“Could be. Who the hell are you?”
“Sebastian Hammerson. I have a job that needs doing and was told you’re a guy that could get it done.” He looked down at the towel. “If I’ve caught you at a bad time maybe I can come back later.”
John was about to declare that the suggestion was a fine idea. After all, his head was far from clear and he’d only just finished a job. And yet there was something about the uninvited guest, something in his mannerisms that caused the mental fog to wisp away with each second. That something, he figured, might be the fact that the guy projected money. It wasn’t so much the silver coloured suit or the stunning gold watch resting upon his wrist. No, it was something less tangible, something that John had somehow learned to pick up over the years but nothing he could put a concrete description to.
“It’s okay, there’s never a good time. Come on in and take a seat. I’ll be with you in a minute.”
It took only a few moments for John to return with the towel replaced with jeans and shirt. Sebastian seemed uncomfortable as he stood in the centre of the living room and looked across the various framed photographs. Most of them were of his wedding, but a couple were of him in uniform from what seemed a lifetime ago. He’d been meaning to get rid of the damn things, and made a mental note that today would be the day they’d be smashed and discarded.
Bobbie slowly made his way to the tattered blanket and watched through smoky eyes as the visitor awkwardly sat on the sofa. John collapsed in a chair opposite and wondered why the hell he’d been woken up, even if it did mean the nightmares would now have to wait for another round.
Sebastian cleared his throat and rubbed at the side of his temple. “I probably should have tried calling before coming here, but I figured I had a better chance of you hearing me out if we could talk face to face.”
“Well here you are, and here I am. Best you just get straight to the point, cause I’m not really one for visitors.”
“They told me as much.”
“They?”
“The people that recommended you. There’s a matter of business, personal business I guess you could say, that I’m hoping you might be able to help me with. It’s a job that requires someone with your skill set.”
“I’m not sure if I want to take another job on right now.” John sighed as the remnants of the valium kept his eyes heavy and thoughts muddy. “I’m still burning a little from the last one and to be honest, things are a little complicated.”
“I’m willing to make it very much worth your while.”
The desire to shut the conversation down and collapse back into a dark slumber was strong, but a small whispering voice of logic reminded him that the mortgage payments weren’t going to be any easier now that his marriage had fallen to pieces.
“I don’t know if I can help you,” John said with a dry mouth, “but hell, might as well tell me what it is you want.”
Sebastian stared at the floor for a small eternity as though unsure of how to formulate the words. Thin lines pulled tight around his eyes. His hands were clasped together so tight the blood began to drain from his fingers. Then with a sudden jerk of his head he looked to John.
“What I’d like you to do is travel to America and extract my wife from a situation that is not only unusual but, I have reason to believe, also quite dangerous. Not in the usual sense of the word, but more in the realm of long term damage.”
The first responsive thought that surfaced in John’s still waking mind was that here was another case of someone wanting their loved one ripped from the sweeping tide of a drug fuelled spiral. The second thought, strong and dominant, was that there was no fucking way he was taking another street case so quickly, and especially not one in another damn country.
“It was Sebastian wasn’t it? Listen Sebastian, if you’re talking about your wife getting caught up in drugs and the crap that comes with it, well, you’re going to be disappointed. I’m not taking any more of those jobs for a while. If you like I can maybe point you in the right direction though.”
He was just about to stand up and show his guest to the door, figuring he couldn’t be clearer than that, but Sebastian shook his head and raised a hand.
“No,” he said, “it’s got nothing to do with drugs. It’s far more complicated than anything like that I assure you. If you give me just a few minutes of your time I have no doubt you’ll begin to understand the predicament I’m in. Please.”
Now, to his own surprise, John found a spark of interest beginning to burn.
“I guess I should make some coffee then.”
He left his guest on the sofa and headed for the kitchen with senses beginning to sharpen. Minutes later he returned and placed two steaming cups onto the small coffee table before collapsing back into the chair. What the hell, he thought, no harm in listening to what the guy had to say. Who knows? It could turn out to be an easy earner.
“Well then,” he said while taking a gulp of caffeine, “I’m all ears.”
Sebastian slowly nodded and eased his hands apart. “I’m sure I don’t need to highlight the fact that what I’m about to tell you I do so in the strictest of confidence.”
“Of course.”
“I guess then I’d best lay it all on the table.”
“Yeah, that’d be best.”
Sebastian reached down, sipped at his coffee, and began.
“I’m fifty two years old. For nearly thirty of those years I practised law. Never in the spotlight, but I was well sought after to assist the sort of clients that you probably spent a good deal of time and energy chasing down when you were still with the force. Big money clients, the kind that ran businesses across the globe.” He nodded as if sure John understood. “To be honest I did it for a bit of a challenge. I enjoyed searching for legal loopholes for dangerous characters. I don’t know why. It sure as hell wasn’t for the money. I’ve never needed money. I was born into money, graced by a bloodline inheritance that has left me with more than I could spend even if I returned to this earth another ten times. But that kind of wealth brings a consequence that very few people could ever understand.”
