THE DEAD WOMAN

by Goldberg, Lee

  Matt shuddered to think what the killer would look like to him. A walking skeleton, maybe? A mummified corpse? Most likely, Matt would see him as a half-decayed zombie. Either way, he didn't want to meet the guy.

  The article went on to say that Eloise Stinnet had been reported missing from nearby Cranston, Tennessee, over a month ago. The body, which had likely been dumped into the creek shortly after her disappearance, showed signs of having been in the water for weeks. That meant that the killer hadn't struck in almost a month, the writer warned, noting that the killer had been escalating his attacks. At first he'd killed only once every few months, but lately the bodies had rolled in every other week. It ended with a warning from Officer Everett for people to use utmost caution when traveling at night. Walk with a friend, try to be home before dark, don't answer the door for strangers, etcetera.

  Matt was just about to fold up the paper when another photo caught his eye. In this one, the county medical examiner stood next to a uniformed officer. Both of them were looking at something on a clipboard. But they weren't what caught Matt's attention. To the right of the ME another officer was putting something into an evidence bag. The image was small, and the resolution none too sharp, but Matt thought he could make out what it was.

  A lollipop.

  "Fuck me," Matt said aloud.

  Just then a rumble alerted him to the approach of a large truck. He looked over the top of the paper and saw Abbey driving the rented box truck up to the store. It looked like she was alone, and he breathed a sigh of relief. He'd half expected Dale to be riding shotgun, but the cop was nowhere in sight. Good. This was going to be hard enough without that asshole around.

  Matt waited until Abbey got out of the truck and walked up to the door. Her black jeans and matching tank top left very little to the imagination, and Matt had a sudden image of her straddling him the night before. He shook his head and ordered himself to snap out of it. The last thing he needed right now was to picture her naked.

  Focus!

  After she walked into the store, Matt stood from the bench. She probably wouldn't listen to him, but he wanted to catch her inside so she couldn't run away before he had a chance to explain himself. Most likely, she'd just yell at him to leave or call the police, but he meant to at least try to talk to her. If nothing else, he wanted his ax back.

  He made it halfway to the door before he heard a noise behind him. Matt whirled around just in time to catch a flash of something shiny as it cracked him on the side of the head.

  The sudden flare of pain tore into him like a wild animal, and Matt stumbled backward on wobbly legs. A warm, wet sensation spread down the side of his face, covering his right eye in a sheen of red. Blood, Matt realized, as his legs gave out.

  His eyes focused just enough to see a figure advancing on him, aluminum baseball bat in hand. One of the townspeople, perhaps? Come to get rid of the murderer in their midst? Matt tried to get his hands up to ward off the next blow, but the circuits from his brain to his nerves hadn't had time to reset, and all he could to was twitch as he sat on the ground.

  "You should have listened to me," the figure said.

  That voice! Matt thought. It sounded familiar, but he couldn't quite place it through the fog in his mind. Was it Mr. Dark?

  Then the image solidified enough for Matt to recognize his attacker.

  "I told you to keep walkin'," Dale said as he raised the bat for another blow. A small green sore began to sprout from the side of the officer's face.

  Matt felt another round of pain. Then there was nothing at all.

  CHAPTER TEN

  Pain brought Matt back to his senses. His head hurt like a bastard, pulsing and throbbing with every agonizing heartbeat. He tried to touch his head, but his arm wouldn't move. His fingers tingled, sending hundreds of needle-like pains running up and down his arm.

  What the fuck? He tried to move his head and a wave of nausea hit him, almost strong enough to send him back to dreamland.

  "Wake up, asshole." The voice stabbed into his ears like a blade, multiplying the pain in his head by a factor of ten. "Open your eyes."

  Matt tried to reply, but all he could manage was a gurgle that might have been "fuck you," but he couldn't be sure.

  A sudden, sharp pressure on the side of his head, right where it hurt the most, caused a white-hot burst of pain to bloom in Matt's head. He couldn't keep the scream inside, and his attacker laughed. The pressure held for a few seconds, then faded. The laughter didn't.

  "You better open your eyes, mister," the voice said. "Next time I won't be so gentle."

