You’re not a hypochondriac if it’s justified. Said every hypochondriac ever.
He was just being cautious of his health. Anyway, he was fine. He was making something out of nothing.
“Je...mappale Sheppard. Mapelle?” He stepped back and smiled at himself. He only remembered one phrase from school. “Je voudrais un torchon s’il vous plait.” Meant “I would like a towel please.” Wouldn’t get him very far. Merde.
He went over to the window and drew the curtains open. The city looked back at him. He loved just watching the skyline, no matter where he was. There was something about staring out at a city, high up, making you think you’re the king of the world. Seeing all the streets and the roads and the alleys and the highways all working together, becoming one organism. He had never been here before, to this city. But it was the same feeling. The Eiffel Tower was lit up, a beacon around which everything else emanated. He had been up there yesterday, lamenting the way he had decided to be a tourist. He was meant to go to the Louvre tomorrow with Douglas (his agent, who was staying somewhere “a little more appropriate to an agent’s salary”), but now he was thinking he might have other plans.
After a late morning, and morning sex, he would probably just rest. Maybe get in a swim. Spend the day in the bar. Maybe she could do it with him.
This was the first real holiday he had had in years. Resident Detective had made him a household name, but at a cost—the intense filming schedule was crazy. When your series was on every weekday, you had to pump out ridiculous amounts of content, ridiculous amounts of lives he meddled in: affairs, stolen money, illegitimate children, misguided domestic lawsuits, more affairs—he had seen them all in the Real Life segment of the show. That was his favorite bit. That was the bit where he could really have some fun.
When you filmed five episodes a day, it was hard to remember specific cases. They all seemed to blend into one. And of course, he couldn’t remember names. One time, he caught a Resident Detective episode and watched himself on screen as if he were someone else. He couldn’t remember doing any of it. Part of it was because he didn’t care. Part of it was because he was “overworked.” Overworked and high all the time, he supposed.
Douglas had suggested the holiday. A chance to recharge the batteries. Come back a bigger and better Morgan Sheppard. Sheppard hadn’t been so convinced but one day, backstage, he had heard Douglas and the programming controller of the station having an argument. The PC said Sheppard was burnt-out—heavily implying it was because of the substance abuse. The plan was for Sheppard to take fourteen days, slow down a bit and come back “refreshed.”
Sheppard didn’t tell Douglas he’d overheard the conversation. He just agreed—and after that, he set about convincing himself. Maybe this was a good idea and maybe he had been hitting it a little hard lately. Douglas was overjoyed—so overjoyed he came too (which was probably why he was so into the idea all along).
So he’d come to Paris five days ago. And so far he felt great. Even more so now he had met this crazy hot woman. Who seems to be taking some time?
He turned from the window and flopped down on the bed. Scrabbling around so he was finally lying down properly, his head between the two pillows. It was comfortable. He closed his eyes. He didn’t realize how tired he was.
What time was it? He hadn’t worn his watch either. He was on holiday—what would be the point? Now was for relaxing. But he didn’t want to be asleep when she came back. He would probably ruin it if he was. And she was so hot. And it had been unreasonably long since the last time. But he was so tired. And his eyes remained shut. And there was a soothing sound. Almost a hissing. He hadn’t heard it before, but maybe it had always been there. And the more he listened, the faster he seemed to fall.
His thoughts fell away. And he was gone.
7
How could this be real? How could this be possible? How could he be in Paris one moment and London the next? The woman. Had the woman done this to him? He hadn’t just moved rooms, he had moved countries. How could you move countries without knowing it? He wouldn’t call it impossible but not entirely possible either. It was in the gray area in between.
How long had it been? How long could he have been out? The red room. And here. How long between those two points? It could’ve been no time at all, could’ve been an eternity. But—no. He had his own personal way of knowing.
