by Kari Fisher
I ran.
I got out of that city as fast as I possibly could, and I never looked back.
Chapter Fourteen
I became Scott Reed.
Tall, cunning, mysterious. I dove into a new life in which I engrossed myself in my new line of work—balancing books for large corporations. I didn’t know what I was doing in the beginning but it didn’t take me that long to figure it out. Everything went smoothly—I was dating, not settling down—but girls were girls. Instead of giving themselves to me, they used me for free meals and bottles of wine on movie dates at my place. As soon as the movie was over, they’d call a cab and stumble outside, slightly tipsy. I’d get a kiss on the cheek, if I was lucky. Was I that terrible to look at? I didn’t think so. I stared at myself in the mirror for hours, trying to figure out their reasoning.
Not even Tara had willingly committed to me. She had no choice when she found out she was pregnant with our first child. I proposed shortly afterwards, and she reluctantly accepted. She had originally moved to this city for the sole purpose of going to school, with the intention of heading back home immediately afterwards. That didn’t happen. Within a few months of meeting me, she was knocked up, dropped out of school, and blamed me for ruining her life. She had no family or friends to keep her here, but she was trapped. This temporary home became the only life she’d ever know and while her dreams spiraled downward in despair, I fucked my patient—not once, but the entire time I was treating her—because I needed sex.
Cora looked just like Tara. I thought I could fall in love with her, but she wouldn’t let me. She was rude and complained about everything, despite how good I was to her. The only thing she didn’t complain about was when I’d pay for our meal at supper—even though she would complain throughout the evening how awful the food was: the steak was too cold, the fries were burned, her drink glass was sweating and making a mess on the table. I swear at one point she told the waiter there was a fly in her soup. The appetizers were too small. She’d like more wine, and whine. The night I killed her, she had ordered a chicken wing wrap—three tender boneless chicken wings in spicy Thai habanero sauce, with lettuce, tomato, and onion, wrapped in a fresh pita. The wrap was ninety percent lettuce. The taste, though mild, was overpowering. Had she wanted a salad, she would have ordered one, she said.
That night, nothing. Not even a kiss on the lips.
Unacceptable.
I was going to have her whether she wanted me or not.
Not.
Here we go again. Running. Leaving. Escaping the life I had created once again.
Goodbye, Scott Reed.
Chapter Fifteen
Renae
“Have you found him yet? It’s been two weeks.” Renae barely looks up when two officers walk into the café, interrupting her lunch. She pushes her turkey, avocado, and onion sandwich topped with tomato and cream cheese on lightly toasted pumpernickel bread to the side of her table and puts down her newspaper.
“No, we haven’t, but we’re following up on a few leads. We do have more questions for you that we’d like to ask, if that’s okay.”
“You know what? It’s not okay,” Renae replies sharply. “I have been nothing but cooperative every time you come asking, but you’re not letting me move on, and you’re not finding him. I can’t keep dealing with this day after day. I can’t get images out of my head of what probably happened to Sophie. I feel like a terrible friend, a terrible person. I feel dirty and used. I slept with a killer. I don’t know what else I could possibly tell you that would help. I don’t know what you want me to say.”
“We don’t mean to upset you, but we need to know about your history with Oliver.”
“I didn’t know Oliver. I knew Scott, and I knew him for less than three months.”
“Thank you.” The officer nods as they both turn to leave. “We’ll let you know if there’s anything else.”
“Of course you will,” Renae sighs, muttering under her breath. “You always do.”
Chapter Sixteen
Lauren
It’s March. Lauren Blue sits on the hood of her car, stretching out her long legs and arching her back, ensuring the sun kisses her skin, keeping it that smooth, rose-tinged ivory color that she loves. For a brief second, she glances behind her and considers taking off her bikini top too, but decides against it—although there is no one here at the moment, this place is usually crawling with people and she doesn’t want to chance anyone seeing her breasts. She looks out on the water. She slides down off the car and her feet touch the beach. It’s not a sandy beach. It’s more like pebbles and shells, though it’s not unpleasant for her bare feet. She takes a few steps into the water until she’s up to her knees. Already she can feel the swift current. The lake narrows here, forcing the water to tumble over the rocky bed very quickly, creating a dangerous, raging current. People who live here often run into the waters with floating toys and let the current pull them about a mile downstream. Tourists have tried to swim out into the middle of the river and have drowned.
Lauren steps further out into the water. She’s up to her hips now. As the water rushes against her, she sways from side to side. The water is so cold that it stings her skin. Another step and it’s up to her belly. She can barely feel her legs. They’re paralyzed. She wonders what it would be like to swim into the middle and drown.
She hears her cell phone ring from where she left it on the hood of the car.
Slowly, she turns around.
One foot in front of the other, she starts out of the water. Her body feels heavy and she’s shivering. Her jean shorts are wet and plastered to her body with cold water, as is the bottom of her dark blue t-shirt. The current fights her as she takes her last few steps out of the enticing lake.
She reaches the phone and realizes she has missed the call. She doesn’t recognize the phone number so she wouldn’t have answered it anyway, but she holds down the voicemail button and listens carefully.
