by Ed Gorman
She sprang from the hedge into Coffey's arms. She'd just landed when he heard the faint thunk of something hitting the ground.
He shone his light down on the black soil beneath the boxwood. There lay the intruder's watch.
He reached down, snatched it up, and then took himself. Crystal, and the watch back inside.
After giving Crystal a special treat of tuna fish, he sat down at the kitchen table and began going over the watch carefully.
The first thing he noticed was the strange symbol on the underside, a circle with a stylized S drawn inside.
And beneath that, in tiny script: SIGMA.
CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
She's a little girl, and she's sick. The flu. The bad stomach has passed, at least. Now all that remains are the headache and the fever. The fever is especially bad for her. Even though she kicks the covers on to the floor, even though (against Mommy's wishes), she sneaks the bedroom window open, she is broiling hot.
And the nightmares. When she's sick like this, the nightmares are especially bad. Running down the long, dark tunnel. A hideous thing only partially human lumbering close behind her. Wanting her. She screams, but somehow she knows that the scream is only in her dream. Mommy can't actually hear the scream and neither can Daddy. She is trapped inside her nightmares, and nobody can get her out. Not ever.
And then she is awake. And she is not a little girl. And she is in a room not her own, a shadowy room.
She is Jenny. And Jenny is twenty-five. And Jenny should be home in her own bed this time of night. She has never been the type to sleep around and that's what this feels like. There's something wrong about being here.
She's Jenny Stafford. Age twenty-five. And she does not want to be here.
A soft mist-kissed breeze comes through the open window. It makes her feel better. Her anxiety flows away from her for a time…
Her bladder is the real problem right now. She really needs to go. She looks around. Where is the bathroom? Then she sees it. The door open just a bit. No lights on. Presumably nobody in there.
She shivers, decides that the breeze isn't so nice after all.
She's getting cold. She starts to bring her left hand up to rub her chilly nose. The hand is stained with something dark and sticky. She brings up her other hand. Same thing, dark and sticky.
She is not an imbecile. She knows immediately what she's looking at. She feels overwhelmed by so many forces. Not knowing where she is or how she got here. Needing so badly to pee. And now, her hands streaked with what must be blood.
She stands up. Legs shaky. Body covered with rough goose bumps. She looks down at herself. Her thighs, her stomach, her breasts are also blood-splashed. What in God's name is going on here?
And then she remembers the other night. The motel room. The dead man. And her not being able to remember any of it. And then the stranger, Coffey, yes, that's his name. Can she really trust him? She has doubts.
It's now or never. Has to pee. Walks carefully across the hardwood floor, grateful for the occasional throw rug on the wood. The bottoms of her feet feel frozen.
When she reaches the bathroom door, she pauses. Force of habit. Good little Catholic girls always pause before bathroom doors. To make sure it's not being used. Someone might be sitting in there right now. In the dark. Some people probably prefer the dark.
She knocks. It's almost funny, knocking in this situation. But she knocks two times and then waits for an answer. When she doesn't get one, she pushes the door open, and that's when she sees the man lying face up on the bathroom floor.
There is a lot of blood in the crotch area. It has leaked on to the floor and has created a small river between his legs. The butcher knife, presumably the same one that claimed the man's masculinity, stands straight up in the man's throat. The eyes are difficult to look at. They are sorrowful eyes, probably a snapshot of the man's whole life. Difficult to imagine that a man would be happy that God or fate had dealt him such a hand.
She doesn't scream, run, get sick, or faint. She is still thinking back to the other night, to the dead man on the bed in the motel, dead also of a knife wound.
What other conclusion can there be? She very quietly goes back to bed and lies down and pulls the covers over her.
Two dead men. Her waking up in close proximity to them. Unable to remember much of anything on either occasion.
The electroshock treatments. The hint from the good gray doctors that Jenny, in certain circumstances, could possibly be dangerous to herself and others, Mrs. Stafford (with Jenny sitting right there next to her mother), and we certainly don't want that to happen, do we? The first thing we need to work on is the depression. I know you've heard a lot of negative things about electroshock, but believe me, it's going to make you feel very good about yourself for the first time in a long, long time, Jenny.
Could possibly be a danger to herself.
Or others.
In certain circumstances.
She thinks about calling Coffey. But can she really trust him? Wasn't it quite a coincidence that he just happened to be appear in that shelter the other night? He's so quiet, mysterious…
And then a name-and a phone number-come to her as she lies there in the darkness. But, no, that's ridiculous. Why would she call him? But even as she thinks this, about him being her enemy, she has a sense that he'd be able to calm her down, walk her through her last week, help her come to terms with what's going on with her spiritually.
She wonders what time it is and then realizes that she doesn't care what time it is. She is too far gone to care. So scared. So disoriented. Is she muttering, or are her teeth merely chattering? She isn't sure. And then suddenly she realizes she hasn't peed. Didn't want to step over the body to sit down. Just too ghoulish. Still, her bladder can't hold out much longer.
She turns and stares at the phone on the nightstand. Even more pressing than her bladder is who she'll call.
