by William Cain
“Think of a way, David. The victims’ families need closure, too. We don’t know who this person is. This killer will just disappear. On the other hand, when we catch the killer, it’ll be accolades and parades.”
“When? You mean IF!” David replies, heatedly.
Addie puts her nose close to his, “I mean when. This is our one chance. Our only chance.”
Before David can speak again, Addie ends their short conversation, telling him, “The killer will get away tonight. We need to lure this person. The only one that can do that is Reggi Thomas. We use Reggi as bait, and it’s under our control. The killer will strike, or try to strike, whoever she’s with.”
David protests, but Addie continues, “When we catch the women this evening, we have to leave them there. The killer isn’t watching them every minute, and even if they are being watched, the killer will strike if Reggi is free and with a friend. We have to use her as bait. And, it has to be her idea.”
“How are you going to get her to do that?” David asks, incredulous.
“Leave it to me,” Addie answers,
“Leave Reggi Thomas to me.”
23
Nothing in life is so exhilarating as to be shot at without result. Winston Churchill
The lovebirds are laughing as they pass through the door of Madison’s home, brightly chatting about the day’s developments. Madison planned it well, with a long walk through Johnson Park and a lazy lunch at Bang the Drum Brewery. She pointed out the Aquatic Center along the way, and the Sensheimer Park that housed the triple-A baseball team’s stadium. She wants Jimmy to get to know the area. She wants him to want to know the area, wants him to think of living with her, here.
Jimmy knows what she’s up to. She’s a sly devil, he’s sure of it. He lets her go on and on. It’s probably just hearing her voice, and seeing her smile, her hair softly blowing in the ocean breeze. Today, she’s wearing a billowy, light dress of one color, soft pink, that reaches to her ankles. Her blouse is silky white, tied into a knot above her navel, just the way she likes it. He hopes she asks him to live with her, soon. The hotel is OK, but it’s not home. Living out of a bag is not his style. When he thinks about doing it for an entire month, he pushes the thought away, down deep. It’s unpleasant.
Anyway, things are going so well between the two of them, it’s just a matter of time before they make themselves permanent residents together. They’ve talked about it, many times. She, recounting her long relationship in Asheville that ended terribly. Him, listening, then telling her about his own live-in girlfriend experience and why it ended. They’ve both suffered through those moments when everything felt right and suddenly unraveled at a speed too fast to stop.
Agreeing to be honest with each other about their feelings is number one. The worst is when one or the other harbors mixed emotions and the relationship develops new, dark angles. Jimmy has promised her he’ll be upfront with what’s on his mind, putting it out there before it festers and ruins it all. It’s comforting to know the other will be honest, even if it hurts. In this, they’ll give their time together the best run it can have, even if it’s only for one month, one year, or one lifetime.
It’s best to show the worst before it can do the damage it always does. The right frame of mind, like this, lightens their mood and makes laughing easy, goofing around and acting silly. In turn, they talk to each other non-stop, just like they did in Texas, where they met. Madison likes to bring up that certain phone conversation, too. That’s when Jimmy asked her to remember the moment. She recalls it with clarity while he listens.
Comfort and ease have settled into their lives, along with the occasional grandmother interruption, as they find after they’ve settled on the patio to give their feet a rest. Reggi opens the front door and heads directly out the back to see them, after calling out and receiving their answered shouts.
“Hey, guys. I’ve been at Nancy’s,” she tells them.
“Oh, Grandmother. What’s the latest? Is Kevin doing better?” Madison asks. Then to Jimmy, “I haven’t introduced you yet. That’s the couple I was telling you about. The one that was attacked.”
She then turns to hear her grandmother give the report, hoping for good news. Jimmy’s all ears. Madison had told him everything she knew. She’d given a grave report, but bold. They had fought back. This person is not invincible, she had told him, and can be beaten. She’s no longer afraid. Jimmy understood her and cautioned her to not take risks. He was also impressed, seeing her spirit and determination. She’s not running away anymore. To him, it’s clear Madison and Reggi have a stalker – a deadly one. Mindful of this, he also turns to Reggi to hear the latest.
