Chasing Darkness (35 page)

Her
round face was familiar. Wide brown eyes gazed down at him, and it looked as
though she was floating several feet off the ground. He saw that she was
gripping the handle of a stepstool and smiled. She was so lifelike, so real,
not even floating but standing on a stepstool beside his bed.

He
felt instantly as though she was meant for him. Her familiar face, her
childlike qualities—God had chosen this angel especially for him. She rubbed
her nose with the back of her hand and continued to stare. It made him smile,
and although his eyelids were heavy he fought to keep them open. He wanted to
memorize her face.

His
eyes won the battle and he closed them, feeling more at peace than he could
ever remember. In God’s eyes, he wasn’t a sick pervert. God had sent this
child, this angel, to prove it. His faith restored, Gerry was prepared to die.

He
pressed his hands against the soft, warm sheets and opened his palms to the
sky. At any moment he expected to see bright light, feel incredible warmth or
even pain. He waited for the sign that the next stage was starting, but nothing
came.

He
opened his eyes and looked back at the angel. She didn’t speak and he wasn’t
sure what to do. He waited. He watched her. He blinked. She blinked. They
repeated the dance several times, and he got the impression she was mimicking
him.

A
minute later she squinted at him, turning her head as she did.

He
blinked again.

She
blinked. “You awake?” she asked.

He
nodded, feeling nervous at the sound of her childlike voice.

The
angel opened her mouth to speak but stopped. Her head cocked toward the door
and she listened.

He
did too. He heard a click and then the slam of a screen door.

The
angel’s eyes widened, and she jumped off the stool and spun to the door. He
wanted to stop her, to tell her to wait, but he couldn’t. He knew instinctively
that he would have to wait through whatever was coming—whatever journey would
lead to the other side.

Thump,
thump, thump.
The floor seemed to shake beneath him. He felt his breath
catch like dry cotton in his throat. He tried to avoid cowering but found
himself shaking.

He
closed his eyes and took a deep breath as the sound came closer. He could hear
the strained breathing of the other creature. He imagined the evil monster, a
giant, lumbering beast trying to pull him to hell. How could that little angel
fight such a monster? How could he?

He
squeezed his eyes shut harder and prayed. Come back, little angel. Don’t leave.

He
heard a low whistling, and his body settled. With a deep breath, he opened his
eyes.

What
he saw stole the breath right back. Bobby’s wife, Martha, was standing over his
bed.

“Finally
awake, are you?”

He
looked around the room. He wasn’t dying. He was at his brother’s house, out in
the room off the barn, healing from the attack. The realization was empty of
any relief. He wished he could go back to the dream. He knew why the little
girl had looked familiar. She was his brother’s daughter, his niece, Jane. He
wished he could be with his sister instead. But he knew he couldn’t. She
couldn’t have helped him. Her husband wouldn’t have allowed it, and she wasn’t
strong enough to fight him.

Martha
got in his face and blew hot, raw-fish breath on him. “I’m not happy ’bout you
being here, you hear me?” She was close enough that he could see the roll of
skin under her chin and the thick, bristly whiskers that stuck out from its
surface.

He
nodded.

“I’m
taking care of you because you’re family. While you’re here, you’ll obey my
rules, you hear?”

He
nodded again, pressing his head back against the pillow and fighting to escape
the disgusting smell of her breath. But the harder he pushed, the closer she
got.

“You
so much as look at my daughter and I’ll cut you into pieces.”

He
blinked hard, feeling the tears fill his eyes. He was pathetic. God didn’t
forgive him. He hadn’t sent an angel to take him away to heaven. Gerry wished
he’d died in the hospital.

“I
brought you soup.” She put the soup on the table with a resolute clank and
turned and lumbered out of the room. As soon as she was gone, Gerry rolled onto
his side, pulled his legs to his chest, and began to cry.

That
evening he made his way out to the oak tree at the far side of his brother’s
property. No one would find him there and he felt safe beneath the thick,
crooked branches. From one of the higher ones, a white rope dangled and Gerry
wondered if anyone had ever killed himself out here. Hanging from a lone oak
tree. He thought he’d heard a song about that when he was a kid, and it was
nice to know someone related to how he felt. At least the injuries were
healing. He still had some stiffness in his back and neck, but it was much
better.

He
had dug the paper out of the recycling bin in the back of the house and brought
it here to read start to finish. He knew that his brother had books in his
house, but Gerry was afraid to ask to borrow them. Martha had never liked him,
so he didn’t want to push things by asking for anything else. All day long his
little niece, Jane, had followed him around like a puppy. Gerry knew what would
happen when Martha caught him with her. He wasn’t safe in his room in the barn.
Jane came in and sat beside his bed or hid in a closet. She scared him to death
the way she kept showing up. He always expected Martha to come in with a
shotgun at any second.

He
leaned his head back against the tree and felt the wind on his cheeks. It was
nice out here, the way some days had been in the prison yard. If only he could
keep Jane away, he might actually be okay to stay.

Gerry
opened the front section of the paper and read an article about the conflict
with China. The paper was a few days old, but it didn’t much matter to him if
he was a few days behind. There were really important things going on in the
world, he reminded himself—more important than himself or Martha or even little
Jane. He rarely understood all the news, but he caught bits and pieces when he
could.

Gerry
focused on his paper and read on. When he got bored with the front page, he
took a break and read the funnies and then went back to the front section
again. Sundays were his favorite because of all the comics and also because of
the ads. He loved to look at the pictures of the kids in clothes and with toys
and stuff. He ran his hand across his forehead, wishing he had something cool
to drink.

