Crone's Moon: A Rowan Gant Investigation

by M. R. Sellars

  “I have to go,” Felicity stated simply, slipping a single strap of the knapsack up over her left shoulder as she brushed past me.

  I didn’t turn nor even say a word. I heard the deadbolt snap and the door creak slightly on the hinges as she swung it open. I could sense her hesitation as she stood in the open doorway, and I could feel her eyes on my back.

  “You know, Rowan,” she finally said. “You can stay gone for a year and a day, or you can stay gone forever, it’s up to you. But a Coven is family. You know that. You have people… people who are more than just friends that are worried about you. They’re your family, and they want to help if you’ll just let them.”

  She grew quiet for a moment, and I slowly turned to face her. She was standing with one hand on the doorknob, staring back at me with a pained sadness in her face.

  As I watched her, she swallowed hard then spoke again. “You know… This will never be over until you stop feeling sorry for yourself.”

  With that, she was gone.

  * * * * *

  I was still brooding when the dogs began barking at the heavy noises on the front porch. I shushed them as I glanced away from the television to quickly check the clock. Only a little over an hour had passed since Felicity had left, so it didn’t seem likely that she was already returning.

  I muted the sound on the television and listened closely, wondering if the noise had simply been one of the cats leaping down from the ledge and thudding on the decking of the porch. It wouldn’t be the first time such a thing had set off what we affectionately called the ‘dog alarm’.

  There was nothing but ambient sound for a moment, and I was just about to up the volume again when a scrape and thud sounded. The new thump was followed by the creak of the screen door levering open. The canines stood their ground and renewed their vocal attempt to keep the intruder at bay, our English setter emitting a dangerous sounding growl that was echoed by a throaty rumble from the Australian cattle dog.

  A moment later the doorbell rang, sending its harsh tone echoing through the house. The dogs immediately exploded once again into angry barks meant to repel the invader.

  I wasn’t expecting anyone, and I couldn’t imagine who would be dropping in unannounced this late in the evening. Even Ben normally called, albeit at times while he was already standing on the porch, but he called nonetheless.

  A paranoid thought raced through my head, and my heart seemed to stop as an artificial hollowness filled my stomach. My subconscious assumed control, and I was gripped by a sudden fear that something was wrong. Given the situation, the first thing that came to mind was that Felicity had been afflicted with another seizure while behind the wheel of her Jeep and that she had been in an accident.

  I jumped up from the chair and strode quickly to the door, not even bothering to look through the peephole before unbolting the lock and swinging it open.

  The sudden impact of a massive fist against my shoulder was pretty much the last thing I had been expecting.

  CHAPTER 11:

  I stumbled backward and let out a yelp of pain as I reached for my shoulder. The force of the impact had caused me to spin a quarter turn away from the door. My primal gut reaction was to keep that momentum going until I reached the ninety-degree point and then run as fast as I could in the opposite direction of the threat. However, my socially ingrained, testosterone-induced reaction was to defend my castle.

  I quickly recovered my balance and twisted back toward the open door, certain that whomever it was attacking me would be only a hair’s breadth from landing another punch. Out of instinct, I brought my arm up to block the expected blow and braced myself against its onslaught. I was already clenching my fists into hard balls, determined that even if I took the first two punches, I was going to give the next three.

  I shot a guarded look past my arm in an attempt to see my attacker, expecting to come face to face with some brazen home invader. Instead, I found Ben holding up the doorframe with his shoulder. He stared back at me with a tired grin.

  “Howth’hell’are’ya’?” he bellowed, creating a single word from an entire sentence.

  “That depends on if you’re going to hit me again,” I answered, slightly miffed.

  “Sorry ‘bout that, whyman,” he mumbled. “Didn’t mean ta’ hitcha’ that hard. Was jes’ s’posed ta’ be a frenly punch ya’know.”

