From A Dead Sleep Page 8
He went to Old Reliable to find that answer. He raised his shoulders and dug a hand down deep into his desolate, front jeans pocket. He retrieved a quarter and held the coin in front of his face.
“Heads is left. Tails is right.”
He flicked the quarter into the air and moved to catch it with his opposite hand. Forgetting those fingers were already wrapped around a flashlight, however, he gasped and quickly lunged forward to use his free hand. The quarter bounced off the side of his wrist and dropped down into the misty darkness below.
“Son of a bitch.”
He searched his pocket for another coin. Empty. He shook his head in annoyance.
Just then, déjà vu from a years-old memory unearthed itself from his conscience. He remembered committing a similar act at that very same spot as a child.
Diana and he used to spend hours playing in the woods around Meyers Bridge. Sometimes it was hide-and-seek, but it was usually Old West. Sean liked being the sheriff with his sister the loyal deputy. Tree-branch-rifles and twig-pistols. Fun, simpler times.
On one day, Diana wanted to switch roles. After some brotherly stubbornness, he said she could be the sheriff if she won a coin toss. As she eagerly watched, he flicked a penny into the air only to purposely let the spinning coin bounce off of his hand and into the river.
“Well, I guess you can’t be sheriff,” he said with a smug look on his mug.
His obvious stunt was received with an unexpected punch to the chest. Diana was never afraid to mix it up with her older brother. It was the same day that she had twisted her ankle and sliced up her knee after losing her balance along a knoll on the western slope. She had been providing backup for her brother during a fierce imaginary shootout.
Sean had carried her in his arms over a mile—all the way back home. She had cried the entire way.
Sean now smirked at the recollection. Back then, he was his sister’s hero.
Upon arriving home that night in their childhood, Sean had promptly received the full brunt of blame from their mother. Anytime her angel got hurt, it was always her older brother’s fault. Bed without dinner.
But as always, little Diana hadn’t forgotten about her big brother. She smuggled him two oatmeal cookies once their mother had fallen asleep in front of the television.
“We always played on the west side,” Sean whispered now, his words inaudible over the howling wind.
As children, they had always stuck to the western slope because it took in more light and was void of flat areas and trenches that maintained rainwater for days on end. The western slope was only muddy after a rain.
Prior to that night, it had barely rained in a week. If the stranger had mud on his shoes, he most likely came from the east.
The increasing wind forced Sean to tug his hood down lower as he climbed up off the road and onto a small embankment on the right side of the bridge. His flashlight traced the landscape, searching for disturbances in the moist earth. With fresh rain already eroding the dirt away with miniature streams, he knew he wouldn’t find anything right there. With his shoulders raised, he disappeared between two thick pines, the branches of which smacked stiffly against the sides of his body like a warning to stay away.
While the cover of sheltering trees partially protected him from the rain, the assortment of dead branches, intertwining roots, and plant life effectively covered the ground like a large fishing net, leaving only patches of naked dirt where footprints would be noticed. Sean lit up each patch he saw, carefully searching for any outlines or imprints.
Fifteen minutes of intense scouring went by without a sign of human misplacement. Sean was thorough, but also understood that there was a large area to cover. He lumbered deeper into the forest, occasionally changing direction and making sure he swept exposed areas from side to side. He kept aware of the sound of the river in the background, knowing it would provide him a direction back to the bridge. In the sunlight, losing one’s way wouldn’t have been as much of an issue. At night, however, in the middle of a rainstorm, one had to be a little more careful. The fairly level ground and limited visibility didn’t offer up any helpful landmarks.
Strong gusts of wind came in intervals from the north. Each time, he could hear the clamor of whistling and the disruption of tree branches about five seconds before the cold air would blast against his body.
The ache in his ankle, while simply a nuisance at first, increasingly protested as he continued to negotiate his body between trees and along shallow trenches. He persevered on.
Other than a few paw-prints and animal droppings, no signs of recent inhabitants were unveiled. Maybe he had chosen the wrong side of the river. Or, maybe his entire theory couldn’t hold enough water to measure up with what moisture was trapped in his soggy shoes.
The further he ventured, the stronger a sense of failure began to burrow at the pit of his stomach. Was there really anything to be found out in these woods, or was he simply the armchair detective that Lumbergh believed him to be?
Several more minutes went by. Nothing. Another cold gust, this one stronger than the others, slapped up under Sean’s hood and sent it flying backwards. With fat raindrops now smacking directly against the top of his head, he decided it was time to head back in defeat. Perhaps nothing was found because there was nothing left to be found. He began making his way back toward the sound of the river.
He’d nearly reached it when the wind died down, and the dull thump of what sounded like an object dropping to the ground prompted Sean’s body to spin around like an unlatched gate on freshly greased hinges. The flashlight beam snapped from side to side as his wide eyes searched for movement. With only his wrist swaying, he listened intently for a good half-minute. Nothing but the constant fall of water from the sky. Perhaps he was growing paranoid, or maybe he was simply exhausted.
