“It looks like I’m crashing then, Kyle.”
“How did you know my name?” Surprise filled his voice.
“Oh, let’s just say I’ve been on your scent for a while. Now, let’s see those hands come up nice and slow.”
Kyle looked at him with bewildered eyes. “But I’m not done yet.”
“Oh, but I think you are.” Tom laughed. “You’re done for good. In case you didn’t notice, I am about to place you under arrest.”
“No, you’re not.” Kyle shook his head for emphasis.
“I get it.” Tom sighed. “You’ve decided to start working on that insanity case early.”
“I’m not crazy! I used to think so, but now I know better. I realize now that I am a visionary, an artist, a—”
“Complete and utter fucking nut job,” Tom finished for him.
“I would expect a small mind like yours to not understand the importance of Kyle’s work,” a female voice said from behind him.
Tom spun to face the unexpected guest.
“Oh, my God.” I really am losing it. Now, I’m seeing ghosts.
Tom stared in disbelief. “What are you?”
“She’s all woman,” Kyle whispered in his ear.
Tom tried to turn around, but his head exploded with blinding pain. He barely felt the impact of the wall. It took all the resolve he could muster just to stay conscious. His vision blurred, but he could still see the image of Kyle bearing down on him. The taste of iron flooded his senses as blood poured into his mouth. The cold steel of the pistol in his hand beckoned to him.
I didn’t drop it, he realized as his senses returned. He raised the gun and fired.
“No!” Nina screamed, throwing her hands in Tom’s direction. His pistol went skating across the floor.
“What the hell?”
Unseen hands gripped his throat.
“Why didn’t you just kill him?” a gravely voice demanded of his oblivious pawn.
“Eramael,” Nina snarled. “I should have known you were here. I couldn’t for the life of me figure out how he snuck up on us.”
Who is she talking to?
“Rise and finish what you started,” Eramael commanded before kissing Tom on the forehead.
Tom suddenly felt like he just woke from a full night sleep. The pain in his head was gone and his thoughts were crystal clear.
He scrambled for his gun.
“We’ve got to get out of here,” Kyle shouted as he knelt on the floor and closed his eyes.
“No, don’t do that in here,” Nina warned.
“Oh, but he has nowhere else to run,” Eramael said with a laugh.
Kyle charged blindly towards the door. Shots rang out as Tom tried to stop him. Kyle threw an elbow that connected with Tom’s chin as he passed him, sending him sprawling to the floor. Tom jumped to his feet and gave chase.
The hallway was already empty by the time he stepped into it.
Where the hell did he go? Tom searched from room to room. He couldn’t have gone far; I just emptied a clip into that freak.
He followed the blood trail, but it just stopped in the center of the living room. He let out a heavy sigh, as the sound of sirens grew louder. How the hell am I going to explain this?
“Fool,” Eramael snapped. “Must I do everything myself?”
Chapter Thirty-Nine
“That was a close one.” Kyle panted, as he paced in his living room. “A little too close if you ask me.”
“I don’t know what to do about Eramael. He nearly ruined the whole evening,” Nina said as she inspected the bullet wounds on Kyle’s chest and gut.
“Will you stop worrying, they only sting a little. I don’t know what he had in that gun, but—”
“Bullets! He had bullets in that gun, lover.”
“Yeah, right. Like I would still be standing here if I were shot nine times.” He snorted.
“I’m serious,” she hissed. “And the bullets are still inside you.”
“Oh my god! What are we going to do?”
“I thought I told you—”
“Yeah, yeah, there is no God. I got it,” he said irritably. “I need to go to the hospital. I must be running on pure adrenaline. Once it wears off I’m gonna to crash where I stand.”
“It’s not adrenaline. Well, that might be part of it, but you are stronger now. Your body can withstand traumas it couldn’t before.”
“So I’m becoming invincible?”
“Nothing in this world, or any other for that matter, is invincible. But there will come a time when it will take more than lead and a little gunpowder to hurt you.”
“Hell, it didn’t hurt me this time.” He laughed at the thought of it. “It just itches… a lot.”
“You’re lucky he didn’t get you in the head or we wouldn’t be having this conversation. There is no doubt your body is changing, but even as strong as you are now, you wouldn’t have survived that. As it is, you are still quite susceptible to infection. We need to get those bullets out of you.”
“You’re not seriously going to take them out yourself, are you? I think we should go to the hospital.”
“I’m not taking anything out. You are.” She looked up to catch his eye. “I am going to help you, but you are going to do the actual extraction yourself.”
“But I don’t know what to do,” he whined.
“I know that, lover. That’s why I said I would help you.” She took both his hands in hers. “Just like everything else I’ve taught you, this takes focus and proper breathing.”
“I thought all that breathing crap was to help me focus.”
“It does, but it also—” She shook her head. “Don’t get sidetracked, lover. We need to get those nasty things out of you as quickly as possible. Now, I want you to clear your thoughts. You are going to feel me touch a spot in your mind. This is where you need to concentrate your energy. Do you understand?”