“Kevin is improving. He lost four teeth but told me he’ll get by. The bruise on his face is turning yellow, which is good. When Nancy told me she has to help him drain the sutured area each evening, I almost threw up. But then the two of them started laughing when they saw my reaction. I think they did it on purpose. I said so, and they admitted to it. At least we can all laugh again.”
“As long as he improves. Did they put a strong lock on their doors?”
“Strong?” Reggi asks, emphatically. “Strong is not nearly the word. They had a locksmith come out and put a steel reinforced deadbolt in the front door. As for the sliders, the usual slide-stop would do, but they had them replaced with the kind of glass that doesn’t shatter. It’s like the windshield of a car. You can punch a hole in it, but it won’t fall.”
“Good, maybe now they can get some sleep,” Madison says, the relief in her answer distinct. “I talked with some of the neighbors about setting up a watch. They’re in. We’re starting tonight. I take my turn in a few days. By that time, I might have company,” she suggests, looking at Jimmy. “Anyway, we should get a call around ten, tonight, with the watch checking in.”
Jimmy takes this moment to enter the conversation, “Listen, girls. I’m off, but I’ll be back soon. I’ll go to my room and freshen up. It was a little hot today, and I can use a change.”
As he stands, Madison asks, “Let me drive you? I’ll get the keys.”
“No, no. I want to walk,” he says, adding, “I want to get to know the area. If I get lost, I’ll call.”
Madison’s fine with it. Her little plan is working, and Jimmy wants to become familiar with this area. Next, she’ll have him thinking about settling here. Then, it’s just a short hop to the unknown - her and his unknown.
He leans down to kiss her, and then gives Reggi a peck on the cheek.
Madison reminds him, “Dinner is at eight, so don’t be late.”
“I won’t. I’ll be right back.”
The two women hear the front door close as he leaves. Madison looks at her grandmother. “What do you think?”
Reggi opens her eyes wide, assessing and forming her opinion. “I think what you think, dear. Your plan is working. Jimmy is making it work. I don’t know which of you wants it more.”
Reggi leans in close and whispers comically, “Try not to blow yourself up with all the ammunition the two of you are carrying for each other. Cupid would not be happy.”
Madison smiles, looks down, deep in thought, softly saying, “I’m in love with him, Grandmother.”
Reggi lifts her hand and strokes the hair on Madison’s head, “I know.”
◆◆◆
Taking a stroll down Laurel Lane, Jimmy spies an ice cream stand. It’s just what he wants before he makes it to his hotel to freshen up. After he orders a simple vanilla soft-serve in a wafer cone, he turns again in the southerly direction, the late day sun beginning to turn to dusk. Life is pretty good these days, and he’s on top of it all. He can’t thank his good fortune enough. Meeting and falling in love with Madison has made his dreams come true. San Luis Obispo is alright enough, impressively perched above the Pacific. Ocean swept breezes keep the seasonal changes more than just bearable.
His future bright, all he needs to do now is shlep his stuff from Tyler, Texas and find a programm
ing job here in this beautiful town. Employment in this area is at a high, even more so in his field. He may be able to command a much higher salary in California than in Texas. He’ll need that to raise a family – if she’ll have him. That’s one thing they haven’t discussed, children. He knows she wants a career. He hopes she wants to raise kids with him as her husband. Maybe he doesn’t even need all that stuff back home, just the family mementos, jewelry, and clothing. He’ll sell everything or just give it away. There wouldn’t be any room in Madison’s home for his furniture anyway.
Yes, the future is bright. Approaching the local YMCA, he discovers a long stand of tall trees behind it. A sign tells him this is Johnson Park, the part he didn’t see earlier today, with trails winding in and out of the range of maples and oaks. The sign also reads the park closes at dusk. He’s not easily frightened with all this talk about a killer at large, and he’s not one to follow all the rules. Jimmy looks up and kids himself that he can make it through the park before dusk settles in. Taking another bite of his ice cream, he finds the closest path and enters. The canopy above blocks the setting sun, making the park eerily quiet and almost dark. He’s comforted by the peace it brings to this soulful walk, the happiness of being alone, able to think of the day behind and the night ahead.
