B10 - His Desire

by Love, Annabelle

  Analyzing each interview in my head had been exhausting, not to mention that it had distracted me. I had avoided quite a few fender benders but I was sure that my luck was going to run out at some point.

  A few minutes after nine, David rang me up. I ran down the stairs with enthusiasm, at the same time wondering what car he had chosen. His vehicle had overshot my building by a few yards. I could see its color through the glass of the entry door. It was dark blue, and seemed like an average, family car. Alas, once I exited the building, it dawned on me that I had misjudged, and it was the same car we’d ridden into the airport.

  “Is this your idea of ‘inconspicuous’?” I asked, pointing at the rear end. “It’s got two double exhausts!”

  “It’s a BMW M3, sweetheart,” David told me. “It’s the most inconspicuous car I’ve got. It was either that or my van. Hop in.”

  My initial thought was to complain. I didn’t know much about cars, but after his startling take off last time he picked me up… Plus, I was well aware of the fact that a double exhaust equals a turbocharger, and that meant a lot of noise. People would hear us coming from hundreds of yards away. All the same, I didn’t voice my annoyance. After all, David had been clear. It was unbelievable, but he didn’t own ‘normal’.

  Later that day however, I discovered that his BMW was the least of my concerns. In the days I had been doing this, I had devised a routine, which I didn’t deviate from. I would head to my destination, keep conversation to a minimum, pose the usual questions and leave.

  David, on the other hand had a much different approach. He introduced himself, and then bombarded his mother’s neighbors with at least ten questions each. The first time he did that, I believed that the elderly lady he was interrogating would snap at him.

  She had no problem at all, though. If anything, she even seemed to enjoy it. And that didn’t change in the following hours. Those pensioners rambled on and on, having David’s undivided attention.

  After we had left Mrs. Higgins’s house, I realized why they had been so talkative. They were all alone in this world. They didn’t have the chance to chat with someone very often, even with a stranger like David.

  The sun was starting to set when we finished up what I thought would be our last interview for the day. I broke out my list and crossed out the names of the people we had interviewed so far. Reading the remaining names, David noted that there were just three people we had yet to meet.

  Why leave that for tomorrow, and suffer more traffic, noise, and the blistering heat?

  I agreed with him in a heartbeat. We would finish up late, but we would save us the trouble of driving back to New Jersey yet again.

  It was already dark when David drove us to the last address on my list. He eased on the brakes outside a rather nice-looking house with a lawn and a freshly-painted fence. It even featured two, lion water fountains, one on each side of the lawn.

  “This doesn’t look like the kind of place you could buy for ninety grand,” David remarked. “What’s this guy’s name again?”

  “Dwayne Carlton, age fifty-two, retired marine,” I informed, strutting alongside him. “He moved in six months ago. That’s why I left him for last. He had already sold before Consolidated Building decided to buy everyone out.”

  “Maybe we shouldn’t have come here at all,” he murmured as I made my way towards the dark window to my left.

  “We need to be thorough,” I remarked, David knocking on his door. I pressed my forehead onto the glass and attempted to look inside. It was pointless. Other than the white sofa in the upper right corner and a white door frame in the middle of the living room, I couldn’t make out anything else.

  A wave of disappointment washed over me. Not only would Carlton likely be clueless as to what had transpired in his old neighborhood, but he wasn’t even there for us to speak with him.

  In the blink of an eye, that ugly feeling gave way to sheer, unadulterated terror. A red beam tore through the darkness of the interior. Moving across the living room, it stopped on my chest, causing my stomach to chill with fear.

  David cried out, lunging towards me.

  I sensed his fingers pushing me away, just when a bullet shattered the glass. Shards were flying across the lawn as my body hit the ground with a thump, David landing on top of me. He rolled over on his back, before the crackling sounds of more bullets ripped through the air.

