by A. J. Aalto
She kept the window rolled down for the fresh air, a crisp distraction from what was building to be a whopper of a headache. Mr. Langerbeins drove in silence, for which she was grateful. They pulled up to the house and Gillian didn’t think twice about handing him her keys.
Where Greg had been a great bear of a man, Paul was slight and wiry, with long arms prone to darting out. Despite his quick and agile movements, Gillian felt instinctively safe around him; she didn’t feel the need to watch where his hands were going.
She followed him in, kicked off her flats, and stumbled in the direction of the couch.
He shut the door behind them with a long, unhappy sigh. “Gillian… what would Greg say about this?”
Nearly blinded by pain, she whimpered, “What?”
“Gillian, you just invited a strange man into your home when you're clearly vulnerable. How well would you be able to defend—”
He had to move quickly when he saw her in motion, lunging forward to grab her as she fell. Her foot hit the coffee table and she toppled. He eased her safely forward onto the couch.
“We hired you,” she said, wrapping both arms around herself and bending at the waist.
“You’re dealing with a scorned ex who seems unhinged. How do you know he didn’t hire me first?” Paul said ominously. “Greg would want you to ask these questions. If this man has gotten a reaction from you, you can’t underestimate him.”
“Maybe I’m only being silly.” She didn’t believe it, but it felt good to say it. “Maybe I’ve over-stated the problem.”
“You were a cop’s wife. Give yourself some credit. What does your gut tell you?” He gave her space to respond, but talking was hurting her head even more. “I’ll tell you what your gut is telling me. Neither you nor your sister would have called me if you didn’t think this man was a serious problem. I ain’t cheap, and you’re not rolling in dough. You told me on the phone that your sister has had bad relationships before, bad break-ups… but you’ve never called me about any other ex-boyfriend. This one worries you. Why?”
Gillian whispered, “Acetaminophen, aspirin, strong coffee. Please.”
He went to the kitchen and started her coffee maker. It was a small pocket kitchen, and he leaned a hip on the doorway while he waited for the coffee to percolate. “Why does this guy worry you?” he repeated.
“His mood seems to shift from needy to angry in the space of a split second. In the texts I’ve seen, anyway,” she said softly. “And he’s constantly insinuating that my sister is crazy and just not thinking straight. That’s not entirely true.”
“Entirely?”
He saw her lips curve in spite of her headache. “Let’s just say, Frankie’s a tad flighty. She has challenges. Who doesn’t? But she’s thinking straight. We both are.”
“Good to hear,” Paul said, turning to fetch the bottle of aspirin and acetaminophen kept right beside the coffee maker and bring them to her.
“She knows what she wants, Mr. Langerbeins. She wants Travis Freeman gone.” And I want Travis Freeman gone.
“And he doesn’t want to get gone,” Paul said.
“He doesn’t want to hear it.”
“Would it surprise you to know that the same morning that your sister hired me,” he said, “I got a very angry phone call from a blocked number? I think your instincts are good, Gillian. He’s seen me, which means he’s watching her.”
Gillian paled and her hand kneaded her eyebrow. She dry swallowed two acetaminophen and two aspirin and took the mug of black coffee he handed her, blowing the steam.
“Should I put milk in that to cool it off?” he offered.
She shook her head, barely able to make decisions through the throbbing pain. She might have, any other time, said yes. As it was, she just needed the mug in her hand, the caffeine in her system. She sipped the hot coffee tentatively.
“I have another concern,” she admitted. “You’ve dealt with a client named Bobby McIntyre?”
“I don’t normally discuss former clients,” Paul warned gently.
“I understand that. But I’m very concerned with having this person back in Frankie’s circle of influence. She’s a former drinking buddy, a vortex of drama, and not trustworthy at all.” Gillian drank more coffee, her nervous guts giving a hard twist. “It’s not my place to choose my sister’s friends or lovers, and I know I sound overprotective. Frankie’s in such a good place right now. Her creative output is high, she’s clean and sober, and we’ve just bought a grand old house together to run as an artist’s retreat, bed and breakfast style.”
