Cursed Blessing

by J. M. LeDuc

  CHAPTER 18

  Brent gathered his thoughts and his things, shut off the lights, and left the library. He was so tired by the time he got home that he skipped dinner. He made a quick phone call to the hospital to check on Lucille.

  “Resting comfortably,” he was told, and then he headed to bed. He thought he might have a hard time falling asleep because his mind raced in a hundred different directions, but surprisingly, he nodded right off. The sound of a car door woke him. He glanced at his clock: 1:05 a.m. As Brent lay there, he heard voices coming from the street in the front of his home. His senses tingled. Carefully, he got out of bed and assumed a crouched position. He made his way to the other side of the room where the window to the back of his house was located. He stayed low so as not to cast a shadow. Slowly, he eased the curtain aside to peer out. Two men came into view. They stood next to a black Hummer talking to each other.

  Son of a…that’s the Hummer that followed me. Brent grabbed the binoculars that were under his bed and concentrated on reading their lips.

  “We need to make this quick,” the taller one said with a British accent. “Once we bust through that door, all hell is going to break loose. Have your gun drawn and be ready to use it. If you see him, shoot but don’t kill him. We need to find that formula or Ferric is going to have our hides.”

  Brent had heard enough. He moved away from the window. He had to think and quickly. He put on the jeans and shirt he’d taken off only hours before and went to his closet. He shut the door behind him before turning on the light. Brent pulled his army-issue backpack off the top shelf and quickly threw it on. Just then, he heard the door bust open and thunderous running up the stairs that led to the inner door of his home. Reaching overhead, Brent slid open the hatch on the ceiling and pulled himself through it to the attic. Once there, he crawled to another small door that led to the roof of his townhouse. As he squeezed through the small opening leading to the roof, he heard the door at the top of the stairs bust open. He stood up and ran to the east side of the roof. While he ran, he slipped off his backpack.

  At the edge of the roof, Brent stopped and then unzipped his pack. He pulled out his climbing rope and tied a quick hangman’s noose in the end. Stepping into his climbing harness, he clipped the other end of the rope onto his harness then placed the end with the slipknot onto the exhaust pipe that protruded about eight inches from the roof. Brent stood at the edge of the roof, his back turned to it, and tugged on the rope to assure himself that it was secure. Then he rappelled from the roof. Below the third floor, Brent stepped onto the overhang. He waited for the appropriate time to rappel the rest of the way. From there, he could see the alley that ran in back of his home and the Hummer. From this vantage point, he listened to the two men inside the house.

  “Hey, James, you see him anywhere?”

  “Nope,” James yelled back.

  “That’s impossible, look harder,” Thomas said. “He must be here. We saw him come home and there’s no other way out. He’s not Houdini, so keep checking. Look in the closet. Maybe he’s as stupid as that old bag we did away with the other night.”

  “Hey, boss, come here. I think he went into the attic through the closet.”

  Thomas ran into the bedroom, and looked in the closet where James stood. “What the hell are you waiting for? Get your skinny buttocks up there and find him!”

  “Right, boss,” James said and jumped for the opening. He missed. “Can you give me a boost?”

  Once in the attic, James found the door to the roof and crawled out onto it. As he searched, Brent heard him talking. Brent knew he wanted to yell by the tone of his voice, but he had to hold it to a whisper so he wouldn’t wake the neighbors and be discovered. “Come out, come out, wherever you are. Give up and I’ll let you live.” James stopped and listened for any sign of Brent. The only sound he heard was crickets. “Dang it. I swear when I find you I’m going to make you pay for making me stand on this roof. I hate heights.”As James’ voice got louder, Brent worried that his adversary would trip over or see the rope. The only thing he had going for him at the moment was the darkness—no stars or moon to light up the sky to reveal his whereabouts. James walked toward the edge and looked down, nearly losing his balance. The darkness made it seem he was even higher than he actually was.

  “Whoa, man, that was close. That’s enough of this crap,” he muttered. “We’ll find you one way or another. When we do, you’ll pay for this!”

