I whirled around to face Eleanor, paused for a moment, and bit my lip.
Should I tell her where I was going and run the risk that she might reveal my whereabouts to Mark? He had cautioned me not to do anything foolish, and I had promised that I would not do anything of the sort. Going to Catherine’s house was definitely foolish. What if the person who attacked Catherine was still there? I pushed that thought out of my mind. I had to find Amber whether or not my actions were foolish.
Weighing my options, I decided to tell Eleanor where I was going. While Eleanor listened intently, I recounted what Officers Ken and Henry had told me about Catherine.
“Eleanor, I need to do a quick search of Catherine’s house myself, but please, please promise me that you won’t tell my friend Mark where I am when he returns to look for me. He will be angry if he finds out I went there without telling him,” I pleaded.
I liked the way that sounded- that Mark would be angry if I went to the house by myself. It made me feel that Mark would be concerned if he found out that I went there alone.
“Who is Mark?” Eleanor asked.
“He was a schoolmate of mine. We had a chemistry class together. Mark went to the hospital to see Catherine, but I don’t want him to know that I am going to her house alone,” I replied.
“I hope Catherine will be all right,” she said in a worried tone of voice. “Catherine and I belonged to the same bridge club for years, you know.”
I gave an audible sigh. “Promise that you won’t tell Mark where I am headed.”
“Celia, you should not go there by yourself. It’s dangerous,” Eleanor cautioned. “Oh, my. All the things that have been happening around here! You don’t even have a car.”
“I’m taking Mom’s car.”
“But you said you would safeguard Victoria’s car until she returned.”
“Will Mom ever come home?” I asked, not expecting a reply.
Eleanor shrugged her shoulders and said, “Your guess is as good as mine.”
I squeezed the door handle and turned it. “Besides, promises were made to be broken,” I said. “This is an emergency, a genuine emergency. I can’t just sit here and wait for the police to find Amber. Don’t forget that the authorities stopped searching for Mom after only a day or two.”
“That does not mean that they will stop looking for Amber. She’s a missing child, not a missing parent!” Eleanor said.
“I don’t trust the police. I’ve got to look for Amber myself,” I said.
Eleanor shook her head and sighed out loud as I opened the door, trotted down the stairs, and headed toward the garage to fetch Mom’s car.
With an obvious appearance of displeasure plastered all over her face, Eleanor stood still on the back porch.
“Promise me you won’t tell Mark where I am going,” I yelled over my shoulder.
“Ok, I promise,” Eleanor reluctantly said, as she went back inside, shutting the door behind her.
I eased open the garage door, jumped into the Lincoln, turned the ignition, and drove down the dirt road.
Chapter 17
When I arrived at Catherine’s house, I parked the Lincoln in the driveway, tossed the windbreaker on the front passenger seat and exited the car. The maroon red brick colonial was impressive, the way it stood alone at the end of Rutinger Road surrounded by woods. A few yards farther into the woods, a small stream ran parallel to the house.
This must be the stream where the jogger found Catherine, I thought. But I did not want to think about that right now. If I focused on the stream, on Catherine, on the senseless events of the past day, I knew that I would be totally distracted. I had to concentrate on searching the house and then get back home before Mark returned and noticed that I was gone.
I quickly scanned my surroundings. The massive house looked forlorn and dark with the window shades down. Even though I examined the entire perimeter of the home, I could not find an open window. Catherine usually kept at least one window open for a breeze, usually in the kitchen, but not now.
I remembered the time that she and I had gone shopping with Mom about two years ago. Catherine had left a few windows open on the main floor. It just so happened that a severe thunderstorm moved through the area that evening. When we returned, the kitchen and living room were drenched with water.
Why were all of her windows shut tonight? Was she afraid that someone would stare through them at her? Did she sense that Edgar was following her again? I wondered whether it was possible that someone had shut the windows after Catherine went to the hospital. Perhaps someone was still in there right now. With great effort, I chased that troublesome thought out of my mind.