He took a breath and turned his foot in the mud to start his way back. It was then that he heard what sounded like the quick, coarse scrape of dirt being shoveled from the ground. It seemed to come from the same direction as the first noise.
“Who’s there?” he shouted.
Without waiting for a response, he immediately galloped forward, leaping over a patch of low shrubs that sprawled out before him. Using his free hand to swing himself around the base of a large aspen, his flashlight dropped down low where it caught the quick glimmer of two marble-like eyes staring back at him.
Sean quickly choked up on the flashlight, ready to use it as a club, but its need as a weapon quickly diminished upon his assessment of what stood before him. Those glazed eyes were attached to nothing other than a small brown-haired creature whose appearance dropped Sean’s jaw. A long-eared jackrabbit, just like the one that had paid him a visit earlier that morning. In fact, it could have very well been the same one. Its thick fur had been matted from the rain, causing its lanky body to look smaller, but the color and markings were dead-on. Once again, a sense that he was being judged relentlessly tapped Sean’s body the same way the weather was buffeting him. However, the events that had taken place since their first meeting had placed Sean into a state that was anything but humbling.
“Get out of here!” he snarled before launching his body forward and kicking a large granite stone from the ground.
The rock slammed into the broadside of a thick, nearby aspen, sailing just a few inches above the rabbit’s head. The frightened creature quickly high-tailed it into the darkness, leaving behind a recognizable thumping sound with each stride.
Sean had nearly knocked his shoe from his foot when he kicked the stone. With his shoulders low and the ache in his ankle now worse, he swore beneath his breath and lowered down to one knee. After setting his flashlight down on the ground, he latched onto his shoestrings, but his fingers quickly came to a halt, as did all movement from his body.
Just inches ahead on the ground, a flat white object lay directly in the Mag’s light path. Its contrast with the earthy tones below, it was standing out like a burning bush.
His temper had unearthed the torn-off front page of a newspaper. He immediately recognized the title up top—The Lakeland Tribune.
The town of Lakeland sat about seven miles north of Winston. Years ago, the towns mirrored each other in population, culture, and seclusion. But today, Lakeland and Winston were polar opposites. Copper mining had put Lakeland on the map back in the late 1800s, but the town hadn’t enjoyed any form of prosperity in decades. Its historical significance wasn’t enough to keep a twentieth century economy sustainable. Thus, in the late 1990s, Lakeland found itself, with a handful of other small Colorado towns, on a petition to the state that requested the self-preservation measure of legalized gambling. Voters statewide eagerly made that request a reality, despite much opposition from many of the resident townsfolk—a handful of whom had actually ended up moving to Winston because of the decision.
Considering the trademark strong winds that routinely visited the region, it wasn’t odd to find such an item in the woods outside of Winston: merely a piece of light trash carried through the air and eventually coming to rest. Only, it hadn’t simply come to a rest. It had been lying directly underneath that rock, among freshly disheveled dirt. When Sean flattened out the paper, he noticed that the printed date was from only two days ago. He knew the find had some significance. With raindrops snapping against the newsprint and round water imprints forming, he quickly shoved the page into the front pocket of his parka for protection.
Lowering his gaze back to the loose, disordered earth in front of him, a tight knot formed in his stomach. There had to be something buried there. As his knees sank deeper into the cold, drenched mud beneath him, his hopes rose.
As if a starter pistol had just been fired off, he found his hands quickly sifting through the soil, probing for anything that could bolster the basis for him being in the middle of the forest by himself, in the midst of a frigid, late night rainstorm. If the trees had eyes, they’d witness a man desperately searching for his own vindication.
It didn’t take long to find something. Sean’s fingers hooked an object that felt at first to be a thick, smooth cord. He used his opposite hand to train the flashlight on what was quickly revealed to be a leather strap, each end still buried.
Like a pirate hoisting up buried treasure from below, he uprooted the attached object with a stern tug. It was some sort of rectangular satchel, about a foot and a half wide and three inches thick. The clearing of the filth and grime that clung to it revealed first a handle and then a strap with notches and a thin metal buckle that secured it shut. It didn’t look all that different from the document brief bags that TV lawyers carried into court with them.
Sean found himself short of breath as he held the bag up in the air and illuminated it for a closer look. Inside it, there had to be some answers to his questions. He nearly yanked it open right then and there but paused for a moment to weigh the consequences of doing so. He worried about the concept of tainted evidence and feared that breaking open the bag would somehow diminish its legitimacy if he offered it up as proof to Lumbergh of what he’d seen transpire at the bridge.
He didn’t ponder the dilemma for very long. He believed that going back to Lumbergh would only complicate things, and he didn’t feel like being accused by the chief of planting the bag to further prolong a story that wasn’t believed in the first place.
“Fuck it,” he muttered before swallowing some bile and reaching for the buckle.
Chapter 12
Diana crawled into bed at 11:34 p.m. The small room was dark, but she could tell her husband was still awake by the sound of his breathing. Lying flat on his back, shirtless and with a forearm behind his head, he lifted the covers for his wife as she slid in next to him. Strong rain pounded the rooftop mercilessly. Water gushing through a drainpipe outside sounded like a waterfall.