  “Move!” he called out yet again, grabbing me by the wrist. Yanking me in the direction of the road, he dragged me across the lawn as I struggled to get back up to my feet. Once I had managed to do so, I ducked my head down, bullets tearing off chunks of grass.

  Reaching the pavement, David let go of my wrist and raced around the car, slugs getting lodged in the rear side-door of his BMW. I swung the passenger’s door open and jumped in, my heart pounding harder and faster in my chest. Keeping my head down, I slammed it shut, for the first time welcoming the roar of a powerful engine. David put his foot hard down on the acceleration, the rear tires of the vehicle squeaking in protest. One more bullet pierced the window behind me, shattering it to pieces as David’s car grumbled off.

  “Are you all right?” he asked, his voice riddled with tension and fear.

  “I’m fine,” I said on an exhale, straightening myself up. “I…” I swallowed hard. “I think my heart is going to explode.”

  “Fuck!” David growled, banging his fist against the steering wheel. “We just got shot at! What the actual fuck? This has got to be him, Stacy. That motherfucker killed my mother.”

  “Woah, slow down there. Let’s not jump into conclusions,” I suggested, unable to keep panic out of my voice.

  “Who’s jumping into conclusions?!” He exclaimed, tossing a nasty glare over at me. “That son of a bitch just tried to kill us!”

  “Due process, David,” I said, running my hand through my hair. “We need to report this.”

  “Right,” he gave a huff of exasperation. “Damn it…” He shook his head in frustration, palming his forehead.

  Shivering with dread, I shut my eyes, and memories from a few months ago returned to my mind. A car screeching to a halt, a lowered window, the moonlight reflecting off the barrel of a rifle…

  The scene of my shooting had haunted my dreams for weeks after my release from hospital. Now, it had come back to haunt my reality.

  The memory continued, and Michelle’s screams reverberated in my skull, the agonizing pain of a bullet raising every fine hair in my body. I huddled up in my seat and burst into wailing sobs, tumbling into the abyss of my nightmare once again.

  “Screw the cops,” I heard David’s soothing voice amid my sniffles. “We’re going to the hospital first.”

  Chapter 14

  David

  Poor Stacy… My elegant redhead had somehow transformed into a scared creature that couldn’t stop crying.

  I kept my mouth shut throughout the drive to the hospital, understanding that anything I said to her would fall on deaf ears. Still, there was another reason behind my silence. I just couldn’t believe what had happened, or why.

  We got shot at?

  Again?

  All I did was knock, and Stacy just snuck a peek through the window. We didn’t even show our faces or speak to anyone. Maybe the shooter did get a good look at Stacy, but was that a reason to try and kill her? Hell, no.

  After arriving at the hospital, while Stacy was being seen by the psychiatrist, I called Jake and asked him to bring his wife and come over to the hospital, without telling him ‘why’. All I could tell him was that there was something wrong with Stacy. She needed any help she could get, and Michelle was the person she trusted more than anyone in the world.

  The moment our eyes met in the waiting room though, I realized that there were a few things I had to say to both of them before I could get to the incident at Carlton’s house. Jake knew about my mother’s passing, but neither of them had any idea about the investigation or our relationship.

  “Da
vid, what was that all about?!” Michelle wondered, stepping ahead of Jake. “What happened to Stacy? And how come you found about it first?”

  “You guys had better sit down for this,” I advised, my voice calm and steady.

  “Okay,” Michelle spoke, obliging me. “I’m all ears.”

  I sucked in the deepest breath possible, folding my arms across my chest. “We all got a little drunk on your wedding, but she got drunk out of her freaking mind.”

  “Are you even listening to yourself?” Michelle narrowed her eyes up at me. “What does our wedding have to do with tonight?”

  “Just let me finish” I pressed. “As I said, Stacy got too drunk. She came to my room, looking for some consolation sex. You know how much she loves you, but…” I paused. “She got jealous. I flat-out rejected her. It didn’t take Einstein to figure out what she’d do if I took advantage of her. I told her about it when we came back to New York, but she couldn’t remember it.”

