Perfect Trust: A Rowan Gant Investigation (43 page)

My voice fell almost to a whisper. “That’s
what we do if someone they aren’t used to is in the house and they
are being bothersome.”

“Exactly,” Ben nodded. “Whoever took Felicity
is someone she knows, Kemosabe. Someone she was comfortable enough
ta’ let into the house but unfamiliar enough that she had ta’ lock
the dogs away. She wasn’t afraid, so he was able ta’ take ‘er down
so unexpectedly that she didn’t even have a chance ta’ fight.”

I stared at him, dumbfounded by the
realization that had overtaken my grey matter.

“You gotta work with me on this, Row. We’re
gonna find ‘er, but I’ve gotta have your help.”

My mind was racing, applying a mental litmus
test to a list of possible suspects I was compiling in my head. I
couldn’t imagine anyone that we knew wanting to harm her. I was
disregarding names as fast as they popped into my head, and soon, I
found myself placing the yardstick up against the same people over
and over again.

“Rowan? Talk ta’ me,” Ben prodded.

“I… It just doesn’t… I’m not…” I stammered.
“I don’t know, Ben. I just can’t think of anyone we know who would
do something like this.”

“Okay, what about enemies? You two are pretty
open about your religion,” he suggested. “Anyone you know that
could maybe have gotten hooked up with a radical group or
somethin’?”

“You pretty much know who my enemies are.” I
shook my head. “And to my knowledge Felicity doesn’t have any. And
religious groups? I doubt it. Besides, I can’t imagine any going
this far.”

“Try tellin’ that ta’ the dead doctors that
were killed by the anti-abortion wackos,” he harrumphed. “It takes
all kinds, Row. Have ya’ pissed off anyone that ya’ know of?”

“I can’t think of anyone off the top of my
head.”

“What about Firehair? She have any
acquaintances you’re not familiar with? Someone who might be a bit
hinky?”

“Sure,” I shrugged. “I don’t know all of her
business contacts, clients, or even members of her photography
club. I suppose one of them could be off kilter.”

“We’re already checkin’ out the folks she was
with today,” he nodded. “She have a rolodex or somethin’ we can
look at?”

I glanced around for her purse and found that
it was no longer on the side table in the living room where I’d
last seen it. “Her purse,” I expressed. “It was on the table over
there.”

“It’s already been bagged,” Ben told me. “She
have an address book in there?”

“Her PDA,” I acknowledged. “She keeps
everything in there. Contacts, appointments, everything.”

“Okay, stay here,” he told me, punctuating
the command with a quick gesture of his hand as he headed for the
front door. “I’ll be right back.”

Silence fell in behind him for a moment, and
I turned my head to see Helen looking back at me with a studious
expression.

“How are you holding up,” she asked.

“As good as can be expected, I suppose.”

She nodded slightly and continued to watch me
as she offered comment. “Benjamin can sometimes resemble a bull in
a china shop with his methods.”

“Yeah,” I acknowledged, “I’ve seen him be
gentler.”

“It is only because he is frightened, Rowan.
He fears for your wife’s safety, and for your sanity. He considers
you family, and you know his sense of duty.”

I nodded. “I know.”

She pursed her lips and her brow furrowed
deeply. Pressing her palms together she held her hands up and
rested her chin on her steepled fingertips. We stood quietly for a
moment, and it became my turn to watch her.

“Rowan, your wife is going to be fine,” she
finally told me.

“Is this the coddling I was asking for
earlier?” I questioned with a flat tone to my words.

“No. It is merely an observation.”

“Do you know something that the rest of us
don’t?”

“I simply know what it is that I feel,” she
answered as she canted her head to the side and blinked. “You of
all people should understand that.”

I allowed her words to comfort me, though the
solace was brief. “Thanks, Helen. I hope you’re right.”

“This thing what you’re talkin’ about?” Ben
interrupted as he entered and thrust a thin, silver case at me.

“Yes,” I nodded as I took it from him and
opened the cover to reveal the electronic device within.

I activated the PDA and withdrew the stylus
from its recessed holder then began systematically tapping it
against the touch sensitive screen. “Here.” I offered the device
back to him. “This is her address book.”

“You go through it,” he told me. “See if
anyone rings a bell. Someone she might’ve mentioned havin’ a
disagreement with. Anything like that.”