In the afternoon, Madison had taken him to the small zoo the town hosts. It was nothing more than a petting zoo, with Madison and himself joining the children with their parents. They spent their hours away feeding llamas out of the palms of their hands. The ostriches were a different beast, however. They don’t mean any harm, but they’re big and clumsy. Feeding them means food at the end of a stick. Sometimes they would come a little too close and pick at Madison’s hair. She’d shriek and Jimmy would come to her rescue. The big birds remained undaunted and Jimmy would pretend to fight for their lives bravely before the docent intervened and shooed them away.
Jimmy smiles broadly remembering the day’s events, laughing to himself as he walks down the paved pathway amidst the well-maintained grounds and wide trunks of the trees. Raising his ice cream to take another, last bite of the cone, he decides to consume the rest in one large mouthful. Suddenly, a figure steps from behind a tree to his right, swinging what looks like a bat level to his face. Quickly, strongly, the bat makes contact with a slap and a thud, crushing the hand held to his face for that one last bite, breaking his nose. Blood and pain are instant. He staggers backward from the force of the blow, grunting loudly as the stinging agony of his broken nose is second only to the amount of blood coming from it.
He remembers being struck in Texas, in the back of the head. Could this be the same person? The same person here in this town now that Madison was speaking of? The same that beat that couple, an attacker with murder in mind? Holding his jaw and nose, he opens his eyes to see the bat-wielding, masked person coming for him from ten feet away, ready to deliver another blow, deadlier than before. This is life or death. Jimmy’s survival instincts drive him from deep down, his adrenaline is pumping. He is on high alert now, knowing the attacker aims to kill him this time. He must take action, right now.
Jimmy is no small man. He knows he can stand and fight. But prudence tells him to run, and that’s what he does. He darts to his right, running with all his might, as swiftly as his legs will carry him. He can hear footsteps matching his own behind him, spurring him on faster and faster, breathlessly running in this dark thin forest. The sun has almost set and with what little light he has, he’s frantically praying he doesn’t trip and fall. He’s almost at the end of the long stand of trees, the exit of the park is in sight. Remembering the aquatic center – just a pool really – is nearby, he decides to change his direction and try to find it. There, he can hide or shelter himself. As he’s fitfully running, he turns his head, quickly looking back. His assailant is far enough away, but closing in on him. At least, that’s what he believes. It serves to heighten his fear, driving him forward.
Grace grants him what he desperately wants. The pool building is in the distance. Now to find an opening. He can’t keep running like this much longer, he’s lost too much blood. All the doors are closed. He decides to not even try them. He’ll lose too much time. Throwing himself at the high fence, he’s already halfway up and he begins to scale it. Just as he’s nearing the top, he feels the swing of the bat fall close to his lower foot, barely missing. Looking down before launching himself over the fence, his pursuer is quickly climbing. The attacker takes a costly moment to swing the lethal bat once more, missing Jimmy’s hand holding the top of the fence he straddles. Jimmy jumps, landing on the other side. Running away, into the complex, he disappears from view.
His attacker carries forward, scaling the obstruction, landing inside the complex’s grounds. Cautiously now, his pursuer pauses to listen, needing to determine if his prey is still running. Thrumming the bat against his palm, he looks down. Not surprised by the trail of blood droplets, the attacker is pleased to have a road map to find the man he wants to kill. Deciding to do it slowly, even slower than first planned, he follows the trail. Inside the complex now, he follows the trail to the pool. Beside the pool to the right are changing rooms and a sauna or two, and the trail continues onward. In the dwindling light, the trail can barely be seen, but it is there.
