All Acts Of Pleasure: A Rowan Gant Investigation

by M. R. Sellars

  “Take your coat off,” he ordered as he stripped out of his own and tossed it into a heap against the building.

  “You’re kidding,” I snipped. “You’re not happy with just fucking my wife over. Now you want to kick my ass too?”

  “Take your coat off,” he repeated, ignoring my question.

  “What for?” I demanded.

  “‘Cause, dumbass, you can swing harder if ya’ haven’t got your goddamn coat on, now take it off.”

  I reluctantly shrugged off my coat and tossed it against the building as he had done with his. Why I bothered I really didn’t know. Whether I had the coat on or not, it wasn’t going to make any difference. He had height, weight, training, and even more importantly, first hand experience over me. There was no way I could come out of this without broken bones and blood loss at the minimum. At least it was cold outside, so I guessed when I folded, I could use the parking lot as an interim full-body ice pack until the ambulance arrived.

  It’s not that I wasn’t going to defend myself, mind you, but I also wasn’t stupid. A no win situation is just that. Somebody isn’t going to win. And, I knew with absolute certainty that it was me who was in the “no” column when it came to a “win” in this instance.

  I stood there, staring back at Ben, building as much hatred as I could in hopes that I would at least get in a shot or two before he clocked me and total darkness fell upon my world. Once again, I could feel my heart hammering in my chest as the glare locked between us.

  Contrary to his instructions, not everyone had stayed inside, and there was now a small gathering of uniformed and plainclothes officers alike forming behind Ben. He didn’t seem to have a problem with it, and truth is, he probably expected the audience. Train wrecks always attract spectators, and that was pretty much what was about to happen.

  I couldn’t say for sure because I wasn’t paying very close attention to them, but something told me wagers were being made within the group. I didn’t imagine they were giving me very good odds.

  “Well, what the hell are ya’ waitin’ for?” Ben finally said. “Come on. Let’s have it!”

  “Have what?!” I snapped.

  “Come on! Take your shot!”

  “What?” I snarled. “You really expect me to throw the first punch right here in front of a bunch of cops?”

  “Everybody heard me say this is personal, right?” he called over his shoulder.

  A disjointed chorus of “yeah’s” and “whatever’s” issued from the handful of onlookers.

  “So then I guess you want me to swing first just so you’ll have a clear conscience when you beat the shit out of me?”

  “Wake up, Rowan. I’ve got no intention of hittin’ you, ya’ fuckin’ idiot! You’re the one that’s got the issues here! Now come on! You been wantin’ ta’ hit me all goddamned day, so just do it and get it over with!”

  Incredulity flowed into my voice, unevenly mixing with the anger that had already claimed the space. “You’re going to let me hit you?”

  “Ain’t that what I just said?”

  “And you aren’t going to hit me back?”

  “I am if ya’ don’t hurry the fuck up and do it!” he shot back. “Now come on!”

  I didn’t wait for him to repeat the invitation again.

  CHAPTER 11:

  “Feel better now?” Ben asked, following the question with a hard groan.

  “A little,” I said, inspecting the ends of my fingers where they protruded from beneath a stained cloth. “I don’t think it’s broken.”

  We were currently parked in a booth back inside the diner, him positioned so that he was facing the door and me on the opposite side of the chipped and uneven table. The burgers from the sack were sitting before him, still folded neatly into their paper wrappers. He hadn’t touched them except to pull them from the bag before sending it across the street with one of the other officers.

  At this point, I wasn’t entirely sure if he was going to eat them or just look at them longingly, as he was still holding an ice-filled dishcloth pressed against the side of his face. Of course, I wasn’t in much better shape considering that I had its frigid twin wrapped around my hand.

  After a moment he grunted. “Yeah, well I wasn’t talkin’ ‘bout your hand.”

  “Oh, you mean…” I replied, pantomiming a right cross.

  “Uh-huh.”

  “Truth?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Right now I’m still thinking about it.”

  “That’s fuckin’ great,” he huffed, voice brimming with sarcasm. “So much for takin’ one on the chin.”