Kyle nodded, letting his skepticism wash away. He could feel her mental fingers probing inside his head. It was a peculiar sensation, but one he rather liked.
“There, can you feel that?” She waited for his nod. “Now, make your body expel the foreign objects. Picture it happening in your mind and it will happen.”
Kyle imagined the inside of his body. Lord knew he had seen enough of the human anatomy to create a vivid picture. He could hear the blood as it pulsated through his veins with each heartbeat. He could feel the rounds lodged in his body. He could almost smell their alien presence there. Light engulfed his body as he pushed with his mind.
The sound of tiny objects bouncing off the floor rewarded his efforts. He opened his eyes and stared with amazement at the blood soaked slugs at his feet.
“How long will it take for the holes to close?” He fingered one that was just over his left nipple.
“I wouldn’t worry about that, lover.” Nina kissed him lightly on the lips. “But, you need to work on being less brash.”
“Don’t look at me that way. It was an honest mistake,” Kyle sang to her.
“What was that?” she pursed her brow as she spoke.
“You know, it’s that song by The Bravery,” he replied in a tone that suggested it was something she should have already known.
“You always have time for your silly jokes, don’t you?”
“Hey, I figured you of all people would understand my love of the fine arts.”
“And The Bravery is fine art?”
“It’s music and music is life. In my humble opinion, there is a song for every occasion. That makes it a fine art. Look, I’m sorry about the way everything went down back there. I know how much you wanted to do the Dance tonight.”
“Don’t worry, lover. All is not lost.” Nina let out a mischievous giggle. “Come with me. I have a surprise for you.”
Kyle followed her down the hall. She stopped in front of the door that led down to the basement.
“Now you want to visit with Dr. Pearlman?” Kyle blurted out in confusion
.
“Just open the door. Your surprise is down stairs,” Nina said with an icy stare.
Kyle did as instructed. He was uneasy about coming down to the basement. He hadn’t visited with Dr. Pearlman in what felt like an eternity. It always made him feel weak when he needed to rely on the good doctor’s advice.
He entered the office to find Betty and Simon Johnson lying on the floor, bound and unconscious.
“We will still Dance before the night is through,” Nina whispered with pride.
“When did you have time to do this?” Kyle stared at the couple in amazement.
“That’s not important, now is it, lover? The only thing that matters is they are here.” She caressed his face as she walked by him. “Bring them upstairs and I will load the music into your stereo.”
“Yes, ma’am,” he replied in a heavy southern drawl.
He grabbed the Johnsons by the bindings over their stomachs. He carried them up the stairs as if they were near weightless. It was only after he dropped them to the floor that Simon started to struggle. The look of terror in his eyes made Kyle want to pull off the tape that covered their mouths, but he couldn’t risk having the screams heard by any neighbors.
Maybe I could just let them scream a little— He reached for Simon’s gag. His body shivered with anticipation.
“Kyle, don’t!” Nina warned sternly. “You’ve heard their screams already. Why take such chances?”
“Sorry,” he said sheepishly, forcing himself to walk away from the couple.
Chapter Forty
“How the hell did this happen?” Captain Duke was so angry, he visibly shook in his chair.
“Captain, I thought I had him.”
Colin slammed his fist on his desk. “You not only let him get away, but you let him take Mr. and Mrs. Johnson with him.”
“I don’t know what happened. I honestly can’t explain it. He was only out of my sight for a second—”
“That’s not possible, Tom. In your report, you said the couple was bound and wounded. In fact, you said a lot of things in this report that just don’t add up.”
I wonder what he would say if I mentioned that I saw a ghost in the room. Tom still wasn’t sure if he could believe what he saw.
“What do you have to say for yourself, man?”
“Look, I don’t know where he went. The forensics guys can back me up on at least part of the report. The blood trail did end in the living room.”
“Oh, that’s right,” Captain Duke baited. “You emptied an entire clip into him.”
“You want to check my gun?” Tom was already sick of his Captain’s attitude. “I bet you a dime to a dollar that when we recover the rounds, you will find blood from the perp on them.”
“That’s just it, detective; there were no bullets to recover. Your spent casings were all over the floor, but nothing made it to the wall.”
“There’s no way!” Tom erupted. “Those shots were fired at close range. Some of them were even point blank. They had to have gone right through him. It’s not like I was using a pop gun. It was a God damned Glock nine millimeter.”
“You said in your report he was shirtless, so there is no chance he was wearing a flak jacket.”
“He wasn’t, Captain. I swear to God.”
“Tom, I am only going to ask you this once,” Captain Duke began, returning to his chair. “Are you back on the sauce?”
“Jesus, Captain. I was on my way back from dropping my children off.”
Duke just stared at him, letting his left eyebrow rise as he waited.
“Of course I wasn’t drinking. I was stone cold sober. You can ask the black and whites. They couldn’t smell any liquor on me.”
“That was incredibly stupid,” he said after a heavy sigh. “Barging into the house before your back up arrived.”
“I was trying to save that couple. If I would have waited any longer—”
“What? They might have been killed? The fact that they are no longer there, gives me pretty good reason to believe they are already dead.”