His last drink had been in the red room with the woman. Red room. Wine and bourbon. The stuff he had tasted in his teeth. And now, his throat and brain were dry. But there wasn’t that gnawing feeling. That little scrambling on the edges of his brain matter, like something fizzing, whenever he didn’t take his pills. So, all dried up but dosed enough. If he had to guess—six hours at the least but no more than twelve. That coupled with the fact that it was day—morning. Ten hours was a reasonable estimate. Ten hours all gone.
He looked away from London. Just in time to see Alan grunt in disapproval. He was walking over to the window. “I’m supposed to be across the river for Christ’s sake.”
“Oh shut up,” Ryan said. Alan looked taken aback and stepped away, crossing his arms and frowning at no one in particular. Ryan was looking out the window, his eyes darting around the scene outside. “We’re near Leicester Square. Facing south.” He looked to everyone else, as if for approval. Sheppard just looked at him in amazement for figuring it out so quickly. Ryan looked back at the window. “We’re in Bank,” he said again, like he was confirming it.
“Try to open the window,” Sheppard said, stretching his arms, although Ryan was already reaching for the latch.
It was a sliding window, one that looked like it would only open an inch due to how high up they were. Ryan unlatched the window and pushed. Nothing. He made a confused grunt and then tried again, putting his full weight on the handle. Nothing. Ryan continued to try, until his hand slipped from the handle and he fell to the floor. Alan just watched him get back up, not bothering to try to help. Ryan righted himself and tried one last time.
“It’s locked,” he said. “Won’t even open an inch.”
“Then let’s try this,” Alan said, and before anyone could stop him, he picked up the chair which Headphones had pushed out from under the desk. Alan brandished the chair and thrust it full force into the window. The chair, and Alan behind it, bounced off the window like it was the wall of a bouncy castle. He was thrown to the floor and the chair flew into the center of the room. Mandy, who was looking through one of the drawers of the desk, narrowly dodged it.
Ryan held his hand out to Alan. “You couldn’t break these windows. They’re thick and antishatter.” Specific. Alan’s eyes narrowed, as Sheppard’s did. That was very specific.
“And even so, where would you go?” Mandy said, looking up from the drawers.
Alan chose not to accept Ryan’s hand, reaching out for the desk to help him up. “Well, I apologize for trying. You all seem to have made yourselves at home here. Ms. Looney Bin might actually be the only sane one amongst you.” He looked around, catching sight of Headphones. “What’s your story?”
Headphones just looked at him, her eyes wide. Alan peered at her sticker.
“Rhona, what are you up to, Rhona? Just listening to some tunes, waiting for the world to end. You teenagers are all bloody imbeciles.”
“Lay off,” Sheppard said, rattling the cuffs. A new pain and a glance upward confirmed what he thought—his wrists were red raw, the cuffs digging into his flesh.
“Oh, don’t you start.” Alan rounded on him. “You’re a walking, talking embarrassment. I read the papers. I know all about your addictions. But this is the worst addiction of all, isn’t it—the lust for attention. Well, congratulations, you’ve got everyone looking at you. And now you’ve got us all stuck here with you.”
“For the last time, I don’t know why we’re here.”
“Bollocks. You television types always know when some idio
cy is going on. Is this about the MacArthur case? You want me out of the way or something?”
“This isn’t about your stupid case,” Mandy said, still rifling through drawers.
Alan laughed, looking from Sheppard to Mandy and back. “Stupid. That’s the word we’re going with, is it? Stupid? Do any of you watch the news?”
“Let’s not lose our heads,” Ryan said, “we’re all in this together.” He put a hand on Alan’s shoulder—an act that wasn’t entirely favored.
Alan shrugged him off. “Yes, but some of us are more in it than others.” He nodded to Sheppard. “Why are you handcuffed, and no one else is?”
The same question he’d asked himself—Alan was just a bit behind him.
Sheppard gritted his teeth—shut his eyes and took a breath. “I don’t know.” Losing his temper wasn’t going to help anything.
