Death Trance

by R. D. Zimmerman

  As I tried to block Chris's last image, I heard Toni tossing about in the living room, alone out there on the couch, later pacing, later yet taking a shower. My mind bubbled and popped. I wanted to go and hold her, and I probably should have, but I thought it might not be right.

  What was truly inappropriate, though, was the two of us flung on our own, fretting and stewing so lonesomely. It seemed like hours before I drifted away, and only then I slipped into a dream that acted out my worries—something about the Dragons bursting down my door, charging in, and murdering us, too. Altogether awful, altogether a distinct possibility. After that, my heart raced, and for the rest of the night I flinched at every noise.

  I was glad when it was time to get up the next morning, even though I could feel the exhaustion puffing my eyes and numbing my joints. I was glad to move into some sort of action, resolve. I didn't like lying and waiting so passively. So it was a relief when, a little before eight o'clock, Toni and I headed out to meet Ed Dawson.

  I locked both locks on my apartment door, double-checked them, and then Toni and I started down the main staircase. Her hand slipped easily into mine as we descended, and I took it, held it.

  “It's not even four blocks to Uptown,” I said, “but we probably shouldn't walk it.”

  “Okay.”

  Her voice was low and calm. Exhausted. I studied her face, noted her lack of color. Had she slept at all?

  We paused in the vestibule, and through the glass door checked the sidewalk and street. I was looking for a man, either Jenkins or Tyler. Or a group of men from the Dragons. Everything, though, looked calm, just a normal morning, just a few people with briefcases trudging off to work.

  Toni and I, still holding hands, had almost reached the sidewalk when I heard a car door open and reflexively scanned the street, my eyes coming to rest on an Olds-mobile, a light green one. A woman climbed out, stood alongside the worn auto. The long, straight hair, the broad face. No, I thought, it couldn't be. Toni clutched my hand tighter yet, gasped and stopped still.

  “I knew you'd go back to him,” said the woman, her voice accusing and deep as if she'd smoked far too many cigarettes, drunk way too much coffee.

  “Laura,” said Toni, her voice barely audible.

  I hadn't seen her in—what?—ten years, but even from a distance I could see how much she'd aged. The hair, though still long, had dulled from light to dark brown, then silvered. Body a little heavier, perhaps. Face puffy, worn, as if she'd partied too hard and too long. A little haggard. Yes, a person in recovery, someone who was not only drying out, but being forced to confront a myriad of personal and family issues.

  “I knew you always wanted him,” continued Laura, hanging on to the edge of the car as if it were an island and everything else a horrible sea.

  Toni said, “What?” She eyed me, then quickly dropped my hand, threw it out of her grasp, took a half-step forward. “Wait, no, don't be—”

  “I understood everything as soon as I called up and heard his voice on the answering machine. I thought it was him, and when I checked the phone book, sure enough, the name and number matched up.” She shook her head in disgust, started climbing back into the Olds-mobile. “I've been sitting out here for a couple of hours praying I was wrong. But I guess I'm not. Hope you lovebirds are happy.”

  Toni jogged to the curb, called across the street, “Laura!”

  But Laura paid no attention, and she brought the Oldsmobile to life with a huge roar, jammed the thing into gear, and burst out of the parking place. To no avail, Toni shouted out again.

  Laura cracked her window, eyed Toni with contempt, and hollered, “Drop dead, Toni!”

  And she was off, racing down the street, turning with a squeal at the first corner, then disappearing.

  “Shit!” said Toni, standing in the street. “Do you see what I mean? Do you? She just drops out of the sky, assumes she knows everything about anything, and then storms off. I can't tell you how many times she's done this exact same thing. Damn her!”

  “I can't believe she thinks we're back together.”

  “She believes exactly what she wants—that she's alone, that no one loves her, that she's a toad.” Toni clenched both hands, hissed her frustration. “Well, she is a toad. God, and I wanted to go out and visit her.” She shook her head, stomped to my car. “Let's get out of here.”

