Secrets Amoung The Shadows

by Sally Berneathy

  It was possible Kay Palmer was Kay Becker. She could have married and changed her name, dyed her light brown hair red.

  Maybe he did know Kay. And maybe he'd never really let go of his childhood playmate but had taken him inside, somehow given him a life and turned him into something evil.

  The voice in his head had warned him that Leanne would betray him...the way Kay had betrayed him.

  Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. Eliot and Edward. Two people—no, two halves of the same person.

  ***

  An hour later Eliot stood outside the Executive Styles shop. Through the windows he could see the women cutting hair and giving manicures.

  He looked down at his hands, clenching and unclenching them. Had he sat in one of those chairs while Kay Palmer smoothed his hands with lotion then buffed his nails?

  In his dream her nails had been long and red...and two of the tips had broken off as she fought for her life. He'd scoured the news reports but had never found that detail mentioned. However, he'd heard that the police often withheld certain details of a crime in order to weed out the false confessions. What would they say if he asked them about the broken fingernails?

  One of the women inside looked up, then smiled and waved. Woodenly Eliot lifted a hand in a return greeting. Did she know him or was she only being polite to a potential client?

  He had to go in. Much as the possibility of what he might discover frightened him, nevertheless he had to know the truth. He straightened his tie, took a deep breath and pushed through the door.

  "Hi, Eliot," the receptionist greeted, and he felt the blood leave his face and freeze in his veins.

  "Hi—" He checked the name plate on her desk. "Hi, Patsy."

  "I'm real sorry about Kay," she said.

  "Yeah, me, too." More sorry than you can ever know. "Do the police have any idea who did it?"

  Patsy leaned forward confidentially, and he moved closer to the desk.

  "Wayne was coming over that night. She was going to tell him she wanted a divorce. Did she tell you that?"

  Eliot could hear the blood roaring past his ears as he listened to Patsy's revelations. "No, she didn't tell me." But he couldn't say if she'd told Edward.

  Patsy's forehead wrinkled. "You did know she was just separated, not divorced, didn't you?"

  "Sure," Eliot lied. "I knew that."

  "Well, Wayne didn't even like the idea of them being separated, so he probably didn't take too kindly to a divorce. I think he killed her in a rage, that's what I think. Wayne Palmer had a terrible temper, especially when he'd been drinking."

  Eliot ran his tongue over suddenly dry lips. "So I was to blame for her death."

  At Patsy's shocked look, he realized he'd spoken the words aloud. "Oh, no," she protested. "Don't you even think that. You made her happy. She was so excited that day. She had her hair done and her nails sculptured just for you. If Wayne agreed to the divorce, she was going to call you right away on your private number, the one that was just for her to use, so the two of you could celebrate."

  "Sculptured? Does that mean her nails were long and red?" All the woman had to do was say no, and he would be able to breathe again.

  "Yeah!" Patsy grinned. "Real long and real red. Just the way you liked them."

  Real long and real red. The air seemed to have gone out of the room. He couldn't get his breath.

  "You okay?"

  He gave one brief, jerky nod. It was the best he could manage.

  "Why don't you come around here and sit down?" Her voice was kind, a kindness he didn't deserve.

  "I'm okay," he croaked.

  "She didn't call you that night, did she?"

  "No. No, she didn't call me." She hadn't called him, but she could have called Edward.

  "I didn't think so. I told the police Wayne was probably the last person to see her alive."

  "Yes," he agreed. "Wayne."

  "You really don't look so good, Eliot. You're taking this pretty hard, aren't you? Oh, I know you're a big, strong, macho man, but I also know you had some real feelings for Kay."

  He wanted to nod, but feared if he started, his head might never stop bobbing.

  "Thanks for talking to me, Patsy." He turned away, his movements stiff and mechanical as he made his way to the door.

  "Sure, Eliot. You come back any time."

  Eliot strode away from the shop, afraid to look back, certain he could feel the hot breath of the hounds of hell pursuing him.

  Chapter 7

  Leanne looked up as Eliot strode into her office, his presence dominating and filling the room. Her breath caught in her throat at the dark aura of anger surrounding him, the storm raging on his face.

  He tossed a business card onto her desk then flopped into the recliner, and she saw the pain in the dark depths of his eyes. His anger was directed inwardly, not at her.

  She lowered her eyes to the card and took a deep breath. Her vision blurred for a moment, but then the words came into sharp focus. Kay Palmer.

  "It was in my desk drawer," he said, his normally smooth voice harsh and grating. "She had mine, too."

  Reluctantly Leanne switched on her recorder even though she wasn't sure she wanted to hear this, much less have a record of it.

  "So you knew her."

  He shook his head, denying it even as his next words admitted it. "Apparently I went to her for manicures."

  "Apparently?"

  "So the police tell me. They came by today to question me."

  She sucked in her breath, trying to keep her reaction silent, but he grinned wryly.

  "Pretty damning, isn't it? I almost told them..." He shrugged. "Well, I didn't know what to tell them, so I took the cowardly way out and didn't say anything. They found my card at her apartment, my name and unlisted phone number in her address book, and my name in her appointment book at Executive Styles."

