21 Dares: A Florida Suspense Mystery (6 page)

Perhaps feeling the slightest twitch of
loneliness, or perhaps it was something else entirely, she picked up a
dog-eared copy of If Tomorrow Comes and read a couple of chapters. She wanted
to lose herself in the book. Laughter from the living room distracted her.
Susan was with her friends—two twin girls named Lindsey and Lindsay. They drank
and giggled and gorged themselves on pizza and cosmopolitans. Abbie did her
best to ignore them and kept her nose in her book.

A little after one, she finally came out of
her room. Clem followed. Susan lay passed out on the couch, snoring. Her smart
phone rested face-up on the coffee table. The screen flashed red squiggly lines
that zig-zagged in alternating directions. Abbie wasn’t sure if that was a
screen saver or symptoms of a dying phone. The twins were long gone. An
infomercial for a garden hose blared on the TV. Susan farted, louder than the
TV, and startled Clem. The cat meowed and ran into the kitchen. Abbie followed.
The pizza box lay open on the counter. There was nothing left inside except a
partially eaten crust and a few stray black olives.

She closed the lid and walked to the front
door. For some unfathomable reason, she touched the door handle. It was locked.
But the chain still dangled from the upper edge of the door. She fit the chain
into the lock on the door frame.

It really didn’t make her feel any safer.

Clem meowed at her feet, and rubbed against
her ankles. Abbie picked him up and cradled him in her arms.

* * * *

Outside, on the other side of the door, the man wearing a
brown hat and a tan trench coat twisted the necklace in his right hand. He
listened to the muffled volume of the TV coming from inside the apartment. He
couldn’t make out the exact words, only the tone of an announcer’s
hyper-excited voice. It was probably an infomercial, he decided, and pressed
the side of his head against the door, listening for Abbie.

Surely she was in there. He didn’t physically
see her come home; he’d lost her in the woods. She’d caught him following her
and he had to disappear. Later, he circled back to her apartment complex. He
hadn’t seen her all evening, but was certain she made it home.

Absentmindedly, he twisted and untwisted the
necklace between the fingers of his right hand. The sound of the chain lock
rattling on the other side of the door startled him. He took a step back,
careful to avoid being seen from the peep hole. Abbie had to be inside. Twin
girls left the apartment over forty-five minutes ago. No one else had come or
gone. Now someone inside—Abbie, perhaps—was locking the chain on the door.

Staying close to the wall, he let the
necklace slip between his fingers, allowing it to stretch to its full length.
The unicorn pendant to
swung
wildly in tight circles.
He stared at it a moment, then tossed it toward the locked door. The necklace
coiled on top the welcome mat.

Taking out his notepad, he jotted down, “1:13
AM – Abbie and the tall roommate locked in apartment.” He shut the notepad and
returned it to a shirt pocket under his trench coat. He headed toward the black
wrought-iron stairs. Adjusting his hat, he walked down the three flights to the
parking lot, his tan trench coat blowing in the night breeze.
 

Chapter 7

L
ittle five-year-old
Abbie Reed hid in the attic.
She sat
on a wood beam, her bare feet firmly planted on the crumbling sheets of
drywall. She backed up until her spine butted against more boxes. She felt
cobwebs in her hair, and the whole space felt uncomfortably stale and silent.
Unnaturally so.

The trap door jolted.
Abbie jumped. The ladder dropped and light from the hallway invaded the dark
corners around her. Abbie held her breath, pushing her body tighter against a dusty
dry cardboard box. There was no more room to move.
Nowhere to
hide.
She looked back at the opening.

The man’s bald head rose
from the trap door, into the attic. Their eyes locked. She trembled, held her
breath. He reached for her.

“Come here Pretty One…”

Abbie
woke with a gasp and clutched her pillow. Clem, lying at the foot of the bed,
lifted his head as if he’d been rudely awoken. Abbie glanced at her cat, then
over at the laptop on her desk. The bubbly music sounded like an alarm, and she
slipped out of bed.
 
She picked up the
computer, humming with an incoming Skype call, and brought it back to the bed.
She sat on top of the covers as her father’s face appeared on the screen.

“Happy
Birthday to you,” he sang. “Happy Birthday dear Abigail…”

“Would
you stop
it.
” Abbie yawned and stretched her arms. “You
know my birthday isn’t until tomorrow.”

Clinton
Reed stopped singing. “But you’re turning twenty-one. I just can’t figure where
the time has gone.”

Abbie
knew her father would be calling early, and was glad he did. But she still felt
unsettled. She knew she’d been dreaming, but she couldn’t remember anything
about it. Only
an uneasiness
lingered.

“You
got plans?” Her father’s face enlarged on the screen as if he’d leaned-in
closer to the camera. “If not, I’ve got a surprise for you.”