  James crawled back into the attic and then lowered himself down into the closet through the small ceiling access.

  “He’s not up there, boss,” he said, as he fell back onto the closet floor.

  “Let’s get out of here,” Thomas said. “I have an idea how we can flush him out.”

  From his hiding place on the ledge, Brent saw them walk across the street to the Hummer. Thomas, the one in charge, pulled his cell phone out of his pocket and dialed his boss’ number.

  “Hello, Mr. Ferric, he’s not here. But I know how we can flush him out. He has that girlfriend, what’s her name.” He listened. “Yeah, Adler, that’s right, e-mail her address into my blackberry and I’ll get right over there and get her. We’ll bait the trap using her. Besides, I could use a little female company, if you know what I mean.”

  Thomas finished his call to Ferric. Looking at James, he said, “You stay here, out of sight, in case he comes back. If he does, put one in his leg so he can’t run and then wait for me to come back.”

  “Right, boss. Hey, how long will it take you? This darkness is freaking me out.”

  “Everything freaks you out. Just stay out of sight. I’ll be back in about an hour. Wait in the house if you want, but make sure you stay hidden.”

  With that, Thomas climbed into the Hummer and drove off, leaving James standing in the street. Brent watched James walk back into his house. As soon as his front door closed, he rappelled the rest of the way down. He quickly unclasped the rope from the harness, letting it drop to the ground around his feet. With one fast, jerking motion of the rope, he released it from the pipe on the roof. He repacked the rope and harness as fast as he could and took off running. He headed east toward the water where there would be less activity. Brent ducked into an alley behind a beachfront condo development. By the time he stopped, he was breathing heavily. He positioned himself under a streetlight and removed his backpack. Flipping it upside down, he shook everything out of it. His satellite phone dropped onto the pavement. Thank God, it’s here. I hope it’s still charged, he thought. He flipped it open and pushed the start button. The LCD screen lit up and the phone turned on.

  “Thank you, God,” he murmured. Knowing Chloe’s phone number by heart, he dialed it. The phone rang and Brent prayed she’d pick it up.

  CHAPTER 19

  Chloe was wakened from a sound sleep. She tried to focus on the brightly lit caller ID but the numbers were fuzzy. Were her eyes playing tricks on her? She reached for her glasses. No, her eyes weren’t playing tricks on her. She recognized the caller immediately.

  Chloe fumbled for the phone receiver. “Hello. Brent?” she said inquisitively in a sleepy voice.

  “Chloe, listen to me. I don’t have time to explain, so please, just listen. Get out of your house, now!”

  “Huh? What? Are you all right, Brent? You’re scaring me.”

  “I know this doesn’t make any sense and I’m sorry for scaring you. But you have to trust me. I need you to gather up just your essentials and get out within ten minutes. Drive the backstreets and meet me at The Loft. Ten minutes, Chloe. Okay?”

  The few seconds of silence on the other end made Brent panic.

  “Are you listening to me, Chloe?” he yelled.

  Chloe’s heart raced a mile a minute as she pulled herself up to a sitting position in the bed. “Yeah, I’m listening, but…”

  “No buts, Chloe. Someone’s coming there to kidnap you or
worse and he’ll be there in less than twenty minutes!”

  “Brent, you’re scaring me.”

  “I know, I’m sorry, but you have to listen. If you ever loved me, you’ll get your stuff together and get out. Please!”

  “Okay, I’ll do it,” she said.

  “Chloe?”

  “Yes?”

  “I love you.”

  Chloe sat up even straighter, listening to the dial tone. “Did he just say ‘I love you’?” she asked herself in the dark.

  Her mind raced wildly. She tried to process everything that had just happened. Brent is many things, she thought, but not an alarmist. I know he wouldn’t talk like that unless he was serious, and maybe even a bit frightened. How much time did he say I had? Ten minutes?