“Lauren, it’s Nathaniel. Call me back.”
He didn’t even need to say his name. Lauren could recognize that man’s voice anywhere.
She holds her phone up to her ear, redialing the phone number he called from.
“Hey, Laur. How have you been?” he asks.
“It’s good to hear your voice.”
“Where are you?”
“Somewhere warm,” Lauren replies, grinning. “No more Chicago winters for me.”
“You’re close,” Nathaniel informs her.
“Am I? Tell me,” she insists.
“Promise me you’ll be careful.”
“I’ll be careful.”
“Promise?”
“I promise,” Lauren sighs, impatiently. “Tell me, Nathaniel.”
“Oliver Fallon fled to Texas, where he’s been working at a company in Dallas called Danis Accounting for the last year. He’s been living under the name of Scott Reed,” Nathaniel explains.
“Perfect. Thanks, Nathaniel.”
“Hold on, Laur. There’s more,” Nathaniel cuts her off. “A warrant has just been issued for Scott Reed’s arrest. He’s wanted for the murder of two Dallas women—Cora James and Sophie Matthews.”
“Oh.”
“You can’t go after him alone, Lauren. He’s obviously dangerous. I mean, we knew he was dangerous, but he’s really, really dangerous. There’s a good chance he’s not even in Dallas anymore. He must be on the run. Where are you?”
“Text me the address where he was. I’m close.”
“How do you know?” Nathaniel asked.
“He had a work conference for Aldona Psychiatric Hospital in San Antonio once, and he loved it here, so I thought maybe he’d come back. So I came here,” Lauren explained.
“Makes sense.”
“I know him, Nathaniel.”
“I know you do. Look, I have to go. I have a ton of stuff that I need to get done around the office. This is the number for the office I’ll be at all week, if you need to reach me. You’
ve got my cell number, too. Let me know,” Nathaniel offers.
“Thanks,” Lauren says sincerely. She hangs up the phone, staring at it in her hand for a few seconds. She realizes she’s still standing there, in front of her car, dripping wet. She grabs her towel and dries off as best she can before hopping into the driver’s seat. She punches Dallas, Texas into the GPS and it shows her the directions for the five hour drive.
The drive is long and flat, just as she had expected—only a few months ago, she had made the same drive, only in the other direction, when she had driven all the way down from Chicago. She barely makes any stops along the way, other than going to the bathroom once in Austin.
It’s dark when she pulls into the driveway at the apartment complex where Oliver Fallon was staying. The building looks like it could have been an old school, perhaps, that was converted into apartments. The outside was rundown. She could hardly tell what color the stucco was, but as she turned right off the main street, her headlights touched the side of the building and it looked like an old tan color, with color chipping away to reveal the grey concrete underneath. She pulls her car around the building to the parking lot in the back. There aren’t any lights back here and she wonders how anyone could actually see when they get home from work—or wherever it was they were—after dark. There’s only one other vehicle in the parking lot other than hers. It’s a grey Toyota Tundra, with chrome trim and a license plate frame that says Pickering. The vehicle looks sinister and dangerous. Does no one else in this shit hole own a vehicle? And why does this one look so expensive? Where the hell is Pickering, anyway? She quickly jogs to the side door of the building, where one tiny, orange, flickering light shines all by itself. She grasps onto the door handle with her right hand and she pulls. It’s locked. She immediately feels a sense of defeat. How exactly is she going to get into the building at this time of night if it’s locked? She slouches back against the wall and slides to the ground, hugging her knees in front of her.
The truck.
Hugging the wall of the building closely, she quietly makes her way around the side to the truck in the parking lot. She nearly trips over a huge rock, wrenching her ankle.
“Ow,” she mutters. “Perfect.”
Carefully picking up the rock, she lifts it above her head and holds it for a second. It’s heavy, and it feels cold in her tiny hands. She squeezes the rock hard with her fingers, almost as though she’s expecting it to break in her hand even though she knows it can’t. Her eyes scan the parking lot. She remains alone. She arches her back, as if growing wings.
With all of her strength, she throws the rock into the windshield. She flinches as the glass shatters loudly, not expecting it to make such a loud noise. Pieces of glass land everywhere. She flinches again as the car alarm begins to blare, almost making her drop to her knees. Instead, despite feeling weak, she runs. She fumbles with her keys as she gets into her car. Thankfully, she hadn’t locked it. She starts it right away and spins around, tearing out of the parking lot before anyone even makes it outside to check on the precious Toyota and the broken glass.
She parks across the street, in the driveway of one of the townhouses in front of the worn down school and shuts her car off. She glances at the watch on her left wrist, making note of the minute hand so that she can allow exactly four minutes of time to pass before re-entering the parking lot opposite from her. Two minutes in, she can see the faint shine of flash lights moving around the corner of the building. Two more minutes and she starts her car, making her way slowly back across the street. She comes to a halt before she makes it past the end of the driveway, and she unzips her jacket so that her cleavage is exposed.
As she pulls into the lot, she sees two men and a woman scrambling around the truck. She parks only a few spaces from where they are pacing back and forth, hands in the air, frustrated.
“Is everything okay?” Lauren asks, as she exits her vehicle. The car alarm is no longer going off.