Mandy had finished searching the drawers but hadn’t found a key. Now, she was just standing there, growing paler and paler. She had something in her hands. She put it down on the bed, and Sheppard saw the words glistening in the light. The Holy Bible. A hotel room’s only constant. “I need to...wash my face.” It looked like she was going to faint. She stumbled out of view, and Sheppard heard a new door open. The bathroom. How had no one thought to check the bathroom?
As Sheppard looked toward the alcove, he saw the woman with the black hair emerge from it. On her chest—HELLO MY NAME IS... Constance. Sheppard watched her, wondering what she was thinking about.
“What I’m saying is this man may be dangerous. Maybe he’s handcuffed for a reason,” Alan was saying. “And I sure as hell know I need to be across London.”
Sheppard kept watching Constance. Her silence unnerved him. Her large, almost cartoonish eyes, accentuated by her panda mascara, fell to the bed and she snatched the Bible up, clutching it to her chest.
“Religious terms must not be taken in vain,” Constance said, in a low guttural tone, which probably escaped everyone else’s hearing.
The situation was slipping from bad to dire in front of Sheppard’s eyes—and he couldn’t even move.
“Let’s all just keep calm,” Ryan said.
“No, let’s not. Let’s not keep calm. This is not about keeping calm,” Alan said.
“Hell. Hell. Hell. Hell. Hell,” Constance said. Headphones, mouth screwed up, looked at each in turn. And then—a scream. A high-pitched desolate scream.
One that seemed to bounce around the room, piercing everyone in the heart.
Sheppard glanced at Constance. But he already knew it wasn’t her.
It was Mandy. In the bathroom. And, just like that, things got worse.
8
The scream seemed to go on forever, but at some point it was over and then there was silence. And somehow the silence seemed much worse. No one moved—Alan and Ryan frozen in their conversation, Headphones peeking round the desk and Constance looking toward the bathroom.
Sheppard’s first reaction was to jolt forward at the sound. The handcuffs ground into his wrists and he yelped in pain. His flight response was overwhelming. He was not a man who wore panic and fear well. Even the moments when he woke up in a cold sweat, his heart beating three times too fast, and thinking that maybe he had finally overdone it, he always secretly knew he would pull through. But here, in this room, he was scared—genuinely scared.
There was a crashing sound as Mandy reentered his field of vision, backing away from the alcove and bumping into Constance.
Constance pushed her away selfishly, like she was diseased.
Mandy looked to Sheppard. Her eyes were glassy reflections of themselves as tears streamed down her face.
She was a pale white color and her skin was slick with sweat.
“What? What is it?” Sheppard said.
Ryan saw it before anyone else, and rushed to Mandy just as she was about to collapse. He caught her just in time.
“There’s... In the bath...” Her voice was small.
“What?” Sheppard said, leaning forward as far as he could.
“A man. I think...a dead man.”
Sheppard felt the bed drop out from under him—free-falling through nothingness. But, of course, he wasn’t.
A snort of derision. Not exactly the response he expected, but Alan seemed to be chuckling to himself. “A dead man. A body in the bathtub. We’ve all been through a lot. We’re all jumpy—we need to keep our cool here. The mind is a fragile thing.” He went over to Mandy and tapped her on the arm—a curt attempt at comforting her. Through tears, Mandy looked at him. “There is. A man. A man in a brown suit.”
“Well, if there is a man, who’s to say he’s not sleeping like we all were.”
Mandy gritted her teeth. “You’re more than welcome to take a look.”
Alan frowned. He straightened one of his cufflinks absentmindedly and cleared his throat. “Very well then.” Sheppard watched Mandy as Alan disappeared around the corner. The girl was silently weeping and turned around to bury her face in Ryan’s shoulder. Sheppard believed her completely. “Alan, don’t go in there.”
But it was too late. He heard the bathroom door open.
Sheppard’s eyes drifted as he tried to focus his hearing on what was happening in the bathroom. He couldn’t move more than two inches, and now the situation had changed. He found himself looking at the TV and had to look for a few seconds before he realized what was different. It was on—the TV was on. The last time he had looked at it, it had been blank. But sometime between then and now, it had started showing a gold mantra in the center of the screen.
