by Brad Parks
“Could it be Beppe Valentino, the physics professor?”
“Yes, that sounds right. The young woman told him he could leave and he did.”
So Beppe’s story checked out.
“What happened next?” Emmett said.
“Well, I asked the young lady for her name and ID so I could get her checked in. And she said she just needed to sit down for a little while. I asked her if she needed anything, maybe a cold pack for the bruise under her eye. And she said no thank you, she was just going to sit for a little while.”
“And you let her?”
“It wasn’t a question of let her. That’s what she was set on doing. She had obviously been crying. And she had that bruise. I thought maybe her boyfriend had hit her, or . . . well, I was just guessing, obviously. But a lot of times, with girls like that, you need to take it slow. You’ll be able to do a lot more good for them later if you don’t jump all over them at the start.”
“Right, of course.”
“I had some kids in back I needed to check on. I asked again if she needed anything and she said no. I told her I’d be right back and she said thank you. I was gone five minutes, maybe ten at most, but I really think it was more like five. And by the time I got back she was gone.”
Emmett sat up a little straighter. “Gone?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Did you . . . try to look for her, or—”
“No. We don’t treat people unless they want to be treated. I have enough to do without chasing after students. They’re too fast for me anyway.”
“I understand. I’m just trying to figure out whether she was alone when she left.”
“Couldn’t tell you. I was in back.”
“But would you have known if someone else came into Dick’s House while you were in back? Is there some kind of bell that rings when the door opens?”
He was thinking back to his visit to Dick’s House, when the woman in the patterned scrubs had appeared so quickly, like she had known someone had entered.
“Oh, well, yes. There’s a chime that sounds. And now that you ask, I did hear that chime. Twice, actually. I thought I would come back in and find two more patients. But instead the waiting room was empty. So I guess it’s possible she left with someone, yes.”
Right. The first chime would have been someone coming in. The second chime was Sheena leaving with that person.
But again he found himself asking: Voluntarily? Or by force?
“Do you have any security cameras in the waiting room?” he asked.
“Oh, goodness no. Would you want a camera staring you in the face when you went somewhere for a treatment that’s supposed to be confidential?”
“I understand. So you have no way of knowing who this young woman might have left with?”
“No, sir. Sorry.”
Emmett asked the woman whether she had any other recollections about Sheena, but nothing seemed germane. He thanked her, then ended the call.
He was now imagining what might have happened: Someone was watching over Wilder, knowing that Sheena had gone in there, waiting for her to come out. That someone followed Beppe’s car to Dick’s House, then saw Beppe walk out. The person moved in, got lucky to find Sheena alone in the waiting room, and removed her by force.
The more benign possibility was that Scott Sugden, assuming that’s who Sheena had been texting, had arrived and taken Sheena somewhere. Was Sheena not at Dick’s House because she was holed up with Scott?
It was understandable, given the ordeal of the past two days, that she’d want some time with her perhaps-boyfriend. But then why hadn’t she been answering her phone or texts? Had she simply fallen into a deep, exhausted sleep, like Emmett?
Time to find out. With effort, he swung his feet down to the floor and propelled himself toward the bathroom.
The address the DMV had on file for Scott Sugden was on West Street, just down the hill from the main Dartmouth campus, a short walk from the Tuck School.
Emmett pulled up to the curb in front of a ramshackle structure that looked like it could house seven or eight people, if they were young, single, and unpicky. It wasn’t quite quarter of seven. There was no sign of movement inside.
There was also no doorbell. Emmett opened a rickety wooden screen door that didn’t have a lot of Hanover winters left in it and knocked on another wooden door that wasn’t much further behind on its journey to ruination.
Unsurprisingly, nothing much happened in response.
A second barrage on the door finally brought forth an unshaven, unhappy twentysomething white guy in a T-shirt, boxer shorts, and socks.
“Yeah?” he said, opening the door, which hadn’t been locked.
“I’m with the state police. I’m looking for Scott Sugden. Have you seen him?”
“Umm, Scott? No. Not since yesterday morning.”
“Do you know where he is?”
“Beats me, man. We don’t exactly take attendance around here, you know?”
“Can I come in and have a look?”
The guy glanced over his shoulder, into the kitchen behind him.
“I’m not with narcotics,” Emmett added. “I don’t have time to make trouble over anyone leaving half a blunt on the table.”
“No, we don’t have anything like that,” the guy said. “It’s just a little messy.”
“I’m not worried,” Emmett assured him.
The guy led Emmett through the kitchen, where the only signs of intoxicating agents were a few empty cans of Milwaukee’s Best.
“Is Scott in trouble or something?” the guy asked.
“No. Nothing like that.”
They climbed the stairs to a hallway. The guy stopped at the second door on the right and tapped on it softly.
“Scott, you in there, man?”
There was no answer. He rapped his knuckles on the door a few more times.
“Scott,” he said.
He waited another five seconds, then turned to Emmett.
“Sorry, man. No one home.”
“Would you mind if I opened the door?” Emmett asked.
The guy’s left cheek dimpled, pulling his face into a look of contemplation.
