“Right,” Tammy said, swiveling around to face Amelia. “The jinx. The media really played that up, didn’t they?”
Donna interrupted to announce a station break. The red light on the camera blinked off.
Stork, headgear around his neck, approached. “Donna, there’s a lamp out above you. Can I get everyone to move off the set while we change it?”
“Sure, Stork. How long?”
“Five minutes. Ten tops.”
“Okay, ladies, stretch your legs,” Donna said. “Don’t get too far from the set, though. We hate to lose a guest when we’re trying to tape a show.”
“Would anyone like a soft drink?” Regina asked the three women. They all declined.
Stork hauled a ladder onto the set and climbed to the top. He donned a heavy leather glove and began to unscrew the bulb.
Regina scanned the set before going to the lounge. She saw Donna standing to the left of the ladder reading from the clipboard; Amelia was several feet away, digging through her reptile handbag, and Tammy was standing with her back to Donna, talking to Tom Gansing.
Regina hurried out, passing control rooms with eerie blue and red lights blinking and glowing through the tinted glass. In the lounge she recognized a few people from the audience at the coffee dispenser. A man was using the pay phone at the far end of the room. She inserted change in the soft drink machine, pushed the buttons, and caught the Sprite can before it hit the bottom. She hurried back to the studio.
She was just passing the control room, entering the set, when the large room plunged into darkness.
“Damnit, Stork, what the hell’d you do?” Tom’s voice bellowed out in the black room.
“I just unscrewed the bulb, that’s all,” Stork called back.
“Someone get the friggin’ lights,” Tom’s voice again.
Regina heard shuffling. Someone was moving in the dark, and fast. She gripped the cold can, and trepidation, like a hovering black entity, made the hair at the nape of her neck rise.
And then she heard the gasp, followed seconds later by a nightmarish scream that seemed to paralyze nearly every part of her. Her mind, however, was clear and sharp. Word for word she recalled the phone conversation that afternoon in which a gravelly voice said: “Crucify the flesh with cleansing spirits.”
Oh, dear God.
She was bumped again. But still she couldn’t move.
The endless scream was tearing into her like the razor-sharp claws of a wild and pain-crazed beast.
CHAPTER 16
Donna heard the screaming, too. It seemed far off and in no way related to her and the agony that, at that moment, was paralyzing her breathing. She could feel, in a thousand different places, beads of red-hot molten steel eating into her. Water. She had to get water. A sea of water in which to submerge and, hopefully, mercifully, drown.
From where she stood in total darkness, clipboard gripped painfully in her fingers. Donna could see bits of glowing red and blue. With the clipboard held straight out, acting as a prod, she hurried toward that panel of lights, tentatively at first, then in ungainly yet rapid haste. She bumped someone, felt fingers pawing at her before she slapped them away and rushed toward her critical destination. The scream followed.
There was nothing for her at the place of the lights, no help, no savior or magic to erase the pain. The lights represented a path out of the blackness and nothing more. A direction in which to guide her toward that precious element — water. Hurry. Hurry. Hurry.
In front of her the green EXIT sign glowed like a rescue beacon. With both arms extended straight out, Donna charged through the wide door into the lighted hallway. The screaming stopped abruptly and Donna, realizing with a dull sense that the sound had been coming from her, felt a diminutive relief. Without the screaming, and with the presence of light, the situation seemed not quite so hopeless. She stumbled across the linoleum, falling to her knees and then coming up, only to fall again. With a strangled cry she lunged through the restroom door, her shoulder bashing painfully against the frame, as she ran toward the row of basins.
With the palm of her hand she frantically pushed the single lever on the faucet. Cold water gushed out and she scooped up a handful, splashing it toward her burning face and throat. The water seemed to intensify the heat. She screamed out, but continued, knowing she had to dilute the oily substance that was eating into her. Moaning in anguish, she pounded the water-saving faucet with both palms, scooping and splashing furiously before it shut off.
