Perfect Trust argi-3

by M. R. Sellars

  “How’s that?”

  “The tragedies like this that have occurred during episodes of nocturnal automatism have been driven by emotion. Responses to stimuli the sleepwalker experienced during waking hours. Stress and emotional upset. And while there may be a triggering incident, in most cases the stimulus has been in place over a long period.”

  “Well,” I said, “stress is apparently what brought me here to begin with, right?”

  “Yes, but let me finish,” she urged. “The crimes committed by sleepwalkers are commonly very brutal and born out of passion. For instance, there was a man who repeatedly stabbed his mother-in-law with a hunting knife; another bludgeoned his mother-in-law to death with a tire iron. Still another repeatedly stabbed and then drowned his wife.

  “There is a definite pattern established here with this type of crime. The attacker knows his or her victim intimately, and the evidence left behind is abundant. There is no conscious, calculated attempt to cover it up, so to speak.”

  “There’s a first time for everything.” I continued my protest, though more as a devil’s advocate than anything else because I desperately wanted to believe her. “Maybe I’m an isolated case.”

  She shrugged. “I suppose that is always a possibility, but I do not believe it for a minute. Neither should you.”

  “Trust me. I don’t want to.”

  “Then don’t, because you did not kill that woman.”

  There was a brief lull as I pondered her comments. I wanted to believe what she said was true, and in reality she had made some very strong arguments. To the contrary, they were stronger than mine when you got right down to it. Still, I was at a loss to explain my presence at that crime scene, and it had become like a terrible itch that I couldn’t reach, no matter how hard I tried.

  By some convoluted reasoning it seemed almost logical that I might have murdered someone. The only thing that kept me from going over the edge was the fact that the reasoning was just exactly that-convoluted.

  “I wonder if this whole idea crossed Ben’s mind at all?” I speculated aloud.

  “Possibly,” Helen allowed. “Quite probably, in fact. But you can be certain he dismissed it fairly quickly.”

  “Why do you say that?”

  “If Benjamin had any inkling that you were responsible for the murder, you would be under the microscope at this very moment.” She made the matter-of-fact statement as she stared out at the muted sky, then turned she back to face me. “Had he any evidence to support such an idea, you would already have been arrested.”

  “Do you think so? I mean, we’ve been friends a long time. You don’t think he’d hold back a bit?”

  “Not if he had any evidence, most definitely. Not even if he had an intuition that you had committed a murder. As his friend you must certainly know that the only loyalty he holds in higher stead than to his friends and family is loyalty to his job as a police officer. No, Rowan. If he thought you did it, you would be in custody. Friend or not.”

  “Yeah,” I agreed quietly. “Ben Storm, supercop.”

  “It is a large part of who he is,” she explained. “We all draw our identities from different sources. For Benjamin, it is his work. He is at his most comfortable as he is defined by his job. In a way, you could say that it is his destiny.”

  “Which would make mine to be what? The flaky, new-age sidekick?” I mused.

  “Your life is not defined by his, Rowan. It is defined by you and your choices.”

  “Maybe, but it seems that my choices over the past couple of years have put me smack in the middle of his world.”

  “Yes, they have,” she conceded. “But in doing so you have been instrumental in bringing down two serial killers. Is that such a bad thing?”

  “At what cost to me though?” I said. “I’ve got no idea which end is up anymore.”

  “I will admit that the cost to you on an emotional level has been substantial,” she replied. “But that cost is not a permanent deficit. That is why you are here talking with me.”

  “You really think I’m going to come out of this okay?”

  “Of course you are, Rowan. You are far stronger than you give yourself credit.”

  “I wish I’d never gotten involved in that first case to begin with,” I sighed heavily.

  “You know you do not mean that,” she rebutted. “Be honest with yourself. If you were in that same situation again, you would make exactly the same decision you did then.”

  “Yeah, probably,” I admitted. “So I guess that makes me a bit of a masochist.”