Her mother is probably waiting by the phone, hoping to hear from her. The problem there is she'll be full of advice and lawyers and fear and anger and the whole thing will be a mess. Jenny needs time to sort things out. Figure out why she's killed two men. If she's killed two men. But if she hasn't, who has? And why blame it on her?
The more she thinks, the more she realizes that there really is only one person she can turn to for such enormous problems as hers.
A noise. Hushed voices in the hallway. Police sneaking up?
Beneath the covers, she tenses. What could she possibly say if they came in here? If they found the body (and why wouldn't they find the body), how could she possibly make them believe that she hadn't had anything to do with it?
Or hadn't she?
That was the most difficult problem of all to confront. Her anger toward men. Maybe, drunk, still slightly unhinged from her time in the psychiatric hospital, maybe she'd found a butcher knife and-
But it was hard to imagine herself, even in a frenzy, cutting off his-
It wasn't the cops. In the hallway. It was a man kissing his wife good-bye and whispering a few things to her. A lot of jobs started earlier these days, designed to let workers get off earlier. Then she heard the man's footsteps, retreating down the hall. Then there was car engine, firing up in the parking lot below.
And then in the silence, she started staring at the phone again. The headache was back. And with such force that she had to stab her fingers deep into her eyeballs to stop the pain.
And then a name filled her mind. Her entire consciousness enshrined the name.
My God, what a crazy, crazy thought, calling him. My God, he was the last person she would call, right?
The very last…
She wondered what he'd say, being awakened at this hour, hearing her voice on the other end of the phone.
He'd been taken with her, no doubt about that. She believed that he sincerely, genuinely liked her for a time. And took a real interest in her. He even helped her in a lot of ways, showed her the things she did and felt that s
he should be proud of. Self-esteem. She hated that particular buzzword. It was so overused. But that, in effect, was what he'd given her-or, more importantly, shown her how to give herself.
Now it wasn't self-esteem she needed. Now it was sanity. Now it was somebody who could at least see the possibility that she hadn't committed these murders… even though most people would blame her absolutely.
She reached out to the phone. She picked up the receiver. She dialed the number. She knew it by heart.
A sleepy male voice answered. "Yes?"
She could picture him. He really was a striking man.
"It's Jenny Stafford," she said. "I need some help. Desperately."
She heard covers rustle. His voice being cleared. She could tell he was sitting up now.
"Where are you?" Quinlan said. "I'll come and get you personally and bring you back to the hospital."
"I'd really appreciate it," she said. "I really would."
CHAPTER FORTY
When the phone rang, Coffey sat up straight, like a comic version of Dracula in his coffin.
He was tired, exhausted really, so little sleep and so much stress, that he had to put himself in context before he could do anything.
Daylight. His bedroom. Bed. All three cats sprawled on the bed. Phone ringing. Phone on nightstand.
He reached over and picked up.
"Sigma Corporation," a male voice said, then continued, "it's your hard-working pal at the police department. Took me a while, but I found out who the lease company issued the van to."
"Sigma Corporation," Coffey said. He thought of the symbol on the underside of the watch the intruder had been wearing. The S shape inside the circle. "Did you get an address?"
"Not far from the Merchandise Mart." He then gave Coffey the address. Coffey kept a pad and pencil on the nightstand.
"I really appreciate this."
"No big deal. Just took a little persistence, is all."
As soon as Coffey hung up, the cats started meowing. Food time. They followed Coffey out to the kitchen. He put down three small plastic bowls on the floor and then put a small measuring cup of dry food in each bowl.
He spent the next fifteen minutes in the bathroom shaving and showering. In his bedroom, he put on black socks, black cordovan loafers, black slacks, white shirt, blue knit tie and tan summer-weight sport coat. This was one of those days when his cabbie attire wouldn't suffice.
He ate breakfast in a McDonald's parking lot and spilled a smidge of coffee on his slacks. He spent half a foolish minute imagining the billions of dollars that would roll in when he sued McDonald's for scalding himself.
Then he was at the library, sitting in the section that had to do with local businesses. He felt like a genius when he came upon the Sigma Corporation logo and found that it matched the S inside the circle.
In the next twenty minutes he learned that Sigma had been incorporated five years ago with six board members and a mission statement that read, in part, "To expand the horizons of such controversial (but worthwhile) human endeavors as holistic healing, criminal rehabilitation through restructured thought processes, and the betterment of daily human life through a reordering of deviant impulses."
In a word (or two words, actually): mind control.
The most interesting name on the board of directors was Kenneth Bowman. He was listed as President and CEO. There was a brief bio of the man. Nothing in his background, with the possible exception of a four-year-stint as the sales manager of a pharmaceutical company, seemed to have any bearing on the stated goals of Sigma.
Coffey punched Kenneth Bowman up on the business computer. There were five such Bowmans in the Chicago area. One wholesaled fruits and vegetables, one had a discount TV and radio store, one owned six tire stores, and one owned three small pharmacies. The Bowman he wanted was listed as the President and CEO of Sigma-but was also listed as co-owner of three other small businesses (Orion, Ltd.; Stoneman Enterprises; and Walker Laboratories). What was even more interesting was the information about the other co-owner, Priscilla Bowman, a psychiatrist and Kenneth Bowman's wife.