  “How about you?” I asked.

  “Hey, I’m not the one with the issues.”

  “Okay, but I meant your jaw.”

  “Oh…hurts like a sonofabitch.”

  While the crux of my own pain was localized dead center on the knuckles, it was still radiating up my forearm, past my elbow, and stabbing into my shoulder at odd intervals. Much to my surprise, the explosion of rage had somehow served to negate my inherent clumsiness; so, as it turned out, I couldn’t have landed a punch any squarer onto Ben’s jaw if I had mapped the angle and trajectory with precision instruments.

  Of course, in addition to that, not really knowing for sure that he wasn’t going to retaliate once I struck, I had gone for broke with that first swing, putting everything I could muster behind it—hatred, anger, strength, and weight. The problem was, as much as it actually ended up hurting him, for me it had still been pretty much like I had slammed my fist into a brick wall. At least, that’s how it felt to my throbbing hand.

  He squinted back at me with one eye, reaching up and working his jaw with his right hand while still keeping the ice pack pressed against it with his left.

  “Jeezus, white man…” he half-groaned. “Where the hell’d ya’ learn ta’ punch like that anyway?”

  “You, as I recall.”

  “Oh yeah…” he muttered.

  We sat in silence for a short span then I asked, “So what do we do now?”

  “That’s up ta’ you, Row,” he answered with a sigh. “I’ve given ya’ all I got. If you wanna keep hatin’ me then there’s nothin’ more I can do about it.”

  “It’s not that I want to, Ben,” I offered.

  “Coulda fooled me.”

  “Look…My head’s not in a very good place right now. I’m sorry.”

  “Yeah, I can tell. You talk ta’ Helen?”

  “Yeah,” I grunted. “She told me you thought you were doing us a favor.”

  He gave his head a shake. “I did, but I’m not talkin’ bout that. I wanna know have ya’ talked to ‘er about you? About what’s goin’ on inside your head.”

  “A little.”

  “A little ain’t enough, Row.”

  “Yeah, I know,” I agreed. “But there will be time for that once I clear Felicity.”

  “How’re you gonna do that?” he asked.

  “I don’t know yet.”

  “Well, I gotta tell ya’, Kemosabe. I don’t either, ‘cause no matter how ya’ slice it, it don’t look good.”

  “Uh-huh. That’s all I seem to be hearing from you, my attorney, and everyone else.”

  “Sorry. Just bein’ honest.”

  “Are you telling me that even you think she’s guilty?”

  He closed his eyes and shook his head, waiting a measured beat before answering. “I don’t want to, but…”

  I waited for him to finish the sentence, however, he simply allowed his voice to trail off.

  “But what, Ben?” I finally asked. “Can you honestly say that you think Felicity is a killer?”

  “Under different circumstances, no.”

  “So what’s so different about the circumstances now?”

  “The cards just ain’t fallin’ in her favor, Row.”

  “Last I recall you had nothing other than circumstantial evidence at best.”

  “I’m afraid it’s gotten a little more complicated.�
�

  “Complicated how?”

  “I can’t really get into it, Row.”

  “Damn you, Ben,” I spat in a low voice. “Don’t keep doing this. You can’t dangle that shit in front of me then clam up all over again. Tell me what’s going on.”

  He looked at me with a pained expression that definitely wasn’t a by-product of the ache in his jaw and then reached up with his free hand to rub his neck.

  “What the hell,” he muttered. “They’ve prob’ly hit ‘er with it by now anyway. The hair samples from the scenes matched with…”

  I immediately cut him off, countering what he was going to say. “…I already told you there’s a logical explanation for that.”

  “Let me finish…” he held out his hand to stop me. “They didn’t just match the samples from the two scenes here. They also measured up with hairs lifted from a homicide in Myrtle Beach that happened around a year ago.”

  Now I knew what the evidence was Jackie had mentioned earlier.

  I offered a cold rebuttal. “A couple of hairs aren’t conclusive, Ben. Even I know that. So does your crime lab. That’s thin and they know it.”

