Chapter 74
Yes, it is cold outside!
Hidden Secrets
Leona Palmer Haag
Chapter 74
Afternoon turned into a nightmare. Katie wanted to
swim. Begged to swim. Screamed to swim each time Jenn refused. Jenn tried every
diversion tactic she knew, and invented several more that would have probably
worked any other time, but not today. Finally she gave in and moved at a
snail’s pace as she gathered supplies, purposely dropping things along the way.
Katie didn’t miss anything and picked up the tanning lotion and sunscreen and raced
back for the swimming suit left behind. She proudly waved it under Jenn’s nose.
“This one is getting too little,” Jenn said. Katie had no idea what that meant,
and didn’t care. She ripped off her clothes and began putting it on upside
down. Jenn sat back and watched, offering no help. Finally Katie whined so much
Jenn was forced to fix things, but instead she twisted the straps enough that
Katie couldn’t get it on. Undaunted, Katie shed it and ran to find her red
swimming suit. When she returned she already had it on.
Jenn had surrounded herself by piles of storybooks, and
invited Katie to come see pictures and read with her, but she pounded on the
backdoor and begged to be released. More than anything Jenn wanted to avoid the
backyard, but finally shoved aside the books and walked slowly to the door.
After more stalling, they eventually stepped out onto the patio. Katie danced
with joy and hopped with excitement as Jenn reluctantly opened the pool. She
silently begged the motor controlling the solar blanket to jam. It didn’t,
exposing sparkling water tempting them toward it. Jenn shivered as she thought
of the dead man only a hundred feet away baking in the Arizona sunshine. Poor
guy. Why had he died? Because he did his job? Was that what would be said about
Nick? “We’re sorry, Mrs. Washington. He did his job, but not quite good enough
this time.”
She loaded Katie into a float toy before she pinched
her nose and plunged under the water to hide her tears. Bubbles burst in soft
pops around her ears. She surfaced and tickled Katie’s dangling toes.
"Ready for your lesson, little water skeeter?"
Katie eagerly nodded.
All of Jenn’s focus turned to teaching Katie to swim
and away from the smells that were surely already steaming off the dead man.
Over and over they practiced her back float and kicks. Playtime started when
the lesson ended. Jenn plopped her into a floating tube again and swam a few
laps before she settled into a chair and paddled with her hands to keep up with
Katie's little kicking, floating, bobbing seat turtle ride. Then Katie wanted
to ride the shark. Then the whale. The seahorse. She finally went back to the
sea turtle—the safest seat in Jenn's estimation.
Before Katie tired, Jenn slid off her seat and swam a
few more laps. Katie used a rubber bat to whack at beach balls and floating
fish. When Jenn couldn’t take the scenes her imagination were producing any
more, swimming time ended. She pulled the toys out and covered the pool, waiting
for the latch to seal the solar blanket in place. She carried her waterlogged
daughter inside saying, "It’s clean up time. Want a shower or bubble
bath?" Before opening the backdoor
she looked back at the pool sparkling under the sun and the trail of drippy
footprints leading across the patio. She hugged Katie tighter, sickened at the
thought of what she’d just done only a few feet away from a corpse.
"Bubbles! Bubbles!" Katie squealed,
reminding Jenn where she could find better thoughts.
Jenn hauled her precious cargo up the back stairs and plunked
Katie down in the bathroom. She sat on the side of the tub and adjusted the
water temperature. She squirted bubble bath solution into the flowing water and
bubbles rose higher and higher. As Jenn watched Katie struggle to get her wet
swimming suit off she wondered about the kinds of twists and turns her life had
been forced into taking—experiences that made her scared to death half the
time, and just plain scared silly the other half. Would she ever let Katie out
of her sight again for even a moment? She predicted the future: Katie would
never allow her to put her down at night in a crib in her own room and turn out
the light if she ever learned about what was happening around her. They’d
become a mother and daughter duet that never ended—tethered together for
eternity.
"Life is great. So much togetherness and broken
rules and disrupted schedules," Jenn cheerfully said. She lent a helping
hand with the bunching swimsuit and freed her toddler, hiding her worries behind
a smile and upbeat humming. How she longed to live a normal life again. Katie
began humming and la, la, la-ing along as Jenn wadded up the wet swimming suit
and tossed it in a sink.
"Getherness," Katie agreed with a giggle.
“Sorry, baby Katie,” Jenn said, apologizing for the
inward sarcasm Katie didn’t understand. “You’re stuck with me and it may be
more than you want when you’re a teenager.”
