Over the Edge (22 page)

Through my chugging brain filtered the memory that I had an appointment in the morning at 8:30 with Dr. Carol Johannis. I'd have to call a cab. It would be oh, so tiring to get to her office and back, but I could hardly wait. I needed a listening ear.

Positive tests.

Vindication.

I ate the meat and cheese, my mind on half numb. Took a drink from my water glass, my fingers shaky and weak. It was difficult to even hold that much weight in my hand. Twice I nearly dropped the glass. As I set it down my gaze wandered past my reflection in the sliding door, the first few inches of the back deck barely visible.

That's when I saw the box.

Chapter 31

THE MIND CAN PLAY A CREATIVE LIST OF TRICKS EVEN WHEN it's well. Had it done that now, invaded as it was by sickness? I gaped at the box, trying to convince myself that my brain was conjuring it. But that thing had not been there when I stood peering out into the floodlit yard just twenty minutes ago.

Had it?

I struggled to my feet and leaned against the table, heart thumping. My arm hairs raised again as I felt my vulnerability, lit up in the room for Stalking Man to see. He
was
out there, wasn't he. Gloating at my startled reaction. Maybe he'd been following my movements through the house, through one back window to the next.

My bleary eyes focused on the box.

Jud Whatshisname. The detective. I should call him.

Right, Jannie, and wake the man up. And what would he find when he got over here—
if
he came at all? An empty box on the deck?

My feet took me to the door. The lock felt cold against my fingers, as if warning me not to open it. What if Stalking Man was right around the corner, waiting to jump me?

I flicked on the floodlights. The backyard shot into bright. I winced. Outside I saw the deck, its steps onto green grass, the bushes along the fence. The trees and gazebo and hot tub. All as before.

I unlocked the door and slid it back. Cool night air hit my face. With my cane I rocked the box. Something moved inside, sliding from one side to the other. Whatever it was it couldn't weigh more than a pound. More ticks?

It would have to be a very big bottle.

I leaned my cane against the wall and held onto the door jamb, slowly leaning down to reach the box. No way was I stepping outside to retrieve it. My hand brushed a top flap, not taped down. I grabbed it and pulled the box over the threshold.

Panting, I relocked the door. This time I left the floodlights on. Only then did I think to lower the beige fabric blinds compressed in a tight long rectangle along the top of the door. I couldn't remember the last time I'd used that shade.

I picked up the box and set it on the table. Held my breath and pushed back the flaps.

Inside lay a cheap-looking cell phone. I stared at it.

The thing rang.

"Ah!" I jerked back. A second ring. It went off a third time while I gaped at it. Should I pick it up?

Next thing I knew, I held the phone in my hand. My finger found the
talk
button.

"How are you feeling, Janessa?"

The voice—
his
voice—ran low and deep.
This isn't what he sounds like in normal life, is it?
If he had a normal life.

Emotions whirled within me. Anger, despair, indignation. The final one—abject fear—sank me into the nearest chair. "Are you in my backyard?"

"It's been too long since I visited your home."

Visited?
"Why do you keep c-coming back? What do you want?"

"Your husband has left, I see. Gone to another woman." He made a sound low in his throat. "Of all things I hadn't foreseen that."

That made two of us.

I licked my lips. "You're following us." What was the man—invisible?

He chuckled, an evil sound. "I've seen the patrol cars drive by your place. And I can guess they've tapped your phone. After our talk you can throw out your new toy, by the way. And no point in tracing this call. It'll only lead to nobody."

I ran a hand across my forehead, no words forming. This man was beyond me. Too clever. Too vicious.

Silence strung out. Odd, my jumbled thoughts. I hated this man but didn't want to sever the tenuous line between us. He was my enemy, yet the only one who understood what was happening to my body. Not that he cared. But then, neither did my husband.

"You find my little gift in your daughter's backpack?"

The tick.
My eyes roved the kitchen floor, as if it might appear at its mere mention.

