Heartstopper (39 page)

“Hey, get a load of this,” Deputy Trent said, holding up a set of handcuffs before placing them in a plastic bag.

John pulled open the closet door, rifled through the clothes on the white plastic hangers, finding nothing of interest. They’d been in the house for over an hour and the search had yielded little of significance. Yes, they’d found a gun, exactly where Cal had said it would be, but it was almost certainly not the murder weapon. And, yes, they had handcuffs and a variety of sex toys, but all of them could actually be bought at Wal-Mart, he’d discovered on a recent foray. And even if Fiona had hardly seemed the type to go in for vibrating pens and crotchless panties, what did he know? Especially about women. How well do we really know anyone?

“Hey, John,” another deputy called from the hall. “I think we may have something.” The young man appeared in the doorway, his round cheeks flushed with excitement, a glint of anticipation in his chocolate brown eyes.

“What have you got?”

“I found these buried at the back of a kitchen drawer. Looks like somebody’s been collecting trophies.” A charm bracelet dangled from his left hand. “It’s just a cheap little thing. Looks like all the charms are pieces of candy. Don’t know if it means anything.”

John felt his entire body start to tingle. Candy Abbot, he was thinking as he pushed the next words out of his mouth. “What else have you got?”

The deputy raised his right hand, displaying a delicate gold necklace curled inside his gloved palm. “Now I
know
this one means something.”

John stared at the necklace. In the center of it was a name, written in gold: LIANA.

I
’ve been trying to come up with some clever names for stores.

You know, something that would draw people in, get them to open their wallets, and, by so doing, stimulate the economy. At the very least, give people a chuckle, a laugh to brighten their otherwise dreary days. You know, like if you’re on your way to work and you see something that makes you smile, a cute puppy or some guy tripping over a bump in the sidewalk, and you know how just thinking about that later on will make you smile, well, that’s the sort of thing I had in mind. Putting a smile on people’s faces. I was in the mall the other day, checking things out, and not only was there nothing in any of the stores that caught my eye, but I realized that even the names of the stores are boring and uninteresting. And I thought, Why can’t we be more imaginative? And more intelligent. I mean, take William Shakespeare, for example. He was a big fan of wordplay. He’d have come up with something smart and amusing.

So how about calling a store that sells tennis equipment, The Merchant of Tennis? Or you could call a jewelry store, Romeo and Jewelry; a savings and loan, All’s Well That Lends Well; a store that hawks hiking shoes, As You Hike It. You could rename Big Macs, Big Macbeths. You
could call an optician, King Leer. Okay, so that’s a bit of a stretch. But you get the idea.

It doesn’t even have to be Shakespeare, as long as it’s clever, as long as the Bard would approve. So, along those lines, I offer Bow WOW, as a dog-grooming salon; SpecialTee Shops, for stores selling T-shirts; and Love’s Labour Lost, for offices where people go to collect unemployment insurance. Of course, that last one’s Shakespeare again. Funny how in the end, everything comes back to sweet William. What would he do with
The Taming of the Shrew
, I wonder.

Oh, I know. How about
Kiss Me, Kate?

Okay, so setting up Cal Hamilton was fun.

Kind of makes up for what happened earlier, which, trust me, was not nearly as much fun as I was anticipating. Isn’t it interesting how nothing ever goes exactly the way you plan? I mean, you have this picture in your head. You think you have everything organized. You think you have every last detail worked out. You can almost taste how it’s gonna go down—I mean, it’s not like I haven’t done this before, you’d think I’d be used to it by now—but life always throws you a curve.

Maybe I should say death always throws you a curve.

Anyway, I guess I should start at the top, as they say. They, again. They’re always saying something. Can’t keep their mouths shut, which you might say was Fiona Hamilton’s problem. God, who’d have thought that little gal would have so much to say? She always seemed like such a quiet, timid little thing. But once she opened up, wow! It was like she’d been waiting years to tell her story, like she couldn’t get the words out fast enough. There was no stopping her. Well, no, that’s not exactly true.

I stopped her.

Okay, so first things first: Fiona Hamilton wasn’t originally part of my plan. She wasn’t even on my radar. No
interest in the woman at all. I had my list. Trust me, she wasn’t on it.

