by Ryan Horvath
Well, they’re firing at me Tim thought as he hastily padded barefoot down the stairs. That can’t be good. Whatever they have on me, it must be pretty fucking convincing for them to bust in here with guns blazing. He reached the basement floor and looked around in the dimness. He found the flashlight he stored at the bottom of the stairs and switched it on. By now the power to the house was surely off and trying a switch would be useless. He swung the beam of the light around. When Tim purchased this property, the basement had been built with a bedroom that had an egress window but Tim quickly had that filled in as he didn’t like the thought of someone climbing in as easily as someone could climb out. Now all the windows down here were small: ten inch by fifteen inch rectangles with small vents and obscured glass. Tim couldn’t see out any of those windows but no one could see in either.
He heard pounding ensue on the door at the top of the stairs and began to look around. Unfortunately, he’d just taken all the clean clothes upstairs from the laundry right before he got into the shower so he found nothing to wear but a very stained and very small once-white tank top that he’d been using as a rag. He’d be running in his boxers for now. At least it’s nice out he thought. If anyone sees me, it’ll just look like I’m out for a nighttime jog.
The shoes he usually wore to mow the lawn or do yard work were down here. He felt a little luck when he found them. When you’re running, whether it be for pleasure or for your life, shoes could make all the difference. These were a battered pair of Pumas that had been fresh-snow white and were now heavily grass-stained and splattered with different colors of paint. But Tim knew they fit his feet like a glove fits a hand. He pulled the shoes on and heard the pounding upstairs intensify. The police would never break through that door by banging on it. And they would never be able to wriggle their doughnut-munching bodies through the small basement windows.
With a small smile on his face and his feet now wrapped in shoes, Tim turned toward the west wall. He studied it quickly until he found the right section. He approached it and finally heard the sound of a power saw on the other side of the steel door. Tim leaned on the wall. With strong arms, he pressed his palms and found the pressure release. Two more pumps and he stepped back. The panel indented slightly and then slowly drew to the side into the wall.
He ducked inside as the blade from the saw impacted the door.
~*~0~0~*~
Tim pressed the release button inside the tunnel and the wall panel slid back into place. The panel offered virtually no visible seam on the other side and it would require someone who didn’t have prior knowledge of its existence to possess impeccable vision to locate it.
Tim debated what to do next. He could hide out right where he was, probably for hours and avoid running and detection but there was always the chance that some wet-behind-the-ears rookie would get lucky and happen across his hiding place. He decided he’d better keep moving.
With flashlight in hand, he worked his way down the corridor. This was not an entirely pleasant escape route. The walls and floor were dirt and rock; the ceiling was held in place by support beams that were going to be in need of replacement soon; and the smell was dank, moist, and earthy. The corridor sloped at a downward angle for about twenty yards before meeting up with another corridor. It was here that his escape route joined up with the storm water drainage system. Most of the tunnels were too small for a full-grown man to walk through, but there was one straight ahead that ran for about sixty yards before leading to a ladder. Tim put the strap of the flashlight in his teeth and the light swayed as he climbed. Tim scaled the ladder, getting grime on hands and knees that had just been cleaned in the shower. He reached the top of the ladder and was met with a manhole cover. He took a few deep breaths. He’d lifted the cover on more than one occasion in the past but that didn’t change the fact that it was very heavy. He pressed his shoulder to the cool metal and strained to lift it. It moved with less effort than he remembered and Tim summed that the adrenaline in his veins was assisting him. He peered out of the crack and into the night, expecting to see the booted feet of SWAT team officers surround him.
But all he saw was headstones. Grave markers. Monuments to the dead. He was in Crystal Lake Cemetery.
Biting into the flashlight strap, Tim heaved the manhole cover to the side as quietly as he could. He didn’t want to attract any police who might be in the area and he also didn’t want to disturb the dead. When he had the cover enough out of the way that he could make his way through, he did so, and stood panting on the sidewalk. He switched off the flashlight, looked around, and spied a groundskeeper’s station. He hurried over to it and used the hose there to clean off his hands and knees as best as he could. An old towel allowed him to pat himself dry.
