This was the last thing she needed right now. A distraction. Something that would divide her attention, skew her focus. But, he was handsome and charming and had such soft lips. Angry with herself for going soft and silly, she slammed the Jeep in gear and pulled from the curb.
Five minutes later, she wheeled into the parking lot at Mercer General Hospital, still unsure how she felt about Nathan’s kiss. As she eased into a parking place, it dawned on her that she had forgotten to take Garrett's knife over to Dr. Klingler's office as she had promised she would. Why had she forgotten? She shook her head in disgust and stepped from her Jeep. Too late now. It would have to wait until tomorrow.
She entered the hospital through the Emergency Department and walked down a quiet corridor to the ICU. Pushing open the double doors, she entered the world of critical care medicine, greeted by the opposing smells of hospital astringency, freshly popped corn, and over-ripe coffee. Rosalie Meyer, the charge nurse, looked up from her perch behind a bank of cardiac monitors.
“Hey, Sam. How’re you doing?”
“Not bad. You?”
“Starving.” She grabbed a handful of popcorn from a paper bag and slid it toward Sam. “Here. I’ll share my dinner with you.”
“Sounds nutritious, but I’ll pass.”
“I wish I could. But, we’ve been so swamped I missed dinner. This is all I could scrounge up.”
“Busy, huh?” Sam poured herself a cup of coffee from the ancient coffee maker that sat behind the nursing station. She took a sip. It tasted as if it had been run through the crankcase of a dead truck.
“Not a seat in the house.” Rosalie waved a hand toward the eight cubicles that formed a semi-circle around the nurse’s station.
Each bed supported a critically ill patient. Cardiac monitors beeped, respirators hissed, and the sound of low voices hung in the air. Doctor Cat Roberts walked out of cubicle three, where Walter Limpke lay.
“Hello, Sam,” Cat said.
“Cat. How’s Walter?”
“Amazingly well. He lost a lot of blood, a couple of feet of bowel, and a kidney, but he’s doing OK.”
“Other than that, how was the play, President Lincoln?”
“Something like that,” Cat smiled. “He’s still out from the anesthesia, but he should be waking up soon. Then we can get him off the ventilator.”
“When do you think I can talk with him?”
“Tomorrow, I’d guess. Any idea who did this?”
Sam decided to keep her answer simple and not bring up Ralph Klingler’s theories. “Not a clue.”
“I’ll call you with an update in the morning. I’ll know more then,” Cat said.
“Thanks.”
“I’d better get busy and finish rounds,” Cat said. “Maybe I can surprise my husband and get home before midnight.”
*
Charlie Walker finished his paper work and decided to call it a day. It had been a long one. He glanced at the clock on the wall opposite his desk, 10:30. Longer than he thought. He phoned his wife, telling her he’d be home in fifteen minutes, adjusted his hat with a tug, and headed for the front door.
As he flipped off the lights, a searing pain erupted in his left temple. He squeezed his eyes shut and grimaced. When he opened his eyes once again, the walls began to pulsate with an eerie green light, like giant computer screens, glowing, flickering.
Balls of yellow and orange leaped and spun across the room like psychotic basketballs before melting into walls once again, where they swirled into vortices of color. The floor writhed with multicolored ribbons, which slithered up the walls and intertwined with one another, enveloping the room like Technicolor snakes. From the colorful striations that spun around him, the evidence room door glowed a brilliant crimson. It twisted, melted, then spun, becoming a vortex that pulled at him.
Charlie wanted to dart out the door, up the street, away from the chaos, but when he tried to flee, the spinning crimson ball that had once been a door held him, drew him. His fear and resistance dissolved in the whirlpool of color that invaded his brain. He staggered toward the beckoning red orb, following it into the evidence room.
An instant later, he was sitting behind the wheel of his Jeep, following a river of molten silver out of town. How did he get here? He had no clue. He momentarily questioned where he was going, and why, but the questions, like his earlier resistance, sank into oblivion.
He turned off the road onto a silvery tributary. The Jeep chugged up a steep incline before stopping near the crest of a ridge. Charlie stepped from the vehicle and trudged to the top of the slope.