“A local house, or out of town?”
“The old Blymhill place at Higgins Point.”
He nodded for her to go on.
“Frankie has a lot to look forward to,” she said. “I don’t want to see her derailed by negative people. Getting rid of Travis Freeman from her life was smart, very smart. Keeping Bobby McIntyre at a distance would be just as wise. I need to know if you see Miss McIntyre around my sister.”
Paul appeared to consider this for a long stretch while Gillian finished her coffee and contemplated turning on a lamp. A late afternoon storm was rolling in across the lake, from west to east, and the room had grown dim.
“I can’t stress this enough,” Gillian said, putting her mug down. “I really can’t have Bobby swooping in while my sister is struggling to rid herself of this toxic ex-boyfriend, while her judgment is off, while she may be vulnerable to ‘help’ from bad places. Do you see what I mean?”
“I can certainly appreciate your concerns, and if you want me to report on this person’s whereabouts, I can do that.” Paul gave a sorry smile. “But since your sister hired me, I can’t very well watch her and report her whereabouts without informing her that this is what you’ve asked me to do.”
Gillian shook her head. “No, I see. Yes, that is fair, of course. Please report on this Travis Freeman person, and let me know where Bobby McIntyre might be.”
Paul nodded, and they made some notes together. When they were through, Paul accepted an envelope of cash from Gillian, and made sure her house keys were in her hand.
“I should get home for dinner. Your remedy seems to be kicking in?” Paul said.
Gillian exhaled slowly. “It always works.”
“Caffeine, acetaminophen, aspirin,” he said. “I’ll have to remember that for next time I have one of my headaches.” He tipped an invisible hat and went to the door, limping heavily. It made her wonder why he didn’t use a cane, and then recognized the signs of pain being angrily ignored as it crossed his face.
Gillian moved to the door, watching him get into his car. She had no reason to believe that Travis Freeman might be watching her in addition to her sister, and felt no fear of the deep shadows that played in the heavy brush across the road and in the ditches on the unkempt neighboring property. Evenings were coming earlier and earlier as October tilted to run downhill toward November, and the dusk swallowed Red Maple Drive once Paul’s headlights retreated. When she turned off the porch light and paused to listen to the evening breeze in the trees, letting the sound soothe her, there was no feeling of unfriendly eyes. Instead, she felt completely alone. Tonight, that was a blessing.
She returned to the coffee table to shake one of the pill bottles. The “acetaminophen” was almost gone; that bottle contained only a few more OxyContin tablets. But she still had plenty of Vicodin in the aspirin bottle, enough to get her through the next wave of pain that would come before bed. She prepared for the worst by digging out her heating pad and pulling the blinds, ordering Thai delivery, and filling the coffee pot.
It would be a long night for Gillian Hearth.
It would be an equally long night for her sister.
Chapter Seven
Sunday, October 26. 9:15 P.M.
Travis Freeman’s gut was a tight knot of rage as he watched the house through cold, blue eyes that his ex-wife had once described as empty. A frigid old cow, Susan Freeman was, constantly overreac
ting and outright disrespecting him. And now she thought she could live without him, and she was finding out the hard way how awful that was. He almost felt sorry for her.
The front door of the house opened. One man left, the one with the limp. Twenty minutes later, another man arrived but did not go inside. Instead, he went around to the back of the house. Travis assumed he entered through the rear entrance.
The temperature outside dropped rapidly but Travis didn’t notice his breath fogging the truck’s driver side window, nor did he notice the wind rustling the silvery Russian olive trees or the moon appearing briefly between heavy cloud banks. He had only his hot ball of hatred and that woman’s face in his mind.
Her lights went out. That woman. His stomach churned. That uppity bitch. She was going to learn some things the hard way, too. Soon.
Travis stewed and smoked a cigarette in the dark.