  “It makes you exactly what your name purports you to be. A person of strength; a protector.”

  Had it been anyone else, I believe I would have been taken aback by the explanation. There aren’t many people who know the inherent meaning of the name Rowan right off the top of their heads, and those who do are usually Pagan. It seems we Pagans have a penchant for knowing the significance behind our appellations. For some reason, however, it came as no surprise to me that Helen Storm would know this, and I took great comfort in it.

  Thick silence cloaked us once again as she allowed me to continue mulling over her well thought out rebuttal to my hasty revelation. The fear had not yet vacated the premises, but it had at least settled into dormancy for the time being.

  “Just as long as I don’t have to wear tights,” I finally said.

  “I’m sorry? I am not sure I understand.”

  “If I’m going to be Ben’s sidekick,” I explained. “I can’t wear tights. I just don’t have the legs for them.”

  *****

  What had been an emergency hour of psychotherapy had turned into almost two hours of deeply thoughtful banter. I was feeling better than I had when I arrived, but I was by no means out of the woods. While I no longer harbored any serious suspicions about being guilty of murder, I couldn’t shake the sense that I was somehow involved more deeply than it appeared on the surface. Whether directly or indirectly, I just knew there was something about Paige Lawson’s death that connected solidly with me. I also had no doubt whatsoever that she was the victim of more than a random accident. I just had no way to prove it…yet.

  As I strode down the corridor toward the elevators, I was repeatedly turning the plague of confusing thoughts over in my head-inspecting each, moving on to the next, and starting the cycle anew when I reached what I believed to be the last one. Here and there along the hall, some of the doors were open. To my left, the happy, synthesized chords of Mannheim Steamroller’s rendition of “Deck the Halls” issued from the interior of an office; through another doorway to my right, the angst-ridden voice of Ozzy Osbourne was heading for derailment on his “Crazy Train.” The two songs met in the middle, intertwined, separated, and then competed for my attention, neither of them ever actually winning the contest. Although, I did have to admit that the helpless anguish being described by the heavy metal lyrics on my right came closest to describing my mood.

  When I reached the end of the hallway, I punched the recessed call button and waited before the polished metal doors of the elevator. Eventually an electromechanical ding announced the arrival of the car, and the doors slid open with a slight rumble to reveal the empty interior. A heavily syncopated version of “God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen” filtered outward from an overhead speaker to join the struggle begun by the other two songs. I stepped in and double tapped the button labeled with an L.

  The even mechanical rumble began again as the two halves of the door began their journeys toward the middle. They would have met had it not been for a feminine hand thrusting quickly between them and engaging the safety. The split doors immediately reversed direction and slid back into their pockets as a harried, young blonde, balancing a stack of files in one arm, rushed through the opening.

  “Sorry,” she apologized as she shifted the healthy stack of folders into both arms. “It’s just, sometimes this elevator takes forever.”

  “That’s okay. Sorry I didn’t see you coming,” I
told her. “Which floor?”

  “Three, please. Thank you.”

  I leaned forward and punched the button for the third floor as I said, “No problem.”

  The young woman remained standing immediately before the doors, obviously in a hurry. She was petite and dressed tastefully in a wool skirt and blazer. Her carefully manicured nails were lacquered a fashionable shade, and her pale skin was brushed with only the barest necessity of makeup needed to enhance her natural beauty.

  My heart hesitated for a beat as I stepped back and caught a glimpse of her profile. Just twenty-four hours ago, I had sat voyeuristically in my truck and watched her as she made her way into the building, all the while fantasizing about what she would look like if she had red hair.

  The recognition sparked a moment of internal embarrassment, even though I knew full well that she had no idea the incident had ever occurred. Unfortunately, the fleeting chagrin was the least of my worries as the imaginings of her with an auburn mane suddenly returned, encroaching upon my mind even more powerfully than before.