  “Why am I not surprised?” Michelle said, shaking her head in disapproval. “That’s happened to her before. I kept telling her not to drink that night, but she wouldn’t listen.”

  “Anyway, well with my mother passing under suspicious circumstances I had her death looked into and her toxicology report came back positive for a prescription drug overdose. So I asked Stacy for help,” I continued, my pulse rising. “I was one hundred-percent sure that a developer called Consolidated Building had done it, because my mom had been refusing to sell. Stacy has been interviewing my mom’s neighbors. We met up in my apartment after her first trip to New Jersey and she heard me singing the same Lenny Kravitz song that I was singing when I took her back to her room. One thing led to another, and, um…” I faltered. “We had sex. And… we’re dating now.”

  I took a deep breath and a pause before continuing, “We came down to Jersey today to do some interviews together, and one of my mother’s old neighbors opened fire at us. Don’t worry; she’s fine, but she freaked out. I think she’s remembering, or maybe even reliving when she got shot at months ago, outside Brooklyn Star, that magazine paper where Jake was going to give that interview.

  “I can’t believe this,” Michelle whispered, her eyes shut as she tilted her head back. Averting his gaze from me, Jake folded his hands behind his head, elbows pointing forward.

  “Which part?” I inquired, my voice deepening.

  “Everything,” her response was sharp. “Look, I’m not going to comment on the fact you two are dating. Stacy’s a big girl. I’m not going to tell her who she should or should not date. But getting shot at? Again? That’s twice in six months, for crying out loud. I mean… this just doesn’t happen in real life, does it? You couldn’t make this up if you tried!”

  “I’m calling 911,” Jake stated, his face stiff. “You stay away from that maniac, you hear? Let the police handle this.” He assumed an emphatic tone, glaring down at me.

  Stay away? That was easier said than done.

  The same bastard who had very likely killed my own mother had tried to gun me and Stacy down. He might have been a marine, but, given the chance, I would pound on him with everything I had. At that moment, the hospital psychiatrist strode into the waiting room, her eyes on me.

  “Ms. Briar is resting now,” she said, the concern on her face upsetting me even further. “She’s suffered a PTSD-related nervous breakdown. She’s going to need some counseling and medication. But be advised, Mr. Marshall, neither will help her much, unless they are combined with good rest, hydration and relaxation. It would also be good if she had some form of exercise, which is also known to help, and she should be around others as she recovers. Does she have friends or family she can stay with?”

  “Thank you doctor, I’m her boyfriend and she can stay with me in my apartment,” I said.

  “When can we see her?” Michelle asked, walking closer to her.

  “I’m afraid you’ll have to wait until tomorrow morning,” Dr. Peters added. “She was in bad shape when she was brought in and so we’ve given her something to help her relax.”

  “I need some fresh air,” I muttered under my breath, starting off down the hallway. On some level, I expected the doctor’s diagnosis. Still, expecting something bad and hearing it are two very different things. I felt like I was suffocating in there, as if someone had grabbed me by the throat and was trying to choke the life out of me.

  That someone had a name.

  Guilt.

  I had put Stacy’s life on the line.

  She had survived another murder attempt, but at what cost? For a while at least, she would be fragile. I had to treat her like a princess, which was fine, but a woman like her wouldn’t like it one bit. My feisty redhead was an independent spirit. For a period of time, she would have to put that aside, and rely on me. More than that, she loved her job, even though I’d often seen her complain about it. How the hell was I going to say to her that she would have to spend some time in my apartment, doing nothing?

  An ambulance siren pierced my ears as I exited the building. It was just coming through the gate, its blue light flashing. Groups of people were coming towards my direction, talking to each other, a big man bumping into me from behind. He didn’t even have the decency to look back. But even if he did, I wouldn’t say a word. I just didn’t have the heart to complain about something so trivial. I had more important things to worry about.

