Shadow Man

by Cody McFadyen

  These words seem to have an almost magical effect on Callie. I watch as color flows back into her skin, life back into her eyes. She sits up straighter. “Thanks for saying that.” She pauses. Her eyes go back down to her lap. “I am sorry.” God, she sounds woebegone. I just want to hug her.

  Marilyn’s eyes twinkle. Her voice chides. “Stop beating yourself up. Kind of makes sense, though.”

  Callie frowns. “How’s that?”

  “Well, look at me. Did you notice the baby? And the Ms., not Mrs., Gale?”

  Callie’s eyebrows lift. “You mean…”

  Marilyn nods. “Yep. I had my own Billy Hamilton.” Another shrug. “But that’s okay. He’s gone, and I have Steven. It’s more than a fair trade. My parents are supporting us and are going to make sure I get back and finish college.” She smiles. “I like my life. It’s turned out fine.” She leans forward, making sure Callie is looking at her. “You need to know that what you did, it didn’t ruin me, okay?”

  Callie sighs. Taps her fingers. Looks around the room, sips her water. Thinks about this. “Well, hell.” She smiles. “It feels strange to be let off the hook so easily.” She hesitates and reaches into her purse. “Want to see something?” she asks Marilyn. She pulls out the baby photo I had seen and hands it over.

  Marilyn examines it. “That’s me?”

  “The day you were born.”

  “Wow, I sure was ugly.” She looks up from the photo at Callie. “You’ve carried this around with you since then?”

  “Always.”

  Marilyn hands the photo back to Callie. Her eyes are gentle. What she says next is Callie, all the way.

  “Gee, this is a real Lifetime made-for-TV moment, huh?”

  Shocked silence, then we all burst into laughter.

  It’s going to be okay.

  28

  WE ARE UPSTAIRS, on Marilyn’s computer, looking at the Red Rose site.

  “I wish that was me,” she says. “But trust me, it isn’t.” She smiles at Callie. “My boobs aren’t that big. And I have stretch marks on my tummy.”

  “Simple cut and paste,” Callie says. “Your face on the body of Ms. Topless.” She runs a hand through her hair. “He did it just to mess with me. He even registered the domain to you. That’s how we got this address—he led me here.”

  Marilyn turns away from the computer. “Am I in danger? Are we—Steven and I—in danger?”

  Callie doesn’t reply right away. Weighing her words. “It’s possible. I can’t be sure. You don’t fit his profile, but…”

  “Serial killers are unpredictable.”

  “Yes.”

  Marilyn nods, thinking. I am surprised that she is not more fearful. “This is almost enough to make me rethink my major.”

  Callie frowns. “What’s your major?”

  “Criminology.”

  Callie’s mouth falls open. So does mine. “You’re kidding.”

  “Nope. Weird, huh?” A lopsided grin. “Coincidence?” she says, sotto voce. “I think not!”

  A smile ghosts across Callie’s face. “Strange days, indeed.”

  “Most peculiar, Momma,” Marilyn quips back, not missing the opening or the reference to the John Lennon song. They both laugh.

  “I don’t want to take any chances,” Callie says, serious again. “I’m going to arrange for police protection until this is over.”

  Marilyn nods, accepting this. She’s a mother; she’s not going to turn the offer down. “You think it’s going to be over at some point?”

  Callie gives her a grim smile. It’s filled with all kinds of promises for Jack Jr. “We’re good, Marilyn.” Callie points at me. “And she’s the best. Bar none.”

  Marilyn looks me over. Examines my scars. “Is that true, Agent Barrett?”

  “We’ll get him,” I say. I decide to leave it at that. Confident, without my own self-doubts. “We usually do. These guys almost always screw up. He will, and that will lead us to him.”

  Marilyn looks back and forth between us. Seems to accept this. “What now?” she asks.

  “Now,” I say, “Agent Thorne is going to call the local police and set up a twenty-four-hour watch on your home. I’m going to call the team and let them know what’s happening. They’re probably all jumping out of their skins.”

  We make our calls. Alan’s relief sounds visceral. Callie meets no resistance from the locals.

  “They’re on their way,” she says.

