His Frozen Heart (17 page)

Even though Dave had known me in high
school, he knew little about where I hung out now or who I spent my
time with. From what little I had known of him, he didn’t have any
big ties to this area, so it wasn’t out of the realm of
possibilities for him to skip town – especially if he was on the
run from the police. A shiver shimmied down my spine: how had he so
easily gotten out of police custody?

Assuring Larry I would be back in the
morning, I said my good-bye and made my way down the hall. I stood
in front of the elevator door, watching the illuminated number
above it. When it arrived on the eighth floor where I stood, the
little metal car was already full. I let it go without trying to
wedge myself in. After the doors closed and it began its descent, I
reached to press the elevator call button again. To my right was a
sign for the stairs. Going down the steps wouldn’t be bad; it
wasn’t like I’d have to do any climbing. Maybe being off this floor
would get rid of that nagging feeling that I was under
surveillance.

Halfway to the seventh floor, the
feeling of dread went from a dull annoying feeling to a sharp fear
that I was being pursued. “This is silly,” I told myself aloud. I
could hear someone walking down the steps a few floors above me. My
stomach cinched tight. Whatever these weird vibes were, I needed to
be in a public place, not in a lonesome stairway. I pulled hard on
the seventh floor door and emerged in front of the same elevator I
had stood in front of one floor up.

I pushed into an overfilled elevator,
not even apologizing for likely taking the car over its maximum
capacity. My car was in the parking garage across the street, and I
liked the idea of walking almost the whole way to my car in a
brightly lit skywalk. My departure must have coincided with a shift
change at the hospital because a steady flow of people were walking
with me to the parking garage.

I got in my car and waited while
several eager cars darted passed me before I could back out.
Luckily, the nurse on Libby’s floor had validated my ticket, so I
wasn’t scrambling for any loose coins in my purse to pay. I had
considered going to Bank Shot to talk to Chris but decided I needed
a clear head, and sleep was the only way that was going to happen.
I began driving toward Maple Street. The radio played a favorite
song; something about the familiar melody soothed me, and I was
finally settling down from the weird feeling I had had in the
hospital.

A light up ahead turned yellow;
stepping on the clutch and easing my foot off the gas, I tried to
be extra careful because I could see the shimmer of the icy
pavement ahead of me. I came to a stop at the red light and began
fiddling with the radio, trying to avoid the commercial that had
cut off the song I liked. The last thing I needed playing in my
head was a catchy jingle about new carpet.

Absently I looked in the rearview
mirror – Dave’s face was staring at me. I screamed so loud that the
windows should have shattered. My foot slid off of the clutch, the
car’s engine and transmission jerking to a stop. Dave didn’t
flinch, his voice was smooth, “I’m sorry. I needed to talk to you.
I need you to tell me what’s going on.”

I scrambled for the door handle, but
it wouldn’t budge. Dave’s hand had reached around my shoulder from
the backseat and was holding the manual lock on the car door down.
I was trapped. “How did you get in here?”

He held up a bent metal coat hanger in
answer to my question. I had gotten into the car the same way lots
of times by sliding one through the closed window and pulling the
manual lock up with the end, so it shouldn’t have surprised me that
he, too, had a master key. The street was clear, no pedestrians to
hear my scream, and no cars behind me to see I needed help. His
voice remained calm when he asked a second time, “Candy, what’s
going on?”

I put on a brave front that I wasn’t
feeling. “What’s going on? You and your friends are trying to kill
me.”

Incredulously he stammered, “Kill you?
Why would I want to kill you? And who was that guy at your house
today?”

That’s the same question my mind had
had on constant replay all day. Why would Dave want to kill me? He
had been so sweet to me at his garage this morning, yet right
afterwards he’d come to my house after me. The light turned green,
but I didn’t move. I stole a glance at the passenger side door. I
could slide across and run back to the hospital. If I timed it
right, I could easily have a ten second head start. I ran three
days a week and could outpace almost everyone I knew. “You tell me.
He let you in,” I spat.

Dave’s brows came together as his
forehead wrinkled in irritation. “He thought I was someone else.”
His eyes narrowed when he asked, “What happened in your house? It
looked like someone butchered a deer in your living
room.”

My breath hitched as the memory of
seeing my living room this morning returned. I saw a sincerity in
his eyes I didn’t expect. “That guy who let you in my house? He
attacked Libby last night.”

His eyes widened, “The cops who
brought me here talked about a woman being in the ICU. They didn’t
say who. I was waiting for dark to leave when I saw your car pull
into the garage. Is she. . .I mean. . .that was a lot of blood. Is
she going to be okay?”

I wanted to scream, “Yes,” but I
didn’t know if she was going to be okay. I didn’t know if she would
ever wake up, or if she did, what kind of brain damage she might
have. “They induced. . .” I couldn’t finish the sentence. What was
he saying? He didn’t know Libby had been attacked? What was he
doing at my house if he wasn’t meeting the psycho stalker? Instead
of finishing my answer, I asked him, “He thought you were someone
else? Who?”

“
I don’t know. When he
figured out I wasn’t the guy he thought I was, he started shooting
at me. What have you and Libby gotten yourselves mixed up
with?”

“
He let you into my house.
What were you doing there?”

Dave’s left hand still held firmly to
the door lock, precluding my exit, as his right hand eased onto my
shoulder while he leaned up toward my seat. His eyes remained fixed
on mine through the rearview mirror. “I’d never seen the guy
before. I went to your house looking for you. I thought you were
inside because your car was out front.” The hand on my shoulder
squeezed me gently when he added, “I didn’t know what to think when
you left my place this morning. I was worried.”

