The Catcher in the Eye (America's Next Top Assistant Mystery Book 1)

by Lotta Smith

  I totally, completely, desperately hated to the possibility of Michael Archangel seeing my remains being dissected. Just imagining the situation was… excruciatingly mortifying! So I was a little bit on the chubby side and he knew it. But hey, isn’t it just too embarrassing to let him see my dead body getting cut open before showing him myself naked in person when I was still alive? Dying was one thing, postmortem humiliation was a totally different story.

  Would he grieve over me? Would he miss me?—I kept on wondering.

  “Ow, gawd…” I muttered. My brain had just started playing Enter Sandman. Not that I hated Metallica, but I wanted my brain to play something more calming, more serene on my exit from this world. …Such as Ave Maria.

  “Ave Maria Gratia plena—” I started singing to the tune of Schubert with Latin lyrics. Thanks to having an Opera singer faux-dad in the past, I knew the song.

  “Ave, ave dominus. Dominus tecum—”

  I wanted to say to Mom ‘Thank you’ and ‘I love you’.

  For unknown reasons, I truly, desperately missed Michael Archangel.

  Chapter 35

  “I want my assistant back.” He looked straight into my eyes.

  “Excuse me? I’m not quite following.” I tilted my head to one side. The alarm was still beeping loudly.

  “Come on, Alan. I know my assistant is trapped here against her will. If you’re 100% sure that my accusation is unfounded, why don’t you call the police?”

  Why he knew my name, I didn’t know.

  Before I got a chance to reply, he pressed on. “I’ll tell you what. You’re not calling the police because having police officers over here is not your best interest.”

  Disabling my alarm by yanking the plug out of the wall socket, he continued. “Isn’t it funny? Even your alarm system is not designated to alert third parties such as a security firm and/or the police.”

  With the alarm killed, a disturbing silence filled the space.

  He continued. “Once law enforcement people come in, they might find incriminating evidence, put two and two together, piece by piece and start wondering if they’d accused the wrong guy and let the true culprit go running loose. Is that correct, Alan?”

  “Stop treating me like a serial killer! Besides that, the so-called Eyeball Snatcher cases are already closed, with the killer, Yves the musician, killing himself and everything. Don’t you have no common sense?”

  I made my point, and he grinned. I felt cold sweat running down my back.

  “That’s interesting,” he chuckled.

  “What’s interesting?” I asked innocently, though I knew my last words should have been unsaid.

  “It’s interesting that you mentioned Eyeball Snatcher. Especially that I haven’t even uttered the word ‘eyeball’ or ‘killing’ in the first place. Isn’t it ironic, the nature of human mind, huh? The more you try to conceal something, the more your mind works on concealing, and as a result, making you focus on the thought. That’s why you mentioned Eyeball Snatcher.”

  “That’s a groundless accusation,” I said firmly. “I have nothing to do with the victims. Much less killing.”

  “Oh yeah? Then why do the crappy art pieces Alice Sinclair had in her room have your finger prints all over?” He tilted his head to one side. Besides that, did you notice that this fact contradicts your comment as having nothing to do with the victims?”

  “I’m an artist so my creations have my finger prints. Besides that, my artwork is not crappy. Shame on you.” I felt like killing him right then.

  “So, you’re Sam. Hey, we were looking for you.” He beamed.

  Maybe I should have denied ‘Sam’ being me, but I didn’t. I didn’t want to waste my time anymore with him. “That’s my artist name and just because one of homicide victims had possessed my work wouldn’t qualify as a justifiable reason to accuse me of killing. Oh, have I mentioned I don’t have your assistant here? You have no reason to accuse me of snatching her. How could you say…?”

  “Cut the crap, Alan.” He butted in before I had finished the sentence. “It’s over.”

  His confidence made me uneasy. Now his words made it clear that I needed to kill him right at the place ASAP.

  Considering the trouble of getting rid of his body, killing this guy had initially seemed burdensome. But hey, you’ve gotta do what you’ve gotta do.