Now what? his mind said. Tim thought back over all the events that had occurred with the man who’d obviously betrayed him. Tim had provided money, drugs, information, motive, and desire to the man he knew only as Miedo. That motherfucker played me from the very beginning! his mind deduced. Tim could only imagine what evidence Miedo had amassed against him.
He took off at a brisk jog in the direction away from his bungalow. He needed some clothes. He needed money. He needed help.
He had none of those things at hand.
He cursed himself one more time for being foolish enough to fall for an underage student.
He thought about the plan he and Miedo had cooked up; the plan that was no longer going according to Tim’s plan. Tim provided Miedo the drugs he used on Martha Dean and Calvin Vale. Heather’s DNA was probably all over his house. Words like kidnapping, aggravated sexual assault, and murder in the first degree boomed in Tim’s ears. His heart rate accelerated even more as he jogged.
But there are other players in his game Tim thought. The current and former officers of the law and the medical examiner. He wondered if Calvin’s best friend fit in anywhere. Was that kid afraid of anything like the rest of them? Tim knew talking to the drunk ex-cop would get him nowhere. And submitting to the detective would surely land him in prison where a guy of his fair looks would quickly become popular. But the medical examiner… she might listen to him. But she was in another county. With no money or vehicle to travel, and no phone to call her, how would he find her?
Tim jogged and some time passed. He cut out of the cemetery and onto Penn Avenue and headed north. He jogged until he got the 44th Avenue and paused to catch his breath. As he watched the few cars pass by, he suddenly felt his stomach leap into his throat when he met the eyes of a driver of one of the cars.
Shit! The detective! his mind said with growing dread.
But the detective must not have seen Tim because he turned his eyes back to the road and cruised through the intersection cautiously.
In the car with the detective were the drunk, the best friend, and the woman, the medical examiner Tim thought might listen to him. He wasn’t going to have to look that hard after all. He watched the car continue straight through the intersection and work its way to the west. Tim fell in behind. The car wasn’t going that fast which meant they were probably close to their destination.
Soon, they pulled up to a house on Memorial Parkway: a quaint well-maintained bungalow built in the 60’s or 70’s. Tim had no idea who lived here. He slipped into a cluster of trees and watched. As the person who lived at the house opened the door and greeted them, he still had no Idea who they were visiting and why.
Tim waited in anticipation.
~~18~~
Terry was more than a little hot under the collar after he got back into his car with Chad, Walt, and Holly. He wished he had some kind of authority over the team that infiltrated Tim Rock’s place. A team of twelve highly skilled and heavily armed men not only failed to catch the coach but they lost him altogether. He’d been pursued into the basement and then vanished. Terry swore at the commanding officer of the team, who also swore back, and Terry stormed back to his car ordering them to tear the place apart and find the son of a bitch.
&
nbsp; “We’re not going to stay a while? See if they find him?” Holly asked as Terry started the car.
“Oh, they’ll find him,” Terry said trying to sound confident. “They cornered him in the basement and had the place surrounded. He’s in there somewhere. Just hiding like a rat.”
Chad scoffed in the seat next to him.
“What? You think otherwise?” Terry said flashing a hard look at Chad.
Chad nodded. “I do. He’s long gone.”
“How the fuck do you know that?” Terry said.
“I may be retired but I still got a little cop in me,” Chad returned. “Call it my hunch but I bet he’s got some kind of escape plan in that basement. Why else would someone run down there? Why trap yourself underground when the police are coming for you?”
“Makes total sense to me,” Walt said.
