Doctors of Darkness Boxed Set

by Ellery A Kane

  “You … scared me.” He raised his gloved hands in surrender. They were large, paw-like.

  “I’m just finishing up in here,” he said. “But I think ya dropped … ” My eyes followed his. It was the black cap from Ginny’s gloss. Not a roach after all. I picked it up.

  “I’m looking for my friend. She came in here maybe ten minutes ago. This is hers.” I showed him the cap, holding it with care as if it was as precious as a rare jewel. He shrugged, barely looking, while he strangled the end of a brimming garbage bag. I screwed the cap back on and slipped the tube into my pocket, feeling silly.

  “Haven’t seen anybody. Usually, the sign keeps ’em out. I can radio my partner for ya, if you’d like.” The man gestured over his shoulder. “He just left with a load of trash.”

  “That’s okay. I must’ve missed her or something.” Even though I knew missing Ginny was as impossible as overlooking the sun. He folded up the yellow sign and waved to me.

  “Why don’t ya give your friend a call? She probably wandered into the bookstore.”

  I waited for him to leave me inside the cool, white tomb of the bathroom. Then I fished my phone from the bottom of my purse and pressed Gin Rummy, the name Ginny typed in herself when we met playing basketball our freshman year. That was before Bellwether’s point guard, Kelly, took an elbow that fractured her jaw, and Ginny deemed herself too pretty for sports. I waited for the ring, Ginny’s typical—Hey Sam, I found a Starbucks. Hot guy behind the counter.

  I thought I might be dreaming when I heard it. I’m still on the plane. I’ve fallen asleep. My head is inching toward 4A’s shoulder. I better open my eyes now. There was that unsettled feeling, the one when disconnected things, mismatched things—a black sock, a blue sock—come together somehow. But after a kind stranger exhumed Ginny’s phone from its resting place, the little sanitary disposal box in the stall furthest from the door, I knew I was wide awake.

  The surface of Ginny’s screen saver, a shirtless Channing Tatum, looked at me with expectation. I clicked a button, and the phone came to life. The notes application was open. With a shot of game-time adrenaline swooshing through my veins, I read the words that seemed meant for me. It was my mother’s name after all.

  Clare, come find me.

  chapter

  two

  roulette wheel

  Teeth. Bone. Blood. I jogged through the airport, hightailing it to baggage claim, where I suspected Ginny waited for me—just a misunderstanding after all. But I couldn’t shake that fractured jaw from four years ago. When I’d caught a glimpse of a tooth hatching from beneath our point guard’s eggshell-white skin, I headed straight for the bench, vomit burning my throat. But not Ginny. She’d sprinted across the court to comfort her, their hands clasped together in a sticky mixture of blood and sweat. That was absolutely disgusting, she’d told me later as we sat together on the bus ride home. That’s when I knew Ginny was braver than me and tougher than she looked. Somehow, the message on her phone reminded me of that tooth. Horrifying in its strangeness. Impossible to unsee.

  Clare, come find me.

  I slowed my pace as I stepped onto the escalator—hopeful—and watched the bag carousels spinning round and round and round beneath me. “She’s fine.” I didn’t sound convincing, so I gave it a second try. “She’s fine.” Baggage claim was swarming with blondes. Surely, Ginny was one of them. She was punishing me for taking 4A’s side. You win, Ginny. You win.

  I fixed my eyes on the board at the edge of the crowd until I found it. Flight 221. Carousel 3. Ginny would be there retrieving the extra bag I’d teased her for packing. Tugging my own suitcase behind me, I made a straight line through the other passengers. They were busy—heads down—calling, texting, reuniting, lugging bags like bodies. It was so normal, too normal, and the seed of my unease started to grow.

  Though I was too young to remember him, my mom always said the hardest part of losing my father was the way life trudged on without him. Like he was a misplaced key or a broken pair of glasses. Nonessential. Easily replaced. Not a shrink whose plane took a terminal nosedive into the side of a mountain. Now I could see what she meant. But Ginny wasn’t dead. She wasn’t even lost. She was here. Somewhere. I knew it.

  “Did she ditch you already?”