Katie lived center and front in Jenn’s world.
Especially now that she suspected she’d never see Nick again. That brought a
flood of questions and concerns. Could Jenn let go of Katie enough that she'd
be a normal child, or would she smother her with fears and phobias. "Don't
go out—it's so dark! Don't stay long—it's too dangerous! Don't! No! Stop!"
she’d constantly be saying for her daughter’s safety and because of her own
apprehensions.
Jenn shivered as she pulled off her own swimming suit.
What about herself? Could she return to Dallas to live in her little house that
had been remodeled because of her husband's career? New tears started sliding
down her cheeks. Oh, stop it, she commanded herself, without achieving the
desired results.
"Mommy sad?" Katie asked as Jenn stepped
into the tub.
"Not during a bubble bath," Jenn cheerfully
said, giving her a smile and wiping off her cheeks and chin.
After the bath, things were slightly better until Jenn
realized she was lost in thought—dark and grizzly thought—as she whipped up fish
tacos for dinner. She forced the images away and plunked Katie down in the
center of the countertop to help her. He daughter say just ten inches away from
her and was completely safe.
After eating they read a pile of books and laughed.
Finally Jenn relaxed and Katie wandered around the house, first playing with a
little kitchen set. Next came dolls. A teddy bear was forced to eat cookies and
Katie chewed and swallowed for it. Then Katie bolted down the stairs, jumping
off the last basement stair. Jenn tried to stop her. "Run!" Katie
squealed as she darted off.
"I hate running," Jenn muttered from close
behind.
"Run fast!" Katie took off like lightning
hoping she'd give chase. Jenn finally followed, glaring at the steel door
leading down to the second basement as she passed it.
Katie raced around, escaping Jenn’s reach until she
climbed onto the treadmill and danced on the track. "I run! Mommy, I run!”
Jenn scooted her off. "Not there, you don't. It's
dangerous." There it was—no, no, no, and don’t. Danger, danger, danger!
She hated saying it.
"You run! Mommy, you run!"
"No thanks. All I seem to ever do is run. Run here.
Run there. Run faster and run further. Run everywhere. You name it. Texas,
Colorado, Utah and Idaho. Throw in Montana and Arizona for torture. Let's try
something new—how about you run while I watch?" She picked up a ball and
tossed it toward her daughter. Katie
squealed and caught it as it rolled up to her chubby legs. Jenn chucked another
ball and it bounced off the wall. Katie raced to capture it and kicked it back.
Good. The ‘wear the toddler out before bedtime’ game had begun.
Katie kicked the ball and Jenn pushed it back,
sometimes directly to her, and other times making it ricochet off a wall or
piece of exercise equipment. Katie chased and pounced on it and laughed,
rolling off in a heap before carrying it back to her. Jenn tickled her. Katie
jumped up and darted away. Jenn crawled after her and grabbed her ankle.
"Gottcha!"
Katie squealed with delight.
Jenn pushed her down and blew raspberries on her
tummy. Katie kicked and giggled and the game started over again. And again. And
again—with balls and running and tickles and laughing—the way life should be.
And then she heard it above the squeals and giggles.
The sound was like a whisper of wind. From somewhere,
but where? It sent shivers up Jenn's spine—so silent, yet so obvious. She
grabbed Katie and bolted up the stairs two at a time. She raced through the
kitchen and ran up the back stairs, across the loft and straight into the
master bedroom. She slammed the door and shoved the lock into place and leaned
against it and looked around. No one was there that she could see. She began
the inspection, this time without saying anything like, “Katie bear, is a hug
hiding for you under the bed, in the closet, behind the door?”
During the search she didn’t discover anyone, but did discovered
something important. She had no phone. No gun. Nothing. She was alone and in
trouble.
Katie had laughed the whole time—that was part of the searching
game. She stopped her laugh now and said, "Snack."
Now Jenn knew she was really in trouble, because the
little basket of granola bars she kept in the bedroom for a moment like this
was empty of everything but one wrapper. "How about a movie?" she
offered.
Katie howled and kicked, demonstrating her age better
than she ever had before. It was an eternally long hour of tantrum and tears
before Katie grew limp and fell asleep. At first she whimpered in her sleep,
sobbing and gasping every now and then, and then she finally settled into deep
slumber. Jenn lay on the bed beside her daughter and stroked her damp cheek,
heartbroken over the scene she’d witnessed because of her own actions. How
could a two-year old understand what had happened? Even Jenn wondered what had
happened that had sent her into panic mode.
