by Anne Hagan
“You forgot ‘with no resources whatsoever’.” I scowled back at her. “I suppose I could go and hang out at Muddy Misers, drink locally brewed beer and hit up cutesy college aged waitresses about whether or not they’ve seen a breaking Amish girl...”
It was Mel’s turn to scowl.
Chapter 7 – An Ex Comes a Calling
Friday, June 13th, 2014
I looked at the calendar on the wall in Mel’s den. It was Friday, Friday the 13th. Of all of the days for me to have to make a major decision...
I’m not normally a superstitious type but I was unnerved by the whole life changing decision choice I was about to relay to the powers that be at the U.S. Customs service and it being a day long thought of as mystical and frightening in American folk lore wasn’t helping my frame of mind. I kept taking deep breaths and blowing them out to try and calm my nerves. Normally, I would pace the floor but that option was effectively ruled out for me. Instead, I just bounced my good leg nervously.
Once it was 8:00 Central time, I knew everyone would be entrenched in their work in the Chicago Field Office. I dialed the switchboard and asked to speak to the Director. I was put through to his assistant and, after several minutes on hold, I was transferred to the man himself.
“Alvin Royer.”
“Director, it’s Special Agent Dana Rossi.”
“Yes; my assistant informed me that it was you. Are you calling with your decision?”
“Yes Director. I’ve decided to leave the Customs Service. I’ll be accepting the offer of medical disability and a settlement from the Secret Service.”
Two hours a half dozen phone calls and pass offs later, my career with Customs was effectively all but extinguished. I had an agent to brief up to take over the mop up on my last big case and some paperwork to sign but I was otherwise a free woman...free, and a nervous wreck.
When my cell phone rang about 11:30 local time and I saw the Chicago area code pop up, I assumed it was someone from the field office calling me again.
“Agent Rossi,” I answered.
“Dana Rossi?”
“Yes. Who is this?” The female voice on the line was familiar but I just couldn’t place it.
“Dana it’s Terri; Terri Dearing.”
What the fuck? I hung up the phone. Terri Dearing, my ex-girlfriend, was the last person on earth I wanted to talk to. Why the hell is she calling me after all of these years and who the hell gave her this number?
I was incensed. My anger boiled over when the phone rang again and the same area code and exchange popped up on the display. I punched the answer button and raised the phone to my ear but I was shaking with so much rage I wasn’t able to say anything.
“Dana? Dana are you there? We got cut off.” That was Terri alright; she hadn’t changed a bit! She had no idea that I had actually hung up on her. “I need to talk to you. It’s important!”
Important to who? Not to me! Nothing you could ever say would be important to me! I regained enough control over my senses that I was able to reply, “I don’t know why you’re calling me or why on earth you would ever think that I would want to talk to you. I don’t. Don’t call me ever again! Lose this number!” I was screaming at her but I didn’t care.
I hung up again before she could respond. I wish the call had come over an old fashioned phone that had a receiver I could have slammed down into the cradle. Of all the nerve on all the days...
I thought about turning the phone off but it was my primary line to Customs and to Mel, both of whom might need to reach me. I was torn about what to do.
My mind raced back to a time, more than three years ago, when I had last dealt with Terri:
Our relationship had been a mistake from the start but only a few years of distance and a little hindsight had shown me that.
I had started out my adult life trying to be straight. It took several years of marriage to a man to show me that I wasn’t fooling anyone, especially myself. My ex-husband Nate and I parted amicably enough but I struggled mightily after that with my sexual orientation.
Terri was the first woman I had a real – if you could call it that – relationship with. Oh, I’d been on dates and I had other lesbian friends but there was no one I had connected with romantically until she came into my life. Once we became an “official” couple, she instantly took charge of everything that centered on “us” as a couple and she began to monitor my every move. Terri was the epitome of a control freak.
Getting away from her had meant giving up most of my friends and giving up “our” home and all of its contents. I’d fared better in my actual divorce. To add insult to injury, I was fired from a security job that I loved because of her venomous attacks to get some sort of revenge on me. Upper management just didn’t want to deal with the antics of a scorned lover gone certifiable and I didn’t blame them.
I retreated for a while and licked my wounds. During a trip home to see my folks in Western PA, I ran into an old high school friend who was working for Customs. After talking with him, I applied and, after several go rounds of questions about why I was let go from my former employer, I was finally hired. The rest, as they say, is history. It was only an ironic twist of fate that got me assigned to the Chicago Field Office but, frankly, I’d spent little of my time with Customs in the actual office and I didn’t venture into any of my old haunts from life with either of my exes, Nate or Terri, when I did.
I was jolted from my reverie by the buzzing of my phone. This time Terri was texting me.
Terri: Dana, we HAVE to talk. I’m in trouble and you’re the only one who can help me.
That’s really rich, her wanting my help, I thought. I didn’t bother to answer her. There was just no way I was ever going to give her the time of day ever again. She could ‘go fly a kite’, as my mother is oh so fond of saying.
