The Simpatico Series Box Set (3 books in 1)

by Dermot Davis

  “You can’t leave,” Fiona said, dreading the notion. “You can’t leave me here alone with this woman!”

  “Why not?”

  “What if she wakes up?”

  “Look, I have it all worked out. She wakes up, she looks around, everything seems normal, see? You tell her that she’s been asleep for ages and that you were looking out for her, making sure that she was okay. You ask her would she like a nice hot pot of tea; of course, she’s going to say yes. By the time they send up the tea and you all chat about, I don’t know, girlie stuff, then I come back and act like everything’s hunky-dory.”

  “Hunky-dory? Girlie stuff?” Fiona asked with a face that could stop a clock. “Are you being serious, right now? You sound like you’re acting out a movie in your own head, Andrew. You’re not leaving me alone with this woman; what is she now? The highest ranking woman in the world’s most secret society?”

  “Call me if there’s a development,” he said, kissing her quickly on the lips and grabbing his jacket to leave.

  “You can’t be—“

  “There is no other way, Fi,” Andrew said, looking like his mind was made up. “Oh, crap,” he then said, like he just remembered. “I’ll have my phone switched off for the meeting. I’ll check in later,” he then said and he blew her a kiss as he left the room.

  “Seriously?” she said out loud to the closed door.

  Andrew arrived at the meeting and as far as he could tell did not arouse any suspicions with his story explaining his sole appearance. In fact, he felt that the other members acted somewhat relieved as they were so caught up with current events regarding Simon and the indeterminate fate of Quanta Systems.

  The organization would probably stand to lose a boat load of money depending on what the courts decided about the fate of the company’s future. Reversing its recent switch from private to public company, the authorities investigating the alleged wrong-doing could really set back the organization’s plans and years of hard work in the blink of an eye.

  Using the few minutes he had before the meeting officially started, Andrew ducked into the bathroom to put in a call to Fiona. Calling her several times, she didn’t pick up. Hoping that it was a simple thing, that she had her phone switched off, he turned off his own phone and rejoined the group.

  Fiona hadn’t noticed that Andrew had been calling her as she was on a call with Professor Dowling at the time her guy had been ringing her. Gus had called her to confirm their prearranged meeting for the following day. “Are you okay, Fiona?” he asked when he detected a strain in her voice.

  “Oh, my god, she moved,” Fiona blurted out when she saw the woman move in her chair for the very first time.

  “Who moved?” he asked.

  “I think she’s going to wake up and Andrew is away at his stupid meeting,” she said, sounding like she was totally freaking out.

  “Is everything okay?” he asked with concern. “Do you need help with something?”

  “What are you doing, like, right now?” she asked when she saw the woman move in her chair, yet again. “Can you get downtown really quick?” she asked.

  “I can come right away, don’t worry about a thing,” he replied calmly.

  Professor Dowling knew exactly where the hotel was located and the room number was so easy to remember that he didn’t need to write anything down. Going straight to his car, he took off knowing that, if the traffic was light, he was but minutes away.

  Trying not to look as preoccupied in his thoughts as he was in actuality, Andrew sat in the meeting with a calm expression. Even though he wished that the evening would go faster, he had been at enough meetings to know that they were never rushed affairs and were only shorter when there was no photograph of a person presented that required the groups’ thoughts or prayers.

  His hopes that the meeting was one of the shorter ones were dashed, however, when a photo was held aloft and the assembled encouraged to send their spiritual support. He remembered that the last time a photo was held up, it was Yakomoto, who, as a result, suffered a sudden heart attack. As Andrew focused on the image in the semi-dark light, his eyes widened and his body froze in shock. The photo being paraded about in front of the small congregation was like a photo that actors use to secure auditions: an eight by ten headshot… of Lily.

  Looking around to see who might also be as stunned as he was, he was even more shocked when no one seemed in the slightest way perturbed. How can this be? Lily was a fellow employee; a dedicated and loyal member of the organization. In his understanding, an image of a person being held aloft at a meeting was comparable to receiving a death sentence. Was a sudden heart attack in the cards for Lily? What could she have done to deserve such punishment?

