The End Of Desire: A Rowan Gant Investigation (7 page)

“Will do, and thank you very much. Again, I’m
sorry I had to disturb you at this hour.” I was doing my best to
recover from my stumble and sound official, so I added, “Now, make
sure you lock the door behind you.”

She simply nodded in reply, but I waited
until she was back inside and I heard the click of the deadbolt
before I turned and headed toward the room.

“Dammit! Stupid. Stupid.” I muttered the
admonishment to myself as I walked.

Concerned that I might need to simply veer
toward my car instead of continuing on with this insanity, I cast a
furtive glance back over my shoulder. Fortunately, I didn’t notice
anything unusual, such as her spying on me from the window, so I
mutely worked at convincing myself she was half asleep and had
completely missed the gaffe.

It didn’t take me very long to cover the
distance between the office and the far corner of the building, and
though I made it a point to walk at a modest pace, my heart was
thumping hard against my ribcage by the time I arrived at the
door.

I stood there for a minute, simply inspecting
the surroundings. The physical characteristics of the building made
room 7 an obvious choice even over and above Miranda’s penchant for
the number. The way this particular end of the structure
terminated, there was an open stairwell leading up to the second
story of the addition. That dead space would have acted as a sound
barrier to dull any errant cries from her victim. Still, there was
a room on the opposite side of this one and, given the limited
availability of lodging in the city lately, it almost had to have
been occupied by someone. Had that been the case, surely the guest
would have heard something.

I gave my head a small shake then reached up
and massaged my temples. I was tired, I had a headache, and I had
just lied my way into a crime scene. My brain was launching into
rampant speculation while ignoring the facts. It remained that a
murder had occurred in room 7, and no one had reported anything
suspicious, so I needed to stop over thinking the situation and
just do what I came here to do.

Glancing back toward the office, I still
didn’t see anything to raise any alarms. Turning in place, I saw
nothing on the parking lot to worry me either. Giving up and
deciding I must be in the clear, I stuck the key into the lock.

The moment metal touched metal, I felt the
chill on my spine once again. This one, however, was just like the
first, carrying with it not fear but a feeling of excitement. As
sick as it seemed, the sense of elation literally felt like the
passionate rush of anticipated sexual release, and it coursed
through me, branching out to touch every nerve. At that instant,
there was no doubt in my mind that Annalise and Miranda had been
here.

I closed my eyes, drew in a deep breath, and
then let it back out slowly as I struggled to ground myself,
mentally fighting to maintain a solid earthly connection and not
allow the cries of the dead to drag me across the veil. Then,
opening my eyes once again, I twisted the key in the lock and
pushed the door open, tearing the tape seal between it and the jamb
in the process.

Ducking beneath the yellow crime scene
tape, I stepped into
her
world.

I
froze in place, an
involuntary physical pause brought about purely by things felt,
rather than seen.

I had only taken a single step across the
threshold and then come back upright before hitting the invisible
wall. Now, as I stood there motionless, the incandescent bulbs in
the walkway overhang were spilling illumination inward through the
open door at my back. The light edged in past my form, revealing
random bits of the room in narrow swaths, making it appear far more
eerie than I suppose it would have under less horrific
circumstances. Of course, it didn’t help that my own distorted
shadow fell along the floor down the center of the oblique display
and then disappeared into the otherwise blue-black darkness, adding
an urgent sense of foreboding to the overall picture.

Of everything permeating the unmoving air, to
me, sex was the most palpable. But, it wasn’t the same stale funk
of peddled intercourse and spent prophylactics that oozed
throughout my lodging back at the Airline Courts. In fact, sweet
watermelon, cigarette smoke, and what might have been a hint of
burnt flesh were actually what formed the base of the obvious
olfactory signature here. However, raw, uninhibited sex was
definitely the high note, and in that way, it rose above everything
else.

Simply being the accent, however, wasn’t good
enough for it where I was concerned. It hit me hard and didn’t let
up. Even at a week old, the assaulting pheromones seemed fresh
enough to have been released into the atmosphere only a moment
before. Unfortunately for me, my awareness of things ethereal
served only to amplify their effects several fold, and no amount of
grounding could stop them.

But, even then it went deeper still.
Intertwined with the base physicality were two very distinct
emotions—love and fear. And, even given the opposite natures of the
two, it was obvious to me that they were not mutually exclusive.
Though starkly different, the feelings wrapped around one another
and then wove themselves tightly into the sex itself. On the
surface, they seemed symbiotic, feeding on one another in an
endlessly growing spiral of depravity.

I blinked hard in the darkness then forced
myself to relax and simply observe. I didn’t know how long I would
be able to actually accomplish that feat, but for now it worked,
and that was enough to allow me to move once again. Taking a pair
of steps farther inward, I twisted in place, carefully shut the
door, and then flipped on the light switch before turning back to
scan the interior.

It looked much as I had imagined it would.
Cheap paneling covered the walls, leading upward from dark
institutional grade carpeting and ending at an off-white
acoustically textured ceiling. A single light fixture clung to the
center of that light-colored plane, spreading luminance downward
from a pair of medium wattage bulbs.

A full bed all but dominated the narrow room,
jutting out from the wall to my left. It had already been stripped
of linens, but the vinyl mattress cover showed several rusted
smears of varying size and shape that I suspected were the product
of blood that had soaked through the sheets. Along the wall to my
right was a low dresser with a television perched on its marred
top.

Also to the right of center, on the back wall
was a doorway leading into a small room housing a vanity-style sink
and dressing mirror; left of that, on the perpendicular wall I
could see what was most likely the door to the shower and toilet.
Oddly, in the far left corner of the main room, a table lamp and
telephone sat on the floor between two outdated chairs. A small,
round table that looked like it might have originally made a home
beneath them was sidled up close to the head of the bed.