  I don’t want to say it, but I have to. “We need to do the same once they arrive. We have to get back.”

  She hesitates, then nods. “I know.” She turns to Marilyn, biting her lower lip. “Marilyn…can I…” She laughs, shaking her head. “This is all so surreal and bizarre, honey-love. But…can we get together again?”

  Marilyn’s smile is immediate. “Of course we can. On one condition.”

  “What’s that?” Callie asks.

  “You tell me your name. I can’t call you ‘Agent Thorne’ forever.”

  We are sitting in the car. Callie hasn’t started it yet. She is gazing at her daughter’s house. I can’t decipher her expression or guess at her thoughts.

  So I ask the obvious question. “How are you?”

  She continues to look off before turning to me. Her face is tired, but thoughtful.

  “I’m…fine, honey-love. I’m not just saying it to reassure you. That went better than I had ever imagined. Or hoped. But it makes me wonder.”

  “About?”

  “What they thought I was going to lose. They said they were going to make us each lose something. But I came out ahead. Do you think that’s how they meant for it to go?”

  I think about this. “No,” I say. “I don’t. I think they were convinced that she wouldn’t accept you. I also think they were convinced that it would knock you off your game fatally.”

  She purses her lips. “I don’t know about that. I agree with the first. But I don’t think they were hoping I was going to be useless as a result of this. I think they were hoping just the opposite, in fact. I’m getting a feel for this one, honey-love. They don’t want to be caught. But they do want to be hunted. And they want us at our best.” She looks at me, a fierce look. “And do you know what? It worked. I won’t quit now until we get them. That was the whole point of this for them, you understand? To let me know that she’ll never be safe until we catch them.”

  Her words feel right to me. Callie has insight, gets the same little epiphanies that I do. It’s part of what makes her good. I say the only thing that it makes sense to say.

  “Then let’s catch them.”

  29

  IT TAKES FOREVER to get back. It was early afternoon by the time we left, and rush hour starts early in southern California. When we arrive in the office, everyone stands up, faces filled with expectancy.

  “Don’t ask, honey-loves,” she says, putting up a hand. “Nothing to say right now.” Her cell phone rings and she turns away to answer it.

  That Callie curtain has been closed again. I’m relieved, and I can tell the others are as well. It means that she’s going to be fine. Everyone would be there for her in an instant, but seeing Callie vulnerable is unsettling. I wonder if this is part of the reason that she closed herself off again. Not so much for herself as for us.

  Alan fills the silence. “I’m going through the case file on Annie again,” Alan says. “Something’s bothering me. Not sure what yet.”

  I nod, but I’m distracted. Or perhaps just tired. I look at my watch, and I’m shocked to see that it’s near the end of the day.

  Not that the limits of our schedule are anything but theoretical. The stakes are too high, doing what we do. I always thought this must be what it’s like to be in combat. When the bullets are flying, you shoot back, whatever time it is. And if you have an opportunity to advance on the enemy, you take it, whether it’s four in the morning or four in the afternoon. The other parallel is that you take advantage of times of silence, the opportunities to rest,
because you don’t know when they’ll come again.

  This seems to be one of those times, so I make the decision any good general should.

  “I want everyone to head home,” I say. “Things may start getting crazy tomorrow. Crazier, I should say. Rest up.”

  James comes up to me. “I won’t be in till lunch,” he says, quiet. “Tomorrow’s that day for me.”

  It takes me a moment to place what he’s talking about. “Oh!” I grimace. “I’m sorry, James. I’d forgotten. Please give my best to your mom.”

  He turns and leaves without reply.

  “I’d forgotten as well, honey-love,” Callie murmurs. “Probably because it gives Damien a human side.”

  “Forgot what?” Leo asks.

  “Tomorrow is the anniversary of the death of James’s sister,” I say. “She was murdered. They go to her grave every year to pay their respects.”

  “Oh.” His face twists into a sour grimace. “Fuck, man!”

  It comes out with a passionate vehemence that startles me.

  He waves it off. “Sorry. I just…this shit is getting to me.”

  “Welcome to the club, honey-love.” Callie’s voice is not unkind.

  “Yeah. I guess.” He takes in a deep breath, lets it out. Runs a hand through his hair. “I’ll see you guys tomorrow.”