  As his heart raced faster than his mind could process, Andrew had a hard time staying in his seat and resisting the urge to rush over to Lily’s apartment to warn her of the danger. When they did finally break, Andrew quickly shook some hands as a formality and once out of the orbit of their suspicions, rushed to his car.

  Making his first phone call to Lily, he wasn’t too surprised that that call went instantly to voicemail. Was she dead already? If he rushed to her apartment what would he find? Like every conspiracy movie he’d ever seen, would the front door be ajar and her lifeless, splayed legs lying on the floor, visible through her open bedroom door? Feeling one hundred percent responsible for her predicament, he felt the need to rush to her apartment to see what help he could provide.

  Making his second call to Fiona, he heaved a sigh of relief when she answered straight away. “Where are you?” she answered with a question.

  “I just got out of the meeting,” he answered.

  “Oh, thank heavens,” Fiona said with exuberant relief. “I think she’s about to wake up.”

  “I have to make a detour,” Andrew said, wincing at her expected response when she found out where. “I have to swing by Lily’s first. I think her life’s in danger.”

  “Your life’s in danger if you don’t get right back here,” she said with clenched teeth. “Now.”

  “Sweetie, I’ll be there as soon as I can but, trust me, this is life or death here,” he said and waited for a response that didn’t come. “Fiona?” he then said, like maybe she hung up.

  “I have to go,” she then said, like she was distracted. “Professor Dowling is at the door.”

  “What?” Andrew asked but realized that she had hung up. “Professor Dowling?” he asked no one in particular.

  “I’m so sorry about that,” Professor Dowling said right away when Fiona opened the door. “You would not believe the traffic.”

  “Sssh,” Fiona whispered as she waved him into the room. “She’s sleeping.”

  “Who’s sleeping?” he asked before seeing the sleeping woman in the armchair.

  “Thank you so much for coming,” Fiona then said, embracing him warmly like she just remembered her manners.

  Dowling accepted the embrace affectionately but his eyes stared ahead, as if transfixed. Shutting the door with her foot, the door slammed shut. “Oh, crap!” Fiona said and looked around to see what Dowling might be staring at in such rapt fascination. The woman’s eyes were open.

  “Oh, my god,” Fiona said, creeped out by the woman’s weird stare. “I can explain everything,” Fiona then said, breaking away from Dowling and slowly approaching the woman. “You fell asleep, like forever,” she said but stopped when she saw that the woman wasn’t paying her the slightest bit of attention. Her eyes wide open, she stared at Dowling. His eyes equally wide open, Dowling returned her stare. “What’s going on?” Fiona said, like she was the only one that didn’t get the memo.

  “Abigail?” Dowling asked, like he couldn’t believe his eyes.

  “Augustus?” the woman asked.

  “You too know each other?” Fiona asked, looking from Dowling to the woman and back again and still utterly confused.

  “Abigail is my wife,” Dowling said with such a huge grin that it was like
he had just died and gone to heaven.

  “Seriously?” Fiona asked and looked at the woman to see if the expression on her face would corroborate his statement: it did. “Well, holy crap!” Fiona said, looking totally baffled.

  Andrew arrived at Lily’s apartment and rang her buzzer. He tried several times more before Lily’s voice sounded on the intercom. “What?” she asked angrily.

  “Lily, it’s me, Andrew.”

  “What do you want?”

  “Buzz me up, I need to see you. It’s urgent.”

  “Andrew, I’m sick. Some other time, okay?”

  “Lily,” he said, hoping to still catch her. “I know why you’re sick. You’ve got to let me in. I can help you.” When the buzzer sounded to release the door, Andrew ran through it and climbed two steps at a time up the stairs to her apartment.

  “Make it quick, Andrew,” Lily said as he entered her apartment. “I need to sleep, even though I can’t get to sleep,” she said as she lay out stretched on the sofa. “My head is like pounded so hard.”

