hysterical. This sudden, amazing recall."
"I've been reading your reports for years in Tokyo. I know you aren't stupid."
"Just a little hysterical."
Nakamura smiled and shook his head.
"Omar knelt beside me, leaning down and whispering in my ear. He said I wouldn't remember him. But that he would come back for me one day. He said I had been cleansed by the sword. Then there would be tests by fire and water, to make me ultimate Priestess. I think he hypnotized me. So I would forget. So I couldn't anticipate what was to happen later. And I really didn't remember Omar until last night. But it was like a strobe light flashing pictures tonight. I looked at him and Samson Stoker, both in the witch's circle, and I could see that hotel room. It was like I was suddenly transported there physically. I could feel his breath on my face as he leaned down. Then I looked again and saw them in the circle. Then it was the room in Las Vegas. It became so clear, suddenly, what had happened."
Michelle looked at Nakamura to see if he believed her. He was looking with intent, exhausted concentration in her face.
Michelle sighed and slipped into the corner of the couch. The drug was taking effect and she was rapidly becoming sleepy. Nakamura turned her around so that her back was leaning against him, his arm draped in front, around her neck and shoulders. It was okay. In fact she felt calmed and it was easier to recall when she felt protected, being held like this.
"I always believed the rapist would come back. I was so scared, I moved to Hawaii."
Nakamura was nodding, she could feel it against her hair. "Harming Heather was his way of making you more vulnerable," he said. "But I wonder what he meant when he said that after the sword there would be tests by fire and water."
"The sword almost killed me. I don't want to find out about tests with fire and water."
"Sounds like a threat."
"I think he does have strange powers," Michelle said sleepily. "Every time he touched me, I would get electrical shocks. Small lightening bolts down my arms."
She felt herself almost going to sleep. "I thought he was nice. I tried to let him seduce me. It was time. But I couldn't, in the end. Something stopped me...his eyes."
Nakamura could feel Michelle relax when she went to sleep as he sat there. He knew Michelle was afraid of men. It had been obvious from the very first day he met her. So she had thought it was time, finally, for a physical relationship and had picked the worse man possible. Omar. He held on a little tighter, feeling protective. It was nice.
He felt himself drifting and shook himself. He had almost fallen asleep. Here he was with a new employee. In a hotel room. Hugging her. He wondered if he could slip off the couch without waking her up and decided it would be impossible. She was a big girl and he didn't think he could carry her to the bed very easily. And she would definitely wake up if he did that. He looked down at the head resting on his shoulder. Her cheek was tan and soft and looked inviting. He felt a compulsion to kiss the skin.
The reason Nakamura hadn't become a doctor was because he was squeamish around blood. People just weren't pretty inside, but he had the feeling if he bit Michelle's cheek the taste would be sweet, fresh and addicting. Like chocolate. It was hard to believe there were veins and muscles under the skin. He thought she was probably beautiful inside, too.
He leaned back against the arm of the couch slowly, pulling her with him, and went to sleep.
CHAPTER 23
This is getting old, Vincent thought. His head was pounding with the ultimate headache of his life. The hospital's diagnosis was alcohol poisoning. And now he had lost all credibility with the police, since they had found him passed out on the beach. Just another tourist drunk. They would never believe that Omar had abducted his student, Suzanne, and made her a witch, or that he had been force-fed alcohol last night. He had no recourse by normal law enforcement channels left. He had to get Suzanne back without any help.
A nurse came into his hospital room. Vincent asked for pain medication, again. She gave him an obnoxiously superior smile and said he would have to wait until the alcohol was completely out of his system. It was too dangerous now. He'd heard it all before. He had begged for just one aspirin, but they weren't buying it.
He had seen the beautiful dark haired woman run into the witch's circle last night. He had seen the tiny women struck by lightening. He had been conscious, but unable to move. He remembered gagging as they poured what felt like liquid fire down his throat.
Vincent's horrible suspicion was that Omar was too powerful for him to threaten with mere exposure. He'd had time to read an entire week of newspapers in his hospital bed. He knew the atrocious rapes and killings were Omar's doing. Hell, he'd be lucky to get out of the islands alive himself with the knowledge he had. Getting Suzanne home would be a miracle.
Lying here wasn't going to do any good, Vincent thought. He might as well go back to his hotel and make plans there. At least he could take some aspirin.
Vincent felt dizzy when he pushed himself out of bed and staggered to the bathroom. He had dry heaves over the sink, losing only a little saliva from his painfully convulsing body. He didn't remember, but he'd had probably puked his guts out last night. There was nothing left. He showered and started feeling passably human. Then he drank about a quart of water from the pitcher on the bedside and really threw up violently.
A nurse caught him dressing and ordered him back to bed. Vincent just shook his head and requested the bill for his overnight stay. This wasn't a lock-up ward. They couldn't keep him.
He knew where Omar lived. He would go there.
Vincent thought he would probably be committing suicide.
* * *
Lucifer was sulking under the bed. Omar had to pull him out again. He gritted his teeth furiously, saying stupid stuff like, Nice kitty and Good kitty. Lucifer was only responding to the pampered
treatment that Michelle had introduced. Omar decided to make one last audacious effort to reanimate the beastly, ferocious qualities within the cat. It was a last resort. One he abhorred, but it was necessary.
Old legends revealed that witches were believed to have what was called a Witch's Mark. Their familiars, or animals that were really imps or devils, took blood nourishment directly from it. Omar had to give Lucifer his own blood to suck.
Lucifer loved blood, Omar thought, as he lay down, bare-chested on his bed, holding Lucifer up by the scruff of the neck. He took the dagger, squinted his eyes, and made a small incision in his chest, just below his own nipple. It made him woozy and the room whirled around for a second as he saw his own precious fluid well up and flow down his chest. He placed Lucifer's nose right in the blood so he would be forced to lick it off in his usual fastidious manner.
Omar cried out in pain as the cat eagerly lapped at his bloody chest. The rough tongue abraded his skin right where the dagger had plunged. It hurt. But it worked. Lucifer was biting him, trying to get more blood out of the tiny wound. Omar had to cut himself repeatedly with the dagger until Lucifer was finally satisfied.
Then he whispered instructions to his cat, sending him concepts of evil, corruption and devastation.
* * *
Michelle loved to go to sleep on the couch at home because it had a back she could snuggle against and feel protected when she nodded off. Now, as she was waking, she felt that same sense of security. She remembered about Heather and started to sit up, but an arm was holding her firmly in place. Her back was resting snugly against Nakamura. Somehow they both fit on the small couch, two pairs of legs overlapping the end. He had both arms around her, one under her neck, holding the top of her shoulder, the other reaching over her waist and around it.
It was unseemly lying here with her new boss, but she was mostly surprised that she felt no panic at all. He had saved Heather's life last night. He had saved her job. She felt affection and gratitude and pulled the arm closer around her. She wanted him here, holding her.