Unquiet Ghosts
Page 28
“It ain’t Alcatraz, sonny. It’s a secure-care home. You got company ID?”
“Yes, ma’am.” Tetchy. He showed her his plastic-encased ID.
Agnes scrutinized the ID as if it might be a counterfeit fifty. When she seemed satisfied at last, she gave him a look. “Never seen you here before.”
“Only started four months ago.”
“Like it?”
“Love it.” He grinned. “Just show me where the equipment is, and I’ll be gone faster than a set of stainless rims at a rap concert.”
The equipment was in a back room. Agnes led him in, then left him to it.
Babek checked through the system, observing the rooms and the layout, then took a copy of the hard-drive data. He tapped on the keyboard for a few minutes, scrolling through the program code, and smiled to himself. Four years at MIT on a scholarship, and stuff like this was easy cheese.
He slid a flash drive into the socket, tapped a few more keys, and waited while his program downloaded.
Babek heard talking and stepped back, peered out toward the reception area. Agnes had just wandered off down one of the hallways with a nurse, some files in her hand. He saw his chance, popped on a plastic surgical glove he took from a pack in his case, plucked the folded handwritten note from one of the case’s pockets, and slid it into the “IN” tray on Agnes’s desk.
He moved back into the equipment room and removed the glove, and when the download was done, he slid out the flash drive and popped it into his pocket. To make sure he’d left no prints, he cleaned everything with a couple of alcohol wipes. He was clicking his tool kit shut when Agnes came in.
“How’s it going?”
“Done and dusted, ma’am.”
“Gee, that was fast.”
“Yeah, Speedy Gonzales, that’s me.” Babek regarded the woman’s grotesque, out-of-date mullet hairstyle. You still saw them out in the hillbilly sticks, as if some folks believed the style—if you could call it a style—would make a comeback. It made Babek want to puke. “You get your hair done recently, ma’am?”
Agnes took it as a compliment, fluffing the back of her mullet with her hand. “Why, no, I didn’t.”
You really ought to think about it, Babek pondered, but then he smiled. “Looks great.”
68
* * *
They say that sometimes when you’re about to die, you see a tunnel of bright light.
Me, I saw a tunnel of light when I woke.
A long strip of blazing, neon-intense white light. And I heard a growling and grunting noise, like a wild animal—a dog, a bear, a hog, maybe. I couldn’t tell which.
No one ever said anything about the noise or the pain at the end of the tunnel, but that’s what I heard and felt as I blinked and came around. I shook my head. Big mistake. Excruciating pain stung my eyeballs like an electric shock.
It made we want to throw up. I blinked and retched.
But all I felt on my tongue was bitter-tasting bile. I hadn’t eaten all day, barely sipped some coffee, my stomach empty.
I tried to wipe my lips, and that was when I realized I was tied down, lying in a bunk, my wrists and feet anchored to it with coils of blue nylon rope. I swallowed, blinked again. The pain started to ebb back into my skull. I closed my eyes to relieve it and opened them again slowly.
I still felt ill.
My white-lit tunnel turned out to be a white neon strip light overhead. I could feel its electric warmth. A weird thought sprouted in my mind, one of those almost out-of-body thoughts we sometimes have but that make no sense: Where was the red-velvet cake? Who cared.
The floor was swaying beneath me.
More rocking than swaying, and then I realized I wasn’t just in a bunk—I was in a boat’s cabin. It was speeding forward, waves slapping beneath the hull. The growling noise was no wild animal. I recognized a coarse engine throb somewhere to the rear.
I looked around. A bare, cramped desk and a chair, a washbasin, and another bunk. A ladder of steps led up to a worn, varnished cabin door that rattled with the engine throb. I creased my forehead, trying to clear the fog. The nauseating pain erupted again and then slowly ebbed away. The blow really hurt—it was hurting now but not as badly as the awareness that my own son had done this to me.
Sean could have killed me. But could I really be certain it was Sean in that split second when I saw the kid’s face? I remembered the boy’s features; he’d be about the same age as Sean. And those boyish looks were still the same, just more grown, more adult.
I tried to replay the face in my mind’s eye. Pale-blue eyes. Blond hair but darker blond than I remembered. Sallow skin. A dimpled chin. A button nose, bigger now but still the same nose, I was sure of it.
Or was my mind playing tricks? Had I merely imagined Sean’s face? A face I loved so much, had soothed on so many restless nights, when a toothache hurt or a fever raged. A face I loved to calm and kiss, no matter if he was loving or throwing a tantrum or too grumpy and restless to sleep.
I had my doubts, but a mother knows. A mother could probably still recognize a child she hadn’t seen in thirty years—or a lifetime.
More than just an umbilical cord ties you to a child. The child is your essence, the bond that ties you to things of the spirit as much as the flesh. The very thought that Sean might want to cause me harm made me want to cry. I felt the sobs growing within me again. A kind of panic. Why did he hurt me?
I felt certain that I didn’t imagine Sean hitting me. But clouded by pain, my mind began to succumb to doubt. My own son would never harm me. But my own husband had harmed me, so wasn’t it possible that Sean might?