  I rotated my shoulder as I rubbed it with my hand. There was still a good deal of dull pain working its way through the joint, and I winced as it popped. I suppose it didn’t help any that he had connected with my left shoulder which was the one Eldon Porter had driven an ice pick into the first time he’d tried to kill me. I’d had surgery to repair the damage that had occurred from both that and the subsequent struggle, but to this day, it still bothered me. I guessed it probably always would.

  “I’ll live,” I told him, my voice still a bit edgy. “Just don’t do it again, please.”

  “Yeah, no prob, Kemonas… Kesomob… Kenomos…”

  “Kemosabe?” I offered.

  “Yeah, that.”

  The glazed look in his eyes and the slurred speech were the first two indicators to grab my attention, so I didn’t actually need to smell the brewery riding along on his breath to know he was all but obliterated. However, there was no avoiding it. I could only recall having seen him this far gone once before, and that was very early on in his career as a police officer. He was a young, far from streetwise uniform, and he had been the first to respond to a particularly heinous murder-suicide. It had affected him deeply then, and as seasoned—almost even jaded— as he had become now, I was certain that it still did to some extent. Evidence that the old adage about never forgetting your first time applied to just about anything, good or bad.

  “Tell me you didn’t drive yourself over here,” I said, refraining from making any drunken Indian jokes. Sober, I knew he would laugh. In this condition, well, let’s just say I didn’t want to test any theories.

  “‘Kay, I won’t.” He pushed away from the doorframe and stepped in, stumbling over the threshold in the process. “Ya’oughta have somon fis that.”

  “Gods, you’re even more cliché when you’re drunk,” I muttered.

  “Whassat?”

  “Nothing.” I shook my head and pushed the door open wider as I motioned him in. “Get in here and sit down, Tonto. I’ll go put some coffee on.”

  “I’ll hava’beer,” he told me as he dropped himself onto the sofa with a heavy thump.

  “Don’t have any,” I lied.

  I stepped forward and looked out into the driveway. His van was nosed in diagonally across the double lane of concrete, effectively blocking any entry or exit. I had already made a mental note to at some point get his keys away from him. I appended it to include repositioning the vehicle so Felicity would be able to pull in when she got home.

  “Scosh then,” he announced.

  “Don’t have any of that either.” I continued down the path of untruthfulness as I closed the door and bolted it.

  “Burrbahn?”

  “Nope.” I was heading for the kitchen now, letting him run down whatever list he could come up with.

  “Vokka.”

  “Can’t say as that I have any of that either,” I called out.

  “How’bout killya?”

  I poked my head back out of the kitchen to look at him with a furrowed brow. “What?”

  “Killya,” he repeated. “Ya’know, killya. Iss Messican.”

  “No,” I replied as I made the connection. “I don’t have any Tequila. But I do have coffee.”

  “Shit,” he mumbled.

  I stepped back into the kitchen and started the coffeemaker’s carafe filling from the filtered tap. While the water was rising, I reached into the cabinet and retrieved the coffee grinder and a bag of beans labeled ‘breakfast blend’. I poured a measure of the roasted coffee into the bowl of the grinder, thought about it for a moment and then added an extra handful. I wasn’t goi
ng to be able to duplicate Ben’s ‘cop coffee’, but I could at least make it a little stronger than usual.

  “Yo whyman,” Ben’s voice boomed through the house. “Wheresa squaw?”

  “Coven meeting,” I called back.

  “Spooky,” I heard him say, then pause. “Why you ain’t there?”

  “Long story,” I answered.

  “Tell me a shtory.”

  “Some other time,” I said.

  After adding the fresh grounds along with a small pinch of coarse salt to the filter basket, I poured in the water and switched the device on. I started to return the grinder and bag of beans to the cabinet but decided against it and left them where they were. I had a feeling it was going to be a long night.

  My own earlier introspection was still floating around in the back of my head, but I consciously put it aside for the time being. I had my suspicions about why my friend was currently parked on my couch in a state of advanced inebriation, but my brain was also developing new theories with each passing second. The only way I was going to know for sure was to hear it directly from him.