  “You’re right, they aren’t,” he agreed. “As far as just comparison goes. But when ya’ combine ‘em with a DNA match, they suddenly take on a lot more weight.”

  “So, you’re telling me Felicity’s DNA matches to evidence found at a crime scene in South Carolina?”

  “And the two homicides here. Yeah, I’m afraid so. That’s the word anyway.”

  “That’s ludicrous.”

  “Maybe so, but from what I’m hearin’ it’s still a fact.”

  I shook my head and stated flatly, “Well, there’s a simple explanation for that too. It’s a mistake.”

  “I wish it was, Row. But, I asked around. After they ran the two here, they sent samples to Washington. What I got told was the Feebs ran ‘em three times. Plus, they got the sample direct from Myrtle Beach and ran that comparison, not us.”

  “I don’t care,” I spat. “They’re still wrong.”

  “Look, Rowan, I don’t wanna believe it either.”

  “Then don’t.”

  He sighed and cleared his throat then sat back against the seat in the booth, regarding me silently. He tossed the ice pack onto the table then gingerly pressed his fingers along his jaw line, wincing slightly but remaining silent.

  “She didn’t do it, Ben,” I appealed once more.

  “Okay, Row,” he spread his hands out in front of him in mock surrender. “Who did then?”

  “I don’t know, but I’m damn sure going to find out.”

  “How?”

  “To start with, I’m going to track down a Lwa.”

  “Row…” he shook his head. “Listen, I know you’re convinced this evil spirit Voodoo thing has got somethin’ to do with this…”

  “And you aren’t?”

  “I dunno. Not quite like you are, I don’t think.”

  “Well, were there signs of a Voodoo ritual at the crime scene in Myrtle Beach?” I demanded.

  Based on my earlier conversation with the young woman at the university in Louisiana, I knew it was a safe bet his answer would be yes. Still, I didn’t want to show my hand just yet. I needed for him to tell me himself.

  “That’s not the point, Row…”

  “There were, weren’t there?”

  “Yeah, there was, but so what? They’re just gonna say that connects it with the Hobbes murder here. And that’s not ta’ mention the fact that there was plenty of evidence that the whole kinky sex thing was involved.”

  “It does connect them, Ben,” I replied. “But, you’ve still got the wrong woman. I don’t know how many times I have to say it—Felicity did NOT do this.”

  “Row, are you forgettin’ what she did to that asshole she picked up in the club?”

  “She didn’t kill him.”

  “Yeah, well she damn near did.”

  “She was possessed at the time. You know that.”

  “I know you keep sayin’ it, but dammit, Row, it doesn’t make it true.”

  “So now you’re calling me a liar?”

  “No, what I’m really tryin’ ta’ say is so what? I wanna believe ya’, but come on…how’re ya’ gonna prove she was possessed?”

  “Like I said, by finding the Lwa.”

  “And then what? You gonna have a nice chat with it and convince it to confess? Somethin’ tells me even you ain’t that good at the hocus-pocus, Kemosabe.”

  “This Lwa is either a personal ancestor or someone who ended up on an altar by mistake, Ben. If I can track down the Lwa, then I’ve tracked down the real killer.”

  “Do I hafta remind you that we can’t arrest an evil spirit? Not to mention that you’re never gonna get a court ta’ listen to ya’ with a story like that.”

  “I don’t mean the spirit itself. What I’m saying is the Lwa needs a corporeal being in order to manifest physical actions on this plane.”

  “Do what?”

  “It needs a body. It has to possess someone in order to commit the murders.”

  “Yeah, well, I hate ta’ tell ya’ this but you just got finished tellin’ me that it possessed Firehair. Ain’t ya’ kinda diggin’ your own hole for her with that approach?”

  “Hers was a collateral possession, Ben. Felicity doesn’t practice Voodoo. Hell, she doesn’t know any more about it than I did when this all started. No…this Lwa is sitting on an altar somewhere, and the practitioner who belongs to it is your killer.”

