Fusion: A collection of short stories from Breakwater Harbor Books’ authors

by Scott Toney

  I think its Wednesday. The girl’s gone. M was angry with me. He saw I’d been sick and said I’d been snooping. He said Odin’s coming for me this afternoon. I bit him dad and he slapped me. I know you’re looking for me but its taking so long.

  The note stopped there because the little pencil she used ran out of lead. The crime scene investigator found the notebook buried in the straw, an old milking journal with a small pencil tied to the spine. They could see the table through a gap in the wooden slats from the bed but fortunately not the contents of the fridge since it was turned to one side. . .

  A shuffling and a clinking of chains brought David back to the present. A correctional officer brought Morgan back in and sat him down with a harsh word.

  “Are you sleeping okay?” David said, hoping it wasn’t as much as his dog was getting.

  “Not much.”

  David was glad. Prison wasn’t supposed to be a picnic.

  “There’s a demon in the Pen. Looks like a gargoyle. He’s sitting over here.”

  Of course he is. David looked at the empty chair against the wall and felt a twinge of fear like a cudgel in his ribs. “You’re in Supermax, right?”

  “Level VI. Death Row,” Morgan confirmed. “We sex offenders always stick together, Detective Van. Always. Stick. Together.”

  David bit his lip to stop from smiling. Morgan was dreaming up all kinds of guff in that comfy little bunk of his. “Tell me what happened on the morning of June 26th?” he said, changing the subject.

  “When the rain stopped I took her for a walk in the woods. I asked her to choose a tree. All the girls choose trees. We marked it with a ribbon.”

  Odd, this tree thing, David thought until he remembered the carved faces and the odor of paint and turpentine. Someone had been happy with a paintbrush.

  “She started to shiver and I didn’t want her to be cold,” Morgan continued.

  “And that bothered you?”

  “Yes. I look after my friends.”

  Friends? There was nothing friendly in a good kidnapping. David couldn’t help thinking he was looking in the face of a hand-grenade without a pin. “Did you touch her, Morgan?”

  “No. We talked.”

  “What did you talk about?”

  “Her mother. My mother.”

  Morgan’s dead mother was a scary thing. She was a crack addict and sold two of her four children to support the habit. She was found some years later hanging from a roller towel in a truck-stop bathroom. None of the police could understand how she did it, roller towels being so close to the ground and all.

  “She said there was a voice in the wind, a still, small voice. I don’t believe in that stuff,” Morgan said, eyes flicking from side to side. “I believe in other things.”

  “What kind of things?”

  “Wings and voices.” Morgan’s voice was smoother than a shrink. “You can hear them if you care to listen.”

  David shook his head. It was all beginning to sound like a ghostly freak show.

  “The demons of the nine worlds, Detective, half-animal, half-man. Odin’s horde.”

  David wasted no time during his break to research Odin, a Norsk god, hanged from the world tree for nine days and nights. Only this Odin was beginning to sound like a real person and that was the part that bothered him.

  “Kizzy wanted to go to the river,” Morgan murmured with a loud sigh. We went to the beaver ponds to catch fish.”

  “What kind of fish?”

  “Trout. There’re loads of them behind the boulders. She told me to close my eyes so I could listen to the trees. God’s music she called it.”

  Pity she hadn’t run away when your eyes were closed. David had a vision of a little girl sitting on a rock like one of those woodland fairies he had seen in a book. She was a little person once. She was a little person still.

  “We caught three and put them on the coals. It was her last supper.”

  Last supper . . . The words seemed to linger in David’s ears like a sad song.

  Morgan leaned back in his chair and sighed. “Then it was Wednesday, Odin’s day. That’s when it happened.”

  Wednesday, June 27 . . . David felt a sliver of terror. He imagined a hunter’s knife slicing through skin and bones and he had to clamp his lips together to stop from heaving.

  “What happened, Morgan?” David said, clearing his throat.

  “She’d been snooping. I could tell by the vomit. She hadn’t eaten the food I gave her. So I fed her the pudding, double the dose this time. And then Odin came. He takes care of the ranch. He takes care of the trees.”