  I clenched my teeth and struggled to keep my breathing even as the thoughts once again assaulted me, this time bringing with them far more lurid imaginings. Dizziness flooded into my skull and induced a nauseating tickle at the back of my throat as darkly perverse desires welled within me. The fantasy no longer entailed a simple change in hair color; it had become a private reel of soft-core pornography directed by someone unseen but most definitely felt.

  The lights in the elevator seemed to flicker and dim as the sliding doors touched in the middle, and the car began its downward journey. She didn’t seem to notice the visual effect, so I assumed that it was happening inside my head alone-not exactly the reassurance I wished for. I could feel myself slipping out of reality, losing control to the director of this lurid fantasy.

  She allows the stack of files to spill onto the floor of the elevator, turning toward me as she does so. Her hair has darkened to a deep red and cascades across her shoulders and down her back. An intense light of desire burns in her eyes as she looks at me and smiles. Wordlessly she shrugs off her blazer and allows it to fall to the floor then begins to slowly unbutton her blouse as she moves toward me.

  I forced myself to seek any type of grounding that I could, no matter how thin or tenuous. I needed something to cling to if I were going to escape this unwanted ethereal bond. I stared directly ahead, fighting to maintain an even rhythm to my breathing while I silently willed the vision to evaporate. A flicker of colors insinuated themselves, flashing the scene from negative to positive and back again. I blinked and saw reality in all its stark wonder. The young woman hadn’t moved an inch. She was standing in front of the doors, her back to me, and still very blonde.

  I made the mistake of sighing in relief, and my grip on this plane gave way. With my desperate concentration shattered, the here and now slipped through my fingers like a greased rope.

  She is half nude now, and as I watch she seductively allows her skirt to drop and steps out of it. Standing before me she is clad in nothing but a garter belt, stockings, and heels. Her makeup has gone from subtle to extreme; her lips are glossed with a garish slash of blood red. She presses her body into mine without a word. I can feel her hot breath on my neck as she slowly undulates against me.

  Again I reached for reality, denying those things I thought I was seeing and experiencing. I could feel my back pressed against the wall in the corner of the elevator. I wasn’t certain if the sensation was just another part of the cheesy skin-flick scenario being forced upon me or if it was the real thing. I banked on it being the latter and folded myself into it as I shut my eyes.

  The sickening male voice I’d heard echoing within my brain the night before suddenly returned. I squeezed my eyes shut even tighter and swallowed hard, fighting to ignore its existence, only to fail miserably in my attempt.

  Oh God, she’s so close to perfect!

  Her skin…

  Her neck…

  She could be her!

  I desperately wanted to scream. I had no idea how much longer the elevator ride was going to last, but to me it had already been an eternity. I was afraid I wasn’t going to make it.

  Look at her…

  Oh sweet Jesus, so close…

  The black gown…

  She’d look so great in the black gown…

  She’ll be almost perfect…

  Almost her…

  Almost…

  I opened my eyes to check the car’s downward progress and sucked in a startled breath. My arm was extended and my hand was less than a pair of inches from the young woman’s shoulder. I was starting to tremble, and I snatched my arm back quickly, grasping my wrist with my other hand and hugging it tight against my body.

  The dark thoughts were now threatening to infect other portions of my anatomy, and I held my breath, fighting to force them away. I concentrated on anything mundane I could grasp-anything that could replace the rampant sexual energies that were building within me.

  A dizzying rush in my ears drowned out almost everything except my own frenzied heartbeat. I scarcely noticed as a muffled electromechanical bong sounded overhead, insinuating itself seamlessly into the barely audible, syncopated mood music. There was a slight jerk, and the doors split, opening wide upon a brightly lit hallway.

  The young woman turned quickly to me and flashed a warm smile, “Merry Christmas.”

  She was gone through the opening before I could reply-not that I was able to do so. For reasons unknown, as quickly as it had begun, the disharmonious reverberation in my ears was instantly gone, replaced by the muted sound of the elevator doors sliding shut and a synthesized melody that closely resembled “Angels We Have Heard On High.”