The man with the bat is smugly following the droplets, thinking he’ll find his victim lying helpless. There, he’ll slowly beat him to death. He’ll break every bone in his body. Pain and torture, with this quiet complex affording him the privacy to do just that. I couldn’t have planned it better! He decides, looking forward to the night’s festivities, looking forward to the killing of this man Jimmy. Suddenly, to his right, a figure charges him from a doorless bath. Someone there, lurking in the dark, races towards him, hitting him in the side with such force, the assailant is thrown off his feet, still clutching the bat, and falling into the deep end.
Surprised, the pursuer rises above the waterline, cursing himself, spitting water that’s made its way down his nose, choking him. His prey is gone. He slaps the water in frustration, screaming gutturally. His primal beast has been put at bay. He’s lost his prize. Beaten, he slowly rises from the pool.
Outside the complex now, Jimmy is running, holding his nose to stop it from bleeding. He was lucky, he knows. Eating the ice cream cone prevented a clean swing of the bat with his hand suffering most of the blow. His plan worked. Dropping blood, then doubling back and waiting served him well. Whoever that is, he’d followed the drops of blood, intent on finding Jimmy and finishing him off. The attacker had been caught off-guard, intently staring at the dark floor, expecting to use the trail of droplets, focused. One moment on the trail, the next, in the pool.
Stopping briefly, Jimmy leans against the side of a building. He slides down, to sit for a moment, exhausted, his face crusted in blood. He closes his eyes to give them a rest and passes out. When he wakes up, a boy of around twelve is shaking his arm. Behind him are other boys, all on bicycles, staring at him. He starts to speak, but the words don’t come out. The boy stands and pulls a cell phone from his pocket.
◆◆◆
Madison’s ring tone alerts her to the call. When she opens her phone, she sees a local number calling through. She answers, has a short conversation with the caller, and then ends it solemnly, deep in thought. Her bottom lip begins to quiver.
Abruptly standing, she calls out, “Grandmother, I’ve got to go out!”
“Where to?” Reggi replies when she reaches the second-floor landing.
“The French Hospital, emergency room. Jimmy’s been hurt,” she replies, picking up her keys and shuffling to put her shoes on.
“I’m coming with you, Madison,” Reggi says loudly, beginning to descend the stairs.
“OK. Don’t fall. I don’t need you to get hurt, too.”
“What happened to him?”
Madison is unsure, but she doesn’t like this untimely injury. Determination and anger are heard in her voice as she says,
&n
bsp; “I don’t know. But I’m going to find out.”
24
The mistakes I've made are dead to me. But I can't take back the things I never did. Jonathan Safran Foer
John Paulson is comfortably seated on the roof of the school, spying on the women’s house below. He’s made a nice little roost for himself, bringing up a light folding chair and collapsible cooler. He felt the need to be hidden, even more than before, after he noticed the other person last night. He set up his chair behind a tall vent, providing him some level of comfort that he is no longer easily visible by someone else nearby. Occasionally, his paranoia, or survival instinct – he’s not sure which – makes him peer around the vent to see if the other person is back. He muses, Great minds think alike, the two of us at the top of this school. The difference is, John knows what he’s here for. He doesn’t know what the other person wants. It nags him.
Tonight is ho-hum. The girls aren’t receiving any visitors of late and he’s already made up his mind to pack it in early and rest easy at home in his hotel room. Maybe he’ll order in some sushi, but then decides against it. He doesn’t need a repeat of last year when he spent the entire night hugging the toilet bowl after he ate bad tuna sashimi rolls. He knew it tasted funny, but he ate them anyway. So, no sushi for him, but maybe a burger from In-N-Out.
He’s about ready to fold things up when the front door of the girls’ home is opened, and the two women quickly head to their SUV. They leave it parked in the driveway, not the garage, and they’re shortly inside, pulling away. That’s odd, where do you think they’re going is the question rolling around in his head. If there was a card game tonight, they’d already be there, he knows. Cursing himself for not having been ready to follow them, and then cursing his bad luck that he’ll probably be here a while until they return, he settles back in and waits.