  "That's all still circumstantial," she protested.

  "It would be, but there's more. She called my office a few weeks ago changing the time of my appointment. I remember getting the message, but I pitched it. I thought it was a joke. I never get manicures."

  "Maybe it was a joke." There could be an explanation for all this, an explanation that didn't stain Eliot's hands with blood. She realized she wanted to find such an explanation, wanted to believe he was not a murderer, but she knew only too well that things usually were exactly as they seemed. And ignoring the truth not only didn't make it go away—ignoring it could also be dangerous.

  "No, it wasn't a joke," he answered, his expression stoic. "I went to the shop and talked to one of her co-workers. She recognized me, called me by name. Kay told her we were involved. So involved that Kay was going to ask her husband for a divorce." His jaw clenched. "Because of me. Her friend thinks maybe Kay's husband killed her because he was jealous. That means, even if I didn't choke her with these hands, I still killed her."

  He had been involved with Kay. So involved that she wanted to divorce her husband to be with him. Had Kay felt the same attraction to Eliot that she herself felt, the same need to ignore the possible consequences of trusting him? Kay had paid for her trust with her life.

  Leanne swallowed hard, trying to swallow this unprofessional distraction. "And you remember nothing about any of that?" she asked. "Even after you got to the shop, it didn't look familiar. Nothing her friend told you brought up a sense of recognition, of deja vu?"

  "No. Nothing. If it wasn't for that dream, I'd think the woman was nuts, that somebody was trying to mess with my mind."

  Everything he told her was consistent with MPD. Almost everything.

  "It sounds like you must have spent a lot of time with her. I know I've asked you this before, but it's very important. Think before you answer. Do you have missing periods of time? Do you suddenly realize it's night, and you can't remember what happened to the evening? Do you check your watch and find that it's two hours later than you thought? Find yourself wearing clothes you don't remember putting on?"


  He shook his head, his lips compressed into a thin line. "I don't know. Maybe. That's normal, isn't it?"

  "No," she said quietly, a chill enveloping her at this sudden breakdown of the last barrier to a diagnosis. "No, Eliot. It's not normal to find yourself in a place you don't remember going to or realize that you've lost several hours."

  He stood and paced the length of her office. "I didn't mean it like that. At least, I don't think I meant it like that. I've always been so absorbed in my work, I'll notice everybody going home and realize I haven't had lunch. I can be driving down the freeway thinking about a knotty problem and miss my exit." He stopped and looked at her, his hands lifted beseechingly. "Doesn't everybody do things like that?"

  "When you put it that way, yes, everybody does things of that nature. What I'm asking you is whether your memory lapses go beyond the normal."

  He sat down again and ran a shaky hand through his hair. "I don't know any more what normal is. There's something else I probably need to tell you about. I understand these other…uh…personalities take on different names."

  She nodded slowly. "Frequently."

  "Well, today when I found Kay's card in my desk, I thought about Edward putting it there."

  "Edward?" She whispered the name as the shadow of despair darkened the windows, invading the room and settling in her gut.

  "Edward was my imaginary playmate when I was a child. At first the other kids went along with the game, but then they got older and went on to other things, and I quit telling them about Edward. But I didn't quit playing with him until I developed a crush on a girl. I went out with her and admitted to her that I still talked to an imaginary person. She laughed at me, then she told everybody else, and it took me a long time to live it down. I never played with Edward again." He stopped, watching her closely. "The girl's name was Kay Becker."

  "Kay Becker, Kay Palmer. Are you saying you think it's the same person?"

  "Kay Palmer was the dead woman's married name. The police said I went to school with her."

  "What do you think?"

  "I don't know. It's possible. She moved across town to a different school when I was fourteen, right after our little fiasco, and I never saw her again. Twenty years later, with her hair dyed—maybe. I can't say for sure. I've only seen her in my dream and on the television news spots."

  "So you gave up your invisible friend because a girl betrayed you and embarrassed you, and now that girl could be a victim of a brutal murder."

  "It doesn't sound good, does it?"

  He was right about that. It didn't sound good. If Edward had emerged during Eliot's childhood and felt Eliot had deserted him, he could have resurfaced years later to take revenge on the person who'd caused such desertion.

  Yet she still found herself reluctant to make such a diagnosis, to admit that Eliot was a killer.

  Was she simply being cautious, as any doctor would be, or was she so drawn to Eliot on a personal basis that she'd lost sight of her objectivity?

  The mere fact that she had to ask herself such a question was uncomfortably disturbing.

  "I suggest we try hypnosis again," she said briskly, trying to mask her self-doubts as well as her fear of what they might discover.

  He shot up from the chair and leaned across her desk, a scowl creasing his brow. "You can't be serious! What if this Edward comes out and tries to kill you?"

  She drew back instinctively. Was he threatening her? The possibility still existed that he was a cold-blooded killer needing a defense of insanity. That was something else she couldn't—or didn't want to—accept.

  "You'll be under hypnosis," she said. "I can handle it."

  "I'd feel better with a little insurance." His features grim, he reached inside his pocket, then slapped his hand on her desk with a thud.