I stepped slowly through the space,
negotiating the tight area between the foot of the mattress and the
short bureau. All the while I was fighting against feelings of
arousal. Under different circumstances I am sure I would have
considered it a pleasant sensation, but at the moment it seemed
sick and twisted. It kept hammering at me, gaining ground with each
shuffling step I took.

I paused again and took a deep breath,
focusing instead on the pounding headache I’d been trying so hard
to forget. The pain wasn’t exactly what I would call welcome, but
it was preferable to the sickening idea of being turned on by what
had happened here, and that was the ethereal sensation I needed to
deny.

Extreme arousal was almost too mild a
description for the feeling that had been coming over me as I stood
out on the walkway, and now that I was directly exposed to the
scene, the excitation was taking over. Though I was alone and had
no need to speak, what little of my rational self that remained
wanted desperately to put what I was feeling into words. However,
try as I might, nouns, adjectives and any other modifier for that
matter had become all but meaningless. I could think of no way to
accurately convey the sensation with simple syllables. Even the
verbal theatrics of an adult film didn’t seem as though they would
do it justice.

I had felt something very similar to this at
the crime scenes in Saint Louis and had thought it close to
overwhelming then. I had even experienced it all first hand the
night Felicity had tried to kill me while under Miranda’s control.
However, each of those instances was merely a faint hint in
comparison to now.

I’m sure that at the other scenes the
sensation had probably been masked by a host of conflicting
energies occupying the room, namely evidence technicians and cops.
As for the night of my direct encounter, I was too busy dealing
with my own fear to take much notice of anything else.

This, however, was different. It was
the first instance in which I had been alone and unthreatened
in
her
world. Although,
whether or not I was truly unthreatened remained to be
seen.

Even as I concentrated on the aching in my
skull, an intense and very pleasant tickle slowly undulated through
my groin. I instantly caught my breath and even felt myself rock
slightly as my knees seemed to buckle momentarily. Even though it
was a shock, the level of pleasure the sensation carried with it
was unlike anything I had ever felt before. I felt sick to my
stomach at the thought of what had caused it, but at the same time
it felt so amazing that I found myself consciously wishing it would
happen again.

Out of reflex I looked down. Even though no
one was here but me, I couldn’t keep from making a self-conscious
check to be certain I wasn’t embarrassing myself. Surprisingly,
given the nature and intensity of the sensation, what one would
assume to be the affected body part appeared to be at rest, and
nothing was out of place.

But, then, when I gave it some thought, I
suppose it shouldn’t have been such a surprise after all. There was
something about the sexual energy that was alien, and having been
down this road before, I knew exactly what it was. The arousal was
patently feminine, just as the fear was wholly masculine.

I simply stood there for at least a solid
minute, maybe even two, struggling to center my thoughts on the
ethereal migraine and deny the other sensation. If my ploy was
truly working I couldn’t say, but since there was no repeat of the
tickle, I pressed forward.

Continuing around the end of the bed, I made
my way over to the table. Its surface was crusted with
reddish-brown smears of dried blood in various patterns just like
the mattress cover. One recognizable outline was almost certainly
that of a knife or maybe even a pair of scissors. Others were not
so defined, some of them large, some of them small. I had seen what
Miranda had done to Officer Hobbes back in Saint Louis, so I knew
mutilation was a big part of her sick turn-on. Therefore, it really
wasn’t a stretch for me to imagine a severed body part or two from
the victim being responsible for the more generous stains.

Here and there, around the edges of the
table, a silvery glint of bi-chromatic fingerprint powder glimmered
in the soft light. A basic effort to go through the motions, I
assumed, because I’m sure the police didn’t really expect to find
anything by way of a usable print here.

Thus far I had been observing a hands off
policy, making it a point to look but not touch. I wish I could say
the decision was because I didn’t want to disturb anything given
that the scene had apparently not yet been cleared. However, noble
as it sounded, that idea had become moot the moment I pushed open
the door. I had broken the seal, so if the police needed to return
in search of further evidence, I had already rendered anything they
might find inadmissible because I had contaminated the room,
thereby breaking the chain. I wasn’t really certain whether what I
had done was a misdemeanor or a felony, or even what penalty it
carried. But, I was definitely hoping I wouldn’t be finding out
anytime soon.

To be painfully honest, the real reason I was
keeping my hands to myself was self-preservation because I feared
my inherent predisposition for uncontrolled psychometry. Simply
being in this room had already bombarded me with more than I was
sure I could handle, the most recent sensation being a case in
point. Actually touching something could put me into a spiral,
sending me through an ethereal event from which I might not
recover.

It’s not like it hadn’t happened before. Over
the years I’d almost died more than once while channeling homicide
victims. I wasn’t too keen on it then, and I definitely wasn’t
interested in becoming one of Miranda’s fatalities by proxy
now.

Squatting down, I brought myself to eye level
with the bed. I don’t know what I thought I was going to see from
that angle, but one never knows until he tries, so I did. I panned
my gaze across the tableau and tried to visualize what had gone on
here one short week ago. Having had what amounted to my own
firsthand experience, I expected it would be relatively easy to do.
What I didn’t expect, however, was the visualization coming upon me
with a vengeance.

In front of me, there is a nude man tied to
the bed, a standard clothesline rope criss-crossing beneath the
metal frame and securing tightly to his wrists and ankles. An extra
loop of the rope is visible around his neck. The reason for it
becomes clear as I watch him struggling against the bonds. Each
time he pulls against them, the noose tightens and he begins to
choke. I can actually hear the distant echoes of him gagging,
muffled though they are, as his mouth is covered with a wide swath
of duct tape which is wound about his head and lower face.