Caterpillar, a Paranormal Romance With a Touch of Horror (22 page)

After several long, tense minutes of silent brooding, Carter finally spoke in a small voice.  “Alright.”

“Really?”  At last, progress.

“Yeah, but so help me, Cat, you better be right about him.  This is my life we’re talking about here.”

“Carter, do you really think for one second that I’d risk your safety for
anything
?”

 “I guess not.” 

“You
guess
not?”

“Fine.  No, you wouldn’t risk my safety.  Whatever.”

“Alright then.  Let me call Tegan.”

“Maybe you should ask him about the cat head, too.”

I grabbed my cell phone and Tegan’s card out of my purse then punched his number in.  It rang several times then his voice mail came on.  I felt a little pang of irritation at the cold chills that popped up on my arms when I heard his voice.  It was just a recording for Pete’s sake. 

I left him a message to call me as soon as he could then hung up.  I knew there was one more unpleasant thing I had to discuss with Carter.

“Did you hear about Jessica?” 

“Yeah, but I don’t want to talk about it.”  Although his face was like stone, I could tell he was hurting.  I knew Carter.  No matter what others said or saw or thought, I
knew
Carter.  I knew he was suffering.  And that was all I needed to know.

“I’m so sorry, Carter.  I can’t imagine…”  Now that I had the chance to talk to him about everything, I couldn’t even think of what to say.  My heart ached for him. 

“I said I don’t want to talk about it, Cat,” he snapped.

“Sorry.”  I guess that included expressions of sympathy.

We chatted about inconsequential things until my phone rang.  It was Tegan.  I asked him if he could come to the house.  He didn’t even hesitate, said he’d be right over. 

About fifteen minutes later, I heard an engine die out front and I walked to the door.  I peeked out in time to see Tegan striding up the walk.  He must not have been very far away.

When he reached the front porch, I saw him look down at the spot where the blood had been.  He was undoubtedly wondering about the wet spot and lingering smell of bleach.

I opened the door.  “Thanks for coming, Tegan.” 

“What’s up?”  His question was casual, but he looked anything but.

“Come in.”  I stepped back to let him enter.  As he walked past me, I got a whiff of that smell that’s uniquely his: wood and leather and something darkly sweet. 

His gaze went straight to Carter, of course.  They looked at each other skeptically for a minute before Tegan turned back toward me.  He raised one eyebrow in a silent question.  “Carter wants to talk to you,” I explained. 

“And so do you,” Carter asserted.  He wasn’t going to let the cat head thing go.  I knew, though, that if it had some other, more supernatural meaning, Tegan couldn’t tell me until Carter wasn’t around.

I lead the way around to the sofa opposite Carter.  Tegan sat on one end, me on the other.  I decided to get the cat head thing out of the way first.  “When I got home tonight, there was a cat head in a sack hanging from my doorknob.  Any idea what to make of that?”

Our eyes met and for a brief second I could see that it
did
have a significant meaning, but then it was gone and he was casual.  “Could be a prank.  Could be gang-related.  Like initiation.  Could be something more.  Hard to say.  You’ve had a lot going on lately.”  An excellent answer, one I thought Carter wouldn’t be suspicious of.

“Hmm.  Something to think about.”  I looked to Carter, prompting him with a nod of my head.  He sat, staring silently into the fire.  I’d have to start.  “You had questions for Carter, right?  You said you wanted him to talk to
you,
right?”

“Yes, I did.”  He turned his attention to Carter, his blue eyes expressionless.  “Where have you been?”

“
That’s
all you wanted to ask me?”  Carter stood up and turned toward the front door.

“Alibi,” Tegan said, his voice flat.

“Carter, sit back down and talk to him.  He came all the way out here.  Just go on and get it over with.” 

Carter didn’t sit back down, but he turned back toward Tegan.  “Look, I didn’t have anything to do with Jessica’s murder.  Or the other two.”

“You’ll need to come with me to the station and give us an official statement.  It looks bad that you ran.”

“I didn’t run!” Carter shouted. 

“Carter, don’t—”

“You didn’t?”  Tegan said, coming slowly to his feet.  His voice was cool, never wavering.  He didn’t get loud or emotional.  His calm made him all the more intimidating and I was sure Carter felt it, too.

“No,” Carter said a little less heatedly.  Then, after a pause, he ran his hand through his shaggy hair and started to pace in front of the fireplace.  “Well, I guess I sort of did.  I freaked, man.  Wouldn’t you?’

“Maybe,” Tegan allowed.  “Come with me to the station.  Give us your official statement.  If you’re innocent, there’s no reason to worry, right?”  When put that way, Carter had no choice but to go. 

I could almost see the wheels in Carter’s mind turning.  After several long, tense minutes of deliberation, he finally spoke.  “Alright.  Let’s go.”

Without realizing I’d been holding it, I released the air trapped in my lungs on a whoosh of relief. 

“Can you drop me at my truck so I can follow you out?”

“No reason.  I’ll bring you back,” Tegan assured.  Carter had stopped pacing and I could see panic in his eyes.  He probably thought they’d keep him.

“Carter, if he says he’ll bring you back, he will,” I offered, trying to put Carter at ease and hoping my confidence in Tegan was justified.  I could almost hear Carter mentally calculating the statistical likelihood of escape. 

Tegan didn’t say a word, obviously not feeling like he should have to convince Carter of his honesty. 
His
character wasn’t the one in question. 