  I was close enough to see my mangled car in the parking lot, the moonlight revealing several bullet holes in the panel behind the rear door. I smiled in bitterness, knowing that I would have to get rid of it. And I had to do that as fast as possible. Selling it to a scrap yard would break my heart, but, if Stacy laid eyes on that BMW again, it might bring up everything from six months ago and tonight all over again, and crush her.

  A cool breeze picked up dust and gravel from the ground, a Ford sedan with a red siren on top rolled down the parking lot. The cop found a spot just three cars down from my M3 and switched off the engine. I stopped a couple of feet behind it and gazed at it until he approached me. Amazingly, it was Detective Graham, the cop who had been investigating my mother’s case.

  “Evening,” I spoke in a lazy tone. “My friend Jake called you about a shooting.”

  “Small world,” he nodded, flashing me a polite smile. “Whoa!” His brows popped up as he looked down at the bullet holes. “Holy shit…” he groaned, “when did this happen?”

  “A little over an hour ago,” I replied, dragging my gaze away from him. “My girlfriend and I were trying to find one of my mother’s old neighbors. Look, I’d say it’s nice to see you again, but I’d be lying. My mother was murdered, and you people don’t know shit about who did it.”

  “We don’t have any new leads,” Graham said, turning to me. “She was on pretty good terms with her neighbors; most of them were even her friends. She hadn’t dated anyone in more than a year, and her ex lives in Vermont. I talked to him, too. He was having drinks with a friend of his in a local bar. His alibi checked out.”

  “Dwayne Carlton?” I squinted my eyes, my hands on my waist.

  “How do you know his name?” He answered my question with a question of his own.

  “We got shot at, right outside his house,” I told him, adrenaline surging through my system. “329, Baker Street. I knocked a couple of times, and then, all hell broke loose. Shit, I knew my mom had dated someone, but I never knew his name.”

  “That’s impossible,” he discarded that notion. “I went to that address. The house was vacant. I got his new address from an old neighbor of his. He’s been living in Vermont for the past five months or so.”

  “Go check it,” I demanded, my face hardening.

  “Okay, I’ll call it in,” tension sped up Graham’s voice as he turned away from me. “Don’t go anywhere.”

  Any shred of my leftover anger had evaporated by the time he talked on the police radio. In its stead was a sense of confusion that was growing by the minute.

  So… Carlt
on was supposed to be living hundreds of miles away… and he and my mom had broken up a while ago. Why had it taken him a whole year to do something?

  “A patrol car is just two blocks away. We’ll know soon,” Graham announced. “Now, will you tell me what you were doing over at Carlton’s house?”

  “I was interviewing my mom’s old neighbors, trying to find some leads or information that would help me find her killer. You know… what you should have been doing!”

  “There’s no need to get defensive, Mr. Marshall,” the cop maintained his calmness. “You wouldn’t happen to know why Carlton was discharged from the Corp, would you?”

  “I don’t have a clue,” I shrugged. “Why do you ask?”

  “Well, if you did, you’d think twice about going anywhere near his place,” Graham presumed, his voice firm. “The guy shot and killed one of his fellow officers in Afghanistan, back in 2004. He’s been in and out of mental hospitals ever since.”

  “Detective, we’re on site,” the female voice on the radio prevented me from speaking. “There’s no one home, but the living room window is shattered and part of the front has damage. There are shell casings all over the floor, too. Over.”

  “Roger that,” Graham acknowledged. “Mr. Marshall, forensics will be here within the hour, so we’ll need your car. We’ll return it to you once the investigation is over. I’m going to need a statement from you too, I’ll call tomorrow. But in the meantime, try to stay out of trouble. Goodnight.”

  I’m already in trouble.

  That thought stormed into my mind as I watched him head back to his car. I couldn’t help it. It was instinct. Apart from discovering my mother’s killer, I also had to worry about Stacy. The next few days would be strange and would test us. I would have to walk on thin ice, take care of her and pray that she recovered quickly…

  Chapter 15