Why do people say “trust me”? Don’t you find that the people who say “trust me” are the very people you shouldn’t trust at all? And why should you trust anyone anyway? Don’t they say trust is something that has to be earned? Of course, they also say things like “Trust your instincts” and “In God we trust.” I have a better one—“Trust no one.” Trust me, that’s the one to remember.

Hey, I just realized that both Liana and Fiona are names that have five letters, the last two being
n
and a. Not only that, but each name has three syllables—Fi-o-na, Li-ana—plus the second letter of each name is an
i
, only with an
e
sound. How do you like that? Not that I’m saying that’s why I chose Fiona, although I confess that now that I’ve thought of it, I do appreciate the symmetry. No, Fiona was what I believe they call a red herring. She was there to throw everyone off the scent, although the idea of any kind of herring being used to throw people
off
a scent is pretty funny when you think about it. Yes, sad little Fiona Hamilton was a means to an end, really, a way to bide my time and have a little fun in the process. I mean, who amongst us doesn’t think Cal Hamilton was due for a little comeuppance? And I just thought it would be fun to get everyone in Torrance to relax a little. I mean, once people think a killer is safely behind bars, they tend to ease up, let down their guard. They’re so relieved, they get careless, even stupid. And stupid people make for easy targets.

Did I mention I have my next target all picked out?

But back to Fiona.

Fiona, much as I expected, wasn’t a barrel of laughs. Nor was she much of a challenge. Frankly, I was disappointed. She was almost too easy. She wasn’t what you’d call a fighter, even when it came to fighting for her life. I guess all those years of abuse had worn her down.

“Cal sent me to get you,” I told her. She didn’t look especially surprised to see me. She just stood there with this blank look on her face, like she wasn’t quite sure who I was. Or maybe she’d learned a long time ago not to ask too many questions. I don’t know. I just know I was only in that house a few minutes before I had her unconscious and out the kitchen door. Nobody saw me. That’s the good thing about carports.

(I wonder how long it’ll be before the science department of Torrance High realizes its supply of chloroform has been, as they say, compromised? Probably not until next year when they start gathering up those stupid frogs for dissection, by which time I won’t be needing it anymore.)

Anyway, I had everything ready for her when we arrived at the house. Of course, she was still asleep, so the full impact of my efforts was lost on her, but I can’t begrudge her that. And I have to say she looked very pretty when she was unconscious. Quite peaceful. Her face was smooth and unlined, and her hair had been freshly washed and it smelled good, like a medley of peaches and apricots. She was wearing this flimsy little blue nightgown—a nightgown in the middle of the day, for God’s sake—and if you looked hard, you could see her nipples. Her breasts were real, and bigger than I expected.

I put her down on the cot, even threw a blanket over her shoulders, because I remember reading that it’s always a good idea to cover yourself with a blanket when you take a nap, or you’ll get a bad chill. Couldn’t have that. Wouldn’t want pathetic, sweet-smelling Fiona catching her death.

So, I covered her up, then made sure the plastic bucket beside the cot was clean. I even left a roll of toilet paper beside it, so there’d be no question as to what the bucket was for. Plus I put several bottles of water—plastic, again—at the foot of the cot, in case she was thirsty when she woke
up. Then I retreated to my room upstairs to wait and watch for her awakening. Boy, what a letdown that was! I mean, there was no reaction at all. Zero. Zilch. Nada. Nothing. It was amazing. She just opened her eyes and sat up, like she’d been waking up in that room all her life. Didn’t even bother looking around. Just sat there, kind of slumped forward, her bare toes not quite touching the floor, as if she were sitting at the end of a dock, dangling her feet over the side. And then after about twenty minutes—twenty minutes!—she finally raised her eyes and started to examine her surroundings. Really slow, like she had all the time in the world, her head turning this way and that, to the right, then the left, her eyes moving up toward the ceiling, then back down to her feet. She saw the bucket, the bottles of water. She didn’t react. She just sat there, her eyes absorbing her predicament. Then, instead of jumping to her feet, instead of screaming, instead of running around in circles like the trapped little mouse she was, what did she do? She lay back down and closed her eyes again! She actually went to sleep. Can you believe that?