Water! Oh God, she had to have water! Lots of it —now! Again she thought of an ocean. Her legs quivered.
The burning was no longer confined to the flesh, it seared deep beneath the pancake makeup and the skin—skin she had so meticulously scrutinized for wrinkles on her birthday only the week before. Her peripheral vision caught fragments in the mirror above the basin. Donna forced herself not to look up. The acrid odor of scorched tissue—her own scorched tissue—made her violently ill. Gagging, she pivoted and ran into the nearest cubicle. She dropped to her knees and with no thought of anything but the reservoir of water before her, plunged her head into the toilet bowl; and as her hands forced the cool water against the raw, fiery skin, she held her breath and prayed.
“Get the damn lights!” Tom shouted. “What the hell’s happening here?!”
Regina had glimpsed a flash of light from the direction of the hallway. Someone, the screaming someone—and Regina was almost certain she knew who belonged to that wretched scream —had gone through the door. She quickly followed, feeling the taped-down cables and wires under her feet. The way was clear as she made for the door. A red light eerily bobbed behind, seeming to keep pace with her.
There was no one in the hall as Regina charged through the door. Without stopping or even pausing, she rushed into the ladies’ room. Her pulse pounded in her brain, making her light-headed. She looked around desperately.
On the floor in the first cubicle was Donna.
Dear God, she prayed, let her just be throwing up.
She rushed into the cubicle, dropped to her knees, and began furiously to splash water over the raw skin. Sensing that the water was already polluted with the burning chemical, Regina pulled Donna to her feet and steered her back to the basin. They nearly collided with the man and his minicamera who had followed her in.
“Sam, get help!” Regina shouted at the cameraman as she pushed Donna’s head into the sink. She pressed the faucet button and began to direct the gushing stream where the burns looked the most severe.
Tom Gansing ran in. “What the hell--? Oh God,” he finished weakly.
“Ambulance,” Regina said. Her hand slipped off the faucet button, causing her to curse in frustration.
“You heard her,” Tom barked at the man with the camera, grabbing him by the back of his shirt and whipping him toward the door. “Call the paramedics!” To Regina he said, “What is it?”
“Acid.”
He knelt, allowing Donna to lean against him. He held the button while Regina flushed the burning skin. He softly crooned encouraging words into Donna’s ear.
The studio exploded with light.
Amelia grimaced and turned her head away from a blinding lamp. She called out Fletcher’s name. Through the entire incident while the lights were out she had whispered his name and had gotten no response. Fear and anger battled within her. She had seen him sitting in the audience during the taping, but at the break he had disappeared.
Shielding her eyes from the bright lights, Amelia scanned the large room full of people. During the blackout, with the exception of the screaming, the room had been strangely quiet. Now everyone was moving and talking. Where the hell was Fletcher?
Tammy rushed up to her, her face more crimson than before. “Jesus, what happened?” Tammy asked, squeezing Amelia’s arm.
With a sudden jerk, Amelia freed her arm from Tammy’s grasp. “How the hell should I know,” she said, still looking for Fletcher. “I can’t see in the dark.”
/> “Where’s Donna?”
“I don’t know, but I intend to find out.” She headed toward the door.
In the hall, people milled about, nonplussed, nervous. Amelia went up to Stork and asked, “What’s happened?”
The man shrugged, but his gaze flickered toward the restroom.
Amelia spun around, strode to the door, and pulled it open. She made it only halfway in before Regina appeared from inside and gently ushered her back out into the hall. “Go back to the studio,” Regina said.
“What happened?”
“Not now, Amelia.”
“Who’s in there?”
“Stork,” Regina called out to the floor man, “stand outside this door and don’t let anyone in except the paramedics and the police.” And then she pulled the door shut in Amelia’s face.
A moment later the paramedics, racing down the hall, wheeled a gurney into the restroom.
