Close Your Eyes: A Novel Part 1

Close Your Eyes.

A Novel.

Iris Johansen, Roy Johansen.

For Sherry Tillinger.

Who made the world a brighter and more loving place.

PROLOGUE.

IT WASN'T JUST her imagination.

Stephanie Marsh looked back as she walked through the second level of the parking garage for Gold's Gym. She wasn't alone.

She had been aware of distant footsteps attempting to fall in time with her own, but she had told herself that they were just echoes reverberating off the empty garage's concrete walls.

No such luck. There was definitely someone in the shadows behind her.

Or was he in front of her?

Stay calm, she told herself. It wasn't as if she were one of the gym's perfect tens who were weirdo magnets in their skimpy, formfitting workout wear.

But since when did a psycho need a reason to attack a woman at 10 P.M. in an empty parking garage?

She was okay, she told herself. Everything would be fine. As long as those security cameras were- Her heart jumped into her throat.

s.h.i.t. The cameras were in place, but the rea.s.suring red glow of their power lights were nowhere to be seen.

She did not break stride as she reached into her purse and gripped the rubber case of her mobile phone. She raised the phone and stared in disbelief at its illuminated screen.

NO CARRIER.

She was accustomed to losing her signal, but not her entire freaking phone company.

This couldn't be happening.

"Need help, young lady?"

A man stepped from the shadows in front of her. He wore dark tennis shoes, khakis, a T-shirt, and a pullover sweater similar to the one her grandfather wore. The man was probably over sixty, and his entire face crinkled as he smiled.

He looked like a nice man, but she knew better than to lower her guard. Jeffrey Dahmer might have looked like a h.e.l.l of a nice guy.

She kept walking. "No problem. Have a good night."

"You, too." He smiled again. "The Portland Street exit is closed. You'll have to go out on Wesleyan."

She nodded and walked faster. This wasn't news. The Portland Street exit was always closed after eight.

Just a few more yards to her car ...

The man held a map of some kind. "Could you help me out with this? I've been wandering around this c.o.c.kamamie garage for ten minutes trying to find a-"

She made a wide arc around him as she neared her car. "I'm sorry, I'm in a hurry."

He took a step closer. And then another. "If you'll just take a look at this..."

The map fell away, revealing a glint of steel.

Pain.

She shuddered, unable to move.

The man now stood next to her. He shook his head as he slowly pulled the blade from her abdomen. "I'm sorry," he whispered. "You don't deserve this."

She stared at him in disbelief, trying to reconcile the kind, regretful face with the horrible thing that was happening to her. She was falling, the floor of the parking garage rising up to meet her. She scarcely felt the impact. Her insides felt like cold concrete, hardening and making it impossible for her to move.

Or breathe. She tried to scream, but there were only gurgling sounds in the back of her throat.

The man wiped his b.l.o.o.d.y knife with a bandana. "Shh. It will be over soon, Stephanie."

He knew who she was.

Then it hit her.

They had found out.

"Schuyler." She pushed out the word.

"Just relax."

"Tell Schuyler..." Darkness crept over her, from the back of her neck, over her skull, taking away thought, taking away everything that she was.

She had to say it. Gotta get this out ...

"Yes, dear?" he asked gently.

Her eyes fluttered as she summoned the last bit of energy her body would ever give her.

"Tell Schuyler I said ... to go to h.e.l.l."

CHAPTER.

1.

KENDRA MICHAELS PULLED the strap over her head and adjusted her guitar in front of her. "We're going to do something different today, Jimmy."

"No!"

She ignored the outburst. Twelve-year-old Jimmy Matthews hated any variation in his routine, but she was determined to coax him, ever so slightly, from his comfort zone. "Look at me, okay?"

Jimmy looked up at her, his dark eyes glittering with defiance. He was autistic, and it had taken weeks for him to feel comfortable enough to make eye contact with her. She'd regarded that as a major victory. She knew there were other breakthroughs to come, if only she could unlock the secrets of that bewildering yet fascinating mind of his.

She held his gaze. "Jimmy, remember when I had you put your hand on my guitar last week? When I told you to feel the music?"

He nodded.

"You liked that, didn't you?"