  Matt tried to comply, but a gummy, sticky substance covered his eyes, gluing the lids shut. Blood. It had to be. There must have been a lot of it.

  "I can't," Matt mumbled. "They're stuck."

  More laughter. "Shit. I shoulda known that'd happen. Hang on." Rough fingers pried his eyelids apart, none too gently, and cleared away some of the gunk with a wet towel.

  Finally, Matt opened his eyes. He found himself sitting in a small, dim room. His arms and legs were strapped to a wooden chair with duct tape. The concrete floor had a drain in the middle, which Matt took as a bad sign. On the floor next to his chair lay a blood-crusted aluminum baseball bat. Matt couldn't see the logo, but underneath the blood the bat was blue and silver.

  He raised his head to see Dale leaning over him. The officer's face sported a decaying green sore on his right cheek. It wasn't big, but it was there. A thin dribble of pus poured from it and ran down his chin. Whatever was going through Dale's mind, Matt had a feeling he wouldn't like it much.

  "What are you doing, Dale?" Matt asked, hoping to stall. "I'm pretty sure this isn't procedure."

  "Fuck you," Dale replied. "You think I don't know about you and Abbey? I know everything. I know you spent the night there last night. Was it worth it?"

  Dale's eyes looked wet. Matt tried to think of something to say that would slow him down, but he couldn't. Nothing the officer would believe anyway, so he settled on the truth.

  "You're right, Dale," he said. "I did spend the night at her place. But you two are divorced. Don't you think it's time you moved on? It's obvious she has."

  "Oh, that's a good one," a new voice said. Matt looked around the room, his vision still a bit hazy, and finally spotted the source. In the far corner, standing in a shadow, was Mr. Dark. "Now tell him how there are still plenty of fish in the sea," the asshole said, giggling. "I'm sure he'll get a kick out of it."

  "I might have known," Matt said. Suddenly it made sense. Dale, the attack, the green sore. Everything. "Of course this is your work."

  Dale turned to the corner, then back to Matt. "Who are you talking to, Cahill?"

  Matt ignored him. "You're going to ruin his life."

  Mr. Dark laughed. Matt understood. Mr. Dark's existence was about pain and suffering, what did he care about ruining the life of one small-town cop? Not a damn thing.

  Fuck!

  "Goddamn it, Cahill, what the hell are you trying to pull?" Dale snarled.

  Matt turned back to the officer, trying his best to ignore Mr. Dark, who was still laughing in the corner. "This isn't right, Dale. And you know it."

  "Fuck you, Cahill. What do you know about right? You're the one sleeping with another man's wife."

  "You're divorced, Dale."

  "The hell we are!" Dale shoved his left hand in Matt's face. The dim light of the room glinted off the gold band on Dale's ring finger. "We've been married almost three years now. Abbey..." Dale's breath caught in his throat, and the tears that had been building finally spilled over onto his cheeks. "She just tells people we are. She never wears her ring. She keeps that little house of hers so she can take guys like you there and...and..."

  Matt winced. He couldn't help it. If what Dale said was true, then Abbey had lied to them both, but Dale was the one paying for it.

  "I'm sorry," he said. "I didn't know."

  Mr. Dark came out of the corner then, walking slowly towards Da
le. "He doesn't care. You fucked his wife. Why should he care?" Mr. Dark said, his black eyes mocking Matt's predicament. "Ignorance of the law is no excuse. Isn't that what cops say?" He winked.

  Dale's face blazed and he raised the bat, ready for another swing.

  "Dale, you don't want to do this," Matt said. "You're pissed. I get it, but this is murder, man."

  "Oh, damn, you're smart," Mr. Dark said. "This is murder. You'll get your prize in a minute." He leaned over to Dale, his gnarled finger inching closer to the small sore on Dale's cheek.

  "I...I...I love her, Cahill," Dale said. The bat trembled in his hands. "I've loved her for years. You should have seen her on our wedding day. She was so beautiful."

  "You really need to watch where you put your pecker," Mr. Dark said, smiling. "It does seem to get you in trouble."

  "Go to hell, Mr. Dark," Matt said.