  “That’s a great theory, Row, even if it is all Twilight Zone and shit…but, even if ya’ could get a judge ta’ listen to ya’, you’re still forgettin’ one thing.”

  “What?”

  “The DNA. It’s the smokin’ gun that puts Firehair at all three scenes. I dunno how you’re gonna get around that, even if ya’ do find this whacked out ghost you’re chasin’.”

  “I still say they’re wrong, Ben,” I insisted.

  “Row, I told ya’ they ran it three times.”

  “So maybe they got the samples mixed up.”

  “That’s not real likely.”

  “Maybe not, but it’s possible.”

  “Yeah, well anything’s possible, but you’re grabbin’ at straws here.”

  “Well, the only other explanation is that someone purposely tampered with the evidence.”

  “Actually, the other explanation is that she’s…”

  “Don’t say it,” I snarled.

  “But…”

  “I said, DON’T SAY IT.”

  “Yeah fine… So, what you’re tryin’ ta’ say is that…well…‘you know who’ is the one who did this?” He deliberately used the verbal evasion in place of Albright’s name. Considering the location, and recent shifts within the department, he couldn’t really be sure about the exact loyalties of all of the other cops in the diner. An outright mention of her wasn’t what you could term a stellar idea; of course, anyone who might be listening and knew my history could have figured out exactly whom he meant.

  The truth was, Ben had already taken a huge risk simply by being seen talking to me at such length. Once word made it up the chain of command, he was probably going to have hell to pay, especially considering that I now suspected he had done more than just call in markers to keep himself involved in this case. In fact, he probably owed more favors than I wanted to know about.

  “Can you think of anyone else with a reason?” I asked.

  “Jeez, Row, I know you two are at odds, but to go so far as to frame Felicity?” He shook his head. “That’s pushin’ a whole ‘nother envelope.”

  “Are you forgetting she tried to use me as bait for Eldon Porter? And, as I recall she was actually overheard saying that if I got killed in the process…what was it? Something like, too bad, so sad?”

  “Yeah, but she had a way outta that. She could get caught real easy if she tampered with evidence. Besides, like I said, there were tests done at the Feeb’s lab in DC
anyway.”

  “So? The evidence still originated here.”

  “Yeah, but not the evidence from Myrtle Beach,” he reminded me. “It went from them to DC. Never even saw Saint Louis, much less her.”

  “Speaking of Myrtle Beach, how did that even get into the mix to begin with?”

  “NCIC hit,” he explained. “The bondage aspect along with the ritual stuff. When our two homicides got entered into the computer, that’s what got spit back out.”

  “Great.”

  “Yeah, well, I didn’t wanna tell ya’ this, but you’re prob’ly gonna find out sooner or later. The homicide in South Carolina wasn’t the only hit.”

  “What are you saying?” I knew full well what he had just implied, but I couldn’t stop the words from tumbling out of my mouth.

  “NCIC returned seven other unresolved cases in various states that have similar characteristics, datin’ back as far as oh-three. The kinky shit, the mutilation, and in a couple of ‘em some of the Voodoo stuff…” He allowed his voice to trail off as he ran through the list.

  “Are they trying to say Felicity committed all of these murders?”

  He nodded. “They’re definitely lookin’ into it. Right now Myrtle Beach is the only department to provide physical evidence that links. That, and they can positively place her there in the city at the time of the murder from the subpoenaed airline records.”

  “Dammit…” I muttered.

  “Just so ya’ know, they’re followin’ up on all her travelin’. Even if they don’t get any more matches with physical evidence from the other states, if they can show that she was in those cities around the times of the other murders…Well, circumstantial or not, put it together with what they already got, an’ it’s gonna make a major impression on a jury… And, it ain’t gonna be a good one, Row.”

  I pondered what he had just said and felt my blood run cold. Instead of getting answers that would help me clear Felicity, I was just getting more and more signs pointing directly to her guilt. However, they were all detours I didn’t intend to follow. I knew my wife was innocent; I just had to prove it to everyone else. Given what Ben had told me over the past few minutes, it was obvious that I needed to do so very soon.