Was he on the level? Was it
possible he
wasn’t
involved? I wanted to believe the earnest expression that held
my gaze, but I couldn’t be gullible, not after everything that had
happened. I had seen Dave at Bank Shot last night. He obviously
knew Teddy. The guy who shot at me and attacked Libby last night
knew Teddy, too.

He must have read the doubt in my
eyes, because his voice spoke softly, “I could never hurt you.
Ever.”

Turmoil erupted inside me. I wanted to
believe him. I wanted to be able to trust someone. After everything
that had happened, I couldn’t pull off this strong façade much
longer. I was close to losing it. Maybe my initial conclusion this
morning was correct: he had a multiple personality disorder and
truly believed he didn’t know these people. That would explain a
lot. From what little I knew about the disorder, I believed that as
long as he stayed with this personality, I would be safe. But I had
no clue what the trigger might be that would make him switch to the
personality from the bar last night – the dangerous
personality.

Dave’s expression was solemn, as if I
were hiding the truth from him, “Who was he, Candy?”

“
I don’t know,” I flared. I
took a deep breath, silently wishing I could know whether to
believe him or not. “You’re sure you don’t know him?”

“
Never seen him before. You
left my garage so fast I didn’t know what to think. I wanted to see
if you were okay. You didn’t answer the door, so I started looking
in windows to see if you had collapsed on the floor or something.
Your Chevelle was parked in front of the house, so I was sure you
were inside. When I saw him through the window, he waved me toward
the front door.”

“
So you came over to my
house and some strange guy let you in? You didn’t think that was
odd?”

“
I didn’t know what to
think. I hadn’t seen you in a while. For all I knew he was your
roommate or boyfriend or something.”

Still skeptical I asked, “At what
point did you figure out that something wasn’t right?”

“
It was weird. As soon as
he let me in, he started talking to me like we were old friends. He
said he hadn’t expected to see me there and told me not to get
pissed, he was doing Teddy a favor.” Dave paused for a minute, as
if he were still trying to make sense of what had happened. “You
had asked me about a Teddy this morning, too. I meet a lot of
people at the garage, and the way he was talking like he knew me, I
didn’t know what to think and was trying to place him. When I came
up empty, I didn’t want to be a jerk and ask who he was, so I asked
him where you were.”

Dave’s eyes darted away from where
they had held mine through the rearview mirror. “He said,
‘Unfortunately, still alive. I’ll take care of her as soon as she
comes back from across the street. You better go before this goes
down.’”

That awful sinking feeling grabbed my
stomach when I asked, “What’d you say?”

“
I don’t remember. I saw
red. Whoever the guy was, he wasn’t a customer, and he had just
told me he wanted to kill you. I attacked him, which is when I
realized he had a gun tucked into the waistband of his jeans. We
wrestled around for a minute, somehow he got loose, and he tried to
shoot me as he ran for the front door.”

“
Then why did you chase him
up the street?”

Dave must not have realized I had
watched most of what had happened from Mrs. Bavcock’s window. He
shook his head as if he didn’t know the answer to my question
either. “I didn’t know what to think. The only thing my mind
processed was the part where he said he wanted you dead. I sort of
snapped.”

Dave was wearing a coat, so I couldn’t
see the bandage on his arm. It wasn’t the same coat he wore
earlier: this one was a brown and black ski parka. The police had
said they were taking him to get stitches. To confirm what they had
told me, I asked, “But you got shot?”

His smile was warm, “Yeah, talk about
contender for worst day ever.”

I startled from the sound of a car’s
horn behind me. I wasn’t sure how many green lights we had sat
through. No longer convinced I needed to escape, but still not
certain I believed him, I restarted the car and eased it into a
brightly lit convenience store parking lot. With what Dave had just
said, I started to question my multiple personality theory. He was
adamant that he wasn’t there to hurt me. For some strange reason, I
believed him. If Dave wanted me dead, he could have easily done it
in the garage or here from my backseat. He had had every
opportunity; instead he was trying to get his mind wrapped around
what had happened. Everything he described seemed logical. What was
I missing?

There was something in Dave’s eyes, an
honesty – a genuineness. He must have noticed that my fear was
ebbing because his enormous legs and body crawled over the bench
seat from the backseat into the front passenger side. When he was
situated and looking into my face with the glow of the convenience
store lights lighting his features, he asked, “Start from the
beginning. Who was the guy in your house? What was he doing
there?”

I shook my head, “I’m not sure. One of
my neighbors had seen him looking out the windows before I got
home. When I parked my car, she didn’t let me go in.”

“
And you had never seen him
before?”

I chewed my lip for a second, “He
robbed me last night at the gas station. He tried to shoot me after
I gave him the money, but I was behind bullet-proof
glass.”

Dave thundered, “He tried to kill you
last night and then came looking for you?” Dave’s eyes were full of
alarm as his hand gripped my arm.

I eased away from him, trying to fade
into the door. I stammered, “Not exactly, I mean, yes.”

Dave saw his outburst had frightened
me because he eased back toward the passenger side door, crossed
his arms, and took a breath. “From the beginning.”

“
Libby and I were playing
pool at Bank Shot last night. She bet this Teddy guy and won. He
didn’t want to pay up, but,” my voice trailed off. This was the
part that I didn’t want to say, because if I were wrong and Dave
did have multiple personalities, this might make the Mark guy come
out.

Dave asked, “But what?”

“
This guy who looked like
you was there. He made fun of Teddy for Libby beating him, then
said something about being respectful of ladies when Teddy threw
her winnings on the floor. It didn’t seem like a big deal at the
time, but when I got to work a few hours later, the guy you met at
my house showed up. He told me Teddy had been gambling with his
money, and he wanted his money back. I gave him money out of the
cash register, and that’s when he told me he had already attacked
Libby.”

“
Wait. The guy in your
house this morning robbed you last night
and
attacked Libby?”