Love Is The Bond: A Rowan Gant Investigation (4 page)

She should know by now that purity couldn’t
satisfy the hunger.

She finished closing her garment bag and
tugged on the zipper. When it didn’t immediately yield to her pull,
she gave it a violent jerk then shrieked at it. “Dammit!”

“Dammit…” She muttered the word again, her
angry voice held low under her breath. “That fat bastard just had
to ruin it…”

It was entirely his fault. She would be fine
right now if it wasn’t for him.

She couldn’t believe it. The sensory
deprivation, smothering, the razor; shit, even the gun didn’t make
him afraid. And, he had known it was the real thing, it was
his own goddamned
gun! He just kept
getting more excited no matter what she did to him. No matter what
she threatened, there was no fear. Even after she would carry out a
torture and follow it with psychological intimidation, implying
that worse was to come, he would just get that much more
aroused.

What a complete pervert he was! He was even
so wrapped up in the game that he didn’t need manual stimulation.
He just got off right there on the bathroom floor.

Damn the premature fucker.

She hadn’t been ready. Not yet.

None of them were ready.
Especially
her
.

She hadn’t even had a chance to open her
attaché, much less do the ritual.

Damn him!

And, if that wasn’t enough, when he had blown
his load, it got all over one of her shoes. Good damn thing he was
carrying a healthy wad of cash. Her fees didn’t include having a
three hundred dollar pair of suede pumps ruined by the likes of
him.

But, even though he had the cash, it still
made her angry.

And, when she got angry, she made mistakes.
Mistakes like the one she made last night when she pulled the
trigger.

No, she hadn’t been ready.

Dammit, dammit, dammit, she just wasn’t ready
yet! And it was his fault! A few more minutes and maybe it would
have been the right time. Maybe she could have evoked some fear,
and then they would have been satiated. And if they were satiated,
then she could have taken him quietly, and she would have had her
reward.

But not this time…

Now, they were turning their backs on
her.

She
was
ignoring her.

She
was going
to let her suffer.

She was being punished because of him.

She finished snapping the closures on the
garment bag and hefted it from the bed then placed it near the door
with her laptop and makeup case.

As she stood there, the word “no” suddenly
rang through her head born of an ethereal voice.

She didn’t move. She simply continued staring
at the luggage, trying to ignore the command.

The hunger continued deep within, hunger that
went far beyond the physical. She closed her eyes, waiting for the
gnawing sensation to pass, but as she feared it only grew
stronger.

They needed to be fed. No…
She
needed to be fed.

She opened her eyes then stepped over to the
window and absently peered through at the sparkling downtown Saint
Louis skyline. Crossing her arms, she hugged herself tightly as if
steeling against the chilly darkness.

“Not yet,” she murmured. “Not here. It’s too
soon.”

The hunger didn’t listen. She could hear the
response echoing in her ears with an unnatural hiss, “Yeesssss…
Nowwwww…”

“No,” she objected quietly, her voice almost
a whimper.

“Yeesssss,” the voice returned. “Ssssheee
demandssss a ssssacrificssssse forrr yourrrr failurrrrreeee…”

She allowed her head to hang forward,
squeezing her eyes tightly shut once more. What had she done? What
pact had she made that now brought her to this point of
addiction?

The voice echoed again, “Yeesssss… Nowwwww…
Ssssheeee demandssss theeeee ssssacrificssssse…”

Slowly, she reached to the desk and picked up
the phone then reluctantly tapped in a number with a lacquered
nail.

“Yes,” she said after listening to an overly
cheerful greeting from the concierge. “Suite 1233. Could you let
the front desk know in the morning that I am going to need the room
for an extra day, perhaps two… Yes… No, I would really prefer to
keep the same room… Yes… No, just some fresh towels… Yes… Thank
you.”

After she nestled the handset back into the
cradle, she looked over at her luggage, all packed and ready to go.
She hadn’t planned for this, and she would be needing a few things.
She then glanced over to the aluminum attaché sitting on the desk
next to her purse.