  She jumped out of bed, ran to the closet, and slipped the spaghetti straps of her nightgown off her shoulders. The gown floated to the ground. She grabbed a pair of jeans and climbed into them as fast as she knew how. She pulled a white t-shirt from its hanger and slipped it over her head.

  Next, she grabbed her overnight bag from the back of the closet. She grabbed another pair of jeans and a couple more shirts, tossing them into the bag. It killed her to not fold them, but she knew she was running out of time. She practically tore a sundress from its hanger before heading to her dresser where she reached for underwear and a brassiere. They went into the bag, too.

  She ran into the bathroom. With a sweep of her hand, she gathered toiletries and her makeup bag. Placing the bag onto the sink edge, she squished everything down and zipped the bag. Tossing it over her shoulder, she ran through the house, grabbed sunglasses, keys, and slipped her feet into flip-flops by the foyer door. She headed for the garage. She slapped the garage door opener on the wall, threw her bag into the back seat and hopped into the driver seat. The motor of her hybrid was nearly silent. Brent would be so proud of her when he found out she’d bought a hybrid. She drove down the quiet street, not knowing when she would see her home again.

  Brent said to stay off the main roads, Chloe reminded herself, so she turned toward the Atlantic Ocean, though the highway would have been much quicker. She trusted Brent. If there was one thing she knew about Brent, it was that she could trust him, a fact she never doubted. Chloe’s thoughts as she drove along Beach Road toward Palm Cove returned to the past.

  She and Brent had been a couple for about a year and a half. Everything was going the way a relationship should go, at least that’s what she’d thought. Although Brent always acted lovingly, he never said the words “I love you” to her. Not until tonight, anyway. He would say he loved her hair or her eyes. He would tell her he loved her intelligence or her body. But never had he said he loved her.

  About eight months ago, Chloe started to cringe when he’d say he loved different aspects or qualities of her. It sounded like nails on a chalkboard. Finally, six months ago, lying in Brent’s bed after spending most of the night with him, Chloe looked into his eyes and said, “I love you, Brent.“ Never taking her eyes off his, she waited for a response. He squirmed and averted her stare.

  He couldn’t look straight into Chloe’s eyes. He turned his head to the side and said, “I know.”

  Chloe, the soft-spoken historian, became rabid with emotion. Chloe, who was so modest that she normally would never get out of bed without first putting on a robe, sat straight up in bed and let the sheets fall from her body. Brent looked at her and saw fire in her eyes. He knew he’d pushed his luck once too often.

  “I know? What the hell does that mean?” Chloe screamed. “Either you love me or you don’t. Which one is it? I need to know. I deserve to know.”

  Stalling for time, Brent reached over, took her robe from the side of the bed, and handed it to her. Chloe’s eyes became more dilated and her facial expressions became more severe as she ripped the robe from his hand and threw it across the room.

  “Well, I guess no answer is all the answer I need, isn’t it?” she said and she gathered her things to leave.

  “Come on, Chloe, we’ve been through this before. You know how I feel about you.”

  “Do I? No, I don’t, Brent! No, I don’t. I know you love parts of me, qualities of me. Heck, if you tear me into pieces so you just have parts, you’d be head over heels in love, but as a whole,” Chloe stretched out her arms to demonstrate, “as an entire woman, something is missing, isn’t it?”

  “Nothing is missing, Chloe. It’s just that I…I just don’t…”

  “You just don’t what, Brent?” she yelled. Tears ran down her face. She sniffed and huffed as she spoke. The sight of her so torn up was like a knife piercing Brent’s heart, yet he sat speechless. “You just don’t what? Love me? Is that what it is?”

  “No, it’s just that I…it’s hard for me to put into words.”

  “Well, I’ll tell you what. I’ll make it easy for you.” By then, she was crying so hard, she could hardly speak. “I’ll give you a little time,” huff, huff, she breathed, “to put it into words. Is six months long enough? I don’t want to see you or hear from you for the next six months.” Her voice grew louder as she spoke. “That should be enough time for any tongue-tied moron to make up his mind. Six months, Brent. Six months.”

