Someone Is Watching (34 page)

“I’m not spying.”

“Really? What would you call it? Using binoculars to check out your neighbors might not technically be a crime, but making false accusations most definitely is.”

“Please tell me you’re not blaming the victim,” Claire says.

“Your sister is not the victim here,” he reminds her. “At least not tonight.”

“You have to look at this from our perspective,” Sam says, interrupting. “A month ago, you suffered a grievous assault. Since then, I understand you’ve made a number of unsubstantiated accusations against not only this Paul Giller but several other men as well, including David Trotter and Jason Harkness.”

I gasp. So they already know about Jason Harkness.

“It’s in your file,” Sam says before I have the chance to inquire.

“Who’s Jason Harkness?” Claire asks.

“You were also involved in a minor car accident a week ago,” Sam continues, again checking his notes. “And tonight you placed an anonymous call to the police to report an assault that both the alleged assailant and his purported victim swear up and down never happened. Not only that, but we find evidence of marijuana in your apartment.…”

“Which I don’t have to remind you is still illegal in the state of Florida,” Llewellyn adds.

My head is spinning. What are they saying? “Are you going to arrest me?”

“No. We’re going to pass on that.…”

“And Paul Giller? He gets a pass, too?” Claire asks.

“Luckily for your sister, Mr. Giller has declined to press charges,” Llewellyn tells her.

“Charges? For what?” I ask.

“Harassment, for starters.”

“Harassment? That’s ridiculous.”

“Is it? I’d say Paul Giller has good reason to be feeling more
than a little pissed. He thinks you have some sort of vendetta against him.”

Claire jumps to her feet. Clearly she’s heard more than enough. “Sorry we wasted your time, gentlemen.”

“Maybe you should think about getting some help,” Sam whispers to me on their way out.

“Thank you,” Claire tells them, closing the door before they can offer any more parting advice. “Who the hell is Jason Harkness?” she asks, spinning toward me as soon as they are gone.

I start walking to the bedroom. “I’m really tired, Claire. Can we do this another time?”

She is right behind me. “No, we can’t do this another time. Who the hell is Jason Harkness?” she asks again. “What haven’t you been telling me?”

I sink down on my bed, reluctantly confiding in her everything that happened after I left Elizabeth Gordon’s office this afternoon and watching her expression shift from curiosity to mild alarm to total disbelief, as I knew it would.

“I don’t understand.…”

“I just wanted to be doing something … taking control of my life … instead of sitting around, being so damn passive and afraid all the time.”

“That’s not what I’m talking about,” she corrects. “Doing something, taking control,
that
I understand. What I can’t wrap my head around is why you didn’t tell me. What is it, Bailey? Don’t you trust me?”

“Of course I trust you.”

“Then why didn’t you tell me what you were planning?”

“Because there
was
no plan. Things just … kind of happened.”

Several seconds pass before she speaks. “Did anything else just
kind of happen
that I should know about?”

I shake my head, deciding not to mention my encounter with Colin Lesser. There’s only so much that one rational human being can be expected to understand, only so much sympathy to go around.

Claire walks to the window and stares toward Paul Giller’s
apartment. “So you think that maybe this Jason Harkness could be the man who raped you?”

I shrug. I don’t know what I think anymore.

“And Paul Giller?” she asks. “What about him?”

“I don’t know.” I fall back so that I’m stretched horizontally across my bed, my right arm raised and draped across my eyes. “You think I’m crazy, don’t you?”

“No, I don’t think you’re crazy. Well,” Claire demurs, “maybe just a little.” Her voice is soft, even kind. I hear the gentle whir of my bedroom blinds being lowered, and I remove my arm from across my eyes and turn my head toward her. She is getting undressed.

“What are you doing?”

“Getting ready for bed.” She pulls a toothbrush out of the side pocket of her sweatpants. “See? I came prepared.”

“What? No. You can’t stay here.”

“You really think you have the strength to kick me out?”

“What about Jade?”

“Sleeping like a baby when I left. I wrote her a note and I’ll leave a message on her voice mail.”

“No. I can’t ask you to do this.”

“You’re not asking. I’m telling. Now shut up and get ready for bed. I don’t have to be at work until noon.” She walks toward the bathroom.