I moved toward the front door and tried to push it open. It would not budge. Perhaps the side door was open. I jumped down the front porch steps and went to the side door. It, too, was locked. Just when I was about to give up, I recalled that there was a sliding door that lead to the patio at the rear of the red structure.
I headed toward the backyard.
Somewhere in the distance, I heard what sounded like a cat’s meow coming from the garage. It must be Cuddy Boy, I thought. Cuddy Boy was only two months old when Catherine found him a few winters ago and decided to take care of him. One day I had gone to Catherine’s house to drop off a pumpkin pie. When Catherine had opened the front door to let me in, she spotted Cuddy Boy sitting on her front porch close to the window. The skinny, cold, and hungry cat had purred in such a mournful way that Catherine felt sorry for him and adopted him on the spot.
After I am done looking inside, I will go back and get Cuddy Boy, I decided. He is probably locked in the garage, and Catherine won’t be back any time soon to let him out.
I made my way to the sliding patio door and pressed on the handle. To my surprise, the door slid open with considerable ease. Without hesitation, I slipped inside.
The interior was dark and smelled musty and damp and appeared unkempt. The layout of the inner rooms was familiar since I had been in the house numerous times over the past several years. I flipped on the light switch in the living room. A timeworn, brown couch occupied the west corner of the room, and next to it was a loveseat with similar worn out fabric. A wooden coffee table with a glass top sat in the center area adorned by an empty ceramic flower vase.
Catherine was elderly and did not have the energy to clean her house much. She had once mentioned to me that she used to have a cleaning lady who showed up twice per week but that one day the cleaning lady quit without any explanation.
Ever since Mom divorced Peter, I stopped having contact with Catherine. Actually, Mom and I just felt awkward visiting Catherine knowing that her son could pop in at any time. But I really respected Catherine and would have continued my relationship with her had Mom not left Peter. I just did not have any idea that Catherine had gone through so much turmoil with Edgar’s other personality stalking her. Catherine had never mentioned Edgar to me. I wonder if Mom knew about Edgar. There were so many questions that I wanted to ask Mom.
I examined the living room a little more closely. It did appear sort of cozy with the beige shag rug at the foot of the couch adding warmth to the room. The fireplace was filled with freshly chopped wood. Who had cut up the wood for Catherine? I knew better than to assume that the old lady had completed the task herself.
A bookshelf took up the entire east corner and was filled with books, magazines, and photographs. One of the pictures caught my attention, and I moved toward the shelf to get a better look.
It was a photo of Catherine when she was in her mid- twenties with a man who was probably her former husband Sylvester, and two young children who appeared to be of elementary school age. The younger child had blond hair and resembled Sylvester with his narrow nose, small blue eyes, and high cheek bones. That’s probably Brandon, I thought. The older child had straight brown hair, dark brown eyes, thick brows, and a sharp chin. “And that’s Peter when he was a child,” I said in a whisper to no one in particular.
As I stood there examining the old photographs on the bookshelf, I could not halt the wave of dread that was washing over me. I recalled reading a book that a psychologist had written which encouraged people to pay close attention to their intuitive feelings since those instincts warn of true impending danger.
But I could not quite put my finger on what was causing me to harbor this sudden sensation of foreboding. The pangs of uneasiness and frustration at the pit of my stomach had begun the moment that I heard Cuddy Boy meowing in the garage, and they were getting worse. Nevertheless, I could not leave the house yet. I had to finish what I had set out to do.
When I went from the living room into the kitchen, I heard a sound like that of a board creaking. It’s probably the wind, I thought. Taking great care not to make any noise, I lifted the window shade above the sink and peered outside. The wind had picked up speed, and the tree branches were swaying violently. It had grown markedly colder. I shivered as I wrapped my arms around my chest. It was then that I realized that my jacket was still in the Lincoln.
I began to climb the narrow stairway at the end of the hallway adjacent to the kitchen that lead to the bedrooms. When I reached the top, I flipped on the light in the first bedroom and peeked inside.
