Widow Town (17 page)

The man touched the side of Ryan’s
face in the darkness, almost the way he had done to Miles, and Ryan couldn’t contain the shudder that coursed through him.

“You’re within the fold now,
Ryan. Welcome to the rebirth.”

Gray woke to the first strands of daylight seeping in through his window.

His dream followed him up through sleep and he lay there, immersed in its embrace. There had been rain, a downpour that washed the fields in silver sheets. It was gentle but steady, unyielding in a
natural and graceful way that only summer storms possess. The cracked ground had become solid once again, the green coming back to the trees and bushes almost at once. He had watched it all from inside his house, watched the water gather and begin to flow in the channel. He had watched his daughter play in the puddles, her small feet splashing each one with yellow boots, a hat pulled down over her head. Flashes of her smile beneath the hat’s brim. Lynn’s smile.

Gray stood and made his way downstairs to the kitchen. He
prepared coffee, listening to the pot chuckle as he looked out at the dry streambed. No water, no life, no laughter.

His phone jittered on the counter and he picked it up, glan
ced at the number and answered.

“Monty, it’s too early for shenanigans.” Gray listened
to his deputy speak and slowly leaned on the counter. A long sigh escaped him. “I’ll be there as soon as I can.” He set the phone down and stared at a blank spot on the wall. With a sudden batting motion he knocked his empty coffee cup off the counter and into the far wall where it shattered, spraying shards of porcelain in every direction. He watched a spinning piece dance on the floor and then fall still before he left the room to dress.

~

When he rounded the corner on the third floor a sense of déjà vu swept over him. Dr. Barder stood outside Miles’s door along with the much shorter form of Monty Wells. A man no older than twenty-five leaned against the wall, his eyes focused on the phone in his hand. He wore a dark blue uniform with a golden patch in the form of an eagle sewn to its shoulder and left breast. Gray walked past him and nodded once as he neared Monty and Barder.

“Morning
, Sheriff,” Monty said, his paunchy face drawn tight beneath his hat.

“I’m so glad you didn’t say ‘good’ before that, Monty,” Gray said, stopping near the doorway. Muted sobs came from within the room, lamentat
ions of a soul that has broken.

“
Dr. Barder,” Gray said, extending a hand.

Barder shook it.
There were deep lines around the doctor’s eyes. “Sheriff. Sorry to see you so soon again.”

“Likewi
se. What happened to him?”

Barder shook his head. “I’m not entirely sure of the cause yet but late last night Mr. Baron had a massive stroke as well as a coronary hematoma. It was very violent in nature.
I checked on him during my rounds an hour or so before and he was resting peacefully.”

Gray turned his head toward the door as a louder wail rose and then fell. “W
hat could have caused it?”

“It may have been a number of things but most likely it was due to some trauma that he underwent while he was being held captive. A blood clot could have formed somewhere in his
system that our initial scans didn’t pick up. Even with the advanced technology we have at our disposal the body still can keep its secrets if it wants to. It appears he had some sort of seizure which dislocated the clot and then pumped it to a vital area such as the brain, causing almost immediate death.”

“Sonofabitch,” Gray said.

“I thought you should know so I called the department and deputy Wells here said he would contact you.”

“Thank you, doctor. Miles was a
friend.” Gray rubbed his eyes, mashing the fatigue from them. “How long have they been in there?”

“A half hour or so,” Barder said, lowering his gaze to the floor. “You never get used to hearing that sound. But I’m sure you gentleme
n know all about that.”

“Yes sir, we do,” Monty said.

The man in the blue uniform approached their group and pocketed his phone. He chewed a piece of gum and the powerful odor of mint hung around him like a cloud.

“So am I good to go, yet?” the man aske
d.

“I would assume so, but I’ll let the sheriff decide that,” Barder answered. “This is Justin Hawkins from Spire Security. He was supposed to be on
duty for this morning’s shift.”

Gray began to turn to the younger man but stopped. “You mean he was relieving the other guard that was on duty overnight, right?” Gray said, looking first at the doctor and then at the security officer.

“No one was on duty overnight,” Justin said, snapping his gum with a loud crack.

“What do you mean, no one was on duty?” Gray
asked, rounding fully on him.

“Just what I said
. We were contracted for shifts from seven a.m. to seven p.m. That’s it.”

Gray inhaled a long breath. “She
riff Enson hired your company?”

“Yep, far as I know.”

Gray closed his eyes and shook his head. “Damn him.”

“So are we good, or
—”

“Yeah, we’re good,” Gray said, his voice taking on an acidic edge. “
Get out of here.”

The younger man nodded and walked away, checking his phone again as he r
ounded the corner out of sight.

“He hired a fucking rent-a-cop instead of placing one of his own deputies here,” Gray said to Monty and Barder as he turned back to them. “And he didn’t ev
en pay them to stay overnight.”