And Jenny Stafford's shrink.
He knew where his next appointment would be.
CHAPTER FORTY-ONE
Several times during the night, Quinlan had considered raping her. Easy enough to do with the drugs he'd given her. But these were light drugs. He needed her to look alert when he brought her in.
Of course, he'd considered raping her many times before. But he'd been reluctant. And he knew why. What would it prove if he had drug-induced sex with her? His pride was that he was able to seduce all his young women through the sheer power of his mind. Yes, he knew it was machismo. Yes, he knew it was vanity. Yes, he knew it was college-sophomore conquest. But he needed it. He was beyond money now; even beyond power in most respects. Power, especially, which brought so much responsibility with it. You constantly had to check on your power, make sure it was secure, and it got very, very tedious.
But sweet seduction. To take an intelligent young woman and to bring her completely under your sway through sheer willpower…
What could be better than that?
He stood now in the doorway of the bedroom he'd prepared for her. Beautiful Jenny, velvet hair a dark storm on the white pillow, eyes and nose and lips of such classical beauty that it made him oddly afraid of her. Beauty was true power, at least for Quinlan.
She stirred. It was time to wake her. Near noon.
She didn't seem to recognize him at first. Her eyes were briefly wild, afraid. And then she seemed to relax some.
He came over and sat on the edge of the bed. He'd slipped her into a black strapless nightgown. Even her shoulders were lovely.
"Good morning," Quinlan said. "It's a beautiful autumn day."
He could barely stop himself from touching her. His fingers sensed the feel of her flesh; his ears anticipated the sound of her gentle voice; his eyes never wanted to close upon her beauty.
The only one he'd never seduced.
And now he would never get the chance.
He said, "Do you remember last night?"
"Last night?" Anxious; even afraid.
"Coming here."
"Yes. Coming here. Yes. I don't know why I came here, though." Her face pinched with disapproval. "You didn't treat me very well when I-was living here. So it doesn't make sense that I'd call you."
"But you did call me."
"Yes; yes, I did."
"And I picked you up and brought you here, and we talked."
"Talked about what?"
"You don't have any recollection?"
She watched his face carefully. "You're scaring me. If there's something you want to say, just say it."
"I'm not sure what to do now."
"About what?" she said.
He took his time answering. "You told me some things last night."
She brushed dark hair back from white skin. "Some things?"
He sighed and stood up and walked over to the window. This particular room was used for guests. The apartments were all decorated by those who lived in them. Guest rooms were as impersonal as most hotel rooms. Double bed, bureau, an easy chair, a bathroom.
In the warm sunlight, a lanky woman in a gray uniform steered a green riding mower around the grounds. At a nearby picnic table, one group of patients were having their lunch.
"What're you trying to tell me?" she said.
He came back over and sat next to her on the bed again. She had pulled the sheet up to her shoulders.
"I'm going to tell you something," he said. Then, "Remember how badly I treated you when you lived here with us."
"Of course I do."
"Do you know why I treated you like that?"
"No, why?"
"Because I was in love with you." Once again, he touched his hand to her cheek. "And I still am." He looked away from her. Nobody had ever accused him of underplaying a dramatic moment. "That's why it's so difficult."
"Why what's
so difficult?"
A sigh. "I think you know, Jenny, what I'm talking about."
"No, I don't. I don't have any idea." Anxiety again. Slowly building fear.
He took her hand. "You killed those two men, Jenny. At least that's what you told me."
"No!" she said. "No, I didn't tell you that! I couldn't have! I wouldn't have!"
Another long sigh. "I have it on tape, Jenny."
She started to get up from the bed, gripping the front of the strapless gown so it wouldn't slide down.
But he pushed her back in bed. "Jenny, you have to stay calm. You know how you can get." She started to speak, but he stopped her. "Don't you see what you did? You called me because you wanted to confess. You knew I'd help you."
"I didn't kill those men!"
He stared at her. "I think you know better than that, don't you, Jenny? If you're really being honest with yourself?"
"No!" she said. "No, I didn't!"
She tried once more to get up. This time, she didn't let him stop her so easily. She pushed against him, raised her fists. He touched a button on the nightstand and Barcroft the security chief appeared.
"We need to get her to the police," Quinlan said. "And it seems she doesn't want to go."
***
Jenny wasn't sure what kind of injection they gave her. They had a lot of needles here at the compound. And a lot of different cutting-edge drugs, too.
Quinlan and his man got her down on the bed. Barcroft gave her the injection. He was gentle, probably only because he didn't want there to be any bruising. How would it look to the police if you brought in a bruised-up woman?
The needle stung. Even when the tip of the hypodermic was penetrating her flesh, Jenny fought against the man.
The effect of the drug, whatever it was, was immediate. It was just a light supplement to the drug she'd already been given. Nothing heavy. She could feel a cold charge of serum coursing through blood. She expected the drug to drag her down, the way a pre-op injection would. But very quickly it became apparent that the drug was intended only to calm her, make her controllable for them.