A few minutes of blissful quiet passed by but I was on edge the whole time waiting for the next missive from her. When it came, I almost fell out of Mel’s rolling desk chair.
Terri: I’m in Zanesville. I need to meet with you.
“What the hell! Why is she in Zanesville? How did she know where to find me?” I was yelling out loud, to no one in particular. “That tears it!”
I texted her back; Me: Why are you in Zanesville?
Her reply came quickly; Terri: I really need your help.
Me: How did you know where to find me?
Terri: A mutual friend told me.
Me: Doubtful! You got all of ‘our’ friends when we split up.
Terri: Don’t be bitter. You know that isn’t true.
“Yep, that’s the Terri I remember; still totally lacking in self-awareness. Everything is about her and nothing is her fault,” I said aloud and then, in my head, Look at me; she has me talking to myself already!
I was disgusted with myself. I laid my phone down, positioned my crutches and hobbled off to the kitchen for a glass of tea followed by a breath of fresh air outside on the deck.
After 10 minutes of trying unsuccessfully to clear my head, I returned to the den and my phone. It was virtually blowing up with texts from my ex.
Terri: Are you there?
Terri: I really do need to talk to you. It’s urgent.
Terri: Dana, I’m not leaving Zanesville until we talk!
Terri: Dana, I’m serious. This is life or death for me.
Terri: Some people are trying to kill me!
That last text got my attention. Terri had done serious financial and emotional damage to me in the past. I’d probably wished her dead myself at least a thousand times. Rather than dealing with all of the mess she’d made of my life and my head, I’d finally managed to block it all out and move on. Maybe she was being dramatic; maybe she wasn’t, but she did have me curious.
Me: Kill you?
Terri: Yes. I’m serious!
I shook my head at what I was about to do; Me: I’ll meet with you ONE TIME. NO PROMISES!
Meeting with her went against all of my better
judgment but she’d come all the way to Ohio thinking I was the one who could help her out of a death warrant, for some odd reason, and I intended to find out what that reason was.
Terri texted me again to say that she was staying in a rented camper cabin near Dillon Dam on Dillon Lake just northwest of Zanesville. There was no way I was going to meet with her at her little camper cabin off in the woods somewhere. That wasn’t going to happen. I had no idea what kind of hornet’s nest I’d be hobbling into and I just didn’t trust her.
I thought for a minute about potential public meeting places that I was familiar with in the area. There just weren’t many but then it occurred to me that the little park Mel and I had talked in earlier in the week would be a perfect, neutral place to meet.
I looked at the clock. From here, I could be there in 15 minutes. That should put me there before Terri who was coming further and who would have to find it. I might just be able to catch a glimpse of the Amish runaway if she kept to the same sort of schedule and I got a move on. Maybe I can turn this huge negative into a little bit of a positive...
I texted Terri the name of the little park and I left it at that. If she never found me, it wasn’t my problem.
Chapter 8 – Meet Up
After putting my crutches in the trunk, I very gingerly worked my way into the driver’s seat of my car. I didn’t want to show Terri any signs of weakness on my part. I’d play my obvious limp by ear when I got to the park if I had to do any walking in her view. My hope was to avoid it at all and not do any weight bearing.
I pulled out of Morelville onto SR 45. It was a beautiful day and, were it not for my mission; I might actually have enjoyed the drive. I passed several cars headed in the opposite direction coming into the area. They were loaded with people probably planning a weekend in the Blue Rock State Park. I envied them for their coming adventures and for the mobility they likely had to enjoy them.
Mentally, I shook myself then I said out loud, “Stop wallowing in misery!” There I go talking to myself again! I just want to get this over with and get back home...
I glanced in my rearview mirror. A silver Honda Accord was several car lengths behind me. In any place but this one, it would hardly be noticeable but out here, in the land of American made pickups and SUVs, it stuck out like a sore thumb. The car was too far behind me for me to get a good look at the driver or at the license plate. Oh well...probably nothing. I jumped back into my own head.
I worked my way north across country to SR 146 and took that into Zanesville. It was the route I was the most familiar with and it would put me not far from the park. Another quick glance in my rearview mirror showed that the Accord was still behind me, even after the turn onto 146. “Odd, but maybe there are two of us headed into Zanesville from the middle of nowhere.” And there I go again! I really have to stop that!
The Accord kept the same distance from me the entire time. If I slowed, it slowed. If I sped up, it sped up. I was sure I was being followed but I didn’t know why and I sure didn’t like it. I floored it and sped toward Zanesville.
When I reached the outskirts of town, I had a dilemma. I wasn’t that familiar with the area. I only knew one bridge to take to get me across the Muskingum River to the park. Making a quick decision, I made a few quick jukes to drive around a couple of city blocks. If I could lose my suspected tail, I could get on the one bridge that I was familiar with and get to Putnam Hill quickly...hopefully before Terri. The Accord seemed like it was far enough behind me that I could shake it if the driver really was tailing me.
After a quick small loop and then a bigger one to watch for the other car, I was confident I was finally free of it. I crossed the bridge and drove north to the park. My tail seemed to be gone.