“Well, to be honest,
Sheriff, it didn’t matter in this case, correct? I mean, the man who was responsible is dead and Mr. Baron died of natural causes,” Barder said.

Gray looked down at the floor and then brought his gaze back to the doctor. “Could anyone have done t
his to him? Caused it somehow?”

“The blood clot?”

“Yes.”

“Not that I’m aware of. The body naturally forms clots but usually they aren’t released into the blood stream
. There are a few chemical agents that could form clots but their effects would kill a person much faster than the clot they cause.” Barder ran a hand through his light hair and blinked. “I’m very sorry, gentlemen, but I’ve been on shift way too long. I need some sleep.”

“Thank you, doctor,” Gray said.

“You’re welcome, and I’m sorry for your loss, I didn’t know Mr. Baron personally but he seemed to have many people who cared about him.”

“
He was a good man,” Monty said.

“Yes he was,” Gray said.

“By the way, how’re the lungs feeling, Sheriff?”

“Better, I’
m keeping up with the inhaler.”

“Good deal. Please cal
l me with any other questions.”

“We will,” Gray said. He watched the lanky physician proceed down the hall and turn at the corridor junction. A black orb mounted in the ceiling snagged Gray’s attention and he t
urned, looking at Miles’s door.

“Well, I guess that’s that, as they say,
Sheriff,” Monty said, tugging at his duty belt to fit it higher over his round stomach.

Gray turned back to look at the camera in the ceiling. “Who the hell are
‘they,’ Monty?”

“Not sure.”

Gray started down the hall, his eyes dead beneath his hat. “I’m not either.”

~

The video room wasn’t much more than a glorified broom closet. Gray looked around it as he entered behind the slender IT coordinator, whose name he thought was Delly. One wall held a thin viewing strip above a keyboard. The technology was completely wireless so the room had a disused look, the desk blank except for a finger pad and a stale cup of coffee. The viewing strip was segmented into dozens of smaller videos, all showing rooms or corridors in the hospital.

“You were concerned about the west third floor hallway?” Delly asked. She had long red hair that hung above her
waistline in a tight braid.

“That’s right,” Gray said, trying to turn in the small space to accommodate Monty’s presence. After a few attempts by Monty to struggle
past him, Gray shook his head.

“It won’t do, Monty, just wait outside for now. There’s not enough air in he
re for the three of us anyway.”

“Sorry, the room was an afterthought when they built the building since all of the technology service is hosted offsite. This is just a control center and no one thought we needed a large room for that,” Delly said, tu
rning back to the viewing wall.

“Feels like a bomb shelter.”

“A what?”

“Never mind. How f
ar back does the recording go?”

“From when the service was turned on
. We could go back to day one.”

“Good. Can we see last night from the time the guard left Mr. Baron’s door t
o this morning when I arrived?”

“Sure thing.” Delly’s long fingers flicked across the finger
pad. The screen before them changed, one square in the upper corner filling up the bulk of the video. The picture contained a view from the ceiling of the third floor hallway. A nurse pushed a patient on a rolling cart, the man’s eyes closed to the harsh light. The scene flickered and changed. A man in an identical uniform as the guard from earlier walked toward the camera and disappeared from view.

“Here we go,” Delly said. “Would you like to spool through it in r
eal time or a different speed?”

“You can go faster, just so that we can see if someone goes in or out of that room on the end.” Gray tapped the screen where Miles’s door sat. It was definable but small even with the enlargement. Motions became hurried on the video. Nurses, doctors, and patients all passed through the viewing area at quadruple their actual speed. Sunshine angled into the hall through a window and moved in a smooth arc as the evening passed into night. Gray recognized Dr. Barder making his rounds and then exiting the scene.
Headlights from the parking lot swung across the hallway several times, blazing and then gone. After that the video seemed to still with no movement for a short time and then a rush of activity filled the screen.

A line of nurses rushed down the hallway to Miles’s room and flooded inside. A moment later two ran back the way they’d come
before reentering the picture rolling a narrow cart between them. Barder followed close behind and all was still for several seconds, then the activity began again with various hospital personal hurrying to and fro, their movements frenetic, the looks on their faces harried then gone.

Gray watched the screen, his eyes never
leaving Miles’s door. The hunched form of Renna supported by David moved down the corridor, their motions choppy and stunted before they vanished inside the room. At last the video calmed and the uniformed guard strode into view, his movements lazy even in fast forward.

“Th
at’s enough, thank you, Delly.”

“Sure thing. Can I
ask what you were looking for?”

“
Anything, but I didn’t see it.”

“Well, let me know if you need
any more help,” she gestured to the close walls. “This is my kingdom.”

Gray smiled.
“Thank you, I may be in touch.”

He
exited the confined space and adjusted his hat. Sunlight streamed in through a bank of high windows above a stairway at the end of the hall. Monty waited for him near a drinking fountain, watching nurses pass by. He straightened up as Gray neared and cleared his throat.