At first I thought it was some kind of trick, that she was being cagey, that she was smarter than I’d realized. I mean, who wakes up in a strange place and doesn’t panic, doesn’t at least get up and walk around, try the door, call out for help? Who just closes her eyes and blindly accepts her fate? I’ll tell you who—Fiona Hamilton, that’s who.

So there I was, up in my hiding place watching, and let me tell you, when I realized she’d actually gone back to sleep,
I
was the one who almost screamed out loud. I mean, how long was this going to take? But what could I do? So I just sat there, waiting for her to wake up again. After a while, I started to get worried. Had I miscalculated, given her too much chloroform? Was she dead? Dead before her time?

And then, after another thirty minutes—half an hour, for Pete’s sake!—her eyes fluttered open and she sat back up.
And this time, she actually managed to push herself to her feet. She walked to the door—I actually got quite excited—and then, guess what? She just stood there. She didn’t even try to open it. She just stared at it for a while, then went back to the cot and sat back down. It was really weird. I couldn’t believe my eyes. I still have trouble believing it.

Eventually she opened one of the water bottles at her feet and took a couple of long sips, then she used the bucket. And the toilet paper. Then she looked around for something to discard the paper in, and when she couldn’t find it—note to self: buy a small, plastic wastepaper basket—she tossed it into the corner. Then she sat back down again and waited. Did she know what she was waiting for?

As it turns out, she actually thought she was waiting for her loving husband. She thought this was all his doing, if you can believe that. As if Cal Hamilton has the imagination to come up with any of this. But that’s what she told me. She said she assumed she’d done something to displease him, and that this was his new way of punishing her.

But I’m getting ahead of myself.

When it became painfully obvious she wasn’t going to do anything to move the game forward, well, I have to admit, I almost panicked. I’m on a pretty tight schedule and I have to be careful not to arouse suspicion. I’ve tempted fate more than a few times lately, taken chances that were quite unnecessary, and I didn’t want to get too cocky. I knew that even if Fiona had all the patience in the world, her crazy turd of a husband didn’t. I knew he’d be out scouring the town as soon as he realized she was missing. Of course, I didn’t realize he’d actually go breaking into houses and assaulting people. That was kind of a bonus.

So I decided I might as well go home, give Fiona a few hours to get hungry and, hopefully, desperate. I know
I
was getting pretty hungry. And I had other things to do. So I left, came back later. And surprise! Fiona was sleeping. Can
you beat that? This woman was really starting to freak me out. I mean, what was the matter with her?

Obviously I had to alter the plan. There was no point in blindly following a course of action that was doomed to failure. So, I skipped the next part—the part where I really get to shine—and went right to the last phase. I went downstairs and unlocked the door.

Then I went inside.

If she heard me come in, she didn’t acknowledge it. Even after I sat down on the cot, right next to her feet, she didn’t budge. No, she just lay there sleeping. I watched her breathe, wondering if she was dreaming, and if so, what about?

I dream all the time, although some people tell you they don’t dream at all. They’re mistaken. The fact is that everybody dreams, although a lot of people don’t remember their dreams. But that doesn’t mean they don’t have them. Studies have clearly shown periods of deep sleep where we’re virtually unconscious, and periods where our subconscious takes over, speaking to us in a variety of symbols we often don’t understand and, even more often, don’t remember. These “dream times” are called REM. And just because we don’t remember these dreams, that doesn’t mean they aren’t important. Aside from releasing the accumulated stresses of the day, our dreams are trying to tell us something. They’re problem-solving. That’s why some people keep having the same dream over and over. These are called recurrent dreams, which people continue to have until they figure out what they mean and deal with them.

And while we’re on the topic of dreams, I had a really strange one the other night. It was quite upsetting. I was standing on a big stage, speaking to a full house. I don’t remember what my speech was about, but whatever it was, it was going really well. I was consistently being interrupted by spontaneous bursts of thunderous applause, and every so often a spotlight would come on in the auditorium and
I was able to look into the audience and see the smiling faces. But then suddenly, instead of applause, there was laughter. People started pointing their fingers. At me. And I looked down and saw that I was naked. Completely, bare-assed naked. And they were pelting me with candy wrappers and hard, chewed pieces of gum. Kids were holding up their cell phones and taking pictures of me. And nothing I said could make them stop. I was totally, utterly humiliated.