  David flexed the muscles in his legs. So Odin was the caretaker, the face-carver.

  “The trees are like headstones you see.”

  There were no bodies buried under the trees. The dogs would have found them if there were, David thought.

  “He got mad at me for keeping her so long,” Morgan said. “He said I should have called him before the ninth hour.”

  The ninth hour in biblical times was around three o’clock in the afternoon. Kizzy should have died the same day she was taken only Morgan took his sweet time.

  “And why was Kizzy any different?” David said.

  “She treated me with respect. She called me sir.” Morgan bit his lip and his gaze drifted to the left. “I liked her, you see. But I am what I am.”

  “What are you, Morgan?”

  “A victim just like you,” Morgan sniffed and raised his chin. “She wasn’t scared of me before then. But I think she knew.”

  “Knew what, Morgan?”

  “She knew she was going to die.”

  The drone of Morgan’s voice was more than David could stand. He hardly listened to the details and he hoped there were enough drugs in that cocktail to have knocked Kizzy out cold.

  “Do you know why I asked for you?” Morgan whispered.

  David shook his head. He had no idea.

  “Because Odin wants nine sacrifices. Nine.”

  David lifted one eyebrow. He thought of the upright stones at the ranch. From the sky they would have appeared as two elliptical shapes joined together like a Norse funeral ship. Burial places. Only there was nothing buried there. “I guess he’s one girl short then.”

  “I’d check your phone if I were you.”

  David refused to fall for it. Nothing had vibrated in his jacket pocket since breakfast and he wasn’t about to pander to a deranged mind. “Tell me, Morgan . . .”

  “Your phone,” Morgan insisted.

  David took the phone from his pocket and noted the flashing light with some impatience. There was a message from the principal at Valley Christian School.

  Sorry for your loss. Ophelia on her way with Sgt. Alvarez. Call if you need anything.

  Luis Alvarez was David’s brother-in-law, the fastest draw with Ruger Security Six. There was nothing unusual in the message. As for his loss . . . David’s wife was in Taos visiting a hypochondriac of a mother-in-law. He hoped the woman had already croaked. It would save at least a hundred miles in gas.

  “You see,” Morgan said, face clouded with insanity, “we must never underestimate the enemy.”

  “The enemy?” David said.

  “Sergeant Alvarez,” Morgan whispered. “He’s not who he says he is.”

  Somehow David could already taste the bile in his throat and the muscles jumping under his skin. He was familiar with that deep dark feeling of dread, the one that tells a man he’s lost the most precious thing he owns. The chair scraped against the vinyl floor as he struggled to stand and he lurched towards the corridor, gasping for air.

  CHAPTER 6

  Darryl chewed his sandwich thoughtfully as the car pulled up behind them. A dark uniform reminded him of a few red lights he’d run and it would be just his luck if he was ticketed for speeding. Money was tight, too tight for a hundred dollar fine.

  “Is there a law against parking and eating,” he muttered, mesmerized by a row of flashing light
s.

  “Troopers patrol this stretch of road for cons,” Razz said between mouthfuls. “Two escaped last winter and got all the way to Golden. We don’t look like cons, son. At least I don’t.”

  “There’s a cop right behind us and he’s just sitting there,” Darryl said, watching a thick-set man with a few days growth on his chin. It was a pursuit car and a Dodge Charger at that.

  “Anyone can park on a hard shoulder,” Razz said, wiping a glob of mustard from his chin.

  “This hard shoulder?” Darryl began to feel uneasy, like he’d just woken up and found a hate-message written on his mirror in lipstick.

  Razz turned his head and looked out of the rear window. “He’s got a kid in the front seat. He might just be doing a routine check.”

  David watched the police officer get out of his car, revolver gripped in one hand, muzzle pointed at the ground. There was something odd about the uniform, something that gripped at his conscience. It was city issue not State, and the man was well out of his jurisdiction.

  Cops don’t tout guns for routine checks . . .

  Darryl waited until the man was parallel to the tail lights of his Comet before his stomach lurched into a state of panic. He turned the key in the ignition and floored it.

