Love Lies Bleeding (8 page)

“Moths only know where they are in relation to the proximity of the moon,” Shep called after Pamela’s fleeing back. “That’s what you are, a big white moth. Not beautiful enough to be a butterfly, and I suppose Grady was your moon.” Shep laughed harshly. He was always at his sharpest during a hunt, as if he was a honed weapon himself. He liked being sharp, and feeling capable. More than capable. He was a perfect killer.

Pamela veered off through a stand of trees and Shep quickly cut sideways in a jog to keep her in sight. “I look forward to being the flame that snuffs you out. First Mr. Doyle wants answers, but he won’t make me be so nice this time.”

He picked up the pace of his jog and began to run.

•••••••••

Pamela veered into a clearing in the forest, tripped over a large branch, and went flying. She barely managed to break her fall.

A bit behind her, Shep laughed.

She looked up, and despite the frantic beating of her heart, she noticed an old stump of a tree hidden behind the large tree she had fallen by. The stump was jagged, as if the tree had died and then cracked off years ago rather than being cut.

Pamela rolled over to look back into the woods. She couldn’t see Shep.

She reached for the large tree branch that had tripped her.

•••••••••

Moments later, Shep stepped into the clearing. He paused, growing even more elated when he saw the train of Pamela’s dress tucked at the back of the large tree she was hiding behind. “Oh, are we done the running part of the program? Where, oh, where, could little Pamela be?”

He jumped around the tree with a mocking growl and a cartoon wild-beast stance. Then he faltered when he saw only the skirt of Pamela’s dress draped over a tree stump.

Realizing his mistake, Shep turned back just as Pamela rounded the tree from behind and smashed the branch across his head.

He fell.

Hard.

Pamela, wearing only the bustier of her dress, lacy underpants, and heels, bludgeoned Shep with the branch. She hit him over and over and over again. Blood from some punctured artery spurted across Pamela’s legs, the shock of it causing her to reel back.

She lowered the branch, trying to calm herself, but never took her eyes off the bloody pile of man that was Shep at her feet.

He gurgled.

“Shut up! Shut up!” Pamela, suddenly absolutely hysterical, hit him again and again. He didn’t make any further noise. “Just shut up! You! You killed Grady! Grady! You killed him! You killed … you killed … you’ve killed me!”

Shep didn’t move.

Pamela, suddenly as exhausted as she had been hysterical a moment before, dropped the branch. She stood for a moment and gazed into the forest. Except she wasn’t really looking at anything at all.

Shep’s blood dripped down her legs.

One bird called to another. Pamela had never known bird calls. She didn’t have an ear for any kind of music. Grady would have known what it was. Grady would have known what to do. Grady had always known.

Her arm twitched, and then her leg. She turned toward her skirt.
 

She stepped around Shep, pulled the skirt off the tree stump, and pulled in back on over her blood-splattered legs. That was better. It wouldn’t do to wander through the woods only half dressed.

•••••••••

Retracing her route through the forest, Pamela, still rather out of it, wandered through the trees until she stumbled upon Karli lying at the base of a large cedar.

“Karli?” Pamela dropped to her knees and tentatively touched Karli’s shoulder.

Karli groaned and reached up a shaky hand to her head. A trace of blood had trickled down her forehead. “What an asshole,” she moaned. “I mean, I knew he wasn’t a nice guy, but … I think he threw me head first into that tree.”

“Can you get up? Wait, do you think you should get up? What if your neck is broken?”

Karli turned her neck carefully, one way and the other, then shrugged. She beckoned for Pamela to help her as she slowly sat up.

“Where’s my gun? Do you see my gun?”

Pamela stood and looked around. Karli, using the tree for support, slowly gained her feet. Pamela found the gun a few feet away and pointed down at it.

Karli tentatively stepped away from the tree, and when she didn’t fall down, picked her way over toward Pamela and the gun. “Where is the prick?”

“Back a ways.”

“Uh-huh.” Karli took in Pamela’s glassy expression and bloodstained bustier. “Well. I didn’t know you had it in you.” She looked oddly grim at this revelation. She checked her gun for bullets, and, noting it was empty, her scowl deepened. She then turned and walked away.

