A Blind Eye (6 page)

“Deal.”

“You scared the mess out of me.” But I figured she already knew that, considering her ear was pressed up against my chest, listening to my heart pound away.

“Sorry,” she said.

I helped her back into the Rover. “I don't think we should stay here. They could come back. Or they might have bugged it, waiting for us.”

“Okay. Where to?”

I shrugged. “These guys are persistent. We can't run forever. They'll find us. They'll find you.” I'd already proven that I stank at keeping her safe. “I think we should tell the police.”

“No way.” She shook her head. “Tried that, didn't I? And it didn't do a bit of good. I already told you, that's how this whole thing started. I dreamed about Katie and went to the police. Then, when Katie actually disappeared, the police came back, asking me questions. It's not coincidence that the next day the kidnappers came after me.” She was shouting now. “So, you can just leave me here, because I won't go. I won't.” She turned her head away and felt for the door handle.

I locked the doors so she couldn't escape and leaned my head back on the seat rest. Stubborn punk Brit-girl. “Fine. Have it your way.” I let out a loud sigh, careful to add extra exasperation on the exhale. “Scarlett, you have to tell me what they want. Do you know them?”

“No. I don't know them, or I would have given their names to the police in London, wouldn't I? And I don't know what they want.”

There had to be something in all of this to help me understand why they were searching for Scarlett. “What about the dream? Can you give me more details about that? Do you know if the men in your dream are the same as the ones in the restaurant and snooping around the cabin?”

“Maybe. Describe them to me.” It sounded like a reasonable request, but in her voice, I sensed a challenge. She was testing me. But about what?

“One was tall with light-brown hair.” I paused. Okay, I got it now. She wanted me to prove I was worthy of associating with a blind girl. I closed my eyes and recreated the scene in the restaurant, since that's when she'd said she recognized one of their voices. I tried to block out any visual aids and focused on the other senses.

I started over. “One was tall, taller than me.” Maybe she could sense height based on voice direction, so I kept that in. “His voice was deep and throaty, like he had a cold or something, but also soothing, like the voice-over for movie trailers.” What else? “Um . . . Oh! He smelled like Old Spice.” I knew 'cause Jay wore it too. “And he chewed gum, so there might have been some mint scent, but I didn't smell it myself.” I'd covered sound and smell. Taste? I couldn't help her there. All I tasted was blood in my mouth after Scarface hit me.

That left me with touch. “He wore a cheap suit, so his clothes would've been rough, like polyester.” Rough clothes?—totally lame. What a bunch of useless garbage. Just because he chewed gum and wore a suit in the restaurant doesn't mean he did in Scarlett's dream.

I looked over at her, and she was covering her mouth, trying not to giggle.

“Shut up,” I said.

She let it all out and laughed even harder. When she finished and wiped her eyes, she said, “Actually, that was brilliant. Probably the best anyone's ever done. Especially after such a short time.”

I gave myself a pat on the back. Another wasted gesture because she couldn't see it. If she only knew how many times I'd blundered, she wouldn't be so liberal with her praise.

I guess I passed the test because she got serious again and said, “In my dream, there are three people, plus Katie, my friend from the Shepherd. They're in a room with a hard, smooth floor. Katie lies on a bed with a cold metal top, no mattress or blankets. A bright light shines on her face, making it warm to the touch. The other three people surround the bed. There is a rolling tray to the side, filled with small tools. When I run my hands over them, they remind me of silverware, but heavy for their size. The tools clink and clatter as they are used and exchanged for others.

“The room smells like medicine and surgical spirit. One person is female. She's tall for a woman and wears glasses. Her hair is pulled up in a knot on her head. ‘We failed,' she says, and her voice is deep and soft, like lying on a bed of cotton fluff, but full of disappointment. The other two are men. One, I think, is the man with the scar; when I touch his face, I feel the mark. The other man fades away, and I wake before I can know him.” By the time she finished speaking, all remnants of laughter and joking were gone.