Turning
the page, he stopped on an article headlined
DEPARTMENT OF
JUSTICE AGENT PRIME SUSPECT INTWO MURDERS
. He folded the paper into a
neat square and lay down on his belly to read it. It was about Sam Chase.

Oh,
no. He didn’t want them to think she did it. He shook his head. Gerry thought
about the man who had attacked him. He’d been in Sam’s car. If that car hadn’t
come by in the alley, Gerry was sure he would be dead. He pictured the man’s
face. Gerry knew who he was. Maybe he could help Sam. He smiled at the thought.
It would be great to help her. Then she would definitely try to help him.

He
put the paper down and sat up, holding his hands together. What should he do?
What if the man came after him? He wanted him put away, but he remembered that
guy’s warning. “If you call the po-lice, I’ll probably answer the goddamn
phone,” he’d said.

Gerry
thought about that man. He couldn’t find Gerry here. It was too far away. Gerry
would just call Sam at home and tell her what he knew without leaving his name.
That would be safe. If that guy answered, Gerry would recognize his voice and
hang up. He could do that.

Gerry
looked at the picture of Agent Samantha Chase in the paper. “Don’t worry. I’m
going to help you.” Smiling, he gathered the paper and headed for the house. He
mattered now. He was helping with the case. Gerry Hecht would do anything to
help his friend Sam Chase.

Sam
cuddled into bed at barely nine o’clock. Nick had called twice, but she’d been
out for the first call and in the shower for the second. She’d gotten the
message that he had heard from his contact on the street, who had confirmed
that Sandi Walters had bought her own heroin. According to Nick’s contact,
there had been a guy on a bike following her. But it was nothing they could
track. Another dead end.

She’d
also missed Nick when he came to get Rob. She hadn’t talked to him since the
chocolate bomb incident. The past few days had been so charged, she was hoping
it would die down. She couldn’t sort her feelings about Nick from her feelings
about the case. It was too much to think about. And with her own involvement in
question now, she was letting Nick handle the case on his own. She needed to
stay close to home, to be here for the boys.

Opening
her book, she laid it against her bent knees and tried to focus on the words.
She read the same paragraph twice and then closed her eyes, rubbing her fists
against their achy redness. She shut the light off and curled down in the bed,
too tired even to close the book.

Her
eyes flashed open and she scanned the empty room, saw her book sprawled on the
floor. Her heart pounded, her muscles were stiff from fighting invisible
sandbags. She glanced at the clock. It was midnight.

Click.
Scrape. Sounds came from the living room. Sam shot upright in the silence,
listening. Her ears honed, she could almost hear the air as it escaped her
lungs. Then, click, scrape, thud. Someone was in the house. Derek and Rob were
spending the night at a friend’s. Had they come home unexpectedly? She didn’t
think so. They would have come to say good night.

Without
turning the light on, Sam opened the drawer in the bedside table and felt for
her gun. Her hands shaking, her fingers tight, she lifted the Glock and pulled
a magazine from a small wooden box, checking the bullets before clicking it
into place.

Rising
from the bed, she opened the door inch by inch until she could slip through.
She peered into the darkness, waiting as the forms developed like photographs
exposed to chemicals. She saw the two couches in the living room, the table and
chairs in the attached eating area. There was no motion.

She
eased herself onward into the hall, crouched, back to the wall, gun drawn. One,
two, three. Move. She took three steps, counted and moved again.

She
paused with the kitchen in view and waited for a sound. As she started to move
again, a shadow crossed the kitchen, heavy feet thudding against the wood
floor. Derek or Rob, she thought. But why would they leave the lights off? No,
it was not her boys. A stranger was in the house.

Fear
tightened her throat, but she continued to count, forcing herself to move
forward. One, two, three. Move. One, two, three. Move.

At
the entrance to the kitchen, she reached around and found the light switch with
her left hand, aimed her gun with her right.

One,
two, three. Move. She flipped the switch. “Freeze.”

A
face turned. A glass dropped. She heard the crash as it hit, the crackle of the
pieces scattering across the hard floor.

Sam
dropped her gun to her side and felt her knees go weak. “Jesus Christ! Jesus
Christ, I almost shot you! Why are you home?”

Derek
shrugged. “I was bored.” He picked up a towel off the counter and began to mop
up the mess as though nothing had happened.

She
removed the magazine from the gun and made sure the chamber was empty. Then,
setting the gun on the counter and holding on to the magazine, she wrapped her
arms around Derek. “You scared the devil out of me here in the dark.”

“Sorry,
Aunt Sam. I was trying to be quiet.”

She
nodded, stroking his back. “I’m just so glad you didn’t get hurt.”

Derek
wrapped his arms around her, and she felt him lean on her. It was so infrequent
that the boys did that.

“Are
you okay?”

She
felt him nod his head against her shoulder. She gripped him tighter.

He
pulled himself away, and she crossed the kitchen to get some wet paper towels.

“Being
a teenager is hard, eh?”

He
looked up at her and nodded.

“I
wouldn’t go back, either. Is there anything I can do to help?”

He
looked at her for a minute as though deciding, and then shook his head. “I
think I’m just going to go to bed.”

She
nodded, wishing she’d been able to break through whatever was holding him back.
“You let me know if you need to talk.”

“Okay.
Good night.”

Sam
had finished cleaning up the glass and started back to bed when the phone rang.
It had to be Nick. “Hello.”

“Is
this Sam Chase?”

She
drew in a raspy breath. But it wasn’t the same voice. “Yes. Who is this?”

“This
is Gerry Hecht.”

Gerry
Hecht? From the cemetery? Was he behind all this? But the voice sounded wrong.
How had he gotten her home number? It was only listed under the boys’ names.

“Do
you remember me?”