Anger and confusion gave me the strength to try to struggle to my feet. I managed to touch the bunk edge with my fingers and tried awkwardly to push myself up, but the nylon ropes bit into my skin, and I collapsed back. My strength drained from me, every muscle weak.
I heard a creaking noise. Then a bolt scraping. Above me, the cabin door slapped open. A gust of wind blew in a dagger of ice-cold air. I shivered, caught a glimpse of glittering night sky, a spray of stars in a dark universe.
A single brown boot slapped onto the first rung of the ladder, then another, and a pair of feet came thundering down the steps.
I recognized the man’s figure even before I saw his face. Heavier and older, wearing a black woolen beanie, his hair graying at the sides, but there was no mistaking those sepia-brown eyes and that handsome face.
Jack.
69
* * *
I struggled to get up again.
“Stay right where you are.”
Jack’s speech sounded slurred. I could smell alcohol. He wore dark brown cords, scuffed black working boots, a heavy blue twill shirt. The black beanie was pulled tight down on his head, and graying tufts of hair stuck out.
He took a leather sheath from his right pocket and slid out a ferocious-looking Bowie hunting knife. I had a terrifying thought. Did Jack get drunk to muster the courage to kill me?
He laid the knife on the table, then yanked off the hat and ran a hand over his hair—longer, greasy, and bedraggled. He pulled up the chair and sat.
“We need to talk, Kath.”
I saw a flash of anger in his eyes. It seemed so absurd. Jack, angry at me? My rage felt searing-hot. “Your first words to me in eight years, and you sound like we need to mend a lovers’ tiff. That’s got to be the understatement of the year.”
“Still lippy, aren’t you?” He tried to smile, seemed to struggle with it, the corners of his mouth barely lifting.
I was seething. I was looking at a man I knew but didn’t know. He was older, his face weathered, his brow more deeply wrinkled. His gorgeous brown eyes and high cheekbones would always mark him out as handsome, but he looked like a man who was weary, tired of life or maybe of running.
His right hand reac
hed out to examine the back of my skull. “How’s your head?”
I recoiled. “What does it matter to you?”
“Some things never change.”
“Meaning?”
“Your feisty temper.”
My eyes flicked to the knife. “Are you going to kill me?”
“Now, why would I kill you?”
“I guess you did that already by taking my children from me, right?”
Jack’s mouth tightened, and he gave a tired, drunken sigh.
My bound hands balled into fists. “I have no idea what you intend for me. All I know is that there are a whole bunch of questions you need to answer. The biggest one of all is why you would disappear with our children. Why, Jack? You survived the crash and vanished—you and Sean and Amy. I know that. I just don’t understand why. Why you threw our lives away. Was it the stuff in the aluminum briefcase?”
His eyes widened. “How do you know about that?”
“The cops have it. They found it at the site.”
“It wasn’t there.” His mouth creased in a grim expression. “I wouldn’t have left it.”
“No, I guess you wouldn’t. All that money. That priceless artifact. What happened? Couldn’t find it?”
His teeth clenched. “I went back to the site many times, looking for it. Never could find it. Where was it?”
“Lodged in some rocky undergrowth, about a hundred feet from the aircraft. Did you steal it, Jack? What else did you steal? Apart from my life, that is?”
He mulled that one over, but after a few seconds of clenching and unclenching his jaw, he still didn’t answer.
“They found a notebook of yours in the case. And the word Red written on a page. The same word they found on that discarded envelope when my mom died. Or is that just a coincidence?”
No response.
“Are you going to answer my questions or just look at me like you don’t care?”
“I’ll plead the Fifth.”
“Why?”
He shrugged and finally said, “I mean you no harm. Really, I don’t, Kath.”
“I hope you’re telling me the truth. Because I figure I’ve had my fill of lies from you.”
He eased the knife back into the sheath. “I had it in mind to cut you free, but I have a feeling it’s better to keep you tied up for now. It’ll be safer, less hassle.”
“Safer for whom?”
“Everyone concerned.”
“Meaning my family?”
He slipped the sheathed knife into his pocket and glanced at his watch. “It won’t be for much longer. Then I’ll explain.”
As angry as I felt, my heart was soaring. My children were alive. I longed to see them again, to hold them. I felt my eyes become wet. Maybe because I experienced such an overwhelming surge of joy now that I knew I would see them again, my fury seemed to slacken.
“You know what I can’t figure out? You sound angry, Jack. It should be me who’s angry. Why are you?”
He still didn’t reply, just gave me a long, unsettling stare, then turned to go.
I didn’t want him to go. I desperately wanted hard answers. “I don’t know what’s worse. Seeing your face again or knowing Sean could have killed me. He sure has a cute way of saying hello to his mother after eight years.”
“He didn’t mean to. He didn’t know who you were.”
“My own son? It was Sean I saw, wasn’t it?”
“Yeah, it was Sean. He overreacted. It’s complicated. At first, we thought you were the police. I was in a bedroom down the hall when we heard you knock.”
I stared at him in despair. “How could you kill them? How could you be so brutal, so despicable? And why? Were you afraid they’d talk? What about DJ’s children? Are they dead, too?”