After a moment, Pamela followed. Not because she actually wanted to go, but as if pulled that direction by Karli’s energy.

Karli glanced over her shoulder to make sure Pamela was behind her. Her jaw was clenched and her eyes narrowed in calculation. She looked very unhappy, and not just because she probably had a concussion as well as some sort of a spinal injury. She was tough. She could handle getting injured. The agency could handle any cleanup, but Pamela … Pamela was going to be a long-term problem.

THE NIGHTMARE

CHAPTER NINE

The Bungalow, Kitsilano

With the time it took for Karli to hot-wire Erwin’s car and navigate traffic across the Lions Gate Bridge and through downtown Vancouver, it was late in the afternoon before she and Pamela veered onto the cracked and grass-overgrown driveway of a ‘60s-style bungalow. Pamela was in the passenger seat, and not even remotely interested in her surroundings.

The other houses in the neighborhood had been updated and remodeled. This should have made the rather neglected home look out of place; instead, it just made it more invisible. Real estate prices were through the roof in this area of Vancouver, which was coveted for its ocean and mountain views and its proximity to the city center. Developers often shoved letters through the bungalow’s mailbox, as there seemed to be no other way to contact the absentee homeowners.

Karli and Pamela exited the car, though Pamela had to be coaxed out. Using a key Karli retrieved from underneath a moss-encrusted empty flowerpot, they entered the house.

•••••••••

The small foyer of the bungalow opened into a sparsely furnished living room. Karli pushed the pile of mail that had accumulated by the door out of her way with her foot. While she looked around, she tossed the keys in her hand in a gesture oddly reminiscent of Shep and his knife. It was a subconscious mimic. The windows, swathed in curtains, provided only dim light. The air was stale. The side tables were dusty. Karli tucked the house keys in her purse — she was still wearing the slut outfit — and turned back to Pamela. “It’s cool. Come in.”
 

Pamela, once again clutching the laptop to her chest, reluctantly entered.

“You’ll be safe here,” Karli said.

“Yes, but I want —”

“To go to Grady, to kill yourself. I don’t know why you even bothered in the forest, or coming back for me.”

“I wouldn’t want anything bad to happen to you. And my … death, I want on my terms, with Grady.”

“Listen. Various people, obviously, seem to think that Grady might have sent you sensitive information. That info needs to get into the right hands.”

“Your agency’s hands?”

“They’re the good guys.”

Pamela, not wanting to continue the conversation, placed a hand on her jaw and exhaled all the pain she was holding at bay. She was utterly exhausted.

“Wait,” Karli said, and then hustled down the hall farther into the house. Alone, Pamela glanced around, seeing a sparsely and impersonally furnished space that made it rather obvious no one lived there. Then Karli returned with a pill bottle for Pamela. “For your tooth.”

Pamela hesitated. Karli sighed and then shook a couple of pills into her hand. She dry swallowed them, then opened her mouth for Pamela to see. She held the bottle out to Pamela, who took it.

“Who lives here?”

“For now, you. Take two of those pills now and give me the bottle back.”

Pamela nodded obediently, then crossed through a far doorway and into the kitchen.
 

•••••••••

Clutching the laptop to her chest with one hand, Pamela palmed some water from the sink tap and swallowed two pills.

Karli leaned against the counter that ran between the stove and fridge. “I’ll be gone, tops, one hour. You take a shower and a nap and I’ll be back with a doctor.” Pamela stared at the water still running out of the tap and didn’t answer. Karli reached over and shut off the tap. “If we get through this and you still want to kill yourself, I’ll drive you to the cemetery myself. Okay?”

Pamela looked up at Karli as if to verify the truth of her words. Seemingly satisfied, she nodded. Karli held out her hand and Pamela, a little reluctantly, gave her the pill bottle back.
 

Karli turned to leave the kitchen but then paused at the door to the living room. “First door in the hall to your right is a bedroom with an en suite.”

Pamela nodded. Karli, completely hesitant to do so, exited through the living room to the foyer.

•••••••••

Back in the foyer, Karli paused by the front door and looked back to see Pamela watching her from the kitchen doorway. “Promise. We’ll go over everything when I get back. Promise.”

Now it was Pamela’s turn to hesitate.

“Trust me. Just a few more hours. Promise?”