Chapter 18
The odor of fresh candles filled the bedroom. I scanned the room quickly. A queen sized bed topped by a brown and white comforter occupied the center of the room. Next to it was a nightstand with a lamp on it. Directly in front of the bed sat a dresser made of dark mahogany wood. A row of round candles in glass holders embellished the dresser top. Just to the right, a window was decorated by a sheer yellow curtain, and immediately opposite the window stood a coat hanger which held all of Catherine’s hats.
I tiptoed toward the dresser and snatched one of the candles, a short cream colored one, in a similarly colored holder. It smelled like lemon and lime. There were a total of seven candles, each one a different hue which released a unique, pleasant odor. The orange one smelled like tangerines, and the red one emitted the aroma of crisp apples. I grabbed the green one, which carried the odor of fresh mint, and as I held it to my nose, a smudge of warm, liquid wax stuck to my fingers.
Abruptly, I dropped the candle. Why was the wax warm? Even if Catherine had lit the candle just before she was rushed the hospital in the early morning hours, it would not have stayed aflame for that long. Besides, the green candle did not look like it had been used for a long time since its wax was still mostly intact.
If Catherine had not lit the candle, who did? Surely, there must be a plausible explanation, I reasoned.
All of my senses were screaming at me, telling me to leave the house at once. Adrenaline shot through my veins, but I ordered myself to stay calm. With Amber’s fate in mind, I took a deep breath, clenched my fists, and decided that I would have to be strong if I intended to find my sister.
Maybe there was a very good explanation as to why the candle was still warm. But suppose that someone was still in the house. Could he or she be watching me at this moment? If that were the case, then I was in trouble. No one knew that I was going to Catherine’s house. No one except Eleanor. But I had made Eleanor promise not to tell anyone where I was, not even Mark. And to add to that, Eleanor faithfully kept secrets.
I almost jumped when I heard what sounded like the dry click of a car door slamming shut. I dashed to the window, pulled open the curtain, and peered outside. The Lincoln was in the driveway, but no one was around. Could I be hearing things? Why would Catherine want to live this far off the main road in the middle of the woods? She used to frequently talk about how she enjoyed solitude and keeping a distance from others. But what would Catherine do in an emergency if she needed to run for help? I stood frozen near the window, unable to take my gaze off the driveway and the Lincoln.
The wind howled.
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw a slight movement in the bushes near the passenger side door of my car. Something had run into the bushes, something brown. It could not have been Cuddy Boy. No, no, I thought to myself. Cuddy Boy was in the garage. Perhaps the cat had found a way to get out. I clenched my fists and swallowed hard. Calm down, I thought. It could have been a squirrel scampering into the shrubs.
Under normal circumstances, I would have already bolted out of the house, took off running, and never looked back. But my quest to find Amber clouded my judgment. I should never have come to Catherine’s house by myself, and I had made a mistake in telling Eleanor to keep my whereabouts a secret. Mark had warned me not to do something foolish, and I had definitely acted out of line when I decided to go running off to Catherine’s house alone. With that thought in mind, I spun around, sprinted down the stairs, through the kitchen, the living room, and out the back door.
Chapter 19
I was about to make a rush toward my car just when I heard Cuddy Boy meowing again. The soft, pathetic whimper was coming from the direction of the garage.
Bewildered, I lingered for a brief moment in the backyard, debating whether or not I should leave the cat in the garage and get out fast. But when the pitiful cry caught my attention again, I decided to rescue the cat.
“Poor Cuddy Boy,” I uttered under my breath. “Now that Catherine’s in the hospital, I’ll take you home with me.” I moved to the garage and tried to pry open the front door. It did not budge.
The keypad on the side of the garage caught my attention. Catherine had told me the code years ago, and it was an easy one to remember. The code was simply 4321. I punched those numbers into the keypad. Nothing happened. Holding my breath, I punched in the code again. Still, nothing. Perhaps Catherine had changed the code. It had been quite a while since I visited the old woman. The last time I had punched in the garage door code was two Christmases ago when Catherine asked me to help her pull the artificial Christmas tree out of the garage so that she could decorate it later.