  "Damn it," Dale shouted. "Stop doing that! This is about me and you. Who the fuck is Mr. Dark?"

  "That would be me," Mr. Dark said, and touched the sore on Dale's cheek.

  "No!" Matt tried again to free his hands, but it was no use.

  Mr. Dark laughed even harder.

  The sore on Dale's face expanded, doubling in size in a matter of seconds. The trickle of pus became a steady stream, and a small beetle appeared and began chewing on the rotting skin. The officer's breathing came faster and faster, and his eyes burned. The smell of decay grew strong as the sore spread across half of Dale's face.

  "Was she worth it?" Dale asked again. "Answer the question, asshole. I wanna know if fucking my wife was worth it."

  "Don't do this, Dale," Matt said. "You're a cop. You know this is wrong."

  "I don't think he cares," Mr. Dark said.

  "Answer me!" Dale shouted. "Was she worth it?"

  "Tell him, Matt," Mr. Dark said. "Tell him what a wild fuck Abbey is. I bet he'd love to hear it."

  "This won't make her stop," Matt whispered. "She's just gonna keep doing it, Dale."

  "Fuck you!" Dale's hands shook, but he hadn't swung the bat yet. Matt noted the tension in the man's arms and the way he gritted his jaw tight. He looked like a man on the edge, but had he gone completely over? Matt was starting to doubt it.

  Mr. Dark was having his doubts, too, it seemed. He stared at Dale like a viper watching a rodent. Waiting for the moment when his poison would do its job.

  The green sore had spread all across Dale's left cheek, but it hadn't gone farther than that. It looked... contained. Matt had never seen anything like it before, but he knew what it meant.

  Dale was fighting it.

  "Dale, look at my face," Matt said. "Look at the blood on it. Is this you? Really?"

  Dale did look, and he quickly looked away. The bat dropped a few inches.

  "I don't think this is you at all, man," Matt said. "I think you're just hurt right now. But if you do this, you can't take it back. You know that."

  Dale looked up, and the bat slipped a few more inches toward the floor. "I don't know what it is. I... she just makes me so crazy. Why does she do shit like this?"

  "I don't know," Matt replied.

  "Well, that's enough of that." Mr. Dark's face blazed. He stepped forward again and placed his entire hand on Dale's cheek. The sore bloomed outward like an explosion, and Dale's eyes and jaw clenched shut so hard Matt could see the veins in his head throbbing. When Dale's eyes opened, Matt felt a chill in his spine. There was no humanity left in them.

  "No, Dale, think about this for a second!" Matt said.

  Dale shook his head. Matt could almost hear the man's jaw muscles straining as he wrestled with Mr. Dark's insidious disease, but it didn't look like it was doing any good. The green rot continued to spread across the man's face.

  "Fuck this!" Dale shouted. Then he swung the bat. Matt closed his eyes and braced for the blow.

  But it never came.

  Matt jumped in his chair as a loud clang sounded through the room. With his eyes closed, Matt couldn't see what was going on, but he heard Dale sobbing well enough. He couldn't do it, Matt realized. When it came right down to it, Dale couldn't kill me.

  There was another sound, too. Mr. Dark's laughter. "You think you've won?" he chortled. "It's only halftime. The game isn't over yet, Matt."

  He opened his eyes to see Dale sitting on the floor, his face in his hands. The bat was on the floor by the far wall, rolling along the concrete with a metallic whisper.

  Matt almost shouted with relief. The sores on Dale's face were gone, replaced by healthy pink skin. The smell of decay that had clung to him had also vanished. Did that mean Dale was out of danger? Matt looked to the corner, but Mr. Dark was gone.

  "Good for you, Dale," Matt whispered. "You beat him."

  In his mind, he heard Mr. Dark's parting comment: It's only halftime. The game isn't over yet, Matt.

  Great, Matt thought. Just fucking great.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  "You sure you don't want to go to the emergency room?" Dale asked. "That's quite a bump."

  "I've had worse," Matt replied, eyeing the lump in the passenger mirror of Dale's cruiser. It was true. After all, he'd died, hadn't he? What's a lump on the head after freezing to death under a thousand tons of snow and ice? "I'll be fine." In truth, it didn't hurt as much as it should. Probably another benefit of his situation. He seemed to heal a lot faster than normal these days.