How did she glean all of that from a dream when she had no vision? Maybe she could see in her dreams. Or maybe she saw the dream world clearly but within her own scope of sensory perception. She'd painted a perfect picture of some kind of medical procedure gone awry. “What did they do to Katie?”

She didn't answer. Instead, she leaned forward and covered her face with her hands.

“Don't cry.” I reached over and put my hand on her back, rubbing in gentle circles.

“In my dream, I touch her face. It's sticky and wet. Smells like blood. Her eyes hang loose out of their sockets.”

My hand froze. “Was Katie blind?”

“No, she wasn't.
Isn't
. She could still be alive, right?” She broke down again, her body shaking.

“Sure. She could be fine.” But I doubted it. If they were this tenacious about finding Scarlett, I didn't have much hope for Katie. That is, assuming the whole dream-becomes-reality thing was true. “What were they doing to her?”

She shook her head. “Dunno.”

I rubbed her back for a second longer, until she lifted her wet face from her hands. Then I said, “Okay, let's get going.”

She sort of nodded, and I thought I heard a soft, “'Kay.”

I backed out of the neighbor's driveway. When we passed my cabin, the front door was only half closed. I stopped the car and opened my door.

“Where are you going?” she cried, her hand latching onto my arm.

“It's fine. I'm just going to lock up. I'll be two seconds.” I hurried to the house and secured the dead bolt then jogged back to the car.

We couldn't stay here. And I wouldn't go home. I'd never get into Canada with Scarlett, not legally anyway. I had no idea how to attempt an undercover border crossing, so that ruled out my aunt's house.

“Okay. Here's the plan”—at least the best plan I could come up with—“I'll take you back to Portland. We can hang out there for a few hours, blend into the crowd, until this Simon guy answers his phone. Then we'll figure out a way to get you on a plane back to London. Will he meet you at the airport?”

She nodded. “I think so. Or I can take the tube.”

I dialed his number and passed the phone to Scarlett.

“He's still not picking up,” she said.

Shoot. I could give her some money to pay for a taxi when she got to the London airport. Maybe I could throw in some extra. I had a couple grand, but was it enough to get her back on her feet? To help her move out of Simon's apartment? They must have assisted living places for people with disabilities, and she'd mentioned a government stipend. Would the men who'd searched the cabin go all the way back to England to kidnap her again? It was hard to believe they'd gone to all that trouble to kidnap her just because she dreamed about a murder. It didn't seem like she posed that much of a threat.

After a quick stop at a fast-food drive-thru, we merged onto the highway, backtracking west toward Portland.

“Scarlett, where were you when you found my car? Before the cemetery? If I knew how you got away from them and into my car, maybe we can find out who is behind all this.”

I hoped that if I had something solid, some real evidence, I could convince Scarlett to go to the police. I'd already proven I was no Jason Bourne. These were problems for professionals—CIA, FBI—whoever solved nasty crimes that spanned two continents. If I couldn't get her home soon, I'd have to go to the police whether she wanted to or not. But if we could figure out who had taken her, maybe the police would be more willing to listen and do something about it.

“When they put me in the suitcase, they must've drugged me,” she said. “When I woke up, I was inside a locked room. Sometimes being blind pays off, because the gits did nothing to secure the windows. I waited until dark—it wasn't long—then crawled out.”

“How did you know you wouldn't fall five stories to your death?” It seemed like a big risk. But maybe that was a gamble she was willing to make rather than end up on the operating table.

“I smelled grass and mulch and felt coolness from the earth on my face.”

The kidnappers weren't the only ones to underestimate the blind girl—though I hated lumping myself in with them. She continually surprised me with her ability to use her other senses to navigate the darkness of her world.

“I went in the direction of quiet. I walked for a long time, until I found myself in a cemetery. I hid as best I could, not knowing for certain if I was totally concealed. Then I heard your car, and I figured, why not? It couldn't be worse.”