Then he tapped the door again and said, “Scott, we’re coming in.”
He turned the knob. The door opened with a creak into a small room whose main feature was a queen-size bed, which was empty but for a tangle of sheets.
“Is it unusual that he wouldn’t sleep here?” Emmett asked.
“Couldn’t tell you. It’s pretty loose around here. People kind of come and go.”
“Do you know if he has a girlfriend?”
“Oh, I have no clue.”
“Have you ever seen him with a woman named Sheena Aiyagari?”
This seemed to spark recognition. “Uh, yeah, hot little Indian chick?”
Emmett wished he had a picture of Sheena so he could confirm it with a little more precision, but he supposed that description would have to do.
“Yes, that’s her.”
“Yeah, she hangs out here sometimes. But I don’t know if they’re dating or what.”
Again, it only mattered so much. Whether or not Sheena was cheating on her fiancé didn’t exempt her from being sexually harassed by an older professor.
“Do you mind?” Emmett asked, then stepped past the guy into the room.
There was a pile of clothes in one corner, but nothing else on the floor. The only furniture was a dresser and a bowl-shaped chair, both of which were serving as repositories for a disorganized collection of books.
Emmett walked to the closet. The space above and below the clothing was stuffed full—shoes, tennis rackets, golf clubs, boxes, bags, and so on. Nothing struck Emmett as being out of the ordinary for a Dartmouth grad student living in tight quarters.
He was in the midst of closing the closet door when, at the last moment, one word on one of the boxes jumped out and caught his attention.
A word he wasn’t expecting to
see in some country-club kid’s closet.
WINCHESTER.
As in the firearms company.
Emmett reopened the door. Sure enough, in the upper-left-hand corner, sitting atop a milk carton filled with toiletry items, there was a box of nine-millimeter ammunition.
He blinked once, twice, puzzling over it. How many MBA students owned firearms?
“Is Scott ex-military?” Emmett asked.
“Scott? No. He’s, like, ex-Yale.”
“Do you know if he likes to target shoot?”
“Uhh . . . maybe? I don’t know. I go to Thayer”—the engineering school—“so it’s not like we hang out a ton, you know?”
Emmett brought down the box, which had a Walmart receipt stuffed in it. He studied the slip until he reached the time stamp. The bullets had been bought at 8:43 p.m. the previous evening.
This wasn’t for target shooting. This was a guy trying to protect his terrified friend/girlfriend. She had texted him, he came to her rescue at Dick’s House, and then one of them got the idea that they should get bullets for Scott’s gun.
Emmett opened the box, which held fifty rounds, of which roughly a third were now missing.
He was now imagining this young man, loading a magazine, stuffing a few extras in his pockets, and saving the receipt, because he planned to put the unused ammo back in the box and return it when she—and this entire situation—calmed down.
But if that was the case, where were they now? Holed up at a hotel? With Sheena having either turned off her phone or unable to charge it for some reason?
Emmett put the box back, then turned to the guy.
“Do you have a number for Scott?” Emmett asked.
“You sure he’s not in trouble?” the guy asked, having seen the box of ammo.
“He may be in trouble,” Emmett said. “But not with me. I’m really just looking for Sheena, and I think she might be with him.”
“Okay, hang on, I got a number for him in my phone.”
The guy thumped down the stairs, to a room in the back of the first floor. Emmett followed and was soon plugging the number into his phone, thanking the guy for his help, and walking back outside.
There, he called Scott Sugden’s number.
It didn’t even ring once.
Just went straight to voice mail.
CHAPTER 56
My eyelids opened four minutes before my bed was set to start shaking.
Ordinarily, it was an act of will not to give in to the temptation of hitting the snooze button a few times.
I had no such issues now. That I slept at all was some combination of a miracle and a testament to the power of exhaustion. Already, the anxiety was coursing through me.
Sitting up, I turned on the light and studied the small cut on my forearm. I hadn’t bandaged it, reasoning—with absolutely no scientific basis whatsoever—that this might allow any of the virus still living on my skin better access to my bloodstream.
I held still for a moment, trying to get in tune with whatever quantum forces might now be at work in my brain.
Had anything happened overnight? Would I recognize if it had?
How do you know? I remembered Detective Webster asking Sheena.
How do you know you’re standing here? she had replied.
Was the feeling really that stark? I wished I could ask Sheena what, precisely, she had experienced. Was it a delicate fluttering in the brain or more like a headache? Would it develop slowly or come on suddenly?
I still wondered if I needed to have a full fit first. Wasn’t it possible the virus was already having some effect? Once a virus got into your body, it began replicating immediately. Even if it needed time to reach critical mass, it was still in there.
That’s what made the flu so pernicious. It was how one first grader could wipe out half his class, even though his parents kept him home: He had been spreading the germ before he was aware he had symptoms. By the time he sprouted a fever, the damage was already done.
I got to my feet, slipped in my hearing aids, walked into the bathroom, and began going through the motions of brushing my teeth when . . .
