Pink Balloons and Other Deadly Things (Mystery Series - Book One) (21 page)

After she left I hid the book on my bookshelf in among some other anthologies. I tried to watch some TV, but the strain of the day caught up with me. I lay down on the couch and was asleep in less than five minutes.

I dreamed Rich was running through the nature center in back of the house clutching the poetry book, and I was chasing after him, yelling, “Give me back my arm! Give me back my arm!”

THE FOLLOWING DAY was Memorial Day Monday. There was no school, and I had planned to take advantage of the sales and go shopping with Allie at
Forever Twenty-One
, her favorite store. Matt was planning to spend the day alternating between GameStop and the Apple Store. Without a car again we’d have to take a bus to the mall. I tried to think how I was going to explain my shattered windshield.

I had scheduled only the one appointment. Vickie had left a message on my answering machine.

“Please, please, can I see you tomorrow? The Bloomingdale’s interviewer set me up with an appointment for Tuesday morning with the Revlon rep. Can we work on a visualization to help me through it?”

I had called back, but it was telephone tag again. I got her machine, left a message saying I would make a special trip to the office and see her at nine. I wanted her to get that job.

I took a taxi and was in the office by eight-twenty, the only person in the building working on the holiday. I’d left the children sleeping. I’d forgotten to tell them I was going to the office, but Meg was there and would explain when they woke up. I figured they were exhausted from their weekend and would probably still be out cold by the time I got home anyway.

The heat wave had returned and held us firmly in its grip. I’d dug out an old cotton pantsuit, not caring that it was baggy and wrinkled, and slapped on some lipstick, deep-sixing my usual morning face-lift. Despite dressing for the tropics, I was sticking to my chair and my palms were sweaty as I reached for the phone to call Ted Brodsky. He wasn’t in yet but was expected any minute. I left a message that it was urgent I speak with him.

I pulled Vickie’s chart and disk, took out the prep gel and electrode paste, and switched on the computer. Glancing up at the wall clock, I saw I had half an hour till she was due, just enough time for me to do a quick alpha-theta session. Normally I try to rev up my creative juices by training for peak performance at least twice a week. This week had been a disaster so far as my own brainwave training was concerned. Maybe, I thought, if I go into a deep, meditative state, the pieces of this crazy puzzle will come together. At the very least going into a theta state would serve to quiet my overwrought brain.

Attaching the sensors, I checked the impedance meter to make sure I had a good contact, flipped my disk into the computer, plugged in, and closed my eyes.

It was an effort to make my mind a blank. Images from the past week crowded my thoughts, thwarting my quest for stillness. Rich’s sullen angry face Saturday night as he left my house, Matt’s, the day he’d fought for my honor, Ruth-Ann offering her cousin’s karate-trained legs for the same reason. And sounds, the loud thumps of my own heartbeat after the rock smashed my windshield, thumps blocking out the chords of the software. And then...

I am inching across a swaying rope bridge, struggling to make it over a dark chasm to something-—a shimmering opalescent bubble on the other side. Clutching the hemp rails, I move, step by driven step, past the halfway mark. My foot slips on the wet wooden slats, catches for a terrifying instant between them. I see the strands begin to fray, drop to my knees, crawl the final distance, and grab the ribbon dangling from the bubble as the bridge crashes into the watery abyss below. And I am lifted high into the air, floating over the water, safe at last. I look up—-and in the bubble is Dot’s dead face, and then it is Erica’s, her elongated emerald earrings swaying in the wind, knocking against each other, swaying, knocking, knocking, bursting the bubble...

KNOCKING. I FORCED MY EYES to open, brought back to the present by loud rapping on the door. I was shaken beyond anything I’d ever experienced in brainwave training, by the strength of my abreaction and the knowledge that, until I faced my fears, I would be haunted by those images for the rest of my life. With a sense of relief, I tore the sensors off, took a couple of minutes to collect myself, and buzzed Vickie in.

All dolled up in a frilly dress that made her look like the heroine of a gothic romance, she opened the door and peered at me from around the door frame.

“Hi,” I greeted her, making a gargantuan effort to cover my perturbation. “Come on in.”

She didn't answer, just stood there posing against the frame fussing with the flowing chiffon scarf at her neck.

Well
, I thought,
good sign. She’s in a modeling mode already.

