“You’re kidding? Jesus, Bill, you were there only one day!”
“That’s all it takes sometimes when you’re good,” Shannon said with a tight grin.
“And of course, modest.”
“Of course.” Shannon’s grin turned into something more weary. “I picked up enough signals talking to Linda’s parents to make me suspicious about the abuse, but I also got lucky. Or as you like to say, maybe I created my own luck.”
“And how did you accomplish that?”
“When I arrived in Wichita I stopped off at their main police station to let them know why I was in town, and a local cop searched me out. He dated Linda back in high school and wanted to make sure I wasn’t there to dig up dirt on her. As it turned out, he also had his own suspicions. We were able to convince his captain to investigate the sexual abuse. It wasn’t easy. The guy looked absolutely crestfallen when he realized he had no choice but to take it on or risk the political fallout if it came out in the press. And I made sure that he knew it would come out in the press.”
“How in the world can the police investigate the abuse now with the girl dead?”
“They probably won’t be able to with Linda. But there’s another daughter who was shipped off to a boarding school in France.”
“And you think he abused her too?”
“It’s a good bet. If he did, he’s going to prison.” Shannon looked out the window, watching as a couple of kids in long baggy jeans walked by, one wearing a Rolling Stones T-shirt, the other a Def Leopard one. He turned back to Eli. “Want to hear a coincidence? The cop who dated Linda also had an aunt murdered by Winters and his cousin.”
“There are no coincidences.”
“You’re going to try to tell me there’s a divine plan that had me meeting that cop?”
“No.” Eli took a bite of his scone and chewed it slowly. After brushing some crumbs from his chin he continued. “Nothing like that. But picture an energy current that swirls about and picks you and other people up with it. That’s why sometimes we keep running into the same people throughout our lifetimes-we’re riding the same energy jet stream. So whatever energy wrought Winters and all of his destruction, also caught the two of you up in its wake. There is no doubt a connection between you and that officer. And whatever it is, it brought the two of you to the same point in Wichita yesterday.”
“All too metaphysical for me.” Shannon started to rub the joints above his two missing fingers, caught himself. “He seemed like a good kid, though, and I guess we are connected in a way. Because of Winters and his cousin we both became cops. And there are the more obvious ways too.”
The two men grew silent then. Shannon’s face darkened as he sunk deep into his own thoughts. Eli had a similarly distant look as he ate his scone and drank his chai. A glimmer showed in his eyes. He brushed more crumbs from his chin, then asked “You don’t think Gibson could be responsible for his daughter’s death? That maybe she threatened to expose him?”
Shannon looked up at him as if he were coming out of a trance. A few seconds passed before the question registered, then he shook his head. “The Wichita police are looking into it. It’s a possibility, but I don’t think that’s what happened.” He caught himself again as he started to massage the area around his missing fingers. “I had a lucid dream last night.” He lowered his voice and edged his chair closer to the table. “It was all very vivid. In the dream I found Linda Gibson sitting by her grave wearing what looked like a burial shawl. I asked her about the abuse; also whether her father was involved with her death. She confirmed the abuse, but denied that he had anything to do with her murder. When I asked who killed her all she did was mutter some gibberish.”
“How do you interpret this?”
Shannon shrugged. “Her muttering gibberish? No idea. The rest of it was probably my subconscious clarifying my thoughts.”
“Or maybe pointing out your gut instincts.”
“Maybe.” He took another long drink of his coffee, finishing it. “There was something very odd about that dream. Before I found Linda, I was floating as if my body were weightless. I felt so light, so much at peace, and all I wanted to do was hold onto that feeling. When I saw Linda by her grave, I knew I’d lose that sense of peace if I went over and talked to her. It was the last thing I wanted to do, and it took every ounce of strength I had to make myself go over to her.”
“Why did you?”
“I knew I was supposed to.”
Eli tapped his forefinger slowly against his upper lip. “I’m wondering,” he muttered.
Shannon waited while he watched Eli methodically tap his lip. Then somewhat impatiently he asked him what he was wondering.
“How vivid was this dream when you woke up?”
“Very.”
“How about now?”
“Still very vivid.”
“Then what I’m wondering is whether you had a lucid dream or instead had left your body.”
“I didn’t leave my body,” Shannon said. “I didn’t feel any of the twisting and ripping sensation that I felt that time with Winters.”
“It’s not always like that. You could’ve transitioned gently from the dream plane to another plane of existence.”
“That’s not the case. Linda didn’t seem real to me. Her skin had this unnatural sheen to it. Almost like she were a ceramic doll.”
“Like she was something very fragile?”
“Yeah.”
“That fits. She was projected as the image you needed to see her as. I’m telling you, Bill, I think you had an out-of-body experience.”
“What I’m thinking is something got slipped into your chai,” Shannon said. He found himself drumming his fingers hard along the table surface. The same antsy feeling he had earlier was back again worming its way into his gut.
“Jesus, Bill, why are you so upset about this? This is what you’ve been working towards.”
“I’m not upset, it wasn’t an out-of-body experience, okay?” Shannon checked his watch and pushed himself out of his chair. “I’ve got to get going. I’m meeting someone at eight. Usual time tomorrow morning?”
Eli nodded slowly, his lips pursed as he studied Shannon. “Normal time tomorrow’s fine.” Then showing a thin smile, added, “I still don’t understand this reaction from you. It’s not as if I rubbed your nose in the fact that your beloved Red Sox lost to the lowly Colorado Rockies two nights ago.”
“They took two out of three, which is better than your Yankees have been doing with Tampa Bay.”
Eli crossed his thick arms, his deadpan expression back in place. “A low blow,” he said. “Try to tell me tomorrow why the idea of that being an out-of-body experience upset you as much as it did.”
“Christ, Eli, I’m telling you I’m not upset. Besides, that’s not what it was. See you tomorrow, okay?”
Shannon nodded to his friend as he moved quickly out of the shop. He had a half hour before he was going to stop by Devens office, but the uneasiness that had worked its way into his gut made it hard for him to sit still. He walked fast down Pearl Street, taking deep breaths as he moved. Two blocks from Juiced Up he spotted the girl from the other day-the one in the flowered vest and long “hippie” skirt who had hit him up for breakfast. She noticed him too and showed a smirk as she made a beeline towards him. When she got within twenty feet, her smirk disappeared and she looked away from him, the color of her face blanching a pale white. Shannon walked past her. He was a block away when he caught a glimpse of his reflection in a storefront window. The look on his face stopped him.
He took several deep breaths and tried to empty his mind as he stared at the Flatirons off in the horizon. He knew part of the reason for his uneasiness was worrying about those Russians, knowing that he and Susan couldn’t move back to their apartment until they were taken care of. And while he knew Susan could more than adequately take care of herself, he still couldn’t help worrying about her going back to that yoga studio. The thought of his dream being an out-of-body experience bothered him too, maybe more than the rest of it.