  Still, whatever it was that had brought him to this state, he had sought refuge here for a reason; and it was a good bet that the reason was to talk.

  He was loyal to a fault and had been there for me more times than I could count, so the very least I could do was listen and be there for him.

  I walked back into the living room to find my friend in a staring contest with Dickens, our black cat, who was perched on the end table quietly inspecting the boisterous human anomaly. As I pulled my rocking chair around to face the sofa, I took the opportunity to look him over myself. The fact that I could see a pistol riding on his hip and his badge clipped to his belt immediately dispelled one of my theories— he hadn’t been fired or suspended.

  “Coffee will be ready in a few minutes,” I offered. “Here’s an idea. Why don’t you tell ME a story?”

  He pointed at Dickens and then looked over at me. “I thing yer cat hase me.”

  “I think he’s confused by you,” I replied. “Can’t say as that I blame him.”

  “You confused,” he asked, his head bobbing as he tried to focus on me.

  “A little, maybe,” I returned. “Mainly wondering why you’re sitting in my living room totally wasted.”

  “‘Caush I’ve been drinkin’.”

  “No kidding. But I’ve known you a long time, Ben. You don’t drink like this.”

  “New hobby,” he mumbled.

  “You might want to think about picking a different one.”

  “Yathink?”

  I nodded. “Yeah.”

  “‘Kay, I thought ‘bout it,” he said almost immediately.

  “Yeah, well you might want to try it again when you’re sober,” I instructed. “So, why don’t you tell me what’s up.”

  “Opposite of down,” he cackled.

  “Yeah, you’re a regular comedian,” I returned with a frown.

  “Oh’yeah,” he said suddenly, a distant but serious look washing over his face. “Iss her.”

  “What?” I asked with a shake of my head.

  “Her,” he repeated, tossing his hand limply outward in an uncoordinated attempt to point. “Iss her.”

  I followed the haphazard thrust with my eyes and looked back over my shoulder at the muted television. A news update was playing out on the glowing screen, with a picture of Tamara Linwood inset at the upper corner.

  “You mean they identified the remains?” I asked as I turned back to him.

  “Uh-huh,” he grunted. “Iss her.”

  I wanted to seize on that point and run with it, but I knew he was in no condition to follow through. I resigned myself to the fact that this was something that would need to be addressed later. How much later was the question.

  “I don’t think that’s why you came here, Ben,” I pressed.

  “Hellno, I came here ta’ visit my friend. You seen ‘im? Shortguy, rise a broom.” He cackled again.

  I was just about to sit back and give up on the conversation when I heard the hissing burp of the coffee pot as it finished its brewing cycle.

  “I’m going to go get us some coffee,” I told him flatly as I rose.

  In the kitchen, I pulled down a pair of mugs from the cabinet and filled them. I started to pick them up then thought about the lack of coordination my friend had just displayed. Figuring that hot coffee and he were not about to mix, I carefully poured a third of his cup back into the pot.

  After a quick wipe of the counter with a dishtowel, I hefted the mugs and headed back for the living room. I was beginning to get the impression that Ben was too far on the other side of sober to actually talk about what had driven him to this point. Still, I was hoping that with a little luck, the java might nudge him back in this direction and get him rolling.

  Unfortunately, my hopes were immediately dashed when I returned. My friend’s head was tilted face upward against the back of the couch, his mouth hanging wide open and his eyes closed. Dickens was draped half across his shoulder and half across the back of the sofa, purring with an in and out warble.

  “Ben?” I said aloud.

  He didn’t respond.

  “Ben?” I said again as I sat his cup of coffee on the end table and then gave his arm a nudge.

  Nothing.

  I let out a sigh and cocked my head, letting my gaze drift out into space. I took a sip of my coffee then walked across the room to the bookshelf and picked up the telephone.