“Got what you needed,
Sheriff?”

“No.”

“Oh. Uh, well what’re we—”

“You can go home, Joseph will be coming on in fifteen. Appreciate you calling m
e this morning.”

“No problem
. What’s on your agenda today?”

Gray walk
ed toward the stairway, the sun too bright on the floor. “Have to get my chores done before the ball or wicked stepmother won’t let me go.”

Monty
shook his head, his face scrunching up before he followed Gray down the sunlit stairs.

Rachel woke in a panic, realizing only as she rose from the depths of sleep that she hadn’t managed to stay awake.

She sat up on the narrow bed, stretching her legs in a flare of pain as the feeling came back to them. The air was cool but not cold, the subtle odor of wet concrete invading her nose. Her eyes flew to the transparent wall across from the bed and found the sleeping form of Ken lying half on and half off the mattress situated
on the floor of the next cell.

A sob
slipped from her mouth as she stood and moved to the composite glass that separated them. She placed a hand against the barrier, reaching out to him while steadying herself at the same time, tears running down her cheeks. His little knees were on the hard concrete while his upper body rested on the mattress. No blanket covered him and as she watched, he turned his head in his sleep, tucking his bare arms beneath him. He was cold.

Rachel sobbed again and looked around the room. The
simple bed against the wall, a water fountain in the corner, a toilet next to it, the steel door without a handle set in the concrete. Nothing else. A scream welled up inside her and she clamped her mouth shut against it. She didn’t want to wake Ken up, now that he’d calmed down and wasn’t crying anymore.

The door to Ken’s cell
squeaked and then swung open.

Rachel pressed herself against the glass, her hands balled into fists.
A man came into Ken’s room, not bothering to shut the door behind him. His eyes found hers and he smiled as he approached her son and gently moved his lower half onto the bed.

“Don’t you touch him! Don’t you
dare hurt him!” Rachel yelled.

He
looked up at her, the constant cold smile on his face. He turned and sat on the bed near Ken’s head and began to stroke his dark hair.

“He’s
finally sleeping,” the man said, his voice filtering into her room through several vents in the ceiling.

“I’ll kill you, I’ll kill you if you hurt him,” Rachel said through the tears that thr
eatened to choke off her voice.

“I don’t doubt you would, Rachel, but seeing that
you’re in there and I’m in here, there’s not a whole lot you can do.”

“What do you want?”

The smile again. A snake’s grin. “I want the natural order of things to be restored, Rachel. The balance is off and the world knows it. There must be equality in all things, don’t you agree?”

“I don’t k
now what you’re talking about.”

“I know yo
u don’t, but someday you will.”

“Let us go, please. I won’t tell anyone about what happened. We’ll l
eave town and never come back.”

The man laughed. “Oh Rachel, let’s not be banal. You know that would never work. You would call the police the moment you were free, we both know that
, so let’s dispense with the pleas for freedom, you’re wasting your breath.”

“Please, just don’t hurt us.”

The man stroked Ken’s hair one last time, tenderly rubbing his forehead with a thumb before he stood and walked closer to the glass. “This is what I’m talking about. Your groveling is nauseating. Your weakness surrounds you like a filthy cloud. You
stink
of it.”

“I’ll do anything, anything,”
she said, the strength slowly seeping from her legs. She slid down the glass to her knees, her hands still pressed to the barrier.

“Yes, you will.
Sometime soon one of the men who took you from your house will come to you. You’ll do whatever he wants or your son dies while you watch. Do you understand?”

Rachel’s breath stuttered out
of her in short blasts. “Yes.”

“If you try to escape, your son dies. If you refuse to eat or drink, he di
es. It’s all very simple, yes?”

“Yes.”

“Good, I’m glad we have an understanding. You’ll find the more cooperative you are the better things will be. Ken will not be harmed if you behave, his salvation lies in you.”

His last words must have struck him funny for the man began to chuckle, a grating sound that echoed in flat tones through the vents. Rachel shook, her entire body trembling
with barely contained violence.

“I know you want to kill me,” he said. “And that’s good, it gives me
hope for the future.”

She
said nothing, only stared at her captor.

“I’ll let you rest now, you’ve both been through an ordeal but you’ll get
used to it here; the routine, the way life flows. It will all become normal soon enough. When faced with something day in and day out, anything can become normal.”

The man turned away, graceful in his movements, fluid like floating death. He stopped at the door and pivoted back around for a last look into the cell. Rachel watched him, the tremors ceasing in her and gi
ving way to a coating of sweat.

“I almost forgot,”
he said. “I announced your arrival here this morning and I have a message for you.” He waited, the silence between them stretching out.

“Yes?”
Her voice barely cleared her mouth.

“Joslyn says ‘hello’.
”

The man smiled one last time and shut the door, its lock snapping
home loud in the sea of quiet.