  He couldn’t remember telling Razz to get down but he heard the shot and felt the warmth of Razz’s head on his lap. They were hurtling along the road at forty miles an hour and climbing. But the cruiser was gaining on them and Darryl felt a sick sensation in the pit of his gut. He checked the rearview mirror and saw the driver, closer now and sporting a stubborn grimace. The child beside him appeared to be crying.

  He’s a car thief and he’s not having my Mercury-man wheel caps, Darryl thought, pushing his foot down as far as it would go. All he could see in his rearview mirror was a pile of smoke and a Dodge Charger up his rear.

  “Razz!” he shouted.

  He heard a grinding of metal and felt the thrust. The front of the Comet almost lifted from the ground, forcing a string of profanity from his mouth. He felt Razz roll off his lap like a rag doll, jammed between the bottom of the steering wheel and his right knee, and he saw the crimson stain on his jeans.

  Razz had taken a hit.

  And then his whole world began to spin before it went black.

  When he came too, he heard a faint buzzing like a dragonfly bouncing from stalk to stalk. There was a stench of burning sage and something tart and heavy like gasoline, and he thought he saw a figure dragging something along the ground.

  “Razz?” He hardly recognized his voice, faint, croaking over the crackling flames. He was too afraid to move.

  The smell of burning rubber was stronger now and he heard the squeak of a wheel in the distance. Shards of glass stabbed at his legs and there was pressure on his chest as if he had been winded. Snow fell in large clumps from dirty grey clouds that scudded in from the west and a far-away howl suggested coyotes nearby. He couldn’t see them but he knew they were there.

  I can feel my legs, he thought. I can feel my fingers.

  The Dodge was twenty feet to his left, barely visible behind a wall of smoke. It was upside down and gutted with flames. The Comet was beyond it close to the curb and listing against a sandbank. Both doors were open and judging by the distance from the road, it had rolled at least twice before landing on its wheels.

  It might even be drivable, he hoped, narrowing his eyes to the smoke. He sensed in that moment that his body had been thrown from the vehicle. It was completely intact, cushioned by a thick mound of sagebrush.

  It was a miracle, the type Razz always talked about.

  A whimpering sound made him turn his head towards the Dodge and there in the dirt, huddled by a rock barely six feet from the front fender, was a child.

  Kizzy, he wanted to shout and his heart throbbed so hard it almost hurt. She looked just like her, same green blazer, same pleated skirt.

  He took his time standing, managing little more than a hobble. He made his way towards the girl, making out two braids and a wealth of black hair. Large brown eyes looked up at him and he saw two bloody knees peeking beneath a torn skirt.

  “Can you move your legs?”

  “I think so.” She moved them just to make sure.

  “What’s your name,” he said, wincing from the pain in his left leg. He could hardly kneel.

  “Ophelia,” the child whispered.

  “I’m Darryl, Darryl Williams,” he said, picking the glass from his arms.

  He looked back at the Dodge and its burned-out windshield. There was no blackened corpse behind the wheel and there wasn’t one on the ground. It was the eerie silence that bothered him and the trees beyond the wreckage seemed to pulse with life as if something moved in the shadows.

  He coaxed Ophelia to her feet, feeling the grip of her fingers. She was tall for her age and scared. She sensed something too.

  “You go to Valley Christian School?” he said, pointing at her blazer.

  “Yes.”

  “It’s a good school.” Darryl swallowed hard and brushed her blazer with a paternal hand. “My girls are there. Keryn and Tessa Williams. Do you know them?”

  “Yes,” she said, wiping her eyes.

  It was the only bond he could think of and a paltry one at that. He wanted her to feel safe. He wanted her to trust him.

  “Who was the man with you?” he asked, catching the grimace. “Not someone you know then?”

  “He was taking me to my dad,” she stammered. “I don’t know why.”

  She was too confused to know why and too frightened to remember. She cried then, just a little.

  “We better find him.”