  If my suspicions were correct, Ben being trashed stemmed from what little I had overheard the day before. I could well be wrong, but I was guessing that he and Allison were at odds. Still, from the looks of things, he wasn’t going to be moving for quite awhile, and there was no reason for her to worry about him when he didn’t come home, even if they were angry at one another.

  I tucked the device up to my ear and heard nothing but a hollow clicking sound. Puzzled, I tapped the off-hook switch a few times. Still, I heard only the hollowness. I settled it back onto the cradle and with my coffee in hand, trudged back into the kitchen to check the phone there. I found the same thing. Next, I ventured back through the living room, down the hall and into the bedroom. There, I found the reason for the dead line. The phone next to the bed was on the floor, along with everything else that had been on the nightstand. In the wake of the carnage were two lounging cats, Emily and Salinger, glassy-eyed and surrounded by the remnants of a catnip-stuffed toy mouse.

  “Hope you two didn’t make any long distance calls,” I said aloud as I picked up the phone and married it back to the cradle.

  After giving the line a moment to reset, I lifted the receiver and got a steady dial tone. As I stabbed in Ben’s home number, I mutely wondered how long the phone had been off the hook and if anyone had tried to call.

  “Hello?” a familiar voice answered after the third ring.

  “Hi, Allison, it’s Rowan,” I said.

  There was an overt silence at the other end then her voice issued again. This time it was a stilted mix of trepidation, confusion, and maybe even annoyance. “Oh, hi, Rowan.”

  I was taken aback by her tone, but I decided to ignore it and ventured forth. “So listen, I’m sorry to call this late, but I didn’t want you to worry. Ben’s okay but he’ll probably be sleeping here tonight. He’s passed out on my couch.”

  The silence crept in once again.

  “Why would I worry?” she finally asked.

  “Umm, uhh,” I stuttered. “I just thought maybe you might be concerned when he didn’t come home.”

  “He hasn’t told you has he?” she asked, her voice audibly softened with a note of understanding now in place of the confusion.

  “Allison, he’s too drunk to make a coherent sentence,” I replied.

  I heard her sigh at the other end. “Rowan… Ben and I separated at the beginning of the month. He hasn’t lived here for two weeks.”

  It was my turn to fall silent. In all of
my imaginings of what might be wrong, the foremost had been something between the two of them. But, not once did I even consider that it was something this bad.

  “Rowan?” she said.

  “Yeah. Yeah, I’m here,” I answered. “Listen… Allison… I’m…”

  “It’s okay, Rowan.” She stopped me. “I’m sorry I was so cold when you called. I just assumed he’d told you.”

  “We are talking about the same Benjamin Storm, right?” I asked.

  “I know what you mean,” she answered.

  I stared at the phone, searching for something to say; anything at all would do, so long as it pushed aside the embarrassed silence.

  “So, Allison,” I finally offered words that no matter how sincere in intent, still sounded tired and overused. “If there’s anything Felicity and I can do…”

  “Just take care of him, Rowan. God knows someone needs to,” she told me, then without another word she hung up.

  I pulled the handset away and held it for a long moment, pondering the painful news. I’d known the two of them for what seemed like forever. They had been together ever since we’d met, and the idea of them splitting up now was completely foreign. Even though there was no mistaking what Allison had just told me, I was still having trouble wrapping my head around the concept.

  I had just settled the phone back onto the base when the squeal of locked brakes and skidding tires sounded on the street in front of the house. I headed out of the bedroom and back up the hallway, only to be greeted by the dogs bellowing at the door as a frantic pounding began against it.

  I rushed to the door, fully expecting to find someone who had just hit an animal, or worse a pedestrian, in front of my house. I twisted the deadbolt and swung the door wide, only to be greeted by RJ, a member of the Coven.

  His eyes were wide, and he wore a frightened mask across his features. The moment I saw him, the anguish that made a perpetual home in the pit of my stomach was released in an explosive torrent. Hollowness filled my chest, and my body tensed. The coffee cup left my hand and shattered with an unceremonious crack against the floor, sending hot java and ceramic shards in all directions.