Night Tides (9 page)

“No worries for me. I’ve got Michelle.”

“Well, no worries for me either,” Rachel snapped. “I can control myself just fine.”

“Uh-huh. Just worries for the people who have to work around you.” And Helena went back inside, leaving Rachel to pace some more.

Rachel went to the tree that shaded the south end of the tiny lot and leaned against it. The bark, ragged and sharp against her shoulders around the straps of her tank top, felt deliciously tangible.

Then she froze. Far down the street, past the old battery-factory building and over the railroad tracks, a truck was parked in front of the row of houses. The glare off the windshield kept her from seeing if anyone was inside, but a little jolt told her that it was the same truck she’d spotted outside her building the afternoon before. Suddenly all thoughts of sex were wiped out by the primal fear of being stalked. The truck did not move, and at this distance she could not make out the license plate or tell if its engine was running.

She’d been stalked before and would not allow it to happen again. She could grab Jimmy from the kitchen and walk down the street to confront the driver; in broad daylight, with a man accompanying her, she should be safe. And that would be fine, unless it turned out that the driver lived in the neighborhood, in one of the old houses refitted as student apartments. Or worked nearby, at one of the neighborhood bars, or the big bank on the corner, or the convenience store five blocks away. Parking was always at a premium on the isthmus, and that might be the only free spot he could find. Maybe it was someone who’d just pulled over to make a phone call.

She shook her head. Maybe she
was
losing it. Perhaps the strain of running the diner, having sex with a body of water instead of a man, and passing thirty without children or family had finally overwhelmed her to the point that she now imagined every strange event represented some threat. She and Rebecca might turn out to be more alike than she ever thought—an idea that terrified her more than any pickup-driving stalker.

“Screw this,” she muttered to the universe, and went back inside.

T
HE ANGRY MAN
stared at the laminated menu. He’d stolen it months ago, on a whim and for no purpose. Yet now he focused all his rage on it and all the unrequited fury of a life of feeling unwanted and unappreciated.

The calligraphy across the top said simply,
Rachel’s
. The motto beneath read,
Cooking like your mother’s, without the nagging
. His brows furrowed in annoyance; did the bitch think that was
funny?
Did she and her snotty friends sit around laughing about it over their lattes and bagels? One day soon he’d show them what he thought was funny, and they definitely wouldn’t laugh at that.

Beneath the logo was a bad photocopied picture of Rachel Matre. She was smiling, her hair was unnaturally coiffed, and she wore a button-down collar. The image reeked of cheap professional photography, the kind done in fifteen minutes at the mall and sold in $19.95 packages. But it was still
her
, still showed that irritating superior smile and conveyed the sense that she was somehow better than everyone else.

He clenched his fist. He wanted more than anything to slap that smile from her face, to knock her to the floor and see her on her hands and knees, begging. He wanted her to know his power and to fear it.

He struck a match, blew it out, and stuck the still-hot tip to the plastic menu cover. It melted through right over her mouth and blacked out her smile. The sharp smell tickled his nose. Then he methodically did the same twice more, putting out both her eyes so that the picture now had the vague appearance of a skull.

He checked his watch, locked the work shed, and went inside, to the door that led into the basement.

CHAPTER NINE

H
ELENA TURNED OFF
the diner’s lights and made sure the front door was locked. The afternoon sun quickly heated the room once the air conditioner shut down. As Rachel made a final, ceremonial pass with a rag down the counter, Helena said, “So what
are
you going to do about it?”

“About what?” Rachel said without looking at her.

“About the fact that you want to jump Marty Walker’s brother’s bones.”

Rachel scowled. “That’s just silly.”

“So’s the fact that we drive on parkways and park on driveways.”

“Helena, leave straight sex to the straight people. No matter what my hormones may want, they still have to take orders from here.” She tapped her temple. “And here says there’s no way I’d allow some ham-handed ex-soldier to paw all over me.”

“Well, speaking for your coworkers and friends, we think you should find
someone
to paw all over you before you bite all our heads off.”

Rachel tossed the rag down vehemently. “Dammit, Helena, just
stop
. I’d like to think I can count on you to be considerate, if no one else.”

Helena looked startled, then hurt. “Sure, Rach,” she mumbled, then untied her apron and went out the back door. In a moment her car started and spun gravel as she quickly drove away.

Rachel stood alone in her empty diner, half blinded by the sun’s reflection off the tile floor. She could never tell Helena the truth: that
no
man pawing all over her could ease her desire. She’d never told anyone about the lakes, ever. Not even—
especially
not even—her ex-husband, Don, who considered her “sexually maladjusted.” But if she didn’t get some relief soon, she might indeed start biting off heads. She’d go mad if she didn’t visit the lake tonight and only hoped she could keep it together until then.

J
ULIE
S
CHUTES DROPPED
into her chair at the
Capital Journal
office and kicked off her shoes beneath her desk. She looked around at the slumped shoulders and weary heads of her fellow reporters, most of whom stared blankly at their computer screens. She recalled the dynamic Rosalind Russell in
His Girl Friday
and wondered how she’d ended up more like Jessica Lange at the end of
Frances
.

