Blood Moon: A Rowan Gant Investigation (29 page)

“I thought so,” he replied then snorted out a small
laugh. “Yeah, my sister is all about the psychic stuff. She watches
the shows on TV and everything.”

“As long as she’s entertained,” I said with a slight
nod and no enthusiasm whatsoever in my voice. “But, do her a big
favor and tell her not to spend money on telephone and TV
psychics.”

“Yeah, I’ve told her that. The way I see it they’re
just a bunch of crooks, right?”

I shrugged. “Probably not all, but most of them,
yeah, that would be my guess. All I can say for sure is that no
amount of money is worth having dead people bounce around inside
your head on purpose, so that should tell you something right
there.”

“What about you?” he asked, giving me a stoic nod.
“What makes you different from them?”

“I only do this because I haven’t got a choice,” I
replied.

My headache had been ramping up ever since we’d
arrived, but for the most part I was once again becoming acquainted
with the pain and, more importantly, treating it as nothing more
than the usual chronic nuisance. Or so I thought.

I had scarcely finished speaking when a violent stab
of agony drilled its way through my brain with enough force to make
me grimace and stumble forward before catching myself. I reached up
with both hands and cradled my head between them as if it was going
to explode.

“Something wrong?” the officer asked.

“Shining…example…of what…I…just said,” I groaned the
sentence in a halting rhythm.

Nausea was beginning to churn in the pit of my
stomach, and my ears were ringing as the parking lot seemed to
undulate beneath my feet. I stumbled in place once again, nearly
pitching face first onto the asphalt.

Felicity instantly took hold of my shoulder in an
attempt to steady me. Ben was only a half step behind her as he
came forward and grabbed me beneath the arms then propped me back
against the van and held me up.

“You gonna be okay, Kemosabe?” my friend asked.

“Do I look like it?” I answered between clenched
teeth.

Felicity spoke up, directing herself to the state
trooper with an air of calm authority. “Officer, the next town
isn’t far from here, aye?”

“Yes ma’am, Wright City. Do we need to get him to
the hospital?”

“No,” she replied, urgency seeping into her voice.
“But we need salt, and a lot of it.”

“Been almost fifteen minutes,” Ben stated in a
matter of fact tone. “He should be getting back here any time
now.”

We were all sitting in the van once again, but the
vehicle was stationary, parked where Ben had originally nosed it in
upon our arrival. We were waiting for everybody’s favorite
seasoning to be delivered to us, which was something I hadn’t been
expecting. All I knew was that Felicity had made the urgent
comment, and then Ben had picked it up and run with it. How he
managed to convince a Warren County Sheriff’s deputy to make a
lights and siren run for as much salt as two twenty-dollar bills
could buy, I had no idea. I wasn’t entirely sure I wanted to know
either.

I had my eyes closed, but I could hear movement up
front. Judging from the sound, I assumed my friend was twisting
around in his seat to check on me since I was sitting in the back.
Both Felicity and he had been doing that quite a bit.

My blind assumption was proven out when he spoke
again, and his voice came at me from a more direct angle. “How you
doin’, Row? Hangin’ in there?”

“It isn’t as bad as you two are making it out to
be,” I mumbled. “It’s just one of the headaches. You should be used
to them by now. I am.”

Of course, the believability of my comment was
rendered null and void by the obvious strain in my voice. The truth
is, I wasn’t even managing to convince myself.

“Yeah, right,” he countered. “And
it was just another one of
those
headaches
earlier too, and then ya’ started
bleedin’ all over the place. What if that happens
again?”

“It won’t.”

“Oh yeah, and how do ya’ know that?”

“Because this isn’t Emily Foster trying to
communicate with me.”

“You’re sure about that?”

“Yes. I can tell by the way it feels.”

“Bullshit. Pain is pain, Row.”

“Trust me, it isn’t.”

“Uh-huh, well big deal. So maybe it’s not Foster.
What if it’s the Jane Doe?” He pressed. “Do I need ta’ remind you
she died the same way? She might just decide ta’ make ya’ bleed
too, and she might not be as nice about it.”