Jack just looked at me. He had that kind of faraway look in his eyes that I remembered so well, the one that told me something disturbing was going on inside his head.
“But then, I guess you did that in Iraq, didn’t you, Jack? Killed innocent men, women, and children. Like that massacre at Red Rock. Did killing just come easily to you?”
He put a foot on the stairway. His body language, his tense manner, and his tight mouth told me he wasn’t going to answer. He plucked out a cell phone. I recognized it as mine. He tossed it onto the floor and brought his foot down hard, grinding it beneath his boot, then stomping on it. When he took his foot away, the phone was a crushed mess.
“In case you think anyone’s going to trace you, I took the battery out as soon as I found the phone in your pocket. Your signal’s dead.”
“I realize something now, Jack Hayes. I didn’t know you. In fact, I really never knew you at all, did I?”
No response.
“What about Sean?”
“You’ll see him after we dock.”
“Why not now?”
He didn’t answer the question but said, “DJ’s kids weren’t there. They must have been somewhere else.”
“What were you doing there?”
“I went to check on DJ. Do a drive-by.”
“Why?”
“He thought some people were following him. Dangerous people. And they were. My gut tells me they may be following you, too.”
“Explain.”
Jack didn’t seem to want to answer that one. “Just take my word. The likelihood is you were followed.”
“Did you kill DJ and Vera?”
“Of course not.”
“Someone did.”
“Yeah, and made it look like it could be a murder-suicide. You saw Vera? I figure she’d been tortured. It could have been made to look like DJ harmed her. But I knew DJ. He wouldn’t have harmed a hair on Vera’s head.”
“Then who killed them?”
“Long story. But my guess is, our family is next.”
I looked at him in shock.
Jack met my stare. “That’s my theory, unless we stop them. And that’s my plan. What I’ve been working on.”
“Why would our family be next?”
The boat buffeted and wobbled, almost throwing Jack off his feet. He grabbed at the bunk. “Later. I’m needed up on deck. There’s some chop on the water, and I don’t want to leave Sean on his own.” He turned, moved up the steps, and pushed open the cabin door.
“No, wait . . .”
But he didn’t.
I saw sparkling stars in the cold universe again, and then the cabin door slammed, and the bolt scraped shut.
70
* * *
Serenity Ridge, Sevierville, Tennessee
Agnes was putting down the phone when she saw the private ambulance pull up by the front door and two paramedics climb out, wearing white scrubs. One of them was pushing an empty wheelchair.
They both looked kinda A-rab. She wasn’t into A-rabs. As far as she was concerned, the U.S. government needed to backpedal the heck out of the A-rabs’ rear ends and focus on stuff closer to home.
The men came in through the front door.
The first guy smiled, sounded real pleasant. “We’ve come for a patient, Kyle Kelly, ma’am. He has a medical appointment in Knoxville.”
“Since when?”
“The appointment was made some weeks ago.”
“Yeah? Well, it ain’t on my chart. And if it ain’t on my chart, Kyle’s going nowhere. No way, José.”
“Please check again, ma’am. The hospital doesn’t usually make mistakes.”
Agnes studied her chart again and puckered her face. “Ain’t on the chart, like I said.”
“Is there anywhere else it might be?”
Agnes searched through the “IN” tray. Sometimes documents and notes got stuck in there. She flicked through a bunch of papers, was about to give up when she found the folded handwritten note. She opened it up.
It was unsigned. A clerical error, Agnes guessed.
She looked at the paramedics and picked up the desk phone. “Looks like you fellas are in business. Let me have Nurse Deesha take you to get Kyle.”
* * *
The two men were following Deesha down a hallway toward the patients’ rooms, taking their time, one of them pushing the wheelchair.
Agnes watched them from the reception desk and scratched her chin. Then she stared again at the note. It was pretty irregular. There was an official form-filling process when a patient had to leave the facility and be seen at a hospital. She studied the handwriting, but it was unfamiliar to her.
She thought of phoning the manager, but she was on vacation in Florida. The paramedics disappeared around a corner with Deesha, and Agnes’s eyes darted to the TV security monitor.
It was blank.
That nerdy guy was supposed to fix the darn thing. Now it wasn’t working. Idiot.
She picked up the note, studied it again, and slapped the page against her palm, thinking. Something bothered her. She just couldn’t figure out what. A gut feeling, maybe, certainly nothing more than that. It was the two men. What were the chances of having two A-rab paramedics. One, maybe, but two? Maybe the other guy was a beaner? But she didn’t think so. He had the same Middle Eastern look as his buddy.
She picked up the phone and called Park West Hospital. Reception put her through to a lady in X-ray appointments. “This is Agnes here at Serenity Ridge. It seems we’ve got a patient scheduled for a noon scan appointment. Can you check on that for me, please? The patient’s name is Kyle Kelly. Thanks.”
It took a few minutes, and the woman came back. “We have no appointment for a Kyle Kelly.”
Agnes felt her heartbeat quicken. “You absolutely sure?”
“Real sure, ma’am. They’re doing routine maintenance on a scanner right now. A lot of the appointments were rescheduled until later today and tomorrow.”