“He’s right,” she said, looking up at the two of them. “This doesn’t appear to be stomach contents. It’s water. Heavily chlorinated water.”
“But how?” Constance asked. “You’ve been right here the whole time. How could you possibly get pool water in your lungs?”
I shook my head wearily and held up my blood-covered hand, “I don’t know for sure, but I’m guessing from the same place I got these symbols.”
“Take off your jacket and let me have a look at that arm,” Doctor Sanders ordered.
“Jeez, Rowan, that’s way out there.” Ben shook his head as I complied with the doctor’s instruction. “I mean water just appearin’ in your lungs from nowhere?”
“I know,” I agreed with a nod. “Trust me, I’m as freaked out by this as you are.” Even now I was fighting an involuntary urge to tremble. Precognition, psychometry, channeling, even the stigmata were one thing, but this… This was beyond anything I had ever experienced, and I was at a loss to explain it. More than that, however, I was afraid of it and that made it even worse.
“You mean this isn’t something that happened because you’re a Witch?” Constance asked.
“Maybe,” I answered, using my explanation to direct my attention away from the rancid fear still slithering up and down my spine. “But WitchCraft is merely a practice and way of life coupled with a religion. Even though it’s not unusual to develop some level of psychic ability through meditation and all, conjuring matter into thin air is the stuff of myths and fairy tales.”
“What about your arm then?” she contended.
“As bizarre as it seems, stigmata aren’t unheard of. My body is simply reacting to an outside stimulus. Granted, in this case the stimulus is coming from the other side of the veil, but nothing was conjured or made to appear from nothingness.”
A muffled peal emitted from Ben’s coat. He thrust his hand into his pocket and withdrew his cell phone.
“Storm,” he answered tersely after flipping the device open. “…Deck? Where the hell are ya’? You were s’posed ta’ be here an hour ago… What? No. You ain’t serious?”
My respirations were now almost normal, and I sat quietly, allowing Doctor Sanders to treat my bruised and bleeding arm. Constance and I watched Ben, listening in on the one-sided conversation as the concerned M.E. tended to my wounds. She had been told about the original occurrence of the symbol, but this was the first time she had witnessed it for herself. However, after what she had seen that night at the morgue, she seemed to be taking this all in stride.
“…Damn!” Ben spat. The phone was now cradled between his ear and shoulder while he scratched in his notepad. “How long ago? Uh-huh… Yeah… Who called it in? Yeah… Okay, gimme that address again… Uh-huh… Yeah, Cherry Wood Trails. Got it. Uh-huh… Yeah, and Mandalay’s with us too… Yeah, we’ll be there as soon as we can. Bye.”
We stared at him expectantly as he ended the call and returned the phone to his pocket. He rested his gaze on me and sighed.
“What was that all about,” Constance asked.
“That was Deckert. I think I just found out why Rowan’s got two of those marks on his arm.” He lifted his free hand and smoothed his hair back.
“Well?” She raised her eyebrows and looked at him questioningly.
“Deck got a call while he was on ‘is way over here. Seems a security guard was makin’ ‘is rounds over at the Cherry Wood Trails condo complex, and he noticed the gate was open leadin’ in to the swimming pool. He went in and found one of those monograms spray painted on the side of the pool house and a Bible layin’ on the snowdrift in front of it.”
I spoke. “Victim number four.”
“They think so. There’s a hole in the ice.” He bobbed his head. “It hasn’t even started to freeze back over yet.”
“I was afraid that might be why there were two.” I nodded toward my arm as Doctor Sanders mechanically wrapped gauze around it and listened in. “But I ignored it again, and whoever is trying to talk to me resorted to the water…” I let my voice trail off as a spasm of the recent personal horror worked its way back into my thoughts.
“Is that what you meant earlier?” the M.E. questioned cynically. “You actually think the water was somehow mystically conjured into your lungs because of what the killer did to the latest victim?”
“No offense, Doctor,” I ventured, “but do you have a reasonable explanation for how it got there? Medical or otherwise?”
“Fluid can build up in lung tissue due to a variety of medical conditions,” she replied.
“Fluid heavily laden with chlorine?” I asked.
She didn’t answer. She just shook her head and continued taping the gauze in place.
“Jeezus, white man,” Ben mused with a loud sigh, “I thought I was gettin’ used to this Twilight Zone shit, but this…”
“Too weird,” Constance muttered.
“Yeah,” Ben echoed quietly. “What she said.”
CHAPTER 13
For the most part, my disquiet had faded into the background during the short drive to the Cherry Wood Trails subdivision. I still did not fully understand why, but suffocation and drowning were my most deep-seated phobias. They had been since I was a small child. To now have my darkest fear brought that close to realization was very nearly more than I had been able to bear.
After twenty minutes of intense concentration, I had almost succeeded in forcing the disturbing thoughts from my mind. Unfortunately, our arrival at the latest crime scene dredged them immediately back to the forefront.
Ben nosed the van into the only available parking space he could find and switched off the engine.
“You gonna be okay?” he asked, worry once again creasing his brow.
I realized as he spoke that my breaths were quickly becoming shallow gasps. The panting had begun as soon as I stared out across the street at the bustling activity around the swimming pool enclosure. I knew there had to be terror in my eyes when I looked at him, and when I jerkily nodded my head to the affirmative, he stared back with an unconvinced, thin-lipped frown.
“Bullshit,” he replied. “You’re a friggin’ wreck. You shoulda gone ta’ the hospital. I’m grabbin’ a squad and sendin’ ya’ home.”
“No.” I shook my head while trying to calm the rampant panic that was building in the pit of my stomach.
He was correct. At the moment I was a wreck, but it was a luxury I couldn’t afford. There simply wasn’t enough time. Me breaking down would not do any good for anyone, including myself, and it definitely wasn’t going to help find the killer.
“No. I’ll be all right,” I continued. “I just need a minute.”
Knowing I had to get a grip, I began to inwardly visualize myself surrounded by an impenetrable shield of white light. In my mind I was carefully constructing a barrier, tangible only on a supernormal level, but exactly what I needed to hold the frightening visions at bay nonetheless. Almost instantly I began to relax.
“Well if ya’ won’t go to the hospital and ya’ won’t go home,” he ventured, “why don’t you just wait here in the van? The techs from the crime scene unit are takin’ pictures, and I can fill ya’ in on any other details afterwards.”
“That may not be enough, Ben,” I returned and cocked my head in the direction of the scene. “Maybe this victim saw his face. Maybe there’s something in there that won’t show up on a photograph but will be visible to me. I can’t let a stupid phobia keep me from doing what I was brought here to do.”
“Fuck phobias, Rowan!” he shot back. “I just watched you almost drown in a goddamned dry apartment. That’s not a phobia, white man, that’s… that’s… Well hell, I dunno what it was, but I know ya’ coulda died. And that