“Not many of us have that sort of money.”
“Not many, no. Do you know what comes with unlimited finances? The loss of feeling, of excitement. When anything you desire is just a snap of the fingers away something becomes lost, something that should be there is gone, a feeling I guess, or a sensation. To be honest I don’t quite have the right word for it. Believe me, I’ve tried for a long time to come up with a simple way of explaining it, but it seems there’s no real way for it. Well, no word I know of. Suffice to say, I’ve come to understand that there’s a hidden sense of humour buried within the universe. If there’s no struggle, it seems, there’s no sense of joy or satisfaction. Not for me anyway.”
“If it makes you feel any better,” John murmured, “I’ve yet to find this joy you’re talking about that’s supposed to come with struggle.”
“I didn’t mean to insult you in any way,” Sebastian continued with a hint of shame cornering his eyes, “but merely wanted to let you know there’s not much in this world that I can’t have. But now it seems this hidden sense of humour has played a most terrible joke on me. My wife was the first person to ignite feelings in me, feelings that I thought were mere flights of fancy penned by drugged poets, and now she’s gone. In the five years since I first held her in my arms I’ve felt an electricity in life beyond anything I could have imagined. Every moment together has given me sensations that no amount of money in the world could come close to replicating. No doubt you’ve heard this sort of story before, but this particular story is mine. It’s a story I felt would remain at the edge of my fingers until I was dead and buried.”
John took a deep breath and exhaled, the interest that had been there just moments ago beginning to fade with the dissolving, formless memories of the nightmare. Sebastian could sense the threatening impatience and cleared his throat before continuing.
“At the risk of coming
across as a broken hearted cliché, it’s important that you know how much I love my wife. It’s equally important that you understand she loved me just as much. I tell you this because I don’t want you to think I’m here with hat in hand hoping to win back a love that is no more, because it’s simply not the case. Unfortunately, it’s a lot more complicated than that. Adding to this complication is the difficult fact that if I tell you too much, you may no longer be in a position to help. Too little, and you may not find a valid reason to help.”
“One option then, is to just tell me what it is you want me to do.”
Sebastian sipped at his coffee and slowly nodded. “I think you’re right John, so that’s exactly what I’ll do.”
“I’m all ears.” And you’re right, he thought, this is turning into a damn cliché and my clock is just about outta time.
“Rebecca, that’s my wife’s name. Rebecca stumbled onto a website about six months ago, I don’t know if it was by accident or if someone gave her the information, I guess at the end of the day it doesn’t matter too much. She was always looking for charitable causes that were solid enough to capture her interest, or new business opportunities that she thought might benefit society. That’s the kind of person she was, or is, more to the point. Of course I could spend the morning illuminating you on all the wonderful things she’s worked very hard on, but I suspect you’ll find these things out on your own. Anyway,” he took a moment to watch Bobbie rise from the blanket and move towards John’s feet where he promptly fell back down ready to dream again, “the website is some sort of business, for want of a better description, that seems to be based in Miami. Maybe business isn’t the right word. Stuff it, I’ll call it by its true name. Cult.”
“Cult?” Okay, maybe things are getting interesting again.
“Yes, I think the word fits a little better.”
“Well what sort of cult are we talking about?”
“Frankly John, that’s what I’m hoping you can find out for me.”
“Okay, so you’re saying Rebecca, your wife, takes a look at a website and races off to America? Why don’t you just go over there and get her?”
A tense smile pursed his lips.
“Dear boy, if it were that simple I wouldn’t be here sipping your coffee.”
“No,” John sighed, “I guess you wouldn’t.”
Outside the wind was beginning to pick up. Heavy pellets of rain began to tap against the windows, hinting that the storm had decided to return for another round. Sebastian sat in silence, peering into what was left of his coffee as well manicured fingers gently rubbed the edge of the porcelain. When the silence threatened to become uncomfortable he placed the cup on the table and continued with his story, eyes staring at something that wasn’t there, that only he could see.
“Just over a year ago, I suffered a small heart attack. On one hand it was nothing too dramatic, but on the other hand it prised open some profound changes in the way I looked at things. Money and work was all that I knew, but laying there with a machine counting each and every heart beat I understood, I knew, that I didn’t want that life anymore. I wanted to pursue the one and only thing that brought me true joy. I wanted to dedicate the time I have left to exploring the world with the greatest person I have ever known, so the second I stepped out of the hospital I decided to sell my businesses and quit the blood soaked semantics that stained my legal activities. But you have to understand, it’s not something that can be done with a mere click of the fingers. These things take time. They have to be attended to with great care and planning of the utmost precision. And that’s where things began to slide horribly wrong.”
“I gotta be honest, I’m still not connecting the dots.”
“Some members of the cult,” the word seemed to spit from his mouth, “reached out and contacted Rebecca. At that stage I still had no idea of what she was looking into, but figured it must have been something exciting because she seemed to be on conference calls just about every night. Over and over again she asked me to join in on the communications, but I was so damn busy with tidying up my affairs that I basically ignored her late night activities. It wasn’t something I did on purpose, it’s just that there were so many pressing matters barking for my attention. I kept thinking to myself, it’s okay, once everything is wrapped up there would be nothing but precious time to start a whole new life. Then three months ago the whole new life theory came true, only far from the way I’d imagined it to.”
