“Maybe not, but from the language I heard coming up the stairs I’d sure put money on you to win a cussin’ contest.”
CHAPTER 16
4:26 P.M. – December 23, 2010
Greenleaf Motel
Hulis Township – Northern Missouri
Constance straightened her posture, then interlaced her fingers behind her neck and arched her back as she stretched. She held the position for several seconds before unclasping her hands and slowly reaching toward the ceiling. She heard a pop from her left shoulder and rotated it carefully, then made another mental note about that massage when she was finally back home in Saint Louis.
Finally, she relaxed and allowed her arms to drop to her sides as her back unbowed. Then she closed her eyes and slowly rolled her head in a circle, first left, then right, then left again. When she was finished working the muscles in her neck, she glanced at her watch, then at the paper-strewn bed. She’d been hunched over for better than two hours this time, so she definitely needed a break.
She sucked in a deep breath, then exhaled slowly, shaking her arms and rocking her hips as she danced in place to get her circulation going. It seemed a bit chilly, so she turned away from the bed and wandered over to the wide heater unit that was mounted through the wall beneath the window of her motel room. It wasn’t pushing any air at the moment, so she bent over and inched the temperature control dial up another notch. It kicked on immediately.
Straightening up, she reached out and pulled back the edge of the dark burgundy insulated drapes that covered the smudged panes, and then peered out through the gap. On the other side of the glass, it was reaching the cusp of darkness. The last throes of what little sunlight had been managing to penetrate the low clouds were throwing themselves against the coming night in a futile suicide assault. However, the dirty blue-gray shadows were winning, just as they always would.
In the dimness she could see that a light snow was still falling, the same as it had been since mid afternoon. Something on the order of an inch had accumulated so far-maybe even a bit more. What she’d been able to tune in earlier on the two-decades-old television had told her that it would be picking up the pace, and there would likely be three to five more on the ground by morning, at least. Sometime around midday tomorrow the weather system was supposed to finally taper off to flurries, leaving another day of overcast skies and an added blast of bitter cold slipping in from the northwest.
It looked like it would definitely be a white Christmas for northern Missouri, not that anyone here in Hulis would be celebrating. Except for Merrie, of course.
Constance felt a sudden chill run the length of her spine, and she shivered.
Out of instinct, she rested the heel of her palm on the butt of her Sig Sauer. Her index finger was extended, and the others were curled lightly over the grip, while her thumb hovered against the quick release. As she leaned in toward the window and twisted to scan the rest of the parking lot, the edge of her hand pressed against her side, sending a brief but sharp pain through the cell-phone bruise. She winced and adjusted her torso a bit, but left her hand resting on her sidearm.
She didn’t consciously believe that she was being watched, but she was still on edge. This wasn’t the first odd chill she’d felt since returning to her room, and it wasn’t because of the heater. While she was at the house on Evergreen Lane, she could almost understand it. Not without some question as to why, of course, but at least it made some kind of sense for it to happen there and then. Here and now, it didn’t.
Her being spooked was unusual enough in itself, but for it to carry over like this was just unheard of. After all, she worked cases on a regular basis with Rowan Gant, a paranormal consultant for the Saint Louis police and the FBI as well. She had been witness to some truly inexplicable things during some unbelievably bizarre cases, so this shouldn’t be a big deal at all.
However, what she was really accustomed to was Rowan’s preternatural cognition, not her own; that was because she didn’t have any. Maybe she’d get a gut feeling here and there, but nothing like he had. He was the supernatural member of the team, not her. She was the skeptic and sometimes his official handler during investigations, but that was all. Yes, she made it a point to remain open minded; however, she was still a rationalist. And, as much as she liked Rowan, she simply wasn’t in a big hurry for his mysticism to start rubbing off on her.
Of course, the more she thought about it, the more she had to admit that all of the exceptional observations being made by Sheriff Carmichael probably weren’t helping her anxiety either. They were certainly nothing inexplicable-as he had proven with his explanations-but they were peculiar nonetheless. As benign as the curmudgeonly old cop seemed on the surface, she still wasn’t sure quite what to make of him. In fact, she had a strange feeling that he was hiding something from her. She didn’t know exactly what it was, but she felt positive that she wasn’t getting the whole story from him.
One thing she did know for certain, however, was that, explicable or not, being the focus of such intimately detailed perceptions coming from someone she really didn’t know was just plain creepy-on too many levels.
Constance let out a heavy sigh and glanced back over her shoulder at the bed. Papers were arranged all across the comforter in semi-organized stacks sorted by dates, case numbers, and in many instances, obvious connections.
Following Sheriff Carmichael’s instructions, Clovis had photocopied the original Merrie Callahan-John Colson case file for her, as well as those pertaining to the seven copycat murders. While they were definitely more complete than the FBI’s own documentation, so far they hadn’t furnished any real answers. If anything, they had created a whole host of new questions after she had been through them the first time. The list of queries had only grown upon the second run through. At this point, she was almost afraid to go for a third pass for fear of becoming even more confused.
A flicker caught the corner of her eye, so she turned back to the window. The lights outside each of the rooms had apparently clicked on via timer or sensor. The strange juxtaposition between the falling darkness and the soft glow of backlighting turned the window into a translucent mirror. The reflection staring back at her was drawn and expressionless. She knew she should really just try to get some sleep, but she was afraid that at this point she was too exhausted for that to happen. She’d crashed straight through that barrier and was now running on adrenalin and caffeine. She knew all too well that couldn’t go on forever.
She sighed, then focused her gaze past the tired face in the glass, and stared out across the parking lot once again. As she was allowing herself to be mesmerized by the falling snow, a soft ding combined with a rapid clatter sounded from the desk a few feet away. She turned her head in time to see her cell phone vibrate toward the edge, then stop, still safely inches from the precipice. She allowed the drapery to fall back into place then padded over to the desk and picked up the device.
The display read, “1 New Text Message.”
She thumbed over to the text folder and opened it. The sender ID for the message that had just arrived was blank, but it was tagged urgent. Constance pursed her lips and sighed. Probably a SPAM text. She’d received them before, but just to be sure, she highlighted it and pressed ‘OK’.
The message read, “CK PRSNL EML”
She scrunched her brow and frowned as she dropped herself into the desk chair and laid the phone aside. A pair of finessed jiggles and a re-orientation of the Gideon’s Bible later, she managed to hang on to a solid Internet connection and proceeded to download her personal email.
The window on the screen filled slowly with line after line of electronic communiques. She didn’t have to spend any time sorting through them, though, as one stood out immediately. Tagged URGENT, with a blank field for both the sender and subject header, it was highlighted in red. However, what made it even more prominent was that it appeared at the bottom of the list, because whoever was behind it had set the date of the email to 12/25/1975. She knew it wasn’t unusual for spammers to use bogus dates in order to get your attention, but the choice of these digits seemed to be more than mere coincidence.