  Quietly I took a deep breath and said firmly. “Stop playing with the words. I said I have nothing to do with the serial murder, and I don’t even know your assistant. It’s tragic that one of my customers had fallen victim to the serial murders, but it’s only a coincidence.”

  “Oh, speaking of a coincidence, is that a coincidence that the presumed time of death of your mother happens to overlap with the dates you stayed in London? I don’t think so. Your biological mother Kelly Dowson was found dead in London about a month ago. She died from liver cirrhosis and the time of death was estimated to be a few days before her body was found. It was quite tragic that she died alone, but that could have processed as just a death of natural causes. Except that her eyeballs were poked out and missing. So in a way, your mother was the first victim of Eyeball Snatcher.”

  “I have never met my biological mother,” I said icily.

  “That’s right, not while she was alive. By the way, Alan, let’s face it; plucking eyeballs out of women and swapping them with your mother’s eyeballs is useless.” He crossed his arms. “That kind of sick ritual only kills the wounded women instead of bringing your mother back to life.”

  I didn’t say anything. Now that he knew everything, denial didn’t seem to work.

  He continued. “I can tell that you haven’t started your sick ritual on her yet. You’re not reeking of blood. That’s good. Sparing the life of a victim tends to give the jury a good impression, Prosecutors might give you a deal.”

  “You think so?” I slumped my shoulders. “If that’s the case, I’ll take you to where she is.” I reached one hand to him as if attempting a handshake, with a concealed lightweight stun-gun in my palm. I was ready to zap him in the outstretched hand.

  But before I could zap him, he pulled away his hand. On top of that, he kicked the hidden stun-gun out of my hand.

  The next thing I knew, I heard a click of a zip tie securing my hands behind my back while I was physically being pinned to the floor.

  He was strong.

  “I was trying my best to play it nice. Don’t forget that you’re the one who screwed it up.”

  He stood up, stomped on the stun-gun with one chunky sole of the boots, crushing the device into bits. Then he started walking.

  Away from the entrance, to the direction of the stairs to the basement.

  I gazed after him in a total disbelief. I was unable to accept my current situation.

  Chapter 36

  “Ave, aaave dominus, dominus tecum. Benedicta tu in mulieribus, et benedictus…”

  I went on singing. As if I was channeling with late Maria Callas. Except my version of Maria came with lousy tunes, missed keys and shaky pronunciation.

  Perhaps, I was desperate to cleanse my soul before coming face-to-face with my final moment in this world. Not that I was terribly afraid of dying, but getting killed by having my eyeballs poked out was totally freaking me out. After all, I have never anticipated my life to be ended in this kind of a brutal way. Nor had I ever imagined dying before turning 30.

  I was scared of the pain, and just thinking about losing my eyeballs totally freaked me out. But what scared me the most was the fear and devastation I imagined I was going to feel.

  I closed my eyes again. I didn’t want to see the killer return to off me for good.

  “Nunc et in hora mortis. In hora mortis nostrae. In hora morrrrrtiiisss nooostraeee!”

  Half choking with emotion, I was screaming the public domain Latin lyrics at the top of my lungs.

  “Kelly, I’m sorry to disturb you in the middle of your very emotional moment. But you know what? I like you bet
ter when you’re not screaming.”

  A familiar voice seemed to have butted in my yowling but I kept on singing. I was determined to let no one ruin my final moment. If the voice wants to insult my singing style, just let it dis me.

  “In horrrra morrrtiiiiissss nostrae!”

  “Um Kelly,” the voice cleared its throat and said. “Will you stop that? And don’t tell me you’re singing. You need to work on the keys and tunes and everything.” This time, with a much stronger clarity and persistence.

  I opened a slit of one eye, opened it wider, then opened the other eye, and the next thing I knew, I started screaming like Janet Leigh from the movie Psycho.

  “Eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeekkkk!!! OHMYGODOHMYGODOHMYGAWD! I’m seeing Karen’s ghost! Oh Karen, I understand you’re not satisfied with my failed attempt to save you but, please do not possess me right now. I’m having enough trouble without getting hexed.”