**
Bobby McIntyre let herself into the side door at Frankie’s little cottage, calling out for the kids, or Doogie, the nearly deaf dog, or her best friend, singing, “Woo hoo, where is everyone?” and pocketing her key ring.
She did not consider that it was after nine on a school night, nor did she think about waking up the dog, which would no doubt bark and wake the neighbors. What Bobby did think about was how excited she was to see her best friend after so many years apart.
She jogged up a short flight of stairs, her flats slapping the old vinyl tiles, to the landing where the half-bathroom was. For a moment, she paused and listened. The dog hadn’t barked the way he should have. Her eyes were dragged, almost against her will, down the long basement flight of stairs, one hard step after another, disappearing into darkness to that cement floor surrounded by sentinel doors into tiny, empty rooms. There had once been a big chest freezer down there, at the far end of the basement, but Bobby doubted Frankie had kept it. Not after everything. And if that freezer was still down there, Bobby didn’t want to know it. Some things were best forgotten.
She heard a sound she didn’t immediately recognize, and went down the hall to the living room and the kitchen, passing the sleeping dog, who didn’t so much as twitch, seeking the source of the noise. Running water. The shower. Frankie was in the shower. Now Bobby could smell soap on the misty, humid air in the hall. She leaned against the wall there, hands in the pockets of her jeans, lingering for a moment, not sure where she wanted to wait. She sidled over to poke her head in the kids’ rooms, establishing that they were empty. She moved on cat-quiet feet into Frankie’s bedroom.
The bedroom walls had been freshly painted, and Bobby didn’t like that she hadn’t known about the change; when had it gone from a soft, spring yellow to eggplant, rich and sultry? There was a time, back in their early art class days, that Frankie and Bobby were a team, and decorating and art decisions were made together. There was a new oil painting over the bed, a sunset over an unfamiliar body of water, palm trees and wetlands. Frankie didn’t like to work from photographs, she preferred to go to a location, to soak it all in. Had she gone on a vacation? The possibility that she’d been kept out of the loop hit Bobby’s gut like a cold fist. When did this happen? Where had she gone? She peered at the signature on the painting and was relieved to see it wasn’t Frankie’s work.
But she purchased it, then. Where? When? From whom? If Frankie still kept a diary, the answer would be in there. But Frankie was also seeing that Travis fellow, last Bobby had heard, and she didn’t want to stumble across anything written in the diary about him. The thought made her sick to her stomach.
Bobby went back to the kitchen, unsettled and tempted to sulk, to make herself a drink. Going through all the cupboards, she found no booze. Since when does Frankie not have a bottle of Captain Morgan on the goddamn counter? She settled on a Pepsi and added ice, and went to plop on the couch, put her feet up, and turn on the TV to wait. She flipped through the channels, settled on the news, grabbed a People magazine off Frankie’s coffee table, and noticed the unusual mess. Odd for Frankie, the poor thing. She wasn’t quite herself. Bobby would fix that.
The shower turned off and the old pipes in the bathroom gave a deep, clanging rattle. Bobby flipped through the magazine, half-interestedly digesting the news about stars and various crimes and issues. She didn’t see Frankie in her robe in the dark hallway right away, and when she did, she yelped.
Frankie had a crowbar, and her eyes were crazy-wide. She bellowed, “Bobby! Jesus! You scared the fuck out of me.”
“Me?” Bobby slapped the magazine down on the couch, swinging her feet down. “You’re the one coming at me with a weapon. What the hell is wrong with you?”
“Why are you here?” Frankie demanded, putting the crowbar down, leaning it against the white leather loveseat. “How did you get in?”
“I have my key, honey,” Bobby said with an astonished laugh. “Hey, you’re really scared. What’s wrong?” She got up. “I knew it. I knew something was off when I talked to you. Christ, what’s happening?”
Frankie’s shoulders slumped. “It’s only a dumb break-up. It’s just…” She burst into tears, and Bobby was quick to close the distance between them with hugs and soft, sympathetic cooing.
