Missing: The Body of Evidence (13 page)

Kyle frowned at the mention of Logan’s
name. Nancy awaited the answer and his thoughts about their future working
together. He picked up his wine glass, swirled the contents around and then
drained his glass. He opened his mouth as if the wine had given him the courage
to answer her question about how to handle Logan if they announced they were an
item. A loud crashing sound outside stopped him from answering.

‘What the crap was that?’ Kyle said.

He moved swiftly out of the room and
returned with his backpack already unzipped and tipped the contents out on the
rug. He grabbed his revolver and a searchlight.

‘Wait here! Grab the poker.’ His tone left
under no illusion she wasn’t to move. He blew out the candles and headed for
the door. The five minutes he was gone seemed like five hours, when to her
relief he called out at the door.

‘It’s me, it was only a stag. The picket
fence is down.’

His flashlight danced around the room as he
opened the door and entered. Nancy turned on the light. Kyle re-lit the candles
and turned out the light.

‘Come on, let’s not have a stag ruin our
night,’ Kyle said.

Nancy placed the poker back in the stand,
while Kyle dropped to his knees, gathered up the contents of his backpack,
stuffed them back in his bag and tossed it on the sofa. Nancy settled back on
the cushions. Kyle seemed to have a look of confidence about him, and this time
there was no hesitating.

‘Where were we before we were rudely
interrupted? Oh, yeah, stuff Logan I say, move in with me, or, I can move in
with you. If things work out we can sell our apartments and buy a house in a
good neighbourhood.’

Her thoughts swirled around in her mind and
she found it hard to contain her excitement. A cloud descended to rain on her
glee. She cursed, as logic started to scramble the good notions in her head and
panic took hold.

‘What about our careers? Logan may just carry
out his threat.’ He looked disappointed at her reply as she gazed into his soul
through his eyes. ‘I’m not saying no, but how do we handle it at work?’

‘Be upfront. I’ll ask for a transfer to
another division.’

Nancy took a hold of his cheeks with her hands
and planted her lips on his. His arms embraced her and they kissed
passionately. They broke apart. She couldn’t believe his unselfishness.
Thoughts of her dad and the blame he dumped on her, for him having to leave the
army reared its ugly head. Words gushed out of her mouth and banished the
thought.

‘No... No, I’ll ask for a transfer, but you
have to promise me one thing?’

‘What’s that?’

‘Well two, actually. No leaving the toilet
seat up and no squeezing the tooth paste from the middle.’

They both roared with laughter.

‘You’re on. Incidentally how did your
appointment go at the doctor’s?’

‘Fine, I have to go for a scan on Monday as
a precaution, but I’ll be okay. How’d it go with the janitor?’

His mood changed as he swung into work
mode.

‘Oh, shit, Kelly. Well, I’ve been dreading
saying this, but it’s not suicide in my mind. He was slumped in the passenger
seat. There were four full cans of beer on his lap and two empty cans on the
ground outside the car. We found his hip flask in his pocket, but it was full.
He had the gun in his hand and the hole in his head made it look like suicide,
but...’

‘But what?’

‘The car wasn’t registered to him. We
checked with the previous owner and he says he sold it for cash two weeks ago,
but the description of the guy he sold it to didn’t fit that of Kelly. The
two-discarded beer cans on the ground left a wet patch. The depth the liquid
had seeped into the soil indicated they had been full when they were emptied.
I’m guessing whoever did it, wasn’t reckoning on someone reporting it so
quickly, when they poured the cans out on the ground. I don’t buy it, that an
alcoholic wouldn’t drink everything in sight before ending it. Then there’s the
note.’

‘Note?’

‘Yeah, found it lodged under the seat. It
had your name at the top and a list of times but with journalist’s shorthand
notes at the side of the times. When I had it deciphered, it shows whoever had
been taking the notes had been following you.’

‘What, it was Kelly who was following me?’

‘You saw him?’

‘No, but I think a black Toyota had been
following me for a few days. I thought maybe I was paranoid.’

‘I don’t think Kelly was following you.
Some of his handwriting taken from when we did the search at his apartment
didn’t match the note. I reckon whoever was following you killed him and lost
the note. I checked with his neighbours, but they didn’t think he had ever
owned a car. One of them said you’d been around the same night asking
questions.’

So that’s how Logan knew I’d been to his
apartment and why he asked if I thought that Kelly had been stalking me.
‘And you only tell me this now? Hang on there, is that why Logan
asked me for my movements at the time of Kelly’s death? Did he think I killed
him?’

‘Do you think you’d be here with me now if
he thought you had?’