With a resigned sigh, she stalked over to the
baggage, retrieved her computer case and began unzipping it as she
made her way to the desk. She might as well get started.

She needed someone to have for dinner,
and it couldn’t be just anyone. No, the demand had been too
specific.
She
wanted
the
sacrifice, and for this occasion,
it needed to be someone very special.

Fortunately, she wouldn’t have to go far. She
already knew him very well.

Tuesday, November 8

3:07 A.M.

A completely unexpected pain bit into my
side. It was sharp and unpleasant but not what one would call
agonizing. In fact, it was really just more along the lines of
“insistently uncomfortable.” Still, whether agonizing or not, I
rolled over out of reflex, moving in what my muddied brain
perceived to be the opposite direction of the vexation.

My head was buzzing as an obnoxious clamor
droned in my ears, and I might have focused in on that disquiet
were it not for the fact that it suddenly, and thankfully, fell
silent. I started to dwell on it anyway, or at least I think that’s
what I was doing. I couldn’t be sure because the dwelling didn’t
last very long. Apparently, my sleepiness-reduced serotonin levels
were more than enough to convince me it wasn’t worth the time. In
what was probably a span of no more than a second, I started
drifting back into the comfortable darkness of sleep.

Of course, it was at about this point in time
that the pain returned, just as sharp and even more unpleasant than
before. This time it arrived in conjunction with a repeat of the
raucous droning followed by a string of unintelligible speech.
Neurons dutifully awakened inside my head, hurried through their
electrochemical greetings with one another, then informed me that
the elbow of the woman beside me in the bed was the instrument of
my torture. Next, I was made privy to the fact that the droning
noise had most assuredly been the ringer on the telephone.

However, my brain still couldn’t interpret
the muddled string of syllables. A full translation being unlikely,
and not being satisfied with simply getting two out of the three,
it did the next best thing and gave me a short list of
possibilities. The top pick among them was something akin to my
wife telling me to answer the phone. Of course, after all of that
thinking being foisted upon me, I was actually awake enough to lay
money down that said pick was dead on the mark.

I groaned and sent my hand searching for the
telephone on the nightstand. As I groped in the dark, using only
one barely open eye for guidance, a passing thought rolled through
my brain: If the thing had a longer cord, I could move it to
Felicity’s side of the bed. It sounded like a good solution at the
moment, but I knew she would probably just move it back. I tried to
dismiss the idea, but something in the mind-fog kept reminding me
that this was the reason she was still sleeping and I wasn’t.

I managed to wrap my hand around the receiver
and yank it from the base just as it started its annoying clamor
once again. Unfortunately, I was a split second too late to avoid a
third purposeful jab and annoyed burst of gibberish from my
grumbling wife.

I winced and tried to roll out of her reach
without falling off the side of the bed. I wasn’t overjoyed about a
phone call in the middle of the night to begin with. Getting
physically abused over it definitely wasn’t helping my mood. Right
about then, another thought shot rapidly through my grey matter:
Was this just going to be a hang-up? We’d had more than our share
of those, at all hours, over the past few years. So many, in fact,
that we’d had our number changed several times. All had been quiet
for a while now, so it actually wouldn’t be a big surprise for the
prank calls to be starting up again.

“This had better be good,” I muttered as I
pushed the handset up next to my ear. At least, that was what I
thought I said. Judging from the response I received, apparently
what I was thinking and what was coming out of my mouth were
mutually exclusive.

“What?” Detective Benjamin Storm’s somewhat
confused sounding voice filtered into my ear. “That you, white
man?”

My heretofore-sluggish synapses instantly
began arcing at full speed as I pushed myself upright and fought to
disentangle my lower half from the bedding. A sickening feeling of
déjà vu was setting in, and I didn’t like it one bit.

