Perfect Trust: A Rowan Gant Investigation (6 page)

“Thanks.” I smiled at her while laying the
card to the side, face down and out of sight. I suspect it was just
a reflex on my part, as she didn’t seem bothered by the photo at
all. With the diner being a cop hangout, she’d probably seen and
heard more than her share of things like this—probably even
worse.

“Kitchen sink omelet with chili and
extra onions.” She stressed the word
extra
as she planted a steaming plate before Ben
with a wide grin. “Anything else I can get you two? More
coffee?”

“We’re good. Thanks, Wendy,” Ben
answered.

As was my habit, I took a moment to twist the
cap off of the pepper shaker and liberally blacken my scrambled
eggs while Ben watched, and then I returned the condiment to its
original state before offering it to him.

“Jeezus, Row. That stuff’ll kill ya’,” he
told me as he accepted the glass shaker but set it aside without
using it.

“And what’s on your plate won’t?” I
countered. “So anyway,” I continued, pointing toward the card with
my fork. “That’s him all right. It’s an old picture, but it’s
him.”

“Yeah, when we compared it to the sketch that
was made from your description, there was pretty much no doubt. We
found enough good prints in the house ta’ get a match through AFIS,
and in no time we had ‘is file from the TDC. Seems ‘e was a guest
of the Lone Star state for a few years. Once we had the file,
everything fell inta place. Blood type, all that jazz.”

“What was he in prison for?”

“Aggravated assault and manslaughter,” he
stated in a matter-of-fact tone.

“So have you notified NCIC or put out an APB
or whatever acronym it is that you law enforcement types like to
do?”

“A BOLO? What for?” He shrugged.

“So you can
be
on the look out
for the guy, maybe?” I stated
incredulously. “I’m assuming that’s what BOLO means?”

“Yeah, that’s what it means…But Jeez, Row,
you ain’t gonna start that again, are ya’? The asshole is
dead.”

“Did you ever find a body?” I demanded.

“No. So what?” he asked, but he didn’t wait
for an answer. “He’s suckin’ mud on the bottom of the river.”

“The body would have surfaced by now,
Ben.”

“Not necessarily, Row.” He shook his
head. “What goes down don’t always come up. Trust me. Plus, the
river flooded pretty good this spring. Maybe I
am
wrong and ‘e ain’t suckin’ mud at all. Maybe
‘e ended up bein’ fish food in the gulf or somethin’. At any rate,
he’s gone. Dead. Eighty-sixed.”

“I’m telling you he isn’t, Ben.”

“All right, tell me. How do ya know?”

“It’s just a feeling, but I know I’m
right.”

“Like I’ve told ya’ before, white man, this
is just one feelin’ I can’t get with you on. I think you’ve just
got some left over heebee jeebees or somethin’.”

“No, Ben,” I spat back tersely. “It’s more
than that.”

“Okay,” he took on his own hard edge,
“then where is he? Why hasn’t he killed again? Hell, why hasn’t he
come after
you
again?”

I had to admit that I didn’t have the answers
to these questions. It was somewhat of an ongoing theme between Ben
and me. Something would tickle the back of my brain, and I would
have some manner of instinctual feeling or precognitive episode. I
would tell my friend, stressing the urgency of the vision, and he
would start asking questions. Then like an idiot, I would sit there
and say, “I don’t know.”

I had to give him credit though; he had come
a long way. The first time I had helped him with an investigation,
he had been a complete and total skeptic. This last time around, he
had been extremely open-minded and willing to chase down the
avenues I pointed out with only my word as a catalyst.

The real truth was that I had even been a bit
of a skeptic myself at first. Even though Magick is a very real
part of my religious path, until recently, I’d never experienced it
to anywhere near the extent that I had during my time helping with
the murder investigations. That’s the funny thing about faith.
Believing in something is one thing. Having it sneak up and bat you
over the head is something else entirely.

Suffice it to say, I was only now getting
over the resulting headache.

But as accepting as he had become, on this
particular point of contention between us Ben was not about to
budge. He was firmly convinced that the now identified Eldon Andrew
Porter was dead, never to return.