  "You sure?"

  "Yeah, I just need to get something. Then I can go."

  They drove on for a few minutes in silence. Several times, Dale looked over at Matt, but he never said anything. Finally, they pulled into the parking lot of Abbey's Antiques. The lights inside were off. Abbey was probably out again. Dale swung the car around to the side of the building and shut off the engine.

  "Look, Cahill," Dale said, "for what it's worth, I'm real sorry about everything."

  "It's all right, Officer."

  "No, it ain't. This ain't like me. I don't know what came over me."

  "It's okay." Matt knew what had come over him, but he wasn't about to tell Dale he'd been attacked by a shadow man. The guy'd been through enough already. All Matt wanted to do now was get his ax and get the hell out of Crawford.

  "Probably stress," Dale mused. "I've been tracking that damn serial killer for months. It's one of the reasons I'm never home. That's probably why Abbey..." He didn't finish the thought, but Matt understood well enough. Dale blamed himself and his job for Abbey's infidelity. Matt would have offered him something comforting but wasn't sure what to say. Hell, for all he knew, Dale's assessment was right on target.

  "Stress can fuck a person up pretty good," Matt said. So can a baseball bat, he added mentally.

  "You sure you don't need a ride anywhere else?"

  "No," Matt replied. "I'll just grab my ax from the shop and walk to the next bus terminal."

  "But that's in Cranston. It's ten miles away."

  "I'm used to walking," Matt replied. In truth, he'd have loved a ride to Cranston, but not from Dale. Who knew what would happen if the green sore came back?

  It's only halftime.

  Matt didn't want to find out. With any luck, he'd catch Abbey, and she could give him a ride. That is, if she would talk to him. He had his doubts, but he meant to try. He needed to talk to her about her husband and Mr. Dark. She claimed to have never seen him, which was probably a good thing, but he needed to warn her about him just in case. Besides, his ax was back at her place anyway, but he didn't think it would be a good idea to mention that to Dale.

  "All right, then," Dale said. "Have a good life, Matt Cahill. Sorry about your head."

  Matt got out of the car. "Sorry about your wife."

  Dale held up his left hand. Matt noted the man was no longer wearing his wedding ring. "Soon to be ex-wife. You're right. She's just gonna keep doing it. But I don't have to live with it. Or her addiction."

  "Addiction?"

  "Yeah, Xanax or Keflex or something. I can't remember what it's called, but thos
e damn little bottles are all over the place. Abbey says it's a sedative. She uses it to fight off panic attacks and shit like that. If you ask me, she's messed up enough without it."

  Matt nodded. He had to agree. He opened the passenger-side door and stepped out, careful not to bump his head.

  "By the way," Dale said. "That back door is probably locked. Here." He tossed something to Matt. It jingled in his fist when he caught it. A key ring. "The big one is the key you're looking for. Just leave them in the shop when you go."

  "Any message for Abbey if I see her?"

  "Give her the keys. She'll know what it means." Dale put the car in drive and wheeled slowly out of the parking lot. A quick left and the lawman was gone, leaving Matt alone in the back of Abbey's Antiques with the keys to the store.

  He let himself in the back, shaking his head. Dale trusted him with the keys to his wife's business, even after everything that happened. Not that there was much left in the place to steal. Matt and Abbey had pretty much cleaned the whole place out. There were still a few things that needed to be moved, but Abbey should be able to take care of them herself. She could probably even return the box truck. Most of the remaining pieces should fit in the back of her van.

  Matt stepped into the back room and walked towards the cot. His bag with all his things was still at Abbey's house, along with his ax. He'd have to wait for Abbey to show up. Sooner or later she would stop by to check on the shop, and he would try to talk to her then.

  Matt settled down to wait.

  It didn't take very long. About twenty minutes after he arrived, a pair of headlights shone in the front window of the store. They were high off the ground and far apart, just like they should be for a truck or van. Matt stood up and moved into the hallway. When the lights outside cut off, he heard the slam of the van's door. He was just about to say something when he heard another door slam, and then voices came to him from the front of the store.