  Darryl turned to look at the cruiser and saw nothing but twisted metal. There were fragments of rubber on the ground torn from the front tires and judging by a pile of glass, the driver’s window had been smashed from the inside. There was a trail in the sand about ten feet from the car as if something had been dragged along the ground. The officer must have pulled Ophelia to safety before the car exploded. But why did he leave her?

  “It’s okay,” Darryl said, coaxing her with a slight tug. “We need to get out of here.”

  Ophelia nodded and grabbed the sleeve of his jacket. The Comet was empty too, hood slightly buckled and a spatter of blood on the passenger window. The key was still in the ignition, fob swinging slightly in the cool breeze.

  They found Razz lying on his side as if he merely slept. He never had time to put his seatbelt on when they sped off the hard shoulder and he was already dead by the time the car spun out of control.

  Funny how the dead don’t linger, not even to say goodbye.

  Darryl felt a dry sob rising in his throat. He had never felt more alone. He never felt more exposed. There they were, standing in a flaming stretch of brush with something out there watching. He stood abruptly and told himself he wasn’t crying. It was just the smoke.

  A tug on his sleeve made him turn and he noticed Ophelia was pointing beyond the burning brush. Darryl saw them too, twenty or more pairs of eyes watching, waiting, a pack of coyotes ready to scavenge amongst the rubble. He walked Ophelia towards the Comet and strapped her into the front seat.

  He saw her face clearly then as he put a hand on her shoulder, speaking in a reassuring voice. She was calmer, eyes pointed forward as if counting the snowflakes on the windshield.

  “Better?” he asked, taking off his jacket and wrapping it around her shoulders.

  “Yes,” she whispered, hands drawn in two tight knuckles.

  He walked around to the driver’s seat and climbed in beside her. Reaching towards the back seat, he found the icebox wedged behind the consul. The lid was thrown back and all he could see inside was a pile of wrappers as if someone had rifled through the contents.

  The gun was gone.

  Darryl closed his eyes for a second. It had to be here somewhere.

  The whimpering caught him off-guard and he turned to see O
phelia’s lips moving. He couldn’t hear what she was saying but he could see what she saw. A dark figure staggered towards the car with a gun in his hand and Darryl recognized the torn uniform and the duty belt.

  He turned the key in the ignition.

  Silence.

  He tried again, hearing only a faint whirring sound from the engine.

  “Get down,” he hissed.

  Ophelia lowered her head and covered herself with the jacket. Darryl turned the key again. A third time and the car grunted into life, back right wheel skidding through the sand. The scrape of metal on tarmac alerted Darryl to a loose front fender and he prayed it would hold once they were on the road.

  And then he heard two shots.

  CHAPTER 7

  David hardly listened to agent’s droning voice. None of it made any sense. The sweet smell of tea made his throat tighten and he couldn’t drink another cup even if he tried. Strange memories began to swirl though his mind and he saw himself as a child, frightened of his father, frightened of life.

  Stand up soldier, his father would say. And wipe those eyes. Men don’t cry.

  David never cried after that, at least not that he could remember. He went through life protected by a thick wall of indifference. It was safer that way.

  At thirty-eight, he was recognized as one of the most persuasive negotiators the police had, a man with whom the prisoner could relate. According to his boss, there was one thing the department disliked and that was his unique quietness, the irrefutable feeling that he was hiding something. No one really knew him. But that’s how David liked it.

  They can never build a case against me, he thought.

  Only they did, of course. They blamed him for flashing his credentials to get out of numerous speeding tickets and for rolling a few joints in his time. He wasn’t guilty of the former. The latter, of course, was different matter. All this was before Morgan Eriksen insisted he would talk to no one else. It shook the department up a bit.

  David was assigned to the case four months ago when the lead detective vanished without a trace. His car was found burned out on the hard shoulder on NM14 with a decapitated rabbit on the front seat. There was a brown luggage tag attached to its back leg with the words until the ninth hour written in black ink and in perfect cursive.

  David’s mind kept circling back to the murders, monstrous deaths that should never have happened. Children ripped from their schools so easily by a maniac. One little girl was taken by a school bus painted white with the name San Felipe Catholic School printed on the outside. Although the color was not standard yellow, the parents assumed the bus was genuine.