She wrenched the knife stuck in my guilty heart, twisting it relentlessly. “You mean until I dumped you on the interstate? I know I said this already, but I really am sorry about that.”

“I know. It's over, and you've made up for it, and more.”

“Sure.”

She leaned her head back and lifted her face toward the sun again. She seemed to like that. I turned on the stereo and selected a playlist. At the very least, I could try to do something that might bring her a little happiness before I sent her home. Something fun. What would a British punk girl like?

I considered stopping at Multnomah Falls for some sightseeing but quickly decided that was a worthless idea. Then I remembered her comment about not having anything to leave behind back at the cabin. I could take her shopping. Didn't all girls love that? How many days had she been wearing those same clothes? I shuddered.

“How long have you been gone?”

“Dunno for sure, but I'm thinking four or five days. I'm not certain how long I stayed in the bag.”

She definitely deserved a diversion. “I'm thinking we should go shopping.” There was a Nordstrom at the Lloyd Center Mall in downtown Portland. We could stop there.

The ride from Hood River took a little over an hour. I parked in the lower level of the mall's huge garage. After consulting the store directory, I took Scarlett to the teens department on the second floor. She clung to my arm while we rode the escalator, grinning the whole way up.

I knew nothing—
nothing
—about shopping for girls. I went straight to a sales lady and said, “Hi, this is my friend Scarlett. Her luggage didn't make it. Can you please help her find whatever she wants?”

The sales lady seemed a little old to be working in juniors. But she smiled and tossed her long, dark hair behind her and said, “Of course.” She looked like she spent a bit too much time down at the make-up counter. A smudge of red lipstick on her teeth distracted me for a moment.

Scarlett tugged on my arm, and I leaned down. “Are you sure this is okay?” she whispered.

“It's more than okay. Really. Anything you want. Just promise me one thing.”

“What?”

“Get some new shoes. Those boots weigh more than you do.”

“Promise.”

The sales lady, Colette, according to her name tag, led us around the floor. She caught on quickly to Scarlett's blindness, describing the clothing with great detail. She described the jeans, shirts, and sweaters—which Scarlett insisted were actually called “jumpers.” Scarlett listened to every word, running her hands over the garments while Colette spoke.

I was about to tell Colette that Scarlett had no concept of color, but then Scarlett snuggled her cheek into a woolly cardigan and asked, “What color is it?”

“You told me you don't know colors,” I said.

“I like to hear it anyway.”

I wondered again what the world was like from inside her head. The sweater was gray. Did that mean everything soft and fuzzy was gray?

After they'd collected a mound of clothes, I hoped we might be done. But instead of heading to the cashier's counter, Colette steered us toward the dressing rooms.

“Ooh, no,” I said, shaking my head. “I am
not
going in there.” The women's bathroom had been bad enough. “I'll wait here.” I sat on a chair outside. A man sitting across from me cast me a sympathetic look.

Colette took Scarlett into the dressing rooms but then came right back out again. She laughed. “She sent me out for some skivvies.”

Oh yeah. No way was I going anywhere near that dressing room. I scooted my chair farther from the entrance then pulled out my phone to check my messages. When I saw three voice mails from my dad, my eyebrows slowly crept up. I pushed play: “Son”—again with the son?—“please call me.”
Beep
. “Christian, some men came to the office last night asking about you.” Yeah, and you led them right to me. “Call me.”
Beep
. “Look, I know you think I don't care.” He was wrong. I didn't
think
he didn't care; I
knew
he didn't care. But his voice strained as he finished the message. “I'm worried. Are you in trouble? Call me.” He hadn't given me or my life a second thought in years. I shook my head. What a sham.

I had two other messages from the same unidentified caller as last night. Both were just a few seconds of nothing, same as before. I pushed the call back button, and the phone rang.

A man answered. “Hello?”

I knew that voice. It was Deepthroat, or whatever his real name was. The tall guy. I didn't respond.