Next to Felicity, Ben Storm was undoubtedly
my best friend in the world. He was exactly the kind of friend for
whom you would do just about anything without question and knew
beyond any doubt he would do the same for you. However, as close as
we were, neither of us were in the habit of calling the other in
the middle of the night just to socialize.

No, we had been down this road far too many
times in the past few years. If he was calling at an odd hour, it
was guaranteed not to be pleasant news, and more often than not, I
had a pounding headache of ethereal origin to prove it. This time,
however, my head felt just fine. Maybe still a bit groggy but
completely devoid of pain. Given the circumstances, that just
piqued my curiosity even more.

“Ben?” I replied, this time managing to keep
my tongue from wrapping around my teeth.

“Yeah,” he replied. “Woke ya’ up, didn’t
I?”

I cast an eye at the glowing numbers on
the bedside clock. When I replied I couldn’t keep the sarcasm out
of my voice. “What do
you
think?”

“Uh-huh, well ya’ can go back ta’ sleep in a
minute, Kemosabe. So listen, can ya’ put Felicity on the
phone?”

“What’s wrong?”

“I’m a homicide cop, and it’s three in the
fuckin’ mornin’, Row. Whaddaya think’s wrong?” he retorted, his own
snippet of sarcasm underlining the words. “Lemme talk ta’ your
wife.”

“Ben…” I allowed my questioning voice to
trail off.

“Row,” he replied succinctly then fell
silent.

After an extended verbal staring contest, I
spoke. “Tell me what’s up, Ben.”

“You got some
Twilight Zone
goin’ on?” he asked, using his
favorite turn of phrase for my supernatural visions.

“No.”

“Good.”

“Well, should I?”

“No, so put yer wife on the phone.”

“But…”

He cut me off. “Listen, Row, chill out. For
once it’s not all about you, okay? Now, lemme talk to
Felicity.”

Even though he wasn’t willing to give me the
details, his comment about being a homicide cop spoke volumes. The
fact that he was calling for Felicity also told me that I had been
correct about Murphy and his damnable law. I obviously wouldn’t be
going back to sleep anytime soon.

I conceded. “Hold on…”

Out of reflex, I sent my free hand searching
through the darkness and switched on my reading lamp then mutely
cursed myself for the action as I squinted against the sudden
influx of light. With a groan I reached over and gave my slumbering
wife a far gentler nudge than she had previously afforded me. She
shrugged, grumbled something just as unintelligible as her earlier
string of syllables and then tried to roll away as she pulled the
comforter up over her face. I hooked my hand into the bedding and
tossed it back with a quick yank, unceremoniously exposing her to
the cool air in the room. This time I had no trouble understanding
the Gaelic curse that flew from her lips.

“Damnú ort!
”
she yelped as she flailed an arm about in search of the
blanket.

Leaning back, I gently caught her wrist
mid-grope then stretched the telephone receiver across the bed. I
stuffed the device into her hand and carefully pushed it toward her
ear.

“It’s for you” was all I said before laying
back against my pillow.

I didn’t know why I was even bothering. I was
fully awake now.

I listened to the one-sided conversation as
she answered with “uh-huh’s” and “umm, yeah’s” for a moment then
finally pushed herself up on an elbow and asked, “Are you sure?…
But I thought… Yeah… Okay then, just a second, let me find a
pen…”

What I was hearing from this side didn’t
sound good at all. I gave in and pushed myself into a sitting
position then swung my legs over the side of the bed. Felicity was
still searching for something to write with when I stood up and
headed for the bathroom.

If my wife was about to apply her warm,
artistic talent to the face of cold, brutal reality, I was going to
be there to make sure she stayed
behind
the camera.

* * * * *

“You just filled out the paperwork a few days
ago.” I called into the dining room from the kitchen. “Have they
even had time to get you on the list?”

I was already dressed and was brewing a fresh
pot of coffee by the time Felicity had taken down the address of
the scene and started slipping into some clothes herself. Now, I
was removing the lids from a pair of oversized travel mugs while my
wife gathered together the photographic equipment she thought she
might need.