The police car, siren screaming, passed John as he walked down Van Ness. A fire and rescue truck followed behind. John was a block from the Bull’s Blood and he hoped to hell his uncle’s bar wasn’t their destination. Both vehicles pulled to the curb at the TV station at the corner.
John slowed. A paramedic van was at the entrance. Curiosity and something more made him turn toward the building rather than go on by. He was thinking as a writer.
He marched through the front door decisively, as if he had every right to be there, and hurried down a long corridor.
At a junction in the building he stopped. To his left he saw a knot of people looking toward a restroom. The restroom door opened. John watched two paramedics backing out wheeling a gurney. Strapped to the gurney was a shoeless woman in a pastel blue dress. Her hair was wet and plastered against her face, and an oxygen mask, along with what appeared to be wet compresses, covered her nose and mouth. The woman was clinging to the hand of the man who hurried along beside the rolling gurney. The man, in his late thirties, with red hair and freckles, turned and spoke to someone standing in the doorway. “Regina, I’m going with her.”
The woman, a pair of blue pumps clutched to her chest, dark wet splotches on her bronze-colored skirt, stared trancelike after the departing group.
John thought he recognized her. Where had he seen her before? At the Bull’s Blood? On television? Then it hit him —at his apartment house. She was the woman with the teenage daughter who had moved into Wilma’s apartment. Regina Van Raven.
Appearing to suddenly snap out of it, she called out, “I’m coming too.”
The two attendants wheeled the gurney. The red-haired man and the woman hurried alongside. As she passed John, one shoe fell from her hand. John swooped it up and handed it to her. Their eyes met briefly. Then she was past him, turning the corner.
From the murmuring group of people, John heard the word, acid. He stood frozen, staring in numb shock at the retreating gurney. It was deja vu and he suddenly felt sick to his stomach.
CHAPTER 17
It was obvious to Amelia that they weren’t going to finish the taping. Not without a hostess. A policeman had come around asking questions, taking down names and phone numbers for questioning at a later date. Fletcher had managed to miss the entire event, only to reappear in the corridor.
Amelia was about to suggest to Fletcher that they leave when she saw Tammy, an arm around each daughter, eyes red from crying, approaching.
“Oh, Amelia, who would do such a thing?” Tammy asked her in a shaky voice.
Amelia looked to Fletcher. He reached out and touched her hand. Quickly pulling it away, she glanced at Tammy to see if she had caught the gesture. But Tammy, not one to be quick witted on the best of days, appeared to be a million miles away. “I have no idea, Tammy,” Amelia said.
“If we’re going to leave the city,” Fletcher whispered in her ear, “we better be on our way before the traffic gets too unbearable.”
Amelia moved away from Tammy and her twins. Fletcher followed.
“Are you insane,” she whispered back. “We can’t go away together after what’s happened here. It’s going to be all over the media. Matthew will want to talk to me and the first place he’ll call will be at my parents’ place in Napa, where I won’t be.”
“Call him first. Tell him you’re all right, then we can leave.”
“I can’t chance it. We’ll go next week.”
“Whatever you say,” he replied stiffly.
“Besides,” she said softly, “I wouldn’t miss this bit of news for anything. Can you imagine the publicity this will bring? Someone wanted Donna Lake off the air ... permanently.”
“What makes you so certain she was the intended target? You said yourself that the lights went out. The place was pitch black. Perhaps the assailant got turned around?”
Amelia stared fixedly at her lover; then, through a tightness in her throat, she asked, “Who else would he want?”
At the pay phone in the lounge, Tammy deposited a quarter, pressed buttons and handed the receiver to Sherry.
“What do I say?” Sherry asked.
“Just get him on the phone, I’ll take over from there.”
“Hi, Mae, it’s Sherry. Is my dad with a patient?” A moment later. “Hi, Daddy, it’s Sher--”
Tammy jerked the phone out of her hand. “Gary, you’ve got to come and get us.” Instant tears sprang to her eyes. “It was horrible. I think it was meant for me, I swear I do. The girls were with me and they could’ve been hit too.”