Before I could object again, Felicity spoke up. “I
have to agree with him, Row. You don’t really know who it is trying
to talk to you, and you told me yourself that it feels odd. It’s
not worth the chance. You can’t afford to lose any more blood. Your
body can’t take it.”

“I still say you two are being paranoid,” I groaned.
My voice still wasn’t convincing, especially to me.

Ben turned his attention toward my wife. “So,
Firehair, lemme ask ya’ somethin’. The salt didn’t work at the
morgue, so what makes ya’ think it’ll work here?”

“Actually, it did work at the morgue,” she replied.
“Just not the way I intended.”

“Coulda fooled me. You wanna explain that one?”

“Simple. It made Emily Foster leave. It just didn’t
keep her from wreaking a little havoc first.”

“You call the white man bleedin’
all over the floor a
little
havoc?”

“Okay, a lot of havoc. It’s just an expression,
Ben.”

“Uh-huh… So what you’re sayin’ is that it was
s’posed ta’ keep all that from happenin’ in the first place?”

“Yes.”

“Yeah, okay…” he grunted. “So ‘splain that one. Why
didn’t it work right?”

“There were extenuating circumstances. It’s
complicated. Better you just trust me and not worry about it.”

A lull fell between them for a few heartbeats.

“Wait…” he finally said, distress welling in his
voice. “Was it my fault? It wasn’t ‘cause there was pepper in there
with the salt too, was it? Dammit, I knew I shoulda picked those
out!”

“No,” she replied, her own voice a mix of forced
reassurance and mild irritation. “That wasn’t it. The pepper didn’t
matter.”

“You sure?”

“Aye, Ben, I’m sure. It wasn’t your fault.”

“Good. So, why didn’t it work right then?”

“Like I said, it’s complicated.”

“Uh-huh… Complicated as in you think I won’t
understand, or complicated as in you’re hidin’ somethin’?”

“It’s WitchCraft, Ben, it isn’t your forte. Isn’t
that what you always tell us?”

“Yeah, but it’s my
for-tay
,” he stressed,
“to know bullshit when I smell it. I’m thinkin’ maybe it didn’t
work right ‘cause you didn’t say a poem.”

“I really think you need to stop dwelling on that,”
she told him coolly.

“Of course you do. Because I’m right, ain’t I?”

“Keep it up and I
will
hurt you,” she told
him, a frost in her voice that chilled the words in such a way as
to add harsh punctuation to the threat.

“Do you think you two could play nice?” I asked.
“Your bickering really isn’t helping my head at all.”

“I am playing nice,” my wife returned. “For the
moment.” She paused then added, “That could change very quickly
though.”

“Looks like he might be back,” Ben announced. “I’ll
go check.” The absent tone in his voice told me he had already
taken a left turn away from the previous conversation and was now
re-focused on the original issue at hand, namely the salt.

I heard his door latch clunk, and the dome light
popped on, making the previously dark world behind my tightly
closed eyes illuminate with a dull, reddish glow. A second or two
later, the same noise sounded on the other side of the vehicle. The
out of synch stereo of both doors opening told me that Felicity was
climbing out as well.

A blast of cold air blew through the interior of the
van, swirling into the back and brushing its unseen fingers across
my face. It actually lent some momentary relief to the throb in my
skull, but momentary was the key word. I knew there wasn’t enough
cold out there to act as an analgesic for what was going on inside
my head—not without literally freezing me to death that is.

“Rowan, stay here,” Felicity instructed. “I’ll be
right back.”

“Yes ma’am,” I muttered in return.

Seconds later the out-of-phase stereo of the doors
thudding closed dropped my world back into cold darkness, with the
small exception of the nearly imperceptible flicker of the
emergency lights through the back windows. I let out a slow breath
and continued rubbing my temples even though the massage wasn’t
proving to give me any relief from the pain. What I really wanted
was a handful of aspirin. At least I knew those would take the edge
off before this became any worse.

Outside the van I could hear muffled voices. Just as
was the case with the murmurings inside my head, I couldn’t make
out any of the actual words, but I could pick out Ben and Felicity
as two members of the conversation. The third person sounded angry,
female, and a little familiar, but I couldn’t attach a name to
it.