  “Kelly, puhleeeeze.” Karen, or rather, Karen’s phantom sighed, tapping the floor with one foot. “Has it ever occurred to you that I may be a person instead of a dissatisfied ghost?”

  “Are you?” I squinted my eyes. Trying to grasp the situation better.

  “Of course.” She nodded.

  She took the knife Alan the Eyeball Snatcher had left on the table, hurried to my behind, and cut the duct tape off my hands and legs with an unbelievable efficiency for a phantom, or an eight-year-old.

  “OHMYGOD, you’re alive!” I clung to her in a bear hug.

  “Assuming I won’t die from choking right here, right now,” she replied with a gasp.

  “Sorry,” I let her go. “So, what happened?” I asked, maybe demanded was the more appropriate term.

  “It’s a long story.” She shrugged.

  “Make it short, will you?” I said, thinking my upbringing’s not all that bad considering I didn’t forget to say will-you? at an emergency like this.

  “Long story cut short, I happen to see visions,” she said.

  “As in?”

  “As in I have extrasensory perception, a.k.a. ESP which enables me to see something that is not happening in front of my eyes but that is definitely bound to happen or have happened in the past.”

  “That is…unbelievable.” I muttered. But her explanation sort of made a sense.

  “I know. That’s a part of my ridiculously excellent academic performance. I tend to get high scores on tests ‘coz I’m seeing the correct answers in my mind’s eye. OK, so there were times I wondered if my test taking style counts as cheating, but I can’t help it. Still, even with ESP, not everyone can perform multiplications and divisions before turning two. In a nutshell, it’s a gift and a curse. When I was younger I often felt sad at times when I knew a frenemy before even meeting that person. But I’m trying to take it positive, like my visions help me keeping myself away from troubles and frenemies.

  “Nowadays I’d been seeing visions after visions and that totally drove me crazy. Anyway, so I came to meet Alan following my vision, and foolishly I got caught and when I woke up, I was at the musician dude’s studio. At the moment, the musician dude Yves was already dead and Alan was determined to kill me as well and abandon my body with that of Yves’s, to make it look like Yves had killed me before killing himself. So I had no choice but to offer the killer to use me as a bait to allure you. And boy, it worked and here I am.”

  “But, what about the blood detected from the sock at Yves’s place?” I pointed out. The blood made us believe she had fallen a victim to violence.

  “I had a nosebleed. Got a little bit too panicky when I saw Yves’s dead body. It was the first time for me to see a dead body. And when I get freaked out, I tend to get nosebleeds, so the blood dropped on one of my socks, my bad.” She said matter-of-factly. “I persuaded Alan to keep me nice and alive so that he can allure you after closing Eyeball Snatcher case to lower the alert level from both law enforcement and the social perspectives. Even though the amount of blood was not large enough, the bloody sock made a good evidence indicating that something terrible had happened to me. In fact, you thought I was dead, right?”

  My jaw dropped. I was at a complete loss for words. After a couple of seconds, I managed to say. “You’re impossible, Karen. You could have gotten yourself killed!”

  “I know. That’s why I had staged my own death,” she shrugged. “Now that he’s got you and everything, it was just a matter of time that he decided to kill me. You know what? That guy is a psycho. So I dangled myself from the doorjamb with a scarf, and I lost my pulse.”

  “Excuse me? How can you lose your pulse?” I asked in a total awe. Now I wasn’t all that sure whichever of them—Karen or Alan, was scarier.

  “Yup, anybody can lose their pulse with a little trick, you know. Buy two soft tennis balls, put one ball under each of your armpits and squeeze tight. Voila, you’ve got cold, pulseless arms due to compromised circulation. I was a bit scared if he searched for pulse in my neck, because I can’t lose my pulse in the neck. Anyway, I went on with my plan. I knew I wasn’t going to die because I saw a vision of me walking out of this house escorted by police officers.”