Cuddy Boy was meowing profusely now. He sensed my presence on the other side of the door. I could not leave him alone in the garage. There had to be a way to help get the cat out. It may be a while before Catherine returned from the hospital, and Cuddy Boy would die of starvation if I abandoned him. How did he get in there in the first place? He could have stumbled inside, and the wind could have shut the side door behind him, I assured myself.
That’s it. That was the answer. I remembered that the garage had a side door which Catherine almost never locked. I went to the side of the garage and was thrilled when I was able to push the door open with great ease.
“Cuddy Boy, come here,” I whispered.
The garage was dark, with the exception of a single ray of light that streamed in from the slightly opened door.
I scanned the garage. It was cluttered with junk. There were boxes stuffed with yard tools, an old typewriter desk, an artificial Christmas tree, some folding chairs, a white poker table, a broom, a rake, a snow shovel, some gardening tools, two large garbage cans, and many old pieces of yard furniture.
Just when I took another step, Cuddy Boy dashed out from behind a garbage can and tried to jump over a few large boxes, but his foot got tangled up in some Christmas light decorations. He struggled fiercely to get loose, baring his teeth and making pathetic, high pitched gurgling sounds. I had never seen him so anxious.
“I’ll help you out,” I said in a soft voice as I reached for Cuddy Boy’s paw and squeezed to pull it loose.
But the brown and gray tiger striped cat, who had usually greeted me with a warm purr, growled and threw me a threatening glare. When I sank to my knees beside the cat and grabbed him, that was when I saw it. Cuddy Boy’s entire body was covered with little specs of blood. On the floor were a half dozen bb gun pellets smeared with blood. Cuddy Boy managed to free his paw from the last of the tangled cords, and he scurried through the side door and out of sight, whimpering and limping as he ran.
Chapter 20
My stomach muscles tightened and a sense of bewilderment and confusion gripped me as I bolted out of th
e garage, raced through the backyard, and down the driveway toward the Lincoln. All of my suspicions about someone being in the house had been correct. Someone had tried to hurt Cuddy Boy and had locked him in the garage. Whoever it was might still be in the house.
Someone probably had been in the bedroom and had recently lit the candle, I thought. And how about the sound of the car door slamming? What about that?
So many things had caught my attention, numerous warning signals, but I had chosen to ignore my gut reaction. My blind desire to find Amber had indeed clouded my judgment. Who would be crazy enough to visit Catherine’s house alone after some lunatic attacker left her injured at the side of a stream?
I took a deep breath as I reached the Lincoln, clutched the door handle, and tried to force open the door. It was locked.
I did not lock it when I exited the car, I thought. I remembered tossing my windbreaker on the front passenger seat and just slipping out of the car. I did not lock the door.
“Uggghhhhh!” I heard myself scream as I fumbled in my jean pocket for the keys.
Clumsily, I tried to stuff the key in the door but my fingers were frozen. The key slipped out my hand, and I sank to my knees, scrabbled in the grass, and snatched it back up. I could not muster the energy to coordinate my mind and my hand to work together toward getting the door open.
Then I happened to glance through the window at the passenger side front seat. My windbreaker was not there. Someone had been in my car, taken my jacket, and locked the door. Someone was still out there, perhaps even watching me this very minute, I thought.
My heart beat wildly in my chest.
If only Mark knew where I was going. He would rush over in an instant. I was sure of that. But then again, I had taken great pains to make sure that Eleanor did not reveal my whereabouts to him.
I finally succeeded in opening the door, and the moment that I tried to climb inside, I heard what sounded like a high pitched gunshot pierce the air. The driver’s side window shattered into a hundred pieces which were now scattered on the ground. Someone has a gun, I thought. If I tried to jump inside the car, I would be a sitting duck. The shots continued to ring out in my direction and hit the driver’s side door with a metallic bang.
Hand Me Down Evil (Hand Me Down Trilogy) Page 5
