He’d tried to pinpoint the cause of his insomnia. Then, in his mind, the events of the past few days had begun to overlap, forming a troubling convergence. There had been a series of seemingly unrelated disruptions of routine, slight indications of a shake-up beneath the surface of normalcy. His mother had referred to them as niggles.
“Never a good sign, niggles,” she had declared while shaking her bony index finger at him. “Could mean a quiver or a quake. You never know. So pay attention to them.”
Roland liked things kept smooth. No wrinkles in the tablecloths. No lumps in the chocolate mousse. No out-of-joint occurrences that were seemingly random.
There was that word again.Seemingly. It was an untrustworthy qualifier. You could die within a week after discovering a seemingly benign tumor.
Several strange events had taken place this evening alone:El Paso’s disobedience and defiance; a homeless man who hadn’t moved for over an hour leaping up in self-defense; Dylan leaving the restaurant unobserved.
When he’d returned to it after dealing with the ruckus in the median, he’d asked staff if they’d seen “his guest” leaving, but no one had, not even the maître d’, who’d been outside on the sidewalk shooing diners back into the dining room.
The security cameras around his place were kept permanently disabled for the protection of his clientele, so they were of no help to him now when he needed them.
He’d assumed that she had simply gotten tired of waiting for him to come back and had left. He’d texted her an apology for leaving her stranded. She had replied with a polite thank you and assurance that she’d arrived safely home. He’d taken her at her word.
But, in retrospect, perhaps he shouldn’t have. Since his initial, favorable opinion of El Paso had proved faulty, perhaps he’d also been misled by Dr. Dylan Reede. Maybe he’d been naive to trust her confidentiality.
Like maggots on rotten meat, he’d felt the niggles crawling all over him.
On impulse, and despite the late hour, he’d called her cell phone, but had gotten her voice mail. Three times. It was unlike her to ignore repetitive calls from him. Because of his atypical work hours, she’d given him her personal number and had invited him to call her when convenient for him. She’d never failed to answer, not even in the wee hours or over a weekend, so why wasn’t she picking up tonight?
Adding that discrepancy to the growing chain of niggles, he’d determined that preemptive action was called for. He contacted his mole in the Auclair PD.
“Two things. I want you to go to Dr. Dylan Reede’s house.”
“Haskell’s therapist?”
“Yeah. Right now. I want to know if she’s at home. You don’t need to know why.”
“All right.”
“While on your way to her place, call this car company.” He’d provided the name. “Identify yourself as a concerned friend. She’d told you she should be home from New Orleans around eleven-thirty. She hasn’t shown up and you’ve been unable to reach her. You’d like to know where she was dropped so you can make sure she’s all right.”
“They may not tell me anything unless I play the cop card.”
“Only if you have to.”
“Yes, sir.”
Ten minutes later, his mole had reported disturbing information: “Dr. Reede never got in the car.”
“Say again?”
“She was at the curb when the driver pulled up.”
“I know that already. Go on.”
“Well, she didn’t get in, and then he lost sight of her in the gathering crowd. He didn’t specify what crowd.”
“I know what crowd. Goon.”
“The driver told his dispatcher that there was some kind of disturbance in the median that was holding up traffic in every direction. He circled the block several times, texting Dr. Reede, asking where she was. He was about to give up and leave without her whenshetextedhimand canceled. She apologized for not notifying him sooner and tipped him an extra fifty for the inconvenience.”
“Are you at her house yet?”
“No, but—”
“Get there!”
