F Paul Wilson - Secret History 02 (44 page)

           
Ed was frozen against the bureau
like a child's tongue to a wrought iron rail in the dead of winter. The thing
before him looked like Kara, and it used Kara's voice—though not the way Kara
used it—yet it was not Kara. It knew things Kara couldn't possibly know, things
only her dead sister could know.

           
"How—?" It was all he
could manage.

           
She got up and began pacing before
him, moving slowly, completely unconscious of her nudity. That such a beautiful
body could be parading before him naked and fill him with only fear and
loathing amazed Ed.

           
"How? That should be obvious,
shouldn't it? I'm not Kara. I'm Dr. Gates, using Kara's body, just as that note
said. And it's a wonderful body, don't you think?" She smiled at him, a
deadly cold, bone-chilling smile. "Let me explain. Don't worry. I'll be brief."

           
But it's so hard to be brief. You
must keep reining in your narrative, forcing yourself to hold back a wealth of
details as you tell Ed Bannion your story. Perhaps it's because you've never
before had the opportunity to tell anyone your story. It has been bottled up
inside for your whole life, fermenting like champagne, building up pressure,
crying to be released. And now that Ed Bannion has allowed you to pop the cork,
the story is gushing and foaming from you in an effervescent torrent.

           
"So you see," you say,
forcing yourself to bring your truncated, expurgated autobiography to a close,
"I have developed the perfect cover for my talent. Quite ingenious, don't
you think?"

           
Bannion, still nude, still cowering
against the bedroom bureau, says nothing. He has not been a terribly receptive
or appreciative audience.

           
"Oh, and those files you
discovered in my office computer? You were right. They were indeed
boiler-plated. I dictate the original reports, Miss Carney types them into the
computer, then hard copies are filed in the locked cabinets. But with my
special patients, I change the computer files, giving them the typical
characteristics of a Multiple Personality Disorder. That's in case anything
untoward happens to them—as it did to Kelly Wade. If there's an investigation
of her death and my records are subpoenaed, I'll simply print out an altered
medical record that nicely explains the erratic behavior that caused her death.
I've been at this a long time, Ed. I have all the angles covered. I've covered
contingencies most people would never think of."

           
Poor Bannion. He looks so pathetic
standing there, trembling. But he believes. It's there in his eyes. He's
completely convinced.

           
Which means it's time.

           
You reach under the bed and search
for the kitchen knife.

           
"What are you doing?" Ed
said, finding his voice at last.

           
Kara had reached under the bed, and
now she was sitting there with the sheet pulled over her lap. What could she
have under the sheet. One of his slippers?

           
Who the hell cared? He wanted
her-him-
it
out of here!

           
And
it
was the only term that seemed to fit. What sort of a creature
was Gates that he could take over bodies like this? And Ed was now completely
convinced that Gates could do it. How else to explain what it knew? Gates had
to have been inside Kelly Wade that night to know what had been said! So
bizarre—a demonic nightmare. But Ed knew he was awake.

           
And he had to get this…
thing
out of here!

           
But how? He wished he had a gun. All
the times he'd planned to pick one up but put it off. He decided to try the
direct approach. And if she wouldn't go, he'd throw her out. He outweighed her
by fifty pounds. It might be an unpleasant scene, but he had to get her
out
!

           
"You'll have to leave. I don't
want you here."

           
She said nothing. Only stared at
him, her hands under the sheet on her lap.

           
His heart thudding, he stepped
toward her.

           
"Out!"

           
You debate the situation. Is there a
way you can leave Bannion here alive? Certainly he'll talk. He'll go to the
State Board and lodge a complaint. He might even go to the papers. He'll be
branded a madman, but the damage will be done. The reputation of Dr. Lawrence
Gates will be permanently smeared.

           
That would ruin everything.

           
Regrettably, there is no other
viable option.

           
There can be no hesitation. Kara is
strong and in excellent condition, but she is still a woman and no match for
Bannion's extra weight.

           
"Didn't you hear me?"
Bannion says, a tremor of fear in his voice. He takes another step closer.
"I said
out
!"

           
You grip the knife handle. With a
single motion you rise and lunge at Bannion. The man's eyes goggle when he sees
the blade. He tries to block it with his hands but the blade slips under them.
It drives forward with all of Kara's strength behind it, the sharp point
piercing the skin at the lower edge of the sternum, slicing up through the
diaphragm and into the heart. You wrench the blade left and right to make sure
you pierce the myocardium, then you yank it free.