  She jumped to her feet at the action, the noise. When he drew back his hand, a .38 caliber revolver lay on her desk.

  "Do you know how to use that?" he demanded.

  "Eliot, where did you get a gun?" she gasped, images of her father's last moments flashing through her mind.

  "It's legal, it's registered," he assured her. "Can you use it?"

  "My father enjoyed hunting. He taught me to shoot when I was very young." But that didn't mean she could. She hadn't touched a gun since her father's death. That gun was a .38, very similar to the one now lying on her desk.

  Slowly she sank back into her chair.

  "Take it, and we'll get on with the hypnosis," he ordered.

  She tried to laugh, but it came out a shrill hiccup. "This is absurd. Are you suggesting I should shoot you if another personality manifests? Please...put the gun away. We'll go somewhere more public if you're concerned about my safety."

  He thrust out of the chair and strode around the desk to her. She flinched backward from the hurricane raging in his eyes.

  "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to scare you. I'd never hurt you. But..." He hefted the gun with one hand, cradled hers with the other, laid the revolver in it and closed her fingers around it. His flesh against hers was warm, but the steel in her palm was cold...and deadly.

  "I don't know about this other person, this Edward," he went on. "In my dream he hated you. Remember what happened last night when a patient got out of control. And Hedlund's half my size."

  She looked away from him and dropped the weapon back onto her desk. Her fingers burned on the outside of her hand where he'd touched her and felt icy on the inside where she'd touched the cold steel.

  "I will not hold a gun on a patient. If you're concerned, we'll postpone further treatment until I can work you in during regular hours or get a colleague to join me."

  He studied her intently for a moment, then straightened his tie and smoothed his suit jacket. "You're probably right." He turned and started toward the door.

  She leapt to her feet and went after him, a little surprised at the strength of her need to prevent him from leaving. She put a restraining hand on his arm just as he reached the door. He stopped and looked down at her hand.

  Suddenly self-conscious, she withdrew her hand from his arm. "What are you going to do?"

  "What I ought to do is call the policemen who came to see me today and tell them everything. I can't take the chance I might hurt somebody else."

  "But?" she urged, hearing the reservation in his words.

  He shifted uncomfortably, looking across the room toward the window rather than at her. "But the thought of being trapped in prison—" He shook his head. "I can't."

  "Then let me help you."

  For a long moment he didn't speak. Finally he looked at her and drew in a deep breath. "If you can see me during regular office hours tomorrow, if we can be sure you have someone here to help you, just in case, okay. Otherwise—" He shook his head. "I'm not going to put you in danger."

  "I'll arrange something," she agreed. "Come back and sit down. We have a lot to talk about even without hypnosis."

  His gaze flickered back to her desk. "If you'll sit between the door and me. And keep the gun at hand."

  "I'll sit right there." She indicated the end of the dark blue sofa beside the door.

  He nodded curtly, strode across the room, took the gun from her desk and laid it on the lamp table beside the sofa. She cringed away from it.

  Swiveling the recliner around to face her, Eliot dropped into it. He clutched his hands tightly together, no longer attempting an unconcerned facade.

  She leaned back, hoping to help him to relax by presenting an example. "Let's talk about the situation with Kay Palmer. You dreamed about her the night she was killed."

  He dipped his head in a brief affirmative.

  "And you have no memory of that night."

  "None. As far as I know I was home all evening."

  "Are you positive you didn't lose a period of time? Be watching one television program one minute then something else entirely different the next? Look at the clock and realize two hours had passed without your noticing it?"

  "I
'm not positive about anything anymore."

  "Tell me about that evening, every detail you remember from the time you left work."

  "I was at the office until around six. Then I went by the gym and worked out for an hour. I stopped to get a pizza. Went home and ate it while I watched a movie on television. I don't remember there being any gaps in the plot. I watched the news and went to bed. While I was sleeping, that's the only time I can't account for."

  "What time was Kay murdered?"

  "The paper said between eight p.m. and midnight."

  "So it could have happened after you went to sleep. Except the network news is over at ten-thirty, and that seems a little late for a crab leg dinner."

  He flinched. "Not necessarily. According to her friend at the shop, after Kay asked her husband for a divorce, if he agreed, she was going to call me to come over and celebrate. That would put the dinner later than normal."

  His words hit Leanne in her mid-section. The possibility of Eliot's guilt was becoming more certain with every new fact. And still she didn't want to believe it. Still she wanted to find another explanation.

  "Her friend said she was going to call me on my private phone number."

  "A private number? An unlisted number, you mean?"

  "I guess. My home phone is unlisted." He scowled, a crease appearing between his eyebrows. "Her friend said it was the number I gave her just for her use. My home phone's unlisted, but a lot of people have the number."

  "A second cell phone?"

  "Not that I know of. Nothing I'm being billed for."

  "Surely you'd have noticed if you had an extra cell phone lying around." She realized she was helping Eliot build a favorable argument instead of trying to be neutral. Against everything she knew to be right, against everything she knew to be safe, she was letting her emotions lead her.