“Sit, sit,” Bobby said. “Look, I’m sorry. I know you told me not to come. But you need support, my gawd, just look at you! Sit on the couch. Let Bobby take care of you. Lord have mercy, you're a sight. Seriously, your color is off, you look like you’ve lost a thousand pounds.”
“Me? You should talk,” Frankie laughed weakly, shaking off the contact. “We always did say you’re light as a feather. You never gain an ounce.”
“You’re picking your face,” Bobby scolded. She felt Frankie move to put more distance between them and didn’t like it one bit. “Look at all those marks.”
“I’m fine,” Frankie said weakly.
“My ass, you’re fine. You wouldn’t be calling me for that Langerbeins prick’s number if you were fine,” Bobby stated, hands on her hips.
“Thank you for that,” Frankie said, sinking onto the couch, chewing her bottom lip. A worried frown rippled her forehead.
“Tell Bobby what’s wrong,” Bobby said, taking the blanket off the back of the couch and draping it over her friend.
“Bobby is talking about herself in the third person again,” Frankie said with forced humor, and then added, “It’s just that I really need to be alone right now.”
“Alone is the last thing you should be,” Bobby said sternly, feeling that urge to sulk again. She softened her tone. “Are you kidding me? Honey, seriously.”
“I’m not in any danger. I’m exhausted and I’m just going to bed.”
Bobby studied her critically. “How about a night cap? Help you sleep?”
“No!” Frankie said, a little sharply. “No, thanks. I’m dry.”
Bobby’s eyebrows shot up. “Oh, is that so? Huh. Well, I suppose that’s not a bad idea,” she replied uncertainly. “I could crash on the couch tonight, in case you need company.”
Frankie set her lips in a firm line. “No, I’m afraid I’d like you to go, Bobby. I want some alone time. It’s nothing personal. I just need to process. And rest. You know? Clear my head.”
“Oh,” Bobby said, rocking back on her heels and cramming her hands in her jeans pockets. “Oh, right. Clear your head. I get it. Yeah, that’s fine. I’ll check on you tomorrow, okay?”
As Bobby retreated to the side door, Frankie called, “Hey, Bobby, could you leave me that extra key you’ve got?”
Her back to Frankie, Bobby grit her teeth. “Oh yeah, sure. No problem.”
“I just need an extra to give to someone,” Frankie said lamely, “for tomorrow. Won’t have time to get a spare made. I’ll get it back to you!”
My ass, Bobby thought, but she said with forced cheer, “Of course, honey. It’s your key. Whatever you need.” She took one of Frankie’s keys off her key ring and set it on the kitchen table, then continued on to the side door. “Call you soon, babe.”
Chapter Eight
Sunday, October 26. 10:30 P.M.
Frankie wrapped a blonde lock of hair around one finger and twisted until the ends made a satisfying snap. She let her hand wander until it had parceled out another lock to just the right thickness and snapped that, too. The broken ends of hair drifted to her lap and she swept them onto the carpet. When she felt well enough to unfold from the couch, she’d vacuum them up, along with the fingernails she’d chewed off and spat, and the corner of the Kleenex she’d shredded. A clean-freak, the unfortunate results of her nervous habits drove her every bit as crazy as the constant vibration of Travis’s text messages arriving. Sometimes, the texts slowed. After Bobby left, the texts had increased, as though Travis knew she was alone again.
Want me to come over?
You shouldn’t be alone right now. You’re too fragile to handle this.
Have you called a doctor?
I’m worried, baby, that’s all.
I’ll just check on you and then leave. Okay?
Should I come now?
Answer your goddamn phone.
Paul had advised her to stop deleting the texts, to keep them as proof of harassment should she need to go to the police. Frankie just wanted to sleep, but how could she with his constant pestering? The house was quiet but for the sound of waves crashing on the pebble beach behind her property. She’d meant to get up and close that window now that the breeze was picking up and the temperature was dropping. She just hadn’t managed to convince herself to get up yet, to unfold from the tight, comforting self-hug she was in under her blanket.