Abbie
rubbed her eyes.
“Really?
What is it?”

“You
remember McKenzie Thomas? Her grandmother lived down the street from us,” he
said. “Well, she called me yesterday.”

“Yeah,
I remember her. What’d she want?”Abbie instantly recalled countless summer
afternoons with McKenzie Thomas, the poor-little-rich-girl with fashionable
play clothes and ribbons in her hair. She wore those brightly colored ribbons throughout
childhood and into her teen years. McKenzie spent every summer with her
grandmother barely a block away and they developed a friendship of sorts that
was based more on accessibility than common interest and camaraderie. Abbie
hadn’t seen McKenzie in a couple of years now. In fact, Abbie almost forgot
about her.
Almost.

“Your
grandmother told her grandmother that you’d moved back to Tampa and now
McKenzie wants to see you.” His image froze on the screen for a second,
then
jumped to catch-up with his facial expression. “I told
her it was your birthday and she wants to take you to lunch.”

“Today?”

“I
gave her your cell phone. I hope you don’t mind.”

“No,
that’s fine.” Abbie hoped her smile was noncommittal. Truth be told, she hadn’t
missed McKenzie’s passive aggressive, my-daddy’s-richer-than-your-daddy jibes. Still,
she wondered what McKenzie had been up to. “That’s fine, I guess,” Abbie said. “We
haven’t spoken in a long time, so it might be nice to catch up.”

“Good
girl. I hope you have fun.” His voice trailed off a little. “I just wish I
could come up there to visit you on your birthday.”

“No
worries.” Abbie forced a smile. She was disappointed but she didn’t want him to
see that. “I don’t want you to do anything you’re uncomfortable doing.”

“I
will at some point. Someday.” Deep worry lines appeared above his brows. “I
promise.”

“Don’t
sweat it,” Abbie said, when the professor crossed her mind again. She stirred
uneasily on the bed. “Actually, there’s something I want to ask you.”

 
“Sure.” His head cocked to one side. He
smiled, obviously waiting for her to continue. Abbie cleared her throat.

“I
have this professor in Behavioral Science and he says he knows you.”

“What’s
his name?”

“Cunningham.”
Abbie watched her father’s face turn ashen. He paused then looked away from the
camera.
Clinton Reed rarely
spoke of anyone or anything from their past.
Before
that night
.
Still, Abbie knew he
thought of it often. Carrying unspoken memories, locking them deep inside, had
taken a toll and prematurely aged him. His hair turned gray, is eyes sagged,
his
shoulders slumped.
 
Not that Abbie really noticed such things.

She just knew that Clinton Reed was there,
always by her side, always protecting her.

Slowly,
with a gravelly voice, he said, “That was a long time ago.”

“Funny.
That’s what he said.” She moved closer to the camera, as if wanting his full
attention. “He’s got a picture of you in his office. It’s you and him and some
other guys sitting in a bar.”

“I
remember that.”

Abbie
waited for him to continue, then impatiently added, “And?”

“We
were in college when that photo was taken. We did stupid things together and—”
He stared intensely at something off camera, as if in deep meditation. When he
looked back, there was a faint tremor in his voice. “That was a long time ago.”

“I
gotta tell you,” she said. “He’s a little, I don’t know—odd?”

“I
barely remember him.” He shook his head. “Like I said, that was a long time
ago.”

Abbie
didn’t push him any further. She knew anything connected to the past, to Tampa
and especially before her sister’s death was off limits. It made him
uncomfortable. It made her uncomfortable too.

“I’ll
talk to you tomorrow, okay?” Abbie said, bringing the conversation to an end.

“Hold
on.” He touched the screen, motioning for her to wait. Clinton Reed leaned
back, revealing a plant and book case behind him. “When it rains…”

“Look
for rainbows.” Abbie knew the drill.

“And
when it’s dark…”

“Look
for stars.”

He
looked directly into the camera. His face filled the screen. “Be careful, okay?”
His voice died away.

“Always,”
she said quickly.
“Always.”

With
that, his image dissolved. The screen returned to the desktop image. Blinking
the sleep from her eyes, Abbie plopped out of bed and made her way to the
window. She pulled the curtains to one side and gazed out at busy street below.
Clem rubbed against her ankle, and Abbie picked him up. She cradled the purring
cat on her shoulder, nuzzling its orange fur.
 

Half
an hour later, Abbie traipsed through the living room. Susan was still passed
out on the sofa, snoring. Clem rushed into the kitchen, tail
raised
.
He meowed as Abbie went to the front door. She unlocked the deadbolt, unlatched
the chain, and opened the door, expecting to find the morning paper. It wasn’t
there.

Instead
she found her necklace on top the welcome mat.