           
Bannion's eyes bulge wide, his face
blanches with agony and the horror of death as he clutches at his chest and
epigastrum. Blood bubbles between his fingers. He makes a gurgling sound in his
throat as he drops to his knees, then topples face first with a loud thunk onto
the hardwood floor.

           
You watch Bannion a moment. You've
never killed before. It's not pleasant to watch someone die. Why do some
personality types find this rewarding? Most unpleasant. But most necessary in
this case, unfortunately.

           
You hurry to the bathroom. There's
blood splattered on your hands and your breasts. You wash it away— there are
definite advantages, it seems, to committing murder in the nude. You scrub the
knife as well and return it to its teak block.

           
You take one last look at Bannion.
Miraculously, he's still alive, but just barely. Blood pools under him, crimson
foam bubbles at his lips.

           
Such a waste. But at least your
secrets are safe.

           
You return to the living room where
you slip back into Kara's sweater and slacks and hurry from the apartment. As
you close the door behind you, the phone begins to ring.

           
Sorry.
No one lives here anymore.

           
It's too late to do anything else
tonight. You'll have to go straight back to Kara's apartment. The Friday night
revelers will still be out in droves. A cab should be easy to find. Especially
in Kara's body.

           
Rob sat in Kelly's apartment and
slammed the phone back onto its cradle. He was having no luck so far with the
list of Bannions. He'd called every single one. Yet with the number of
no-answers he'd had, he couldn't be sure if he'd already hit the right one.

           
He tried being analytical.

           
Wouldn't Ed have given Kara his home
phone number?

           
Rob searched the apartment and found
the papers that Ed had left with Kara on Thursday. His card was there, with his
home phone number and address written on it. West 70th. It figured.

           
He called the number and let it ring
for a long time. He was about to hang up when the ringing was broken by a
clatter, as if the receiver had fallen on the floor.

           
Then a voice like death came over
the wire.

           
The ringing of the phone drew Ed
from the wonderful lethargy that enveloped him. He was cold, colder than he had
ever been in his life, but it didn't seem to matter. He was in that floating,
dreamy state before sleep when consciousness is still hanging on but everything
is fluid, everything is peaceful, everything and anything is possible.

           
He felt wet. His chest and abdomen
were soaked. Probably with blood. Somewhere in his brain a voice— probably the
same unheeded voice as before—screamed that he was dying. But that wasn't true.
Couldn't be. He'd been stabbed, yes, but there was no pain now. Only cold. And
you couldn't die of cold. Not in a heated Coronado apartment. Not with what he
laid out a month in mortgage payments.

           
His outflung arm was only inches
from the phone wire where it jacked into the wall. He stretched and reached it.
He tugged on the wire and the phone dropped to the floor with a bang that sent
Shockwaves vibrating through his skull.

           
The trimline receiver tumbled to a
rest near his head. Ed tried to reach the receiver, to bring it closer to his
lips, but his arms wouldn't respond. He tried to shout but the words gurgled in
his throat, emerging as a barely intelligible croak.

           
A tinny voice rattled out of it.

           
"Hello?
Hello? Is this Ed Bannion? From Paramount? Hello? This is the police
calling."

           
Ed didn't recognize the voice. He
tried again to make his voice work.

           
"Help… dying…"

           
Why had he said that? He wasn't
dying. Just tired. And very cold.

           
"What?
What did you say? Did you say you're dying? Hello?"

           
It sounded a little like Kara's
detective friend, Harris. Ed tried to speak again, to reassure Detective Harris
that he was all right, but no words came. He was so tired. Too tired to talk.
Maybe later.

           
Who
is this? Hello, damn it!"

           
Finally the voice clicked off,
replaced by silence. Blessed silence. Now he could get some sleep. So tired.
And so cold. If only he could get warm, everything would be perfect…

           
… perfect…

           
He
roused himself. What if that panicky voice in his head was right? What if he
went to sleep and didn't wake up? He had to warn them about Dr. Gates, about
what he was doing to Kara, and to others. But how? Even if he could manage to
dial the phone, he couldn't talk. He could just barely move his finger.