  Then she grinned ear to ear. “So, now that you’ve arranged a police raid and everything. We’re safe and we’ve got the killer, ready to have justice to be served.”

  “Police raid?” I blinked, “What police raid?”

  Jeez Louise, something was not quite right.

  Chapter 37

  Slumped on the cold hard floor, I saw him walking away from me. His back getting further and further from me had indicated that my first and the last opportunity ever to make my dream come true was slipping away from my fingertips.

  “I want my assistant back.”—His words made a burning twinge in my heart. The way he talked and his tone of voice when he talked about Kelly annoyed the hell out of me. He spoke of her as if she was his possession or something. He had the gall to demand her back, as if he had already owned her.

  He turned the corner, went out of my sight as I lolled there. I was miserable.

  Hissing, roaring through my gritted teeth, I managed to stand up. The mere thought of just lying there, doing nothing but seeing that bastard ruin my plan, was unacceptable. Kicking off my shoes to kill the sound of my footsteps, I sprang into action.

  Having my hands still tied behind my back made it difficult to execute my project, then again, I had home advantage. I also knew the knife I’d left on the basement table can cut me free in a second.

  I knew what I had to do: Disable the bastard, free myself from the stupid restraint, and then reincarnate my mother using Kelly.

  Reaching the knife in the basement before the annoying P.I. was the key.

  I shifted on the corridor without making sounds. I reached the corner, caught the glimpse of the P.I.’s back. He was about to open the door to the stairs to the basement where I kept Kelly. It was now or never. I rushed to the door and opened it.

  With a desperate determination and a sharp aim, I jumped from the top of the stairs.

  Chapter 38

  “What police raid?” I asked her. I was clueless.

  “I’m talking about this police raid which is taking a place right now. You heard the beeps, didn’t you?” Karen crossed her arms.

  “I heard that, yeah.”

  “So I assumed you’ve arranged a police raid with something like a GPS device and all before you got yourself dragged in here.” She tilted her head to the side, eyes sparkling with hopes. “You’ve arranged the raid, didn’t you?”

  “No.”

  “But you called Mr. Archangel, right?”

  “No,” I shook my head. “He called me, but it was just five seconds before I got zapped. And guess what? You don’t get to communicate very well within five seconds.”

  “Excuse me?” Her eyebrows shot to north. “Why didn’t you call Mr. Archangel or the police?”

  “You told me not to tell anyone, especially not the police or Michael Archangel.”

 
“Come on, you’re supposed to have at least called Mr. Archangel. Haven’t you learned that ‘Don’t tell anyone’ is a code actually meaning ‘Do tell everybody’?” she snapped.

  “Alright, so I should have called my boss even though currently, Michael Archangel and the police, much less the feds are not in their greatest terms on the account they are accusing him of failing to save you and let Yves, the alleged serial killer kill himself. Otherwise, I’d have noticed them and your mom. Especially, your mom. The news of your possible death devastated her so much and she totally resents that she thought of sending you to summer camp in the first place.”

  I snapped back and immediately wished to take my words back. For the first time, Karen seemed to be in a real shock.

  “I’m sorry,” I said. “It’s not your fault. Probably, you just couldn’t tell me to call backup when he was by your side, listening to every word you uttered.”

  “It’s Okay, I’m peachy and dandy. At least, I don’t need to go to that snobby summer camp.” She said nonchalantly, lifting up her chin. “And it looks like we’re gonna make it out of here unharmed.”

  “So?” I said expectedly.

  “So, what?”

  “How many police officers do we have here right now?”

  “I don’t know,” she shrugged. “How could I know?”

  “How about using your psychic ability to get the idea?”

  “For your information, it’s not like I have much control over my visions. Come to think of it, suppose I see visions nonstop 24/7, that’ll drive me crazy. Besides that, if I had more control with my visions and I can see anything I want to see, that’s not very good for my karma. Albeit that’ll save me lots of movie money. Some things are better left unseen, you know.”