From his vantage point, he could see far into the velvety night. The lights of Mercer’s Corner, down and to his right, scintillated like a trove of precious jewels--diamonds, topaz, rubies. Overhead, the glow of the cloud shrouded moon cast an opalescent haze over the desert floor, which shimmered as if it were liquid. Ahead, a hundred feet below and a mile away, the golden campfire where Garrett’s Groupies huddled flickered and flared, emitting a warmth that seemed to flow up the slope and caress him like an August breeze.
He pulled a plastic bag from his pocket and opened it. He removed a knife from the bag and stared at it without recognition. Kneeling, he excoriated a shallow trench in the sandy soil at the base of a twenty-foot high emerald boulder. He settled the knife in the depression, scooped dirt over it, and secured its resting place with a flat purple rock.
He slipped and scuffed his way down the slope to his Jeep, got in, and retraced his route through town, and beyond, toward home. By the time he turned into his driveway, the world had returned to normal, his headache had evaporated, and he held no memory of what had happened, only a vague confusion about why it took him thirty minutes to drive home.
*
Sam left the hospital, heading home, but before she got there, she received a page from the 911 operator. Ada Blumenthal, who lived by herself a half mile south of town, was sure someone was trying to claw through her bedroom window and kill her. Sam detoured by Ada's house for the third time this week. The prowler this time: a tumbleweed that lay against the house, buffeted by the wind.
Typically, Sam or Charlie or Hector answered about two-dozen prowler calls a year, half from Ada Blumenthal. This was Sam’s tenth call this week. The entire town was wound tightly, edging toward hysteria.
Goddamn Garrett.
By the time Sam reached home, exhaustion had deflated her like a helium filled party balloon the morning after, hovering nearer the floor than the ceiling. She wanted to take a hot shower, crawl into bed, pull the covers over her head, and drift away from the madness. That’s exactly what she did.
As she waited for sleep, her thoughts turned to Nathan. Why had he kissed her? Why did she let him? She could still feel his lips against hers. Damn it. She didn’t want to feel this way.
Finally, sleep dragged her downward, enveloping her completely. Thoughts of Nathan, of Garrett, of the murders fell away as she entered the domain of REM sleep--that dark corner of somnolence where renewed energy, peace, and calm lay. Where dreams and nightmares lived.
Sam rarely dreamed, or if she did, she rarely remembered them. Those that did survive until morning were typically pleasant black and white childhood vignettes such as fishing with her father or baking cookies with her mother.
The closest she ever came to a full-fledged nightmare were the rare occasions when she dreamed of her father’s funeral. Even though she was seventeen at the time, she remembered little of that day. Only tears and pale frozen faces, and cold rain held at bay by a forest of black umbrellas, and a rectangular hole in the ground into which her father’s casket was lowered. A hole that devoured him and took him from her forever.
Tonight she dreamed of the day she caught her first fish. She and her father drifted aimlessly on a tranquil lake in his old aluminum boat. He showed her how to bait a hook, carefully avoiding the treacherous barb. She lowered the line into the water and watched the bobber float gently away over the glassy surface. Even when it drifted through the sun’s reflection, a fiery streak that assaulted her eyes, she refused to unfix her gaze from the plastic ball for fear she would miss the fish, her fish, that was sure to bite.
She relived the excitement that swelled within her as the bobber fluttered and dipped beneath the surface for a brief moment, then again, and finally the powerful jerk as the fish took the bait.
Her father’s massive hands surrounded hers as the rod dipped toward the water. The taut line cut through the water as the fish fought for its freedom. Right, left, away, and finally toward them as the relentless drag of the line wore the fish into submission. Together, they lifted the pole and her fish popped from the water and dangled near the gunwale, its silvery body glistening in the sunlight.
Then, her father was gone. The boat, the lake, the sun-drenched day, all gone.
Only the fish, her fish, remained, floating head down before her, its sleek body silhouetted against a black background. It began a sinuous writhing, its eyes languid as if waking from a restful sleep. Suddenly, the eyes dilated to blackness and the fluid motions became a frantic squirming as if driven by pain and fear.
A knife appeared. Its polished curved blade lashed at the fish, slicing through its flesh and releasing red ribbons that drifted into the surrounding darkness. The fish screamed in pain; its voice that of a child's.