Pamela finally nodded. Karli turned away, but then turned back. Seemed she was doing a lot of second guessing herself this particular day. “I need to hear you say it.”

“I won’t kill myself here or attempt to get to Grady’s grave while you are gone.”

Somewhat satisfied Karli nodded, exited, and locked the door behind her. Pamela, still cradling the laptop, wandered off down the hall.

•••••••••

Outside the bungalow, Karli leaned back against the front door. She stared pensively out at the street for a moment, and then, sighing resignedly, she opened her hand to reveal two pills.

She looked at the pills as if she loathed the sight of them, then, shaking her head, she dropped the pills back in the bottle.

Turning back to catch sight of Pamela wandering down the hall through the door’s sidelight window, Karli then hustled over to Erwin’s car.

•••••••••

Pamela looked into the bedroom just down from the kitchen. A double bed with plain white sheets and a side table were the only furnishings in the room. No headboard, no bureau, but Pamela didn’t even remotely care about such things anymore.

She took a few steps toward the door that connected to the en suite. But then she suddenly felt a little woozy.

She swayed, steadied herself, and then stumbled back to sit on the edge of the bed. She reverently placed the laptop beside her and opened it. As she tried to boot the computer, she struggled to keep her eyes open.
Eventually, she lost that struggle. Pamela tipped sideways, unconscious, on the bed, her right hand still on the keys of the laptop.
 

•••••••••

Black.
 

Muted voices.

A male and a female. Their voices familiar, but not easily identifiable.

Pamela was pretty sure she was dreaming.

“She down?”

“She’s practically drooling.”

She attempted to open and focus her eyes, but all she could make out were two very blurry figures at the base of the bed.

“You know, if this doesn’t work, we might have to … you know, monster mash her.”

“You saw the memo. There is no more mashing,” the female voice mocked. “Plus, dating yourself much?”

“Ah, is little Karli scared to lose her bestest friend in the —”

“I do what I have to, don’t I?” the woman snapped back.

The image of the two people blurred back into black.

•••••••••

Pamela opened her eyes.

She was lying in a bed, covered with a thick down duvet. The room was different from before. It was personally decorated with photographs and knickknacks. Once again, pink dominated. Her laptop sat on a white-painted antique desk in the corner. Whoever had painted over actual wood was an idiot, but there was no denying it was a pretty desk that suited the decor of the bedroom perfectly.

Pamela groaned and held a hand to her aching jaw. Her arm was clean, no sign of dirt or blood or scars. Her hair was no longer in an French twist, but spilled freely over the soft pillow underneath her head. It was curly, as if recently washed and allowed to dry naturally. She was wearing a pink tank top.

The wedding gown was gone.

As she struggled to sit up, her movement disturbed the person lying beside her. He protectively flung an arm across her.

It was Grady.

Pamela screamed.

Grady bolted awake.

Hysterically kicking the sheets with her feet, she tried to get out of the bed.
 

“Hey, hey.” At the sound of his voice, Pamela paused and stared at Grady. Elation warred with pain until the absolute need to believe that he was alive won out. Pamela flung herself at him, kissing him wildly. Grady attempted to fend off the bulk of her amorous assault.

“Hey, hey, careful. Careful. Did … did you have a bad dream?”

“I should have … I should have trusted, I’ll never doubt again.”
 

“Shhh, you’re just having a bad reaction to the drugs,” he said. “You know, like the dentist said.”

“Dentist?”

“Your root canal. Certainly you can feel that?”

“Yes, but —”

Grady climbed out of bed.

“Don’t leave.”

“I’m not,” he said, as he leaned back to kiss her forehead. “Just getting you something to eat. It’ll help take the edge off.”

He slipped out of the room, carefully closing the door behind him.

Pamela looked around, still completely disoriented. She remembered and then looked at the smooth, unwounded skin of her wrists. She ran her finger over the flesh of her forearm and frowned.

“Something wrong?” Grady asked, as he entered with a lunch tray. Pamela just stared at him. It felt like he’d only been gone from the room for about thirty seconds or so, which was odd, wasn’t it?. “That must have been a really bad dream.” Grady placed the tray over Pamela’s lap. “Was it the one where all your teeth are loose and you start accidentally pulling them out?”