  I turned around, nearly colliding with a grinning Levi. “What is that supposed to mean?” The fierceness in my words registered as his eyes widened and his smiled deflated. “Why did you say all that stuff on the plane?”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “About Ginny being careful? Remember?” I knew I sounded a little unhinged, and after a few heads turned to look at me, I realized I was practically yelling.

  Levi started walking past me, pretending he didn’t know me. “You agreed with me,” he mumbled. “And I thought she was the crazy one.” Backpack slung over one shoulder, he kept moving until he was on the opposite end of the carousel—as far away as he could manage. The red light flashed, the horn blaring like it was announcing the end of the world. The sheets of metal came to life, and the bags dropped like marbles on a spinning roulette wheel.

  When I saw Ginny’s bag—the bright pink ribbon she’d tied around the handle giving her away—I waited. It fell in line with the others and began its slow procession. It passed Levi and all the other expectant eyes until it was right back where it began. With each revolution, the suitcases dwindled, plucked off and wheeled out to their awaiting adventures, and the tightening in my stomach became impossible to ignore. I sat down on the edge of the cold metal and watched the pink ribbon go by. Again. It was the last bag. The only bag. I buried my head in my hands.

  “Um … ” I didn’t look up. I didn’t have to. After staring at those boots for the three-hour plane ride, they were unmistakable. “Don’t bite my head off, but are you okay?”

  I didn’t want to say it out loud. It felt irrevocable, like casting a spell, but it demanded saying. “I can’t find my friend. She’s gone.”

  chapter

  three

  occam’s razor

  Are you sure she didn’t leave without you?” Levi joined me on the carousel’s edge as it ground to a stop.

  “No!” I smacked the top of Ginny’s unclaimed suitcase with my palm, and he jumped. “Sorry,” I murmured, waiting for him to do something—walk, run, or excuse himself away from me, crazy airport girl. “She wouldn’t do that.” I flipped her phone between my palms, that message still gnawing at my brain. “She never came out of the bathroom.” I was sure of it now.

  “It’s Samantha, right?” I nodded half-heartedly, wishing I was someone else. “Well, Samantha, that doesn’t make any sense.”

  He was doing it again. That adult voice. “I know it sounds crazy, but that’s what happened.” I produced the only evidence I had. “This is her phone. I found it in one of the stalls.” Levi read the message to himself. Frowning, he rubbed the stubble on his chin. “Clare,” he said aloud. Then he got quiet. Good, I thought. Keep your judgments to yourself, hot airplane boy. But then, “There’s got to be a logical explanation. A simple one. You know, Occam’s razor and all.”

  “Funny you’d say that, creepy stranger who made a subtle threat to my missing friend.” I stood up with no idea where to go.

  “Touché.” His laugh was a warm blanket I wanted to nestle into—Ginny would be back any minute to steal my spotlight like she always did—but instead I shrugged it off. “Am I really that creepy?” he teased.

  To my horror, I actually giggled. Ginny was missing. Gone. And I was making eyes at hot airplane boy. What a complete bitch! That’s what Ginny would’ve said. “This isn’t funny. In case you haven’t noticed, I’m kinda freaking out here.” Tugging both bags awkwardly, one in each hand, I turned my back to him and started fast walking.

  “Oh, I noticed.” He was right behind me. “There are police at the security counter up on
the ticketing level if you’re interested.”

  “Police?” That word landed like a sucker punch, and I spun around to face him.

  He shrugged. “You said she wouldn’t leave. She’s not here. And you seem to think I had something to do with that. So … ”

  “Do you think something bad happened to her?” I whispered that word the way a child would. As if saying it would make it so.

  He shook his head. “I don’t think she’s hooked up with Cutthroat yet, if that’s what you’re asking.”

  “Fine.” I produced my yearbook smile. “Thanks for your help. I’m sure you have somewhere to be.”

  He backed away from me and gave a lukewarm wave. “Suit yourself.”

  ****

  “Virginia Dalton, please report to the Terminal Two Security Desk.” Ginny was going to skin me alive for telling them her full name. When our freshman English had teacher called roll that first day, her face had turned crimson. It sounds like the name of a pilgrim. An unattractive pilgrim, she’d lamented. I’d thought it sounded lovely. Mature and distinguished. Two qualities Ginny lacked.