"You s-stay away from my daughter!" I slumped forward, panic stealing through my lungs. "You don't need Lauren. You have
me.
"

"And what good are you doing me, Mrs. McNeil?" He spat the words. "Can you tell me one thing your husband is doing that shows he's willing to take a second look at his research findings? All I see is him moving
away
from you."

The names and faces of all the Lyme patients I'd read about online scrolled through my mind. Their struggles. How they fought to convince the medical world of their plight. This man didn't deserve to be counted among them. "You don't care about Lyme patients! You're just a terrorist."

The phone line seemed to chill. "
Don't
you tell me who I care about. Don't you
dare
tell me."

"Then why did you do this? Why would you wish it on anybody?"

"Not anybody. Just Doc Brock's wife."

"Why not
him?
" After all, wasn't Brock the real target? "Why me?"

I heard the slow hiss of expelled air. "I know what it's like to see a wife suffer."

My mouth opened, then closed. Something told me he hadn't planned on letting that clue about himself slip. A bit of humanity. A
reason.
"What happened?"

"What do you care?"

"I know what she's feeling."

"Felt."

"What?"

"She's dead." The words were thin and flat.

"From Lyme?"

No response, as if the stupid question wasn't worth an answer. My insides iced over. I thought of the listed names of victims on that web site, from small child to the elderly. I remembered the tirades against my husband, how again and again his research had blocked long term treatment. How would I feel about Dr. Brock McNeil if I'd lost a loved one to Lyme?

Empathy swelled in me, only to quickly scab over. This man fancied himself some White Knight for the Lyme awareness community? A self-righteous advocate who'd suffered so much he could do anything he pleased? Guess again. He didn't deserve to be any part of those people. He'd purposely made me sick. Now he was threatening Lauren. No one but a monster would wish the very disease that killed his wife on someone else, especially a child.

I dropped my head in the palm of one hand. How could I fight this man? His hatred went too deep, too cold. "I'm sorry."

"I don't want your sympathy. I want your action. You have forty-eight hours to talk some sense into your husband, got that, Janessa? Within forty-eight hours I want to see him issue a statement that he's rethinking his stance on chronic Lyme disease. That watching you suffer from it has opened his eyes."

Right. I didn't even have a positive diagnosis yet. "And if he doesn't?"

"I'll get to Lauren. Don't think I won't. And then I'll go down the list of the committee members. They all have wives and children of their own."

No.
My body started to vibrate. Now I had not just Lauren to protect, but all the other families as well? I could barely walk. Half the time I couldn't think clearly. How was I supposed to save all these innocent people?

I swallowed hard. "L-listen to me. Brock won't . . . He's not . . ."

"What choice do you have, Mrs. McNeil?"

"But—"

"
What
choice?"

"None! But Brock isn't listening."

"You want your daughter to feel like you do right now?"

"No!"

"You want to be responsible for the other families?"

"I—"

"Then I suggest you
make
your husband listen."

"Call
him.
Please. He doesn't b-believe you even exist."

"Where does he think that tick in your daughter's backpack came from? You?"

"I . . . I lost it."

"What?"

"The tick."

A beat of silence. "You
lost
it?"

"It's somewhere in my kitchen."

"Somewhere in your—" He snorted. "So find it."

"I can't." My tone hardened. "If you'll remember you made me so sick I can hardly move."

Air seeped over the line. "How.
Stupid.
Are you?"

My fingers curled. If only I had his neck to wrap them around. "Pretty stupid. But then—you did that to me too."

"Do you know how many illnesses that tick is carrying?"

Let me guess—Lyme and three coinfections. This man was utterly mad. "So send me another one. The m-mail will do just fine. Better yet, send it straight to the L-Lyme lab. I'm sure they'll concede it carries the diseases."

"Janessa—"

"You don't need me at all!" Tears scratched my eyes. "Why bother with stupid me?"

A moment passed. I could feel his seething.

"Are you quite through?"

No. Yes. My veins ran so steaming I could barely speak. "Why?" The whisper hissed out of me. "Why are doing this? Who
are
you?"

He laughed, a grating sound. "Perhaps it hasn't occurred to you, Mrs. McNeil, that I enjoy seeing you suffer."