I turned the small LCD display back toward
myself and proceeded to page through the listings, one entry at a
time. She had combined our home address book with her own, so
various bits of data stood out as familiar while others did not.
Before long, however, they all began to look like just so many
letters and numbers jumbled together.

I stopped and removed my glasses then rubbed
my eyes.

“Somethin’ wrong?” Ben queried.

“Not really,” I answered as I slipped my
glasses back on to my face. “It just seems like I’ve been staring
at small print all day.”

“Ya’ pretty much have. So, ya’ recognize
anything?”

“Well, yeah,” I said. “But nothing that leaps
out at me as particularly suspicious.”

“So, what are ya’ doin’ now?” he asked as he
nodded in the direction of the device.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean what are ya’ doin’?” he reiterated,
raising an eyebrow. “You aren’t even lookin’ at the damn
thing.”

The sound of the stylus clacking against the
touch sensitive plate reached my ears, and I realized my hand was
moving completely of its own accord. As I rotated my head and
looked down at the PDA in my hand, the out of phase tones of a
voice echoed quietly in the back of my head.

“There. Is this better?”

Unconsciously, I had switched the handheld
computer into a notepad mode and even traded it off to my right
hand. My left was now rapidly scratching the stylus against the
surface of the screen.

A quick glance at the LCD showed a digitized
string of handwriting that repeatedly scrawled, DEAD I AM, DEAD I
AM, DEAD I AM, DEAD I AM…

“Dammit!” I exclaimed as I immediately forced
my hand to stop moving. “Leave me alone! Just leave me alone!”

“Whoa,” Ben raised his voice to compete with
mine. “What the hell?”

“Schaeffer!” I exclaimed, dropping the PDA
and stylus onto the table then shaking my hands as if trying to rid
them of something disgusting. “She won’t leave me alone!”

“What? Like she’s here now?”

“Yes, dammit!” I was angry, and I spun in
place looking for any indication of the girl’s spirit around me.
“Go away, Debbie! I can’t help you right now!”

In my head I could hear her chanting at
an ever-quickening pace,
“DEAD I AM, DEAD
I AM, DEAD I AM, DEAD I AM, DEADIAM, DEADIAM, DEADIAM, DEADIAM,
DEADIAM, DEADIAMDEADIAMDEADIAMDEADIAMDEADIAM…”

I seized on the welling anger within me and
thrust it outward in a violent rush, attempting to sweep away
anything ethereal in my path. The energy exploded outward, only to
reach unanticipated limits and return in force. A shockwave of pain
backlashed through my head as the energy ricocheted around the
room. I saw Helen turn her head then squint, which told me that she
had felt it as well, a fact that for some reason I didn’t find all
that surprising. Fortunately for her, she was only a spectator; I
was the target.

A pinpoint of agony drilled into my skull
directly between my eyes and sent me physically staggering
backward. I felt my heel thump against something, and I started to
fall, then a tight grip latched on to my arm as someone guided me
into a chair.

“Rowan? Rowan?” Ben’s words were thick as
they flowed into my ears. “Are ya’ okay? What’s goin’ on? Answer
me.”

I leaned forward in the seat, dropping my
face into my hands, and heaved hard against the pain. I’m sure that
to him it looked like I was having a seizure.

“ROWAN?!” he demanded again, his voice
loud.

I held up a hand as a signal to him as I
grimaced through the onslaught of agony. I’d brought this upon
myself. My own anger was bouncing around inside the ethereal
barriers Felicity and I had placed around the house, and it now
came back to me threefold if not more. I was simply paying for my
own lack of control.

While my presence within had acted as a
doorway for Debbie Schaeffer to enter, it hadn’t been terribly
effective as an exit for the burst of energy. On top of that, I
hadn’t been the least bit grounded when it returned.

I mutely cursed myself for the stupidity of
the action as the pain slowly began to subside. After a moment,
misery faded into something resembling a severe sinus headache, and
I sighed heavily.

I remained motionless as I opened my eyes and
allowed them to focus on the object I’d tripped over.

There on the floor was a sealed cardboard
box, roughly eight-by-ten by maybe twelve inches tall. I stared at
it as the image clarified, then slowly allowed my eyes to come to
rest on the label. It was upside down from my point of view, but I
could still read it without difficulty.