  We rode to Uptown in stormy silence, Toni muttering but not really saying anything. I parked in a lot, and as we walked to Sherman's Cafe, a popular spot on Henne-pin just down from the Uptown Theater, Toni assertively took my hand.

  “Are you all right?” I asked as I pulled open the door.

  “Don't worry, I'll be okay.” She took a deep breath, and added, “Just forget about Laura. I'm sure she won't be back.”

  Once inside, I looked across the cafe, a bright place buzzing with morning business, and said, “There he is.”

  Liz's therapist, Ed Dawson, was seated at a table in the middle of the room, and he raised his brow, opened his eyes wide, upon seeing us. We quickly went to him, and he stood, took Toni's hand first, then mine.

  “Thanks for meeting us so early,” I said.

  “Absolutely.”

  I felt quickly relieved. Here was someone who could listen and on whom we could impose our worries and fears. Here was someone who could advise us on all of this. That was his glow anyway. The kind of safe-harbor feelings he seemed to give off. Yet he was worried. That much was obvious from the serious, even stern, look upon his face.

  “I can't believe it.” Dawson motioned toward a newspaper he'd placed on the empty fourth chair. “It's even in this morning's paper. And the brutality of it—that poor woman.”

  I shook my head as the recent incident with Laura was overshadowed by the memory of Chris's murder.

  Toni said, “Well, there's certainly no question anymore that Liz was murdered.”

  “No, I suppose not,” replied Dawson.

  On the phone last night, Toni had told Dawson most of the story of finding Chris, and Dawson had listened, taken it all in, agreed with Toni's initial speculations.

  “Did Liz ever mention Chris?” I asked as our waiter came over and poured coffee for us all.

  He pursed his lips, shook his head. “Not much. She did say she liked the girl across the hall—I do remember that—but nothing else. And once she came in all upset because she was having trouble with the caretaker.”

  I glanced at Toni, then back to Dawson. “With John? What kind of trouble?”

  “Oh, nothing major. He was just getting after her for playing her stereo too loud. As I understood, it was kind of a control thing with him, and Liz just needed some help on how to tell him to back off.”

  Dawson had two or three clients that morning, so we ordered right away. Pancakes sounded good. Something nice and grounding, food that was solid and not runny, food that would soak up the acidy sensation in my stomach.

  Toni didn't waste a minute. She turned from the waiter, back to Dawson and asked, “What about dating —did she mention anyone besides Tyler? Was she going out with anyone besides him?”

  Dawson thought, took a sip of coffee. “No. She never mentioned anyone, that is. We spent quite a bit of time talking about her relationship with Rob. Before they broke up she was eager to go out with other people, but he didn't want her to.”

  “He was jealous?” I asked.

  “Oh, yes. According to Liz, Rob had a real problem with even the thought of her seeing other men. With his temper, too.” He thought for a moment, then added, “This was told to me in confidentiality, of course, but I suppose now it's in Liz's best interest. Rob Tyler's a violent man—he struck Liz on several different occasions and threatened her as well.”

  Toni closed her eyes and shook her head.

  “That's why she wanted out of the relationship,” continued Dawson. “She knew that it would be best for her to leave Tyler and find someone else, and I was encouraging this. She did say there were a couple of peop
le she wouldn't mind going out with.”

  “So it's possible, then, that she might have started seeing someone else?” I asked.

  “Well, maybe.” Dawson seemed to withdraw in thought, looking out the front window, wrinkling his brow, then added, “Recently she talked about another fellow, someone she was beginning to like.”

  Toni asked, “An older man?”

  “Well, as a matter of fact, yes, that's right. That's how it came up—she asked me what I thought about age differences in couples. I said if the relationship was good, then it didn't matter. She smiled and blushed a little bit and told me about an older guy who was really nice to her. She was wondering what it would be like to go out with him.”

  I turned to Toni. “That could have been Jenkins.”

  Our breakfasts came soon, and as we ate, Toni went into detail about yesterday—our following Tyler, going down to the St. Croix River, taking pictures. And then, of course, finding Chris, and talking to Lieutenant Jenkins and seeing the thing on his wrist, that southwestern bracelet, the very same one we'd seen in the photograph. The more Toni explained, the slower Dawson ate, until finally he put down his fork and knife altogether, and just sat there, dumbfounded, pale even, in discomfort.