As his wife had suffered? And merely because I was married to Brock McNeil? "So you're nothing but a sadist. And here I thought you wanted to help p-people suffering from Lyme."

"I
am
helping them!" Anger seemed to erase his calm. Now every word shook, as if I'd plucked at the core of him. "It's what my wife wanted. One day they'll thank me. Every one of them."

"She wanted you to help—or hurt?"

Something smacked on his end of the line, like a fist against wood. "I
am
helping! I
am!
I'm keeping my promise to her!"

"Was she a g-good woman?"

"The best." His voice caught. The sound chilled me. He seemed like a bomb ready to blow, but my own anger ran too deep to stop now.

"Then why should she be p-proud of you? Harming another wife. Threatening a child. She'd never approve."

"Shut up!"

"If she were still alive, she'd
divorce
you."

"Shut—"

"She hates you from the grave."

"Shut
up!
" I heard a crash. Hard breaths spat over the line. "Don't you
ever
say anything like that again. Ever!"

What was I thinking, goading this unstable man into a rage?

We sat there, I in my sane world and he in his insanity, his panting like slaps in my ears.

I swallowed, my throat beyond dry. "I know you're helping." I forced my tone to remain comforting, even as my heart galloped. "And I want to do what you say. I want to c-convince Brock to change his mind. But no matter what I do, he won't listen."

"Even when his daughter's health is on the line?"

"He doesn't
believe
me."

"You keep getting strange calls."

My teeth gritted. "He doesn't b-believe that either."

"And you're obviously sick. In front of his very eyes."

"He doesn't
care!
" The words burst from me, then throbbed in the air of my empty, abandoned house. So much for keeping calm. There it was—the mean, ugly truth I hadn't wanted to admit even to myself.

Brock didn't care.

Not today. Not tomorrow. He didn't love me anymore. He wasn't coming back. He
didn't care.

I heard the slow intake of breath, as if Stalking Man had looked into the very face of evil. "Then he truly is a beast, isn't he?"

A sob snagged in my throat. "Please. Just don't—"

"Forty-eight hours."

"But how do I—"

"I won't contact you again."

"No, wait. Don't hang up!"

The line deadened.

"Hello? Hello!"

Nothing.

"Hello!"

I lowered the phone to the table and started to cry. Tears fell into my plate until I pushed it away, the very smell of lunch meat now disgusting. I hunched there, small, sick and beaten, and crossed my arms over my chest, hugging myself when no one else would.

Forty-eight hours.

I could phone Brock right now and tell him about this new call. But I knew he would just declare me an even bigger liar. He'd rant at me for continuing in my madness. And Jud Maxwell was off duty by now. Besides, what proof would I have to offer the detective that I hadn't bought the cell myself and called it from yet another throw-away phone? If he could trace the call, it would surely show that it had originated from this area. Just like before.

"God, please . . ." I could whisper no more. Not the smallest of prayers. Could only hope those two words were all God needed to hear. My mind scrambled for the psalms I'd read, but I only remembered one phrase.

My foot has slipped.

I sat at the table, rocking, rocking. Hopelessness welled in my lungs until I thought I would drown. This man was beyond crazy. To spend so much time—and resources—planning such crimes.

What was I supposed to do?

A long time passed, until the tears finally dried up. By that time I barely clung to the chair. I stared at the wall, my chest fiery with pain. Minutes ticked by as I made no move. Little by little the anguish seeped away. In its place trickled a new awareness, something too big, too out there to even consider in my demolished state—yet there it was.

No one was going to help me protect Lauren or anyone else. No one. I had no physical strength and a fraction of my mental power. But somehow, some way, no matter what it cost me—I would have to stop this madman.

TUESDAY

Chapter 32

IN THE MORNING I AWOKE ON THE COUCH WITH NO MEMORY of having gotten there. The clock read 6:00. My body felt no better for having slept. In fact it fought me to merely sit up, as if my limbs were weighted with lead, my chest with steel. My hand trembled so much as I reached for my cane that I wasn't sure I'd be able to hold it.