Nancy wasn’t sure how to answer that
question, when another thought struck her.

‘What made you go to Bittersweet Butterfly
to buy the present?’

He looked uncomfortable, crossed his arms
across his chest, tugged at his short sleeves and bit his bottom lip. He let
out a sigh before answering.

‘I followed you when you left the office to
go for your doctor’s appointment, just in case you were being stalked by
whoever killed Kelly.’

‘But you were at the office when I arrived.’

‘I got a lucky break in traffic, caught up
and passed you. I only arrived minutes before you did. That’s why Logan kept
you in the office, for your own safety. I told him I’d take care of it after
you’d finished work.’

‘And you only tell me now! What if someone
wanted to attack me and you’d been busy in the shop buying the present?’

‘Yeah, sorry, it was stupid of me when I
think back, but no one was following you, only me.’

‘But I could be in danger now. You should
have told me. I haven’t even brought my gun.’ Nancy held up her hand as if to
surrender her dark mood that was fermenting and smiled outwardly.

‘Sorry, you’re right, I should have told
you right away, but it was only a hunch at the time. No one followed us here,
so you can relax.’

‘Forget it, let’s go to bed. My head’s
swimming with the wine.’
Logan was right, work and relationships don’t mix.
Damn, I wonder if Kyle thought I could have shot Kelly, until he had a chance
to run the theory past Logan?
The notion that they may not have trusted her
cut her deeply, and she was finding it hard to escape the dark thought. She
hoped that she was off the mark with the idea, but reasoned, that
was
why Logan questioned her movements at the time of Kelly’s death.

They both staggered to the bedroom under
the influence of too much wine. Nancy took off her silk robe and discarded it
on the floorboards. The bedside lamp almost tumbled from the surface of the
bedside drawers as she hit the ON switch. She grabbed the lamp, managed to stop
it crashing to the floor and then slipped between the sheets. She snickered at
the sight of Kyle tripping on his boxers as he tried to undress. Kyle threw
back the sheets and flopped onto the mattress. Kyle groaned.

‘Ohhh, my head,’

Nancy closed her eyes for a second. She
gripped the top sheet. The space around her spun, as if the bed was twisting
and turning, like a white water raft out of control on rapids. Her eyes opened
to end the nightmare. Acid rose from the pit of her stomach to her throat.
Instinct told her she was going to throw up the night’s feast. She threw back
the bedcovers and charged to the bathroom, just in time to say her prayers to
the porcelain god. The ordeal over with, she turned on the tap at the basin and
splashed water on her face. Her throat felt like she had a burr lodged in it.

She headed for the kitchen on autopilot,
until her eyes adjusted to the dark aided by the neon light on the
refrigerator. Nancy took the carton of milk from the refrigerator, took a swig
and put the carton back on the shelf. Her throat felt a little better, but she
still felt dizzy. She put her hand to her scalp, relieved that the side effects
of a night drinking wine had dulled the pain in her head. A hot shudder passed
through her body. Nancy wiped sweat from her forehead. The light in the kitchen
flickered. The hissing sound of energy and sparks behind the light switch cover
made it glow. Dancing light flooded the kitchen from the living room, creating
eerie shadows. The temperature seemed to rise fast, making it difficult to
breathe. She rushed into the living room to see all the candles lit.

‘Kyle, you there?’

A cold blast of air hit her face and the
candle flames flickered and died. Nancy located Kyle’s backpack on the sofa,
and took out his flashlight. An ice cold wave ran through her body at the sense
there was a presence in the room. Nancy opened a closet door in the living
room, located the main energy switch and turned it off. She wondered if Kyle
had maybe gone looking for her, lit the candles and gone back to bed. She
rushed to the bedroom and shone the light on the bed. Kyle was asleep in the foetal
position. Nancy climbed into bed beside him, turned off the flashlight and put
it on the surface of the bedside drawer. She drew her body into the contours of
Kyle’s body, and placed her arm around him.

‘I was thinking, what if the janitor’s son,
David, had killed him, and they had both been stalking me? Incidentally, did
you just light the candles?’

Nancy sighed at the lack of a response and
drifted off to sleep.

Through bleary eyes, Nancy awoke and
turned to look at Kyle. Even as he slept, she felt secure in his presence. The
conversation from the evening before flooded her thoughts. The notion she had
committed to them living together, felt natural. Her fingers ruffled his hair.
Kyle grunted and turned away from her. She sank her head into her feathered
pillow, a smile on her lips. She closed her eyes to the sentiment of the lyrics
from
Flying Without Wings,
and thought that maybe, at last, she had
found that special someone to make her life complete. There was a sense that
she was floating, like a free spirit, when she suddenly came to an abrupt halt,
as if she had hit an impregnable wall and it had knocked the breath out of her
.
She opened her eyes.