The park was a little busier on a summer Friday afternoon than it had been on Monday when Mel and I were there but it wasn’t packed. I saw that the table where we’d sat on Monday was free and there were few people nearby. It would work for a private discussion in full public view.
I parked and hobbled slowly toward the table, keeping as much of my weight off of my left leg as possible. I realized quickly that I probably should have used my crutches. The 20 yards to the table felt like a thousand by the time I reached it.
Once I was seated and I’d caught my breath, I pulled out my cell phone. There were no new messages from Terri. I noted that the time was now nearly 12:30; about the time we’d seen the Amish girl on Monday. I scanned the walking path for her but I didn’t see her.
I called Mel’s cell. After the potential tail, I thought it would be wise to clue her in on what I was doing. She didn’t answer. I left a brief message letting her know about the tail and where I was now but I didn’t say anything more only because I really didn’t know what all to tell her until I heard Terri out.
I felt safe meeting with Terri in a public place even after what had happened on the way over. Me thinking I was being followed was probably just me being silly and thinking crazy thoughts anyway after listening to Terri. Since the park was right in Zanesville, I knew help wouldn’t be too far away if I did have a problem.
Movement caught my eye to my right. A young woman stood up from a bench inside a gazebo, closed a book and started down the gazebo steps. It was the girl Mel suspected was Hannah Yoder.
My luck is changing!
Hannah walked past my table and out across the parking lot behind me toward the street, much as she had on Monday. When she reached the road she turned left and continued walking to where it dead ended in a traffic circle. She went through the trees past the dead end and was gone. I knew she’d come out by a couple of businesses and that Muddy Misers, where Mel and I had eaten Monday, was just across the road from those. There were no homes in that direction in close walking distance. Could she be working in one of those businesses through there?
“What are you looking at?”
I startled and about jumped through my skin. I’d been so intent on watching after Hannah, I hadn’t seen Terri come up behind me herself from the parking lot.
I didn’t answer her; I just looked her over. She was never thin but she was at least 30 pounds heavier now than when I’d last seen her a few years or so ago. Her short, sandy colored hair was graying at the temples. Thinking back, I remembered that she was a half dozen years older than me which made her about 40 now. The graying made a little sense but the haggard look on her face was new. Terri had always had such a baby smooth face.
“It’s good to see you Dana. You look well.” She took a seat opposite me without asking.
“Terri.”
She looked around quickly. “So, are you staying near here?”
“No.”
She leaned across the table, “One word answers, huh?”
“Look Terri, you called this meeting. I don’t want to be here at all so can we just cut to the chase?”
“Why so hostile Dana? I’m the one in trouble here. What did I ever do to you, after all?”
I sucked in a deep breath and slowly counted to ten as I let it out. It just wasn’t worth getting into it with her. I knew I shouldn’t have come!
“I’m sorry to trouble you but you’re the only one I can turn to with my problem. I really don’t know what else to do.” Her voice lost its edge and began to tremble as she spoke. When I didn’t respond, she continued; “Do you remember Janice?”
“Janice Wright?” I nodded.
“Yes. After we split up,” she waggled her finger back and forth between the two of us, “she and I dated briefly. She was working HR for Harrah’s Joliet...the casino then.” She looked at me for confirmation.
I shrugged. “I guess. I don’t remember.”
“No, she was. I had some, ah, issues with my employer at the time and we parted ways.”
I just bet!
“Anyway, Janice hooked me up with a blackjack dealer job at the casino.”
“Mmm, I’ll bet that was convenient.”
“I know what you’re thinking but it wasn
’t like that. Things didn’t go far between us because Janice ended up getting a promotion. She moved out to Las Vegas. She was gone before I even finished my dealer training.”
“I see. So what does this have to do with the trouble you’re in?”
“I’m getting to that. Things went great at Harrah’s for a while, see. I really liked my job. I made good money at it too...” She trailed off.
“Made? Did you quit?”
She shook her head. “I was asked to resign.”
“You were fired?”
“Not fired. I resigned.”
“Are you welcome back to Harrah’s?”
Her chin dropped. Her next statement was said so low I almost didn’t catch it, “I’m not welcome in the casino industry.”
“Spill it Terri! Tell me what happened.”
She drew in a deep breath and continued, “I was doing great as a dealer. A pit boss job was opening up. I was training up for that. Everything was going great and then I met Aggie a few months ago.”
“Aggie?”
“Yeah. I doubt you know her. Neither did I. Me and a couple of the other dealers, we would sometimes go out to a...a club in Chicago and hang out after hours, you know. A private club.”
“A gay club?”
“Sort of.”
“Define ‘sort of’.”
She hesitated for a minute and then admitted, “It was a private club for anonymous hook ups.”
I wasn’t shocked. I knew such places existed even though I’d never been in one. They weren’t my scene but I could see the appeal they would have for a control freak like Terri. I’d be willing to bet she got her kicks there with a little BDSM role playing.
“So you met Aggie at this club?”
“She was a pretty little bar fly that hung around in the lounge a lot. She didn’t ah...um...use the private rooms all the time.”