  “They held up your photo, at the meeting,” Andrew said quickly. “I came here straight away.”

  “They were praying for me?” she said, like it was a good thing. “At the meeting? How did they know I was sick? I came home and all of a sudden I had to crash.”

  “You don’t know?” he asked.

  “Don’t know what?”

  “They’re not praying for you to get well when the serpents pray at meetings; they’re praying for you to get sick.”

  Looking at Andrew like he just told her the most ridiculous thing she ever heard, Lily could barely respond. “Andrew?” she said, like she was too ill to even talk.

  “Lily, you’re under psychic attack. That’s why you’re sick; you don’t even know why you’re sick, do you? Have you ever even felt this way before?”

  “I’d get a headache now and then but nothing like this,” she said, thinking. “It’s like I’ve got a migraine and I don’t have an ounce of energy left in my body; like it’s the flu but not really like the flu, you know?” she asked, looking puzzled. “I got suspended, Andrew,” she then said. “It was, like, the worst day of my life, ever. First the SEC people raided the place and it was like, total craziness, those guys don’t mess around. Then I got escorted downtown. They accused me of being in on it, whatever it is, whatever is going on. They grilled me for hours; it was horrible,” she said tearfully. “Then the organization suspended me. I don’t know if I have a job anymore.”

  “Hold that thought,” Andrew said when he saw his cell phone light up with an incoming call from Fiona. “Hey, Fi, how are you holding up?” he asked when he picked up.

  “You won’t believe what just happened!” Fiona said in a hushed voice. Calling from the bathroom, Fiona checked that the other two were still preoccupied with each other. As if entranced, they continued to stare at each other.

  “What?” Andrew asked, fearing that whatever had just happened was too much for him to handle. “The woman woke up? What? Are you okay?”

  “Oh, the woman woke up and guess what?”

  “Jeez, just tell me, Fiona,” Andrew said desperately. “What?”

  “Professor Dowling called me and he said that he’d come over.”

  “Yeah?” Andrew said, impatiently.

  “They’re married!”

  “Who’s married? What are you talking about?”

  “The woman and Professor Dowling are married. Like, they looked at each other and they were like, totally just staring at each other and then—”

  “The woman’s name is Abigail?” Andrew interrupted, piecing it together. “His wife that went missing years ago?”

  “I guess,” Fiona said. “She’s not missing now.”

  “Well, I didn’t see that coming. What are they doing now?”

  “Just staring at each other, pretty much. I don’t think they know what to say to each other, I mean, what do you say to someone after twenty-five years? Where are you?” she then asked, like she just remembered.

  “Long story short, Lily is under psychic attack by the serpents. I was at the meeting and they held up her photo like they think she’s responsible for your dad, which she isn’t. I’m at her apartment and she’s not in good shape,” he said, looking at her stretched out in pain on the sofa.

  “What are you going to do?”

  “I don’t know,” Andrew said, realizing that he really didn’t have a plan. “How do you protect someone from psychic attack?” he asked and then thought of something. “Oh, maybe Gus would know! Can you ask him and be real quiet? Don’t let that woman—”

  “I know what to do,” Fiona said, interrupting.

  “You do?”

  “Get Lily over to Professor Dowling’s house and I’ll meet you there, hold on,” she then said as she took the phone from her ear and gently approached Dowling. “Can I have the keys to your house, real quick?” she whispered into Dowling’s ear.

  Without shifting his gaze, Dowling reached into his pocket and took out his house keys. “Certainly, sweetie,” he said, turning his head to give her a wink. “We’ll be fine.”

  “Cool,” Fiona said, giving him a warm smile and taking the keys. “Okay,” she then said, once back on the phone. “I’m leaving now. Meet me there.”

  Left alone to each other, Dowling and Abigail became more relaxed. “I never thought I’d ever see you again, alive,” Dowling said.

  “You thought I was dead?” Abigail asked like it was something of a morbid thought.