“I had to try.” Tom shook his head. “I wasn’t prepared for how strong this guy was.”
“At least one good thing came from all this,” Duke said, leaning back in his seat and putting his hands behind his head. “We have our first real description and an honest to God blood sample.”
“Let’s hope it turns up better information than the first sample did.”
“Brian Pearlman’s blood was at the scene of that first crime. There is no doubt about that. Maybe, the two of them are in cahoots.”
“He wasn’t there.”
“How can you be sure? Did you check the house before…?”
The rest of Colin’s words faded away as Tom replayed the moment where he heard the female perp talking to a third person.
I should have known you were here. I couldn’t for the life of me figure out how he snuck up on us.
He could see her looking at someone over his shoulder, but he had been too dazed to turn around. What was that name she said? He racked his brain for the answer. It was a strange sounding name, something foreign he guessed.
“Eramael!” Tom smacked his hands together as the name came to him.
“Beg pardon?” Captain Duke ceased his rant, dumbfounded.
“There was a second person there, but it wasn’t Pearlman. I heard the name Eramael.”
“Why didn’t you mention this in the report?”
“Everything happened so fast, I guess it just slipped my mind.”
He stared at Tom, eyes wide. “That’s a huge frigging detail to overlook—”
“I know, I know. It just…” Tom struggled to fit the pieces together. “What if Pearlman was just a decoy? We have spent so much time tracking him, we haven’t even considered the possibility we were after the wrong guy.” Tom decided it wasn’t a good time to bring up the information he and Anna had discovered in Pearlman’s files.
“Holy shit, Tom! The media is going to crucify us over this,” he barked, slapping his desk.
“Maybe, not,” Tom offered, stroking his chin. “Why don’t we keep a lid on it for a while?”
“Tom, it’s already all over the news that we let The Puppeteer escape.”
“You said it yourself, there were no bodies carried out of the house. They are just speculating. If we take an official ‘no comment’ stance, we might be able to keep the dogs at bay until we can figure out the next move.”
“The headlines on this morning’s paper say we let The Puppeteer slip through our fingers. It’s right there on the front page,” he insisted, but his voice lacked conviction.
“That may be, but they didn’t say anything about how many suspects where in the home or anything else that would suggest they know what is really going on.”
After a moment, Duke nodded. “All right, I will do what I can to keep this quiet for as long as possible.”
“It’s only a matter of time now. They know we are on to them. That alone should be enough to either make them stop or make them sloppy.”
“I hope you’re right,” the Captain sighed. “This is turning into a fiasco. When these murders first started back up, I thought we would be chasing an old man trying to recapture his youth. Now we’re chasing a doctor-patient duo and possibly someone named Eramael? It just doesn’t make sense.”
It makes less sense than you think.
Tom wished he could tell him everything that happened in that house without sounding insane.
“Well, if there’s nothing else, I had better go find Anna. She is probably pissed that she missed all the action.”
“Understandably so.” He fixed him with an icy stare. “This is the last time anything like this happens. I don’t care if you are walking home from the bar and see him in the street, you don’t attempt an arrest without having your partner at your side. Minimum.”
“Captain—”
“If it happens again, you’re through. I will fire your ass so quick it wi
ll make your head spin. Have I made myself clear?”
“Crystal.”
“Let me know if you can dig up anything else on this Eramael character.”
“Yes, sir.”
Tom left the office, glad the reprimand hadn’t led to suspension.
I wonder if I can talk to Anna about all this. She’s been pretty cool lately, but… Who are you kidding? Your partner is the last person in the world you want to worry about your mental stability.
He stopped a few steps away from her door and took a couple of seconds to gain his composure. Just tell her what she needs to know, nothing more, nothing less. You don’t want her to think you’re crazy, but God help us if I’m not.
He took a deep breath, put on his best smile and strolled through the door.
Chapter Forty-One
Glancing at his watch, Tom saw it was late. He needed to get home. His kids were at his apartment with a sitter, but he wanted to spend as much time as he could before they moved away.
After grabbing his stuff and locking up, he decided to stop by Anna’s office. Just the thought of her name brought memories of their night together rushing to the surface. True to his word, they hadn’t even talked about it with each other.
I just wish I could stop thinking about her like this.
“I’m heading home, partner. Call if you need anything,” he said, poking his head through her door.
“Come on, Tom. It’s been two days now and you still haven’t told me how you came to be at that house,” Anna said, exasperated.
“I already told you. I just happened to be in the vicinity, that’s all.”
“Oh, don’t feed me that bullshit. I read the report. Now, tell me what really happened.”
“I was driving through the neighborhood and I saw some suspicious activity. I decided to investigate,” he answered dryly.
“Uh huh. And what exactly were you doing driving around in a neighborhood on the Southside?”
“It was luck.” He shrugged, wishing she would just drop it.
“Jesus, Tom. Why won’t you just tell me? I’m your partner. I have a right to know.”
“I can’t!” he screamed before he could stop himself.
The Dance Page 23