In the silence her mind replayed the fright. The
whisper of air. She'd heard it many times, but never with such a devastating reaction.
It was nothing, really, she told herself over and over. Just faulty
imagination. Last summer Matt had rewired her reactions to normal things—like
air movements—and no matter how hard she tried, she hadn’t fully recovered. To
prove it really had been insignificant, Jenn finally slid off the bed. She
tip-toed to the door and listened. Not a sound. But what did she expect?
Bagpipes? A rock band? Someone saying, "Open up or I'll shoot?" She
laughed. You’re such a silly girl, she scolded herself.
But she didn’t open the door. She crept back to the
bed and lay down again. She knew another long night was creeping up on her
again. She flipped off all but one lamp and stared at the halo of shadows it
cast. Until she dared venture out of the bedroom again, she was alone. Alone without
the ability to contact anyone. Kevin would be glad. She couldn’t entice another
yelling swearing storm out of him tonight. She sat up and pulled her laptop
onto her knees and pulled up her journal and typed: What a day. Nothing to brag
about. Katie will never remember it. I don't think she saw the dead man.
Rather, the dead men. She never heard
the sound or felt the air adjusting
itself as if it had been shoved from behind. How would it be to live like
that—totally innocent and protected and completely trusting? I’m sure I’ll
never know, and I’ll try to keep it that way for my baby.
Jenn saved the entry, then smiled. She had access to
email. Duh. Unless Kevin was in one of his stingy moods, which could be the
case. To find out she typed: “Kevin, guess where I am?”
No reply.
She reached out next to her brother: “Shawn, are you
around?”
No reply.
Next she tried Matt, her pseudo husband, because she
knew Nick would never answer her, but Matt might: “Nick, do you ever check this
email address?”
Nothing.
She tried Nick anyway. As expected, she received no
reply.
Jenn continued with her coworker: “Linda Jo, are you
online?”
There was no answer.
She stared at her emails. She was wrong—completely
wrong. She couldn't talk to anyone because no one answered. Everyone else had a
life—something they could do tonight, places they could go. None of them were hiding
behind a locked door in a different state. All of them were free. And happy.
And capable of doing anything they wanted whenever they wanted without fear or
restrictions.
Tears trickled down her face. She wiped them away and
headed to the bathroom for a glass of water to replace the water loss. She
studied her forlorn reflection in the mirror and that made her cry harder. When
she finally regained control she went back to bed. Resting on the comforter was
the laptop. She shoved it aside, then pulled it back and took one more chance
and typed in Angela's name and then guessed at the rest of her address. Not at
AOL. Not at gmail. Not at hotmail. What about Yahoo? She tried several
combinations, receiving “delivery failure” notices each time. And then the
message didn’t pop up in red, but a message came through: "Jenn, my long
lost friend, is that you?!!"
"I found her," Jenn whispered. She drummed
her fingers on the edge of the laptop, wondering what she should do or say.
Finally she typed: “Yes.” She stared at the single word at least a minute
before she decided no matter who Angela might be, she needed a friend
tonight—badly. She added, “Angela, tell me what's going on. What about that guy
you saw the other day? You know, the scary dude with the bat-wing ears?”
Angela replied, “False alarm. Another guy. Weird,
don't you think? I haven't heard from you in ages. What's going on? How is
Dallas? I envy your warm temperatures. We’ve having another cold spell, but
this one won’t last as long, I’m sure.”
For an hour Jenn sat with her laptop on her knees as
they chatted back and forth. Angela finally said she needed to go to bed. Jenn
typed one last message: “Will you take a minute and do me a huge favor?”
“Sure, name it.”
“Call the Dallas office after you log off and have
them deliver a message to my Uncle Kevin. Tell him to check the email I sent
him today.”
“That's it? Check an email? Now that I’m looking
closer, you haven’t said anything about anything important. What's really going on? I’ve got a funny
feeling in the back of my mind that it’s something. What did you say in the
email to your uncle in the Dallas office?” Angela wrote.
Jenn stared at Angela’s question. If Angela was
connected to the bat wing-eared man in anyway, she’d already said too much to
her. She finally removed her hands from over her pounding heart and placed a
smidgeon of trust in her and replied: “It’s nothing much. Just about swimming
lessons and hiking. Thanks for making the call for me. I've misplaced my phone.
It's not a fun way to live, but it made me turn on the computer, and that was
good because it’s been fun talking to you. Again, thanks for making the call
for me tonight. Maybe I'll talk to you tomorrow.”