Lying on the bed, on her back, she was
unable to move a muscle, while an unseen pressure pinned her to the mattress,
just as in her previous dream. She was aware of Kyle lying beside her, but
couldn’t call out to him, or lift a finger to warn him of her plight. A naked
figure, enveloped in flames, faced her from the open bedroom doorframe. The
abstract features on the face of the figure appeared uncannily like the
janitor’s son. The glow from the figure lit the bedroom, casting a searing heat
toward her.

Another human figure appeared at the
bottom of the bed, with its back facing toward her. This naked figure had the
appearance of being translucent, as if formed from silicone jelly. The silicone
figure between her and the flaming figure afforded some respite from the
searing heat emanating from the apparition at the door. The silicone figure
held out his arms to form a cross with his body and rose above the bed. An
almost transparent veil appeared between the fiery figure and the silicone
figure, further shielding the heat, and the temperature dropped. The fiery figure
posed in a stance as if making ready to pitch a baseball. A ball of fire left
the palm of his hand and struck the veil. The veil acted as an energy field and
absorbed the fireball, extinguishing the flames. The silicone figure brought
his arms together in front of him, causing the veil to envelop the other figure
and hold it captive. The body of the silicone figure remained facing forward as
his head turned full circle to face her. The face carried the exact features of
the janitor’s son, down to the press studs embedded in the skull. His lips
didn’t move but she heard the words.

‘You must leave, turn off your cell
phone, and get out of here.’

The apparitions disappeared as quickly as
they had appeared. Nancy broke free from her paralysis and sat up, gasping for
breath.

The temperature in the bedroom at the
cabin returned to normal. Nancy pinched at the flesh on her thigh. The fleeting
pain told her she was at least awake. Her head throbbed, she assumed from too
much wine from the night before. She turned and looked at Kyle. He was still
curled up in the same foetal position, with his back to her, from when he had
drifted off to sleep.

The nightmare had annoyed her, rather than
caused her alarm. If the doctor had been right in his interpretation of her
dream, then she failed to see why it had recurred. After last night’s earnest
conversation with Kyle, she thought she was no longer in a place from which she
needed to escape; on the contrary, she had everything to look forward to in a
new beginning. Kyle groaned and turned over to face her. He opened one eye and
his mouth contorted in an Elvis curl. He didn’t exactly look like the man of
her dreams, with his hair standing on end like Stan Laurel. A night’s growth
under his nose ran down to his jaw line.

‘Morning.’

‘Morning.’ She stroked the stubble on his
chin. ‘Breakfast?’

‘Just a coffee would be fine. I don’t think
my palette would taste anything just yet.’ He stuck out his tongue.’

‘Ughh, that’s disgusting. Put it away.’ The
white fur on his tongue looked as though bacteria had decided to colonize it
overnight.

‘Come here and give me a kiss.’

‘Not with that thing in your mouth. Wait
until you’ve cleaned your teeth. I’ll leave some mouthwash out on the sink top.’

The crunching sound of tyres on gravel
outside caught her attention.

‘Sounds like the handyman is here.’

Nancy threw back the quilt and jumped out
of bed. After a shower, she dressed, slipping on a T-shirt and jeans over her
underwear. A glance at Kyle, and he rolled over, burying his head in the
pillow. In the living room, Nancy set about clearing the leftovers from the
picnic and placed the cushions back on the sofa. The curtains on the small
window next to the front door fluttered in the breeze.

‘Damn, must’ve forgotten to close it last
night and that’s what caused the candles to go out.’

Nancy walked over to the window and opened
the curtain. The handyman was busy emptying the back of his SUV of picket fence
slats. Nancy called out to him.

‘I’m making coffee, do you want one?’

‘Mighty kind, Ma’am, but no thanks.’

‘There’s a problem with the light switch in
the kitchen, do you think you could take a look at it for me. I need the
electric switched on to make a coffee.’

‘Sure, right away.’

Nancy opened the door for him and he walked
in carrying a toolbox. She followed him to the kitchen and watched him as he
removed the cover on the light switch. He looked like a frontiersman who had
stepped out of the eighteen hundreds. His hair was as long as his flowing white
beard which failed to hide his bright red cheeks. He wore a long sleeved chequered
shirt with suspenders holding up his chamois pants. His belt held a hunting
knife in a sheath covered with a pattern of coloured beads, and which looked
like it had been fashioned by Native Americans. He poked around with his
screwdriver and then turned to her.