He shrugged.

"You could feel it, couldn't you? I saw you tapping your fingers and moving your feet."

He thought for a moment. "I felt it all over."

"I know. And I thought to myself, this guy has rhythm. You know what that means, don't you? It means you can feel the beat. You can feel it in your bones ... and in your soul."

He looked away again. "I want to sing. I always sing."

"And you're a really good singer. And you can keep singing, but I want you to do something else."

She turned and walked across her small studio. It was a carpeted, octagonal-shaped room with a whiteboard, a piano, several colorful music-themed posters, and a large mirrored panel at the far end. "Come here, I want to show you something."

Jimmy hesitated.

She smiled luminously at him. "I promise that you're going to like this, honey. Don't you trust me?"

He didn't answer, then nodded jerkily. "I ... trust you."

Her heart melted. Another victory.

"That means a lot to me, Jimmy." She gripped the corner of a white tarp and pulled it away to reveal a percussion kit.

His eyes widened. "Drums!"

"Do you like it?"

He bit his lip. "Why should I like it? I don't know how to play drums."

"Anybody can play drums. Whether they can play them well, that's another matter." She picked up a pair of drumsticks and placed them in Jimmy's hands, curling the fingers around in a matched grip. She pulled him around to the other side of the drum set. "Now sit down. This will be fun."

Jimmy slowly sat, holding the drumsticks in front of him as if they were sticks of unstable dynamite.

"You don't have to hold them so tightly. Loosen up, feel the beat like you did last time."

He looked at the various surfaces around him. "But what do I do?"

She strummed the guitar. "Whatever you feel like doing. Whatever sounds and feels good to you." She played George Harrison's "Got My Mind Set on You," accenting the song's strong and clean rhythms.

Jimmy held the sticks over the snare drum.

"Anytime."

He struck the drum's surface tentatively.

"Both sticks, Jimmy ... Come on, it's fun!"

He used both sticks to accompany her on the snare, striking with a not-entirely-unrhythmic beat.

"That's fantastic!"

He closed his eyes and nodded. He branched out to the tom-tom on his left, accenting his stylings with the lower-pitched drum.

"Good!" She pointed down to the pedal on the floor. "That's for the ba.s.s drum. Want to try it?"

He pressed the pedal and reacted with a start as the kicker struck the drum surface. He stepped on it again and again, repeating the motion until he found the rhythm she had set.

He continued on the ba.s.s drum as he struck the snare and tom-tom with increased vigor.

Kendra studied him. Could it be?

Ever so slightly, a faint smile was pulling at the corners of his mouth.

Yes.

KENDRA MICHAELS DIDN'T appear to be the b.i.t.c.h he'd thought she'd be, Adam Lynch thought, as he watched her through the one-way gla.s.s in the observation room as she interacted with the child. What he'd heard about her had been far from complimentary, but that could be due to jealousy. Her work had completely overshadowed that of the FBI agents from whom he'd received reports. Evidently, she had not done it diplomatically.

Yet every move, every expression, was warm and gentle as she taught that troubled boy. A puzzle. If he was going to use her, he had to know which b.u.t.tons to push to do it. He had no doubt he'd find a way to do it. It was a skill that had earned him both applause and hatred over the years. But it was annoying that he'd been given the wrong information with which to develop a method to do it. He studied her, looking for an answer to the paradox.

Though she was of middle height and slim, she did not appear fragile at all. When she walked or moved, she had a litheness that spoke of strength and suppleness earned by frequent exercise. Her shoulder-length, pale brown hair was sun-streaked in places. Her face ... Strength there, too. A strong chin, well-formed lips that still spoke of control and discipline, large hazel eyes that were set far apart and seemed to hold intelligence as well as humor. Not a pretty face, but for an instant, when she smiled at the boy, he had seen a flash, a beauty. It was the most dangerous form of allure, which could challenge a man to try to make that elusive beauty reappear again and again. She wouldn't appeal to everyone. She was too strong, too confident, but Lynch was drawn to that challenge.

He felt a rush of sudden eagerness at the thought of dealing with Kendra Michaels. She was interesting. He had grown so accustomed to successfully manipulating his targets that any change, any stretch, was welcome.