“Let me guess, you came home to find her asking for a divorce and a paycheque for the rest of her life.”
“You know what? As devastating and painful as that would surely have been, at least I would’ve known it was a decision she had come to make. So in answer to your question, no, there were no divorce papers waiting to surprise me.”
The rain began to drum louder and the room grew a little colder. Sebastian rubbed his hands as he continued.
“For a week leading up to the day the conference calls became longer and longer. If I was lucky she would crawl into bed before sunrise, exhausted. When I finally had the time to ask about her new venture I was met with silence. Then, it was a Thursday I do believe, I had an afternoon meeting at the law form. I signed the final document, a stroke of the pen shattering the last connection I had to any kind of business or responsibility. Even though it meant Rebecca and I would finally have the time together we deserved, my hand shook so much it took several minutes to complete the signature. On the way home I grabbed a bottle of champagne, a dozen red roses and a couple of first class plane tickets to Paris. She’d never been there you see.” Now his eyes lifted from the unseen object of his fascination and met John’s. “When I got home I walked through the door and sensed something was wrong almost instantly. I don’t know how to explain it, but it was as if all the electricity had somehow been sucked out of the air. Rebecca was gone. Everything in the house was still in its place, but the soul had been ripped away. I found a note pinned to the fridge. Shall I tell you what it said?”
“If you don’t mind sharing something like that, I’m all ears.”
“It said that she was sorry for the sudden divergence in paths, and that she had started a new journey that was always supposed to be. The note then stipulated that the love she has for me has not diminished, that it would always be there, but that some things can be greater even than love, and then she warned me not to try to find her. I don’t need to tell you that I just about fell to pieces there and then. Since that day confusion and sorrow have taken turns to torment me.”
“How can you be sure she won’t be coming back?” John asked. “You said nothing had been taken from the house. Who knows, maybe she’s just a little spooked by something? You’re hardly the first guy to be left holding a bucket full of questions.”
“That’s true, but I don’t think I’ll be holding my breath for that outcome.” Sebastian sighed and rubbed the back of his head. “When I came to grips with the fact that she really had gone I didn’t know what to do or where to start. None of her friends new where she might be, and I had a number of people keeping an eye out for her. Then one night I tried to send her an email and that’s when I found a link to the website for the cult she’d been talking with, and I put two and two together. They were advertising a seminar in Miami the following week, so I flew over and headed for the hotel they were using. When I arrived there though, I was refused entry. I couldn’t believe it. It’s got me how they knew who I was, but a young guy who looked as though he was born in a gym grabbed my arm, guided me back out onto the sidewalk and told me Rebecca had made it perfectly clear I was not to be allowed anywhere near her. Maybe she was expecting me to work out where she’d gone? They sure seemed to have an idea to keep an eye out for me. So I jumped in a cab and headed to my room. When I opened my emails, hoping there was something, anything from her, I found a number of letters threatening legal action if I tried in any way to make contact.”
“So if she knows you know where she is, and
you’re getting legal threats to stay the hell way, I’m not sure what it is you think I’ll be able to do. Hell, you’re rolling in cash and you’re a damn lawyer. You could hire a private army to storm in and grab her if you really wanted.”
“Funny you should say that actually. I had substantial investments in three large businesses in Miami, five in total for the country if you include the two in New York, and one particular business had what I guess you could say were questionable directors.”
“Mob?”
“That’s an outdated term, but I guess you could say that. Even though I’ve concluded my business interests I still have a very strong relationship with a couple of the head players. I was quite emotional, as you can probably imagine, and turned to them to see what they knew about this damn cult. The offer was placed on the table to apply pressure and try to get her out of there, but even though my head was reeling I just knew it wouldn’t be the right decision.” His eyes narrowed and mouth drew tight. “Guys like that, they’re not what you would call subtle. Sure, they probably could have got to her, but the last thing I want is to bring her back here kicking and screaming. No, I need someone, someone like you to infiltrate the organisation and talk to some sense to her. She’s a very smart woman and I truly believe with the right words she’ll see the mess she’s got herself into and walk away.”
John reached down to rub Bobbie’s neck. “No offence, but if she’s so smart then how did she get swept up in the first place?”
“That, dear boy, is what I need you to find out. Information about this group is scant to say the least. Sure, there’s a little to be found, but what I do know is that they tend to reach out to people with money. When it comes to the charities that we supported it was usually Rebecca at the forefront, hence the reason they contacted her. If I had paid a little more attention I might have more answers for you, but I don’t. I can’t even tell you what the seminar was about. But is seems there is another scheduled in a week’s time, so there’s a window of opportunity to find out what it’s all about and maybe find my wife. What do you say John, you think this is something you can do?”
The Hallucigenia Project Page 4