Yes. There was something there. I was sure of it. I pivoted out back into the hallway, back toward the bedroom and . . .
Again, there it was. I felt . . . something.
And didn’t that make sense? Up until two nights ago, Matt spent at least eight hours a day in that bedroom. There had to be some trace of the virus left behind, which the virus in me was now reacting to. I hadn’t felt it when I was just lying in bed, but once I separated from it just a little, I could feel the difference when I neared it again.
If I could detect something that slight, was it possible I could now locate Matt?
Maybe I just needed to give myself the chance.
And, really, no time like now.
I heard Aimee stirring. Morgan was still asleep, so I tiptoed over to my sister’s room and softly tapped the door.
She opened it.
“Hey, I think I need to go out for a little bit,” I said.
“Like you went out last night?” Aimee asked, raising an eyebrow.
“Something like that. You okay getting Morgan off to school? The bus comes at—”
“Just go,” Aimee said.
I didn’t wait for another word. I dressed hurriedly and was soon back in the CRV, even though I didn’t know where to point it.
The morning was still, cloudy, like it might snow again. I relaxed, trying to get back in touch with the feeling of being entangled—on an atomic level—with Matt, the man I was entangled with in so many other ways already.
I thought about him, about our lives together. A memory came back. It was from just before our wedding, when we were taking a ballroom dance class so we wouldn’t make complete fools of ourselves during our first dance.
With my tendency toward overanalysis, I had never been much of a dancer. Matt danced like a mathematical genius, which is to say poorly.
The teacher, a self-assured older woman with an air of wisdom about her, noticed us struggling. She sidled over to me and said, “Don’t worry about the steps so much. Just think about how much that man right there adores you.”
Then she closed in and whispered, “You’re a lucky girl. There’s not a woman in this room whose partner looks at her the way he looks at you.”
And the woman was right. When the big moment came, I just focused on Matt, his loving gaze. Everyone later commented how radiant I looked during that dance.
All I did was reflect him.
That was the kind of entanglement I had experienced before. Now it was time to concentrate on this new kind.
As much by reflex as anything, I started driving toward downtown Hanover. Something about it felt right.
Until it didn’t. As I neared the Dartmouth Green, there was a faint voice in my head—almost like the whisperings of that dance teacher—that told me I was no longer going the right direction.
Was this how the power evinced itself? Was it really just an instinct that you learned to pay attention to, a quiet conviction you allowed to take over?
I turned left on South Main Street, pointing myself away from downtown. I followed it down the hill as it became Route 10, not knowing why I was going that direction until suddenly . . .
Yes. Sachem Village. Where Sheena lived.
Without thinking too much, I made the turn and was soon parking in front of Sheena’s place. This must have been the virus in her that I was feeling. Had she returned to her apartment overnight?
I got out of the car and rang the doorbell.
There was no response.
My eyes fell on the numeric keypad, whose code I had watched Sheena enter the previous day.
Having that knowledge and using it were, of course, two different things.
I paused, wrestling with the conundrum.
But not for long.
It was like the quantum forces were driving me. I typed 4-3-2-1 into the pad, then turned t
he handle and shuffled inside. I didn’t fully shut the door behind me, just left it slightly ajar, as if this made my actions something short of breaking and entering.
Sheena’s apartment was exactly as it had been the day before: tidy and neat, as if she was expecting company any moment. The walls were decorated with Rothko prints, whose lines and shapes must have appealed to the scientist in Sheena.
Behind the couch was an island with barstools that served as a transition into the kitchen area. I walked over to it. The only object on the island was a device I did not own but instantly recognized from its ubiquitous advertising: a Facebook Portal.
These things were essentially on all the time, weren’t they? Always listening. Always following you. Creepy.
I studied the screen, then curious, pressed the power button.
The device informed me there had been a missed call. Bhabhu at 9:34 p.m.
And at 9:31. And 9:23. And 9:17. And 9:15. And 9:08. And 9:05. And 9:03. And 8:59.
The same thing happened the night before: missed calls, starting at 9:00 p.m. and lasting for the next half hour.
Then I checked the received calls and understood why. Bhabhu called every night—like, every night—around 9:00 p.m.
The calls typically lasted anywhere from fifteen to thirty minutes. One or two went longer. None were shorter.
They were all from Bhabhu. And only Bhabhu.
Suddenly, something Lauryn Ward had said was coming back. About how she tidied up the kitchen each night after putting her daughter to bed at 8:45 p.m., at which point she’d see Sheena’s headlights swinging in.
She’s usually home by nine o’clock at the latest, every night, without fail.
Obviously, Sheena was rushing back each night to video chat with Bhabhu.
I felt like I could already guess who Bhabhu was. But just to confirm, I googled the word and was soon looking at a Rajasthani phrase book.
Bhabhu was a colloquial word for “mother.”
Who Sheena apparently talked to every night at nine o’clock.
Which wasn’t that unusual in an Indian family. There was a large Indian community in the New Jersey library system I’d served, so it had been explained to me many times: according to cultural custom, the parents are considered to be responsible for their children—their daughters, especially—until marriage.