“Is she back down?” he asked, not sounding at all tired.
“She went right back to sleep. Probably a bad dream,” she said. “I tried calling Sean again. Still a busy signal. He must have taken the phone off the hook.”
“In no mood for talking, I’d imagine,” he added.
She placed her arm over his chest and rested her head along his shoulder. Clad in one of the oversized, button-down shirts she preferred to sleep in, she could feel the beat of her husband’s heart against her shoulder. Minutes went by as they silently stared at the ceiling; the sound of the storm was almost inaudible against the thoughts racing through their minds. A loud roar of thunder suddenly sent a tremble through the house. When it ended, she spoke.
“Is it possible he’s telling the truth?”
It was the same question Gary had been asking himself throughout the day. “Anything’s possible, but I scoured that bridge. Believe me, for the sake of your brother’s own sanity, I was hoping to find some blood . . . or anything.” “Did you check the forest?”
“Around the bridge, we did. We found nothing.”
“Why would he make it up, Gary? It doesn’t make sense.”
He turned to her, cupping her shoulder with his free hand. “I stopped trying to figure out Sean Coleman a long time ago.”
She turned more to him, studying him in the flashes of lightning for several moments. She kissed his lips. “I’m so sorry, honey. You shouldn’t have to deal with stuff like this.”
She ran the inside of her bare thigh against his and placed her hand behind his head, pulling him into a deeper kiss. He smiled in the darkness and pulled his wife on top of him. His hands slid down to her hips.
Pulsed flashes of lightning lit up the room from a side window. Diana let out a surprised gasp as she caught the reflection of a hunched-over figure in the wide mirror above her dresser. She quickly spun up off of Gary and to her knees, her head whipping toward the bedroom door. As another battering of thunder punished the sky above, his wife’s sudden movement led Gary to instinctively reach for his nightstand drawer where he kept a pistol. Instead, his knuckles sent a small half-filled glass of water to the floor where it shattered loudly.
“Mom?” Diane called out.
Gary twisted his body away from the doorway and quickly felt for the small lamp beside him. When the bulb clicked on, he turned back to see Diana lunging toward her now-awake mother.
Dolores stood just inside the doorway, bent at the hip with her forearm resting along the top of a nearby dresser for support. Her pale blue pajama bottoms were clearly wet. She had had an accident. Diana held her mother’s free hand and placed an arm around her waist, concerned that the elderly, stroke-stricken woman might fall.
“Broom!” Dolores groaned, which both Diana and Gary knew to mean bathroom.
Dolores’ tired eyes lifted to meet her daughter’s, as a stream of drool slid down the left side of her permanently twisted mouth—a result of the stroke she suffered two years ago.
Diana’s eyes told Gary that she would take care of the problem. As she led her mother away, Gary sat up in bed and studied the mess of broken glass and water steaming its way along a floorboard. Down the hallway, he heard his wife offering instructions of what she was doing in a voice loud enough for her mother to hear. He turned to a seated position on the side of the bed and let his legs dangle. His feet almost touched the floor. His shoulders dropped, and his elbows rested on top of his knees.
“Damn you, Sean.”
Sunday
Chapter 13
Green. Everything was as bright as day, and green—the sofa, the television set, Rocco . . . The old dachshund’s lifeless eyes looked like a pair of illuminant buttons on a control panel. The goggles Sean had found were night-vision goggles.
Sean had thought they might be when he had reached inside the bag in the middle of the storm. His Uncle Zed used to have a similar pair of goggles a couple of years ago. He’d p
icked them up at a flea market in Frisco, Colorado, and later traded them in town for some ammo. But these were different—much more serious and expensive-looking. Possibly military issue or some mock variety that could be ordered out of a cheesy survivalist magazine. They were made of an imposing black metal, fastened to an elaborate head mount of canvas straps to keep the rubber eyecups suctioned to the wearer’s head, leaving the wearer’s hands free. They looked almost brand new.
Sean lowered the complex gadget from his exhausted, stinging eyes and laid it back down carefully across the small wooden kitchen table in front of him. The table’s bad leg caused it to wobble. His hand found the back of his head and scratched at the persistent itch. A few more hours and the sun would be up and with it a new day, but he feared little light would be shed in the form of answers. In fact, his late night finding prompted more questions than anything.
Other than the goggles, the most notable item in the brief bag was a woven stocking cap, deep purple in color. The fluffy trim along the rim suggested that it was designed for women. There was no suicide note to be found and no forms of identification, just a well-used red ballpoint pen, an empty book of mailing stamps, and a handful of paperclips and binding clips. Not exactly the enlightening evidence he had hoped for.
But Sean was confident that the bag definitely belonged to that stranger on the bridge. Those wide red marks he saw under the dead man’s eyes were the tip-off. They were large and clear enough for a hungover drunk to see from forty yards away. They weren’t caused by large eyeglasses as Sean had initially thought. They were caused by the night-visions, and judging by their prominence, they had been worn by the stranger for quite some time prior to him sending a bullet through the back of his head.