As I sat there listening to what seemed to be
escalating into an argument, I tried to focus on it, but the pain
in my head caused my concentration to abandon me, leaving my mind
to wander off wherever it so desired. My recent thought of wanting
aspirin seemed to be its favored destination, and it made a beeline
to it. Self-preservation was trumping everything else.

As I dwelled on the desire to be pain free, I
vaguely remembered Ben mentioning earlier that he had a bottle of
the over-the-counter painkiller on hand if I needed it. Soon I
found myself wondering if it was possibly stashed somewhere in the
van. Logically, I knew it was one of the last things I should be
putting into my body at the moment, but the growing migraine had
pushed me to the point of no longer caring about doctor’s
instructions. I needed something to at least dull the ache because
it was now well past the point of being ignored.

I remained motionless for a moment, now ruminating
over whether or not the mere act of moving would only serve to make
the pain worse. If it did and I managed to find the aspirin, no big
deal, but if I couldn’t locate the meds, then I was going to be
royally screwed. I weighed the two options as carefully as my
throbbing brain would let me then decided to take the chance.
Unfortunately, my decision to do something other than just sit here
and suffer came too late to do any good. The second I opened my
eyes and started leaning forward to begin my quest turned out to be
the exact same second the side door of the van flew open with an
unceremonious grind and thump.

Angry words instantly blasted through the interior,
centered directly on me. “What in the name of God do you think
you’re doing, Gant?”

I looked over to see Captain Barbara Albright
glaring at me, her gaze a mixture of anger and insistence. The
identity behind the mystery voice now became painfully
apparent.

“I told you to back off!” Felicity shouted from
behind her. “Leave him alone!”

Peering past the angry cop who was now blocking the
opening, I saw Ben latch onto my wife just as she started forward.
Then he pulled her back before she could literally assault the
woman.

“Storm,” Albright spat the words without tearing her
eyes away from me. “Cuff that bitch and get her out of the way
right now.”

If I hadn’t been hurting so much I think I would
have been surprised by her blatant use of profanity, mild as it
was. It was definitely out of character for the holier-than-thou
Albright. Of course, what I heard next was no shock at all
considering that it came spewing from the livid redhead behind
her.

“
Fekking
saigh!
” Felicity growled.
“
Póg mo thóin!
Damnú
, Ben, let go of me!”

“Look, Captain, I’m not gonna cuff ‘er…” Ben
insisted. “There’s no reason for it.” Then he quipped, “I’ll try
ta’ keep ‘er from kickin’ your ass, but I’m not makin’ any
guarantees.”

“I gave you an order,” she told him.

“Yeah, but I’m not takin’ it.”

“Fine, I’ll do it myself.” Albright wheeled around
and reached beneath her coat.

My friend snorted and twisted so that he was between
Felicity and her. “Not happenin’… There’s no reason for this ta’
get ridiculous. Listen, you need ta’ just calm down and give the
man some room like she said.”

Of course, with all of this commotion confined to a
small space that just happened to be more or less surrounded by
cops, the altercation had attracted more than a little attention.
Without even trying I counted three state troopers and two
sheriff’s deputies descending on us already and wouldn’t be
surprised if more showed up at any minute.

“What’s the problem here,” one of the uniformed
officers asked.

Albright waved her badge in the air and announced,
“I’m Captain Albright… I have it under control. I’m just asking
Mister Gant a few questions.”

“You know you aren’t even s’posed ta’ be here,
Captain,” Ben said, loud enough for everyone to hear. “You’re on
administrative leave.”

She disregarded his comment and ignored the growing
turmoil. Instead, she wheeled back around to face me and demanded,
“Answer me, Gant.”

Felicity suddenly let out a banshee
screech, there was a heavy thump, Ben yelped, then I heard him
snarl, “Goddammit, Felicity, don’t fuckin’ kick me again! And stop
squirmin’ or I
will
cuff ya’!”

One of the deputies leapt forward and grabbed my
wife by the arm and wrenched it back then immediately began
slipping his own handcuffs from his belt. My wife let out a pained
scream as he continued twisting her arm in an attempt to subdue
her. I could also see that one of the troopers had unholstered his
taser and was holding it at the ready.