Sam reached out to pull it to safety, away from the cruel blade, but the knife hacked at her, opening deep wounds in her hands and wrists. The fish whimpered and cried and legs and arms sprouted from its bleeding torso as it transformed into a child. Two other children appeared, all three now suspended in the mouth of the mineshaft by ropes, which bound their ankles.
"No," Sam screamed, recognizing Tommy Waters, Lee Ann Hobert, and Rachel Culbertson. She lunged forward, attempting to wrap them in her arms and shield them from the knife, but they fell away into the black void of the mine.
Sam rushed after them, but stumbled and fell to her knees. Before her, three small hearts lay on a stone alter surrounded by black candles. Above her, a shadowy form with two fiery red eyes glared down. A scaly hand held the knife, its blade reflecting the amber glow of the candlelight.
Then, like her father before, these images also faded.
She entered a dream world that she had never before visited. It was a tranquil and soothing place that engendered the warmth and safety she needed. A calm serenity settled over her. She floated in a velvety blackness, not on water, but as if buoyed by a warm breeze, which like a lover’s breath danced across her neck, her breasts.
She inhaled sharply as moist lips trailed along the curve of her breast and enveloped her nipple. Her fingers intertwined with her mysterious lover’s hair, pulling him to her. His fingers played down her back, cupped her buttocks, and drew her tightly against him. He entered her with a single smooth stroke and she welcomed his heat within her. They rolled and soared and undulated in a sensuous dance as silvery streaks of electricity flowed around and through them.
Their eyes met.
The face before her was Nathan’s. Yet not. It was the same soft lips that had kissed her only hours earlier. The same sable eyes, model perfect face, and boyish shock of hair. Yet, faint wrinkles at the corner of the eyes and slackness of the skin bespoke of an older, lived-in face.
The face blurred, slipping from view, then returning, in waves like a weak signal on the rabbit-eared TV of her youth, pulsing, distorting. The image twisted, faded, then snapped into clarity. A clear sharp image, a face she instantly recognized.
Garrett.
The monochrome of her dream world flashed into brilliant color. It was as if the light had fractured, not just into its seven spectral hues, but into every possible color, each of such intensity that it burned her eyes.
Garrett’s face faded and Nathan’s reappeared, but it in turn waned, yielding once again to Garrett. The two visions warred with each other. She fought to hold Nathan’s image before her, fearing that if she lost it she would descend into a hellish nightmare from which she might never return. Her grip failed and Nathan’s visage dissolved into Garrett’s.
His face appeared to be covered with scales, which reflected the hues that surrounded them like a chameleon responding to its environment. His eyes shimmered a ruby red. He threw back his head and laughed, deep and guttural, ending in a sonorous hiss.
She pushed him away, attempting to expel him from her, but he held her tightly, sharp claws digging into her back. His slick, serpentine body writhed against her, within her. She clawed at his face, but could not puncture his scaly armor. Rather, her fingernails split and cracked and blood ran from beneath them. Her blood.
The Garrett/reptile stared into her eyes, his elongated pupils widening, a crimson blaze flashing from within their black depths. "Samantha." The word tumbled out on billows of purple mist. "You are the one."
"No," she screamed.
"You are the one who will seal my bond with Lucifer."
She screamed again, but the sound emerged as a low moan as liquid heat arose within her. She felt smothered, enveloped, dominated, powerless to resist.
"Come to me," he whispered.
"No." She intended the word as a command, but it escaped as a whimper.
"You must. I need you," he said. The purple mist that carried the words enveloped her, suffocating her with its thick, fetid sweetness.
She attempted to twist away from him, but her body responded to his probing even as she willed it not to. Wave after wave of sexual pleasure crashed over her as the Garrett/serpent rode the oceanic swells with her.
"You are the one," he murmured.
She jerked to wakefulness, heart hammering, breath coming in raspy gasps. She rolled out of bed and shakily rose to her feet.
Perspiration glued her tee shirt to her body, pulling heat from her, giving it to the night air. A chill rippled through her as she peeled the soaked garment over her head and tossed it to the floor. Fear cloyed at her. Her blood felt like a river of ice and her chest ached as if her heart had frozen and cracked open, spilling its crystalline contents.