“K. I’ll call him. Bye, and take care,” Angela replied
before she went offline.
Jenn stared at her glowing computer and wondered if
Angela would call. She desperately need someone she could trust who could
comfort her—if Kevin would possibly attempt it. She clicked on his name and sent
another message: “Kevin, I heard a noise. A whisper-whoosh kind of noise. I
hear them occasionally, but this time it was really weird and scary. Maybe
because of my hike today. Whatever the case, I'm locked in the bedroom upstairs,
but I left my phone in my purse in the kitchen. Guess what else is in the
purse—right, my gun. All I've got is email, and I’m way too scared to go get my
purse. So scared I might pee my pants—that scared.”
Surely he’d respond to that—remind her how nice the
palace was, with a warning to not defile it or she’d be kicked out.
Jenn pushed send. She waited and watched, but there
was no immediate reply.
She clicked on Matt's name and typed: “Hey, long lost
husband, my dear sweet Samuel, I need contact. I'm scared. Please send me an
email or call me when you get this. Never mind the phone call unless it's in
the morning. You know me, I left my phone in my purse in the kitchen and I'm
heading to bed and will leave it there all night. You got it—I'm scared and
won’t go down to get it. Katie and I are locked in the bedroom and I’m way too scared
to venture out, not even for chocolate. Gotta go so I can curl up under the
covers and shiver and shake all night. Bye. But please reply. Please!”
Jenn pushed send, then instantly regretted stating her
fears. It only made goose bumps start relay racing up and down her arms and
legs, and the shadows around her sway menacingly.
Jenn returned to her inbox. No one had responded. She
clicked on Kevin and typed: “Please read this as soon as you get it. I really,
really, really need to talk to you, except I don’t have my phone, so email me.
I think someone besides my bodyguard is in the second…”
Low battery! Low battery! Her computer screen flashed.
Jenn stared at the words. She quickly pressed send.
She watched the screen. It was successfully sent! She sighed with relief and
started anther message. Maybe the battery would hold out a while longer.
"Kevin, I'm sure…" The screen went black. As pitch black as the night
beyond the windows. She had lost all contact with humanity.
She closed the laptop and pushed it aside. She knew
where the power cord was. Sitting on the coffee table in the loft. Maybe less
than twenty-five feet away. And no, she wasn't going out to get it. Never! She
took a deep breath and told herself to settle down and relax. Morning would
come. Tonight was like all the other nights in the opulent castle. She'd heard
and felt the whispers before and nothing had happened. They were safe.
Completely.
Jenn crawled from bed and brushed her teeth, then
looked around. She was bone-tired, but knew she couldn’t shut her brain down
and wouldn’t sleep. Something deep inside her brain and body were on high
alert. She flipped through a magazine and tossed it aside, then scanned movie
titles in the stack of DVD’s. She'd seen everything at least twice. She
tip-toed to the front window and peered out. Why couldn't she live a settled,
relaxed life like Kristina? A silver minivan cruised past and she pushed the
curtain back into place as her heart thudded. But what was a mini-van? Everyone
owned one, it seemed.
She silently crept to the back French doors and peeked
through a thin opening between draper panels. The night was dark as pitch—a
black ink stain sky speckled with jewels above, and shadows hunkering down on the
land beneath. She stared at the pool shed and fence beyond—her eyes unwilling
to look at it, and unable to look away. Had they already come and removed the
bodies? She pulled the curtains together and overlapped them so nothing would
enter. She didn't want to witness body removal if it was underway. Then she inched
the curtains open just enough to check the door lock. Secure. She repeated
enclosing the bedroom from prying eyes—especially hers facing outward.
After tip-toeing back to bed she huddled under the
covers and wished the whole world were different. Couldn’t it be quiet,
peaceful and normal, where husbands stayed home and drugs were never invented,
or jobs that chased bad people because bad people doing bad things had never occurred
to anyone? Tears slid down her cheeks. Most of all, she wished she knew where Nick
was. Now tears freely flowed. Pain settled into her heart. Deep, dark,
soul-shattering pain. With searching fingertips she reached for the remote.
Maybe an upbeat chick-flick was in order. Something to chase fear away. Her
fingers touched the remote the same moment she heard it. Unmistakably,
something shattered below. Glass on icy marble tile. It sounded like the plate
Katie had knocked off the countertop the previous week. But she hadn’t left any
plates on the counter tonight, or in the sink, or anything else that would
shatter if bumped. It had to be a window.