‘Can’t see anything, but I’ve tightened up
the connections. Can you switch on the mains for me please, ma’am.’

Nancy scuttled out of the kitchen, opened
the closet door, flicked on the main switch and returned to the kitchen.

‘Seems okay to me, now. We have a bunch of
problems with power outages in this neck of the woods. Usually the lights just
dim, but if it goes off at the sub-station, it can cause a surge when it comes
back on.’

The handyman snapped his toolbox shut and
left through the kitchen door. The refrigerator was buzzing loudly.
Oh no,
the milk.
She grasped at the refrigerator handle, opened the door, grabbed
the carton of milk and held it to her nose.
Thank God.
The milk carton
was warm, but luckily, the milk hadn’t soured. Nancy switched on the kettle and
headed outside to have a look around.

The smell of pine hit her senses. It made a
wonderful change from the foul polluted air back in LA. She stood for a moment
and took a deep breath. The view before her astounded her. The cabin sat on a
small plateau set in the hillside. The rolling hill before her, covered in low
brush, ran down to a creek in the valley. Beyond that were the pine covered
mountains, set against a clear turquoise sky. She headed around the back of the
cabin. The handyman stood in the back yard next to a solitary tree stripped of
bark at the bottom of the trunk. He took off his hat and scratched his scalp.

‘Damn stag, all these hectares of trees and
he has to take a liking for this here one.’

‘Yeah, he paid us a visit last night. Gave
us a shock.’

‘I’ll mend the picket fence and build a
frame to encircle and protect the tree. I hope it won’t inconvenience you none?’

‘Nah, don’t worry. I don’t think we’ll be
having a barbecue today. We’ll be off on the trails hiking.’

‘Good thing, it’s hot as hell and dry as
tinder out here, don’t want to be lighting no fires or the sparks could set the
whole mountain alight.’

The back yard was small, with a gate and
path at the bottom leading to a steep slope covered in brush, toward a line of
pine trees on the ridge of the hillside. Nancy made her way back inside the
cabin. Kyle was in the kitchen pouring the coffee and his grin greeted her.

‘You do remember all we said last night?’

‘No,’ she lied. ‘What was that? I was
drunk.’ He looked hurt, but she could not hold a straight face and started to
laugh. ‘Of course, I can remember, come here. You have brushed your teeth?’

‘Yeah, and gargled with your mouthwash.’

She threw her arms around his waist and
they shared a minty-flavoured kiss.

‘What are we doing today?’ Kyle asked as
they broke apart and he passed her a coffee.

Nancy held the mug to her nose, savoured
the aroma and took a sip.

‘Hmmm, that tastes good. I was thinking
that maybe we could hike along the trails, but not too far. The doctor says I
shouldn’t do anything too energetic. We could go to the lake out back this
morning for you to do some fishing. After a light lunch we could go for a walk
along the trails.’

‘Sounds good to me, that way we both get to
do what we like. How far is the lake? Have you been there before?’

Nancy stopped to think. She had been to the
area before, but never to a lake and wondered why she had said what she had
about the lake. Then it struck her. The dreams of her travelling with David to
the cabin, that’s where she had seen a lake.

‘You see a ghost or something?’

‘It’s... I... em. Look, don’t laugh.’ She
hesitated.
What the hell, no point in having secrets.
‘You’re gonna
think I’m three cents short of a dollar. I don’t think there will be a lake.
It’s just something I plucked from a dream of how I imagined the surrounding
area to look.’

‘One way to find out. I’ll ask the
handyman. If there isn’t a lake, fine, there’s always the creek.’ Kyle seemed
totally unfazed and made to leave the kitchen. ‘Back soon.’

Nancy went to sit on the sofa. She hoped he
would return to tell her there wasn’t a lake. He came back with a big smile.

‘There’s a lake over the ridge out back,
and he says there’s some good fishing to be had.’

A cold shiver trembled its way through her
body.

‘Lucky coincidence, then.’

‘Yeah, looks like it. Now I just need you
to dream I catch lots of fish.’

They both laughed, but inside, Nancy was
unnerved. All she hoped for was that the scene at the lake was like nothing
from her dream. Kyle gathered his fishing tackle and they set of to the lake.
Kyle walked briskly ahead. The handyman was busy nailing new slats on the
picket fence when Nancy passed him. She stopped for a moment and turned to face
him.

‘The children who were here before us left
a note asking me to say hi.’

‘Children? Ain’t seen no children, ma’am.
Just got back from a two-week vacation.’

His answer wiped the smile from her face.

‘You are David?’

‘Sure am.’