“What the hell are you talking about?” Gary said, exasperation evident in his voice.
“Acid. Someone tossed acid in Donna Lake’s face. It was meant for me, I know it.”
“Slow down and explain—without the theatrics. But first, are the girls okay?”
“Yes, thank God.” She began to hiccup. Whenever she became extremely emotional, she got the hiccups. The girls looked at each other and giggled nervously. “We’re at the studio, the TV station. Everything was going great, then we broke for station identification and this bulb—”
“Damnit, Tammy, get to the point.”
“During the break all the lights in the studio went out and someone threw acid in Donna’s face. But it was supposed to be for me. I know it.”
“How do you know?”
“Not on the phone.” She waited and when Gary failed to respond, she went on. “You have to come and pick us up. I’m too shook-up to drive. I’m scared, Gary. The girls are scared.”
Tammy handed the receiver to Kerry and with the other hand she pinched her on the arm.
“I’m scared, Daddy.”
And before Tammy could pinch her too, Sherry leaned forward and spoke into the mouthpiece. “Me too, Daddy. Won’t’cha come and get us, please?”
“Where are you?” he said in a quiet voice, filled with resignation.
Tammy took back the phone and gave Gary instructions.
An hour later, after dropping the girls off for the night with a friend of theirs from school, Gary Kowalski pulled his Porsche into the driveway of the house in Daly City. Out of the corner of her eye Tammy watched Gary as he glared at her Honda Accord in the driveway. Then he glared at her, his mouth a tight line.
“Too shook-up to drive, huh?” he said.
She had lied to him. That afternoon they had taken BART into the city.
“Christ, I was so scared I forgot that we didn’t drive in.”
Several minutes later Gary was sitting on the recliner, a tall, frosty glass of iced tea in his hand. He had adamantly refused any food. Warrior sat obediently at his feet, his large black head resting on his previous master’s knee.
“Are you ready to tell me yet?” Gary asked, putting down the iced tea untouched.
Tammy paced the room. Warrior, with only his eyes moving, looked from Gary to Tammy.
“I was dating this man.” She glanced at him to catch his reaction regarding her with another man. Gary stared at her, his expression impassive. “I was dating this man when I met another man I liked be
tter. I told Brad —that’s his name—that I couldn’t see him anymore and ... well, he sort of flipped out. He’s crazy about me. He begged me not to dump him. When he realized it was hopeless, he said that if he couldn’t have me nobody could, and that I’d be sorry ... things like that.” The lies flowed effortlessly from her.
“When was this?”
“About a week ago.”
“The girls heard him threaten you?”
“Well ...”
“I didn’t think so.”
“Maybe they did.”
“I’m sure they’ll say they did. Look, if you’re lying to me —shit,” he growled, “it doesn’t matter if you are or aren’t. The fact that something bad happened to someone else doesn’t prove it was meant for you. You’re trying to manipulate me again, Tam, and if there’s anything I hate more than your lying, it’s your manipulating. Can’t you just let me go?”
“If I’m in danger, then your children are in danger.”
“What do you want me to do?”
“Stay with us until he’s caught.”
“You’re being unreasonable. I have a medical practice in the city.”
“We can stay at your place.”
“Damnit, Tammy, if you’re so sure it’s this Brad guy, call the police and report him.”
“I don’t have proof.”
Gary heaved himself out of the recliner. “I can’t help you. You’ve made your bed, now you can lie in it.”
“What about the girls? Should they suffer because their father hates their mother and doesn’t give a gnat’s ass about her well-being?”
“Okay.” Gary whirled around and, trying to control his temper, said gruffly, “Okay. This is what I’ll do. If you’re so damned worried about the girls, I’ll take them home with me. I’ll take them, but Goddamnit, I won’t take you.”
She began to cry and hiccup at the same time. This time the tears were sincere. She loved him so much. Couldn’t he see how much she loved him and how much he was hurting her?
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