A window? Probably not, but maybe a vase had fallen over.
But there was no open window or breeze to blow a vase over, and no vase where it
would fall and shatter on a tile floor. She’s already child-proofed the home so
Katie didn’t entirely demolish it and the furnishings. There were no house pets
to knock things over. No unlocked doors, either. It was a window and a robber.
He’d find her purse, her gun, her phone. He’d find her and Katie!
There was nothing she could do but hide under the
covers. She kept her ears and nose out. Her nose so she wouldn't suffocate. Her
ears for the obvious reason. She heard a car pass on the street, much slower
this time. Jenn slid out of bed and pulled Katie into her arms, wrapping her in
a blanket to stay warm. She tip-toed to the front window and peeked out. There
was nothing but a starlit night with a sliver of waning moon. She stared at the
night—the bushes and boulders and lamp posts and houses and their hulking
shadows until her eyes blurred and her arms felt like they'd rip off under
Katie’s weight. Then she saw something. A dark shadow moving along the
sidewalk. Jenn held her breath. It
stopped at the fence line before her home and a neighbor’s, just enough out of
sight that she couldn’t tell what it was—a neighbor walking a dog, maybe? A
moment later the shadow slid into darkness on the opposite side of the fence,
and she was sure no dog led or followed what looked like a shadow man.
Frantically Jenn’s head jerked around the room looking
for something—an intruder, or maybe someone to help. But it was just her and
Katie in the room, and no one else. Her heart pounded so hard it thundered in
her ears. She was trapped, no one knew it, and escape was impossible.
“Stop it! Stop it! Stop it!” she commanded herself in
soft whispers over and over again. “You’re freaking out over nothing, so stop
it!”
Her arms shook so hard she thought she’d drop Katie.
If her daughter screamed, she’d lose it too, so she clung tighter to her. Her
knees shook so badly she knew she’d collapse if she tried to move.
“Jenn, honey, stop it,” she begged herself, among
tears. “You should have gone to bed, gone to sleep, and not looked out the
window. Stop freaking yourself out. You saw a coyote or porcupine or something
like that.”
Frozen in place for what felt like an eternity, Jenn’s
mind blasted away at every event that day—the bodies, the horrible swimming
experience, the whispers of sound and sucking air, the emails only Angela
received, the shadow, and her purse a million miles away. It was time to hide. She
raced across the room and grabbed two pillows and more blankets from the bed,
and carrying a bundle twice her size she dove into the walk-in closet. In the
farthest corner she deposited her load. She raced back to the door and swung it
shut and for the first time noticed a latch on the inside. She locked herself
in. Then she curled up with Katie among the shoes, wrapping themselves up
tightly, as if that might ward off danger.
The night was long. Filled with dread. And silence. No
matter how much she strained her ears, she heard nothing. Not a sound. Her eyes
grew heavy. It was terrible what her imagination could do when they shut. She
saw shadows, heard glass break, felt the house shudder. Heard thuds and felt
whooshes of air.
Jenn sucked in air slowly and exhaled. There was no
way to stop the house from contracting as temperatures dropped. Every creak and
moan was natural. Every sound is normal, Jenn thought as attempted shutting the
faint sounds out. Her house in Dallas did the same every morning and night. Why
shouldn’t a mansion in Arizona?
There was no mistaking the next sound—a creak only made
when someone walked up stairs in movies containing haunted mansions. Jenn’s ears
pricked up, suddenly fully alert again. Listening. Straining. She waited to
hear footsteps outside the bedroom door, then across the carpet and into the
bathroom, and up to the closet door. Nothing. Then she heard it. Another slight
thump.
Then a thud. Heavy, this time. It was no house naturally
stretching and yawning before bedtime this time. It had been deliberate and
enough to feel through the padding of blankets she huddled on.
Then came silence.
More silence.
And more silence.
Nothing but silence.
Jenn hated her imagination. Absolutely abhorred it.
She saw too many things in the stillness. Stealthy, dangerous, frightening
things carrying weapons that made her heart race. She burrowed deeper into the
blankets with Katie and tried to shut out the images.
A tiny whoosh.
Quiet again.
Totally quiet.
Forever quiet.
She shivered. She fought to keep her eyes open. Her
ears open. To logically explain all the noises. She was losing the battle. But
if they closed, would the closet door burst open because the lock had no power to hold back
anything? Life would end without her preventing it.
End Chapter 74
Not every chapter is short....
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