This was one instance where I wished with
every fiber of my being that he was correct and that I was
completely and unequivocally wrong. But that itch in the back of my
head just wouldn’t go away.

“Yeah, I thought so,” my friend finally
replied to my silence then let out a sigh. “Look, Row, I’m not
tryin’ to be an ass here. And this is exactly what I was afraid was
gonna happen. I know your intuition is pretty good. Hell, I’ve come
to rely on all that hocus-pocus stuff at times, but I really think
you’re wrong on this one. ID’n this whack-job was just a piece’a
blind luck, and it’s nothin’ but clerical shit now. It’s just a
name an’ face ta’ stick in the case file. The
closed
case file.”

I didn’t argue. Belaboring the point was
going to cause nothing more than strife between us. Besides, I
really and truly did want him to be correct this time instead of
me.

“Yeah.” I nodded. “Okay.”

“Okay. So if we’re settled on that, here’s
somethin’ else we found out about ‘im that ya’ might find
interesting,” Ben offered, as if giving me a consolation prize for
losing the disagreement.

“What’s that?”

“During his trial it seems there was a bit of
a ruckus over his mental state,” he explained. “Coupl’a expert
witnesses rattlin’ a bunch of psycho babble about ‘im being highly
suggestible and incapable of distinguishin’ right from wrong. But
as it was, he had an overworked and under funded PD for an
attorney. Just couldn’t get the jury to go for the insanity
defense.”

“So you think he was insane?”

“Who knows?” He shrugged. “I think any
asshole that goes around killin’ people is insane, but then I also
don’t think they should get off scot-free because of it.”

“I’m inclined to agree with you, but I’m not
sure I follow.”

“That’s ‘cause you haven’t heard the really
hinky part yet.”

“And that is?”

“When they put ‘im away he ended up in
a special kind of cell block. Somethin’ called a
God Pod
.”

“God Pod?”

“Yeah, it’s a cell block that’s run by a
prison ministry. Rehabilitation by gettin’ religion.”

“That’s not entirely a bad thing, Ben,” I
said. “Faith can be an important part of a person’s life. It can
provide a moral compass to those who need direction.”

“Yeah, but this is some pretty strict shit,
Row,” he returned then scooped up a forkful of the dangerous
looking omelet. “They pretty much brow-beat the inmates with the
holy scripture.”

“And you think that if he was insane to begin
with…” I let my voice fade, leaving the end of the sentence
unspoken. It wasn’t that I didn’t know what to say. It was the fact
that the thought of the penal system having created this monster
suddenly overtook me, and my earlier brush with nausea was
returning.

Ben picked up where I left off, expressing
his own thoughts aloud. “What I think is that if ya’ got a mentally
unstable fruitcake who’s that open ta’ suggestion, and ya’ subject
‘im to Bible study and prayer meetins’ from sunup ta’ sundown,
seven days a week, somethin’s bound to snap. Maybe it snaps good.
Maybe it snaps bad. I think ya’ can guess which direction I think
this wingnut went.”

“Don’t tell me,” I shook my head in
disbelief, “They preach Evangelical, Old Testament.”

“From what I understand, yeah. Why? That mean
somethin’?”

“It would explain a slight discrepancy that
bothered me.”

“What’s that?”

“Well, he embraced the
Malleus Maleficarum
along with a
very old, very outdated, and no longer accepted Catholic ideal—that
being the literal eradication of heretics. He even went so far as
to dress as a priest,” I explained. “But, in my encounter with him,
he seemed to come at things from a far more fire and brimstone
approach, as opposed to the calmer, ritualistic trappings of
Catholicism. The words he spoke were more than a sectarian ceremony
for him. He was, for all intents and purposes,
preaching.”

“Like I said, that’s one screwed up wingnut,”
Ben offered. “But I guess it’d be a hell of a sermon.”

“Exactly.” I nodded.

“Guess it’s a good thing he’s history then,”
he stated before shoveling a portion of the formidable breakfast
into his mouth.

The twinge that had lanced through my
shoulder earlier now returned with a treble hook of barbs trailing
in its wake. The pain deep in the joint burrowed its way up the
side of my neck and joined with that unforgiving itch in the back
of my brain.

Now I had two problems to worry about. But
for now they were mine—and mine alone.