She checked her e-mail, but none required her immediate attention. Her voice mail, likewise, had nothing. She had all the material needed for her article on the effects of the recent abductions, but she couldn’t focus on writing. She was still furious over the scene at the diner—not so much the criticism of her story, but the implication that the gossip found on that
goddamned-sonofabitching blog
was better than her own careful work.

Just as she was about to force herself to write something, a voice said, “Why, hello there.”

She looked up. The
Cap Jo’s
editor, Sam “Garish” Garnett, stood in front of her desk. As always, he was dressed impeccably in a suit and tie, his salt-and-pepper hair immobile in its cocoon of product. In the year he’d been at the helm, the former tabloid editor had made changes that included increasing the typeface size so shorter stories took up more space and gradually shifting the editorial emphasis to what he called “infotainment.” “Remember,” he often said at staff meetings, “in today’s world the ‘tainment is as important as the info.”

He sat on the edge of her desk like Paul Drake on
Perry Mason
and asked, “How did the man-on-the-street stuff go?”

“It went great,” Julie said. “Until that goddamned bikini picture came up again.”

Garnett sighed with elaborate patience. “Jules, you need to get past that. It might have been over the line, but it’s also over and done with. Move on.”

“
I
didn’t bring it up,” she said through her teeth. “And don’t call me ‘Jules,’ Garish.”

He blushed slightly beneath his tan. Because of his background in celebrity rags and supermarket tabloids, being taken seriously was his Achilles’ heel. “Very well, Juliet,” he said, deliberately using her full name. “As I’ve told you several times, the use of attractive young women to sell products is as old as civilization itself.” He raised his voice so that others nearby could hear. “And as I will doubtless tell you again, when the opportunity presents itself, I feel strongly we should take advantage of it.”

“The news shouldn’t be a ‘product,’ Sam. What we print should fucking
matter.”

From the cubicle behind her, Tony Russo, the sports editor, called out to Julie, “Get him to show you the picture to go with your current story.”

She stared up at Garnett. “What?” she hissed.

Russo peeked over the cubicle wall. “He got a swim-suit shot from the Kimmell girl’s boyfriend.”

“You didn’t,” Julie gasped, too appalled to even be angry. “Sam, for God’s sake, the girl’s been kidnapped, probably raped and murdered. You can’t turn her into a sex object.”

“We should use her high school graduation photo, then?” Garnett said defensively. “Or the one where she’s drunk at some party? People can get those for free on flyers all over town.”

Julie was on her feet now, leaning across the desk, and Garnett stood so he could back away. “We should have some goddamned
dignity
, Sam. And some standards. We want people to trust us, don’t we?”

Heads gophered over the other cubicle walls. Garnett, seeing that he had an audience, straightened his tie and said loudly, “We
want
people to spend their pocket change to get our newspaper out of the machines. If the picture of a pretty girl—who, I might add, is part of a legitimate news story—makes them do that, then I say we use it. And since I sit in the room whose door says
Editor-in-Chief
, what I say goes.” He met Julie’s eyes. “Is that clear, Juliet?”

She wanted to hurl the stapler beside her hand at his smug face. Instead, she said, “Perfectly, Garish.” Then she sat down and deliberately turned her attention back to her computer screen.

Garnett turned and strolled, carefully and calmly, back to his office. Julie knew that one of his management secrets was to always act as if he’d won every argument. It didn’t make the back of his head less a target. She pointed her finger like a pistol and said softly,
“Bang
, you bastard.”

E
THAN PUSHED
the bar away from his chest, then pulled it back. Sweat trickled into his eyes, and his bad shoulder protested. But he kept going.

The cavernous Harvard Fitness Club was almost empty this late, as the after-work crowd returned to their families, flat-screen TVs, and Internet surfing. Through the big windows, traffic on the Beltline made trails of white and red lights in the darkness. Only one other man, much younger and slighter than Ethan, was working out nearby, and he simply ran on a treadmill, aware only of the music provided through his iPod’s earbuds. That suited Ethan fine; he definitely didn’t feel chatty.

He finished the last repetition and sat, gasping, head down, watching sweat drop to the rubber mat beneath the machine’s bench. He’d pushed himself past the sensible point and knew his shoulder would repay him with soreness for a week, but he had to burn off the nervous energy that had kept him twitching and distracted all day. He’d paced his office, driving Ambika mad and drinking far too much coffee, until Marty finally called to say that the work site was cleared for use. Now he had to figure out a way to make up the last two days.

He wiped the sweat with a towel. He was lying to himself, he knew. What had distracted him wasn’t really work. It was the image of Rachel Matre that simply wouldn’t leave his mind.

Why should a woman like that, a smug pseudohippie who lacked even the courtesy to say thanks after he chased off that dickhead, have such a strong hold on him? He’d gone out of his way to flirt with a dozen women that day, from the college girl who worked at the video store to the fiftyish lady who delivered his office mail. One, a stunning redhead so engrossed in her cell phone she’d nearly trampled him on the sidewalk, had actually given him her business card along with an apology. He hadn’t called her, but he
had
dialed Julie’s number, except for the last digit. But none of it got Rachel out of his head. Or out of other, more insistent parts of his anatomy.