Tegan inclined his head toward the door.  Carter looked at me then, tight-lipped and stiff-legged, strode to the door ahead of Tegan.  He opened it and walked out, toward Tegan’s SUV parked at the curb.

Once Carter was out the door Tegan turned back to me.  “Get some sleep.  You look tired.  We’ll talk later.”  He brushed the hair back from my face, away from the scar that I tried so hard to cover.  With a quirk of his lips that was not quite a smile, he turned and left. 

I closed and locked the door, listening as Tegan’s engine started and then faded down the street.  I was suddenly exhausted. 

I got ready for bed and must’ve fallen asleep as soon as my head hit the pillow.  It seemed like I’d only been in bed a few minutes when the ring of my cell phone woke me.  I rolled over to answer it and looked at the clock.  The red numbers showed me it had been more than four hours since Carter and Tegan had left.  Four hours is a long time unless you’re sleeping, then it’s just a tiny blip on the delta wave radar.

I picked up the phone.  Carter started talking before I could even get a sleepy greeting out of my mouth.  “Cat, it’s me.  Listen, I need you to do me a favor.”

“Carter, it’s the middle of the night.  Are you back at home?  Can’t it wait?”

“No, it can’t wait.  I wouldn’t have called if it could wait, Cat.” 

“Alright, alright.  What do you want?”  I sat up trying to push through the cotton in my head. 

“I need you to go to my house and get something for me.”  I listened to his instructions, trying really hard to remember what he was saying.  When he was finished, I repeated it all back to him and he seemed satisfied that I’d retained it.  “A cop will meet you there to get it, but he’ll wait outside.”

A tiny light flicked on in my head just then.  I realized Carter must have proof of his whereabouts, but that proof must be located near something he didn’t want the cops to see. 

Must be drugs,
I thought, exasperated
.

“Fine, Carter, but once this is all cleared up, I’m not helping you
any more
.  If you get in trouble, you’ll have to find your own way out.  I’m done.”  I flipped the phone closed. 

I flung the covers off and got out of my warm, cozy cocoon and stomped angrily across the floor to the closet.  I slipped on some yoga pants and a sweatshirt, some big fluffy socks and a ball cap, slid my feet into my shoes and headed for the door. 

It didn’t take me ten minutes to get to Carter’s.  Once there, I dug through the bushes at the front of his townhouse, pulled out the fake hide-a-key rock and let myself in.  I went into his bedroom, to the dresser where a handful of papers and some change lay strewn across the top.  It didn’t take me long to find what he wanted.  He’d kept several receipts that placed him elsewhere at the time of one of the murders. 

On the dresser was a framed picture of Carter and Jessica, holding up glasses of champagne at a party somewhere.  They had on those goofy party hats, party whistles in their mouths and a big sign behind them read “Happy New Year!”  Peeking out from behind the frame was a zip lock baggy.  I pulled it out.  I didn’t have to smell it to know it was marijuana.  As I suspected, Carter had needed my help because involving the cops would’ve landed him in more trouble.

I took the bag, intending to carry it to the toilet, but when I moved it, another bag fell out from behind it.  It was full of an assortment of colored pills.  Yep, he’d have been in big trouble.  Even though Carter probably planned to swallow each and every pill and smoke every last bud of pot, there was enough there to convince any judge he had intent to distribute the drugs, which was a much worse offense.  Possession was one thing.  Mass quantity was another.

“Carter, you idiot!”  I shouted to no one in particular.  That was it.  No more helping Carter. I’d been mad when I’d cut him off earlier, but after finding drugs in his house, I fully intended to follow through with my threat.

I carried the bags into the bathroom and unrolled them, dumping the contents into the toilet water.  I pushed the lever to flush, watching with immense satisfaction as the cocktail of illegal substances circled the drain.  Carter would swallow his tongue when he discovered what I’d done, but that was fine.  It’d save me from having to kill him.

All the pills didn’t flush the first time, so I pushed the handle again.  I leaned against the sink, waiting to make sure the rest would go down with the second swirl.  Something at the tub caught my eye.  It looked like a dark substance was dripping from beneath the shower curtain. 

Chapter Nineteen

A gush of adrenaline flooded my body.  I was instantly hyper alert.  I bent slightly to look at the material more closely.  It wasn’t something dripping.  It was hair.  Blonde hair.

Somewhere in the back of my mind, I wondered if I should go get the cop that was supposed to be waiting for me outside.  Unfortunately, that part of my brain wasn’t communicating with my motor skills because my legs carried me closer to the tub instead.

I slowly reached out toward the curtain, but my hand stilled before I fisted it in the vinyl.  The silence was absolute, deafening, and eerie as I contemplated the likelihood of there being a dead body in the bath tub.  My heart raced, the heavy throb of it pounding in my ears.  Then, like ripping off a Band-aid, I tore the curtain back.  The rings clattered along the rod noisily, but I didn’t much care.  My mind was already otherwise occupied. 

I saw.  Things I didn’t want to see.  Images that would be forever burned into my mind, like a picture exposed on film.

It was grotesque and overtly sexual—a macabre lover’s embrace.  A woman, dead and bloodied, lay atop a man in the tub.  Her nude body bore no marks, only streaks of blood that had poured from the wound at the back of her head.  A large swath of her scalp was peeled back, exposing crushed white bone beneath.