It was addressed to Felicity O’Brien and
Emerald Photographic Services, which was her company name. What
really drew my attention, however, was the return address: Arch
Color Labs, 3754 Ash Bend Avenue.

There is an old adage that most everyone has
heard, about snakes, nearness to them, and getting bit by same
because of said close proximity. This is where I now found myself,
and the fangs of this particular serpent were, to say the least,
firmly embedded in my carotid artery, and the venom was now
reaching my brain.

Bits and pieces of information, snippets of
conversations, and channeled vices began coalescing in my frontal
lobes to form a mental picture that should have been crystal clear
all along. How I’d managed to avoid putting this all together, I
had no idea, but there was no stopping it now. Whatever mental
block had been shielding the overtly obvious from my sight had now
been obliterated, and it was all making sense.

“You’ve got to be kidding me,” I muttered
just loud enough to be heard.

“Do what?” Ben asked. “Rowan, what’s goin’
on? What the hell was that all about?”

“Harold,” I said a bit louder. “It’s
Harold.”

“Harold who?”

“Harold…the sorry sonofabitch that owns Arch
Color Labs,” I announced, ignoring the throb in my skull and
looking up at my friend. “That’s Harold who.”

“You’re gonna hafta elaborate, Row.”

“This box,” I explained as I pointed to the
offending container. “It wasn’t here when I left this morning.”

“Yeah, so maybe it got delivered while you
were with me and Chuck. Ya’ haven’t been home all day ya’know.”

“No. Wouldn’t happen. Arch is less than a
mile from here. He never ships orders to Felicity. She picks them
up.”

“Okay, so just playin’ devil’s advocate
here…are you sure she didn’t?” he asked.

“She didn’t have time. Not today of all days.
And before you ask, he’s closed on weekends so it wasn’t riding
around in her Jeep for the past few days either.”

“Okay, good, we’re maybe onta’ somethin’
here. So what makes ya’ think it’s this Harold guy and not an
employee?”

“Because it’s a one man operation. Besides,
he smokes like a fiend and that’s why he’s been dressing them
up.”

“He dresses ‘em up ‘cause he smokes?
What?”

“No!” I snapped. “Listen to me. The bastard
smokes! And Felicity is why he’s dressing them up!”

“Whoa, back up,” my friend said. “Which case
are we talkin’ about here?”

“All of it, Ben,” I said in exasperation.
“All of it. He’s the one who killed Debbie Schaeffer and Paige
Lawson. He’s the one who’s been raping all these women, and he’s
the one who took Felicity. Now can we go?”

“Whoa, slow down, white man,” he instructed.
“I think maybe you’re gettin’ some stuff crossed up here.”

“No, no I’m not.” I shook my head,
incredulous that he wasn’t understanding, and then I realized that
he had no reason to. Thus far I’d told him next to nothing by way
of the facts as I saw them. I was simply spouting random
observations and my own fevered conclusions.

I forced myself to stay in my seat and tried
to explain what I was talking about. “Okay, here it is. Did you by
any chance notice the resemblance between Felicity and Heather
Burke?”

“Heather Burke is a blue-eyed blonde,
Row.”

“I know,” I returned. “But try to follow me
here. I’m talking about her other physical attributes. Size, shape
of face, skin tone. That’s why he uses the wig and the tinted
contacts. Try to imagine Heather Burke with long red hair.”

“Okay.” He nodded slightly after a thoughtful
pause. “I guess maybe I can see that.”

“Now, what about Miranda Hodges and Paige
Lawson?” I urged.

“Yeah, they all kinda resemble one another,
but don’t ya’ think you’re pushin’ it a bit?”

“No, I don’t.” I shook my head hard. I wanted
to get moving but I knew it was never going to happen unless I
could convince him I was correct. “He has been dressing them up to
look like Felicity and then taking pictures of them. He’s been
living out his fantasy about my wife through them.”

“I dunno, Rowan. We’ll check it out, but
let’s not start drawin’ conclusions just yet.”

“Fine,” I snarled, “fine, just forget all
that. The important thing is I’m telling you he’s the one who’s got
Felicity, and we need to stop him before he hurts her.”

“I’m not doubtin’ ya’,” Ben held up a hand
before I could object, “Well, actually, yes I am, ‘cause we don’t
need ta’ go off half-cocked an’ chasin’ our tails right now.”