  “You're sure about all this?” he asked.

  Well, as sure as we could be, I said. The only truly stupid thing we'd done was hand over the pictures to him. We were both certain of one thing, though. The bracelet. We'd both recognized it right away.

  Dawson shook his head. “Oh, my God.”

  Toni and I glanced at each other, both of us smugly pleased by Dawson's shock and concern. It was confirming, affirming—all of that stuff. So we weren't nuts. The ramifications were dreadful. If Jenkins wasn't undercover, it would mean that a police lieutenant was a member of a dark cult. It would send a blast all the way through the police force, right up to the mayor's office.

  Speculating, I said, “If the Dragons are responsible for killing those four women, Liz, now Chris, and probably the blond woman we saw down in that warehouse, that would be seven.”

  “Dear God,” muttered Dawson.

  The waiter poured us fresh coffee, and we sat there stewing over the possibilities, venturing what might have happened, who might have killed Liz and why. Rob Tyler certainly could have murdered Liz and made it look like a suicide, either as part of a cult ritual or perhaps out of jealousy.

  “You know,” Toni commented, “Liz always wanted the truth out in the open. It would have been just like her to threaten to expose the Dragons.”

  “Yeah.” As I thought about it, that fit, made sense. “After all, the night Liz died, Chris saw her with someone who matched Jenkins's description.”

  Toni said, “And don't forget we were the ones who told Jenkins—not Rob Tyler—about that. That Chris might be able to help, I mean.”

  Our thoughts fell into silence. All so logical. So complete. It was like dominoes falling, one right after the other. Neat and clean. Poor Liz, poor Chris. If their deaths could be attributed to Jenkins, how many other deaths had he covered up? What other crimes had he forced to remain undetected?

  Ed Dawson looked shaken. This obviously wasn't the kind of stuff he liked to be involved in. Divorces, self-esteem, parental problems. Those were his specialties.

  He asked, “So what are you going to do?”

  “I don't know.” I rubbed my chin. “I just wish there was a way to get Rob Tyler to talk. That's what I thought about in the middle of the night—some way of forcing him to tell us what he knows.”

  “Yeah, but how?” said Toni.

  “I don't know, but there must be a way of getting him to say something about the Dragons and Jenkins. If only we had some evidence, something to bribe him with.”

  “Wait, wait, wait.” Dawson lifted his hands, palms out. “Just slow down. You don't want to go getting yourselves into any more trouble than necessary. I think it's best if you just back off a bit, let the proper authorities handle this.”

  “But who?” asked Toni. “What if there're other Dragons in the police?”

  Dawson considered it, said, “I have a cousin in St. Paul who works for the FBI. Do you want me to call him and see what he can find out about Jenkins?”

  “That'd be great,” said Toni, smiling for the first time that morning.

  Which was where we left it: Dawson was going to get hold of his cousin as soon as possible and we were to wait for his advice. That was probably the best way. It should have been, anyway. As we sat there finishing our meals, though, my mind kept going down another path, the one where we forced Tyler to tell us what he knew. To do that, though, we needed something—information, an object, something remotely incriminating. But what?

  Ed Dawson soon excused himself, dashing off to his first session of the day, promising he'd be in touch with us soon, this morning probably. His idea seemed safe, a good way to be handling this. Turn it all over to some higher power: the FBI.

  After he left, I took the last several bites of my pancakes, stared into my plate, felt oddly unsettled. What were we supposed to do for the rest of the day, go shopping? How were we supposed to bide our time so passively? That certainly wasn't my nature, and, turning to Toni, looking at her, seeing her eyes darting, hands fidgeting, I recognized that it wasn't hers, either.

  “Toni, what do you think about going back to Liz's apartment and taking one more look?”

  “I think that'd be a really good idea.”