  “What happens now?” I asked. I’d been standing there staring at Officer Guthrey since he first paged Ginny ten minutes ago. In between bites of a thick sandwich, he’d already echoed Levi’s skepticism.

  “We wait for her to turn up.” Chew. Chew. Chew.

  “And if she doesn’t?”

  He took a swig of coffee from his mug. “She will. They usually do.”

  “They?”

  “Missing teenagers.”

  I sighed. “But what about the note? Ginny would never leave her phone.”

  “Listen. I know you’re worried about your friend, but more than likely she’s playing games with you. You said yourself the two of you had a little tiff on the plane—”

  “It wasn’t a—”

  “ … about a boy. She’s probably gone to the hotel—”

  “She wouldn’t—”

  “ … ahead of you. It’s getting late. I betcha she’ll be there waiting.” I opened my mouth to launch another protest, but he held up his hand. “Here. Take my card. If you haven’t heard from her in forty-eight hours, we can file a missing person’s report. In the meantime, I’ll take a walk up to the bathroom and see what I see. Okay?”

  “Forty-eight hours?” Our flight home left in less.

  He answered my question with one of his own. “Is there someone you can call? Your mother? Her mother? A friend? To let them know what’s happened.”

  I nodded, hoping my face didn’t give it away. No chance in hell I planned on telling my mom about any of this. Not yet anyway. She’d already responded to my I’m-fine-and-will-call-when-I-get-to-the-hotel text with three unanswered calls. I pocketed Officer Guthrey’s card and left the security desk. Still Ginny-less.

  ****

  The glass doors parted for me, and I wheeled the bags into a cold fog, unthinking, like a zombie unearthed in the world of the living. I laid my suitcase onto the sidewalk, rifling through its outer pocket for my sweater. An unwelcome reminder that Ginny had my jacket. I pulled my arms through the sleeves and sat on my bag, trying to ward off the sudden nausea with a long inhale, exhale. At least Ginny paid for the hotel in advance with her mother’s credit card. The graduation money in my wallet—a grand total of $500—wouldn’t get me far.

  “What now?” I said aloud to no one.

  “Want to share a taxi?” Levi leaned up against the wall, headphones in his ears, hands in his pockets. I had to admit, as pathetic as it sounded, I was relieved to see him, grateful for the momentary shushing of the panicked voice in my head. I didn’t even care he caught me talking to myself. Because I’d never taken a taxi anywhere. Bellwether had two stoplights, more tractors than people, and zero taxis. And, if I’m being honest, because he was ridiculously good-looking.

  “Okay. Now you’re officially creepy.”

  He half-smiled, but the lights from inside cast tiny half-moons under his eyes, making him seem serious, pensive. “I figured you’d say that. You can tell me no if you’d like, but I thought you might want some company, given the circumstances.”

  “And what circumstances are those?”

  He ticked them off on his fingers. “You being in a new city alone. Your friend being missing. That cryptic note. The police not believing you and telling you to come back in forty-eight hours … I’m just guessing here.”

  “All true,” I admitted. “I’ll share a cab if we drop you off first. I don’t want any creepers to know where I’m staying.”

  “Fair enough.”

  A few minutes later, Levi and I sat in the back of a taxi, his closeness already familiar to me. I leaned toward him just a little, inhaling the scent of his leather jacket. It barely drowned the stench of stale cigarette smoke. I felt giddy. I felt guilty. I wasn’t sure how to feel, so I pretended to be Ginny. Within a three-mile radius of a cute boy, she always knew what to do.

  “Do you really think she could be at the hotel?” I asked as he settled in, winding the cord of his headphones into a tight coil.

  “It wouldn’t surprise me. She’s probably researching the hottest hot spots right now.” His words were a comfort, a momentary paperweight for the chaos inside me, even if I didn’t believe them. “In fact, I’ll bet she’s typing that exact phrase into Google.”