Terry looked at Walt then back to Chad and then at Holly. Her eyes suggested agreement. Terry snatched up his phone and entered a number as he shifted the car in reverse. He relayed to the commanding officer of the team the suspicions of his car mates as he navigated them back onto the street. “Dr. Andrews’s place isn’t far,” Terry said after he disconnected the call. He slowly drove them toward their next destination and, as he did, a heavy sense of something loomed over him. His skin crawled from head to foot beneath his clothing.
~*~0~0~*~
“Is this where he lived when you guys dated?” Walt asked Holly as they looked up at the house from inside the car.
Holly shook her head. “No. He just had a small loft in Northeast,” she answered. She stared at the bungalow. The visible gardens, even at night, were beautiful, lush, and well-maintained. The house was impeccably painted in soft beige accented with hunter green trim. From behind the windows lights glowed. The front porch light beckoned invitingly. Holly hadn’t seen Justin Andrews in quite a while and she wondered how he would respond to her after what happened at their final encounter. She had the briefest thought that she wouldn’t be able to get out of the car, but the curiosity surrounding this case took the reins, and she opened her door. The case wasn’t entirely the source of her curiosity. She wanted to see Justin; see how he was doing; see if maybe she’d made a mistake about him. When he opened his front door and his unctuous voice slid across the threshold and into Holly’s ears, she knew she’d been right to get him out of her life.
~*~0~0~*~
“Holly? Holly… Nabors?” Justin Andrews said as he stepped out onto his front porch. He spoke in his most pleasant tone and looked down the short set of concrete stairs at the four people who had shown up on his doorstep. “And Chad Dean?” He gave his patient a puzzled look and offered them a little laughter. In his hand, he held a rocks glass that was over half full of bourbon. “Is this some kind of reverse house call?”
Before either of them could speak, the man who was very obviously a police detective stepped up and flashed his badge. “I’m Detective Calles. We’d like to ask you a few questions. I apologize for the lateness of the hour but time is critical.”
“Of course,” Justin said, flashing them an award-winning smile.
The detective fiddled with his phone and pulled up a photo. He showed it to Justin. It was a picture. A person. A person Justin knew well.
“Do you know this girl?” the detective asked.
“Yes,” Justin said after looking calmly at the photo. Her name was Heather and she was one of his patients.
“Care to elaborate?” the detective asked.
Justin sipped his bourbon. From the corner of his eye, he could see his patient was eyeing the glass. “No. I don’t care to elaborate.” He sipped the bourbon again and flashed a quick glance at his patient when he did.
“Come again?” the detective said.
“I said, no. I do not care to elaborate on my knowledge of this girl,” Justin said. He hoped his eyes sparkled and he fought to restrain laughter.
“She’s one of his patients too,” Chad said. “He can’t talk about her.”
“Is that true?” the detective asked Justin.
“I can neither deny nor confirm,” Justin returned. He sipped his bourbon again and the ice in the glass rattled a bit. He saw Chad lick his lips.
“It’s just that the girl’s life may be at stake,” the detective said raising his voice. “But I know how you damn doctors are.” He scrolled through his phone and quickly produced another photo which he showed to Justin. “How ‘bout him? Know this kid?”
Justin looked at the picture of Calvin Vale and his lie fell right out as he’d planned. “No, I don’t know him personally or professionally,” he lied. “What’s this all about, Detective? Holly? Chad?” Justin said moving his eyes to each of them. When he ended with Chad, he sipped again from the glass and saw Chad’s lust for alcohol painted all over his face. He took another healthy swallow.
“Your name has been popping up a lot the last few hours, Dr. Andrews,” Holly said.
“Oh it’s ‘doctor’ now?” Justin said to her. “Come on, Holly. We know each other a little better than that. Don’t we?” he playfully added. He raised the hand not holding the glass and extended his index finger which he casually ran under his nose and smiled. He saw her flush and blush and knew she recalled the time he’d expertly used that finger to rapidly bring her to orgasm in an elevator on their last date before she found him uninvited in her bedroom . He could see she was visibly embarrassed by the gesture and he continued. “How? How exactly has my name been coming up?” He bounced his eyebrows at her.