I didn’t say a word.

December 18

Saint Louis, Missouri

I was trying very hard to remember exactly
what it was that I was doing here. For some unknown reason, I was
at a complete loss. Truth was, I didn’t even know how I had come to
be anywhere other than my own warm bed, and it was more than just a
little disconcerting. Still, it certainly wasn’t the first time I’d
experienced this phenomena recently, although the sickening feel of
personal defilement was conspicuously absent this time. While
somewhat of a consolation, that fact still did nothing to quell the
oncoming panic, so I forced myself to remain calm and try to think
it through.

Cognitive reasoning isn’t exactly an easy
task when you feel like a refugee from the amnesia ward. My
thoughts felt jumbled, but I was heartened that I actually had some
of them for a change. Unfortunately, I don’t really think that they
all belonged to me. Every now and then I would grapple with one of
the memories as it tumbled through my numbed consciousness,
inspecting it closely before it could get away. I was reasonably
certain that such thoughts as “which pair of shoes I should wear
with my new dress,” and “setting up an appointment to have my nails
done before the party” belonged to someone else entirely. It was
also a safe bet that said someone was female. What I was doing with
her memories I couldn’t say, but they were fading from existence as
quickly as they came in, and that wasn’t going to make it any
easier to figure out.

There were, however, two things that kept
circulating around my muddled grey matter with an
uncharacteristically sharp clarity. One was a large glowing yellow
rectangle. The other was a particularly nasty, and relatively
familiar, burning sensation on the side of my neck coupled with a
feeling of utter helplessness and disorientation. I couldn’t quite
tell which of us should lay claim to this pair of thoughts. Until
recently I’d thought of them purely as my own. Now in retrospect, I
had to wonder. Of course, I suppose it was always possible that
they were being shared by both of us.

I shifted uncomfortably in my seat and
continued to stare at the scene before me while pondering the
greater meaning of luminescent geometric shapes and inexplicable
pains. For the moment I resigned myself to the present situation in
hopes some thought of lesser obscurity would finally provide an
answer.

The tableau beyond the slightly fogged window
strobed frantically with patches of red, blue, and white like an
insane outdoor disco. Strings of holiday lights entwined through
evergreen hedgerows were winking in and out of time with the
brighter flashes in a futile attempt to find dominance over the
darkness. I should have found the panorama saddening, but instead I
felt little empathy for much of anything.

Flickering light bars mounted atop emergency
vehicles were things to which I was growing far too accustomed. I
reached this conclusion quickly with no resistance whatsoever from
my rational self. It was undeniable. There was a time, when
gathered in such an excessive number, the flashing beacons would
have reminded me of severe tragedy. At this particular moment,
however, they were simply an annoyance that my eyes were being
forced to contend with.

Once upon a different time in my life a
garish slash of yellow crime scene tape would have insinuated
itself into my soul, bringing with it quick fear and deep sorrow.
Now, an example of that thin plastic barrier was close by, slowly
undulating on a cold winter breeze. In this instance it seemed
simply a part of the everyday landscape. At least that is how it
seemed to the me I had become.

Even the squawking radios and idling engines
that tainted the night with their continuous disharmony seemed
nothing more than a normal slice of reality. They neither belonged
nor didn’t belong. They were very simply just there.

The bare truth was that nothing mattered to
me now. Nothing but the yellow rectangle of light pouring through
the open door of the townhouse apartment, a haunting incandescent
spill that was being easily absorbed by a thirsty sponge of
darkness.

Regrettably, it looked like I was going to
have to answer some serious questions before I got anywhere near
that doorway. At least that was the impression I was getting from
the stern look molded onto Detective Benjamin Storm’s features.

I hadn’t seen my friend since meeting him for
breakfast earlier in the month. It wasn’t surprising really, what
with the holidays barreling in upon us—Chanukah had already
arrived, securing first place in a yearly contest; with Yule,
Christmas, and Kwanzaa lining up in the queue. Schedules were
tight—being full of parties, relatives, and even in light of the
season, work. I had hoped that the next time we saw one another, it
would be at a gathering of family and friends where we could share
a drink and forget about the everyday rigors of the world.