“Claire …”

“You’re welcome,” she says before I can formulate the words to thank her. “Now get some sleep.”

—

I’m in the middle of a nightmare in which I’m being chased along the ocean road by a jogger wielding a large butcher knife. Across the street, in front of a small church, I see Heath sharing a joint with Paul Giller. My assailant catches up to me, grabbing my hair and pulling my head back, his knife slicing effortlessly across my throat. I collapse to the sidewalk, my life bleeding onto the hard
concrete, as all around me, the sky fills with the sound of laughter and church bells explode in song.

I know it’s the phone even before I’m fully awake, that its ringing has infiltrated my dream. I sit up and look over at Claire, who is sleeping beside me, undisturbed by either bad dreams or the untimely ringing of the telephone. Is it possible she doesn’t hear it? Is it ringing at all? Am I still dreaming? “Claire,” I say, my hand brushing against her shoulder. “Claire …”

She stirs, flips over onto her back. “Hmm?”

“The phone …”

She twists her head in my direction and opens her eyes. “What?” She pushes herself into a sitting position. “What’s happening?”

“Do you hear the phone?”

Her head shoots toward the nightstand. “Somebody phoned?”

I realize the phone has stopped ringing.

“Were you having a nightmare?”

“I guess,” I say, deciding it’s easier this way.

She takes me in her arms. “Go back to sleep, sweetie,” she says, drawing me back down and laying her head next to mine on the pillow, one arm draped protectively across my hip. “You’re exhausted,” she says, already drifting back toward unconsciousness. “You need your sleep.”

I feel her breath warm on the nape of my neck as she succumbs to the sleep I know will elude me for the balance of the night. Instead I lie there beside her, afraid to close my eyes, waiting for the phone to ring again.

—

It rings at just after eight o’clock the next morning.

It isn’t really ringing, I tell myself.

“Aren’t you going to answer that?” Claire asks, rubbing her eyes and sitting up in bed.

“You can hear that?”

“Of course I can hear it.”

I reach for the phone. “Hello?”

“It’s Jade,” the voice informs me without unnecessary preamble. “Is my mother still there?”

“Right beside me.” I hand the phone to my sister, then proceed into the bathroom, deciding to forego my usual early morning search of the premises. I don’t want to alarm Claire any more than is absolutely necessary.

When I return to the bedroom some twenty minutes later, scrubbed clean and wrapped in my voluminous terry cloth robe, Claire is already dressed and waiting for me with a hot cup of freshly brewed coffee. “Everything all right with Jade?” I ask.

“She’s fine. Just wanted to know how late I’d be getting home tonight. Which means she probably has something devious in mind. Teenagers—what can I tell you?”

I feel guilty that I have taken Claire away from her daughter.

“Don’t give me that look,” Claire says. “This has nothing to do with you. How’s your coffee? Strong enough?”

Claire has become so adept at reading my thoughts. “It’s perfect,” I tell her, even before I’ve taken a sip.

“So, what are the plans for today?” she asks as the phone rings again. “Want me to get that?” She glances at the caller ID. “Unknown caller,” she remarks, picking up the phone before it can ring again. “Hello?” A slight pause. “No, this is her sister. Who can I say is calling?” Claire holds the phone out for me to take. “It’s a Dr. Lesser,” she whispers, eyebrows raised.

I feel the color drain from my face. It takes all my willpower to force a smile onto my lips, all my strength to exchange the coffee in my hand for the phone in hers. Why is he calling? What does he want? How did he get my number? “Hello?”

“Hi, there. Remember me?”

“Of course.”

“Sorry to be calling so early, but I wanted to catch you before you went out.”

Why is he calling? How did he get my number?

“Look. I’ll get right to the point,” he continues. “I find you … interesting, to say the least, and I’m calling because I was hoping I
could persuade you to have dinner with me. I googled you, in case you’re wondering how.…”

Someone else who can read my mind, I think, aware that Claire is watching me with curious eyes. “I can’t.”

“Can’t or just don’t find me as interesting as I find you?”

“Thank you very much for calling,” I tell him. “I’ll make another appointment as soon as I know my schedule.” I disconnect the line before he can say another word. “My dentist,” I lie. “Apparently I missed my last appointment.”