“My wife is dead,” Chad answered flatly.
“You’re kidding?” Justin said convincingly and with feigned sympathy. “What happened?”
“Someone threw her out of a speeding car, it looks like,” Chad replied.
Justin, as Miedo, of course knew differently but said, “I’m very sorry to hear that.” He took more of the amber liquid in his mouth, swallowed, and then let out a sigh, successfully directing his alcohol-laden breath toward Chad. Justin could see beads of sweat coming out on Chad’s brow and saw a tremor shimmy his hands. “I still don’t see what that has to do with me.”
“Mrs. Dean is dead and the girl in the picture I showed you is missing and… in a lot of trouble,” the detective said. “You saying you didn’t have anything to do with that?”
Justin scoffed and sipped his drink. “I certainly did not, Detective. And if you had any evidence to the contrary, you would have come here with a warrant and not a teenager.” He waved a hand in the direction of the youngest member of this party of visitors who had been silent so far.
“Look, you don’t have to tell us anything about my wife’s condition but maybe she confided something in you. Was there someone after her?” Chad said.
Justin shook his head. “’Confided‘ is the big word there, Chad. Tell me how you would feel if I told them about some of your demons?” He took a taunting drink, finishing off the bourbon in the glass, and saw dark marks of perspiration were forming under Chad’s arms. “I take the confidentiality of all my patients very seriously. Now tell me… How long has Heather been missing?” He put a hand up to silence Holly before she could say something. “I think it’s fair you have deduced she is a patient of mine. And if her life is truly at stake, I am obligated to do what I can to assist you…SHORT of breaking her confidence.”
~*~0~0~*~
“Her parents say it’s been days. Close to five now,” Terry answered. He fished another photo off his phone and showed it to the doctor. “Have you ever seen this guy?” He showed him a photo of Tim Rock.
“Hmmm…. He looks familiar, like maybe I’ve seen him in the neighborhood or at the grocery store or something,” Justin said.
“Could be. He doesn’t live too far away from here. We believe the girl’s… Heather’s… DNA is all over this guy’s house. We think he took her… has her hanging up somewhere, and has been using her as a sexual punching bag. Did Heather ever mention anybody… anybody she might have been afraid of?”
/> “Or in love with?” Holly supplemented.
“No,” Justin said after a moment’s thought. “Such things were not in our realm of discussion. And before you ask, I will not tell you the specifics of our conversations.”
~*~0~0~*~
Something about this exchange wasn’t sitting well with Terry. He convinced himself on the way over here that Justin Andrews would tell him anything he wanted to know but the doctor wasn’t being so forthcoming. He speculated it was because one of the doctor’s patients was standing in earshot. “Can you three go back to the car?” he said to Chad, Holly, and Walt. He saw both Chad and Holly start to protest but strangely; Walt looked eager to retreat. Before they could get too many words out, Terry sharply said, “I’ll explain later.” When they were out of listening range he said, “What do you know about phobias, Doctor.”
“Quite a bit. I’m sure I don’t need to tell you it’s one of my areas of expertise,” the doctor replied. “Do you suffer from a phobia, Detective?”
Terry didn’t immediately respond. Instead he looked back at the mismatched trio he was travelling with. “If you asked them, they’d say we’ve all got a few fears rattling around in our heads.”
“Would you like to tell me about it?” the doctor said.
Terry looked at the doctor with reproach. “You know, Doc? There’s something about you I can’t quite put my finger on so I’m not telling you shit about the skeletons that walk around in my closet.”
“Of course,” the doctor said, appearing to take no offense. “There are many people who aren’t agreeable to psychiatric help.”
“Are you mocking me?” Terry said, puffing up his chest and feeling heat rise in his face.
“Of course not, Detective,” the doctor replied. He half smirked and added, “Just offering a little free medical help.”
“Well, something tells me I wouldn’t want it from you,” Terry said. “Your patients are not having the best track record.”