We hope you enjoy your stay! in a loopy, almost illegible, scrawl.
And there was something else in the corner. A little blue bar with white numbers, like something you would see when you connected a very old VCR. Sheppard had to screw up his eyes to see it. “YOUR PAY-PER-VIEW STARTS IN: 00:00:57.” Counting down—less than a minute. How did the TV turn on? And what was the pay-per-view?
Sheppard opened his mouth to tell someone—anyone. But at that moment, the bathroom door opened and Alan reappeared. His face mirrored Mandy’s almost perfectly. He took off his glasses and wiped them with a cloth he took out of his upper pocket.
“It appears the situation is slightly graver than I first thought.”
Ryan detached himself from Mandy and started forward.
Alan put up a hand. “Save yourself some sleepless nights, son.”
Ryan took a beat, and nodded.
“He’s facedown, so I couldn’t tell much, but there’s blood—a lot of blood. Around the torso,” Alan said, plainly. Sheppard wondered if that was the tone of voice he used in court. “No one else goes in there. Believe me, you don’t want any part in this.”
Sheppard didn’t know what to say, so a question slipped out. “Did you recognize him?”
Alan’s eyes snapped to him. “Now that’s an interesting question to ask.”
“There has to be a reason we’re all here. I just...”
“What are you hiding, Mr. Sheppard? I’m supposing you know all of this already. I’m supposing this is all some kind of sick game and I’m supposing we’ve all been roped into it against our will. Anything to say for yourself?”
Sheppard stared at him, walking the line between anger and fear. And he only half noticed the fact that the TV screen had changed.
And a new voice cut in. Slightly muffled. Coming through the TV speakers. “No. Yes and yes.” Every face in the room turned toward the TV. A profile on the TV screen, but Sheppard’s brain had to catch up to puzzle out who. It was a man, but his face was concealed behind a garish and colorful cartoon horse mask—like something you would see on Halloween. The eye holes were cut out, so this cartoon had big green human eyes. It was unsettling—gross, and Sheppard felt a shiver of disgust and fear.
The man on the TV laughed. “Glad to
see we’re all getting along.”
9
“Hello, everyone,” the horse man said. His voice was slick and smooth and the bad speakers on the TV gave it a detached, otherworldly cadence. “Hello, Morgan.”
Someone yelped. Constance—Sheppard thought it was Constance, although he couldn’t really tell. His full attention was on the horse mask. He didn’t know why, but he just knew. They were all in serious trouble, and he couldn’t shake the feeling that he was worst of all.
“What is this?” Alan said, stepping forward to the TV. “Who are you?”
Was this a conversation? Or a recording?
The horse mask reacted. A conversation then. “You don’t know me, not yet at least. But I know you. I know all of you. Especially you, Morgan Sheppard. I have been following your work very closely. It’s hard not to.”
Eyes on him, like always. Was this a fan—a deranged, obsessed fan? Sheppard had had his fair share of oddball supporters over the years, and he had heard horror stories about others.
“What’s happening?” Sheppard heard himself say. “What do you want?” Something was very wrong here—more than it had ever been in his life.
The mask heard him. That meant there was a microphone. Maybe a camera. Somewhere—most likely watching since they woke up.
“How the mighty have fallen,” the horse mask said. Enjoying this—the sick bastard was enjoying this. “Cuffed to a bed, with your mind racing to every eventuality—every possible way you could get out of this. With your instincts, I’m surprised you haven’t bitten off your own hands and gone barreling through the front door by now.”
Sheppard faltered. He hadn’t exactly done that, but he had ripped at his wrists. “What did you do to us?”
The horse mask ignored him. “Do you ever look at yourself, Morgan Sheppard? Do you ever look in the mirror and see the drug-addled insipid attention whore you’ve become? A life governed by television contracts and YouTube comments. Stepping all over other people.”
Guess Who Page 3