“And he called you himself?”

“Must be a slow morning,” I offer as the phone in my hand rings again.

“Not around here,” Claire says.

I lift the phone to my ear, a series of disconcerting thoughts swirling through my brain:
Why did I lie to Claire? What was Colin’s real motive for calling me? Is it possible he’s exactly as he presents—a man who finds me “interesting” and wants to take me to dinner?
“Hello?” I all but shout into the receiver in an effort to send such thoughts scattering.

I listen to the familiar voice on the other end of the line, my heart moving to my mouth, my breath freezing in my lungs.

Tell me you love me.

“Oh, God.” I click off the phone and let it fall to the floor.

“What is it?” Claire asks. “Who was that, Bailey?”

“It was Detective Castillo,” I answer when I’m able to find my voice.

“What did he say?
Tell me.
”

“Apparently another woman was raped last night about ten blocks from where I was attacked. They have a man in custody, and they want me to come to the station to see if I can identify him.”

“When?”

“As soon as possible.”

Claire lowers my cup of coffee to the nightstand. “Let’s go.”

Approximately forty minutes later Claire pulls my car into the parking lot of the police station at 400 Northwest 2nd Avenue in the part of downtown Miami known as Little Havana. The sky is threatening rain, and the winds, already blowing at twenty-five miles an hour, are picking up speed. According to the weather report on the all-news radio station we’ve been listening to, a tropical storm is gathering strength somewhere east of Cuba, although there’s still hope it will miss Florida, dying an inauspicious death somewhere in the middle of the Atlantic.

“Ready?” Claire asks, turning off the engine and unbuckling her seat belt.

Ready to meet the man who raped you?

“You can do this.” She reaches over to pat my hand.

I look toward the modern mainly white structure that is something of an architectural hodgepodge, with its angular, McDonald’s-esque exoskeleton frame jutting from its sides to wrap around the upper floors. The building is three, maybe four stories high, it’s hard to tell from this angle. Bold blue letters across the top of its exterior spell out
MIAMI POLICE DEPARTMENT
. Tall, leafy trees—
the kind whose names I should know but never seem to remember—line the sidewalk and walkway leading to the front door.

You can do this,
I repeat silently.
You can do this.

I don’t move.

“We can just sit here a while,” Claire says, although I know she doesn’t have all day, that she has to be at work by noon. “This is such an interesting area,” she comments, looking down the decidedly blue-collar street that contains little of note. “Did you know that originally this area was chock-a-block with Jewish delis? Then came the Cuban bodegas and espresso shops. And now the Latinos have pretty much taken over.”

“Interesting,” I say, although I’ve only heard snatches of what she’s been saying. “How do you know all this?” We both know I’m not really interested in Claire’s answer, that I’m simply trying to prolong the conversation, a conversation it’s clear Claire only initiated to distract me from my swelling panic.

“Jade’s been studying local history in school. Or more accurately,
I’ve
been studying, and she’s been goofing off. Oh, well. Maybe she’ll learn by osmosis.”

“You’re a good mom.”

“The jury’s still out on that one,” she demurs.

“And a great sister.”

She laughs, a surprisingly hollow sound. “Heath doesn’t think so.”

Heath doesn’t think, I correct silently, although I would never voice this thought out loud. To do so would be disloyal to the only real sibling I’ve ever known. Until now. “That’s just because he doesn’t know you.”

“Nor does he want to.”

“He’ll change his mind.”

“Maybe.” Claire checks her watch. “You ready to do this?”

“How can I identify a man I never saw?”

“You’ll take a good look. You’ll take your time. You’ll do your best. That’s all anyone can ask.”

I nod and push open the passenger door, feeling the wind pushing back, as if warning me to stay put. Claire comes around to my
side of the car and grabs my hand, guiding me across the parking lot. The wind is whipping my hair into a frenzy. It shoots out in all directions, as if I’ve just stepped on a live wire, each strand a tiny whip lashing at my cheeks and eyes. “It’s funny the way things work out, isn’t it?” I ask, coming to a sudden halt behind an ancient black Buick, amazed at what I’m about to say.