  He leaves with a last, halfhearted wave. Callie looks after him, thoughtful. “First case is always hard. And this one is especially bad.”

  “Yeah. He’ll be okay, though.”

  “I think so too, honey-love. I wasn’t sure of him at the beginning of this, but little Leo is coming along.” She turns to me. “So, what are you going to be doing tonight?”

  “She’s coming over for dinner, that’s what,” Alan rumbles. He looks at me. “Elaina insists.”

  “I don’t know…”

  “You should go, Smoky. It would do you good,” Callie says. She gives me a meaningful look. “And it might be good for Bonnie as well.” She walks over to her desk, grabs her purse. “Besides, that’s what I’m going to be doing.”

  “You’re eating dinner at Alan’s?”

  “No, silly. That was my daughter on the phone.” She pauses. “That sounds strange, doesn’t it? Anyhoo…I’ll be eating over there tonight with her and my—shudder at the thought—grandson.”

  “That’s great, Callie!” I grin at her. “Or should I say—Granny?”

  “Not if you want to remain a friend, honey-love,” she says, airy. She heads to the door of the office, stops and looks back at me. “Go to dinner. Do something normal, with other people.”

  “Well?” Alan asks. “You gonna come over or get me in trouble with Elaina?”

  “Oh for God’s sake. Fine.”

  He grins at me. “Cool. I’ll meet you over there.”

  And he and Callie are gone, and I am alone in our offices. I do plan to follow Callie’s advice. The kicker for me had been the comment about Bonnie. It would be good for her. Certainly better than going straight home to my—what had he called it?—ghost ship of a home.

  But I want to sit here for a moment. Things have been moving at such a breakneck speed, physically, mentally, spiritually. I am both energized and exhausted. I sum up the past days to myself. I have gone from suicidal to wanting to live. I have lost my best friend in the world. I have reacquainted myself with an even older friend, my gun. I have acquired a mute daughter, who might never recover. I have remembered killing my own daughter. I have found out that Callie has not just a daughter, but a grandson. I’ve discovered that a woman I love, Elaina, has cancer and might or might not be fine. I have become more familiar with the business of pornography than I ever wanted to be.

  Yes, the bullets have, indeed, been flying.

  Right now, though, the chatter of gunfire is absent, and silence rules. Time to use that silence, like a good soldier. I get up and leave the office myself, locking the door behind me, heading down the elevator.

  On the way down, I realize that my silence is different from the silence of the average, everyday person. It’s an opportunity to rest, true. But it’s a silence filled with tension and waiting. Because you never know when the gunfire will start up again.

  Are Jack Jr. and friend doing the same thing right now? Resting up before their next murder?

  When Alan answers the door, I go on alert. He looks upset, enraged, fighting tears and the desire to murder at the same time.

  “That motherfucker,” he hisses.

  “What?!?” I ask, alarmed, brushing into the house past him. “Is Elaina all right? Bonnie?”

  “No one’s hurt, but that fucker…” He stands there for a moment, clenching his fists. If he was not my friend, I’d be terrified. He rushes over to an end table, picks up a legal-size manila envelope, hands it to me.

  I look at the front. It’s addressed, To Elaina Washington: R.I.P. I go cold.

  “Look inside,” Alan growls.

  I open it up. There’s a typed note, clipped to a series of pages. When I look at the pages, I understand.

  “Shit, Alan…”

  “Her fucking medical history,” he says, and begins pacing back and forth. “All about the tumor, the doctor’s notes.” He grabs the packet from me, flips a few pages. “Look at this part that he highlighted for her!”

  I take it back from him and read what he’d indicated.

  Mrs. Washington is stage two, bordering on a stage three. Outlook good, but must ensure the patient understands that full stage three still possible, though unlikely.

  “Read his fucking note!”

  I look at it, see the familiar salutation.

  Greetings, Mrs. Washington!

  I wouldn’t call myself a friend of your husband. More of a…business acquaintance. I thought you’d appreciate knowing the truth about your current situation.

  Do you know what the survival rates are for stage three, dearie? I quote: “Stage III: Metastasis to lymph nodes around the colon, a 35–60 percent chance for five-year survival.”