  I let out a heavy sigh as the red-tinted darkness pooled lower in my body, finally flowing outward to leave me feeling physically weakened and emotionally spent. I literally stumbled away from the wall of the car, grateful no one else was there to witness my condition. I had just begun to regain my composure when the doors again fractured down the center and opened onto the lobby.

  In a fit of panic, I wondered if I should rush back upstairs to Helen Storm’s office and tell her what had just happened, but I was almost afraid I would encounter the young woman again on the way back up. If I did, I wasn’t entirely sure I could control the urges that had almost overtaken me moments before. I thought about it hard, not moving from the corner of the car as I stared into space at nothing in particular.

  My immediate reaction was to seek the psychological relevance of the episode in order to understand it, obtain another dose of reassurance that I wasn’t well on my way to criminally insane. But something in the back of my head kept telling me that psychoanalysis wasn’t going to reveal an answer to this one. This was something more-something completely beyond the pale-at least so far as it applied to the mundane world.

  I gave up on weighing the options when I realized the elevator doors had slid shut once again.

  I absently punched the recessed door-open button on the panel and exited the confines of the lift, then quickly crossed the tiled lobby, hooked past a too-symmetrically decorated Christmas tree, and pushed onward out through the glass doors.

  A cool breeze caressed my face and forced me to calm a bit more. I stopped for a moment on the sidewalk and turned away from the wind as I lit a cigarette then inhaled the smoke deep into my lungs. As I exhaled, I was certain that I heard a familiar voice in the distance but not the dark one as before. This one had plagued me for several days now, beginning as unfamiliar scratchings on a page before finally coming into its own. As usual, it was filled with a peculiar mix of desperation and mockery at the same time.

  Gimme a D!

  Gimme an E!

  Gimme an A!

  Gimme another D!

  What’s that spell?

  DEAD! DEAD! DEAD!

  DEAD, Rowan.

  I’m dead for God’s sake; so quit feeling sorry for yourself.

&nbs
p; Do something about it.

  My decision was made for me. My gut told me that there was something more than just my addled psyche at work here and I was going to have to figure it out on my own. As frightened by the prospect as I now was, I had no choice but to follow its lead.

  CHAPTER 14

  When I exited the parking lot of the medical building, my head was telling me to turn left toward home. After all, Felicity would be expecting me, and there were still a million things that needed to get done before the gathering tomorrow evening.

  My gut, on the other hand, asserted its newly assigned leadership and pre-empted the turn with a pair of rights before finally making that left, and I was soon motoring north on the Innerbelt. Thirty minutes later I awoke from an absent-minded daze as I found myself pulling off onto the shoulder of an isolated section of Highway 367, not far from the Clark Bridge and Alton, Illinois.

  I sat for several minutes, engine running, while I pondered the autopilot that had brought me here. I had traveled this road more times than I could remember and had even pulled off along the side to watch the eagles that would winter in the area. However, it wasn’t yet the season for eagle watching, not to mention it was a bit late in the day for the activity. Besides, the prime spot for it was much farther down the stretch of asphalt anyway. This particular spot on the roadside had attracted me for a far more sinister reason, and though I’d never stopped here before, I had arrived at this exact location with only my subconscious as a guide.

  I sat staring through the passenger side window, peering past my own reflection in the glass and allowing my eyes to adjust to the cold shadows. In what little was left of the fading light, I could just barely make out a twisted ribbon of yellow and black crime scene tape stretched between spindly tree trunks in the distance.

  I finally switched off the headlights and cast a quick glance at the radio before twisting the key to kill the engine. The digital clock on its face showed it to be almost 5 p.m. With tomorrow being winter solstice, the shortest day of the year, official sunset was rapidly approaching. In fact, it was less than an hour away. However, considering the thick blanket of grey clouds that was acting as a barrier to the sun’s rays, dusk had been abbreviated, and for all intents and purposes nightfall was already upon us. The miniscule amount of illumination still available would be completely gone in a matter of heartbeats.