  “You disappeared. I didn’t know what to think.”

  “Ah,” she said, looking towards the windows, as if it were a very long story. “Yes. Sorry about that.”

  “Sorry?” he asked, like it was a weak response. “You’ve been missing over twenty-five years.”

  “Missing to you,” she said and then regretted her comment. “It’s a long story.”

  “I’ve got time,” Dowling said, without attitude.

  “Yes, well,” she said and paused like she didn’t. “I don’t know what to tell you, Gus,” she then said, like she didn’t owe him an explanation. “Perhaps it wasn’t working out between us?” she said like it was a question.

  “It wasn’t?” he asked, like she would have to try a bit harder to explain.

  “How have you been?” she then asked, as if wanting to change the nature of their discussion.

  “There hasn’t a day gone by that I didn’t miss you or think about you, Abigail,” he said with tears forming in his eyes.

  “I see,” she said, obviously not sharing a similar sentiment. “I do think about you now and then,” she then said, as if to please him. “I haven’t had much of a personal life since; it’s been mostly about work, I’m afraid.”

  “That sounds lonely.”

  “Yes, it is, I suppose,” she said thoughtfully. “The years go by so quickly.”

  “They certainly do,” Dowling agreed.

  “We should send down for some tea,” she then said brightly. “Or coffee for you, if you’d prefer.”

  “No, tea would be perfect,” he said with a smile.

  “Yes, a nice hot pot of tea,” she said like it was the best thing ever. “They’ve been promising me some tea ever since I arrived,” she said as she walked to the phone. “You people have a lot to learn about proper hospitality in this country, I’ll tell you that right now,” she said playfully.

  “Abigail,” Dowling said as he looked at her admiringly. “You haven’t changed one bit.”

  Hotel phone in hand, Abigail surprised them both when her face broke out into the biggest smile.

  Fiona was the first to arrive at Dowling’s house. Once inside, she switched on the lights and quickly returned to the front door when she heard someone knocking. Andrew was supporting Lily who looked like she could barely hold herself up or walk unaided. “Fiona, this is Lily; Lily, this is Fiona,” Andrew said hurriedly as if to quickly dispense with the initial formalities.

 
“Hi, Lily,” Fiona said, opening the door wider for Andrew to walk her inside. “How are you feeling?”

  Looking like she could hardly lift her head to speak, Lily rose her head only slightly. “Not too good,” she said like it was an understatement.

  “Where’s professor Dowling?” Andrew asked, looking around like he was happy to have the assistance of a professional.

  “He’s at the hotel,” Fiona answered, like it was obvious. “He’s visiting with his ex-wife or wife or whoever she is.”

  “So, why are we coming here?” Andrew asked, like it was a wild goose chase.

  “Follow me,” Fiona said as she walked past the aisles of Dowling’s laboratory test equipment. “Put her in here,” she said once she had arrived at the enclosed kiosk that looked like a phone booth and opened the door.

  “What is it?” Andrew asked, shifting Lily’s weight so that he could place her easily into the booth.

  “It’s an EMF shield something or other,” Fiona said that prompted a quizzical look from Andrew.

  “A what?”

  “I don’t know its proper name but it’s designed to shield out thought energy and high frequency waves for remote viewing experiments. It’s going to work!” she then said when Andrew looked at her with an expression that she didn’t know what she was talking about.

  “Okay,” he said, like it was her funeral.

  “You got any better ideas, Einstein?” Fiona asked.

  “Guys?” Lily said as she was losing her grip on the door.

  Taking a firmer grasp of her, Andrew placed Lily into the booth where she slid to the floor into a comfortable-looking positon. “How’s that?” he asked as he closed the door.

  Giving the thumbs up sign, Lily reacted like it was helping a good deal.

  “Told you,” Fiona said to Andrew but not looking at him.

  “I didn’t say that it wouldn’t,” Andrew protested. “It just sounded like you didn’t,” he said and stopped for fear of incriminating himself.