  I grinned, then redirected. Get him talking about himself—a boy’s favorite subject. That tidbit was somewhere in Ginny’s playbook. “You never told us why you came to San Francisco.” Despite her best efforts, Ginny had only coaxed the vital stats. Name: Levi Beckett. Age: Twenty-one, almost twenty-two. Favorite basketball team: San Antonio Spurs. Relationship status: Single.

  “Long story. Short cab ride.”

  “So that’s how it’s going to be. Man of mystery, huh?”

  “For now.”

  I pushed my lower lip out into an exaggerated pout, hoping I didn’t look as silly as I felt. “If I guess right, will you tell me?”

  “If you guess right, then we’re going to Vegas, because you, Samantha, are a mind reader.” Maybe I wasn’t as hopeless as I thought. The way he said my name sounded a lot like flirting.

  “Well, Mr. Beckett, you don’t strike me as a tourist. You’re not visiting your girlfriend. Um … job interview? It’s that or a super-secret spy mission.”

  Levi threw his head back, laughing. At me. Not with me. And I squashed the sudden urge to karate chop his Adam’s apple. Headphones in hand, still chuckling, he reached down to open his backpack. His backpack. His backpack. His only luggage. I scoured my memory hoping I was wrong.

  “You travel light.” When he nodded, I pushed harder. “So why were you waiting at baggage claim?”

  He didn’t answer right away. His crocodile-green eyes were such a compelling distraction, I almost missed it, deep in the gullet of his backpack. Like most of Bellwether’s residents, my mother owned one just like it, hidden in a safe under her bed. Just in case, she’d told me when I turned sixteen. Right before she’d sent me to a weapons safety class and revealed the eight-digit password—my birth date—to open Pandora’s box. I’d never asked in case of what.

  Before Levi caught me looking, I turned my face to the window and listened for the sound of the zipper. When all its teeth were gnashed together, the quiet palpable between us, I realized I was holding my breath. Still, I didn’t move until he spoke.

  “I was headed out of the airport to my, uh, … job interview … ” He paused for my obligatory eye roll. “ … when I ran into you. It seemed like you needed help. And what can I say? I’m a sucker for a damsel in distress.”

  My throat closed around unspoken words, snuffing them out like a flame pressed between cold fingers. My insides were alive, crawling with the inexplicability of my new reality. Ginny, missing. Me, in a taxi with Levi Beckett. And his gun.
<
br />   chapter

  four

  naÏve

  I found a hole in the taxi’s seat just beneath my hand, a small wound in the Naugahyde. I prodded the foam flesh with my finger as we drove, desperate for a diversion. Levi’s backpack had taken on life. It was squatting like a toad—mouth closed—barely visible in the darkness. He hadn’t reached for it again. Thankfully. Still, the metallic taste of fear lingered on my tongue, no matter how many swigs of bottled water I downed. Ahead of us, a procession of brake lights snaked toward the city. Stop and go. Stop and go. Levi rolled down his window, letting in a gust of air that felt more December than June. It shocked me into speaking.

  “Short cab ride, huh?”

  Levi shrugged. “Typical Bay Area gridlock. Should’ve figured. I guess you don’t see a lot of traffic jams in Bellwether, Texas.”

  “We don’t see much of anything in Bellwether—unless hayfields and farm animals count.”

  “So you’re a cowgirl?”

  “I’m a guard. Basketball. No cows involved.” I wasn’t about to tell Levi about my mom’s herd of cattle. Or the chickens she kept in a coop behind our house.

  “That’s too bad,” he said. “I lived on a farm for a little while.”

  “You did?”

  “Why so surprised? Can’t picture me in Wranglers, boots, and a cowboy hat?”

  “Not really. You seem like a textbook city slicker.”

  Laughing, he pointed to my cell phone, propped precariously on my thigh. “I think your leg is buzzing.” I flipped it over, face down, hoping he hadn’t seen it. “You can answer it. I don’t mind.”

  I shook my head. “Trust me, you don’t want to hear that conversation. My mom didn’t exactly give this trip her blessing.”

  He narrowed his eyes at me like he was seeing me for the first time. “Really? I wouldn’t have figured you for a rebel.”