Looking past her, I saw Ruth-Ann come quietly up the stairs and take a seat in the waiting room.

What was she doing here? And then I remembered I’d forgotten to call her and tell her we weren’t having Group this morning. I was about to get up, apologize and send her home when Vickie’s expression caught my attention.

She was staring at me as though I’d suddenly metamorphosed into a creature from another planet.

Self-consciously, I smoothed my wrinkled blouse, wondering if my face showed the effects of the frightening visualization.

“Sit down, Vickie,” I said, indicating the recliner. “We’ll talk while I hook you up.”

“How old’re you?” she asked in her breathy voice.

“What?”

“I’ll bet you’re at least thirty-five.”

Great. Nothing I like better than starting my day with an abreaction followed by a discussion about a subject on which I’m becoming increasingly sensitive.

“Does my age have anything to do with why it was so important for you to see me today?”

“No. I just wondered.”

“Good.” I got up and reached for the prep gel. “Start relaxing and tell me about the interview.”

“I guess you must've been very pretty when you were young.”

Okay, so some of us look better with makeup. “Thanks,” I said wryly. “Now we’ve got that out of the way, can we---”

“I’m a lot sexier, though.”

I sighed. It was going to be a difficult session. “You want to tell me what this is about?”

“Why do you use the name Carlin?”

“Excuse me?”

“Your name’s Burnham.”

I managed a smile. “Carlin's my maiden name. I use it professionally because my degrees were earned when that was still my name.” I indicated the framed diplomas hung behind my desk. “See?”

Her gaze wandered to the wall. “I only just found out about it.”

“Well, it doesn’t matter, does it? I’m the same person.” I switched on the tape recorder. “We still don’t have any air conditioning. I know it’s hot but you have a lot you want to work on, so why don’t we---”

“I don't think I’ll be staying.”

“What?”

“I won’t be staying long,” she repeated without budging from the doorway.

“You left a message saying you had to prepare for the interview with the Revlon rep.”

She licked her lips. “That was just to get you here.”

I blew. I couldn’t help it. I was so uptight and so hot, my professionalism went flying out those useless windows. “Vickie, I’ve had a really difficult week, and I’m not in the mood for games. I came in especially on a holiday. I feel like I’ve been boiled in lava, and you come in here acting like---”

I stopped as all the saliva in my mouth dried up. Because Vickie’s nervous fidgeting had tugged her scarf loose and as I watched, it fluttered to the carpet like a wounded multicolored bird.

And I saw it-—the antique gold pocket watch chain circling her delicate neck, its diamond and ruby clasp capturing the light from my lamp, the stones glittering and sparkling at the cleft in her throat like a hideous cluster of blood and tears.

The next thing I knew I was looking down the barrel of a gun.

“I’m really sorry,” she whispered. “I like you, I really do, but you’re Dickie’s wife, so I have to send you off in a pink balloon just like the others.”

A pink balloon. The visualization I’d given her!

Vickie and Dickie, Dickie and Vickie.
The names boomeranged noisily off the walls inside my skull. Dickie was Rich! It wasn’t that Rich had made one bad deal too many. He’d had one affair too many! And I was going to die because of it. Here in this hot hellhole of an office, wearing no makeup and my ratty old pea-green pantsuit, my life was coming to an end!

“Funny it’s working out this way,” she said pleasantly. “‘Cause, you know, it all went down because of you.”

Perspiration trickled down my face. Here I was in a real life-threatening situation; time for the adrenaline to start pumping, time for my fight or flight response to kick in! I cast desperately around for a weapon. I thought about the letter opener I keep in my top drawer, but there was no way I could get to it. My eyes lit on the impedance meter. It had weight. If I could just inch my hand toward it while keeping Vickie talking...

I forced my tongue to unstick from my palate. “What do you mean?” I croaked.

“You’re the one told me to take charge of my life. You said I could make things happen instead of always letting them happen to me.” She smiled brightly. “So I did.”

I was afraid I knew the answer, but stalling for time, I asked anyway. “What things?”

“Remember when we did that exercise where you told me to put all the people who’d ever hurt me in a big pink balloon and send them floating away over the mountains?”

“It was a guided imagery exercise! You were only supposed to do it figuratively—-you know, in your imagination—-to help you deal with getting them out of your life.”