  For it was fully possible that we'd missed something, that we might find something there to hold against Rob Tyler. And besides, we had to go back over to Liz's because when we'd left so quickly last night, we'd left the apartment wide open and Jenkins standing in there.

  We had to claim it back.

  Chapter 25

  As we drove to Liz's, we fell into silence again, neither one of us talking about Liz or Chris or Jenkins. Or Laura, for that matter, wherever she was. Off binging perhaps?

  When we parked in front of Liz's, we got out, came around the front of the car. It was rather daunting, looking up at the small apartment building. The two lower apartments were once occupied by young women, both now dead. It made me sick.

  I checked the street, spotted John's brown van, but no cop car. Still, I was rather worried that we might find Jenkins here at Chris's or perhaps, God forbid, still in Liz's apartment. But he wasn't. No one was. When Toni opened the building's outer door, we were greeted first by total silence, and then by yellow and black tape on Chris's door stating this was a crime scene, keep out, police—all that kind of stuff. The door was pulled tightly shut, secured, and sealed with tape. So it really had happened. Someone had been killed here.

  I turned to Liz's door, which was nicely closed, didn't look violated in any way, and I just stood there as Toni went up to it, key in hand. What was wrong here? What was calling out as not being right? I couldn't tell, but a queasy feeling rolled through my stomach, rocked my insides, as Toni unlocked the door and pushed it open. I took a few steps, then stopped right on the threshold and checked the door. There was no tape here, nothing had been sealed. The lock was a dead bolt, which you had to lock from the outside.

  “Wait a minute,” I said. “We left this door wide open and Jenkins standing in here. How'd he lock it?”

  Toni stopped in the living room, looked at the key in her hand. “Shit, you don't think he has a key, do you? You don't think Liz gave him one?”

  “I don't know.” But I didn't like it. “Come on, let's hurry. Look for anything that has to do with Tyler—clothing, writing, anything—then let's get out of here. I don't want to run into Jenkins.”

  “I just hope he didn't take anything last night.”

  Toni disappeared into the back, starting in the bedroom, shuffling through Liz's desk, her closet and dresser. I took the living room, starting with the bricks-and-board bookcase three levels tall, the exact kind I'd had for years until I moved so many times that the thought of lugging it all one more time made me
abandon the whole setup. Lined up across the pine boards were CDs and lots of paperbacks. Just a few hardcovers. Most of the books were sci-fi novels, which I found interesting but not particularly useful. I checked all the books, hoping to find something on cults, perhaps something that would show an obsession with groups of a devious nature. But nothing. Her music was fairly standard, even mild. R.E.M. and a handful of New Age stuff, too.

  I was down by the stereo when I glanced along the boards, saw that camera, the small black one, on the far end of the top shelf. I remembered having seen it before, of course, but I didn't remember seeing it open, as it was now, the back side open to the film cavity. I stepped over there, stood above the camera, gazing down. The lens was toward the wall, the back toward the living room. No, it hadn't been that way at all. I remembered seeing the lens, remembered wondering what Liz had last taken pictures of. Shit, I should have thought of it before, for if there had been any film it was now most definitely gone.

  I turned around. Couch, dumpy chair. By the door a small table with a bowl. Attracted by a pile of papers that was climbing out of the bowl like rising bread dough, I went over and started sorting through discarded mail, bills that had been opened, half-pulled out, then ignored. Some flyers. Communications from two or three charitable organizations, too—I saw the envelope from the omnipresent Minnesota Public Radio and skipped right past it. At the bottom of the bowl there were some rubber bands, and a pair of sunglasses. A discarded battery. And then a jumbo-sized paper clip with two keys on it, one a very small one, the other more of a standard-issue house key. I picked it up, let it dangle from my fingers.

  A voice down the hall called, “What's that?”

  I turned, saw Toni standing outside the kitchen doorway, and said, “Keys—they were in this bowl.”

  I turned to the door, opened it, and tried the larger of the keys in the lock, but it wouldn't even begin to fit.

  “It's not a duplicate,” I said.

  Toni came out, stood next to me, looked at the keys on the paper clip, and said, “This small one's got to be a mail key.”