Now it was dark again, and he faced the possibility of another sleepless, solitary, repeatedly tumescent night. He could work on his taxes, or take cold showers, or simply jerk off and get it over with. It wasn’t like he had no options.

He pounded his forehead on the weight machine’s handle. What was
wrong
with him? Was Marty right, and he’d closed himself off so much since returning from Iraq that he risked an unplanned, and no doubt embarrassing, explosion of repressed feelings? What he’d seen, and done, festered just below his consciousness every moment, yet he resolutely refused to discuss it. Even when it took away his sleep, his peace of mind, and sometimes his very manhood, he’d keep his word and hold his tongue. It made people like Julie believe that the army had stripped away his humanity and left him just an efficient, and violent, machine.

He went to the mats near the wall and began his cooldown stretches. He extended his right leg and bent over it, his fingers hooking over the toe of his shoe. As he did, a pair of worn white running shoes passed in front of him, and a matching set of long, pale legs knelt and then straightened. He looked up and saw the redhead he’d bumped into earlier.

For a moment her face scrunched in annoyance at his scrutiny, then she recognized him. “Well, hello. Isn’t this a small world?”

“Round too,” he said with a smile. “Haven’t seen you here before.”

“I usually go to the one on the east side, but I had a late meeting over here today.”

He watched her eyes flick over him, evaluating him as blatantly as he might a woman on the street. He didn’t mind; for some reason, women had always found him attractive, and the hard, lean edge he’d acquired during his tour of duty seemed to only enhance that. He reciprocated, enjoying the way her workout clothes displayed far more pale, freckled flesh than she’d shown earlier on the street.

As she stretched, she said, “Do you even remember my name?”

He grinned and shook his head. “Don’t take it personally. Some days I barely remember my own.”

“It’s Ethan,” she said as she bent low over her knee, allowing him an unobstructed view down her sports bra cleavage. She had freckles there as well. “I’m Cindy. Cin for short; no pun intended.”

He laughed. “No pun?”

“Well, maybe a little pun,” she admitted. She got to her feet and looked down at him. “I’m just starting, and you’ve already finished. A metaphor for our relationship?”

“We have a relationship?” he said, and stood. She was shorter in her tennis shoes, but the force of her personality made up for any loss in physical stature. “I thought it was just a pedestrian fender bender.”

She gave him an open and inviting smile. With no makeup and her hair pulled haphazardly back, she was still a stunner. “I’ll be done in half an hour. If you don’t mind me a little sweaty, we could meet for a cup of coffee before I head home.”

He started to say yes—
intended
to say yes. Her physical beauty was matched by her honesty and bluntness, two qualities he found immensely attractive. And he had no history with her, so perhaps his other issues might not trouble him. Yet, before he could utter the words, the memory of Rachel standing in the window flashed vividly before him. Inexplicably, infuriatingly, he felt that making a date with anyone else would be a mistake. “I’m sorry,” he blurted. “I can’t.”

“Married?” she asked simply, with no indication that it would alter her interest.

“No, just… off the market at the moment.” She nodded in acceptance. “Okay. Well, Ethan, you’ve got my number if you decide to relist yourself.” And with that she turned and trotted off down the indoor running track that circled the machines. He made sure he was gone by the time she finished her first lap. The scruffy kid behind the greeter’s desk barely looked up from his online poker as Ethan headed to the dressing room.

T
HE
Capital Journal’s
offices were mostly deserted, which suited Julie just fine. She’d restrained herself as long as she could, and now she had to let it out. The humiliation at the diner had weighed on her all afternoon with the vivid intensity of something from high school. Garnett’s comments only added to it. Just like in eleventh grade, all she wanted to do was curl up and cry.

Tough reporters didn’t cry, though, and few in Madison were as tough as Julie Schutes. A homemade desk sign given to her by the previous editor read,
She Schutes, She Scores
, and she loved being the paper’s go-to reporter for breaking crime news. The abducted Chinese girl had not really moved the public, but readers latched on to Faith Lucas: beautiful, blond, young, and vanished. Just like that teenager who’d disappeared in the Bahamas, the Lucas girl cast a seductive spell over these plain Midwesterners, giving them the schadenfreude their mundane, unglamorous lives needed. Julie and Garish Garnett were alike in understanding that, and that fact made her hate him even more.

But as she’d tried to write about the thoughts of those same Midwesterners, from the ones offering prayers for safe returns to those who felt it was, ultimately, the girls’ own fault, even Julie began to lose her enthusiasm. There could be no happy resolution; the forty-eight-hour window had passed for all the victims. Now it was simply a matter of reporting where, in the vast woods all over Wisconsin, their bodies would be found. After that, it would be standard crime reporting, dry and by the book, until the perp was caught. She hoped he was, at least, an interesting lunatic and not some standard, dull-eyed serial killer.

She should be glad to be involved in such an important ongoing story. But instead she sat in the back stall in the deserted women’s restroom, sobbing so hard it made her cheeks hurt.