“I know, but I thought how much better if I could get rid of them for real.” She giggled. “So I sort of-—you could say, stuck a pin in the balloon.” She made it sound as if she were a naughty girl who had played an innocuous prank.

My hand crept toward the meter. “You didn’t even know Erica and Dot. How could they have---”

“Dickie was going to marry Erica. And Dot wanted him. She found the pictures he took of me, and she called me up. She invited me to her apartment, but I went earlier than she said. I surprised her in the bathtub. She wouldn’t give them to me. I had to find them myself.”

“But why did you have to—-why did you---”

“She guessed about Erica. She was going to turn me in so she could have Dickie. She had pictures of him all over her walls, you know,” she went on conversationally, “like he was hers. He wasn’t hers, he was mine and I didn’t like her having all those pictures, so I tore them up.”

“Vickie,” I pleaded, as the Sharpie scrawl flashed, “I’ve never hurt you. I don’t deserve to be sent off in a pink balloon.”

“I know,” she said, lowering the gun. “This makes me really sad. But Dickie wants you back. Only ‘cause of the children probably, because I’m much younger and prettier than you.”

“No! He doesn’t--—” I started to protest.

“I saw him go in your house. He wants his children.” The gun came up again, pointing straight at my heart. “But you won’t be lonely for long. ‘Cause after we’re married, I’ll send the children to you.”

My heart stopped beating. Then cold rage replaced terror. No way was I going to let my children, my beautiful Allie and my sweet Mattie, die at the hands of this psycho!

My fingers crept the final millimeters and closed over the cold metal box. I glanced up, measuring the distance I’d have to throw it to knock the gun out of Vickie's hand.

And then I thought of Ruth-Ann. From her chair she could see only Vickie’s back, so I knew she was unaware of what was happening.

How could I communicate the danger? If I yelled at Vickie to drop the gun, she might shoot me
and
Ruth-Ann.

“What kind of car do you drive?” I asked loudly, my voice trembling.

“A Camry. Why?”

“One of those Japanese cars,”
Sue had said
. “A foreign job, black,”
from the man with the rock.

“Because when you threw that rock at my car yesterday, a man saw you, and he described your car. It’s black, isn’t it?”

The gun wavered.

“He also got the license plate number,” I went on, “so the police know who you are. They know you killed Erica and Dot.”

Ruth-Ann was on her feet now. I sent her a silent screaming appeal
. Call 911, Ruth-Ann! Get out of here and call 911!

But my mental telepathy mechanism was on the blink. She didn’t get my message. I saw her reach into her bag and pull something out.

Oh, please, let it be a gun,
I prayed, though I couldn’t picture Ruth-Ann carrying a gun.

A sly smile played over Vickie’s face. “You’re just saying that to scare me.”

I continued talking loudly so she wouldn’t hear Ruth-Ann. “Have I ever lied to you?”

I flinched as the gun bobbled in her hand. “No.”

“I’m your therapist. You need me. I can make the police understand that you-—you’re-—confused.”

Wrong approach. I heard the safety catch click off. “I’m not confused!”

“You’re confused about Rich-—Dickie. He doesn’t want me. He only came over last night to talk about visitation rights because we're getting divorced.”

Then I saw what Ruth-Ann held in her hand. Her car keys. Car keys? What the hell did she think she was going to do with---

And then things happened fast. Ruth-Ann’s hand came around in front of Vickie's face, spraying something. I ducked as Vickie screamed, clawing at her eyes. The gun went off, but I seemed to be alive, so I threw the meter with all my might straight at her. And missed! The gun was waving around wildly. I dashed around my desk, grabbed her flailing arm, smashed her hand against the desk, shaking the gun free. I heard it bounce off the wall and saw Ruth-Ann kick it away. Blinded, howling, thrashing violently, Vickie fell to the floor. Her long arms reached out, found my leg, pulled me down on top of her, her graceful body infused with the strength of a wildcat. I felt her teeth sink into my arm, my cry of pain cut short as her legs wrapped around me like a boa constrictor, squeezing the breath out of me. Then Ruth-Ann was pulling them off, and I heard Vickie give a yelp as, from out of my tearing eyes, I saw Ruth-Ann plop her plump little body down on Vickie’s legs, pinning them firmly to the floor.