Haunted Humans Part 5

"They're not famous people," Morgan said, "just people I know."

"Odd," said Afra. "How could you take an act like that on the road?"

"Dr. Dara says it's more like they're different parts of me, or, like, I choose a different voice to express different things."

"D.J. Bubbe," said Afra. "A friend from work?"

"That's not important right now," D.J. said. "What's important is that I have to leave the building, because that guy you chased off knows I live here. He's looking for me. He wants to kill me. He's already killed four other people, Afra. You've been trying to find out about my past, well, here it is. His name's Chase Kennedy. Do you remember the case? He was my boyfriend in my other life, and while he was romancing me, he was murdering other women. I worked with the police to catch and convict him. He was on Death Row last I heard, but today, I got messages from him at work, and when I came home, I found a message from him there, and Morgan was just helping me move out when he showed up and you got rid of him. I've got to find someplace to hide."

"Are you serious?" Afra asked.

D.J. stared at her.

Afra said, "He scared off awfully easy."

"He likes being alone with his victims. It's one of his things. Besides, that was a pretty big gun you had."

Afra poured tea. Morgan sat up and accepted a cup. D.J. accepted a cup too, and watched her hostess. After they had sipped in silence for a little while, Afra said, "You're thinking about this wrong. Better if you fort up here, get your protection, keep a vigil; call the police. They could watch outside, catch him trying to get in. There you are. No running and hiding. A running target's a lot more vulnerable than somebody who chooses her own ground."

D.J. looked at Morgan, wondering if Gary had two cents he'd like to toss in at this point.

"If you'll sit there with that gun in your lap, I'll watch out the front window while Doro calls the police," said Gary. "Good thing it's still light."

Afra's eyebrows lowered at this new voice from Morgan, but she set down her cup and retrieved the gun from a drawer by the front door.

"Phone's over there," said Afra, pointing toward the kitchen.

"Gary, you know anyone up here?" D.J. asked, heading for the phone.

"I don't think so."

Afra said, "How come you introduced this boy as Morgan and now you're calling him Gary?"

"Morgan has a different name for each voice, Afra. I know it sounds weird, but .

. . . "There was no way D.J. could explain this sensibly. Frowning, she paged through Afra's phone book until she found a non-emergency number for the police and dialed.

A woman answered. D.J. pulled herself together. "Hi. I was wondering if you could help me. I think someone's trying to kill me."

The woman listened while D.J. ran the story past her. The woman said someone would be over to check the handwriting on the wall soon.

D.J. hung up and felt despair. How could anybody take her seriously? "Did that sound convincing?" she asked Morgan, wondering if Gary was still in the forefront.

He was. "Don't worry. They should check everything, no matter how strange it sounds. Especially in a community like this one, where there probably isn't a lot going on. You won't have to talk them into it. The evidence will."

D.J. replaced the phone book on the lower shelf of the phone stand. "I sure hope so." She tried to compare herself with people she had observed when they came to be evaluated by Dr. Bollings. No, she wasn't hysterical or tangential; her orientation as to time and place were good; she didn't sound irrational. Of course, some of the most coherent-sounding people turned out to be the really disturbed ones. Maybe her affect was too flat. Maybe she should have talked faster.

But really, the situation was absurd.

She remembered the stab of terror she had felt when Chase's voice came from the shadow at the top of the stairs, and she sank down slowly and smoothly until she was sprawled on Afra's rug. He was here. He was coming for her. He had killed before. Even Gary hadn't been able to stop him. n.o.body knew where he was.

She lay immobilized for a while, her gaze fixed on a water stain on the ceiling that looked like a skull. Her hands and feet felt as if they were miles away, and she couldn't seem to move them.

Sounds came through the cotton over her ears, but for a time she didn't sort them out. A hand touched her shoulder and she jerked, then lay still. A head interrupted her focus on the ceiling. Young face, Fu Manchu mustache, wide worried blue eyes. "Deej? Miss Deej?" the mouth said.

She blinked and noticed that she was breathing.

Afra's face appeared beside Morgan's. "Child? Child, are you all right?"

D.J. brought a hand up, rubbed it over her face. "What happened?" she said.

"You kind of fainted," said Morgan, his brows pinched together above the bridge of his nose. "I never seen a girl do that before."

D.J. closed her eyes and tried to reconcile this with her own image of herself.

It was hard. "Sorry," she said.

"Good Lord," said Afra, "if anyone ever had an excuse to faint, you do."

"I thought people only fainted because of bad corsets," D.J. said, and tried to sit up. Morgan put a hand under her elbow and helped her. "Thanks," she said, looking at him. Saul's sneer lifted the comer of his mouth, but his eyes looked kind.

A knock sounded on the door, and Afra went over to let a uniformed policeman in.

With Saul's help, D.J. struggled to her feet. She looked at him and smiled. He smirked back and pinched her rear.

"You're such a shmuck," she whispered.

"So they say," he whispered back, and slid an arm around her waist. "Put your arm around my shoulders and I'll help you over to the couch."

Furious, she obeyed him. As he let her down on the couch, his hand strayed up to feel her breast so quickly no one could have noticed it except the two of them.

"Stop it," she whispered through clenched teeth as he sat down beside her, still smirking. "Think what you're teaching Morgan."

"Exactly," he whispered. "Kid's way too pa.s.sive."

Afra brought the policeman over. "This is Officer Vance," she said. "Can you talk to him, D.J.?"

D.J. rubbed her eyes, licked her lips. "I guess," she said. When she lowered her hands to her lap, Morgan took one and squeezed it just a little. Glancing at his profile, she couldn't tell who he was. His grip was warm and firm, so probably not Morgan. Even if it was that a.s.shole Saul, she decided, it felt better to have someone hold her hand than to be alone with this. She suspected that Saul was supportive under his abrasive behavior.

Of course, she'd been wrong about a man before.

Still, she held onto his hand and looked at the officer.

Officer Vance was young and sandy-haired, and had a sad long face that made him look as if he belonged in a British comedy: wide blue eyes, long nose, long chin. He took out a notebook.

She told him about the messages at the office, the letter Dr. Bollings had received, the spray-paint upstairs. "I'll never forget his handwriting. And then we saw him."

"What?" His wide eyes went wider.

"He was here in the building. He cornered me and Morgan in the bas.e.m.e.nt, but Afra drove him out with a gun. Then we came in here and called you."

"You didn't tell the dispatcher you'd made visual contact with the subject,"

said Officer Vance.