She
picked it up. The shiny unicorn pendant spun tightly to the right,
then
unwound to the left. She couldn’t believe her eyes.

Abbie
gazed down the empty hallway. No one was there. She looked down at the
necklace. The unicorn sparkled in the sunlight.

*
 
*
 
*
 
*

After fixing the clasp on her necklace, Abbie slipped it
around her neck and headed to the campus. She hurried to Professor
Cunningham ’s
office early that morning. The image of the
man in the woods was still fresh on her mind.
Tan trench coat.
Brown hat.
He was following
her. It wasn’t her imagination. And now, she believed, he knew where she lived.
Without
thinking, she grasped the unicorn pendant and shook the worry away.

Swinging
around the corner into the faculty office, Abbie saw his door open, lights on. Professor
Cunningham was talking to another student— that chubby white-blonde girl from
class.
Miss Larson was it?

Abbie
would have to wait. Taking a seat in the hallway, she gazed out the large
window overlooking the campus grounds. Beyond the manicured lawn and
flowerbeds, a group of students talked to a campus security guard.

It
looked like Josh Parks, standing there in his dark blue uniform. Two girls
laughed at something he said. One waved a hand through her hair. The other
touched Josh’s shoulder. She couldn’t imagine what was so funny. Maybe he told
them the same joke he’d told her last night. A Mexican fire chief naming his
sons Hose A and Hose B. She chuckled at that, when she felt a tap on her arm.

“
You waitin’
for Professor Cunningham?”

Abbie
turned and looked up. Miss Larson stood over her, wearing a black 50’s retro skirt
with laced combat boots. The streak in her white-blonde hair was now more pink
than purple. She often wore gothic party dresses to class, so Abbie didn’t
think much of it. Instead, she was more interested in Professor
Cunningham.
 
“How’s his mood?”

Miss
Larson smirked, smacking her gum.
“Interesting.”

Abbie
laughed at that. “That’s funny. Cause he always says...”

“Yeah,
he’s
 
messed
up.” She shot Abbie a knowing smile,
then
made her way
down the hall. Turning her head to look back, she waved at Abbie as she left.
“Good luck.”

Abbie
didn’t return the wave. Instead, she looked back out the window, hoping to
catch one last glance of Josh Parks. The grounds below were empty. He’d driven
away in his blue and white golf cart with the flashing orange lights. Even the
two chatty girls were gone.

Sighing,
Abbie got up and knocked on the door casing of Professor Cunningham’s office.
He waved her in without looking up from the papers on his desk.

“It’s
me again,” she said, remaining in the doorway. “I told Clinton Reed about you
and he told me to tell you hello.”

The
Professor put down his pen and glanced at her. “I seriously doubt that.”

“Well,
maybe not in so many words.” She walked into his office and stepped to the
photograph on the wall. She looked at the image of Clinton Reed in the bar,
seemingly so young and happy. “You know, it’s weird, but Clinton Reed doesn’t
have any pictures from when he was a young man. When was this taken?”

The
Professor folded his arms across his chest. Abbie noticed he was wearing
another sweater vest. This one was a sickening dark olive.

“Fifteen,
maybe sixteen years ago,” he said.

“I’ve
never even seen Clinton Reed take as much as a sip of alcohol.” She peered
closer to the photograph, studying the bar. “Where was this taken?”

“In a little dive outside of Tampa.”

“I’m
kinda impressed.” Abbie noticed, within the photograph, another picture hanging
on the wall over the booth. It was in the center, between the college boys
holding up their frosty mugs. It almost looked like young Clinton Reed was looking
over at it.

Then
Abbie noticed something else. The tiny picture hanging on the wall, the one her
father appeared to be staring at, looked like a cartoon. It looked like a
drawing of Gareth the Ghoul.

Abbie
glanced at the cartoon cel hanging on the Professor’s wall. It looked like the
same frame. The same grays, blues and yellow. It looked like the exact same
picture.

The connection chilled her, and she didn’t
know why. It was just a silly character. She hadn’t watched a Gareth cartoon in
years. A
cute
ghoul-child with a
 
Southern
accent, Gareth haunted a graveyard along with a whole community of adult ghouls
from the Civil War. They delighted in eating people. Gareth, however, was a
nonconformist among ghouls: he preferred to make friends with the living. So,
he packed up his belongings and ventured out into the world, hoping to find
friends.

Even
as a little girl, she hated that cartoon.
It came on television every afternoon, and it
terrified her. She would hide behind the couch or run under the bed in her
grandparent’s room, waiting for Clinton Reed to come home. Funny a cartoon cel
would be hanging in the professor’s office. And what was the connection to
Clinton Reed?

The
Professor interrupted her. “Was there something I could help you with, Miss
Reed?”