  Goodness! If I was a betting man, I’m afraid I’d have to bet against you!

  Best of luck—I’ll be keeping an eye on your progress!

  From Hell,

  Jack Jr.

  “Is this true, Alan?”

  “Not the way he put it, no,” he snarls. “I called the doctor. He said that if he was really concerned about it, he would have said so. He wasn’t withholding anything. Shit, the note was written to remind himself what to tell us during her next visit.”

  “But Elaina saw it as written, with no explanation.”

  I get the answer from the misery in his eyes.

  I turn away from him for a moment, putting a hand to my forehead. An almost blinding rage has flared up inside me. Of all the people he could hurt, other than Bonnie, Elaina is perhaps the most undeserving. I remember this morning, the way her presence alone broke through Bonnie’s barriers. I remember her with me, in the hospital. I want to kill Jack Jr.

  He continues to gain access to our lives, to the personal parts of us. Bugs in Hillstead’s office to get to me. Now what? Breaking into a hospital to get Elaina’s medical records?

  What else does he know?

  I turn to Alan. “How is she?”

  He takes a sudden seat in an easy chair. Looks lost. “First she was scared. Then she started crying.”

  “Where is she?”

  “Up in the bedroom, with Bonnie.” He gives me a tired look. “Bonnie won’t leave her side.” He puts his head in his hands. “Goddammit, Smoky…why her?”

  I sigh, and move to him, putting a hand on his shoulder. “Because they knew it would hurt you like this, Alan.”

  His head snaps up, eyes filled with fire. “I want these fuckers so bad.”

  “I know.” Boy, do I. “Listen, Alan. I know it probably won’t help…but I don’t think Elaina’s in any physical danger from Jack Jr. and company, at least not right now. I don’t think that’s the purpose of this.”

  “What mak
es you say that?”

  I shake my head, thinking about what Callie had said earlier today. “This is a part of their game. They want us to hunt them. And they wants us at our best. To give us a personal stake in this.”

  His face grows grim. “It’s working.”

  I nod. “No shit.”

  He leans back, sighs. The sigh is belly-deep and full of sadness. He looks up at me, eyes pleading. “Can you go up and see her?”

  I touch his shoulder. “Of course I can.”

  I dread it, but of course I can.

  ***

  I knock on the bedroom door, open it, and peek my head in. Elaina is lying on her side, back to me. Bonnie is sitting next to her, stroking her hair. Bonnie looks at me as I enter, and I stop. Her eyes are full of fury. We stare at each other for a moment, and I nod in understanding. They’d hurt her Elaina. She was mad.

  I move around the bed, sitting down on its edge. The memory of the hospital flies into my mind. Elaina’s eyes are open, staring off at nothing. Her face is puffy from tears. “Hey,” I say.

  She glances up at me. Goes back to looking at nothing. Bonnie keeps stroking her hair.

  “Do you know what upsets me the most, Smoky?” she says, breaking the silence.

  “No. Tell me.”

  “That Alan and I never had children. We tried and tried and tried, but it just never happened. Now I’m too old, and I have to deal with cancer.” She closes her eyes, opens them. “And this man gets to invade our lives. Gets to laugh at us. At me. Make me afraid.”

  “That’s what he’s trying to do.”

  “Yes. And it worked.” Silence. “I would have made a good mom, don’t you think, Smoky?”

  My face twists. I’m horrified by the depth of Elaina’s pain. It’s Bonnie who answers her question. She taps on Elaina’s shoulder, and Elaina turns her head to look at her. Bonnie makes sure she’s watching, and then she nods.

  Yes, she’s saying. You would have made a wonderful mom.

  Elaina’s eyes go soft. She reaches out to touch Bonnie’s face. “Thank you, sweetheart.” Silence. She looks at me. “Why is he doing this, Smoky?”

  Why did he do it, why is he doing it, why did this happen? Why my daughter, my son, my husband, my wife? This is the unending question from victims. “The short answer is that he likes hurting you, Elaina. That’s the simple motivation. The other side of it is that he knows it’ll make Alan afraid. That makes him feel powerful. And he likes that very much.”