  With those words, she stormed out of his life.

  Chloe remembered that Brent had called her for the first few weeks after that, but she wouldn’t pick up the phone. Let him stew and worry a bit longer, she’d thought. She wanted him to think that he’d really lost her. But she knew all along that she could never let him go. For good or bad, she loved Brent and didn’t want a life without him in it.

  Then the calls stopped altogether. She had sat by the phone for days, waiting for him to call. He never did.

  It had been just over six months since she stormed out of his room, and she was sure she’d lost him. She almost believed she was better off without him. She’d convinced herself that he had found someone else…then, tonight happened.

  Did he really say he loved me? she wondered. Did he mean it or was it just the severity of the moment that made him say it?

  CHAPTER 20

  Driving the coastal road took longer than Chloe had expected. Finally, she spotted the sign that read, “Entering Palm Cove” and she started to get excited. It was the same feeling she had when she first passed that sign a couple of years earlier. Chloe, a historian by occupation, had been assigned a job that brought her to the Palm Cove Public Library.

  Her assignment was to piece together the history of the city. Palm Cove was the second oldest settlement in the southeastern part of the United States, and yet its history was a mystery. No public records dated back further than seventy years but the library building was much older than that. To complicate the problem even more, Chloe couldn’t find any street maps or architectural drawings any older than the public records she had been able to find. Usually, they were some of the easier documents for her to come by when she gathered facts about a city’s history.

  Brent had told her he was at least a fifth generation resident of Palm Cove. But when Chloe asked for details about the town’s history, he couldn’t or wouldn’t shed any light on the subject.

  Truth be told, Brent did everything not to talk about the city. The main reasons at the time were the rooms behind the bookshelf. His great, great grandfather designed and built the library, as well as most of the other original buildings in Palm Cove. Brent was part of the history of Palm Cove. Part of him, the largest part, wanted to take Chloe by the hand and show her the rooms. He knew it was the biggest missing part of her research, but another part of him knew he had to keep their existence a secret. He didn’t know why. He just knew that his grandfather told him to keep it a secret. His gut instinct agreed.

  So, he rationalized that the purity of the building, the honor and sanctity of the library, would be destroyed if the information became public. It would be turned into another tou
rist trap like other historical towns he’d visited. That was something he despised and he couldn’t let it happen, even if it meant holding out on Chloe.

  When Brent was much younger, his grandfather had told him that to love someone meant you were totally honest with them. Brent held those words dear to his heart long after his grandfather died.

  And there lay the conflict, the reason he couldn’t tell Chloe that he loved her. In his rational mind, he thought he loved her, but he just couldn’t be completely truthful with her. Since that seemed to be the case, how could it be love? The only thing Brent was sure of was that he wasn’t sure of anything.

  Chloe’s assignment was terminated due to lack of tangible research materials. She tried her best to convince Brent to buy a car so that he could travel to and from Palm Cove and Sand Harbor, where she lived. He’d have no part of it. He didn’t need a car, he told her. Move in with him, he pressed. She would have, except for two things: her faith and those three missing words.

  Toward the end of their relationship, each time she drove by the “Entering Palm Cove” sign, resentment and frustration built in her like bile in the back of her throat.

  Passing the sign that read, “Entering Palm Cove” caused a subconscious giggle to escape from her lips. Chloe suddenly felt nervous in anticipation of seeing Brent again. She could feel goose-bumps popping up all over her. As her senses settled down, the familiar feelings of love returned—feelings she had thought were lost six months ago.

  Chloe turned on Third Avenue and then turned a sharp left into an alley behind an old three-story brick building affectionately known as The Loft. She did as Brent instructed and parked in the alley.

  Unable to move for a few moments, she thought, This is crazy. I feel like a giddy schoolgirl whose about to meet her dream date. Snap out of it, Chloe. She checked her hair and makeup in the rearview mirror, looked at her watch and got out of her car. It was still pitch black outside when she entered The Loft through the back door.