“No, man. Someone broke into my neighbor’s car,” one of the men explains as he approaches Lauren with his flashlight pointed at her.
“I’m fucking pissed,” Lauren can hear the other man say. He turns toward Lauren and shines his flashlight in her face. “Did you see anything?”
“No, I just got here,” she says, pointing to her car as though that was obvious.
“Well, did you see anyone leaving? Was anyone going out as you were coming in?” he asks, coming at her.
“Back off, Steve,” the girl warns. She shines her light at him, revealing a frustrated looking blond man, who isn’t overly tall. Though he isn’t overweight, he does look out of shape—it just seems like had he come out here and caught someone actively breaking into his vehicle, there would not have been much he could do.
“I’m sorry,” Steve offers, backing down. He’s obviously upset, and probably doesn’t mean to take it out on an innocent Lauren.
“It’s cool,” Lauren replies, nodding. “I’m sorry about your truck. Was anything taken?”
“Some money,” the neighbor replies. “It was in the dash. Dude, I told you, never keep money in the dash.”
“That sucks. Do you guys need anything? Do you need me to call anyone?” Lauren offers.
“We’ve already called the cops, actually. They should be here any second,” the girl explains. Both guys return to how they were, pacing back and forth, surveying the damage. Almost right on cue, the sirens on the police cars are heard in the distance and the faint blue and red flashing lights appear down the road.
“There they are,” Lauren says. “Hopefully you guys get this all figured out. Please let me know if you need anything. I’m in apartment 210.”
“Thanks,” the girl responds.
“Shit, I’m sorry. Do any of you happen to have your door key? I left mine at my boyfriend’s place. Man, I’m glad you guys are out here. I mean, I’m not—not under these circumstances—you know what I mean,” Lauren chuckles.
“Yeah, no problem,” the girl replies happily. She briskly walks over to the door and unlocks it, pulling it open and holding it for Lauren.
“Thanks.” Lauren nods and smiles politely as she walks through the door. It closes and locks behind her. She walks up the flight of stairs and follows the dirty red carpeted floor to apartment 210. The carpet looks like it could be the original from when the building had still been used as a school. The flooring on either side of the carpet is ugly yellow, broken tile. The apartments in this building have presumably been renovated—at least, Lauren hopes they have for the sake of the tenants—but the halls certainly have not.
The apartment is the last one on the right in the hallway. Lauren reaches for the doorknob. It’s locked. She’s not surprised. She was able to get into the building, but now what? She looks around for a weapon but the rest of the hallway is empty—there isn’t even a fire extinguisher in sight. The door looks flimsy. It’s wooden. The lock looks like it can be easily broken, too; it’s not even a deadbolt.
A quick glance down the hallway ensures that no one is watching, although at this time of night, that was pretty much a given. Lauren leans back as far as she can toward the opposite wall, and then, holding the door knob, she slams her body into the wooden door of apartment 210.
She hears the lock snap as the door swings open. She steps into Oliver Fallon’s apartment and takes a deep breath.
It feels as though he’d been here not all that long ago, though she knows it has been at least several days. She stands in the kitchen, facing the dining room and then the living room behind it, in the small, open concept apartment. There’s still a reading lamp on in the corner of the living room on the nightstand by the black leather couch beside the DVD shelf. There are crumbs on the place mat that sits prettily on the black two person kitchen table. There is a stack of sticky notes on the white kitchen counter. Even though they look like they’ve been used, they’re blank. Lauren slowly walks over to them, picks them up and flips through them. Nothing.
&n
bsp; You led quite the boring life after me, didn’t you, Oliver.
She opens a drawer in the kitchen. Oliver owns two forks, two spoons, and one knife. In the cupboard: one bowl, a large plate, and a mug. The fridge is empty other than a bottle of mustard and some old lunch meat. Lauren giggles to herself. Oliver had never seemed like the kind of man who would use mustard on a ham sandwich, but perhaps she was wrong.
She closes the door and jumps when an emaciated cat hisses, arching its back while ready to attack from the corner of the kitchen, where its empty food and water bowl sit on the floor. The cat is white, with two different colored eyes. It looks like it hasn’t been fed in weeks, even though Oliver has been gone no longer than a few days.
“Here kitty,” Lauren whispers, kneeling down. The cat continues to hiss and refuses to come any closer. Lauren opens a few cupboard doors until she finds a baggie of tiny kibbles that looks like it can be cat food. “Is this what you want?”
She inches her way over to the cat’s food bowl. The cat screeches but steps aside, allowing her access to the bowl. She dumps the contents of the bag into the bowl. The cat, still leery of Lauren, stretches out as far as she can to smell the food. Her big eyes turn upwards toward Lauren, who nods with approval. The cat eats.
While she eats, Lauren fills up her water bowl, and leaves out a second bowl of water too.
Returning to the task at hand, Lauren continues her walk through Oliver’s apartment. He owns a few DVD movies—mostly comedies, one of them with a blank sticky note on it. The dresser drawers in his bedroom still have clothes in them, although not a lot. There are three shirts and two pairs of dress pants. Only two pairs of boxers. Gross.